ONE
In the bathroom Chunks stumbled by the girl passed out on the toilet and pissed in the bathtub. The walls shook and the mirror rattled and he couldn't hear her breathing. His world spun so he stepped into the tub and put his forehead and one forearm on the tile and pissed on the faucet and as close to the drain as he could. The urine tapped his boots and his red laces. The whole time he worried about someone coming in. He wanted to take his time but didn't know how much time. He pulled the shower curtain closed. Chunks didn't want the girl to wake up and say something smart and get herself punched and then get himself jumped in the yard. He didn't know whose girl it was. He steadied himself and drew the curtain. He only had one good eye at that point. No sound but the bass line and bottles falling and clanking. He looked at the girl. She sat slumped but the hair was long over her face, dirty blond and dotted in ash and puke. Chunks stepped out of the bathtub.
He splashed water on his face and lit one of the last three cigarettes and got an idea and locked the door latch.
Chunks zipped up his cutoff jeans and pushed some of the hair out of her face. He remembered her from nothing at all. Not earlier in the night not on the street not at Veronica Vernon's place or Pow's. She had a round young face of fifteen, sixteen. She was pale and not breathing. Chunks thought nothing of it. He took out his penis and slapped her face with it. He gently held it to poke each eye and almost fell over and cut it off on the corner of the sink. He brushed her teeth with his Star of David cock ring.
Someone tried to open the door. When they couldn't they yelled something and he couldn't hear.
"OUT OF ORDER," Chunks said.
They banged away.
"FUCK OFF," Chunks said.
He groped the girl's chest and fell in love with her. She was wearing a sun dress and had no tats and so he found a pen and wrote his number down on her shoulder and got an idea and put his cigarette out. He wrote OUT OF ORDER on an old zine called SNAGGLETOOTHED LESBIAN DARLA. There was a rusty toolbox and it was open and he got the gray duct tape. He unlocked the door and quickly opened the door and held back the small army forming outside it.
"Sorry," he said. He taped up the sign. "Plumbing."
Someone grabbed his shoulder and he punched their wrist and made sure all his rings would be read later. "I LIVE HERE," Chunks said, and went back into the bathroom.
The girl hadn't moved. He wanted to do more with her so he lifted her legs and then saw the blood on her thighs.
He thought of the first time he was fucking and the girl was on her period and she didn't tell him and he didn't know what the fuck was going on. He couldn't imagine being all squishy with blood like some queasy, burdened, leaky, emotional-tightroper. His first fuck said XY was a mutated XX chromosome. Well she can have it, he thought. He picked the girl up. Her ass sweat made a ripping sound with the toilet seat.
Chunks saw the fetus then, and all the blood, and the blood that had sprayed the sides of the bowl, and the alien cord that had sagged and torn like a condom, used, and the stink suddenly filled the world and he laid her down and threw up in the sink. The umbilical tore when he laid her down on it. The fluid that remained washed over the floor. He slipped and sat in it.
Outside the song ended but the bass line remained for the new one. Plastic cups in trash bins, kegs shifting in ice. He felt the girl's arm. Lizard cool. He lit his second to last cigarette and flushed the toilet with the miscarriage in it and went to a stiff forgotten towel and mopped the floor and began to take the bath curtain down. He looked in the toilet to see if the thing was still there but it was small and it was gone.
He was wrapping the girl up in the bath curtain and thinking of what the next move would be if he were a smarter person when the music stopped and the crowd quieted and Chunks knew it was a noise complaint and the pigs were here.
Chunks casually left the bathroom with the tool box. He took out a hammer and a handful of long nails. He thought of Christ and calmly, accurately nailed the corners of the door.
Upstairs he passed through the living room. Outside his two roommates stood with the pigs on the porch with their walkie talkies and their Mag lights. He went to his room and got a duffel bag and emptied laundry from it and went back to the basement with it.
"SORRY GUYS," he said to the crowd, "SHOW'S UPSTAIRS NOW. THE PIGS ARE UPSTAIRS. THEIR WIVES ARE WAITING TO GET FUCKED. THEY NEED MORE KIDS SO THEY CAN HAVE MORE HOPE. BUT YOU GET UPSTAIRS AND YOU SHOW THEM SOME KIDS AND YOU SHOW THEM WHERE HOPE IS AT THESE DAYS. STOP COWERING IN A BASEMENT. GO OUTSIDE, EVERYONE, AND SHIT AND PISS FOR THE CRACKER PIGS WHO THINK THEY OWN THE NIGHT."
The crowd moves upstairs and outside and into the air with their beers if not to do anything then to see it. Chunks pulls the nails from the bathroom door.
He wrapped the girl up and put her into the duffel bag. It took much effort. He was of a normal build. It was hard to have enough food. He smoked too much. He got the girl into the bag and got scared when he got sober. He realized he did not know where he was going to put the bag. Everyone was in the yard now. There was a shovel in the garage. He could see the red and blue lights outside hitting the window over the bathtub and reflecting off the back of a street sign. He would need more time. Veronica had a little car and Pow had a truck but both were out of town. It was late July and it was hot. There were still people in the basement. The band from the city was putting their equipment away and were waiting to get paid a little for gas and they were going to ask him about that when he left the bathroom and they were going to notice the bag and the weight of it and he realized that the entire situation was too silly to worry about being caught so he left the bathroom, carrying the girl over his shoulder in the duffel bag, and the bassist from Jefferson Internship came up to him and said, "Did we make anything tonight?"
Chunks' ears were ringing too loudly to hear fuck all so he calmly put down the bag, pulled out some cash, removed a twenty, handed it over, and said, "I don't know what they're going to give you, but there's this and a jug of vodka upstairs."
The bassist smiled. It was plenty.
"Thanks, man," he said. "What's in the bag?"
"Plumbing's fucked," Chunks said. "Lot of shit got soaked."
