by Leslie Glass
At one A.M. the streets were finally quieter. No more parents hustling along clumps of kids in costumes. Not so many dressed-up faggots. A few here and there. Faggots never bothered him. Anyway, Bobbie had things on his mind. He was working a case, wasn’t looking for trouble. He wandered over to Riverside across the stretch of dead grass to the Henry Hudson Parkway. He liked watching the cars speed along next to the Hudson River, the mile-wide slash of black water that separated New York from the rest of the country. In Riverside Park he would sit on the grass or a bench and tell himself the stories of his life exactly the same way, over and over—all the horrors right up to the day the bastard Harold Dickey and the bitch Clara Treadwell unjustly cut off his balls and destroyed his life after a thirty-year career in nursing. Because of them Bobbie Boudreau was no longer a nurse, not a nurse of any kind. For almost a year he’d been a cleaner, floor polisher, garbage collector, lightbulb changer—not even a plumber, electrical engineer, or handyman. His asshole boss said he had to work his way up for even that kind of work.
When he wandered along the labyrinth of underground passages that connected the six buildings in the huge hospital complex dressed as a janitor—a fat clip of official keys banging against his hip—Bobbie looked as if that seniority was already his. He was both big and broad, still hard enough in his spreading midsection to look disciplined. There was an air of authority in his movements. His face was solid with concentration and purpose. He had the belligerence of someone in charge. Seldom did anyone stop him. When they did, it was usually for directions. Doctors, nurses, administrators, maintenance, even security intent on their own troubles rushed past him every day. Those who took the briefest second to glance his way felt immediately reassured that he was just your average good-guy hospital worker, like they were—honest, trustworthy, caring. A person who would not waste a second before fixing something gone wrong. And he did fix things gone wrong.
He was about to cross the viaduct that formed a bridge over the Ninety-sixth Street entrance to the Henry Hudson Parkway when a powerful stench of excrement startled him. He was filled with disgust even before the bum shambled from behind a bush. The bum was muttering to himself; his sorry-looking penis still hung out of pants not yet buttoned and zipped.
Bobbie swerved to avoid him, but the bundle of rags figured he’d found a mark and didn’t want to let him go. “Hey, pal,” he called, forgetting to zip his fly as he hurried after Bobbie.
“Fuck off.”
“Hey, pal, that’s no way to talk. You got a dollar? I’m hungry.”
The bum followed Bobbie onto the bridge, whining. “I’m hungry, man. You know what it feels like to be hungry? All I need is a dollar. One dollar. What’s a dollar to a rich man like you?”
The piece of shit was disgusting, had no control. He stank; he defecated in the bushes like a dog. And now the filthy mongrel was following him across the bridge, mocking him. It was a mortal insult.
“I said fuck off.”
The bum grabbed at his arm, whining some more. Bobbie didn’t like to be crowded. A thin stream of traffic, heading north, whipped by behind them on the parkway. The light changed and a car crossed the intersection below.
“Hey, pal, think of Jesus. Would Jesus walk away from a friend in need?”
Bobbie stopped short and drew himself up to his full height. He was six two or six three and weighed two hundred and thirty pounds. The piece of shit was talking to him about Jesus. Bobbie stared.
The guy figured he’d scored. “Yeah, gimme a dollar. But for the grace of God I could be you, pal.”
He was wrong. Bobbie could never be him. Bobbie was good. Bobbie was clean. He was efficient. He was in control. Bobbie didn’t stop to think any further. He picked up the offense that thought it could be him and tossed it over the railing. His move took two seconds, maybe three. Some deeply soothing sounds followed: a grunt as the asshole was picked up, a scream as he fell, then the thud as he hit the ground. If the bum survived the fall, he didn’t live long. Almost instantly there was a series of crashes as an oncoming car, speeding up to enter the parkway below, struck him, braked abruptly, and was in turn bulldozed by the car behind. Bobbie kept walking. It all felt exactly like the Lord reaching down with His grace and punishing the wicked.
