Unraveling

by Owen Thomas

  “Hey there,” I say casually to her when he is gone.

  “Hey yourself.” She smiles. “Sorry I’m late.”

  “No worries. The case?”

  “The case. What else? I’m telling you, this judge got his license off a cereal-box. You won’t believe what he ordered us to do.”

  She tells me, at great length, what the cereal box judge has ordered them to do and she is right about me not believing. I can’t believe it; but that’s only because I don’t understand most of what she is telling me and I instinctively do not believe what I do not understand, to wit, most of my own life. Tales of discovery violations and protective orders and quashed subpoenas and a tidal wave of new work dominate the discussion through the salad and well into the entrée. I am neither uninterested nor riveted by her words, but I am increasingly relieved to be in the middle of such a familiar tableau. There is strange comfort in watching her talk and eat and go on about her life. There is normalcy here. With every forkful of Leoni’s signature lasagna I devour the lie that this – right here, right now – is my life. I empty my glass, drowning out the howling of the beastly thing in the parking lot that claims to be my life. But that is not my life. This is my life. That, is my fake life, howling and screaming outside of my real life like a haggish, disease-ridden strumpet who has followed me home from a bar I never frequent and who has gotten it into her pickled brain that by asking her the time of day I have asked her to marry me. This is my life. This is my life. This is my life. Mae and I are out to dinner at Leoni’s and she is speaking to me of her own concerns. I concentrate not so much on the meaning of her words as the shape of them at the moment they leave her lips. Dino Paul Crocetti on a ten-song loop tries his best to stir it all together.

  … When you walk in a dream, but you know you’re not dreamin’, signore… Scusami, but you see, back in old Napoli, …

  “So, speaking of all things legal…”

  Mae pivots the conversation unexpectedly with a tone revealing that all of this has been prelude; that we have been engaged in rapport-building small talk so that she might gracefully segue into something far more delicate.

  “There is something we need to talk about, Dave.”

  “Oh?” The possibilities, all of them bad, burn up the synaptic connections and Dino ambles off into noise.

  “The…well, the police have asked to interview me?”

  It is as bad as it is unexpected, and the effect on both my appetite and my burgeoning optimism is instantaneous.

  “What?”

  “The Columbus Police Department called Daryl this morning.”

  “Who the hell is Daryl?”

  “Daryl Slotnick? Heads our litigation group? Real short guy? Christmas party?”

  “Oh, that prick.”

  “He was drunk. You didn’t help things.”

  “Hey. He actually looked like an elf. He shouldn’t have worn the hat. Anyway…”

  “Anyway, they called Daryl and Daryl asked for it in writing, so then we got the letter this afternoon.”

  All of the questions and objections and exclamations get stuck in the doorway of my mouth like a bad Marx Brothers routine. All I can give her is an expression of uncomprehending pain.

  “I know. I know. Dave, just let me…”

  “Who called?”

  “The Colum…”

  “Who? Officer North?”

  “No. It was a woman. Officer Fleming. Carol I think.”

  “Your office represents me. They can’t…”

  “Our office doesn’t represent you, Dave. We were fired. Remember?”

  “But…”

  “Look. They know this is sticky. That’s why CPD is working the request through Daryl. They want to go ahead and get the attorney-client privilege objections on the table so we can work through them.”

  “So you’re objecting.”

  “Of course. But the objections won’t hold.”

  “Why? Why won’t…”

  “First, because I’m not a lawyer. Second, because the firm does not represent you. Third, because even when the firm did represent you they anticipated something like this and they built a Chinese wall…”

  “A what?”

  “A Chinese wall…they call it a Chinese wall…they made sure I had no access to any information about your defense. They made sure I was never a part of your defense or the attorney-client dialogue. Okay?”

  “Whatever.”

  “Fourth, Daryl says that CPD will permit me to have an attorney from the firm sit in on the interview, probably Glenda, and they will agree not to ask for any information which we think is legally protected.”

  “I…I don’t…what does that mean?”

  “It means that the CPD doesn’t care about what your lawyers know. They’re after what I know.”

