The Throwback Special

by Chris Bachelder

  “I’m sorry to hear about your marriage,” Robert didn’t say.

  “It’s just one of those things,” Andy didn’t respond. Nor did he say anything about the day he and his wife told their two children. That night, one of his final nights in the house, Andy went to check on his nine-year-old son in his room. He planned to sit on the edge of the boy’s bed, to say things to him while he slept. But the boy wasn’t there. Andy searched the house, gripping his phone, preparing to call someone, the police. Finally, he climbed to the third floor to his thirteen-year-old daughter’s bedroom. Andy said none of this to Robert. He opened his daughter’s bedroom door gently, even though he was expressly not allowed in the room, and had not been for a couple of years. A lamp was on inside. Andy smelled the fresh paint. She had painted her walls. The color was ridiculous, but she had done a neat job. The room was heartbreakingly clean and organized. The items on her bookshelves were arranged perfectly. He had had no idea what was up here, but he never would have guessed this. A silk butterfly dangled from the ceiling, spinning slowly in an invisible draft. The girl was in bed, texting. Andy’s son was curled beside her, asleep. His son and daughter didn’t even like each other. All they did was fight. The boy was not allowed in this room. Andy’s daughter did not look up from her phone. Andy nodded to her, and he left the room.

  Robert knew that Andy was going through a hard time. He knew he had a kid, maybe two. The question Robert would not ask had a long answer that Andy would not provide. Robert wanted to help. He wanted to give something to Andy. “My mother has Alzheimer’s,” he said quietly.

  “Really?” Andy said. “Robert, I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Thanks,” Robert said.

  This was something Robert could offer, even if it wasn’t true. He had just visited his mother in Wisconsin, and though her mind certainly was not as sharp as it had once been, she was doing just fine, still living by herself. Together they had handed out candy to neighborhood trick-or-treaters. They had run out of treats and turned the porch light out at eight o’clock. Then they had watched a documentary about the enormous salt mines beneath the Great Lakes.

  - 4 -

  THE FOUNTAIN

  THE EMPTY HALLWAYS WERE HAZY WITH sconce light and Wi-Fi radio waves. The small red lights of ceiling smoke detectors blinked in no discernible pattern. An elevator car rumbled in its shaft, transporting nothing but a name tag (Marc) and the scent of degraded deodorant. A ghost coursed the stairwell. The vending alcoves clicked and hummed.

  Vince’s T-shirt read Daytona Beach, and he snored intermittently.

  Carl’s T-shirt read No Coffee No Peace, and the Sharpie wouldn’t wash off his hands.

  Wesley’s T-shirt read Richardson’s Lawn & Garden, and he composed, in his mind, in the dark, a long letter to his son.

  Gary’s tank top read I ATE THE MEGABURGER, and he snored aggressively.

  Bald Michael’s T-shirt read Miller High Life, and his sleep apnea machine made a pleasant bubbling sound like a fish tank.

  George’s T-shirt had a picture of Darwin with an enormous block of text far too small to read, and he snored slowly.

  Nate’s T-shirt read WTF?, and in the dark he regretted the cigarette.

  Robert’s T-shirt was inside out to conceal the design, and in the dark he worried that his older daughter was developing an eating disorder.

  Andy’s T-shirt read Which Way to Rock City?, and he snored like a cartoon hound.

  Gil’s T-shirt had a picture of Thor and Loki, and his hand was asleep beneath his pillow.

  Myron’s T-shirt was yellow, and he snored with a placid countenance.

  Tommy’s T-shirt was incomprehensible, and he snored beneath his mustache.

  Fat Michael’s sweaty shirt read Bailey’s Peak Challenge 2006, and he ran seven-minute miles on the treadmill in the hotel’s Workout Center, wearing his Joe Theismann helmet and staring blankly over the single bar of the face mask into the wall-length mirror.

  Derek’s T-shirt read University of Virginia School of Law, and in the dark he wondered if he should put some pachysandra or other ground cover on that steep slope in his backyard.

  Steven’s T-shirt had a picture of sunlight passing through a prism, and he snored consistently.

  Jeff’s T-shirt read Ninja in Training, and he told Steven, snoring beside him, that as much as he hated to say it, this would probably have to be his last year.

  Randy’s T-shirt read Thompson Optical, and he could begin to feel the gentle tug of the pill.

  Chad’s T-shirt read California Dreamin’, and he snored without making a sound.

