Y Is for Fidelity

by Logan Ryan Smith

  “We could go back to the apartment and play some FIFA,” I offer.

  “Hmm…”

  After Joe’s we did a kind of pub crawl, making stops in Logan Square and Wicker Park where girls in their early twenties wear short plaid skirts and long stockings and the guys wear super tight jeans and scruffy beards. They kept playing music on the jukebox that couldn’t decide if it was depressing or peppy, and Ben said it was “music for pussies and bed-wetters.” Actually, he said that to more than a few young men’s fuzzy faces and few of them even managed eye contact in response. Ben and I clearly didn’t fit in so we kept moving on, but not before walking (wobbling) past all the mansions on Logan Boulevard where big oaks cast shaking shadows in the moonlight. Ben told me one of the mansions was haunted and had been so for the last twenty or thirty years after a series of gruesome murders happened there. He said anyone who rings the doorbell is immediately shot in the chest with a shotgun blast. Not only that, the wound turns into a black hole, which sucks the rest of the person—and anyone standing near—into it. We stopped in front of the place. It looked like a stone castle—sort of. He dared me to ring the doorbell and I snickered and crept up the walkway to the porch, quiet as a mouse with a broken neck. I was about to ding-dong-ditch when Ben yelled BANG! and I jumped eight feet into the air and ran back through the black wrought iron gate to the sidewalk where he was doubled over in a fit of laughter.

  After that, we carried on southwest when I realized we were near Oak Park. He asked me why I didn’t have a girlfriend. He said he wondered if he wasn’t living with some kind of queer. He said I worried him. I told him I wasn’t a queer and he laughed and said he didn’t really care. That’s when I told him about Taylor. I was way past my limit already when he suggested egging “that heartless bitch’s fucking house,” so, I agreed. Unlike Madelyn, Ben was completely on my side. He understood my frustration and the pain I went through. I couldn’t even get that much from my own brother.

  So, here we are, hiding behind a parked car in snooty Oak Park as the goop of at least ten eggs drips down the fancy façade of Taylor’s fancy freaking house. Meanwhile, the egg white on my right arm is hardening and tightening the skin there. I kind of like it. I repress an urge to pick and peel it.

  “Why? What do you want to do?” I ask once I realize Ben isn’t going to say anything else.

  He pulls a pack of Camels out from his tracksuit jacket and lights up. He blows smoke for a while into the quiet suburban night. I don’t interrupt. Eventually he rests his chin against his chest and I think he’s going to pass out. Instead, he tears his white tanktop, ripping a swatch of it off, which he twists in both hands. Picking the Johnny Walker up from the sidewalk, he takes that twist of cloth and shoves it into the bottle.

  “What… what are you doing?” I ask, mesmerized as he pulls out his Bic lighter again, flicks it, and watches the long flame dance out of it, his cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, his eyes glazed over as he stares into the fire.

  Finally, he turns his head toward me, and his lips, very slightly, curl up at the corners.

  “Did I mention my father was a fireman?”

  “You don’t know who your father is.”

  Ben pulls himself up from sitting against the Jaguar’s front tire and turns toward Taylor’s Queen Anne-style house. He sways in the cool evening breeze, lighter in one hand, rag-stuffed scotch bottle in the other, his cigarette dangling from his lips.

  “No,” I say.

  He lights the rag.

  “No. Oh, no no no,” I say, but I don’t reach out and try to stop him. In fact, I don’t even stand. I’m scared and don’t want to come out from my hiding place behind the parked car. My heart races and my limbs tingle. My palms sweat and I think the egg white on my arm is actually cooking.

  All I can do is watch. The fire in the rag starts small, barely there. It gets big quick, and when the heat is too much for Ben, he shouts, “Ahhhh! Fuck you!” and flings the flaming bottle across the street at that pretty house.

  It SHATTERS against the front door. A pool of flame spreads beneath it, and flame trickles up the door then spiders in all directions. I see this because I’m standing now, somehow, though I don’t recall telling my tingly legs to lift me up.

  “Ben… what did you do?”

  The look in his grey eyes—it’s like he doesn’t know what he just did, and doesn’t know how to answer me. For a moment he’s scared, confused.

