A Mound Over Hell

by Gary Morgenstein

  Nothing disembodied drifted towards her. Ghoulish curled fingers, upraised palms. Maybe it had been an accident. A bump, jostle, crowded subway platform, commuters eager to get home. She probably had been drinking.

  All pure guesses except the sensation and the long dark and here she was again. She waited a foot from the edge, looking around. Panic started. Clammy hands and a skipping heart. Steady, she told herself. Mooshie leaned over, peering down at the tracks. Her shoulders arched together, trying to feel something. She’d been twenty-five pounds heavier over the thick muscles. One nudge wouldn’t have worked.

  She could easily imagine the rest. If it had happened like that. What if the sensation in the small of the back had been from landing on the tracks? Maybe those black metal lines were the memory. Maybe she’d stumbled backwards, tripped. Maybe she had been drinking really heavily. Mooshie had done a lot of that. Maybe she toppled and the train roared over her. Pureed Lopez.

  Mooshie fitfully clutched her groin at the platform. Empty, filthy, smelly rat home. Think this was a meeting place for anything other than memories you can’t remember? She kicked some bottles onto the tracks, wildly dumping over a garbage can and shoving all the refuse onto the rail. Cans, bottles, chicken wings.

  A fat appreciative rat trotted over to check out the panting intruder in the oversized jacket who was feeding the brothers and sisters on the tracks. Mooshie knelt, beckoning with a finger.

  Did you see anything?

  The rodent suddenly squeaked an unpleasant sound of dread, jumping over the platform and disappearing onto the tracks.

  I hear you, she muttered. I hear you.

  • • • •

  VERNON JACKSON’S UPPER lip disappeared somewhere into his hairline.

  “Run?”

  Standing between home and the dugout, the other seven members of the Hawks murmured uneasily.

  Puppy silently warned Ty and Mick to shut up, which only deepened the rest of the team’s anxiety. Something wasn’t right. Called in an off-day. Told the HGs were gone. Now there was that weird leathery glove on the really old guy’s hand while the second really old guy swung the bat as if measuring their foreheads.

  “Yes. Run, Vern.” Puppy hopped in place like he was stamping out a fire. “You hit the ball…”

  Neal Shen, whose HG had played first, raised his hand. “A real ball?”

  Ty yanked the baseball out of his dried-out glove and threw it at Shen, who barely ducked. “Yeah, that. And stop your belly aching. In the old days I would’ve hit you in the nose.”

  The team tightened their ranks, butt to butt.

  “Run. Hit.” Puppy paused. “Catch. Throw. Like real baseball players.”

  Dimitri Izansky nervously raised his hand halfway, figuring that’d only get him hit in the leg and then he wouldn’t have to run. “Why?”

  “Excellent question, Dmitri.” Puppy clapped enthusiastically as if Izansky had discovered a way to make real cream-filled donuts. “Because we’re turning back the clocks.”

  Everyone looked at Ty and Mickey.

  “We want, in this good-bye, lights out and sleep well my darlings, to play the game the way it was once played.”

  Ty spit on the ground.

  “Commissioner Kenuda thinks it’s a great idea. We got permission to practice here because I know you’re not used to running. Or throwing. Catching. Hitting a real ball.”

  “Which is the hardest thing in sports,” Mickey added.

  That set off another round of anxious mutters.

  “But you can do it. Yes, Shannon?”

  The gangly bald woman retreated behind Shen, who panicked, thinking he was a target again. He ran into the dugout, falling down the steps.

  Puppy waved aside their concerns about the loud crying in the runway. “Shannon, you played real baseball, didn’t you?”

  “High school in Dallas, Texas.”

  “I died there,” Mick called out happily. “You know where I’m buried?”

  Shannon stepped behind Vernon. Actually all the remaining players hid behind the wide catcher.

  “You’re a pro, then.” Puppy craned his head to find Shannon, who was kneeling. “All of you are. You know the game. You’re committed. You’ve done this for years, watching the HGs. They were you. Their talents came from your talents. You were their inspirations. And look, the Falcons will go through the same thing.”

  “They’ll be real, too?” Jackson asked.

