Work Text:
Houston, TX
Wednesday 4 August 1993
The first alert was when someone who actually was paying attention to the TV shouted out "What the Sam Hill is that damn fool doing?!?" That got all eyes on the TV, just in time to see Texas Rangers pitcher Nolan Ryan grab Chicago White Sox third baseman Robin Ventura around the neck and commence pounding him in the head, repeatedly. By the time the third slow-motion replay had cycled through, someone shouted "Call up LaFiamma!"
"He ain't home!" Came the reply. "All he talked about today was he has a date tonight!"
"Which means unless Lundy physically drags his ass outta bed, he'll slap the snooze button at least three times, right?"
"If he don't just sleep through it completely. Either way, he's fixin' to be late tomorrow."
For those who didn't know him, the unholy glee in Esteban Gutierrez's eyes would have been frightening. For some who did know him, it was anyway. "Gentlemen, we have little time to plan, but I believe we can pull this off."
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Houston, TX
Thursday 5 August 1993
Predictably, Joe LaFiamma slept through his alarm, waking up cursing how late he was. 'Levon, where the Hell are you?' Rolling up to sit on the side of the bed, he glanced at the clock, winced. Time for a shower, yes. Time for a decent breakfast and enough SportsCenter to catch up on last night's Cubs-Pirates game, not a chance in Hell. He dove into the bathroom, went out the door tucking his shirt in, tie loose around his neck. Guessing at what traffic would look like at this hour of the day, he skipped the morning drive time show and indulged in the Cobra's newest accessory upgrade -- an in-dash CD player. Bad enough he'd likely get trapped in the Jimmy at some point today, listening to someone wailing about "My ex used my truck to run over my dog." In his car, he'd damn well listen to his music!
He fixed his tie at a stoplight, listening to the police band chatter. Particularly his partner, trapped on the Northwest Freeway behind a wreck caused by three 18-wheelers trying to be in the same place at one time. Since he was the officer on scene, it was his responsibility to deal with until Highway Patrol could get there. LaFiamma chuckled, and wisely stayed off the airwaves. Lundy's best prediction was that he'd get into the office just about in time to punch out for the day, and that the wreck was going to screw up traffic clear back to Austin. Or worse, since one of the trucks was a tanker, hauling volatile chemicals that would screw up a lot more than traffic if they got loose. If Joe was lucky, Levon would never know how badly he himself was running behind. 'It's nearly fifty miles between Prairie View and Houston, and he lives on the other side of Prairie View, at that! He's putting a hundred miles on the Jimmy every day, just getting from home to work and back! Who ever heard of living that far away from where you work? Texans.'
Beaumont was lying in wait almost the second he got in the door. "There's stress fractures in the floor under your desk, LaFiamma. Since Lundy's held up with that semi wreck, why don't you take a bush hog to some of your paperwork?"
"Yeah, why don't I. Before I end up down in the basement with the San Diego Padres." A nice, quiet, peaceful day, indoors with the blessed air conditioning. The worst thing he'd be facing was bleeding to death from a thousand paper cuts.
He never saw Joanne nod at the desk sergeant, or the uncharacteristically evil smile on her face.
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It was nearing three o'clock by the time Lundy found his way to Riesner, since he'd had to hunt up five sporting goods stores to find what he was looking for. The Highway Patrol boys who'd finally showed up at the wreck scene to relieve him had filled him in on the gag, and despite knowing LaFiamma was a Cubs fan, there was just no way he was going to miss out on having a part in it. Some enterprising soul with the Mounted Division had come up with the idea of hooking up a ten-up trailer and making a circuit of all the police stations in Greater Houston, rather than taking cops off the streets to make trips to Riesner that would take them out of their areas. Esteban and Joe-Bill were overseeing construction, well aware of the potential consequences should their grand idea implode.
Lundy parked the Jimmy two spaces over from what had become a small castle. Carrying his offering, he walked up to Esteban. "All right, explain this to me. Seein' as I'm the one who'll have to be hearin' about it from now 'til forever."
"You see the Rangers game last night?"
"No, I didn't, I was at a meeting. We got somethin' runnin' around killin' livestock and small animals. Scared the holy Hell out of Fooler the other night."
"He's okay?" Joe-Bill wanted to know.