  He laughs, hits me in the chest with the back of his hand, and flicks his cigarette over the hood of the Jaguar into the street.

  “Come on. Let’s go.” He sprints down the street, leaving me behind.

  I’m paralyzed.

  I’m paralyzed until lights are flicking on in Taylor’s house, first upstairs, then systematically downward until the dark windows beside the front door become yellow rectangles. Before I know it, I’m catching up to Ben. He seems surprised at my speed.

  “Good work,” he says as we round the corner onto the main street where the 24-hour Jewel and a bunch of dark, closed up shops are. We’re both bent over, hands on knees, catching our breath. It’s harder for Ben because he keeps laughing. I just don’t get it. What’s going on here?

  Ben spots a taxi a few blocks away and whistles loudly through his teeth and soon we’re climbing into the backseat.

  “Good work?” I ask. “I didn’t do anything!”

  “You did great,” Ben says, panting.

  “Where to?” the cabby asks.

  “Home,” Ben says, grinning at me.

  “And where’s that, cupcake?” the cabby asks.

  CHAPTER 14.

  DING-DONG

  It’s Captain Stephen Peacock. He’s first, as always—but only after me, of course. For some reason he likes to claim being first to the chatroom even though I’m always first, waiting on everyone to finally show up and join me. It’s almost like my presence doesn’t count. Anyway, my caramel macchiato is still piping hot and my nerves are spraying sparks against the underside of my skin.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK has joined your private room, American BBC Fanatics.

  JAMES HERIOT: Peacock, you’ll never believe what’s happened.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: Hey! Now you know I like to get the first word in.

  JAMES HERIOT: I know, I’m sorry. I just need to tell someone. My GD therapist is on vacation this week or something!

  CAPTAIN JACK has joined your private room, American BBC Fanatics.

  CAPTAIN JACK: Therapists. Can’t live with ‘em, can’t sleep with the ones that look like Robin Williams in Goodwill Hunting.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: Captain Jack, your lust knows no bounds.

  DAVE LISTER has joined your private room, American BBC Fanatics.

  DAVE LISTER: No kidding! It runs the gamut from David Tennant to funny troll-man Robin Williams.

  CAPTAIN JACK: Both are beautiful souls (le sigh).

  DAVE LISTER: Were, you mean.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: At least in the instance of Sir Robin Williams who is no longer with us, sadly.

  CAPTAIN JACK: Right. I know. I miss him every day.

  DAVE LISTER: I know what you mean, Jack. I still miss John Candy.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: I’ll miss Prince until the day I die.

  DAVE LISTER: Peacock! I had no idea you were a Prince fan! I was still in my protracted mourning phase over Bowie when Prince left us.

  CAPTAIN JACK: Celebrities really shouldn’t be allowed to die.

  JAMES HERIOT: OK OK OK, I was talking here.

  VYVYAN BASTERD has joined your private room, American BBC Fanatics.

  VYVYAN BASTERD: Oye, you slags! Sir James Heriot has the floor.

  JAMES HERIOT: Thank you, Vyvyan. And good to see you.

  VYVYAN BASTERD: And lord knows when Precious James has the floor we goddamned well better listen!

  DAVE LISTER: LOL

  CAPTAIN JACK: If we don’t give him the floor he’ll start flickin
g the lights on and off until we quiet down!

  JAMES HERIOT: Hey!

  VYVYAN BASTERD: :-P

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: What is it, James? Everyone simmer down. His therapist is on vacation this week and we’re all he has at the moment.

  JAMES HERIOT: Well, that’s not exactly true.

  CAPTAIN JACK: Oh, that’s so sad!

  DAVE LISTER: Go on, sport. What’s troublin’ your wee lil heart?

  JAMES HERIOT: I burned someone’s house down.

  CAPTAIN JACK: What?

  DAVE LISTER: What?

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: Oh, dear!

  VYVYAN BASTERD: Right on! Anarchy in the USA, motherfuckers!

  JAMES HERIOT: Actually, I more or less bombed it.

  CAPTAIN JACK: You bombed someone’s house?

  VYVYAN BASTERD: Yeah, how’d you do that, mate?

