"Nayler, Ray - Pinball Zen" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nayler Ray)

"Jen said what?"

Phil raised one chewed hand and went out the door.

The couple came up with their clubs and slid them in the window.

"Thanks."

Stan leaned into the microphone. "The arcade will be closing in five minutes. Please finish your current game. The machines will be shut off in five minutes, and no refunds will be issued."

The two kids looked around for the robot voice that had come out of nowhere. Stan went outside and lit a cigarette. It was getting colder. He stared at Jen's mashed cigarette butt on the cement. There had been nothing. The whole thing was like a dream--the stink of Phil's ski mask, David opening the strongbox and showing him the gray steel bottom, the single dollar bill sliding across the metal. David with his wide Native American face lying calmly on the floor, letting Stan tie his hands with the plastic lock-rings, and saying:

"Who put you up to this? Who was it? You tell him...."

"Tell him what?" Nuzzling the barrel of the gun into his greasy scalp.

"Nothing. Forget it."

The kids came out and walked toward the parking lot, speaking to one another in Tagalog. He watched their white caps going away.

Inside, the Altered Beast machine shouted "RISE FROM YOUR GRAVE!!!" again. He walked in and yanked its plug. After counting his register out, he dropped two tokens into the old Star Wars pinball game. It had a defective flipper that hit the ball too hard, but it was the only game in the arcade that he played. He was used to the flipper. He made the skill shot for two million, hit the ramp three times to light up the extra ball, and then battered the Death Star open for the tri-ball. Sometimes he could play, and sometimes he couldn't. Tonight he was on. By the second ball he had the replay, and he made the victory lap for 25 million. Even his bounces were lucky, as if the ball just didn't want to go down, He loved the cheesy quotes from the movie, the way the scratchy Leia voice said "This is some rescue!" when the third ball finally dropped.

Sometimes he could play for hours on a couple of quarters, and other times it was one play and nothing else. There was a secret to it--some perfect level of distraction, of Zen, he called it, that you had to have to play well. The ball seemed to know when you were trying too hard, and dropped right between the flippers every time.

In the second game he scored close to 200 million, the machine clacking out the replay before the first ball had even dropped. So Jen and Phil were talking? Let them. If she wanted to get back with her psycho speed-freak ex-boyfriend, that was her business.

An hour later he gave up. He just couldn't lose, and he left four unused credits on the machine. His eyes had begun to hurt, and his fingers were numb but still perfect on the side buttons. He flicked the main switch, and the machines turned off with an electric sigh. He locked the door. Let them sweep up in the morning.

The night had gotten colder, and frost sparkled on his windshield. The lights on the El Camino went from red to green to red again in sequence.

He heard the three pops, hollow like someone stabbing a balloon. He was on the ground, looking at his tire. His ears were ringing. There was another pop when he tried to stand up, so he lay very still. What was the trick? Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. Maybe it was just luck.

A car started somewhere.

No, it couldn't be just luck. There was more to it. He closed his eyes and tried to think.


RAY NAYLER was born in Desbiens, Quebec. His short fiction has appeared in a variety of magazines, from Ellery Queen to Crimewave to The Berkeley Fiction Review. His first novella, AMERICAN GRAVEYARDS, is now available as a Crimewave Special from the publishers of Crimewave magazine; details are available at www.ttapress.com. Ray lives in California. He can be contacted at like_the_rabbit@hotmail.com.

Copyright (c) 2001 Ray Nayler