Pineapple Pizza Monday

Mondays at work were always long days, Harley thought. After a weekend with his girlfriend, Jamie, he was dying for a quiet evening without meaningful conversation. He’d set up a date with Luke (who had, of course, named his dog “AnnaLee”) to watch the local baseball game with him, and ordered his own favorite, a large pineapple and ham (“Large Mauai, deliver 6:45” he heard shouted out) pizza. His ‘fridge was stocked with Molson and a few IPAs, and there were still a few pounds left of potato chips and Cheese Fish from the Costco packages, only slightly smaller than their puppy chow bags. Sam, his cubicle’s mirror-man (desk across from him, with only a plexiglass barrier; they would sometimes play, like the Marx brothers, that a looking-glass had been removed) asked if he was doing anything special that night, a common afternoon query designed less to elicit an answer than to convey that any conversation beat pretending to work. Harley had just shaken his head, which truthfully expressed his expectation. Just a quiet evening with a friend, he anticipated.

Luke texted him at about 4:30 p.m. saying he couldn’t make it; his girlfriend insisted on making him dinner. Actually, the message in its entirety read, “Sorry. Liver. You know.” Harley understood fully. Luke was still within the first month of his new relationship, and the obligatory liver meal was scheduled. It was never clear to him why young women always tested potential mates by seeing if they would eat liver. He’d never known a man who could stand the organ, whether chopped or sauteed with onion and garlic, and he hoped for Luke’s sake that the date was at Luke’s house, so that he could slip the meat to AnnaLee and push the onions around the plate sufficiently to charm his belle.

The last man who willingly ate liver had, he knew, pulled it from the still living body of his implacable foe, and chomped it raw just to disrespect his nemesis. He could not believe that any woman, cooking for herself, would choose liver over bacon, or a steak, or chicken wings, or going hungry, although he’d met a few he suspected would put liver chunks in their kale-arugula salad. It must be a way for a woman to impress her man with her mothering instincts, helping him eat healthy food. “Was this the arcana they taught girls in high school domestic arts classes?” he wondered. He regretted losing Luke, but wasn’t offering to change places, liver for pizza, chips, and beer.

Harley considered canceling the pizza, since a large was enough for four, but decided, what the hell, nothing’s wrong with leftovers (except liver). He noted that he’d never been to a pizza parlor which included liver among the twenty or so selections on the “Make Your Own” menu, which omission fully proved his point.

So the evening would be even quieter, no real problem for him. He could see himself, stuffed and at the edge of drunk, falling asleep in front of the tv in the eighth inning, the Mayhems behind 14-5. Paradise.

Jack’s Crack Pizza did not lose any business on account of the dirty jokes about its name. The owner’s name was “Jack”, and he could laugh with the best gibes, and stare down all the others. He’d lived a rough life in a poor neighborhood, teased constantly: “Why it’s John Potter. I must go, go!” By the time he played high school football, strong safety, his nickname was “Just Jack”, or “JJ”, due to his reluctance to reveal his last name. His Mom was Italian, though, and he grew up, as the eldest child with a working mom, learning to make many dinners. A pizza parlor, offering also salads, buffalo wings, burgers, spaghetti and lasagne, was hardly more difficult to manage than dinner for his four younger sibs and parents.

The siblings were all adults now, with his youngest sister married to a true doofus, in his opinion, which he kept to himself. The guy, a bland “Ted”, hadn’t held a steady job until JJ hired him as a delivery person. Not only did that help out Rose (his father’s sole sense of humor seemed to be in naming his children) by sending some money to her family, or at least lowering what Ted took from Rose’ earnings for his own habits, but it also gave Jack a plausible reason to make sure their car kept running.

JJ had suspected Ted of stealing from the restaurant, and once had held up to Rose’s view in her kitchen a restaurant supply sized shaker of oregano. “Oh, JJ,” she effused, “I forgot to thank you for selling us all that food and stuff at cost. It’s a godsend. I’m using some of the tomato sauce on the chicken cacciatore.”

