On and on go the disquisitions, as relentless as the clouds of ivorygray smog through the hospital window, velvety and choking. I am so powerless that when I occasionally make a sound of protest, I’m shot down with no attempt to control the sarcasm from on high.
Me: You want me to write another letter to Mary’s uncle buttering him up about chinesepridemall.com?
Larry: Yes, Dan, unless you’re suffering writer’s block again.
Me: But if I may, Chinese pride, Emerald Isle pride, all these Web sites you’ve concocted-do you actually believe in any of these things?
Larry: What do my beliefs have to do with it? This is business. Do I believe in Eskimo pride, just because I own a Web site called igloopower. com? Theoretically, sure, why not, but it’s not something I’m emotionally invested in. Am I invested in gay pride? I don’t want to mislead you, so I’ll have to admit: not that much. Nuffing against them, even though I once got stuck behind a gay-pride parade for four hours and had to wonder, do faggots have to be that proud? But Chinese pride could be the biggest haul of all, now that I’ve been here and see what these people require. Mary’s uncle is a man I feel I could work with. He doesn’t say a lot, but he knows where the bodies are buried.
Meanwhile the dictation goes on at any hour, recording the devolution of our life here.
Sept. 25. Dear Colleagues & Godchildren:
A major development took place yesterday that I am most unhappy about. I left the hospital on my own accord for a little stroll but apparently the powers that be thought I was trying to escape and they have insisted that my subordinate Dan pretty much move into the spare room of my suite to keep watch over me. It is true that I did fall in the street and sustained some fairly impressive scabs on my elbows and knees but I am irked that Dan has to now be here even more with me, taking up the good couch and watching every single thing I do with that upper caste accent of his, not that he can help it. If any or all of you would like to write the hospital to petition on my behalf I will not stop you.
Yes, it’s true, I am his hostage, as he is mine. I haven’t checked out of the Super 2, but I spend more time in the hospital suite than anywhere else, frequently crashing on the couch in his spare room, just as I did after college. My life is all Larry, all the time: smelling Larry in my clothes, dreaming Larry in my sleep. By night our heads rest against opposite sides of the same hospital wall, completing the mind meld. By day I sit in my molded-plastic school chair and type.
Sept. 26. Dear Candey Blossoms Candidate AZ418B:
Please be advised that I do not now nor ever did in the past request a romantic dalliance with you. You sound like a nice girl but I am satisfied with the one I got. Plus you are Korean and I am specializing in China right now, even though you point out rather convincingly that Koreans have more advanced fashion sense than China girls. I thank you for your consideration, but please no more mash notes.
As for the elephant in the room, we make no further reference to it. The fatwa’s just there, lighting Larry up from the inside. In odd moments when I believe he’s sleeping I steal a glimpse at the Internet to try to gain perspective on the issue, Googling the history of the Motor Men and/or digging up strangely pertinent definitions.
cozen transitive verb:
1. To cheat; to defraud; to deceive, usually by petty tricks. Perhaps derives from Early Modern French cousiner, “to defraud; literally to treat as if a cousin (hence to claim to be a cousin in order to defraud).”
So much have I become his Mini-Me that I find myself thinking, Maybe there is something sweet about the life of a munitions dealer. After all, isn’t that the profession Rimbaud entered after resigning from poetry at age nineteen-how bad could it be? Larry’s shuffling walk, his stumbling gait, I now view as languid. Even the fatwa now makes a kind of mad sense to me. Larry’s not an evil monster. He’s merely concocted the perfect payback for his disadvantaged life. And it is perfect. Burton was the first golden boy of the overprivileged generation from which Larry was excluded. By screwing Burton, he’s in effect screwing this whole generation of rich snots, including me.
And by roping me in, he’s made me a party to my own screwing.
Only one thing is going to snap me out of this-seeing Jade hop two-footed out of her bullet train from Beijing to visit us.
“Hey there, 24.”
“Hello, 84.”
