Pulse

by Michael Harvey

  One of the world’s great libraries, the Widener had never been accused of being subtle, boasting a sweeping run of unnaturally broad steps ending in a row of Corinthian columns fronting a building made of brick the color of blood. Inside, the library housed more than three million volumes spread out over fifty-seven miles of shelving. Even better, no one working there had a clue as to where anything might be shelved and the only obvious sign in the place was one that read EXIT over the front door. The thinking was, if you were smart enough (or lucky enough or connected enough or rich enough) to get into Harvard, you sure as hell should be able to find a book on your own. And if the book you were looking for happened to be a copy of the Gutenberg Bible? Well, you’d come to the right place. There were only forty-seven such copies in the world and, of course, the Widener had one of them. One night a would-be robber tried to steal Harvard’s Gutenberg. He was found the next morning facedown and unconscious after he slipped trying to shimmy down a rope hung from one of the library’s upper windows. The burglar got a cracked skull for his trouble. The two-volume, seventy-pound bible emerged without a scratch. The message for all those wannabe book thieves out there: Don’t fuck with Harvard lest the gods themselves smite ye down.

  Harry found a seat near the top of the library steps and looked out over the Yard, still dozing in the early morning chill. Thanksgiving break didn’t start until next Tuesday, but a lot of students were already clearing out. Harry didn’t mind a bit. He closed his eyes and dropped his head back, letting the winter sun warm his face. Most of the jock types at Harvard went for collared polos and khakis, topsiders in the spring and duck boots in the fall. Harry was wearing a beat-up leather jacket with ripped jeans tucked into a pair of paratroop boots he’d bought at an army surplus store.

  “Who you waiting on?”

  “Go away.” Harry spoke without opening his eyes. Jesus Sanchez wasn’t having it. Harry shaded his face and watched the man everyone called “Zeus” climb the final few steps, his massive stride one of the few things on campus that was a match for the Widener’s staircase. Zeus had barely taken a seat when a woman called out and waved. The woman’s name was Suzanne and hell yes, she was going to be at the Oxford Ale House this afternoon for happy hour. Were Zeus and his pals going to be there? Good, she’d look for them. Zeus watched until she disappeared from sight.

  “You know who that is?”

  “I bet you’re gonna tell me.”

  “Hot, that’s who that is. Hot as hell.” Zeus swung his keg of a head around. “Dude, she’d love someone like you.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Women love that rebel shit. By the way, I’d bleach the hair.”

  “No way.”

  “Why not? The season’s over. Bleach it pure fucking white. You’d look like Bowie.”

  “Let Bowie look like Bowie. You been running?”

  Zeus was wearing a maroon practice jersey and plain gray bottoms. His black hair was wrung with sweat and he had a towel wrapped around his neck. “Three miles along the river.”

  Harry held out his fist. Zeus touched it.

  “Had to get rid of the poison. Too many beers at Wursthaus last night. Then we went over to Eliot.”

  “Eliot. What were you doing over there?”

  Eliot House was “more Harvard than Harvard”—full of blue bloods who liked to drink G&Ts, talk about their families’ money, and laugh up their sleeves at everyone who wasn’t them. Of course they had the best parties with the best women and everyone secretly wanted to live there.

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Zeus said. “What the fuck am I doing here? You know what, though? They’re not bad guys. Told me I should think about transferring next year.”

  The backup offensive tackle should have been an afterthought at a place like Eliot, a poor Hispanic kid from Hyde Park who’d wheedled his way into Harvard cuz he had some heft and could play football, not spectacularly well but good enough for the Ivies. Still, there was something about Zeus, an oozing brand of charisma that was hard to nail down and even harder to resist. Whether he was hanging with the crew who cut the grass at the stadium or the Saltonstalls from Eliot, Zeus had a way of making people feel good about themselves, drawing them in even as he kept them at a distance. Harry figured Zeus was the first natural-born politician he’d ever met.

  “Met a nice woman last night, Harry.”

  “At Eliot?”

  “The Wursthaus, but then she came over with us. Premed at Tufts. Hot.”

