of light penetrated the darkness, falling across the shoulder and face of the girl sleeping in the bed. Bobby tried to remember her name.
He went into the bathroom and pissed. He felt good. A little hung over, but good. The rib-cage thing was all better, or just about. He saw his reflection in the mirror: he was in shape, in great shape considering it was only March.
Back in the bedroom, the phone was ringing. He answered it. “Yeah?”
“Morning, big guy.” It was Wald. “How was the flight?”
“Fine.”
“How’s that rib cage?”
“Fine.”
“Hungry?”
“Starving.”
“Pick you up in fifteen minutes, if that’s okay.”
“Yeah.”
“Got a little surprise for you.”
“What?”
“You’ll see.”
The girl opened her eyes. They were on him right away. She gave him a long look. Oh, Christ.
“Good morning, Bobby,” she said.
“Morning, babe.”
She sat up, exposing her breasts. Nice ones.
“Last night was fantastic, Bobby.”
“Yeah.” Or thanks; should he have said thanks? Or that it was fantastic for him too? Yeah. That was probably it. Too late. He recalled how she’d come over to him in the bar, while the front-desk people took care of his bags; or maybe that was another time, another girl, and this one had been waiting by the pool when he’d left the bar and walked across the inner court to his room.
Under the sheets, her lower body made a grinding motion. “Feels early,” she said. “Coming back to bed?” Her nipples hardened, just like that.
“Sorry,” he told her. “Got to run.”
“When’ll you be back?”
“Late.” She didn’t take the hint. “Maybe you better get going too.”
She bit her lip. “How about a little kiss good-bye?”
Bobby leaned over and gave her a little kiss. She smelled of sex. He considered and rejected a peck on the forehead, went with a lip kiss, but closemouthed and quick. She had other ideas; turning his kiss into something else, and taking hold of his dick.
“Mmm,” she said.
They left the room together. Wald was parked outside in his Targa with the 6 PRCNT vanity plate.
“Bye, Bobby,” she said. “See you sometime.”
“Bye.”
He got into the car. Wald was smiling. “Nice,” he said, watching the girl hurry off, tossing her hair in the sunshine. “Does she have a sister?”
“I don’t know.”
“Even the mother would probably do.”
Bobby was tired of the subject. “Where’re we going?”
“Pancake Palace?”
“Sure.”
“And then I’ll run you over to the facility. They’re expecting you at ten-thirty. Photos, handshakes, all that, but no interviews. BP at eleven. Okay?”
“Sure.”
“And last but not least.” Wald reached inside his linen jacket, handed Bobby an envelope.
Bobby opened it. Inside was a check in his name, drawn on the Chase Manhattan Bank for $1,175,000. “This is?…”
“First half of the signing bonus,” Wald said. “Minus the agency fee.”
“Oh.”
He started to put it in his pocket, but Wald said, “Want me to bank it this afternoon? Shame to lose out on a day’s interest.”
“What’s a day’s interest?”
“On this? Hundred and fifty, two hundred bucks, at current rates. Something like that. Maybe we can make a deal.”
“You can make a deal on interest rates?”
“It’s like Archimedes, Bobby. Get me a lever long enough and I can move the earth. Your job is to-”
“Get you the lever.” Bobby handed him the check.
Wald laughed. “No flies on you.” The breeze blew through the open roof of the Targa, heavy, hot, humid.
They sat at a booth along the back wall of Pancake Palace. Bobby had blueberry pancakes with maple syrup, OJ, coffee.
“Get ready,” Wald said.
A father at a nearby table was nudging his son. The son didn’t want to do it. “He won’t bite,” said the father in a stage whisper, maybe hoping Bobby would look up, smile at the boy, seem approachable, nonbiting. Bobby kept eating, head down.
But still the boy came, holding out a baseball and a pen. Didn’t say anything, just laid them by the pancakes. Bobby wrote his name on the ball. Didn’t say anything either. Then the father came over, big smile, hitching up his pants, toast crumbs on his lips.
“Gonna hit one out for us this year, Bobby?”
“I’m eating breakfast,” Bobby said.
The father, still smiling, laid four or five more balls in front of him. This was a money-making operation. Bobby started to repeat what he’d just said, but Wald, glancing around the room, said, “Globe ’s watching,” so Bobby signed the balls.
“All right, ” said the father, as though about to high-five somebody. Not “thanks.” He dropped the balls in a plastic bag.
Wald picked up the check. They got in the Targa, drove south past fast-food places, an alligator farm, a fireworks stand. Wald switched on the radio.
“… shoulda been running on the play, situation like that. What I can’t understand is-”
Bobby switched it off.
“When’s Valerie coming?” Wald asked.
Bobby’s wife didn’t like to be called Val anymore. Bobby kept forgetting, but Wald never did. “School vacation,” Bobby said.
“When’s that?”
“Don’t know. She’s supposed to call.” Bobby saw a man in rags doing a stiff-legged dance by the side of the road. “What’s the surprise?” he asked.
“Surprise?”
“You were talking about on the phone.”
“I gave it to you already. The check, Bobby. The bonus.”
“Oh.”
Wald pulled into the training complex, parked in front of a palm tree with Bobby’s name posted on it. Bobby slipped on his headphones, pressed PLAY. They got out. Wald popped the trunk, took out the equipment bag. Bobby looked around. He didn’t like Florida, didn’t like the heavy air. He liked the air in Arizona, where he’d trained for the last ten years. They walked toward the clubhouse.
“I’ll take that,” Bobby said. He carried his equipment bag inside.
