The Rabbit Factory

by Marshall Karp

  I arrived home at thirty-four minutes after midnight. The eerie green digits that the Acura designers had foolishly thought only served to tell time glowed happily with the good news that I had just been dealt a four-card straight: 1, 2, 3, 4, all lined up in a row. According to Joanie’s rules, the better your poker hand, the greater your reward, so I knew excellent things were in store for me. Maybe Elkins’s killer would be sitting in my kitchen, cuffed to the table, writing out his confession.

  Joanie wasn’t a mystic or a kook or any of those other labels we give people who don’t rigorously follow the Accepted Path of Logic and Reason. Like millions of other perfectly sane people, she believed there are powers beyond the observable physical world. She would read our horoscopes daily, knock on wood whenever the occasion called for it, and was always on the lookout for Signs From God. So Dashboard Poker became much more than a game. To Joanie, it was one of God’s many ways of communicating with us. G-mail.

  Joanie had more than a passing need to hear from God. She desperately wanted a baby. Each month as her unfertilized eggs would drop, and the blood and the tears would flow from her body, she would pray for God’s blessings and ask for His help. Some nights I would see her kneeling at her bedside, the angelic little Catholic girl, hands clasped, her lips moving in silent prayer. Other times she would storm out of the bathroom, the EPT strip in her hand unmistakably negative, and she’d thrust it up to the heavens and yell, “Thank you, God, but this is not the fucking sign I was asking for.”

  Eventually, we turned to one of God’s helpers on earth, Kristian Kraus, fertility doctor to the stars. His patients adored him, and from the moment you met him, you knew why. Kraus was about sixty, with silver hair, a golden tan, and blue eyes that radiated compassion, understanding, and most of all, hope.

  But being a trained detective, I could see beyond the Marcus Welby façade. The man reeked of money. His suit cost more than my car. His Ferrari in the parking lot cost more than my house. And according to Joanie’s estimate, he also had about $200,000 worth of limited-edition prints. And that was just in his waiting room. We were never invited to his home in Hancock Park or the beach house in Malibu.

  The receptionist handed us a horse-choking bill after our “initial consultation,” which is an expensive way of saying “first visit.” On the drive home I gently asked Joanie if we really needed this pricey a doctor. “No,” she said. “There’s another guy who works out of the Kmart on La Cienega. Let’s take the bus down there tomorrow and check him out.” The subject was closed.

  There was one wall in Kraus’s office that had no expensive art. Just pictures of expensive babies. Girl babies, boy babies, fat babies, wrinkled babies, twin babies, triplet babies, black babies, Asian babies, and of course, hundreds of silver-spoon-in-the-mouth, money-up-the-wazoo, rich white babies. Some of the kids posed with stuffed animals, some with real dogs, and some with easily identifiable People Magazine cover parents. In the middle of all those photos was a large plaque that read Kristian’s Miracles.

  The wall was sacred, and every seat in the waiting room faced it. You sat there for never less than an hour, and the wall spoke to you. “This is what you’re here for, folks. See how easy it is? We do it every day.” To me it said, Did you see Dr. Kraus’s platinum Rolex and his ostrich-leather wing tips? Those are just some of the many things he spends your money on. This wall is dedicated to you. Thank you for your contribution.

  After six visits that included poking, probing, sperm collecting, and various other procedures that were an amalgam of humiliation and comic relief, the good doctor announced his conclusions. “You appear to be in that very small category of couples where the tests are basically,” he paused to clear his honeyed-voice throat, “inconclusive.”

  The fucker couldn’t find a thing wrong with either of us. He was, he consoled us, terribly, terribly disappointed to put us through all those tests and come up with no definitive diagnosis. But not so disappointed that he didn’t cash our checks. His best advice was don’t give up. Keep trying for another six months, and if you don’t get pregnant, we should consider in vitro. By “we” he meant me, Joanie, and our checkbook.

