Trouble at Devoe Park

Trouble at Devoe Park



It was a pleasant sunny day with temperatures in the mid 80s as I woke up and wondered what I would do today. My feet hit the ground around 8:30 that morning since my circadian clock had not readjusted to the fact that I did not have to go to school that day. I had just graduated two weeks earlier from Tolentine High School, a private Catholic high school in the Bronx, and I was at the beginning of what I referred to as my final summer recess. It would be off to get a job when this summer was over.

I was the only one at home that morning as all of my siblings and my mother had already left to go to work. I had just put two slices of bread in the toaster and two eggs on the stove to make hard boiled eggs for breakfast when the phone rang.

“Hello” I said.

“Hi, it's Charlie,” the voice on the other end spoke.

Charlie Meagher was a classmate and close friend of mine. I had met him when I transferred to the school in my sophomore year. We did everything together. Went to each other's houses, attended sporting events at the school, went to dances that were held at various schools around the Bronx.

“Hi Charlie, how's it going?”

“Pretty good,” he replied. “What are you up to today, Pat?”

“I don't know. I haven't gotten that far yet. I just got up about 10 minutes ago and I am fixing breakfast.”

“Oh, what are you having?”

“I figured I would have Coffee, toast and some eggs.”

“Well, that's better than what my breakfast was. I had leftover Pizza from last nights dinner. It was okay but I had to remove the pepperoni from the top of it. I don't like them as they are too spicy, but my brother Kenny won the coin toss last night at supper and we had to cater to his whims. What do you feel like doing today?” Charlie asked.

“I don't know. Do you want to go to the park and play some B ball,” I asked.

“Yeah that sounds like a good idea.”

“Why don't you bring your basketball with you as mine needs some air to be put into it. That sounds good. Why don't we meet at 10 o'clock at the entrance to the park.”

Charlie knew exactly what park I was talking about. We were going to Devoe Park, which was right down the street from where I lived.

There we had our plans set for the day or so I thought. That toast popped by this point and I put a thin smear of butter on each of the slices. Meanwhile I heard the two eggs bouncing up-and-down in the pan on the stovetop, as the water had started to boil. I finished and put the two eggs and toast on a plate and grabbed a coffee and headed for the living room to watch the morning news. The story of the day what is how Neil Armstrong and his fellow astronauts were preparing for a lunar moonshot, that would result in the historical event of a man walking on the moon's surface.

It was 10 minutes of 10 when I shut off the TV and put the dishes in the sink. I had plenty of time to meet up with Charlie at the appointed hour. Arriving at the south entrance to the park, I saw Charlie standing there with his basketball under his arm.

“Hey how's it going?” I asked.

“Good,” he said. “Right on time. I like that.”

We headed down the paved blacktop path to where the basketball courts were. We weren't more then a minute inside the park when Charlie reached into his pocket and grabbed a couple of firecrackers and a lighter from his other pocket. We always carried lighters on us, as we were both Marlboro smokers. He lit one of the firecrackers and tossed it to the side and yelled “watch out”

The firecracker exploded and left a small paper confetti downpour onto the blacktop.
“Hey where did you get those,” I asked.

“My father brought them home from work the other night.”

He handed me a couple of them and said, “Here have some fun.”

The two of us continued towards the basketball courts and listened to the small explosions we created with our shared loot.

I happened to turn around and noticed two beat cops headed in our direction. One was outside the park walking along the cast iron fence, that surrounded the park, and the other cop was about 50 yards behind us on the path that we were on.

“Charlie,” I said, “we are in trouble now.”

There was no point in starting to run to get away as that would've only made the situation that much worse. The two of us stood still eyes fixed on these two avengers and waited for the other shoe to drop.

Both officers arrived together at the same time, though they took different paths to catch up with us. Both of them looked pristine in their appearance with their blue blouses, adorned with brass buttons and shiny silver badges.

“Okay both of you empty your pockets on that park bench.”
.
Both of us stood side-by-side, just inches apart, and emptied the contents of all four pockets of our dungarees as ordered.

“What is that cellophane bag from?” one of the officers asked me.

“It's nothing,” I said. “They are just the empty wrappers from a couple of Ring Dings cupcakes that I had yesterday.”

“Probably stole them,” I heard him mutter under his breath.

“Do you know it's illegal to have fireworks?” they asked.

“Yes sir” we both answered in unison.

“Do you clowns have any ID on you?”
We both produced our High School ID cards, and each officer took them from each of us and pulled out their ticket books and started to write. Finishing the tickets, one officer told us that we were being cited for possession of fireworks and that we would have to make an appearance at Bronx Criminal Court on the date that he put on the ticket. Each one of us was handed a copy of the citation. I was a little bit relieved that we weren't being arrested at that point until Charlie puffed out his chest like that of a Roman Gladiator and asked the cop who just gave him the ticket, “Hey do you know my father?”

“No, I don't believe so,” the officer replied.

“My father is Peter Meagher. He is a deputy inspector with the NYPD. In fact my father is the head commander, who is in charge of all of the uniformed officers in the borough of the Bronx.”

This new information did not seem to phase either one of the officers as they stood there, just staring at us. The officer that was dealing with Charlie directly said,“Oh yeah I know who your father is.”

Charlie now thinking that he had the upper hand asked the cop “so what do you think I ought to do with this,” now handing the ticket back towards the officer.
The cop without even changing his facial expression took the copy of the ticket he had given Charlie and gave it a fast review. He then replied, “Why don't you bring this home and show it to your father. He'll be able to tell you what to do with it now.”

This was definitely not the answer that Charlie was hoping to hear.

Both offices closed their ticket books, returned them to their back pockets respectively, scoffed up the unused firecrackers and put them in their pockets.

One of the offices said “Behave yourself ,”as they turned and walked away and continued on their beat.

Charlie and I just sat on that park bench, not interested in playing basketball anymore. We were just thankful we hadn't been arrested on this bright sunny day, with temperatures in the mid 80s. Weeks later, Charlie and I made an appearance in front of a judge and were ordered to pay a sixty-five dollar fine for our antics on that fateful day. To this very day, my mother was never made aware of our incident at Devoe Park. I had enough to deal with this episode without bringing more pressure down on top of me.

Welcome to Life 101.

I never should have answered that telephone call this morning.