The Flex of the Thumb (6 page)

Driving his brand new Lincoln Town Car, Vernon Lucas took Vano home from the hospital. Other than the lack of stamina associated with his weakened condition, Vano seemed to be feeling just fine. The new automobile had burgundy velour seats and a busy instrument panel which looked extremely high tech. His father asked him how he liked the car.

After a pause Vano said, “It's real nice, Dad.”

Vernon had never heard his son call him
Dad
before. He went ahead nevertheless, “I got it up at Thornton's in Victorville. Railsback took 2500 dollars off the sticker price, or I wouldn't have been interested. I really don't need a new car, since the Buick was only a year old, but when someone makes you an offer like that, it's hard to pass up.”

Vano was in a comfort zone of low but firm resonance. It was
hooommm
. When he finally spoke, it was only to repeat himself: “It's real nice, Dad.”

“You see this?” asked Lucas Senior. He pointed to a small blue button on the steering column.

“I see it,” said Vano.

“Why are your answers taking so long? Are you paying attention? This button activates a read-out panel; it's computer operated. Give you about any data you can think of.” Saying this, he pushed the button, which produced an illuminated green rectangular screen above the radio console. Yellow digital letters and numbers indicated the vehicle's speed, current fuel efficiency in miles per gallon, the time, the date, revolutions per minute of the engine, exact running temperature, and several other pieces of information Vano couldn't be sure about.

Looking at this glut of data, Vano felt an uncomfortable flicker, but then it went away.

“Railsback told me the computer panel was the cat's meow, and anybody who has one doesn't want to do without it. It was slick, the way he was trying to gouge me for the few extra bucks, but I told him if I was going to pay for it, the deal was off. He was more or less over a barrel then, because he knew I didn't really need the car anyway; the bottom line is, he threw it in for no extra cost.”

Then Vernon stopped talking about the car. Vano wondered what to think about the computer read-out panel. Eventually he said, “It's real nice, Dad.”

Lucas Senior decided that ought to be enough small talk. It was time to broach the most salient topic: “How soon do you think you'll be ready to pitch again?”

Another lengthy pause transpired before Vano said, “I remember pitching baseball.”

“You remember pitching baseball? Did I hear you right?”

“Yes. I do. I believe my memory is intact.”

“What did that blow to the head
do
to you?” Vernon Lucas felt his blood pressure escalating to a higher level. “
You remember pitching baseball
?? That's like saying Michael Jordan remembers making a basket!”

Approximately five seconds passed before Vano said, “I can't remember who Michael Jordan is.”

Vernon's agitation intensified beyond his best intentions. “I don't know what zone you've been in for the last month, but I've been in the combat zone. I've been fending off questions from the Oakland management, legal inquiries from soft drink companies, nagging from the media, and prayer requests from Sister Cecilia. We're going to have to talk a little turkey here. With all due respect for your condition, of course.”

“How is Sister Cecilia doing?” Vano heard himself asking. But then he felt himself retreating down the corridor of
hooommm
to a place of deeper reverberations. He said again, “I can remember pitching.”

“Do you remember pitching to the Oakland A's? Do you remember blowing them away in the Coliseum?”

Eventually, when the answer arrived, it was “Yes.” But Vano discovered that even when his memories were clear, there were no emotional attachments associated with them. They were utterly neutral, like recollecting the turns you might take along a route to reach a particular destination.

Vernon continued aggressively, “Then maybe you remember what's at stake? The gold mine is still out there waiting. When do you suppose you'll be ready to do some throwing?”

Vano pondered the question, but without urgency, in a condition of total serenity. “When it sounds like it might be fun?” he asked, by way of answering.

“Fun?!” sputtered Vernon. “Did you say
fun
??” His crescendoing level of frustration warned him to slow down. As luck would have it, they were on the outskirts of Bakersfield, where he had a favorite restaurant. He swung the car into the parking lot of
The Cut Above
.

