New York City Noir

by Tim McLoughlin

  “The falcon just grabbed a pigeon.”

  “What falcon?” I asked.

  “A peregrine falcon nest up there with a fledgling.” She was pointing to a small stone doorway high above the second pillar. By her general demeanor, I knew this Audubon member wasn’t her

  I still had fifteen minutes before her toast. I spent the time scanning both sides of the river for any glint of a wine glass. After an hour, feeling empty and pissed, I headed back to Brooklyn and walked to the F train stop at York.

  A teenage girl was waiting all alone at the farthest end of the platform. I seriously considered dragging her a few extra feet into the darkness of the tunnel. But before I took a step, I realized the token clerk got a good look at me. If she screamed, there would only be one escape route. I was actually relieved when someone else finally showed up.

  Upon arriving home, an e-mail was waiting for me: Happy birthday to you.

  I wrote back that I was in agony for her.

  Agony?

  I know this sounds odd, but I think I’ve fallen in love with you.

  That’s funny. Tell me another.

  I’m serious. I can’t get you out of my head. I’m always thinking about you. Can’t we just put all the bullshit aside and meet somewhere like two adults? We’ll just have coffee and if you like what you see, we can go on a proper date.

  To be quite honest, I’m nothing special to look at. Right now, you claim to be in love with me and we didn’t even meet. I’ve gone on dates with guys who’ve used me in the most degrading ways and then decided never to call me again. Frankly, I don’t even like sex. (I only like what it symbolizes.)

  Me neither! We don’t have to have a sexual relationship. I can love you as a friend.

  We can be friends on the Internet.

  In order to assuage my obsession, and allay my fears of rejection, I need to meet you face to face.

  And by meeting you, I stand to lose everything, she replied, as though we were corresponding in some goddamned nineteenth-century epistolary novel like two star-crossed lovers.

  I promise, even if you’re old, fat and limbless, if you got bad skin or an overbite, if you smell awful or can’t dress, or your eyes are too close together, or your ears stick out, whatever irregularity or infirmity you got, I will forever maintain our friendship.

  I’m sorry but no.

  Are you a man? Is that it, because if that is the case, even that I will not mind, but I need to see you.

  Please try to understand—I just can’t.

  I feel that this is cruel and manipulative on your part and I resent it.

  I’ve only adhered to the stated rules of our friendship.

  You led me to believe that this relationship would eventually lead somewhere.

  And so it has. I feel I know you, and here we are arguing with all the intimacy of old lovers.

  Are you married? Or in a relationship?

  Not that it matters, but no. Please try to understand that anonymity is for both our sakes.

  That is so fucking patronizing! And I resent this mock legal formality as if you have some bullshit authority!

  You’re right, I’m sorry, but frankly you’re scaring me.

  I don’t mean to, but if I can’t find some resolution to this, you’ll leave me with no recourse other than to cease this relationship as it presently exists.

  When did you become such a needy person! The thing I always found most attractive about you was that you always sounded so firm and strong. I took you to be a lone wolf but here you are a braying little lamb.

  I didn’t respond.

  Perhaps we can work something else out.

  I didn’t respond.

  Perhaps I can speak to you on the phone. Would that be acceptable? You can give me your number and I’ll call you at some specified time.

  I didn’t respond.

  What exactly is it you hope to gain from our meeting? If anything, I believe it will kill the love—a word I don’t use lightly—that does exist.

  I didn’t respond.

  Do you want me to be more vulnerable, is that it?

  Though I wanted to respond, I didn’t. I really was half hoping she’d just go away—for her own sake.

  Suppose I send you a nude photo of myself—deleting my face of course—my nudity will be fully vulnerable for you to see. If you respond to this, I will e-mail the photo. I will also trust that you won’t simply laugh at my less than perfect body and then never return my messages. This is my last and best offer, and let me assure you that even if we were to meet (which we won’t) you’d never get such a candid view of me. If you don’t reply to this final offer, I will be compelled to bid you farewell and give up this e-mail address.

