Last God Standing

by Michael Boatman

  The nervous maître d’ grabbed two menus from his lectern, turned on his heel and waggled two fingers to indicate that we should follow him. He walked, with an almost preternatural economy of motion, toward the center of the large main dining room. His attitude was practically breathable.

  “Well,” a big African voice boomed out. My eyes followed the throbbing sound waves to the table where Surabhi’s parents, along with her sister Calliope, sat. “The star-crossed young lovers finally deign to grace us with their arrival.”

  “Sorry, everyone,” Surabhi chirped. “Sorry!”

  “This is how they wish to start their lives together?” Magnus said to anyone within earshot. “Two hours late and without thought of a phone call.”

  “I said sorry, Daddy. My nav was out, and both our mobiles are complete shit.”

  Surabhi hugged her mother while Magnus offered a constipated buffalo grunt that effectively communicated his feelings about faulty mobile phones, wonky navigation systems, excuses in general, and tardy American boyfriends in particular.

  “Mum… this is…”

  “Hello, Lando,” Marian said. “Surabhi’s told me so much about you, I’m happy to finally meet you face to face.”

  Imagine the lesbian love child of Lena Horne and Michelle Obama. Marian Dotson-Moloke was fifty-five years old and nearly as beautiful as her daughter. She was of average height but her effortless elegance made her appear taller. She was the daughter of the first African-American State Supreme Court Justice from the state of North Carolina; had graduated Suma cum laude from Harvard Law. She worked high up in legal affairs for the London office of the American Ambassador to the United Nations. She was adorned in a shimmering black dress that highlighted bare shoulders, flawless cocoa-brown skin and bare arms toned from regular weight training and her years as a pentathlete at the University of North Carolina, her undergraduate Alma Mater.

  “Pleasure to meet you, Mrs Moloke.”

  “Please, call me Marian. I can’t wait to learn all about you, and your family.”

  “Hah!”

  “Are you alright?”

  “Just stubbed my toe. I’m fine.”

  Surabhi beamed. She’d once told me that her mother remained one of her closest allies even during the wild wars of adolescence. The relief in her eyes was a testament to their relationship. Then she took a deep breath and stepped into the shadow of the man-mountain that had spawned her.

  I’d fought rogue deities and malignant nature spirits, sutured ruptured realities and realigned unwieldy continuums. I was the Embodiment of Order, the Banisher of Chaos. I was God, for Christ’s sake. But nothing bothered me more than watching Magnus Moloke wrap his arm around my woman.

  “Daddy…”

  “Yes, my darling?”

  “You’re doing it.”

  “No! No, I’m not.”

  “Magnus,” Marian warned. “You’re smothering her.”

  Magnus released Surabhi, reluctantly. Then he chuffed her lovingly on the shoulder. Surabhi smiled, and punched him, hard, on the bicep.

  “Strong!” Magnus crowed. “See that, boyfriend? She’s still a Moloke!”

  Surabhi’s sister Calliope had been quietly rifling through Magnus’ wallet, plucking bills the way a gardener weeds an unruly garden. Magnus rapped on the table.

  “You see how your sister keeps in shape, Calliope?”

  Calliope shot her father a look that would have sent Medusa scrambling for cover. Calliope was fat; she easily tipped the scales at over two hundred and fifty pounds, well within an acceptable healthy range for a woman of her age… if that woman stood nine feet tall. Calliope stood about five six. On a light day, after a year of intensive dieting, strenuous exercise and projectile vomiting she might pass for “portly.” Now, she was just fat. Ironically, she was also gorgeous. Calliope Moloke was one of those unfortunate women who make random passersby think, “What a beautiful face. If only…” Calliope was doomed to be the “if only” in a never-ending line of pitying strangers’ beauty evaluations. Thus her seething rancor.

  We’d once caught her screaming into a mirror she’d strategically smashed so that it reflected her only from the neck up. She’d sworn off alcohol, milk, carbohydrates, red meat, wheat, sugar, salt, nuts, fruit, cheeses, shellfish, warm soups, eggs, and all associated oils and unguents before heading straight for the refrigerator, where she grabbed a rice cake and slammed the door on her way to her managerial job at Pizza Hut.

