“Sonofabitch!”
A good five hundred feet.
* * *
Hank blinkedfor a minuteto get the purple smoke from his eyes. It didn’t help. The interior of the bottle looked like a junkman’s heaven. He’d been in pawn shops that were less cluttered.
Contraptions sat in every corner, some with cogs and belts and strange mechanics. An ancient battle ax and a bowl of figs and dates sat next to a fat clock filled with water and sand and a series of chutes that looked like a rat’s maze.
There was a camera and tripod, a powdered wig, shoe buckles, and a collection of vests, each more gaudy than the last. A fancy board game like checkers sat next to a hand organ that was propped against a bed warmer and bellows.
Hank shifted, and his elbow hit a tall Greek urn filled with—he frowned and picked up a small book—dime novels? He glanced at the genie, who sat on the edge of an orange-and-red-striped bench seat with feet shaped like dragons. The genie’s legs were crossed, and he rested his chin on one hand while he swung one foot to the tune of his toe bell.
Hank couldn’t get used to this.
He looked down and saw stacks of newspapers, pamphlets, and scrolls piled beneath the seat.
He looked up. Silk drapes in .purple and red and yellow hung like tents in a carnival nightmare from the sides of the bottle and a thin film of mosquito netting was hooked over brass wall hooks that were in the shape of pythons.
There were pillows, fancy tasseled pillows in every color and style, strewn over a collection of small but old Persian carpets. A gong went off near his right ear, and he turned Just as a carved wooden clock chimed a stupid tune while a small wooden man and woman with finger cymbals for hats rolled out of doors in the face of the clock, rode along a small track where they met, then bent and banged their heads to the count of the hour.
He turned away and froze when he saw something he hadn’t seen in years. Leaning against a gaudy red wall was a baseball bat, a black Al Spalding glove, and a ball.
He took a couple of stiff steps closer and picked up the baseball bat. The wood felt heavy, and he slid his hands to the grip, instinctively testing the bat for weight and balance. He held it in front of him and stared at it.
His mind drifted back to a time when he had one foolish dream—well, not a dream, but a chance. And now, after so many years had passed, it seemed as if that chance hadn’t been a moment from his past, but one from someone else’s life, some tall tale he’d heard another man telling, a story, a lie, an excuse—like the big fish that got away.
He looked at the bat in his hand. Perhaps because he’d been locked away for the last four years, perhaps because he was getting older, whatever, he stared at that damned baseball bat, and it stood for everything he’d thrown away over forty years, every door that might have opened and shone a crack of light on the dark path he’d chosen for himself, chosen because he was so damn afraid that life might not really be as bad as he thought it was.
He closed his eyes for a moment and saw himself running fast and hard with fists flying away from every opportunity. Ready to lose, because deep inside him, he was too damn scared to try to win.
“Hi, Hank!”
He whipped around. Theodore stood a few feet behind him. Hank stared at the kid for second, caught in a confusing lapse between the past and the present. He leaned the bat back against the wall, then faced Theodore.
As if fate were jeering him, the kid was wearing a Chicago White Stockings baseball cap. A wreath of olive leaves hung around his neck, a toga was fitted over his clothes and hung on the floor next to a half-burned fiddle. The kid had a badminton racket slung over one shoulder. The white feather birdie was clutched in his fist. He lifted the hand with the badminton racket and waved.
Hank glanced at the genie, who sat on that divan watching him with great interest. Hank scowled.
The genie’s eyes grew larger, and he snatched a novel from the Greek urn. “Don’t mind me,” he said too casually. He lay back on the divan, crossed one leg over the other, and began to read.
Hank waited, but Muddy didn’t look up. “Come here, kid.”
Theodore cocked his head at him but didn’t move. “Am I in trouble?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh.”
“I said come here.”
“I don’t want to.”
“If I have to walk over there, I’m going to be even madder.”
“I wish—”
“Don’t wish!” Hank dove for the kid, his hand reaching.
