by Jason Starr
Peter’s plan was to propose to his mother for real on his eighteenth birthday. He figured his father would probably be dead by then anyway. His father was sixty-four, had a heart condition, and had already undergone a quadruple bypass. He was in such bad shape that there was even talk of attempting a transplant at some point. Even if the old man somehow managed to survive, Peter didn’t think he would be much of an obstacle. He knew his mother and father weren’t really in love and that his mother would divorce him in a second to marry her son, as soon as it became legally possible.
Then, the summer after ninth grade, everything suddenly changed. It was funny because it started as a typical Saturday morning in July—very harmless. Peter and his mother and father had breakfast on the screened-in porch and then his mother announced she was taking a shower. Peter and his father remained at the table, his father reading the Berkshire Eagle. Peter waited a couple of minutes, taking the last few bites of his French toast, then said he was going up to his room. Instead, he went to the bathroom door in his parents’ bedroom and carefully opened it, just an inch or two. His mother never locked the door while she showered and Peter had always assumed that she did this on purpose, because she expected him to look in, because she wanted him to.
As usual the sliding shower door was only halfway shut, so whenever his mother reached for the soap or shampoo, or stepped away from the spray to scrub herself, Peter had a great view of her full breasts, wide hips, and the wet dark hair between her legs. The house was old, built in the nineteenth century, and the stairs and floorboards always creaked in advance of anyone approaching. But because of the noise of the shower, it wasn’t as easy to hear, and Peter had to listen closely for any noise of his father. Meanwhile, he unsnapped his shorts and reached into his boxer briefs and started playing with himself. He got hard right away and the sight of his mother, reaching up to massage shampoo into her hair, her breasts becoming higher and firmer, made him even more excited. He had to squeeze himself to prevent an orgasm and then something happened that had never happened before.
Whenever Peter watched his mother in the shower, they never made eye contact, even though he knew she knew she was being watched. Although the bathroom door was always cracked open very slightly, if she wanted privacy she could have simply locked it. Peter had always assumed that his mother never looked in his direction because she wanted him to watch her, but didn’t want to admit to it, or at least didn’t want to bring any attention to it.
This was why Peter was surprised when his mother looked right at him. It was such a big change from the norm that Peter didn’t know how to react. He froze for a couple of seconds, his left hand still gripping his cock, then smiled. He expected his mother to smile back, maybe invite him to come into the shower with her. But his mother wasn’t smiling. She had a look of shock, horror, repulsion, and then she was screaming at him, storming out of the shower, grabbing a towel from the rack and fumbling to wrap herself with it. Peter was very confused, unable to understand what he’d done to make her so upset. Before he could say anything, his mother opened the door fully, came over, and grabbed him. She screamed, “You bastard! You disgusting fucking bastard!” and slapped him across the face as hard as she could.
Peter hadn’t thought about that slap, how devastating it had been, in a long time, but as he was squeezing Frat Boy’s neck, waiting for him to hurry up and die already, it all came back to him—the way his mother had suddenly turned on him, how she’d called him “a disgusting fucking bastard,” how in that instant his total love for her turned to total hatred. But he really had no idea why he was thinking about all this now, at this moment, when he should’ve been concentrating on getting Frat Boy dead. He started squeezing the bastard’s neck with even more force, feeling like he was compressing the neck to nothing, that his hands would soon meet in a mess of blood, broken bones, and flesh.
Although Frat Boy’s eyes looked frozen and lifeless and his body was limp, Peter didn’t let up for another minute or two. Finally, he released his grip and let Frat Boy crumple onto the concrete. Peter’s hands hurt and his fingers were so tense that it was difficult to straighten them out of their curled positions. But looking down at the body, he was pleased that problem numero uno was officially out of the way. Not wasting a second, he kneeled, removed Frat Boy’s wallet, took all the money, then left the wallet next to the body. Then he took off the gloves and calmly stuffed them in the back left pocket of his jeans while looking toward the stairs to his right and to his left. There was no one in either direction and it was quiet except for the sound of water falling from the ceiling of the tunnel in a steady drip. Peter doubted anyone in the park could have heard anything anyway. Except for a weak gasp when Peter had made his move, pushing him up against the wall, Frat Boy hadn’t made a peep.
