Perpetual Check (2 page)

“You win?”

Zeke shakes his head. “I screwed up my serve and got bounced in the first round because my wrist was sore as hell.”

“That's a shame,” Pramod says with an obvious touch of sarcasm. “I guess you would have won it all.”

“I might have. I would have at least advanced a couple of rounds.”

Pramod yawns widely without covering his mouth. “Yeah, well, I guess I ought to get some sleep,” he says. “I probably need to be fully awake by noon.”

He's seeded second and doesn't expect to be tested until at least the semifinals.

Zeke will need to be fully awake by nine, on the other hand. None of these matches will be easy for him, but he thinks he can work his way through the bracket and upset some people. The guys he beat earlier tonight were pretty competitive.

“You'd get Buddy Malone in the semis, huh?” Zeke asks, not quite wanting to leave yet.

Pramod gives a dismissive laugh. “Malone. I'm not even
thinking
about him.”

“He beat me a few weeks ago,” Zeke says, shaking his head.

“Yeah, well, you aren't me.” Pramod tosses his cup into the trash basket and grins. “He did beat me once. That was a year ago, at least. Not since.”

“Where else did you play him?”

“I don't know. Tournaments. Be sure the door shuts behind you.” Pramod strips off his shorts as he's crawling into bed.

“Okay. See you tomorrow,” Zeke says.

The hallway is deserted. Zeke starts walking toward the elevator and slips his hand into his pocket again for the room key, but it isn't there. He checks his wallet, but he knows it isn't there either.

Shit.
They signed release forms saying they'd be in their rooms by midnight. He can't go to the front desk for a new key.

The truth is, Zeke hadn't realized that the card thing
was
a key. He thought it was a credit card to use for room service. He also didn't realize that the door would lock automatically when he closed it.

He takes the elevator down one flight and tries his door handle, but it won't open. So he pounds on the door across the hall to get his little brother out of bed.

TWO
Beneath Her

Randy had said virtually nothing on the way over in the car that afternoon. He just sat in the back and listened to Zeke and their father go on about strategy and pressure and being remorseless to an opponent.

“These chess people, they'll fold up against an athlete like you,” Mr. Mansfield said to Zeke. He cleared his throat and added—a comment Randy was certain was aimed at him— that “these thinkers are basically soft, you see. They might know the game a little better than you do, but when you turn up the heat, they'll run back to their books. You've got to
finish,
you know? Wear them down psychologically. Show them what it's like to be in the crunch zone.”

Zeke just kept nodding, looking confident. Randy stared at trucks as his father sped past them on Route 81. He read the billboards for Applebee's and Scranton Toyota and Mercy Hospital. He stared at the leather upholstery on the back of the driver's seat.

“We're just as smart as any of these chess geeks,” Mr. Mansfield was saying. “But our major advantage is our toughness. Nobody knocks us down; and when they do, we get up and belt ‘em in the teeth.”

Randy winced and checked his own front teeth with his thumb. Zeke'd given him a sharp elbow to the mouth a few days ago. Zeke was doing the dishes, and Randy bent over to toss a banana peel into the garbage can beneath the sink.

“Totally inadvertent,” said Mr. Mansfield, who witnessed the whole thing. “Wise up, Randy. Don't put your head where it doesn't belong.”

Randy wakes up suddenly, unsure where that pounding is coming from or even where he is. He reaches for his glasses and remembers that he's in a hotel room and one of the idiots from the tournament is trying to get him up.

He opens the door to his brother.

“What do you want?” Randy says.

“I gotta crash here. I lost my key.”

Randy shakes his head but opens the door farther. “What time is it?” he asks, rubbing one eye with his finger.

“I don't even know.”

Randy sighs audibly. “Were you drinking?”

“Some. What do you care?”

“I don't.” Randy climbs back into bed, the one nearer the door.

Zeke flops onto the other bed and turns on the light. He frowns at the photo on the table between the beds—Randy's girlfriend, Dina.

Dina's at the house all the time, but Zeke's never even acknowledged her.

“How the hell did you lose your key?” Randy asks.

“I don't know. I guess I left it in my room.”

Randy rolls over and presses the pillow against his ear. “Can you shut the light?” he says.

Zeke turns it off. “What time did you go to sleep?” he asks.

“Who knows? I watched the news at eleven. Then I was abook for a few minutes. After that.”

“You were a
book
? What the hell does that mean?”

“I wasn't
a
book,” Randy says. “I was reading.
Abook.
It's an adverb. Like aboard a train. Aloft in the air. Abook.”

“That's not even a word.”

“Well, it should be.”

Randy loves making up words, especially since it annoys his brother.

They're quiet for several minutes. Finally, Zeke says, “I thought I won pretty easily tonight. Both matches.”

“The early rounds
should
be easy,” Randy says.

“Not for everybody. I mean, three-quarters of the field are already gone, so it wasn't easy for them. Everybody I played was supposedly as good as I was or better.”

“Yeah,” Randy says. “I forgot you didn't get seeded.”

