The Player

by Brad Parks

  “Well, there’s that, and also there’s an accounting thing going on. I didn’t exactly understand it, but I guess the money comes out of different pots, and for tax reasons, it made sense for the city to have a $1.4 million credit in one place and a $1.1 million debit in another. It’s something to do with state aid.”

  “Okay,” I said. You had to love the vagaries of municipal accounting, which were designed seemingly to keep lay people as confused as possible. The problem is, it often had the same effect on the professionals hired to understand them.

  “Except here’s where it gets really good,” Tommy said, getting so excited he had uncrossed his legs and was now leaning forward on the desk. “The city gave Vaughn the cleanup money even though he still hasn’t paid them for the land.”

  “So he’s walking around with what is essentially a free $1.1 million loan, all while owing them $1.4 million.”

  “Yep. My source said no one in city hall wanted to make a big deal out of it, because they were afraid they’d end up looking as bad as McAlister. And the South Ward councilman hadn’t made a fuss because he’s afraid if he presses too hard, McAlister Properties will pull the plug on the project—and I guess he was planning on making McAlister Arms a centerpiece of his reelection campaign. My source said he was starting to think that McAlister might be able to get away with never paying.”

  “Meaning the city would have paid him $1.1 million to take ownership of a property with a fair market value of at least twice that?” I said.

  That, perhaps, started to explain why city hall wasn’t putting any stress on the police department to solve Vaughn’s murder. Men like Pritch and Hakeem Rogers were usually antennae for political pressure—due to the aforementioned axiom about what flows downhill. But neither of them had sensed that pressure this time, because, if anything, it was being applied in the opposite direction. No one in city government wanted this murder to get much attention, and therefore no one was calling the police department to demand justice.

  In short, there was a bit of a stench around Vaughn McAlister, and the less it was fanned, the fewer people would have to smell it.

  “You got it,” Tommy said. “So I’m thinking maybe we do a follow that says something like, ‘Slain developer was broke as a joke.’ You think that would be good?”

  “Well, I’m all for following the money. So yeah, let’s try and do a piece about McAlister’s finances,” I said. “But let’s not put him in the poorhouse just yet. Developers are always playing games with cash flow. He might have just known he could wait a little while before paying Newark, while some of his other creditors were a little more insistent.”

  “Or he could have used it for bribe money,” Tommy said, giggling. Tommy giggled about such wanton breaches of trust from public officials mostly because Tommy giggled about everything.

  “You might want to pull his campaign contributions to see if he tried to do some of it legally,” I suggested. “As for the other stuff, how much of that can we get on the record?”

  “All of it. It’s just going to take a little while. Now that I know what to ask for, I’ve requested the necessary documents from the city clerk’s office. It’s a question of how long they sit on it.”

  “What’s their average these days?”

  “They’ve been pretty good, actually. I’ve got a girlfriend there who helps me out.”

  “A girlfriend with apparently no gaydar whatsoever,” I pointed out.

  “Well, she’s a lot older than me. So who knows? Maybe she has a son that she’s just waiting to set me up with. She’s Puerto Rican and she’s pretty fine for an older woman. I bet if you put her mouth on a guy, it would—”

  “Okay, okay. I don’t want you to have to take a cold shower,” I said.

  “Yeah, speaking of which, your girlfriend is approaching,” Tommy said.

  It said a lot about the precarious state of my existence that I had to turn to discover whom he was talking about. But when I did, I saw Kira O’Brien slinking toward me, wearing one of her conservative work outfits—pink sweater set, gray slacks—with her hair up in a little bun. Seeing her made me feel vaguely guilty, simply because I had been thinking a lot about Tina—for understandable reasons—and quite a bit less about my favorite librarian.

  “Hi, Tommy,” she said.

  “Hey, Keer,” Tommy said.

  Then she looked at me and announced, “Carter, I’ve given this a lot of thought and … I think I’m ready to take the next step in our relationship.”