  I finally responded: I am inclined to accept this offer, but I suppose I must do so with a word of caution. In matters of the heart, there are no lies, nor is there right and wrong. Despite all the cliches to the contrary, the heart is a shark. It consumes what it must, and turns its back on what it cannot use. This photo might very well do the trick, and satiate the hunger of obsession, but there is a chance that I will still find myself pining for you. If so, then I’m truly sorry.

  Spare me the bad Tennessee Williams prose. If I am going to stand naked before a mirror, and snap a goddamn polaroid of myself, then scan it into my computer and e-mail it to you—some whiny clown whose name I don’t even know—I damn well insist that I get some assurances for it. Specifically promise me that you will continue our correspondence without any more bullshit. Otherwise, goodbye forever.

  It wasn’t exactly like I had a lot to lose. Still, in an effort to drive a hard bargain, to get the very most I could, I said, All right, but let me begin by saying, I can spot a phony picture right off. If you do take a self-portrait, I expect it to be well lit, well focused, and in color. In addition to your body, I will require your hair—not just pubic, but head hair. And if you dye your hair or put on a wig, and I sense that too, the deal is off. I understand you don’t want to show your face, fine. But a woman’s hair is very important to me, it allows me to grasp some sense of her character and identity.

  Although I’m beginning to fear that I seriously miscalculated you, she replied, an offer made is an offer kept. I suppose I can reveal my hair, but first I plan to wash and brush it, so if you find that “phony” say so now. Let me also specify that the photo will not be some raunchy piece of pornography. I will stand nude, in a lit room at a distance of several feet, and snap the photo using my polaroid camera, but I’m not some hussy, so if that is what you’re expecting, say so now as I do not want to degrade myself any more than I have to. If you send me a follow-up e-mail saying you were expecting to see “pink” or some crap like that—just forget it, buster. It’ll be a straight-forward shot, minus my face.

  I replied: I know you well enough to know that you wouldn’t pose in some pornographic fashion, and you should know me well enough to know that I wouldn’t expect such a tawdry thing. Though you probably don’t believe me, this is not for erotic purposes.

  * * *

  Three days passed without a word. Then on the night of the fourth day, checking my e-mail account, I saw it: her e-mail with an attachment had arrived. The re: said, Why not take all of me.

  When I hit the attachment, I slowly watched a naked form loading onto my screen. As she was revealed, I could barely catch my breath. I didn’t remember seeing anyone quite as erotic. The entire time I knew it was her, simply because she really was quite ordinary. Her brushed-out shag of red hair, then an oval whited-out face, strong shoulders, a firm, lean torso. Beautiful breasts, a flat unscarred abdomen. Below that was an untrimmed tangle of reddish brown pubic hair, so rich I could smell her. All unscrolling into a typical, intelligent, early-middle-aged woman, who clearly watched her diet and occasionally exercised.

  The one detail that particularly caught my eye was just above her ankle. It was a small green sea horse.

  The correspondence had quickly devolved into a game o
f stud poker. After seeing the photo, I had this instinct to fold. The little voice in my head said, this is as much as you can ever hope to hurt her. So, if only to do that, it made sense not to reply.

  Therefore I made no response. Of course, she grew indignant sending her own unrequited e-mails. But I never opened them and I only read the re: line Where are you? and, Am I that Ugly? and, I thought you were a man of your word. Finally, after the second week, I got a re: from her that read, I forgive you, I only hope this the worst thing you ever did.

  When I opened the message, it said, If vanishing after seeing me nude is the worst thing you’ve ever done, I’m glad I could sacrifice myself for you—if only to give you a taste of the darkness.

  No, I’ve done a lot worse, I replied.

  Thank god, and I was beginning to think you a boy scout.

  That’s funny coming from such a girl scout.

  Oh, I do a million little, awful things every day.

  Like what?

