Joe's Liver

by Di Filippo, Paul

  But on the balance, Ardy decides, he has nothing to complain about. Why, he is positively ecstatic to be alive! His head grows dizzy with contemplation of the First World wonders yet to be encountered. Or could the vertigo be attributed to hunger and fatigue? In any case, his first task remains the same: to step inside the station and procure a ticket for Pleasantville.

  Ardy moves away from the sports car, bidding it a silent adieu.

  In front of the station is a statue: atop a tall obelisk is balanced a granite ball; atop the ball, clinging precariously with her toes, is a heroic, lyre-strumming woman wearing a puzzled expression. Ardy pauses a moment to empathize with the woman. Her symbolic predicament reminds him of his own.

  Crossing the tarmac, he soon enters the shadow of the station. Up a step or two, through a door, and he is inside.

  Spotting the ticket-sellers cage across the width of the large hall, Ardy makes a beeline there, although the smell emanating from the snackbar exerts a more visceral tug.

  The cage is manned by an elderly fellow wearing a red Amtrak vest. Thin strands of damp white hair salted with dandruff cling moistly to his skull. He seems the very soul of helpfulness.

  “Hello, sir, I wish to procure a ticket for the town of Pleasantville, New York, zip code one-zero-five- seven-zero.”

  “Don’t go there.”

  Ardy at first believes the clerk is commanding him not to journey thither.

  “I beg your pardon, sir?”

  “Whatsamatta, Mister Zipcode, you gotcha head up your ass? Read my lips: we - don’t - go’ there.”

  “Oh, I follow your drift now, sir. Well, then, what do you suggest?”

  “About what?”

  Ardy studies the elderly gentleman for signs of facetiousness, but can detect none beneath his stony visage.

  “Why, with regards to my reaching Pleasantville, of course.”

  The clerk forces a sentence fragment out through tight lips. “Might catch a bus for there once you get to New York.”

  Ardy considers the suggestion. Although he is reluctant to plunge into the most forbidding metropolis of the First World (“The South Bronx: Hellhole or War Zone?” is but one of several past scary titles that instantly occur to Ardy), he sees no other choice. Surely nothing could happen to him in merely transiting from Amtrak Station to Port Authority bus depot, which his reading has informed him are practically contiguous.…

  “All right, sir, a single one-way ticket for The Big Apple. Do you have sleeping car accommodations, perhaps, in which I might refresh myself?”

  “Lissen, wiseguy, it’s all unreserved seats, twenty-nine ninety-five, cash or charge.”

  “Cash.”

  The clerk taps the keyboard of a computer and a printer disgorges a ticket. Ardy watches in fascination.

  “Amazing.”

  “Yeah, ain’t it. Here’s your change.”

  “Thank you, sir. Enjoy this splendid day.”

  “Grrr!”

  Ardy next moves to the snackbar, where he orders and consumes two Breakfast Specials consisting of eggs, ham, toast and home fries, with unlimited coffee, his first food since the lamentable “gaggers” almost twenty-four hours ago. It seems his appetite, coached by such champion eaters as Doctor Spencer and Dawn, is approaching First World magnitude.

  At last sated, he returns to the waiting area. His train, he notes, is due in less than an hour.

  As the cognoscenti say, he has it “made in the shade.”

  Ardy takes a seat beside a fat black woman who reminds him of a Spice Island matron, except that she is dressed in a manner unlike those familiar motherly types, wearing as she does a pair of quilted boots that resemble those of lunar explorers; jeans; a fake fur coat; and a big fur hat not unlike Ardy’s own.

  Ardy smiles at her, but her attention is riveted to the screen of a miniature television cradled in her lap.

  Intrigued by her concentration, Ardy steals a look at the display on the pocket monitor.

  He confronts his own face, centered in the camera’s eye, a microphone shoved beneath his jaw. In the background is the Faunce House lounge. The videotaped Ardy is answering some stupid question with an equally foolish reply. He looks like an addlepated anarchist.

  Ardy’s formerly complacent stomach does flipflops.

  At that moment the fat woman looks up, an irate expression on her round fur-surrounded face, as if she is about to berate Ardy for intruding on her viewing. As she recognizes Ardy’s identity, however, her face collapses in utter panic,

  “Madam, I am not whom you take me for.…” Ardy begins weakly.

