Everything on the Line

by Bob Mitchell

  “A real sonuvabitch!” Greek-chorus-of-one Ira Spade echoes.

  “Well, sir,” Spike intones after slurping his hot chocolate and wiping his lips with his pajama sleeve, “from what I been told, winning was a total obsession for this old fanatical coach, who saw football not just as a sport, but as war, the two activities using many of the same survival tactics. Yep, his knowledge of military history was legendary, so they say. And so he taught his boys to go out there in the trenches and to be tough and mean and to fight till the end for good ol’ OSU and the good ol’ U.S. of A. and good ol’ apple pie, hot dogs, and the flag…

  Spike mops his sweaty brow with his pajama sleeve and takes a deep breath as his audience of three listens breathlessly.

  “…and, y’know, this good ol’ Ohio boy bastard sonuvabitch was plainspoken and hardly ever cursed—his favorite word was ‘goldarn’—and he had this high-pitched, lispy, avuncular, I’d-never-hurt-a-fly, sing-songy voice but deep inside he had this goddam fire in his belly and a temper you wouldn’t believe how hot and scary it was and every once in a while it’d just come out of him on the sidelines and this particular time you see in the photo he got so caught up in winning the game and he was sort of getting on, if you get my drift, and something must’ve gone haywire upstairs and he just unloaded on this Clemson kid after the kid intercepted a pass late in the fourth quarter and let ’im have it…

  “And that was the last game good ol’ Woody ever coached in his life, ’cause they fired him the next day. Man, that mean sonuvabitch sure went out in a blaze of glory! And y’know, even though they fired his sorry keister, he still remains the most beloved figure in Buckeyes history, and they named the street the stadium’s on ‘Woody Hayes Drive,’ and also a Chair in National Security Studies after him, and they even built a huge statue of him on campus right in the middle of the goddamned Oval!”

  Spike raises his THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY mug and toasts, “To Wayne Woodrow Hayes, the greatest sonuvabitch winner who ever lived!”

  “Amen!” Sadie shouts gleefully.

  “Amen!” echoes Jack, who is really into it now.

  “And one more thing,” Spike adds, looking right at Jack. “Ol’ Woody gave us a great legacy, ’specially if you been around the block like I have, ’cause he taught us that football, just like life, is a matter of pure survival, of…dog eat dog, of…win or…”

  “Die!” Jack and Ira fill in the blank together and execute a double fist-bump.

  * * *

  If a die-hard Ohio State Buckeyes football fan were on his deathbed and could be granted one wish before the end, he would without question request to be in the stands at Ohio Stadium in Columbus to witness the end-of-regular-season finale, the bitterly contested Ohio State-Michigan game. This is precisely where Ira and Jack and Spike and Sadie are, out here in the middle of the chaos, fully exposed to the freezing air and the maniacal atmosphere of the rabid home field during one of the greatest rivalries in all of sport.

  Oh, say can you see see see by the dawn’s early light light light…

  The Ohio for America Patriotic State Choir is harmonizing on the fifty-yard line, and, like Pavlov’s dogs salivating at the sound of the pre-dinner bell, the great majority of the 105,749 conditioned spectators place their red-blooded American hands on their red-blooded American hearts at the sound of the pregame anthem.

  …O’er the land of the free free free and the home of the brave brave brave?

  Before the final verse is enunciated, a wave of hysterical cheering drowns out the patriotism and puts it on hold. Love of country is one thing.

  But this is Ohio State football.

  “This should be one helluva game,” Spike Devlin roars, taking a swig of Southern Comfort from his THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY flask. “Both teams are 9-0, both are scoring machines—”

  “Go Bucks!” Sadie screams uncontrollably into the frigid air. A sizable wad of Juicy Fruit shoots out of her mouth, and she pops into it another five sticks without missing a beat.

  “Yeah,” Ira agrees, ripping the flask from Spike’s gloved hand and taking a swig of his own to defrost himself, “it should be a real pisser!”

  Ira, a good ol’ OSU alum, is thinking about how this whole experience is going to toughen Jack up for the Aussie Open in January.

  Jack, born and raised in New York City and new to all of this, is thinking about the fact that he cannot feel his own face.

