The Normals

by David Gilbert

  Too bad he has to call collect.

  Sally accepts the charges, though not without muttering, "Typical."

  "I'm on a pay phone and I don't have enough change," Billy explains. Nothing from the other end.

  "Sally," he says. "I'm sorry. Really. Sorry. Seriously. I'm sorry. Sally?"

  The alliteration briefly frustrates him. "I apologize." He tries stringing words into a sentence—"I know how shitty me leaving all of a sudden without warning was"—but they sound as eloquent as his handwriting.

  More nothing.

  "But I had to go."

  Nothing still.

  "Just disappear for a while."

  "Your friend Ragnar has been around," Sally finally says.

  "Really? Ragnar was there? You saw him?"

  "Yep," she says. "Two nights ago I come home to find a cat nailed to the door. A dead cat. Poor thing had a collar with a tag. His name was Billy and he belonged to Ragnar and he was nailed to my door for all the neighbors to see. Luckily they thought it was some freaky Chinese thing."

  "A dead cat?"

  "And last night somebody was waiting in my apartment, just sitting there in the dark and for a second I thought it was your sorry ass with your tail between your legs, but no, it was him. He asked me where you were and I told him I had no idea and he said, too bad, I'd be your stand-in if you didn't show up soon. Then he shoved me, Billy. A pretty hard shove, too." Sally cracks near tears. "I swear I'm bruised. You know I've got a lot on my mind without your problems shoving me around."

  "What did he look like?"

  "He shoved me and you're asking what he looked like? Oh, he was positively dreamy, how's that, Billy? You know what, you're a real prick.Think about someone else for just a second, think about me, think about what you did to me, just leaving, and I'm stuck packing up this place like I have any free time. I don't even know why I'm talking to you."

  "You're right. I'm sorry."

  "Stop saying 'sorry.' 'Sorry' is not some magical word."

  Billy grips the receiver like the floor could collapse any moment. "Sally, you're in grave danger. Maybe I—"

  "Grave danger? Oh Billy. I'm kidding about Ragnar. The prick stuff I'll stand by, but Ragnar, I'm kidding. Nobody's been here. I thought I was being obvious enough with the whole cat-crucified-on-my-front-door thing, but maybe not, maybe you're that delusional. Nobody's been here.No phone calls. Nothing."

  "No phone calls?"

  "You sound disappointed."

  "Maybe they know where I am then."

  "And where the fuck is that?"

  "I can't tell you," Billy says.

  Sally groans. "Time out and listen to me, just listen, because this is my field of expertise. I did some research. Ragnar & Sons is a totally professional operation. Aboveboard. They don't operate out of some dark alley and they're not going to hurt you. They might want to hurt you—God knows I understand that—but they're not going to hurt you. They just want their money. Hurting you is bad for business. Hurting you won't get them paid. These aren't bookies who depend on street cred and can't afford deadbeats running around their hood. The worst they'll do is go to court and try garnering a percentage of your pay."

  "But you saw their letters to me. What do you call that?"

  "Creative intimidation," Sally tells him. "You probably got an overeager client rep that's trying to make an impression on his boss. That's all. If he can squeeze money from you then he looks good. He's in a win-win situation."

  "I don't buy that. I talked to this guy on the phone."

  "My bet is he's a twenty-two-year-old pencil dick who's seen too many movies." Sally, when annoyed, slips into the corners of her Brooklyn upbringing. "Do everyone a favor and get over yourself. Even if this fucker's a kong, no excuse for being a jerk and leaving me in the lurch."

  "You're right."

  "I realize our relationship was casual, and in a week the hole would've been on the other ass, with me leaving for Cambridge, but—"

  "Why can't you say Harvard? Why can't anyone say Harvard?"

  "Fine. Harvard. But let's think about my recent situation in purely technical terms. Nothing personal, just business. Okay? You know what I've been doing since your sudden departure? Let's see. Packing up the apartment. Alone. Finding storage space. Arguing over the security deposit with our pleasant landlord. Rendering the corpse we call furniture. God knows how the couch ever crawled in here. Closing accounts and paying bills. All alone and all while I'm working a full day and all with the unfortunate but now necessary help of my parents, who are so smug and controlling I feel positively Tibetan in my plight."

