Bosstown

by Adam Abramowitz

  “It’s time,” my father says, turning to look at me for the first time. On the TV, Matt Damon pulls wads of cash from hiding places around his apartment.

  “Time for what, Pops?”

  “I can hear it in his voice. That’s all there is, the voice.”

  I look to Sid, who points to the TV and shrugs.

  “He calls me,” my father says.

  “Who?”

  “Whattaya mean who?” My father works his tongue against his bottom gums, his lightning-bolt scar flashing as he presses his lip forward. His eyes are reflective lenses, his face without nuance, the rough edges in his voice worn smooth, even his Boston accent polished of any personality; not my father at all, and I’m not ready, don’t know if I’ll ever be ready for this. How do you talk to a man who wakes each morning in the portal of a time machine, who communes with ghosts? How do you help a man who doesn’t realize he’s fallen get up off the ground?

  “He wants his money,” my dad says, turning back to the screen.

  “See?” Sid says.

  “Diane took the rest.”

  “Diane,” I say. “That’s great, Pops. You’ve been talking to Mom?”

  “What?” My father begins to rock himself, gently at first and then harder, as if trying to gain momentum to rise from the couch. “He wants to meet. But not tonight. Tonight’s not good. Tomorrow.”

  “Meet you where?”

  “I told him I buried it.…”

  His rocking subsides as on the TV, cards are dealt around a poker table. His eyes darken, something akin to recognition, a return to self, flashing momentarily. It’s a lot to ask for, too much, as my dad continues, “He said he’d bring a shovel. He’s had practice over the years. It’s true. Lots of practice.…”

  “And so it goes. Listen, I’ll call Zero, get somebody down here to relieve me, or I’ll just stick around, I ain’t got nothing going on. Go do what you gotta do, Z. Everything okay?”

  “Fine, Sid. Thanks, you’re the best.” I kiss my father’s cheek, but his eyes stay glued to the television.

  “Yeah? Tell that to Petey when he gets out. You’ll get an earful.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself, Sid. Just keep in mind necrophilia’s considered a crime against humanity.”

  “Yeah? So what? I’ll just add it to my list, then.”

  THIRTY-THREE

  My first run sends me downtown into the shaded canyon of the Financial District, the city’s well-dressed foot soldiers providing me with plenty of cover as I make a concerted effort to avoid any roving bike police patrolling for jaywalkers and expired courier tags. For logistical purposes, Martha keeps me downtown, cleaning up the backlog of steady and long-term clients that accumulated while Damien slept off his hangover and I scammed eight hundred dollars from some girl whose next plastic surgery would be to repair blown-out sinus cavities.

  Gus’s clients are peppered into the mix, but they’re all scrubbed and corporate—legal writs, notarized forms, ball game tickets—nobody I encounter is cold sweating or sniffling blood into a tissue. If the receptionists and lobby bouncers even realize Gus is missing, they don’t show it, and I’m reminded that in the everyday scheme of things, we’re pretty much interchangeable parts. The delivery’s the thing, and if it’s eye candy they’re looking for, they’ll have to wait until I’m healed. I keep the sunglasses on, make it a point not to sweat on the suits.

  Since the first Big Dig shovels hit the streets, downtown traffic’s been an ever-changing mess, construction diverting cars and pedestrians to wayward destinations. A walk around the block can turn into a Himalayan trek through restricted hard-hat zones; nobody gets a direct route to where they want to go. Even a pedestrian change of direction is difficult, bordering on dangerous, as crowds are aggressively herded through orange bucket embankments by uniformed traffic division crossing guards, the more loose-limbed members of their hostile fraternity practically break-dancing in the streets.

  I leave them all behind, cutting diagonally across the Boston Commons, the Statehouse dome blinging like a Brahmin rapper’s solid gold tooth. I catch a wave of optimism as I approach a DPW crew patching up a pothole, but on closer inspection, it’s business as usual: five guys in orange vests, two doing all the work, the other three supervising to make sure it’s done poorly so they’ll have to come back tomorrow and do it all over again. White dashes fly beneath my wheels like a string of undotted i’s.

  Ah, Beantown.

