Beyond the Fence

By Josh Eidem

Much has been written about professional baseball, from the lowest levels of the minors to the bright lights of the big leagues. Beyond the Fence, rather, is a story about town ball, as Spring Valley Hawk Lance Chatworth would put it, "The last pure form of the game on Earth."

Beyond the Fence is loosely based on several true stories from author Josh Eidem's ten years around amateur baseball, and set against the backdrop of the endearing but sometimes nefarious Plum City Memorial Weekend Baseball Tournament. It is a story championing those athletes who compete for the love of their sport, to feed their competitive spirit, or just for somewhere to fit in. If you've ever been associated with a team (of misfits) in any sport, you'll find plenty of familiar characters on Chatworth's Hawks.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Josh Eidem
• Release date: Jan 19, 2011

Book preview

BEYOND THE FENCE

Josh Eidem

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2011 Josh Eidem

This book is available in print at most online retailers.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. All rights reserved.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Epilogue

Author’s Note

Beyond the Fence

There comes a point in many people’s lives when they can no longer play the role they have chosen for themselves. When that happens, we are like actors finding that someone has changed the play.

- Brian Jackson (1921-1999), Irish Novelist

Chapter 1

The Fan

In my life, I’ve only left one Miller Lite unfinished. I’m a small town guy, raised on a farm amidst corn fields and dairy pastures, where the tallest building in a ten-mile radius was our own grain bin. Big cities like Minneapolis overwhelm me. I also don’t care much for pro baseball; amateur ball is my game. So when the Minnesota Twins opened their new ballpark, Target Field, I tried to stay away. But one feature of the new digs kept drawing my interest: a bar on the concourse behind left field called Town Ball Tavern.

Behind every good small town amateur baseball team is a good small town bar. The name Town Ball Tavern conjured images in my mind of great town ball bars I’d visited throughout my life, like Bill’s Bar in Spring Valley, Greg’s Corner Bar in Plum City, or Andy’s in Red Wing. I pictured cozy, dark barrooms with wood paneling, scratched bar tops with local business cards stuck underneath the laminate, and walls covered in hunting trophies. Set against other walls were Big Buck Hunter or Golden Tee consoles, some of those fake gambling machines, and a juke box with nothing on the playlist but classic rock, ’80s hair bands, and ’90s country music. Great town ball bars also held a few well-worn pool tables and more than a few friendly local characters.

The last town ball bar I’d been in was the East Ender Bar and Grill in Ellsworth, Wisconsin. The St. Croix Valley Baseball League holds its spring scheduling meeting each April in the East Ender’s dark back room. This past spring was the twenty-second consecutive year I’d attended on behalf of the Spring Valley Hawks.

It was on an unseasonably warm Wednesday evening in April. The front door to the bar was a simple white screen door that creaked loudly. The East Ender is always dark; a true dive bar that’s more of a cave. The Brewers game on the barroom television was the only light that shone out of the darkness. As my eyes adjusted to the barroom I could see that I recognized its lone patron sitting near the door. It was Baldy. I cringed and briefly thought about backpedaling. He was sitting on an old, worn stool in his trademark cut off jean shorts, white pocket tee with no sleeves, and faded JanSport backpack. He was tall and thin, with perpetual stubble on his face. Truthfully, I’ve known Baldy a long time, but never known his real name. He was just Baldy. The lines on his face and the loose skin on his arms made him look around sixty years old, but he could have been thirty for all anyone ever knew. A life spent in and out of the Pierce County Jail between stints of riding the country’s rails took a yearly toll on his body.

As Baldy turned to look at me walk by, I avoided eye contact and sat at the opposite end of the bar. The place smelled of old cigarette smoke, stale beer, and last week’s urine. The ceiling tiles were stained and yellowed. Hey, Lloyd, I said to the middle-aged, stringy-haired bartender. Busy tonight I see.

Just another Wednesday night in Ellsworth, Fan, he replied. Lloyd smiled a wide grin, revealing crooked, yellow teeth with chewing tobacco dotting his gums. Miller Lite?