  "I tried to get rid of most my stuff," Billy says.

  "Which wasn't much," Sally shoots back.

  "True."

  "The point is, while the rest of the stuff is mine, you certainly enjoyed my stuff, slept on my stuff and cooked on my stuff and maybe took advantage of my stuff, free of charge. You kind of squatted on my life, Billy. And hey, no problem, I liked the company, I really did. But now I feel like you were using me."

  "I'm sorry."

  "Enough with sorry. All I'm saying is you could've given me your help for a couple of days."

  "The whole Ragnar situation was—"

  "Billy—"

  "—heating up."

  "Enough with Ragnar."

  Sally's doorbell buzzes (always a horrible sound in Billy's book).

  "Hold on a second," Sally says.

  "What?"

  "It's the door."

  Judging by the tonal quality of her footsteps and the muffle of the security intercom and the unlocking of the door, Billy figures Sally has placed the receiver on the coffee table. Sally loves the phone too much for a cordless model; she prefers the umbilical restraint and enjoys worrying the elastic around her fingers as she walks around the apartment like an all-banter cabaret singer. Billy imagines his head resting on the coffee table, near the pile of magazines and the three remote controls, just another bit of endless clutter.

  Then he hears a scream.

  "Sally?" he says, testing the air.

  Something like a plate shatters.

  "Sally."

  Billy hears her pleading, "Please don't hurt me."

  He hears a deep voice shouting, "Where's Schine?"

  "Who?"

  "Don't be smart with me, bitch."

  A slap of skin and Sally starts crying, an uncharacteristic noise from her mouth, both odd and ordinary, like a popular song played on an ancient instrument. It makes Billy sick.

  "One more time. Where is he?"

  "I swear I don't know."

  "Sally," Billy almost yells. They must be near the coffee table, and Billy pictures, briefly, the phone sneaking up behind Ragnar and strangling him.

  "I know you know."

  "I don't."

  "You're lying."

  "I'm not."

  "Sally?" Billy wonders if he should hang up and dial 911? Could he get 911 for Manhattan? Would the local 911 dispatcher put through a long­distance emergency? Should he give up his toehold on the coffee table for the chance of 911? He has no idea. But his indecision films beautifully in the nickel plate of the pay phone, a fun-house mirror effect Billy regrets noticing.

  "Then you're going to have to pay."

  "But I don't know where he is."

  Is Sally pinned on her back, with a knife to her throat or a gun against her temple? Expecting ripped fabric, abused flesh, sobs, instead Billy hears what seems to be giggling. Is he tickling her? The man must be insane.

  Billy whispers, "Tell him, Sally."

  "I really have no idea."

  The voice shushes her.

  " I __"

  "Shhhh."

  "Please."

  "It's okay, it's okay. Relax, okay. Just relax." The voice could be stroking Sally's hair and thumbing away her tears. Nothing creepier than psychotic tenderness.

  "I swear he's gone," she says.

  Again with the giggling. What is this madman do
ing? "Then I guess I'll have to leave a message."

  "Don't you fucking dare," brave, feisty Sally warns.

  "Or else what?"

  "Just don't."

  "What're you going to do?"

  "Get the fuck off me," Sally shrieks.

  And that's when Billy really yells. "I'm here! Right here!" He wishes the phone could hop up and down and wave wildly with heroic distraction. "Hey Ragnar! Ragnar!"

  Nurse Clifford/George pokes her head into the hallway. "Everything all right?"

  "Yes." Billy covers the mouthpiece. "Sorry."

  "We might want to keep our voices down."

  "My grandparents," Billy explains. "Almost deaf. Very frustrating."

  The soft infirmities of family pull her back.

  Billy resumes with, "Ragnar!"

  "Goddamn it," Sally says, pissed and amazingly unafraid.

  "Where is he?"

  "Okay, enough, seriously."

  "I'm here! I'm here!" Billy tugs the handset's armored cord.

  "Ragnar!"

  "Give him this for me."

  "Don't you—"

  Billy hears slurping.

  "You fucking jerk," Sally squeals.

  "Thought you'd like that."

  "Ragnar! The phone! I'm on the phone!" Billy yells.