"He's fine," Lundy replied. "I was watchin' the Astros and the Braves, and Fooler started kickin' up a fuss. By the time I got out there with a shotgun, whatever it was had run off. And with the rain, there was no tracks to be had. I heard about what happened on the radio, and the Highway Patrol filled me in from there. So get with the 'splainin', Lucy."
"It's wooden pallets," Esteban cackled. "Stood on end and lashed together with barb wire, and braced on the bottom with cinder blocks. Since the Cobra's so small and low-slung, when we stood the pallets up, they were plenty high enough. We braced the top with 2X4's, and put a door over those to make a roof. All of these -- " he tapped the box in Lundy's hand, "go around and on that. Annie let us borrow her Polaroid, we got pictures of the whole thing."
"Where'd you get all that on such short notice?"
"I got a cousin in construction," Joe-Bill replied. "His crew was takin' down that mansion that burned last week. He had the door in his garage, lookin' to sell it."
"LaFiamma ain't seen this yet, has he?"
"Nope," Joe-Bill shook his head. "Joanne snagged him soon as he got in. He's been chained up indoors doin' homework since he got here. Furthest he's been from his desk all day is the outhouse, ain't even had lunch."
Esteban consulted the clipboard in his hand. "And you, amigo, are just about the last name on the list. It's time for the big reveal."
Lundy sighed. 'Why me? Why oh why oh why me?' "I'll get him." He hoped his arrival into the building would go unnoticed until he reached LaFiamma's desk. He'd forgotten how long he'd known Annie Hartung.
"A diller, a dollar, a ten o'clock scholar, what makes you come so soon? You used to come at ten o'clock, and now you come at noon!" Annie grinned widely at his weary grin.
"Thanks a lot, Annie, Just be grateful I didn't shoot those damn truck drivers. The one hauling the tanker knew damn well what he was carrying."
Being far enough away not to have heard Annie, Joe still looked up in surprise as Levon rapped on his desk. "Wow, I wasn't expecting to see you until tomorrow."
"Or Monday sometime, huh?" Lundy nodded his head in the direction of the door. "Somethin' you need to see outside." As Joe pushed away from his desk, so did almost everyone else. By the time they got outside, they were leading a parade.
"WHERE THE HELL IS MY CAR?!? WHAT HAVE YOU HILLBILLIES DONE TO MY CAR?!?"
To LaFiamma's eyes, his beloved Cobra was buried under a mountain of ... boxing gloves? Joe-Bill held out an envelope full of Polaroids like a magic talisman. "Your car's fine, Joe! Esteban measured it all out, nothin's gonna happen to the car!"
LaFiamma snatched the envelope with a snarl, flipping through the pictures. Standing behind and to one side, Lundy watched the tension and anger fade from LaFiamma's shoulders. Finally the other man chuckled, tossing the envelope back to Joe-Bill.
"Okay, I guess I can live with that. Just ... why boxing gloves? Can't be my stellar personality after all this time, you'd have done it years ago."
Even Annie and Joanne couldn't hold back the laughter. "Rumor has it you were on a date last night?" Annie queried. At Joe's nod, she continued. "The White Sox are in Arlington, playing the Rangers. Last night was Nolan Ryan's turn to pitch." She paused at Lundy's muttered "Aw, damn," knowing how he hated missing seeing the local son pitch, no matter what uniform he wore. "'Long about the third inning, he drilled Robin Ventura, who decided to take exception and charge the mound."
LaFiamma groaned. "Ventura, you dumbass. Everybody knows Ryan's into martial arts!"
"That goes back to when he was pitchin' here for the Astros," Lundy interjected. "They went out to San Diego to play the Padres, and he got charged by Dave Winfield."
"He got about two steps from the mound and his brain finally kicked in." Joe-Bill picked up the tale. "He caught himself and pulled up, like 'Wait, what in the Hell am I DOIN'?' but it was too late. Nolan had him. Took him around the neck like Lundy would with a steer at brandin' time and just started beatin' on him."
"Ventura got ejected from the game but Ryan didn't." Esteban finished. "So Chicago's manager started arguing that, and he got tossed!"
Joe snorted at that. "If Gene Lamont had a brain he'd be dangerous." He looked at the castle of boxes of boxing gloves. "What, every cop in Greater Houston got in on this? And you put it all together since last night?"
"Motivation and determination, hermano. Motivation and determination. And likely a healthy dose of your charming reputation."
