Another gutter ball. Ryan's third for the night. His rage ticked up a notch. He was better than this. He was strong, he was focused, he was prepared. If anyone deserved strike after strike after strike, it was him: Years of lifting weights gave him the right; a life inside alleys around the world, perfecting his form, owed him nothing by Xs, and owed him now, tonight, on this third date with a woman, Divisuyani, he found through an online fan forum.
He picked up his favorite ball, nicknamed Orange Swan for the burnt brightness of its well-polished surface. The 15 pounds of unexpressed victory felt like warm clay in his hands. He wound up, released.
Orange Swan dove straight into the right gutter. Instead of smiling awkwardly and returning to dry his hand over the chortling ball chute, Ryan sprinted down the glistening lane, bringing silence to the entire facility as his wounded-ape screams filled the air. No, he demanded. No, no, no. This is not me, I am more. He reached the end of the lane just as Orange Swan did. He dove, took her into his arms, his head crashing into the assembled pins, knocking all 10 down. The silence grew heavy: the mustachioed man with a 12-beer belly held his breath without knowing, the 10-year-old smearing birthday cake frosting over her eight-pound ball stared with her mouth open, the flock of ageless monks with their brown robes and shaved heads smiled and waited.
On his back, his mind surrounded by fallen pins, the orange ball clutched against his chest, shame mounting like snow drifts amid a blizzard, Ryan felt peace come to him for the first time in years.