  JAMES HERIOT: I used molotov cocktails.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: James, what in the blazes are you talking about?

  JAMES HERIOT: No. Actually, I used pipe bombs. Three. I mean, a half-dozen. I mean, 27. 27 small pipe bombs.

  DAVE LISTER: You’re scaring me, friend.

  JAMES HERIOT: Yeah. There was this person and she pissed me off so I bombed her house.

  DAVE LISTER: She???

  VYVYAN BASTERD: Whoa.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: Where, exactly, did you learn to make a pipe bomb, James?

  JAMES HERIOT: The internet. Where else?

  DAVE LISTER: Is this some kind of joke?

  CAPTAIN JACK: Of course it is. Our James wouldn’t BOMB anybody LOL

  JAMES HERIOT: Look it up on the Chicago Tribune website. You’ll see a house in Oak Park recently burned to the ground. That was me. Me!

  VYVYAN BASTERD: And how many innocent souls perished from your wicked deeds, Precious James?

  JAMES HERIOT: You watch it, VYVYAN! You all think I don’t know who you are but all it takes is a tiny bit of amateur hacking and I’ll have your addresses, names, and social security numbers in less than an hour. And no one died. Don’t be daft. I’m not a murderer.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: OK, enough of the funny stuff now, James.

  JAMES HERIOT: I’m not going to be a doormat anymore. Not for you, or anyone else.

  VYVYAN BASTERD: Whoa, ya fuckin’ cunt! When have we ever treated you like a doormat?

  CAPTAIN JACK: Yeah, James, what’s gotten into you?

  JAMES HERIOT: Look at yourselves. Look at us. We’re losers! What else could explain our regular Wednesday meetups? What do we even talk about?

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: I get it. Someone’s having a bout of depression and trying to scare us away.

  DAVE LISTER: It’s textbook, James. Peacock is right. You’re pushing us away because you’re unhappy with something about yourself right now.

  JAMES HERIOT: Shut up! Shut up! I’m not! I’ve never felt more alive and fulfilled in my life! You people are losers! You’re bringing me down! I don’t need you! I don’t need you anymore!

  VYVYAN BASTERD: OK, I don’t know about you guys, but how about we ban him from our chatroom? Seriously, I don’t come here to get harassed by some nutter I don’t even know. This is supposed to be fun.

  DAVE LISTER: Isn’t that a bit drastic?

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: Yeah. Clearly our James is going through a rough time if he’s willing to fabricate such lies and try so desperately to upset us.

  JAMES HERIOT: DON’T YOU DARE ALL TALK LIKE I’M NOT EVEN HERE!!!

  CAPTAIN JACK: I don’t know, guys, he’s kind of scaring me.

  VYVYAN BASTERD: Me too.

  CAPTAIN STEPHEN PEACOCK: I don’t know…

  DAVE LISTER: :-(

  JAMES HERIOT: Fuck you you fucking nerds! I don’t need you! You’re bringing me down! You are part of the reason I’m such a GD loser! I’ll bomb your fucking houses, too! I’ll

  [YOU HAVE BEEN LOCKED OUT OF THE PRIVATE ROOM, AMERICAN BBC FANATICS. THIS BAN IS IN EFFECT FOR ONE MONTH AFTER WHICH YOU MAY ASK PERMISSION TO REENTER AT THE SOLE DISCRETION OF THE ROOM OWNERS]

  I try to type YOU CAN’T DO THIS TO ME! but there’s nowhere left for me to type. I close my MacBook Air calmly, sip my caramel macchiato, and let it scald my esophagus with future cancer. It’s a cruel world. So, I just sit, and I breathe, and I watch and burn. I watch people out the big front windows of Latte A Lot either coming home or on their way to meet friends and loved ones. Everyone has somewhere to be. They’re like bits of rolling garbage in the street.

  People.

  People are trash.

  CHAPTER 15.

  Unnhh.

  Ahh.

  Oh, god!

  You like that? You like that, bitch?

  Unnhh. Unnhh. Oh…

  You like that?

  Yes! Yes! God, yes!

  SMACK! SMACK!

  Where do you want it? Where do you fucking want it? On your face? You want it all over your pretty little face?

