New teeth, p.11
New Teeth, page 11
“That’s what I remember, too,” her mother said.
“There’s no point in doing this,” Lauren said. “Every time, it just leads to frustration.”
“We’re frustrated, too!” her father said. He sighed. “I’m sorry for growling just now. I was flooded.”
“That’s all right,” Lauren muttered. “Go ahead.”
“Thank you,” he said. “My point is: I know we weren’t great parents. We were young, and we were wolves, and we didn’t always know what we were doing. But every time we see you, all we do is apologize, over and over, and it’s not easy. In order to do it, we both had to learn to talk English, and it hurts our throats and sounds insane. Just hearing my voice right now coming out of my mouth—it’s incredibly unnatural and disturbing. So if you want us to keep saying sorry, with these weird, choking animal voices, we will. Because we are sorry. But at a certain point…the ball is in your court.”
The room fell silent, allowing them to hear a distant squeak.
“Sounds like someone’s up!” Gabe said, grateful for an excuse to flee the living room. He ducked out and returned a moment later, holding their three-year-old daughter, Haley. She was gripping a small orange ball—the source of the squeaking. Her eyes were bleary from sleep, but when she saw her grandparents, she let out a squeal and buried her face in their fur.
Lauren was surprised that Haley even remembered who they were. She’d barely spent any time with them. There was the Thanksgiving before this one, and that Memorial Day when they’d flown her to Siberia because Gabe’s sister was getting married, and there were no kids at the wedding, and it was just the easiest childcare option. Lauren had expected Haley to be homesick that weekend in the tundra, but somehow she’d managed to enjoy herself. It didn’t hurt that her grandparents had spoiled her rotten. Lauren had asked them to limit Haley’s screen time, but they let her watch as many cartoons as she wanted. They claimed it was because they didn’t understand what screens were and had no way of differentiating between an iPad and any other reflective surface, like a puddle or an eye. Lauren suspected they were lying, but somehow she found herself charmed by their indulgence of her daughter. In their coddling of Haley, she sensed a desire to make up for the past, a subconscious awareness that there were wrongs that needed righting.
Haley tossed her orange ball across the room, and her grandparents obediently fetched it. It was surreal to Lauren to see her folks so docile, but of course to her daughter it made perfect sense. She didn’t see her grandparents as the vicious wolves they were. To her, they were just Papa and Gam Gam.
Someday she’d have to tell Haley the truth about her childhood, and the trauma she’d endured.
Or maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe she’d tell a different narrative, one that focused on the things that they’d got right. How they’d fed her, sheltered her, and defended her from hawks. For all their dysfunction, she’d ended up turning out okay. In some ways, her parents’ flaws had even contributed to her success. (She knew, for example, that her essay about them was a major factor in her getting into Brown.)
Haley was about to throw the ball again, when instead she walked over to her mother.
“Now Mommy throw,” she said, pressing the soggy ball into her hand.
Lauren turned it over in her palm. It was hard to tell if the drool was her parents’ or her daughter’s. Haley had some new teeth coming in. Lauren had recently brought her to the dentist and the X-ray of her child’s jaw had shocked her. There wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, but it was disturbing to see all those adult teeth embedded in her skull, a lifetime of canines and molars, waiting their turn to erupt. It would be years before the teeth broke through her gums, decades in some cases, with braces, retainers and extractions along the way. Why couldn’t humans come out fully formed, with everything they needed? Why did it have to take so long and hurt so much to finish growing up?
She gazed at her parents, now crouching low on the carpet in a show of deference. In wolf years, they were four hundred years old. She wondered what their upbringings had been like. They’d been raised by wolves, too, of course. They’d never spoken about their parents, and it occurred to Lauren only now that she had never asked.
She held up the ball and her parents stared at it with tired yellow eyes. Their panting was labored, but their pupils were focused, tracking the ball as she tentatively traced it through the air. She could hear them faintly whimpering, as plaintive as two pups begging for scraps.
“Throw, Mommy,” Haley pleaded. “Throw.”
