The Tony Pena Story

Here's Joe Posnanski's Tony Pena story. It originally ran in the Kansas City Star back in 2003. Joe reprinted it on his blog in 2010:

On the road to Villa Vasquez, Tony Pena cried, not for the first time that day and not for the last.

"No," he said. "Not that story. I will not tell that story."

His Mercedes raced through dust and bugs and waves of heat, past emptiness.

Nobody lives on the road to Villa Vasquez. It is too hot and too dry. They say that when revolutionaries were killed — in the Dominican Republic, revolutionaries were often killed — their bodies were buried here.

They say that at night, you hear ghosts.

"Not that story," Pena said again. He shook his head. "I will tell you everything. But not that story. Some things, the heart cannot bear to hear."

He stared through the windshield ahead and did not talk for a moment. The silence was unlike him. Pena cannot bear quiet. He has always needed noise in his life — music, applause, laughter, bat cracks, glove pops, cheers, whistles, chatter, snores, the ringing of cell phones. Pena has three cell phones. When one does not ring for even a short while — a rare occurrence — he instinctively checks to make sure it works.

"No," he said again, and then "No" again to fill the silence. Tears trickled from beneath his sunglasses. His hands tightened on the steering wheel, and blood rushed to his fingertips. He pushed the car even faster. The cactuses blurred past. After a while, a small shack appeared. Another. A farmer. A goat. We had reached Villa Vasquez. The ghosts were behind us.

"Now," Pena said, his tears already dried, "I will show you where it all began."