by Brian Hodge
Napoleon behind the wheel, edgy now as well, rigid with scrutiny, “Just let me call Mr. Andrew, he’s very clear, don’t be giving rides without him saying so.”
Through clenched teeth: “Just unlock the door.”
Napoleon, turning his head away, to look straight ahead.
“Unlock the fucking door!”
Only then did it dawn on him that Napoleon must have been looking at something. His own head, slow turn, thinking he could hear his neck creak — everything was that intensified, every heavy heartbeat and popping bead of sweat and brittle breath had been mere buildup. The heightening of all awareness, to lead him to this moment. It was nearly sexual in its totalbody experience; no wonder hanged men spasmed one last orgasm into their pants.
The man—
The shotgun—
The eruption.
Penetrated, then, in the grip of something so much larger, that swept him off his feet to hurl him toward the concrete wall, boneshatter, his joyous burst not white but red, and eons later, at last he fell. Everything alive and vivid around him, and he was a part of it all, had been broken down and integrated into the whole. Engine’s roar and screech of limo tires, taillights receding before him and a cloud of exhaust in his face while a second wild blast shattered glass.
Gone…? Gone.
More footsteps descending the ramp from above. Partners in death, now joined. Had assassins been on Noah’s ark, traveling two by two? And here they were. They stood as tall as gods.
Poised above him, so much work yet to be finished, and the only thing wider than his eyes was his silently gasping mouth.
And then they let him have it there, too.
Hyde Park Village was like a prairie dog town for yuppies. Weekend, weeknight, it never failed. The only difference in timing was their numbers. Fussy busybodies strolling the narrow little streets, small upscale shops, très chic, and even the palm trees seemed cleaner. Wednesday evening, it could be worse, and Justin found a curbside parking place with minimal hassle.
Walking briskly, long stride, hands in pockets to minimize the flapping of the dark jacket that hit him at mid-thigh. He veered around a trio of window-shoppers, women who looked no older than he was, and if there was anything less than a platinum card among the three, he’d have been surprised. Never truly comfortable here, as if he would someday be walking along, minding his own business, then see fingers pointed in accusation, and hear a disdainful outcry: HE doesn’t belong here. GET HIM!
Meanwhile, Leonard had gone full-blown neurotic on him. This should be interesting.
J. B. Winberie was a corner place, indoor-outdoor, the choice was yours. Justin spotted him, solo at a white table behind the white sidewalk railing. Just follow the billowing smoke, like a cloud pillar on a desert trek for new lands.
Leonard Greenwald was a man under the shredding influence of whatever came after stress. Face, loose and pale, with a thick coat of sweat. Jittery hands, one keeping a constant cigarette burning, the other at his drink. They were not alone out here, other sidewalk dwellers at nearby tables, ostensibly there for drinks and sandwiches and conversation, but Justin knew these strangers had gotten lucky: Leonard was the real show tonight. You could tell it in the oblique glances, the perceptible hush on Justin’s arrival that never would have fallen had Leonard merely been one more reveler running a tab.
Always that terrible fascination in witnessing the collapse of another, there but for the grace of God and superior intellect go I … and could you talk a little louder?
Leonard acknowledged him with a weak nod, an even weaker smile, all twitches and nicotine mainline. Even his hair looked unhealthy. Wetting his lips, having a hard time getting started.
“I guess this is where I’m supposed to tell you this better be good,” Justin said. “But, uh … I can see it probably is.”
Leonard gulped at his drink, sour face at the harsh burn. “Bad timing? April, I mean?”
“No. She’s painting, it’s okay.”
He finished his drink, soured again, pushed the lonely jumble of melting ice cubes aside. From across the table his breath was toxic, his voice a low scratch. “I never liked Scotch anyway.”
“Len,” Justin said, firmly, made him look up. Tone and eye contact saying the rest: Whatever it is, out with it.
“There’s a … a decision I have to make. And I can’t do it alone. You? When it comes down to it, out of anybody at the agency I know, who’s involved in this, when you want to, you can be about the most bloodless there is. You just don’t look back, do you?”