Lauren lifted the ball high, feeling its heavy, sticky weight. Then she took a deep breath and let it go.
Screwball
The best thing about playing baseball is the chow. They give you three bucks a day for meal money, and you get to pick the things you eat. For breakfast, I had flapjacks with butter, biscuits with gravy, beefsteak with eggs, six rolls with butter, two sides of liverwurst, oatmeal, ketchup, and plenty of potatoes. I never go hungry like before.
It feels funny being so far from the orphanage. The good news is, I’m not the only rookie. There’s another new player, named Jack, and they have us rooming together. Even though we’re both nineteen, I really look up to him. He’s got what they call “discipline.” Every day he wakes up at four a.m. and does two hours of German squats. Then he drinks raw eggs and runs up and down the staircase till he pukes. He is a serious teetotaler: no drinking, smoking, chew, or even sweets. He does have a girl named Bella that he writes to at Miss Parker’s Finishing School in Buffalo, but he says their relationship is “noble” and “above suspicion.” If anyone’s gonna make the team, it’s him.
I was in knots our first practice. I’ve only ever played orphan ball, and there’s guys here who played up in the majors, like Deek Derrick from Philly and Speedy Ball from the Cleveland Naps. I wanted to ask them all sorts of questions, like did they ever meet Cy Young, but Jack warned me not to speak to any vets. You have to “earn their respect” first. You’ll know you’ve been accepted, he told me, when they give you a nickname. I asked him if he had a nickname yet, and he said, “Sort of.” And I asked, “What does that mean?” And he said that some of the fellas called him Junior. And I asked him why, and his voice got kind of quiet, and he said it was because his daddy was the manager.
And I said really loud, “Why didn’t you tell me your daddy was the manager?” And Deek and Speedy looked over at us. And I asked them if they knew that Jack’s daddy was the manager, and Deek nodded slowly and said, “Yes, we’re all aware.”
I tried my best to copy Jack all day so that I wouldn’t screw up. But I ended up embarrassing myself anyway. I was taking batting practice with the other pitchers, and we were all supposed to bunt. But when I got up to the plate, I saw all those vets staring at me, and I got so nervous I forgot to lay one down, and I just swung the bat like regular, and the ball went all the way over the fence, and the rail tracks, and some houses, and ended up splashing in a river. And everyone got really quiet, like the nuns at the orphanage used to when I screwed up doing my sums. And Mr. Dunn stared at me and said, “My God.” So I said I was sorry, and that I’d remember to bunt next time, and I started to run to get the ball, because, you know, that’s Orioles property. But before I got past the infield, Deek whistled for me to come back. And he patted me on the shoulder and said, “Don’t worry about the ball. We got plenty of ’em, babe.”
And I turned to Junior and gave him a thumbs-up, because now I had a nickname, too, just like him!
And since then, that’s what everyone’s been calling me. Babe, or the Babe, or Babe Ruth.
1914 Baltimore Orioles, AA International League, Spring Training
Babe Ruth, #21, P, OF
Career Major League Batting Average: .342
Total Major League Home Runs: 714
World Champions: 7
Jack Dunn, #16, Manager
Career Minor League Coaching Wins: 2,107
Jack Dunn Jr., #20, LF
Career Minor League Batting Average: .175
That night, I saw Junior writing numbers in a book. I asked him about it, and he said he likes to track his daily progress using “mathematics.” And he flipped through the pages, and it had all his records from his high school, and he showed me how he’d worked to make sure his batting average went up every year, so by the time he was a senior, he was hitting almost .250. And he asked me what I’d batted for St. Mary’s, and I explained that things weren’t really like that at the orphanage. I just hit and pitched when people told me to. And then one day, I was splitting lumber in the work yard, and Brother Mathias came by with Mr. Dunn and said, “George, throw the ball for this nice man.” And he handed me a baseball, and I threw it over a building, and then I found out I was going to get to ride a train.