  The same guard is manning the door at 38 Newbury, except today he’s jazzed up the uniform, added a dark blue commando sweater to go with his single-striped navy pants. Something in his demeanor suggests a heightened sense of awareness or anticipation. Then again, maybe he’s just got gas.

  “So I happened to be reading the papers this morning…,” he says as I reach for the door.

  “Okay,” I say, backtracking.

  “That you got hit yesterday?”

  I take off my sunglasses, figuring an eyeful of stitches is worth at least a thousand words.

  “You weren’t wearing a helmet yesterday,” he observes.

  “Nope.”

  “And now you are. Isn’t that a little like locking the barn doors after the horses are loose already?”

  “Stable,” I say. “Horses are kept in stables.”

  “All right, cowboy.”

  I take a deep breath, look up to the sky. “Actually, I’m just covering up a bad hair day.”

  “You too?” He lifts his blue cap, revealing a shock of corkscrew curls. “Why back so soon?”

  I point toward the Black Hole windows.

  “Was it really that much green you lost yesterday?” He twists the cap back on, wrestling his hair into submission.

  “I couldn’t tell you. I just pick shit up and deliver it.” My tone comes out sharper than I meant it.

  “Hey, don’t shoot the messenger, right?”

  “Exactly.” Why waste bullets when you can run him down with a gold Buick? “Here’s a question for you. You notice any police around here yesterday? Maybe a couple of guys visiting the sixth floor?”

  “Black and white guys, not more than a few hours after you left,” he says. “Detectives.”

  “They badge you?”

  “Didn’t have to. They all carry themselves like they got something shoved up their ass. Ah, fuck, I shouldn’t have said that. I got family on the force in Medford, and my brother-in-law’s a stand-up guy. I’m just a little sore today—ignore me, everybody else on this street does. All this standing around, my leg’s killing me.”

  “Me too,” I say. “We could start a club.”

  “Trust me, brother, you don’t want to be in my club.” He pulls up his right pant leg, revealing a flesh-colored metal and plastic prosthesis that runs from somewhere above his knee all the way into his custom-made black shoe.

  I nod like an idiot. “Where?”

  “Iraq.” He shrugs, looking off into space, avoiding my eyes. “Place called Hamdiyah, some little shithole you probably never heard of. I shouldn’t be complaining. I was one of the lucky ones.”

  “Zesty Meyers,” I say, holding out my hand.

  “Charles Valdes. But my friends call me Charlie.” He takes my hand, thoughtful enough not to crush it; bright red pebble-sized indentations still dot my palms.

  “Good to meet you, Charlie.”

  “I said my friends.” Charlie carves himself a stone-face, but his ears have risen a millimeter, tilting his cap to shade smiling eyes.

  “Man, I hope you don’t play poker,” I warn him.

  “Hells no. I only spend my money on the necessities: wine, women, and song. The rest—”

  “I blow on useless shit.”

  “Oh, you heard that one already?”

  “Really, you’re gonna make me say it…?”

  “Don’t quit my day job?” Charlie winces into the line, turns himself in a tight little circle on his one good leg. “Shit, what’s to quit? Listen, Zesty, go on up, do
what you gotta do and don’t worry about your bike over there. I guarantee no dogs’ll be pissing on your wheels today. And those detectives? I told them you were here but I couldn’t tell them what office you visited on account of you never signed the register.”

  “It’s no problem,” I say, chewing on a thought before figuring, what the hell. “You able to ride with that leg of yours, Charlie?”

  “You mean like a bike? Shit, I did some stationary rehabbing at Walter Reed, only I didn’t have to balance.”

  I dangle a set of phantom keys from my hand.

  “Maan…” Charlie bends a look up and down Newbury, contemplating the repercussions of skipping out on his post. “What the hell. I get canned, they’ll be doing me a favor. I’m freakin’ bored out of my skull.”

  “You could always be a messenger,” I say cheerfully. “The hours are long, the work’s dangerous, but the pay sucks.”

  “Sounds about right.” Charlie mounts the seat and pushes off the curb with his good leg. “You better hope I come back,” he wolfs, a cab swerving violently to avoid his swaying takeoff. “I ain’t joking neither. I think I got this!”