JJ avoided looking into her pantry, having seen a Sysco-labeled carton of mozzarella in the ‘fridge. “On the bright side,” he mused to himself, “that clears Chuck and Cher, and explains why the inventory doesn’t match sales. I don’t even have to try to reconcile them any more, because they won’t.” He admitted grudging admiration for Ted’s scheme: stealing on one side, and getting money from Rose supposedly to pay for the loot on the other. Once, he’d left a Post-It on a two pound can of tuna (not a favorite, but requested for a few pizzas every week): “Say hi to Rose for me.” When he closed up, there was a Post-It on the wall near where the can had been: “She loves you, bro.”

Occasionally, as with Harley’s order, he’d favor Ted even more – Ted was family, even if a mook – by making an entire delivery order “off book”. No entry on a numbered order pad. Jack had learned, through two employees who disappeared on their first shift, to collect up front from the car boys. They were charged a reduced rate, so gained a guaranteed $4/pizza delivered, plus kept the tips. On the “off book” orders, Ted got to keep the tip plus the full cost of the pizza – free to him – collected upon delivery.

Ted liked delivering to Harley; Harley was a sure $4 or $5 tip, and convenient to the restaurant, perfect for the returning last stop. This Monday evening, arriving late and missing the spate of 6:00 p.m. deliveries, Ted was given 9 pizzas with assorted sides, with four at one location and two at another, for a sure $32 and maybe even as much as $100 on this trip alone, what with tips and keeping Harley’s payment. He could give Rose $75 later, getting a big kiss and a step-up for bedtime, and get it all back from her after unloading the purloins and carefully adding up for Rose what he owed Jack. And if he did a second delivery, he’d have lots of money for himself – enough to bet on the Knicks and watch tomorrow’s game in a sports bar – and not get home tonight until the kids were snug in bed. He was careful always to blow the sleeping cherubim a goodnight kiss from their bedroom door.

Ted pretended he was short on money picking up Harley’s and the other eight pizzas, asking Jack for credit, but Jack would have none of that; he drew some lines. He just stared at Ted. All the car boys knew they needed $250 at the start of a shift to pay for the pizzas; if Jake really charged them $250, it meant a whole lot of food to deliver and, in a just and grateful world, a purseful of tips. JJ demanded $208.60, and settled with Ted for $200 even. Ted didn’t even blush producing the two c-notes from a wallet showing a few twenties as well. Most of the car boys didn’t carry any small bills, so they could honestly claim not to have change.

Monday commute traffic was never very bad. Harley attributed this to the many people with hangovers who called in sick. He was home by 6:30 p.m., thinking he’d have just enough time to shower and change, pop a cold one, and tune the tv to the ballgame before the pizza arrived. He stabbed the right buttons on the remote and muted the tv, waiting for the game to start.

He ordered Alexa to play Indiana, a personal favorite although sloppily sentimental, by Haskett Myers and his Southern Electric Trio (four people in total). It was a talking country song, with the lyrics’ rough meter smoothed out in the singing. The guitar solos between verses were sloppy Clapton covers, but passable for country funk humor. The Southern Electric Trio was virtually unknown: even Google couldn’t find a gig of the band, and Harley was amazed that the song was in the Amazon Prime catalog. The group cracked the top 200 Country list only once, for two weeks, with the irreverent My Mom Was A Virgin When She Bore My Younger Brother, the refrain of which includes the unforgettable, “He may be my brother, but he cain’t be no kin, ‘cause my Moma was a virgin when she bore him. And that’s why my poor Daddy died of drinking sloe gin.”

Harley was humming along with the tune, sometimes breaking into words, as he set the tv up to play the Bay Hens game. He could see that the pre-game interviews were on; he wasn’t interested in the pat answers: “I try to give 120% each game for my team, but the Bay Hens are formidable, and I’m sure it will be a tight contest.”

The Mayfield Bay Bay Hens – the area was an egg and dairy district – was more commonly known as the Mayhems. It was the only independent team in the league, a regional “C” league. Most of the league’s teams were populated by youngsters, from high school teens to mid-twenties, hoping to make it to the Show: lots of raw talent. The Mayhems had a few of those, youngsters passed over in several drafts by then, but a larger contingent than any other team of players who had reached AAA, or even a dip of the toe in the Show, but had been demoted, passed over on waivers, and largely forgotten, usually due to behavioral issues. The team did have a few players, including the player-manager, who were psychologically stable and mature, but just couldn’t kick their baseball jones, despite knowing they’d never make the major grade.