Peter wanted to leave the tunnel and the park as fast as possible, but he knew running away would be the absolute wrong thing to do. If someone saw him and then discovered the body he would be an obvious suspect. So he left the park calmly, walking with his head down just in case, and made it out to East End Avenue without passing a single person. East End was pretty empty as well. Across the street, up the block, a man was walking his dog but he was facing the other direction and was too far away to get a good look at Peter anyway. Toward Grade Mansion, a few kids were walking uptown, but they were a block or two away. As Peter crossed the street, a cab was waiting at the red light. Peter purposely didn’t look in the driver’s direction, but it didn’t matter anyway. Why would a cab driver care about some random guy on the street?
Walking along Eighty-sixth Street, toward York Avenue, Peter passed a couple of people. He kept his head down slightly, avoiding eye contact. He didn’t care if people noticed his dark hair—he just didn’t want anyone to get a good look at his face. Approaching First Avenue, the sidewalks became more populated, and he must’ve passed dozens of people by the time he reached Third. But Peter wasn’t concerned about being noticed anymore. He was too far from the murder scene for anyone to make a connection. But, just to play it safe, rather than taking a cab, he took a subway. While there were many more chances of being noticed on a subway, it seemed more likely that a cabdriver would take a close look at him, and he wanted to stay as anonymous as possible. He also wanted to get back to his hotel room quickly and was worried that he’d have to wait a long time for a train to come. But someone upstairs must’ve been watching over him tonight, making sure everything went his way, because moments after he arrived on the platform a train pulled into the station. He got on one of the cars toward the back of the train and sat at the far end, near the door leading to the next car. There were several other people in the car, but they didn’t even seem to notice Peter was there.
Twenty or so minutes later, the train pulled into the Twenty-third Street station. Peter walked several blocks back uptown to Rocky Sullivan’s, a bar on Lexington. Although it was nearly one o’clock there were a mix of twenty-somethings and older alcoholic types, enjoying themselves, and most of them would still be there drinking at three or four in the morning. Sets of eyes shifted toward him as he walked in, the way people always, instinctively, check out fresh meat entering a bar, but no one seemed to take any great notice of him. It helped that the crowd was mostly guys and couples. Peter continued toward the back area, where some more people were seated, and went straight to the men’s room. He went in, locked the door, and started washing the color out of his hair, eyebrows, and goatee.
It was temporary spray-in color and the dark brown rinsed out easily with soap and water. In a few minutes, he was a blond again. With some paper towels, he dried himself, and then he left the bathroom. As he walked back through the bar, no one even looked at him. He exited and headed downtown on Lexington.
At the corner of Twenty-eighth and Lex, Peter reached into his back pocket, figuring he’d drop the gloves into the garbage can as soon as he passed by, or maybe bury them under the top layer of garbage, but right away he knew something was w
rong. The bulge in his pocket seemed smaller than it was the last time he’d felt it, when he was leaving the park. Then he took out one glove from the pocket, not two. He felt his other pocket, but he knew it was pointless. He’d put both of the gloves in his back left pocket and one of them had fallen out.
He started back toward the bar, in case he’d lost it there, but then he turned around and continued downtown again. Going back to the bar would’ve been a mistake. If he started looking around for something, people might’ve noticed. Besides, he knew the glove wasn’t in the bathroom because he remembered checking before he left to make sure he hadn’t left anything behind. The last time he recalled actually feeling his back pocket to assure himself the gloves were still there was when he was leaving the park. The most likely possibility was that the glove had fallen out while he was walking on the street or—even more likely—while he was sitting on the subway. If he’d lost the glove on the subway it wasn’t a big deal. It was an inconspicuous latex glove that would probably be picked up and thrown away by a sanitation worker. But if he’d dropped the glove on the street, especially anywhere near the park, it would be a major problem.
