by Dean Kutzler
Jack read her body language and was about to launch into how he didn’t believe the computer system couldn’t be overridden when he saw the paperback book Cassie had hidden earlier, laying face down on her desk.
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott.
He didn’t have the heart, or the right, to turn ghetto on her. There was a time and place for everything and this wasn’t one of them. Even if he argued with Miss Battle-Axe-Betty Trevor, she’d only take it out on Cassie, who was nice enough to have given him the extra time when he hadn’t even asked.
“You know what Cassie, you’re right. I’m sorry. I appreciate you going the extra mile in the first place. It’s waited this long—what’s a little longer?” He said with a shrug and a smile.
“Thank you,” she said, glancing towards the Bill Blass Catalogue room. “And I’m truly sorry.” The relief on her face told Jack he’d done the right thing. After all, fair was fair and she’d given him more than his share.
Jack dug in his pocket for his cell phone. It had to be getting late. His only option was to get to an electronics store before it closed, so he could purchase a new laptop to access his email and continue reading his uncle’s research. He shook his head as he made his way through the library towards the exit. It would figure his time would run out at such a crucial moment.
He tapped the HOME button on his phone to check the time, forgetting he’d silenced it, and saw that his mother had called and left a message. He worried for a second as he waited for the message to play, but remembered his instructions for the security company he’d hired; Call immediately if there was any trouble.
He was out the library doors and jogging down the steps, listening to his mother’s message: “Jack. No frettin’, this is your Momma. Erything’s fine, child. The nice security gentleman you sent is just a pleasure, but extraneously unnecessary. I suffa the fate of distress of anotha kind, Jack. I’ve been goin’ through all your father’s things and it’s just drainin’ the life from my heart. If you aren’t too busy, would you mind coming home and helpin’ me make the arrangements? I long for the comfort of family, as no other comfort could suffice. Just drop by after you get this message, when you can. Hopefully I’ll see you soon, son.”
Jack stuffed the phone back in his pocket and stopped halfway down the marble steps. She never called him son unless she was upset. He’d been busy chasing the murderers of his family, but in that moment, he realized it was the living that counted the most. The laptop could wait. He finished sprinting down the steps, ready to hail a cab when he remembered Harold’s Card.
A Cabbie Affair…
Jack loved the man’s positive attitude and right about now, he could use a little levity. He didn’t want to bring any more doom and gloom to his mother. She’d dealt with enough of that already.
Harold picked up on the third ring. “Harold Poytner, A Cabbie Affair at yer service!”
“Harold, it’s Jack rem—“
“Aaaaayyyee! Jack! Of course I remember ya buddy! Yous been on my mind. Vera’n I been worried ‘bout ya. Everything okay?”
“It’s good to hear your voice Harold. Things are—well. Let’s just say they’re looking up. I’ll tell you all about it when I see you. Are you close to the New York Public Library?”
“Is da Big Apple red?” He joked. “Hang tight. I’ll be dare in—“ A loud horn cut him off. “I’m drivin’ heeeeyya! Move it! Dis ain’t a standoff! Sorrys Jack. Don’t blink. I’m dare.”
Before Jack hung up the phone, he could hear more honking along with some choice words. The man was a saint in a hellfire-wagon.
With a screech of wheels rounding the corner onto East 42nd street, Jack spotted Harold. As they sped, honked, careened and bounced their way towards his mother’s home, Jack was lost in the story-telling and oblivious to Harold’s navigational skills. Leaving out the tree and church fire, he filled Harold in on the rest of what had happened, also skirting around his illegal activity since he’d last seen him the night Harold had dropped him off at the diner to meet with Father Alazar.
Surprisingly, Harold was quiet throughout the entire story-telling, nodding and ‘uh-huhing’ in all the appropriate places. When Jack was done, he looked out the cab window and realized they’d been sitting in front of his mother’s home for about half an hour. Harold knew exactly what Jack needed.
Glancing at the meter Harold had shut off, Jack said, “I’m sorry Harold. I was so caught up in the story—“
“Haaay! Don’t even mention it,” he said as he twisted his cap around and gave Jack a warm smile. “Honest Abe.” Then his smile turned serious. “These Beny Flowheem guys sound worse than da Mafioso's. Wait’ll I tells Vera. She ain’t gonna believe it. Bet she ain’t seen no movie like dat! But in alls reality, Jack. They ain’t soundin’ like a bunch you wanna mess wit’. Specially on yas own.”
“You’re a good man Harold. It’s been more than a Cabbie Affair. Thank you for listening and thank you for the advice. But, I’ll be okay.” Jack went to reach through the window to give Harold another hundred dollar bill and he snapped the window shut, shook his head and nearly nipped Jack’s knuckles.
“No. Dis rides on me an ya ain’t foolin’ me dis time!”
Jack started to protest, but Harold flipped down the little plexiglass piece in the window that resembled an ashtray meant for change exchange, put his lips to the hole and said, “Vera’d have my hide!” Then he let it snap shut, flashing Jack with a pouty face that said he meant business. The Bluetooth light blinked on Harold’s earpiece like an exclamation point.