  Charles’s V-neck T-shirt was white, and all of his T-shirts were V-neck and white.

  Adam’s T-shirt read Second Place Is the First Loser, and in the dark he calculated his chances.

  Peter’s T-shirt was blue, and he stared at the clock, waiting for the number to change.

  Trent’s T-shirt read Big Data, and although he courteously wore a nasal strip, he snored with calamitous volume. When he woke up, he discovered that his nose was running. Though he did not have a cold, or he hadn’t had a cold when he went to bed, mucus was now streaming down his face, his neck. In the dark he reached toward the bedside table for a tissue or towel. He grasped something soft, and brought it to his face. As he did so, he realized that the mucus was blood, and that the tissue was a jersey.

  In the bathroom, with the light on and the door closed, Trent stopped the nosebleed by clogging his nostrils with bits of toilet paper. He unwadded Gil’s Mark May jersey and held it up in front of the mirror. The stain was intense, and extensive. With despair, Trent considered (reasonably, but incorrectly) that this year might now very well be remembered primarily as the year that Trent ruined Gil’s jersey, instead of the year that Randy picked Donnie Warren seventh in the lottery, or the year that Adam came late, or the year of the weird pizza guy, or the year without the conference room, or the year of Tommy’s mustache. Trent could not remember the edict about laundering bloodstains, whether it involved cold water or hot water or club soda or what. In the dark room he found his pants. His belt jingled like a sleigh on the eaves. Someone in the room was snoring like a lazy dog in a cartoon. He eased the door shut, walked toward the elevator with bare feet and a bloody jersey. Angela, one of the more than a dozen vice presidents in the top-heavy management structure of Prestige Vista Solutions, watched Trent from the peephole of Room 318, and then called the front desk.

  Trent waited by the elevator, but it did not arrive. A door led to the stairwell. Trent closed his eyes and extended his index finger, touching lightly the Braille letters on the sign beside the door. Repeatedly he moved his finger left to right across the tiny raised dots. Stairs, he said to himself. Stairs. When he opened his eyes, he saw that he was reading not Braille letters but the knobby residue of pink gum on the wall. Astonished, he put his fingers back on the letters.

  He walked down the stairs, keeping his eyes closed. He could feel the layers of paint on the railing. He could hear the rain, the service road villainy, the metronomic beat of Fat Michael’s stride on the treadmill in the Workout Center. Through occluded nostrils he smelled chlorine, though the hotel did not have an indoor pool. He put two feet on each step, a blind and barefoot man clutching a bloody jersey. After descending two flights, Trent opened his eyes. He looked first at the bottoms of his feet, then wished he hadn’t. He saw a door marked Lobby, and he saw the stairs continue down. His eyes now open, he walked slowly down the stairs another flight to a door marked Staff Only. Propped beside the door at the bottom of the dim stairwell was a wet bicycle with a basket attached to its handlebars. In the basket, a glistening bike helmet and a thermos. Trent laid the jersey across the bicycle seat. He unscrewed the two lids of the thermos, and put his face to the opening. It was vegetable soup! The steam from the hot soup washed his skin, and he drew the vapor through his mouth, deep into his lungs. He screwed on the lids, returned the thermos to the basket, and removed the jersey from the bic
ycle seat.

  Beyond the door marked Staff Only was a long, dark hallway, lined with locked doors of supply rooms and offices—manager, assistant manager, head of housekeeping, head of maintenance, and someone named Mr. Cottrell, on whose door was affixed a yellowed quotation by George Bernard Shaw: “The great advantage of a hotel is that it is a refuge from home life.” On the cinder-block wall a bulletin board featured the grainy mug shots of recent employees of the month. At the end of the hallway, Trent found a door labeled Laundry, and he went inside. The laundry room was large, loud, bright, and blurry with heat. An entire wall was lined with enormous washing machines and dryers, all in use, humming and spinning and vibrating. Another wall was lined floor-to-ceiling with shelves containing sheets, pillowcases, and towels, folded and stacked. The smell in the room, not unpleasant, was as if the towels and linens had been slightly singed. In the corner, a large birdcage, draped with a dark T-shirt, was suspended by a yellow rope from the ceiling. Trent stood blinking in the white heat. He looked down at his jersey. The stain was the reddest thing he had ever seen. In the heat and the light he was suddenly aware of his own substantial weight, the burdensome layers of himself.