Yeah, and a menu too, I said. Circumstances had me there early that night. In twenty-two years, it was the first time I’d been to the East Ender and needed to think about ordering dinner. Lloyd nodded and handed me a laminated piece of white paper. It had simple black type, Times New Roman size 16. There were seven types of burgers, two types of fries, three versions of pizza, and three types of appetizers. I looked around briefly and for the first time wondered where the door to the kitchen might be. I didn’t see one. Lloyd came back with my dark bottle of Miller Lite, tossing the bottle cap ten feet into a barrel at Baldy’s end of the bar.

Nice shot! Baldy earnestly called out. He began loudly laughing to himself.

Lloyd didn’t acknowledge the compliment. Know whatcha want?

Bacon cheeseburger and fries basket, I said. Some mini tacos, too.

Coming right up, Lloyd replied. I waited for him to disappear through some trap door to the kitchen.

Instead, Lloyd bent down in front of a small, wood paneled mini-freezer near Baldy’s end of the bar. I couldn’t help but smile. Out came a bacon cheeseburger, fries, and mini-tacos. All three items were individually wrapped in plastic. Lloyd unwrapped them, set them on a paper plate, and tossed them in the microwave.

Another trait of a town ball bar: a freezer and microwave is enough to qualify as a grill. I chuckled to myself before taking a long swig of my Miller Lite. As I set down my bottle, I detected the unmistakable smell of body odor. Baldy had slid down the bar.

Hey friend, my name’s Baldy, he said. He had introduced himself to me this way every time we’d met in the past couple decades. He offered a handshake. I took it.

Hey, Baldy. You can call me Fan, I said.

Fan? Fan of what? It was another standard Baldy question.

Baseball, Baldy. What other game is there? I said. Baldy broke into a wide smile. Each August, Baldy would jump a train on highway 10 and head out of town, presumably to spend the winter in warmer climates. But each spring he would return to Ellsworth for one thing.

You ever see the Hubbers play? I used to chuckle when Baldy asked me this, because the only place I ever saw him than the East Ender was at Ellsworth Hubbers town baseball games.

I nodded. Sure have, I said.

Funny I haven’t seen you there, he said. I am the Hubbers’ number one fan. Number one. He put his index finger up in the air to prove his point. He was telling the truth; if you took in an Ellsworth town baseball game in the summer, Baldy would be there, probably down the first base line, sometimes trying to talk to the umpire, sometimes the right fielder, sometimes the first baseman. Sometimes, he’d be sprawled out on the grass, hands folded on his chest like a Catholic funeral, sound asleep. Little kids liked to poke him and run away to see if he was alive. He didn’t always wake up, but he was always alive.

Will the Hubbers be any good this year? I asked him.

Any good? He looked at me like I, not the rail-riding tramp of Ellsworth, was the craziest person in the bar. They’ll win the league, for sure. Wow, you really need to watch them play, Fan. They’re the best team in the league by far! I disagreed with him, but wasn’t going to argue. I took another swig of my beer.

Say, Fan, he said, taking a drag off his cigarette, Have you taken the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal friend and savior? Oh, damnit, I thought. Two constants about Baldy at Hubbers games: first, he would be down the first base line. Second, he’d be quoting the King James Bible to anyone who would listen.

I looked at the clock. There was another hour until the meeting. I downed the rest of my beer as Baldy turned to stare ahead at the bottles of liquor lined up on the bar wall and launched into some convoluted piece of scripture.

Lloyd, another Miller Lite, please, I called. I was clearly too sober to listen to Baldy’s religious ramblings, and Lloyd knew it. He already had another beer for me in his hand.

This one’s on me, he said as he smiled and set it down. Maybe the next one, too. I nodded and mouthed thank you to him. I sighed, but it was hard to be too upset with Baldy. These were just the type of people you meet in town ball bars. I wondered, as I sipped my Miller Lite, how different Baldy and I really were. After all, we both loved baseball.

So, with my affinity for town ball and town ball bars, I had to check out Town Ball Tavern at Target Field since it was advertised as a tribute to small town baseball. I expected to walk into something resembling the East Ender in Ellsworth. Instead, I found a stainless steel bar and fake wood laminate floor. The tables were made out of Formica and looked right out of an Ikea catalog. The only smells were new construction, gourmet food coming from a vast kitchen, and a faint whiff of bleach-laden cleaning solution. There were aerial photos of beautiful small town local ballparks, but they were tucked away in a corner far from major traffic. Still, I ordered a Miller Lite and leaned on the bar. I noticed the music, not Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, Def Leppard, or Garth Brooks, but some infuriating techno beat. There were no pool tables.

