Personal Effects

by J. C. Hutchins

  I descended Brinkvale’s front steps, cringing slightly at the chilly air. Malcolm waited for me at the bottom.

  “Zach T,” the janitor said, and gave a little salute. He held a rake in his other gloved hand; Primoris had decided to begin its annual shedding during the past hour, it seemed.

  “Two bottles, Grey Goose,” I said. “I don’t know when I’ll get ’em to you, but you’ll get ’em. I’ve been suspended, maybe fired. But I’m good for it. Promise.”

  Malcolm didn’t smile. His voice was serious, conspiratorial.

  “That’s not all you’re giving me, is it”

  I nodded, knowing what he meant.

  “Didn’t forget about that, either,” I said. “Tell me. What’s going to happen to his effects”

  Malcolm shrugged. The large ring of Brinkvale keys jingled on his hip.

  “Nothing, Zach T. Absolutely nothing. The Sub might as well be the deep blue sea. Toss something in, it sinks to the bottom, never seen again. The Brink’s basement is where paperwork goes to die.”

  “Sounds like that warehouse at the end of that Indiana Jones movie,” I said. “The one where they put the Ark of the Covenant. I wish I could see it.”

  Malcolm shuddered; I couldn’t tell if it was the wind, or something else.

  “It ain’t,” he said. “You don’t.”

  “The folder’s locked in my desk,” I told him. “Make sure it sinks.”

  I extended my other hand. The janitor shook it.

  “It was a pleasure working with you,” I said.

  “Likewise. I always liked you, Zach T. You kept things … interesting … around here.”

  He eyed me for a moment and then smiled.

  “Looks like you learned to pitch after all, huh, kid”

  I grinned back, gave a silent salute, and walked in silence to the parking lot.

  Dad was waiting for me there.

  He stood by Rachael’s red Saturn, hands buried in his overcoat pockets, the same undertaker pose he’d had in the 67th Precinct’s parking lot. The wind gusted around him, whipped and tugged at his collar, as if unhappy with his presence here. I could sympathize.

  “Son,” he said.

  I glanced around, searching for a police cruiser. There wasn’t one. An official-looking black Lincoln was parked nearby; presumably a D.A. office loaner, since my father’s BMW was most certainly in a repair shop. The car was empty. My father had made the trek here alone.

  “He’s gone,” I said.

  “Gone,” Dad affirmed. “Noon sharp. I believe you were in the infirmary. I’m … I’m sorry you didn’t see him off.”

  I raised my chin, and looked into his eyes.

  “I said all I needed to say to him.”

  “Why, Zachary”

  My father’s expression had gone from impassive slate to pained curiosity. I waited for more.

  “Why? Why didn’t you drop it? Why did you—there’s no other word for it—why did you defy me? Why, especially now, at the end, when you see that I was right? When you see I wanted to protect you? I … I don’t … ″

  I watched him as his voice trailed off, remembering the moment back in the precinct lot when he’d lost control—when he’d screamed his confession to me, his primal snarl, his reason for pursuing the blind man like a junkyard dog. It was then that I’d finally seen my father as a mortal, capable of frailty. The tumblers had fallen then, and he had, too. It had been a painful, necessary thing. It was evolution.

  I couldn’t tell him that, and I wouldn’t expect Dad to understand it. I’d have to learn to live with it.

  “I guess you were right,” I said. “I’m like Mom. Caring to a fault. Curious, too. Rushing in, asking questions only after it’s all done. It’s like you said. I needed history.”

  Dad smiled slightly. It was confident again.

  “Context,” he said.

  I suppressed many things at that moment: The urge to tell him how disappointed I was in him; how I knew the things he’d done two decades ago … the sins against his brother and sons; how I loathed-yet-still-loved him; how I would silently continue to defy him and visit the imprisoned man who was proud of me, the father-f igure I barely remembered, the buried man who lived on.

  “Taylor Family Loyalty,” I whispered. I glanced from the horizon back to my father. “What’s going to happen to Grace”

  His smile faded. His blue eyes went ice-cold, full-bore D.A.

  “The confession speeds up everything,” he replied. “If he pleads no contest—and there’s no reason to think that he won’t—the trial will be short. I won’t push for the death penalty. The confession, his regret for the murders and this ‘conflict of interest’ business between us would make that … strategically difficult.”

  I ground my teeth. I wanted to grab his fluttering coat collar and shake a sliver of compassion into his obsessed brain. Fucking strategy. I could bombard him with so much goddamned “history” and “context” right now his head would spin off his shoulders.

  I closed my eyes and sucked in a deep lungful of air. Dad would deliver that which Drake craved. The price his soul demanded. Justice.

  I exhaled, and opened my eyes.

  “I’m sorry she was killed, Dad. I’m sorry you lost her.”