He picked up the girl and stumbled upstairs with her. He passed a small group loitering in the bare living room watching the cops aiming lights at kids throwing cups at the cruisers and more police sirens could be heard, far off but getting closer. Chunks thought to put the girl in his closet and go outside and make an appearance. He knew at that point that if some girl enters a person's home and dies, the homeowner will incur no legal repercussions. But something inside him wanted to create a crime where only tragedy existed before. That way, he could never be pigeon-holed.
He thought about it more outside. His roommates argued with one pig over the fine, two pigs were trying to ticket for public urination, and three pigs were hurrying punks home, not noticing that all they would do is walk off with their beers, circle around in the dark to the other side of the house, return to the back yard, and reappear in the front yard.
A block down, someone lit off fireworks.
A police helicopter buzzed over neighborhood trees and punks cheered. They pissed and shit all over the place. They pissed and shit in the cul de sac, right out in the street. Half the block was on vacation anyway.
Chunks bummed a smoke from an old guy he knew only as Squalor Squirrel when the pig came up to him.
"You live here?"
"Yeshir."
"What's your name?"
"Gerald Chunkasey."
"How do you spell that?"
Chunks told him and said, "If we're going down for public nuisance and noise you might as well know I've got a dead girl in my closet."
"Do you, now?" The pig made a face. "We'll be around in the morning, then. We're busy now."
"She won't be here in the morning, Officer."
"Oh no?"
"We're getting married in the morning."
It was another full hour of Chunks laying on his bed, too tired to turn the light off, before the pigs left and the punks went into the night and the chopper flew away and the leftover fireworks were gone. It was the high point of summer and eventually Chunks shared a few words over the night's events with Tye and got up and went to the garage and got the green shovel.
TWO
Too many unwitting fools in the world, that is what’s wrong - and what has always been wrong, he thought. Ignorance was the flimsiest excuse of them all and despite the obvious stupidity and oblivion of seemingly all the people around him, Arthur thought it was too much to ask for him to believe that the general population's IQ was in the single digits…
Aggravating as these observations had been for nearly all of his 76 years, Arthur was confounded beyond redemption that they even seemed to apply to his own flesh and blood. It was less obvious with his son – oh, it was there, but seemed mild in comparison to the manifestation in his grandson Walter. Where was the feeling of pride he’d always looked forward to in his later life and how could he live with the irritating-disillusionment-verging-on-disgrace that weighed so heavy on his heart?
His wife wasn’t technically related to him, and she’d worn the mantle of reasonable intelligence and awareness elegantly, well into her 50’s. He could forgive her slowly encroaching dizziness because she wore it well too… and she was polite. She knew the basics of etiquette and they were still with her. When she made liver for dinner, she always made him a chopped steak because she knew he hated liver, he didn’t have to remind her. She always put his extra change and his nail-clippers in the little brass dish on his dresser when she did laundry and she vacuumed while he was out at the hardware store or walking the dog. She knew life was easier for everyone when you paid attention and followed a few rules of consideration.
Floyd, his son, had always begrudgingly complied with the fundamental rules of decency and respect and he didn’t have to be told more than once (or occasionally twice) when he’d stepped out of line. By the time he was an adult he’d had enough practice that he hardly annoyed Arthur at all anymore.
But Walter… willful, distracted, selfish little beast. He had to be told each and every basic rule and protocol several times; and again when the situation varied in the slightest detail. He seemed to have a finite capacity for new information and his ability to build a library of concepts was downright remedial.
Floyd hated dropping Walter off at his folks’ house. He’d grown up there, and he knew, it wasn’t any fun for a kid being around his father. Alice generally dropped Walter off when they needed to ask them to watch him.
Walter didn’t seem to mind, he loved the old man. Every time he came home, it seemed as if he’d been to summer camp or something, so Floyd just tried to steer clear of it for the most part. It was all he could do to go over for holidays and the occasional Sunday dinner. It gave him flashbacks listening to Arthur constantly berate Walter, but it just rolled off the little guy’s back like so much water off a duck.
Floyd had tried to learn that trick from his son, but he hadn’t been very successful thus far. Last Christmas when he gave his mother a Roomba he thought he’d found the perfect gift. He knew her back was giving her trouble from time to time and vacuuming three to four times a week couldn’t be helping. Since Arthur couldn’t be subjected to the “infernal noise” of the old Hoover upright, this seemed like the perfect solution to Floyd. He had thought he might get two or three words of approval from his father.
“Housework is a job, Floyd, your mom doesn’t need a bunch of toys taking up space and gathering more dust. We aren’t impressed by your extravagances anyway. Sometimes I don’t know how you keep money in the bank, even if you are a lawyer.”
Oh yes, and a law degree followed closely by an invitation to join a successful private practice hadn’t won him any prizes either. Even his lovely, accomplished wife seemed to displease Arthur.
Floyd knew Arthur thought she was hot; it’s creepy when you see that look in your own father’s eye and he’s not looking at your mother. Especially if he is looking at your wife. Somehow though, once they got married it only got worse. Now Arthur leered at her from across the room while he kvetched about how she didn’t cook or clean or take care of the family like a real wife and mother. Then there was the fact that she talked so much. Floyd was convinced it wasn’t the amount of actual talking, but the authority in her voice. Alice was a professional, and she knew the automobile industry. They often argued over foreign cars versus domestic. Arthur wouldn’t budge and Alice wouldn’t concede.
“You’re gonna sit right there and tell me you think it’s right that those people in China and Japan are shipping cars over here by the boat-load and we’re shutting down factories every six months?”
“As soon as American auto companies are willing to make the more efficient models that consumers want to buy and give up on limited obsolescence we can talk about what’s right. Until then, a little pressure must be applied.”
That was generally when Arthur had to go to the restroom or walk the dog and he wouldn’t be in a hurry to come back in either case. Later, at dinner though, there he’d be, sitting at the far end of the table ogling Alice as she passed the mashed potatoes.