When I was halfway done with my beer, the bartender, a college-aged kid with gel in his hair, pimples, and dual earrings, asked me to move from the rail so he could help the person behind me. I looked him in the eye, calmly set my beer down, and left. I didn’t just leave Town Ball Tavern, but the stadium entirely. I have not been back to Target Field since and have no plans to go. It was no fitting tribute to small town baseball, and I doubted anyone would tolerate someone like Baldy in a place like Town Ball Tavern. My half-finished Miller Lite was presumably dumped. The sacrifice was worth it.

Most people around the St. Croix Valley Baseball League know me only as The Fan. My real name is Lance Chatworth. I am tall and gangly, kind of like Baldy I suppose, but with messy brown hair, small eyeglasses, and no desire to ride the rails. I prefer four wheels; if you see a restored 1941 MB Willys army jeep on the roads of Western Wisconsin, I’m driving it. My favorite t-shirt is black, has armpit holes, and says Spring Valley Hawks in cursive bubble script across the front.

The Spring Valley Hawks are a town ball team. Most people don’t understand why I’ve spent a quarter of a century on the team. Here is a conversation I had once with a petite blond-haired woman named Callie in a bar called Main Street Junction, a true town ball tavern, in Plum City. One of my favorite Neil Young songs had just started on the juke box. She asked me if I had big plans for Memorial Day Weekend.

I’m here for the tournament, with the Spring Valley Hawks, I said.

The Hawks? Who’s that? she asked. She playfully stirred the diluted remains of her drink with a small red straw. The ice cubes clinked against the glass and the dim barroom lights made her hair shine.

It’s a baseball team, I answered.

A minor league team, like for the Brewers or something like that? She smiled and her face beamed as she asked the question. I couldn’t believe I’d found a girl in a bar in Plum City who knew about the Brewers but didn’t know about the town’s Memorial Weekend Baseball Tournament. Are you a coach? she asked. I wondered if she was sizing up my wallet, too. Did she think I was some rich former pro ballplayer?

No, I’m a player, I said gently. But we’re not a minor league team, we don’t get paid. She stopped stirring and looked confused, like a child grinding her gears over a tough math problem.

Finally, her eyes lit up and twinkled with false understanding. I knew what she would say next and winced. Oh, softball you meant.

Only a crazy person, crazier than Baldy, would mistake the Hawks for a softball team. I may drive a 1941 army jeep. I may like to wear the same black t-shirt for three days in a row on Memorial Day Weekend. But I am not a crazy person.

No, I meant baseball, I calmly explained. It’s a town ball team, a men’s amateur team. You don’t know about the annual Plum City baseball tournament?

No, I live in Durand, down the street from Annie here, she motioned towards the brunette bartender. Moved up here from Iowa City last winter. Men’s baseball, huh? She looked into her empty drink. Her dream of falling in love in a chance barroom meeting with a mysterious rich ex-major leaguer vanished. Instead, she undoubtedly pictured a bunch of beer-chugging, overweight, uncouth old men, cavorting around a baseball field like a bunch of dimwits and nimrods, men who she thought needed to let go of their little boy dreams of being big league ballplayers and just grow up.

You should come to the game tomorrow, check it out, I offered. I always invited skeptics to the field to show them the truth about town ball, how it’s far from what they’ve imagined. I’ve converted several souls over the years.

I noticed her eyes dart to the sides of the room. Well, it sounds nice, but I have a family thing, she said. I knew she was lying, both about thinking it was nice and having plans, but I was used to it.

Another one, Callie? Annie the bartender asked. She already had a glass in her hand, expecting Callie to say yes.

I think I’m going to head over to Molly’s for one, Annie, she answered. Nice talking with you, she said to me with a faint smile, And have a good time with the, uh, tournament. As she walked out, I sighed, downed the last of my beer, and ordered a shot of gin.

Gin? Annie asked. It was a valid question. At nearly two in the morning, not much good can come out of a bar’s only patron downing a shot of anything. Besides, with a taste resembling suckling a pine tree, it takes a fair amount of self-loathing to order a shot of gin.

Yeah, rail gin, don’t give me any of that Tanqueray shit. Give me the good stuff, I grinned.