But watching the Bay Hens was a kick, even if they were 5-21 in the win-loss column, because there was more of a chance of a good fight on the baseball diamond by the sons of Summer than there was in Winter on the ice rink of a pro hockey game. So after it started, Harley would half-listen to the game, listening for a rising crowd noise reflecting an interesting development, and half-listen to his music, and maybe also skim some magazines, to reach the proverbial 120% effort.

Indiana came to me; she said, “The stream is running and the fish are jumping.”

Indiana came to me, all bubbly and excited. She said, “I’ve packed a basket. Let’s have a picnic. Come with me to the old mill trace.”

Indiana, with a smile so broad it put the sun to shame, and smelling of clover and warm Summer sunshine, took my hand and pulled me to my feet.

She said, “Bring your pole. Let’s go fishing. I’ve got no license, so it’ll be catch and release.”

Running about five minutes late, but not hearing the doorbell, he dried off, dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, and plopped into his favorite armchair. “Aahh,” he sighed. He liked Jamie, and she was pretty enough that he was proud to be out with her, even if people did often think he was the “Jamie” and she the “Harley”. But he had stayed at her place – she preferred her own tidy apartment to his post-college poverty give-away-furnished messy studio, for some reason – from Friday evening through Sunday, and now relished the quiet.

She liked to talk of their “relationship,” which to her was a concrete item, perhaps a Michelangelo David, while to him it was only a facet of the present moment, having no specific form, something to live or do rather than view or touch or, worst yet, talk about. Same with notions like “honesty” and “openness”. He didn’t like to lie, but sometimes it was necessary, or at least appropriate; he recalled an essay by Mark Twain on the subject which he remembered as agreeing totally with him. And when he was hoping to start making out, and she was on and on about something (he’d shaken the subject out of his head by his polite nodding), his central thought being, “When will she shut up so I can kiss her?” he didn’t like to be put on the spot with her “openness” question of, “What are you thinking about?”

Jaime apparently viewed all male relationships as a prelude to a possible family life. She strained to be loveable, supportive, and nurturing, which qualities she mistakenly thought defined a man’s dream partner. She subtly tested each boyfriend, in ways grotesquely obvious to the man, on his kindness, consideration, motivation to succeed, love of children and pets, and other boxes of an subconscious internal checklist. Harley had passed her liver test, though she wasn’t sure his compliments were heartfelt.

Now, as a moment in time, was to Jaime only a prelude to a future, one she saw clearly as if already recorded. Harley only wanted to pass hours enjoyably with Jaime, have a nice dinner, see a movie or concert, or even trudge around a museum, making the “now” pleasant; his thoughts of the future extended no farther than that evening and the crucial issue of when he should swallow a Viagra; he didn’t like to waste any. A few days with Jamie of navigating those cross-purposes left him exhausted. An evening of solitude was welcome.

The doorbell still didn’t ring, but the phone did, with Jaime’s ringtone. “Damn, give me a break,” he shouted at the phone, and “Alexa, pause” at the ispeaker, before picking up the phone and saying sweetly, “Hey, Jaime, what’s up? How are you doing?”

“Peggy told me Luke’s eating at her place tonight. I knew you had your regular beer binge, ha ha, scheduled with him, so I called to see if you wanted replacement company.” Jaime had introduced Luke to Peggy, who worked with her.

“Good god, no,” Harley would have shouted had he internalized her openness and honesty criteria, but summoning some truth, he prevaricated, “No, not necessary. I’m looking to watch some tv and turn in early.”

“Well, yeah, I understand,” she said, with an undertone that Harley took as her posting a demerit on his running score. “But I wanted to get your opinion on a show I just saw.” She was catering to his ego, he knew, but remained silent.

“In it, a master criminal who had taken on a different identity, with surgery for a new face, because INTERPOL was getting too close to catching him, was walking on a quay in Paris. He had an unusual type of body odor, giving off some unique molecules. Other people couldn’t sense it, but, for instance, dogs gave him a wide berth. A slime mold under the dock reacted to his odor, hugely excited, and pooled on the underside of the dock, under his feet.