Justin, focusing, pinpoint sharp. “Involved in what?”
“I decided to work late tonight, do some cleanup in my files.” He started to take another hit off the watery remains of his earlier Scotch. Arm relaxed, then rigid. Trembling, and then the glass went arcing off the table to shatter.
And the noise Leonard was making all at once, this was the worst of it, Justin sitting stupid and helpless and looking into Leonard’s face as the man’s eyes went hazy, faraway a moment, then back with greater vengeance, wholly in the here and now, and the moment was ghastly.
Leonard looked as if he were trying to swallow, though was unable to, with a froglike bulging of his throat. Eyes huge and popping, then a muffled whine arising, fists slamming onto the table, and by now he had the blatant attention of those who had before only watched by stealth. Justin started to rise, to get behind him, the Heimlich maneuver coming to mind, but no, that couldn’t be right, Leonard wasn’t eating, hadn’t even gotten the empty glass to his mouth, so why couldn’t he breathe?
Leonard’s lips parted then, and it was as if he were some enormous infant full of terror and rage — dinnertime, let that latest mouthful of hated food slide back out. Yes. Very much like that, a huge rejected slab of raw meat, bursting past his teeth, past his lips, thick with blood weeping from red cracks across its hide—
Such cries arising from everyone present to witness, and Justin wasn’t so sure but that his own voice hadn’t been added to the din, and what the hell was it—
His tongue, HIS TONGUE—
And that was it, wasn’t it, Leonard’s tongue suddenly swollen a size never intended for the human mouth and throat. Like a beef tongue lolling fat and heavy from his face.
His chair capsized to dump him to the sidewalk beneath a darkened Tampa sky. Leonard stared into the cold depths of the infinite while thrashing in frenzy, Justin kneeling beside him with hands of obsolescence.
What must the rest of that huge bleeding tongue be like, still inside, down at the root? The other nine-tenths of the iceberg. Justin grabbed a soup spoon from somebody else’s table, maneuvered it like a doctor’s wooden depressor, stomach rolling when he saw the thick spongy mass flex beneath he metal. Lost cause, there was just so much, he would have to cut, to cut, and there was no way he could do that.
He wanted to run until his lungs ached. Didn’t Leonard just say he never looked back? Surely here was a sight worth putting behind him.
But Justin stayed put, blood on his palms and spit on his fingers, and the only dim blessing of the evening was that Leonard’s convulsive suffocation was at least over quickly.
It only seemed like forever.
Chapter 14
Forensics
A lot of them looked at him differently in the days to follow, in the hallways of Segal/Goldberg Advertising. It was never something Justin was able to qualify, but was rather like a whispered breath insinuated beneath innocuous conversations on banal subjects.
Leonard Greenwald, dead; Justin there to witness. Surely this dreamlike unease after the fact would feel different had there been the comfort of an explanation.
But they were denied that. Leonard’s death had been freakish and grotesque, shrugging off attempts at easy explanation. And here at the agency, Justin had nearly forgotten he wasn’t normal. Perhaps it was genuine, and maybe it was paranoia, but his abnormality seemed an issue again, after more than a year. He was, after all, already anointed in the wa
ys of sudden death and exotic tragedy. Now the mystique had been renewed, and if before it had been merely secondhand news, it was now reborn under their noses.
The autopsy on Leonard Greenwald remained inconclusive, cause of death theorized to be a hyperallergic reaction to some as-yet-unidentified substance. That he had suffocated on his own tongue was not in dispute, nor was this even unheard of. Sudden virulent swelling of the lungs, bronchial tubes, and mucous membranes, had occurred with seafood allergies. Pilots of crop dusters could die from reactions to organophosphates. The venom in stings from bees, wasps, and hornets had claimed victims.
But even the most malignant inflammations occurred over several minutes, sometimes as many as twenty from the onset of symptoms. Not a matter of seconds. And in postmortem tests, every conceivable pathological idea was shot down.
The unexplainable could put an uneasy spin on anyone’s death.