  “Know about what?”

  “I have no idea, Dave. Suspicious activities. Lifestyle. Habits. Things you may have told me.”

  “Like what, Mae? Like what?”

  “Calm down. Lower your voice. I don’t know, Dave. No one has asked me anything yet. I don’t know. Daryl and Glenda both think it’s an act of desperation. I can’t think of anything I know that would be useful to them. It has to do with either the pending drug prosecution or the investigation into what’s her name.”

  “Brittany.”

  “Brittany. Probably the drugs, though, since that’s what’s set for trial.”

  My stomach is knotting. It feels like it has changed its mind and wants to reject everything I have eaten in the last twenty minutes.

  “When… when will…”

  “Well, the letter requested two hours tomorrow afternoon, but Daryl and Glenda said it will take a couple of weeks of back and forth letter writing before anything happens. Glenda was going to call you and explain but I insisted that I do it.”

  She has reached out and clasped my hand, which is clutching the stem of my glass like a club. There is a slowly dawning understanding that she has deliberately stopped the wheels of a cold and impersonal legal machine to protect my feelings.

  “Thanks, Mae.”

  “I feel really bad about this, Dave. And I care about you.”

  “I know. Thanks.”

  “Glenda has a call in to the Public Defender’s Office. Bobby? Donny?”

  “Lonnie.”

  “Right. Lonnie. You sure you know what you’re doing there?”

  “I can’t afford Glenda.”

  “What about your folks?”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Why?”

  “I can’t.” The candle gutters and spits and the flame disappears up into a black wisp of smoke. “How’d Glenda take it?”

  “You going over to the PD’s? It’s happened before. Money’s always an issue at some point. She’s used to it. I don’t think there’s any hard feelings.”

  “So what are you going to say?”

  “To the…Dave, I don’t even know what they’re going to ask.”

  “About Brittany.”

  “I only know what you told me.”

  “About drugs.”

  “What about drugs? You like pot, but rarely have any. You smoke it casually when someone offers it. You’re not a dealer. You don’t sell. You don’t distribute. I’ve never seen you with more than two ounces at a time.”

  “Coke?”

  “Never in my experience.”

  “Ecstasy?”

  “Not that I know of. Do you do Ecstasy, Dave?”

  The directness of the question is like a small electric shock. There is a moment of paranoid insanity that lasts a lifetime in my head. I realize that she is wearing a wire tucked under one of her breasts and coiled like a snake just beneath the fabric of her blouse. I am being deftly interviewed, as only Mae can do it, for the benefit of a trio of cops wearing headphones in a van parked outside. I have been set up, but good.

  “No, wait.” Mae misinterprets my hesitation. “Don’t answer that. If you’re into X then I woul
d rather not know it. In fact, if you are into any of that shit I really would rather not know. Whatever they ask, I’m not lying about it, Dave.”

  “I don’t want you to lie. I don’t. I don’t have anything to hide. I’ve never done X. I’ve never done coke.”

  “Let’s not even talk about it. I just wanted to let you know …”

  “I’ve smoked a little pot, that’s all.”

  “A little?”

  “Well. Yeah. A little.”

  “Not what I heard.”

  “It wasn’t mine, Mae.”

  “Whose was it? Never mind. I don’t want to know.”

  “A friend.”

  “A dealer.”

  “No.”

  “I don’t want to know.”

  We both pick at what’s left of our food.

  “Sure wish you had listened to me, though,” she says, not looking at me.

  “About what?”

  Now she looks at me. She does not need words.

  “About the pot? About smoking the occasional reefer? That old argument?”

  “Yes, Dave. Drugs are nothing but trouble.”

  “You think all of this is punishment for smoking weed?”

  “I didn’t say punishment.”

  “You think I’m in this mess because I smoked some grass?”

  “Aren’t you?”

  “No. They found pot, okay it was a lot of pot, but it wasn’t my pot, and they found it only when they tossed my home executing a search warrant that was meant to uncover a violin belonging to a girl I have never harmed in any way. They are only interested in me in the first place because they found her crap in my car after an illegal search. I’ve got nothing to do with this stupid kid.”