  “Of course. You’re playing each other.”

  That relaxed them a little and justified their wisdom in cowering behind Jackson.

  “But I play differently,” Cobb warned.

  Ty wisely interpreted Puppy’s blazing eyes and stepped back.

  “We’re getting real equipment. Not this crap.” Puppy took Mickey’s bat and tapped it on the ground. It cracked. He held it up as evidence. “Good stuff. Major league. Any more questions?”

  Vern’s followers nudged him. “What about the pay?”

  “You’re still getting paid.”

  “For only hitting. And not a real ball. We should get more.”

  Puppy sighed. “You know you can’t change an employment agreement, Vern.”

  “We can if the employer agrees,” Jackson said stubbornly.

  Puppy’s voice hardened. “I had to go to bat, so to speak, to get Fisher and Boccicelli to agree and then, then, I met with Third Cousin Kenuda.”

  They whispered in the huddle. Mickey and Ty each picked up part of the splintered bat.

  “We need more money,” Jackson insisted.

  Ty and Mickey flanked the group, tapping the bats on their open palms. The huddle got a lot tighter. Puppy just watched.

  “You got paid for doing this for how long?” Mickey asked.

  Vernon lifted his chin in fake defiance. “Nine years.”

  “Nine years?” Ty clucked his tongue. “Nine years pretending to be a baseball player.”

  Bat slap, bat slap, bat slap.

  “You stole money,” Mick accused.

  “I never stole anything.” Jackson trembled.

  Cobb edged closer. “You made fun of our game with your pathetic farce.”

  Bat slap, bat slap, bat slap.

  “Now we’re giving you a last chance and you want to steal more money?” Mickey yelled. “I’m gonna give you a whupping you never knew could be.”

  Mantle chased Vernon around the infield landing blows until the chubby catcher collapsed between third and home. Puppy interceded before there was much more blood. Jackson moaned.

  “What’s it going to be, Vern? You’re the team leader.” He gestured at the five remaining players holding hands and chanting Grandma’s Blessing:

  “May our love always be for love

  May we think of the Family as ourselves

  May we work hard and reward effort

  May we help those who cannot succeed.”

  “We’re afraid of looking like shit,” Jackson whispered.

  “So am I.” Puppy squeezed the catcher’s bruised arm; Vern groaned. “But I won’t let that happen.”

  Jackson was doubtful. “And we won’t pay for our own toilet paper anymore.”

  They shook hands on the deal; there had to be a lot of old napkins in the concession storage closet. Mickey and Ty began organizing fielding practice; they’d have to take turns sharing the glove.

  Puppy saw a silver head glisten by the entrance to Section 116. Damn, he berated himself, catching up with the A29 just outside the stadium.

  “Hey.” Puppy touched the robot’s shoulder. It turned with sullen metallic eyes. “I’m sorry. I should’ve given you a head’s up, but Fisher and Boccicelli got the letter of approval just late yesterday.”

  “Fifteen years,” the A29 said. “We started the same time. You didn’t know anything. I showed you around. Pointed out where to go in the stadium. What to avoid. How not to fall in the rocket holes. Kept you from making mistakes.”

  “Yes, you did,” he replied
softly.

  “Yes I did,” the A29’s voice rattled. “Was there ever a complaint about my work?”

  “It’s not about that.”

  “Oh, I know. I was being dry. This is because you need humans.”

  Puppy pursed his lips. “It’s our last season.”

  “And I can’t appreciate that? Who came up with the HGs running on the field together? All those acrobatic catches? Home runs bouncing off the brocades?

  “They were great.”

  “But not human.”

  “No.” Puppy shook his head. “They’re just representative of humans.”

  The robot’s eyes glittered angrily as it waved at the broken ballpark. “It’s the humans’ fault this happened, not ours.”

  “Believe me, I know. Can I help somehow? What if we reassigned you to another job?”

  “Take someone else’s position? Let’s collude and stab someone else in the back.” The A29 shook its head in disgust. “We don’t do that in the Little Extended Family. I thought you humans didn’t do that anymore. Oh wait, you just don’t do that to each other.”

