Game Face

by Mark Troy

  “Possibly. Where did you get your water?”

  “I filled the bottles myself. I use a mix of Gatorade and water to get the right electrolytes.”

  “Anybody handle the bottles after you filled them?”

  She shook her head. “I put the cooler on the sidelines and did some stretches on the court. Janet showed up. Szymanski was there when I finished.”

  “Did you talk to her?”

  “She wished me luck and went over to her own sideline. I did notice that her cooler looked like mine. My God, Lyon, you don’t think she did it?”

  I couldn’t rule her out. Athletes are supposed to leave their aggression on the court, but they don’t always. Women are only a little better at it than men. The ex-athlete in me wanted to believe Szymanski had no part in it; the detective in me kept that possibility open.

  * * * * *

  Janet Abbott was the consummate team player. Her efforts on the court went a long way towards making Paula look good. I caught up to her in the hotel’s outdoor bar by the dolphin pool. She took a bite of a chicken cashew salad and said, “Sure Karen came over. We were teammates in college.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Have a good match. She wanted to get together tonight.”

  “How intense is this rivalry?”

  “Paula and Karen are two of a kind. You don’t get Paula’s numbers by settling for less than perfection. And Karen? Kill leader in her rookie year? That’s determination.”

  “Why do you team with Paula?”

  She pushed bits of salad around with a fork while she formed her answer. “Because I want to win. I know, she’s hard to get along with, but Paula and me, we’re good together. For two years we won everything. Last year was hard on both of us. I wasn’t winning without her, couldn’t wait until she got back.”

  “And Paula?” I asked.

  “She hated not being able to compete. She had more modeling and personal appearance jobs than she could handle. She made more money than ever, but she wanted to play. She wants to be the kill leader.”

  “Szymanski’s not going to give it up so easily.”

  “No. She’ll do anything she can to keep the title.”

  “Anything? Would she harm Paula?”

  Janet pondered that. “Karen harm someone? Not in a million years. She’s Miss Social Conscience. Sea turtles, land mines, children’s health and nutrition.”

  “Sweatshops?”

  “Probably.”

  * * * * *

  The hotel had provided two ground floor rooms to be used as dressing rooms, one for each team. I convinced David Hino to accompany me while I had a look.

  “What are we looking for?” he asked.

  “Don’t know. Anybody been in here since the match?”

  “The wahines. They changed and left. Nobody else. This one was Sandblasters.”

  The room showed little evidence of occupancy. David and I checked the closet, the drawers and the wastebaskets. Paula and Janet had left nothing behind but some damp towels and an energy bar wrapper. They hadn’t used even the bathsoap or shampoo. Probably brought their own. Janet, anyway; Paula had gone straight to the hospital.

  Nothing under the nightstand or behind the bed, but the connecting door was open a crack. The latch hadn’t engaged. I pulled it open and tested the door on the other side. It swung in on my touch.

  “Is there any reason this would be open?”

  David joined me at the door. “Not unless the players open it. Maybe they wanted a chat. They were friends, yeah?”

  “Some of them.”

  We passed into the room used by the Salon Style team. Like the previous room, it gave little indication of use. I went to the closet while David checked the bathroom. A few seconds later he called out, “Val, you better look.”

  It was a plastic squeeze bottle, just like the ones Paula drank from and it had Sandblasters’ logo on it.

  “It seem odd for Salon Style to have Sandblasters’ bottle?”

  Odd? Yes. Proof? No. Sandblasters marketed their name as aggressively as Nike. Every fifth kid on the beach sported Sandblasters clothes and carried Sandblasters schwag. There were lots of innocent ways for a Salon Style player to acquire a Sandblasters water bottle. I took a taste. “Watered-down Gatorade. We’re getting warm.”

  The next find belonged to me — a brown medicine bottle wedged behind the dresser. I levered it out with a coat hanger and lifted it carefully so as to preserve any prints. Even though it was sealed, I caught a scent around the cap of that acrid, eye-searing odor every biology student knows.

