Carlucci's Heart

by Richard Paul Russo

  Two days of rain had given way to a mild heat wave. The temperature climbed into the eighties during the day, and didn’t cool off much at night. It was still spring, so the heat wasn’t too bad, but right now it was probably still above seventy, and humidity was fairly high. She liked this kind of weather.

  The street was a mindless swarm of people and vehicles, flashing colored lights and barking voices, competing blasts of alarms and pounding music, all infused with the stench of weed smoke, spilled alcohol, rotting plants, and burning oil. She heard glass break nearby, an explosion of some kind, a hammering sound, then a loud braying laugh. Someone pawed at her face, and she knocked the hand away.

  She wanted a drink. She wanted several drinks, but she didn’t want to sweat and fight in the bars, so she went without.

  Traffic was stopped at the intersection ahead, and a crowd had formed in the middle of the street. Feeling reckless, she climbed on the back of a bus stop bench to see what was happening, using a power pole for support. There was a large open space in the middle of the crowd, roughly circular, and inside it were three men in wire head-cages, bare from the waist up and all three lightning-leashed to their handlers. Caroline thought she recognized the stocky woman handler on the far side of the circle, the one she’d run into two weeks ago on her way to see Tito. The handler was shouting through the head-cage at her charge, presumably giving him instructions.

  The crowd around the three men and their handlers was growing, and people were climbing onto stalled and parked vehicles, sidewalk stands, balconies, anything that afforded a better view. Before long, Caroline’s own view would be completely blocked. Just as well, she thought, she didn’t really want to see this. She knew what was coming she could already hear the betting begin.

  The three men were roped together in a kind of circle, or rough triangle, fewer than ten feet of rope between each of them; each man remained leashed to his handler, and the collars around their necks shimmered with electricity.

  A man in body armor went to each of the head-caged men and slapped dermal patches onto their necks, half a dozen to each probably crashers, deadeners, and skyrockets. Within minutes, the three men in head-cages would be completely wired and crazed. Finally, a set of metal hand-claws was strapped onto the right arm and hand of each man. They would tear each other apart.

  That was enough for Caroline. She climbed down from the bench and pushed into the crowd, working her way toward the buildings until she could get past the intersection. A frenzied roar swelled from the crowd, and she knew it had begun.

  Once past the intersection, the crowds thinned, but the sidewalk was still full and hectic. A man bleeding profusely from a head wound staggered toward her, hissing at her as he went by. Two teenaged tattoo-girls shuffled along a few feet in front of her, arms wrapped around one another, their ponytails laced together with wire webbing. A rat pack ten or twelve strong marched steadfastly along the sidewalk, forcing people to move out of its way. Caroline got jammed up against a pokey booth; the gooner inside grinned and breathed a foul, warm stench into her face, nauseating her. Finally the rat pack swept past, the pressure eased, and she pushed away from the booth.

  She walked along in a kind of daze, hardly paying attention to her surroundings, almost unconsciously fending off the hasslers and pervs. She just didn’t feel much of anything.

  She had been in this numb and dazed state of mind almost constantly since the night Tina had come by. She couldn’t shake it, and most of the time she didn’t even want to shake it. Most of the time she just didn’t care.

  In the years since the Gould’s Syndrome had been diagnosed, Caroline had thought she’d come to terms with the disease. She knew its activation was inevitable, she knew it was ultimately terminal, and she had thought she had come to terms with the fear and the dread, and the self-pity.

  Clearly she hadn’t.

  She’d been fooled, it seemed, because in all these years, other than developing a tendency to tire easily, the Gould’s had not gone active. The markers had been picked up in a routine screening, and she’d been informed of what they meant. She had been given all the details of the disease, including the possible and probable ways it would progress once it had gone active, and she’d been told what the ultimate prognosis was. She’d known she would have several years before it went fully active, before the myelin sheathing of her central nervous system would begin to degenerate in earnest, but she’d also known that it was unlikely she would live to see thirty, and that no one with Gould’s had ever lived past thirty-two. And she’d known there was no treatment for it, no cure. She’d known all that.

