Carl didn’t see Mariko at the races that afternoon, but she phoned his room that evening. He was in his white robe, sitting in the living-room area of his suite and looking over the room service menu. On the TV the sound was down as Barack and Michelle Obama walked across the White House lawn; they held hands and the wind stirred around them. Carl offered to meet Mariko downstairs for a drink. Instead, she asked for his room number. While he waited for her, Carl tried to decide about the robe, whether he ought to greet her while still in it. He didn’t want to appear as if he had expectations. He tried to decide and there came a knock at the door and because he hadn’t been able to decide, he wore the robe to the door. Mariko wore a light green dress with a slender black belt. She had on high heels and carried a purse. Her hair was cinched up in a bun at the back of her head. She looked tired. She said, “Hello, Mr. Timberlake, how are you?”
Carl said, “Do you want to go out? I can change.”
“Are you going to let me in?”
He stepped to one side. Mariko dipped her head and walked by him. She took a few steps into the suite and then she stopped. She turned partway and said, “I could use a drink.”
“There are airline bottles in the little fridge there,” he said, nodding.
“Make me something, will you?” She walked across the suite, to the window that looked down to the swimming pool.
Carl went to the refrigerator, opened the door, and looked inside it for a time. “Do you have a beer?” he heard her voice say. He removed a sixteen-ounce can of Stella. He opened it and removed a clean glass from the shelf over the refrigerator. He carried the glass of beer over to her and she turned as he approached and accepted it.
She took a sip.
“What are you up to today?” he said. “You own a horse or something?”
“I’ve been visiting my son at SDSU,” she said. She considered his expression, then said, “San Diego State.”
“I figured it went something like that. You have a son, huh?”
“That a dealbreaker?” Mariko wore make-up today. She was pretty enough, but in a different way.
“I have a son and two daughters,” Carl said. “Two ex-wives. That’s how I roll.”
Mariko brought the glass to her lips again. She took a drink, swallowed. “Actually, I’m not sure why I am here.”
“Yeah, I get that sometimes.” He wanted to enjoy this, whatever it was they were about to do. He was ready for company, but it seemed especially good to have the company of another rider. “You wanted to see how a real jockey has it,” he said.
“Dom Feathers has a house that looks out over the Pacific Ocean,” she said. “He wasn’t even the leading jock here last meet. My friends and I go to parties there.”
“Right.”
She said, “Do you mind if I ask you a question? How can you spend so much of your life riding bad horses? Just for fun, my friends and I Googled you. We went to the Jockeys’ Guild page. Aren’t you just totally over that?” She took a drink and watched him. She was trying to anger him. She meant business. She was probably curious, as well.
Carl said, “Bad horses can win races.”
Mariko looked at him in a kind way. She turned her shoulders, glanced to the window that looked out on the pool. “When I came up, I rode at Portland Meadows. Yakima. Hastings Park up in BC,” she said. “I’m not superior. I don’t want you to think that about me.”
“You get hurt?”
Her eyes were on him again. “I just grew out of it. I had a chance to come to Balboa and exercise horses. No more race rides,” she said with a shrug. “When I was young, it was this act of rebellion or something. My father, let’s just say he didn’t respond well at all to that. I ran away to the races, to the bad racetracks. Yakima, first. I rode the fairs, too. Santa Rosa, Stockton. Bull rings.” She moved the glass close to his chest. “Very, very dangerous.”
Carl couldn’t decide if she wanted him to take the glass. He didn’t reach for it right away, but then he did. He lifted the glass from her hand and said, “Good horses break down.”
She blinked. “Sure they do. But that’s the cosmos. That’s the way it goes. But you’re not asking for that kind of trouble when you’re on a good horse.”
“That all depends.” He thought about kissing her right then. He couldn’t tell if what she was giving him was a sign. If this were Cleveland, it would have been plenty. He said, “I’m risking something by coming out here.” He had not made any type of move towards her but now Carl leaned closer. “Back in Cleveland, my girlfriend is probably getting together with her ex-husband right now.” He decided to lean back some. He took a drink from the glass of beer. “You don’t need to tell me about trouble, lady.”
Mariko fixed her eyes on him. “Is that why you found me, because of your girlfriend?”
“I found you?” he said. “You were there. But, yeah, she is about to screw me over. Tell me why you’re up here. Your son tell you you were a bad mother?” It wounded her, he could see that right away. He hadn’t meant to hurt her, he just wanted to keep up with her. Her mouth was closed and her jaw muscles knotted at the corners. He was about to apologize.
She said, “My friends dared me to come up here to see you. They said, ‘Pay that guy a visit. See if he’s got any game.’”
