The Good Neighbor

by William Kowalski

  “Depends on what you mean by ‘worth it,’ ” Colt said.

  The doctor grinned. “Well, lessee. I have about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in student loans to pay back. And they’re projecting that in the next five years my malpractice pre miums will outstrip my earnings by . . . well, I forget how much, but it’s not like it even matters. Once you have more money going out than coming in, it’s time to get a new job. Basically, I need to make a million dollars as soon as possible.” Dr. Doody laughed again. “Any ideas?”

  “Yeah,” Colt said. “Buy low and sell high.” Dr. Doody’s smile disappeared.

  “Come on,” he said. “Everyone knows that.”

  Colt sighed. How was he to explain the hours of research that went into determining a stock’s worth? It was complicated, and there was no substitute for it; you had to have an idea of what a company was worth to know whether their stock was a bargain or not. But even more complicated was the other part of it, the part he didn’t understand himself, which was that every time a kid fell off his bike in Iowa, the shudders traveled two thousand miles through the earth and rippled through the exchange floor in

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  New York, manifesting themselves as the tiniest tick in the digital numbers. The market was simply a reflection of the universe, but there was no way a man of science would believe that. Colt al most didn’t believe it himself—although he knew that it was true nonetheless.

  “I can’t tell you how to get rich,” he said.

  “Yeah, but what do you buy?” Dr. Doody prodded him. “I mean, how do you decide what to invest in?”

  “It’s a feeling,” Colt said. “It’s like a sailor looking at the hori zon in the morning. You ever do any sailing?”

  “Some.”

  “Well, you know how they say red sky at night, sailor ’s delight, et cetera?”

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s kind of the same thing. Sailing is both an art and a science. You just trust your gut, no matter what the signs say. If it looks like a nice day but they’ve got a bad feeling, some guys won’t go out.”

  “You’re talking about superstition,” said Dr. Doody.

  “Yeah. If you want to call it that. Sailors can read charts and wind direction and all that. But they’re also the most supersti tious people there are. The second most, I mean,” he corrected himself. “Traders are the first. Everyone I know carries some little thing with them, like a rabbit’s foot or something.”

  “Yeah? So what do you carry?”

  Colt permitted himself a wan smile. “A ring,” he said. “But I lost it. And you can see what the consequences of that were.”

  “Yeah, well, thanks, anyway,” said the doctor, making a note on a chart. “I’ll be in tomorrow.” Dr. Doody went away as suddenly as he had come, leaving Colt with the distinct impression that he had just been diagnosed as being full of shit.

  Colt didn’t care. Most of the time, he lay in agony, not wanting to talk to anybody. The staff were puzzled by his refusal of more pain medication, for clearly it was so bad that at times he could

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  hardly speak; he could only clench his teeth and moan like a wounded animal, tossing his head from side to side. Yet he refused everything they offered him, for Colt knew he was damned if he was going back to that courtroom—literally—and he preferred to do his suffering here on earth.

  When the nurse named Betty was on duty again, she came in and laid a hand on his forehead, clicking her pink tongue.

  “We’re not givin’ out medals, y’know,” she said.

  “It gives me nightmares,” he told her, wincing as the broken ends of his bones moved yet again, ever so minutely. “I had three. I can’t handle another one.”

  Betty laughed out of her abdomen. “Honey, why on earth not?” she said. “What are you so afraid of?”

  “They said I was going to be sentenced.” “Who said that?”

  “The judge.”

  “Oh,” Betty said knowingly. “You had that kind of a night mare.”

  Colt was surprised. “You know the kind I mean?” he asked. “Happens all the time in here,” Betty said. “People dreamin’ of

  their judgment.”

  “Other people have the same dream?”

  “Sure they do,” Betty said. “People who saw their own death close enough to touch it, anyway. Has the same effect on ’em. Well, not all of ’em. But enough. The smart ones. They tell me all about ’em, too. You think you’re any more different than anybody else? Don’t you know we’re all the same?”

  “Sure,” said Colt. “Everything is connected. I knew that.” He caught her eye and went on earnestly, “Did you know this? A car crash in Paris shows up on the Dow later that very same day. The question is—how? That’s what I’ve never been able to piece to gether. I know it works—I just don’t know why, or how, or even when. Nobody does. At least nobody that I know of. But someday, someday someone’s gonna come along who can see everything all

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  at once. He’ll be able to read the stock board and tell you what’s happened at every moment all over the world. He’ll be like . . . plugged in. The One. The Reader. Everything is already con nected, but until he comes along, no one’s gonna know how it all works.”

  “That’s right, honey,” said Betty, who hadn’t really been listen ing—Colt had been rambling on and off since he came in, and she heard only a select few words. “Jesus is connected, like you say. And them dreams is just your mind lookin’ back over your life and figurin’ out what you didn’t do that you should a done, and what you done that you shouldn’t a.” Betty fluffed his pillow up for him and felt his pulse. “You got any regrets?” she asked casually, as she glanced at her watch.

  “Regrets? Yeah. About a million of ’em,” said Colt.

