No Hope for Gomez!

by Graham Parke

  Similar misalignments occur for entire nations, although this is admittedly less tragic. One nation of explorers might do well in the 16th century, while another, with a knack for just-in-time production systems, might fare better a few hundred years later. Then I begin to see cycles; the first nation rising back to the top of the economic markets as they explore space, after a nation with a knack for building efficient, high-powered thrust systems creates the necessary equipment to get them up there.

  For nations I reserve no worry, but for individuals my heart bleeds.

  Blog entry: My laptop beeped to indicate it had done all it could to drop my files off in cyberspace and it was ready for a more challenging task. I told it to try and stop just one piece of Nigerian spam.

  Blog entry: Hicks came over to ask me to check the display. “I think you’ll like it,” he said. “It really showcases the wide range of antiques we have to offer.”

  “There’s no need,” I said, feeling particularly lazy. “I trust you implicitly.” By which I meant that I didn’t really care. “There are some boxes with old tax papers in the back that you can carry to the storage room.”

  Hicks’ shoulders dropped.

  “On the other hand,” I said, not wanting Hicks to suffer any more attacks, “a good display is vital for business. Let’s have a look at what you’ve come up with, shall we?”

  I hoisted myself out of my chair and followed Hicks to the front of the store. He had indeed displayed a wide range of antiques in the windows. Sadly, I lacked the necessary skills to judge whether the display was any good. As, I suspected, did Hicks.

  “Good,” I said. “Well done.” I pointed out a few random objects. “The antiques are, eh, very well displayed.”

  Hicks nodded proudly. “Aren’t they?”

  “They are.”

  “So, what do you like most?” Hicks looked at me expectantly.

  “Well, I guess I would have to say, eh, the coat hanger. The way it holds up, eh, that coat, it’s very eclectic.”

  “Eclectic?”

  “No, esoteric.”

  “What?”

  “Ironic?”

  “Ah, ironic.” Hicks nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, I guess it is rather ironic.”

  I gave Hicks a pat on the back and watched him amble off to the back, in search of the tax papers. I waited for that warm, fuzzy feeling of having done good, of having successfully motivated a troubled young man, but it didn’t come. Hardly fair. Returned to my desk and started up my laptop.

  Blog entry: Back to my Joseph Miller investigation. For lack of better clues I began to read Joseph’s blog. They chronicled his life as a meatpacker for a local slaughterhouse down by the docks. He didn’t seem to enjoy his job much. What I assumed would be a set of amusing work anecdotes, or some boring events described in interesting and unexpected ways, sadly turned out to be dry descriptions of random days. No turns of phrase, no witticisms, not even any good old sarcasm. I couldn’t work out why he’d bothered writing any of it – who the intended audience was. I was hard pressed to believe even a spouse would’ve found anything of interest.

  As I read on (scanned, really), it occurred to me how cool it would be to find Joseph’s trial blogs. If I could somehow gain access to his entries on how he’d been progressing during the drug trial, I could make some real progress. He would’ve described any unexpected feelings related to his well-being. Perhaps I’d see a problem developing, something the researchers missed because it progressed slowly and they hadn’t known what was coming. I might be able to distill some kind of early warning signs, something to tip me off if it started happening to me.

  (What if it started with paranoia about the trial, then progressed into liking Dr. Hargrove, and ended up with worrying about manual looms?)

  Sadly, all I had was this meatpacking blog, which, apparently, chronicled the whole truth and nothing but the truth about meatpacking. Which was quite a lot more than I ever hoped to learn about the subject.

  Blog entry: Decide to give the detective work a rest. Hicks returned from the back to tell me he’d succeeded in moving a box. As it turned out, moving boxes of tax papers gave him redeye. He asked for something else to do. Told him to do some sweeping.

  Blog entry: Far from five o’clock. Got bored. Wondered if I was perhaps born in the wrong era. If there was something else I should be doing. Something I’d not only be good at, but which I’d find meaningful and, at a pinch, fun.

