Emily St. John Mandel - The Lola Quartet

"Have you been gambling?"

"No." She felt sick. "A little. Yes."

"A little?"

"I bought a couple of scratch-and-win tickets before work today."

"Just two?"

"Twelve," Sasha said. It had been so easy to slide back in. The tickets were so bright and as she'd carried them out to her car they'd seemed almost like real tickets, like slips of paper that might transport her to another place. The colors vibrating with possibility.

"Well," he said. " First time in a while. You have them with you?"

He knew her well. She'd kept them in her apron pocket. She laid them out on the table, iridescent rectangles with gray smudges where she'd scraped away the film to reveal the numbers. Across the room she was aware of Bianca watching her with concern. They'd been working together for years now and Bianca knew about the Gamblers Anonymous meetings, about the tickets, about Sasha's ruined credit rating and her fallen-down life. They'd talked about scratch-and-win tickets. Bianca had had a drinking problem when she was younger and said she understood.

"You won twenty-one dollars," William said. "Congratulations. Was it worth it?"

She'd seen it as a sign, but of course she couldn't tell him that. One hundred twenty-one thousand, twenty-one, the mirror of twelve, twelve tickets, if this wasn't a pattern then what was? But she knew where the rabbit hole led and so she looked away from the twelve rect angles on the table and said, " Could you please take these away from me?" and when she looked back they were gone.

"What time do you get off work?"

"Six a.m.," she said.

"Seriously? That late?"

"I work twelve-hour shifts a couple times a week."

William was flipping through his notebook. It was a worn leather scrap of a thing that he carried everywhere. Sasha saw it as an affectation— who still carries a leather notebook? — and sometimes found it obscurely irritating.

"Here," he said, "there's a meeting up on Lakeview Crescent at seven." He wrote an address on a notebook page, tore it off and gave it to her. "I won't be there. Seven a.m.'s when I get my kid up for school. You'll go, won't you?"

"I will. Thank you."

Sh e w a s tired at six a.m. but the suburbs were beautiful, the heat already rising and the sky streaked with pink, streetlights fading out as she drove. She was frightened but she had some hope. Daniel had come in after William had left and told her his plan. His grandmother was very close to death, he said, and he didn't like to think of death in these terms but the fact was that he was expecting an inheritance. He was going to go to Utah and negotiate with Paul. "People like him don't really want to draw attention to themselves," he'd said. "There's no reason why he wouldn't be willing to talk." She could have wept for happiness, but she'd settled for kissing him on the cheek. He was leaving for Utah the next morning.

Lakeview Crescent was in a planned development, the houses set at angles around a man-made lake with palm trees all around it, small piers out into the water. The meeting was being held in a private home. She drove slowly with the scrap of paper William had given her in her hand, reading numbers on mailboxes, but even before she read the street address of the meeting house she saw the cars out front.

In the chilled air of the living room Sasha picked a chair facing the floor-to-ceiling windows. The lake was brilliant in the early light.

"It's stocked with fish," a woman, Loreen, said. It was her house but she seemed anxious and out of place in it. She wore a white blouse and jeans and her hair was spiked up. The impression was of a punk rocker trying to impersonate a housewife. There was a white guitar leaning against a wall at the end of the room. The sleeve of her blouse slipped up as she passed Sasha a cup of coffee, and Sasha saw the edge of a tattoo — the letters "ocks" in gothic script, blurred and faded with time and sunlight. She wished she could ask to see the rest.

There was the usual round of introductions. She found herself looking out at the water, mesmerized and caffeinated, bone-tired, thinking about swimming. She wasn't a strong swimmer but she'd always enjoyed it, the shock of a new element, the moment of plunging when the water closed over her and she was suspended. She felt a little feverish, as always happened when she was exhausted, sweat between her uniform and her skin, and she realized that everyone was looking at her and that she'd heard her name at least once.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I just got off the night shift." There were sympathetic smiles but most of the people here were day workers, well dressed and polished, going to an early-morning meeting because after this they were driving to their offices, and she saw that they didn't really understand. "My name's Sasha," she said. "I used to gamble. I lost everything of value."

"What did you lose?" This from a man whose name she couldn't remember, thirtyish in a linen suit and expensive-looking glasses.

"I spent a student-loan payment on Lotto tickets and poker games," Sasha said, "so I had to drop out of school after a semester. I was studying English literature and finance. I know it doesn't matter anymore, but my grades that first semester were really high. I stole some watches. I stole my dad's car." She'd told the story so many times that it sounded flat to her now. A recitation about loss and poker games and tickets. "I bought some scratch-and-win tickets today," she said. "I mean yesterday. Before work."

"I did that too," Loreen said. "Just last week." The conversation shifted away from Sasha, toward scratch-and-win tickets and how they were everywhere now, every 7-Eleven and gas station and grocery store, and Sasha's attention drifted back to the lake. "It's all part of the sickness," someone said. Reflections of palm trees shimmered over the water.

W i l l i a m c a l l e d her in the late afternoon, when he knew she'd be up. She was sitting on the front steps smoking a cigarette.

"Did you go to the meeting this morning?" he asked.

"I did," she said. "It was a good idea. Thanks for making me go."

"You sound tense."

"I'm fine." What could she possibly tell him? William understood gambling. He understood what it felt like to slip away from yourself and to move beyond your own control, to turn into someone you never meant to become who did things you never wanted to do, but he didn't know that her sister had stolen over a hundred thousand dollars from a drug dealer. She'd been sitting on the front steps for an hour, because she couldn't bear to be alone inside.

"I've known you for a while now," he said. "I don't believe you."

"Just family problems. No gambling."

"Okay," he said, and this was one of the things she liked best about him, the way he let things drop so easily. "Hope it all works out. You going to our regular meeting later?"

"I think I'll go tomorrow."

After the phone call she stayed on the steps for a while longer looking out at the twilight, restless and utterly alone. There were kids playing basketball in a driveway across the street. She waved when one of them looked at her, but he didn't wave back. There were hours to go before she had to leave for work but she didn't want to stay here anymore. She went back inside for her handbag and a clean uniform, draped the uniform carefully across the backseat of her car so it wouldn't get wrinkled, and left the neighborhood. She was as alone in the car as she'd been in the house, but at least the car didn't echo with anyone else's absence.

Sa s h a p a r k e d at the end of a beach access road and walked down to the water. There were two new scratch-and-win tickets in her pocket from when she'd stopped to get gas. Two was a manageable number. Two wasn't the end of the world. She wouldn't dive into the ocean tonight but it was nice to think that she could. The lights of a yacht shone over the water but other than that there was nothing, only the sea and the sand and the bright stars and Sasha, the tickets stiff and sharp-edged in the pocket of her jeans.