For Love of the Game Read Online Free PDF

each other wordlessly for a magic time, and never mentioned love. They were playing the greatest of games, but to Carol life was all a game, and she was going to play the damned thing from here on out and never again take anything seriously, the way poor Billy did too often when he lost, and so they did not use the word “love.” She did not want to talk any more of normal life and marriage andshe did not ever want to go back to “meditation,” which had taught her nothing and made her very blue. She promised him: “Champ, we’ll have a ball, as you fellas say, one way or the other. You’ll never see me cry. Never. I’ll cry to myself. And don’t you cry to me. Billy, bless your head, you’re more fun than any kid I’ve ever known. And you’re such a lovely boy. A sweet sweet boy. So. Let’s
do it
. Now. Chumley.”
    Four years. They would see each other three or four days at a time. Then nothing for perhaps a week, never longer than a month. In the winter he went home to Colorado for the Indian summer and she came out and then he came in, every month, and then they went one winter to New Zealand, but she stayed only three weeks because of her job, and then next year they went again, and it was better and then … this summer past … her birthday … she was weary. In the late innings. Hot summer. Work. Never ask questions. She’ll tell you. But she was always
there
and he never told her troubles and sometimes she’d bitch a bit about the job, but never truly seriously in detail, never to lean on his shoulder and sob. They were light to each other whatever the darkness. But Billy Chapel needed no help against sadness. He took the death of his parents alone, no other way, no possible help. And that was true of the rest of it. He was playing toward the end with a very bad team that was there behind him and around himevery day and was a weight, a growing weight, and he hated to lose but he had always been able to take that with faith that it was only temporary, that he’d win the next time, and they knew it, they knew it was only luck that beat him. He often lost now but he went right on with no less faith … and he did love the game, did love to play, he loved just to be out there throwing, planning, dreaming, thinking, and was cheered to rest and dream between the endless games, waiting, and then came that day, that night, when she did not come. All this was summing itself up in one long, wide picture flowing across his mind, reaching an end, a true end that morning, as he jogged down a winding puddled path toward the high-spouting fountain he saw at a distance—and there she was sitting, the golden blonde, the long and perfect, yes,
perfect
legs, sitting on a green bench dressed in a classic gray raincoat leaning forward staring into the fountain, both hands in her pockets, herself tucked inside the raincoat, huddled. Slight jolt to the eyes to see her. She looked up. He slowed, stopped, lifted the right hand, small salute.
    “Howdy, ma’am.”
    “Hey.”
    She did not look into his face. She moved over a small way on the bench. He sat.
    He said: “How you doin’?”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “S’all right. I knew there was a good reason. I sure did miss you.”
    He saw a tear on the corner of her eye. She turned her face away.
    She said: “I tried to make a telephone call. Couldn’t. Dammit. When I tried to call, I’d start to cry.” She pulled out a Kleenex from her purse, squeezed it, didn’t put it to the eye. “I
hate
that. Goddammit. You never saw me cry. That was … the agreement. The deal.”
    “Why did you have to cry?”
    “Ah.” She shook her head. “I was drinking too much. Much too much. You know, Billy, honest, I sometimes drink too goddam much. I know, hard for you to believe, you know how … prissy I get … but, oh, hell. I was smashed. And when I get smashed, lately, you know? I get very sad.” She glanced at him for the first time, then quickly away. She so