In Real Life

by Lawrence Tabak

  “No, I had to make a phone call.”

  He looks as his watch, which is one of those big gold ones that old rich guys wear back home. “Two minutes. We have introductions in two minutes. And you go hide to make call.”

  “I wasn’t hiding,” I say again.

  “Come, come,” he shouts, like I’ve been a bad dog.

  He leads me to the side of the stage where all the Anaconda players are queued up. We can see the stage, but not the audience. After a couple of minutes the crowd starts screaming and the curtain must be rising because colored spotlights are strafing the stage, making the computer equipment and silver scaffolding and monitors shine like fireworks.

  Then an announcer quiets the crowd and they start introducing the team. One at a time, the guys run out onto the stage to huge cheers and then stand at attention at the front of the stage. When there are only four of us left the announcer takes a lot more time and then each of top three players is introduced. The screaming is thunderous, so loud I actually hold my hands over my ears. I’m absolutely relieved that they’ve left me out because I really don’t deserve to be playing with these guys. So I’m sort of breathing easy when I hear the announcer say something that sounds familiar, but I can’t quite make it out because the screaming is doing what I thought impossible—hitting a new level of volume. Then I hear it again, and someone is physically pushing me on stage where I’m stumbling, blinded by the spots. I can’t see a single thing past the edge of the stage, it’s like looking into the sun. The noise hits me front-on like a fire hose on full blast and I must freeze, before Sung Gi takes pity and jogs over and leads me to the line, where the guys are standing and smiling and waving. I look at them and finally raise my hand and wave and it’s like I’m an orchestra conductor signaling a fortissimo finale.

  Finally the spotlights are off us and they introduce, much more quickly, a group of boys in red and white team shirts. I try to figure out which one will be my opponent. Within a few minutes they have us sorted into pairs and I’m sitting in front of a monitor, across from a kid who looks about twelve. Then the monitor in front of me flashes to life and begins a countdown from twenty, each number has a different Mordant Isles theme. The crowd is yelling out each number, and I actually recognize the words when they get to ten. My wonderful Korean tutor taught me how to count to ten at one of our first sessions.

  At zero the screen lights up with the Mordant Isles starter map and I start with a standard troop development, trying to remember all the shortcuts that the team has discovered. My opponent seems a bit slow and lost. But then, I have to appreciate where I’d be if I had only two days to work the map, probably solo, instead of close to thirty with twelve pros. Even as bad as I am compared to my teammates, it’s no contest, and I have to work hard not to close him down in ten minutes. I glance right and left and see that the other pros are dogging it too. At around the twenty-minute mark I hear an announcement and a loud cheer, which I take to be the first declared victory. The rest of us finish sometime over the next ten minutes. I’m close to the last when I finish off his last troops. The two of us stand and he bows and I try the same, trying to remember what my Korean teacher told me about how low to bow when someone is younger and you’ve just trounced him in front of thousands.

  The Korean fans are cheering my name like I just won the World Series and I turn and wave a couple times before jogging off stage.

  Yeong is there, greeting each of us as we step out of the lights, patting each of us on the back. But me, he pulls me aside.

  “You see, ActionSeth. How much they love you already. You are big star!”

  I thank him and tell him I’m not feeling well and better lie down and rest. Could I go back to my apartment? He waves over a guy I don’t recognize who leads me down a maze of halls and out a backdoor into the chilly Korean air, lit with yellowish streetlights and hundreds of headlights. He waves a cab down, tells him my address, and a half hour later I’m back in the apartment, watching our three best players on Sky Game TV playing in the tournament.

  I glance up at the TV to the sound of some very familiar, awful pop music and see the hideous sight of me fake-smiling while tipping back a can of that lame orange-flavored Korean soda. We spent two entire days getting that stupid shot just right. I jump up and turn off the TV. It’s around noon back in Kansas and I Skype dial Hannah’s cell a half-dozen times before realizing that it’s still Friday back there and she’s probably in the middle of school. I leave a text message. I don’t know who else to call. I Google her name, to see if anything pops up. Then I check her Facebook page and she’s added some information about the Savannah School for the Arts. It links to their website. The school looks like something out of Gone with the Wind. Lots of that stuff that hangs from trees. I Google “stuff that hangs from trees in Savannah.” Spanish moss.

