Primal Threat

by Earl Emerson

  Everybody sprinted through the encampment and down the trail to the escarpment, from which they would be able to see the finish line. Zak was first, arriving in time to spot Giancarlo streaking down the rutted road and disappearing from view in a blur. “Where are they?” Nadine asked, breathlessly.

  “Behind those trees. Watch the bridge.” As he spoke, bicycle and rider flew across the bridge, kicking up a cloud of dust as fine as flour. Zak had never seen anybody go that fast on a mountain bike.

  “There he is!” screamed Nadine.

  Bouncing as it disappeared behind the trees, the truck reappeared on the same stretch of road where they’d seen Giancarlo. If there was one thing Zak could tell even from this distance, it was that Scooter had never fully regained control of the Ford, which was slewing wildly over the lower washboard sections. Moments later the truck zipped across the concrete bridge and shot up the road a quarter of a mile, trailed by huge pillows of dust that enveloped the finish-line observers in a sheet of brown and gray as tall as a house.

  “How much did we win by?” asked Fred.

  His brother stood on top of a nearby boulder and got on his walkie-talkie. “Race start to race finish. It was my truck, right?”

  “Negatory,” came the response on his handset. “Negatory, big buddy. The bike won by three seconds.”

  “Three seconds?” Fred said. “Three seconds? That’s bullshit. If Chuck had been driving…Scooter doesn’t know how to handle that rig. Did you see him?”

  “Whooee,” Hugh said, leaping from one rock to another. “I’m rich.” They straggled back in three distinct groups, the white Ford, the Porsche, and Giancarlo pedaling alone up the mountainside in bike shorts, his long pants slung around his neck. The Jeep group was visibly morose and somewhat dumbfounded over the results, while the girls seemed to think it was marvelous that a man on a bicycle had outraced a truck. Zak continued to sit on the lookout rock while everyone except Nadine went back through camp to greet the returning racers. Nadine touched Zak’s shoulder and said, “You knew that was going to happen, didn’t you?”

  Zak watched the colors in the sky. The sun would sink in another hour, but right now, squatting above the horizon in the haze and lacking the cookie-cutter crispness it usually punched in the atmosphere, it was simply a large, pale, unfocused yellow gap in the purple western sky.

  By the time Zak and Nadine got back to the camp, Fred, Chuck, Kasey, and Scooter were huddled together. The girls were in a clump talking and watching Hugh perform a victory dance, slapping his mouth, whoo-whooing, and generally making an ass of himself.

  “Shut up, you fucking retard,” Scooter said, rushing over to Hugh and slapping him across the bicycle helmet four or five times in quick succession. Hugh cowered and raised his arms to protect himself. Before anybody could get close enough to stop Scooter, he’d slapped Hugh across the face and knocked his glasses to the ground. Hugh started crying, or giving a pretty good imitation of it, then dropped to his hands and knees, where he searched ineffectually for his glasses.

  Nadine rushed to Hugh’s side, followed by every woman in camp.

  “Geez, you’re a dick,” said Jennifer Moore.

  While Hugh was being pampered by the women, Giancarlo stepped closer to Zak and said, “He better watch himself.”

  Hugh, bolstered by the women’s attentions and clearly feeling invulnerable now that he had the camp’s sympathy, skipped over to Scooter and held out his hand. “Pay up, big daddy.”

  “Fuck you, you moron.”

  “Gotta pay,” Hugh said, glancing around uncertainly. “That’s my thousand dollars in your wallet.”

  “You deaf or something? Get away from me, fucker. That was a fluke. It would never happen again in a million years.”

  “It was no fluke,” Zak said. “Giancarlo could race you down that hill all night and you’d never beat him.”

  “So what’s Giancarlo, some sort of downhill prodigy? You bastards. You threw in a ringer, didn’t you?”

  “Calm down,” said Kasey. “It’s not like your driving didn’t suck.”

