Ever laugh at the lengths a friend goes to in his devotion to his favorite team? Here's an excerpt from one of my unpublished novels, Present and Past, that relates the story a colleague once told me of an encounter he had at the ballpark. It's a few-minutes read:
Freddie chuckled as he scanned the menu.
"Wha’?" said Tony, smiling.
"The Yankee Bean Soup reminded me of something. I was at a game with Philly."
"Laro or Scungille?"
"Laro, the Yankee Clipper, who else? A customer gave me a coup le of box seats near the Yankee dugout. Philly was in his glory. You should've seen him smiling. While we were sitting there watching BP, two teenage girls came down the aisle and started calling out to Bucky Dent."
"Who's that?"
"The shortstop back then. Anyway, they were wearing 'I Love Bucky' but tons and T-shirts. Dent saw them, came over, and gave them a ball each and autographed them. Meanwhile, Philly's standing there with this stunned look on his face. He was hurt, insulted that Dent didn't have anything for him. He was already tanked and the game was still a half-hour away. He looked at Dent with a seri ousness you wouldn't believe, and said: 'Where's mine, Bucky?' And Dent looked at him as if he was nuts. And Philly said: 'D’they get sick every time the Yankees lose? D’they lose sleep ov er it like I do? I been a Yankee fan all my life. Don't I get anything?'"
"Get atta here," said Tony, eyes wide with mirth.
Freddie raised a hand and said: "I swear to...." He caught himself, realizing it was Tony's phrase.
"What a moron. What'd the guy do?"
"He just walked away. I was dying trying not to laugh. Talk about the poor soul. It ruined his day. It must've been the only time in his life he didn't enjoy a Yankee game in person. And they lost too, so he was really depressed."
"He was always an idiot."
"The Yankees are his passion."
"You mean besides beer. What’s it get ‘im? He’s a loser."
"I love going to the Stadium with him. He's a million laughs. One time Fat Joe had him running around the upper deck leading cheers. He had his arms raised, his head thrown back proudly, and his index fingers pointing toward heaven, saying: 'Yankees -- number one forever.' The whole section was laughing."
"He shoulda spit on the guy."
"He can't give balls to everybody who asks. He'd go broke. In fact, I never liked him until that day. It was as if he was paying the girls back for buying his stuff. It was nice."
"I bet he was only lookin' to get laid."
"They were fifteen at most."
"All the better. Between 'em they were thirty."
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