  * * * * *

  Karen Szymanski opened the door to David’s knock. She had changed from her Jantzen two-piece to white shorts and a batik top. Her hair was still damp from the shower. Her face, devoid of makeup, exuded a healthy glow. In appearance, she was the embodiment of the all-American girl. Like Paula, she had the long graceful body that cameras love. I’d seen her photos in both Volleyball Magazine and Elle.

  “It’s terrible what happened to Paula,” she said after inviting us in.

  We were in the living room of a spacious suite on the top floor of the hotel. Graceful rattan pieces and light fabrics suggested tropical elegance. Floor to ceiling windows gave a view of the ocean that was blood red in the setting sun. Three doors led to other rooms which I guessed to be as well-appointed as the one we were in.

  Born too soon, dammit. My pro tours in Italy we’d slept three to a room, bathroom down the hall. I took the chair Szymanski offered. David walked to the window and looked out, then continued a casual inspection of the room.

  “Do you get along with Paula?” I asked.

  “We’re competitors. We’re after the same brass ring. I admire her, but friends? No.”

  “You’re friends with Janet Abbott. You visited their sideline before the match.”

  Karen frowned. “Janet and I roomed in college. What does that have to do with Paula?”

  “I understand you’re active in social causes.”

  “I’ve gotten a lot from the sport. I want to give back.”

  “Children’s health?”

  David had moved out of my vision but not out of Karen’s. She watched him from the corner of her eye while she answered. “Yes, sure. Do you know that a quarter of the world’s children grow up in conditions without minimal sanitation?”

  “What about child labor? Does that concern you?”

  “Of course.”

  “Are you doing something to stop it?”

  She looked at me narrowly. “Like what?”

  “Let’s say something dramatic. An attention getter. Something involving Sandblasters.”

  Szymanski got out of her chair. “I get it now. That’s why you asked about my visit to the sideline. You think I poisoned Paula.”

  “Did you?”

  “I have nothing more to say to you.”

  David was leafing through a pile of mail at a corner desk. He paused. “Val!”

  “That’s mine,” yelled Karen. “You’ve got no right to snoop.”

  David brandished a tabloid-style newsletter. The title said, “Coalition Against Child Labor.” Taking up half the front page was a picture of a girl, no more than seven, with big, sad eyes and a chain keeping her at a sewing machine. “Check the stories,” he said.

  One was titled, “Sandblasters Sportswear Enslaves Children.” The other was “Sweatshop Toxins.” Some yellow-highlighted words caught my eye; one word in particular — “formaldehyde.”

  “The police will be interested in this,” I said.

  * * * * *

  The cops’ interest lasted just long enough to determine they didn’t have enough to detain her. I learned it the next morning before going to the hospital.

  Paula was ready to leave when I arrived. “You heard?” I asked when we were in my car.

  “Yes,” she said. “A player! I can’t believe it. Do you think that organization brainwashed her?”

  “She says
she has nothing to do with the Coalition. Doesn’t know how she got the material.”

  “But it had her address. And what about my water bottle in their dressing room?”

  “She doesn’t know how that got there either. Anyone could have left it.”

  “What about fingerprints?”

  I shook my head. “Too much sweat on it.” I looked over at Paula. She was lost in thought, concentrating on something the way I’d seen her at matches. “The bad news,” I continued, “is that none of this amounts to enough for the police to hold her or charge her.”

  “Crap,” she said. No ref to red card her. “Now she’ll be coming for me. This time I hope you’re ready.”

  “Dammit, Paula, I was ready last time.”

  “Well, she was more ready. Now you know who to expect. It should be a piece of cake this time.”

  “Right. I know who to expect.” My knuckles on the steering wheel were white. Piece of cake? Piece of garbage! If Szymanski really was part of a larger group intent on hurting Paula, the next assailant would be someone different.

  We were silent the rest of the trip to Paula’s rented cottage in Kuilima. The sun was directly overhead when we arrived. Light tradewinds rattled the coconut palms and carried a tang of salt off the ocean.

  The doctor had ordered Paula to rest. She did a light workout and went to her bedroom to nap. I patrolled the grounds and the house before sitting down at her desk to make some phone calls.

