In Real Life

by Lawrence Tabak

  So to put it mildly, I don’t have the kind of practice Garrett does at these sorts of things, and when I pick up the phone I’m kind of stuttering so that Brit has to say, “Seth? Is that you?”

  “Yah, no nah,” is what I actually spit out.

  “Seth?

  Finally I manage to say yeah.

  “Oh great. Hey, the reason I’m calling your house is that I don’t have your cell and if you check Facebook I’ve friended you. Anyway, you know that final group project thing that we have to do for history?”

  Brit Leigh’s Facebook friend? After an entire year of trying to get up the nerve. Just like that? As far as a history project, I’m thinking, but blanking.

  “Anyway, Ben and Katie and I wanted to know if you’d be in our group?”

  Something about this project thing is in the back of my mind. Maybe a handout we got a few weeks ago?

  “We’re going to meet at the library tomorrow afternoon at four, you know the branch over by Panera?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, will you?”

  “What?” I muttered.

  “You know, be in our group…”

  “Ha, yah,” I mutter, thinking, what a moron.

  “Seth?”

  Finally I managed to say, “Yeah, sure, I guess…” and then, before I can stop it from actually being uttered I add, inanely, “but why…”

  There was a pause, and she said, “Seth, you’re kidding right?”

  I shake my head before I realize that she can’t see me and say “no.” And I’m not kidding.

  “Seth, everyone knows you’re like the smartest kid in class. Like when Mr. Hobson asked about that strategy thing during the Battle of Gettysburg and no one knew a thing about it and you finally raised your hand and explained it like you had just spent a week preparing a report on it?”

  “Oh, that thing.” Mr. Hobson asked if anyone could give an example of a critical tactical maneuver in the Battle of Gettysburg. There was a long silence. Since I knew a little bit about the Twentieth Maine’s famous bayonet charge on Little Round Top I finally raised my hand and blabbered on about it for a while.

  A couple summer back my mom had decided it would be good for Garrett and me and her to have one last vacation together before he left for college. Since money is always an issue, she got my Uncle Andy to lend her his lake house in Northern Wisconsin. So it takes us almost two days to drive there, which is pretty awful to contemplate in itself, and then we’re stuck in this little house without any Internet connection and a TV that gets three stations.

  Uncle Andy has a job with some big corporation in Minneapolis, but his hobby is the Civil War. So I’m stuck up in the middle of nowhere and he’s got about five-hundred books, all on the Civil War. With nothing better to do I read though a couple of them. And what’s sad is that I was actually getting interested, especially in the whole battle strategy thing. I mean, it’s not all that different than the strategies I use in Starfare. So I had read a couple accounts of the Twentieth Maine’s wheeled bayonet charge, which is one of the more famous battle maneuvers in the whole war. That’s why I could answer Mr. Hobson’s question. I got so into it that I went up to the board and drew a diagram, which I can scarcely bear to think about, it’s so em­­barrassing.

  So just like that I’m in the Brit Leigh History Group. I say this out loud about ten times. Like pinching yourself to see if you’re in a dream. All because Mom tortured me with that vacation to Uncle Andy’s lake house. The world works in weird ways.

  I immediately get on Facebook and sure enough, there’s a message from Brit. Of course, now I have to worry about what Brit saw. I glance through my friends list and realize that it’s not as bad as I thought. Not all geeky gamer guys. There’s a couple of girls who used to play Magic with us at the local card shop. Becca, who’s my friend Eric’s girlfriend. And some of Becca’s friends. And a bunch of girls from school I don’t know that well who probably friended the entire class. And Mercedes, this girl from middle school who told me she was not named after the car. We had this lame unit on ballroom dancing in eighth grade and we sort of became regular partners. I’m not even sure how it happened. After the unit was over she was always sending me dumb little emails and asking if I was going to the football game that night or the mall over the weekend or if I wanted to get together to study. Which at the time was no, no, no because I wasn’t wasting prime gaming time at football games or hanging around the mall and I never studied. Thinking about it now, I just sort of shake my head because she was pretty and nice and I was just clueless.

  Then I look more closely at the picture I’ve got posted. It’s awful. And that’s what Brit saw. It’s a picture Mom took of me when we were on vacation. I was sitting on the side of the dock, just sort of staring at the little fish that poke around the slimy poles that hold it up and didn’t even know she took it until we got back home. It was near the end of the vacation and my hair was lighter than it usually is. It’s not as though I liked the picture. It’s just that I hate having my picture taken and that was the only one I could find.

  People always say I take after Mom, mostly because my hair is light and wavy like hers, while Garrett has my father’s straight, dark hair. I also got my mom’s height gene, because last time we stood next to each other I was about a half-foot shorter than Garrett, although Mom tells me that all the boys on her side of the family were late bloomers. Come to think of it, my pants aren’t dragging on the ground like they used to, so maybe I am still growing. Anyway, Garrett’s no giant himself. Dad says the only reason he wasn’t recruited by any of the big D1 basketball schools was because he’s not even six foot, although that’s what the high school programs said.

