Pangs of Conscience
A Story (part 1)
The old man turned his head. His eyes dug into the ceiling as if all the words he ever wanted to say to the boy were buried beneath those timber beams.
“It wasn’t always like this,” Michael said to the river below as he tossed his Atlanta Braves cap to the side, pulled his knees to his chest, and rested his sun-smacked cheek on his arm. “I used to play ball with my friend Jimmy. Sometimes, Jimmy’s little brother Danny would tag along, and we’d make him think playing outfield was the greatest. Really, we just wanted him to chase down the balls we hit during our home run derbies.”
Michael had many conversations with the river that summer. Sure, these conversations were a little lopsided, as the river never talked back, but Michael knew from his conduct class that listening was as important as responding, and empathetic listening was a master skill, one the river had perfected, perhaps, throughout a lifetime of hanging on to the words of lonely boys who sat at the bank and hid their toes in the sand.
“I wonder if those guys miss me like I miss them,” Michael said. “Maybe, yes. Maybe, no.” He got to his feet slowly. His small body ached, and he wondered if this is what it felt like to be old. If so, he’d rather stay young. Friends, or no friends. Baseball, or no baseball. With both hands on the small of his back, he contorted at the waist, counting off the pops and cracks his spine squealed with each bend and twist. Then he rolled up his jeans — “workin’ blues” his dad called them — and waded ankle deep in the cool and refreshing water.
A school of minnows idled in the river’s underlying current, while a few rogue swimmers nibbled at his feet in search of a quick snack. Michael’s eyes flitted over the stacks of river rocks laying just beneath the surface. He thought about how these flat rocks reminded him of the silver dollar pancakes his mom used to make him Saturday mornings. And the sunset’s warm, golden glow made the water look like the syrup he so generously helped himself to.
He scooped up one of the rocks and shook it off. He searched for a target. Across the river, about forty-five feet away, Michael would’ve guessed, was an old tree stump peaking out of the water. “That’ll do,” he whispered to himself. He focused on the center of the stump, imagining it the catcher’s mitt his grandfather bought for him during the after-church flea market. Facing the stump, Michael brought the rock to his chest and lifted his left leg, breaking up the feeding frenzy around his toes. He shifted his pivot foot slightly, cocked his right arm back, and pitched a perfect strike. The crack of the rock against the stump echoed loud enough to scare some freshwater birds into flight. “Strike one,” Michael said through a crooked smile.
“Alright, Smoltzy,” a booming voice startled.
Michael spun around. It took him a few seconds — which stretched to minutes in his mind — to adjust his eyes to the figure standing atop the riverbank, silhouetted by the day’s sinking sun. But even if it took him an hour, Michael would’ve waited, because seeing the man’s face was vital. In there, lay the imbalance. Just which way did the scale tip? Michael would admit, sometimes, he simply could not tell, but other times he could read his father, like soothsayers read the wrinkles on your palms and tell you if you’re going to be rich and famous, or married with children.
“Wash up, boy. Marlins at eight,” his father said.
“Justice will be served tonight. No way he doesn’t knock four bases,” Michael said.
“Maybe yes, maybe no, only one way to find out,” his father replied.
Baseball is what connected Michael to most things in life, and it was about the only conduit to his father’s attention these days. For that reason, he clung to it, so tight it invaded his dreams. A few times a week, fragmented images of his father dangling over a cliff, white-knuckling the barrel of a Louisville Slugger, while he desperately, failingly, tried to pull him up rolled across the back of his eye lids like a video recording from a projector. It wasn’t until many years later at the University did an advisor help him put the pieces together. Michael was never saving his father. His father was wanting to yank him over the edge.
The Braves won that game. Handedly. David Justice walloped two home runs, one over right field and one just left of center, and Michael was in a deep, immovable sleep inches away from the T.V. by the third inning. He awoke briefly when his father carried him from floor to bed, the sweet and smoky aroma of cheap whiskey pricking his consciousness with every footfall, until the rise-fall rhythm of his father’s chest lulled him back into his dreams. That night he dreamt little, but when he did, he dreamt of campfires.
