The Giants have been whooped by the As three games straight in their annual battle by the bay.  Tonight the Giants have one more chance.  Back in 1989 this same match up was set against an area-altering event during game three of the World Series.  This is short short fiction about that day from the point of view of a very young not-yet-baseball fan.

On the TV a man with no hair talked about a battle and a bay.  He called a little man a giant.  The little man had black streaks under his eyes.  The TV made a funny noise, then squiggly lines, and then it went black.  Mama Rose took my hand, put Bobby’s hand in mine, and ran from the house.  The screen door slammed.  She took us to the park across the street and set us in swings.  She kept looking up at the trees and wires. She looked at her watch and then looked up and down the street.  She asked us if we’d felt anything.  We both shook our heads.

A woman with bright red hair came into the playground with a little girl and a brown dog.  She asked Mama Rose if she’d seen the news.  Mama Rose said, “Don’t scare the boys.”

“What happened,” I asked, but Mama Rose didn’t look at me.

The red haired woman talked about a game and a stick and a cypress.  She talked fast and looked up at the trees.  Mama Rose asked if her husband was ok.  The red haired woman did not answer.

A man smoking a cigarette came into the park carrying a small girl with snot running from her nose.  The man closed one eye and held the cigarette in his lips.  Something from the smoke end dropped on the little girl’s arm.  She yelled “Ouch,” while he wiped up the snot with a white rag.

“The Marina got hit hard,” he said to Mama Rose.

Mama Rose shook her head and shushed the man.  She took me and Bobby back to the house.

She looked up the stairs and said, “Dave I need you.”

She told him to watch us while she ran next door.  He turned on the TV.  A man with wires and stuff coming out his ears talked fast with a crunched up face.  There was a large grassy place with lots of orange seats and people running.

He pushed a button on the remote.  A car was driving on a street over water.  The road in front of the car fell and the car vanished.   He pushed the remote and there was a sideways house with smoke coming out of the windows.  He pushed the remote and a car was driving on a street over water.  The road fell and another car vanished.  A woman with big eyes and a bright red mouth talked fast about an epicenter.  She did not blink.

“Daddy Dave,” asked Bobby, “What’s an epicenter?”

Daddy Dave turned off the TV and said “Let’s have a snack.”

Bobby asked if we could watch cartoons.  Daddy Dave said that the TV was over heating and we would have to wait until it cooled down.

Mama Rose came back with two kids I did not know.  The one with the orange shirt said a truck was squashed like a pancake.

“A pancake?” asked the other kid.

“A pancake,” said the kid again.

Mama Rose told the boys to play in the back yard.  The one in the orange shirt said that he’d just seen a bunch of people squashed like pancakes.

“Out, out,” Mama Rose told the boys.  “Out!”