Now Playing by Ron Koertge Page A

late? Were you asleep?”
    “No, it’s okay. What’s up?”
    “Did you get my message about the racetrack? Well, my dad set it up, but it’s for tomorrow morning. Are you okay with that?”
    “Sure.”
    “Six a.m. tomorrow morning.”
    “Yikes.”
    “So . . . ?”
    “What if Colleen came with us? I don’t think she’ll want to, but what if she did?”
    There’s a very long three-second silence before A.J. asks, “Why would she want to?”
    “She’s staying here. With Grandma and me. For just a couple of days.”
    “And this is just you being a good friend?”
    “Something like that. Nobody ever crashed at your house?”
    “Yeah, but we made s’mores and watched DVDs.”
    “She doesn’t have anyplace else to go.”
    “What about her parents?”
    “Out of the picture or hopeless.”
    “Are you serious?” A.J. asks. “She’s totally on her own?”
    “Pretty much. She’s a tough cookie.”
    “Tell me about it.”
    In the morning, Grandma finds me in the kitchen.
    “Benjamin, are you all right? What are you doing up so early?”
    I’d been staring at the All-Bran box, and it was staring back. “I’m fine. A.J. and I are going to that racetrack in Arcadia.”
    “Neither one of you is old enough to bet.”
    “Grandma, it’s still dark. Nobody’s betting. It’s just when we can talk to this jockey for this movie A.J. thinks she wants to make.”
    Grandma’s wearing a nightgown and something that matches over that. They’re both filmy, and I’d never tell her this, but she looks a little like one of Dracula’s wives. When I was little, I thought she slept standing up so nothing would get wrinkled.
    “Is Colleen asleep?” she asks.
    “Everybody’s asleep but you and me and a bunch of jockeys.”
    “Is Colleen going with you and your new friend?”
    “I’ll ask, but there’s no way. Colleen’s not a morning person.”
    She looks at the coffeepot on the stove but doesn’t get up. I tell her, “I’ll get it for you.”
    “No, caffeine makes me meditate too fast.” She adjusts the salt and pepper shakers, lining them up perfectly. “When Colleen does wake up, what should I do with her? I’m going to yoga.”
    “She knows where the kitchen is.”
    “But she’ll be here alone.”
    I pick up the bowl and drink the last of the milk. Grandma hates it when I do that. “She’s not going to steal the silver.”
    “Oh, Benjamin. I know that.”
    I stand up and put my napkin on the chair like I might come back. “My mom had a job, right?”
    Grandma looks up at me. “Why this sudden interest in your mother?”
    “I don’t know. Colleen and I were swapping stories last night. So, did my mom have a job? I kind of remember her being dressed up when she dropped me off here for the day.”
    “Before your father was killed, she’d managed to get her real-estate license.”
    “So she sold houses.”
    “She showed a house or two, but that was the extent of it.”
    “She was pretty, wasn’t she?”
    Grandma takes what I’m sure her yoga teacher would call a deep, cleansing breath. “She was.”
    Except for my cereal bowl, the table is spotless, and there’s a rose in a little crystal vase. I know what Colleen meant last night about all this wearing her out. It’s so picture-perfect. Maybe that’s why I like documentaries. They’re almost always rough around the edges.
    “So she —” But I don’t get to finish because there’s the lightest, most polite
tap-tap
at the front door.
    I ask, “Do you want to say hi to A.J.?”
    “Just say that I’ll call her mother later about the Congo.”
    I let A.J. in, ask her to wait one minute, then go to Colleen’s room. I knock until I hear her move around and then go in. She sits up and squints at me.
    “What time is it?”
    “About five thirty.”
    She collapses. “Oh, my God!”
    “I’m going out with A.J. for a little while. Movie stuff. You can come if you want.”
    Colleen just turns over and mutters, “Tell her to