Must Hate Robots
This is a short story I wrote two years ago. It’s probably my favorite short story I’ve written, reminding me of summer days.
Daniel was trying to fill his outfield. He had his bat over his shoulder with his glove dangling from the end. Little Rizwan Kazjahni was at his side, glancing up at him and trying to match his purposeful gait. Daniel was wearing his new Pittsburgh Pirates Bicentennial baseball cap. It was shaped like an ovular hatbox with a sharp edge all around the top. It looked like the style worn by the players from the eighteen hundreds. When Daniel put it back on that morning he imagined himself a burly white man with a handlebar mustache belting one over the 400 feet mark. His dad bought it for him at the game last night. They were in heaven together. Three Rivers Stadium roared and the Pirates trounced those rotten Phillies 6 to 1.
Daniel need an outfield today. Tut from Northside had challenged him to play their team at four. Sometimes Tut brought his team to Daniel’s sandlot off Carson St. Today was Daniel’s turn to meet them at theirs. But he needed nine players. Tut would not even consider playing Daniel unless he had a full team.
“If I can round up seven can you spot me two?”
Tut spat his tobacco juice and shook his head. “Round up some honkies, if you need to. But if you don’t got nine, we ain’t playin’.”
Baseball was it to Daniel. He had to play. He could have just gone to Tut with the six he had and played for his team. Tut never had problems finding teams to play after little league season ended. But Daniel did. And he was a coach too, besides a pitcher and cleanup batter. There was no way he was going to submit himself to Tut’s big ugly self. It was one of those “Better to serve in hell…” deals. But scraping up that outfield was going to be a toughy.
They tried Timmy Mayfield first.
“Hey, Timmy! Four o’clock over near the Clark plant. Tut’s ready for us. You can play right field.”
Timmy’s face scrunched up. “Four? Lost in Space comes on at three-thirty. Then Prince Planet and Ultra Man. I can play at five-thirty.”
“Game starts at four, man! ‘Lost in Space’? ‘Ultra Man’? This is BASEBALL, Timmy!”
Timmy thought for a minute. “Nah, these are really good episodes today. I don’t wanna miss ‘em.”
Rizwan had to double time it to keep up with Daniel.
“‘Prince Planet’?” Daniel snuffed. “Who’s he compared with stealin’ second? Who’s he compared to Dave Parker? Dave Parker’s Ultra Man!”
Next was Robbie Goehring. Robbie was a reliable player. They were in the top reading group together at school. But Robbie’s mom was prejudiced. Anytime Daniel came to the door she had to anounce,”Robbie, that nice little colored boy is here to see you.” Daniel HATED that, but was willing to endure it today to get Robbie to play ball.
Daniel was pleasantly surprised by Mrs. Goehring on this afternoon. “Robbie, Danny’s here.”
Holy Smoke, Daniel thought. No ‘colored’ intro.
She stood by the door with Daniel and waited for Robbie. Finally she smiled at Daniel and asked, “So, did you watch Good Times last night?”
Oh, for Pete’s sake!
“No, Ma’am. I’m partial to Happy Days.”
Robbie finally appeared. “Hey, Daniel.”
“Hey, Robbie. Game at four. Against Tut. You can play right field.”
Robbie hesitated, winced, then shook his head. “I’m working on my new Huey, Dewey, and Louie models.”
“They have models about ducks?”
Robbie looked offended. “No! These are Huey, Dewey, and Louie, the robots from Silent Running.”
It was Daniel’s turn to wince. “Robots? I need you, Robbie! You can actually play! You can build robots tonight after we play baseball. Come on!”
Daniel and Rizwan were marching on alone, of course. Rizwan was nearly running now, to keep up.
“Robots. Robots! Man, I’m gonna start a club up, and the only rule I’m gonna have is that you gotta hate robots!”
Luckily, Kyle Stuber and his brother Mikey were home together. If Daniel could get them to play, maybe Tut would let him bum one player. This was risky, though. The last time Kyle played, he ran off second on a caught fly ball, was tagged out, broke into tears and ran home. But he could play…
Oh no. Kyle and Mikey were in their back yard playing Star Trek. Kyle was Captain Kirk. He had a squirt gun for a phaser. Mikey was wearing plastic pointy Mr. Spock ears. He had a cassette player for a tri-corder. This was not a good start.
“You can be Dr. Bones McKoy, Daniel! And Rizwan can be an alien!”
“No, Kyle,” Daniel pleaded, “you can be right field, and Mikey can be center!”
Kyle shook his head. “No. I don’t like playing ball.”
“But you’re great, Kyle!” Not a complete stretch of the truth. “Remember that time when Tut had bases loaded in the last inning and you ran back and caught that fly ball? You won the game for us! Tell me how phasers and robots and tri-corders are gonna give you a feeling like that?”
Rizwan matched Daniel’s droopy funeral pace.
”I don’t get it,” Daniel lamented. “Kent Tekulve’s averaging five hitless innings per game. Willie Stargell and Bill Robinson are battling it out for .400 averages. But I can’t even get three kids to play outfield!” He spat and cursed. “Robots!”
Daniel could not fathom that his frustrations would only mount higher next summer. Star Wars would be coming to a theater near you!
