sometimes when his estrogen levels went out of whack and everything seemed so rotten and awful. Besides, it felt good to have a good cry every now and then, but what he did behind closed doors should be his own private business. The telephone ringing brought Roy back to the present. It could be that reporter. It had to be.
Roy tore out of the stoners’ room and entered his apartment, grabbing the phone on the third ring.
“Tell me more about this Jose character.”
“Is this Roy B. Brands?” The caller had a deeper, harsher voice than the kid who had called earlier.
“Yes it is. So who is this guy who has the nerve to think he can break my record?” Roy said. This had to be that cub reporter’s boss.
“Mr. or Ms. Brands or whoever the fuck you are, I have a piece of paper in front of me sayin’ you owe me one-hundred and eighty-one thousand bucks, fucko. I’m intendin’ to collect—”
Roy slammed the phone onto the cradle. It rang again immediately, and he ripped the cord out off the wall, sending bits of plastic and wire across the apartment. Good Lord, he had been trying to stay on the down low, and he’d gone low down to do it. But now it looked like they’d found him again. That asshole creditor was just one of many who were trying to track him down. Was the whole home-run-record-breaking-Jose-thing a lark, a motherfucking hoax used to get gullible Roy Brands to admit he was living in a dump in the deepest, darkest wasteland in Richmond, California?
“Yeah, that’s it,” he said aloud. “You just got yourself found, Roy.”
He hated to hear his high pitch squeal of a voice that he now carried. It reminded him of his mother’s. That booming big baritone Roy once had was long-long gone, as were his testicles. No, no, no. He couldn’t go down that road of heartache and regret. It would only end up in a long crying session and a box of tissue ain’t as cheap as it used to be.
He had to think of something else. Looking at the cardboard folding table littered with unpaid bills, he stared at the last remaining artifact from his former life that hadn’t been seized, the trophy given to him by the baseball commissioner himself when he hit 78 home runs. Bud had been so happy to present it to him, only to have the nerve to ask for it back when those steroid allegations started hitting the fan. Fuck him. He gave it away, and he couldn’t take it back. If he thought steroids were a problem, then he should have done something about it when Canseco and McGwire were juicing like crazy. He hadn’t done anything different than they did, except take a more potent version of the juice. One that still had crazy aftereffects.
Then the question re-emerged. What if his record was in danger? The record that he owned, the record that he earned. Juice or no juice, Roy had smashed ball after ball over outfield walls across America. He had to hit a flying sphere thrown anywhere between 80 to 100 miles an hour with a wooden cylinder. Making contact wasn’t easy. It’s even harder to hit the ball straight. And home runs, well, that was the hardest thing to do, and he had hit them. Seventy-eight of them in one season. And there ain’t no way in hell a Spanish-speaking second baseman was going to take that record away… if that rumor was true.
He heard his other neighbors, Carlos and Maria, shouting back and forth in Spanglish. Words like fuckhead, shit-for-brains, cunt, and several over English profanities always got mixed into their heated arguments. And if they weren’t arguing, they were doing the nasty, and everybody in the apartment complex and probably the entire block could hear them. Crazy mothers, to be sure, but maybe they knew about the Jose guy. He was one of their own, right?
Roy trudged back outside and knocked on their door. The couple kept arguing, so he knocked harder.
“Who’s that, your novio?” Carlos shouted inside the apartment.
“Fuck you, pendejo!” Maria responded as she opened the door. Roy looked down at this little Latina lady. Even though it was the middle of the morning, she was decked out to the nines from her hair done up down to her stiletto high heels and in between, a tight red dress showing off her immense curves. Roy wondered if he should get some tips from her if he was going to continue this cross-dressing business.
“Hello there, I was wondering if…”
Maria’s eyes widened. She turned back to Carlos, who wore a tight tank top displaying an arm full of tats.
“It’s the black lady next door. Why don’t you bang her too?”
“I just might. Her ta-tas are bigger than yours,” Carlos said with a laugh.
Maria’s face flushed. She yanked a picture of the Virgin Mary and child from the wall and flung it at Carlos. He ducked, and it smashed against an overturned chair. Bits of glass scattered on the messy carpet.
“You did not just throw that.” His eyes were wide in disbelief.
Roy noticed that it might have been the last unbroken object in the apartment until a few seconds ago.
Maria crossed herself. “You made me do it. I can’t help myself sometimes, Carlos.”
Roy cleared his voice. “Look, um. I was wondering if either of you might know of a Jose Morales. He plays baseball.”
Carlos turned and picked up the broken picture, holding it gingerly in his fingers. Maria walked over and put her arm around him. He looked over at her as if forgetting she was there. “Madre Santa Maria y bebé Jesús…”
Maria put her finger to his lips, stopping him from speaking. “I want your bebé, Carlos. Quiero tu bebé.”
He turned, wrapping his arms around her. “Really?”
“Absolutamente.”
Roy didn’t know what was going on, but they didn’t seem to know or care that he was there as they started making out. Carlos dropped the picture as he worked his hands all over Maria’s body. Roy had no idea what to do. He felt a stirring in his loins, something that had been absent for quite a while, as he watched Carlos manhandle Maria. Carlos began kissing Maria’s neck, working his way down to her cleavage, while Maria stepped on the picture, tearing a hole in it with the heel. Roy entered the room.
“You… wait…”
The couple didn’t notice him or the picture. Maria was busy working on Carlos’s belt while he was pulling the top of her dress down. Roy quietly took steps back.
“I think I’ll just come back another time.”
He couldn’t help himself and stole one more look. Carlos’s pants were around his ankles, and Maria had her legs wrapped around him, her mouth open and eyes closed, ready to belt out a powerful scream. Roy shut the door as she uttered her first, “Ooh yeah, baby!” There would be many more of these exclamations in the next several minutes.
Standing outside with his hand on the doorknob, Roy wanted to take another peak. They wouldn’t even know if he watched them the entire time, would they? He started to turn the handle.
“Ms. Brands.”
A yelp escaped Roy’s lips. He turned to see one of those dozen kids from upstairs who only wanted to jump up and down all day and night. Maria wailed, “Harder, harder.” Roy felt blood rising to face.
“What’d you want? You shouldn’t be hearing stuff like this.”
“Oh,
