The Bureau of Dreams to be Continued by Edward Drobinski - HTML preview

The Bureau of Dreams to be Continued

Page 273

Yankee Stadium

The boy’s hand was small in his father’s, but it gripped tight; tight enough to make the father glance down and smile. It was the boy’s first trip to Yankee Stadium, and the air buzzed with the kind of electricity only a doubleheader could conjure. The year was 1956, and Mickey Mantle was having a season for the ages.

It was a sun drenched Saturday in the Bronx. The father, dressed in a short sleeved button down and slacks, grips his son’s hand as they emerged from the 161st Street subway station to join the stream of fans heading toward Yankee Stadium, a sea of navy caps and vendor calls. The boy, seven years old and wide eyed, wears a Yankees cap slightly too big for his head, the brim casting a shadow over his freckled face.

They pass vendors hawking peanuts, scorecards, and pennants. The father buys his son a paper cone of roasted peanuts and a glossy program with Mickey Mantle’s face on the cover. The boy clutches it like a sacred text. The little one stared at the cover; Mantle’s grin, the bat slung over his shoulder, and whispered, “He looks like a superhero.”

The father guides his son up the concrete ramps, past the scent of hot dogs and the echo of organ music. Then, like stepping