Floyd stepped on the brake and made a wide, last minute right had turn. He’d forgotten he was taking Walter to his folks’. Just heading to the airport by habit – Alice would take a cab in to pick Walter up later. He had to get to the office soon, his new client was eager to start preliminaries right away.
“Grandpa! Grandpa!” Arthur winced at the harsh, scraping sound of Walter scrambling up the stairs in those stupid, impractical hiking boots he’d gotten for his birthday last year. It was July and the kid would be wearing shorts and looking like a ridiculous rendition of Indiana Jones with peanut butter on his upper lip as he ruined the finish on the hardwood.
As he placed the last of the utility bills in their proper files, Arthur stood up and walked toward the door of his office in order to head Walter off.
Floyd had called on Tuesday, Alice was out of town on business, again, and he had to work on Saturday, “I have to get ready for a new client, and I thought Alice was going to be home Friday, but it turns out she’s gone until Saturday afternoon.
They were always important, they were always potentially “potentially the biggest case of his career”, and they invariably took precedent over parenting. Arthur had to give him some slack because his career had often taken precedent as well – even though he hadn't been a “big time lawyer”.
He reminded himself that it wasn’t Walter’s selfish in-consideration that had foisted him on Arthur this particular Saturday. “Hey there big guy, ready to go to Louise’s?”
Walter jumped up, threw himself, full-force with a heavy downward swing of both fists, to the floor, and bounced impossibly high to grab Arthur around the neck. “I’m ready Grandpa!” he screeched as his heavy, impractical boots slammed into Arthur’s thighs. Biting his tongue, Arthur lifted him under the arms and placed him back on the floor harder than was necessary.
“Dad-gummit Walter! Be careful with those confounded boots! Quit acting like a two year old!”
“I’m gonna be five Grandpa, in this many weeks!” Walter held up three fingers on his right hand with the help of his left hand to keep his pinky tucked down.
“Well, you wouldn’t know it from your behavior. If I were you I’d want to act my age, maybe a little older, so I didn’t make a fool of myself and my family.”
In the car on the way to the diner, Arthur didn’t talk much. He was wishing this weren’t the second Saturday of the month. Any other Saturday he could have stayed home and worked in his office or his wood shop and Grace would have watched Walter. But on second Sundays, he went to brunch with the boys over at Louise’s and Grace thought it would be a good chance for them both to get out of the house. She had threatened that she needed to vacuum, either way.
As he pulled into the parking lot, Arthur reminded Walter, “act your age now, these men won’t put up with your baby behavior any better ‘n me.”
Walter was singing non-verbal lyrics to some song he obviously didn’t really know and bouncing his heels on the car seat for emphasis.
“Careful with those ridiculous boots! Did you hear what I said?”
“Yes, Grandpa, act my age: mmwahh diddeeee, mwahh grond dale…”
“Stop it with the boots! Now!” Arthur stepped on the brake quickly and firmly before he needed to, making the whole car lurch and throwing Arthur forward into the shoulder strap.
“Sorry, Grandpa.”
As they walked into the diner, Arthur was startled to see a large group of little girls and two mothers sitting at their usual table. Looked like some sort of Girl Scout troop or something. They were making intolerable, high-pitched noises.
“Over here Arthur! We’re over here!” Mel was waving his arms in the air like an idiot.
Toward the back of the diner, Glen and Mel were seated by a window with their coffee already poured and an extra cup waiting for him.
“What’s going on in here today? Who let those girls have our table?”
“They got here just in front of us,” laughed Glen, “it’s the only table they’d all fit at. They had to bring out a couple extra chairs from the back.”
“Clarice knows we come in every second Saturday, and she knows that’s the table we like,” mumbled Arthur. He didn’t know who to finger for the inconsiderate move, but he wasn’t going to leave Clarice his usual two-dollar tip.
“Like Glen said, it was the only table they’d all fit around” repeated Mel. He did that, a lot. Arthur was used to it; he only wished he’d leave off the “Like Glen said,” part.
“Where’s John?”
“He had to clean out the garage, ‘s been promising the wife since May,” offered Glen. He was obviously disappointed, but, unlike Arthur, he understood.
“Who’s this big guy?” asked Mel, ruffling Walter’s hair to distract him while he pinched the side of his stomach. Walter let out a deafening screech, “just as high pitched as the girls,” Walter thought.
“Hold it down, Walter! There’s plenty of loud, obnoxious kids in here already. He stayed home to clean out the garage?”
“Like Glen said, he promised Mary,” chimed Mel.
“I heard what Glen said, Mel; I just can’t believe he couldn’t have done it next Saturday. Or last Saturday for that matter.”
“Well, they had the grandkids last weekend and it’s gonna be hot come the end of July,” offered Glen. He started to fill Arthur’s coffee cup from the pot on the table.
“It’s only once a month, you’d think he could work around it,” Arthur was not convinced, he thought it was rude. John missed as many times as he showed up, always with some excuse that sounded made up.
“Like Glen said, it’s gonna be hot next weekend,” Mel was still trying to sneak another tickle-pinch in on Walter.
“I heard him, Mel, just seems rude to me,” Arthur picked up a menu and looked at it as if he were going to order something.
“How did it go?” Grace was wrapping up the vacuum cord and wheeling it to the closet. Floyd had gotten her a Roomba last Christmas, but Arthur said it bothered him just as much as the regular vacuum, even if it was quieter, and Grace was sure it didn’t really get the floor clean anyway.
“I had coffee, I had coffee, I had COF-FEE!” Walter emphasized his excitement with extra-hard stomps for each syllable.
“Walter, stop it, RIGHT NOW!”
“Doesn’t look like you needed any coffee Walter, you seem wide awake to me!” Grace gave Arthur “the look” and he was reminded that he was being too loud in the house as well.
“Your mom called and she’ll be by in about an hour to pick you up on her way back from the airport. Would you like to help me take cookies out of the oven?” Grace scooped Walter up and carried him into the kitchen.