Don’t look at me, Justin wanted to tell his coworkers. Those who dealt with him as if bizarre tragedy were contagious. I was just home to answer the phone at the wrong time, is all.
What Leonard had wanted to talk about? Too many possibilities, not enough particulars. At first glance, with Leonard keeping company with a smoldering ashtray, Justin had wondered if the guy’s marriage had fractured. He’d seen the look before, playboy of the western world realizing too late that he was losing what mattered after all. Or maybe Len had come from a visit to the doctor, diagnosed with some venereal souvenir from that weekend in New Orleans.
But that phrase, that one phrase: out of anybody at the agency I know, who’s involved in this… It had to narrow things down, didn’t it?
Friday night he was still running it through his head, what they had been mutually involved with. Since his arrival at the agency, accounts alone numbered around fifteen, not to mention the friends, coworkers, and acquaintances in common. And with them came every little tactic, rumor, and innuendo of agency politics.
The Caribe thing came to mind, as if he should at least consider it, then dismiss it. Though they were hardly involved there; just that residual guilt floating around, and who needed it? On the way up to the Segal/Goldberg offices, he swore to himself he wouldn’t think of that anymore.
Eleven o’clock on Friday night; never was he more guaranteed of solitude. The building security guard — Angel, a pudgy Cuban with hair gone silver, face as brown as a pecan — let him in downstairs to the office tower’s lobby and joked with him all the way to the elevator. Up he went, alone, express-style.
A soft electronic chime announced his arrival, eleventh floor, and he dug his keys from his jacket pocket. Let himself in through the glass double doors. The Segal/Goldberg logo was painted onto the glass, clean as a razor’s cut, sans serif lettering with half a sun underlapping the right side.
Enough lights still burned along his usual path back, the familiar gauntlet. Here the ferns, there the rubber tree. He knew without checking the trash cans that the custodial staff had yet to make it by. Carpet nap still mashed by ten thousand footfalls.
The Creative Department he found darkened, though. Their bullpen of partitioned corrals waiting for the herd again, come Monday morning. By night it looked so much smaller and inconsequential, without the bustle, without the ulcerous adrenaline squeezed out by the pressure of looming deadlines.
Onward.
Leonard’s office was another hallway distant, Account Exec Row. They rated individual offices, with highly coveted windows. Stand in the darkened doorway and behold, Tampa by night, that panorama of nocturnal feeders framed like a living portrait that changed at every glance.
Justin clicked on Leonard’s light. By no means sprawling as offices went, but until this moment it had never looked to have so many hidden nooks and crannies. He didn’t even know what he was looking for.
Leonard, man, what was it you wanted to tell me?
Justin sat, the chair unfamiliar beneath him, the depressions left by another pair of cheeks. The desktop alone was a paper Alps, and he shuffled through each stack, scanning pages, files, random jottings on memo pads and yellow adhesive slips. It could have been anything.
The drawers were next, and these were harder to go through. Desk drawers were for grieving; that was where the true person lived. Leonard Greenwald the account exec may have been all across the desktop, but inside the drawers, as often as not, he was just Len. Small personal treasures, reminders of the man, faults and all. Big bottle of Mylanta, next to a pint of J&B. A matchbook, three gone, from some trendy downtown bar, a number scratched inside the cover in what Justin recognized as Leonard’s boozy hand. A stack of crayon drawings — Daddy at work, one was titled. Justin smiled with a bitten lower lip. Which of Leonard’s two kids saw him as orange, with green hair? These seemed so deliberately positioned in the drawer, so perfectly aligned, the care could not have been accidental.
Never once had Justin considered him the kind of man who kept his kids’ crayon masterpieces within quick view at the office.
Apparently he’d been wrong. Not the first time. And he was learning nothing here. This was looking more and more like a fool’s errand.
The funeral was tomorrow, and he would be there, of course. Why didn’t that seem enough? Why this compulsion to still hear Leonard out, even after he was dead and cold? Whatever he had been on the verge of saying.
Justin turned out the lights and left the offices.