  Three ‘bots—ticket taker, concessionaire and janitor—stepped out from behind a beam, standing so closely they seemed one.

  Puppy tried again. “If you ever need anything.”

  “Anything what?”

  He frowned. “I don’t understand…”

  The robot tilted its head. “You don’t even know my name. You don’t even know I have one. It’s Harold. That’s my name. Harold.”

  Harold joined its friends for a last collective glare before they remembered their place with rounded shoulders and lowered eyes, and shuffled up the subway steps.

  • • • •

  OUTSIDE THE ORPHANAGE, two Holy Warriors smoked cigarettes, leaning in casual menace against the silver van, machine guns slung over their shoulders. Azhar hurried past with a murmured greeting.

  Hussein resentfully tossed silverware into the large plastic container, clearing the communal dining room.

  “Why are the sex traders here?” Azhar jerked his hand at the window.

  “Selection time.” Hussein leered.

  “That was just last month.”

  “Appetites, appetites.” Hussein plucked an uneaten fig from a plate.

  “They took eight last time.”

  “Now they take more.” Hussein’s lecherous smile grew. “Is there one they should put aside for you?”

  Azhar raced up the stairs to the top floor, where he tapped on the square in the ceiling leading to the attic.

  “Clary?”

  Please be there. He rapped harder; voices passed in the hallway, heavy boots, dark laughs.

  “Sweetheart, are you there?”

  He forced open the door, blood dribbling under his gouged fingernails. A lonely doll with one eye stared back in the hiding place.

  Azhar ran down the steps and tore open the first door on the left.

  The barrel of a machine gun pressed against his temple.

  A Holy Warrior stepped in front, the gun never leaving Azhar’s head. Two girls around twelve were tied naked to their cots as a doctor in a white robe examined them. Neither girl was Clary. Thank you, Allah. For what? For giving away two other children? Shame flooded his face.

  The Warrior shoved Azhar into the hallway. He passed another Warrior with another pious greeting and tried the other bedroom. It was locked. Someone cried from within. A girl. A boy. He couldn’t tell. Azhar ran down to the first floor and tried two more doors. Both were locked.

  From outside came terrified cries. Azhar knelt by the window on the staircase, peering over the ledge.

  A boy, chained in the middle of a group of five naked youngsters wearing red lipstick, was kicked viciously in the side, dragging his manacled colleagues to the ground in a terrified tangle. A Warrior roughly lifted the boy up and set him back on his feet, straightening the line as they were tossed into the back of the van.

  “Careful. No bruising,” admonished the physician. “That is for the clients to do.”

  He laughed at his joke.

  Five girls in white dresses and painted faces, also chained together, were dragged across the driveway. Azhar leaned forward trying to recognize Clary beneath the lipstick; the girls all wore blonde wigs.

  “Have you lost someone?” Hazma asked.

  Azhar muttered, rising.

  “The kitchen needs mopping.”

  “Then why are you standing here?” Mustafa snapped.

  “Because that is your job. Not peeking at little girls.” Hazma tilted his head shrewdly. “Ah. It is the angry Spanish girl. With the big brown eyes.”

  If he called her name and she wasn’t there, she would be unsafe. They would take her out of spite. And if it were Clary down there, chained like a dog, what could he do? Tuck her under his arm from the mouth of the Mufti?

  “There are others.” Hazma clasped Mustafa’s shoulder. “She had no ass.”

  Azhar hit Hazma in the stomach just hard enough so he bent over, gasping.

  The sex trader’s van roared away, trailed by two Ford jeeps of Warriors, triumphantly firing their guns.

  15

  A very fat woman peered suspiciously at Puppy. There had always been fat women manning the DV community center info desk. As a kid, he used to think it was the same one, year after year, built downstairs in the back like a banned humanoid ‘bot.

  He held out his Lifecard again. “Work.”

  She rubbed her ear, considering him carefully, as did everyone in the center, quietly shooting pool, playing darts. She snapped her fingers, gaining full attention, and held up Puppy’s childish drawing. The sketch was passed around. She returned to her paperwork with a careless shrug.