  Like ignoring the elderly lady who sits outside my building and greets me every morning. Or yelling at mothers whose children scream too loud in the playground across the street. Or just contributing to the mediocrity of the routine world by filling up space, taking resources and only leaving a trail of excrement behind.

  None of those are even illegal.

  Perhaps, but how many awful legal acts equate to one small illegal thing? For that matter, are certain illegal acts really even that awful?

  Murder is illegal, but is it always awful? Do most people even earn their right to exist? I think the worst things in life are actually quite legal.

  That’s true in theory. In a world of six billion people in which most contribute nothing, I’d rather live among fewer people of a high quality. However, I am not a murderer.

  What does that mean? To be a murderer, you simply commit murder.

  Actually there are common traits that go into the composition of many homicidal minds. For starters, psychologists found that babies who aren’t held and shown affection during a crucial period of their infancy lose a basic human empathy that flowers into compassion and understanding.

  How do they test for compassion among infants?

  They found that babies who were held and hugged and kissed and loved will cry when other babies are crying, demonstrating empathy (not to be confused with sympathy), while infants that were not loved remain silent while other babies wept.

  I didn’t remember other babies crying when I was grow-ing up, but if they did, I probably just found it annoying. I wrote back, asking about other ingredients that go into the murderous cookie dough.

  They found an inordinate amount of killers suffered from some kind of head trauma.

  I did remember hitting my head as a kid, but I also remembered other kids of my age group suffering from head injuries. In my old neighborhood, kids fell out of trees, off bicycles, down stairs all the time.

  What else? I persisted.

  Many violent personalities were victims of violence themselves during their childhood.

  You sound like you’ve read your stuff, I fired back, pissed at her simplistic, Martha Stewart recipe for how to shake and bake a murderer.

  Only because I live in constant fear of crime. Is that so wrong? Don’t you have any fears?

  Sure.

  What are they?

  It was the perfect opportunity, so I wrote back: I’ll tell you mine, but only if you tell me yours.

  Fine, you first.

  Attempting to be truly macabre, I wrote: Having my penis slowly dissected with my own scalpel. What about you?

  Being cut off. Just floating in a bottomless pit of blackness, still alive, with only your own worthless existence to contemplate. That’s the most harrowing thing I can think of. Apparently she had given the question some thought.

  That engendered my newest fantasy. When I finally found her that’s what I’d do. After blinding and paralyzing her, I’d submerge her in a sensory-deprivation tank with water matching her skin temperature so that she’d feel nothing. Then I’d slip a tube down her throat for oxygen, and an IV drip in her arm for nutrients. I’d just leave her alive for a month or two until she slowly starved to death.

  * * *

  Some weeks later, two events occurred within days of each other. The first was a simple warning from my e-mail server, stating that I was running out of space for my account. Always a pack rat, reluctant to delete anything, I was forced to download all the e-mails she had sent to me. Upon doing this, I reread all her little messages—they had all the tedium of a drawing-room romance. Aside from that, though, I became aware for the first time exactly how many little geographic references she had made over the weeks and months.

  While walking home the next day, I noticed that the decennial census had just commenced. Young folks with shoulder bags that read U.S. Census were tramping around my neighborhood. Immediately, it struck me that this would be an ideal cover for someone who wanted to inconspicuously canvas an area. I let out an accidental squeal as I realized that an excellent opportunity existed for me to find her.

  I had planned to simply join up and work for the census, but the very next afternoon I stopped at a local Burger King. That’s when I saw a group of them. Four census enumerators were going over their forms with what looked to be a supervisor. I bought a burger and coffee, and taking off my jacket, I headed to a small table at one end where they were sitting. Slowly sipping my coffee and eating my burger, I waited.

  When one census enumerator was up getting food and another was in the bathroom, only two remained at the table. I approached discreetly and draped my jacket over the nearst U.S. Census bag, which was sitting on the floor. Then, pulling it under my arm, I dashed out.