Jack laughed at Harold’s theatrics, but the resolve on the man’s face was clear and it wasn’t about the free ride. They said their goodbyes and Jack told Harold to give Vera a kiss for him. Harold said he would and gave Jack another look, reminding him to be careful.
Jack stood there on the curb and watched the cab’s rear lights turn into pinpricks as Harold pulled away into the city night. He needed a few minutes to get his mind in the right frame. He had to be strong for his mother. The bonds between children and parents were far different than the bond of two soul mates. Although Jack desperately mourned the loss of his father, he could not imagine the pain of losing Calvin, his partner of seven years.
That’s when it hit him.
His mind always worked that way. Whenever something was troubling him, he’d put it out of his head and before long, like a computer program running in the background, his brain would silently think on a resolve and pop the answer into his head when it was ready.
He hadn’t thought about Calvin once since he’d left the message on his cell phone. He’d been too caught up in finding his family’s murderers. Jack realized in this moment that their little separation wasn’t a question of his love for Calvin. It’d never been about that, nor a codependency problem, nor issues about his father, or anything else of that nature.
It had been purely about Jack, himself.
He’d almost realized it when he’d listened to his mother’s message. The living were all that truly mattered. Staring up the building thinking about his mother sitting all alone in that apartment, mourning the loss of her husband of over forty years, made him realize he couldn’t fathom the pain and hopelessness she must be feeling deep down in her heart. An ache that literally started in your chest and radiated like blackened veins running throughout the body, until there was nothing left but the dull realization that nothing could be done to bring that person back.
The intense emotion, the raw love Jack felt for Calvin, could only be outdone by the pain from its loss. Just like the problem-solving that Jack’s brain ran in the background, it also fought to protect him from things of which his consciousness was unaware.
Jack had felt something pushing him away from Calvin for weeks and now he understood. The fear of losing him in any capacity, especially death, was too much even for his subconscious to handle, so it did the next best thing it knew to protect itself. It tried removing the cause: True Love.
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If Jack didn’t love Calvin so unconditionally, he wouldn’t have been so vulnerable to the devastating pain true love would eventually demand for sacrifice. But his brain hadn’t computed the most important factor. Love didn’t compute. There was no turning it on or shutting it off. Love comes, unbound. Love finds its victims, not the other way around. Like all things in life, nothing worth a damn was ever easy. The unfortunate price paid for love would be the eventual loss of that loved one, but not the love. Love goes beyond the physical. It would always be held in the center of the heart, and not the beating one.
When he was finished helping his mother, he would go home and hold Calvin in his arms and tell him how much he meant to him. Love always found a way and Jack would cherish it, not until it ended, but until the day it became eternal.
Jack was rooting through his wallet for his old keycard to the private elevator entrance of his childhood home when he heard the sound of glass shattering in the distance. It sounded like a car window. He wasn’t surprised in a city filled with crime, but it didn’t usually happen in this neighborhood.
He found the card and rode the elevator up to his childhood penthouse home. He’d ridden this elevator countless times, but had never felt the weight of this ride. He had to be strong in the face of his mother’s grief. The loss of his father and uncle had severed his heart, but had been temporarily salved-over by his quest for justice. His mother had nothing. Just her son.
The elevator came to a halt and the doors slid open. Jack’s eyebrows shot up at the man standing in the lobby. The man gave him a square smile and extended his hand for a handshake. Jack opened his mouth to speak as his mother quickly stepped around from the side and stood behind the man.
“Jack, I’m so glad you came. You got my, aaah—message,” his mother said with a nervous laugh. “This is Laws, the nice security man you hired to keep a watchful eye on your dear old mother.”
That’s right, he’d forgotten about that even though his mother had mentioned him in the message. Of course he’d be guarding the only entrance into the penthouse apartment. His uncle’s money bought only the best. Reading his mother’s nervous body language, he thought it must’ve been unnerving having a security guard in the apartment all the time. Jack gave him the up-down once-over. The man definitely fit the build for security personnel.
The man’s smiling expression never wavered the entire time as Jack reached out to shake his hand.
“Hi—it looks like the agency sent over their—“
He didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence. The instant Jack took hold of his hand, before the first pump of the handshake, the man twisted Jack’s fingers around until the pain forced him to do a one-eighty. With Jack’s back facing him, the man let go and looped his hands under Jack’s arms and firmly laced his fingers behind his neck, pushing forward and twisting him around with enough force to almost break his neck. Jack was instantly immobilized from the painful maneuver. He played possum for a second, more from shock, then started thrashing his legs and arms about to try and gain some purchase.
The man tightened his grip on Jack and bashed him against a half-table alongside the elevator, causing his hip to let out a loud crack. Jack’s eyes grew wide in anticipation of the pain that never followed. His adrenalin must have been kicking in because he felt nothing.
“Stay still und you won’t be hurt,” Lars said. The confident smile shined bright through his voice.
“Mom,” he grunted through his teeth. “Mom! Run!” That’s all he could manage. He wasn’t in a position to see where she went, but it wasn’t the elevator. He’d have heard it. The Italian Father Angeli’s dying words were taunting him in the back of his mind: The Sons of God have many pawns, even in the justice system.