I’m touched by her smallness when we hug on the platform. Pulling away, I’m amazed by all I’d forgotten or hadn’t sufficiently noticed: those oblong nostrils, the bubbles in her teeth that keep re-creating themselves. She has a delightful thing she does with her tongue when she speaks. Sometimes it licks her bottom lip so it’s as glossy as lipstick, other times it curls beneath her back teeth in an almost impish manner. How had I overlooked this before?
And she’s so happy! “I nudge you,” she says, pushing my shoulder slightly.
“I nudge you, too,” I say, returning the endearment or whatever it’s supposed to be. This makes her happier still, her face both familiar and new, and so animated I can barely keep up with it. But then one last fleeting hug as her face takes a sudden downturn.
“Worried about you and Larry so much!”
So we’re off.
In the cab from the train station, I have a silent conversation. Cool God! You who maketh Situations Splendid! Thank You for the women You alwayssend my way. Where would we men be without them? Women arranged for me to find this hospital, women have been caring for Larry in this hospital, women do everything but pack my lunch and give me milk money! How in the world did You engineer them so fierce and loving? I even got e-mails in the last few days from my old Asian flames, Corazón and Company, who forgive me, of all things…asking what they can do to help! O Lordy Lord I long to praise, who chilleth out the passions of crazy lovers in due time and restoreth order between cousins, where would we be without You?
Per Jade’s request we go directly to see Larry. I usher her into our sheet-darkened cave, kicking Ring Ding wrappers out of the way, closing the door to the bathroom so no vagabond scents might offend her quivering oblongs. Just having someone in my corner to objectify things rouses me from the stupor I’ve been in since the Shabbos Duck. I reclaim myself.
The deposed ayatollah is snoring. Jade looks him over fondly, fretfully, maternally-the hulk reduced to a fetal figure under a blanket that shudders with his breathing.
“You really stay here now?” she whispers. “I thought you joshing me.”
“Oh, ain’t no joshing matter.”
“Why he keep cell phone in Kleenex box?”
“So he won’t lose it, along with his important documents.”
“Why instruction papers taped all over walls?”
“To remind him where the Kleenex box is.”
Jade assesses the situation with a gravity I haven’t seen before. “Oy vay,” she concludes. “What Dr. X say about situation?”
“We haven’t been able to see him.”
“Ma?!” she cries, a hoarse whisper. “But this is the deal, you are here for Dr. X.”
“We’re just playing by their rules.”
Jade takes note of my helpless grimace, makes a decision. “No matter,” she declares. “We find Dr. X now, get the fresh scoop.”
Instantly Larry wakes up. “I’m coming,” he says.
“The patient spying on us!” Jade giggles, giving him a kiss on his cheek. “You overhear all our state secrets.”
“Huwwo, Jade, huwwo, Dan,” he says. Just by the pitch he uses, I can tell, mercifully, that we’re back to our original dynamics. His reign of terror’s over.
“But we have no appointment,” I note.
“We hunt him down!” Jade says.
Larry and I exchange a wary look, the first eyeball contact we’ve had in a week. Why hadn’t we thought of that?
“By the way, Dan, you don’t have to worry about my conduct,” he says as Jade and I help him put on his Sunday best. “I’ve mastered a blend just for situ
ations like these-a unique mix of obsequiousness and assertiveness that I think you’ll appreciate.”
“Better to err on the side of shutting up,” I caution him. Sorry if that came out unkindly, but I’ve just come off a dark week, and with so much at stake in this meeting, we can’t afford to have anyone rock the boat.
“Aye-aye, Cap’n,” he replies good-naturedly. “It’s doubtful you’ll hear peep one from me.”
I’m not letting him off the hook. “Whatever you do,” I say, ducking into the bathroom to prepare, “just don’t pitch him any inventions.”
“Scout’s honor,” Larry says. He flashes me a smile meant to be charming.
On the fourth floor, Jade and I support a formally clad Larry by either elbow as we find a wall directory behind glass. Jade runs her finger down a list of Chinese names, and we travel through a maze of corridors until we locate the corresponding office number. The light under his door indicates that Dr. X is in. Larry stops me from knocking so he can push three mini Dove chocolates into his mouth. “Energy,” he explains.