  “I have a metabolic condition. It’s not my fault I’m hypothyroidal. But my capitalist father thinks it’s all in my head. Which is completely typical for a bourgeois drone like you, Daddy.”

  Magnus grunted. Calliope turned red.

  “Of course, anything that deviates from your Judeo-Christian Corporate hivemind standard of European beauty threatens your sense of male entitlement. Isn’t that right, Daddy?”

  “Calliope, please…” Marian warned. Calliope turned the spotlight of her hostility on me while simultaneously reaching for the bread basket.

  “One day my fat arse and I are going to destroy the Global Military Industrial Complex. Did my anorexic sister tell you that?”

  “Dad,” Surabhi said. “This is Lando. Lando… meet Dad.”

  I extended my hand. “Pleasure to meet you, Magnus…”

  Magnus gripped my right hand like a man forced to grasp a spitting cobra. The strength that vibrated in that grip was shocking and I had to grind my molars just to keep from swearing. Magnus squeezed harder. The bones in my hand squeaked, and I wondered how much pressure my knuckles could take before they exploded like burning Brazil nuts.

  “Doctor Moloke,” he corrected, before releasing me.

  We all sat; Magnus next to Marian and Surabhi next to me on my left, while Calliope overwhelmed the chair directly to my right.

  “Nice to see you again, Calliope.”

  Calliope smirked and went back to plundering the bread basket.

  “So, Lando,” Marian said. “Surabhi tells me you’re a comedian. How interesting for you.”

  “Yes. Comedy has always been my passion.”

  Magnus was glaring at me, his massive hands locked together on the tabletop. He looked like he was practicing a strangulation murder, and it didn’t take godly insight to know whose imaginary neck he was throttling between those giant paws.

  Even seated, Magnus towered over the rest of us. He easily stood six feet six inches tall, with shoulders nearly as wide as our dinner table. His athletic prowess was legend. He’d led Ethiopia to its first gold medal in soccer at the 1980 Olympic Games. He’d captured the imagination of the world and legions of adoring fans, emigrating to the UK to open a string of successful businesses ranging from a chain of urban movie theaters and athletic equipment stores to a line of his own sportswear: MAGLOK. In London he’d lent his image to a line of organic foods – Back to the Land Organic Foods were rapidly sweeping across Europe. The healthy fare had even begun to attract attention from stateside retailers like Whole Foods and Trader Joes. He’d even starred in a rap video, Bootyrock! In it he invented a dance called Da Magnus March. The song became an international hit. The dance it spawned remained an irritating planetary sensation.

  “The Comedian,” Magnus snarled. His teeth were unnaturally white. They looked healthy enough to gnaw through the cables on a suspension bridge. “You any good?”

  “He’s excellent. He’s really great, Dad.”

  “Thanks, babe,” I said, a little too forcefully. My battles with divine sociopaths had taught me the importance of claiming bragging rights right off the bat. Reticence might add mystery to rock stars and billionaires, but on the battlefield of Ego a big mouth is the best weapon. Surabhi had just hamstrung me in front of her father.

  Herb could handle this. I should have listened to all those lectures.

  “I’ve had gigs at all the local clubs. I’ve been making the rounds across the Midwest.”

  “What about television? Any interest from the ne
tworks?”

  “Well, no, but I’ve…”

  “Cable?”

  “W… well…Chicago’s… not a… huge comedy town.”

  “Isn’t Chicago the home of Second City?” Magnus said. “The birthplace of improvisational comedy? A city with comedy clubs falling out of its massive, alcoholic backside? Wasn’t that fellow… oh, what was his name?”

  “John Belushi?” Calliope offered, smiling through a mouthful of multigrain.

  “Right! Wasn’t John Belushi from Chicago?”

  “Well… yes.”

  “I believe a lot of successful comedians came from Chicago,” Magnus rumbled on. “Bill Murray, Dan Ackroyd, although I believe he grew up in Canada. Chris Farley…”

  Magnus glanced at Calliope. “He was the fat one, Cali. Died of a heart attack when he was only nineteen years old.”

  “I believe he was in his thirties, Magnus,” I offered. “And all the guys you mentioned are actors, not really comedians.”