  Scooter turned to Zak and said, “You talk tough when your friends are taking the risks. Let’s see you get on the bike and try it.”

  “Pay Hugh and I’ll think about it.”

  “You’ll race me if I pay the moron?”

  “You pay Hugh, I’ll race.”

  “Another thousand?” Zak was surprised at how keen Scooter was to engage in a second wager after losing the first. “Or are you chicken? Tell you what. I’ll drive with one hand tied behind my back. Better yet, I’ll drive drunk.”

  “I thought you were already driving drunk,” Zak said.

  “Fuck you.”

  “Pay Hugh.”

  “Sure. Why not? You lose, the two of you pay me back the thousand tonight and the second thousand when the banks open Monday.” Scooter took out his wallet and counted out ten one-hundred-dollar bills, whereupon Hugh danced away counting and recounting the bills. Even to Zak, who knew this was an act, the exuberant gloating grew bothersome. Zak borrowed Giancarlo’s bike but retrieved his own helmet and shoes from camp, strapped on the gear and rode around for a minute or two, then pedaled out of sight higher on the road, turned back down the hill, and let it rip for a hundred yards in an abbreviated practice run. He hit an unexpected rock in the road, bounced, and almost crashed before regaining control.

  “Sit back and let it roll,” Giancarlo advised when he got to the starting line. “Feather the brakes before the first right-hand turn then don’t touch them through the turn. Feather them a little bit before the last set of washboard, then ease up and let it roll. Watch out for the gravel at the bottom.”

  Nadine and her girlfriends jumped into the Porsche while everybody else remained at the starting line. Before they left, Nadine came over and kissed Zak’s cheek, then glanced over to make sure Scooter saw it. “Good luck.”

  Zak knew the kiss would only make Scooter angrier and wondered for the first time if Nadine was using him against Scooter in some sort of battle in which Zak had already been nominated to be the loser. He didn’t think Nadine had that much guile—any guile, for that matter—but it was something he’d never considered until that moment.

  Scooter watched Nadine climb into the Porsche SUV twenty yards away. “Pussy,” Scooter said, winking conspiratorially at Zak as if they were best buddies. “You spend nine months trying to get out and the next ninety years doing your damnedest to get back in.”

  “Shut up.”

  “Don’t tell me you don’t want to fuck that.”

  “Just get in the truck and try not to kill yourself.”

  “Sure. Fine.” He stepped close and said, “But I’m going to catch you and it’s going to be the sorriest ‘accident’ you ever saw. There’s not going to be a thing any of your friends will be able to do about it.”

  “I think I’m going to give the money to Greenpeace,” Zak said. “Just to piss you off.”

  17

  May

  Zak couldn’t help feeling twinges of envy during his first visit to the Seattle Tennis Club. Generally, when the outdoor courts were damp, Nadine opted to play at Seattle U, but this week the custodial staff’s summer floor-polishing program had rendered it unavailable.

  After four weeks of getting trounced almost daily, Zak had finally managed to win a few hard-fought points but no games. He suspected his improvement was dispiriting to Nadine, who voiced fears that she was subconsciously allowing him points. The notion that she might be easing up because he was a guy was unthinkable to her. “You do any better, I’m going to see a sports psychiatrist,” Nadine said, joking.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Zak said. “I still haven’t won a game.”

  “But I haven’t skunked you in a week.”

  “You like me. I make you nervous.”

  “I do like you, but you don’t make me that nervous.”

  “Don’t bet on it.” Zak loved her competitiveness and knew the comm
ent would make her try harder.

  They played for an hour, during which she became more and more distracted and then finally excused herself. “I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”

  Zak took the occasion to get a drink of water and visit the men’s room. When he got back to the court, she still had not returned. After twenty minutes he spotted her near a Coke machine on the far side of a gaggle of middle-aged women who played in some sort of June Cleaver league, all in tennis whites and with three-hundred-dollar rackets under their arms. As he drew closer, Zak saw that Nadine was talking to a man in a baseball cap and dark sunglasses. Scooter.