  Doorways begin to fill with normals who check on the commotion in the hall, perhaps curious if this is a side effect, seeing Billy jump up and down and pound the wall. They look like children peering between banisters, watching their parents fight.

  "God-fucking-damn it!" Billy yells.

  Nurse Clifford/George reappears, this time unappeasable. "Keep your voice down or no more phone privileges. And ease up on the swears."

  "Sorry."

  "This isn't a pool hall."

  "Sorry."

  "Or a locker room."

  "I'm sorry."

  "Or some football game."

  "I get it, okay, Ms. . . . Nurse . . . ma'am."

  "Well then, keep it down."

  "Okay." Billy returns to the eavesdropping. "Sally? Ragnar?"

  More and more normals peer from their rooms: Stew Slocum, Yul Gertner, Craig Buckner, Gretchen with cards fanned in her hand, Luke Sillansky with cards fanned as well, toadying himself behind her shoulder and shaking his head as if rudely interrupted in mid whist.

  "Just tell him I'm on the phone," Billy wishes aloud, using more ESP than AT&T. Physical helplessness creeps into his stomach: His insides buckle under the weight and become airless and dusty from collapse. Frustration stings his eyes. Then he hears, "Schine?" over the line.

  Billy freezes.

  "That you, Schine?"

  "Yes," Billy whispers, calmer than expected. "It's me, it's Billy Schine. Listen, I'll turn myself in. I'll offer myself up fully and totally. I can be in New York in four hours, by late tonight, and you can break my legs first thing in the morning. You can do whatever you need to do. But don't hurt her. Please. Don't hurt her. If you do, or already did, I will find you and I will kill you. I will." The words sound unreal, scripted, but the emotion catches his voice. Billy loosens his grip on the telephone as if rather than falling he might float.

  "You dare challenge me!" Ragnar bellows, which is followed by a maniacal, uhm, ridiculous cackle, like a professional wrestler.

  "Well—"

  Billy hears another voice, Sally, safe in the background and saying, "Give me the fucking phone, you idiot."

  Before departing, Ragnar says, "You might be the biggest tool in the world."

  Billy deflates, realizing he's been had.

  And then Sally is in his ear. "Hey."

  "Your brother?"

  "He had me pinned."

  Tommy Hu shouts, "You're a dipshit, Schine," Tommy, eighteen, no doubt sporting gel-inspired bed-head and a Bay City Rollers T-shirt and absurdly flared bell-bottoms. Cut him and he bleeds sarcastically. Tommy, the youngest Hu, the only Hu born on U.S. soil, never needed to assimilate, so he disassociated.

  "Well, you got me," Billy says.

  "I think you need serious help," Sally tells him.

  "Why, because I believed you, because I thought you were really being hurt and I was worried? And you think I need serious help?"

  "You're Ragnar-obsessed."

  "I thought you were being hurt."

  "You'll buy anything Ragnar. I should sic them on you for your own good."

  "I was really scared for you."

  "Aw, poor baby," Sally says. "I wish I could comfort you but I'm in the middle of packing up the apartment. That's why my asshole of a brother is here."

  "You mean Ragnar the magnificent," shouts Tommy.

  "Shut up." Then Sally, softly: "You know, you ruined a good thing. We were friends and you dumped me like we were lovers, and suddenly, I'm upset, like I'm the woman scorned. I can't say I ever want to see you again, and that is sad. Sad was the last thing I was expecting from us. I was expecting the opposite. You know what I was expecting? That we'd pack up together and maybe order in one more time. I was. But you changed all that. You know what my last memory of you is? You doing what you did the morning you left and me helping you out, which, in retrospect, I suppose is perfect."

  "I'm sorry."

  "You should see my brother. He's hopeless at packing anything that's not square."

  "I'm sorry."

  "And I can't stand the feel of cardboard on my skin."

  "I'm sorry."

  "You know, Billy, there's a point where I'm sorry kind of slips away from apology and lands smack-dab into contempt. I'm hanging up now."

  And with that—click. Billy stands there, still listening, as if on the other side of a door. Adrenaline fades and is replaced with a drowsy numbness as well as something far less romantic. Billy hangs up the phone, a miserable invention, he thinks, born with pain, with acid spilling on Bell's thigh while he fiddled his clump of primordial transmission, Bell screaming for his friend who was fiddling a similar clump. Mr. Watson, come here, I want you! Watson must have been amazed. The machine captured a man. He probably leaned forward and listened for more music while his mentor burned alone downstairs.