  So I just sort of stare at the Skype screen for a long while, waiting for a pop-up message that never appears.

  13.

  I continue to Skype Hannah’s cell every half hour or so, wondering what she’ll think, when she sees all these missed calls. I flip the TV on to see how our guys are doing. Tae-Uk loses first round to the number one player from the Pusan Raiders. Our top two players make the final eight, which is a very good showing, guaranteeing that the team will get a decent payout. I get caught up in Sang-Chul’s quarterfinal match, which has an amazing frantic ending with the Korean announcer screaming like it’s a photo finish at the Kentucky Derby. I find myself standing up and cheering as he finishes off the last of his opponent’s ships. He’s our last hope in the semis, but can’t quite pull it off. When they show a close-up of him after the match his face is glistening with sweat and he looks exhausted.

  When I try Hannah’s number again after the match she picks up on the first ring.

  I tell her it’s getting late, Saturday night.

  “So how’s it going?”

  I want to tell her how frustrating it is. That I have no idea what the guys on my team are talking about. That it’s like a dream where you go onto the field to play soccer and when the whistle blows you realize it’s not soccer, but some weird sport like rugby and you’ve got the ball and a dozen giant guys are converging on you to squish you like a bug.

  “Pretty good,” I lie. “I played on TV earlier this evening. In front of a live audience of about five thousand. Probably a couple million on TV.”

  “Wow, so how did you do?”

  “I just played one match, but I won,” I say, skipping over the part about my opponent being a twelve year old kid who had no clue how to play the map.

  “Wow. I Googled you and found this big ad with all this Korean writing and your picture. I think it was like for some sort of soft drink.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “ActionOrange. It’s my first big endorsement deal.”

  “Endorsement? Wow. I can’t believe I know someone famous.”

  Hannah, I miss you, I hate it here. What do you say I come home and the two of us, we can pick off where we were I’m thinking.

  Instead I say, “Yeah, all the Korean girls go nuts over me. It’s like I’m in a chart-topping boy band or something.”

  “I’m jealous,” Hannah says. “Although I can always say I knew you when.”

  “Yeah, you can always say that,” I say, but thinking, she said “jealous.” Then wondering if any of the guys on the team actually get within ten feet of a girl outside of the occasional autograph and snapshot. I can’t imagine when. They’re either programmed every waking hour or off with their families on Sundays.

  14.

  On Sunday I sleep until it’s time for my call with Mom. At first she was leery of the whole Skype chat thing, but it only took a couple of calls to get her acclimated.

  “I hope you haven’t lost weight,” is the first thing she says. “Are you getting enough to eat?” I get the fruits and vegeta
bles lecture.

  Mom is pretty good at seeing through me, so she asks six variations of “what’s wrong?”

  I don’t give her the whole story, but I do say that it’s hard, being so far away without anyone who speaks English.

  “Maybe we should talk more often. I could ask Steve here to set me up on Thursday nights. That would be, what, Friday mornings for you?”

  I explain that they keep me way too busy for that—that Sundays are my only day off.

  To fill the gap she tells me all about Martin and how far his yoga has progressed and I listen, because it’s nice to hear her voice, even though I couldn’t care less about Martin’s plow execution. Mom always seems almost on the verge of tears when it’s time to disconnect and it ends up me consoling her, instead of the other way around.

  Afterwards I resist the urge to call Hannah, even though it’s a good time to connect, since it’s early evening back home. It’s great when we’re talking, but afterwards. Afterwards, the hollow feeling is so awful.

  I do get DTerra online and we have a pretty good conversation. I’m upfront about the suckiness of my situation. He thinks I’m exaggerating. Still prefers to think of it as a dream come true, but after I bitch for about a half hour he’s finally getting a sense of the downside.

