Expiration Date

by Duane Swierczynski

  “Where do they keep him locked up?”

  “No,” Dean said. “Can’t tell you that. Too dangerous. You don’t want anything to do with Billy Derace. They keep that menace on sedatives twenty-four/seven. Weird shit happens when he wakes up.”

  “Come on, Dean. For old time’s sake.”

  “You trying to con an old con? Nothing doing.”

  But Dean’s eyes gave it away anyway. They flicked over to his right. Toward that 1950s building I’d spotted. The Papiro Center.

  Dean tried cover it up by changing the topic.

  “So how’s your sister?”

  “I don’t have a sister. I’m an only child.”

  “Sure you do—the two of you were together on the Moshulu, when you got lost at the Bicentennial. You know, the little blond-haired girl eating the popcorn with you.”

  That stopped me cold. Suddenly I knew who he was talking about, but it wasn’t my sister. It had been my mom’s youngest sister, who was only nine months older than me.

  We had been down at Penn’s Landing because my father had been hired to play with a band called The Shuttlebums in front of Winston’s Restaurant. And across a pedestrian bridge was a huge clipper ship, since converted to a restaurant, called the Moshulu. During the summer of 1976 my dad was working maintenance on that boat.

  Mid-gig, I somehow conned my aunt, who was all of five years old, into walking over the bridge and checking out the boat. My parents went insane with worry, but luckily we were picked up by an off-duty cop, who thought it was a little suspicious that two little kids sat themselves down at a small table meant for two—meaning, no room for parents.

  “You’re the guy who found us?” I asked. “How is that possible? How do you even recognize me?”

  “It’s not your face,” he said. “It’s your soul.”

  Okay then. I thanked him and then excused myself. Leave it to me to get lost as a kid, only to be found by a raving lunatic who could see other people’s souls.

  The lights were mostly out in the Papiro Center. The back doors were locked. The front door was locked and controlled by a keypad. Why did I think it would be open? This was a mental hospital.

  I stood there, looking up at the building. I’d already trespassed; I’d feel like a moron just leaving without trying something.

  Screw it.

  I shouted.

  “BILLY DERACE!”

  This would either work right away, or not. If I saw a light on the ground floor, I’d bolt.

  “BILLY! DERACE!”

  Come on you nutcase. Get up out of bed, come to your window, look down. I’ll know in a second if you recognize me. Which of these windows is yours?

  Then, on the left side—movement. No light, just a shadow on shadows. Dark gray on black. A male figure? It was too hard to see.

  Behind me I heard a cough. My head whipped around; nobody. I looked back up at the window.

  Nothing.

  Just the rain, smacking into the grass, the blacktop path leading back to the main building.

  Suddenly security lights flickered to life all around me. Crap. The main office knew I was here. I ran back the way I came, figuring that I could slow down my hurried jog at the last minute and just stroll on out of there, clipboard in hand.

  But the door I’d used to get out was locked, trapping me outside.

  Trapping me on the grounds of a three-hundred-year-old insane asylum.

  Okay, so I freaked out a little. I ran in the opposite direction, toward the fence near Adams Avenue, where we’d parked. At the very least, I thought I could yell to Meghan and let her know what happened before they tackled me to the wet grass and wrestled me into a straitjacket. Meghan’s dad was a powerful lawyer. I’m sure he could get me out of this place. Eventually.

  There were voices behind me. I ran faster. You never realize how much you depend on your arms for balance until you lose feeling in one of them. I felt like I was going to tip over at any minute. Which would make it much easier to wrestle me into a straitjacket.

  As I approached the gate, I saw that Meghan was out of the car, waiting for me. Her hair was dripping wet, and she urged me forward with her hands.

  “Hurry!”

  I skidded to a halt and almost slammed into the gate.

  “They’ve got me surrounded. Look, go call your dad and tell him you have a dumbass for a friend who thought it would be funny if he—”

  “Give me your foot.”

  I looked down. Meghan was reaching through the bars, fingers intertwined, making a little step for me.

  “No way. I’m too heavy. And I’ve only got one functioning arm.”

  “Will you just give me your foot? I’ll push you over the fence.”

  I didn’t have the chance to have a talk with my father about women; he died before I’d reached puberty. But even I knew that when a beautiful woman is standing in the pouring rain, offering to help lift you over the black metal fence outside an insane asylum, you take her up on the offer.

  I stepped into Meghan’s hands, then reached up for the top of the fence. I could tell immediately that she’d grossly underestimated my weight. Her hands felt like they were attached to rubber cables, ready to snap at any moment. I wanted to stop and apologize—sorry I’m so heavy, Meghan. It’s all of the beer I’ve been drinking. But there wasn’t time. Meghan summoned some kind of inner Incredible Hulk–style gamma ray strength and pulled her arms up, lifting me to where I could just grab the top of the gate with the three good fingers on my left hand.

  I held on as tightly as I could, then swung my left foot up to the top of the fence. The rubber soles of my shoes clung to the metal for a fraction of a second, and it was enough time for Meghan to give me another superhuman push, and for me to pull myself up and over.

  I was over the fence.

  And then I was falling.

  The good news was that I’d managed to not land on top of Meghan—she’d scurried out of the way the moment my foot left her hands. But as I landed, my right foot twisted. I had a fleeting moment of wow, I actually managed to land on my feet before I completely went down.

