Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

by Patrick O’Connor

DAN slumped down on the seat next to the old lady who was staring keenly out towards the
vast expanse of green grass.

He didn’t think he’d ever seen grass cut so neatly, laid out in precise, differently shaded
squares.

“Oh good shot,” she said and immediately scribbled something in a blue book perched on her
knee.

“Placed that superbly past mid-off.”

“I’m sorry?” he replied.

“Oh, are you American? We don’t get many of them here.” she said.

“No I suppose not.”

“Your first cricket match?”

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

“Yes, I…”

Dan felt the dull fog which had clouded his mind over the last 24 hours tighten its grip. His head
was pounding ferociously and he didn’t really want to talk. Fortunately she seemed more
interested in writing in her book and made another entry.

WHY would an African-American woman, born and bred in Fort Worth, want to swap Texas for
an English suburb in Nottingham, the home of Robin Hood?

That’s what puzzled Dan. All he received was a text saying Mel was leaving him, that the
marriage “had run out of steam.” It shook him to his bones.  Her sister had come round to
collect her clothes and stuff and whilst she was packing Dan sneaked a look at her cell phone
and discovered an address in Nottingham where Mel was apparently staying.

A long haul to Heathrow, then a switch to a regional airport near Nottingham and it was a tired,
bedraggled and confused Dan who turned up outside the quaint small semi-detached house last
night.

There had always been a slight concern in the back of his mind that being in a mixed-race
marriage could cause a problem at some stage. Was Mel under pressure from her family to
hitch up with a black guy, was that it?

That theory was torpedoed immediately the door was opened and Dan was greeted by a
ginger-haired, bearded man with a posh English accent. He sounded like Hugh Grant but
looked like someone from ZZ Top who had had a trim.

Mel appeared behind him and in a short, snappy exchange in a leafy English avenue late on a
sultry summer evening, informed Dan that she had fallen head over heels in love with ‘Nigel’
whom she had met at a conference Stateside and that she wanted a divorce – quickly.  A few
minutes later he had found a 24 hour store, bought two bottles of whisky and eventually passed
out on a bench in a nearby park.

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

A park keeper, maybe influenced by his strange Texan drawl, had politely moved him on the
following morning and after two large cups of black coffee at a café, Dan wandered along the
road before he came to a huge stadium.

Still totally befuddled by what had happened, he bought a ticket and entered through the gates
to the Trent Bridge cricket ground, one of England’s most famous sporting arenas.

CURIOUSITY got the better of him.

“What are you doing?” asked Dan.

“This? Oh this is my scorebook. It’s a ball by ball record of the game,” explained the woman,
who told him her name was Alice. He guessed she was in her late 70s. She was a slight, frail
looking woman, in a plain white dress, with her grey hair tied back in a bun, tucked under a
large orange sun hat. She was surrounded by a vast array of paraphernalia, a cushion that had
seen better days, large canvas bag, flask, pair of binoculars, newspaper, small radio with ear
plugs, two books, travel rug and of course, her scorebook.

There was an appealing liveliness in her eyes and she had a very direct and honest way of
looking at him.

Dan felt self-conscious, aware that he was a dishevelled, unshaven, and probably smelly 34

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

year old wearing the crumpled dark blue business suit he had flown over in. He was still
clutching a small travel bag, the only piece of luggage to accompany him on his flight from
Dallas.

Despite that, Alice moved the book closer to him so he could see its detailed format. “See, if the
batsman doesn’t score you just put in a dot, a dot ball means no runs have been scored.”

Dan didn’t really understand what she was talking about but at least momentarily it took his
mind off other matters.

“You’ll have to excuse me, I know absolutely nothing about cricket, even less about what you’re
doing,” said Dan. When he could, he watched the Texas Rangers baseball team and from what
he could see, there were a few similarities but otherwise he was clueless as to what was going
on.

“So what are you doing here?”

It was a perfectly reasonable question.

As he lay slumped on the park bench last night, the whisky slowly working its way through his
body, Dan felt at an all-time low. Mel had been his life, his whole being. But now he realised he
had ignored the warning signs that had cropped up with increasing regularity over the last few
months. Mel had gradually become less attentive, it had seemed as if her mind was elsewhere. 
And now her body was elsewhere. Was the ginger man making love to her right now?