  ActionSeth: I’ll never catch up with these guys. Not speaking Korean. It’s just 2 hard.

  DTerra: You’ve got to give it a shot. I know how good u r.

  ActionSeth: U don’t know how good everyone is here. Even the little kids, they could kill in a US tournament. I can barely make a high school team here.

  DTerra: That’s bogus. U hang in there and in a few months you’ll be owning them all.

  ActionSeth: Right.

  DT has to do something with his family so after he signs off I clean up my email and visit a bunch of my favorite message boards.

  I’m so bored after a couple of hours that I’m actually kind of pleased when I see an old, familiar name slipping through my IM filter.

  Stompazer2: HEY PUTZ I SAW U OWNING SOME GRADE SCHOOL KID ON SKY TV NICE JOB.

  I don’t give him the pleasure of a response, but I’m curious. If he was kidding about being in Korea then he wouldn’t have seen that show on TV. But if he wasn’t, then why I hadn’t heard a thing about him?

  Stompazer2: Got some news for u. We just got accepted into the Prozone League.

  Prozone is the premiere Starfare league, where Team Anaconda plays.

  Stompazer2: Yeah, u heard it here 1st. It will be announced on Monday. One of 2 new expansion teams.

  Stompazer2: hey, u there.

  ActionSeth: yes?

  Stompazer2: We’re set 2 go. Xerus International. Remember that name, noob. We got the best guys from Europe, South America. You know most of them. Bendo, from Germany. TheBorg, from Sweden. Me. Of course.

  ActionSeth: So?

  Stompazer2: So we got 1 requirement. English. We train in English.

  ActionSeth: So?

  Stompazer2: So I happen 2 know from my contacts that ur getting nowhere fast. Not the 1st time. These Koreans can b real dicks. That’s why it’s so easy to get the best European guys. They love it. Joining forces to beat those asswipes. We’re going to do it our way. None of this bs indentured servitude and ass-kissing coaches. Want to hop into the sack with a pair of Korean twin teens, we’re all for it. Private rooms, state of the art training facilities, plenty of seed money.

  Stompazer2: Of course, u got a no-compete clause built in to your contract, so ur stuck with those Korean snakes for 2 years unless u can get fired. By then, we’ll b tops in the world. 2 bad u will miss out. Besides, ur 2 much of a noob for r standards.

  ActionSeth: Up yours.

  Stompazer2: U would b expert in that department—what with all those Anacondas porking u daily. we’ve got 1 Korean player committed to the team—Doo-Ri Song. Or Song Doo-Ri as these ass-backwards tards say. You never heard of him? He’s young and good and hungry. Maybe the other guys mentioned him?

  Stompazer2: didn’t think so. He’s the guy they kicked off to make room for the blond bombshell.

  I just stare at the screen dumbly.

  Stompazer2: How come u live every day with these guys and I know more about that team than u? The only guy on your team who speaks fluent English and they kick him off. He’s hilarious. he’ll be doing standup after he retires from E-games. And the guys on the team, they loved him. Treated him like a little bro. Makes u wonder how they feel about the American blondie who got him fired.

  As much as I want to disbelieve anything Stomp says, it all makes such good sense.

  Stompazer2: And by the way, that orange soda tastes like ass.

  15.

  Back when I was in Kansas I’d dream of having a whole day to myself with nothing but broadband and Starfare. No one bugging me. But by evening I’m going stir crazy. I know the team has all these rules about where you can go when and always signing out with the coach, but honestly, what’s that about anyway? Say I want to step outside, get a snack. You think the coach wants me to wake him up and get his OK?

  I get out the phrase book from my Korean teacher and look up “nightclub.” I say it to myself about a hundred times while I get dressed in my regular clothes instead of that annoying team shirt that I’ve worn over a hundred days in a row.

  When I get down on the street I hail a cab which is just some little Korean compact painted yellow. I get in and carefully say the words for nightclub. The driver repeats it and I say yeah. Then he opens up with a flurry of Korean, which is probably a list of every nightclub in Seoul. I just say the word for nightclub and I’m guessing he’s made a choice because we’re off.

