Nature of the Game

by James Grady

  “I’m from about as far away from the ocean as you can get,” she said as they left a public parking lot at Redondo Beach.

  “Where’s that?” asked Nick.

  “Nebraska.” She giggled. “Lorri Lane from Nebraska. What a hick. Sounds like Superman’s girlfriend.”

  “How’d you meet Jud?”

  “I was working in a hair-cutting place in Santa Monica. Answering phones, appointments. He was still working for that lock company then, and he came in to change the locks….”

  She shrugged.

  “He was funny. Nice. And he wouldn’t take no for an answer. Kept me from doing dumb things. I used to like pills. Jud … He took care of me. Pulled me out of that.”

  Lorri cocked her head. “There’s never any … It’s like he always knows. He’s never stuck. Or lost.”

  She lit a cigarette before they reached the beach.

  “Forget about me being able to quit,” she said.

  “I didn’t say anything.”

  “Good.” And she laughed. “There’s the ocean.”

  Rolling gray-green waves, only a handful of people on the sand that chilly workday afternoon.

  “Jud says he fell for you the first time he saw you.”

  “Well …” She shrugged. “Guess I just got lucky. We laugh a lot. He’s real smart. Stronger than anyone I ever met.

  “I don’t mean just his muscles,” she said.

  “I know,” Nick told her.

  “Did he really do all those things?” she asked.

  “All what things?”

  “Come on,” she said, “I won’t rat on you to him.” She let Nick struggle for an answer, then laughed. “Never mind. He’s your buddy, right? He says you understand him better than anybody but me, which is good, I guess, ’cause I don’t understand about all that Washington stuff.”

  “Most people don’t.”

  “Hey,” she said, “don’t shine me to be nice. I only got out of high school, but I’m not that dumb.”

  “Who said you were dumb?”

  “Some people think so.”

  “They’re wrong.”

  “Yeah. Yeah.” She smiled to the ocean. “I got out of Nebraska, didn’t I?”

  “Why here?”

  “Here’s got an ocean.” She lost her smile. “Better chance of being somebody here. Sure certain of being nobody in Nebraska. Being nothing. Or what they let you be.”

  “Who do you want to be?”

  She laughed. “How the hell should I know?”

  He laughed with her. They walked closer to the water.

  “People back home thought I was beautiful.”

  “You are.”

  “Yeah, well, big deal. Here I am. I was going to …” She cocked her face and grinned, clicked an imaginary camera at Nick. “Pictures, you know? Hollywood.”

  She stared at the sea. “I saw the smog, realized I’d never even find the doors. Wouldn’t know what to do if I got inside. Other than that, there were just more of the same offers I got in Nebraska. Same guys, only they didn’t drive pickups or wear caps. But the weather’s better, and there’s the ocean.”

  “And then you met Jud.”

  “Yeah,” she said. Smiled. “Then I met Jud.

  “Hey!” She laughed, fishing a Polaroid out of her purse. “I’m in Hollywood! Take my picture!”

  The night before, she’d snapped a shot of Jud and Nick, buddies sitting side by side on a red couch.

  Nick took the camera. For a moment, they were making history or art or at least entertainment. Film professionals. He struck a firm stance. She twirled around on the sand between him and the sea, her chestnut hair floating like waves, snapping around just so as she gave a smile to the magic dark eye: not sultry, not taunting, not slick or impersonally perfect. A face of a beautiful girl who’d not been born by these waters.

  Click.

  A minute later, the camera rolled out a warm snapshot.

  “It’s great,” he said.

  “What should we do with it?” she asked, looking at Nick.

  “Give it to Jud,” he answered. “Surprise him with it.”

  “Yeah,” she said after a heartbeat. “He’ll love it.”

  Years later, sitting in his Washington office, Nick wondered, Where are those pictures now?

  And where’s Lorri?

  When your life breaks apart, you stumble back to where it all started, call it home, call it whatever; if you can get there, you go back to where you used to be whole.

  Nebraska.

  Nick took an atlas off his shelf, turned to the map in the middle of the book. The state was white, with red and green and black roads and a thousand towns.

