Chris Grabenstein - Ring Toss

Some men have a code they live by.

Other men? Not so much.

My partner, John Ceepak, has a very strict, very rigid moral code that guides every single decision he makes, all day, every day.

Me? I’m a little more loosey-goosey. Then again, I’m twenty-five, he’s pushing forty.

It’s the middle of July. We’re on the job with the Sea Haven Police Department, working the late shift on a Saturday night. In a Jersey shore resort town like ours, that usually means we’d be breaking up under-age beer blasts on the beach or making sure nobody speeds through our kid-packed ice cream zones.

This particular Saturday night, however, we’re working a tip on the Sea Haven Boardwalk. We’re there to bust the new owner/operator of The Lord Of The Rings Toss booth. Any connection to the wildly popular movie franchise is purely intentional, I’m sure, though not officially licensed or paid for. The old ring toss boss just hired some local sign painter to rip off Bilbo, Gandalf, and that Elf with the arrows and then bought a can of gold spray paint to spritz his plastic rings so they’d be the same color as Frodo’s.

But Copyright Infringement isn’t why we’re here.

Ceepak’s adopted stepson, T.J. Lapscynski-Ceepak (yeah, the kid’s name sounds like a disease with a telethon), used to work in this same boardwalk arcade a couple summers ago. Now he’s getting ready for college: the Naval Academy at Annapolis. His step-dad used to be an Army man before he became a cop — ending his career as an M.P. over in Baghdad during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Although Ceepak never attended the Army academy at West Point, he went ahead and adopted their cadet honor code as his personal credo: He will not lie, cheat, steal or tolerate those who do.

Makes it hard for my partner to stroll past the brightly lit boardwalk amusements. Wheel Of Fortune, Basketball Hoops, Frog Bog, The Dog Pounder, Squirt-The-Clown, The Claw Crane. They’re all basically legalized cheats; a chance to spend fifty bucks to win your girlfriend a ten-dollar purple gorilla the size of a couch just so you can lug it around for her all night.

Me? I figure everybody knows the games along the boards are basically rip-offs. You play for laughs. Or to impress your date. Or because you hate clowns.

Like I said, my own code is a little less stringent than Ceepak’s.

“Six rings for one dollar,” says the scrawny guy working the ring toss booth. He’s wearing a head mic so we can all hear how bored he is with his job. Maybe his life. “Six rings for a buck, six rings to test you luck.”

“Look carefully at the bottles, Danny,” whispers Ceepak. “T.J. has advised me that the new management of this booth is engaging in what the New Jersey Legalized Games of Chance Control Commission would label deceptive, misleading, or fraudulent activity intended to reduce a customer’s chance of winning.”

Yep, here in the Garden State, we have an agency to regulate boardwalk games. The LGCCC. They also handle bingo and church raffles.

“Show your lady your stuff, win a Shrek filled with fluff.” The ring toss barker keeps droning on, unaware that he’s about to be busted. “Step right up, gents. Win a Scooby Doo for your cutie-poo. Take home a Tweetie for your sweetie.” I figure he has one of those rhyming dictionaries at home.

Behind him, I see 49 glass bottles arranged in a tight square. A few already have golden plastic rings looped around their necks.

“They do that to make it look like someone else has already won,” says Professor Ceepak.

I nod.

They also put the bottles very close to the front of the booth — to make it look soooo easy to win. Heck, you feel like you can just reach out and drop the ring right on top of a bottle. But you can’t.

And, even if you could, the plastic bracelet might bounce back off.

That’s because, according to our informant T.J., the joker running the ring toss enterprise this summer has slipped nearly invisible glass lips over 80 percent of the bottles, making it virtually impossible for the small rings to catch hold of the necks. Yep, young T.J. has been in the Ceepak household long enough to make his stepdad’s code his own. The young dude (who cut off all his dreadlocks, by the way, the night before his Annapolis interview) will not tolerate cheating. Or losing. I think he figured out the game was rigged when, last weekend, this booth broke his world-record winning streak (the kid can nail the nipple on a squeeze bottle of ketchup with an onion ring).

Ceepak pulls a summons out of the thigh pocket of his cargo shorts. There’s a three thousand dollar fine attached to rigging a boardwalk game of chance. I reflexively check my holster to make sure my Glock is still there. Three thousand dollar fines are never easily swallowed by carnies who, by law, can only charge one dollar per player per game.

We’re all set to step up and slap down our papers on the counter when both our radios start squawking.

“Unit A-12, 10–41. Mussel Beach Motel. See the man. Mr. Sean Ryan. Room 114.”

In Sea Haven, 10–41 means, “neighbor trouble.” In a motel, it usually means one room is making way too much noise and the “neighbors” are complaining.

Ceepak unclips the mic from his shoulder. “This is A-12. We’re on our way.”

He jams the summons back into his pants pocket.

A radio call trumps writing up a corrupt ring toss game every time.

The Mussel Beach Motel over on Beach Lane is owned and operated by the parents of one of my best friends since forever, Becca Adkinson. In fact, this week, Becca is running the place by herself: Her parents left our vacation paradise so they could go on a summer vacation of their own. Up to Canada. When you sell fun-in-the-sun, your idea of a break is a fireworks festival in Montreal.

We’re not flashing lights or wailing sirens but we have scooted over to Ocean Avenue so we can zip south a little faster. Along the way, we pass The Ice Cream Scoop Sloop, Cap’n Scrubby’s Car Wash, The Bagel Lagoon, and The Treasure Chest Gift Shoppe. What can I say? We’re a tourist town on an eighteen-mile long strip of sand and surf. I think the Chamber of Commerce only recognizes businesses with semi-nautical names.

The Mussel Beach Motel is a two-story, horseshoe-shaped stucco box with a sign out front advertising a Newly Refurbished Pool.

“They should change that sign,” says Ceepak as we pull into the parking lot.

He’s right. Becca’s dad fixed the cracks in the swimming pool a couple years ago so the sign is, basically, lying and Ceepak’s honor code extends to all aspects of life, billboards included.

“Officers!”

A bald man with horn-rimmed round glasses comes out of Room 114 windmilling his scrawny arms up over his head.

“Mr. Ryan?” says Ceepak.

“Yes. What took you so long? These people are ruining my vacation.”

In the distance, I can hear animated voices.

“Get outta my face!”

“No. You get outta this room!”

“Calm down, Connie.”

“Get out. Seriously.”

Sounds like an Italian family dinner after some Irish kid dating one of the daughters says Sinatra never really sang, he just sort of talked and snapped his fingers.

Hey, when I said it, I didn’t realize Barbara Baccia’s parents and brother and sisters were such freakish fans. Miss Baccia and I never dated again. Too bad. Her mom made great gravy. Gravy is what you and I would call spaghetti sauce.

“They’re on the second floor,” says Mr. Ryan, his voice shaky. I don’t think he’s used to dealing with confrontation. At his height (short) and weight (puny), I don’t blame him.

“Have you registered a complaint with the management?” asks Ceepak.