“I don’t have any game at all,” he said. “I’ll save you the trouble.” It was uncomfortable now. It had been that way since she had stepped into the room, but now it was too much. He was riding in the San Diego Handicap tomorrow and flying home after the race. He said, “Let me treat you to dinner. I got this menu in here.”
“I’m a good mother, asshole,” she said. “My son has a motorcycle. I am trying to talk him into selling it. You don’t have to wear a helmet in this state. That’s a real concern of mine.”
“So, this is your mother look?”
“Sometimes casual doesn’t cut it. Once in a while he calls me by my first name. I don’t like that. His father’s a tall man. So is he.”
“My son is a salesman,” Carl said. “I hear he’s good at it. Here.” He held the glass of beer back to her. She shook her head. “Will you stay for dinner? It’s on the house,” he said. “Please.”
She did not answer.
“I’ll bring you the menu,” he said.
Mariko ordered a lobster salad and—at Carl’s urging—a bottle of champagne. She slipped off her heels. He sipped from a glass of champagne and she ate her salad. They watched pay-perview, something with Ben Stiller. After it was over, she excused herself, closed the restroom door behind her, and when she stepped out again, she was nude. She was slender and muscular and her hair was loose.
“What happens next?” she said.
“Everything.”
Carl stood and shed himself of the ridiculous robe. They turned off the TV and had sex on the couch. Mariko lay on the couch afterward and covered herself with Carl’s robe. Eventually, she fell asleep. Carl decided to sleep as well, and he went to the bedroom.
In the middle of the night, he awakened. It was well past two and he wanted her to get into bed with him. Mariko was gone, however. The white robe was folded on the couch. Carl walked over to it and ran his hand across the fabric. He sat down next to the folded robe. After a time he said, “I wanted to tell you about Big Zip.” He stayed quiet after this and tried to imagine where Mariko lived and what type of life she had. Something like his, but with better furniture. In Cleveland, he would have to work harder to get a woman like this. What would she say if one of her friends asked, What about that guy who came out here to ride Big Zip? He thought of how Mariko might answer. I went up there to see him. Wants it all. Nothing unique.
Carl returned to the bedroom and crawled back under the covers. He hadn’t phoned Christine yesterday, though he had thought about doing so on any number of occasions. He’d felt the greatest urge to do this while he sat in the grandstand and watched the races. He wanted to tell her about the jockeys’ quarters and some of the famous riders there, to tell her how he felt because this specifically had surprised him. He thought about how he wanted to describe it. He would say, I have not felt any age in particular for the past month or so, since I have been with you. He thought that she would like this, and on a couple of occasions he had taken his cell phone from his shirt pocket and stared at it. It was the middle of the afternoon at Balboa and she would be at work already—if in fact she had reported to work.
Carl had talked his way into Christine’s apartment because she was vulnerable. She had been cleaned out by her former husband and she needed something else to happen in her life. She’d been ready for a few winners. Carl hadn’t been living with her for long, five weeks all told. He didn’t want to get her voicemail again. They hadn’t talked one time since he had left for California, but he understood that she was telling him something. He lay awake in bed and thought about the rest of his own life. It seemed like a good enough time to do this. He was in a comfortable bed in a suite in a hotel that had a clear, clean swimming pool, just across the street from the ocean.
He was not going to be a valet. He would be a jockey until the end. He formed an image in his mind of a skeleton riding a horse in a morning workout. He pictured this happening at Summit Park. He tried to imagine how the wind felt as it whistled through his ribcage. He wondered if his thoughts now were simply a way of protecting himself when it came to the idea of losing Christine. Christine wanted to understand the races, this was the thing that was pretty heartbreaking about all of this. How would this trip have gone if she had been with him? She would like this hotel. She would have liked what was in the distance beyond the racetrack. She was a Midwestern woman. He would have liked showing her off to Wesley Dade. That might have been better than riding in a race he didn’t figure to win. Christine might have seen another side of Carl if she had flown out here with him. He understood that was partially why she hadn’t wanted to join him. That it would make their split more painful.
“Well, I’m here, goddamnit,” he said. He spoke these words aloud, before he knew anything else. His heartbeat quickened and he sat up in bed. He reached for the switch at the base of the lamp on the nightstand. The light flickered on and it brought a bluish glow to the room. Carl set his hands on top of the covers, atop his thighs. He said, “I have a mount today. Eighth race, the feature. The horse I am riding is a good horse. Me getting to ride him in the first place was nothing but dumb luck… If I can get in the clear early, I think I can win.” He drew in a breath and then exhaled. “I wouldn’t gamble the plantation on this. But a little something, sure.” It was a true assessment. He felt exhausted. He lifted his right hand and softly snapped his fingers. What would happen would happen, just like that. Or it wouldn’t. He reached over, switched off the light. He slid under the covers, brought them up to his neck. Time, he thought, to get a little more rest.