At three A.M., feeling on top of the world—like the right hand of God itself—Bobbie slipped into the Stone Pavilion of the hospital through a service door on an empty loading dock at level B2. After the incident with the bum, he had gone home to change into the gray uniform of a maintenance crew he didn’t work on and to pick up a toolbox that was not part of his job. He hadn’t yet acquired the correct jacket, so he wasn’t wearing one, even though the temperature had dropped way down again. The stolen plastic ID clipped to the stolen shirt identified his own slightly freckled, flat-featured, unsmiling face below slicked-back, gray-flecked curly hair as that of a senior maintenance worker in the Psychiatric Centre where he was no longer allowed to go.
Bobbie liked thinking that if the two bastards who ruined his life knew he was still around, they’d finish him for good. They thought they could kill people and get away with it. Bobbie snorted at the fact that he was too smart for them. They didn’t know he was still around. He hummed his little God ditty. “The Lord’s too slow for Bobbie Boudreau.”
He turned down a branch in the tunnel that began its descent to level B3. He heard the clicking of the relays in the machine room that provided electricity to the nearest bank of elevators. He passed on to the long, long pump room that drove hot water through the pipes and radiators of all twenty floors of the Stone Pavilion and heard the fierce hiss of steam, jetting harmlessly into the air from dozens of safety valves. Then he passed the deep-cold quiet of the morgue at the center of the H in the building’s courtyard, a ridiculously long way from everything.
Abruptly the ground started to rise up to level B2 again. The color of the stripe on the floor changed from yellow to blue, signaling passage into another building, the Psychiatric Centre, the funny farm. Whatever you want to call it, Bobbie Boudreau was coming home to finish the work he’d started.
three
At seven-thirty A.M., Dr. Clara Treadwell felt some satisfaction at the miserable weather as she walked the half-block from her impressive penthouse overlooking the Hudson River to her impressive executive suite with the same view on the twentieth floor of the Psychiatric Centre. The sky was battleship-gray, hanging low over the choppy water. Although it was only the first of November, already it was a winter day, a harbinger of the many dismal days ahead.
She flipped up the collar of her navy cashmere coat and congratulated herself for insisting on returning to New York yesterday straight from Sarasota, instead of spending the night in Washington with the Senator as he had wanted. He was getting very demanding lately, almost like a husband who couldn’t stand sleeping alone a single night. She decided it was time to start setting limits for him. Getting home by five-thirty, she’d had the evening to pick up her messages, return calls, go over the dozens of memos and reports she had to deal with as Director of the Psychiatric Centre, Chief Psychiatrist, Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at the medical school, and Mathew McPherson Appleton Professor.
When she’d been a medical student at the university and later a psychiatric resident at the Centre, Clara Treadwell never thought she’d have a single one of those titles, much less all of them. Nor did she ever dream that she’d be appointed to a President’s Commission on Mental Health and meet the Senator who’d made that cause his life’s work. When she’d been a resident, she never would have believed that a woman past forty-five could not only attain such status but could also attract a man of similar accomplishments (and far greater wealth) and that they could fall in love with all the passion and excitement of teenagers.
Every day when Clara Treadwell awoke in her stunning apartment, decorated with fine antique furniture and painted in shades of beige and peach to soften the light and flatter her complexion, she
felt the thrill of her accomplishments all over again. The apartment, a perk of her job, cost her only a dollar a year. That was gratifying in itself. But even more thrilling was the fact that she was the first woman ever to have it.
She was the first woman Chairman and Director of the Psychiatric Centre, the first to be head of the department and the first to have the name professorship. Her freshly washed hair whipped around her face in the wind off the river despite the generous dose of hairspray she’d given it. She ducked quickly into the cavernous building, patting her hair back into place.
“Morning. Morning,” she murmured as she waited for the elevator, conscious of her position and how important it was to acknowledge the people around her.