  “Yes, lots of Chicago comedians have made the jump to television,” Magnus continued. “The good ones anyway.”

  “Yes,” Marian interposed. “It must be very difficult to get up on a stage to make people laugh, Lando. I know I could never do it.”

  Magnus chuckled. “No sensible person would, dear.”

  “I meant, Magnus, that it takes a special kind of courage to expose yourself in that way. A certain forcefulness of vision.”

  “That’s right, Marian. It’s tough sometimes, but I like the challenge. It’s great when you can turn an audience around… get them on your side.”

  “Sounds a little desperate, wouldn’t you say?”

  Surabhi sighed, loudly. “Daddy.”

  “I simply meant that traveling from city to city, living out of your suitcase in cheap motels just to chase down the approval of drunken strangers might be viewed as a bit needy in some circles.”

  “What ‘circles’ would you be referring to, Magnus?”

  Magnus’ bridge-crushing smile broadened.

  “Normal, healthy society. Most people go to work every day. They labor at jobs they despise for low pay and little hope of advancement. They look at actors and comedians, showbusiness people… well a bit like they look at their Tupperware: nice when it’s wanted but not really necessary… or particularly useful.”

  Surabhi and her mother both sighed.

  “Well I think helping people forget their problems for a while is necessary, Magnus.”

  “Oh, really.”

  “Sure. It’s deep in the human race, the need to enjoy a funny story or laugh at a good joke.”

  “So you consider yourself a storyteller? A sort of modern day shaman dancing around the communal firepit, battling encroaching cultural darkness with pithy observations and witty repartee?”

  “Ahhhh… well… Yes. I suppose you could say that.”

  Magnus leaned forward, teeth glinting like clean daggers.

  “I’d call that somewhat elitist. Wouldn’t you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean who named you official shaman, eh? Lando Cooper: Voice of the People? Who gave you the insight to illuminate the unwashed masses?”

  “Daddy, that’s enough.”

  “Now wait a minute, Magnus. I never said I was illuminating…”

  “But that’s what the really great comedians do isn’t it?” Magnus barreled on. “Show us hidden elements within the collective soul; drag our human foibles out into the light so that we can laugh at ourselves? Like Bill Cosby or Charlie Chaplin. They teach us perspective using their own experiences as comedic launching pads. They were artists, masters. Are you telling us that you’ve got the talent to match Bill Cosby?”

  I took a long drink of water. My throat was suddenly as dry as Cosby’s last book, and the dryness seemed to have moved upward and flashfried my brain. Who knew Magnus Moloke was a student of American Comedy?

  They were all looking at me: Surabhi’s brow furrowed with the same worried expression I saw echoed on Marian’s face; Magnus glaring, his eyebrows arched in exactly the same way Surabhi’s did when she’d successfully carpetbombed my defenses; Calliope sneering at me, her cheeks stuffed with sourdough...

  “Hey… I just like to tell jokes.”

  I saw the satisfaction in Magnus’ eyes; the disappointment in Marian’s face and the schadenfreude in Calliope’s smirk.

  Surabhi laughed, too loudly.

  “See? I told you he was brilliant!”

  CHAPTER X

  WINED

  Magnus ordered his steak “bloody rare”, as if that was a surprise to anyone. Surabhi ordered a salad. We were both vegetarians. Her repulsion at the thought of consuming animal flesh fit well with the realities of my situation: when you can perceive the emotions of sentient beings, paying for them to be butchered for the enjoyment of eating their pan-seared remains is a bit of a buzz-kill.

  Marian ordered the same salad, I believed, as a show of solidarity with Surabhi. I’d dropped a ball I wasn’t even sure I’d been thrown. Now I sensed Surabhi’s mother trying to shore up her resolve. Barbara would have ordered a gin and tonic and bribed the waiter to put sugar in Magnus’ gas tank.

  “So,” Magnus continued, chewing cheerfully. “Surabhi tells us your dad’s a local celebrity.”

  “Yeah. He’s Crazy Herb, the King of Auto Supplies.”

  “He’s funny,” Marian said. “They used to play his commercials on cable back when I was working in New York. I loved all the crazy stunts and the animals.”

  “Yes,” Magnus grunted. “Hilarious. And your mother?”