“When he moved, the slime mold moved. When he reached shore, it followed him, almost beneath his shoes. The criminal noticed this, and being an expert in mycology and also neural network artificial intelligence, he came up with an ingenious plan. He scooped up the mold into a cup he found, and took it to his lab’ratory. Offering the mold many different foods, he discovered that aside from his B.O., ha, ha, the slime mold reacted favorably to blue cheese crumbles. He bought a few packages at Whole Foods – although a criminal, he was into health food – and started to experiment.

“He could get the mold to follow him without rewards, just by odor, but it looked like a pool of dirty water at his feet. With a heat lamp behind him, he would throw finely ground flakes of blue cheese into the slime – which was slowly growing – whenever it assumed a better shape, I guess like kibbles for a dog. He slowly taught the mold to fill the cooler space behind him when he stood in front of the heat lamp. In only about a month, the slime mold would almost instantly form the shape of his projection on the floor, although it quivered some when he fed it.”

Jaime went into excruciating detail on the criminal’s tutoring of the slime mold, while Harley nodded unseen. His college major had been German History, with a vague aim of joining the diplomatic corps. It was true that he worked for a biochemical firm, but in the marketing department, assessing return on investment for different media promotions. Aside from speculating on how it got its name, he wouldn’t know a slime mold from a morel; he felt he knew quite enough about mushrooms to avoid buying or picking any. Why his opinion would be valuable to Jaime he couldn’t guess.

“The slime mold was entirely black; he named it ‘Ebon.’ Ebontually, ha, ha, he could walk down the street, with the mold virtually attached to his feet, attracting no attention because the mold flowed to look like his shadow. Most people didn’t notice that his shadow stayed intact even when clouds momentarily blocked the sun. A few more months, and he taught the fungus to pick up small objects, and hide them under the mold. After a few sessions in his back yard, when a slow walk yielded a bounty of the rings, coins, watches and wallets he had laid out and had his fungus shadow pass over, he was ready for a real test.

“He chose a sunny day, and walked alongside the Seine. His haul was only a few sou, a ring, and an older iphone, but it was a vindication of the method. His eventual goal was to steal jewelry, but he still had to work out how Ebon would perform inside, under artificial lights. While he pondered that, he made a decent living stealing items at outdoor arts fairs, standing west of the exhibits in the afternoon.”

Jaime droned on. Harley wondered if the show was several hours long, or even a serial; if so, he fervently hoped she had reached at least the mid-way episode. He noticed that the ballgame was about to begin, which meant it was past 7:00 p.m., and the pizza was late. Hoping that providence might save him from a lie, he interrupted Jaime.

“Oh, wait. Someone’s at the door. It’s probably the pizza. I’ve got to go. Also,” he added, straying into outright dishonesty, “I promised to call my folks at 7:00. Feel free to call again later.” He knew he’d earned another demerit for not promising to call her back.

“Oh. All right. Say ‘hi’ for me to your Mom. I don’t know if I’ll call back later. I might get too engrossed in my crosswords.” She hoped he’d be miffed by her prioritizing the puzzles over calling him back, but he wasn’t. “Bye!” “Bye.”

The game was in a commercial when the call ended, so he unpaused Alexa for a stanza.

Indiana in the sunlight, her hair brown and flowing, her eyes looking deeply, her dimples laughing gently,

Indiana said, “Times a wasting. I’m jumping with excitement. Put down your books and play hooky with me.”

She pulled me along, my feet hardly touching the earth as I walked hand-in-hand with her to the stream.

Indiana she kissed me, she tasted of cinnamon, of long winter’s nights, still on a warm summer’s day.

Ted made his first deliveries, two pizzas at one house, but only a $2 tip, so he pushed a tricycle from the yard onto the street on his way out. The next delivery yielded, with his sad, “Sorry, no change,” $30 for a $21 pizza. The four-pizza stop was at a private house up a long driveway. About ten cars were parked in front. A short man sporting the permanent three-day beard in vogue for young professionals, met him at the door.

“Four pizzas; total $92,” Ted said, adding $6.00 to the actual total.

“Yeah, no problem. Come in and put them on that table,” the man said, pointing. There were about 15 people with drinks inside, a corner bar with open bottles of wine, whisky, and other libations, a smell of pot and even a few vape pens on the table. He set the pizzas down next to a round mirror with a thick line of white powder; the mirror obviously taken down from the entrance hall where its hanging nail was visible.

“You’re not offended?” the bearded man asked, seeing Ted eying the line.