  * * *

  Sensitive interpreter of social situations that he is, Tommy took that as his cue to leave. Kira planted herself in the seat he had just vacated. I found myself wishing this conversation—wherever it was leading—didn’t have to take place in the middle of the newsroom. Kira was unconcerned about public displays of, well, just about anything.

  “Uh, okay, what next step?” I said, trying to keep my voice hushed.

  “Well,” she said, sitting up very properly, with a special twinkle in her blue eyes. “I know we haven’t really talked about our relationship or put any labels on it. So I don’t want this to be too sudden. And you can tell me if you think it is. You’ll tell me, right?”

  “Uh, yeah, sure, I guess,” I said, but inside I was already flinching.

  “Seriously, I want to be careful that we’re not moving too fast for you,” she continued. “I know how guys are with the C-word.”

  “The … C-word?” I asked. The only C-word I could think of that I had serious problems with was “celibacy.”

  She glanced left, then right, then whispered, “You know, the C-word: ‘commitment.’”

  Oh no. Not now. Not here. I suddenly felt my internal temperature rising. The last time a woman had started talking in these kinds of terms with me, it was a few years back. The girl I had been seeing at the time told me her lease was up, and she strongly suggested—to the point where one could say she informed me—that she was moving in with me. I’ll spare the details and say it ended when she moved out, having strongly suggested and/or informed me that she was having an affair with a guy from her office.

  And it’s not that, under ordinary circumstances, I would mind having a girl as cute and spunky and smart as Kira want to progress our relationship. I mean, true, we had never really had a serious conversation about anything. But that wasn’t the issue. It’s just that, in matters such as these, my circumstances were T-minus nine months from changing dramatically.

  “So,” she continued. “I don’t want you to freak out or anything but…”

  I may have winced as I waited for her next words.

  “I want to take you to the Zombie Ball,” she said. Then added, “As my date.”

  I waited for there to be more. Like, I want to take you to the Zombie Ball and I want you to propose to me there. But there was nothing more forthcoming. Then I remembered: this was Kira. Simple, fun, easygoing Kira. She called it the “C-word” because she was more afraid of it than I was.

  “Oh,” said, feeling my body instantly cool off. “Sure. No problem. When is it?”

  “Friday night,” she said.

  I winced again, but for different reasons. “Ugh, I can’t make it that night,” I said. Kira immediately looked hurt, so I explained, “My sister is getting married this weekend. Friday night is her rehearsal dinner.”

  “You … you have a sister?” Kira asked.

  Like I said, we had never had a serious conversation. “Yeah. She lives in New York and I don’t see her a lot, so I guess you haven’t had a chance to meet her yet.”

  “And she’s getting married?”

  “Yeah. On Saturday,” I said.

  “Around here?”

  “In Millburn, yeah.”

  “Are you … going with anyone?”

  “No,” I said.

  “Oh,” she said, and suddenly she wasn’t looking at me anymore.

  And then, with roughly the same speed as continents divide and mountains grow, it occ
urred to me: Kira wanted to go to the wedding. With me.

  I was so proud of myself for realizing this, I didn’t think about the long-term implications of what I asked next. Let me be more clear about this: I really, truly wasn’t thinking. Sometimes people—and by people, I mean women—don’t get this about guys. They’ll get all haughty and superior and snap, What were you thinking? And that fact is, we weren’t thinking anything at all. We just weren’t.

  This was one of those times. I just cleared my throat and tried to make it sound like I was still in the flow of the conversation. “You want go to with me?”

  “Of course!” she said immediately, her entire face lifting upward, the twinkle back in her eyes. “I mean, it’s your sister’s wedding. I love weddings. Why wouldn’t I want to go?”

  “I don’t know. I just didn’t think you’d be interested. I mean, you do know the only person at a wedding who’s allowed to be in costume is the bride, right?”

  “Wait, you mean I can’t wear my pink Power Rangers outfit?” she said, deadpan, then gave me a wink.

  “Well, as long as it’s not white,” I said.

