Black Fridays

by Michael Sears

  “Sometimes I go in, after he falls asleep, and I kiss the air over his forehead. I’m afraid that if I touch him, he’ll wake up and have a fit—he’s got a thing about germs.” I gave a short rueful laugh. “At least he’s clean. He is the cleanest little five-year-old you can imagine.”

  I looked back at Wanda. The intensity of her sympathy was hard to face.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Shit. I got carried away. I don’t get to talk about this much. God, you just wanted the short answer, right? ‘How’s your kid?’ ‘Oh, just fine. Fine.’ Really, I am sorry.”

  “No, no. It’s okay. You just caught me off guard.” She took my arm, pulled it to her, and turned again uptown. We walked about a dozen steps before she spoke again. “If you ever want to talk about it again, let me know, okay? That’s some powerful magic you’ve got going on.”

  —

  “KALISPERA, SKELI. Nice to see you again.” The speaker was a well-muscled but very round man in his sixties.

  “Efharisto, Aristos. Kalispera. Pos eisai.”

  “Good. Good. Fenese poli orea apopse.”

  Wanda kissed him lightly on the cheek. “Eisai poli evgenikos.”

  They smiled like old friends. I tried smiling, too.

  The aromas of grilling lamb, garlic, cardamom, oregano, and freshly baked pita all assaulted me at once. I was overpowered.

  We were seated in the garden in back. Strands of tiny beads of light offset the twilight and candles. It was early but the restaurant was already full.

  “May I order? For both of us.”

  No woman had ever asked me that before.

  “May I order the wine, at least?”

  “Hmmp.”

  I was beginning to learn what that little sound meant—or thought I was.

  “I’m entirely in your hands,” I said.

  She grinned and tossed her hair. A waiter appeared as though summoned telepathically.

  “Do you still serve sangria here?”

  “Plenty,” he said.

  “We’ll have a pitcher.”

  I had not drunk sangria since a particularly bad episode in college.

  “Aah,” I said.

  She gave that elfin laugh again. “Oh, stop. This will surprise you.”

  It did. Food began to arrive. Large platters filled with small dishes. Bowls of hummus and tzatziki, and a platter of warm bread. A salad. An appetizer of small grilled fish as salty as the Atlantic Ocean. Moussaka. Lamb.

  “Here. You have to try this,” she said, pushing a small plate of tzatziki toward me.

  I could smell the garlic from across the table—my nose and palate were still adjusting to life outside.

  “Not too strong on the garlic, I hope.”

  “Incredibly strong. And as I just had some, I would advise you to do the same. Self-defense.”

  She scooped up a sizable dollop with her index finger and placed it in my mouth. For a moment, my senses were so overwhelmed I thought I’d gone deaf.

  “Like it?”

  I enjoyed watching her eat. She was consumed with the tastes, aromas, and textures of each dish. Conversation was unnecessary—an interference. The lamb chops had been reduced to spindly ribs of bone before she spoke again.

  “You are a very unusual guy, do you know that? Very few guys can just enjoy the moment at dinner. It’s like they’re working to impress all the time. It’s a bore. But you just dig in and soak up the flavors, the smells.”

  “I’m sorry, I haven’t eaten this well in a very long time.”

  “Please. Let me keep my illusions.”

  I couldn’t let such a misperception stand. “I’ve been sitting here trying to come up with something to say. Something brilliant. Or at least something not completely lame. I am finding that it is very important to me that you think well of me.”

  She tilted her head in a look of appraisal. “I don’t know what to make of you.”

  That didn’t make me any less uncomfortable.

  “Is Wanda your real name?”

  “You don’t believe I’m really Wanda the Wandaful?”

  “Is Kelly your real name?”

  “Kelly? No. Why Kelly?”

  “I thought I heard the man at the door call you that.”

  “Aristos? We were speaking Greek.”

  I was no closer to having my question answered. Instead of pursuing it any further, I sipped the sangria. It was excellent.

  Wanda began a soft chuckle that grew into a full-bellied laugh. “Skeli! He called me Skeli!” She smiled at me fondly. “It’s an old joke of his. He says I’m like a good wine. We both have great legs.”

  “You speak Greek?” It was a night of revelations.

  “Not really. Army brat. I can order food and ask to use the bathroom in half a dozen languages.”

  “I like ‘Skeli.’ May I call you Skeli?”

  “Aristos feeds me. He’s earned the right to call me Osama if he wants.”

  “Is that all it takes?”

  “He feeds me really well.”

  “So is Wanda another alias?”

  She gave a sly smile. “If we’re trading secrets, I get to ask first.”

  Wanda reached over and linked our fingers. A woman’s affectionate touch managed to send immediate signals to the more primitive areas of my brain. I couldn’t tell if there was really a promise there, or if my deprived neurons were interpreting any signal as a sexual come-on.

  “Okay, but no Deadhead questions, all right?”

  “Agreed.”

  I braced myself for a question about Angie. The worst buzzkill I could think of.

  “What did you do on Wall Street?”

  If she knew I had worked on Wall Street, she probably knew the rest of the story. I wanted to take my hand back, but she tightened her fingers and gave me an intense look of interest.

