"Honey, hurry up, you have to leave now! You don't want to be late for your tennis match with your boss!"
shouted Jeff's mother.
"Oh, damn!" Jeff's dad said looking at his watch. He looked at Jeff, and shook his head. His mind must be
playing tricks on him. He grabbed the single white sock and pulled it on. He shoved it into the tennis shoe he
had been carrying with him, and tied it tight. Then he stood up, and quickly looked himself up and down, and
ran downstairs and out to the waiting car grabbing his tennis bag and racket as he exited the house.
He barely made it to the boss's club on time. The whole time his mind kept nagging him that his son Jeff was
now his sock. That was impossible.
"Hello, Mr. Conrad!" Jeff's dad shouted as he jogged on to the reserved court.
"Cutting it a bit close, Dennis," Donald Conrad chided.
"Well, sir, you're the one who always says be punctual. Not too early, not too late," he quoted.
"Uh, yes, well then shall we have at it?"
"Do you want to warm up first, sir?"
"A couple lobs back and forth, I guess?"
The two took to the court. Dennis kept distractedly looking down at his foot. He missed the first practice
ball, and his boss frowned.
"Come on, Dennis, be alive out there. That was an easy lob. We want to be ready for our doubles match against
Bouvier," he advised. Jacques Bouvier was a close competitor, and they had a match scheduled for later this
afternoon.
"Sorry, sir. I'll keep my head in the game," Dennis answered.
He returned the next few balls. Even though he kept glancing down at his foot as he ran back and forth
hitting the ball, Dennis kept returning every shot. He was playing better than before. His fast reaction,
and spurts of speed on the court reminded Mr. Conrad of a much younger man. Ah, when he had played tennis in
college, the young men had moved like that. Jeff was in fact on the tennis team and was top seed at his
school. Somehow as his father's sweat soaked into Jeff, Jeff's skill soaked into his father. The game was now
30-Love, and the boss was losing for the first time. Soon it was over, and too everyone's surprise, mostly his
own, Dennis leapt over the net to shake his boss's hand.
"Remarkable, Dennis, best game you ever played, but you seemed - well, a bit distracted. Something bothering
in you?" Donald Conrad asked. He wondered if all those games he had won were due to Dennis letting him win or
whether Dennis had somehow suddenly improved. Either way he felt good about their chances against Bouvier in
their match later. Perhaps it was a fluke? So he played two more games with Dennis, losing each in record
time.
While sitting at the bar, drinking Long Island ice teas with his boss, Dennis slipped off the shoe containing
his son and stared at his stockinged foot and wiggled his toes.
"Something bothering you, Dennis? You seem in another world?" Conrad asked.
Dennis opened his mouth, and paused. How insane would it be to say, "I think my sock is my son Jeff"? So
instead he said, "I'm sorry, I'm just rehearsing my presentation for the Maxwell account on Monday. I just
keep feel that I'm missing something."
"Ah? Well, you keep thinking about it then. You've played your best game ever today, and I want you to keep
playing it - you see I've placed a sizable wager with Bouvier on our match today."
"Oh?" Dennis said absentmindedly slipping his foot back into his tennis shoe and tying it tightly on his foot.
Mr. Bouvier and his partner were walking toward their table. The match would soon begin.