Something for Nothing

by David Anthony

  “Well, what do you think?” Peter asked. “Isn’t it great?”

  “Yeah, Martin,” Linda said. “Come on, say something.”

  Martin nodded, and forced a quick smile.

  “Yeah,” he said. “It’s great, Peter. Thank you. I’ll put it up in my office.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Finding them had been pure luck. Martin had been saying yeah, yeah, it’s all set, I just have to pick them up. But in fact he’d been worried. Since the announcement that Gaylord Perry was pitching on July eighth, the game had been completely sold out, and it was impossible to find tickets. It was a big deal: that’s all there was to it. Everyone wanted to go, especially now that Perry might tie the American League record for consecutive wins. The record (according to Peter, who’d been reading the green sports page of the Chronicle every day and reporting to Martin about it) was sixteen.

  “Are you sure?” Peter kept saying. “I mean, it’s all set up, right?”

  Martin suspected that Linda had planted a seed of doubt in Peter’s ear—some indirect version of “Your dad’s a screw-up, don’t forget that.” But whatever it was, he’d known he was running out of time.

  And then, out of nowhere, Ludwig said he had a guy—scribbled a name on a piece of paper, said he knew him from somewhere and that he was looking to unload some tickets. It was a huge relief.

  So now it was the day before the Fourth of July, and Martin was in Berkeley with Peter. They were on their way to fetch the tickets.

  Driving along Shattuck Avenue, he saw that the gas lines were really big. They were longer, even, than the ones in Walnut Station. People must be filling up for the Fourth, he thought.

  He glanced down at the piece of paper Ludwig had given him, and that he was holding in his hand.

  He knew the guy lived near Spenger’s. The slip of paper said Eighth Street, just north of University.

  “Okay,” he said to Peter. “We’ll be there in a minute.”

  “Are you lost?” Peter asked.

  Martin glanced over at him. He was sitting in the front passenger seat. “No,” he said. “I’m not lost. I come over here all the time. And I grew up around here, remember?”

  “Okay,” Peter said. “If you say so.”

  Martin turned from Shattuck to University. The UC campus was right there, at the end of University. There were lots of students walking along the sidewalks, and it occurred to him that they must be holding summer classes.

  He had to brake for a traffic backup, and leaning out the window he saw that it was because a crowd of thirty or forty people had waded out into the street. It was a bunch of hippie types—long-haired and scruffy-looking. They were waving signs around and yelling. He and Peter were at least ten cars back from the action, but they had a good view of what was going on. Jesus, Martin thought. Didn’t they have anything better to do? Didn’t you have to study at a school like Berkeley?

  “Who are those people?” Peter asked. “What’re they doing?”

  “They’re protesting,” Martin said.

  “Protesting?” Peter said.

  “Yeah,” Martin said. “You know, demonstrating.”

  Peter looked at Martin, then back at the crowd. “About what?” he asked.

  “Who knows?” Martin responded. “The war in Vietnam. President Nixon. Everything. Nothing. I don’t know.”

  “Oh,” Peter said. He paused, and Martin could tell that he was thinking, trying to connect the dots. “So Nixon’s a bad president, right?”

  Martin thought for a second. “I don’t know. I guess. Or he got caught doing some stuff he shouldn’t have done, anyway. And then he got caught lying about it. So yeah, he screwed up. He’s a screwup, I guess you could say.”

  Traffic started moving, but slowly. Martin thought about how his father would respond to Peter’s question, about how he’d tell Peter that Nixon was a corrupt asshole, and that he was going to grow up in a world where everyone knew you couldn’t trust politicians. And he’d tell him that it would be better that way, that people would take responsibility for things, and not just blindly trust their leaders anymore.

  Martin closed his eyes for a long second and wondered if he had a headache coming on. When he opened them, he saw that the protestors had made their way to the other side of the street. They were doing the same thing they’d been doing on the campus side—yelling and carrying on. From what Martin could tell, no one was paying much attention to them.

  “But Nixon’s going to get fired, right?” Peter asked. “That’s what Mrs. Bishop said.”

  “Huh,” Martin said. “I don’t know about that. I think he might quit. Or resign, that is. I’m not sure.”