  Now it was a question of which neighborhood. All the clues were there. It was simply a matter of triangulating the various details she had mentioned in her e-mails. I extracted and isolated every single geographical reference into a list. The three most significant details were that she lived a few blocks from the river, and that there was a view of both the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty. In Dumbo you couldn’t make out the statue. From Cobble Hill you couldn’t see the Bridge. Only Brooklyn Heights allowed views of both—it was just that easy. In fact, those two simple variables only allowed about a three-block stretch of real estate. She had to either be on Montague Terrace, Pierrepont Place, or Columbia Terrace. Montague Terrace had a play-ground across the street that she had mentioned. Behind the Breukelen, a door-manned apartment building, was a row of three small brownstones. She had to be in one of them. Two of the brownstones were single-family occupancies. The last one had apartments.

  I came early the next day, ready to wait her out. Try to see if I could spot a curly-red-haired middle-aged woman with a dark green sea horse tattoo on her ankle. Red is a minority hair color, so the fact that I had insisted she show it was further proof of my superior intellect.

  Her sea horse would be the confirming mark, yet she would have to be wearing a dress or shorts in order to spot the tattoo. As this was unlikely, I realized I might have to subtly interrogate any possible suspects. After four hours, a half-dozen women had come and gone from the buildings, but no big red.

  Finally, around 4, before everyone came home from work—and the risk of her sharp screams could get me caught—I pulled on the census bag, put on a hat, a pair of tortoiseshell glasses, and decided to knock on a few doors.

  In the first brownstone was an old lady that loved to talk. In the second building was a shy kid whose parents weren’t home. Each of them was a perfectly useful victim, and though I couldn’t help but think that the police would eventually interview these two, I was hopeful that the disguise might work. After all, most people aren’t very observant.

  When I finally came to the old outdoor intercom of the last building, I felt my heart beat in my ears, and I knew she was here. Ringing the first-floor and then the second-floor apartments, I got no response. Upon pressing the loose top-floor b
utton, I wondered if the buzzer was even connected to anything.

  “Who is it?” a woman’s timid voice peeped out.

  “Census.”

  A buzz sounded and the downstairs door popped open, allowing access to a musty, dark stairwell. There were no bikes, shopping carts, or baby carriages in the hallway. If there were other tenants in the building, I saw no immediate signs of them. By the time I got up the stairs to her door, it was slightly ajar. I opened it and called out, “Hello, U.S. Government, anyone home?”

  “Hi there,” a middle-aged woman muttered.

  “Hi, we didn’t get your census form,” I began, looking her up and down. Her hair was a brownish red bundle, so she could’ve been the one, but it wasn’t decisive. She was wearing loose shapeless pants, so it wasn’t evident if she had the tattoo on her calf. As I took a form out of my bag and started slowly going through the questions, she spotted the fact that the sides of my shirt were wet with perspiration—the result of hours in the sun waiting for her. I kept wiping off my forehead to keep the sweat from dripping on the form.

  “Would you like a Coke?” she graciously asked, taking a can from her fridge.

  “No thanks,” I replied. “Are you married, single, divorced?”

  She opened a water faucet and just let it run until it was cold. The slight spray of cool water splattering on my hot neck finally compelled me to say, “Actually, a cup of water would be perfect.”

  She grabbed a glass from a high shelf, filled and put it down before me. While I pressed it to my forehead, she said, “If you don’t mind, I’ll fill this out myself.”

  As she marked in the various boxes, I sipped the water and surveyed the room. Floral wallpaper, evenly spaced reproductions, various pictures and knickknacks—all the trappings of middle class housekeeping. I was desperately trying to ascertain whether her spouse or lover was in the other room. If she had a dog or cat, I would’ve seen it by then. But was a kid or parent sleeping in the back? All was quiet as she checked through the income boxes and then onto the questions of ethnicity.

  “All done,” she replied a moment later, folding the form in half and handing it back to me.