“Thank you,” was all Nicolai could think to say.
“You are velcome. Keep them safe and give them to your children. In these stones is the very blood ov the Vicoff name. Vith these the very first Vicoff seized control of his kingdom and killed his greatest foe!” Rooka stared meticulously into Nicolai’s eyes, holding him in enchantment. “And defeated qvite a few voman’s defenses as vell!” He laughed heartily and left for his appointment, pinching Nicolai’s cheeks and tussling his hair on the way out. Rooka stayed only one week after that. He remarked at how real estate prices in Europe had skyrocketed and returned to his castle in the woods.
Nicolai stepped out of the shower invigorated. As he dried himself he thought: Poor Rooka, a lonely old man. He remembered how after Rooka had left them, life became normal again, boring again. Rifka left shortly after, giving up her dreams of dancing, and once again everyone forgot about Rooka. All except for Nicolai, who kept up a correspondence which wavered more or less infrequently. He visited him occasionally and felt fortunate to have seen the man only months before his deathno, of course, that’s ridiculous, he thought; I haven’t seen the man in over five years, or had he? Foggy brain, from the hot shower no doubt.
When he returned to the room Antonini had reappeared. He sat crumpled in a corner massaging a blackened eye. Franz still lay asleep, turned now on his other side clenching his tummy. Nicolai said hello to Antonini but was either ignored or not heard. He took his clothes and returned to the shower room to dress. He chose a casual shirt, some slacks, a wool jacket, and his favorite belt. He fingered a hole in the belt and felt a sense of loss. Burial at sea, old fellow. Burial at sea. He dropped off his towels and noticed that Antonini was sobbing now and had apparently overturned Franz’s bucket as it now rested on top of his head, the contents drooling over his shoulders. Franz snored.
When Nicolai arrived, the lounge was already emptying as people hurried off to dinner, but Nicolai decided to sit at the bar in hopes that his femme would appear. Sitting next to him was Alligheri, gay with liquor. The two unavoidably fell into an incoherent conversation; incoherent because Alligheri spoke very little English. Nicolai tried to cover his ignorance of Italian by speaking with a thick accent he’d gleamed from a Marx brother’s pic and by throwing in the phrase “Mama Mia!” at what felt like appropriate moments. For all its lack of creativity, this method apparently worked and Alligheri continue his jabbering.
After half of an hour had passed and the mysterious Iberian had not shown, Nicolai decided to abandon the lounge for the dining room. Hoping Alligheri would not follow, he threw a casual “Buon giorno!” his way and hopped off the stool. Alligheri, quickly catching on, too leaped from his perch shouting “Buon giorno” and followed Nicolai into the next room. When Alligheri sat with him at a table, Nicolai wished (for once) that Franz was present. He soon re-evaluated the Italian’s virtue, for only seconds later a mysterious bottle of The Bubbly appeared at their table (The Bubbly is a Californian champagne, fermented from Chilean grapes, grown from seeds who’s progenitors once grew in a fine French vineyardas an unusual side note, the fields producing this vintage are owned by The Bubonic Winery Company of California, USA and of absolutely no relation to the organization running the vessel upon which it was served). The arrival of the bottle (and this is the good part) was succeeded by a friendly wave from across the room and a surprising re-introduction to Nicolai’s Spanish speaking siren. She and her husband (who had sent the stuff) joined them at their table and he (Nicholas, the American) relieved Nicolai of Alligheri’s conversation. “May I smoke?” she asked, and did.
“You left so quickly before. I did not get a chance to ask your name.” She looked at him quixotically.
“Nicolai, are you flirting with me?” He was shocked by this unexpected question and turned to see if her husband had heard, but he had not. Before returning to her uncomfortable stare, Nicolai noted that the American used the same method of communicating with Alligheri as he had, and with equal success. As he came back around he found himself tongue-tied. Seemingly sensing this, a waiter brought him something to keep it busy and Nicolai set to eating. The Iberian did not receive any food and the other two men ignored theirs, but Nicolai ate ferociously. As he did he felt soft toes playing up his leg. Excited by this sensual (and he thought fittingly Mediterranean) action, he ate faster still. “You will excuse me,” his companion announced and she stood up and left. It was not so much her exit which caused him to choke on his next mouthful, but that in her absence a foot still flitted over his leg.