  Zak negotiated his way around the group of women and approached the couple. “What the hell are you doing here?” Scooter asked.

  “I was playing tennis.” Zak stood close to Nadine. “You all right?”

  “Scooter and I were just talking. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  Zak turned to Scooter. “Stalking old friends?”

  Scooter’s face revolved through a medley of disbelief, disgust, and then antipathy. “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about you showing up at almost all of our tennis games.”

  “Fuck you, buddy.” Glowering at Nadine, Scooter added, “Jesus, pal. My family were founding members of this club. I can be here whenever I want, and unlike you, I don’t have to ride in on someone else’s membership card. And here’s a bulletin for you. Nadine’s way out of your league.”

  “She’s better off with a stalker? Is that what you’re saying?”

  “You keep this up, I’m going to speak to my attorneys about slander.”

  Zak had a feeling they were headed toward a physical confrontation. There was no doubt in his mind that he was fitter and stronger than Scooter—Zak was six feet one, slim, and muscular; Scooter was a few inches shorter and forty pounds heavier, the extra bulk consisting of the kind of baby fat some people carried into their twenties—but according to Nadine, her ex-boyfriend had taken years of martial arts training.

  “You broke into her car, didn’t you?”

  “What?”

  “You heard me. You broke into Nadine’s car at Green Lake.”

  Zak knew and hoped Nadine did, too, that the proof of guilt was the way Scooter’s face went through a catalog of feigned reactions. Even behind the dark sunglasses you could tell his eyes were flitting all around the room. He was nervous as a cornered ferret.

  “What makes you think I have a key to Nadine’s car?”

  “How did you know it was done with a key?”

  “You little firehouse fag. When are you going to realize you don’t have anything to offer her? On top of everything else, your family and her family are going to fit together like fine cheese and horse turds. I mean, Jesus, your dad’s working on the pool house like a wetback.”

  “Scooter,” Nadine said. “Stop it.”

  “I’m not going to stop it. Somebody needs to say this. If everybody in your family’s too polite to tell this guy what they’re thinking, then I’ll just have to step up to the plate. They don’t like you, pal. None of them likes you. Nadine’s parents and Kasey think you’re nothing but a gold digger.” Zak knew from the way Nadine tensed up that Scooter wasn’t inventing these accusations. “We all know you’re after her money. And don’t dare tell me I’m stalking my own girlfriend.”

  “Ex-girlfriend.”

  “Girlfriend. I never broke up with her.”

  “Scooter,” Nadine said, “I broke up with you, and you know it.”

  “The crux of the matter is I’m right for Nadine, I can provide her with the material comforts she needs in life, and you can’t.”

  “I’m going to support myself,” Nadine said. “I’m going to be a social worker. And you won’t be around.”

  “The point is,” Scooter continued, throwing Nadine a withering look, “I can treat her the way she deserves to be treated, and somebody like you…I mean, do you even know how to order wine or use a salad fork?”

  “Come on, Zak,” Nadine said, tugging Zak’s arm. “Let’s go play tennis.”

  Scooter and Zak glared at each other for several long seconds without moving. “Nadine, it matters where people come from. Look at his father. And that oversexed sister with the Dolly Parton boobs? Kasey said—”

  Zak started toward Scooter, but Nadine pulled his arm and managed to swing him around in a half circle as if he were on a tether. He knew Nadine was strong, but she surprised him with just how strong. Scooter had crouched in a defensive stance. “Come on, motherfucker. Try me.”

  “You fool,” said Nadine. “I told you I never want to see you again.”

  “You know you love me.” Scooter smiled a smile that in another time and under other circumstances might have been charming.

  “Get out,” Nadine said. By now everybody in the corridor was watching, and Scooter, realizing he’d become the center of attention, ambled toward the door with a deliberate slowness and left the building without looking back.