We were about to go to sleep, when a clump of dirt smacked against the window. So I jumped out of bed and looked outside, and all the veterans were there! And they said they were going to a tavern. And I said I wasn’t sure if Junior went for taverns but that I would ask him, and they said, “Don’t ask Junior. We don’t want him to come. Don’t invite him, just come without him, please. Don’t bring him.” And I turned to Junior, who was sitting right there, and told him how swell I thought it was that the veterans supported him so much in his decision to be a teetotaler. And he sighed and said, “Thanks, Babe.”
I was nervous to go out with the veterans, but it turns out Junior was wrong about them. They were the most welcoming group I’d ever seen. They kept slapping me on the back and offering me whiskeys. I wanted a drink, to stop my heart from pounding, but I figured I’d lay off the stuff, to follow Junior’s example. So I drank Coca-Cola and listened while the guys told me stories about their playing days. And I asked if they had ever met Cy Young. And they said they hadn’t, but Mr. Dunn “sure had” and when I asked what they meant, they said that Mr. Dunn once shut him out 2‒zip!
I had no idea Mr. Dunn had been a ballplayer, but it turns out he pitched a few years in the majors, and he would have been an all-time great, but one day his elbow burst into fifty pieces. He tried to keep pitching after that, but he couldn’t throw curveballs anymore, they just didn’t have the same bite, and also batters could tell when he was about to do one, because he would scream really loud, you know, from agony.
When he started in the majors, his nickname was Peppy Dunn, because he was always pacing around the dugout, clapping his hands, with a big smile on his face. But after his injury, people started calling him Screaming Dunn, and then Pain Dunn or Sad Dunn, and now he didn’t have a nickname anymore, he was just Mr. Dunn, the manager of the minor league Baltimore Orioles.
I asked the guys why Mr. Dunn didn’t try to manage in the majors, and they said no front office would give him a shot on account of his record in the minors. The Orioles have been losing for years in Double A, and last season they finished almost twenty games out, even behind the Rochester Hustlers, which is really saying something, because their team is like a carnival team, and they’ve got a clown at second base, with the red nose and the shoes and the whole deal, and everyone agrees his act is pretty good with all the handkerchiefs, but you don’t want to lose to a guy like that at baseball. Mr. Dunn’s only chance of getting noticed by the majors would be if we won the whole league, by a lot.
“Maybe we will,” I said. “We got some good guys, right?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Deek said. “You’re only as good as your weakest link.”
And I got nervous and said, “Are you guys talking about me?” And for some reason, everybody laughed.
Junior was still awake when I got home, writing letters to Bella at Miss Parker’s Finishing School in Buffalo. And I realized, with cuts coming soon, that it might be our last night together. So I said to him that I sure hoped I made the team, but if I didn’t, I’d write him from the orphanage, care of the Baltimore Orioles, and he could send me letters from the road, with all his box scores, so I could follow along when he was making good. And at least, when I was old and gray, I’d be able to tell everyone I’d met a baseball legend, the great Jack Dunn Jr.
The next day was the last day of tryouts and Mr. Dunn made an announcement. He said he’d heard a rumor that some players were concerned that he was “biased.” But it wasn’t true.
“The Baltimore Orioles are a meritocracy,” he said. “Everyone gets the same shot. It doesn’t matter if you’re a veteran, a rookie, or, you know…whatever.”
A few guys turned toward Junior, and he looked down at his cleats.
“In order to guarantee fairness,” Mr. Dunn went on, “I have developed a series of drills that are mathematically designed to test each player’s aptitude.” Then he blew his whistle, and it was time to go to work.
I tried my best at his drills, but I’d never done them before, and it was hard to keep everything straight. For example, one time we were doing throws from deep center, and I was supposed to toss it to the cutoff man at second, but I forgot and just threw it past him on a line drive straight into the catcher’s mitt, and the catcher fell backward from the force. And someone stood and said, “Our game is forever changed. Nothing will ever be the same.” And everyone kind of bowed their heads in silence for a while, like the nuns used to at St. Mary’s when the priest talked about Jesus. And I was, like, “What’s happening?” Another mistake I made is that I hit a ball too hard and it exploded.
