Wolf Howling

by Brian van Brunt

  Our waitress returns with our drinks and, at my direction, walks over to Keith to bring him his cocktail and shot. I take the chance to pick up my shot and hold it in my hand and turn away from Dan and Huck to watch Cassandra slink across the stage. I start to let the shot spill to the floor under the table, likely adding to any variety of unknown liquids spilled in this place.

  “Careful there,” comes from my side, “you are spilling your drink. Though, Cassandra has that effect on a lot of people.” I turn to see the redhead from earlier in the black bikini standing above me.

  “Mind if I sit?” she asks. Then suddenly I have her on my lap. “My name is Mynx. What’s yours?” She snuggles up against my chest.

  “I’m Al, nice to meet you Mynx.” I set down my empty shot glass on the table, unnoticed by Huck and Dan, and take a sip of the crown and coke.

  She asks all the normal questions. Are you local? You go to school? What do you study? Oh, I studied something like that too. The music switches over from the seductive sexy into something a bit more Nine Inch Nails meets Lovage. Cassandra moves into her second set. Huck takes his little Asian treat to one of the back rooms for a dance. Dan seems enthralled in a conversation. I hold up my end of the conversation with Mynx and spend the appropriate amount of time staring at her ample cleavage.

  I don’t want you to think I don’t like girls. I like girls. So, don’t be a fuck about it. What I struggle with is this vapid ball of fluff on my lap and the likely amount of diseases that are cycling in her bloodstream and in her dirty holes. But, this was always part of the plan.

  “Hey so, Mynx, want to go and have a dance with me in the back?” I ask her. She smiles back at me with a wink and says, “You know I do,” as she gets up and walks me back to the VIP section. Dan and Huck high-five me as I go. “Go get some, Al!” and “Hell ya, playa. Forget that other ho,” follow me to the back.

  Cassandra finishes her dance on the stage as we walk by. Mynx has my hand and brings me to a desk before the door leading outside. The short, heavy-set man behind the desk working the register wears a grey bowler hat with a black stripe. “What’ll it be?” he asks us both, but mostly Mynx. She looks to me. She says, “It’s one dance for $40 in the back room and three for a hundred.” I say, “Maybe let’s just start with one and see how it goes from there.” She smiles at me without missing a beat and turns to Bowler Hat. “Just one to start,” she says. “I’ll see if I can convince him to get some more when we get back in the dark. I can be very persuasive.” I take out two twenties and leave them on the desk. Bowler makes change and pushes back a ten and twenty to Mynx. She makes the money disappear into her black clutch. It has a neon pink kitty on it.

  She guides me out of the club and down a short courtyard that has small rooms on the left side of the building and a fountain with chairs around it on the right. She leads me to the first room, where the sound from the main club is being pumped in via a speaker in the ceiling. Mynx pulls my hand and I follow her in. “Get comfortable, handsome,” she says, sitting me in the center of a couch in the back of the room and setting her purse on the table before taking off her stiletto heels.

  I’ll spare you the details of the dance. They are unremarkable. My goal here is not to get off with some nasty whore, but rather show the guys I’m taking some time to enjoy myself and to be in a club where I can disappear for a while. Mynx takes off her top, grinds a bit on me, and then the song is over. Under three minutes. She makes a push to upsell me for some more dances, but I think she gets that I’m not overly interested in her. No lead in the pencil, so to speak. Well, no lead for her. That’s for later.

  She leads me out and I return an awkward hug with her while she excuses herself to go to the restroom. I see Keith talking with Cassandra in the corner, likely negotiating a marriage proposal. Dan and Huck are back at the table with their respective girls. They order drinks from the waitress.

  It’s time for me to make my move. I walk over to the bar and confirm that they are all distracted. If anything, the club has gotten busier. I give the club one more sweep—all clear with my friends—and walk out onto the street.

  The air feels different. Kind of an electricity in the night. I walk back to my car, parked over in the lot by Decatur. It’s a quick walk to the Chevy Impala, parked on the far side of the lot without the security cameras looking over me.