“Sure you did.”

“I
did
forget.”

“Believe me, getting seeded makes a
big
difference. Unseeded players are always at a disadvantage, whether they deserve to be or not.”

“We still have to win the games,” Randy says.

“Yeah, but you start out with an
expectation.”

“We
earned
it.”

“Well, don't go getting a big head about it like these other guys,” Zeke says. “Pramod thinks he's such hot shit. And Jenna or whatever her name is—the top seed—she wouldn't even play poker with us. Acted like we were all so far beneath her.”

“She told me she was too sleepy to play.”

“When did
you
talk to her?”

“After dinner,” Randy says. “In the lobby.”

“For how long?”

“I don't know. Maybe twenty minutes.”

“Twenty minutes?” Zeke says. “What could you possibly have twenty minutes of stuff to talk to her about?”

“I don't know. Classic rock. She likes Dylan. The Grateful Dead. Tracy Chapman.”

“Who?”

“Some singer.”

After dinner, Randy had found Jenna leaning against the wall outside a room on the third floor, talking to Buddy Malone. The door was propped open with somebody's suitcase, and
Randy could see about a half dozen guys in there setting up for a poker game, including Zeke. He was hoping Zeke wouldn't be there, but it was a moot point anyway, since Randy didn't have any money to buy into the game.

“You guys playing?” Randy asked.

“Probably not,” said Malone, a tall guy with frizzy red hair and a scruffy goatee. “It's already after ten and I'm beat.”

Jenna wiggled her mouth and looked like she was thinking it over. “I think I'll pass,” she said. “You?”

“Can't,” Randy said. “No cash. No big deal, though. My brother is pretty much the last guy I'd want to get in a poker game with.”

“Because he's too good?” Jenna asked.

“Because he's toxic.”

Jenna laughed. “Which one is he?”

Randy peered around the door and jutted his chin toward the poker game. “That one. Dark curly hair.”

“Oh.” She nodded. “He's pretty cute.”

Randy shrugged. “Looks are deceiving.”

“You two look different.”

Randy is on the pudgy side and only five foot six—which is actually a half inch taller than Zeke—with freckles and no facial hair yet. Could easily pass for a seventh grader, even though he's in ninth. He gets his dominant features from their mother; Zeke is lean and wiry and looks much more like their dad.

Malone looked at his watch and yawned. “I'll see you guys tomorrow,” he said. He caught Randy's eye. “Your brother almost beat me a couple of weeks ago. But I hear you're better than he is.”

“Heard right,” Randy said. “
He
doesn't think so, but the record speaks for itself.”

There was a lot of laughing and cursing coming from the poker game. Jenna frowned and asked Randy if he'd liked to go down to the lobby and talk.

“Sure.”
All these guys her age here and she wants to hang out with
me
?

They started walking down the hallway but turned back when they heard a loud crash from the poker room.

Pramod stuck his head out the door and grinned at Jenna. “A lamp broke,” he said, shoving the suitcase back into the room with his foot.

“Just like that, huh?”

Pramod smirked and laughed. “Spontaneously… Why aren't you in here, gorgeous?”

“Too tired,” she said. “Big day tomorrow.”

“This your servant?” Pramod asked, pointing at Randy. He didn't wait for an answer. “I can blow off this card game, if you're looking for a companion. If you need a massage or something.”

Jenna frowned. “I don't think so. You better go clean up that lamp.”

“They got it under control. I'll be in room 407 later if you change your mind. Call anytime; I'll come running.”

She turned and started walking. “Don't hold your breath.”

Downstairs, she took a seat on a leather couch in the lobby and folded one knee over the other. She was still wearing the beige skirt she wore to dinner; most of the others had put on jeans or sweats for the evening.

Randy had worn a black Guns n’ Roses T-shirt to the
dinner, and Zeke told him he was pathetic. But it hadn't occurred to Randy to bring anything dressier.

“You into classic rock?” Jenna asked, pointing to the shirt.

“Absolutely,” Randy said. “My brother hates it, so I blast it as much as possible.”

“You don't like him very much, huh?”

Randy rolled his eyes and folded his arms across his chest. “He never gives me a chance to.”

Randy flicks on the light, climbs out of bed, and walks over to the window. The clock says 1:56. He glances out at downtown Scranton—the gray piles of old snow around the courthouse square, the dim lights of the storefronts, the ancient Electric City neon sign atop a building across the way.

“So what else did Jenna want to know?” Zeke asks.

“What do you mean?”

“She knows she'll probably wind up playing me in the fourth round. Was she asking you about my game or something?”

“No. You never came up.”

“I bet,” Zeke says.

“Don't be a jerk. Like I'd give away your game to her?”

“Well, she must have had some motive for talking to you.”

“Maybe she was just being friendly.”

“Watch what you say if she comes up to you tomorrow.”

Randy doesn't respond. He walks past the beds to the bathroom and brushes his teeth again. Dinner was garlicky and he can still taste it.