The Stake

“Not again.”

“Yeah.” Madhousewas his twelfth novel, and the third to be demolished by a copyeditor.

“What’re you going to do?” Jean asked.

“I have to fix it. I don’t have any choice.” He scowled at the carpet. “Maybe I could get them to take my name off and publish it under the name of the copyeditor.”

“It’s that bad?”

“And then some.”

“Why do they let it happen?”

“God, I don’t know. It’s the luck of the draw, I guess. This time, they happened to send my book to some idiot who thinks she’s a writer.”

“Or he,” Jean said, standing up for her gender.

“Or it.”

“Couldn’t you just write a letter to Susan, or something, and explain the situation? Maybe they could send a fresh copy to someone else.”

He shook his head. “I don’t think she’d appreciate that. It’d be like calling them jerks for sending it to some illiterate butcher. Besides, they already paid to have it done. And they’re on a tight time schedule by now, or they wouldn’t want the damn thing back in six days.”

“Maybe you should phone Susan.”

“The last thing I need is to get a reputation as a troublemaker.”

“So you’re just going to take it lying down?”

“I’m going to take it sitting on my butt with a red pen in one hand and a copy of my British edition in the other. If the people in London didn’t fix it, it didn’t need fixing.” He hung his head and sighed.

Jean stepped in front of him. She rubbed his shoulders. “I’m sorry, honey.”

“Fortunes of war. The thing is... it’ll have to be mailed Wednesday for next-day delivery. If I go to your folks’ place, that only gives me about three days to go through the whole damn thing and try to... save it.”

“You could take it along.”

“I wouldn’t be fit to live with, anyway. Maybe you and Lane should just go ahead without me.” As he spoke the words, he realized that he didn’t want to be left behind. Not for this. But he couldn’t go. “If I spend the whole weekend working on it, maybe I’ll be feeling human again by the time you get back.”

“I suppose we could call it off,” she said, stroking his hair. “Go up next weekend instead.”

“No, don’t do that. It’s their anniversary. Besides, you’ve been looking forward to it. No need for all of us to suffer because of this crap.”

“If you’re sure,” she muttered.

“I don’t see any choice.”

Larry went back to his office. His throat felt tight.

You didn’t want to go in the first place, he reminded himself.

But that was before he found out he would have to be laboring over Madhouse.

He stared at his computer screen.

“Maybe there are some other ‘box’ angles. Fool around with it.”

Right. Sure thing. Maybe sometime next week.

No more working out the details for The Box. No more plunging toward the conclusion of Night Stranger.

The next few days belonged to Madhouse, a book that he’d finished eighteen months ago. A book that had already been published in England — and about all they had changed over there was “windshield” to “windscreen” and added u’s to words like color.

“So who said life is fair?” he muttered, and shut his computer off.

Twelve

“I have a special announcement to make,” Mr. Kramer said with two minutes remaining before the bell. “As I’ve mentioned before, the drama department at the city college is putting on Hamletnext week. I’m sure the production will be well worth seeing for all of you, and I urge every one of you to attend if you can. Now, here’s the thing. I’ve obtained four free tickets to the Saturday night performance. Only four of you will be able to participate, but for those lucky students, I’ll provide tickets and transportation.” He smiled. “That way, you won’t have to bug your parents to borrow a car.” A few of the kids laughed. “If any of you would like to take advantage of the opportunity, just stay in your seats after the bell rings.”

Lane gnawed her lower lip. Should she stay? Jim might ask her out for that night.

We can always go out Friday night instead, she told herself.

It wouldbe neat to see the play, especially with Mr. Kramer. Couldn’t hurt, either, in the Brownie points department.

The bell rang. Lane remained in her seat.

As Jessica stepped by, she glanced at Lane and shook her head.

Probably thinks I’m an idiot, wanting to give up a Saturday night to see Shakespeare.

Maybe I am. If it turns out that Jim’s busy Friday night, I’m going to kick myself. He was gone last weekend, I’ll be gone this weekend. That’ll make three weeks in a row if I go to the play and he can’t make it on Friday.

ThisSaturday night was when she’d wanted to go out with him. All week he’d been especially nice. Trying to make up, Lane supposed, for being such a creep Monday morning.

She turned on her seat. Five other kids had remained in the room.

There’re six of us, and he can only take four. If I’m not picked, that’ll solve the problem right there.

“I see I’ve got more Shakespeare fans than tickets,” Mr. Kramer said. “That’s certainly gratifying, but it does present a little difficulty. We want to be fair about this.” He dug a hand into a pocket of his slacks and pulled out a quarter. “I’ll flip a coin. The first two of you to lose will have to bow out. Does that sound okay to everyone?”

Nobody objected.

“Okay, Lane, you first. Call it in the air.” He rested the coin on his thumbnail and flicked it high.

“Heads,” Lane said.

It landed in the palm of his right hand. He slapped it onto the back of his left, kept it covered and smiled at her. “Want to change your mind?”

“Nope. I’ll stick with heads.”

He looked. “Heads it is,” he said, tipping his hand and letting the coin drop into the other.

He didn’t let anyone see it, Lane realized.

What the heck, they’re his tickets.

“Okay, George, your turn.”

George won. So did Aaron and Sandra.

Jerry and Heidi, the losers, called the coin again to determine who would be first choice as an alternate in case one of the chosen was unable to attend. Heidi won.

“Okay,” Mr. Kramer said, “I’ll fill you in on the details later. In the meantime, have a good weekend. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t.”

That comment brought a few chuckles.

Lane gathered her books and stood up. “I’m glad you’re one of the lucky four,” he said. “Maybe I’ll get a chance to meet your father when I pick you up for the play.”

“I’m sure he’ll be glad to meet you.”