  And he remembered: Night. Jud and Lorri’s L.A. condo. Jud out. Helping Lorri with her new job, lugging a hanging garment bag into the living room, unzipping it to count and bundle three-quarters of a million dollars in fifties and hundreds, cram the lesser bills in the chump-change drawer in the kitchen. They’d smoked a joint, which made their math something to double-check again and again. Laughing, she told him she was from …

  “… a piss-ant place so south of Lincoln it’s almost in Kansas.”

  She told him the name, and stoned, he went, “Hey!” and told her there was an author who had that same name.

  Whatever it was.

  In his office, Nick put his finger on the capital of the Cornhusker State, scanned the white space below it, tiny circles labeled Crete, Cortland, Tecumseh …

  Conrad.

  That part of Nebraska was a 402 area code. The operator told Nick there were three Lanes listed in Conrad: Byron, Mary, and Jack. No Lorri, no L.

  Nick looked at his watch: noon hour in Nebraska.

  Mary’s line was busy. Nobody home at Byron’s. A man answered, “Yeah?” at Jack’s after the third ring. Nick heard kids screaming in the background, a woman yelling, television.

  “I’m calling long distance,” said Nick: so take me seriously, help me. I’m looking for a friend of mine, Lorri Lane. She used to live in Conrad.”

  “You lookin’ to get money out of her, you’re out of luck, and I ain’t pickin’ up no more of her tabs.”

  Big family, Lorri had told Nick. All boys. My uncles and brothers used to knock me around some. Nothing special.

  “She doesn’t owe me anything,” Nick told the man. “I just need to talk to her. Can you tell me where she is?”

  “She’s here.”

  “Living with you?”

  “I ain’t that dumb, mister…. Shut up or I’ll knock you on your ass!… Don’t mind that: kids. You know.”

  “Yeah,” said Nick, picturing the scene he could only hear. “Where’s Lorri?”

  “Lives in that dickhead Jensen’s trailer out east o’ town. Day or night, you want her, she’s there, though you won’t find a line at her door these days.”

  “Does she have a phone?”

  “How the hell else can welfare make sure to send her checks? ’Sides, she’s gotta call Grearson’s, get ’em to deliver her macaroni and wine …. I told you to shut up!”

  Over the phone line, Nick heard the smack of a blow, a small boy’s scream turning to a wail that ran from the room.

  “Look, I ain’t got all day. You want her number?”

  He rattled off four digits: in Conrad, prefixes weren’t necessary.

  It took fifteen minutes for Nick to dial the eleven digits on his phone. It took six rings for her to answer.

  “Hello?” The woman’s voice was hoarse, timid.

  “Lorri? It’s Nick.”

  “Hello?” In the background, the TV volume faded.

  “Nick Kelley. The writer from Washington. Remember?”

  “Ohhh!” Soft. Happy. “Nick! Nick! I know you! How are you? Are you here? Are you coming over? What—

  “Did he tell you?” she screamed. “Does he know where I am? He told you! What does he want? I’m not here! I’m not—”

  “Nobody told me anything!” Nick yelled ove
r her panic. “Nobody. Just you. I remembered what you told me, about Nebraska, being from Conrad, the ocean.”

  “The ocean,” she said, calmer. “Yes, I remember, too.

  “But he doesn’t know where I am.” Calmer, colder.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Good,” she said. “Good. I don’t think so. Good.”

  Nick heard the rasp of a farmer’s match, the sigh of a cigarette lit.

  “So … How are you?” asked Nick.

  “I’m fine,” said Lorri.

  “I got married,” he blurted out. “I have a baby. A son.”

  “A baby,” she whispered. “A baby.”

  “I know about … the divorce.”

  “I’m not going back, I’m not, I can’t,” she chanted. “No.”

  “Nobody will make you.”

  “You won’t tell anyone, will you?”

  “No,” promised Nick. “No.”

  “Why … why did you call? Did … Did you miss me?”

  “I remember the good times,” he told her.

  “Were they?” She laughed.

  “How are you living?”

  “Oh, you know.” He heard her swallow. “After I got out of the last place, I just … ended up back here.”