  I unlock the trunk and sling the black cape over one shoulder. It’s a bit warm, but it’s important for all my fun. There is a nice hood sewn into the fabric as well. I take out the large pack and sling it onto my back. It’s heavy with the P90, Glock, tactical vest, body armor, and extra clips. There is also my mask. I’m very excited to wear that mask.

  I carry out the three bags from Rouses shopping market. They are cloth bags, each weighed down with what looks like 2–3 lbs. of groceries. Two of them contain Huck’s M-80 fireworks rigged to some fuses and modified soda bottles. The last bag contains my best impression of what a bomb would look like to a regular person. Wires, LED lights, and batteries with duct tape wrapped around a pipe. In the end, this one has nothing but some gun powder from one of the M-80’s sprinkled on the outside and the leavings from a few sparklers scraped into the bottom of the bag. Not anything that would do any damage, but it sure looks concerning. About 30 minutes of concerning. All the bags have light items like potato chips and paper towels on the top.

  Chapter 5:5, “Check the bolts securing the grand Ferris wheel to the earth, as once the spinning starts, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Everything is squared and verified. I’m ready.

  Despite the heavy load, I walk with a spring in my step.

  It’s time to start the show.

  Time for the thunder.

  Chapter 11

  New Orleans, Spring, Tuesday, 8:15pm

  The night spun Wagner onto Bourbon Street. The alcohol from the four quick drinks continued to fuel a nice buzz as he walked into the crowd. There was electricity in the air. The sights and sounds blended together. They called him deeper down Bourbon Street.

  Wagner was out of sorts. He was annoyed and frustrated at having left Cassandra. He felt this growing weariness coming over him with everything going on today. Hell, maybe Cassandra was the person he was supposed to meet in the bar. But he knew that wasn’t right. Not by a long shot.

  In his distraction, he walked directly into a thin, wiry man with dirty brown hair. He wore a faded t-shirt with the words, “I got Bourbon-Faced on Shit Street” printed across the front. He wore jeans that carried their own story of stains and rips from his travels. He held a cigarette in one hand and a half-filled plastic cup with the logo of Hurricane Joe’s in the other. Wagner pushed past him.

  “Heeeeeyyyy!” he said.

  Wagner turned back and looked at him.

  “So that’s your how-do-you-do? Not even a hello? Nothing?” He wove back and forth in time to the music blasting out of the club across the street.

  Wagner looked him over. He wasn’t the least bit familiar to him. “I’m sorry, do I know you?” he said.

  Bourbon-Faced feigned a look of surprise and shock at Wagner’s words. “Do you…do you know…KNOW ME?” He brought his hand down hard against his chest. “That hurts, man. Hurts right here.” He pounded his chest in case Wagner didn’t get the reference.

  “I’m sorry…I just don’t think…” Wagner began. The man attempted to playfully punch Wagner in the arm and succeeded in missing the arm all together and instead lost both his cigarette and drink all at once. He spun and went down and crashed onto the street. In his fall, he tried to catch himself by grabbing onto a group of young college students, one lanky and tall wearing a green wave t-shirt and holding an unrealistically large white cup with the words Huge Ass Beer on the front. Another had an opossum on his shirt and a third looked at Wagner with alert eyes. He was wearing black jeans and had some kind of fox on his shirt.

  The drink spilled on Green-Wave T-Shirt and Opossum Kid got this shit-eating gr
in on his face. He instinctively kicked at Bourbon-Faced as he fell to the ground. The Huge Ass Beer hit the ground in a splash. Green-Wave T-Shirt looked sadly at his beer, as if amazed that it was truly gone. Coins spilled onto the street, probably from the pockets of one of the kids. Opossum Kid continued to kick at the man on the ground. The tall, lanky kid seemed to come to his senses and tried to pull his friend off Bourbon-Faced as the kicking intensified.

  Opossum Kid yelled, “You goddamned drunk!” and kicked at him harder. Some well-dressed conventioneers yelled at the pair of college boys, “Hey! Leave him alone!” Others stopped and gawked. The bouncer took notice and went over to investigate.