  My father blinked. He turned his face away.

  “She was beautiful and brilliant,” he whispered. “I think … No. I know you would’ve liked her.”

  I thought of last night’s madness in my Alphabet City apartment, and at Daniel Drake’s house—and how that “very large world” above ours had spilled over, if only for a few moments, into this one. I didn’t want to know why Drake’s cell phone rang when it had. I didn’t want to know if it was the corroded battery or something else. I knew only the name on its screen, and that it had been angelic, and that it was now buried with the past, where it belonged.

  “I think you’re right,” I said.

  I hugged him and loved him the best I could.

  30

  “Katabatic!”

  I grinned at my brother’s exclamation as I placed the last of our spoons into the silverware drawer. He and Rachael were performing some technical tomfoolery in the living room; something involving Lucas’ laptop and her monstrous widescreen television. True to my road-trek promise to Rachael, I’d cooked dinner and washed the dishes.

  When Luc had learned of this penance, he’d cackled and christened me “The Dish Slut.” Har-dee-frickin’-har.

  At least Lucas had asked no questions about my bashed-and-patched body earlier this evening. My brisk “Greatest Hits” recounting of last night and this morning—including the standoff with Daniel Drake, Dad at The Brink and my suspension, but excluding details about nearly everything else—had satisfied him. Much like his uncanny ability to know when it was time to depart a social setting, Lucas also knew when it was best to skip the fine print.

  He had asked about Daniel Drake’s condition; I think he felt for the fallen son, just as I did. I’d called Haverstraw’s hospital on my way home from The Brink. Daniel was in stable condition.

  I leaned into the living room and silently watched my tribe as they giggled at the TV, admiring their creativity and resourcefulness—and loving the themness of them.

  Lucas had rigged the laptop to the tiny parkour cameras he’d shown me at Well7 on the night of Gram’s memorial service. With Rachael’s computer sorcery, the Toughbook now streamed wireless video to the television. The jittery footage was separated into four boxes on the screen, one for each of Lucas’ feet and hands. It was like the title sequence from “The Brady Bunch” … if a spastic dog had filmed it.

  “Dig it, Dish Slut,” Lucas said, pointing at the screen. The contents of one sub-screen jerked, now recording its own on-screen footage. The image was a whirling visual feedback loop, video filming video filming video.

  “Awesome,” I said, and sat beside Rachael on the couch. She _ leaned her head against my shoulder. I held her hand. Bliss hopped into my
lap and purred. Dali looked on from the well-worn “Zach chair” in the corner.

  “How long must I endure this crass moniker?” I asked my brother.

  “A whole month,” he snickered. He gave Rachael a wink. “That’s the deal, right, Hochcrot? Z’s doing ’em for a dirty thirty. You’re Palmolive’s bitch, bro.”

  “He’s getting off easy, at that,” Rachael said.

  I nodded, squeezing her hand. Oh, how I knew that was true. Oh, how I loved this woman and her patience—and her acceptance, if not understanding, of how I was wired.

  Lucas bounced in place before us; the footage from his toys stuttered and pixelated, trying desperately to keep up. Dali bolted from the room.

  “Ahem. Your resident wunderkind has a new creative vision,” he announced, beaming. “I’m using my ParkourCams as monster POV footage for … a horror thriller.”

  He raised his hands, made them into playful claws and growled.

  “Snarl,” Rachael deadpanned.

  “Is this movie about a black figure that stalks prey who’ve been ‘marked for death’ by a blind man?” I asked.

  Lucas nodded furiously. His curly hair rocked like a shabby shrub in a hurricane.

  “New genre: parkhourror. Title: Obsidian Vengeance. ‘Based on a true—’”

  “I’d work on it,” I said. “A lot.”

  The three of us laughed. For the first time in days, I felt safe. Warm.

  Latin music blared from my brother’s pocket. Shakira. The chica. Lucas raised his eyebrows appreciatively and fished the cell phone from his baggy pants.

  “Heh, nine o’clock sharp,” he said, placing the phone to his ear. The TV behind him blurred brown, an IMAX close-up of his shaggy hair. I smirked. I didn’t think the technology was quite “there” yet.

  He spoke into the phone for a moment, hung up, and began disconnecting the cameras from his limbs. The gear was soon stowed—and the television screen, thankfully, was now black.

  “Mustn’t keep the brilliant, exotic young lady waiting,” he said. “We’re catching a new sci-fi movie tonight.”

  “Ahh, young love,” Rachael cooed. She turned to me. “When was the last time you took me to a late-night flick?”

  I nodded to the bookshelf near her home theater system. It brimmed with our video collection.

  “Up for some James Bond?” I asked.

  Now she squeezed my hand.

  “Kiss kiss, bang bang comes later,” she said. “After we fight.”

