"You called a strange woman during a long track on the radio." She looked like Christmas had come early. "That's the most romantic thing I've ever heard."
"It was not romantic. It was a business negotiation."
"Seventy-five bucks and store credit," she agreed. "Very businesslike." She closed the Galaga's back panel and screwed it shut and stood up, wiping her hands on a rag. "Okay. I'll tell you about my grandmother. And then I'll make you a deal. But first, you have to play me."
"Play you."
She nodded at the Galaga. Its attract screen was cycling: the little white fighter ship, the swooping blue-and-yellow bugs, the high-score list. The top line said FRS. So did the second. So did the third.
"Best of three," she said. "You win, I give you the tape and you never hear from me again. I win—"
"You get the record. Which doesn't exist."
"I win," Frankie said, "and you play 'Lake Street Moon' on the radio. On your show. For my grandmother's birthday. It's March the eighth."
Augie laughed out loud. It was not a nice laugh; it was the laugh of a man being invited to set himself on fire. "Absolutely not."
"Scared?"
"Of losing to you at Galaga? I've been playing Galaga since 1981."
"I've been fixing Galaga since 1981," Frankie said, and fed in a quarter. "I know where every bug lives."
She destroyed him.
It wasn't close. It wasn't even sporting. In the first game he lost his last ship on stage seven while she was on stage twenty-two, and she hadn't even taken off her parka. In the second game she let a boss bug capture her fighter in its tractor beam on purpose, then shot the bug and got the ship back doubled, the two little white fighters gliding side by side and spitting fire, and he heard himself make a small helpless noise of admiration that he would deny for the rest of his life. One of the eleven regulars came over to watch. Then two more.
When it was done, the bartender put a free Grain Belt in front of her without being asked.
"Best of three," Frankie said kindly. "I guess we don't need the third one."