  I knew admitting that my mother ran a South Side tavern chain, even a lucrative one – in a struggling economy my mother’s bars still cleared tidy profits – would only deepen the quagmire that was sucking me down like quicksand with a grudge. But my failure to meet Magnus’ challenge had robbed me of confidence. I needed to hit back. It was a situation my father would have called a “Mexican Douche Party”.

  Herb’s Rule of Business Engagement #22D

  Never refuse an invitation to a Mexican Douche Party. Such a refusal could cost you an eye, or the right to live a life free from scorn and ridicule.

  Herbert “Crazy Herb” Cooper. The King of Autoparts.

  But I was so desperate to impress Magnus that I couldn’t come up with anything better. The truth was all I had.

  “She owns a couple of bars on the South Side. One of them’s called Barb’s. The other one’s called the Silver Foxhole. It caters to a lot of veterans.”

  “A bar,” Magnus hummed. “That’s rough work isn’t it?”

  “Pretty rough. She’s been held up three times since Christmas.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “Yep. But my mother’s tough.”

  Shut up, Lando.

  “She’s been held up nine times in the last four years.”

  Shut your mouth. Shut it now.

  Common sense was demanding a strategic withdrawal to the restroom where I could manufacture a sudden bowel obstruction or spontaneously ruptured spleen, something suitably dramatic to allow me time to regroup and figure out how this all went so terribly wrong.

  “Barb, that’s my mom’s name, Barbara-Jean…”

  Shut up/No keep going. You can do it!

  “…she keeps a shotgun under the bar. She also carries a .38 in a special shoulder holster.”

  “Is that right?”

  Stop/Go on/Run/Make it right/SHUT UP...

  “Yeah. She can blow the eye out of a sparrow on the wing at thirty yards.”

  Surabhi snatched the bread basket from Calliope and shoved a roll into her mouth. At least it was whole wheat.

  Magnus chewed, swallowed. “A formidable woman.”

  “Indeed. Last year she shot a guy who tried to rob the Silver Foxhole. She was cleared of all charges though. The Homicide detectives made her an honorary member of SWAT. They call her ‘The Widowmaker’.”

  I laughed. No one joined me.<
br />
  “She… makes a lot of money.”

  Surabhi was consuming breadsticks at a rate a California wildfire would have been hard pressed to match.

  “I’ve got some news,” Calliope piped in. “That is, if anyone cares.”

  Marian spoke up. “What is it, dear?

  “I’m joining the Taliban.”

  “Oh, Calliope.”

  “I mean it, Mummy. Master Omar, my spiritual advisor, wants to bring America to its knees. Daddy, can I have five thousand dollars?”

  Magnus’s eyes never left mine.

  “Whatever for, my darling?”

  “I want to buy two tickets to Afghanistan. Master Omar and I want to join the Jihad, but I can’t do coach. I cramp easily and there’s no leg room.”

  “You’re not going to Afganistan, Calliope,” Magnus said quietly. “This is just another pathetic bid to draw attention away from the reason we’ve all gathered here tonight.”

  “I believe in Master Omar’s mission, Daddy. It’s really like… who I’m meant to be.”

  Magnus shrugged, grinning. “Daughters. What can you do?”

  “Ahem.”

  The uptight maître d’ was standing behind me with a glass and two unopened wine bottles. He looked even more peevish than when we’d burst through the front door.

  “The gentleman sends his compliments to Mister Cooper.”

  I looked in the direction the maître d’ indicated. In the furthest corner of the restaurant, a man sat shrouded in darkness. He was big, broad-shouldered and black-haired, sporting a prominent beard. He was dressed in an expensive-looking black suit with a blood-red silk shirt open at the collar. He was facing us, his right hand holding a glass of some clear beverage, vodka with a twist of lime, perhaps, or straight scotch – he looked like a scotch drinker. Our eyes met, and he smiled and raised his glass even higher.

  “The gentleman says he is an admirer of your work, and sends the wine with his blessings.”

  Relief filled my chest with newfound hope. “The gentleman” had obviously seen me onstage, probably at the Comedy Castle or ChiChi Marimba’s. The apparently wealthy gentleman was… a fan.

  “Red or white, monsieur?”