The Cut Above
had subdued lighting and a decor to suggest the turn of the century. Vano's father stopped at the bar long enough to order two dry martinis. He downed one in a hurry, then carried the other to their table. On the table was a kerosene lamp, but it wasn't burning; it was only for looks.

The waitress came. Vano's father ordered garden salad and braised sirloin tips on toast, cooked in wine sauce. He told the waitress, “And one more of these martinis. Dry. Make that right away, please.”

When it was his turn, Vano said, “I'd like a cheeseburger, please.”

“Oh come on,” complained his father. “Is that what you're going to order?”

Vano felt another of the uncomfortable flickers before the answer came to him. “They didn't have cheeseburgers in the hospital, I think I'd enjoy one.”

“How do you know what they fed you in the hospital? You were eating through a tube.”

Briefly, “I'm pretty sure it wasn't cheeseburgers.”

“That's not something you order in a place like this. You can get a cheeseburger at Burger King, for god's sake. This menu has a large selection. Maybe you'd better look it over again.”

The waitress stood with her pad and pencil poised while Vano tried to peruse the menu again. He wanted to think of a reply, but these things seemed to come or they didn't. He found himself flickering again, just before going numb. Finally his father instructed the waitress, “I guess you might as well bring him a cheeseburger.”

There was no conversation during the meal. Vano thought the cheeseburger tasted very good. When they were finished eating, Vernon ordered coffee.

The waitress brought the coffee.

“Oh come on,” complained Vernon Lucas to the waitress. “When I order coffee, I want a
real
cup. This cup is only half full.”

Vano took a disinterested look at the cup, in which the brown liquid rose to a level one half inch below the brim. The waitress said quietly, “With all due respect, Sir, I'd say it's more than half full.”

“I don't want half a cup, I want a full cup when I order coffee.”

“I'd be happy to bring you some more, Sir.”

“Well of course.”

She went to get the pot. During her absence, Vernon said to his son, “Let's see if we can negotiate some kind of a timetable.”

Vano wasn't sure what a timetable would mean, but he could tell that his father was ready to return to the subject of pitching baseball. “Timetable?”

“That's what I said. Timetable. When you might be able to start throwing, a little at a time to start with, then working on up. Are you with me on this?”

The waitress returned to their table with the pot and painstakingly brought Vernon's cup right up to the brim. “That's more like it,” Vano's father said to her. “That's what I call a full cup. Thank you.”

Vano was observing this exchange from deep in. His father and the waitress were now miniature figures on the far side of a vast and bland landscape. With no stress whatsoever, Vano wondered what his answer to the timetable question would turn out to be.

As it happened, it was moot. Using both hands, Vano's father lifted the brimming cup toward his lips with trembling fingers. When he burned his mouth, his hands began to shake. The scalding coffee washed down over both his hands. The cup fell clattering to the saucer while the old man screeched in pain. Beads of sweat formed quickly on his scarlet scalp. Vano watched his father flap his hands to shed some of the pain while the coffee soaked deep into the tablecloth.

Vano spent the bigger part of August in a state of unattached tranquility, physically as well as psychically. The comfort zone of
hooommm
seemed to fit him like a glove. He enjoyed the lassitude of the condo deck, with its warm southern exposure and firm mountain view. He read a good many books, reflectively, books such as
Kon-Tiki,
by Thor Heyerdahl,
The Snow Leopard
by Peter Matthiesen, and
In My Own Way
by Alan Watts.

“What will you do if you're not a baseball pitcher?” Sister Cecilia asked him one day.

Vano looked up slowly from his reading, taking the necessary time to absorb the question. “I'm not sure,” he said.

“Will you get a job?”

“I don't know.”

“Maybe you could.”

“That would be nice.”

“You're so agreeable, Vano; do you know that?”

Eventually Vano replied, “I never thought about it. Yes, I guess I am agreeable.”

Sister found no discomfort in the long pauses which delayed his answers. She enjoyed the newer, gentler Vano. In fact, although she would never say so to his father, she felt relief in his apparent liberation from the reckless, aggressive male mode. She asked him about college.