  In a corner next to the washing machines Trent saw an enormous pile of jumbled sheets, five or six feet high, presumably dirty, though spotless and white. Trent took three steps toward the pile, and noticed that it was concave across the top like a bowl or a nest, and inside the pile of linens he saw dark clothes against the white. He stepped closer and looked in. There he saw a man and a woman, both wearing hotel uniforms. They were lying on their backs, holding hands, asleep. Trent checked for their breath, watched their chests rise and fall. Their faces were flushed in the heat. The woman was perhaps thirty. The name tag on her vest read Holly. The man was a bit older, with streaks of gray in his dark hair. He did not have a name tag on his vest. Their breathing was synchronized, their fingers interlaced. Later, Trent’s wife would ask him if the man and woman were wearing wedding rings, but it had not occurred to Trent to look for rings, and he would not remember. Holly appeared to be pregnant, though Trent could not be sure. He knew that pregnant women should not sleep on their backs—it restricts blood flow to the fetus—and yet he also knew how important sleep was during pregnancy.

  Trent heard a scuffling sound behind the T-shirt draped over the birdcage. He backed away from the nest of sheets, as you back away from royalty. At the door, he turned and left the room, making sure the heavy door closed without a sound. He walked through the dark hallway and into the stairwell, which still smelled of soup. He climbed the stairs to the lobby. There, directly before him, in the center of the lobby, the celebrated fountain was burbling and splashing, its series of bowls filling and spilling merrily. The yellow tape had been removed, as had the notice from the health department. The fountain was large, though not ostentatious. It was, as the Internet reviews claimed, an attractive feature, and a visitor admiring the centerpiece of the lobby would never have guessed that he currently stood one hundred yards from a roaring interstate with floral crosses in its median. There was a woman on her knees in front of the fountain, her back to Trent. She had removed her shoes and placed them tidily on the floor beside her. When Trent approached, he saw that her long sleeves were rolled, her elbows resting on the edge of the fountain. She gripped a toothbrush, and she diligently scrubbed a light stain on a white blouse.

  The woman did not look up at Trent as he neared the fountain. “An old traveler’s trick,” she said, scrubbing.

  Trent nodded, though he didn’t understand.

  “They put so much bleach in,” she said.

  Trent looked around. He could see, through the automatic doors, a luggage cart gleaming in the rain. At the front desk, a young clerk stared at a monitor. He paid no attention to Trent or to the woman.

  “He doesn’t care?” Trent asked, pointing at the desk clerk.

  “He doesn’t see,” she said.

  Trent knelt beside the woman, exposing the dirty soles of his feet to security cameras. He looked up at the young clerk, but he was no longer visible behind the desk and monitor. With great effort he resisted looking at the enormous clock, as he did not want a way to name the moment. He did not know if it was early or late. The television in the lobby was, remarkably, off.

  “Do you mind?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “The fountain is for everyone,” she said. Her tone was inaccessible to Trent. The sentence was a locked pine box, simple and pretty. She looked at Trent for the first time. She smiled, deepening the mystery. As she turned back to her work, Trent realized for the first time that he was still wearing his nasal strip, that his nostrils were still clogged with red bits of toilet paper.

  “Help yourself,” she said, indicating her toothbrush and washcloths.

  Trent looked into the fountain. All of the dirty coins were gone. What would he wish for with one wish? He watched the business traveler at work beside him. The muscles of her forearm fluttered as she scrubbed. Wispy strands of hair pulled out of her ponytail, dropped like a curtain in front of her face. Her necklace, some pendant or charm on a silver chain, dangled just above the water. She was meticulous, devout in her attention. If she noticed the large bloodstain on Trent’s garment, she made no indication. Trent dipped the Mark May jersey into the water of the fountain. Kneeling, silent, he tamped, brushed, and blotted the stain, imitating his fellow pilgrim. They worked together, apart. The water gurgled and splashed, cold drops leaped to touch his cheeks and neck. Gradually, the blood swam in wavy lines away from the jersey, vanishing in the clear pool.

