She was wearing the rain like a blanket, draped over tired shoulders and tired eyes desperate for relief. Her phone was aglow. New Message, it read. Hank (Cell).
At first, she didn't want to read it. But then she realized that she was only sitting in Yankee Stadium's section 236 in the rain because of Hank, with the abstract hope that maybe he would see her on television like she saw him weeks ago, wondering if this whole divorce thing was a good idea after all. Sure, his gambling problem was difficult to live with, and those years of watching Goodfellas surrounded by cans of Miller Light did little to save the floundering marriage, but once she threw Hank out of the house, sending him to take up residence in Sacramento, California, she realized it may all have been one step too far. It wasn't that she missed a partner, or a man. No. None of that. Carol was a strong woman. She missed Hank.
She took her seat in the left field section of Yankee stadium, remembering the days with Cano in pinstripes, bringing the kids to the games and cheering the boys with her husband. But now all she had on the field was an emblem from the past, re-emerging like a spectre and wearing new colors and a blue crown with the letter 'S.' She thought of all the day games she had attended with Hank--those obnoxious trips downtown with a husband drunk by the third inning, the baseball strategy walkthroughs that never materialized the way Hank predicted, and the lonely subway rides back to their Staten townhouse. But for some reason, tonight, seeing this Robinson Cano wearing navy blue and green was just enough to push her over the edge. Something was different.
All too different.
The first inning began without a hitch, as she watched CC Sabathia quickly strike out Abraham Almonte and get Stefen Romero to pop out in foul territory next to first base. By this time, her phone was ablaze with a text from Hank, presumably drunk, still trying to get her attention here weeks after the Mariners' opening series in Anaheim.
hi carol hope your booing cano tonight do one for me
he texted, grammar a casualty of getting the message to her before Cano's at bat. She knew, she knew full well that this was the story in New York that week--Robinson Cano's return, the impending boos. She just couldn't help care, though, despite her hoping to reconnect with Hank in some way. It was why she was at the game, after all. But when she saw Robbie walk into the box, digging his foot in to face Sabathia, she could only feel a nostalgia hovering in the air, drenched in memories of times long past: Hank's 36th, Robbie hitting a homer into the upper deck in '09, wrecking their Honda civic on the way to catching the Battleship movie in summer of 2013.
But the boos--the boos were sent down from the few Yankees fans taking up real estate at Yankee Stadium this evening, braving the rain to tell this traitor that he screwed up big time by leaving the sacred pinstripe empire. - See more at: http://www.fancyjersey.com/
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