  But apparently, in some deep and real way, she hadn’t.

  When the vision in her eye had gone funny and she’d lost control of her Teg and sprawled to the floor, then she had known.

  She was scared now, and she didn’t want to be scared. And she was afraid she would never be able to get away from that fear.

  She had stopped walking, and now stood at the inner edge of the sidewalk, leaning against a building wall. How long had she been standing here, people moving past her? She looked up, saw the sign for Turtle Joe’s just above her head, and nodded to herself; probably this was where she’d been headed all along.

  She walked past Turtle Joe’s and turned into the alcove entrance to the death house. Everything looked the same: the crude red skull-and-crossbones, the grille over the heavy wooden door, the cracked brick and crumbling mortar of the arch and walls, the chipped and cracked and stained marble flagstones under her feet. Caroline pushed the door open, stepped inside, and closed the door behind her.

  Quiet and dim light. Familiar smell of damp and sickness, and something acrid, almost burning her nose. The lobby was empty.

  She took the stairs slowly, one deliberate step at a time, keeping her attention on her feet. Since that night with Tina her vision had been fine, and she hadn’t lost control of her leg again, but she knew it could happen at any time, and she spent much of her time waiting for it to happen again. She couldn’t help herself.

  When she reached the third-floor landing, she didn’t need to rest; instead, she kept right on walking down the hall toward Tito’s old room. The black door looked just the same. But everything was so quiet she imagined that if she unlocked the door and found Tito inside, it would only be if he were already dead, lying on the floor, eyes open, waiting for someone to come and take him away.

  She unlocked the dead bolt, then put her key in the knob, turned it, and pushed the door inward. There were lights on inside the room, and she froze, the door only half open. She remained motionless, listening, but didn’t hear anything. Her heart was beating fast and hard, and her mouth went dry.

  “Tito?” she ventured. She slid the key out of the knob, gripped it tightly in her right hand.

  There was a slight rustle, then a soft, timid voice. “Who is it?” A woman’s voice.

  Caroline stepped carefully around the door. Huddled against the far wall, on the mattress that had served as Tito’s bed, were a woman and a young girl. The woman appeared to be in her thirties, and the girl about nine or ten. Both had straight, dirty blond hair and dark blue eyes, both were dressed in T-shirts and jeans. Both of them looked scared.

  “It’s all right,” Caroline said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

  “Do you live here?” the woman asked. “We were told the room was empty.”

  “No. I had a friend who lived here. He’s been gone for a while.”

  “Is he coming back?” The woman coughed, glanced at the girl, then turned back to Caroline. “We don’t have anywhere else to go.”

  Caroline breathed in very deeply, held it for a few moments, then slowly let it out, shaking her head. “No.” The truth of that sank into her completely for the first time. “No, he won’t be back. You can stay here.” Exhaustion washed over her, combining with the earlier numbness, and she wanted to lie down on Tito’s old sofa, go to sleep, and not wake up for days. “I’m sorry
I bothered you,” she said to the woman and the girl. “I’ll just go.”

  “Wait,” the woman said. “Can we… can we have your key?” She pointed at the key in Caroline’s hand. “We can lock the door when we’re inside, but we can’t lock it when we leave. No one had a key.”

  Caroline nodded. She crossed the room and handed the key to the woman, wondering if the woman was contagious, wondering why she cared. The woman thanked her. Then, feeling awkward, Caroline asked, “Why are you here?”

  “We don’t have anyplace else to go,” the woman said. “We haven’t got much money.”

  “No, I meant…” She shook her head. “I’m sorry, just…” She tried to wave it off. What was she thinking? What was wrong with her? Leave these poor people alone. She started to turn away, but the woman reached out and touched her arm.

  “My daughter’s dying,” the woman said.

  Caroline looked at the young girl. She didn’t look sick. Tired, maybe, and hungry, but not sick. But then I don’t look sick either, she thought.

