[Brackets] (32 page)

“I told you,” Lena snarled, holding her breath
.
“
I wasn’t there
.”

“Don’t talk to me like I don’t know you. I know who called that play.
And by the way, it was a really bad idea, and I would have told you that if you had talked to me about it before.
”

By this time, the argument had become so loud that much of the crowd had turned to see what was happening. Lena realized that they were drawing attention and tugged Tucker down the street another hundred feet. But they had nothing more to say. They stood in silence, staring past each other’s heads.

At last, Tucker said, “I’m going back. Come if you want.
And for the record, I didn’t come out here because of guilt. I came out here because I haven’t seen you in five days, and I wanted to give you the chance to come be with me
.”

“Well then why don’t you stay, and you can be with me?” Lena challenged, speaking through a whole spectrum of emotions.

For a moment Tucker didn’t say anything. But then, “I have to get back. They’re throwing this party for me. Call me when you’re done.”

He walked away from Lena, away from the murmuring crowd, away from the side-lined cameramen and reporters, and went back up the street to his car. As he walked, he pulled open the Tupperware container, picked up the entire stack of chips and cheese, and crunched down hard through the middle.

*
             
*
             
*
             
*

It wasn’t until the second half of the second half that Tucker noticed Carla, coat still on, standing near the door. It was hard to notice anyone; his apartment was jam-packed with roommates,
neighbors, friends, people Tucker didn’t even know. Thanks to his roommates, word had gotten out that the man with the perfect bracket was having a party. By half-time, there were so many people crowding around their relatively ancient TV that Tucker’s
roommates
begged their neighbor to let them use his nice
54
-in
ch flat screen. The neighbor agreed after they handed over a hefty
deposit. Now, with five minutes left in the game and Nebraska riding a barrage of three-pointers to victory, it was getting hard to see even that massive screen. Everyone was standing, jumping, cheering with every big play. There was a couple in the middle of the couch that made out every time
Nebraska made a shot. After one particularly fast run of Nebraska field goals, Tucker couldn’t take the affectionate display anymore
and got up to go to the kitchen. That’s when he
noticed Carla,
wedged in between some of the latecomers. She gave him a small, uncomfortable wave when he noticed her. Tucker was surprised—Carla seemed like the outgoing type in person, but she looked out of place among the partying fans.

Tucker squeezed through the press to get over to her, but once there, he still had to yell to be heard. “What do you think?”

“Fun,” she yelled back.

“Yeah?” The conversation stalled out before it really had begun.

“So I finished reviewing that press statement.” Carla started pulling something out of her purse, but Tucker held up his hands.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa—this is game time. That’s sacred time. When we’re watching a game, we are here,” he pointed down with one hand, “and work is waaaaaay over there.” He pointed out the window toward campus. “Let me get you that beer I promised, and we can look at it in…” Tucker peered over the heads of the crowd to see the screen, “…two minutes of playing time.”

He waded into the kitchen, wondering how he might be able to get the all-business girl to loosen up a bit.

His roommate poked his head in. “Dude, somebody at the door for you.”

Tucker stared blankly. “Tell him to come in.”

“They said they wanted to talk privately.”
“They? Wait…a guy and girl?” His roommate nodded. Tucker rolled his eyes.

“Okay, do me a favor—give this to the blonde girl in the back and tell her I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

Tucker approached the door hoping to end the conversation very quickly.

“Tucker! You are the man!” Rick yelled
with
both arms up in the air
as soon as Tucker appeared
. Abby stood behind
Rick, applauding
. “You could have told us you had another perfect round in your bracket! Why don’t you
ever
call?”

“Uh, how did you know…”

Abby had put her arm around Rick and patted him on the shoulder. “We saw an article about you in the school paper, and Rick had to go look you up on ESPN to make sure. That’s really amazingly impressive, Tucker.”

Tucker shook his head. “What are you doing here? How did you two even find me?”

“Yeah, like it’s really hard to find an address for a college student. You know about the internet, right?” Rick snarked.

“I asked you what you were doing here,” Tucker asked
, now
very impatient
.

“The bracket par-ta
y, of course.
” Rick looked over Tucker’s shoulders at the game, now in its final thirty seconds.

“And…” prompted Abby, “there’s something that we want to talk to you about. Privately.”

“Right,” said Rick. “That,
too.”

Tucker shook his head. “Look, I still don’t know who you are. I have no idea why you keep bothering me. But whatever it is, I don’t want to be involved. So if you wouldn’t mind just leaving and letting me get back...”

“We understand,” said Rick, semi-serious now. “You don’t want to talk with us at all, you want nothing to do with us, you just want to watch some games. We get that, you’ve actually made that very clear from the beginning. So, let’s do this. Thirty seconds, we pitch our idea, then we leave. If you don’t like it, you never have to see us again.”

Tucker hesitated. Rick looked at him steadily
while
Abby stood holding
Rick’s
a
rm, her eyes a little graver. An explosion
of applause
in the living room
indicated that the game was over. People started
to get up and move
around
. Tucker sighed.

“It’s going to be a madhouse here until everyone leaves. We can go to my room. For thirty seconds.”

