Title: Small Vices
Author(s): Robert B. Parker
Publisher(s): Putnam Publishing Group
Pages: 207
Year: 1997
Format: MOBY
Language: English
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He wasn$prime;t at his condo. I found him on the indoor practice court at Taft playing against a short red-haired scrambler who kept getting the ball back over the net without looking very good doing it. The tennis coach was watching them closely, and maybe ten undergraduates were in the stands. Stapleton had graduated from Taft last June while I was fighting the hill in Santa Barbara, but he$prime;d redshirted his first two years and had another year of eligibility left. And, according to my research, his coaches didn$prime;t feel he was ready yet for the pro tour. Stapleton$prime;s game was serve and volley, and he looked overpowering. Except the red-haired kid kept returning his serve and lobbing Stapleton$prime;s volleys to push him back to the base line. It was annoying Stapleton. He kept hitting the ball harder, and the kid kept getting to it and getting his racquet on it and getting it back over the net. Sometimes he$prime;d hit it on the rim of the racquet. Sometimes it would come back over the net like a damaged pigeon. But he kept getting it back and Stapleton kept hitting it harder. And the harder he hit it, the more erratic he became. They played three games while I watched. The red-haired kid held serve in the second one, and broke Stapleton$prime;s serve in the third. Stapleton doublefaulted on the game point and threw his racquet straight up into the air. It arced nearly to the top of the arena and fell clattering on the composition court five feet from the red-haired kid, who was grinning. I stood in the shadow of the stands for a while and watched.
«Control, Stapes, focus and control,» the coach said to him. «He$prime;s not beating you. You$prime;re beating yourself.»
«Control this,» Stapleton said and walked off the court and out the runway through the stands past me.
I fell silently in beside him as he walked, and we were out of the indoor facility and into the bright fall sunshine before he took notice of me. His focus on being mad seemed good. On the walkway that led toward the student union, Stapleton stopped abruptly and turned and looked at me.
«Are you following me?» he said.
«I prefer to think of it as you and me forging ahead together,» I said.
Stapleton recognized me. I could see the stages of recognition play on his face. First he realized he knew me. Then he realized who I was. Then he realized I was supposed to be dead. And finally he realized that I wasn$prime;t dead. The effect of the sequence was cumulative. He stepped back two big steps.