  A man answered at the national headquarters of the Coalition Against Child Labor. I’d gotten the number, Los Angeles area code, from the newsletter in Szymanski’s hotel room. “We don’t give out information about our supporters,” he said when I asked about Szymanski.

  “But she is a contributor to your organization?”

  “What part didn’t you understand?”

  “How does your organization feel about violence or threats of violence?”

  The phone went dead.

  Next I called David Hino, needing to hear a friendly voice. “About to call you,” he said. ”Karen Szymanski came back to the hotel. Thought you might want to know.”

  “I do. Can you keep an eye on her for me?”

  “Val, us hotel dicks protect our guests. We don’t spy on them.”

  “And us bodyguards protect our clients.”

  “Call you if she leaves, okay?”

  I hung up and settled into the bodyguard routine.

  Paula’s cottage befitted her marquee player status. Three-bedroom, ocean front, it had a sauna and grass volleyball court. The furniture was pre-war, territorial style with mementos from visits by the likes of Chester Nimitz. The War in the Pacific could have been won at this desk, its shiny surface littered with maps while khaki-clad men plotted positions through a cloud of cigar smoke.

  Now it was Paula’s notebook computer that sat on the desk, screen saver on, scrolling through a collection of photos — the life story of Paula Evangelista. With nothing else to do, I watched the show. First came a shot of Paula in a First Communion dress with a man and woman I guessed to be her parents; then Paula, not much older, and the same woman in bathing suits; Paula, age nine or ten, shooting a basket while the man beamed proudly. Then came photos from high school and college, sports mostly. Her mother appeared at graduation. The last photos gave highlights from her modeling and professional careers.

  Suddenly something clicked in me. I felt I knew Paula Evangelista like a sister, like myself. In my own apartment, at the bottom of an old box lay similar photos — me in a First Communion dress, or maybe a birthday dress, and Mom and Dad. But after age eleven, Dad was absent from the photos. If anyone had asked about Dad, I’d say he’d be at the game if he could. Every game I scanned the stands. Two things I was sure of: I’d see him there someday, but not on a day the team was losing. I don’t remember how I lost my faith, but after that first year in Italy, I put the pictures away and stopped scanning the stands.

  I would bet that Paula hadn’t lost her faith.

  As I tossed around this insight, the screen saver dissolved with a message that she had new mail. A window opened up displaying dozens of messages, most of which said, “Get Well,” in the subject line, but two messages caught my eye. One, from Morrison Talent Representatives, said, “Bad News re Sandblasters.” The other said, “Sandblasters lies,” and the sender was the Coalition Against Child Labor. Was this another threat? A new M.O. — email instead of phone? I had no qualms about reading it. It wasn’t a threat but a news release. It said that a spokesperson for Sandblasters Sportswear categorically denied the allegations in the CACL newsletter. CACL promised a response.

  Why sent it to Paula? And what was the bad news about Sandblasters? I opened the message from Morrison. It said:

  “Paula,

  Hate to break it to you like this. JW at Sandblasters signed Karen Szymanski for the Killer On The Road promo. I told him to give you some time and you’ll be the kill leader, but the SOB wants to gear it up now. Quelle Surprise! The guy has the loyalty of a shark. Don’t lose hope. I’m working on Nike for you. Keep your fingers crossed.

  Jeff.”

  Karen Szymanski had signed with Sandblasters. Was she really the psycho who threatened Paula? A wild idea struck me. I opened the message from the Coalition, hit the reply button and typed, “I haven’t received my last newsletter. Is there a problem with my subscription?” I added Paula Evangelista’s name and sent it.

  I toured the grounds while I waited. The reply arrived thirty minutes later: “Your subscription is current.”

  Paula’s voice startled me. “Hey, Lyon, how about doing some drills with me?” I looked up to see her standing in the doorway, wearing tights and a sport top, towel around her neck, volleyball in hand. “We’ll do some light ones. Nothing you can’t handle.”

  I spread my hands helplessly. “Didn’t bring a change.”

  “You can wear one of mine. We’re about the same size.”