Turning to lead the way, Tucker stepped right into Carla.

“Oh, sorry—everything okay?”

Carla looked around him at Rick and Abby.

“Weren’t we going to talk after the game?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah, um…this is going to take thirty seconds, I swear. Grab whatever you want and I’ll be right out.” They passed quickly into the hallway
.

“So was that the girlfriend?” Rick asked
, following Tucker into his room
.

“Uh, no, Carla is from work, Lena is the girlfriend…why
do you need to know all this
?”

“
That one’s
not hard on the eyes, all I’m saying.”

“Rick!” Abby warned. “
Sorry, Tucker, s
ometimes he steps out of bounds.” She shot Rick a look as
she hande
d Tuc
ker a folded piece of paper.
It
looked familiar when he smoothed it out.

…
peaceful end to
the crisis in Southeast Asia
to be accomplished through mediation, given the reluctance of western countries to become too involved and the reluctance of the smaller ASEAN countries to trust Chinese intervention, which stems not just from China’s open antagonism towards Many Hands, but also from their long history of seeking to take geopolitical advantage of the smaller nations. Without a local nation like South Korea mediating the conflict, or until one side gives up or wins, Many Hands and the Chinese/Western coalition will be locke
d in
an e
xtended conflict
with potentially dangerous consequences. However, the South Korean govermnent currently lacks the political will and social backing that would be required…

Rick and Abby looked on while he read. “Recognize it?” Abby asked. “You misspelled ‘government’, by the way.”

“Thanks,” said Tucker sarcastically. “How did you get this?”

Rick jumped in.
“We found it in your boss’s recycling bin. We wanted to ask—”

“Wait, you went through Dr.
Tonkin’s trash? I seriously need to call the police on you people.”

“No, Tucker,” Abby paused to glare at Rick. “We didn’t break into your boss’s office. We went
there
this afternoon to see if he could get us a visit with Wol Pot, but he got called out to talk with somebody. While we were waiting, Rick started messing around, doing some shooting practice with paper in the recycling bin. That’s how we found this—Rick couldn’t make the stupid basket into the trash can and he finally uncrumpled the paper claiming that there was something wrong with it.”

“Which there was,” Rick inserted loudly. “Staple in the corner totally threw off the center of balance.”

“Anyway, when we figured out that you wrote it, we realized that you were the one we needed to talk to. You see, the world has changed a little since you wrote this, but
your idea is still good. T
he South Korean higher-ups
might be willing to go along with some of the suggestions that you give here
.”

“How do you know that?” Tucker asked.

“Because,” said Rick, “we’ve been talking to the South Koreans. That’s why we’re here.”

Tucker surveyed the two,
Abby looking earnest and worried, Rick also looking uncharacteristically serious. The more he learned about these people, the less he understood them.

“Here’s the situation
,”
Abby
continued. “Wol Pot will probably end the hunger strike soon. We think he will
actually
leave
over
the weekend. That gives us a small window of opportunity to send them a message…”

“Whoa, whoa,” said Tucker, backing up, “I’m not going to do anything, like…”

“No, no,” Rick corrected, “s
he means we want to literally give them a written message.”

“Oh.”

“Ri
ght. Sorry, bad choice of words,
” Abby apologized. “
Anyway, Wol Pot may have won over a lot of Americans
, but he still has to report back to the Thai government,
and they
aren’t very happy about
what he’s done. If he goes back
and all he has is the plan that our State Department has put on the table, he won’t last a week in any kind of position of power
. If that happens, the Thais
go the way of Myanmar
and become a Many Hands state
. But, if we can get Wol Pot this message before he leaves, that the South Koreans
can step in to ensure
a balance in the negotiations
, then he goes back with some
leveraging
power and he can help them turn things around for good.”

Tucker processed what he was being told
and shrugged
. “So go tell him. Or go tell Tonkin. He’s the one in those meetings. Why are you talking to me?”

“Tonkin’s under
pressure to push
Maxwell’s plan
. Maybe he would have considered it if he w
ere
under less pressure, but at this point he’s just repeating what he’s being told; he isn’t seriously considering other options, even from you.”

“He said that?”

“Uh, no. We inferred it.
Y
our memo
was
in the recycling bin
, right
? As for Wol Pot himself, he’s not taking any more official visitors or calls. He’s basically hunkering down with his aides to make his final decision. So we need
someone
to
get
this message to him just to let him know that there’s another way.”

“Then tell the South Koreans to figure out how to tell him.”

“Tucker, you aren’t listening. Our being here right now
is
South Korea trying to tell him. We kind of are South Korea.
Anyonghaseyo
.” Abby bowed slightly.

Tucker folded his arms and thought.
“
You
think I can
get in to deliver this message
?”

“We think you can, yes.” Abby extended an envelope to Tucker.

Tucker put his head down and listened to the party
breaking up in the living room, reminding him of the parts of his life that used to be normal
. His roommates would be eating the last of the Skyline Platter, analyzing the play-by-play on the couch. His neighbor would be moving his TV back, freaking out about scratching it. Lena might be stopping by to check in—and Carla would still be there. Tucker’s head snapped back up.