1 Thomas Griffin 160 Park Street Portsmouth, NH 03801 thgn3333@comcast.net 603-812-7364 Tennis Match Did your dad do it?

Wallace Hemingway, my opponent, said. We sat next to each other in white, plastic chairs, by the side of the tennis court. We drank water, toweled our faces, fiddled with our sweatbands and sweaty caps. Warm-up was over. Fucked your mother? I said. Fuck you, he said. Time, my coach yelled from the other side of the chain link fence. We were the home team. Must suck having your dad in the state pen, Wallace said, on his way to the baseline. He was fair, I thought, so fair I couldnt make out the hair on his legs, or maybe he didnt have any hair. In any case, his skin was already beginning to burn, and I found solace in that. One point at a time, Black. My coach clapped his hands. Lets put this asshole out of his misery. Coaches werent supposed to swear; even players werent. You could be docked points. This was high school. Wallace had some kind of birthmark just above his lip, which made it look like hed done a messy job putting on lipstick, and the red mark went right under his nostril. The effect creeped me out a little, and I used it as motivation on the court. I

2 had a good record against him, which explained why coach put me, our teams number two singles player, against Wallace, his teams number one. I broke serve in the first game; on the changeover, Wallace kept it up. You seen him yet? Whats he wear, orange pajamas all day? he said. Theyre red, I said. Like that thing under your nose. Wallace broke me back, then held serve. On the changeover, he asked if the cops had cuffed my father in front of me, my sister, and my mother. No, I told him, he was busy fucking his mother. But it was lame, I knew, to use the same insult twice; there was no question that Wallace was winning the battle of words. He broke me again and held serve again, to make it 4-1. No tennis courts in prison, Wallace said, especially if youre in solitary confinement. My dad had taught me to play tennis. He was a small guy, so he favored the counter-puncher approach: be as steady as possible, keep making the other guy hit shots and eventually hed miss one. When I was on my game, I was a human backboard, and my opponent would become frustrated and start making unforced errors in bunches. I wasnt on my game today, but I didnt blame my dad. Something about Wallaces constant taunting made me want to defend the bastard. Wallace took the last two games of the first set to win, 6-1. What the fuck? coach said to me between sets. Wheres Black Smith? I dont see Black Smith out there, just somebody who looks like him, losing to a shithead he usually wipes the court with. Most teachers and other adults in my life, even my classmates, tended to tiptoe around me since the verdict sent my dad up

3 river. Coach must have figured that pussyfooting around me wasnt doing me any favors; sooner than later, Id have to grow up now that the breadwinner in the family was making license plates. Sure enough, Mom was already talking about moving because we didnt have the money to stay in our nice house with the big yard on our happy road anymore. A couple of weeks earlier, Silver had been home and picked me up at school in our Volvo wagon. When we returned home, Mom was talking to a real estate agent. If we throw in the car, she said, gesturing to the Volvo, can we ask another ten grand? At that the real estate agent, who was a fat guy smoothing his tie, began laughing as if my mom had made a great joke. But mom didnt joke these days, and she looked at Silver and me in a hopeless kind of way, as if saying these were the sorts of clowns we would have to deal with now that dad was in the slammer. What an asshole! I said. Thats the spirit! coach said. He was probably thinking that I meant Wallace Hemingway, but I was thinking of my dad. I hoped he was in solitary confinement with only orange pajamas for company. Time! coach called. Go get him, Black, he said before swinging the chain link gate shut behind me. Are you worried - about your dad, I mean? Wallace said as we walked onto the court. The IRA must be worried hes gonna squeal, right? They gotta have guys on the inside I bet theyll try to rub him out. Do you know how small they can make bombs these days? I said. I mean bombs that can fit in, say, a tennis can, or even a tube of sunblock, and still level a

4 house. I could put a bomb in your tennis bag, I told Wallace, and youd never even know it was there until, of course, it blew up, and you became a stain on the ceiling. Wallace took the first game of the second set, but hed had to work for it because Id found my rhythm. On the changeover, he sat and had a big gulp of Gatorade before he said anything, which I took as a sign that he was running out of gas. Whats your name, anyway? I mean your real name, was all he could come up with. Arthur Ashe, I said. I was Black Smith; my sister was Silver Smith. That alone should have tipped somebody off that my dad was a big-time bullshitter. Mom had gone along with the names, though we each had a middle name inherited from her: Millet, for me, my moms maiden name; Rose, for Silver, our grandmothers name. Mom was talking about dropping Smith now that Dad was out of the picture. I won the next two games. Wallace had the more powerful shots, but I just kept sending them back, and he started to take wild chances: swinging volleys from mid-court, slams from the baseline, second serves as hard as the first. He was playing my game. Two-one, me. Your mom musta known, he said, sitting in his plastic chair with a towel over his face. Or she was in on it. Yeah, he said, nodding his head behind the towel, she had to know your dad was a crook, which makes her a crook, too. Youve got two crooks for parents, he said. Mom might have been in on the whole operation, even if she acted as surprised and pissed off as Silver and me when everything went down. Im sure

5 Silver was thinking the same thing, but neither of us wanted to mention it because if mom was a criminal, too, where did that leave us? I was a stupid junior in high school, Silver a freshman at an expensive liberal arts college. We werent about to strike out on our own. And tennis was the only thing that kept my life sane. Funny thing was, up to about ten weeks earlier, I would have sworn on a stack of bibles that my parents were the happiest couple ever. I never heard either one so much as raise a voice to the other, nor to us. We had a happy childhood with our own bedrooms and pets and ski vacations and tennis and music lessons you get the idea. Dad had had us all into his bogus office at Pilgrim Insurance at Post Office Square in Boston several times; it was high up in the building, and you could look out his big window and see Boston Harbor and planes taking off and landing at Logan airport. Absolutely, I said to Wallace as he took a swig of Gatorade. We all knew. And we can all fuck someone up really bad if we want to. And not just with bombs. I told him he was beginning to get really red. A pale guy like him, I said, really ought to use some sunblock. As it happened, I said, I had some on me, but he told me to eat shit. Id hate to play me when I was on my game. Itd be really annoying. I went up 4-1. Wallaces coach was trying to encourage his best player: Lets go, Wallace. One point at a time. I always thought that was stupid advice for a tennis player: of course you played one point at a time. I think it comes from the old Alcoholics Anonymous saying: one day at a time. Maybe it makes sense for a drunk, or an inmate.