“Hardly,” Ted answered, wiping his mouth to make sure he wasn’t drooling.

“Well, help yourself. Stay a bit. Have a drink.” The bearded man turned and started talking with a tall, older woman, speaking directly into her cleavage.

Judging that acting would be better for him than asking, Ted pulled a bill from his pocket, rolled it, and sniffed the entire line, favoring his right nostril, since his left bled more easily. He didn’t care if the line were cocaine, or meth, or pcp, or some designer substance; he prided himself on his freedom from discrimination in such matters.

“Pharmaceutical grade cocaine, meant to be diluted to the proverbial 7%,” the short man said, looking over his shoulder. “O’ my god,” Ted said, not in answer, but involuntarily as the first flakes hit his brain. A line like that would probably cut through four or five drinks, he thought, but decided to stick to one; his last DUI had cost over $7,000, and if he lost his license, he lost his cushy job. He fixed himself a White Russian, the Dude’s favorite drink, which also was easy on his stomach and left virtually no smell.

He talked about something and nothing with a young woman, a pre-med she said, for ten or so minutes, while the first flush warmed his body. The host came over and asked, “By chance, do you have another pizza?”

“Funny you ask,” Ted replied, “on my first delivery, two pizzas, no one was home. I waited and knocked, but nobody! So I have those two. One’s a large ham and pineapple; the other’s a medium Supreme, heavy on the mushrooms.”

“Yeah, well, let us have the large. The Supreme’s got too much meat on it for some of the guests.”

Ted went to his car and retrieved Harley’s pizza.

“This should cover it all,” the host said, and handed Ted two $100 bills, and added a $40, “for a tip.” Ted glanced at the mirror, which showed only the ceiling, and the host handed him a small bullet-shaped snifter. Ted knew fully how to use it, and took a farewell snort up each nostril.

“Anytime,” he told the host. As walked out, he shut the door behind him before giving a primal wolf howl. The host had been too diligent for him to pocket the snifter, but Ted was in a grateful forgiving mood anyway.

On the tv, the game was in the second inning when Harley finished his first IPA, a dark brown local brew sporting a thick white head in Harley’s mug. The pitcher was the Mayhems’ ace; he’d been in the majors almost two years, until the combination of drugs, wildness, on- and off-field antics, two domestic abuse allegations, and a smart mouth that the managers and owners could do without, relegated him to the blackball list of all pro teams. After the leadoff batter in the first had drilled the first pitch of the game into center for a ringing single, the next pitch caught the subsequent batter, trying to bunt the runner over, square in his back while turning away; it was at least 18 inches inside. The umpire looked hard at him, but since the visitor’s bench wasn’t making a fuss – two men on and no outs in the first – he let it slide. The local tv station blacked out the pitcher’s mouth, to protect the Mayfield Bay lip readers.

“Jimmy seems upset at the ump, ‘though the ump didn’t even give him a warning,” the announcer noted. The color man replied, “I think he questioned whether the ump was related to either his mother or his father, suggesting farm animals were involved, and even implied he was his own parent. I don’t know why’s he’s so agitated.”

Jimmy induced a grounder to third for a 5-4-3 double play. He then threw three perfect high strikes, each of which the batter took. Jimmy was about to walk off the field when the umpire signaled a count of 2:1. A black oblong again covered Jimmy’s mouth, with the color man saying only, “What he says now isn’t consistent with the genetics of what he said before.” A dribbler to the shortstop, who bare-handed it and bounced the throw to first, allowed a run to score when the ball escaped from the first baseman’s mitt. Jimmy caught a liner off the bat of the oversized fifth place batter for the final out of the inning, taunting the batter while walking off the mound to the dugout. The score was still 1 to 0 at the top of the second.

Harley was upset that the pizza was late, but consoled himself with chips and salsa, and a Molson straight from the bottle. He dug through his desktop and found Jack’s Crack Pizza’s ad: “On time within 30 minutes, or it’s free!” He was due a liberated pizza. He decided that a $5 tip, which was, he figured, infinity percent of the cost of a free pizza, was appropriate, and folded a $5 bill into his front pocket.

Knowing that Jaime would ask about his parents, he pressed their icon on his phone and called. The best! No answer! He left a loving message: nothing wrong, just calling to see how you are and to say I miss you. Now if only the damn pizza would come.