  She snickered and rewarded me with a genuinely happy smile. “Oh, this is going to be great. I’m so glad you asked me. I actually have the perfect dress for a wedding. I got it last year for my friend’s wedding. There’s just one problem with it.”

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  She rose from her chair, walked over to me, leaned in close, and whispered, “It’s kind of tight. And the only way to avoid having panty lines is not to wear—”

  “Carter Ross!” came a loud, female voice, jolting us both.

  It was coming from the opposite side of the newsroom, from the mouth of Tina Thompson. I looked over and saw she was crooking one finger at me in a repeated motion, the internationally accepted sign for “get your ass in here.”

  “Excuse me,” I said to Kira. “I like where this conversation is going, and I would like to continue it. But in the meantime, I do believe I’m being paged.”

  “Okay,” Kira said. “I can’t wait for this weekend. Rehearsal dinner Friday night, wedding Saturday night?”

  “You got it,” I said.

  With her face still about two feet from mine, she gave me a devilish look that made my insides do a backflip. “We are going to have an awesome time,” she said. “Weddings make me so—”

  “Carter!” Tina hollered again.

  “To be continued,” I said, lifting myself from my chair and walking toward Tina’s office.

  On the way, I heard Buster Hays growl, “I miss the days when it was nothing but guys in here.”

  * * *

  During the final twenty feet of my walk to Tina’s office, I thought hard about what the source of her ire might be. Usually, I was pretty good at knowing my transgressions, a self-awareness I could use to assist in preparing a rigorous defense.

  But, in this case, I was lost. I had put a good scoop in that day’s paper. I was working on a story for the next day’s paper that she—and, more important, Brodie—would like. I had not gone behind her back about anything I could remember. And, I mean, sure, Kira and I had just been talking in rather close quarters, but she kept insisting she didn’t care about that.

  Then I thought, well, maybe I hadn’t done anything wrong. Maybe she was just feeling impatient because deadlines had been moved up for some reason. Maybe the pregnancy hormones were starting to make her a little nutty. Maybe this was no big deal.

  “You wanted to see me?” I said with forced innocence.

  “Close the door,” she ordered.

  Close the door. Never good. I complied.

  “Take a seat,” she said, taking one of the two chairs that faced her desk.

  And that’s when I felt what it was to be a turkey. In mid-November. With a farmer who was sharpening his ax. When Tina really wanted to take my head off, she always chose one of the chairs that faced her desk, because it pointed away from the newsroom. That way, none of the gossips in the room would be able to read her lips. Tina always liked her most serious scolding to be done without closed-captioning.

  My butt had just barely met the chair when she clenched her teeth and bristled, “What the hell, Carter?”

  “Uh, what hell are you referring to?”

  “You didn’t tell anyone my … condition … did you?” she said, fiercely.

  “No. Why would I want to? I’ve barely even had the chance to—”

  “No one?” she demanded again.

  “No.”

  “Not even your mother?” she seethed.

  “My mother? Why would I tell my mother? She’s not exactly the first person I’d rush to with the news that I’m about to have a child out of wedlock.”

  “So you’re sure she has no idea?”

  “Not unless she’s telepathic. I haven’t even talked to her since I got the news myself. Why do you ask?”

  “Because I just got off the phone with her,” Tina said. “She just called and invited me to your sister’s wedding. She wants me at the rehearsal dinner, the wedding, the Sunday brunch, the whole thing.”

  “And what did you say?”

  “What else could I say? I said yes. I don’t seem to be having any luck convincing you to pretend this baby isn’t yours. So, unless you come to your senses, this woman is going to be my child’s grandmother. Your sister is going to be the aunt. Plus, your mom has always been so sweet to me. I couldn’t very well tell her to go pound sand.”

  “You could have said you already had plans.”

  “Yes, I suppose I could have. But I didn’t think of that. In any event, it’s too late now. It’s settled.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” I said.

