Chapter 6

It was October, the boarding house was full of boarders again, and I remained a resident of Frederick, Maryland despite having no guidance yet from the Orioles Organization concerning where I would be assigned in the coming season.

I knew that my solid performance for the Frederick Keys would likely mean that I’d be moved up to the Double-A Bowie Baysox in the Eastern League. Getting assigned to the Orioles’ Triple-A club (Norfolk) wasn’t out of the question, but I knew the Orioles had lots of highly regarded infield prospects who’d been in Norfolk the previous season. Unless one or more of those guys was injured, traded or maybe moved up to the majors, my prospects for moving up two classifications in a single season were pretty slender. I figured to be in Bowie – just south of Baltimore – at least to begin the coming season.

Until February, however, there was no place I had to be, and I had a pretty good gig in Frederick. I liked the town, I was friendly with several of my fellow boarders, most of whom were returnees from the spring semester, and of course I was especially friendly with my landlady, Emily Chambers.

I drove down to Bowie one day just to scout the city and look at the Baysox’ ballpark, but there was absolutely no reason for me to hurry down there and rent an apartment. There would be time enough to do that when I knew for certain that I’d be assigned there. What if I suddenly got traded to a club on the other side of the country? What if my spring training at some other club’s minor league camp turned out to be in Arizona instead of Florida? Why not just stay in Frederick, get into playing shape at a local facility, and wait for the call to go to Florida when mid-February rolled around?

That’s what I did. I worked out several hours a day, four days a week. I ran around the college’s cinder track four miles every day that I didn’t work out, and I ate and slept to my heart’s content in my comfortable little third-floor apartment at Emily’s.

Emily was busier now, with her full complement of boarders, but she had help with the cooking and the housekeeping so she wasn’t unduly burdened. The green tie was on the left nail most of the time and Emily and I remained secret lovers all through the winter. If anyone suspected anything, it might have been Mabel, the cook and part-time housekeeper. Mabel had no cleaning duties in Emily’s apartment or in mine, but she might have gotten a few hints from the food and drink loaded from time to time on the dumbwaiter in the kitchen, and then unloaded in Emily’s apartment. Still, if Mabel had any suspicions about Emily’s personal life, she kept them to herself. I didn’t see any sign, from my fellow boarders, of so much as a raised eyebrow.

Carl Hedberg, one of the boarders with a room below mine on the second floor, was a fifth-year senior at the local college and a member of the lacrosse team. He was fascinated by my presumably glamorous life as a minor-league baseball player, and by my staying over as a boarder at Emily’s over the winter. “Haven’t you been reassigned yet for next season?” he asked me one day during the college’s Thanksgiving holidays.

“I’ll probably go to Bowie,” I answered, “but I haven’t gotten the solid word yet.”

“Won’t you know before you go to Florida for spring training?”

“I don’t know,” I told him. “Maybe, but most likely not. Lots of stuff could happen. I could be traded.”

“Yeah? Have you heard anything? Rumors?”

“No. It’s not likely. But anything’s possible.”

“Seems kinda strange, you staying over like this. You got any family?”

“Got a stepfather out in Colorado,” I said. “Got a married sister in California with a couple ‘rugrats. No place that I gotta be.”

“Well, I guess Frederick is a decent-enough place. I’m always glad to get out of here, though, when school is out. You seem to like it, though.”

“I like this boarding house,” I said. “I’m not likely to find a deal as good as this in Bowie. And moving there now would seem – I don’t know – presumptuous. What if the Orioles just reassign me to Frederick?”

“Yeah, I guess. Hey, Randy, what do you think of Betsy?”

The Betsy that Hedberg was talking about was our newest fellow boarder – a transfer student from Mary Washington College in northern Virginia. Betsy Lowry was a big, buxom, somewhat spectacular third-year undergrad with, maybe, fifteen extra pounds on her curvaceous torso but who – to say the very least – carried all fifteen extremely well. She looked strong enough to break a full-grown man in half, but her pleasant manner, her casual style of dress, and her extraordinarily friendly disposition made her seem, instead, inviting and available.

“I think she’s – extremely attractive,” I answered honesty.

“Oh, Jesus! She makes my dick hard!” Carl said. “I’ve been having erotic dreams about her!”

“Well, Hell, go for it!” I said. “She certainly seems friendly enough. Ask her out!”

“Me?” Carl said. “Naw, I’m too much of a schlub. But she’s been looking you over pretty steadily.”

“Me?”

“C’mon, Randy! You know all the girls in this place think you’re a fucking stud! You could have your pick.”

“Yeah, well. I’ve sorta ... got a steady girl back home, Carl.”

“In fucking Colorado? Why aren’t you out there with her, then?”

I had to think fast. I wasn’t particularly good at making up tall tales. “Not in Colorado,” I said. “Nashville. We met in school, at Vandy.”

“Well, that’s a lot closer! Have you even been down there to see her, since the season ended?”

“Uh. No. She’s ... in the military. She was in ROTC and came out of school an officer – in the ... ah ... Navy Reserves. She’s a whatchacallet – an ensign. She’s on active duty right now.”

“No shit? The fucking Navy? An officer? Jesus, have you seen those fucking uniforms the women officers wear? The white ones? Goddamn! Nothing sexier! Nothing! Honest to God, Randy, if I had me a girlfriend, was a navy officer? If she was butt-naked, I’d tell er to put her goddamned uniform back on! That’s how fucking sexy those navy whites are! Where’s she stationed?”

Still inventing as I went along, I said, “San Diego. But they’re at sea right now. She’s on a ... a cruiser.”

“Yeah? A cruiser, huh? That’s like – a smaller battleship, like, right? I mean, bigger than a destroyer?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“You got a picture of her?” Carl was eager now.

“Uh. No. Not on me.”

“I’ll bet she’s pretty special, huh?”