by James Ross
“Both men are doing what they needed to do. Tank hasn’t made up as much ground as he would have liked with those four birdies.”
“It gets tougher from here. They still have to go through Indian Ambush,” Trent said.
“And we know what can happen there,” Callum followed.
“In the meantime can you prepare us for the ninth hole?”
“It’s tough. What has there been here today?” The audience could hear papers shuffling in the background noise. “Only one birdie on this hole today,” Callum said as he answered his own question. “The tournament committee added somewhat of a European flare to this hole in that it resembles more of a links-style look.”
“Can you explain that to the viewers?” Trent inquired.
“First off, the hole is four hundred and ninety-eight yards.”
“That’s a long par four,” Trent added.
“That’s right and today it’s playing straight into what I’d say is a two-club wind. It’s just extremely difficult for a player to put the ball on the right spot on the green.” He looked at Trent. “Now what the committee has done is place several pot bunkers in the fairway. To compound that, they’ve graded the fairway so that the ball will roll toward those hidden devils.”
“That hardly seems fair.”
“Guys playing at his level like the challenge,” Callum countered. “You need a guide dog to see those little boogers out there.” The broadcasters looked down to the players on the tee.
“They’ve played the hole and know where to aim, but the turf is harder and faster now that the course has dried somewhat. Couple that with a breeze in their face and . . .”
“Let’s join Monique on the tee.”
“Both players are scouring through their yardage books,” the female pro reported. Dickie Doo pointed to a spot on a page for Tank as J Dub was making Opur aware of the danger.
“What they can’t control are the elements of nature,” Callum reminded the viewers. “Tank is stepping to the tee. We’ll see momentarily.” After watching Tank’s shot he continued, “It looks like it should be fine, but can we get the guys to give us a close-up view as the ball releases across the fairway?” The camera zoomed into the ball bounding down the fairway, running over a mound, across a berm and following a swale until it came to rest free of trouble.
“He’s in the fairway with a shot to the green,” Trent announced.
A minute later the camera followed the flight of Opur’s ball through the air. The background of choppy clouds dotted against the blue sky made it easier for the cameraman to follow. The serene, peaceful look of the ball flying through space seemed soothing but gave no indication of the effects of the wind on the tiny white sphere.
“That should be safe,” Callum reported. The ball scooted across the grass like a prairie dog searching for its home. It came to rest near a pot bunker.
“He’s in the fairway too!” Trent announced with anxiety. The match was keeping viewers tuned in which added to his popularity.
“That’s bonkers!” Callum shouted.
“Why?” Trent queried. “He’s safe. He’s sitting on the grass.”
“Think about it, are you a nutter?”
“What do you mean?” Trent questioned. “His ball found the turf out of the pot bunker.”
Callum scowled at his broadcast partner. “Use your loaf, chap.”
“Huh?”
Callum took his fist and tapped on his scalp with his knuckles. “Your head! Your head!” Trent was as bewildered as a third grader looking at a calculus formula. “Where’s he going to stand?” Callum blurted.
Trent stared at the ball as it rested inches away from the right wall of the trap. “Oh, now I see what you mean. Where he has to stand is three feet below his ball.”
“No kidding,” Callum uttered. “He won’t be happy when he sees that.”
In the meantime four women had squeezed in along the ropes next to Julie and Morgan. Two had on sundresses that skirted in the breeze while the others wore culottes and golf shirts. “Here they come,” the blonde in the light green sundress said.
“Maybe Tank will notice me,” the brunette in navy blue culottes said. She reached into her purse for some lip stick and applied a fresh coat.
“Tank?” the blonde wearing a visor exclaimed. “He’s last year’s news. I want that new hunk.” Morgan glanced at Julie then looked at the foursome out of the side of her eye.
“He is cute,” the striking, auburn haired woman in the light blue golf shirt replied.
“That’s the one I want,” the blonde in the green sundress said as the players got closer. “Look at his hair!” The ladies pushed against Morgan as they crammed closer. Morgan fell against Julie.