The guy could have at least made it easier on him.
Sure. Kick Leonard when he’s down.
“Why couldn’t it have rained?” Justin said. “It’s too nice a day for a funeral.”
April leaned in, squeezed his hand harder. “There’s no such thing.”
He looked into the sky, blue November, subtropical. Only a few clouds, and even these were the jaunty, fluffy kind. Those that dreamers at looked to find shapes while lying on their backs and counting elephants in flight. Eastern Tampa, suburbs dwindling to country flatlands, palm trees having given way to pines. As good a place for a cemetery as any.
“A sunny funeral, it just reminds you you’d rather be somewhere else. Anywhere. Doing anything.”
“Does it remind you of Erik’s?” And she was so gentle, saying that. April had that knack.
“Yeah. That too.”
That unwelcome déjà vu of another funeral, another state, last year. Best friends or coworkers, these farewells were all the same: too formal and too early in life, and too scripted for any goodbyes that would truly have meant anything.
Leonard Greenwald had been a Lutheran, and the turnout at the funeral home had been heavy. Family Justin had never heard of, beyond the immediate; coworkers whom it seemed strange to see out of context, as if they had no lives beyond the agency. He and April were properly solemn and somber of dress, he in gray, she in navy. Their whole pew in the chapel uncomfortable and shifting too much, the air conditioning on too high.
Next, the convoy east to the cemetery, headlights at high noon. They lost a few to attrition, a smaller crowd arriving at this necropolis, the quiet earth and its sleepers. The white hearse down on a gravel drive, and Justin and April hanging back from the burial site. Still waiting for the pallbearers to unload Leonard’s bronzed chariot into the afterlife.
“When I was a little girl,” said April, softly, her cemetery voice, “my favorite aunt died of cancer. I was four, maybe? I barely remember much about her now. But I remember how much it frightened me to think of her dead. I used to picture her sitting beneath the ground, in this little cramped hole. Looking up at the daylight, and listening to people walking overhead … wishing she could go back up and join them. That was my first concept of death.”
Justin smiled. Amused, touched. Tender. “Like a time-out penalty that lasts forever.”
“And she would be shivering all the time, because she felt so cold.”
“When did you get the story straight?”
“I don’t know, for sure. Have I, yet?”
The pallbearers had lat
ched on to the coffin rails, were beginning that final march to the grave. All in step, two, three, four. April started to drift along again, as well, holding to Justin’s arm. Soft ground; high heels could be treacherous.
“I just sort of remember starting to notice how hard people seem to laugh at visitations. As long as you’re not standing by the open coffin, everything’s so much funnier. Because everything’s so much more intensified, I guess.”
“You need the laughs more.”
“My grandfather died when I was in high school, just a few days after I had my appendix out. My cousins and I got to talking at the visitation. About Grandpa, the pranks we used to play on him, and the way he’d let us think he never saw them coming. I got to laughing so hard I popped my stitches and they had to run me back to the emergency room.”
He laughed, inappropriate time and place, but did it ever feel good. He stifled it as best he could. “Leave it to you to upstage a funeral.”
The final words at the gravesite: coffin poised beside its hole, folding chairs for family and a transplanted garden, just waiting to wither. The final prayers for survivors and soul. It never took long at this stage. They were heading back to the car in ten minutes, soft murmurs of surrounding conversations growing louder with every step away.
“Excuse me…”
Justin felt the tap on his shoulder, turned. A stranger, never seen before this day. Medium height and pattern baldness, no comb-over to camouflage. The suit was quality, tailored, but the tie needed dry-cleaning. Nobody’s perfect.
“You worked with Leonard, did you? You were with him Wednesday night?”
Justin nodded, flashed a quick look at April, her guarded neutrality at this intrusion. Said nothing.
“One of the family pointed you out. I’m Doctor Arthur Dirkson. The Greenwalds’ family physician.” They shook; his grip so firm and smooth and cool, he had to be a doctor. Musing, then, “I don’t come to funerals very often, I’m sorry to say. It’s like admitting … failure. But I digress.”