  I’ve spent the past couple Tuesdays and Thursdays getting lunch with Katharine at work. We clearly clicked. She likes to gossip about coworkers—their drinking and drug habits, which are sleeping together, who broke up with who, who’s cheating on who, who’s stealing staplers, and whether they’re cat or dog people. I found out quickly I could keep her enthralled with stories detailing what I’d found on our coworkers’ computers—their search history, stuff they managed to download, the music they listen to. I made her promise not to tell anyone and when she did I told her it was my duty as sysadmin to periodically read randomly selected outgoing email. She gasped. She said, “Oh, no! I hope you’ve never read any of my email. Oh my god, how embarrassed I’d be!” I assured her that I hadn’t (I had, of course—it has helped me enormously in that it taught me she likes the Bulls, books by Gillian Flynn, movies by J.J. Abrams, some kind of music called “dark wave,” and intelligent men (and of course that meant I could continue to tell my math-based jokes, which had her laughing 33.3339674% of the time (ha!))). Most importantly it told me she spends many of her Friday nights watching Netflix and drinking (gasp) chardonnay! And you know why? Because she’s recently out of a relationship. In her emails (she writes a lot of personal emails on company time) she has used the word “vulnerable” quite often.

  Tonight’s Friday, and she is most definitely not watching Netflix right now and drinking chardonnay alone.

  After work I was crossing the marble floor of the sky-cutting building on Wacker near the river when I saw Katharine exiting the big glass doors onto the city street. I jogged (like a paraplegic, or, at least, like my brother without his prosthetic) out of the building and caught up to her. After admitting she had no plans it was easy to convince her to join me for a drink. We had a few at the bar in the Hyatt down the street from work. She tried to guess who were tourists, who were business people, and who were hookers. I got the impression she was good at reading people. We drank chardonnay, but very slowly. She suggested we go somewhere more lively, and, not knowing where else to go, I suggested Joe’s and she agreed. When we walked into the tiny bar crusty with toothless rabble and middle-aged people yellow with jaundice, I recognized the error of my suggestion. A very earthy but not-so-lively Howlin’ Wolf song played out of the internet jukebox. Katharine said it was fine, however. She told me she loved dive bars (she had mentioned that, too, in an email I’d read—I’d forgotten that but I’m certain my keen subconscious guided us there!).

  I’ll have to look up what a “dive” bar is. Perhaps it has something to do with the semi-nautical theme?

  Speaking of, I pointed out the anchor with “Free Beer Tomorrow” painted on it, and we both had a good laugh about that. I mentioned the bar was very pro-Bulls (having forgotten she never told me she was a Bulls fan) and she said, “Oh! I love the Bulls! You’re a basketball fan?” which I replied to in the affirmative, of course, while she went on and on about somebody named Derrick Rose for minutes on end. Apparently he gets injured a lot, making one leg of his all but usel
ess. I wondered if he’s sporting a fake limb. Maybe he does. But, even with that fake leg he’s still a big superstar. Damn cripples. Gosh-darned cripples are loved by everyone!

  Even though the chardonnay we drank at Joe’s was flat we drank it faster than we had at the Hyatt. After a few I told her how Sharron, in accounts, became addicted to MDMA after she caught her husband sleeping with Carol, her best friend, also in accounts. Sharon has an “online therapist” by the name of Jaimus Thurston, and he had “prescribed” her taking a bit of ecstasy from time to time to alleviate the depression and also to open her mind and body. It worked like a charm, for a time. Sharon started an online dating profile and listed herself as available for “short-term dating and casual sex” and began exacting her happy revenge on her husband one hook-up at a time. It didn’t last, of course, and now Sharron has been asking Jaimus about undetectable poisons she might be able to slip into Carol’s coffee. Because. Because she loves her husband, of course.

  Katharine absolutely loved that story so I continued, telling her how Dennis, also from work, likes to get paddled by a giant man dressed like Wall Street Goldilocks. I told her he frequented a seedy porn-slash-sex shop in Uptown called Fisters. To make it sound more convincing, while also giving myself an air of power, I told her I soon would have to discipline both Sharron and Dennis for their frivolous use of company time.