“You sure you’re okay to do this?” I ask.
“Give me thirty seconds,” he says, pushing in three more. Finally: “Let’s do it.”
Just as I’m about to knock, though, another delay. Larry is looking at me as though a turkey just flew out of my nose.
“You took your earring out,” he says.
“You noticed.”
“I do have my ‘on’ days, Dan.”
“And let me tell you I never take out my earring for anyone,” I admit. “Not to interview heads of state, not to speak to a convention of shrinks, never. But just this once, I want to make sure there are no glitches.”
“I appreciate it,” Larry says. “This is a very straight individual we’re dealing with.”
Does Larry also notice that I’ve gargled with Listerine and scrubbed my nails? I haven’t taken this many precautions since the reunion with the kidnap cabbie. But after all, what if Dr. X receives a phone call from a certain medical colleague at Harvard-who doesn’t realize how he’s cooking his own goose-and deems it inadvisable to proceed? I need all the credibility I can get.
Larry and I both take a deep breath. Only Jade is completely composed, a blank slate.
We knock.
And are admitted into a plush office. Two walls are lined with ceramic eagles and parrots. In between the sculptures are expensive unopened bottles of imported scotch-more showpieces. The rest of the walls are taken up with photos of Dr. X smiling suavely with various sheiks and international CEOs. But in person Dr. X doesn’t smile as suavely. In fact, he doesn’t smile at all. He looks like a stern older brother of the pleasant man in the photos.
“Your country give us many problems,” Dr. X begins after ushering us to our seats.
I gulp.
“So many bad words, rumors about what we doing. They call us murderer! Say we kill students for kidneys! Members of Falun Gong outlaw sect. We never kill these person. Only murderer-criminals who deserve be killed!”
This is not going well. I look at Jade but get nothing back. Do I see a chastened look on Larry’s face? But he’s impossible to read as well. There are plastic potted plants in all four corners of the room, looking rather proud of being plastic. A slight smell of toilet lingers in the air.
“ China is not so bad,” Dr. X continues in a scolding tone. “I am not a member of the Party, but I believe that for Chinese our system is the best. Not absolute freedom like you have, but little by little. We have over two-thousand-year history. Give China time. Maybe fifty, one hundred years we be like you. But not now. You want us implode like Soviet Union? No, slowly, slowly is the ticket, also quietly, quietly.” He takes off his orange-tinted Bono glasses and tosses them on his desk.” You understand?”
I understand. I cannot tell whether Larry understands. As for Jade-I’ve never seen her so unreadable. Her eyes trap the light to reveal zero.
“And don’t take picture of me with cell-phone camera when you pretend you text-messaging! No tricks like those, I not born yesterday…”
“No, certainly not,” I say.
“Last year simple,” Dr. X continues, putting his glasses back on. “I do more than hundred and fifty kidneys, important people all over world. When I do them, they become lifelong friends. They help me. One hand wash other. You understand?”
In case I didn’t, there’s a photo of Dr. X shaking hands and exchanging toothy grins with a famous sixties American radical I almost recognize. I can’t quite remember: What did the radical do to get on Nixon’s enemy list? And where’ve I seen those ceramic parrots before?
“This year very difficult. That is why number-one importance is silence. I do not tell government I work on Westerner. I perform in secret. If government know I need kidney for Westerner, they take knife to my program, shut down hospital. So number one is silence. You must protect my program.”
“I will tell the truth,” I say.
This is a tactical error for which I’m immediately taken to task.
“No truth, no lies. Just silence. Otherwise I not able to get permit to help foreigners, not just your cousin, everyone.”
“No, of course not, I understand.”