  It takes about twenty minutes to get to a part of downtown that isn’t familiar. The sidewalks are jammed with people, who spill over into the street, slowing traffic to a crawl. Each side of the street is lined with huge vertical neon signs in bright shades of yellow and green and red, crammed with Korean script and the occasional English word.

  After about ten minutes of weaving through this district he drops me right in front of a place with a flashing sign that says Helios with a long queue outside. I don’t know what it takes to get into this club, but based on who’s waiting, it certainly isn’t fancy suits or sequined dresses. Although the weather is warmer than when I first arrived in Seoul, about forty beautiful Korean girls look like they’re freezing to death, standing in line, knee high boots and bare thighs. Arms wrapped about their short leather jackets. As I dig out my wallet I look down at my T-shirt (it’s a black one from last year’s nationals) and my worn jeans and almost bark out one of the only other things I can say in Korean– my address. But I’ve gone this far, might as well give it a shot.

  As soon as I get out of the cab I can hear the dance music seeping out of the building the way the smell of grilled meat surrounds a fast food place. I swear everyone waiting is staring at me, probably because I’m the only Westerner. A guy in a suit, who appears to be guarding the door, immediately comes over and bows and gestures for me to follow. And just like that I’m inside the door, the warmth and music and cigarette smoke hitting me with a wave. I pay a girl in a fancy black dress twenty-five thousand won and take a stairway downstairs, with each step the throb of the bass and the dance music and the buzz of the crowd crescendos until I step into an ear-deafening cavernous room which is lit by strobes and spotlights shooting through the smoke. I don’t recognize the music, but it could be any one of a thousand of those computer-generated dance tracks.

  The floor is packed with young Koreans jumping around in what might be called dancing while shouting and drinking and smoking. The crowd sort of parts as I walk through, heading towards what I think is a bar in the back. The drinking age in Korea is eighteen but I’ve heard it’s loosely enforced, if at all. So when I get to the bar I order a bee
r. I’m not much into drinking, but I always liked the way cold beer looks in all those commercials, with the condensation streaming down the bottle.

  Of course, nothing is that easy and the bartender is shouting something, probably twenty different brands of beer. I look around, see a guy standing a few feet away with a bottle that says OB and point at that. Living where you don’t speak the language, it’s like going back to being two years old, pointing and grunting.

  Before the beer arrives I feel a presence behind me and I turn to find about a half-dozen young Korean girls. I don’t know what they’re saying, but they seem to know my name. So naturally I smile and nod and when one of them finds a pen and paper in her purse I sign my name. Off to the side is another young Korean girl with a red streak in her hair, looking at me with what I take is amusement.

  The DJ puts on a new song, this one in English. It even sounds familiar, some sort of hip-hop dance cut with the hook, “You get it on you take it off.” Before I can take a sip the girl with the red streak in her hair half drags me onto the floor and starts gyrating so I just sort of join in the fray. Now, my dance moves are so lame that they’ve never ventured further than my bedroom mirror, but with the strobe lights and the mass of humanity it’s pretty easy to just sort of jump around and no one can really tell what you’re doing.

  Actually, I’m stealing glances at this girl and I like what I see. This girl is looking me right in the eyes, and so I stare right back. She’s wearing some sort of multi-layered outfit that seems to expose a couple layers of underwear. She’s got that normal black, square cut hair with the red streak dyed down the side and she manages to dance her way in front of me, no matter which way I turn. I’m still holding onto the cold bottle of beer with one hand, and when I stop jumping to take a sip, I’m sort of gagging at the awful taste when she wraps both arms around me and kisses me.

  Still holding me, she leans so that her lips are against my ear and she says something that sounds like English. A hot Korean chick who speaks English? I can’t believe I didn’t find this place sooner. Then she takes my hand, the one without the beer and pulls me across the floor. I don’t know where we’re going, but I hope it’s a dark corner.