  He tried to picture Mrs. Bishop out on the street with these protestors, yelling at cars and waving a sign that said resign now! She’d be wearing the jeans she’d sported for her visit to his house. Or no—maybe it would be one of the short dresses she wore on school days. Either way, he knew, she wouldn’t fit in very well.

  “Can the President get arrested?” Peter asked. “Or can they chop off his head, like they did to the King of France?”

  Martin looked over at Peter. “No,” he said. He let out a laugh. “They won’t chop off his head. That’s definitely not going to happen.”

  Jesus, he thought. This fucking kid.

  But as he drove past the campus it occurred to Martin that Nixon’s day of reckoning might coincide with his own. Nixon would get taken away in cuffs the same day Martin was hauled out of his house, hands cuffed and shackled behind his back just like the President (or the soon-to-be ex-President). The lights would be flashing on the cruiser sitting in his driveway (his circular driveway), and Alan Guthrie would be standing halfway up the drive, drinking it in. Maybe Miriam Weaver would see the commotion and come wandering up the street. She’d put a worried hand to her mouth, and she and Martin would make eye contact through the back-door window of the police cruiser. It would be the last time he saw her for a long time—but maybe the look on her face (not just worried but heartbroken) would sustain him through his time in prison.

  Martin drove down University to Eighth Street. The house was five or six blocks off University. Number 1640. Not a great neighborhood, but not as bad as he thought it might be. Lots of junky-looking cars on the street and in driveways, but the tiny front yards had plants and flowers (big clumps of rosemary, bright perennials, that kind of thing). And the little stucco houses were painted various colors. Yellow, blue. You could see that people had made an effort. Which was nice, because in general, the streets in that area between San Pablo Avenue and the bay were a little sketchy. A couple of people from Spenger’s said it had gotten worse back there. More and more black and Mexican families had been moving into rental places, and there was more crime. Lots of break-ins, drugs, a few muggings.

  “Okay,” Martin said, slowing down in front of a house with the number 1640 on the wall by the front stairway. “I think this is it.”

  There wasn’t any room to park along the street, and so he pulled his Cadillac up into the little driveway—or part of the way up the drive. There was a big Ford pickup blocking most of the space, and there were a couple of kids’ bicycles lying on the ground by the open garage door. The garage was a mess. A table saw, ladders, boxes, a wheelbarrow with a green lawn hose sticking out of it. There were a couple of motorcycles taking up a lot of space (which made sense; Ludwig had said something about this guy and motorcycles). One of them was a dirt bike of some sort. It was up on milk crates and almost completely taken apart. The other one was a big street bike, a Norton or a Triumph.

  “How about if you wait here,” Martin said. “I’ll just be a minute. You can read your magazine.” He pointed down at the issue of Sports Illustrated Peter had brought along, and that was sitting on the seat next to him. It had just come in the mail a week or so before, and Peter was excited because it had a picture of Reggie Jackson on the cover. He was at the end of one of his trademark swings, legs and torso twisted
with effort, and above him in big yellow letters it said SUPERDUPERSTAR. No one else had a swing like that, Martin had told Peter. And it was true—the guy really was one of a kind.

  “Why can’t I come with you?” Peter said. “I’ll be quiet.”

  “Just wait here,” Martin said. He opened the door and got out of the car.

  The house was just a box, basically, but with a little wing up above the garage, on the right. It was a small place. Martin could picture it—a tiny living room and kitchen, a couple of bedrooms, and a bathroom. And that was it.

  The door opened before Martin was halfway up the drive, and a big white guy stepped outside. Or not so much big as wide—thick arms and shoulders, big thighs. He had short dark hair, boots, and a black T-shirt with the words Lynyrd Skynyrd on it. Martin knew this was a rock band. Ludwig had mentioned them, said they were good. Maybe the two of them got together and listened to Lynyrd Skynyrd records. Maybe they lay on the floor and looked at the album covers and sang the lyrics.

  “Can I help you?” The guy stepped over one of the kids’ bikes and stopped at the top of the driveway.