Recovering from his fit and clearing his air passage (all the while ignored by the two men), Nicolai excused himself from the table and pursued his lovely. He saw her entering a stairwell at the end of the hall. Noticing an exit to his left, he charged down the stairs and rushed to meet her as she arrived on the lower level. He waited for her behind the door and counted her clicking heels as they approachedthat is, as they approached and then retreated. He’d chosen the wrong floor. He ran down another level and caught her. “I had to speak to you again. Tomorrow we will land in Boston and it will be too late. From the moment I saw you removing your undergarments in the lounge, I felt a tremendous rush, a surge ofyou’re thinking hormonesbut it was...I love you. I love you to death and I don’t even know your name. I’m sorry if this comes as a shock to you, but I would not be able to live knowing I hadn’t said it[not wholly true, but he was going for effect].” He paused for a response and his legs shook; he had never been so forward with a woman.
“Nicholas,” she said and he turned, expecting to see her behemoth husband, “I mean Nicolai, I feel the same. I doubted your feelings when you let that slob touch you like a woman under the table. Kiss me.” He moved to. “No wait,” she stopped him. “Not here. Later. Midnight on the deck, yes?” He nodded and she left him then to his second-hand.
Nicolai went up to deck immediately. He dreamed of their life together in America. It would be a comfortable one now thanks to Rooka. He pictured them going to swank parties after the theater, all of the gentleman commenting on his beautiful wife. “She’s the knock-out of this party, Nicolai,” “What a catch. How’d an old lug like you nail that one down,” “I’d give my left arm tono, that and half a nut to have a shot at her, buddy” (always one of those types at a party, he thought). Midnight came and went for Nicolai and his only visitor was a pelican which saw fit to perch near his post. It squatted, and then without warning seemed to faint; falling, falling dead as an anchor toward the water and then in seeming mockery it opened its wings and soared into the distance. This act it repeated ad-infinitum, until suddenly it grew bored and flew off into the distance and did not return. But that last time Nicolai thought he saw it turn briefly and squawk, “Sucker!” Of this though he was not sure.
Nicolai awoke. He looked at his watch and it showed three. I must have dozed off. He stood. The night was still black, but a flood of activity busied the deck. Crew members in white and some in bedclothes ran from one exit to another in almost pointless fashion. Once, the captain (he must have been for his robe was of silk) appeared and was informed of something, he took a definitive draw from his pipe and then disappeared again. The busy-bodies stopped their work at about four-fifteen and Nicolai retired, alone. Before he went below deck, a light far off caught his eye. “America” and he knew that another fine lady awaited his arrival there.
Nicolai ran through the woods at a terrifying pace. The choo-choo was just ahead. He could not keep up with his mother who crushed his left hand with her paw. In his other, he cradled his Pookie, a stuffed rabbit. She dragged him now through a bush and Pookie’s eye caught on a branch and popped out. He screamed and tried to wrestle himself free. Through his tear-stained eyes he could see similar dramas played out among the trees. It must be hundreds, he thought, and saw Silva, a schoolmate of his. “Silva,” he called.
“Nicky, the train. Hurry. We must get to the train!” she yelled back. They did make the train. Cram
ped in a car, he cuddled his rabbit in a corner. A red string poked out where a button (eye) once looked upon the world. He cried himself to sleep. He was safe. When he woke up he noticed that the soft swaying of the train had been replaced by a violent shaking. His eyes opened on a soldier in a blue uniform, decorated with gold and silver that burned his eyes. He screamed.
“Mr. Vicoff?” Where was he? In his stateroom. The Gramercy, yes, America. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and looked up. He asked the soldier who he was and found out that the soldier was in fact a police officer. He requested that if Nicolai would please dress and come to the deck they would like to ask him a few questions.