Those tortuous thoughts bounced around his mind, his depression getting deeper and deeper
until he was quite clear what his next step had to be.

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

DAN astonished himself by the answer he gave the woman.

“My wife’s just left me, I’ve come here to kill myself.”

She didn’t bat an eyelid.

“I thought about running out in front of a car but just couldn’t do it. Then I saw these huge big
stands that you have here and thought I could jump off, you know, end it all.”

It was such a stark statement, but he wasn’t being entirely honest. The fact that Dan had been
dumped in favour of another man was hurtful enough but for an Englishman!  He had always
disliked the English and their prissy mannerisms. What better way to end it all than by
desecrating that most English of institutions, the cricket ground.

Dan gazed around the giant stadium with its rows and rows of white seats which glistened in the
summer sun.  It was sparsely populated with a mainly middle aged or elderly, male crowd dotted
sparingly around. It definitely needed a splattering of colour he thought.

Dan had been told the English like their irony, how ironic would it be for Nigel if Mel’s estranged
husband leapt off a stand at Trent Bridge and crashed onto the concrete below, leaving a
massive blood-red stain. That would certainly blow a hole in his English cool.

“Oh you can’t do that, absolutely not,” stated Alice quite firmly.

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

“Notts are bowling very well at the moment, they’ve been keeping a fine line and length all
morning and I’m not going to have their concentration spoilt by some over emotional Yank.  “No,
young man if you want to be all dramatic and Hollywood, you’ll have to find somewhere else,
this is a cricket ground, one of the best in the world. For God’s sake, we stage Test matches
here. Do you know who’s played on this hallowed turf, Botham, Richards, Sobers, the greats, oh
no we DON’T do suicides here.”

With that, she looked away from him and continued scribbling. A moment later she said:
“Anyway why would you want to do something that silly?”

In the background Dan could hear the noise of leather against willow, bat against ball, and the
occasional shout from one of the cricketers. The men, dressed in their regulation all-white
outfits, either threw the ball or hit it with their wooden bats ferociously and ran about
energetically. To what purpose he hadn’t got a clue.

Surprisingly, Dan found it easy to pour his heart out to this stranger whom he had only just met.
He opened up like he had never done before about his love for Mel, about his anguish that his
marriage was over, about the hurt and anger that was burning a vicious hole right through him.

It was like talking to someone you would meet in a bar or on a bus or train, someone you knew
you would probably never meet again and he found it liberating, a great release.

Alice continued to make her entries as she listened but when Dan had finished unburdening
himself said: “Oh is that all? It’s not the end of the world.”

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

“No?” he glared. How dare this woman dismiss his plight so casually?

There was a break in play as drinks were brought out to refresh the cricketers.

“You know Dan, I can call you Dan can’t I? For over 40 years my husband used to come and
watch cricket here. I wasn’t interested, like you I knew nothing about the game. And then one
day he keeled over and died, just a few feet from where we are sitting, he didn’t even get to eat
the cucumber sandwiches I had made. I was devastated.

“A few weeks later, when I was sorting out his things, I came across a whole pile of
scorebooks.  He had kept a record of every game he’d been to since 1973. I was curious, I
wondered what the fascination was, so one day I came down here myself.”

Alice explained that initially she had felt desperately out of place, exposed, lonely.

“My husband had died Dan, I was totally alone, no children, most of our friends were his friends
and they seemed to drift away after a while. Yes, there were times when I felt at the end of my
tether, utterly, utterly depressed. And like you, there were times when I felt very sorry for
myself.  But I kept coming to Trent Bridge.

“At first it was just something to get me out of the house but I got hooked. The game can enthral
you, sure it’s slow and intricate but it’s totally absorbing. There are plenty of people who come
here on their own, including some women. Everyone’s very friendly, you can chat or be on your
own if you want to. It took me away from my misery Dan.”

Alice paused to make another entry in her scorebook and for a while they both just sat there
silently. Dan watched the play and he could slowly feel his muscles loosen, his tension easing.

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

There was another halt to activities when one of the batsmen was out and Alice said: “Then
someone showed me how to use a scorebook and before I knew it, I was filling it in, just like
Roger.”

