Strike Three. You're Out! Pt. 03

Author's note: This is a work of fiction. The characters portrayed in this story are not real people. Any similarity between characters and organizations and real people is purely coincidental.

Thanks to all who read Chapters 1 and 2 and provided criticism. It is always welcome...even the criticism that hurts. After conferring with some buddies, I acknowledge that the AR-15 issue was a mistake on my part. The name of the lake in Chapter 1 was fictional, but made to send as if it was in Upstate New York.

What else? Oh yeah...A couple of readers seemed pissed that I used "Page" and "Paige" for names of the characters. This was done purposely to draw on imagery created in movies made by the actresses mentioned in the story, as was the Jeremy character.

Once again...A fair warning...If you hated chapters 1 and/or 2, you will be just as pissed after reading chapter 3. Leave now.

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Rocco

The next two years were very painful and empty for me. I just couldn't figure out how this smart, vivacious, loving and loyal woman who told me for years that I was the center of her existence, could just bail on me. My phone still held a dozen pictures of her, which I just couldn't erase. Each night before going to bed, I looked longingly at those pictures. Many nights I cried. Some nights, in a weak moment, I jerked off while looking at them. I actually suffered from depression that was so deep, I started seeing a therapist. You already know that the PTSD dreams returned. But after a couple of months, I pulled out of my depression and decided I needed to move on with my life.

Then, just as quickly as my life had turned to crap, some good things started happening to me. The spring after the divorce, I got the call. In April of 2015, I became a rookie major league umpire. Not only was I now earning the big bucks, but I no longer needed to drive all night to get to the next town, no more staying in flee-bag motels, eating crappy food. I finally made it. But it seemed like a hollow achievement because Paige wasn't there to enjoy it with me. She always told me that she believed in me and knew I would make it. And when I got to "the show," she promised to be at my first game, seated between first and home down in the lower boxes. But that wasn't meant to be.

In my first game, as it happens, I was stationed at first base. And in between innings, I kept looking back, hoping to see the impossible. Even though I knew she wouldn't be there, I still scanned the crowd for her face. I was still in love with her and continued to miss her terribly. I started eating in only the finest restaurants on the road and I stayed in the best hotels. But I would have traded it all for one night of beef stew, corn bread, and making love with Paige.

During that time, I led a pretty lonely existence. I never went out, didn't want to get into a relationship, and had no interest in doing anything but umpiring and working out. Trust for another woman wasn't going to come easily, if at all. I drank a little to take the edge off of the loneliness, but never to excess. I was making good money. What did I spend it on? Basically, high priced escorts. I did some research and found the classiest girls in each city we visited. For $1,000 a night, I got the best that money could buy. This was just what I needed at the time. No romantic entanglements. No pretenses. Just a way to get my rocks off. I would usually indulge two or three times a month. That was all I needed. But after a while, the lack of an emotional bond with these women just left me with an empty feeling. I gave up on the hookers, and resorted to dating my right hand, often still jerking off to pictures of Paige. God, that sounds pathetic, doesn't it? Well, that's the best adjective I could use for my fucked up life...pathetic. I admit it. I sucked at life!

Somehow I soldiered on, lonely and miserable in my personal life. But professionally, I was more successful than in my wildest dreams. In the fall of 2015, I was voted by the team managers as one of the top umpires in the league, even though I was a rookie. In 2017 I was named as part of the crew that would umpire the World Series between the New Amsterdam Federals and the Brooklyn Bridges. It was to be a subway series. That meant that I would have plenty of support from my family and friends. Mom never really understood baseball, but she was at every game I umpired at home. I made sure I got her tickets.

I worked behind the plate for the first game of the series. To say I was psyched was an understatement. After the game, I reflected back on my life. And again, even though professionally I felt on top of the world, I was hollow inside. Two conflicting emotions were battling it out inside of me. I realized that no matter how satisfied I was professionally, I was a failure in my personal life. I had plenty of opportunity to straighten up and fly right. People would try to set me up with classy women all the time. And some of these babes were pretty hot. I got to a point where I actually dated once or twice. But those encounters were also hollow. I kept comparing them to Paige.