  “I’m sorry,” she said again. “Do you have any money?” A stupid question, she realized as soon as she asked. If the woman had any money she wouldn’t be here with her daughter in this godforsaken death house.

  “A little,” the woman said. Probably a lie.

  “Food?”

  “The Sisters bring us meals.”

  They had nothing. Caroline looked around the room, saw an open suitcase with a few clothes, a few children’s books on the sofa, but nothing else that hadn’t been left behind by Mouse.

  “Is there something I can do to help?” Caroline asked.

  The woman didn’t answer. Caroline knew she was not doing this very well. She looked back and forth between the woman and the girl, feeling cold and afraid again. “I’m dying too,” she finally said.

  No one said anything for a long time. Eventually the girl said, “Can you help us?”

  Caroline looked at the woman. “Something,” she said. “If you want me to.”

  The girl nodded. Her mother just said, “There’s some tea here. Would you like some?”

  Tito’s herb teas. Nobody thought they were worth stealing. “Sure,” she said, smiling. “That would be nice.” The little girl smiled back.

  CHAPTER 10

  “I feel like shit,” Nikki said.

  She was sitting in a black plastic chair by an open window in her apartment, her head resting against the wooden frame, eyes closed. Cage stood just inside the front door, watching her. The air was warm and stuffy, and stank of burned food.

  “Why aren’t you in bed?” he asked.

  She gave him a tired smile and opened one eye. “I’m not that sick. I just feel crappy.” She closed her eye. “I was heating up some soup and nodded off. I burned it.”

  The apartment was a fairly large one-room studio, with a separate kitchen alcove, and a full bath off the back corner. There wasn’t much furniture. Nikki slept in a sleeping bag on an old cot, and she ate on a sheet of plywood laid across stacks of plastic crates. There was a single stuffed chair beside a floor lamp, where she read at night, and several black plastic chairs she used when working at her tapestry looms. All three of the vertical looms were set up now, two with tapestries just begun, the other with one nearing completion. She’d been working on this last one for well over a year, and like most of her tapestries it incorporated both Native American and Native African motifs, heavily abstracted; hundreds of colored threads dangled from the back of the loom.

  “Have you eaten anything today?” Cage asked.

  Nikki shook her head, dreadlock beads clicking against the window frame with each movement.

  “Want me to cook you something?”

  “Soup?” Nikki said, smiling again.

  “Sure. Soup.”

  He crossed the room to the kitchen alcove, glanced at the pot of burned soup soaking in the sink, then opened the cupboard under the counter and dug around for another pot.

  “Soup’s above the stove,” she said.

  The upper cupboard was pretty well stocked with canned goods, though about half of it was cat food. Nikki fed the neighborhood strays down in the alley. She was allergic to cat dander, so she couldn’t keep any cats in the apartment for herself.

  Cage took down a can of chicken soup with rice and vegetables. “Chicken soup,” he said. “Best thing for you.”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  He opened the can, poured the contents into the pot, then turned on the burner and set the flame low. He stirred the soup a few times, then left it and walked back across the room, sitting in one of the plastic chairs a few feet from Nikki.

  “Do you have a fever?”

  She nodded, the sun flashing off her cheek inlays. “Not bad, though. Just over a hundred.”

  “You take anything for it?”

  “Of course.”

  “What else? Sore throat, muscle aches?”

  “Sore throat and a nasty goddamn headache.” She grimaced. “That’s all.”

  “Bad cold,” Cage said. “Maybe some kind of flu.”

  “Yeah, probably.” She opened both eyes, raised her head a bit, and looked at him. “You hear anything about Stinger?”

  Cage shook his head. He wished he could say something to make her forget about Stinger, but he knew it wasn’t possible. He couldn’t forget about it himself he kept seeing those injected eyes and the blood on Nikki’s finger hooks, kept smelling that awful breath. And he kept hearing the fear in Tiger’s voice. At least Nikki hadn’t heard Tiger’s story.

  He scooted the chair right up to her, reached out and raised her chin, then felt her neck with his fingers. “Lymph nodes a bit swollen, but not too bad.”

