Fast Greens by Turk Pipkin

autographs and an occasional jealous husband. When I asked him how he avoided distractions, Cherry told me he used to hit practice balls with a lady friend sunning nearby in her birthday suit. Once he got used to that, the rest was easy.
    â€œJewel darling!” drawled Roscoe as they sat in his cart in the middle of the fairway. “Ol’ March there is knee-deep in shit and coffee break’s about over. And we know what that means. Back on his head! He ain’t never gonna find that ball. Maybe you and I should run off to Foat Worth to celebrate.”
    Tilting his bottle, Roscoe toasted March’s lost balls and then waited for March to give up the search. That Dr Pepper had run through me pretty quick, and with Jewel ten feet away I had to excuse myself for the woods. By the time I reached the nearest bushes, March had found his ball. From my new position I had a good view as he studied his dismal prospects, blocked from the others’ view by the same cover I was using, blocked from the green by a row of trees and blocked from a rat’s-ass chance of reaching the fairway by all of it.
    Since neither March nor Fromholz saw me standing there conducting my business, it was almost like being the proverbial fly on the wall.
    â€œHow much did Roscoe give you, Ace?” March asked Fromholz.
    â€œA hundred.”
    March took out his wallet. “Here’s five hundred.”
    â€œYou want me to move it?” asked Fromholz.
    â€œMove it?” says March. “Hell, I want you to hit it!”
    March handed Fromholz what looked to be a four-wood.
    Alarmed, I turned back to the fairway to see if the others were watching, but they couldn’t see a thing; I was the only witness. I didn’t even know if Fromholz knew how to play golf. Even for a pro, getting the ball over those trees would have been tough with a wood. Fromholz took a couple of powerful practice swings, free and loose, then stepped up to the ball.
    â€œFore!” yelled March.
    The group in the fairway jerked their heads up in unison, kind of like cows in a field. Jewel had taught me to think in such pictures, but I don’t think she’d have been humored to be a part of that one.
    Fromholz made a move at the ball exactly like each of his perfect practice swings, and the ball jumped off his open clubface and soared out of sight. I couldn’t tell where it went, but when it cleared the trees Sandy started hollering and screaming from the fairway.
    â€œYeah! Yeah! Great shot, March! Go! Go! Yeah!” Sandy was only about four words away from being speechless.
    When you see a golfer with a great swing, it sticks with you forever. To this day I’ve only seen about a dozen truly great swings, and they belonged to Sandy, maybe to Beast, to a handful of guys out on the Tour (not all of whom have been successful), and to Fromholz. Later on I learned that our ref had shown a lot of golfing promise until he’d been hit square in the eye by a golf ball. I’d hate to be the idiot who hit a ball that destroyed something so fine in a man as tough as Fromholz.
    Zipping up my fly, I ran back to the fairway as fast as I could. By the remarks I surmised that March’s ball was either on or very near the green; in two shots, putting for eagle. And Roscoe just couldn’t imagine how that duffer March could have managed such an incredible shot.
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15
    I was by nature neither a fighter nor a fink, falling somewhere in the middle ground of these dubious childhood achievements. I’d always made too good of grades to be hip, and I teetered precariously on the line of being a Goody Two-shoes, but I could usually be counted on to participate in a little group mayhem as long as it didn’t cause me any physical pain. Most notable among these escalating instances of delinquency in San Angelo was a boredom-induced rock fight among a group of my sixth-grade classmates. I hadn’t really wanted to take