“It might be nice to go to college,” he replied.

“Maybe you could go to Entrada. You visited there.”

“That would be nice.”

“Letters keep coming from that baseball coach you talked to. But your grades in high school were low, Vano, and it seems late to be applying.”

What Sister was saying was true. There was no reply which occurred to him. His
hooommm
was ultra firm.

She continued, “Maybe you could still get in. Maybe it's not too late to apply to junior college.”

After another substantial delay Vano told her, “I think I would enjoy going to college.”

None of this serenity registered on Vano's father, however. Vernon was engaged in a desperate cycle of damage-control activities day and night. When he wasn't on the phone with doctors and lawyers, he was stalling Oakland Athletics' personnel or product endorsement opportunities. He acted as Vano's press secretary, to field the ongoing but dwindling calls from press people and other media.

The Oakland general manager visited Vano once on the deck to remind him about the signing bonus.

“We already have a lot of money in this house,” Vano told him.

“It wouldn't take much,” countered Rakestraw. “I know you're not in shape, but if you could demonstrate that you can still throw, there's still a lot of money on the table.”

Vano pointed out that he didn't feel any desire to be a pitcher. Then he asked the GM if he'd ever had the pleasure of reading
Kon-Tiki
.

This irrelevant question prompted Rakestraw to try a more manipulative approach: “I traded three guys to get you. Three proven major leaguers, I might add.”

These remarks, meant to provoke in Vano a sense of guilt, fell short of their goal. Vano felt a serene indifference to anything Rakestraw might have to say. He finally answered, “Maybe the three players will be happy with their new team.”

The frustrated Rakestraw knew when it was time to fold. On the way out he said to Vernon Lucas, “I see what you mean.”

“You don't have a clue,” was the dispirited father's reply.

Vernon paid Gomez and Ann-Marie five hundred dollars apiece to see what they could do, but Gomez could offer only baseball, and Ann-Marie, sex. Vano obliged Ann-Marie, and he played catch with Gomez, both without engagement. He was firm in his understanding that sex and baseball were activities of the ego connection, and not capable of providing any lasting satisfaction.

At the end of the month Vernon Lucas threw up his hands in disgust and permitted Vano to enroll at Entrada College. “At least it'll get him away from home,” he muttered to Sister. Entrada was an institution in need of students, as it happened, so Vano's substandard high school record was no obstacle. As long as he could pay the cost, the school would be happy to admit Vano, and of course, his father had plenty of money.

The night before he was to leave for college, Vano was alone in the den watching the TV news when Sister Cecilia came home from Salvation Army band practice. She fussed around in the kitchen for half an hour or so. By the time the late news was over, she came into the den and sat next to Vano on the couch. “I can't get used to the idea that you're going away to college. You're going to be gone for a long time, Vano; I'm going to miss you.”

“I'll miss you too, Sister Cecilia.”

“It's going to be pretty lonely around here.”

After a delay of a few seconds Vano said, “Sister, I thought you were Catholic.”

“Of course I'm
Catolico
; the Salvation Army band is just an outside activity I enjoy.” She couldn't help but like him this way, though. “It's a very thoughtful observation for you to make, Vano.”

He waited again before speaking, “Maybe you could come to Entrada for a visit sometime. It might help to alleviate the loneliness.”

“It's getting late, Vano, and I'm awfully tired. How would you like to tuck me into bed?”

Sister had never asked him a question like this before. “I never thought about it,” he said.

In her eyes were unfamiliar pinpoints of light as she told him, “I think it would be awfully nice if you would.”

Vano felt a flickering like a train passing rapidly through a station, but the moment passed. When he found his tongue he said, “Okay then, I guess.”

They went up to Sister Cecilia's bedroom. After she seated Vano on the edge of the bed, she got a pink nylon nightgown from her dresser and laid it beside him. Then, facing him, she said, “I'm ready now.”