  The woman lets out a piercing scream that resonates in the hall like a diva’s swan song. My God, thinks Ardy, what lungs …

  “It’s him!” bellows the woman. “It’s that Dungstep Toejam! Help, help!”

  “Madam, you are performing a karmic betrayal on a great and glorious cause by drawing attention to me, even though I am not who you think. Have you no sympathy for a captive nation of monks and meditators…?”

  “Help, help, murder!”

  Looking around, Ardy spots Amtrak security guards converging on him.

  “Madam, could I convince you to fabricate a believable explanation dismissing this altercation away? I have a train I do not wish to miss.…”

  The woman’s answering scream convinces Ardy of the futility of further cajoling. In an instant he is up out of his chair and running like a frightened rabbit, pursued by what seems like a whole private army of Amtrak guards.

  Outside Ardy hightails it across the parking lot. Reaching the far side of the street that borders the lot, he pauses and turns. The sounds of pursuit have stopped.

  The Amtrak guards are drawn up at the edge of the lot, shifting nervously from foot to foot, eyeing Ardy maliciously.

  “Hey, that’s not fair,” says one. “Come back here.”

  “Why?” asks Ardy.

  “We gotta arrest you, but we can’t leave Amtrak property.”

  “Would it make any difference in your attitude if I told you I was a legitimate ticket-holder, and thus in a manner of speaking, your boss?”

  “Hell, no! You’re still a desperate fugitive and subject to arrest. Read the back of your ticket.”

  Curious, Ardy does so and discovers, in small print, the following clause:

  Carriage hereunder is subject to the Conditions of Contract and the rules and regulations of Amtrak, which do not apply to suspected or convicted felons, or anyone who has ever at any time for any cause run afoul of any properly vested authority of this or any other nation, not excluding the Roman Catholic Church, the Boy Scouts of America, the Pop Warner League, the 4-H Club, the Screenwriters Guild, The President’s War On Drugs …

  “I see. In that case, farewell.”

  “Hey, come back here! Someone call the real cops …!”

  Ardy trots through the Streets of New London. It seems a charming town, and he wishes he could stay longer. However, circumstances being what they are, he simply cannot indulge himself.

  A bum with crusty snot-sodden mustache and chew-fingered gloves is standing on a street corner. As Ardy approaches, he says, “Spare some change, Mister ?”

  “Perhaps you can answer a question, sir. I assume that a branch of the interstate highway system passes close to this town.”

  “Yeah, yeah, just head straight down Main, you can’t miss it, now whadda ’bout some change?”

  “I suspect I shall be needing all my liquid resources soon, sir, but you may avail yourself of this.”

  Ardy jogs off, leaving the bum to ponder the Amtrak ticket in his dirty glove. Hopefully, the recipient of Ardy’s largesse will be able to function within the parameters outlined on the reverse.

  Ardy hears the freeway before he sees it. Soon thereafter, he finds himself standing beneath a portion of the road elevated some seventy-five feet above his head on gargantuan trestles. Helplessly contemplating, with craning neck, the inaccessible roadway, Ardy ponders his next ac
tion. Even if he can find a method of reaching the freeway, will it not be swarming with police units, alert for his guilty face? It seems a conundrum of the first magnitude, akin to the Gordian Knot.

  As Ardy dithers, two vehicles pull to a stop beside him. One is a dilapidated yellow school bus painted with slogans, chief of which is the legend: the ethical circus. Behind the bus, presenting a contrasting neatness, is a long recreational vehicle with a factory-applied W on its side.

  Driving the bus is a young woman. She pulls down her window and says, “Excuse me, but do you know where the highway is?”

  “Yes. That’s it above our heads.”

  “Well, I can see that! What I need is the onramp.”

  “And I also, Miss.”

  “Where’s your car? We can hunt for it together.”

  “Unfortunately, I am sans automobile at the moment.…”

  “Oh … Do you need a ride then?”

  “It depends on your destination, Miss. I was heading to Pleasantville, by way of New York City.”

  “Well, hop in then! We’re heading to Manhattan ourselves.”