  Mr. Watson, come here, I want you!

  What perfect first words.

  The phone rings.

  Billy startles, then, "Hello," answers.

  Silence.

  "Hello?"

  The silence is familiar.

  "Sally?"

  The line disconnects.

  Walking back to his room, Billy pictures Sally sitting on the couch, her finger tapping the liquid crystal display of her caller ID.

  "Hey Schine."

  Billy looks up and sees Ossap and Dullick.

  "You done screaming?" asks Dullick.

  "I think so."

  Ossap flexes his mouth into a frown. His lips seem burdened with a heavy load—"Good"—and his left eye twitches—"because"—and his head jerks as if pulling the words free—"we need the phone"—like a bird with a stubborn worm.

  "Yeah," Dullick says, counting change and drooling.

  16

  ON MONDAY the side effects of Allevatrox have come into ugly bloom.

  Though Billy feels nothing, nothing yet, he's seen it in others, like Ossap whose facial expressions would scare small children, eating, talking, walking about like the bogeyman until Dullick—"Ossap!"— tells him he's getting freaky, stretching his neck like some pervert tortoise, and Ossap apologizes, controlling himself for a few minutes until forgetting brings on another spell. Ossap is not alone. Other normals can be spotted chawing their own tongues, rolling their eyes upward, curling their lips like they're yelling in slow motion. Drooling has also hit. Those afflicted carry plastic-cup spittoons, which they consult every minute, a clepsydra in spit, their glands manufactering too much saliva to swallow without getting sick. Conversation with these people is difficult. The akinesiacs and akathi-siacs are also being divvied up within the group. The akinesiacs are zombies, slow and stiff, not too far removed from a graveyard and a
full moon. And the akathisiacs could be channeling hummingbirds. Fingers fluttering from hands fluttering from wrists fluttering from arms, they are the chorus line of dancers behind an invisible lead in gold lame. The akinesiacs and akathisiacs, Billy thinks, they're like the Jets and the Sharks.

  And that afternoon, there's a rumble.

  It's Roger Coop, akinesia, versus Anton Krojak, akathisia.

  Roger Coop spends his day waiting for a call that never comes. He's almost always the first to answer the ring—"Yeah!"—stomping from his room—"I got it, I got it!"—and when invariably the call is for somebody else, he screams the name—"Anton Krojac, phone!"—as if an elaborate scam has been perpetrated on his rigid frame.

  "Anton Krojac, phone!" he screams again.

  "Anton Krojac, you've got a phone call!" he screams louder.

  Now Roger Coop is goose-stepping from room to room.

  "You know who and where Anton Krojac is?" he asks Lannigan, Billy, and Do.

  Nope.

  Finally Krojac is found, napping in bed—"Can't you hear, phone!"— and Anton—"Relax, dude"—all electric shimmy, is escorted to the payphone by the plodding Roger who's already laying the groundwork for a short conversation—"Dude, I talk for as long as I like"—and Roger is none too pleased—"Don't dude me, you Croat!"—and Anton wags his arms—"I'm a fucking Serb from Massapequa, you idiot!"—and with the atypical antipsychotic heat coursing through his fingers, Anton grazes, inadvertently—"I swear"—the rigid cheek—"Fucking prick!"—of Roger Coop. Pushing ensues, followed by a series of misguided blows. A crowd is attracted. They watch Roger and Anton clutch like heavyweights in the last round. Roger does rope-a-dope without the rope; Anton throws extravagant punches that startle him more than his opponent. Roger leads with his head (Oomph!); Anton counters with his chin (Arrah!) Roger falls between Anton's legs (Yoops!); Anton trips over Roger's shoulder and pile drives the floor with his funny bone (Kphuck!); Roger lies sprawled, exhausted, pinned (Haaphew!); Anton rolls over and manages, by mistake, a glancing knee to the groin (Fwaaah!); Roger reflexively tenses and stubs his big toe (Oyooh!) on Anton's (Nyumph!) nose.