"Yeah, right."
"I should think a better question would be, what are you going to do with them all?" Joanne fixed LaFiamma with a direct look.
"Donate them, of course," he shot back. "The guy who owns the gym where I work out will think I'm royalty when I show up with all of this. He's trying to start a boxing tourney for underprivileged kids, one of the stumbling blocks is they never have enough equipment."
Joanne nodded. "I'll call over to Mounted, have Patty-Lynn come back with her trailer."
"Wait," LaFiamma looked over at Vaughan, one of the guys from Vice. "You keep art supplies for your kids in your desk, right?"
"Sure do," the other man replied. "What you need?"
"Paper and markers. I want to make a sign, have someone take a picture of me, the sign and this -- " he chucked a thumb at the castle of boxing gloves. "And I'll send it to Ventura. There still film in that Polaroid?"
"Nah, we used the last of it," Esteban replied. "Lo siento, Annie." Annie shrugged it off.
Joanne shook her head. "I've got an Instamatic in my desk, go make your sign." She scanned the assembled crowd. "Don't the rest of you have anything else to do?"
Laughing at the success of a prank well pulled, everyone trundled back inside.
The sign was done in red and green, the colors of the Italian flag (Robin Ventura also being Italian) and read 'Grazie Mille, Robin!' Joe had also drawn reasonable facsimiles of his Chicago and Houston badges, just so Ventura would know, and written a letter explaining what the ballplayer's momentary brain freeze had led to.
Later, as they enjoyed an early dinner at Chicken's, Lundy had to know. "You ever gonna tell 'em you're a Cubs fan?"
Joe shook his head. "Some things transcend team loyalty. Stupidity of the magnitude that Ventura displayed, he didn't just embarrass himself, he didn't just embarrass the White Sox. He embarrassed the entire city of Chicago. And for a prank like that to be pulled together and pulled off so quickly and so well? Partner, I'm actually proud to wear this one."
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By Monday, August 9th, a memo had been dispersed to every police and fire station in Greater Houston. From there it spread through Texas, and as late as 2015, a copy was spotted pinned to a bulletin board in a police gym as far away as Honolulu. And forever after (in Houston at least) 'Boxing Gloves' came to mean successfully pulling off the impossible on a second's notice.
Rules for 'Boxing Gloves'
Sgt. Joseph A. LaFiamma, Houston Police Department, Major Crimes Division
Sunday 8 August 1993
Since I'm the first person this was done to, I'm reserving the right to lay down a few ground rules. Here goes:
1. Your average everyday unforced error doesn't count. Everyone has their off days. To qualify for 'Boxing Gloves', the bonehead move in question has to be solidly between "What were you thinking?" and "Were you even thinking?"
2. The bonehead in question must not be a rookie in his/her chosen field. Rookies are expected to not have two brain cells to rub together. Remember, you were one once, and you didn't know what you didn't know.
3. The bonehead move in question must not result in death. Stupid Human Tricks are funny, Death is not. Never forget that our day often doesn't start until someone else's ends. Permanently.
4. Any damage incurred to the vehicle of the 'Glovee' will be paid for by the 'Glovers'. There's nothing bad guys like more than cops having a civil war over something stupid.
5. Whatever vehicle is being 'Gloved', make sure the 'Glovee' and his/her partner have another vehicle available at all times. For this reason, cruisers may not be 'Gloved'. We need those.
6. Whatever is henceforth used as 'Boxing Gloves', try to make sure it's something that can easily be donated to charity once the 'Glovee' has accepted his/her lumps.
7. Keep it family friendly. Don't use anything for 'Boxing Gloves' you wouldn't want your Great-Aunt Minnie hearing about at church.
8. Personal attacks on the 'Glovee's' family -- or partner, if said 'Glovee' is in K9/Mounted -- are forbidden. Always remember to think how you'd feel.
9. Rank does not equal exemption. Brass can (and should!) be 'Gloved'. Never hurts to remind than that they too walked a beat once.
10. To all potential 'Glovees': Remember, it's all in good fun. Your Brothers & Sisters in Blue rag because we love. Accept your 'Boxing Gloves' in the spirit of camaraderie and good humor they're intended. (That being said, it is permissible to keep a notebook of who 'Gloved' you last. Just to keep track.)
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