  Aside from a relatively small segregated section of maize-and-blue-clad Michigan faithful, the horseshoe that is Ohio Stadium is a sea of scarlet and gray: Ohio State flags and Ohio State scarves and Ohio State windbreakers and Ohio State wine pouches and Ohio State booze flasks and Ohio State coolers and Ohio State baseball caps.

  The first half is a roller-coaster blur of action, each side scoring at will: 7-0 Michigan, 7-7, 14-7 Michigan, 14-14, 21-14 Michigan, 21-21, 28-21 Michigan, 28-28, 31-28 Michigan. And, with five seconds left in the half, Chris Zacheroff kicks a 49-yard field goal to tie it, 31-31, for the Bucks, then is carted off the field when a hard-charging Michigan defensive end lands flush on his kicking foot.

  And the crowd goes wild.

  Spike Devlin refills his THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY flask with Southern Comfort and it is passed around to Ira and then to Sadie and Ira says no, he’s in training when it reaches Jack and everyone’s having a good old time.

  And now there’s a growing murmur in the crowd because here comes the Ohio State Marching Band and OSU fans know exactly what’s coming but it doesn’t matter, they’re screaming anyhow in anticipation and now the band has formed a huge capital O with their bodies and now they’re looping the h as they march in single file from one letter to the next, spelling out in perfect precision the celebrated and beloved “script Ohio,” and from above they look like an army of highly disciplined ants and now they’re up to the i and then the o and the fans are going bananas and when the sousaphone player suddenly jumps out of the top of the o and runs out to the tip of the i and raises his plumed marching band hat aloft and bends over dramatically at the waist, like he’s bowing to Her Frigging Majesty the Queen of England, so that his hefty silver instrument nearly touches the ground, thus dotting the i with aplomb and fanfare and bravado, every single Buckeyes fan in the place goes ballistic and hearts are really racing now, even that of New Yorker and non-OSU alum Jack Spade.

  And the second half is underway, and maybe because the temperature has fallen to zero both defenses stiffen, so to speak, and neither offense can get anything going and the entire half is a series of dropped frozen footballs and fumbled frozen footballs and wobbly passes and sacks and vicious hits and prostrate bodies and Ira leans over to Jack to tell him this is what football is all about and that the team that is toughest and wants to win the most will in fact win and he’ll be goddamned if Ohio State isn’t that team and Jack can barely nod his frozen head and Sadie’s gum has settled between her upper and lower rows of teeth, sealing her mouth shut, and Spike fills up his THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY flask once again with Southern Comfort and he and Ira and Sadie, who has managed to pry open her mouth, take swigs.

  And now the Buckeyes recover a fumble in their own territory and can’t advance the ball on their first three downs and there’s one second left in the game and their only option is to send freshman sub John Gabelino out there to kick what would be a school-record 67-yard field goal under the direst of circumstances and that’s what they do and frosh Gabelino’s knees are shaking not so much from fear as from the fact that the thermometer now reads five below zero and the snap is good and the kick is airborne and it might have the distance but it’s starting to hook and 105,749 fans are standing and going ballistic and doink! the ball hits the left goalpost and ricochets down and hits the crossbar and dribbles excruciatingly slowly across the bar and finally drops…over it!

  And the Ohio State Buckeyes have pulled this one out of their cloacal aperture to prevail, 34-31, and Ohio Stadium is absolute bedlam and the roar exiting the
frozen throats of the OSU horde can be heard all the way in Pataskala and West Jefferson and the ghost of Wayne Woodrow Hayes is hovering over the stadium and, exposing the gap between his two front teeth, the legendary coach is smiling contentedly.

  Ira Spade leans over to Jack and whispers in his ear the famous quote uttered almost a century ago by then-assistant Buckeyes coach, Lou Holtz:

  The people of Columbus are great. They’re behind you 100%, win or tie.

  Jack Spade understands the lesson taught to him by his father, the same lesson as always, the lesson that losing is never an option and that winning is the Great American Dream. He understands that his father is talking about Ohio State but even more about him and the Australian Open, and he understands how important it is for him to win this upcoming major and to beat Ugo Bellezza and to be number one and he wants to smile at his father and show him that he gets it and that he appreciates the sentiment but he can’t right now because his entire face is as frozen as the Arctic tundra.

  * * *

  The bristles of Ira Spade’s black mustache are as stiff as those of a brush suffused with two-day-old paint.