  - 5 -

  RITES

  IT WOULD BE DIFFICULT TO OVERSTATE THE men’s enthusiasm for continental breakfast. To be clear, their zeal had little or nothing to do with this particular hotel’s version of the standard spread. As petulant online reviewers made very clear, the hotel’s breakfast was not in any way exceptional or distinctive. It was a completely average continental breakfast, and this was why the men loved it. The breakfast involved no surprises and no risks. It involved no deliberation and no ordering, no indecision or regret. With plastic tongs they heaped large quantities of known sweet rations onto their Styrofoam plates. Everything tasted like it looked. There were no interesting spices or herbs, no local flavors, no subtle variations on classics. It was a bounty of carbohydrates, and the items never ran out. There was always more, and it was always free. Continental breakfast made them feel—made many of them feel—as if they were getting away with something. And at the same time they felt it was a form of recognition, and at the same time they felt it was but a tiny portion of what they were owed. And so it was that the long table of processed food and crop-dusted fruit was for the men simultaneously gift, reward, and restitution. Their appetites were severe.

  Wearing their jerseys, the men arrived in the dining area early, but they discovered that the buffet had been set upon by dozens of employees of Prestige Vista Solutions. The men lurked at the boundaries of the dining area, anxious about resources. They watched the employees scoop and tong and toast. The female employees decimated the fruit. The male employees leaned close to inspect the plates of pastries, their ties grazing the glaze. There was good-natured joking about PowerPoint, about the taking of minutes. Those in line for the waffle maker shared wedding photos, baby photos, house photos, injury photos. Someone had adopted three more dogs. Everyone was eager to talk to Jim—Cyber Jim, not Khakis Jim—about their computer problems. When the employees of Prestige Vista Solutions had filled their plates and cups, they filed out of the dining area, and disappeared into the conference room like a line of ants. The men in their jerseys watched, and when they turned back to the continental banquet, the serving platters had been replenished, the yogurt pyramids reconstructed. They descended on the simple sugars, ravenous but with a clear and disheartening sense that there was no real connection between breakfast and merit.

  •

  FAT MICHAEL stirred gray powder into each of the three pla
stic cups in front of him. The powder did not dissolve. In wet, floating clumps it spun inside the rims of the cups, suggesting, somehow, the passage of time. Fat Michael drank all of the cups rapidly, one after another, his eyes pinched shut. He did not look good. He looked incredible, but he did not look good. Also, he was itchy, and he raked his legs with his fingernails. Myron and Tommy sat across from Fat Michael, eating silently. It was the one time during the year they used flavored coffee creamer. Their presence at the table somehow made Fat Michael seem more alone than he would have seemed if he had actually been alone.

  “This muffin is all right,” Myron said in a low voice. Tommy’s face looked weird because he was doing exercises to strengthen his pelvic floor.

  A hotel employee named Nick walked into the dining area wearing Chad’s shoes. The shoes were too small, and very wet, but he liked them. They made him feel like a lucky person, though he knew himself to be an unlucky person. He wrapped a bagel in a napkin, filled a cup with orange juice. He remembered the time when Lawrence Taylor snapped Joe Theismann’s leg on Monday Night Football. He remembered exactly where he was, and what he was doing. He clearly remembered Howard Cosell’s anguished reaction, though he remembered it incorrectly because Cosell’s last season on Monday Night Football had been 1983. He moved toward the men in the jerseys. He had a burden he was eager to set down.

  From across the room Charles saw Nick approaching the defensive backs’ breakfast table with an expression of fullness, and he stood quickly, placing his napkin on the table. “Excuse me, guys,” he said. He walked through the dining area, into the lobby. For a moment he stood before the fountain, which was once again dry. Each year in this hotel lobby he was forced to recall that as a child he had stolen quarters from a mall fountain (soaking the cuffs of his sweatshirt) so that he could purchase, in the filthy bathroom of a gas station near his house, an erotic puzzle entitled Boobs Galore. The small puzzle box contained nine cardboard squares that could be arranged, on a floor behind a locked bedroom door, to form a picture of a sad, shirtless woman with enormous breasts. Charles remembered that the woman, when reconstituted, was sitting on what he now knew to be a Windsor chair, and that any adolescent lust he could gin up at the sight of her demoralizingly large breasts was almost immediately dowsed by the way she looked back at Charles. The puzzle piece with her face (top row, middle column) countervailed all of the other eight pieces. That face was more nude by far than her body. The look on her face implicated Charles. It suggested that she was forced to share Charles’s shame and disappointment, and she was resentful. Or perhaps Charles was forced to share her shame and disappointment, and he was resentful. In either case, Charles and this nine-piece shirtless woman in a Windsor chair had been trapped together in a sticky web of shame, disappointment, and resentment. Charles had stolen coins for this experience. In his backyard he had dug a small hole. He had put the puzzle in the hole, and then lit it with a long wooden match. It burned in blues and greens.