  When they got to the court, Nadine said, “I don’t feel like tennis anymore.”

  “He was watching us play, wasn’t he?”

  “How can I stop him? He’s a member here. Plus, I have to see him socially. He comes to the house to see Kasey.”

  After she’d gathered up her warm-up clothes, she started crying. Zak put his arm around her shoulders as they walked out of the court area.

  “I’m okay. It’s just…I ran into him at Bellevue Square two days ago. And today I saw him over there by the door while we were playing. He talks about taking care of me, but when we were going together he totally took me for granted unless there was another guy threatening to pay attention to me. He’s so jealous. We hardly ever spent any time talking like you and I do. It was always, ‘Let’s go do something with Kasey and the guys.’ Or, ‘Let’s go to my house and fool around.’”

  They ended up on a bench in one of the unused outdoor courts as clouds scudded across the sky at intervals, exposing patches of blue behind them. The spotty sunshine warmed Zak considerably. “I’m sorry I’m such a baby,” Nadine said.

  “Does your family really think I’m chasing you for your money?”

  “I’m sorry he said that. That was just embarrassing.”

  “Do they?”

  “They don’t know you like I do. Besides, you didn’t chase me. I chased you. That’s how we became friends in the first place. I made it happen.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She giggled, the laughter a release from the stress and tears. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “No, I want to hear this.”

  “I told Mom to call you for that pool house job.”

  “You what?”

  “When we were all at your fire station I learned you did remodeling. I told Mom to call you. The only trouble was your father took the job, and he was there for weeks before you showed up. I was still going with Scooter, but I had my eye on you. Maybe it was because you saved me in the wreck. That day you showed up, I got out of the pool, took a super-quick shower, and ran downstairs to meet you.”

  “Is any of this true?”

  “It’s all true.”

  They watched the clouds scudding across the sky.

  Zak knew she was working up her nerve to tell him something that had been bubbling beneath the surface every time Scooter’s name came up.

  “I don’t even know how I got into this. We were just all of a sudden going together. I mean, we were dating once in a while, and then he wanted me to tell him I wouldn’t see anyone else, and I wasn’t seeing anyone else right then so it seemed like an easy thing to say. And after that he got so he wanted to know where I was all day. At first I was flattered. No guy had ever taken that much interest in me. He used to call my cell phone when I was in class or at practice. I started turning it off, but that only made him mad. And we used to go out on these long dates where he’d drive me somewhere and wouldn’t take me home…”

  “Unl
ess what?”

  “I didn’t say unless.”

  “But it’s there in your voice.”

  “Favors, he called them.”

  “You don’t have to tell me the rest.”

  “No, I need somebody to hear this, and you’re the only person in the world I feel comfortable talking to right now.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “The whole thing happened in increments. We got into this thing where we would go to his house or if his folks were hanging around we’d go somewhere in his car and he would ask me to touch him. At first I didn’t want to, but he wouldn’t take me home unless I did. He knew I wanted to be a virgin on my wedding night and he said he respected that, but he claimed what we were doing didn’t have anything to do with being a virgin. He said it was a matter of healthy living and if a guy didn’t get some release he could get sick. So I would touch him and then…well…”

  “Please don’t tell me this.”

  “No, I do. I have to tell somebody. He said every girl he’d ever dated had done it. He said it was what couples did. That it was no big deal. At the time, I was thinking we would eventually get married. He hadn’t asked me or anything, but it seemed to be the place we were headed. I talked to my pastor, who more or less told me any expression of love short of intercourse was okay. When I tried to pin him down on definitions, he got nervous and cut off the conversation.

  “It was always this struggle, this big argument, and then I would give in, if only to get some peace, and afterward he would drive me home with this self-satisfied smirk on his face. You must think I’m horrible.”

  “I think you did everything you could to remain within the boundaries of your faith.”

  “Despite how much he says he loves me, sometimes I feel Scooter really hates me.”