by Sells, W. G.
“Run!” he yelled and headed back toward the elevator.
Eau de Chèvre
[Previously in Traverse, Inc. – Julie Peters arrives at the nineteenth floor to begin her first day on the job only to discover no one there seems to know anything about her, Traverse, Inc., or Mr. Peepers. Once back in the elevator, Scooter directs her to the proper part of the building by sending the elevator sideways. When Scooter escorts her down a long, dimly-lit, narrow hallway to the Teddy Roosevelt poster entrance, an alarm sounds and gunshots go off. Scooter quickly leads Julie back to the elevator....]
Scooter opened the elevator door and pushed me inside.
“Go to six, get out, turn left and take the stairs down to the lobby the rest of the way,” he said hurriedly, and then pulled a pistol from his waistband. I didn’t move. I must have been staring at the pistol too long.
“Julie!”
“Yes.”
“Six!”
“Got it!”
“Good. See you later,” he said and turned to run back towards Teddy.
I went to push six but my body was shaking so badly my finger almost hit seven. I steadied myself and finally got it right. The door closed and I was about to breathe a heavy sigh when I heard two more gunshots. My sigh got caught in my throat as my stomach shot up to meet it. I retched and orange juice and bagel with cream cheese flooded my mouth, my nose, and the elevator floor. My eyes blurred with tears and my throat burned with stomach and citric acid. I choked and backed away from the puddle to lean against the side of the elevator.
There was a song playing through the speaker but my brain couldn’t make out what it was as the elevator went sideways for a few seconds and then paused before heading downwards. I wiped my eyes to be able to see the floor numbers descending, but I couldn’t focus. My knees were shaking and I was seconds from losing the rest of the orange juice through a lower cavity.
C’mon, Julie. Get it together. The ride from nineteen to six seemed to take both an eternity and to go way too fast. I didn’t know which was worse – being in the elevator or having to exit, but before I could figure out my feelings, the elevator door opened.
It was surreal to one minute be in a deserted hallway gunfight, to then throw up in a sideways moving elevator, and then enter what seemed to be the regular goings-on of a normal office environment. I wiped my eyes and my mouth and willed my feet to start moving.
I tried not to look at anyone as I turned to the left and headed for the stairway. Sound was muffled in my ears, but I could hear the floor’s receptionist on the phone telling someone that she would leave a message for someone else and then she stopped in mid-sentence – was she looking at me? I sensed other people walking about tending to their own business. In my state of mind they were only shadows of people – out of focus phantoms with folders full of papers and promises, pens readied to record the utterances of others more worthy of their ink - but did they all just stop in mid-stride and look at me?
I tried not to let them know I was noticing as I opened the stairway door and headed for the steps. When the door closed behind me, I listened for anyone in the stairwell above and below, but the only sound was the clunking of my new Gucci heels, the jangling of my new Michael Kors clutch, and the pounding of my quickly aging racing heart.
I clunked my way down each level, stopping at the last step and peering around the corner to see if anyone was looking through the tiny four-by-eight inch glass window of the doors marked fifth…fourth…third…and second…floors.
As I reached the lobby floor I paused at the doorway to straighten my hair and blouse and to check the Gucci’s for breakfast. Clean. That’s good. I focused my eyes, and put my hands on my face and took a deep breath. Okay, you can do this.
I looked through the door’s glass and saw sunlight coming from the right side – obviously the side where the main entrance would be. People were passing by the door and talking as if nothing out of the ordinary was going on. Good. I turned the handle, opened the door, and walked toward the light…
“Julie Peters!” a man’s voice called out almost immediately from behind me.
Shit. I kept walking like I didn’t hear, my knees somehow striding against the buckling they were begging to do.
“Ms. Peters!”
“Yes,” I said and turned my head with nonchalance, as if the Maître d had said, “Excuse me, ma’am, but your table is ready.” Wonderful, may I sit near the exit?
My feet kept moving as I saw a very well-dressed man who oozed federal employment on a level far exceeding the exclamation of any pedestrian pledge or conventional motto. He looked like a man who took a solemn oath in a marble-walled, underground, torch-lit hall while sipping goat’s blood from an ornate silver chalice – the result of which was the need to wear sunglasses on cloudy days.
“Please come with us, Ms. Peters,” he said quietly and firmly, motioning with his head as if the other sun-glassed men coming towards me from all angles were with him. They were. They surrounded me and clasped my arms, and all I could see was my disheveled reflection in their shaded eyes. My head swooned from the array of men’s cologne seemingly layered with citrusy top notes of orange; heart notes of toasted pumpernickel bagel, and a base note of musky goat’s blood tempered with fear.