  One night, during our Just-Keep-Trying-For-Good-Old-Doctor-Kraus Phase, I got home around 9 p.m. I had just pulled my fourth sixteen-hour stakeout in a row, and I was cop-weary. I shucked my clothes in a heap on the floor and my body in a second heap on our bed. This is where my memory gets fuzzy, but I do remember bits and pieces of it. I had to rely on Joanie to fill me in on the finer points the next day.

  Apparently two hours after I hit the pillow, she came home from a PTA meeting. Joanie taught third grade and loved it. She gently nudged me out of REM until she was convinced I had achieved a minimal state of auditory awareness. I, of course, couldn’t hear shit.

  “I had a rotten night,” she said. “Suzie Dilallo’s parents came directly from a cocktail party, and they were both half-sloshed. Doreen Riggins’s father got so excited when I told him how well his daughter was doing in math that he threw his hands up and knocked over my diet Coke and spilled it on my next five reports.” She waited for my usual husbandly concerned response. Getting none, she put her mouth to my ear. “Are you even listening to me?”

  Technically I was listening, but I had not yet reached the stage where I could decipher. Her gentle nudging became aggressive prodding and quickly escalated into serious pummeling. Somewhere short of assault and battery, my brain opened up for business, and I managed to grumble, “Mmm, lis’ning.”

  “I’m sick and tired of going to PTA meetings as a ‘T’,” she said. “I want to go as a ‘P.’ All the way driving home, I was totally bummed, and then bam! I pulled into our driveway at exactly eleven minutes after eleven. Four aces, right there on the dashboard clock. It’s the best hand you can get, so I know God has something spectacular planned for me.”

  “Hope you win the Lotto,” I mumbled, still not opening my eyes.

  “I’m ovulating, and I was thinking maybe a big handsome man would make mad passionate love to me and get me pregnant,” she said.

  “’Morrow,” I said. “Inna morning.”

  “Dashboard Poker payoffs don’t carry over to the next day,” she explained as if I were coherent enough to comprehend the rules.

  “Go way. Penis sleeping,” I said.

  “I have ways of arousing penises from their slumber,” she said.

  Indeed she did. The next day she told me that I had dozed off several times in the middle. I apologized. “No apologies required,” she said. “It was very tender, very different. No heavy breathing. Just snoring.”

  I still think dashboard clocks contain messages from above, but that night four aces wasn’t a winning hand.

  I parked the Acura, turned off the ignition, and the 12:34 faded into oblivion. As I walked up to the front door I found myself singing “Ol’ Man River.” It’s one of my all-time favorites and whenever my ass is dragging, I like to dig into the real soulful part about Ah gets weary. I always assumed it was an old Negro spiritual. Until my third date with Joanie. We were in her kitchen making pasta and small talk, when I heard “Ol’ Man River” coming from her stereo. I would never have had the balls to do it with any other woman, but I grabbed the slotted spoon, turned it into a microphone, and sang along to the best of my limited Caucasian ability.

  “And now I discover yet another facet of Detective Lomax,” she said, applauding and kissing me on the cheek. “He does show tunes.”

  It was the first time she had kissed me so spontaneously, as if we were a couple who gave little cheek kisses all the time. I made a check mark on my mental scorecard and wondered if kitchen kissing could lead to bedroom kissing, which had been on my agenda since Day One, but which was as yet unchecked. It took me a few seconds to return to earth and realize that I couldn’t process her post-kiss comment. “What do you mean ‘show tunes’?” I said.

  “That song is from Showboat. Oscar Hammerstein and Jerome Kern. If you eat all you
r pasta like a good boy, I’ll buy you the album.”

  I stared at her in all my cultural ignorance. “It’s a show tune?”

  “Don’t be upset,” she said. “Just because you can sing show tunes doesn’t necessarily mean you’re gay.” Then she turned the burner off under the pasta, removed the spoon from my hand and kissed me for real. A few minutes later she gave me the chance to prove how absolutely heterosexual I could be.

  I am now totally secure in my musical masculinity. I do, however, have difficulty reconciling the fact that my father, who bawls at Puppy Chow commercials, can dismiss a genius like Hammerstein, yet be totally enthralled by lyrics like my wife ran away with my best friend, and I sure do miss him.