There were no fights, but there was an ominous occurrence in the top of the second. Jimmy, in his anger, was throwing hot heat. “That was 112 mph,” the announcer noted. The color man reminded the listeners that the Mayfield speed gun was notorious, having registered Bartolo Colon, “Big Sexy,” at 94 mph at a signing event after Colon’s retirement.

“Looked to be right down the middle, about belt high,” the announcer said. “I can’t really say why it was called a ball.”

“Can’t figure out why the batter didn’t swing,” the color man said diplomatically. Jimmy was uncharacteristically silent.

On the next pitch, the announcer commented that lots of umps might have called it a strike, though perhaps a few finicky ones would demur that it was high. The color man coughed. The count became 3-0 when another fastball, about knee high on the outside corner, was disdained by the ump.

“Sort of a small strike zone today by Raymond,” said the announcer.

“Or, he’s trying to teach Jimmy a lesson,” said the color man, who quickly added, “not that any ump would stoop to that.”

Jimmy was visibly fuming.

“That’s not a Groucho Marx mustache,” advised the announcer, “we’ve blacked out some of Jimmy’s comments.” The infielders met at the mound, then all walked back to their positions, backwards, staring at the home plate ump the entire way. The Mayhems were a kick. Jimmy threw a fastball right down the middle of the plate, a pitch the ump didn’t have to call, as it was hit out of the stadium. 2-0. “Where’s that freakin’ pizza,” Harley growled.

The third and fourth innings were unremarkable, except for Harley’s growing frustration over the pizza, now past an hour late. It was 2-1 at the top of the fifth, and Jimmy was still on the mound, almost a record 17 batters pitched to without being lifted or ejected.

“Seems like that last pitch on the Bay Hens’ strike-out,” the announcer said, “was the type of high pitch Jimmy can’t get Raymond to give him a strike call on.”

“Nobody could,” stated the color man bluntly, “the pitch was neck high. Look at the replay. The batter dug himself in waiting for the next pitch; it never occurred to him it was a strike.” The manager came out to protest for form’s sake, but primarily to push the batter away from Raymond before he was ejected. He had no desire to lose a close game by replacing a good hitter with his utility infielder.

Harley missed all the top of the fifth, because Ted arrived. He muted the tv, and answered the door. Ted was holding a large pizza warmer bag; he’d put the pizza inside, from where it had been on the car seat, before walking to Harley’s door.

“You’re late,” Harley said. “The pizza’s free.” Ted recoiled.

“Free? After I have to fix a flat to get here, you’re stiffing me? You know they take that out of my pay, don’t you? It’ll mean I run at a loss for the entire evening. Before the flat, I had three in a row, ‘please leave it at the door and take the twenty,’ just to avoid looking me in the face when they didn’t tip squat.” Ted gave Harley a simpering ‘the world is crushing me’ look, a practiced pose. It wasn’t easy to look sad with all that cocaine running through his veins, but Harley looked too secure to try bluster.

“Shit. I’ll give you $5 for a tip; that’s it.”

“C’mon, guy, don’t do that to me. My ol’ lady ‘ill kill me if I come home with nothing, not even making gas. I’m sorry it’s late, but I made tracks after the flat. I was really trying. It’s still piping hot.”

“Shit. $10, that’s it.”

“Heck, the pizza’s more than that; it’s over $20.”

“No freakin’ way. It’s $18 and change; I order it every week.”

“Naw, it’s a Supreme. You must have forgot.”

“A Supreme? No. Ham and pineapple, large, like always. Show me what you’ve got.”

Ted pulled the pizza box from the bag.

“It’s only a medium. And it’s got mushrooms, and black olives, and lots of other junk. No ham, no pineapple. You guys must have screwed up the order.” Harley’s anger was palpable.

“Naw. You want me to go to the car and get the order form? It has your name, address, time you called, delivery time 6:45, and clear as day, ‘medium Supreme’. And the pizza’s got ham, like there, and there. No pineapple; should have ordered that if you wanted it, all extras are free on the Supreme.”

“What about the slogan, ‘free if it’s late?’”

“Okay, sure man, if you want to stiff me. I have to tell Jack, of course, and then you’ll have to find another pizza place, ‘cause he hates ungrateful customers. Say, $18 for the pizza, $5 off.”

