The Bad Poet

by Michael Paul Fuller

“Ms. King! Ms. King!”

  I turned around to see Sarah Halvorson dashing toward me. “Hi, Sarah. What’s up?”

  “Would you get me some help on the executive profile project?” Sarah’s cobalt eyes gazed on me while she tucked a strand of blonde hair behind her ear. She was raised on a dairy farm just outside Kohler, Wisconsin and was of Swedish descent, for sure.

  “Didn’t we bring in some help last week?”

  She turned back toward one of the last newsstands in Chicago. Little John’s Newsstand was located in the main lobby of our building right across the street from city hall. Reaching into her Dolce and Gabbana purse, “Hi, Andy. A pack of Salem Lights, please,” Sarah said, almost like she was ashamed.

  “Sure.” Andy coughed out an elderly smoker’s hack. He sold everything from cigarettes to cigarette papers, Skittles to Snickers and Ebony to Newsweek magazines. He was an older black man who had worked this stand even before “The Boss” the original Richard J. Daley became Mayor. “That’ll be five seventyfive.”

  “Sarah, you need to give those things up,” I said.

  She handed Andy six dollars in ones. “Yeah, I know,” she said with a hint of frustration. “Thanks, Andy.” Then walked away.

  “You’re welcome,” he grumbled.

  “So what’s the problem?” I asked Sarah.

  She bit the bottom of her skinny dry smoker’s lip and said, “It’s just too much work and there’s not enough time.”

  I gently held Sarah’s arm. “Didn’t Jack give you another person?”

  “Yes, but she’s new and doesn’t know a damn thing. I have to train her on just about everything.” Sarah tore open the pack, lit a cigarette and took a long drag. “I just need some help,” she said, exhaling a cloud of smoke.

  “Well, I’ll have to talk with Jack.”

  She petitioned, “Please, talk to him. Make Jack understand I can’t do all of this.”

  “I’ll speak with him, but I can’t guarantee anyt…” “What? What’s wrong?” she asked.

  I stretched my neck around Sarah’s blond tresses to get a better view. “Is that…” I stuttered.

  Sarah turned around to search who it was that grabbed my attention. “Is that who?”

  With the insincerity of a politician thirty points behind in the polls. “…Yes. …Everything’s fine,” I said.

  “Well, I better smoke outside before security boots me out of the building. Then run back into the office, you know how Jack is when he can’t find people,” Sarah said.

  “Yeah, okay.” I don’t think I ever looked at her. “I’ll see you later.”

  “You going back in?” she asked.

  “I’ve got something to do first.” While I stood there staring through the revolving glass door, I noticed that Sarah had finished her cigarette, doused it into the smoker’s ash tray standing next to the outside door, and entered into the building.

  Extending my neck to view the person I thought I’d seen before, I joined the morning crowd merging into the Jackson Coleman National Bank and Trust building. In an effort not to appear obvious, I peeked from behind one of the giant granite pillars and checked the spot just beyond Little John’s Newsstand. I couldn’t believe who I saw, it was Agent Hicks. Why couldn’t he leave me alone?

  Since the day the police had invaded my home, I awoke each morning thankful I hadn’t been charged with a crime. Anytime you’re caught up in the criminal justice system, it can be a long uphill climb out of the abyss. On the surface, it appeared that authorities believed everything that I told them, all except for Agent Hicks; that chocolate Kojak seemed to have it in for me. He was a constant nuisance, harassing and questioning me like a common criminal. Hicks would drop by my office following a full day of work to ask me questions or he’d just walk by and wave or nod, trying to intimidate me. One time he even showed up at a R. Kelly concert at the Arie Crown Theater and sat across the aisle from me. I’m not sure how he pulled that one off. But this time, I decided to pre-empt his plan. “Agent Hicks!” I bellowed out to him so everyone in the lobby could hear.

  He spun around, surprised that I’d snuck up on him and blew his little sneaky cover. “Why, Carla. How are you?” he stuttered.

  I could tell he wasn’t ready for my aggressive attack. “I’m fine. But what are you doing here again?”

  “I’m thinking about opening an account at Jackson Coleman National Bank,” he said with a grin.

  “Really?”

  “That’s right. I don’t think the bank I use now is giving me the best service,” he said.

  Naturally, I didn’t believe a word he said, but I continued to play his game. “Well, Jackson Coleman National Bank is an excellent choice,” I said. “Would you like for me to introduce you to one of our vice presidents in Personal Banking?”