  I unlocked my front door. Andre was sacked out on the sofa. He stretched his legs, arched his back, and started to get up. “Stay,” I said. “I have to make a phone call.” He understood the ‘stay’ part and went back to sleep.

  It was too late to call Terry at home, but I knew he’d check his office voicemail before he drank his first cup of coffee. I left a message with the highlights of my conversation with Big Jim, starting with his observations on the finger in the flipbook and ending with Danny Eeg and his billion-dollar motive.

  I hung up the phone. “Oh, and one more thing,” I said, once I was sure the connection was broken. “Someone has a contract out on my brother Frankie. But that’s my problem.”

  I went to the fridge and took a few gulps of orange juice straight from the carton. The sugar hit would jolt me awake for about ten minutes and then I’d come down faster than an Austrian bobsled team. I just needed to stay awake long enough to re-read one of Joanie’s letters.

  I opened the back door, and before I let Andre out, I said, “Business!” which he knows means ‘No sniffing for squirrels or other frivolous dog diversions. Just body functions.’

  I stripped to my boxers, pressed the Oral B electric to my teeth for about one-tenth of the 120 seconds they recommend, and tended to my own business. Andre was waiting at the door when I got there. I locked up, turned off the TV, got Letter Number One from its wooden box, and crawled into bed.

  CHAPTER 22

  The first letter was seventeen pages. An epic. Longer by far than any of the ones that followed. I’d be lucky if I could stay awake long enough to read two pages. But I was jonesing for a connection with Joanie. I think it had something to do with the fact that I had met, and, okay I’ll say it, mentally undressed not one but two women today. Amy Cheever and Diana…

  Fuck! I couldn’t remember Diana’s last name. Fried cop brain. It didn’t matter. It’s not like she was a murder suspect and I needed to get it right for my report to Kilcullen.

  What’s the suspect’s name, Lomax? It’s Diana, sir. Diana something or other. Darned if I can remember her last name, but she was wearing this cool Rambo Rabbit watch. You’re fired, Lomax. Thank you, sir. Can I please read the letter from my dead wife now, sir?

  I pulled a fistful of paper from the envelope and turned to page one.

  Dearest Mike,

  I love you. I love you. I love you.

  Well, that’s a good way to start. I’ve been trying to write this letter for weeks, but it keeps coming out maudlin or depressing or just plain dumb. Would you believe that the first ten drafts started out with, “By the time you read this, I’ll be dead.” I should have said, “By the time I write this, I’ll be dead.” I’ve torn up so many versions of this letter that I’m starting to feel guilty about how many trees I’ve killed.

  Fuck it. No more striving for perfection. This is the last draft.

  The whole idea of writing to you came to me when I was lying in the hospital watching the chemo drip. For months they’ve been pumping my body full of this evil poison that has left me weak and hairless and no fun to be married to. They tell me it’s the only way to kill the even more evil poison that is rotting out my insides. But that day on that table I realized it’s not going to work. The cancer is going to win.

  Don’t try to argue with me, because if you’re reading this, then I really am dead, which means I’ve won the argument.

  Do you remember what you said that night I told you about the tumors? Your very first words were, “You’ll beat it, Babe.” Well, if I do beat it, I will shower you with kisses and burn this letter. But my Mom didn’t beat it, my Aunt Lil didn’t beat it, and after all these months of hospital stays, radiation treatments, and chemo sessions, I’m seeing the glass half empty.

  Women don’t have the same fears that men have. And I don’t have the same fears most rational women have. Don’t laugh, but what scares me the most right now (not counting the part where I get put in a box, which gets put in a hole, which gets covered with dirt) is that you won’t remember me when I’m gone.

  I know how stupid that sounds. I can hear your reaction. Are you crazy? How could I ever forget you?

  I was 14 when my mother died, and even though I knew her for fourteen years, I can hardly remember her now. You’ve only known me for seven years. I know you’ll have my pictures and those hideous family videotapes from Big Jim’s Halloween parties, but I want you to have something else. My heart. My soul. My essence.