  Without further ado, the woman opens the folding doors of the bus and Ardy scrambles aboard.

  The doors close and the bus roars off, presumably followed by the allied mobile home, the driver of which Ardy was unable to discern, beneath the gloom of the overpass. Balancing on the top step, Ardy initially focuses on the woman behind the wheel. Her long sandy hair frames a thin, yet rather pleasant face. Her skin is preternaturally pale, nearly translucent; her lips are almost bloodless. No make-up ameliorates this pallor. She wears a down vest over a white cowled sweater, and jeans.

  “If we drive parallel to the freeway,” says the woman, “we’re bound to find an entrance sooner or later.”

  “Although I do not have enough experience to comment on your scheme, Miss, it seems logically sound.”

  The woman takes her gaze from the road for a moment and bestows it on Ardy. Her eyes are a subtle grey, like the Spice Island skies just prior to a squall. Ardy finds them irrationally disturbing, and it bothers him until he realizes why: a particularly fanatical Sister at the orphanage possessed just such eyes. Named Sister Virgilia Raimunda Nietzsche, the harridan was certainly the only member of the Order of Eternal Recurrence toward whom Ardy bears any ill feelings whatsoever,

  “You’re not native to this country, are you?” says the driving woman.

  Ardy sighs. Is it all to start up again so soon, the cycle of lying and entanglements, followed by cataclysms and flight? Will he ever reach his goal, or is he doomed to be forever diverted, no sooner escaping the embrace of one faction than falling into that of another? Is this what life in the First World is like for everyone, or has he been singled out because of his foreign nature? Perhaps, he thinks, he has brought this fate on himself. Perhaps by giving in to the whims of others so easily, by indulging in prevarications and mendacity, he has lost the pure-heartedness and resolve that once drove him so steadfastly.

  Yes, yes, that’s it! Sudden insight blooms like a clear flame within Ardy’s bosom. He must avoid all further betrayals to his own conscience if he is ever to have success with his quest. Starting now!

  “No, I’m not,” answers Ardy forthrightly. “Is it so obvious?”

  The woman’s eyes are back on the road now, and her profile offers only half the visual clues to her reactions. Ardy regards her closely, and is rewarded for his honesty, he believes, by a corresponding respect and forthcomingness on her part.

  “I knew it, I just knew it. Oh, its not really obvious, but when you’ve worked with as many refugees as I have, little things register on a subconscious level. Where are you from? No, don’t tell me, let me guess. Despite that hokey disguise, the facepaint and all, you must be a Latino. Honduras? Costa Rica? Guatemala? No? You don’t have to say, I can imagine what you’re running from, why you might want to keep your past to yourself. My God, I can’t believe how fate dropped you into our lap. You are on the run, aren’t you? No, don’t bother to lie, it’s all right, you’re among friends now. Just look around.”

  Up till this moment, Ardy, still standing, has been preoccupied with maintaining his footing as the ungainly bus careers down the bumpy streets, with resolving certain moral dilemmas, and with sizing up the woman driving. He has had no time to do so much as glance backward. Now he does so.

  Every seat on the bus is occupied. There are approximately forty people acting as audience to the colloquy between Ardy and the driver. And every single one of them has the same generic appearance. The silent watchers are mixed male and female, with the men predominating. They are all apparently Amerindians from south of the border. Their grim and enigmatic features look carved from tropical woods. They are clad in a variety of northern and southern modes: flannel shirts topped by colorful hand-woven capes, peaked felted caps with earflaps clashing with bulky synthetic jackets. They all stare forward with absolute fixity of concentration, apparently ready for anything from lunch to Armageddon. Their visual concentration is palpable. It is like being solemnly weighed by a gallery of Incan, Aztec and Mayan deities and being found wanting.

  Ardy is completely nonplussed. “This is a prison bus, isn’t it? These are hardened murderers, thieves and arsonists.”

  The woman laughs. “No, of course not.”

  “Then surely you are escorting these people to a sanitarium of some sort. Why are there no guards? Have your charges been suitably tranquilized? Judging from their stolidity, I would assume so.…”

  “Well, you’d be wrong. These people don’t belong in any institution.”

  “The apple harvest is long over in these parts, I believe.”

  “You’re right about that, at least.”

