twenty
Daaaamn: like a really emphasized wow;
can be use to express almost any
emotion including admiration
Transcribing affidavits is like working on those little puzzles in the kids magazines I got growing up. There were all these little blanks with symbols underneath, and you’d look up the symbol to figure out which letter went in the blank. Only affidavits are way crazy, and there aren’t any blanks. It’s frying my brain. All of these have to be translated from shorthand into English. Whoever created shorthand was nuts. I think it’d be way easier to just write things out.
I take a break to wipe my hands across my face and blink my eyes a few times. I run my hands through my hair and stare off at the ceiling.
“That bad, huh?” Brianna’s soft voice pulls me back to reality.
I grin, sheepishly. “On a scale of one to ten with ten being equal to being scraped over Grimace Rock? I’d give it a nine.” Then I bat my eyelashes at her. “I need a few minutes to space out. Don’t turn me in. Pretty pleeeeease?”
She throws her head back and laughs. Full-on belly laugh. Then she pushes at my shoulder. “That’s what works for little girls.”
“Sexist.”
“Never. In fact, would you like to go on a date tonight?” Brianna’s face remains calm, as if girls ask guys out all the time.
Daaaamn. That’s hot. I’m in. “Why yes I would, fair queen. Where?”
She pouts her lips. “A queen should not do all the work.”
I smile and bow.
As Brianna and I walk underneath the neon-lit awning and open the doors, a blast of stale popcorn and pizza hits us. The sounds of bowling balls thudding against wood lanes ricochet off the concrete walls.
I head straight to the counter where a Blue Hair waits to ring us up. She’s gotta be in her seventies. According to her nametag, she’s Gladys.
I say, “Hi ma’am. We’d like to rent a lane for the next couple of hours. We’ll need the works—shoes, balls, gutter blockers.” I shift my eyes back and forth before giving a loud stage-whisper. “She’s a total newb.”
“Well, I’ll be darned.” She winks at Brianna and doesn’t even acknowledge me. “You let old Gladys fix you up. The first experience is always important.”
Brianna laughs and thp. umps my elbow. “We don’t need gutter blockers.”
I give her a wide-eyed innocent look. “Are you sure?”
She puts her hands on those killer hips.
“She doesn’t need the blockers,” I say. “I guess we’ll only need the shoes and balls.”
Gladys laughs a raspy smoker’s laugh and rings me up. “Okay, sugar. You’re lane thirty. You let old Gladys know if you need anything else. You can pick out your shoes over there, and the balls are across from the lanes.”
We grab retro shoes that reek of disinfectant. Then we head to our lane. We’ve got the last one, by the wall. It’s been painted graffiti style with a mural of old famous
people like Marilyn Monroe, Elvis, and Buddy Holly.
I turn around and fling my arm toward a rack of balls a few feet away. “Why don’t you step into my office?”
“I’d love to,” Brianna says.
Feeling like a king, I walk over and check out the goods. I grab a lime-green fifteen-pounder. Brianna hovers over a couple of balls before choosing an orange eight-pounder. I wiggle my eyebrows up and down. “You ready to get schooled?”
She swishes her hips as we walk back to our lane. “Don’t get too cocky, Mr. Watson. I might surprise you.”
“Let me have it. No holding back.”
She laughs. “Oh, don’t you worry about that.”
I set up the computer system, keying in the monikers Linda and El Toro, which mean “pretty” and “the bull.”
Brianna says, “What’s that?”
I grin, forgetting she’s doesn’t speak Spanish. “What? I’m half Mexican. This is my cultural twist on Beauty and the Beast. Linda means pretty.”
She smiles. “All right, Toro. Show me what you got.”
I say, “Who says I’m Toro? Kidding.”
I snag my ball and swagger toward the lane. Thunk. It hits the wood with a loud thud and rolls straight down the middle. Two thirds of the way down, it starts curving toward the gutter.
“It’s all part of the plan,” I say. “Watch and learn.”
Then the ball curves back at the last second and knocks two pins down.
“All part of the plan, eh?” Brianna bumps me with her hips.
I’m having trouble focusing.
I wait at the ball return, finally able to come up with something witty. “Humble beginnings make victorgs 18" aligy taste that much sweeter.” I grab the ball as it pops out of the chute and approach the lane holding the ball in both hands. I stand at the edge, widen my stance, and bend down, swinging the ball back between my legs and tossing it gently down the center. It wobbles down the middle and ends up knocking down all but one remaining pin. I turn to Brianna, waiting for a response. She winks and gives a small nod of appreciation. I pull my arms back, fist tightened, in a yeah baby motion and take a seat. “You’re up, Buttercup.”
Brianna grabs her ball like she knows exactly what she’s doing. She walks like a queen toward the lane, stops at the edge, flings her arm back and releases the ball too early. It makes a loud thud and rolls toward me. I stop it with my feet. Then I howl with laughter.
Brianna shrugs her shoulders. “Humble beginnings, right?”
“I’m thinking that’s along the lines of inglorious or meager or infamous.”
“Thanks.”
“Anytime.”
She gets the ball and heads back toward the lane. I walk up beside her and say, “Okay, it’s time for a mini-lesson.”
She puts a hand on her hip and waits.
I say, “Watch me act it out in slow motion.” She watches my exaggerated walk and fake release, looking antsy to do it herself. “Notice, I didn’t stop and then toss. It’s all one fluid movement. You want to keep your thumb pointing straight. If your thumb points to the right, then the ball is likely to roll in that direction. Keep your elbow straight and slightly bend your left knee, which should be in front by the time you glide to the edge.”
“Got it.”
I say, “Let me walk you through it.”
Then I stand so close I can smell her perfume. I reach for her right arm and guide her through the motion, my hand on the back of hers. As I swing her arm to the edge, I say, “Release now.” Then I let go of her hand and step away fast, blood whooshing through my body. “You’ll get it this time.”
She says quietly, “Yep. Definitely. Thanks for the tip.”
Then she knocks down eight pins. We high-five. “You rock!” I say.
By the final round, she’s kicking my butt and loving every minute of it. We return our funky shoes to Gladys. She hands me a buy one hour, get the second hour free card. “Come again, honey. And bring your girlfriend.”
And even though I’m not sure about the label, neither one of us corrects her.