Mile Zero

by Sanchez, Thomas

  “Even MK?”

  Handsomemost turned his cloudy eyes to Justo. “Watch your tongue.”

  “Thought you didn’t need no favors?”

  “Listen,” Handsomemost hissed, “what shit you be carrying?”

  “MK’s coming back.”

  “You be tryin to jack off my ego?”

  “Don’t believe me. Just willing to do a favor, guess you don’t need it.”

  Handsomemost stared into his Scotch, silent as a drowned man.

  “Here’s to Crazies, that they might even the score!” Bubba-Bob raised his mug. “You can piss, you can moan, but you can’t kill all the Crazies. God bless their looney tunes!”

  “To Crazies,” chorused many in the crowd.

  “Fuck you,” voted others.

  “I gots my numbers covered.” Handsomemost pressed his thin lips together. “But MK ridin back into town, gots to be no good for some.”

  “Where’s Renoir?”

  “You ain’t spittin acid in my eye? MK’s headed back?”

  “Heard MK’s coming to get his girl.”

  “Girl? I knows everythings, never hearda no chick.”

  “Lila.”

  “That little redneck skirt St. Cloud’s been chasin?”

  “She’s a lot more skirt than you think.”

  “Wheeewh. MK had a bitch hidden in the woodpile all the time.”

  “Coming back for her, and other things.”

  “Other things?” Handsomemost stood, running hands over silk black clothes to smooth creases. “Time to rock and roll.” He tapped the toes of his alligator loafers. “How’d you get word anyway?”

  “Brogan, he accommodated.”

  “Thanks for the chit and the chat.”

  “Hey! Where you going? You owe me.”

  “Try Dick Dock.”

  “Already did, first place I looked.”

  “Up behind there, in the old fort where they got that garden. Try the orchids.”

  “Certain?”

  Handsomemost poked a bony finger into the ruffled front of Justo’s shirt. “Certain as your granny used to wash dishes for white folks.” He backed away, his bony finger still pointing. “I don’t owes no favors. You owes me.”

  Someday, Justo promised, he was going to blow the mustard off that strutting hot dog. Someday when there would no longer be anyone to accommodate, even halfway. What he told Handsomemost about MK was only half true. Handsomemost was so smart, he could figure which half to believe.

  Angelica poured Justo a beer. “If it’s true about MK coming, St. Cloud better catch the first rocket out of town.”

  “Lila’s left. Saw her headed over Cow Key Bridge in her convertible about six this morning.”

  “How do you know she’s not coming back?”

  “I can tell by the look on a woman’s face if she’s driving off this rock for the last time.”

  “Look into my face.” Angelica rested her chin in her hands, inches from Justo. “What do you see?”

  Justo studied the blond closeness, sweet breath brushing his skin, his face flushed. “I see pleasure and pain, a homewrecker in search of a home, a woman too honest to take I do for an answer.”

  “You see too much, honey.” Angelica’s lips came closer, her hand touching his cheek. “Go home to your warm Cuban bread. Go home, family man.”

  Bubba-Bob slammed his fist on the bar. “Goddamnit! A fishin man can’t get a drink because the bartender’s hustling the heat!”

  “Only trying to bribe him with my good looks and high-school education. No money changed hands.”

  Bubba-Bob slid onto the stool vacated by Handsomemost, his hand locking on Justo’s shoulder. “Let me buy you an anejo, hear your little girl’s getting married today.”

  “Not married.” Angelica opened a bottle of anejo. “It’s sort of a debutante’s ball. Fabulous gowns and a big feast.”

  “Sounds goddamn expensive.” Bubba-Bob squeezed Justo’s shoulder. “How much money you make as a cop? Maybe you want to go king-fishin with ol Bubba, pull some extra bucks into the boat.”

  “I’ll take that anejo.”

  Angelica poured the rum with a sly wink. “Today’s worse than a wedding. Give your daughter away and get nothing back.”

  Justo raised his glass in farewell salute to Angelica, she still remained the wildest flower in his life. “No hay rosas sin espinas!”

  There are no roses without thorns.