And then I got the strangest phone call from a doctor at a hospital in Peekskill, New York. The call came at the hotel the morning after the first game of the series. Somehow this doctor had tracked me down through the baseball commissioner's office. He apologized for bothering me and told me that he was probably wasting my time. The doctor asked me if I knew someone by the name of Paige Pistiglione. When I told him she was my ex-wife, he made a sound that seemed to indicate that he had just found the missing piece of a puzzle. The doctor then told me about a patient who had that name. When I pressed him for more details, he said it was too involved to get into it on the phone. He wondered if I could come to his office in Peekskill later that morning to discuss the matter further. I was intrigued, to say the least. So, since I didn't have to be at the ballpark until late that afternoon for the next game of the World Series, which was to be a night game, and I was curious, I decided to see him.

When I arrived at the doctor's office, he related to me the circumstances that brought this mysterious patient into the hospital two weeks ago. She was involved in a serious automobile accident. Her driver's license said she was Paige Pistiglione. She suffered significant head trauma and was kept in an induced coma until the swelling on her brain came down. About a week ago, the swelling subsided, her vital signs were excellent, and she was brought back to consciousness. By all accounts, he said she was making a remarkable physical recovery. But mentally, they were very concerned. And that's where I came in.

The patient knew her name, but the address she gave them didn't match the one on her driver's license. They couldn't locate any next of kin. In fact, the only address the patient remembered was my house, our old home when we were together. Worse than that, she insisted that it was 2015, two years ago. She kept asking for her husband Rocco, and wondered why she was being left all alone. At times this would agitate her to the point where she needed sedation.

The evening before, her hospital roommate was watching the first game of the World Series, the one in which I was umpiring at the plate. The announcer rattled off the names of the umpires. Since I was the home plate umpire, he naturally announced my name first. When this patient heard the announcer say, "Calling balls and strikes tonight is Rocco 'The Pistol' Pistiglione," Paige screamed at the top of her lungs, "That's my husband...That's my husband. He's in the World Series. Oh my God! I can't believe it!"

The nurses had to sedate her, since she just wouldn't calm down. While in an agitated state, she kept trying to tell the nurses that her husband was on television, in the World Series. The more she tried to explain, the more frustrated and anxious she became. The staff filled the doctor in the next morning. When the doctor made his rounds, the patient was very animated, telling the doctor that she had to call her husband; that I was the umpire of last night's game. She couldn't understand why I wasn't with her in the hospital and why I hadn't told her that I finally made it to the majors. "Why doesn't anyone believe me?" she lamented.

When the doctor related this story to me, I got chills down my spine.

"How could this possibly be?" I thought.

The doctor took a chance by calling me, thinking that if he could prove her wrong, perhaps her memory of the last two years would return. So, he asked me to see her. I balked at first. (Pardon the pun.) But he talked me into it, hoping that he could prove his patient to snap back to reality, and perhaps that would jog her memory. When he took me over to the hospital wing, I approached her room with a mixture of excitement and trepidation.

I entered the patient's room still uneasy about what I might find. The woman in the hospital bed had her head resting to the left on her pillow, staring out the window with a forlorn look on her face. She turned her head slightly to the right, and I felt like someone punched me in the gut. I knew as soon as I saw her that this was indeed my Paige. It took her a second or two to focus. But when she saw me, Paige screamed my name excitedly, and jumped right out of the bed and into my arms. The doctor had to call the nurse to help get her back into bed. She quickly got tipsy and nearly passed out. But she wouldn't let go of my hand. She was banged up and bruised, and looked a little green around the gills, but she was still the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. My eyes teared up as she told me how happy she was to see me, and wouldn't let go of my hand. Earlier, the doctor had told me that if this patient turned out to be my Paige, I should not try to recount the events of the last two years. He emphasized that the shock might be too much for her.

