“All I know is, I heard a noise—Addie’s incessant chatter had stopped some minutes before—and I instinctively reached for the samurai sword,” said Jeff. He trembled a bit and pulled the afghan closer around him.
“Purely defensive,” said Val, nodding. “Go on.”
“Well, when the shower curtain opened, I jumped out, saw the dog, and held the sword out in front of me. They always say you should put something between you and an attacking dog.”
“A sharp blade is a good thing,” encouraged Val.
“He was completely nude,” I whispered.
“I was in the shower!”
Val told me to shut up and drink my whiskey. I obeyed, but I knew that that vision would never leave me.
“All right, so you had the sword out. The … inevitable resulted, right? Your neighbor ran out screaming. Then what?”
Fat Bald Jeff swallowed with difficulty. “We had to clean up the mess. It could have dripped down into the landlady’s apartment, and she’d stick me with the cleaning bill.”
“I haven’t had my dinner,” I said. They looked at me as if I were mad.
“My digestion—” I began, but they both held up their hands to stop me. Val shook me.
“Do you have any concept of what’s going on here?” he yelled right in my face. He had new follicles sprouting in his bare patch.
“I’m sorry,” I whimpered, “but I get very nervous when I haven’t eaten. I feel faint and dizzy. May I lie down here? Jeff, could you just move over an eensy bit? Thank you.”
Val stomped into the kitchen and returned with half a kielbasa. He shoved it in my hand and warned me not to say another word. I was grateful for the sausage. It was a bit fatty for my tastes, but I dared not say a thing!
Jeff continued, “We wrapped up the head and the body in two bedsheets, and I put them in front of the landlady’s son’s door. I didn’t know what else to do with them. Maybe he would want to bury them. Nobody was around. Addie mopped up the blood.” He looked at me appreciatively.
“She is good at cleaning,” Val Wayne grudgingly replied.
Well, I ruined my pedal pushers and pink gingham blouse. They would have to go in the trash. Why couldn’t I have been wearing the sari during the bloodbath? But I never could have ridden my bicycle in the sari. Thoughts crowded into my head and I groaned. Jeff hadn’t ruined any of his stupid black clothes, as he went outside in his birthday suit to deliver the carcass. I suppose I should be glad he bothered to put on any clothes at all for our bike ride home.
Val refilled our mugs and asked what I was doing at Jeff’s so late on a weeknight.
Immediately I blurted out the truth, Crook-Eye website and all.
“You stupid idiot!” screamed Jeff. “I told you to keep your trap shut.”
I wailed, “I’m sorry, I can’t hold up under heavy interrogation.”
He sputtered, “That was heavy interrogation?”
I buried my head under the blanket and sobbed miserably. “You don’t know Val.”
But Val, of course, thought the website was hilarious and, in any event, would not blab. He firmly told Jeff to sleep at our apartment tonight; there was no telling what would be waiting for him back at his hovel.
In the middle of the night, I awoke to a desperate cry coming from the living room. I sprang from bed and ran out there. Jeff was thrashing about on the couch, moaning in his sleep.
Tried to shake him out of his dream, but to no effect. Yelling his name produced no result either, so I grabbed one of our fondue forks from the kitchen fondue nook and jabbed him repeatedly in the chest.
He woke up.
“Stop poking me,” he said irritably, sitting up. I switched on the light and gasped. Again, he was completely naked! I don’t understand the modern fascination with nudity; I am never nude.
Averting my eyes, I draped the afghan over Jeff’s tumescence and explained that he was having a bad dream. I omitted that it was a very loud dream and had deprived me of much-needed rest, as he had had a tough night.
“Ugh,” he groaned, “I dreamt that the mongrel had come back from the front stoop to haunt me. It was carrying its own head in your bicycle basket.”
We were both quiet for a moment as Jeff arranged himself under the blanket and gulped the last sip of his partially curdled milk and whiskey. Then we heard it. A low, mournful yowl coming from outside. Jeff’s eyebrows shot up into his oily globe. I explained about the white puppy next door.