  Harry snuck a glance. With his baker’s belly, old man jowls, and receding hairline, Zeus didn’t remind anyone of Paul Newman. Still, the women were as helpless against the man’s powers of persuasion as anyone else.

  “That’s great, Zeus. I’d like to meet her.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure. You gonna be okay for exams?”

  Zeus was majoring in finance, with an eye toward Harvard’s B-school. Long shot? Maybe. Then again, it was Zeus, so maybe not.

  “Stats is a bitch,” he said. “Otherwise, I’m good.”

  “Let me know if you need help.”

  “How about tonight?”

  “I already told you.”

  “You need to go, Harry.”

  It was an unofficial tradition among the football players. Every year at the end of the season a handful of them piled into a car (sometimes cars) and headed down to Boston’s Combat Zone. They’d park on Washington, crack the windows, and watch the action. The girls would come over and flirt, maybe drink a beer with the college kids, even do a little business in the alley if anyone had the cash.

  “You know I work down there,” Harry said. For the past year and a half, he’d been volunteering at Boston’s Pine Street Inn. The first few months it was handing out coffee and sandwiches from the basement of a dark, damp building in Chinatown. Pretty soon he was tagging along with a couple of social workers as they ventured into the Zone, passing out pamphlets on venereal disease and strips of condoms. If the girls didn’t know him by name, they’d probably know his face.

  “Be an hour. Two, tops. Drink some beers, whistle at the girls, and we’re out.” Zeus cocked his head and gave Harry his best hangdog look. Harry knew he was being worked but didn’t mind it. That was the genius of Zeus. Harry sometimes wondered what the guy was like when he wasn’t onstage, when he wasn’t working it.

  “We don’t get out of the car,” Harry said.

  “What do you think? I wanna get my dick sucked in an alley by some toothless grandma? We’re tourists. Windows up, doors locked, enjoy the show. You wanna grab breakfast?”

  “Tasty?”

  “Let’s go.”

  Zeus got up first and started down the Widener’s front steps. Harry hung back. Maybe it was his little brother leaving the apartment, maybe it was something else, but a sudden melancholy had stolen over him, like it was all happening too fast and the best of it had already passed him by. He took a last look out over the Yard and inhaled, wanting nothing more than to put the morning in a bottle and take it with him. Then Zeus yelled and waved an arm. Harry exhaled and followed his best friend down the steps.

  11

  DANIEL SAT near the back of the bus and felt the two bottles in his pocket. One contained clear capsules, a tiny snowfall of white powder heaped up in each. The other was filled with multicolored tablets, reds and oranges and purples that always reminded him of Flintstone vitamins. Except they weren’t. They were dream chasers.

  Twice a month, Daniel visited the clinic where his doctor asked the same questions. How did he feel? Sad? Glad? Angry? Anxious? Describe, if he could, his color wheel of emotion. When he talked, which wasn’t often, Daniel told the doctor he couldn’t feel a thing. That was a lie. He felt everything. His feelings, hers, the people down the corridor sitting in the waiting room. Everyone’s. And it weighed on him, rendered him numb.

  He cracked the window and closed his eyes, letting the wind pucker his cheeks. The bus groaned to a stop and spit out a few pass
engers, then picked up speed as it slipped back into traffic. Daniel glanced around to see if anyone was watching. All he saw were the backs of newspapers. No one watched anyone on the Brookline Avenue bus at seven in the morning. It was a living, breathing hearse, rolling down the street in a velvet green fog.

  Daniel pulled out the two bottles of pills and held them tight in his lap. He hadn’t told the doc about his dreams from last night. She would have loved them. And why not? Dreams were the red meat of the mind. And these were prime cuts. A tumble of images so fast and so fresh and so real they threatened to break through the skin of sleep and burst into some unhinged mutation of reality.

  Terrifying. Fascinating. And entirely his.