  “Hi,” Martin said. He gave a little wave, but he stopped where he was, halfway up the driveway. “I’m Martin . . . Michael Ludwig’s friend. I’m here for the A’s tickets. For the game on the eighth.”

  Martin expected his mention of Ludwig’s name to break the ice. Okay, yeah, sure—no problem. Come on in, let me get them. But the guy just stood there. No look of recognition or acknowledgment.

  “The A’s tickets,” he said. Flat—a statement. Not a question.

  Martin looked at him. He was pretty sure he had the right place. But maybe not, which would explain why this guy was acting kind of strangely.

  “You know,” Martin said, taking a step backward. “I think I might have the wrong house. I’m looking for a guy named George Maddox. Do you maybe know if he lives somewhere along this street?” He looked over at the house next door, to the right, and then back at the house on the left. Then he glanced back at Peter in the Cadillac. He was still sitting in the front seat, looking out at them.

  The guy watched Martin for a second, not really doing anything. Thick arms and hands still hanging at his sides.

  “You’ve got the right place,” the guy said, finally. He had bushy eyebrows (to go with his thick body), and he raised them just a little bit and nodded. “I’m George.”

  “Oh,” Martin said. He’d been about to take another step backward and then turn around and walk away. “Okay, well—”

  “You were going to come by a few days ago, right?” the guy asked. He cocked his head just a little bit, and folded them across his big chest, covering up the Lynyrd Skynyrd insignia.

  “Uh, yeah . . . I guess so,” Martin said. “But I’ve just been really busy. This is actually the first chance I’ve had to come by. And I would have called, you know, but I didn’t have a number and so . . . I don’t know.” He gave the guy what he hoped was a friendly expression of helplessness, hands out and hands palms upward. But then he had a flash of anxiety.

  “Do you still have them?” he asked. “The tickets? You haven’t sold them, have you?”

  The guy raised his eyebrows again. “Oh, I still have them,” he said. “In fact, I’ve actually got them right here.”

  He unfolded his arms, reached back, and pulled out his wallet. Martin noticed that it was connected to a belt loop by one of those little chain things. Jesus, he thought. How does Ludwig know this guy?

  But even as he thought this, he was distracted by the green, gold, and white of the tickets as they emerged from the guy’s wallet. Yes, he thought. Jackpot. Touchdown. Something had actually worked out.

  “Hey,” Martin said, pointing at the tickets and taking a couple of steps forward. “Look at that. There they are. Great.” He looked at the guy and smiled. The guy nodded. Then he smiled—a real smile—and Martin saw to his surprise that he had beautiful teeth, and a handsome smile.

  “July eighth, at seven-thirty-five,” the guy said, reading the heading of the ticket out loud to Martin. “Oakland A’s versus Cleveland Indians.” He held the tickets in his left hand and put his wallet back into his back pocket with his right. Martin watched as the chain swung around with the wallet. Then he held the tickets up so that Martin could see them clearly, and waved them a tiny bit. He was still smiling.

  Martin took a quick glance over his shoulder, back at Peter in the Cadillac. He’d seen the tickets, too—he was bouncing up and down in the front seat, and when he saw Martin look at him, he gave him a thumbs-up sign. It was something Martin told him pilots started doing in World War II, and Peter had picked up on it, did it all the time. Martin was tempted to return the gesture but resisted, in case it distracted Maddox somehow.

  Martin reached back for his own wallet. He’d put $120 in there for this specific transaction—six crisp new $20 bills.

  “Okay,” he said. “So Ludwig said that you said eighty dollars, right? For the two? I’ve gotta admit that I think that’s pretty steep, but okay. So—”

  “Well,” the guy said, interrupting him again. “That’s right. That’s what I told Michael last week.” The guy glanced over at Peter, in the Cadillac, and then at Martin. His gaze drifted down to Martin’s shiny alligator shoes. Then he folded his arms again, so that the tickets were tucked away under his left armpit and behind his shoulder.

  “That’s what you told him last week?” Martin asked. He didn’t like where this was going. He stood there with his wallet in his hand, ready to open it, but waiting.