He said, “So you haven’t done anything about it? You just listen to it night after night?”
I replied that the animal officials were supposedly handling it, since I, unlike some people, cannot solve domestic animal problems with a samurai sword.
His eyes strayed to the fondue fork in my hand. His stomach gurgled obtrusively.
“Mmmm,” he said, “fondue.”
After what Fat Bald Jeff had done for me in terms of workplace liberation and increased self-esteem, I felt it was not asking too much to make him a bubbling kettle of fondue.
“Stale millet bread okay with you?” I asked, cutting it up into little cubes.
Had a nice snack together, despite the fact that three-thirty A.M. is not one of my prescribed meal times. But since my day’s eating schedule had been wrecked by the late night kielbasa, I figured, why not? I am becoming more daring and devil-may-care with the passage of each day.
Fat Bald Jeff and I rode the bus together to work. In the front there was a single empty seat, in which he promptly stuffed himself. I sent a lukewarm poison dart his way but recalled it, considering what he’d been through the previous night.
He looked up at me, half-rose, and said, “Oh. Please take it.”
“No, no,” I replied politely, preparing to sit anyway.
He shrugged, plopped back down, and took out a paperback titled 101 Things to Do Till the Revolution. Doesn’t he understand the elaborate etiquette dance our society has devised?
When we reached the Place, we could hardly get through the crowd. Two TV news crews had staked themselves outside the building, and sleepy, unarmed Earl stood sentry at the doors, checking staff IDs. We passed through and entered the lobby. Zombies were swarming in a near panic.
“What’s going on?” I asked Jeff above the din.
He gave me a crafty smile and said, “The biscotti are burning.”
“I don’t understand this metaphor anymore,” I complained. “Are the biscotti people or the plan, because—”
His smile distorted into a tense grimace, and he spoke through clamped jaws. “Shut up. Figure it out yourself. I’ll find you later.” And he disappeared into the crowd. I waited for the elevator to take me to the second floor. The doors slid open. The interior of the elevator was covered in BONGS NOT BOMBS stickers.
On the second floor, publishing was in turmoil! Someone had roped off the entrance to Coddles’s office, restricting the zombies crowding in the hallway. Throughout the department I heard mingled laughter, screaming, and crying. Pushed my way down the corridor to my cubicle. The noise was so deafening I couldn’t even hear the constant, annoying hum of the fluorescent lights. Logged on and saw my e-mail in box flooded with messages intended for all staff. The executive director condemned Crook-Eye, Ltd., and its libelous blasphemies (ha!), particularly the article about how she violated the public relations high school intern last year in the executive coat closet. Interns, ignored by practically everyone, often make friends with the mailroom staff and disclose vital information.
Bev and Lura came into my cubicle to relay the latest news.
“The board has put the executive director under investigation!” cried Bev.
Lura added, “And most of the department heads and some of the unit heads, including Coddles.”
“Where is Coddles?” I asked. “Barricaded in his office?”
They shrugged. Imagine barricading yourself in a room filled with Italian Provincial furniture!
The halls were filled with meandering zo
mbies. Nobody was working. It was all because of Fat Bald Jeff and me!
Down in the graphic designer wing, I noticed this morning’s Sun-Times on the conference table. Front-page scandal, complete with Coddles’s disgusting hobbies! Picked it up and hurried over to Francis’s cubicle, when I noticed that all the nameplates on the walls had been covered with political slogan stickers. Many of them had MUMIA crossed out and replaced with BIG LOU.
“Did you see the newspaper?” I asked, sitting down in the folding chair opposite Francis.
For a few minutes we happily discussed the turmoil. Francis said a lunchtime candlelight vigil had been planned in the dungeon around Big Lou’s old locker. Perhaps this was the next step in Big Lou’s vindication and eventual reinstatement. He was a nice fellow and had often invited the lower-rung publishing staff to clandestine poker games held by junior maintenance crew in the boiler room after hours. They played for M&M’s, and if gassy Bev hadn’t always joined in, I might have participated.