“Shit. All right. Shit.” Harley gave him $20, and waited for $2 back. Ted acted like the deal was over, but Harley kept glaring, his hand out.

“What? No tip?” Ted retreated to outside the door, carrying his empty hot bag, and patted all his pockets. “What with the ‘leave it at the doors’, I got no change. I think I have some quarters in the car. Wait a min.”

Harley, disgusted, slammed the door in Ted’s face instead. Ted, proud of a concluding con, keyed the car in the driveway (it wasn’t Harley’s) on his way to his own car. Even skipping the last scheduled delivery – Harley had that pizza now – it was a good evening. He decided not to get another delivery load and have to listen to Jack’s grousing because the skipped customer was complaining. He was confident the Knicks would win tomorrow; they’d lost the last three. “Prob’ly would have been smoother to deliver the Supreme to the guy who ordered it, and skip Harley, but all’s well that ends well,” he mused. He wanted to get home to Rose before his high wore off.

The Supreme was stone cold. Harley ordered Alexa to continue playing Indiana, then went to the kitchen area where he put two slices on a plate and set the microwave for 90 seconds. He had decided not to bother to pick off the mushrooms and olives.

“Indiana, hold me tight, let me feel your body, so warm and so womanly, so petite and so light.”

Indiana hugged me to her, murmuring sweet nothings, nuzzled my neck and sighed like the breeze.

“Put down your reel and grab up your rod,” Indiana whispered sweetly, “you don’t need bait to catch fish today.

“I’ve caught you. I love you,” Indiana said softly. “And I’ll never leave you, ‘till my breath cease to come.”

Armed with his pizza and another Molson (IPAs were too heavy for a Supreme), Harley shouted, “Alexa, pause” and unmuted the tv. Jimmy, amazingly, was still on the mound, his back to the plate, shouting curses at the outfield fence.

“Jimmy’s probably telling the center fielder that this hitter has power,” the announcer speculated. “Could be,” said the color man, “but he’s using some unusual phraseology for that, it seems.”

There was a runner on first base. A replay showed a fastball, clocked at 108 mph, inside half of the plate, nipple high. It had been called a ball, completing the walk. The batter was careful not to look at Jimmy as he took off his elbow and foot guards, and trotted to first.

Harley added some crushed red peppers to the pizza, and took a long-delayed bite. Finally the evening was working out. The Supreme wasn’t too bad, and actually the mushrooms were tasty.

“Now that was a pitch Jimmy probably regrets sending,” the announcer said after the first pitch to the next batter. “Caught too much of the plate, and up in the zone. I bet Tony’s kicking himself for letting that one go by. You don’t need much of a swing to put one like that out of the ballpark; the pitch provides the power.”

“It was called a ball,” the color man noted. “It’s not like Jimmy to take this calmly,” he continued, “yet he’s not saying a thing, just looking at the catcher and shaking off all the signs.

“You don’t need many signs for Jimmy. He’s got only a fastball, and a wild pitch. He never had a curve, and he stopped using a change-up after hitters’ averages against it topped .400. He’s a mano-a-mano pitcher: if you can’t stand my heat, stay out of my kitchen.”

“Exactly,” said the announcer, with a confident tone belying that he could make no sense of the last statement.

“Well, that might have been a strike,” said the announcer, against a background of crowd roar, “but the umpire’s made no call.” Harley looked up from fishing a slice of olive out of the crease between the cushion and the side of the armchair; the umpire was flat on his back on the ground. “I think it caught the ump on that dingy-thing that hangs down from the mask to protect his neck. Probably knocked the breath out of him. Not a good play by the catcher.”

“Doesn’t look like the catcher moved his mitt much. On the replay, see, the mitt stays down at his hips, the pitch comes in and the catcher moves his head a bit to the side, but doesn’t try to catch it. Strange. Hits the ump dead on the neck protector at about 100 mph. The catcher’s helping him up now, asking if he’s okay, saying he was fooled by the pitch; Jimmy misread the sign.”

“Yes, but he didn’t take his mask off; I think the catcher is smiling. I know the ump isn’t. He’s making the call: it’s a ball. All the umpires are having a conference.”

Harley took the occasion to get some Parmesan cheese from the ‘fridge and sprinkle it on the pizza.