“Hey!” Julie yelled. “We’ve got a pregnant woman here!”
“And we’ve got one that wants to get pregnant,” the auburn haired gal hissed. “He’s such a piece of . . .” She sighed. “Look at those shoulders.”
“And that waist.”
“I’d push him down and ride that until . . .”
“Can you gals hold it down a little?” Julie complained. She elbowed her way back up to the rope. “Give my friend some room to breathe.”
The gals moved an inch or two and glared at Julie and Morgan. The blonde in the visor started a verbal assault. “Why don’t you take her into some air conditioning?”
“Yeah, where it’s nice and comfortable.”
“We’re out here to watch the boys.”
“And in her condition she can’t do any of them any good.”
The blonde in the green sundress who was obviously inebriated glared at Morgan.
“Have you ever had one with hair like that?” the auburn haired gal said. “Mmm. That’s so sexy. It’s like being with a rocker,” she growled. “It brings out the animal in me.” The gals giggled at themselves.
On the course Opur placed his hand on his hips then furtively gestured to J Dub. “What can I do?” He was pissed. “Dammit!”
J Dub stood the bag up on the fairway away from the ball. He scratched his head. After wincing he cupped his hands behind his head, tilted it backward and looked at the heavens. “Okay, let’s . . .”
“I can’t get to the ball!”
“Yes you can,” J Dub said relaxed and rational. “The golf course has a way of evening things out.” He was trying to come up with the right words to calm Opur down. “What we don’t want to do is take a big number. Let’s play for a five, take our medicine and live for another hole.” He walked over to the ball.
“This is crap!”
“Calm down. What’s done is done. Get it together,” J Dub said coolly. “Relax.” He walked over to the ball and stood on the opposite side of it. “Look, we’ve practiced this many times.” He stood with his back to the green. With the ball on his right side he made a motion like he was hitting a ball with a croquet-style swing. The far outside of the club was soled against the grass.
Opur worked his mouth back and forth. He knew the shot. It was one that came in handy once every two or three years. Reluctantly he grabbed a club and practiced a swing. After a deep breath and a verbalized sigh he agreed. “Okay.”
“What’s he doing now?’ the gal in the visor asked.
“Maybe he saw us,” the one in the light green sundress sighed.
“He’s shaking his tiny little butt our way,” the auburn haired beauty said.
“You hoo! You hoo! Over here!” the blonde with the visor shouted.
“For Pete’s sake if YouWho hears that he might run over,” Julie said to Morgan. “His name is Yuuto and the guys kept messing it up. That’s how he got his nickname.”
The marshal on the course worked his way toward the females. He spread his arms and put his hands in the air in a subtle approach to keep things quiet. “Doesn’t he know how many sea breezes we’ve had?” the blonde in the sundress said to her girlfriends. They all giggled.
Julie looked at them disgusted.
&
nbsp; “What’s wrong?” Morgan asked.
Julie whispered, “Besides the obvious, now I’m upset by what Captain Jer said.”
“Which was?”
“Women don’t have a clue. By listening to them now I understand what he was talking about.” Julie groaned. “I hate it when he’s always right.”
On the course J Dub asked, “Do you have it?”
Opur shook his head. With the back of his head against the breeze his long hair kept blowing in his face. “We’ve got to get a rubber band to tie this back.” He walked away from the ball and advanced to his bag. “It’s in the top pouch.” J Dub fetched the elastic loop out of the bag as Opur pulled his hair back and held it.
“You hoo! You hoo!” the blonde with the visor yelled. “My Gawd, is he HOT or what?”
“I’ll fight you for some of that,” the blonde with the green sundress said. “Look how gorgeous he is!” The quartet giggled.
Opur approached the ball and after a tiny amount of trepidation, executed the shot. It traveled about sixty yards and didn’t get more than fifteen feet off the ground. J Dub gave him an animated clap. “What can you do?” Opur said with a shrug.