  At least it’s an interesting picture, the way the sun was playing off the water behind me. Maybe, I thought, someone would like the way I looked, like I was contemplating the meaning of life or quantum mechanics. Like I was one of those brooding, sensitive boys who get the girls in bad teen movies, when everyone knows in real life they don’t. Anyway, I was probably thinking about some Starfare battle of the past, trying to figure out a more efficient way to harvest lifesource points.

  6.

  Mom has this big guilt trip over taking her current boyfriend Martin to a week at this yoga or meditation or some other drink-the-Kool-Aid institute in California. She gets all wound up about me staying alone and eating sugary cereal and fast food, but I tell her after all these years of taking care of us, she deserves it. After managing to avoid a teary goodbye scene with them I’m getting really comfortable over at Dad’s. I’m finishing up my third Starfare win in a row when I glance at the computer clock and realize I’m going to be late to Brit’s history group. Especially since I have no choice but to bike. I’m still gasping as I ditch my bike on the library rack.

  The group has a table in the back and Brit sees me first and waves. So naturally that reduces me to a state of total imbecility. Rather than have to talk I squirm down into the open chair and pick up a copy of the assignment that’s on the table. I’m pretty sure everyone is staring at me because I’m still breathing hard and my forehead is damp and I wonder if I smell too.

  I skim over the assignment and figure out that we have to pick a topic and do a group presentation on the Great Depression. On the plus side, presentations are usually no-brainers. Then again, you have to sit through all the others, which can be excruciating.

  “Black Monday and the stock market collapse, WPA and federal job creation, Conservation Corps…” Each one sounding as bad as the previous.

  I glance over at Brit and she’s concentrating on the topics, resting her chin on her hand. She’s wearing a T-shirt with these shiny things that make star patterns, including one centered perfectly on her right breast. When she looks my way I jerk my eyes back at the paper.

  In the end we choose the Dust Bowl topic, e
ven though one of the girls didn’t even know what it was. And when you think about it, it is sort of goofy name. Sounds like where Kansas U goes to play football in December when they’re 8-6. Meanwhile, I’m trying to figure out how to game this so that I can either end up doing some part of the project one-on-one with Brit or do something that only takes fifteen minutes. I end up taking on the computer stuff—setting up the PowerPoint with pictures and maybe getting some old songs to play at the beginning and the end.

  When I mention I saw a whole photo exhibit on the Dust Bowl at a museum, taken by some photographer paid by the government, Brit reaches across the table and puts her hand on my arm. I’m stunned to discover just how many nerves a human has in the forearm.

  “I just knew you’d be a big help,” she says. I find the courage to meet her eyes and the look she’s giving me seems pleasant enough, but it’s missing anything special. And believe me, I’m open to the smallest, subtlest sign.

  7.

  There’s great news one week into Mom’s trip. She wants to stay another two weeks at her “Institute.”

  “I really feel like I’m close to a breakthrough,” she says when she breaks the news by phone. I have to answer a dozen questions about what I’m eating, but I lie cheerfully, thinking only how much of a win it will be for my Starfare game.

  “You deserve it, Mom,” I tell her, and mean it. “It’s great that you can take time for yourself.”

  Then she wishes me good luck at the tournament and I tell her I love her, which I know is kind of corny to say, but it’s true, and I know it means a lot to her.

  “I love you too honey,” she says, and then we hang up.

  With Mom out of the picture and Dad on the road I’m getting tons of online time. Stomp badgers me every night for a rematch, but I just ignore him. Block him from my IM, but he seems to always reappear with a different screen name. I can tell it’s him, because he’s always screaming in all-caps and calling me a putz, whatever that is.

  At about midnight the day before Brit’s group meets again I spend my twenty minutes putting up some titles and pasting in photos. At our second and final meeting Brit acts like I should be nominated for a genius fellowship.

  “I would have never found that music!” she gushes. “It’s perfect.” I file shared a couple of Depression era songs. “Brother Can You Spare a Dime,” opens the show and this Woody Guthrie song about hobos ends it. I’m such a dork that now that I’m Brit’s Facebook friend it’s like my life is complete. I still can’t bring myself to even say hi to her in the hall.

  We take the AP exam for Calc two weeks before finals week, which is a breeze, and so it’s pretty much goofing off there. History is just presentations and our group is almost last. I think my PowerPoint kills and Mr. Hobson actually says “nice job,” which is, for him, excessive praise. I love finals week—only an hour or two at school a day.

  My gaming is going great. I’m playing straight through to one or two in the morning. Grab a bowl of cereal for dinner, or call in a pizza, and I’m good to go.

  Two days before I’m booked to leave I get into a game with a really annoying player who is just awful. He keeps sending me idiotic messages about how lucky I am and how he’s just setting me up for a late game surprise. He’s so bad I decide to humiliate him by taking over his base with miners—which would be like winning a tank battle with Toyota pickups. One good thing about miners is that you can stack them up like Legos and I decide to try to build a bridge over his fortifications. It’s almost working when I realize that I’m giving him time to catch up. So I send some warriors after the miners and I’m amazed that they just cruise up the back of the miners and breach his fortress, destroying him in seconds. There’s no way that warriors are supposed to be able to get through these walls—it’s like the scene in The Lord of the Rings where Saruman uses gunpowder to blast a hole in the walls of Helm’s Deep.