  “Well, except that you were kissing her in a bar and she gave you her drugs.”

  “No. She did not give me her drugs and I wasn’t kissing her in a bar. She was kissing me against my will and I took her drugs against her will, just to protect her, and I didn’t even know all of those drugs were in there, because all she had even offered me was some pot.”

  “She asked you to get high with her?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “How’d she know you were into that whole scene?”

  “Scene? It’s not a scene, Mae. There’s no scene. It’s just… it’s…”

  “How’d she know?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she didn’t. Maybe it was a wild guess.”

  “Pretty gutsy. You were her teacher.” The past tense is like a knife.

  “Yes. No. I don’t know. It was stupid, not gutsy. This whole thing is ridiculous.”

  “Except that someone was kissing someone and she’s missing and the drugs and her purse were in your possession. And as for the pot…wait, stop, what am I doing? I don’t want to know any of this.”

  “Stop saying that. This is all about Brittany Kline. It’s a misunderstanding. It’s not about me or a lifestyle or… or a scene.”

  Our waiter has made two passes but has obviously felt the vibe and wisely decided to keep moving. Mae scoots her plate away and holds her wine and looks at me, letting the temperature drop.

  …We can sing in the glow of a star that I know of, where lovers enjoy peace of mind... Let us leave the confusion and all disillusion behind… Just like birds of a feather, a rainbow together we’ll find …Vooooooooolare, oh oh…

  “Look. I’m not trying to make you upset. I know you could never hurt anyone. I know you care about your students. Okay? I know that. I think the whole pot thing of yours is unfortunate; you know I always have…”

  “Mae…”

  “But… but I’m inclined to believe that none of it was yours and that all of this is a misunderstanding.”

  “Inclined? You’re inclined?”

  “Yes. And if they ask my opinion, that’s what I’ll tell them. Dave, maybe this thing, this interview, won’t even happen. Maybe it’ll be more trouble than it’s worth. I’ll let you know how it goes, if it goes.”

  …No wonder my happy heart sings… Your love has given me wings… Nel blu, dipinto di blu…

  The waiter senses his opportunity and descends upon us with water and dessert menus, taking away the rest of the abandoned food. Mae opens the menu and reads, knowing that I am still engaged; still plugged into a drama she wants to escape. I watch her as she reads, twisting black locks in her fingers, and I realize that she is not really reading anything. Her eyes are fixed, head motionless. She is thinking. She is not done.

  “I don’t want any more,” she says finally.

  “Me neither. Why did we ever think the food in this place was good? Let’s go someplace else for dessert. Or coffee.”

  “I’m not talking about dessert, Dave.”

  …Tell me quick… Ain’t love a kick… in the heeeeeeead…

  I try to drive home slowly in blackness. I take the back roads, avoiding arteries and looking for spider veins, the smaller and darker the better. If I see other humans, I want to be able to open my door and take them out without four lanes of screaming spectators. I’m in the mood for isolated thumps into crop ditches that will be invisible until morning. Shrieks of surprise devoured into quick silence by a dark, still land.

  But Ben Franklin and Tom Edison have ruined everything. Everywhere I go there is light, even out past Powell Road on the smallest streets I can find. Fucking Ben and Tom. Light everywhere; traffic everywhere; people everywhere. Roads without options angle sharply and unexpectedly and I get shunted off into ridiculously Byzantine neighborhoods designed to keep people from escaping. One dead-end cul-de-sac after another, I try to fight my way back to the 71, changing my strategy as I go. Interstate freeway mayhem is probably exactly the ticket anyway. They want to make me into a criminal? I will show them a criminal. They’ll forget all about Brittany Kline and a little marijuana. John Rambo was just minding his own business when he was arrested for vagrancy and harassed. Just look at what that got them.

