The boy, only 6, turned to his father as he prepared to write a personal message to Jose Fernandez on the makeshift Wall of Remembrance outside Marlins Park.
“How do you spell love?” he asked.
You spell it the way the Miami Marlins did Monday night.
You spell it in ways large and small, such as the No. 16 every Marlins player wore — and which no Marlins player will ever wear again.
You spell it with a moment of silence and hugs shared by each Marlins player with each Mets player. With a fairytale leadoff home run by the Marlins’ Dee Gordon, who was overcome with emotion.
You spell it with a pregame team gathering at the mound Jose Fernandez commanded with fire and joy. And you spell it with your index finger, as each Marlins player did, inscribing their personal messages to Jose in that mound.
“Rest with God,” one player wrote.
A day earlier, they were jolted awake with news that Fernandez, their 24-year-old spark plug, had been killed with two friends in a boating accident off Miami Beach.
A night earlier, instead of playing a game, the entire team was bused to the Fernandez family home for an excruciating 45 minutes, trying to find comforting words for a family but knowing no such words exist.
How do you play a game a day after that? One way is the way the Marlins did, blowing out the New York Mets by taking a 5-0 lead in the first two innings. Gordon sparked it while wearing Fernandez’s batting helmet, according to Fox Sports Florida.
But how much relief could it possibly be at a time when manager Don Mattingly said the objective was simply, “just get through the day.”
Everyone wondered how. Owner Jeffrey Loria mentioned Roberto Clemente, Lou Gehrig, Thurman Munson — baseball tragedies that never healed.
“And sadly Jose,” he said.
Loria made it clear Fernandez’s No. 16 will be retired.
“Nobody’s going to wear it, I can tell you that now,” he said. “Nobody will wear that number again.”
Loria called this his “lowest moment.” Someone asked if he’d feel any differently if it were a blood relative.
“It wouldn’t feel any different whatsoever,” he said softly.
He recalled the phone call from team President David Samson on Sunday morning:
“Jose’s been killed.”
“What? What?”
Loria was in New York, sitting in the same chair he once sat in when he fielded another call with bad news.
“That chair is gone now,” he said. “That chair left the house yesterday.”
A few feet away, Scott Boras, Fernandez’s agent, recalled getting his phone call when it was 4:30 a.m. in California before hopping on a plane.
“When you get here it hits …,” Boras said, breaking down.
Mattingly, too, was glassy-eyed in meeting with reporters before the game. Visiting the Fernandez family, he said, had taken him back in time.
“Watching his mom and grandmother yesterday reminded me of my brother, who was killed at 23, when I was like 6 years old,” Mattingly said. “And they shielded me. I was not really a part of all that, what was going on. But now I know what was going on. So I knew the pain.”
The visit was “unspeakable,” Samson said.
“You walk into that house and there was a hole,” he said. “I’m not a spiritual man. It felt like there was a hole above the house and it had taken Jose to heaven and left his people wondering, ‘Where did that hole come from?’”
Fernandez’s services are pending but likely to be at a church near the ballpark on Thursday and open to the public, Samson said. The team is off Thursday and the players “will certainly be able to attend,” he said.
Samson and Loria made it clear the Marlins will map out a long-term plan to honor Fernandez. For now, they will wear a patch on their uniforms beginning Tuesday night.
Outside the ballpark, fans silently and patiently stood in line, waiting to sign the Wall of Remembrance. They included 6-year-old Luis Cruz Jr., who asked his father how to spell love in his message to Fernandez, who lived two blocks down.
Anthony Perez-Florido of Pinecrest quietly added flowers to a growing stack.
“Most of us come from a Cuban background, and this guy told the exact story — what we suffered, what our ancestors suffered through,” said Perez-Florido, who at 24 is the same age as Fernandez. “He almost had to sacrifice his life in order to get here to the United States and he found freedom here, finally.”
All Cubans could relate, Perez-Florido added.
“Any problem you had in the world, when you came out to the ballpark it’s Jose Day, it was the happiest day in the world,” he said.
Monday was the saddest.
It began with a moment of silence. As it concluded, Mets manager Terry Collins embraced Mattingly. Players took the cue, the teams lining up, somewhat like postgame handshakes in the NHL playoffs, except handshakes wouldn’t do. Each Met hugged each Marlin, patting him on the back in the process. A video tribute played.
After players held what appeared to be a group prayer and wrote on the mound, the public address played the Furious 7 song, “See You Again.”
Fitting all the Marlins with No. 16 required the approval of Major League Baseball, then a race against time. The uniform company in Philadelphia worked through the night, flying them down just in time, with “FERNANDEZ” on the back of each.
The evening was toned down. Between innings, soft music played as the center-field video board displayed images of Fernandez, seemingly always grinning, interspersed with tweets and shots of fans holding signs in tribute. Players chose special walk-up music Fernandez liked.
Memories? Everybody had them. Once composed, Boras mentioned how he used to tease Fernandez for having a better earned-run average at home than on the road. He used to tell Fernandez, “I’m going to take your mother on the road, because your ERA is a run and a half lower when she’s in the stadium.”
Loria remembered taking a young Fernandez shopping for something to hold his electronic toys on the road.
“We’re going to get you the roller bags you need so you look like a major-league baseball player,” Loria recalled saying. “We went, and to his credit, he didn’t want the most expensive one there. I had to insist on it.”
Stories helped ease the pain. Although he wasn’t specific, Mattingly said players have “all kinds of resources” to cope. He held a team meeting, during which time there were 38 grown men, all crying, Samson said.
“They’re a unit that lost a leg, an appendage,” Samson said. “And they’re trying to figure out how to get mobile again.”
The shock was still too fresh, the pain too raw, for Samson, who would not refer to Fernandez in the past tense. Maybe time will help.
“Next year, you’re going to see celebrations of his life,” Samson said. “But it’s nothing to celebrate today. There’s just crying. There’s tears. There’s questioning. There’s people trying to figure it out.
“There will be time to celebrate his life. And we will celebrate it.
“There’s a lot to celebrate.”
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