Annie shook her head in disbelief. Suit yourself, she said. I could read the look on her face: mild self-loathing was one thing, but shots of rail gin, that’s madness. When the rest of the Hawks get down here tomorrow night, she’d learn, I thought.

She set the shot down in front of me. I paid for it, tossed it back, and got up from my barstool. I stumbled out into the street before throwing up all over the sidewalk. When I finished retching, I leaned my forearm against the brick outside wall of the bar and took a deep breath of the cool, damp, late-May air.

Ah, I spoke aloud in the street to the ghosts of town ball’s past, Another year of Plum City, here we come.

Chapter 2

The Long Timer

Two days before Memorial Day in 2009, I was in a corner of a dark auditorium waiting to listen to a middle school band. My friend Mitch Rudesill, a former third baseman for the Spring Valley Hawks, was the St. Croix Central Middle School band director. Unfortunately for Mitch, he was a chubby, pear-shaped guy. I felt sorry for him each year at his annual band concert because he’d always sweat through his dress shirt. Each time he’d gesture with his baton it would reveal growing stains beneath his armpits, like he’d been hit with water balloons. I casually tried to suggest he wear lighter-colored clothing, but I never flat out said, Dude, your pits are disgusting and everyone can see them. I probably should have. Instead, I just showed up for his concerts so at least one person in the crowd would offer him a genuinely kind smile rather than a polite smile meant to mask a look of disgust.

I wasn’t sweating through my shirt, because I’d worn my Hawks t-shirt. After all, it was the Saturday of the Plum City Memorial Weekend Baseball Tournament and there was a game to get to that afternoon.

Fellow Hawks outfielder Kevin Griffin was across the auditorium from me. His squirrelly, blond-haired 5-year old twin boys Cooper and Kuehn sat to his right, while his golden-haired wife sat to his left. Kevin’s thick-necked brother-in-law sat farther down the row. If Kevin had noticed the heat and stuffiness of the room, he’d have felt bad for former teammate Mitch, too. But he didn’t notice the lack of air conditioning or the pit stains because he was preoccupied.

On the drive to St. Croix Central Middle School in his red crew-cab F-150, Kevin’s wife had called from their minivan ahead of him to say she was going to stop at the pharmacy in Hammond and pick him up a box of hair coloring. The gesture was innocent, even kind and thoughtful, but it was obvious from his fidgeting in the auditorium that it annoyed him. Baseball players by nature are fragile and sensitive. Kevin was no different. He was brooding.

Damnit, Fan, Kevin said later that night at Greg’s Corner Bar in Plum City, Baseball players don’t have gray hair.

I tried to explain to him that he was elaborating what was precisely her point, but he couldn’t see it. Oh, just get me another beer, would ya, Fan? Kevin said.

Kevin spiked his hair straight up at the front, always like a neatly trimmed hedge on the lawn of the White House. Kevin was proud to say he’d been sporting that look since he was a little boy getting his hair buzzed at George Keeling’s barber shop on McKay Avenue in Spring Valley. Even though he lived twenty-five minutes from George’s chair now, he still made the drive every time he needed a trim.

Kevin had asked his wife over the years if she thought he should change his hairstyle, but she would smile and tell him she liked it. I always thought it was his square jaw line, tall and lean athletic physique, dark brown eyes, or the dimple in his chin.

Nope, she said, Really, I just like his hair.

Kevin tugged on his blue tie. It was criss-crossed with prints of tiny baseballs, and his wife just shook her head whenever she caught him putting it on. They waited for their niece April, her brother’s sixth grader, to make her appearance in the third flute chair. The auditorium was filled with the sounds of politely muffled coughs, hushed voices, and squeaky seat hinges. Kevin’s illuminated watch glowed 3:04 in the dark.

To begin the show, Mitch turned on stage like a Grizzly Bear pausing from salmon fishing and took a polite bow, which at his size unfortunately made for more of a curtsy. I grimaced. Kevin’s wife tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention. He looked up and saw that she was pointing at their boys. Cooper had Kuehn in a headlock. Kevin pulled them apart, and gave them a stern look that I knew he didn’t really mean. What he truly hoped was that both of them, not just Cooper, knew how to put a kid in a headlock. As Mitch turned to direct the band, I considered some useful situations for administering a headlock: subduing a purse snatcher, rustling cattle, and self-defense in the case of a bench-clearing brawl. The middle schoolers began to grind through an off-key version of Calvin Custer’s Camptown Variations.

