The Ruined House

Source: lithub.com --- Thursday, November 30, 2017
Sunday, ten thirty a.m. The city was still half-asleep. The clean, quiet streets gleamed in the bluish light. In front of the building, a no-longer-young father in a Baseball cap was teaching his son to catch a fly ball. Even such an absurdly urban scene, the narrow strip of sidewalk a makeshift outfield, bespoke the freedom of an America that refused to be fenced in. So, for thousands of generations, hunters and warriors had handed down their skills in mime and movement, just like this father enacting the major league center fielder for his son who lapped it up eagerly, leaning forward with his tongue sticking slightly out. Ann Lee’s car was parked near the corner of 108th Street. Andrew, thinking with a smile of her girlishly sweet body still cuddled beneath the blanket, had to move the driver’s seat back to squeeze into it before readjusting the rearview mirror. Walter had taught him and his brother, Matthew, to play ball, too, displaying the same expertise he had mowed the lawn with every Saturday in a white polo shirt, his tanned biceps visible beneath its short sleeves. Tall and proud, he had mowed one precise square of grass after another without having to look down. The car glided along Broadway. A few early customers sat in the sidewalk cafés and restaurants, first swallows of the flocks that would wait their turn for Sunday brunch in long lines. How many years had it been since he first read Portnoy’s Complaint ? The g ...

from Baseball http://ift.tt/2ioXBlL