She unbuttoned her coat, could not resist showing off the sleek new suit and trim body under it. She had to admit her figure wasn’t perfect anymore, but she dressed well, moved gracefully, and knew she still looked—if not great—at least good enough to attract attention wherever she went. It was with the warm feeling of being able to assess herself critically and come to an objective conclusion that Clara Treadwell entered the elevator of the Psychiatric Centre. For nearly six minutes, as the crowded box made its tedious progress upstairs, she concentrated on her strategy for the various meetings at which she would preside that day, feeling a sense of mastery in all things.
Then, as the elevator doors opened on the twentieth floor, her body tensed at the unwelcome sight of Harold Dickey hurrying out of the executive suite. The tension started with the familiar tingle at the base of her neck that felt as if, once again, she’d been bitten by a tiny insect pest she’d repeatedly neglected to squash into oblivion.
“Ah, there you are!” Harold’s face creased into a delighted smile. “I was hoping to catch you.”
“I’ll bet you were,” she muttered coldly, brushing past him. Harold reached out and took her arm, halting Clara’s retreat. The tic in her cheek, which twitched only when she was absolutely exhausted or impatient beyond enduring, made its first tentative throb. She sighed. “What do you want, Hal?”
He smiled his old smile. “Just you,” his smile said.
She shook her head. Not a chance. Not a ghost of a chance.
“Did you have a good weekend with the Senator?” he asked.
“Harold, you were coming from my office.” Clara said the words slowly, giving herself a moment to calm down. She was deeply angry at his pushing, pushing, pushing her so that very soon, if he didn’t get a grip, he was going to force her to squash him.
“Yes, yes. I wanted to chat with you before the meeting about your proposed changes in the guidelines of the Quality Assurance Committee. I thought it might be useful.”
“Oh?” she said. Another management problem for her to finesse. This was how Hal blackmailed her to be with him. When she didn’t make time for him, he became difficult. He played the devil’s advocate in her meetings, raised questions that engaged the others on the committee in hours of wasteful debates about trivial points. Often he changed people’s minds about the issues.
Harold Dickey had quickly withdrawn his hold on her arm, but his face was still softened by that obnoxious expression of adoration no woman can bear seeing on a man she doesn’t admire. They were stopped right outside the entrance to the executive suite, where Clara’s assistant, the vice chairman, the chief resident, and various other functionaries could observe them perfectly well.
Harold’s expression was particularly offensive to Clara because he was way over sixty now and past his prime. His hair was white and had receded far enough to reveal the dome of his bright shiny skull. His stomach had grown, and so had the fleshy pouches under his eyes. The gray Brooks Brothers suit he wore was shapeless. He still ran, and still played tennis, but his fire was gone. The only thing about Harold that was the same as when Clara had been a resident under his supervision eighteen years ago was the mustache. The white mustache had been very distinguished then, made him look dapper and a little dangerous. It still made him look a little dangerous. But now he was dangerous.
She’d been lenient for a long time—understanding, gracious, thoughtful, sensitive. She’d given him projects and even referrals. Just last night she’d referred a patient to him, Ray Cowles. She remembered with annoyance the conversation she and Ray had had about it. Ray and Hal were difficult children who irritated her almost beyond endurance. Let them bother each other; they deserved it.
Clara’s day was not starting well. Every man in her life required boundaries and discipline, not diplomacy. She had to spend precious moments dealing with each one. Having to take the time to reason with them annoyed her. Her tic made its second throb. She shook her head impatiently to make it stop. “Harold, I’m late for a meeting.”
“Oh, my. I wouldn’t want to keep you,” he said with that asinine adoring smile. “What time would be good for you?”
“No time. I have the day from hell today.”
“Do you want to have dinner later? I could hold my thoughts until then.”
“No, I have an association meeting.”
“Great, so do I. We can go together.” He looked hopeful.
Clara’s lips compressed with disgust. She shook her head at how he just wouldn’t let it die. She had married and divorced twice, had had many lovers, and had made her way through the complicated politics of two other psychiatric institutions since Harold had been her mentor, her supervisor, her lover. Now, after all these years, even though she was his superior in every way, he still had the supreme arrogance to think that he could get her back. Harold Dickey had not figured at all in her deliberations about returning to New York after a thirteen-year absence. The return of his desire, his continued and growing interest after much discouragement, had surprised her at first. Then she was amused; she thought he could be useful. Now, however, she felt different.
