#Wattys2015 The Ghost of James Fitzpatrick

Chapter 3

James

I must admit, I had not thought about others since I first saw myself in the water, only the nature of the bizarre and rather morbid scene before me. Somewhere, just a couple blocks beyond the foot of the old Highway 70 Bridge, at 421 Lilac Street, my mother and my little brother, though I could not see them, were also looking for me.

Yesterday, or should I say The Last Day, started out pretty gloomy. No rain, just clouds.

I woke before my alarm, and I could hear the early morning rumbling of the trucks heading across The Bridge. The colder the air, I discovered as a little kid, the clearer the sounds of the trucks. They were somewhere between 2nd and 3rd gear, gathering speed for the slight incline over the Mississippi River.

Every muscle in me ached as I sat up in bed. Baseball tryouts had gone on for almost 2 weeks, and I had pushed myself to the limit. I had to. Senior year was tough enough, I didn't know a math problem could go on for so long, and I was currently writing and researching a history paper on President Jimmy Carter's foreign policy. I'm over halfway through the thing, and it's become painfully obvious that he and I are both in over our heads, and struggling with the subject at hand.

The one thing I did have going for me at school was baseball, so I didn't mind the tedious papers I would eventually get back with red marks all over the margins. I knew America's pastime like the back of my own hand. Particularly, the Cardinals.

I knew every player on the '78 roster, their stats, the team standings, and while most fans were busy slobbering over their first baseman, Keith Hernandez, I liked Ted Simmons, a catcher, because I liked catchers. I was a catcher. Always busy, always had a hand in the game.

Ted Simmons was one of the best hitting catchers in all of Major League Baseball history, his batting average was .285, and if you know baseball, you know that's damn good, especially for a catcher.

So, that was one thing (among countless others) that I didn't have in common with Ted Simmons. I was currently in a true blue hitting slump, and I knew it. Coach knew it, my teammates knew it, my mom knew it, the barber knew it, the lady that works the cash registers at Balian's Market knew it, but the last straw yesterday was my neighbor, Margaret Miller. Did I mention she was six?

I was climbing on my bike in the morning before school, trying my best to balance my baseball gear on my back, when I heard the hoarse voice of our neighbor, Mr. Lewis, holler at me from across the street.

"Jimmy!" He bent down for his morning paper and gave me a wave as he straightened himself.

"Morning Sarge." I waved back at the old man. He was shot in the eye by a sniper in France in World War One, and he wore a bad ass pirate patch on his right eye to cover God only knows what. He was a member of the all black, 92nd Infantry, a genuine 'Buffalo Soldier' and was actually awarded the Purple Heart years after the war. He was an honest to goodness war hero, and he had been sharing war stories with me for as long as I could remember. I loved Sergeant Lewis, but he didn't know that.

"Give 'em hell today Jimmy," he yelled back at me as he shuffled back into the warmth of his home.

"Yessir, I will," I yelled back at him as I straddled my bike.

That's when I saw Margaret Miller ride her little, red bicycle down the driveway next door.

"Good morning, Margaret," I said.

"Hi James," she replied, "where're ya  going?" 

"School, then baseball practice."

"Oooooooh," she said shaking her head, rather sadly I might add. I couldn't help but grin at her, she was awful cute, she was messy and her nose had an old scab from a run in with the pavement, I assumed. Her red braids looked as though she had slept in them.

"Why? Is that a bad thing?" I asked her.

"No," said Margaret, "Daddy says you're in a terrible slump, and he wishes he knew what you needed to get out of it, because he would get that for you."

I just smiled at her.

"Tell your dad I wish I knew myself."

"He says you're spending a lot of time 'riding the pine,'' she continued twisting the knife, "but I don't know what that means."

"That means I'm sitting on the bench a lot Margaret, and your dad's exactly right."

She looked at me very seriously.

"I still don't get it."

I began my slow pedal away from Margaret, and she hollered after me:

"Mama tells daddy to leave you alone, because she says you're a doll, but I don't think a boy would like to be called a doll, but I like you no matter what, James!"

She's waved feverishly as I began to coast away. I glanced back at her smiled.

"I like you too, Margaret".

Off I rolled, not realizing that would be the last time I would ever see Sarge or Margaret Miller.

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