  THERE WERE no roses inside the Civil War fort, no shackled Confederate soldiers, no fat cattle to feed Union troops. Towering brick walls constructed to withstand pounding of cannonballs fired from offshore ships now protected the local garden club’s offering of southern flora. Palm-lined pathways led to a lattice-covered grotto choked with vivid growth of orchids. Within the grotto’s overhead tumble of filtered light Renoir was not to be found. Justo opened a door onto a footpath winding beneath fragrant magnolias to a fence at the Atlantic’s edge. A solitary figure in a rumpled white suit gazed through the fence’s chained links.

  Renoir knew Justo was coming. He did not attempt to run. Behind black-lensed glasses his attention remained fixed on youthful males in sleek swimsuits reclining along the arc of a wooden pier. Older men, fully clothed, moved cautiously among the youths. Renoir’s words were flat as the sea beyond. “That’s where I first met him. Suppose it would be better if I could say he wasn’t like the others. Fact is he was just like the others. That’s what attracted me from the beginning. Funny, those things, attractions, yearnings which can’t be denied.”

  In blue heat beating on his blue coat Justo was sweltering. He had been in such a hurry he forgot to leave the coat in the car. Something prevented him from taking it off. He felt he had to keep it on in front of Renoir, like a badge.

  “Out on the pier is where I met him. Wasn’t his beauty attracted me. Most people couldn’t see past his beauty, beyond tanned muscles he was always flexing. It was his vitality got me. So many people in life are dead to their visceral selves, tell themselves how life should be before they live it, what rules will dominate, what rules will repel inexplicable attraction. They never play another game. My father was like that. Isaac set out to become famous, fame became his cage. Only room for one in the cage of fame, everyone else is locked out. I was locked out. But my man was a wild creature, couldn’t be housebroken, refused to be caged. No rules of attraction or domination for him, no rules period. You don’t know what it was like to wake up at the crack of dawn with that urgency. Like sun coming up, everything possible, life on the rise.”

  Justo cleared his throat, sweat poured from his body, the blue coat soaked through. “Guess we all live by the notion there is something bigger than we are, something to bet one’s life on.”

  Renoir wheeled around. “What would you know about it?”

  “You’re right. What can someone like me possibly understand?”

  “Nothing is what. You want the truth? Truth is, the singularity of your hetero friendships chills me to the bone.” Renoir turned the glare of his sunglasses back to oil-slicked bodies on the pier. “My man came down here to cheat on me. I came here to cheat on him too, but I couldn’t free myself to be with anyone else. Wonder if I’ll ever love someone so much again? To want to cheat on him to hurt him, continually test what we have. You see, it has nothing to do with preference, everything to do with desire. But you don’t see, do you? Don’t see.”

  Heat and anejo were unraveling Justo’s senses, what happened two days before seemed so distant, when he had smashed through the front door of Renoir’s house after the cemetery shooting. Inside the bedroom he felt himself winding back through time, as if he were the person stumbling upon Count von Cosel’s beloved bride. The eyes staring from the bed mirrored a backward journey beyond burdensome physicality, toward peace never offered the living. When the ambulance arrived the body was smoothed into a stretcher, borne from sheltering shadows of Renoir’s home into a sun of disquieting intensity. “You did your best.”
Justo heard his own voice coming back to him. “Cared for him until the end. There’s nothing bigger.”

  “How long will it all hold?” Renoir leaned heavily against the fence, his white suit darkly smudged from sleeping on the ground. “I wanted him comforted. Is that asking too much? Couldn’t bear his being with strangers.”

  “I hate to be the one to tell you, he’s in the hospital. It isn’t as good, but he’s getting the right kind of attention, I made certain. Don’t blame yourself, you did everything.”

  “Everything? I couldn’t go back to the house, you had it watched. When he needed me most I failed. It was all I could do to stop Zobop, I knew who he was after next. Couldn’t go to my father the night he was dying, because of a yellow rock thrown through my window with a note around it: The Angel of Death awaits, your fate rises with sun in cemetery.”

  “I got the same rock-thrown summons.”

  “I found the biggest angel in the cemetery and waited behind it.”

  “Smarter than I was, so many angels. Should have figured it though, the biggest angel is atop the grave people believe von Cosel’s bride was secretly buried in. For all I knew, when St. Cloud came running into the cemetery, he could have been Zobop, I almost shot him. I stayed low, something had to pop, everything had been too well planned.”