  There was no way to be sure, of course. Not until I found evidence of any kind of special ability within, and that would only happen if and when the opportunity arose.

  A catch 22: You can’t find out what your knack is if you never get to do it.

  7.

  Blog entry: Visited the clinic the next day. Went well, although I was a bit upset when the guy ahead of me came running from Dr. Hargrove’s office, chased by two large lab assistants. As he sped towards the exit, he shouted, “OVER MY FAT BODY!”

  Wasn’t sure what to do. Decided the guy’s session was probably over and went in.

  (Blog edit: I later had an opportunity to ask him if he’d meant to say: ‘Over my dead body!’ but to this he merely rolled his eyes and said; ‘Nothing’s that bad.’)

  Dr. Hargrove seemed unfazed. “Hi, Gomez,” she said. “How are you doing?” She gestured to the chair opposite her desk. “Please have a seat so we can get started.”

  “I’ve been good,” I said. “Great, in fact.” I nodded in the direction of the waiting room. “What was that all about?”

  Dr. Hargrove waved it away. “Nothing to be concerned about.”

  She took a new questionnaire from her desk and jotted down my ID at the top. Apparently she knew it by heart. My worries melted as I tried not to wonder too hard what this meant. Beaming, I said, “Some people, eh? What can you do?”

  “I’m not at liberty to discuss other trial participants, Gomez,” Dr. Hargrove said, then she looked up from her form and whispered conspiratorially, “Especially if those participants were suffering from interactions due to a second trial they’d secretly signed up for.”

  “Yeah,” I said, looking deep into her eyes and discovering at least two new colors. “I guess that would be something to keep under wraps.”

  Dr. Hargrove gave me a quick, sweet smile, and started on her questions.

  “Any dizziness, nausea, or headaches since your last visit?”

  “Nope.”

  “Difficulty swallowing?”

  “Nope.”

  “Unexpected feelings of elation or euphoria?”

  “Not really, no.”

  When she reached the last question, “Anything else that’s not on the list?” I told her how I’d felt a little out of breath about half an hour after our last session. “I suddenly started breathing very fast and very deeply,” I said, “for no apparent reason.”

  “How long did this last?”

  I cast my mind back. “I’d say less than two minutes… three tops.”

  “Did it return at any point?”

  I shook my head. “No. It happened just the once.”

  Dr. Hargrove made some notes on the form. “Good,” she said. “Good.” She shot me another smile, which faded too quickly. “Anything else?”

  “I don’t think so, no.”

  The initial high from seeing Dr. Hargrove write down my ID from memory had dissipated and I began to notice she didn’t seem her usual self. She looked a bit down. A bit sad.

  “Is everything alright?” I asked.

  “What?” She looked up from her form. She’d been miles away. “Yes, Gomez,” she said, “you’re doing great, nothing to worry about.”

  “I meant with you. Is everything alright with you?”

  “Of course,” she said. But it seemed like an automatic response.

  Blog entry: After taking my pills, I left the clinic and walked over to the zoo, which was a few blocks down the street. I bought a ticket and spent an hour wandering around, not exactly sure w
hat I was looking for. There were no signs of anything lethal out in the open, of course, nothing you could come into contact with that would allow you to make it home safely and then lapse into a deadly coma. And, there were no signs of Joseph Miller having been there.

  I made another circle of the entire compound, finding nothing.

  Blog entry: Thinking over my next move, I bought a plastic crocodile and an ice cream cone at the souvenir stand. Immediately started to feel silly, so I gave the crocodile to a passing child. When I tried to give my half-eaten ice cream to another child, I ran into the first problem of the day.

  Blog entry: Dusted myself off. Pushed some tissue up my nose to stop the bleeding. Ignored a sudden bout of intense déjà vu.

  I also realized I shouldn’t be looking for clues, I should be asking for them.