  Paula gave me a T-back top and briefs. She was right about the fit. I left my phone with my clothes in a spare bedroom. The gun was another matter. Did I need it, now? Had there ever been a threat or had Paula made it all up? It was better to be safe. I used the belt from my slacks to holster it in back.

  We started off volleying across the net. Paula was patient, offering advice and encouragement and easy serves. I didn’t pose her a challenge, but I kept up. We soon established a rhythm.

  It came my turn to serve. I took the ball to the baseline and prepared to toss it up. “How did you know the Coalition literature was addressed to Szymanski?”

  Paula shrugged. “Did I say I knew? Must have been a lucky guess. C’mon and serve.”

  I served. She returned it easily, forcing me to dive for the dig. I knocked it into the net. Paula served. “Lyon, were you reading my mail when I came in?”

  “I was looking at your pictures. How old were you when your father left?” Her serve stung my forearms.

  “He didn’t leave.” She dug my return effortlessly. It hit just inside the sideline and bounced away.

  I retrieved the ball and prepared to hit it back. “You’re waiting for him?”

  “He’ll be here. You didn’t answer my question. Did you read my mail?”

  “Yes. You sent the Coalition newsletter to Karen. Probably highlighted the words yourself. You made up the threats, planted the water bottle and poisoned yourself, making it look like Karen did it.”

  Paula showed no surprise. “Why would I do that?”

  “Sandblasters planned to drop you if you didn’t lead in kills. Your agent confirmed it, but you probably knew it all along. Karen’s their new spokesperson.”

  “Screw Sandblasters! I can make 150k a week posing in overpriced rags. Serve dammit!”

  “It’s not the money with you, is it? It’s winning. You need to be on top. You think your father ran out on you because you weren’t winning and that he won’t come back if you’re losing.” I put up a high rainbow serve that a fifth grad
er could handle. “You think nobody loves you if you don’t win.”

  She let it drop behind her. “Oh, Puh leeze, Lyon. Did you get knocked on the head in a self-help bookstore? My father’s got nothing to do with it.”

  “I don’t get it. Did you really think you could frame Karen that easily? Any first year law student could have that evidence thrown out.”

  The ball rolled towards a tall hedge that concealed a chain-link fence. Paula went after it. She said, “Karen wants to kill me, but nobody believes me. I thought if I made up some evidence I could convince you.”

  “Paula, listen to me. Your life is not in danger. Karen Szymanski is not trying to harm you.”

  Paula picked up the ball and peered through the hedge. “I’m going to die you know. She’ll try again and she’ll probably succeed.”

  “Stop it, Paula!’

  “Oh my God! She’s here!”

  “Paula . . .”

  “There!”

  I looked through the gap in the hedge to where Paula pointed and saw Karen Szymanski approaching the gate.

  “Get in the house! I’ll see what she wants.” I reached behind me, closed my hand around the grips, but did not draw the gun.

  Szymanski’s face registered surprise when she saw me. “Where’s Paula? I thought she was alone.”

  “Why are you here, Karen?”

  “Paula asked me to come.”

  “Let her in, Lyon,” said Paula behind me.

  Szymanski came through the gate.

  I said, “What’s going on, Paula?”

  Paula tossed the ball in the air nonchalantly. “Karen and I have some things to clear up.” She tossed the ball again.

  “She didn’t harm you, Paula.”

  “I know, I know. The evidence is weak. I’m tired of hearing it.”

  Paula tossed the ball again and stretched up for it, connecting with her fist at the top of the arc. She put all of her fabulous arm speed into the serve, but to me it seemed to occur in super slo-mo as I reached for my gun. Too late! The ball exploded in my chest forcing out my breath, leaving not enough to scream when the Colt, still in the holster, delivered a hammer blow to my spine and kidneys as I hit the turf.

  Karen Szymanski did the screaming. It sounded far away.

  Paula rolled me onto my stomach. I tried to get up but my legs felt numb and wobbly. Tried to breathe but my lungs wouldn’t cooperate. The effort yielded agony. I felt a tug on the holster. A rasping, sucking sound told me my lungs were working again. I rolled onto my side, curled up in a ball. The pain in my back gradually took over from the pain in my chest.