  It must be the pain making me talk this way, he thought. Be cause I know damn well I don’t regret any decision I ever made. Except for not throwing Flebberman out the window before we ever left my apartment.

  “Well, who don’t? You lucky,” Betty said. “You still young. You got plenty of time to set things right again.”

  “I’m almost forty years old,” said Colt. “I don’t feel as young as I used to.”

  “Gracious, honey, who does?” laughed Betty. “I’m forty-three, but some mornin’s I know what it’s like to be seventy. ’Specially in my feet.”

  “You married?” Colt asked.

  “Oh, yes,” said Betty. “And so is you, so don’t get fresh.”

  Colt managed a smile. “Not for long, I’m not. How’s my pulse?”

  “Crazy. Like you runnin’ a marathon. Now, izzat because of my girlish figger or is it your arm hurtin’ again?”

  “Both.”

  “You sure you don’t want somethin’ to help you sleep?”

  By now the pain had made Colt half-delirious, and things had

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  begun to swim in and out of focus; the bounds of reality were blurred, like the smudged outlines of a chalk drawing, and he stared at Betty in her shimmering white uniform as though she’d just descended from a cloud.

  “Are you an angel?” he asked.

  Betty smiled. She put her hand on his forehead again.

  “You be surprised how often I hear that, too,” she said. “You go to sleep now. I think you’re tired enough.”

  And, encouraged by her warm, dry hand on his skin, he slept.

  ❚ ❚ ❚

  Francie didn’t come to see him again—no surprise there—nor did Jennifer Flebberman—no surprise there, either. No one came to see him, in fact, nor did anyone send cards or flowers—none of which, when he thought about it, came as a surprise, either. Sym pathy, in his business, was the one commodity no one wanted to trade in, because you might as well cut someone’s throat as pity them. Yet later that day he began to wonder why Forszak hadn’t at least sent him a note or som
ething, to acknowledge the fact that he still existed—and only then did it occur to Colt that no one at Anchor Capital even knew where he was.

  “Betty!” he called, pressing the buzzer on the side of his bed. Betty came to the door, wiping her hands on a tissue.

  “Now, Coltrane, what is it?” she said. “I do love to say that name. He was always one o’ my favorites. You finally change your mind about that medicine?”

  “No,” he said. “I just realized no one at my job knows where I am. They might think I’ve just disappeared or something. Can you help me use the phone?”

  “If you want,” she said. She came in and dialed the number he dictated, and held the phone up to Colt’s ear as it rang.

  “Anchor Capital, this is Jeanette speaking, how can I help you?” purred the receptionist.

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  Colt paused. Something in Jeanette’s voice struck a familiar and none-too-pleasant chord in him. Even though the Snake Pit was sealed off by glass doors, he could still hear the occasional muffled shout, and it went through his head like a bolt of light ning. Just imagining himself in there made him tired and achy all over.

  “Jeanette. It’s Colt Hart.”

  He heard her gasp. “Mr. Hart!” she said. “Everyone’s been wor ried sick about you!”

  Yeah, right, he thought.

  “I can’t talk long,” he said. “Just tell Forszak I had to take a lit tle time off. Had an accident.”

  “An accident? My God, are you all—”

  “Jeanette, I really can’t talk. My head is killing me. Tell Forszak I’m all right and I’ll be back in—well, a few days.”

  Colt caught Betty’s eye then and noted her wry smile of amusement. She shook her head, as if to say, Oh, no you won’t.

  “Is there anything you—”

  “Good-bye, Jeanette,” said Colt, pressing the hang-up button. “That’s right. You just think about getting better. That’s all you

  need to worry about right now,” said Betty, taking the phone away from him.

  ❚ ❚ ❚

  On Monday morning, the doctor told Colt he could go home. His plaster cast had been replaced with one of fiberglass; this was sup ported by a strut that rested on his hip and held it out at a ninety- degree angle to his body. He looked, he thought as he regarded himself in the mirror, like a half-trussed chicken.

  It was just after noon when he was released. Betty had not been in that morning, and Colt realized, with a sinking heart, that he wasn’t going to see her again. He had grown attached to her. On the spur of the moment he went to the nurse’s station and

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  asked one of the nurses to hold a piece of paper for him, while he wrote on it:

  Dear Betty,

  Thanks for everything. You saved me.

  Coltrane Hart

  “She’ll like that,” said the nurse. “She always likes to hear things from her patients.”

  “She’s a hell of a nurse,” said Colt. “You’re all good nurses.” “Why, thank you,” said the nurse, one he hadn’t met yet. “I feel like I’ve been here for a year,” Colt told her.

  “That’s normal,” she said. “Lots of people feel that way. A day in the hospital is like a month outside, we always say.”

  “I hope that doesn’t apply to the people who work here, too,” Colt said.

  The nurse tittered. “Sometimes it seems that way,” she said.

  “I don’t know how to explain this,” Colt said, “but I’m going to miss being here. I almost don’t want to leave. I’ve gotten used to it.”

  “That’s normal, too,” the nurse said. “One look at your bill will probably cure you of that, though.”

  “I don’t even want to see it,” said Colt.