  Lucas made a sour expression as he walked to the door.

  “Ick. Glad I won’t be around for the make-up. You guys have a welcome up night, dig?”

  “Dug,” Rachael and I said simultaneously.

  He grinned and stepped into the hallway.

  “’Dore you,” he said.

  I grinned. “’Dore you back, bro.”

  “Martini shot, everybody.”

  The door latched shut and he bounded down the stairs, rolling thunder, just as he had when we were kids.

  I turned to my woman—my anchor, my sail, the second half of my heartbeat. I gazed into her eyes.

  “Are we going to fight now?” I asked. I wasn’t playful. I was worried.

  “Do you want to fight?” she replied.

  “No.”

  “Doghouse rain check, then.” She pulled off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. “Tired.”

  “Me too.”

  “Do you really think Peterson is going to fire you?” she asked. “I mean, I can pull in more shifts, more writing gigs if we need the money. See about more sponsorship for PixelVixen707. We’ll be okay for a month or so, but … Z, you can’t be out of a job for long.”

  I nodded, somber. Rachael and I allowed ourselves many luxuries: dinner out, damned good beer, feeding our creative needs for more art supplies and techno-gizmos. But this life didn’t come cheap.

  “I know, babe. And I don’t know. The old man knows a lot. A helluva lot, stuff from well beyond The Brink. I don’t know how he got it all. Guess he’s not as daffy—or removed—as we Morlocks think he is.”

  I pulled her close, sighing. Bliss hopped from my lap.

  “Listen to me. ‘We Morlocks.’ Let me put it this way: I’d fire me.”

  “Not good,” she whispered. “But you saved Drake.”

  “In a way,” I agreed, and this was true. I kissed her head. I inhaled her scent and closed my eyes, wanting nothing more than more, more of this, for as long as I could. “He needed the blood washed from his hands. The blood of a Russian and his family. Eye for eye, punishment, remorse. Paid in full. I hope.”

  The silence between us now was both comforting and anxious. His past had been put to rest. My future was in tatters. Had it been worth it?

  “Yes,” Rachael whispered, as if reading my thoughts. “I hope so, too.”

  We held each other, silent again, surrounded by our glowing chili pepper halo.

  “Did you see it?” she asked. “Did you really see it?”

  The Dark Man. Chernobog.

  “I’ll tell you what the therapist saw,” I said. “Paranoia. Superstition saturation. My fear of the dark, cranked up past ten. But if you want to know what Z saw … and felt … yeah. It was as real as it gets.”

  “Mmm.”

  Her breathing became softer, as did mine. Sleep, finally. Sleep.

  Bzzzzzz.

  We perked up, confused.

  My cell phone vibrated against our steamer trunk table again, then stopped. Skeleton song chimed from its speaker.

  I pulled away from her, already missing her warmth, picking up the phone. A text message, from …

  “Dr. Peterson?” I said.

  We leaned against each other, shoulders touching, as I slid open the phone’s tiny keyboard. The message blinked to life on the LCD screen.

  LEAVE OF ABSENCE CANCELED. NIGHT SHIFT R.N. REPORTS ERRATIC BEHAVIOR IN YOUR PATIENT, JAMES VAN ZANDT. REPORT TO BRINK, TOMORROW AM. IT WOULD BE PRUDENT …

  There was more to the message. I clicked the keypad’s “down” arrow.

  … TO BRUSH UP ON YOUR MONOPOLY, it read.

  “Jimmy Van Zandt,” I said. I turned to her, grinning. “They call him ‘Park Place.’ Autistic, impenetrable, obsessed with that board game.”

  She smiled back, and leaned in. We kissed.

  “So, ‘James Bond Will Return,’” she said, quoting the line at the end of nearly every 007 film. “What’s this adventure going to be called, hottie artist?”

  I chuckled. “I’ll tell you in the morning, geek goddess,” I said, and we kissed again, more passionately this time.

  We stumbled through our apartment, a tangle of rushing hands and half-kisses, far too tired for lovemaking, too far in love to care. The cats scattered, leaving us to the bedroom and our impatient romance. We needed this, this closeness, this being.

  The bed was cold, but not for long, and when it came time to dim the bedside “Zach light,” I twisted its knob further and further, until I could barely see her exquisite face.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, gazing down at me.

  “I’m learning to live a little dangerously,” I said. “I’m okay. I’m … I’m okay.”

  And for now, this was also true.

  The light clicked off. We glowed bright, in the darkness.

  Copyright © 2009 by Smith & Tinker, Inc. All rights reserved. Manufactured in China. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  www.stmartins.com

  eISBN 9781429989367

  First eBook Edition : April 2011

  First Edition: June 2009

 

 

 
-ms-filter: grayscale(100%); filter: grayscale(100%); " class="sharethis-inline-share-buttons">share