“Everyone seems to have copied your Mumia and bong stickers,” I said, picking invisible lint off the frilly placket of my count of Monte Cristo blouse.
“Well,” he replied, absently searching for Cheerios in his hair, “actually, I put them up myself.”
I looked at him uneasily, sensing the approaching inquest.
He leaned in earnestly and whispered, “It’s okay. I know. You’re Crook-Eye, aren’t you?”
But before I could deny or admit anything under his brutal inquisition, Bev burst into Francis’s cubicle.
“Did you hear?” she shrieked. “Coddles is dead! He threw himself in front of an El train.”
Absolutely frantic, I tore down the back stairwell. That’s how disturbed I was—did not even think of using the elevator! I needed a few moments’ rest once I reached the dungeon, but there was nothing to sit on but a dusty old computer box, and I’d forgotten my hanky.
Fat Bald Jeff was sitting calmly at his workstation, typing away as though nothing was out of the ordinary. I attempted to run past the administrative desk geek guarding the Hole, but he barred my ingress.
“You cannot just waltz—”
I interrupted, breathless. “I know, sorry. I just wanted to ask Jeff a question.”
The frail geek sucked his gums and teeth dry as he glared at me, two spots of puce blotching his gray cheeks.
“Fat Bald, Fat Bald,” I added quickly.
He groaned into the intercom microphone. “Fat Bald Jeff, please come to the administration desk. Fat Bald Jeff, to the administration desk.”
The geek stiffly settled back in his chair and regarded me coldly. Jeff took his sweet old time getting to the glass door.
I smiled at the desk nerd; perhaps he just needed a little kindness to bring him out of his horrible geek shell. “I just noticed we have the same spectacles,” I began, resting my elbows on the desk.
He gave a dry little cough. “They’re dismantling our department. Please do not rest your limbs on my desk.”
Fat Bald Jeff finally came and rescued me. Other Jeff hovered anxiously around us as we walked back over to the workstations. His RON’S PIZZA baseball cap had finally come apart in the back and was held together with packing tape.
Other Jeff said, “What am I going to do? No one else will ever hire me.”
Fat Bald Jeff said kindly, “They can’t fire all of us. And nobody here will work for your wages.” Placated, Other Jeff went back to his cubicle. Fat Bald Jeff and I went over to his desk, where he began working at his computer. I chewed my thumbnails.
“They’re dismantling your department?” I asked.
“Yeah, no biggie.”
Then I burst out with the awful news. “Jeff, Coddles is dead.”
“Yes, I heard,” he said mildly. He continued to type, his fat fingers darting about the keyboard like overstuffed crappie trawling for chum.
“He threw himself in front of the El!” I said. “And it’s all our—”
He stopped typing and silenced me with a look that would freeze the sun. My stomach rumbled nervously. It was 12:06.
He cleared his throat and resumed typing. “He accidentally fell in its path this morning on the way to work. He was reading the Sun-Times as he walked down the platform, engrossed in some article, and tumbled right onto the track as the Evanston Express roared by.”
Evanston! How cruel and ironic fate is.
“He didn’t kill himself?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” said Jeff. “Didn’t you see the e-mail Miss Fernquist posted at eleven-thirty?” He brought it up onscreen for me to read.
To: All staff
From: L. Fernquist, publishing
As you may have heard, our colleague—and my dear boss—Albert Barr passed away this morning. Some of you called him Coddles. Contrary to what some employees have been saying, Albert accidentally stepped in front of the El. It’s a shame that he left our world without being able to clear his good name of the lies printed about him on the Internet. I don’t know who these Crook-Eye jerks are, but they don’t speak for me. Albert was a real good boss, and to you bitches in the secretarial pool: I got promoted over you because I’m good with shorthand and for no other reason.
Also, Albert was a big fan of the El, as you can see by the following e-mail I just received, and if he was going to kill himself, he wouldn’t use the train.