  Enough of this, Wagner thought. Another crazy night in the Quarter. The people on Bourbon swarmed around them and Wagner made his escape down the street. He thought of Mancuso arresting the elderly communist at the start of Toole’s classic, A Confederacy of Dunces. The crowd formed, and Wagner-Ignatius made his escape in the chaos.

  A man walked up to him, short and fat, and told Wagner excitedly, “Betcha I can tell ya where ya got dem shoes, big man!”

  Wagner avoided eye contact and told the man, “On my feet, my brother, right here in New Orleans…” and walked away. The scam was for tourists, with the hustler betting he could guess where you got your shoes. Jokes on you, though, you got your shoes on your feet, hee-haw!

  The gas street lamps were on, most built and installed by the Bevolo Company around the corner on Royal Street. The lights flickered against the copper and glass and cast an eerie glow on the brick walls. There was a homeless woman coming toward him. She pushed a folding shopping cart filled to the brim with random items from the city. There was nothing worth anything much, but not totally worthless. An old baseball cap, an umbrella with broken spokes, a beat up red Igloo ice cooler, a bag of lighters, three large flashlights tied together, and a small rolling suitcase with a crushed end.

  “Don’t tell me to get out!” she yelled at no one in particular.

  Wagner avoided eye contact and looked down at the street. She was about thirty feet in front of him. He considered switching to the other side of the block to avoid her. A premonition of sorts.

  She muttered to herself, “I hate China in my brain layer. China is going to kill you. He forgot to die. Do you understand that? He forgot to die.”

  Buzzed and out of sorts, Wagner didn’t really want to interact with this woman. His steps brought him closer though. Should he cross the street? Turn around? He kept walking toward her.

  She didn’t see him yet and continued to yell, “It was 16 weeks ago they came into my house and ate my groceries. That goddamn monkey president. Fuck Obama and his Mama!”

  Wagner was close enough now to see that she was wearing a “walk for recovery” t-shirt. It was ripped and stained, and several sizes too large.

  A plane flew above and she looked up at the blinking red lights as it crossed the sky. Wagner hoped this was enough to distract her so he could pass by without conversation.

  “You see that? A flying bird on one finger.” She shook her fist up at the plane as it crossed above her. “Don’t be so greedy with the sky.”

  Wagner was too close now. She saw him and asked, “Do you think it will explode like the other one? Will it explode in the air?”

  He tried to avoid her gaze and kept walking. New Orleans was always filled with characters, but this had been an exceptionally challenging day.

  She wasn’t hampered. “I see you...cheers to me, cheers to you. If you do, fuck you.”

  She reached into her cart and took out a plastic bag of baloney. She peeled off a piece and folded it twice before cramming it all into her mouth. She did the same again with a second slice. Wagner slowed as he passed her, mesmerized by her chewing. Like how cars slow as they pass the scene of an accident. A fascinating bit of mastication.

  Bits of meat sprayed from her mouth as she spoke to Wagner, “It’s a dark, dark day. I’ve sinned and we are not going to be able to get a move. It will be a cross next time. That will be the son of God.”

  She continued, “He was riding me. Riding all over me. He hears me now. Breaking my bones.” She shook a piece of unfolded baloney at him for emphasis.

  Wagner had enough. He picked up his pace. She called to him as he walked by, “The Rosary. You know she loves you no matter what! If you ever even had a momma. She is the greatest momma you never had. And she ain’t no goddamn beggar.”

  She was mostly out of earshot now. Wagner quickened his pace.

  “No one would die for you!” she yelled in a high-pitched screech.

  Wagner turned back to her. Something about what she was yelling. That same elusive feeling. Just hovering at the distant limits of his memory. Familiar but forgotten.

  “You know that, right? No one would die for you! You are empty!”

  He walked away from her and towards Jackson Square.

  There was a light wind cutting through the night. He wished he’d worn a heavier shirt. His apartment wasn’t far down from Jackson, toward the Marigny and Bywater, adjacent to the Quarter. A group of musicians formed a band of sorts and blared out the classics, like “When the Saints go Marching In”, and “St. James Infirmary Blues” to throngs of tourists huddled against the ramparts of the cathedral.