“He’s such a sissy little boy,” thought Arthur, “it’s no wonder.”
“I’m going into my wood shop to sand down that dining chair,” he said, loud enough for them to hear him in the kitchen.
“I’m coming, Grandpa, I’m coming, I’m COM-ING!”
“I said no more stomping, Walter!” He turned toward the hallway and walked slowly, hoping the hour would pass quickly. Alice was usually on time at least.
“Mommy, mommy, MOM-MY!” Walter bolted from the woodshop. He’d landed hard when he jumped off the bench, but at least he wasn’t stomping this time.
“There’s my little man,” said Alice, as she stooped to straighten her son’s wily hair and brush it out of his eyes. “What have you been doing today?”
“I had coffee, and I rode in Grandpa’s car and we made wood dust!”
“Five year olds call it sawdust, Walter; you should practice using the right words.”
Alice was laughing despite her better judgment, “but it’s so amazing how he makes up his own phrases and sometimes I think they’re better than the ones everybody else uses.” She was so glad that Floyd seemed, in every way, to have been adopted or fathered by the milkman. She hoped Grace had a good secret like that.
“Teach him to go against the grain and he’ll make a habit of it,” mumbled Arthur, he’d said it again and again. He really only wanted Walter to grow up but Alice was a ridiculous parent.
“Against the grain sounds like creativity to me,” she chirped cheerfully. She’d stopped letting him get to her years ago. If there was one person on earth that wasn't going to give her parenting lessons, it was Arthur.
“Here’s some of those cookies, Walter. Be sure and save some for your daddy when he gets home.” Grace handed Walter a neatly wrapped plate of snickerdoodles, about two dozen of them.
“Oh my, that’s a lot of cookies Grandma,” said Alice, “what do you say, Walter?”
“Thank you Grandma!”
Alice took the plate from Walter as he ran out the front door to the car.
“I’m really trying to help Floyd drop a few pounds, Grace. It’s his idea.”
“Oh honey, I forgot, let me put a few back, just a minute.”
“It’s all that fast food he eats. If you both have to work all the time you should hire a cook or a housekeeper or something.” Walter didn’t like all the cookies and cakes Grace constantly produced either, but at least she could cook.
“That would be silly, besides, we’re saving for Walter’s college fund.” Alice took the reduced plate of cookies from Grace and headed for the door.
Walter thought Alice was very attractive, but something changed all that for him whenever she spoke. He felt sorry for Floyd, perhaps she hadn’t done much talking while they were dating. Maybe that all started after they got married.
Grace watched as they backed out of the driveway. It seemed like a waste to take a cab in from the airport. She could have gone to get Alice, but Arthur didn’t like for her to drive that far. If Arthur drove, it would have been a long trip with Walter in the car, even if she went along. Of course she would have gone along, poor little Walter, an hour and a half at the diner with Arthur was enough. She wondered if Arthur knew how lucky he was that Walter knew he loved him. Surely it was hard for outsiders to see that he did.
THREE
Floyd’s Blackberry vibrated and he was reaching to unlatch his briefcase when the uniformed officer led Brandon Reinard into the room in his orange jumpsuit. Floyd stood up. His client was not handcuffed.
“Hello, Brandon,” he said. “I brought you lunch.”
The boy looked at the cop and said, “This is alright?”
“I had to take out the underground tunnel guide,” Floyd said, “but it’s still hot.”
The officer left and shut the door and the lawyer saw him turn his back and not move.
“Thai okay?”
“Yeah.”
“Well you eat and I’ll talk.”
“Sure,” Reinard said.
“The bondsman I was counting on won’t be back until tomorrow, so you’ll have to spend another night. But first thing in the morning you’ll be out on seventy-five thousand dollars bail. I suggest you go back to work immediately. Do not leave the county for any reason. Like we discussed on the phone. When you were arrested they confiscated your phone. A case of this kind demands you never use that phone again. You may not believe it when I tell you: they’ll bug your shoes if it means they don’t have to burn gas tracking you all over the city.”
Brandon continued eating.
Floyd looked at him. He opened his briefcase. In pulling out the Reinard file he noticed that the private investigator had left a message. He shut the briefcase and examined the file.
“When your apartment was raided,” he said, “none of the computers taken matched the hacker’s IP address. Let’s not get into that. Thing is, it’s unclear just where the judge was when the warrant was signed. The hacker used WiFi, and the police can only pinpoint to 50 feet. It could’ve been someone out in the parking lot for all they know. It seems you came close to the demo: 22, bright, computer science and engineering background. And a record.”
“They didn’t search anyone else?” Brandon said around the food.
“No,” Floyd said, “but either side of your two apartments are vacancies.”
“Is there any history of those apartments being broken into?”
Floyd paused. “I can check that…”
“Have you had a lot of these cases?”
He paused again. “No, Brandon, but I’ve got a team of people who know much more about this stuff than I do.”
“What would be my motivation?” Brandon asked, and Floyd tried to get his thoughts off of his wife and back into this room, with this client.
“Hatred of the United States.”
“I’m a registered Republican.”
“You don’t vote that way,” Floyd said, “and you’ve been GOP about eighteen months.”
“This city has changed more electronic voting booth contracts and challenged more precincts than there are voters,” Brandon said. He finished his food and wiped his chin and took a sip of coffee. He stared at Floyd. He smiled. He said, “You’re working on filing a countersuit, right?”
“There are other ways to do this,” Floyd said. The last thing he needed was to create adversaries in a town built on favors. “First I need bank records, I need online transactions, I need to make sure – “
“You need to make sure the mayor’s campaign coffers weren’t sent offshore via Western Union or the Bank of America. I don’t bank. I don’t have an ATM account. I open and close PayPal accounts like library books. I change email addresses every six months. I haven’t been out of town except a family reunion two weeks ago. What did they find on my computer?”
