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with her.”
    “Number 19 working.”
    A couple of other women in yoga pants entered the waiting room and the manager turned her attention to them. Ann kept her place at the front of the line, but the manager just moved over to the side to collect the women’s money and give them their towels and robes.
    “You bother our customers,” the manager said after they left for the locker room.
    “I need to talk with Number 19.”
    “Number 19 doesn’t want to see you.”
    “You didn’t even speak to her. You don’t know.”
    The manager adjusted her glasses and pointed to a sign above a glass shelf that held beauty products. WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO REFUSE SERVICE TO ANYONE, it read. Ann was very familiar with the sign. They had the same one at the restaurant.
    “Listen,” Ann said, raising her voice, “I can close this place down, you know.”
    “Yah, yah.” The manager turned her back to Ann and rearranged some bottles of body scrub on the glass shelf.
    “I’ll tell immigration that you’re using illegals.”
    The manager snapped her head back toward Ann. “What has Number 19 told you?”
    Ann’s stomach felt queasy. Maybe she had gone too far. The last thing that she wanted to do was get Number 19 in trouble with her boss. “Nothing,” she said. “Just that you better watch out.”
    Ann walked out of the waiting room and went to the driving range to release some tension. This time she chose a spot on the far left side so she could keep an eye on the massage room door. One of her balls was sailing to the hundred-fifty-foot mark when she noticed someone leaving the massage room.
    Number 19. By herself.
    “Number 19!” she called out, and quickly walked over to face her.
    The masseuse lowered her head, as if she was preparing to experience something distasteful. One of her bobby pins was coming loose, and Ann fought the urge to push it back in her hair.
    “What’s wrong? Did your manager do something to you? I tried to set her straight—that tip money is yours.”
    “Why you say anything? Not your business.” Number 19 continued walking, and Ann pulled at her elbow.
    Number 19 wrestled back her arm and Ann was surprised to experience her wrath. “I fire!”
    Ann couldn’t believe this news. “I was just trying to help you. You have to understand.”
    “No job. No money. How can I live? You understand?” Number 19 ran down the stairs and Ann, still carrying her nine iron, chased after her. But the masseuse knew the ins and outs of the building better than Ann, who lost track of her, then dashed outside and asked the security guard if he had seen the masseuse walking by. The security guard shook his head, so Ann headed to the bus stop to find Number 19. But there was no sign of her.
    After an hour, Ann went to speak to the manager again. “You need to give Number 19 her job back.”
    “I need to do nothing.” The wooden tip box was open again, the stacks of twenties lined up beside it. “Get out. You can’t prove anything.”
    “I can get you in trouble.”
    “Who you? Poor nasty girl. Nobody going to listen to nasty girl.”
    “They’ll listen,” Ann said, fingering the grip of the nine iron. “You need to give Number 19 her job back.”
    “Number 19? You know numbers, but no name?” The manager threw her head back and laughed, her tangerine mouth resembling a demented clown’s.
    Ann held the golf club like a baseball bat and swung. A matte of hair flew off the manager’s scalp and her body lurched backwards into the glass shelves, which shattered, spilling the bottles of beauty products onto the linoleum floor.
    It was quiet for a moment, aside from the bottles rolling in the shards of glass. A bloody mass clung to the end of the club as Ann dropped it on the floor. She then walked over to the other side of the counter. The manager’s face was contorted and her glasses had flown to the far corner of the reception area. There was a huge gash on the right side of her forehead and blood