6 I won the second set, six-one. Thats what Im talking about! Coach yelled from behind the fence. He was shaking the chain-link like he was a prisoner wanting to bust loose from his pen. Wallace was quiet. He had his towel draped over his head and neck; sitting in his plastic chair, he looked like a ghost, a red ghost, though: the backs of his legs were the color of steamed lobster. Everyone knew that even if I managed to win the 10-point tiebreaker, wed lose the overall match to Wallaces team; we were in last place in our league with no chance of making the playoffs. Maybe Coach thought a win would help me get over my jailbird dad, or some such bullshit, but he hadnt mentioned a word about him all season, so I figured he either didnt know anything or didnt care, which was fine by me. Too many people cared, from my homeroom teacher to my classmates to the goddamned janitor. Tennis was a fucking relief. Time! Coach yelled. Lets get this in before the rain comes. It was only then that I noticed there were big black thunderheads to the west, heading straight for the Rock Harbor High tennis courts. Minimum Security, New Castle, Wallace said through his towel. Not only had he lost it on the court, I thought, he couldnt even come up with decent trash talk anymore. Its for white-collar prisoners, and its like a fuckin resort. Hes in a Max Secure place in Farmington, I said, and its a hole, trust me. Not your dad, Wallace said. My dad. He was doing three to five for embezzling money from his clients, which was just a fancy name for ripping them off. Turned out theyd kept it on the down low because his dad, a lawyer, had

7 figured it all out, made a plea, paid back most of the funds hed stolen, kissed enough asses to make things right sort of. My moms still pissed as hell, two years into his term, Wallace said. Asshole, but not as big an asshole as your dad, I guess. Running guns gets you in deeper shit than stealing rich peoples money. Also, while Wallaces dad was a lawyer, my dad was an alien; not only was his name a fake, so was his passport, his job, his whole fucked-up life, my fucked-up life. Talk was the Brits wanted him even worse than we did, and he was going to be extradited to the UK. I told Wallace I wasnt ever going to see my son-of-a-bitch of a father again he was so up the river he was half-way across the pond. What the fuck am I supposed to do when he comes home, Wallace said, throw him a goddamn party? His mother, he said, was too much of pussy to throw her husband out on his ass. I went up 6-zip in the tiebreak, or 4 points away from the match. Wallace seemed to be giving up, going for winners on every serve and groundstroke and volley and putting his shots either in the net or way long. One almost made it over the fence. The clouds began to obscure the sun. On the changeover, Wallace told me his mom wanted him to write a weekly letter to his father, basically to keep his dad up to date on Wallaces life. Fuck that, he said. I told her she could keep him up to date. To which his mom responded that, despite everything, his dad still loved Wallace very much. Whats that supposed to mean, coming from a con man like my dad? he said. I thought of my dad in his tennis whites, and his freckly arms and legs that Silver had inherited but not me. I remembered as a little kid putting my feet in his

8 Jack Purcells and trying on his tennis cap, both of which were impossibly big for me. Whatever else, I was sure the tennis hadnt been a con: my dad had loved teaching me the groundstrokes and serves and volleys of the game. The sportsmanship. I told Wallace if he just kept the ball in play for a little, Id let him win a couple of points. So Wallace won eight points in a row, and my coach started to foam at the mouth. It was 9-7, Wallace, at the changeover. It was dark now, and the first metallic smell of approaching rain was on the wind; coach told us to forget sitting and finish the goddamn match. I tied it at 9, then Wallace went ahead, and I won the next point, and then I went ahead and Wallace won the point after that. And the tiebreak continued like that - neither of us could win the two points in a row necessary to win the tiebreak. The first fat drops splattered against the court, and we had no time at all to gather our racquets and sweats and balls and water bottles before it was a torrential downpour so heavy I couldnt see 10 feet in front of me running off the court with my racquet bag slung over my shoulder. I thought I heard Wallace laughing or crying, which was impossible what with the rain hammering the courts and the fence and the thunder and cracks of lightning making a fireworks show. After practice the next day, Coach took me aside and laid his meaty hand and forearm across my shoulders as he told me that the match would be a draw, which was a relief because from the doleful expression on coachs face I figured at first he was throwing me off the team for not winning on purpose which Im still not sure I did. None of it mattered as Wallaces team was winning 4 matches to zip.

9 You two match up well, coach said, his hand giving the back of my neck a quick squeeze. You have no idea how well, I was thinking. Youll have another crack at him next season, he said. If, I thought, my mom hasnt decided to move us out of Rock Harbor. If I dont have to quit school and sell my tennis racquets and wash cars for a living. If the IRA doesnt rub out the rest of us Smiths for fear that Dad spilled the beans to us and they dont take any chances. Silver said I had a lively imagination, but my feeling was, outside the lines of a tennis court, there were no real rules or certainties. And even on the court, Wallace Hemingway and I had proven there was always a chance that no one would ever win.