  It is Sunday morning, November 26, the day after the OSU-Michigan game, and Ira and Jack are in the middle of a furious practice session in the brand-new indoor Kenny Road Tennis Club, a “bubble” shaped like a giant triple igloo and reinforced with minimal insulation. Ira has instructed that the thermostat be turned down to 40 degrees and it is minus fifteen outside, which explains the spiky nature of his subnasal growth.

  To Ira’s delight, Jack is freezing in this arctic environment yet gritting his teeth and being stubbornly determined in spite of it. Mission accomplished.

  The workout is proceeding swimmingly, and frigid Jack is on fire. As proficient and savvy as Ira Spade is on the tennis court, for the first time ever he is finding it difficult to keep up with his supremely talented and possessed young charge: Mr. Spade is no match for Mr. Hyde.

  “Listen here, you sonuvabitch,” Ira barks during a break, the frozen spikes of his mustache protruding outward, like a great white shark’s upper row of teeth. “This Bellezza kid? He’s gonna be tough, and I mean tough. He’s got a helluva game and he’s proven how great and tough he is time and again. And right now, looks like you two are neck and neck. But guess what. You are tougher! You think I brought you out here in this freezing goddam Ohio weather for nothing? Listen, when you get Down Under to Melbourne, where it’s gonna be over 100 frigging degrees, this’ll feel to you like you were in San Diego. Anyway, I’ll be goddamned if we’re gonna let Bellezza bypass you and be the best ever. That honor was reserved for you, and you alone, y’hear?

  “Now, I heard something about this kid’s having a soft spot. He’s apparently interested in poetry and art and all that sissy stuff, y’know? It’s all a buncha crap, and besides, how can a softie Italiano like that be better than you? And to top it off…he can’t even frigging hear! Well, we’ll show him! You and I are gonna go down there to Melbourne and show him what America’s all about, and who’s a real winner. That’s all that matters, so just remember all those quotes from good ol’ Woody Hayes when you’re bashing this Bellezza kid’s brains in.

  Ira is spent and beginning to lose all feeling in his extremities.

  “Okay, nice workout today, let’s hit the showers,” he says to Jack.

  A nearly frozen Mr. Hyde is slowly transforming himself back to Dr. Jekyll and throws a towel around his neck. “Yep, we’ll show him, and how!” Jack says to his father. “I’ll never disappoint you.”

  As father and son trudge painfully to the men’s locker room, Ira is thinking about the huge goddam Norman Brookes Trophy that will be awarded to the next Aussie Open men’s winner, the mammoth silver bowl planted on top of a pedestal and with the characters 2052 JACK SPADE engraved in silver below.

  Jack is thinking about the last four words that came out of his mouth.

  * * *

  It is 11:59 P.M. on Sunday evening, November 26th, the day after the OSU-Michigan game, and Avis Spade is all alone in her Manhattan apartment, in her son Jack’s bathroom.

  It is November 26th, the day Avis Spade was born, and her globe-trotting husband and son have once again forgotten to call her from the road to wish her a happy birthday.

  It has been quite a day for Avis, spent alone doing errands and reading and making phone calls and sending e-mails and working out at the gym, but mostly sitting by the phone and waiting for the call.

  And now her birthday is nearly over and the Cinderella hour is almost upon her, and she is sitting on the floor of Jack’s bathroom, a room she spends almost no time in because of her respect for her son’s privacy, yet here she is, her back leaning against the tiled wall, her mind racing with thoughts that are not good at all.

  She is thinking about how the entire day has gone by without a peep from Ira and she can understand that maybe, but why can’t Jack, her only child, break away from his father for just one tiny minute and make a simple phone call? and she has through the years learned to tolerate the loneliness but has never quite gotten used to being forgotten and she is also thinking about the dreadful visit she got in the early afternoon today from Odi Mondheim and how he told her he just came to talk a little business and how that sounded strange since he always does his business with Ira and never with her so why is he here?

  And she is thinking about how Odi looked at her with that funny, twisted look and how he approached her, like Uriah Heep with those beady little eyes and rubbing his hands together, and then about how the short, fat, bald, chinless Odi Mondheim with the Dick Cheney sneer actually touched her hand! and how she withdrew it immediately and let out a shriek that sent Odi fleeing the apartment, like a rat in the attic munching on a stolen wedge of cheese is frightened away by a sudden noise, and she is still feeling the touch of his hairy, pudgy little hand on hers and is filled once again with revulsion and disgust for Odi and now, many hours later, for her very life.