Peter considered retracing his steps, taking the subway back uptown and walking toward the park along Eighty-sixth Street, then he realized how insane that would be. It was too late to do anything about it now. For all he knew the body had already been discovered. Someone walking their dog late at night might’ve realized that the guy curled up in the tunnel near the wall hadn’t OD’d and wasn’t asleep, and the person might’ve called the police. The entire park could be a crime scene now, with cops searching the nearby streets as well. If he’d dropped the glove anywhere between the park and the Eighty-sixth Street subway station and the police found it, it would be held as possible evidence.
Peter felt like an idiot for not putting the gloves away more securely. Even if he’d put a glove in each back pocket instead of stuffing both of them into one, he probably wouldn’t be in this position. He tried to remember if he’d felt the pocket to make sure the gloves were there at any point between leaving the park and leaving the bar, but he couldn’t remember for sure. He was certain that if he had dropped the glove on the way to the subway, he would’ve noticed because he’d been so hyperaware of everything at that point. But he was sure that he hadn’t looked back when he left the subway so he very well could’ve left the glove on the seat.
Continuing uptown along Lexington, he decided that in all likelihood he had no reason to stress. Even if the police found the glove, what would they do with it? Peter had no connection to Frat Boy; there would be no reason to even question him. If someone at the Big Easy on Second Avenue came forward, the police would be searching for a dark-haired guy. How would the glove help them one way or another?
Peter became even more convinced that the second glove was insignificant. Everything was going perfectly—he had zero chance of getting caught. At the next corner, he buried the other glove in a garbage can, under some newspapers. Then, casually, he continued toward his hotel.
Hector was working at the desk. There was no way to enter unseen or to avoid a conversation with him, nor was there a reason to. Peter had been staying out late a lot recently so there was nothing unusual about him returning past one A.M. Besides, the police wouldn’t be asking.
“Hey, man,” Hector said. “Yo, hold up, I got something for you.” He opened a drawer, took out an envelope, and said, “Knicks tickets.”
“Wow,” Peter said. “Why’re you—”
“’Cause you been so cool to me, man, giving me such good advice and shit, I wanted to give you something. It’s Knicks-Golden State, a week from Saturday. They’re green seats, behind the basket. You won’t be sittin’ next to Spike Lee, but at least you can see the whole game from there.”
“This is really cool, but you didn’t have to buy me tickets.”
“I didn’t buy ’em, man. My cousin got season tickets and he couldn’t use them and he was like, You wanna go? So I took ’em, figured I give ’em to you instead.”
“You sure? Why don’t you take Lucy?”
“She don’t like basketball and I been to two games already this year and they lost both times. I’m a bad luck charm and shit. I want you to have ’em, man. You can go, right? You can take your woman, what’s her name again?”
“Katie.”
“Katie, that’s right. She like basketball?”
Peter had no idea, which irritated him. He felt like he should know everything about her, that he should know her as well as he knew himself.
“Yeah, she loves it,” he said.
“Cool. So you guys go, have a good time, on me. And maybe the Knicks’ll win too, ’cause my ass ain’t there.”
Peter laughed, then said, “Well, thanks.”
“I should be thankin’ you, man. If it wasn’t for you, me and Lucy wouldn’t be talkin’ about gettin’ married and shit.”
“Wow, you guys are seriously talking about marriage?”
“Yeah, soon as we get the money, we’re gonna do it. I figure, Why not? Everybody else gettin’ married, right?”
“That’s wonderful,” Peter said, proud of himself for helping to bring two people in love together. “I’m glad to be of service.”
“So when’re you gonna bring Katie around here so I can meet her?” Hector asked.
Peter realized it would probably seem weird to admit that Katie had never been to the hotel, so he said, “She was here yesterday afternoon. You weren’t working.”