  “Then I confess to utter confusion. Who are these people, where are you going, and what do you intend when you get there?”

  “I don’t think I’m the one to tell you. I should leave that to Father Jim.”

  The woman’s voice takes on a different tone with the mention of this new person, a tone midway between adoration and awe. Ardy is now completely baffled.

  “Father Jim? Your male parent is aboard? Would you please direct me to him then? I confess I cannot pick him out by sheer physiognomic similarities.…”

  Again the woman laughs. Ardy imagines he might enjoy the sound, were he not so perplexed as to verge on paranoia.

  “No, no, Father Jim’s in the Winnebago. He’s the guiding light behind The Ethical Circus. I’m just his assistant. My name’s Kirsten, by the way. Kirsten Dahl.”

  “I am pleased to meet you, Miss Dahl. My own name is Ardy.”

  “Well, Ardy, why don’t you take that empty seat right behind me. I think I’ve spotted an onramp up ahead, and I don’t want you to take a tumble going around the curve.”

  Ardy drops into the indicated seat. He looks nervously over his shoulder. The massed dark eyes of the Indians remain unwaveringly fixed on him. He turns back toward the front of the bus. The eyes continue to drill dozens of hot little holes in his back.

  The bus is climbing an incline now, leaving behind the potholed secondary streets of New London for the slightly less decrepit surface of the tremendous interstate web of superhighways, with its much greater freedom and anonymity. Ardy feels instant relief once they are speeding south down the multilane, Jersey-barriered sluice. As the shadows of buildings fall away and the bus fills with sunlight, the likelihood of Ardy’s own quest meeting with some success assumes a greater measure of probability in his own eyes.

  “This is wonderful!” Miss Dahl informs Ardy, “We’re only a couple of hours away from the city now. Pretty soon we’ll be at the church, and we can all relax a bit before the first performance. And of course, within an hour or so, we’ll stop on the highway for lunch. Are you hungry, Ardy?”

  About to reply that he has just eaten breakfast, Ardy realizes that his stomach is surprisingly empty. He forgot for a while that running for one’s freedom requires more calories than
simply being chauffeur to a lonely matron or escort to a bored art student.

  “Yes, I could enjoy a meal, Miss Dahl. That is, if it won’t put you out to have another mouth to feed.”

  “Oh, that’s nothing. It’s only Christian charity to help wherever one can. And it’s not like you’re an absolute stranger or anything — why, I can sense already how well you’ll fit into the Circus. And your English is so good! I’m afraid that’s one drawback with the others that sort of limits the dramatic impact of our performances. All they can really do is sit on the stage and maybe exhibit their scars while Father Jim” — again, that shift in tone — “tells their stories. But someone like you could actually narrate the horrors you’ve experienced. It would be so much more dramatic.”

  “Miss Dahl, I don’t think you realize …”

  “Oh, I understand all right! There’s no need to recount all the gruesome tortures and beatings and starvation you’ve experienced. I’ve read the Amnesty reports and seen the pictures. No, don’t resurrect all those awful memories now. Save them to convince the people who need convincing about the misguided NAFTA-drunk policy of this country.”

  “Miss Dahl …”

  “Please, don’t treat me as just another Yankee imperialist, I’m on your side. Call me Kirsten.”

  “If you wish, Kirsten, but I’m afraid you have a few misconceptions about my past.”

  “Oh, I know that no one who hasn’t experienced the oppression firsthand can ever really comprehend it. But that’s what we need you for, to hear testimony to all the complacent people in this country.”

  “Kirsten, I’m afraid I conceive my mission differently.…”

  “Oh, listen to me rattle on! I’ve said too much already. I hope Father Jim isn’t mad at me! Once you talk to him, I’m sure he’ll make everything clear.”

  “I hope so, Kirsten.”

  After an hour’s travel — full of absolute silence like that which Ardy imagines might prevail in the deepest crypts of a jungle-wreathed temple — Kirsten flicks on her right turn-signal and pulls into a roadside rest area that consists of an arc of pavement with a few scattered snow-covered picnic tables. Shutting off the motor, she rises and says, “Okay, everyone, wait here, I’ll be right back!” Then she leaves the bus for the Winnebago, which has pulled up behind.