  Found one of the zoo people picking up the trash around a bin and asked her if she’d known Joseph Miller. She screwed up her face.

  “He was a volunteer,” I offered. “38, dark hair, tall, wrote a blog about meatpacking?”

  “Miller…” she said. “Miller...” She let the name roll around her tongue. “Yeah, I think I remember him. Wasn’t he John’s Tuesday afternoon monkey-poop scooper?”

  “Could be,” I said. “Could be. So, where can I find this John? Is he working today?”

  Blog entry: John was working that day. I found him out by the monkey cages as instructed. He was a thoughtful looking man in his mid-fifties. He sported a ruffled old fedora and a manly five o’clock shadow.

  “Joseph Miller…” He shook his head. “No, sorry, never heard of him.”

  “Are you sure? People around here seem to think he was your Tuesday afternoon monkey-poop scooper.”

  “Ah,” John said. His face cleared, “Joe! Sure, I know Joe! Good guy. Quiet, but a hard worker. When he bothers to show up that is. Haven’t seen him in a while.”

  “He died,” I told him. “Passed out in his apartment, then dehydrated.”

  “Really?” John shot me an incredulous look. “I can’t believe it. Joe? Are you sure?”

  “Quite sure. Any idea what might have caused it?”

  He shook his head. “I can’t believe it,” he said. “Joe’s dead?”

  “Yes. Is there anything around here he might have come into contact with that would make him pass out?”

  John shrugged and shook his head. “All we have here are monkeys,” he said. “Monkeys, monkey feed, monkey poo, monkey pee. That’s it.”

  “No chemicals?”

  “Not really, no. We don’t even use delousing powders; the monkeys do it all themselves.”

  “Could Joe have been allergic to the monkeys?”

  “I guess,” John said. “But I don’t see how that would make him pass out.”

  “If his throat swelled up, caused him to suffocate?”

  John scratched his five o’clock shadow. “That’s a pretty severe reaction,” he said. “If Joe were that sensitive to anything around here, he wouldn’t have made back to his apartment.”

  I was down to grasping at straws. “What if someone knew he was allergic to something, put it in his pocket, and Joe didn’t come into contact with it until he changed his clothes at home?”

  John frowned. “You’re grasping at straws now, aren’t you?”

  I could only shrug.

  “What you’re suggesting is that Joe’s death wasn’t an accident.” John gave me a hard look. “If that’s the case, then maybe you should be looking at people who wanted him dead, not people who needed him to scoop up monkey poo.” He arched his brows.

  “Well,” I said, and left it at that.

  8.

  Blog entry: Returned home tired and headachy. Decided to take the elevator instead of the stairs.

  Blog entry: Made a mental note to stop using the elevator, even on tiring, headachy days. Resolved to make a little project out of determining which was more painful: (1.) Climbing eight flights of stairs, (2.) Running into Warren in the elevator.

  Also realized I needed to examine the chances of running into Warren so often. I’d yet to run into any of my other neighbors.

  I had to be extremely unlucky: No Hope for Gomez!

  Blog entry: Reason the elevator run-in was so uncomfortable: Warren tried to hand me another manuscript.

  He just happened to have it on him, he said, and thought I might want to take a look. It was roughly the same size as the previous script (very thick!), and I immediately understood this to be a huge indicator of its quality. Especially as Warren implied he’d written the whole thing since our previous encounter, several days earlier.

  Warren said, “You’re like my only fan at the moment.” He grinned as if this was an obvious understatement. As if droves of fans were already resenting my position as the first person to glean his brilliantly ordered words.

  “I’m sure that description is inaccurate on many levels.” I smiled.

  The elevator stopped on my floor and I got off. I told Warren there was no chance in hell I was reading another one of his damn manuscripts and left him gaping at my receding back.