  “You can just take it down to the business office,” said the nurse, handing him a folded sheet of paper. “They’ll handle you down there.”

  “All right,” said Colt. “So long. And thanks.”

  ❚ ❚ ❚

  He hired a car to take him back to New York, and rode in the back, in silence, letting the chauffeur babble on about his grandchil

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  dren—the pain was still bad enough that it took up most of his concentration. It was with extreme relief that he climbed the stairs to their apartment. He felt automatically in his pocket for his keys, only to remember that Flebberman had thrown them out the window. He cursed. There was certainly no point in going out to look for them now. Then he remembered that he hadn’t even locked the door to the apartment—how could he? Which meant that it had been sitting unlocked for an entire week.

  A lifetime in New York had taught Colt that you never went into your apartment if you had the slightest reason to suspect there was someone else in there—because the odds were that someone was, or had been. But he had nowhere else to go, and be sides, the ride from Allentown had exhausted him. He wanted nothing more than to sit on his own couch, tune the television to MSNBC, and take a nap. Hesitantly he tried the knob. The door swung open, creaking too loudly. Colt winced. If anyone was in side, they would know he was here now.

  At first glance, everything in the front room appeared to be where it was supposed to be. Scarcely believing his good fortune, Colt took a few hesitant steps inside, remembering just in time to swing his arm out of the way so it didn’t collide with the door frame. It was going to take him a while to get used to that. No lurking burglars clobbered him on the head, no junkies were nod ding off in the corner. Perhaps he’d beaten the odds—he’d gotten away with it. Score another one for Mayor Giuliani, he thought. With a sigh of contentment, Colt slammed the door and locked it—safe.

  Then he turned around again and let out a yodel of surprise. There before him, having just appeared in the kitchen doorway, was a nude man with long hair and a heavily bruised face.

  “Holy shit!” said the nude man. “What are you doing here?” “Gaah!” said Colt.

  He turned and tried to make his escape, but having already for gotten that he’d just closed the door, he ran into it, the fingers of

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  his upraised arm slamming directly into the fireproof steel and sending shock waves from his fingernails all the way up to his shoulder. For several moments he couldn’t even speak, and the world around swam in and out of focus. When he could draw breath again, he let out a howl that bespoke all the suffering that had been brought upon him over the last week, and he thought, not for the first time: Just cut the fucking thing off, and let me be done with it.

  “Colt, man! It’s me!” the nude man said.

  Colt, still in agony, turned to look at him. The man’s face was as black and blue as if he’d been used for batting practice, but he recognized the long hair, and the whiny voice.

  “Jesus, Michael,” he said. “What are you doing here?”

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  The Offer

  Michael helped Colt into the living room and sat him down on the couch.

  “The door was open,” he said. “So I let myself in. I didn’t know where you were, but I didn’t think you’d mind—not after you heard what I went through.”

  “What you went through?” Colt said. “Look at me! Do I look like I give a flaming crap what you went through?”

  “You are looking pretty banged up. Where’d you get the busted wing?”

  “I got kidnapped. And then there was a car wreck.” “Kidnapped! What? That shit is fucked up! Is Francie all right?” “She’s fine. She wasn’t involved. It was our lovely neighbor out

  in Pennsylvania. He was upset over that cemetery that you two found. I had it moved, only—there was a problem.”

  “No fucking way,” said Michael. “That is so fucked up!”

  “Yeah. Well put. What did happen to you?” Colt asked. “You look like you got attacked by a hockey team.”

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  “It was a street gang,” Micha
el said. “See, I was sort of wander ing around, trying to figure out what to do with all that—”

  “Listen, Michael,” Colt said. “Before you say another word, do me a favor and put some clothes on.”

  Michael looked down at himself. “Oops,” he said.

  ❚ ❚ ❚

  It was a drug deal gone bad, Michael explained to Colt, when he had thrown on his jeans and poncho.

  “Drug deal? What drug deal?”

  “I had a few pounds of pot in my bus. I’m surprised Francie didn’t tell you about it,” he said. “I thought for sure she would.”

  “Francie and I are getting a divorce,” Colt said. “There’s proba bly a lot of things she hasn’t told me.”

  Michael’s eyes widened. “No way!” he said. “Now that’s the best news I’ve heard in years.”

  “Thank you,” said Colt. “Please go on.”

  “Serious, bro. Nothing personal, but you guys really don’t—” “I knew what you meant,” said Colt. “Now would you please

  continue?”

  “Well, at first I thought I would go back to Denver and try to find the guys it belonged to.”

  “The guys what belonged to?”

  “All this pot I ended up with by mistake,” Michael said. “Michael. Nobody ends up with pot by mistake,” said Colt. “Yeah, well, whatever. What I’m tryin’ to tell you is that I had

  all this pot I had to get rid of that didn’t belong to me. But then I thought, no way, Denver is crazy. The cops out there are probably looking for me, and they definitely wouldn’t understand. Plus, it’s a really long ways. So I decided to just get rid of it, like Francie told me I should. So, like, I was riding along the interstate, throw ing little bits of it out through the hole in my floor—”