The Game

look for Papa, but he wasn’t there. So I got in my car and drove to my apartment. Five minutes later, Papa called. He said, “It’s not Mystery’s house. My name is on the lease, and you’re my guest. I’m going to pick you up right now.” So he snuck me back into the house.
    MYSTERY: Papa was breaking a cardinal rule. He was hiring my exgirlfriend, who I trained, to be in his workshops, which was an idea he’d stolen from me.
    HERBAL (to Mystery, via e-mail): I have been told that my bedroom and personal belongings have been “destroyed” because Katya was at the house. I don’t know exactly what destroyed means, but now I do not feel safe in my own house. You seem to believe that the world revolves around you and that everyone else should bend to your wishes.
    MYSTERY (to Herbal, via e-mail): I don’t want Katya here and that is so final that there will be no need for you to reply to this e-mail in any way. Nor bring up the subject again, for it will arouse my anger so deeply that you will be thrown through glass. There will be no further warning. If she comes around when you return, I will instantly pound you—it will be fast, hard, unexpected, merciless, and repetitive. If you come by and she isn’t around, then we can safely live in peace under the same roof. Either way, our business relationship is, obviously, finished.
    TYLER DURDEN (via e-mail, to Mystery): You lost Katya for many reasons, but to me it appeared as though you emotionally leeched offof her. You are needy and like a black hole sucking in attention. You can’t handle not being the center of attention for even one minute. That is your tragic flaw. Don’t offer your girls to your friends. Don’t try to make a party girl into your girlfriend. And don’t underestimate the consequences of bringing recently converted AFCs into our lifestyle.

My phone rang every day while I was in Miami. I’d pick it up, and it would be Mystery or Herbal or Katya or Twyla or Tyler Durden. I even received phone calls about Project Austin, which was also falling apart: The gas and electricity had been shut off because the bills hadn’t been paid, and the bedrooms were cluttered with candles, dirty clothing, and pornography. But the only person I really wanted to hear from was Lisa.
    When I returned to Project Hollywood, Herbal’s room was in tatters. There were holes in his wall; his door was propped up precariously against its hinges; his mattress lay over his television set; and glass and dirt were strewn across the hardwood floor.
    From the perspective of a pickup artist, all Mystery was doing was strengthening Katya and Herbal’s relationship by creating drama and a common enemy. But Mystery wasn’t thinking like a pickup artist. He was unable to control himself.
    That night, the doorbell rang. When Mystery answered it, he found a well-muscled man in his twenties standing in the rain with an angry look on his face. Katya’s car was parked in front of the house.
    “I’m Katya’s brother,” the man told Mystery.
    “I don’t think so. I know her brother.”
    “Well,” he said, stepping past Mystery and into the house. “I heard you threatened to kill her. And that’s not going to happen.”
    “I never threatened Katya.” Mystery sized Katya’s friend up. He was shorter than him but definitely stronger. “I threatened Herbal.”
    “Well, if you do anything to her, I will personally crack your skull wide open.”
    Mystery never responded well to provocation. Just like during our argument in the car at the Trans-Dniester border, Mystery snapped. The veins in his neck leaped to attention; his face ripened; he grew an inch.
    “You want to go?” Mystery yelled. “Let’s go then, because I’m ready to take this thing all the way.”
    “Fine,” Katya’s friend said. “Then step outside. I don’t want to get blood on the carpet.”
    “No, let’s do it right here. I want blood on the floor. I want something to remember you by.”
    In the periphery of his vision, Mystery spotted a cluster of large rocks he’d brought back from the beach and painted into runestones. He reached for one, prepared to smash his adversary’s head in, then quickly changed his mind. He took three giant strides to Herbal’s already-decimated door and kicked it to the ground again.
    “Come on then,” Mystery yelled. “I’m not making any apologies for what I’m about to do.”
    He grabbed a bookshelf and pulled it over.
    Katya’s friend saw the