When the song finally came to a screeching halt, a student fell out of his seat, and the polite audience held back their laughter. Kevin took advantage of the distraction to subversively check his watch and squeaked to a more comfortable position in his chair. He looked over and smiled at his patient wife, a smile of both admiration and self-satisfaction at not being caught clock-watching. She was still strikingly beautiful. Even at the age of forty she was the envy of the auditorium. In the ladder theory of dating, where you try to move up one rung in quality with each relationship, Kevin had definitely topped out his ladder. He would forgive her about the hair coloring.

We all stood as the band started a rendition of A Star Spangled Banner. I removed my Hawks hat. For most of the audience, the anthem was a reminder of the sacrifice of our men and women in uniform. They imagined smells of apple pie, booming fireworks displays, or iconic visions of fluttering American flags in the wind on cloudless days.

I knew that Kevin’s mind went somewhere distinctly different, because I’d been there before. It was simple psychology, really. Years of playing for the Hawks made the national anthem a natural Pavlonian trigger. His lips were moving with the anthem’s words, revealing his mental transportation to the third base line on a hot July day, standing perfectly erect, alternating his gaze between the American flag hanging calmly in center field and the back of the player’s head in front of him as he quietly sang the words to himself. His imagined hat was in his right hand, pressed tight against his chest. His left arm hung at his side holding imagined pine tar stained batting gloves. The smells of popcorn, hot dogs, beer, and dirt fluttered in and out of his nostrils like a hummingbird looking for nectar.

The middle school band on stage changed shape. Mitch, dressed in his navy shirt, turned into a base umpire, alternating his arms between safe and out calls, holding the fate of both teams in his hands as he moved the baton through the air. Three students with clarinets became players sitting on the bench with bats between their knees. One of them was boning his bat, rubbing it down with a smooth cow bone to close up pores and harden the wood. Another kid was taping up his handle in a criss-crossed pattern, while the last of the three was using a rag to apply a thick layer of sweet-smelling pine tar. The tuba player, hardly visible behind all the brass of his instrument, turned into a portly young catcher in all his gear. The violinists became pitchers stretching. The flutists became middle infielders, their gloves covering their mouths so they could converse in secret. The beat of the percussionists became the sound of Kevin’s own heartbeat before a big game. His brow started to furrow, as if he was getting ready to go into battle.

As the melody finished, those in the audience that chose to sing along extended their Home of the bra-aaa-ve long enough to stay with a pesky, exaggerating trombone player. Kevin took his hand from his heart and went to put his invisible hat on. When Big Bear Mitch turned and the crowd applauded, Kevin just stood there with a faraway look in his eye. It made me want to laugh, but I stifled my chuckles as the auditorium fell silent.

The crowd sat and Kevin was still standing. His wife pinched him and his lips seemed to utter Ouch as he quickly sat. His cheeks blushed and sweat formed on his forehead. His niece April had noticed. She was already beyond embarrassed, red as a lobster, with an angry scowl on her face that would make even the most hardened metal melt. She tried to hide behind her thin, black music stand.

Kevin’s wife just looked at him and shook her head. Usually she had a good sense of humor about him, but not this time. Daddy’s crazy, Cooper said.

Yes, Coop, Daddy’s crazy, his wife responded, sighing.

If you ask me, Kevin should be excused for his near-religious experience, because for a member of the Spring Valley Hawks, two days before Memorial Day is a holy date. It is the opening day of the Plum City Baseball tournament. Plum City is hallowed Wisconsin ground, a town ball Jerusalem. The town’s team, the Blues, runs a league tournament that serves as the team’s fundraiser and the de facto start of the town ball season. Next to Ray Luebker’s cow pasture, the Blues’ ballpark has an adjacent campground where players from throughout the league tent out for the weekend and mingle.

Kevin should have already been in Plum City that Saturday afternoon in 2009. Instead, he was sweating in the back of a darkened middle school auditorium having just caused somewhat of a scene. Kevin looked at his watch again. He reached over and put it in front of his wife’s face. Ugh, just go, she whispered.

I can probably hold out for another song, he said.

No, you don’t want to keep the guys waiting.