  She laughed. “I knew the way. I knew the rules.”

  “There was this guy,” she said, “other guys but then Paul, Paul Jensen … This is his trailer, he … We … Well, what the hell, right? It didn’t work out either.”

  Her laugh turned into a cough, a choke.

  “Don’t worry,” she gasped. “You sign enough papers saying you’re sick, they send you money in the mail. Long as you don’t get better, everything’s all right.

  “Just a minute,” she said, put the phone down on a table.

  Nick her heard footsteps fade, come back. Something clunked on the wood next to the receiver in Nebraska. He heard a plastic snap, liquid splashing. He saw his reflection in the window of his office and felt like throwing up.

  “Back again,” Lorri said into the phone. Another rasp of a match, drawn breath. “Another guy that did the Casper. Remember? Jud used to call it doing the Casper ’cause there was this cartoon, see, and the friendly ghost’s name was—”

  “I remember,” said Nick.

  “Long as I remember to keep some money for the phone, don’t have to go nowhere. I got a roof. I know the rules.”

  “That’s good, Lorri.”

  “Why did you call, Nick? We couldn’t go to your wedding.”

  “I’m looking for Jud. I thought—”

  “I don’t know where he is! I told you I don’t know and I don’t want to know or who he is! Needles or wet sheets or shock machines or nothing’s gonna make me know anything! Don’t tell me! Don’t tell him! Who the hell are you, huh? Who the hell?”

  “Lorri, if Jud calls—”

  “Don’t let him! Don’t let him get me!”

  “He won’t get you, Lorri. You know he wouldn’t hurt you.”

  “Who hurts who? Huh? How does it work?”

  “Lorri, I don’t think he’ll come see you. But he might call you soon. If he does, I need you to promise me something.”

  “No! If he calls, he’ll … Promise you?”

  “Please, it’s important.”

  “You always were important, Nick. You were real, too.”

  “If he calls, if you talk to Jud, promise me you’ll tell him I need to talk to him. Please, Lorri: promise me.”

  “Promise?” He heard laughter, he heard sobs. “Promise you, Nick? Yeah, okay, I can do that. I can promise.”

  “Thank you! Thanks, I … Lorri?”

  “Huh?”

  “Is there … Do you need … Is there anything I can do?”

  “Anything you can do.” Her flat voice trailed off into silence. A long time passed. He heard her smoking, the rattle of an ashtray.

  Then she said, “No, Nick, there’s nothing you can do.”

  DANCE WITH AN ANGEL

  One look at the house and Wes knew he’d found the right place.

  The house was one of ten thousand ordinary houses in a Los Angeles neighborhood known for its ordinary houses. The roof was faded black, the white walls were peeling. Patches of sick grass and packed dirt made up the front yard. A driveway ran along one side of the house. Back by the open garage, a man wearing a denim shirt and jeans tinkered with a motorcycle.

  Dean Jacobsen, thought Wes. Nick Kelley didn’t call you because you’re a movie mogul or a book publisher.

  Despite his excitement, Wes yawned. Beth had kissed him twice when she dropped him at Washington’s Dulles airport.

  “Once for luck, once for me,” she’d said, laughed and driven his car back to their apartment building.

  Wes dozed fitfully as the plane carried him westward through the night. He’d dreamed warm dreams of yellow light. In L.A., he rented a car and drove over streets he’d left what seemed like years before, though it had been less than two days.

  B.B., he thought. Before Beth.

  When Wes parked his car across the street from the right house, the man didn’t stop working on the motorcycle. He didn’t look like the pictures of Jud Stuart.

  A raindrop splattered on Wes’s windshield. Gray clouds rolled across the sky, absorbing the city’s smog. A chilly gust of wind rocked the car. Wes thought about putting on his trench coat, left it on the backseat and climbed out.

  No one was visible through the house’s windows.

  In the wind, Wes heard the babble of daytime TV. A little girl on a tricycle peddled along the sidewalk; she dinged the bell on her handlebars.

  Wes crossed the street, walked up the driveway.

  “Excuse me!” he called to the man working on the motorcycle. “Are you Mr. Dean Jacobsen?”