“I’m sorry, I just don’t get it,” said Dan.

Alice smiled as if she was talking to a small boy: “Just by looking at the scorebook you can
appreciate all the ebbs and flows of the match. It tells you who scores the most runs, who took
the most wickets, how many sixes or fours were scored.”

“Sixes, fours?”said a  puzzled Dan.

“I read somewhere how you could explain cricket to a foreigner, now then, how does it go?” she
laughed.

She paused momentarily and her forehead wrinkled in concentration: “Right here goes: ‘You
have two sides, one out in the field and one in. Each man that's in the side that's in goes out
and when he's out he comes in and the next man goes in until he's out. When they are all out,
the side that's out comes in and the side that's been in goes out and tries to get those coming
in, out. Sometimes you get men still in and not out. When a man goes out to go in, the men who
are out try to get him out and when he is out he goes in and the next man in goes out and goes
in. There are two men called umpires who stay all out all the time and they decide when the
men who are in are out. When both sides have been in and all the men have been out, and both
sides have been out twice after all the men have been in, including those who are not out, that
is the end of the game.’ ”

Alice looked very pleased with herself and giggled girlishly.

Dan then noticed that all the cricketers were leaving the field.

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

“Is it finished?” he asked.

“Oh no, it’s lunch. Have you brought anything?”

What a strange question to ask a man preparing to commit suicide, thought Dan.

“Er, no.”

“Wait here, keep an eye on my things and I’ll bring you something.”

Dan sat there and could feel himself relaxing.  He took his jacket off as it was getting quite
sunny and warm, not Texas warm of course, but still very pleasant.

A couple of elderly men strolled past him, exchanged pleasantries and seemed really pleased to
find an American watching cricket. The sky was crystal blue clear and he noticed a few young
boys had gone out onto the extremities of the pitch to play their own mini-version of cricket.

He was very thirsty and was relieved to see Alice return with some sandwiches, bottled water
and a large sun straw hat.

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

He devoured his food quickly whilst Alice produced her own salad meal from tiny plastic
containers and picked at it delicately. She also took out some sun tan lotion and shared it with
Dan.

Alice asked him about Texas and baseball and he had to admit, she was very agreeable
company.

After about 40 minutes the players returned.

According to Alice, Notts were doing very well and she showed him in more detail how to make
entries in the scorebook. She provided a potted history of the Trent Bridge ground and some of
the historic matches played there which helped him understand the reverence in which she held
the arena.

Midway through the afternoon Alice announced she needed to take a toilet break and asked
Dan to ‘man’ the scorebook.

“I usually ask anyone close by if they can do it but since you’re here, you might as well have a
go.”

Whilst she was away Dan studiously observed what was going on on the field of play as best he
could and nervously made his entries in the scorebook. He hoped he’d done it properly, he
didn’t want to let Alice down.

When she returned, she looked at the scorebook and said “excellent,” a comment which gave
him a warm glow.

“A cricket match is like life,”she said. “You never quite know what’s round the corner. Look at
that batsman, he thinks he knows where the next ball is going to land, whether it will swerve or
bounce, but he can’t be certain. He simply plays each ball as best he can and then prepares for

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

the next one. That’s what we have to do with life.”

For a moment Alice looked very pensive. “One day a woman came and sat next to me and
asked me if I was Roger’s widow.”

“She told me that she and Roger had had an affair for over 15 years. They had met at the
cricket you see. I never had a clue, I never saw that ball coming.”

Dan touched Alice gently on the arm and she smiled at him.

“The batsman has to prepare for every eventuality and sometimes he may not score a run but
he isn’t out either. Then you mark it down as a dot ball. It isn’t the best outcome but it’s not the
end of the world, you get to bat on,” said Alice.

“Okay, it’s not been a good day for you, your wife has left you and you thought about killing
yourself. But you haven’t, you’ve kept me company and you’ve been able to watch a good day’s
cricket into the bargain. You get to bat on Dan.”

Dan realised he hadn’t thought about Mel for a quite a while.

“Sort of a dot ball day then,” he said with a wry smile.

© Patrick O’Connor 2010

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Dot Ball - Short Story of the Month - August

Written by Patrick O'Connor

Sunday, 01 August 2010 11:08

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