  “Planned?”

  “Maybe that’s not the right word. Madmen don’t plan things so much as they hatch plots. You were right about fearing for Floyd’s life. He was part of a connection, running through you, to St. Cloud, to me, to Voltaire. All connected in a chain of events going back to when I took that ouanga from Voltaire on the refugee boat. Space Cadet was in the crowd on the dock, saw me take the ouanga, also saw you on the beach that morning I gave Floyd mouth-to-mouth. I hadn’t realized Floyd tried to drown himself that morning. Didn’t make the connection until I discovered Floyd’s illness. Space Cadet made his connections long ago, thought he knew where all the secrets were buried.”

  “What about Marilyn’s Andy?”

  “In the wrong place at the right time, up to nothing more than scamming at Sugarloaf when he came upon Space Cadet sacrificing a goat in the bat tower. Deal is, only the initiated can witness a sacrifice, for the unclean to do so is to ordain their own sacrificial end. In the beginning I thought we were up against a new cult. It was worse, the madness of one person who thought he was many. Takes only one person to shoot a President, kiss the cheek of Christ. No bottom to what humans will stoop to, no end to what they’ll place their faith in. Space Cadet was a full-tilt Space Graduate, all the way to top of the class as Zobop. Everything he imagined was real, because he acted upon it. Lo que de noche se hace, de día aparece. That which is done by night can be seen by day.”

  “He’s gone now, it’s over.”

  “All evil springs from the same source, stamp it out here, pops up there. I found where he lived, under the Seven Mile Bridge, inside the tunnel carrying telephone and water lines. Crawled on my belly through the dark to where he last holed up, traffic thundering overhead, waterpipe hissing in my ears, everything slick with mildew. Found a box of newspaper clippings and journals dating back to the sixties. The journals were all marked Tiger Car Manual, except the most recent, Adios Twentieth Century. Space Cadet wasn’t one of the walking wounded, he had on track shoes, speeding toward destruction, a generational time bomb. He was trying to bullshit the gods, believed the severed ears of Satan were drumskins beating out his destiny, telling him what to do. No drums in the tunnel, only journals to explain what he was hearing, the clippings to tell us what he was twisting, like the ones about that infection started by green monkeys which St. Cloud said Voltaire had. If I hadn’t read the clippings I wouldn’t have realized what Floyd was suffering. Space Cadet was convinced the earth would rot from its core if he didn’t protect the purity of water, which roared over his head through the pipe in the tunnel. He made connections, not so random selections. Those who threatened purity had to be sacrificed. Everything followed ceremony. Sun rising over the cemetery after All Saints’ Eve was the anointed time for Bamboches Guede Mysteres, big party for the Mysteries, when the dead arise and mount cleansed bodies, ride fresh souls. Space Cadet bent all rules, also bent his back digging our graves in the cemetery, ready and waiting.”

  Justo pulled a handkerchief from his coat, mopping sweat from his brow. He looked beyond the curved pier to the Casa Marina Hotel, he was going to be late for his daughter’s Quince. Cars from far away as Tampa were filling the hotel parking lot. He took another swipe at his sweaty forehead.

  “Way I see it, Space Cadet knew too little about too much. Important thing is it’s finished, you stopped it.”

  The handsome lines of Renoir’s face were drawn down in the high sun to a wash of weariness. Pelicans landed on pier pilings, spreading wet wings to sea’s reflected heat. “Used to come here every day after school at the end of World War Two, when the hotel was taken over by the Navy for officers’ quarters. All those gentlemen in white.”

  “There’s an all-points bulletin out for you.”

  “Crisp uniforms, sun couldn’t uncrease them.”

  “Why don’t you hand over the gun so we can ease this show on the road.”

  “Gun?” Renoir faced Justo. “I traded it to Handsomemost, so he would keep people from telling you where I was. It’s probably in Puerto Rico by now.”

  “If I make the arrest I’ve got to read you your Mirandas, cuff you up and haul you in. Don’t want to do that. Just go peaceful, turn yourself in voluntary. We’ll have a shot at springing you on self-defense.”