  Hicks shied away, “Well…uh, uh… no… no. I don’t think that will be necessary.”

  “It’s no problem,” I said, speaking even louder. I could tell Mr. Simmons to set you up.”

  He started to turn away. “No thank you, I’m just getting some information.”

  I noticed my good friend and colleague Ed Kiefer easing around one of the dark green granite pillars in the atrium. He was probably on his break, but Ed never turned down the chance to add a new customer. “Hold on, Mr. Hicks, I see one of our Senior Vice Presidents. Mr. Kiefer!” I flagged him down by waving my arms. “Ed, over here!”

  Ed noticed me and waved back then strolled over to us, looking like the hefty actor, John Candy.

  “Ed, I’d like to introduce you to someone,” I spoke loud enough so that he could hear me through the crowd.

  “Hello,” Ed said in his effervescent manner. I’ve known Ed Kiefer for more than fourteen years and had never seen him in a negative mood, which is highly uncommon in the banking business. His portly couch potato stomach poked out like a proud pregnant mothers and his graying comb-over was on its last loose strand.

  “Ed, I’d like you to meet Mr. Hicks.”

  Kiefer stuck out his chubby pale hand. “Hello, Mr. Hicks.”

  Agent Hicks hesitated. “Oh, hi.”

  I continued the charade and said, “Mr. Hicks is interested in an account with Jackson Coleman Bank. Isn’t that right, Mr. Hicks?”

  Agent Hicks shuffled in place. I saw the anxiety building in his chest. “Well, all I really wanted was some information.” “And some information you shall have,” Kiefer said.

  I smiled at Ed, then turned to Agent Hicks and said, “I told him Ed Kiefer was the man with the answers.”

  Ed returned my smile and said, “Yes, sir. Right away. Come with me.”

  “Well…” Hicks started.

  Kiefer beamed with that banker’s “give me your money” smile, “Now don’t worry about a thing. I’ve done this thousands of times.”

  “Well, I don’t have a lot of time,” Hicks said, trying to ease his way out.

  “This won’t take but a minute.” Kiefer always had an ABC attitude, Always Be Closing. He was a bulldog not soon to let Agent Hicks from his grip, until he made him the next Jackson Coleman National Bank customer.

  “Thanks, Ed,” I said, satisfied for thinking fast on my feet and thwarting Hicks’s troublesome ways.

  “No problem, Carla.”

  “I’ll see you soon, Ms. King,” Hicks said. He tried to fake a smile, but I was familiar with those determined eyes that struggled to make me confess things about myself that were not true and it was those eyes that anger rolled from. He hesitantly followed Kiefer to his office like a Christian to the lion’s den. He was done for. Kiefer and the other sharks in the Personal Banking department would have all of Hicks’s money by the time he left the floor.

  Laughing under my breath and smiling like the curious cat that just swallowed the laughing bird, it was sweet revenge. Finally, I had flipped the script on him, but harassing me had to stop. Even though it was persecution at its lowest level, I thought harassing was still illegal. He didn’t have a chance to ques
tion me this time, but who knew where he’d show up next or what he’d do. I just kept telling myself that when they caught Cutino, it would all be over. But he was still a fugitive, and from my understanding, the authorities couldn’t locate him and didn’t know what he was up to. That sneaky low life could have been anywhere. He was like Bin Laden on the run, only without the Al Qaeda organization hiding him. Even to the police, Cutino was a ghost who had disappeared into the mist without a trace.

  Koltrane continued to e-mail and warn me to watch my step with Natalie and not to let her lead me into something harmful. But, I understood my girl’s personality faults. She was mischievous with energy to spare. Her mind often spun webs of confusion and gossip. But I suppose that’s what I liked most about her. We came from the same neighborhood and lived through the ebb and flow of life’s mysteries while surviving day to day as single mothers in the midst of Chicago’s big shoulders. When Sidney left me and times were the hardest, Natalie took us in and dropped cash in my hand to help me survive.

  Back in the day when we were freshman in high school, roly-poly Donna Williams and her football sized squad of bullies finally felt it was my time to get picked on, and it was Natalie who rose up and backed them off of me. When Michael Hudson dumped me and crushed my heart into a million pieces in my senior year, it was Natalie’s humor and strength that brought me back to life. She’d been a bell-weather through many storms in my life and continued to buoy my spirits when waves seemed to drown me like a tsunami rushing my tiny island of life.

  CHAPTER 8