  “Of course they’re swollen.”

  He tipped her head so the sunlight fell directly on her face. He looked into her eyes and felt relieved; they were bright and clear, with no signs of hemorrhage. “Open your mouth and try to work your tongue down.” She did; he made a slight adjustment of the angle and got a fairly good look at her throat. A little red, but it looked okay. He nodded and let her go. “You look all right. You might feel lousy for a week or two, but you know what to do.” He smiled. “And I’ll stop by regularly to see how you’re doing, give you a hand.”

  “Thanks, Mom.”

  Cage got up, went into the bathroom, and washed his hands thoroughly with cidal soap. She was going to be fine. He returned to the stove and checked on the soup; steam was rising from the pot.

  “Soup’s ready,” he said. “Come on over to the table.”

  “I think I’ll just eat here,” Nikki said.

  Cage poured soup into a bowl, got a spoon and napkin, took it over to her. He set the bowl on the windowsill, spoon and napkin beside it.

  “Thanks,” Nikki said.

  “Anything else I can get you? Something to drink?”

  “No, that’s all right. I’ll make tea later.”

  “You want me to bring you something from the clinic? I’m going there now.”

  “This is supposed to be your day off, Cage.”

  “Madelaine’s shorthanded today.”

  “You’re always shorthanded at the clinic. Seven days a week.”

  He shrugged. “I’m just going by to check in, see how things are. I won’t stay long.”

  Nikki snorted. She spooned some soup into her mouth. “Thanks again. It’s good.”

  “So. Anything from the clinic?”

  “No, Cage. I’m not dying. I’ll be fine.”

  “I’ll see you later, then.”

  She nodded and waved her spoon at him. He turned and left.

  The RadioLand Street Clinic was on the ground floor of an old brick apartment building, half a block from the Core and in the vague and blurred border between the Latin and Euro quarters of the Tenderloin. The clinic was flanked by a Nightgames arcade on one side, and a head juicer shop on the other. Above it were three floors of hooker suites, and above that six floors of overcrowded apartments. Cage�
�s own apartment was on the fourth floor, with the hookers he got free rent and irregular meals in exchange for providing the women with free medical care.

  Madelaine and the crew were holding their own. She looked tired, but she smiled when she saw Cage come in through the clinic door, and shook her head.

  “Get out of here,” she told him. “This is your day off.”

  There were maybe fifteen people waiting, sitting on the chairs, benches, and old collapsing sofas scattered through the room. About half of them looked quite ill; all of them looked dead poor. Only five or six children, though. Often there were twice this many people waiting for medical attention, so this was a pretty quiet day.

  Franzee, a short, chunky, and very pretty redhead, kept the clinic running, working as nurse, clerk, and office manager; she was kneeling in front of an old man, talking to him and making notes. Buck, the clinic errand boy, was moving a gurney down the left hallway. And Madelaine stood behind the main counter, one hand resting on a stack of folders, the other holding a ceramic cup with bright red letters on the side saying,

  “DOCTORS AREN’T GODS. NOT EVEN CLOSE.”

  The cup would be full of god-awful herb tea that smelled nearly as bad as it tasted. Madelaine was tall and thin, closing in on fifty, her hair almost completely white. She’d been working street clinics for more than thirteen years, and it never seemed to get her down, which amazed Cage. The clinic work got him down all the time.

  A young woman came out of one of the examination rooms and gazed hollowly at him. Her face was drawn, her eyes dark and sunken. A gauze bandage was taped to her inner arm, probably over an IV shunt. The young woman approached the counter, gaze shifting from Cage to Madelaine.

  “Vashti, remember,” Madelaine said, her voice soft but firm. “Try to drink a lot of fluids. Water, herb teas, soup, juices, whatever. But more important… we’ll send Buck over later today with a case of IV fluids. Do a bag every hour, like I showed you, all right? And if you start to feel worse, come back in. Call us if you have to, okay? If you can’t get here one of us will come see you.”