  “I used to manage a group of traders. Currencies. Foreign exchange. It’s not very exciting to talk about.” I sounded boorish, I knew. “Sometimes it was exciting doing it.”

  She squeezed my hand again, encouraging me to say more.

  “But I made a couple of mistakes. I don’t do that anymore. Right now I’m doing private consulting.” I’d always thought of consulting as a joke—another way of saying you were looking for a real job. It might be as close as I was going to get.

  “I’ve heard about the mistakes,” she said.

  “Oh.” I did manage to retrieve my hand that time. I didn’t want to talk about it. Ever. And certainly not on our first date.

  “PaJohn told us. He remembered reading about it in the Journal a few years ago.”

  “It figures. He’s the only one at the bar who reads anything other than the Racing Form.”

  “Don’t be mean,” she said, reaching for my hand again. “Nobody cares, you know. And besides, everybody reads the Post.”

  “I don’t like being discussed.” I sounded angry and defensive. I sounded like a jerk.

  “That’s what Vinny said. He told PaJohn that if you ever got around to wanting to talk about it, that was fine, but otherwise everybody should just leave it be.”

  I hadn’t expected such sensitivity from the afternoon bar crowd. I realized that said something not so pleasant about me.

  “That was nice of him.”

  “Yup.”

  “But you asked.”

  “Yup.” She flashed me her smile again.

  I took a deep breath and a leap of faith. “Okay. I spent two years away for a white-collar crime. But I didn’t steal customers’ money. It was an accounting shuffle. A big one. Half a billion dollars.”

  Her eyebrows shot up. Put that way, it was an impressive accomplishment—if not quite an achievement.

/>   “When I got caught, I thought they went hard on me, but I’m starting to change my mind.” I couldn’t read her, but I kept on talking. “But if you were to ask me if I regret what I did, or if I would never do it again, I’d have to say the best I can come up with is that I don’t ever want to get caught again.”

  It was the first time I had talked so freely to anyone about my recent past—and it surprised me how desperately I wanted to be understood. I was still trying to understand it myself. But at the same time, I left out huge chunks. Things I wasn’t ready to share with anyone just yet.

  The next step was hers. If she was some thrill-seeking vampire, just dating an ex-con for the turn-on of a bit of danger, I had probably blown it. And I could live with that. I just hoped she wasn’t the judgmental type, waiting to shut me down, or patronize or even lecture me, as soon as she had extracted my confession.

  “So, tell me. Is this a deal breaker or what?”

  She put her hand on top of mine again. This time the neuron signals were crystal clear. “I just wanted to know how you went two years without getting laid.”

  —

  THE DOOR TO Wanda’s building was plastered with building permits, many of them more than two years old, and a large green dumpster hugged the curb out front. Antique marble lined the entranceway, yet the only light came from a bare bulb dangling from the ceiling. Plaster dust and drying paint clung to the air.

  “How’s your stamina, handsome?”

  Before I had a chance to embarrass myself with an answer, she continued.

  “It’s five flights and the elevator has been under renovation since before the market collapsed.”

  “I’ll manage.”

  Wanda led the way. She had no trouble. Neither did I. Prison was good for something.

  She stopped at 5A, unlocked the door, and turned to me. “You made it.”

  “The only thing keeping me going those last two flights was the sight of your beautiful legs in front of me.”

  She flicked her hem upward by about an inch. “There’s more.”

  Inside the apartment the floors needed refinishing and the fixtures were showing their age, but the space was huge. My entire apartment would have fit in her living room. There was a formal dining room, an eat-in kitchen, and a hallway leading from the foyer back to the bedrooms. Three of them.

  “I’m having a Grand Marnier. Join me?” she said, leading me through to the living room.

  Grand Marnier always left me with a splitting headache in the morning. “Yes, thanks.”

  I sat on the couch, swirling the liquor in the pony-sized snifter, while Wanda lit candles on the end table and slid a CD into the stereo. I held my breath and braced myself for Brad Paisley or Taylor Swift. It was Norah Jones. I exhaled.

  “I just have to ask . . .”

  “How the hell does an ex-dancer with no money,” she finished my question, “and now a student with even less, get to have an apartment like this?”

  “I hope there’s a good story behind it.”

  “No such luck. My ex owns the building. I get to stay here rent-free until he changes his mind. And as long as the real estate market sucks, I’m in the clear. He also pays for my school.”

  “Sorry. We weren’t going to talk about our exes,” I said.

  “Yeah, but in some neighborhoods, talking about real estate is the same as foreplay.”

  A second song came on. Slow and wistful. I put my glass on the table and took Wanda’s hand.

  “This I can dance to. Will you join me?”

  There was a question in her eye—I must have answered it.

  She rose off the couch in a long, fluid glide—as smooth and strong as silk. Our hips swayed, a slow and sensual dance, while I buried my face in her hair, breathing her in. It was all familiar but also new. We fit everywhere it mattered. I placed a single kiss on her bare neck and she gave a tiny shudder.

  “Mmmm.” It was half sigh and half growl.