  The guy nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “But, like I said, I thought you were going to come by here over the weekend. That was the plan, Ludwig said. So in fact, I waited all day for you on Saturday.” He shrugged. “I had some stuff to do over in Oakland, but I didn’t want to miss you, and so I sat here in my garage, working on my bike all day long, waiting for you to show up. My wife was pretty pissed off, actually,” he said, gesturing toward his house with a thumb-over-the-shoulder movement.

  Martin followed the trajectory of Maddox’s thumb toward the house. He half expected to see the guy’s wife standing there in the window, scowling at him. She wasn’t there. But—worse, almost—Martin saw that one of Maddox’s kids was standing in the living room window, watching him. It was a little girl. She looked like she was about six, and he was pretty sure that she belonged to one of the bikes lying on the ground next to Maddox. She’d pushed the curtains aside, and there she was, watching. He didn’t know how long she’d been there. Like her dad, she had dark hair, and—at least from his angle—she looked a little creepy. Someone had cut a straight line of bangs across her forehead, and she was wearing a white nightgown even though it was the middle of the day.

  Martin looked back at Maddox. Okay, he thought. I get it. He wants a little extra cash for the hassle.

  “All right,” he said. “Look, I’m sorry I made you wait around for me. I didn’t know you were going to be stuck here. I mean, I wish I’d just gotten your phone number from Ludwig—from Michael. But yeah, I’m sorry.” (Though by the way, he thought, have you ever heard of leaving a note? If you leave a note, then you don’t need to wait around. People know you’re coming back, because you told them so in your note.)

  He paused, looking at the guy, waiting for him to respond. But nothing happened. Just more standing there. This guy is a weirdo, Martin thought—then wondered for a brief, scared second if he’d actually said it out loud. It wouldn’t have been the first time recently that he’d spoken the thing he’d been thinking. It was as if his private, inside-my-head voice was getting cocky and starting to assert itself by leaping out into public conversation. But he saw from the guy’s blank expression that this wasn’t one of those times.

  “So,” Martin said. “It sounds like you’re saying that they cost more now, or something. But I gotta say, eighty dollars is a lot of money as it is.”

  Now the guy nodded, did the whole raised-eyebrows thing again.

&nb
sp; “Well,” the guy said. “I mean, I’m not a big baseball fan, necessarily. I actually got these tickets from my father-in-law. He got them from someone who didn’t want them, and . . . whatever . . . now I’ve got them.” Martin wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say. He was pretty sure the guy wasn’t done talking, though.

  “But, well, yeah, I’ve been reading about the game,” the guy said. He raised himself up on the balls of his feet and then let himself down again. Martin could tell that it was a nervous gesture, probably one he wasn’t aware of, and one he’d been falling back on his whole life. “I’ve also been listening about it on the radio,” he said. “The whole Gaylord Perry thing. You know. And I’m pretty sure I could have sold these tickets a couple of days ago for the price I quoted to Michael. But now . . . I mean, people have been going kind of crazy. There just aren’t any tickets. Every single seat is gonna be filled. And, you know, usually, hardly anyone goes to A’s games—which is kind of fucked up, if you think about it, because they’re so good. I mean, they’re the world champs, right? But they’ll play the Royals or the White Sox, and it’s a big deal if they get ten thousand people.”

  He paused and looked at Martin like he was expecting some sort of response. But Martin didn’t know how to respond.

  “Okay,” Martin said. “So I guess you’re saying that you want to raise the price a little bit.” He was starting to feel like this guy was more than just weird. He actually seemed like he was a bit of a nut job. Maybe Ludwig liked this quality in people, the whole I’m-a-nut-job-from-Berkeley thing. He was dating Jenny, after all.

  The guy rose up on his toes again, let himself back down.

  “Well,” he said. “After you didn’t show up over the weekend, I thought that an extra hundred dollars was fair. You know, for me waiting around and everything.” He gave Martin a look suggesting that this was the most reasonable thing in the world.

  Martin was mesmerized. Was this guy for real?

  The guy cleared his throat. “But then you didn’t come on Monday, either. I mean, I thought that when you didn’t make it by Sunday, that you’d try to get here on Monday. So I waited again on Monday. And then again on Tuesday. I was in and out, but yeah, a lot of waiting.”