Are you sure?

Yeah, we’ll be out there later. Just go. He whispered goodbye to his boys, and rose from his seat slowly. He opened the door to the school’s front lobby and a scratched and worn tile floor. The smell of student council popcorn wafted from the concession stand.

I met him in the lobby. Heading out? I asked.

Fan! Why aren’t you in P.C. already?

Just because we’re not riding together doesn’t mean we can’t carpool, right? I answered.

We were interrupted by the sound of another voice in the lobby. Kevin? Fan? No way! It was a gruff but familiar tone. There was a thick, musky smell of cologne and leather. It didn’t smell like baseball glove leather, but more like ancient office furniture. I thought that was you guys!

Hanson? Kevin asked. We all shook hands and smiled. It was Ben Hanson, another former Spring Valley Hawk. He, too, had ballooned since his playing days.

You got a- Kevin pointed his thumb toward the auditorium.

Yeah, yeah, my daughter, she’s in the band. Tuba player. She’s got a lot from my side of family. Poor thing, Hanson joked, rubbing his belly and laughing. Hanson had put on about thirty-five pounds since the last time he wore a Hawks uniform. A lot of town ball players get used to enjoying a few beers after a game, and it seems to be a habit that sticks with them after their playing days. A rotund, balding, mustached Hanson was in stark contrast to the slick fielding, fresh-faced shortstop we remembered. You guys got kids? he asked. I shook my head no.

Yeah, twin boys, Kevin answered him. Started kindergarten this year. I was here to watch my niece.

Man, Hanse, it’s good to see you. It’s been, I don’t know, how long? I asked him.

Gotta be fifteen, sixteen years at least, Fan. Last place I saw you guys was Augusta, when was that?

I think ’93? Kevin offered. I knew it was in 1993, and I knew Kevin knew it was in 1993, but we pretended not to know because we’re both nice guys.

Yeah, that sounds right, Hanson nodded, smiling. We got smoked in the state finals by those Amish bastards. Augusta was a small town east of Eau Claire, far from the interstate, but another town ball hotbed like Plum City.

Oberley hit that bomb off Chance, banged it off the big purple jungle gym in centerfield, I said.

We all watched Augusta’s Ted Oberley’s home run ball sail through the blue sky in our mind’s eyes. I didn’t think that ball was ever coming down, Kevin added.

The place went nuts, too, I said.

Their fans were crazy, banging that big white drum behind home plate. We really got throttled, Hanson said.

It was a great year though, I remember that, I said, though if you ask me, each year is a great one in its own way.

Yeah, it was, Hanson trailed off.

You moved east, right? Grad school? I asked.

Pennsylvania. I really didn’t want to leave the team, but you know how it goes, Hanson said. He shrugged his shoulders like it was no big deal. Kevin and I exchanged a look. It meant, yeah Hanson, that’s how it went for you. Speak for yourself. I just opened up a car dealership back here with a few of my partners from out east. Come on down and I’ll get you a good deal on a truck. Did I see in the parking lot you’re still driving that old F-150?

Hey, it still gets the job done, Kevin answered.

Kind of like us, Kev, I thought. I didn’t dare say it. Did you play any ball out east? I asked Hanson instead.

I played a couple of years for a team out there, wasn’t the same though, so I gave it up, Hanson answered. Hey, you guys aren’t playing on one of those 35-and-over teams, are you? I was actually thinking about trying to find one of those teams this summer.

We scoffed at the idea. Actually, we’re still playing for the Hawks, I said. Kev and I are on our way out to P.C. right now.

Get out of here! Come on, I can’t play a game of Yahtzee without my back giving out, and you’re playing for the Hawks? No way. Hanson stood there incredulous, like I’d told him I’d seen the ghost of Lincoln or lit myself on fire like a protesting Buddhist monk.

Kevin chuckled. Ah, guys like us still got a couple good years left, Hanse. You know, we’re always looking for players. Why don’t you come back? We could use you. Given Hanson’s expanded waistline, it sounded like a lie, but our team was especially untalented. In fact, we kind of sucked.

Hanson shuffled his feet a little bit and looked down. I thought he looked sheepish. "Ah, I got kids running around, the wife, I don’t know. Lots to do around the house, working a lot of nights. Just too many responsibilities. Man, I don’t know how you guys got time for it, but