“Nothing,” he said. “The data was erased.” Floyd stared at Brandon.
“You think I erased it?”
“There wasn’t anything on it. Anything.”
“I was reformatting my hard drive. I’ve called technical support. The call should be recorded.”
“Good,” Floyd said.
Floyd met Gerald Warrell in the park where they got hot dogs from the vendor and sat watching teenagers on skateboards. “Where do they find the time?” Gerald said, now much plumper, rounder, balder, more divorced. “I didn’t get to do all that much when I was their age. My dad was having heart attacks left and right. And I spent most of it driving lumber around. Contractor’s son. No youth for a contractor’s son. For a lawyer’s son, too much, huh?” Gerald handed over a rolled up Chicago Tribune. “What else do we work towards?”
“I don’t exist so Walter can work twice as hard someday,” Floyd said, trying to add something to small talk that made him sick. He didn’t like revelations. Especially from others. They were endearing themselves. Or they were arbitrarily ingratiating themselves, which made them look weak. Who needs someone and why? It was a question for the tombstone.
Floyd looked at the front page.
“Let me know when you see it,” Warrell said.
And before the sentence was finished there was the prosecutor and the composition of his legal team; cybercrimes investigators and state’s-evidence hackers and players in landmark, textbook, year-one law decisions. Floyd could only remember opening up a file box prepared by his interns and pre-law students to see droplets of pizza sauce and the smell of pepperoni.
“The Mayor has suspended the campaign,” Warrell said, “so expect his staff to find nothing much better to do with their time than follow this kid around.”
“We’ve got to hide him,” Floyd said.
“You got to hide him and then you’ve got to move him, and keep moving him.”
“So he’ll have to quit working.”
“Damn right he’ll have to,” Warrell said. “One point three million of the Mayor’s re-election fund is gone.”
“What does your guy inside the campaign say?”
“They went through employment records all night,” Warrell said. “They want to get their account balances, which is illegal. They’re trying to rule out their own backyard. The disgruntled. The fired. Until then they send everyone home, they try and get some spin on this. Their opponent will say, ‘How can they protect us when they can’t even firewall?’ Their eyes are on the accounting department and in-house website security.” Warrell finished his hot dog and lit a cigarette. “I got a boat. We can put Brandon in that.”
“What kind of boat?”
“A house boat,” the investigator said. “Leave it out there day and night. He can’t go back to that apartment. Someone’s going to have to pack it all and put it in storage until the case is over.”
“I’ll call his Dad tomorrow,” Floyd said.
“When you do,” Warrell said, standing, “tell him it’s seven hundred a month for the boat.”
Floyd didn’t think Brandon’s things would be in storage for very long.
He hailed a cab from the bookstore where he bought HACKING FOR DUMMIES. He discovered that Alice had called. He called back and got her voice mail. Three reporters from three newspapers wanted a quote. He got out at a high-rise office building, nodded to security and took the elevator to the fifth floor. It was almost three in the afternoon.
One of the firm’s partners was waiting in his office.
“Someone from the FBI was here today,” he said. “He left his card.”
“Does that make you nervous?”
“What did the kid say?”
“He said he was innocent.” Floyd put his briefcase down and took off his coat.
“That’s a relief.”
“I think someone was in his apartment, though, time of the theft,” Floyd said. “I’ve got a bunch of monkeys going through his online friend’s lists.”
“And the Mayor’s office called. He wants to meet.”
“What do you want to do?”
“You don’t meet him without one of us.”
“Money doesn’t just disappear, even after it becomes ones and zeroes,” Floyd said. “Tell me we got some experts. Tell me we got someone. Because, look, Carl, they can put this kid away with a fifth of who they got, no matter what they actually have on him.”
“Maybe we’ll get lucky,” the partner said, standing. “Maybe the Feds are investigating the mayor.”
“In that case we’ll hand Reinard over to Justice and you and I can go yachting this weekend,” Floyd said.
“You, me, Mayor, lunch, tomorrow?”
“Shame we have to meet under these circumstances.”
“What circumstances do you want?” The partner opened the door and stepped in the reception area. “I’ll see if we can get into Mauritio’s before it opens.”
Alice got her husband’s message on the floor of the Detroit Auto Show, where she had spent the last week in polite presentations of “green” seat cushions, “green” upholstery and “green” interior lighting. Projectors and pie charts and prospects dashed by men who were here on vacation, catering rampages and mistress-acquisition. A few relationships were forged, but not with those whose work would be in The New York Times on Sunday. She had almost given up. She hid it from the higher-ups by lively happy hour cocktails full of ideas and energy. Alice felt if the charm could be turned up here, among her co-presenters and project manager, she could hardly be blamed for not trying.
When she returned to the hotel room it had been cleaned and there was a new paper on the table. She found Floyd’s name in an article on A12. That was about as far she wanted to go into the article. She turned on the TV and called her husband.
“Where are you?”
“I’m still at the office,” Floyd said. “Late night war room.”
FOUR
Standing up from the table, Lyle knocked over the table tent, which was inconveniently doubling as a holder for the salt, pepper, sugar and sweetener packets and Tabasco, as well as the napkins. It was a messy, loud moment.
“Ohhh,” he said, stooping to scoop up what he could reach without crawling completely under the table. He calculated the angle of the waitress’ sight line to see what he could get away with leaving, or brushing further back toward the wall…
“Don’t worry about it, Lyle,” she said. Clarice was laughing at him, as he often gave her the opportunity to do.
“I’m sorry Clarice, trying to get up and pull out my wallet at the same time…”
“It’s not a problem, no broken glass, no liquids, no problem. Really.”
Lyle hated behaving like the “cute, older guy” that everyone took him for. It wasn’t so bad being considered cute, but handsome would be nice for a change. Fat chance, though, even as a little boy ladies had referred to him as pretty.
Clarice laid his bill on the table and patted his shoulder empathetically as she walked away smiling and filling out her next ticket. He was going to have to tip her at least 25% to save face.