"Just go along with her and make her believe it is still 2015," he ordered. "The shock of finding out she was missing two years might be too much for her already overloaded brain to handle."

Eventually, he admonished, we would bring her up to the present day.

We finally got Paige to settle down. She asked me lots of questions, mainly centered around why I hadn't told her I made it to the majors. I lied and told her it all happened so fast, I never got the chance. I noticed, as I held her left hand, that she was still wearing both her engagement ring and her wedding band. My fingers on my left hand were drawn to the rings, and I fiddled with them with my thumb and index finger the way I used to do when we held hands. That caused her to look closely at my hand.

"Rocco...Where is your wedding band? Why aren't you wearing it?"

"Oh," I responded quickly. "I took it off before the game last night and forgot to put it back on. You know I was always afraid the ring would slip off during a game. Here it is, right here around my neck. I put it on the same chain as the Saint Christopher medal you gave me when I left for the season the spring after we were married. Remember?"

So, you're probably wondering how the ring ended up on the chain around my neck? I feel like a beaten cuckold for admitting this, but after the divorce I put it on the chain and never took it off. It made me feel close to what Paige and I had before the bad times started. I know...I know...You're all thinking I'm a pathetic loser. Well, I am! Does that make you feel any better. Sorry...I admit it...I still loved the woman and couldn't let her memory go.

The nurse soon gave her a sedative, but Paige still wouldn't let go of my hand, holding on with a vice-like grip. I sat with her and held her hand while she fell asleep. And then I left to head over to the ballpark for the next game, completely confounded by the day's events. Since I was assigned the left field foul line out in the outfield for game 2, I had lots of time to think about this completely fucked up situation. I had to be careful and not daydream out there. I almost blew a call on a line drive that screamed past third base in the fifth inning. Thank God I snapped out of it just as the ball landed in fair territory. I pointed to fair territory with my right hand, indicating it was a fair ball.

The doctor asked me to return the next day and for several days after to see if it would help Paige's memory. But each time I entered the room, to Paige it was still 2015. It was the same each time she saw me. I'd walk in and her eyes would light up. She would grab my hand and pull me down for a kiss. There was no sign that her memory of the last two years was returning. She had absolutely not one damned clue about all the heartache that passed between us. How fucked up is that?

It pretty much went this way for the next couple of weeks, the duration of the World Series. It went the full seven games. When the series ended, the doctor called me into his office for another consultation.

"Rocco, the good news is that Paige is pretty much all healed physically from her accident. We'd like to send her home. Look Rocco...I know this is a lot to ask. But my associates and I think it's best if you brought her home with you. You say you still live in the same house as when you were married. So, she'll be in familiar surroundings. When she finally begins to come around and realize what's really happened, she'll have a familiar face with her for support."

"Look Doc, I don't know if I can handle this. The circumstances surrounding our breakup were pretty traumatic for me. This would be like pretending what she did to me never happened. I don't know if I could handle that. I'm all mixed up inside. I'm bouncing back and forth on this, feeling one minute like I want to tell her that I'm glad she's all fucked up and tell her to have a lousy life. Then in the next minute, all I want to do is pick her up in my arms and claim her for my own again. Fuck, Doc!. This really sucks! I think if I just walked away now, I could move on again. It'll be damned tough, but I've done it before and I can do it again. But if I get sucked into this sorry-assed situation, I know what'll happen. I'll get attached all over again only to throw her out on her cheating ass when her memory returns."

"I understand Rocco. But look...We've got no options here. If you don't take her, she'll need to be removed to a mental health facility. And since she's got no visible means of support, at least none that we can identify, she'd be put into a state-run facility. You don't need me to tell you what those places are like."