  Daniel unscrewed the top of the Flintstone bottle and slowly tipped it upside down, watching Wilma and Fred and Barney bounce off the side of the bus and disappear under its spinning rubber wheels. Then he did the same with the capsules, laying a lovely trail of dream chasers down Brookline Avenue for anyone who might care to follow.

  * * *

  He got off at Longwood Avenue, walking the half mile or so to Avenue Louis Pasteur. There was a line of buses outside Latin School, belching smoke and burping out dozens of kids who streamed up the steps and through the front doors. Daniel made his way down the row, searching for the charter from Dorchester and not finding it. He sat on the curb to wait. Five minutes, ten. Finally, it hit the corner, driver fat and white, face lobster red with concentration, lips mouthing a string of silent curses while the yellow bus slammed to the bottom of a pothole and struggled to hold the turn. Daniel stood up as the charter slid to a stop, brakes grinding in protest, and the door opened. The driver studied Daniel with whiskey eyes that blinked once then disappeared behind a wall of kids, all elbows and fists, fighting to get off first like the bus was gonna blow up or something. The Dorchester charter ran through Dot and Roxbury, snaking through the South End and Chinatown at the tail end of its route. Most of the kids on the bus hailed from neighborhoods like Fields Corner, Savin Hill, and Dudley Square. Some had parents who gave a shit. Plenty didn’t. Still, they were on the bus every morning. And that said something.

  Grace was one of the last to get off. Ben Jacob was just ahead of her. Daniel had first met Ben on the charter two years ago when they were in the eighth grade. Ben lived in Milton and his parents were both doctors. Later, Daniel would discover Ben could have gotten a ride every day from his dad, but he wanted to take the charter. So his father dropped him off at a stop in the city and he rode in. That first day Ben was sitting in a seat across from Daniel when another kid, Billy Shine, got on. Shine was a fullback on the football team and a grade-A asshole. He took one look at Ben and ripped him out of his seat. The side of Ben’s face hit a metal pole in the middle of the aisle, and he fell into the well for the back steps. A couple of kids snickered. Most just pushed past to grab whatever seats were left.

  Ben was on his hands and knees gathering up books and papers when Daniel knelt down to help him. “Fuckin’ hebe” rang down from somewhere behind them, a titter of nervous laughter following. Ben pinned a black yarmulke back on his mop of hair and settled himself on the top step. His glasses were broken, so he got out a roll of electric tape and began to mend them. Shine sat ten feet away, gazing out the window. Daniel joined Ben on the step, turning and staring as hard as he could at Shine, challenging, daring him to make eye contact. He knew Shine wouldn’t mess with him because of Harry, who was still at Latin and a senior. If Shine did come after him, that was all right, too. Daniel had never been afraid of a beating. In the end, Shine did what bullies usually do when someone pushes back, even a little. He looked around for easier pickings. It would be another six months before Daniel actually talked to Ben, but Daniel always felt good about that first day. Ben would have, too, if he’d ever noticed. But that was Ben.

  “Hey, Daniel.” Ben gave up a high five, bumping a large brown briefcase against Daniel’s legs and adjusting his glasses.

  “Hey, Ben.”

  Grace crowded close by Ben’s shoulder. “You didn’t call.”

  “Sorry,” Daniel said. “I got busy.”

  Grace wanted to hear about the apartment, but Daniel shook his head and the three of them started walking.

  “You have all your lines translated?” Grace said.

  Daniel hadn’t done any of his homework and would just have to hope he didn’t get called on.

  “I can help,” Ben said. He was in advanced Latin and Greek. Basically, Ben knew Virgil better than Virgil. He was also the kind of guy who’d help anyone who asked and never make a big deal out of it.

  “Thanks,” Daniel said, stopping about halfway up the front steps of the high school. “Where are you first period?”

  “Study hall, but I’m working as a door monitor. One of the side doors near the gym. How about you?”

  Daniel pointed at himself and Grace. “We got study hall, too. Working in the English Department.”

  “Let’s go.” Grace tugged at Daniel’s sleeve. Most of the kids had already filtered into school. Ben was looking anxiously across the street.

  “What is it?” Daniel said.