Arriving on deck, Nicolai saw that they were docked at a pier. Scattered about the deck were small groups of passengers, each accompanied by one of the officers. On the port side of the ship a plank had been lowered to the dock and presently some crew members he recognized were carrying two long stretchers down it. The stretchers were covered with white sheets. The officer who had wakened him found him again and brought him up to the bridge. There they entered a door which led to a large room. In the center of the room in a chair much too large sat Antonini, eye blacker than ever. Two men in suits were nodding to each other. When they finished their silent communication they let Antonini leave and asked Nicolai to sit in his place.
They asked him about Elisabeta. She’s been dead for some time, he told them. No, they corrected him, and Nicolai heard their tale. Some time in the early morning his Iberian love and her husband had been killed. Nicolai had been seen in the dining room with them and did he know anything at all that might be helpful. No, he wished to tell him, but could not speak. He welled up with tears and his eyes requisitioned the required moisture from his mouth, leaving it dry. They offered him some tea and he greedily accepted. He told them what he knew (which was little) and left out mention of their planned rendezvous. They let him go then. “No further questions.”
“Only,” Nicolai asked, “What killed them?”
“Irreconcilable differences.” They laughed.
Nicolai started down the ladder and then stopped because he’d forgotten to return the mug. When he did stop he tripped and the mug slipped from his grip, and from his new vantage pointface down on the floorhe watched it tumble down the ladder and roll to the edge of the deck. There it achieved, without falling, a unique balance. He began a descent to retrieve it, but before he could reach the mug, a Pakistani gentleman stepped a little bit too near it and sent the mug soaring into the harbor, leaving only a puddle which went drip-drip off the side of the boat.
Nicolai opted not to explore Boston and went instead to his cabin. He was glad to find his room empty. Her husband must have learned of the affair, he reasoned. Or perhaps not. Perhaps she tired of his free-wheeling ways. Nicolai opened the porthole set in the wall. He leaned his head through it and breathed in all the oxygen he could hold and when he’d done, a droplet bounced off of his nose. He retracted his head and stuck his hand out to test if more rain was coming and discovered that it was not rain at all, but a viscous red fluid. He immediately dove for Franz’s bucket and unleashed his disgust in a flood of tears and mucus. Empty of all he could spare (and some he couldn’t), he fell on his back and choked on his sobs. He brought his hand to his face to clear way the tears and had to laugh at it’s scent. He laughed until a sharp pain in his stomach prohibited any more joviality. I am a fool, a fool. For of course, he now realized, they certainly would have cleaned up the blood; and he laughed himself back to sleep.
The next thing Nicolai saw was Franz’s derriere. The fat man was leaning over his bunk and placing things in a large suitcase. Nicolai looked out the window. The sun was much higher, but they were still at the dock. I must have slept only a few hours. He stood up in what little room Franz left. The Veronese’s beds were stripped and their closets empty. They must be remaining in Boston, he thought. Nice town, but not for me, and then out loud, “I can’t wait to see Lady Liberty’s light!”
“You’ll have to make a special trip then,” Franz said without looking at him, “We passed that fifteen minutes ago.” My God, he thought, New York already. He quickly looked out the porthole. It was true, he had slept through it. Why hadn’t anyone wakened him. Franz finished packing his trunk and a waiting porter removed it. “Well Nicolai, good-bye. I only hope I don’t have to bring you any more messages.” He laughed heartily at his own joke and punched Nicolai on the shoulder.
When he was gone, Nicolai hurriedly threw all of his belongings into a bag. He could already see a line forming at customs and wanted very much not to be last. He checked his passport and visa and called a porter. He then went up to deck. The sun was shining brightly. New York harbor. Liberty was not visible from where they had docked, but someone pointed out to him that it was just around that island over there. He tipped the porter who brought him his bags and took his place in line. Franz somehow had gotten to the front and Nicolai saw him duck into a waiting car. Antonini and Alligheri were met by a group of similar looking men who disappeared singing around a corner. Two hours later he passed through customs losing only some fruit he’d taken to eatbut had forgottenand stepped onto American soil. As he crossed into the street a yellow taxi cab squealed up from behind and stopped, blocking his way, an unshaven face looked at him and beckoned him to enter. Nicolai opened the door and they zoomed away.