  “Who are you?” said the man. He was as tall as Wes and heavier in the chest. Dirty-blond hair. He held a wrench.

  “I’m a lawyer,” answered Wes. “Are you Dean Jacobsen?”

  “Why?”

  “It’s okay,” said Wes, “this isn’t about you.”

  The man’s bright eyes swept the driveway.

  “Seems like it’s just you and me.” His grin was slow and thin. “So I’ll be Dean.”

  He didn’t put down the wrench.

  “I’m an attorney.” Wes held out his laminated American Bar Association card. The card confirmed only that Wes was a member. As Dean glanced at it, Wes said, “I’ve got good news.”

  “No lawyer has good news.”

  A woman raised a window of the house next door. They looked at her. She shut the window, lowered her shade.

  “A friend of yours has come into an inheritance,” said Wes. “But we’re having trouble locating him, and we hoped you might know where he is.”

  “What makes you think I’ve got a friend?”

  “My colleague got your name from someone who knows the two of you. I think it was a woman.”

  “You gotta be careful with the women you believe,” said Dean. “Where you from?”

  “Pennsylvania.” Wes had a Bar membership card from that state that didn’t show his place of employment.

  “Who’s this friend you think I got?”

  “A man named Jud Stuart.”

  “Oh.”

  An icy water pellet hit Wes’s shirt. The sky above the garage churned with pregnant gray clouds.

  “I just need to talk to him,” said Wes. “Let him know about the inheritance. Straighten out a few details.”

  “Who died?”

  “I’m sorry, that’s confidential.”

  Dean laughed. He tossed the wrench into a tool chest.

  “You’re lucky and smart, Wesley,” said Dean with a grin. He looked around his neighborhood; at the house where the woman had drawn the shade. The wind stirred trash in his garage. From across the street came the dinging of a tricycle bell.

  “How so?” asked Wes.

  “Smart, because like you said, Jud’s my friend. And luck
y, ’cause I’m on my way to meet him. Now.”

  Don’t let him slip away! Wes thought. He said, “I’ll come along. Save everybody trouble. Get him the good news.”

  Dean smiled. “If that’s what you want.”

  “We’ll take my car,” said Wes.

  “I’ll go inside and get my jacket.”

  A maroon windbreaker dangled from the fence. Wes pointed to it. “What’s that?”

  “Ah.” Dean shook his head. “How’d I forget?”

  Dean slid into the jacket, put the toolbox in the gaping garage. He pulled down the heavy overhead door with one hand.

  “Let’s go riding in the car-car,” said Dean.

  On the freeway, Wes asked, “Where are we going?”

  “Just far enough,” said Dean.

  From the first freeway to a second. Traffic was light.

  “Where are we going?” Wes asked again.

  “A public place. A safe place. Jud is a cautious man.”

  “He’s just a name to me,” said Wes. “What’s he like?”

  “He’s the man,” whispered Dean. “He is the man. Others pretend, he is. He knows.”

  “What does he know?”

  “The big secret.” Dean smiled.

  “What’s that?” asked Wes, his heart racing.

  Dean’s black eyes pulled back from the windshield; fire danced in them as they turned and touched Wes.

  “Everybody dies,” answered Dean.

  Cars whizzed by them. Rain dotted the windshield. The rush of their journey sucked the water droplets up the glass, away.

  “Take that exit,” said Dean.

  The sign said Barham Boulevard. Houses clung to the hills beside the highway. A black tower skyscraper poked the clouds. Roads and houses stretched off into the mist.

  “Used to be, I didn’t talk this much,” said Dean.

  A concrete ditch paralleled their path. Beyond it were hangar-like tan buildings. Movie billboards perched on those flat roofs. Wet emerald grass covered the hill to their right.

  “How did you meet Jud?” asked Wes.

  “People put us in touch.” Dean smiled. “He beat me once. At his old condo by the beach. I’d been careless with his trust. Didn’t know who he truly was. He took me down to the garage. It was like dancing with an angel. Then I knew.”

  “That he was the man,” said Wes.

  Dean shrugged. “Somebody has to be.”

  “What man is that?”