  “Now that I don’t have Floyd there’s no place to go home to.” Renoir removed his sunglasses, squinting in strong light. “Tell me, did you ever come down here after school?”

  “Surrender voluntary. Simple as that. Maybe I can spring you to see Floyd.”

  “Won’t be time for that.” Renoir slipped his glasses back on.

  “You’d be surprised what I can arrange.”

  “That’s something no one can arrange.”

  Justo knew he was definitely late for the Quince. The band had begun in the hotel ballroom, music floated out the high-arched doors, across white chairs on lawn rolling to sea’s edge, guests were glancing at watches, wondering where he was. He tried to think of his daughter in her formal gown, radiant, a beginning. He placed a hand on Renoir’s shoulder. “You know, an enemy is made for life, but a friend can be lost in a moment. I don’t want to lose you.”

  Renoir did not turn his gaze from the pier, looking straight as he spoke in trembling voice. “I want to thank you for saving Floyd that morning on the beach.”

  “I wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.”

  “This illness Floyd has, more revelations are coming out. They say it can be passed by blood contact. I remember how badly Floyd’s mouth was bleeding that morning when I pulled him from the water. Thought he would bleed to death, then you kissed him back to life.” Renoir pressed his hands against the fence, fingers lacing through chain mesh in a tightening grip. “It’s true, a friend can be lost in a moment. Watch yourself, Justo, watch very closely. I worry about you.”

  “I pray for you.”

  “You still don’t understand.”

  27

  ANY DAY that begins with a nightmare is a day that will turn upright. In St. Cloud’s nightmare he was sitting ringside among a sweating mob watching a tattooed baby contest. Each squirming contestant was held by its tiny feet in ring center by a proud mama, then turned slowly to ohhs and ahhs from an appreciative crowd. From the soles of their feet to the crowns of their hairless heads, the babies’ bodies were elaborated with tattoos depicting everything from tropical birds to battleships sunk in forgotten wars. The last contestants were twins, boy and girl, held high by a daddy instead of a mommy. Daddy’s own skin was camouflaged with a million needle pricks of tattoo ink. No matter where the overhead spotlight struck daddy’s corpulent body, every inch of his hide told a story. Daddy swung squalling
twins by twin heels, twirling them to a blur, then stopping short, stripping diapers to expose on dimpled buttocks a spreading tattooed bloom of prize-winning roses. Daddy smacked the blooming buttocks, stoking them fire-engine red. The more twins wailed the more daddy spanked. The crowd grew unruly and booed. The more the crowd booed the more daddy paddled. The plump posteriors became too hot to handle. Daddy plunked babies into buckets of cold water to cool their angry roses. The crowd rose in unison: Fix fix, we demand money back! The cry woke up St. Cloud. Lila was not next to him. The fan whirring over his bed sounded like the uproar from a distant crowd. Sun streaming through the window was ablaze with late morning fury above his bed. In the kitchen, taped to a jar of papaya preserves he had made himself, was a note: I go where I want to go. There are no knots. Love y’all. A knock came from the front door as St. Cloud read the note for the fifth time. He opened the door. A fat man bearing striking resemblance to daddy of twins handed over a letter. Fat man demanded St. Cloud sign a paper declaring he had received the letter, then wheeled off on a bicycle up the lane. St. Cloud ripped open the envelope. After all these years his divorce from Evelyn was finally finalized. In one morning St. Cloud’s wife and girlfriend were out of his life forever. Life was a fixed event. By the time he stumbled outside with his nightmare hangover and double dose of reality, he was half-cocked and fully loaded, insultingly late for the Quince of Justo’s daughter. If there was a crooked way to walk a straight line St. Cloud still hoped he could find the zigzag path.

  THE PARKING LOT of the seaside hotel was crowded with cars from everywhere in Florida. Bellhops guarding the lobby entrance insisted St. Cloud present his invitation to the private party under way. This was not what St. Cloud needed, in his half-cocked position he was only a hair-trigger pull from detonating. Didn’t the uniformed inquisitors preventing his entry realize Henry Flagler’s hotel at the end of the ocean-going railroad was designed to receive dignified persons? A spitting rage would erupt from Uncle Henry if he learned esteemed guests were detained at the portals to paradise promised.