“I’m…sorry,” I choked out, “but…you…must…have…me… confused…”
“…with another Julie Peters who used to work for Senator John Hughes and is now employed by Traverse, Inc?” He finished my sentence with an exclamation point, question mark, and end quote.
My knees finally gave in and my mouth stayed open longer than the door to their car as they whisked me inside and sped off down the street.
Prison or Jail?
[Previously in Traverse, Inc. – Julie Peters had been taken on an exclusive elevator ride to the headquarters of Traverse, Inc. only to wind up running for her life as gunshots rang out. As she headed out the main doors of the building, she was accosted by a group of government agent- types who whisked her into a car and sped away.]
The ride seemed an eternity as no words were exchanged. I thought of Scooter and Tree and Peepers and the rest and hoped they were okay. They were big boys and girls playing big boy and girl games and knew the consequences. I still felt very much a bystander to the overall picture, but my heart went out to them.
After being shoved inside the car, I made up my mind not to protest my innocence or feign ignorance, but I was utterly surprised that the four men in the vehicle were content to sit in silence. It was clear that they knew who I was and who I had come to see, so there seemed no use in their questioning me or in my pretending, but I had expected some sort of interrogation. I guessed they didn’t want or need my confession or denial. So what did they want?
I only felt awkward when we stopped at lights or when pedestrians broke from the curb to halt traffic en mass, and preferred it when the scenery spun by in a blur of people, cars, and buildings, as inertia suspended the sense and feeling of reality. Reality? If this is real, then why are they taking ME? I don’t know anything. It’s my first day on the job, for heaven’s sake!
The thoughts came from nowhere – especially given my previous state of total surrender. When your breakfast comes up and your knees go down, it’s pretty much a sign of capitulation – except I wasn’t as played as I thought and I was getting mad. This little buzz kill thinks he’s gonna sit here and not explain himself, well, he’s got another thing coming. They should have handcuffed me.
“Where are you taking me?” I asked the one in the front passenger seat – the one who had called out my name and who commanded the others. “If you know all about me then you know today was my first day with Traverse Incorporated. What the hell do you want with me?”
I paused and gave him a chance to speak. He didn’t move. There wasn’t even a twitch in his ear as he sat staring out the front glass. I took another tack.
“What happened to the people in the building? Did you shoot t
hem? Are they dead?”
We were moving at a faster pace having hit the parkway and my captors seemed to be content with allowing me to rant. The one on my left sat with hands folded in his lap. The one on my right had one arm stretched behind me and the other on the door rest. He was the bigger of the two and the one who could grab me the fastest. I picked him for the first salvo - a shot to the nuts. When the one on the left lunged for me I’d give him an elbow in the throat, and front passenger seat Buzz Kill was gonna get a Gucci in the mug when he finally turned around. I’d figure out the driver on the fly and then maybe they’d answer me. Probably not, but what exactly do I have to lose. I gave him one last chance.
“Listen, I know you are just doing your job, but that’s all I was going to do too - begin a job. I’m not an enemy of the state, so please don’t treat me like this and at least answer my questions.”
I paused again. Nothing. Okay then, on the count of three – nuts – throat – face …ready…set…
“We have a job for you too,” Buzz Kill said.
I was floored. Another second and they would have had something to talk about at their back room debriefing meetings. “So, will someone please explain what happened to you guys?” “Well boss, that Julie Peters chick kicked the shit out of us during transport. Ben might never have children, Stu lost his larynx and my eye popped out from her Gucci heel. We still haven’t found our driver….”
“What kind of job do you have exactly?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Why would I work for you? The people in that building helped me when no one else would, and you go and shoot them and expect me to work for you? Are you nuts?”
“We didn’t shoot anyone,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Yeah, sure,” I said. “I heard the shots – four of them.”
“It wasn’t us. We had one team on-site. Mine. And we were downstairs the whole time waiting for you.”
“Bullshit!” I’d had enough. “You could have picked me up before I got into the building.”
“I was told to wait and get you on the way out.”
“You were told…” I couldn’t even finish what he had just said. The implications were strange to say the least. Someone wanted me to go into the building, go through the painful process of finding my way to where I was supposed to go in a secret location inside an office complex, and then get flushed out by gunshots….
“Who the hell told you to do that?”
“I can’t say.”
Yes you can, you mother…focus, Julie!
“Well, if someone told you to take me wherever you are taking me because someone had a job for me, then it stands to reason that that someone is going to explain to me what the job is. Right? So, please, I think it’s safe to tell me who that someone is.”
“You are meeting the Director.”
“The Director of the CIA?” What the hell! Why on God’s green earth would the Director of the CI-fricken –A want me to do anything? This makes no sense…
“Not the CIA,” he said.