  I swallowed hard. The implications of my unthinking solicitation of Kira as my wedding date just a few scant moments earlier were now clear to me. For the record: it is generally unwise to ask one woman to a significant family function when another woman is carrying your seed.

  “Sorry I accused you of having told your mom. The last thing I want is anyone’s sympathy. But I’m still just, I don’t know, a little freaked out about this whole thing. I feel like I can’t get my head around it.”

  “Believe me, I know what you mean.”

  Tina’s boil had already cooled to the point where it wasn’t even a simmer. “Well, I guess there are worse things than going to a wedding as your date.”

  I gulped. “Yeah, about that…”

  “What?”

  I wanted to be honest with her and tell her I had just invited Kira so we could share a good laugh about this awkward little predicament. Except there were at least four factors to consider. One, she might not find it so laughable. Two, it wouldn’t be good for the health of my unborn child to make Mommy’s blood pressure spike dramatically. Three, there was an entire newsroom full of eardrums behind me, and I had to be considerate of their pain thresholds. And, four, I’m chicken.

  So I just said, “Never mind.”

  “Okay,” she said, giving me a nice pat on the knee as she got out of her chair and went around to her normal position behind her desk. “By the way, how’s the McAlister follow coming?”

  I enlightened her on the most recent developments, agreed to have something filed by seven, then exited her office. But instead of returning to my desk, I peeled off down the back stairway and out the side entrance—an emergency exit whose alarm had long ago been disabled by the smokers who sneaked out that way to grab a cigarette. It seemed to be clear of loiterers for the moment, so I pulled out my phone and speed dialed the Ross family home in Millburn, with the intention of fixing this little dilemma.

  “Hello,” my mother answered.

  “Hey, Mom, it’s me.”

  “Hi, honey!” she said brightly; then—because I never call during the day—she quickly asked, “Is everything all right.”

  “Yeah, fine,” I said tersely. “Except … Mom, why did you invite Tina to the wedding?”

  “Well, she’s
your friend, dear, and there was an empty seat at your table and I just thought it would be perfect.”

  Oh, it was perfect all right. A perfect disaster. “Mom, did it ever occur to you that if I had wanted Tina at the wedding I already would have asked her?”

  “Well, I thought maybe you were just being obstinate. You get that from your father’s side, you know. What’s the problem? Are you two having a spat?”

  No, Mom, we’re actually having a baby, I wanted to say. But instead I stuck with the more immediate issue: “The problem is I just invited someone else.”

  “Oh, did you ask Tommy?” Mom asked. Then, before I could mount an answer, she started gushing: “Because I thought you knew I already asked him. There was an opening at your cousin Glenn’s table, and I’ve always wondered if he might, you know, lean that way. He’s never been married and he’s so good-looking. Everyone says he looks just like Dirk Pitt.”

  “Brad Pitt, Mom. Everyone says he looks like Brad Pitt. Dirk Pitt is the guy in the Clive Cussler novels.”

  “Right. Brad Pitt. The one with all those children. No danger of Glenn doing that.” She chuckled at herself and continued: “But it really would be great if he and Tommy maybe took a shine to each other. Is that an okay word? A “shine”? Is that what you say with gays? I really have learned to be open-minded about this sort of thing. I even voted for gay marriage on the—”

  “Mom! This isn’t about Tommy. It’s about me. I invited a girl.”

  This gave Mom a hitch in her conversational stride. “A … a girl?” she said, and I could picture the confused, hurt look on her face. “Do you have a girlfriend, honey? You never told us anything about a girlfriend.”

  I started sputtering and stammering. It was amazing how, even as a thirty-two-year-old man—fully grown and independent for many years—I could still be made to feel like a blushing teenager by my mother. Finally I spit out: “I have a girl who’s a . . a … friend. We don’t really know each other that well yet. Her name is Kira. She’s a librarian here at the paper. And I just invited her to be my date for the weekend.”

  “Oh. That is a problem.”

  “It sure is.”

  “That will unbalance the seating,” she said, heavily.