  Ben poked his chin toward the hulking outline of Boston English. The second-oldest high school in the city, English dated back to 1821. Unlike Latin School, English was not an exam school and had a student population that was more than ninety percent black. Two weeks ago, a kid from English was beaten up outside a drugstore on Huntington Avenue. Three days later, two Latin School kids were mugged in the Fens. One of the Latin School kids got slashed in the side with a knife and showed off the wound to twenty or so students in the bathroom. Last week, more than a hundred English students massed on the street shared by the two schools. Daniel watched from the windows like everyone else as one of the kids from English climbed up on a car and the students started to chant. As quickly as it started, however, the thing lost its momentum, the crowd breaking up into smaller groups and drifting away. Pretty soon the block was quiet again. But the time bomb was ticking and everyone knew it.

  “Nothing’s gonna happen,” Daniel said, while Grace continued to nudge.

  “You don’t sound like you believe it,” Ben said.

  “You worried about being on the door?”

  “Heck no.”

  Ben weighed a hundred pounds on a good day and had never thrown a punch, or anything else, in anger in his life. As door monitor he’d be Latin School’s first line of defense should something happen. Not the best of plans—in fact, probably the worst—but it was what they had. The three friends ran up the steps and ducked inside just as the bell for homeroom rang.

  12

  THE TASTY’S early morning rush had subsided for the moment, allowing them to spread out at one end of the counter. Harry took a sip of coffee and stared out the window at traffic, listening idly as Zeus ordered four eggs scrambled and a side of toast. The counterman asked Harry what he wanted. He got an English muffin just to be polite, then put down his mug and rubbed a hand over his scalp. The counterman must have thought that was some sort of signal because he hustled over with the pot and gave them both a refill.

  “He thinks you’re from fucking Mars,” Zeus said.

  “It’s Harvard Square. The guy sees all kinds coming through the door.”

  “Yeah, but none of them made first team All-Ivy.”

  Harry laughed.

  “You think he doesn’t know who you are?”

  “Save it.”

  “I’m serious. People know you, Harry. And that means something.”

  Zeus’s mountain of eggs took less time to cook than they did to crack. Harry watched as the big tackle pulled across the salt and pepper shakers and began to season his food.

  “What’s bugging you?” Harry said.

  “Nothing.”

  “Come on.”

  “You should be careful, that’s all.”

  “Careful of what? I got a couple of mentions in the Globe. Big deal.”

  “F
olks notice. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “I don’t get it. One minute you’re telling me to be careful, then you’re dragging me down to the Zone.”

  “Different.”

  “How so?”

  “Cuz it’s one night and I’ll be there.”

  “And you’re gonna look after me?”

  “I’m always looking after you, bro. Always.” Zeus shoveled a forkful of eggs onto a piece of toast and folded it into his mouth, washing it down with a mouthful of coffee. “Hey, look, it’s your asshole roomie.”

  Harry followed Zeus’s gaze out the front window. Neil Prescott stood in the shadow of the Red Line stop, talking to a woman Harry didn’t recognize, probably trying to get her number with an eye toward getting her drunk and into his bed.

  “Guy’s a tool,” Harry said.

  “Hence the moniker—asshole roomie. Fuck, he’s coming over.”

  Most students at Harvard lived on campus. Prescott was a junior who couldn’t. Harry wasn’t privy to all the details, but there was a rumor of gambling during his freshman year. And something about a fifteen-year-old he’d knocked up. Prescott’s dad and grandfather were both Harvard men, both football players, so it all got handled. Harry didn’t really care. Prescott had an apartment near campus with an empty bedroom. And Harry had Daniel. So they struck their deal. Harry watched as Prescott made his way across the street and into the diner. He slid onto a stool next to Zeus but turned his attention immediately to Harry.

  “What’s up, Fitzsimmons?” Prescott called everyone by their last name.

  “Just hangin’.”

  “You sleep in the apartment last night?”

  Harry nodded. He knew Prescott had been out all night and was dying to share details of his latest conquest. Again, Harry wasn’t interested.