“FBI?” he shook his head sideways. I was getting annoyed again and looking to hurt Ben’s crotch.
“Are we going to play twenty questions?” I asked.
“No. We’re here.”
I looked up and out the front window of the car and saw a huge building with slit windows, barbed wire fences, gates, and a big sign that read, “Maryland Correctional Institution – Jessup.”
I had to ask. “So, the director is in prison or directs the prison?”
“It’s a jail not a prison, and you can ask the director yourself, Ms. Peters.”
The car stopped and the big guy got out and motioned for me to exit. Five seconds later their car was gone and I was standing alone in front of the prison or jail. Whatever.
'Scuse me
[Previously in Traverse, Inc. – Julie Peters has been forcefully taken in a car by four men and discovers their “Director,” who is not CIA or FBI, has a job for her. The men drop her off in front of a Maryland correctional jail.]
I stood in front of the jail feeling like a Muggle being dropped off in front of Hogwarts. What possible business could have I have for being here? Gazing up at the massive fortress-like compound I was lost in the myriad of wires, fences, light poles, warning signs and sheer coldness of its existence. I knew that living, breathing people were in there, but it felt totally devoid of life. I was so entranced I didn’t hear the car pull up behind me.
“Please get in, Julie,” a woman’s voice said.
I turned and saw a tiny, gray-haired lady with glasses driving an older-model Buick Skylark. This is the “Director?” Are we going to play bridge? AARP wants me? What the…
“Busy morning, dear,” she phrased as both a question and a statement as I took my seat next to her. I didn’t feel like chitchat as she sped off.
“Where are we going?”
“Just down the road a piece. Hungry?”
No, I already savored breakfast twice, thanks. “Not really. Would you mind if we skipped the formalities and you go ahead and answer some of my questions?”
“Yes, I would mind,” she said in both a sweet and forceful way. “I’ll cover everything, I promise, but first things first, you know - easy does it. We’re going to take this one step at a time.”
First things first - easy does it - one step at a time - Does she know I’m…I turned to look at her and realized my mouth was wide open. I closed it, but not before she saw my expression.
“You like beer, don’t you?”
Damn. Before I could say anything she pulled into the parking lot of the Blob’s Park Bavarian Beer Garden. I had to read the sign several times to make sure I was getting it right. As we got out of the car, I realized she wasn’t going to the front door, but was heading around to the left side of the massive building.
“They’re closed, dear. They don’t open till later this evening for dinner and dancing. We’ll be out of here before then, I promise.”
Dinner and dancing actually sounded quite inviting considering what I had just gone through, though fat, red-faced, brat-eating, beer-drinking, polka-dancing, perspiring men in shorts and suspenders normally scared me. But given my previous circumstances, I suddenly considered myself having gotten over that old hang up. Oompahpah.
We entered through a side door, went through a hallway that passed the kitchen on our left, and into the cavernous great hall, which featured a stage, large dance floor, and enough tables around the perimeter to accommodate three Panzer Corps’. The smell of the place helped me envision the sweaty dancing, sloppy chugging and sausage gorging that went on. On a table in the middle of the dance floor was a large stein of foamy beer and a small cup of black coffee. Does she also know I only drink black coffee? I sighed and sat in front of the coffee.
“The owner is a friend – former client actually,” she said, as she sat down and grabbed the stein with both hands. “We did some work to get her re-opened when she was forced to close by the state.”
I nodded and sipped my coffee as she raised foam to her upper lip. I didn’t care about the owner of Blob’s Park Bavarian Beer Garden, so before she had another chance to speak I cut her off.
“So, who are you and why am I here?”
“Ah, that’s delicious,” she said as she brought the stein down. “My name is Ruth Elliott and you are here to begin your first day of work. You begin tonight, by the way.”
Before I could respond, a large woman with a big smile came out of the kitchen with a tray of food, another stein of beer and more coffee. She said something in German. Ruth chuckled, shook her head sideways, and replied in German. The woman cackled loudly, raised her eyes as she looked at me and said, “Gut luck, dear!”
As the woman walked back to the kitchen I looked to Ruth for translation.
“She wanted to know if you were a con,” she said.
“Oh?
“I told her, no, you were sweet and innocent, but you were g
oing to jail tonight.”
“What?”
I waited as she took a big bite of waffle topped with breakfast sausage and syrup. She was older, maybe seventy-five, but she could wolf down some food – and beer.
“You know the jail where my boys dropped you off? You’re going in there tonight.”
“I’m going to jail?”
“You’re going to lead an AA meeting in the women’s section,” she said, and gulped some more beer. “See the box under the table?”
I looked under the table cloth and saw a small cardboard box with books and pamphlets. I recognized them immediately.