“Oh, man, can’t believe I missed that shit,” Hector said. “Definitely bring her around when I’m working so I can say hey. Or, yo, I got an idea. How ’bout you, me, Lucy, Katie, go out to dinner sometime? You know, a double date.”
Peter remembered the double date that Katie, Katie’s friend Amanda, Frat Boy, and Frat Boy’s friend had been on the other night. Peter had watched them from across the street while the two couples ate outside at Mustang. They all looked like they were having such a great time, but Peter knew that Katie was just faking it, that she was really miserable as hell and desperately needed to be rescued.
“A double date sounds like a great idea,” Peter said. “Let’s definitely do that.”
After thanking Hector again for the tickets, Peter said good night and took the elevator up to his room. He wanted to call Katie right away. He wanted to tell her that Frat Boy was gone forever, that there were no obstacles in their way anymore, that they could spend the rest of their lives together. But as badly as he wanted to hear her voice and jump-start their future, he knew he had to let things take their own course and unfold naturally.
He went into the bathroom and shaved his goatee. He realized he hadn’t been clean-shaven in a long time, in about five years, and he felt like the change in his appearance was appropriate, symbolic. He was looking in the mirror at the new Peter Wells. Tonight marked a fresh start for him; he had taken his first big step toward happily-ever-after.
In the shower, he luxuriated, letting the hot stream relax his neck and shoulders. Aside from the lost glove, he was pleased with how well everything had gone. If the body wasn’t discovered tonight, it would definitely be by sometime in the morning. The police would canvass the Upper East Side, interviewing everyone, and maybe a few suspicious dark-haired guys with goatees and criminal records would be taken in for questioning. But eventually, maybe in a month or two, the police would stop looking and the incident would become just another unsolved New York City homicide.
Peter was proud of himself for handling the situation so well. If he hadn’t gotten rid of Frat Boy, Katie could’ve stayed with him, deluding herself into believing he was a nice guy; or worse, she might’ve discovered that Peter was following her and misunderstood why he was doing it. She might have freaked, panicked, and then everything would’ve been shot to hell.
Four days ago, on Monday morning, Peter had decided to resolve the Frat Boy situation. The night before had been total misery. Peter could
n’t sleep at all, thinking about Katie, wanting to go over to her place and be with her so badly. In the morning, he couldn’t resist. He put on his Yankees cap and sunglasses and went to her block, standing about fifty yards away across the street. When she left for work he felt like he was in a movie, like when the guy looks at the girl everyone knows he’s going to get in the end, and you can tell how pained the guy is that he doesn’t have the girl yet because there are still obstacles in the way. Keeping a safe distance of about a half block between them, he followed her to the subway. She took her usual route. As she waited to cross Third Avenue, he approached on the other side of the street and he saw her face, how distraught she looked, and it was hard to tell, but was she talking to herself? It sickened him to see her so unhappy, and it was also frustrating as hell. If she only knew that her ticket to happiness was right across the street!
She went down to the subway at Eighty-sixth Street and he followed. He stood on the platform a safe distance away, but it hardly mattered. She looked so pissed off and preoccupied that Tom Cruise could’ve been standing on the platform and she wouldn’t have noticed. When a train arrived, he got onto the same car as her, but went in through a different door. The train was jam-packed and Katie was causing a delay, trying to squeeze in. A few nasty-looking people were complaining and Peter felt protective. He wanted to strangle all of those assholes who were being cruel to his woman, and he might’ve done it if the train wasn’t so crowded.
During the ride to Fifty-first Street, he couldn’t stop staring at her. When she got off the train and went up the narrow stairs, he was several people behind her. It was agonizingly hard to be so close yet so far away. He almost went over to her and confessed his undying love. He knew if he did, they would’ve kissed, and then it would’ve been roll credits, the end. But he managed to rein it in, reminding himself that they were actors in a great romance, and that there was always pain in love stories before pleasure.