This must have been what he’d meant. Last time Jack checked, security companies weren’t in the justice system. Damned language translations.
His worst fear was coming true with every jolt of pain in his neck. He’d feared leaving his mother unprotected was the worst thing he could have done.
Total opposite.
He should have listened to the damned priest. He never should have trusted anyone with her life but himself and now he’d put her in danger as a direct result.
They have the damned book.
What more could they want?
The lineage book? A little voice spoke up in his mind like it had the nerve to know the answer. A terrible answer. The lineage book. The book he still had at the brownstone. Whether it was an epiphany or just his neck snapping, he couldn’t tell the difference, but just then a memory from his childhood flashed in his head. A cold day in fall by the pond in Central Park and a brand new toy boat.
It wasn’t the lineage book they wanted.
The stress on his neck was growing more excruciating. Every time he even struggled in the slightest way, Lars would squeeze his fingertips into the sides of his neck, like a lobster pinch.
“We can do walking or sleeping. Yours is choice,” the smiling voice said, as he slipped his thumbs over Jack’s carotid arteries and began to squeeze.
Jack felt the edges of his vision fading into blackness. His mind was swirling toward a dark pit of unnatural euphoria. He wasn’t winning, no matter how hard he struggled. Better to be awake and know what’s going on. If the man wanted him dead, he’d have been toast by now and as long as the man had a hold of him, his mother was safe. For now.
“Okay, okay,” he wheezed, fearing he was going to pass out. “Let go. I’ll cooperate.”
Lars held the pressure on his neck just until he felt Jack’s legs start to buckle, then eased up, and Jack’s vision and mind began to clear with the rush of fresh blood to his brain. “I letting go, but know,” he slipped his thumbs under the base of Jack’s chin, then cruelly pushed his fingers forward hard enough to cause him to gag and choke violently, “this hold I can do quickly again. No?”
He held on for about thirty more seconds as Jack gurgled and gagged, then he let go of his throat. Jack dropped to his knees, coughing and spitting, trying to catch his breath. A dark red ring appeared around his neck. He put his hands on the floor and coughed a little harder, cocking his head to see where Lars's feet were.
“Uh uh. Don’t be foolish boy. I won’t give choice next time.” He planted his foot in Jack’s side and shoved him down, up against the elevator.
“That’ll be enough of that,” his mother’s voice sternly said.
Jack flipped over and sat up against the elevator doors. His mother was standing behind Lars with a gun in her hand. Way to go mom! Never mess with a southern woman's children.
“Stand up.” Still stern.
Jack got up from the floor, straightened out his clothes and started to walk towards the phone on the other half-table by the elevator.
“Stay right there, son.” She motioned the gun in Lars's direction and said, “Laws.”
“Mom, let me call the police first. Then we can deal with—“
Then he caught it—her face. It was stone. She wasn’t scared. She’d always been a strong southern woman, but her eyes. He was staring directly into them. Windows to the soul and all—not even a hint of alarm.
Then his eyes darted towards Lars. That same confident, immovable smile bled from his voice and was riding the lips of that boxy jaw line on his face. Without taking his eyes off of Laws, he said, “Mom. What’s going on here?” Lars's brow drew down and his left cheek pulled the corner of his mouth up into a sinister sneer.
He didn’t want to look. He couldn’t look and couldn’t not look. Time flipped a switch while he fought to hang on as his eyes traveled the distance of a thousand betrayals. They didn’t stop until they hit the coldness of his mother’s gaze. They were a bit softer now, but unyielding as an ice wall.
He fought the pull as hard as he could, but his eyes were drawn down to the steely glint of the gun in her hand.
It was pointed at him.
As a journalist in his career, he’d always searched
for the right word; the word that acted as the best vehicle to convey the message at full throttle. Less was always more, or the message got lost in a sea of nouns and verbs and adjectives and adverbs and so on, until the reader was as lost as the point of the story.
There wasn’t a single word for this moment.
Nor any combination of words.
Not in this lifetime.
Not in an infinity of lifetimes.
So he just stared into his mother’s cold eyes, waiting for the soul within to bring him back to purpose.
“I’m sorry, Jack.” She said, as the three little words chased away the bit of softness in her eyes. “I do believe there’s only one thing more important to a southern woman than her family.” She tore away from his stare, thickening her accent and steeling her voice before her eyes returned to his. “And that is power. Without power, there can be no security in familial bonds. Someday, you’ll understand, Jack.”
Who was this woman? This woman he’d known for twenty-nine years. The woman that changed his diapers. The woman that read him bedtime stories before she tucked the covers under his chin. The woman that put bandaids on his scraped knees. The woman that sent him off to private school with the Scooby-Doo lunch box.
The woman that was his mother.
The—woman.
She was a complete and utter stranger.
How couldn’t he have ever known?
He searched her eyes and face again and saw no remembrance of the woman that brought him into this world and nurtured him before he stepped out into it on his own.
“But—but. Why?” There was that word. That word that didn’t quite convey the question. Jack had to ask anyway, his betrayal demanded it. “They killed my, father—your, your husband and they butchered Uncle Terry? Why?”