To: Miss Fernquist, secretary to Albert Barr
From: Ian el-Sabbah, CTA Red Line manager I wish to convey my deep sadness about the Evanston Express tragedy this morning. I can’t tell you the number of times passengers have stumbled onto the rails while reading the Sun-Times. I manage the Red Line, not the Express, and of course I am in no way liable for this accident and in fact boast a reasonably good record regarding chance casualties on my line. I had a special ongoing dialogue with Mr. Barr about the standard of excellence on the El, and I appreciated his frequent, lengthy criticisms about my ability to do my job. I am pleased that your boss had not given up on us at the Chicago Transit Authority, even though his complaints were unwavering and rambling and somewhat psychotic. Of course, if he had only stayed away from the El as he threatened to do numerous times, this whole unfortunate business would have been avoided. But I will always recall with fondness our correspondence, and hope you will pass along my condolences to his grandmother, to whom he was exceedingly attached.
Sincerely,
Ian el-Sabbah, soon to be promoted
to Evanston Express manager
“I don’t feel so good,” I whimpered, clutching my stomach. Fat Bald Jeff checked his watch.
“Oh, yes. It’s a quarter past twelve. I’m going to pick up some beer brats for Big Lou’s candlelight vigil, if you’d like one. Coming?”
I shook my head. I wanted to talk more about Coddles, but Jeff warned me to keep my mouth shut and we’d discuss it later in private. Lurched blindly to the elevator. Coddles—dead! I couldn’t help but feel responsible.
Of course he was repugnant. And it wasn’t just the kiddie porn and yucko diapers, it was his slave-driving tactics, his disregard for the well-being of his employees. I shouldn’t worry about Coddles, right? I should worry about Fat Bald Jeff, working for a pittance, living in a grotty attic, fending off the advances of mad landladies and mongrels. Yet I did feel guilty about my supervisor. It’s almost as though I pushed him off the platform myself, though heaven knows that in reality my upper body strength is geriatric at best. Maybe there was a Mrs. Coddles weeping over the loss of her breadwinner. I wanted to be a rabble-rouser, not a Coddles-killer. If I hadn’t started Crook-Eye with Jeff, Coddles would probably be here right now, eyeing my bosom and working me into my grave. Now he’s roasting in hell. It’s my fault. It’s not my fault. Is it my fault?
This cannot be good for my digestion.
Brought my egg salad on millet bread into my cube and ate lunch. The events of the past twenty-four hours made my head swim, and I couldn’t face eating in the editorial lounge. Plus th
e temp had fallen asleep at his desk in the common area, and truth be told, poor fellow, he really did stink.
By one o’clock I’d had enough. None of the journals I edited had come back from layout, and I had nothing to do and nobody to boss me. Went home (lousy bus is not so bad in the middle of the day), changed into grubby pumpkin-farmer pants, plain polo-necked shirt, and childish white gym sneakers, and went into the garden to work. Paco was out there, making manure tea.
He asked if I was playing “hooker” from work today. Instead of correcting his English, which would have been the kinder, more constructive thing, I just nodded. I cannot take responsibility for assimilating immigrants into our culture, any more than I can take responsibility for what newspapers people choose to read while standing so close to the El tracks. It wasn’t my fault. It was totally my fault. Oh, hell.
Decided not to put my poisonous plants so close to Alma’s stinko mustard greens. True, she is awful and probably longs for the solace of the cemetery, but I could not face going to jail on murder charges. All that denim and subordination, not to mention the lecherous cell-block matrons and thin gruel. I would not last a day in prison! I couldn’t fashion a knife out of a toothbrush if my life depended upon it.
Alma shrieked instructions at me from her back porch. She wanted her rows of watercress perfectly straight and verbally abused me until I had planted them right. Meanwhile, Paco kept shouting, “Playing hooker!” and pointing at me.
Alma shouted back, “Don’t have to tell me!”
Our society is in shambles due to the incivility of our elderly citizens.
Took out Alma’s garbage. She tossed it at me as I came up the stairs, so I had no choice. A clear plastic bag stuffed with horrible clothes from her extra room sat outside her door, so I asked her if she wanted me to throw those out as well.
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