The Iowa Baseball Confederacy. W. Kinsella P.

wasn’t just vague hopes like a lot of kids have. I knew what I was doing. I’ve made a living from the game for almost fifteen years. And I’m gonna make the Bigs yet, you wait and see.’

      ‘You’ll make it, Stan. We know that,’ I say.

      ‘I mean, I’ve seen guys with twice as much talent as me throw it all away. They party all night and stagger in ten minutes before a game, wearing their hangovers like badges. It’s not fair that my reflexes are one one-hundredth of a second slower than theirs. I mean, I work out three hours every afternoon. I’ve always hustled, haven’t I, Gid?’

      ‘You’ve always hustled,’ says Gloria from the darkness. Her voice is lifeless. She answers by rote. She, like me, has learned to agree with Stan without even listening to him.

      ‘And I put a washtub on its side, used it for home plate. I’d make the catch and rear back, and I got so I could hit that tub on the first or second bounce about nine times out of ten. You know what the difference is between the Bigs and the minors?’ Stan waits only one beat, not expecting a reply. ‘Consistency. The whole thing is consistency. There are players in the minors who make spectacular plays and hit the ball just as hard as in the majors, but the guys in the Bigs are more consistent. They make the plays not just nine out of ten times but ninety-nine out of a hundred.’ He pauses thoughtfully for a moment. ‘You know, I’d hit that tub nine out of ten times, but the tenth one might end up thirty feet down the line, or hit the barn door fifteen feet in the air, making a sound like a gun going off. Hey, Gideon, how about you come out and hit me some flies in the morning?’

      When we got home after the game, I kissed Sunny gently and pulled her against me. Her lips were dry and she made them thin and did not return my kiss. I did everything I could think of to please her. I touched her with my finger tips, gently undressed her, massaged her, fondled her, loved her with my hands, my tongue, held back my own passion, waited for a response from her, received none.

      I remember once, at a time like this, when Sunny was in one of her moods, she said something bitter, something designed to make me hate her.

      ‘Can’t you tell by the way I touch you that I love you?’ I said.

      ‘No,’ said Sunny, precipitating a long silence.

      Eventually I made love with her. Her body was unpliant, mannequin-like. I wanted so desperately to rouse her, I controlled myself carefully, rocked her gently for a long time, until our bodies were slick and delicious.

      ‘Can’t you finish up?’ Sunny said, not even in a whisper. ‘I’m tired.’

      If she had known how close I came to killing her then, it would have made her happy.

      I threw myself off her without a word and lay like a rock in the darkness, my body taut, nerve ends twitching. Late in the night I heard her leave. I woke to the tinkling of hangers in our closet, knew she was packing a few blouses, a couple of pairs of jeans, in the same battered suitcase she arrived with twelve years ago. I lay, tense as piano wire, afraid to speak, afraid not to. She closed the front door quietly; I listened to her tiny footsteps descend the stairs, fade away as she moved down the sidewalk.