The calls started the minute he got in his cab. Lyle had learned to time his lunch break so he could get as many rides as possible before he went home at 2:00 – if he skipped breakfast, he was hungry by 10 or 10:30. He could take several executives to lunch and quite a few half-day office workers home before his shift ended.
“I’ve got Mr. Anderson scheduled for pick-up at 12:15 – but first, how soon could you get south, near 127th and Glendale?” It was Meredith.
Lyle was considered pretty hard working in his field. Cabbies were notorious for being lazy and inconsiderate in Chicago, but many people would make specific requests for him when they called in. He hardly ever had to drive around looking to be hailed.
“On my way, it’ll take me about 10.”
“Thanks, Lyle – headed to the airport, U. S. Airways, gate 7. Pick up at 12705 Fairview, should be out front waiting.”
“Got it.”
“Base out.”
“352 out.”
Lyle pulled his door shut and eased out into traffic on 93rd and sailed down Chester where he turned left through a yellow light.
Pulling up in front of the house, Lyle expected to see a businessman checking his watch and acting put-off at having to wait more than five minutes, even though he lived way out south in the high-end, generic suburbs. There was no one waiting.
After a few minutes, Lyle decided to turn on his flashers and go to the door to knock. As he got out of his cab, he saw a woman standing at the corner, holding all her luggage, flight bag, overnight case, laptop and small suitcase – facing the wrong direction. He decided pull up in front of her to see if she was his ride.
As he slowed for the stop sign, he pretended to adjust his rear view and leaned over to change stations on the radio.
“Excuse me, I’m expecting a cab, would that be you?”
Lyle lowered the window to speak with her, she was gorgeous. “Going to the airport?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’m your guy.” He jumped out of the car and rushed around the front of the cab to meet her. “Can I get that for you?” He took her suitcase and overnight case.
“Thank you so much, I was starting to get a sore shoulder!”
As Lyle carried the bags to the trunk, he ran his arm across his mouth and was horrified to find gravy smeared down his sleeve to the cuff. He grabbed his handkerchief and keys from his jacket pocket simultaneously as he closed the trunk and scrubbed at his moustache while his keys jangled loudly and slipped out of his grip. He bent to pick them up and she ran smack into him with her laptop bag.
“Oh! Excuse me, I’m so sorry.”
“That’s alright,” mumbled Lyle as he caught himself and stood back up. “At least we’re both klutzes,” he thought as he chuckled and felt his face flush red hot.
He hurried on to the car door and opened it, reaching to take her overnight case.
“Oh, could I sit up front, with you?” I always feel silly being chauffeured around.”
Lyle sort of froze for a moment. This was a very attractive woman who was obviously well off, squeaky clean and well dressed. Her clothes appeared to have been laundered professionally, not even wrinkled from sitting in the plane. She wanted to sit up front, with him, Lyle with the gravy-stained jacket and a three-day-old shave?
“Well, sure, if you’d like,” he fumbled as he moved to open the front door.
As she slipped into the cab, Lyle got a very good look at her long, smooth legs. He couldn’t tell if she had hose on or not; he was sure she must, nobody’s legs were that perfect.
Running his fingers through his hair and scrubbing at his teeth with his index finger, Lyle rounded his cab and got in. “U. S. Airways, gate 7, right?” he asked.
“Yes, that’s it. It was very kind of you to rush out to pick me up. I should’ve called earlier. Can’t always get a signal for my phone from the house, it’s really strong at the corner for some reason.”
“Oh, I wasn’t downtown when they called, it was no problem. Glad to do it.”
She laughed softly, “Well, you certainly are more pleasant that any cab driver I’ve ever met. I hope you really don’t mind my sitting up front, but it is a long drive and I thought you seemed very pleasant.”
Lyle was almost trembling, “No, no, no problem. I enjoy talking with my passengers, it just usually takes several rides before they feel comfortable with me. You know, at first they just think I’m nosy or annoying.”
She laughed again, Lyle liked her laugh. “People are so paranoid. What’s your name again?”
“Lyle, Lyle Bremmer.”
“Well, Lyle Bremmer, I’m Alice. Just Alice.”
“Where are you flying to Just Alice?”
“Just Alice!” She was still laughing. “How long have you been driving a cab, Lyle?”
“Right at five years. Five years, next Monday.”
“Five years, congratulations! What did you do before that?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“I’d believe anything you told me, Lyle. You seem like an honest man.”
“Alright, I was a stock broker from 1989 until 1998, and then I became a singer/songwriter for a few years.”
“You’re joking!”
“Well, I don’t perform my own music anymore, I tried it for a while but I do better selling my songs than singing them myself. So, I took up driving.”
“Well then!”
“I told you you wouldn’t believe me.”
“No, I believe you,” her face got quite serious, “it’s just that it seems like an unlikely progression.”
“Some people would call it a digression, but I really enjoy dealing with people one-on-one, it seems more real. I never knew anyone at the stock-exchange and people at the nightclubs seemed so distant. I wasn’t out there drinking and talking, I was creating an atmosphere for them so they could meet and talk to each other. I really enjoy driving.”
“So, you still write music?” She asked. He could tell she hoped he did.
“Oh sure, but like I said, other people do the performing.”
Alice seemed genuinely excited, “Maybe we could go hear some of it.”
Lyle was not sure what to make of this lady. Sure, he’d love to take out on a Saturday night to hear Aaron Sullivan at Poets. Aaron was the best at doing Lyle’s music the way he wanted it done. They could go out to dinner before, Lyle hadn’t been on a date in ages, but is that what she meant?
“I get back from Denver on Friday afternoon,” she was saying, “Do you work on Saturday?”
“No. I mean, no, I don’t work.” Lyle tried desperately to think of what to say next. “Yeah, that would be great.”
“My flight comes in at four twenty; I’ll meet you, at the gate 9, alright?”