The toughest drill was grounders. Mr. Dunn’s getting on, but he can still hit with pop and he was laying down all kinds of junk at us. The rollers were fine, but the one-hoppers gave everyone fits. Even Deek and Speedy missed a couple. I handled mine all right, although there was one that hit a pebble, and bounced real high over my shoulder, so instead of fielding it with my glove, I had to jump up and barehand it, then throw it around my body in a single twirling motion.
Junior was up next. I could tell he was nervous, but he handled the rollers like a pro. It was pretty impressive to watch. It was almost like he could tell in advance which side his dad was gonna hit to. I wondered if they’d ever done the drill before.
When they were finished, Mr. Dunn said, “Perfect score! Unbelievable!”
Junior smiled and was about to leave the infield when Deek said, “What about one-hoppers?”
Mr. Dunn’s eyes got real round, like a frightened rabbit’s. But then he smiled wide and said, “Thank you so much for reminding me, Deek. I almost forgot about the one-hoppers.” Then he turned to Junior and said, a little softly, “You ready, kiddo?”
And Junior cleared his throat and said, “Yes, sir.”
And Mr. Dunn took out a bucket of balls.
“These are one-hoppers now,” he said.
“Yes, sir,” Junior said again. And he pounded his mitt, to show that he was ready. And Mr. Dunn hit over a one-hopper and it bounced right by his son.
Deek and Speedy both started to snicker, and Junior’s face turned red, but Mr. Dunn didn’t seem to notice any of that. He just smiled at Junior and said, “It’s all right, here comes another!” And he hit over the next ball, but that one got through, too.
And Mr. Dunn smiled even wider and said, “Great effort!” And he kept shouting out things like that after every miss, like “Good hustle!” or “Way to stay with it!” or “Nice technique!” but by the middle of the bucket, he’d run out of things to say, so he just started saying, “Nice try,” over and over.
“Nice try…nice try…nice try…”
Mr. Dunn hit the last ball right at Junior, but it bounced off a pebble and started to sail past his shoulder. Junior tried to barehand it, like how I had done, and he was really close to pulling it off, but at the very last second, instead of snagging the ball, he fell down hard on his face, and his pants and jock split open, and his butt popped out, and everyone kind of gasped, because there was his butt. And he just kind of lay there on the dirt for a while, with his face in the mud and everybody staring at his naked butt.
And there was a long pause, and then Mr. Dunn blew his whistle and said tryouts were over.
Deek said Mr. Dunn always nailed the roster to the tree behind the backstop so everyone would know where to find it. It could be ten minutes or it could be ten hours, depending on how long it took Mr. Dunn to make his picks.
I decided to stand by the tree and wait there as long as it took. After a few minutes, though, I started to get pretty hungry, and then I thought, If they’re sending me back to the orphanage tomorrow morning, I better spend all my meal money now, in case they try to take it from me. So I went to the hotel restaurant and gave the maître d’ all the coins I had and told him to bring me as much food as it could buy me, and it didn’t have to make any sense, it could be all mixed together, in a bucket or whatever, and I didn’t care if I got the shits. And then I ate four steaks with cream sauce and three bowls of pudding and fish of the day and turtle soup and shrimp and tapioca. And in the end, I still had four cents change, so I went to a grocer to spend it up on candy. But as I was reaching for the licorice, I saw a big display of eggs. And I thought about Junior, and how he loved to drink eggs in the morning, for his puking exercise, and I decided to get him some eggs as a present. And I stuck them in my pocket, and it was around that time I heard a hammering noise.
When I saw the lineup nailed to the tree, I got so nervous, I felt like drinking a whole gallon of whiskey. But then I thought to myself, Well, if I don’t make the team, at least I got to ride on a train and see a big city like Fayetteville and go on an elevator and try tapioca, so I should be thankful. Then I said a prayer to God and read the list and there I was:
George Herman Ruth, Pitcher/Outfield
