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Authors: Susan Beth Pfeffer
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the person in need of assistance.
8. No food or drink is allowed in Yankee Stadium. All bags must be left on the bus. Anyone carrying anything into Yankee Stadium will be ejected.
9. If you find the person you are looking for, you will remain at Yankee Stadium to fill out the appropriate paperwork. If you do not, you must leave on the bus you took to get there. You will not be allowed on any other bus.
THESE RULES ARE FOR YOUR OWN SAFETY .
THEY MUST BE OBEYED .
Alex thought the rules were stringent, but they made sense, and he was relieved that what was called for was so carefully spelled out. He liked rules. Carlos was always trying to get away with something, or at least he used to be like that before enlisting, but Alex found that rules imposed a structure, and he preferred that. He always did better when he knew exactly what was expected of him.
He wished the flyer hadn’t kept referring to bodies, though. He couldn’t stand the idea of Mami being nothing more than an anonymous body.
He pictured Mami then, sitting at the table, working on her homework while her children worked on theirs. How proud they all were when she got her GED . He thought of her at the stove, cooking their dinner. He remembered once when he’d been sick with fever, and Mami had pressed a cold washcloth against his forehead and held his hand until he’d fallen asleep. He envisioned her in church, shushing them while Father Franco gave his sermon.
For a week he’d refused to think of her, and now he was overwhelmed by a thousand different images. What if he found [**]Mami at Yankee Stadium? What if he didn’t?
He realized then that everybody in line for the 11:30 bus, everybody waiting for whatever bus, was as overwhelmed with thoughts and memories of the people gone from their lives as he was. No wonder no one was talking. The only protection from grief was silence and rules.
Eventually they began boarding their bus. Number 22, he noted. He gave his name to the bus driver and was handed a card that said 33. He took an aisle seat, next to a heavyset woman who kept squeezing a packet of tissues.
“You all have your tickets:” the bus driver asked before they began the journey.
Everyone said yes.
“And you have the list of rules?”
“Yes,” they all responded.
“Be sure to follow the instructions,” the bus driver cautioned them. “Stay in place once you get there. God go with you.”
Alex looked around the bus. He was the youngest person there, but a few seemed to be in their early twenties. Since only one person from a family was allowed to go, the passengers on the bus were all strangers to each other. Several of them were praying. Others stared straight ahead, or looked out the window. A few had their eves closed, and a handful were crying.
Alex stared out the window at the apartments on Riverside Drive as the bus whizzed up the West Side Highway. The buildings looked substantial, unlikely ever to erode. As they drove past Eighty-eighth Street, he resisted the temptation to demand to be let off. He knew what he had to do, what rules he had to follow.
After a while the bus pulled into its parking space and the people were told to get off in an orderly fashion, making sure to have their tickets in hand and to remember where their bus was located and that its number was 22. Alex got off and displayed his ticket to the officer standing there. From the outside, Yankee Stadium seemed much as it always had. He remembered the half dozen or so times he’d gone to a game with Papi and Carlos, sitting in the bleachers, worrying, shouting, eating, thrilled to be there with his father and big brother. During one game —he was nine or ten—the score was tied in the bottom of the eleventh and one of the Yankees hit a walk-off grand slam. He’d felt like he’d witnessed history, he’d been so excited.
“Stay in line. Don’t wander off,” the officer said. “Stand in line. Don’t wander off. If you leave your
8. No food or drink is allowed in Yankee Stadium. All bags must be left on the bus. Anyone carrying anything into Yankee Stadium will be ejected.
9. If you find the person you are looking for, you will remain at Yankee Stadium to fill out the appropriate paperwork. If you do not, you must leave on the bus you took to get there. You will not be allowed on any other bus.
THESE RULES ARE FOR YOUR OWN SAFETY .
THEY MUST BE OBEYED .
Alex thought the rules were stringent, but they made sense, and he was relieved that what was called for was so carefully spelled out. He liked rules. Carlos was always trying to get away with something, or at least he used to be like that before enlisting, but Alex found that rules imposed a structure, and he preferred that. He always did better when he knew exactly what was expected of him.
He wished the flyer hadn’t kept referring to bodies, though. He couldn’t stand the idea of Mami being nothing more than an anonymous body.
He pictured Mami then, sitting at the table, working on her homework while her children worked on theirs. How proud they all were when she got her GED . He thought of her at the stove, cooking their dinner. He remembered once when he’d been sick with fever, and Mami had pressed a cold washcloth against his forehead and held his hand until he’d fallen asleep. He envisioned her in church, shushing them while Father Franco gave his sermon.
For a week he’d refused to think of her, and now he was overwhelmed by a thousand different images. What if he found [**]Mami at Yankee Stadium? What if he didn’t?
He realized then that everybody in line for the 11:30 bus, everybody waiting for whatever bus, was as overwhelmed with thoughts and memories of the people gone from their lives as he was. No wonder no one was talking. The only protection from grief was silence and rules.
Eventually they began boarding their bus. Number 22, he noted. He gave his name to the bus driver and was handed a card that said 33. He took an aisle seat, next to a heavyset woman who kept squeezing a packet of tissues.
“You all have your tickets:” the bus driver asked before they began the journey.
Everyone said yes.
“And you have the list of rules?”
“Yes,” they all responded.
“Be sure to follow the instructions,” the bus driver cautioned them. “Stay in place once you get there. God go with you.”
Alex looked around the bus. He was the youngest person there, but a few seemed to be in their early twenties. Since only one person from a family was allowed to go, the passengers on the bus were all strangers to each other. Several of them were praying. Others stared straight ahead, or looked out the window. A few had their eves closed, and a handful were crying.
Alex stared out the window at the apartments on Riverside Drive as the bus whizzed up the West Side Highway. The buildings looked substantial, unlikely ever to erode. As they drove past Eighty-eighth Street, he resisted the temptation to demand to be let off. He knew what he had to do, what rules he had to follow.
After a while the bus pulled into its parking space and the people were told to get off in an orderly fashion, making sure to have their tickets in hand and to remember where their bus was located and that its number was 22. Alex got off and displayed his ticket to the officer standing there. From the outside, Yankee Stadium seemed much as it always had. He remembered the half dozen or so times he’d gone to a game with Papi and Carlos, sitting in the bleachers, worrying, shouting, eating, thrilled to be there with his father and big brother. During one game —he was nine or ten—the score was tied in the bottom of the eleventh and one of the Yankees hit a walk-off grand slam. He’d felt like he’d witnessed history, he’d been so excited.
“Stay in line. Don’t wander off,” the officer said. “Stand in line. Don’t wander off. If you leave your
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