  A tall teen with long earrings and black leggings wandered over. He looked Puppy up and down with wary distaste. He made the sign of a D and V with his fingers. Puppy tugged down his lower lip in acknowledgement.

  The kid narrowed his eyes, not entirely convinced but, of course, Puppy would be easy to find if he was lying, and pulled a pen out of Puppy’s pocket, scribbling down an address. He turned his palms up. The fat woman gloated as she ran Puppy’s Lifecard through the deduction machine to pay for a round of Aubrey’s Strawberry-Coated Choco Treats.

  The row of tiny brick houses snuggled protectively along East 155th Street as if too small to make it on their own. He knocked just once on a bland rust-colored house. There were no doorbells in DV homes; that was rude and noisy. If someone wanted you, they would wait for you to respond. If they wanted the visitor, they’d hear.

  About five minutes passed before Frecklie opened the door. His left eyebrow raised slightly, discharging caution down his face.

  The immaculate house gleamed from years of scrubbing and vacuuming, showing in the faint pine-scented antiseptic odor, scuffed dining room table and chairs, and thin brown rug curling up four square against the walls; a neat garden flowered above the window ledge. Frecklie waited until Puppy ate a piece of AG apple pie from the deep white porcelain dish on the kitchen counter, searching for signs of displeasure. He beamed when Puppy held out his plate for another piece. Guest satisfied. Until that happened, there could be no conversation. Puppy would have to plow his way through the entire fridge.

  Puppy accepted a cup of coffee and tapped his watch. Tomorrow. Puppy accentuated that with the forefinger snail gesture.

  Frecklie nodded, but didn’t answer. Maybe he’d been wrong about this kid. Puppy tapped his lips and touched his ear. Never heard from you.

  Frecklie turned up his palms and touched the top of his head. Waiting.

  Puppy shrugged. For?

  A very pretty slim Asian woman in her mid-thirties with thin black hair tied in a bun stood in the door with an unpleasant stare that seemed perfectly at home on her lean face. She put down the grocery bags and walked past Puppy as if he didn’t exist, jerking her thumb questioningly; Frecklie nodded, wincing. The teen opened his mouth and the woman cut him short with eyes
so narrow an ant would’ve choked on the lashes.

  No introductions until she was certain she wanted to meet him. She turned her back, fumbling with the buttons on her blue cloth overcoat.

  “Reg okay?” Puppy asked, his shorthand a little rusty; this one would chew his elbow off if he inflected wrong.

  The woman nodded grudgingly.

  “I have three jobs open at the stadium,” Puppy explained. “I figure taking tickets would be best.”

  Why. The woman half-raised her hands; the delicate fingers were spotted with cuts.

  “Because it’s handling money. You need to be smart.”

  Frecklie’s pleased smile at the trust quickly faded under his mother’s hard look. She wiggled a forefinger on both her hands.

  “The other jobs are cleaning up and running the concession stand. There’s no real food and there’s no way the stadium will ever look nice, so handling tickets at the door is the winner.”

  Beth waved good-bye.

  “Yes. It quit.”

  The woman lifted her left shoulder in a mockery of the ancient ‘bot tilt, fixed decades ago in the final models; prejudice had a long memory.

  “Yes, a ‘bot job.”

  Beth half squatted as if pooping.

  “It’s not a crap job.” Puppy grew annoyed. “What else does he have going?”

  Her veined hands tensed, pointing at her son.

  “Everyone in the DV’s a brain.” He smacked his temple; Frecklie repeated the gesture and the woman rose up slightly on her toes, bouncing like a boxer. “He needs more for the University application. Otherwise he’ll end up at Bronx College like I did. He’s too bright for that.”

  Puppy politely looked away so she and her son could exchange comments. Frecklie pleaded silently. She sighed softly and rubbed her finger and thumb together.

  “Minimum wage,” Puppy answered.

  Frecklie shook his head. “Ten percent above what the robot got.”

  Puppy helplessly flung his hands in the air; Frecklie laughed. The merriment didn’t last as the woman slowly turned toward Puppy, a faint ridge of impish freckles sliding off her nose, though that didn’t thaw the cold blue eyes.