  Scattered among the musicians and the homeless attempting to stretch out on the benches was an assortment of fortunetellers, oracles, and tarot readers. A woman in a long peasant dress with violet streaks woven into her hair caught Wagner’s eye and invited him to sit down.

  Normally, he would have kept walking, but this day had already been far from normal. Maybe some guidance from the other side would help ease his mind.

  “My name is Jade. Would you like to know your future?” she asked Wagner.

  Jade was in her late forties and had the look of someone who has lived close to the streets. Not homeless—always a few steps away from that—but not that many steps.

  “I’m Wagner. Nice to meet you. I feel like some clarity is just what I need in my life tonight,” he said.

  Jade shuffled the cards and placed a golf-ball sized piece of clear crystal on top of the deck.

  She gestured to Wagner. “You cut the deck.”

  Wagner obliged and split the deck near the middle. Jade took the cards and laid them out, three cards in front of him face down.

  “You’re local, of course?” Jade said.

  “Yes, fairly local,” Wagner replied.

  Locals had a certain way about them that differentiated them from the tourists. To a practiced eye, something as simple as the shoes you wore could tell the entire story. The way people dressed, how they crossed a street, all of it tells a story about where you are from, how often you visit. Before moving down from Boston, Wagner had come to New Orleans each month to write. By the eighth or ninth trip, people assumed he was local. No magic fortune telling here, not yet.

  “Let’s see. The first tells of your past. Where you have been and who you are.” She flipped the card.

  Wagner looked at a seated man in a chariot with a wand in his right hand. He sat between two sphinxes, one black and one white. Castles rose in the background of the card and there was a cloth with stars draped over the chariot. The numeral VII stood above the seated man at the top of the card.

  “The chariot. Two cats, one black and one white. You are a person of dichotomies,” she said.

  “In the past, you had a sense of focus and determination in reaching your goals. You had confidence in your abilities. Boldness to the point of aggression in your endeavors.” She looked up to him.

  Wagner nodded politely. He was captivated by the two figures at the bottom of the card. The sphinxes.

  “Good and evil. You’ve been through battles and choices. And have come through with a firm stance and perseverance.”

  Wagner nodded again, not giving much away to Jade, and thanked her for her interpretation. He had read some about the tarot, dabbled in it some himself even. He had a
deck that sat on his bookshelf between Sartre and Faulkner, this time Faulkner’s Sound and Fury, not his cat.

  Jade smiled, “I see your determination from the past. It still clings. Let’s see what your current situation is.” She reached for the middle card.

  Wagner’s eyes widened at the turning of the card. The tower. It’s rare to draw two cards from the major arcana, let alone this particular card given his day’s events. The major arcana is made up of 22 cards, with the remaining 56 cards of the deck called the minor arcana. These were then further divided into four suits of 14 cards each: cups, wands, pentacles, and swords. Emotions, passion and ideas, material possessions, and challenges within you, roughly translated.

  The card was dark, with a gray-stone tower in the center and people falling from either side as lightning and fire exploded at the apex. Clouds floated and small wisps of fire poured from the windows. By any stretch of the imagination, it was an ominous card.

  Jade ran her finger over the card. “There is conflict in your life. An unexpected event has recently disturbed you. Given the context of the first card you drew, your ambition and success may have been built on a false premise. It is time for a change.” She looked at Wagner.

  “While you may feel shaken and disturbed, these are normal reactions to a tower event. But with the destruction and instability, there comes a salvation. The last card will give you a clue as to how you will see your way through the event that has disturbed your peace and harmony. This next card is your salvation. It is your way out.”

  She turned the last card. A man stood in a boat and held a long pole while he guided the boat across a river. Six swords stood upright in the boat. A crouched and hooded female figure sat next to a little boy in the center of the boat. The shore was far off in the distance. The waves were turbulent in the foreground, almost as if the boat had come through some rapids. The water was flat and smooth in front of the boat. The numeral VI was etched at the top.