  They’ve made significant progress at Black Hole, the whiff of beers and babes overwhelmed by the cleaning crew and some antiseptic spray; Joey Ramone is rocking out a cover of Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World,” only the volume isn’t enough to burst an eardrum. The downstairs neighbors must be relieved as hell.

  They’ve also finished unpacking, and the front desk is manned by the yin to Britta’s yang, a short, not unattractive girl with black bangs cut straight across her forehead, black fingernail polish, eyeliner, and purple lipstick highlighting a messenger-devouring smile. She’s a goth Betty Boop, and she looks vaguely familiar. I’ve seen her out before, the Middle East on Mass Ave. or Bill’s Bar on Lansdowne—Darcy, Daley, something like that, vaguely slutty, risky, high-maintenance, kinky rewards. Bad timing with all my cuts and bruises; she shows me only business interest.

  “Dropping off?” she says.

  “Dropping by. Is Britta here?” Not that Darcy/Daley’s lacking curves herself. Like I said, she’s short, so I have the angle on her, only half guilty for looking because she hasn’t put a lot of effort into hiding anything. The difference is I don’t get caught this time, my eyes steady masked by the orange-tinted Oakleys.

  “She’s not in today,” she says, frowning.

  “How about Gus?”

  “No. Do you—”

  “What about Ray?”

  “Is he expecting you?”

  “Nope.”

  “He’s in a meeting right now.”

  “With who?”

  “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

  “Yeah? You’d be amazed.”

  “I doubt it. Anyway, I can’t interrupt him.”

  “Trust me, he wants to see me.”

  The girl twists up her face, the punctuation marks of her features skewing at odd angles. “Hey, you can’t go back there! He’s in a meeting!”

  The unpacking extends to the rest of the office. The moving supplies and blankets are gone; a magnet board is already tacked three deep with laser-printed photographs from the party. I grab two shots and slide them into my pack, passing toward Ray Valentine’s frosted-glass corner office.

  “Give those back!” Darcy/Daley uses her outside voice; she’s hot on my tail as Whac-A-Mole heads pop out the tops and sides of cubicles. “He just stole pictures from the party! Somebody call security!”

  “We have security?” A telemarketing headset cuts across a Flock of Seagulls revival haircut.

  “What number do we call?” says another through a yawn.

  “A picture?” says a third. “God, I hope it’s not of me. I was plastered!”

  I don’t bother knocking, and I’m surprised the door’s unlocked, considering Ray Valentine’s hunched over his desk snorting a massive line of cocaine off a black vinyl disc, a white mound piled precipitously close to the center hole.

  “What the fuck!” Valentine rears up from huffing. His eyes, as much as I can see of them, lit, his optic stalks fried to their roots, his right eye dimming fast as it swells shut under fresh bruises.

  Valentine’s also sporting a large bump on the left side of his temple, an almost comical swelling like a thought balloon fighting to escape his head and float free above him. His bottom lip is split down the middle, a single dollop of blood dropping onto his half-snorted line; the powdered worm sizzles as it mixes with whatever the coke was cut with.

  “Who the fuck are you?”

  “He’s asking for Britta and Gus,” Darcy/Daley says, a crowd gathering behind her.

  “Close the door!” he roars.

  “I’ll get security.”

  “What? No! Close the door! He can stay.”

  Darcy/Daley is a portrait of confused but does as she’s told, her coworkers reduced to milling shadows before dispersing to light up the rumor hotline. It wouldn’t surprise me if someone had snapped a picture in the ten seconds the door was open; there’s nothing like a shot of your boss snorting Mount Everest to help you negotiate your next pay raise.

  Valentine looks me over, comes to some sort of conclusion, and lowers himself to vacuum the rest of the line, holding his longish brown hair off his forehead with one hand, plugging his unoccupied nostril with the other—a talent to behold. And not an ungracious one either. Finished, he cuts another line and extends the bill toward me.

  “Wow. Yesterday I can’t even get a cup of real coffee in this joint, and today I get rocket fuel. No thanks.” I wave him off. If I wanted to grind my teeth all day, I’d get myself a real job.