“Hal, I said I’m busy.”
“I like that outfit,” he murmured. “You look very pretty, Clara. Is it new?”
The navy suit was new. His commenting on it was inappropriate. She was the Director of the Centre. She could force him out, eviscerate him. She’d done it to many better men than Dickey would ever be. She was terminating him, no question, just as she had terminated Ray. And Hal was absolutely certain she wouldn’t. The tic in her cheek throbbed, confirming her decision.
He smiled. “Have a good day.”
four
Almost before dawn on November 1, Maria Sanchez heard her son, Detective-Sergeant Mike Sanchez, rise from his solitary bed and cross the hall to the bathroom, yawning loudly. The bathroom door closed. Five or ten seconds later his water splashed loudly in the toilet. The toilet flushed. Then came the sound of heavy rain as the shower pounded the bathroom tiles. Each day it was the same. It took Mike exactly twenty minutes to urinate, shower, shave, and dress.
Each day Maria spent those twenty minutes waiting for her bitter coffee to brew and watching the joggers stretch at the entrance to Van Cortlandt Park, then disappear, their legs pumping easily up and down. The joggers ran in the summer heat, in the chilling rain. In the winter months they appeared before the sky began to lighten, some not even wearing sweatpants or jackets, their breath making steam. Maria knew who some of them were, what buildings they lived in, at what hour they took the Broadway elevated train that ran within view of her window into Manhattan.
Mike told her she was the kind of witness they liked to have on the stand in court, a person who knew what was going on around her, noticed when something was different and remembered it later. It made her feel good when he said that. Her hijo was an important man. He didn’t have to patrol the streets or wear a uniform anymore. He’d had his picture in the newspaper. Maria still showed the clipping of her son to her friends. She was proud that everybody in the neighborhood knew him, came to him asking for things. They thought her hijo could personally fix all their parking tickets, speeding tickets, all their problems with any government agency, including the IRS. She never told anyone otherwise.<
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She also knew her son could have any woman he wanted. Even without the uniform, he was a good-looking man, still excited them. The single women in the neighborhood kept their eyes on him, flirting all the time. And some of the married women, too. Maria didn’t blame them. No one had trouble when Mike was around.
The walls in the old building were thin. Behind the bathroom door she heard him burp, then adjust the water in the shower. The faucet whined as he turned up the hot and the pipes began to clank. She hesitated, unsure of what to do. She had a box of wooden matches in one hand and her favorite rosary with the pink cut-glass beads in the other. She was a superstitious woman, knew timing and ritual mattered. Yesterday was Halloween. She wouldn’t have lit a candle yesterday for anything. This year God had finally intervened for Mike. Mike’s wife, Maria, who had left him five years ago, was finally dead of her leukemia. Halloween was over and November 2 was tomorrow. Could she start the ceremony a day early, light just one candle now, or should she wait?
Maria Sanchez had celebrated November 2, Mexico’s Day of the Dead, faithfully for all of the thirty years she had lived in this Bronx apartment overlooking Broadway, the elevated train, and Van Cortlandt Park. This year, however, she’d begun her shrine to the dead two months earlier than usual. She took out the old, old photos of her mother and father, uncles and aunts long gone; mementos of other half-forgotten relatives; the relics of her two babies, dead in infancy many, many years ago in Mexico, and those of her husband, Marco, when he was young. She studied them one by one, then arranged them on the heavy, carved wooden table, along with offerings of food, candles, and the prayer cards she got from her church.
The shower droned on in the bathroom. As she weighed the odds of her desire against the possibility of doing wrong, the coffee perked, and the sky lightened to day. Because her daughter-in-law had been too religious to divorce, Maria was glad she was dead. Then, ashamed of the sinful thought, she quickly extracted a match from the box, struck it, and inhaled the pungent sulfur odor.