Chapter 2
It has been said that America’s most titillating resource is her women. Nicolai had heard this many times both before and during his voyage; whilst en-route a cabinmate of his would always bring up the subject and then in a throaty voice murmur, “Women” and fall into uncontrollable, evil laughter. Nicolai assumed this to be the symptom of some long undiagnosed neurological disorder, but subsequent experience bore out that most unusual testimony. They were everywhere: walking on the street, in the laundry parlors, on subterranean transport. He even saw one in a tree, singing like a chicken. No, he thought, no chickens in trees. Their mere presence was a pain to him. Some developmental misstep, some important phase of maturity left out of his juvenile education made it impossible for Nicolai to function around a woman he found attractive; more than that though, attraction itself was not enough to disable his bladder control. It was direct confrontation with that attraction, and his inability to act upon it, that drove him insane (much too harsh, crazy). He could watch, he could listen, and he could think (Lord, could he ever), but to act, to that he had never been driven (well, perhaps once, with devastating results). It was in response then to the throng of cuties in New York that he ceased all outside explorations and locked himself up in his room.
Then one afternoon he made a discovery. The shower in his bathroom was much too small. Essentially it was a bath tub which had been convertedusing several visible pipesinto a shower head at just under chest level, requiring the bather to stretch and squirm in the most uncomfortable ways in order to moisten consecutive body parts. An added difficulty presented itself when one tried to prop themselves against the wall and was greeted by a more than mild electrical shock from the exposed pipes. Nicolai’s discovery was not that American plumbers were an ingenious lot, more skilled in geometric innovation than functional mediocrity, but that when he achieved the perfect stasis between electrical neutrality and cleanliness he could see beyond the glass paned window in his apartment, through a littered courtyard, and into a small bathroom across the way (and just a shimmy to the left) and that that other, opposite (negative to my positive, he thought) bathroom was oft and only used by a succulent young woman.
Nicolai began spending a majority of his time in the bathroom. He imagined what would transpire if he were questioned on this behavior. Spending a lot of time in the bathroom, are we?, he would be asked. He’s the one! You, you’re the sickoid who’s been watching me!, he would be accused. Is it true? Is it true? Is it true? Nicolai knew what he would do. He would look them in the eyes, smirk his face, and pat his belly. American diet,
you know. They would smile, the picture of embarrassment, and Nicolai would take a swig of the pink stuff, wiping off a fluorescent mustache on his sleeve. That is how I shall handle all those busy-bodies. While accostations seemed a distant possibility, one pressing problem he did run into was that five or eight showers a day began to wear on his complexion (nasty wetdry wrinkles), but Nicolai found that by crouching in a small niche beneath the window he was able to view his visioness just as well. Since her apartment was reversed, Nicolai’s angle afforded him a panoramic of all her fixtures; nothing, though, beyond into the fertile ground of general living.
Nicolai was satisfied with his situation and it was a collage of unique fortuities that made that situation so amenable. Initially, he was to be placed in a lower level apartment as he had requested when arranging the lease. The landlord, however, seemed to have no idea of Nicolai’s pending arrival and apologized but he had just let his sole vacant ground floor apartment (garden apartment), but he had a wonderful space only six flights up which while being a little more expensive was the cream-of-his-crop. Nicolai saw no choice, The Spruce Ridge House was the only building he could find offering a month-to-month lease, and he took it. Then, after having accustomed himself to seventy-two steps (counted twice) a knock came at the door. Visitors already? He looked through the eyeport and a bright flash momentarily blinded him. Recovering, he looked again; what’s this, a badge? He opened the door and found his landlord, quivering slightly and flanked by two stern-suited men who pushed Nicolai out of the way and immediately began taking some measurements. The landlord took him aside and cordially explained that there was a slight problem, but would he mind (no choice) switching rooms. It was only one more flight up and around the bend and usually it would cost considerably more per month but, considering distress and all, they’d make an even swap. So eleven steps (mental note: recount) and several paces more, Nicolai arrived present predicament. The second fortuity was of course due to modern shower design. The third was a double blessing, for the building suffered from a lack of hot water which prevented the bathroom windows from fogging and at the same time provided for a slew of needed cold showers.
I Thought My Uncle Was A Vampire, But He Was Just A Creep Page 3