“That was great. Let’s get the next shot on the dance floor.”
Meanwhile near the ladies, Tank and Dickie Doo were trying to solve their own set of problems. “We’ve got two twenty left,” the caddy indicated.
The brunette in the blue culottes patted her left breast. “Be still my heart,” she murmured.
“We can almost touch him,” the blonde in the green sundress said. A nasty look came from the marshal.
“Whoops!” the blonde in the visor said. “Shhhhhh!”
Seconds later Tank’s shot was eaten up by the wind and fell short of the green. “That’s the first errant ball he’s hit all day,” Callum said from the booth.
“It gives Opur life,” Trent conceded.
From a hundred and ninety yards Opur could only get the ball as close as forty feet. His subsequent two putts gave him a bogey. “He’s proved he’s human,” Callum said, “but that still is only twelve putts through nine holes.”
In the meantime Tank chipped his ball to ten feet and knocked it in to save par. “That gives him a four under par, thirty-two on the front,” Trent advised the public.
“And he’s only two shots behind in his quest for the prized fedora,” Callum added.
Chapter Seventy-Three
Players that were ahead of Tank and Opur had encountered some difficulty. The subsequent delay provided a wait on the tenth tee box. Morgan and Julie sauntered over to the area and squeezed their way to the walkway area that had been cleared. Opur couldn’t miss the bright red maternity top. He walked up to the pair.
“Are you feelin’ okay, Honey?” She reached up and examined his bandage. Then she brushed the hair off his forehead.
Opur shook his head negatively. “I’m not sure I’m going to make it. I’m lightheaded and feel like throwing up.”
“What’s wrong?”
“My head has been throbbing all day.”
“I’m sorry for throwin’ the phone at you. Are you hung over too?”
“Nah, not at all.” Opur put his hands up to his temples. “It just feels like my head is going to explode. Maybe I took too much over-the-counter stuff.”
J Dub motioned for Opur to get on the tee. Tournament officials wearing fedoras adorned with the tradition two-foot, blue plume stoically stood close by. He turned to leave. Morgan reached out for his hand. “Wait. Turn around.” Opur turned his back to Morgan. “This will give you your attitude back.” She reached up and took the rubber band off his ponytail. “No matter what happens I want you to know I’m proud of you.”
Opur took his visor off and shook his hair into place. The quartet of women stood twelve feet away. “I love you, Sweetie.” He bent over and gave her a peck on the lips.
“I love you, too.”
Dickie Doo subtly nudged Tank and motioned to the pair. Sarcastically he commented, “Isn’t that cute?”
“Oh, my Gawd,” the blonde in the light green sundress said to her friends.
Chapter Seventy-Four
“What is it you say every Sunday at this juncture?” Trent joshed to Callum.
“Let the match begin!” the Englishman said with a grin. “The back nine at The Classic is as unique as any set of holes on any golf course in the world,” Callum began. “More careers have been made or destroyed over this piece of real estate than one can count.”
“We start out with a six hundred and twenty yard par five,” Trent announced.
“Even with a strong tailwind the pros cannot carry the ball onto this green in two,” Callum said. The landing area for the second shot is dotted with sand traps and the hundred and twenty yards from there to the green is nothing but swampland.”
“How do you handicap the action on the back nine?” Trent asked his broadcast partner.
“Tank has been there before. Making up two strokes back here is nothing. Heck that can happen on one errant swing,” Callum sighed. “But we know from past years that birdies are hard to come by. It’s literally a survival contest.”
It didn’t take long for that comment to ring true. Each golfer hit the fairway off the tee and laid up short of the swamp on their second shot. “Are you going to make it?” J Dub asked Opur. His pace had lagged behind.
“Hand me the umbrella.”
J Dub looked at him like he was out of his mind. “The rain shouldn’t come until after the round.”
Opur looked to the skies. “I want some shade.”