  After the game I stop and think about what I’ve just discovered. If players were unaware of this move, they’d never try to defend it and I could turn any game around in just a few minutes. It was like when the U.S. was the only country with the atomic bomb—I could rule at will.

  The only person I even mention it to is DTerra, and I don’t go into the details. He’s talked his dad into letting him fly out for Nationals, getting in the night before I do to play the grinder. It will be nice to have someone to hang out with—and rooting for me.

  When I finally get to bed the night before my trip I’m still wired from the frantic practice games. I stare at the ceiling, where a break in my curtains produces a little bar of light from a street lamp. It looks like an arrow, pointing towards my door, the hallway, the future.

  “Hey Brit,” I whisper. She turns around in the chair in front of me, her hair spinning across her face.

  “Maybe you heard—I just won this big tournament and $30,000 and need to celebrate. I’m thinking of dinner at The American Club, maybe scalp some front row seats for Lady GaGa.”

  Her jaw drops and now it’s her who’s stuttering.

  “I’m going to rent a stretch limo—should we get the Escalade or the Hummer?”

  8.

  Dad dropped me off at the airport. The whole way he was on his cell, some heated business discussion about the proper way to allocate costs to projects or something. While I’m getting my bag out of the trunk he pulls the phone from his ear and shouts, “Call me when your plane lands.”

  While I’m waiting for the boarding call my cell rings. It’s Mom. She says she can’t believe I’m old enough to be jetting across the country by myself. That it was just yesterday that we were sitting at the kitchen table, playing board games.

  “You remember Chutes & Ladders?” she asks. I say I do.

  “I should have known, even back then, about you and games. Every day you’d beg me to get out a board game or a deck of cards. And you weren’t even in school yet. In kindergarten you could read every Monopoly Chance card. And I’d have to explain what a ‘bank error’ or ‘beauty contest’ was.”

  “And then there was the time at the pediatrician’s? You’re four years old, sitting on the floor with one of those really complex wooden 3D puzzles that you have to make into a ball? So we’re sitting there, and the doctor keeps losing his place, distracted by you down on the floor, where you’re working with all the wooden shapes. So finally I say, ‘He really likes puzzles.’ And the doctor nods and says, ‘I see that, but honestly I’ve never seen anyone solve it before.’ And sure enough I glance down and you’re putting the final piece into the ball.”

  Then they call my boarding group. Mom says she’ll call me later, to make sure I got in OK.

  I’ve got a bunch of saved games on my laptop and I spend the flight going over these. Surprise bonus: they hand out warm chocolate chip cookies and the flight attendant, who looks a lot like that actress from CSI, gives me extras.

  The hotel turns out to be really nice, right down the street from the convention center where the tournament is being held. I have a room on the eleventh floor which looks out across the city and part of the ocean, where I can see the front end of an aircraft carrier. My room number is 1123, which is easy to remember—the first two digits add up to the third and the middle two digits add up to the fourth. I try to call DTerra on his cell but get voice mail. That’s a good sign. Probably still in the qualies.

  He got a room for one night and then is moving into mine to save money. I’m so anxious to find him and so nervous about the tournament that I don’t really think about how cool the view is, or how blue and sparkly the ocean looks. I throw my bag on the bed, pop my iPod earbuds in and head over to the tournament site to find out a little more about that $30,000.

  They really didn’t need to put up all the huge “STARFARE” banners at the entrance to the convention center. All you have to do is follow the flow of black T-shirts, compute
r backpacks and bad complexions. They’re coming from all directions and funneling through a set of giant glass doors in the side of a white concrete building that is so long and tall it looks like it could have been built to keep out the barbarians on the other side. As I get closer to the doors and pick up my pace I feel taller and lighter.

  As I climb the final steps into the center I’m behind a group of three guys and a girl, all in T-shirts with their Starfare screen names on their backs. I catch “Gforce22,” “HelterSkelter” and “GamerzG!rl.” I don’t recognize any of their gamer names. But then only about half of the people there are actually playing in Nationals. On top of the last chance grinder there are at least twenty sidebar tournaments and a lot of people show up just to play in the side events and watch their heroes. The thing is, if they knew who I was they’d probably all stop and stare and start whispering. This realization has a strange effect on me. Back home, at school, I’m lost in the crowd. Here, when people start connecting me to my screen name, I’ll be like one of North High’s celebrities. Like Garrett.

  9.

  The convention hall is actually a cool place. They keep it kind of dark, so that floor is lit with the glow from the hundreds of monitors set up on row after row of tables. Up front they have four feature tables facing a huge area of seating with giant projection screens above the players so the crowd can watch the matches in real time. Around the perimeter of the room are about fifty different vendors selling everything from gaming mouses to comic books based on Starfare.