“Sounds great.” Lyle felt numb. He dropped Alice off, carrying her bags in for her and confirming their plans. On the trip back he realized he rarely had any contact with women anymore. Except for Meredith, of course. He was really excited; felt like a little kid.
“Base to 352, Lyle?”
“Yeah Meredith, what’s up?” Lyle had been whistling.
“Can you pick up one more before you go home? It’s Mr. Kalin.”
“Sure, where is he now?” Lyle wanted to tell Mr. Kalin about his date.
“Down at the Sheridan. When can you get there?”
“I’m almost there now, give me five.”
“Thanks Lyle, base out.”
Lyle glided through traffic easily. He felt like he was flying. What a great day! He swung left onto Elm and he was there.
“Hi there, Floyd!” he beamed. “How’s your day so far?”
Mr. Kalin looked worn out and under a lot of pressure – as usual. But he really did like Lyle, so he managed a smile. “Oh, you know Lyle, long, hard and potentially profitable.”
“Where you going?”
“I need to be at the Emerson-Marley Building by two o’clock. Can we make it?”
“No problem, I’ll get you there.” He would tell Floyd about his date later, maybe tomorrow, if he was having a better day.
“So tell me about your day; it couldn’t have been all that bad.”
“Well, for starters,” Mr. Kalin sighed, “please tell me you got my wife to the airport on time.”
“Your wife?”
“Yes, Alice. I called and asked them to send you to pick her up, did she make her flight?”
“Oh yes, she got there in plenty of time. Dropped her off just after lunch”
“Well, thank goodness for that anyway.”
They both sank into their seats and sighed.
Alice couldn’t stand airports anymore. They were becoming her home away from home; they were no longer filled with the excitement and glamour they had held when she first accepted this job. For nearly three years she had been able to imagine her life was her own when she was travelling.
Feeling like, believing that she was the bread-winner, the adventurer, the hunter-gatherer. That had been a fantasy that kept her content and distracted. Now all that used to free her spirit was collecting over her head and oppressing her more than marrying young and becoming immediately pregnant ever had.
Secrets were difficult to maintain – they had to be protected like very old Christmas ornaments. If they were allowed to fall on hard facts or crack against each other they became threatening, harmful shards that would rip deep into her life and tear it apart.
Even visions of the sparkling splinters of carelessly unattended lies used to intrigue her. The challenge of keeping them away from her family had been like a very high-stakes game with a substantial payoff. Now everything bored her and all of it made her tired.
Handing her boarding pass to the young man at the gate she almost rolled her eyes at his obvious attention to her legs. People were pathetic when they displayed their desires that openly.
“Have a nice trip, miss.” He tried to wedge some pseudo-sincerity into the phrase, but it wouldn’t fit.
“I’m sure I will,” Alice savored the words. She felt taller than she really was. She had learned to look down on everyone.
He actually appeared slightly hurt. Alice didn’t care.
The company would gladly pay for business class when she travelled, but Alice preferred coach. She had mastered the technique/game/skill of obtaining a bulk-head window seat and she could nearly always ensure that the seat next to her would be empty. She knew which flights to book, what time of day, which day of the week, which airline, it all mattered.
Something about managing to get what you wanted without paying extra to fly business class gave her a feeling of power, importance. Sometimes she could tell the flight attendants admired her and sometimes she sensed they resented her. Either way, she found it flattering.
“Would you care for a pillow, Ms. Klein?”
“No, just a cleaner copy of your flight magazine, please.” Alice never accepted what they offered, she always asked for something else. She had learned to be very cordial though, which was best done by assuming an air of genuine need for the thing you were asking for.
“Of course, I’ll be right back.”
As the flight attendant disappeared behind the separator panel, a young woman with two young children made her way down the aisle. Alice concentrated on her blackberry, checking her schedule and preparing to call the hotel before the plane began to taxi.
“Now sit down here and put on your safety belt, Lucas. I’m going to take your sister to the restroom.” The woman was gone before Alice realized what was happening.
“We’re going to see my Aunt Jane and Uncle Bill, but daddy’s not coming with us, he has to work.” He seemed like a nice enough little boy, but thinking about the hour and a half flight with his 18 month old sister less than two feet from her made Alice cringe.
“Well I’m sure your aunt and uncle will be delighted to see you and your sister.” Alice could see the attendant returning with her magazine.
“I think Aunt Jane will be glad daddy’s not coming, mommy says she doesn’t like her brothers very much either. Uncle Bill and me are the only men she likes.”
Alice lifted her chin to indicate that she needed to speak with the stewardess as she took at the magazine.
“I’m afraid I’m coming down with a bit of a cold, I might be contagious and his sister is so tiny…”
“I understand, we’ll see what we can do.” Alice returned to her blackberry and pulled up the number for the hotel.”
“Excuse me ma’am,” she had intercepted the woman before she got back to her seat – very impressive. “I think you and your children will be much more comfortable in row F, follow me and we’ll get some blankets and pillows for the kids.”
“Why thank you so much, could we get a window for Lucas, this is his first time on a plane.”
“I think we can get him a view.”
Alice recognized the skill set. Flight attendants, good ones, were worth their weight in gold. Row F was over the wing, it was loud and really had no view. Lucas would never know the difference.
FIVE
It’s difficult to mark when Steve Stanton became “Squalor Squirrel” to the local punks - a man who squatted from underpass to shed to vacant home and who the police knew better than fat people knew the Burger King - but it could have arguably started when his German Shepherd named Benny was left outside accidently during a hailstorm and was pummeled to death by ice the size of baseballs.
It was the same year of his divorce. His wife would nod out with the needle still in her. He came home once after his construction job to Benny humping her as she lay unconscious. He never told her. After this all intimacies were gone.