Over the course of the next few days, I sought out the advice of both family and close friends. I even tracked down Father Mickey in Chicago. Of course, his advice leaned toward the Christian side of things. He told me that taking care of Paige was an opportunity to demonstrate just how much of a Christian I was. He went on to say, surprisingly, that "...all that crap about missing mass on a Sunday being a mortal sin, and going to confession before receiving communion was a crock. That's all bullshit. It's the stuff we really do with our lives that determines whether or not we're a sinner in the eyes of God. My boy, this is where the rubber is gonna meet the road for you, lad. This is your moment to do the right thing. I know it's hard. But I think you already know the right thing here, bucko."

My mother was another surprise. Not one to mince words, mom truly got her Irish up and unloaded on me with both barrels. As she spoke, her brogue got thicker and thicker, and she became more and more agitated. Though she had been the soul of Christian charity throughout her life, mom was dead set against my getting further involved with Paige. She railed about the whore she had become.

"God help me, but on the soul of your dead father, God bless his sainted heart, this feckin' woman will cause you more pain. You take her in and you would be her omadhaun." (For those of you who weren't raised Irish, literally translated, it means 'simpleton.' But what my mother was really saying was that I was an asshole.) "Get on with your life son. You've no time to go messin' about with no trollop."

In the end, I went against mom's wishes. And, while she didn't cut me out of her life because of it, she told me that she refused to see Paige and would keep her distance from me "...until I got my feckin' head out of my arse. As far as I'm concerned, that woman is as useful to you as a lighthouse on a bog."

But I just felt like I didn't have much of a choice. Paige was still the woman I would love forever. And I had to help her.

In my next conversation with her doctor, he said it was time to take the next step. "I think that Paige is ready to begin hearing the truth about the last two years. Over the next couple of days, you and I are going to gradually fill her in. But we're not going to go into the gory details. You'll tell her that the two of you just fell out of love and decided to go your separate ways. When we feel she's ready, you can take her home. We'll be checking with you by phone, and you'll need to bring her in every couple of weeks so we can check on her progress."

So, within several days we slowly began to bring Paige up to speed, as it were. We told her about her accident and her amnesia. On the night before she was ready to come home, we thought it would be a good time to tell her about our break-up. I related the story to her as gently as I could. But she kept repeating, "No, Rocco. That can't be. It can't be. I would never do that to you. I love you. Oh my God, what have I done to you? Please tell me this isn't true!"

Her tears just kept flowing throughout that whole conversation. She just refused to accept reality.

In the days before taking Paige home, I gave the house a once-over. Truth be told, I never slept in our bedroom again after the divorce. This is going to sound weird, but by now you know that this whole fucking story is weird. What's one more thing as evidence of my fucked up shit?

I had closed up our bedroom like a crypt. The day I walked away from Paige, I removed all of my junk, and then closed the door to that room and never went back in. How fitting that if you stepped back into that room, it was like going back two years in a time machine. I never touched her clothes or other stuff. I just walked away from that room like I had our marriage. The guest room had been my room. Hell...I didn't spend too much time in the house during the baseball season anyway. A few times I had thought about selling it, but just never got around to it. Well, at least Paige's transition to "normal" life would be made easier by my laziness. She would have our bedroom, and it would be as if she never left it. Given that it was early fall, there was a bit of a chill in the air. For her trip home from the hospital, I dug out a pair of Paige's old jeans and my New Amsterdam University hoodie that she used to love to wear. I even had a pair of her old sneakers.

That first day back in the house was not in the least bit strange or unfamiliar for Paige. But for me, it caused an odd mix of confusion, sadness, and excitement all at the same time. I ordered a pizza for dinner from what used to be our favorite place. When it came time for bed, we both had to address the 500 pound gorilla in the room...the sleeping arrangements.

Paige, by this time, knew the story about our breakup that the doctor and I told her. But facing that reality now made her quiver with worry. When I told her that I would be sleeping in the guest room, her lower lip trembled and she asked, "Rocco, can't you just stay with me tonight? I'm so afraid of all of the things that you told me have happened. I don't know if I can face the night alone."