  My refusal gives Valentine pause. “Straightedge?”

  “Hardly,” I disappoint him. “You know who I am?”

  “Hey, that’s my line.” Valentine laughs, the movement producing an avalanche of powder onto the front of his shirt. If the blow wasn’t sitting right there in front of him, I’d think he’d just been careless with a powdered donut.

  “You’re certainly not Gus,” he says, tap-touching his shirt with his index finger before wiping the residue over the swelling surrounding his eye. It doesn’t strike me as such a smart move, but maybe he’s got the same medical coverage I do. “Gus would have his shnozola a foot deep in this pile if I offered it to him.”

  “Wouldn’t that cut into his profits, since he’s the one selling it?”

  “Well, you might have a point there.” Valentine smiles numbly, showing me horse’s teeth. “So what do you want? No, let me guess. You’re in a band, right? Guitarist? Nah, not guitar, you got the arms of a drummer but the attitude to just crash in here, upset poor Darcy just trying to do her job. That right there says to me front and center, lead singer, spotlight, where’s the fucking spotlight!” Valentine springs from his seat. “Am I right? Tell me I’m not right. You looking for a record deal…?”

  “Zesty,” I say.

  “Zesty! Oh, that’s perfect right there. Wouldn’t have to change a thing. You looking for a record deal, Zesty?”

  “No.”

  “Really? That’s a first. Aren’t all you messengers something else besides twelve-speed wheel jockeys?”

  “You tell me.”

  “Yeah, man, I’m just doing this till I hit it big-time, right? Oops, I hit a nerve? Shit, I could make a million dollars with you, Zesty. Would you like a million dollars?”

  “It would solve a few problems,” I admit.

  “Yes it would! Only there’s one hitch, Zesty, one major fucking obstacle. Know what that is?”

  “Enlighten me.”

  “There’s a thousand clowns out there who look just like you, and they all want the same thing, Zesty. Ten thousand clowns. Bring in the clowns!”

  “Like Gus?” I say.

  “Well, see, now I gotta tell you, Gus might be the exception. Gus actually has some bona-fide talent, but at heart he’s a fuckup, plain and simple. Are you a fuckup, Zesty?”

 
“It’s too early to tell. I’ll have to get back to you on that one.”

  “Yeah, well, Gus is a fuckup. Aside from the fact that band name sucks and he’s too loyal to the retards he plays with, Gus doesn’t listen. Do you listen, Zesty?”

  “I’m sorry, you were saying something?”

  “See, that’s what I’m talking about. Sarcasm is a cancer. It’ll eat you alive.”

  Then I’m a walking dead man. “What happened to your face?” I leave the sarcasm out of my voice just in case.

  “What happened to yours?”

  “I’ll get to that in a minute. Gus is signed to your label, right?”

  “To my everlasting regret.”

  “Why? Didn’t you just tell me he has talent?”

  “See, you weren’t listening! I just told you he was a fuckup. Capital F, capital U.”

  “Is dealing blow one of his fuckups, or is that on you?”

  “You mean do I deal blow? Hell no. I’m in the record business, Zesty. Look around you. I got an office on Newbury Street with all the trimmings. Secretaries, talent scouts, a warehouse full of merchandise. Want a T-shirt? The blow’s just a fringe benefit; you should know that.” Valentine again extends the bill, but I shake my head. “You mind?” He gestures to the mound.

  “Knock yourself out,” I tell him.

  Valentine throws himself back into his seat and busies himself separating a line from the pile with a platinum Amex card, scratching the vinyl apparently not a concern.

  “So what’s the problem with Gus, then? You signed his band, and I know you’re steering business his way, so the two of you should be getting along just great.”

  “Says who?” Valentine sits up, shivering as the drug ignites something in his bloodstream.

  I reach into my pack and flip the picture of my Marlborough Street model onto his desk.

  “Oh her. You know, for someone who makes a living getting her picture taken, that bitch talks too much.”

  “Actually, she snorts too much. Do you know where Gus is right now?”

  “No. Why would I?”

  “Did Darryl beat you up?”