Benny had been the only thing to fill in the space left. Something to come home to. He had been in his late thirties that year. Not much had gone his way. Just bad friends and too much drink and the obstructed center of someone who never had anyone worth having. Working hard for nothing. He was orphaned at sixteen. His mother of cancer and his father was a biker and split when he was born. He was just a man in pictures of parties. Squalor Squirrel always considered a victim of his gene pool, so when he fell asleep on the couch, drunk, a Bad Brains album on the turntable skipping, surrounded by a carpet of cigarette butts, and then awoke and went outside for air and saw Benny like a wet bloody rug in the backyard, he thought, “Oh, that’s right.” As in, Oh, that’s right, that’s what happens to guys like me. Something inside had been evicted long ago, and a few weeks after he buried Benny he was evicted for real. He didn’t fight it.
The next ten years were methamphetamines, Salvation Army bunks, vagrancy and public nuisance arrests, DUI’s and licenses never to return; and like many a townie of notorious misfortune, he found himself embraced by the area youth. Specifically, gutter punks with ten-year plans similar to his own.
And for his squirrelly, guarded behavior they called him Squalor Squirrel, and each micro-generation of punk saw him as some vague and proxy Colonel leading the charge of Who Gives A Fuck. He didn’t much like their music, but just as one warms to rockabilly in the Texas heat, the sounds of One Million Dead Cops was as fine a choir as any rock-bottom cathedral.
It was their couches and their hospitality that helped him through chilly winters and it was their gross kitchens that maintained his outsized belly when the city pantries went dry and the soup kitchens closed well before dinner hour.
Every once in awhile the gap was too great. He would overstay his welcome and be thrown out. More often he would leave. In the middle of the night Steve would hunt for the darkest, quietest places under cold stars, a big man and a big pack and a sleeping bag and those little things he had gained and cared enough to hold onto.
He would walk by apartments, empty, with the lights on inside to catch the eye of potential leasers and after months of this he found a rhythm to the rentals in the unpopular nooks of the city and its suburbs.
Squalor Squirrel found not one but two spots at Bradlock Glens Apartments. He entered through the balcony during the summer, when all the students were gone and the NOW LEASING signs were hoisted desperately: were the landlords aware of how bright these beacons shined?
Usually he would pass on a good place to the squatters he knew. Not this time. This was his. He wanted enough of the noise, the drama.
There was a kid, early twenties, who lived next door, and he spent a few waking hours listening to the booms and crashes of online gaming from speakers that rattled the walls and drew too much attention.
One day they ran into each other in the hallway.
Squalor Squirrel froze, but the young man was smiling.
He held out his hand.
“Brandon,” he said. “Brandon Reinard.” He looked at his clothes. “Are you the new maintenance guy?”
“Y-yeah,” he said. “P-part time.” He took a shot at making eye contact and added, “Seasonal.”
“That’s great,” Brandon said. “Look, I’m on my way out the door, but I’m having some trouble with the air vents. I don’t think they’ve been cleaned since 1988. Do you think you’ll have time to take a look..?”
“Well, I-I’ve got a few other things I n-need to do today,” Steve said.
“Should I should fill out a maintenance request then?”
“Oh no,” he said, “n-no that’ll be alright. I’ll see if I can’t get to it – what’s today?”
“Wednesday.”
“How about F-Friday?” Steve said. “Afternoon.”
“I’ll be at work, but you’ve got a key?”
“I can get it at the of-office.”
“That would be great,” Brandon said. “What’s your name again?”
“S-Steve.” Pause. “Stanton.”
“That would be great, Steve,” Brandon said. “It was nice meeting you.”
Brandon went down the steps and out the door and Squalor Squirrel stood there awhile in the empty hall before going back into the empty apartment and thinking about what to do.
*
“What are you doing here?”
He had fallen asleep.
“Who are you?”
Steve sat up.
The man stepped forward and closed the door.
“S-steve,” he said, “I’m Steve.”
“Steve what?”
“Stanton.”
“What are you doing in here?”
“I was just…”
“Sleeping.”
Steve stood and saw the wine on his shirt through the hangover.
“How did you get in here?”
“Through the…” Steve gestured toward the floor and ceiling. “You the l-landlord?”
“I’m the landlord,” said the landlord.
“Oh,” Steve said and began grabbing his things.
“Wait,” the landlord said, “How long have you been here?”
“Few hours,” Steve said. “What’s legal?”
“Not quite any of it, Steve.” The man stepped in closer. “How did you find this place?”
“I’m not going to bother you, sir,” Steve said, putting on the backpack and rolling up his bed.
“I’m not too bothered,” he said. “Do you know how long this place has gone unrented?”
“A long time,” Steve said.
“You don’t have go just yet.”
“I think I’d better,” Steve said.
“I’m Mike Elder,” the landlord said and held out his hand.
Steve stopped and looked at the floor as he shook Mike Elder’s hand.
“You’re out of work?”
“I’m out of work, yes sir.”
“Out of work and nowhere to go.”
“That’s r-right, sir.”
Mike looked around the apartment. “You’re clean at least,” he said. “Except for the wine, and the shirt.”
“I’m sorry to bother you,” Steve said, trying to leave again.
“I hate to spring this on you,” Mike said. “But are you handy with tools?”
“Um.” With the hangover the sunlight ate into Steve’s brain. “Some. C-Construction jobs. Things l-like that.”
“Good,” Mike said, “good.”
That night Steve had a quiet Christian dinner with Mike’s family.
And by Friday afternoon he was indeed the part-time maintenance man at Bradlock Glens Apartments and was in Brandon’s living room unscrewing the vent and peering inside with a flashlight. In the dark were thick webs. He cleared them away with a brush. Beyond it the vent had caved in and torn. He could see the bricks that were pushing in as the ceiling made its decades-long descent. The air was being diverted into the ceiling, enlarging its gaps, sapping its strength.
It was a big job and Steve needed a big drink.
When Brandon returned he told him about it and showed him the problem.
“How long will that take to fix?” Reinard asked.
“That’s a s-structural problem,” Steve said, and left it at that.
“So not anytime soon.”