  A woman is walking a dog. I pull over to ask for directions back to civilization. The dog, black with a white mark along the length of his nose, barks and lunges at the car. The woman tenses and pulls back. She, along with everyone else, has assumed the worst about me. I roll down the window and ask my question and she relaxes and smiles and begins pointing. The dog takes advantage of the slackened leash to rear up and drape his front paws over the open window. I am convinced that the rest of him is coming too and that he is looking for my throat, which explains my little scream and the alacrity with which my head moves for the passenger seat.

  The woman pulls him off the car laughing, assuring me that he – Mr. Pibb – is harmless. I am forced to laugh with her. I am forced to prove the difference between being startled and being afraid. Mr. Pibb and I bond through the open window until my exposed skin is lathered in slobber and flecked with hair. When she is done pointing and explaining, I thank her profusely to show that none of this bothers me in the least. I wave goodnight as I drive off.

  The 71 is humming with the end of the rush hour surge. I find a slot behind a blue SUV and let the river carry me north into spot-lit darkness. In front of me is a flatbed truck carrying a silver Civic. It’s my car, pre-Eddy Mac makeover, chained to the truck by the axels. It glides effortlessly backwards in front of me. I am overcome with an ineffable sense of shame and inadequacy. Eddy Mac’s flat matte silver does not favorably compare to Honda’s factory silver. Duct tape is more reflective. We are mirror reflections, headlights to headlights, for miles. But it’s like a mirror reflecting the past; the good ol’ days when my life, while maybe tiny and foreign compared to my father’s expectations, still gleamed in its own way; still resembled the others of my make that rolled off the same assembly line. It seems so long ago.

  I deliberately overshoot my exit by a good thirty miles before I turn around and head back south. With the freeway has come perseveration. Navigation is now entirely by rote and my brain is free to endlessly replay the evening, which I have managed to distill down into
a few hard facts that come at me point blank, like baseballs from a self-reloading pitching machine. Whap! Whap! Whap! I have no bat and I wear no helmet.

  The police intend on interviewing Mae Chang. Whap! But why? What do they think she knows? What does she know? What in the hell is there to know? She will tell them that I am no stranger to cannabis. Whap! That’s not good. I once installed a fluorescent light under my bathroom sink and tried to grow my own. I once gained ten pounds in college eating pot brownies. I once talked of buying a parrot and naming him Ganja. Mae knows all of that. Whap! None of that is good. Shit. None of that is good.

  Okay, but what else? What have I told her about Brittany Kline? Nothing that I have not already told Officer North. But can she keep it straight? One slip will sound like new, undisclosed information and I am far from impressed with Mae’s command of the facts. Whap! Not to mention her willful uncertainty. Whap! If they ask her whether I currently use cocaine or ecstasy is she going to just shrug her shoulders and claim she doesn’t know, suggesting that such a thing is even possible? Does she fucking know me or doesn’t she? Ms. Chang, has Mr. Johns been diddling his students? Gee, officer, I really couldn’t tell you. I’m not inclined to think so because I’ve never personally seen him diddle students, but I guess you never really know for sure.

  Are they going to get into sex? Can they ask her about that? Sex? Do I care? I don’t care. Do I? Do I say things in bed? Is there anything weird? Implicating? No. It’s just sex. Right? No threesomes. No toys. No diapers. No porn. Computer porn. Enough of that to turn a laptop into a paperweight, but nothing integrated into the physical act of lovemaking. Okay, some porn once but we weren’t really watching. And the sound was off. Certainly no pain. Well, the spanking. There was the spanking. That was pain. She was upset. But what does that prove except that I got carried away. So I’m impulsive when aroused. Shit; that’s not good either. Whap!

  And who’s going to be asking these questions anyway? Chuck ‘I’m a real man’ North will be asking the questions. Whap! Whap! Whap! Why wouldn’t it be North? Of course it will be him. He’ll be all over Mae like a cheap suit. He’ll take no end of pleasure in asking her every intimate detail about me – and about her – that he can get away with. And he’ll serve up my only lie with relish: We’ll get married soon, I’m sure. Oh, he’ll love to tell her that one. Whap! Whap! Whap!