Like most American tales, this one begins with baseball. The unusual sight of an entirely left-handed battery on an otherwise empty diamond; father catching son. A splitter—fast and cutting—fools the father as the bottom drops out of its trajectory and right onto his toe, causing a small amount of blood to pool under the nail. After some hobbling and a few muttered curse words in Tagalog, he turns to the son and apologetically calls it a day. “That was a good pitch, anak,” he says.