  I figured if I just write what I feel and let it all pour out, you’ll never be able to get me out of your mind. So I’m going to write as many letters as I can. This is the first in a series. You get to open one a month. You can’t open them all at once. I don’t want to be gone from your life so soon. I want you to still anticipate me, still wait to hear from me, still keep me in your head and in your heart.

  Part of me thinks this is a very unhealthy, selfish, twisted thing to do to you. But the other part of me (the part that says it’s not a sin for a girl to feel sorry for herself) says, Don’t worry about Mike. He can handle it. He’s one tough cop. He’s a fantastic, resilient, extraordinary hell of a man. Just do what you’ve got to do for yourself and your own sanity.

  I just stopped typing, hit the Print button and read back everything I’ve written so far. Yuck. It makes me want to throw up even more than the chemo. This is usually the point where I tear it to shreds. But if I keep going back to Page Zero, one day I won’t be able to write, and all you’ll have is zero. The other night I wanted to ask you if you would hate me for leaving you a letter like this. But I decided that you would rather I shared all my irradiated ruminations and emotions with you, than share nothing. I hope I made the right choice.

  Where to start? First of all—most of all—I want to apologize for never bearing you a child. I know that’s not what you want to hear, so I won’t dwell on it. But I do have one semi-positive thought. Maybe it was God’s will that we never had a baby. True, there will never be that tangible piece of me to leave behind who would love you unconditionally. But there will also be one less child in the world who has to suffer the early death of his mother. If little Link had been born, I would have become his Missing Link. Oh, God, that’s awful. Feel free to tear up this drivel yourself.

  Do you remember the day I met you? I went home that night and wrote pages and pages in my diary about my incredible adventure at the Dunkin’ Donut Shop. I wrote a lot about poor Mr. Flores, because I knew no one else would write about just another junkie who got killed in just another stupid robbery. And then I wrote about the gorgeous homicide detective who took my statement and then offered to buy me a cup of coffee because mine spilled all over my skirt during the shooting.

  I burned my diary a few weeks ago. It was filled with things I would have wanted you to read, but it was also filled with despair. My infertility haunted me, and there were so many times that the only way to get relief from the pain was to put all my anger and fears on paper. I don’t want you to see that after I’m gone. But I saved the page with our first conversation. Here it is. Word for word.

  Neatly taped to the letter was a page from her original diary. Blue ink on ivory paper. Her handwriting. Of everything she has written, this is the part that if I read out loud, I’ll start to cry
. I began to read. Out loud.

  And then he said, Can I buy you another cup of coffee? And I said, Considering what just happened, I think they’ll give me one for free. And he said, I meant some other time. Or if you’ve had it with coffee, I could buy you a drink.

  I was so excited, but I had to be cool, so I said, You’re asking me out? Isn’t that frowned upon? And he said, Only if you frown upon it. I said, I’ve never gone out with a policeman. And he looked a little nervous, but he said, What kind of guys do you go out with? And I said, Usually jerks. Then he gives me this fantastic smile and he says, Heck, I can be a jerk if it’ll help me get on the list. And my heart is racing, but not from the shooting, and I say, That won’t be necessary. I’ve been thinking of branching out.

  We’re going out to dinner on Friday night. We’ll sleep together on our third date, and then I’ll marry him. Thank you God. It was 4:56 on the dashboard clock when I pulled into the donut shop. I knew something good would happen, but you had me worried when the bullets started flying.

  My eyes were wet. That was as far as I could read tonight. I dropped the letter to the floor and turned off the light. I rolled over on my stomach and stretched one leg across the middle of the bed. The sheets on Joanie’s side were crisp and cold. Her side was empty, but I could still feel her in the room. I found a cool part on the pillow and scrunched my face into it. “Good night,” I said. “I love you.”

  Once again, our music drifted into my head.

  Ah gets weary, and sick o’ tryin.

  Ah’m tired o’ living and feared o’ dyin’,

  Dat Ol’ Man River,

  He jes’ keep rollin’ along.

  And then a voice inside my head whispered softly, “Trantanella. Diana’s last name is Trantanella. Big Jim wrote it down for you.”