J Dub handed him the accessory. After Opur opened it J Dub asked, “Where did you get that?” The umbrella did not resemble any manufactured in the states. It looked like the top of a toadstool. The sides were two feet deep. “It looks like you can crawl in there and go to sleep.”
“Maybe.” Opur hummed a tune.
“Are you going to tell me?”
“What?”
“Where you got it?”
“Oh,” Opur said. “Malaysia.” He had gotten aloof, almost disoriented. “Have you ever been there?”
“Can’t say that I have. I’m just a sheltered Midwestern boy,” J Dub answered. He looked at Opur. The sluggish attitude had returned. “What’s wrong with you?”
“I’m tired. I feel like I could lay down and take a nap.”
J Dub was astonished. “What? We’re on the back nine of The Classic on Sunday and you’re leading the tournament.”
“There’s monkeys over there you know.”
J Dub looked around. “There aren’t any monkeys around.”
“Sure there are. They’re in the woods and they run out and grab your ball,” Opur said.
“What are you talking about?”
“It feels so good in the shade.” Opur tilted his head back and sighed. His mouth flew open. He took deep breaths, almost gasping for air. “The heat saps all the energy out of you. This is brutal.” His gait was not straight. He took a serpentine route down the fairway.
“What’s going on down there, Monique?” Trent asked from the booth.
“Your guess is as good as mine. I don’t know what Opur’s doing, but I’ll try to get closer to find out.”
“Opur! Opur! What is going on?” J Dub asked as he stopped, put his hand on Opur’s shoulder and attempted to snap the player out of it.
The young man looked to be in a trance. He violently shook his head. After a few seconds Opur brought his hands to his forehead, winced, shook out some more cobwebs and raised his head. Slowly he rotated his vision to notice the horizon and the surroundings on the golf course. “Where are we?”
“We’re on the tenth hole of The Classic,” J Dub answered.
“We’re not in Malaysia?” the kid questioned.
“No, we’re in the final round of The Classic.”
Opur noticed the umbrella that he had placed down on the ground. “What’s that doing out?”
“You asked
for it,” J Dub replied, “to get some shade.”
“That’s what we did over there when I played some tournaments in the Far East. We walked under the umbrella because it was so hot and humid.”
“You’re back here now, in the United States. We’re down in Alabama.” J Dub paused. Everything had become surreal. “Do you want me to call some help?”
Opur looked around some more. He still wasn’t all there. Everything was blurry and his mental faculties were in a fog. Then he noticed Tank. “No, don’t call any help.” Once again he shook his head and then raised his arms skyward. He let out a big yawn and took two steps. Then he stopped and looked back at J Dub. With resolution he continued, “Are you going to come along? Let’s go beat him.”
Chapter Seventy-Five
“What was that all about?” Elia asked some of his buddies from Prairie Winds. The gang had gotten more organized and had made a pact to try and stay closer together for the final nine holes.
“It certainly was odd,” BT said. “I hope he’s all right.”
“Maybe he jus’ be hot,” YouWho said. He swished his hand in front of his black bangs. “Tem’chur on rise.”
“It looks like something more than that is going on,” Curt said. He scanned the surroundings. “Hey Scottie P, there’s your gal in the white dress and the polka dots.” The guys laughed.
“She took those heels off,” Paco said. “I didn’t think she’d make eighteen holes in them.”
“Maybe she be pregnant,” YouWho said.
“What are you talking about?” BT asked.
“Don’t you have saying in dis country ’bout barefoot an’ pregnant?” YouWho asked.
The guys laughed. “That doesn’t have anything to do with her taking her shoes off,” Elia said.
“Yeah, I bet it has more to do with her getting blisters on her toes,” Paco followed.
“Hey, Scottie P, inch over close to her. Can you see if she has blisters on her feet?” Elia asked.
“You can tell her you’re a eunuch or a gelding or something if she asks. That way she won’t think you’re hitting on her,” Captain Jer yelled out.