  Blog entry: Prepared a quick dinner; fried eggs, slices of onion and tomato, potato chips. Found some time to cast my mind back over the events of the day. Next to Joseph’s unexpected death, I now had another pressing question about him; how had he managed to sink so low before he died? What had happened to the man who’d so vehemently described meatpacking? Had in fact likened it to the noble art of T-shirt folding? The man who’d written pearls of urban poetry like the ever elusive; ‘Ode to This Feeling of Having Forgotten Something’, and the surprising; ‘It Wasn’t My Keys This Time, I’m Sure’. What had this lost soul been reduced to? Not even a relief cashier, not even a Thursday morning litter collector. No, Joseph Miller had allowed the Universe to reduce him to being someone’s Tuesday afternoon monkey-poop scooper.

  Oh, the humanity!

  Blog entry: Burned my eggs, threw them out, made some toast. Watched reality TV until my mind went numb, then carried myself off to bed. Still managed to lie awake for hours, analyzing my feelings for Dr. Hargrove. Decided it was time to find out once and for all if my feelings were real (what is love?), or merely transference, a uniform fetish, or a drug induced side effect. For this, I surmised, I needed to devise an objective test. The primary goal of this test would be to determine if what I was feeling were indeed feelings. The secondary goal would be to determine if they were indeed my feelings.

  As no such test came immediately to mind, I congratulated myself on a job well done and left actually devising the test for the next day. Relieved I’d figured out my next move, I was relaxed enough to try to fall asleep.

  Blog entry: Didn’t fall asleep. Spent the better part of the night listening to Warren drill holes in my floor.

  Blog entry: Woke early. Still tired. Drilling hadn’t stopped. I’d have to offer to read Warren’s new manuscript. That wouldn’t be easy, I’d have to convince him my change of heart wasn’t related to the noise. I couldn’t let him know he basically had me on a leash.

  9.

  Blog note: Realize there’s a very simple and obvious test I can perform to determine the validity of my feelings for Dr. Hargrove. This test is so obvious and simple, it boggles the mind. Haven’t been able to work out what this test is, though, so I’ll have to concentrate harder.

  Blog entry: Fast breakfast of orange juice and toast, then off to the store. Arrived early but Hicks was already waiting. He didn’t allow me to open before nine, so we waited around a bit. Looked like fair weather, carried some of the good crap out to the curb.

  Blog entry: Slow morning. Sold some small wood pieces to a young couple for their collection. Think maybe the pieces were part of the counter, as they were attached to it with nails. Couple seemed pleased; decided not to worry about it.

  Blog entry: Very quiet. No more customers. Only sounds were Hicks’ sweeping, my breathing, and a strange squeaking coming from the counter.

  B
log entry: Resumed perusing Joseph’s meatpacking blog. Was back at square one with my private investigation, all I had to go on were Joseph’s ramblings. Little did I know I would soon stumble upon something that’d break the Miller case wide open.

  I was going back and forth over his blog entries when, suddenly, my eye fell on a sidebar with some links and symbols. I’d been so engrossed in the entries that I’d neglected to take a good look at the design of the site itself. Most of the links in the sidebar were of no interest, but one of the symbols looked strangely familiar. It depicted a snake crawling along the outer rim of a circle. I couldn’t quite place it, but, as I hovered my mouse pointer over it, I noticed it was a clickable link. I clicked it and was taken to a page on a ratings site. As it turned out, Joseph’s blog had been voted the number 5 meatpacking blog in the country!

  Who would’ve thought?

  Immediately alarm bells went off in my head. Had Joseph become somewhat of a celebrity? Had he gathered a following that warranted investigation? Was this meatpacking blogging business more competitive than I’d thought?

  This opened up several new lines of investigation, all of which might very well lead to the cause of Joseph’s demise. At least, that’s what I thought until I discovered that the meatpacking nomination page had in fact been visited by only seven people in the last two years.

  Hardly what you’d call stiff competition.

  Decided it was another dead end. Closed the ratings site.

  Blog entry: “I’ve done the back,” Hicks said. He stepped out of the shadows holding his threadbare sweeper. “Anything else need sweeping?”