  Avis Spade is sitting here, all alone on Jack’s bathroom floor, lost in her gloomy thoughts, and in the palm of her left hand is a large number of small white oval pills, two dozen perhaps, just sitting there in her motionless hand, and she is still deep in her lugubrious thoughts and a single fat tear forms in her left eye and freezes there.

  On the sink nearby is an empty pharmaceutical bottle with a white label, on which are typed the words:

  XANAX 4 MG TABLET

  GENERIC FOR: ALPRAZOLAM

  14

  Strine Opn

  TSUM RIN MELBN N STOIM FUHTH STRINE OPN, MITE! Or, in non-Australian English: “It’s summer in Melbourne and it’s time for the Australian Open, mate!”

  It is January of 2052, summertime for Aussies since the seasons Down Under are Upside Down, and it is indeed Australian Open time in the south of the state of Victoria, and also time for yet another expected major showdown between the two most dominant twenty-one-year-olds of all time, Ugo Bellezza and Jack Spade.

  Xoitment zin the air, because potentially it will be the sixth consecutive year Jack and Ugo will have met in the finals of the Aussie Open and, incredibly, the sixteenth major finals they will have contested (they’ve never met at Wimbledon). For five years now, each player has been trying to establish some daylight between himself and his rival, but so far to no avail, both Ugo and Jack having racked up an improbable ten majors apiece.

  And here they are in Melbourne, city of beautiful old parks and gardens, the Yarra River running through it, Victorian buildings and modern skyscrapers intermingling. In abso-bloody-lutely gawgeous ol’ Melbn they are, and there are shrimps on the barbie and cricket balls and Aussie rules footballs in the air, and crikey and bugger me dead it’s bloody hot in here, so crank up the egg nishner, Melba, and how ya goin’? and no problems, mite, and g’dye and scona bee a Gloria sty, yep, sure is going to be a glorious day, and bloody oath, seems like every fair dinkum Aussie, every Sheila and every Joe is in a pub now throwing back an amber fluid, a coldie,
probly a Swan’s or a Grumpy’s or a Piss Weak or an Emu Bitter or a Red Ant or a Tooheys New, mite, and some even have a gutful of piss, they’ve throw down one too many stubbies, I reckon, and some even have the wobbly boot on, and it seems like every fair dinkum Aussie’s bendin’ the elbow and knockin’ back a tinny, that is, ’cept for those old girls, those mums outside in the bloody heat pushing their little ankle biters in prams, holy dooley and stone the crows!

  * * *

  Ugo and Giglio are chatting in a far corner of the men’s locker room a few hours before Ugo’s opening match against the promising Thai prodigy, Paradorn Siributparapathpornpongnonthaboonpot.

  “And one more thing, ragazzo, before you take the court,” Giglio signs to Ugo. “Never forget your history. Remember where you are now, and respect the game the Australians have played since the days of the great old coach, Harry Hopman. Remember that the temple of their wonderful tennis has always been based on the great pillars of fitness and sportsmanship and camaraderie. Remember also that although they have produced some of the greatest singles players ever, players like Bromwich and Sedgman and Hoad and Rosewall and Laver and Emerson and Newcombe, they have also come in magnificent pairs, demonstrating their unselfishness and strategic brilliance. Quist and Bromwich, Sedgman and McGregor, Hoad and Rosewall, Rose and Hartwig, Cooper and Anderson, Laver and Fraser, Emerson and Stolle, Newcombe and Roche, Alexander and Dent, McNamee and MacNamara, the Woodies… So just go out there, like you always do, with empathy in your heart and sportsmanship in your spirit, and make not only Italy, but also Australia proud!”

  * * *

  “Now, go out there and beat that Russian sonuvabitch!” Ira shouts at Jack inside the rented Mercedes 2900SLR-VX before his son’s first-round match with Igor Pakalenko. “Last time you two played, you didn’t have your usual killer instinct and you let him get that game in the second set that prevented you from bageling him. I want you to go out there and win ugly and manhandle him and rip him apart. And never forget your history: Win or—”