“The first base umpire, Chet Flatley, is switching with Raymond. So now the crew chief is at the plate, and Ray’s at first. It’ll take a few minutes for Ray to remove his mask and body armor and give them to Chet.”

“Jimmy’s looking steadily at third base, his back to Raymond. I bet Ray’d love to eject Jimmy, but he can’t prove it wasn’t the catcher’s mistake. Let’s take a break with our sponsor.”

Harley muted the tv for the commercials, and let Alexa finish Indiana.

Indiana died last Spring; she was gone in a heartbeat. She was but a whisper in time’s roaring rush.

I’d had forty years, and they’d slid by so quickly, like a silvery fish running the rapids to spawn.

“Indiana,” I said, when I thought she was sleeping, deathly pale in the white hospital bed.

“I can’t make it without you. I need you with me. You’re my life and my reason and my breath and my bread.”

Indiana, she heard me. She said, ere she left me, “Darling forgive me. I lied that day oh so long ago.

“I didn’t need a license. We’d get that later. For the fish I was after, it was always catch and keep.”

“Jimmy’s keeping an eye on the runner, but he’s no threat to steal. Let me see. Yup, only two steals this year, and one was that play last month when the catcher couldn’t find the ball right behind him, and he could have walked to second.”

“He just about did. He’ll never make the majors ‘cause he’s too slow, although he has all the other baseball tools. His average is in the low 200's mainly because he’s always out on close plays at first. But there’s Jimmy lobbing a throw over. I don’t think you can keep him much closer; his lead is only about three feet.”

“Pitch to the plate. Fastball. Inside corner, knee high. Strike one.”

“A pretty pitch. Most likely foul the ball off his foot if he tried to swing at it.”

“Another look at first. The runner’s so close he doesn’t have to dive, just move his left foot to the base if there’s a throw.”

“Jimmy’s stepped off the rubber and there is a throw to first, a fastball. Whoa! Sweet Mayfield! That hit the ump right on the chest, well, maybe it was deflected a bit by his hand in self-defense.”

“Doesn’t look like Lionel at first tried very hard to catch the pick-off. On the replay, let’s see, the mitt starts stretched out to the pitcher, waiting, but before the pitch Lionel steps onto the field as if he thinks a pitch to the plate will be made. The pickoff throw goes right past him. He’s looking at the batter and doesn’t try to catch it. Strange.

“Ray put up his hands; I think the ball hit his left thumb first. Must have been about 100 mph. The first base coach is helping him up now, asking if he’s okay. Lionel’s saying he missed the pick-off sign, ‘So sorry.’

“Chet, at the plate, has just ejected Jimmy and Lionel. The Bay Hens’ manager is screaming, saying there’s no cause for that, it’s just a risk of the game. Chet’s holding up one finger, now two. Bobby can’t afford to be ejected; he’s not only the manager, he’s the back-up for first base. Jimmy’s leaving the mound, howling, ‘So sorry, so sorry,’ and the hometown crowd is taking up the chant.”

“What a game!” Harley thought, as the crowd chanted “So sorry” and a wave was started. He cogitated and concluded that one more slice and one more Molson were in order. He was getting full and sleepy, and a top-off on each would be perfect. There would still be five slices for leftovers.

The game resumed with three umpires; Ray had his thumb bandaged by the visitors’ trainer, and took a seat in the stands, but left very soon after. All the fans near him had moved away, and a rain of peanuts and sunflower seeds settled on him, sparing anyone else. Random shouts of “So sorry” followed him as he went down the aisle. The third base ump went to first. The second base umpire, now oddly wearing a mask, slid over into the 4-6 hole, where he could cover third as well.

“That’s a pop up for the third out. It’s time for the seventh inning stretch, and a word from our sponsor.”

With perfect timing, Harley’s dad called. They chatted a few minutes; Dad subtly reminding Harley that Ma’s birthday was next week. “Love you.” “Love you, too.” They concluded the call just as the tv returned from commercials.

Damn: the phone rang again, this time with no special tone. It was Luke.

“Hey, man, I’m only about a minute away. Still up? I’m starving. Care for some company?”

“Shit, man, yeah. Plenty of pizza left: liver with onions.”

“Funny man. See you in a min’.”

Monday, Monday. Sometimes it just turns out that way.