Saturday, April 25, 2015
His Bell
You couldn't report yourself as missing.
Someone had to miss you, and wonder where
you've gotten to, and, of course, seek the help
of the police.
He went about, expecting a cruiser's stopping,
its blue light spinning down to still.
He had dropped his wallet, probably watching
Omar and Celeste in the new ape enclosure.
Had climbed an old fretwork that the apes had
formerly used, but now outside their fancy one.
Nobody turned it in to Lost and Found.
Just as well, since he forgot his name, and someone
would surely have asked, thence checking driver's license.
Ricky and Elinor, God's New Gifts absolutely, took him
home and fed him, tried questions to jog his memory.
No go.
That night they went to Lefty's Paradise to watch
Giants-Eagle on TV.
There the Professor guessed he had graduated Harvard,
and his fresh companion, the ex chorus boy, opined he
had the quickness of an athlete or dancer.
“Good and healthy and strong!” remarked Sudsy, who
hired him on the spot to unload trucks, flu having swept
his small firm.
Strictly under the table, since no Social Security number.
So he had found friends, a neighborhood, a hangout,
and a job!...and a name, Chauncey, bestowed by the Professor.
Not bad for his first disconcerting day.
That late night on the daybed gracing the sun porch,
he tried to fit some things together.
No use, but he replayed the football game in acutest detail.
Maybe that was kind of key?
Beatrice got interested in his story. She despatched trucks,
and started bringing him lunch. They dated, and eventually
he left his cozy daybed for her cramped studio apartment.
“Believe me, Chaunce fills it up without yours truly!”
Beats had season tickets for the Jets, but had promised them
to others in her family, but not for any playoff games.
The Bengals coming in for the first round got Chauncey so
excited he could hardly speak.
The old man checking the ticket with some sort of wand cried,
"Buzz Ackley! and they couldn’t find YOU better seats than THESE?"
Ripper Collins later sought him out with his mike for the Jumbotron.
..."But I'm not sure I'm he."
"Well, I'm sure! That ‘he’ gives it away: Pure Yalie!"
He took him down to the field and the young players, of course,
couldn't recognize him, but the twin gray-bearded trainers,
Hip and Bix, hugged him together, and massaged his shoulders.
She worked her laptop that evening. "You live in Nutley," she
told him, "18 Appletree Lane, wife Cindy, girl at Trenton State,
boy in Air Force."
They drove there next day, and Cindy fainted.
Detectives Markham and Pesticci were present, making sure that
Beats’ cautious phone call to Cindy wasn’t a con, and knew how to
revive her. Too, they swabbed his mouth for DNA. They explained
that they kept his case from the media since they believed it
involved the Mafia taking over sports memorabilia.
“We expected you were wearing a cement overcoat at the bottom
of a polluted pond in The Meadowlands somewhere.”
Cindy proved completely sure, and needed no DNA, so Beats left.
In a couple of weeks, Buzz recalled almost everything, and the
couple invited Beats back. Cindy told her she'd love her forever!
She became Aunt Beats at Christmas etc. to the youngsters
back from college and the Air Force.
Cindy, strangely, never had a jealous bone.
All the characters in this story of forgetting are pretty
unusual.
Buzz has more than his share of where did I put my...?
but functions appropriately enough for his age.
The League is kicking in to a fund to help those like him.
“I do remember every SINGLE time on the field that my bell
was truly rung!”
Labels: Bengals, characters, DNA, Eagles, football, forgetting, friends, Giants, Jets, Meadowlands, NFL, relationship, wife