“Only silence…”
As though in response, the room falls into a hush. Just as the doctor ordered. I can make out the ticking from an antique grandfather clock in the corner, doubtless the gift of a grateful tycoon somewhere. Tick-tick…tock…
Am I not dressed properly? It’s well and good that I took out my earring, but the rest of my business attire is hardly up to snuff. Untucked shirt, goatee that hasn’t been groomed since I arrived in China, hat that isn’t quite as white as it was before encountering this air… No wonder Dr. X is directing all his comments to Larry and his Albanian threads. Every time the doctor is forced to swing his head in my direction, he keeps his eyes closed. At least we’re both two-fisted in the fake-power-prop department…
Tick-tick…tock…
There’s a sound to my left, a bullfrog warming up, tones so low I almost don’t recognize them for a minute. Then I realize they’re emanating from Larry’s throat.
“I couldn’t help noticing there’s no security on your office door,” he says.
“Why need security?” Dr. X says irritably. “We have guards at front door, many guards strolling grounds-”
“Why is because anyone already inside the hospital can access your sanctum with impunity,” Larry informs him expressionlessly. “What you need…”
To my horror, Larry regales Dr. X with a description of his “mock security system,” an ornate wall plate studded with plastic buttons: black, yellow, red. “But no wires, no fuse, no circuitry,” Larry informs him. “Besides being a plain wall plate, ninety-nine cents at most hardware stores, with about sixteen cents of added decoration, it’s nuffing.”
Dr. X contemplates the notion for a long minute. “It’s nuffing?” he echoes.
“That’s the beauty part,” Larry says. “It doesn’t send out a silent alarm to notify the police. Doesn’t set off a siren to scare the neighbors. It does nuffing but let the perp imagine the worst.”
I shoot Larry a warning look meant to signify, What happened to Scout’shonor? He shoots one back that signifies, What do Scouts know about building rapport?…and resumes maintaining his deadpan gaze.
Dr. X pushes out his chair an inch. “I hook up how?”
“Self-sticking adhesive on the back.”
Dr. X loosens the muscles of his face, and for the first time I can see that it would be a pleasant face-that is, if we were on the same team as those well-nourished CEOs. “How many I can buy?”
“No need,” Larry says. “Once you give the word, I can have four dozen speeding their way to you, free of charge.”
Larry allows a small smile to squat on his lips. Dr. X does the same, filling the smile with the filter end of a Benson & Hedges cigarette that Larry leans to light, after which he leaves the Cosmos Club ma
tchbook on the desk facing himself, so Dr. X has to strain a little to read it.
“I like the way this man think,” Dr. X says to no one in particular, exhaling yellow smoke, perusing the matchbook, exhaling smoke that’s even yellower a second time. “So to matter at hand. I need best kidney for this situation, suitable and young. I have already potential donor being check for disease, AIDS and so forth.”
“So wait,” I say cautiously. “Does this mean we’re moving forward?”
“I help you because you are friend of friend, but you keep secret top priority. I like Americans, but please, no more Americans! You getting last kidney in China.”
I mask my excitement by skimming my eyes over the medical tomes lined up impressively in the bookcase behind Dr. X’s head. A video titled Carnivore Babes is in among the tomes, making no effort to disguise itself. Jade maintains her blankness while her pupils make tiny flickering motions as though observing a Ping-Pong match under a microscope.
“We are peppering very many documents for permission to go through,” Dr. X continues. “Need strict order from high court. Paperwork in process for donor to sign, also his family, everyone be on same page, no coercion.”
I look over at Jade, who betrays not so much as a blink. I don’t need to look at Larry. I can hear the knuckles being cracked beneath his poker face.
I can hardly contain myself. “You pepper all the documents you need,” I say. “So do you mind if I ask who the donor is?”
“Bad-bad criminal,” Dr. X says. “Thirty-one years of age and already kill many people. Break in woman’s house, kill woman’s father, then decide he want no witness so come back and kill woman and woman’s baby. Very bad man!” he says with surprising vehemence. “I would kill him hundred times!”
Tick-tick…tock…
After a heated pause during which the toilet smell grows a little sharper, Larry and I choose the same second to both blurt out questions. I let him go first.
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