  Another song started up, the beat slightly faster. We almost broke apart, but she pulled me to her and we continued to sway to our own music. She pressed against me. I tried to concentrate on the batting order and stats of the Yankees starters. I was two years out of practice. I couldn’t get past Jeter. Wanda giggled.

  “What’s that?” I said.

  “If that’s going to keep getting in the way, maybe we should do something about it.”

  I kissed her. Sweet. Grand Marnier. Wet. Strong.

  I let her lead me to the bedroom.

  The first time was rushed. When I came—after A-Rod, but long before Jorge—it was a two-year explosion that left me dazed. She looked up at me, pleased with herself and her effect on me.

  I felt, for a moment, peace. For the briefest flicker of time, I lost all awareness of prison, an ex-wife, Stockman, the SEC, The Science and Fiction of Autism, the oppressive squeeze of money, and the constant awareness that everything for me seemed to have peaked some years before and all the rest was simply walking through the blocking and repeating the lines of a secondary role in my own life. For that split second, I felt like someone else. Me.

  She closed her eyes. I kissed her lids and whispered, “Skeli.”

  “Hah! You don’t get me that cheap.”

  I kissed her on the lips again. Still sweet, but salty now as well. Still wet. Still strong. Still hungry. I felt my body responding.

  She giggled again.

  I began to pull away, but she held me in place with those perfect legs. “That has to be a world-record recovery time.”

  —

  I STOOD OVER the Kid, watching him sleep. I felt blessed.

  I loved him no less, nor no more than a few hours before, but the anchor of onerous responsibility had been lifted—a feeling I had not had the courage to acknowledge. I still felt the responsibility, but it was now a banner streaming in the wind, a source of pride.

  Sexual release. Kindness. Intimacy. The feeling of a woman’s naked breasts pressed against my bare chest. The freedom of a few hours to begin to love another made me love my son more, not less.

  A part of me acknowledged that I did not yet deserve such good fortune.

  The Kid gave a mini-snore, something between a gasp and a snuffle, and turned his head toward the faint light reflected from the street below.

  For all my sins, there was my penance, his limbs askew after kicking away the sheets, his face glowing with his mother’s beauty, the picture marred only by a faint spittle of drool that hung from his lip, which, upon reflection, could have mirrored his mother under the right circumstances.

  And for the few good deeds I may have done along the way, there, too, was the miracle of my reward. My salvation.

  —

  THAT FEELING, that glow, was gone by morning. That’s when the bodies started piling up.

  SPUD WAS HUNGOVER. Most of Wall Street—up to a certain age, which I had passed long since—was hungover. It was Friday morning and that was just part of the cultural norm.

  I have heard various explanations for the Thursday-night bacchanal, most having to do with the daily and weekly migratory patterns of commuters—the Bridge and Tunnel crowd—but my favorite had a truer anthropologic ring. As colleges did away with Friday classes, students responded by adding a full third day to the weekend, a ritual they then carried on to their working lives. Whatever the reason, the public should be aware that major financial decisions are regularly made on Friday mornings by people whose brain and other nervous system functions are still suffering the effects of that last round of four-in-the-morning Jägermeister shots.

  “What you got for me?” I greeted him brightly. Whenever I had been severely hungover, the thing I hated most was a bright greeting.

  He looked at me with red eyes and exhaled an aroma of stale beer and tequi
la.

  “I met up with Lowell Barrington last night.”

  The OTC stock trader. He was on my list for early afternoon.

  “He bought me a few beers,” he continued.

  “And?”

  “He wanted to know what you know.”

  “What did you say?”

  “The truth. There may be something here, maybe not. Arrowhead might have something to do with it. And maybe not.”

  “How did he take it?”

  “He switched from beer to scotch. Doubles. I think he’s scared shitless.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Something about having to talk to his father. He was getting a little wobbly by that time. I don’t know what he meant.”

  “All right. I guess we’ll find out. Meantime, anything more on the Arrowhead trades?”

  “No pattern I can see.”

  “Keep looking. I’ll be back. I’ve got to check in with Stockman.”

  —

  GWEN GAVE ME one of her best apologetic smiles. I waited. I read all the newspapers. Just as I was about to go back and start over again, Barilla and Jack Avery arrived.

  “What’s this about?” Barilla asked me.

  “No idea. He’s kept me waiting almost an hour.”

  Avery sank onto the couch facing me and said nothing.

  Gwen’s intercom buzzed. “You may all go in now.”

  I wasn’t comfortable giving my report for an audience. I had suspicions, but no hard facts. All I hoped to get out of the meeting was another week’s work. But with a gang in there, I wasn’t going to be in control.

  Stockman didn’t rise, but waved us all to chairs. Barilla and I took the two seats facing his desk. Avery took the couch.

  “So, Jason? You have a report for us?” It sounded like a question, but it wasn’t. It was my cue. I was obviously supposed to have a report prepared.

  “No. What I’ve got is more questions. And I have some suspicions.”

  Avery jumped right in. “If there is nothing there, then you’ve found it. End of story.”

  Stockman barely acknowledged him. “Please, continue, Jason,” he murmured, as though he had the script in hand.