  Meghan helped me up, asked if I could put any weight on it. I tried. I told her no. She told me to stop being a pansy, and then helped me limp back to her passenger seat. The water ran down through my hair and onto my face. I eased back into the seat, used my good hand to pull my bad leg into the car, then we took off, rocketing down Adams Avenue.

  “Thank God you were by that fence.”

  I looked over at Meghan. Her hands were gripping the steering wheel tightly, and her arms were shaking. Probably from the exertion, the worry, the adrenaline.

  She looked at me.

  “I presume that was you, shouting the name ‘Billy Derace’?”

  “The doors were locked. What else could I do?”

  She didn’t respond. By the time we’d cleared about three blocks, there were no sirens, no pursing vehicles, no spotlights. We’d gotten away clean.

  Which is what probably emboldened me to suggest something really stupid.

  “Slow down and go back around.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Go back and park on the other side of the grounds. I’ve got an idea.”

  “You can barely walk.”

  “I don’t plan on walking.”

  I reached into my overcoat pocket and pulled out a single white pill. I’d tucked one in there, just in case.

  Meghan got it right away—there are no dull forks in her silverware drawer. Still, she thought it was a really stupid idea.

  “What good is it for you to sneak into that place back in 1972? Billy Derace’s only twelve years old, and he’s living at home. He’s not going to be placed here until years later.”

  “The Papiro Center is the place listed on DeMeo’s letterhead. His office might be on Frankford Avenue, but he works out of this building, too. Maybe we couldn’t find any notes about his experiments because he kept them all here.”
/>   “So you’re just going to pass out on the front seat on my car. What am I supposed to say to the cops when they pull over to check out what I’m doing here? And you know they’re going to pull over and check it out.”

  “Keep driving, then. Just don’t go too far.”

  We used her car key to cut the pill in half. I figured that dosage should give me enough time to slip through the gates, through the front door and into that building.

  At first I wasn’t even sure it worked—the place looked exactly the same now as it did back in 1972. This was a well-maintained loony bin, and always had been. But then I realized I was sitting in the middle of the street on a cold dark night, and the cars around me were all vintage models. Meghan’s Prius was nowhere to be seen.

  I slipped right through the asylum gates—which weren’t locked now. Guess security wasn’t a big concern back in 1972.

  There were sodium lights dotting the grounds, casting wide ovals of yellow light on the lawn. I stuck to the dark patches.

  When I reached the front door I grit my teeth and closed my eyes and just went for it.

  Then I was inside.

  Past the reception area, the doctors’ offices and up a narrow row of concrete stairs and into the main quarters…

  Which were empty.

  Nothing. Just gurneys, completely stripped of everything except their thin mattresses.

  Wasn’t this where the experiments were supposed to be happening right about now? Did I miss them? Did I have the wrong building, after all?

  I spent time back downstairs in the offices, rooting through filing cabinets, but they were empty, too.

  By the time I thought to slip across the grounds and try another building, I could feel the dizziness starting again, and my grip on everything slipping away.

  I woke up groggy. Throbbing. Taste of sour metal in my mouth. Sweat all over my face, and nostrils full of a gamey scent that I quickly realized was me.

  Meghan was next to me, driving.

  “Did you find anything?”

  “No.”

  I insisted on parking at the hospital garage again, even though it meant a five-block walk for me on a bad ankle. Climbing up to the third floor wasn’t fun either. Meghan tried to hide it, but she couldn’t keep the smile off her face as we slowly made our way up.

  “I still can’t believe you just shouted his name.”

  “Fine. Next time we break into a mental hospital, you go over the fence.”

  And then we reached my apartment door.

  But it was already open.

  We could see the torn-up wood where the burglar had used the crowbar. Probably took him less than five seconds—jam the steel into the wedge between door and frame, pull once, maybe twice, and presto, you’re breaking and entering.

  We immediately tried to figure out what was missing, but the place was so cluttered with boxes, it was difficult. I had no TV to steal, no fancy DVD players or jewelry.

  Meghan walked over to the desk.

  “Your laptop’s still here.”

  “It’s too ancient to pawn.”

  My father’s albums were still stacked up against the Technics turntable, which was also a relief. The peanut butter and apples were still on the kitchenette counter. My books were still stacked up on the cherrywood desk.

  “Wow. I think someone busted into your place, saw that you had jack shit, then turned around and left.”

  “I’m glad you think this is funny.”

  “I don’t. Not really.”

  “I don’t know whether I should be relieved or depressed.”

  I limped into the bathroom to wash my face, then used a hand towel to dry my hair a little, which was dripping from the storm. Since the medicine cabinet mirror was still smashed, I had no idea how I looked. When my hair’s wet a certain way, you can see the top of my head where I’m starting to go bald. I usually try to comb it to cover it up. Now I knew why men preferred fedoras back in the day.

  Hanging the towel up I could feel my ankle really starting to throb. An aspirin would probably help, but then I remembered that I didn’t have any real aspirin; just the transport-you-back-in-time variety. Tylenol A.D. Take two and call me thirty years ago.

  Wait.

  “Meghan!”

  “What?”

  “Did you move the bottle of pills?”

  She appeared in the doorway.

  “The pills?”

  “Yes. The pills.”

  I could see the brown ring of rust where the Tylenol bottle used to sit, but the bottle itself was gone.

  That was the only thing the burglar had taken, it seemed.

  But how did this guy know about the pills? Why had he taken them now?

  “You should go. I’ll walk you to your car.”

  “And leave you wet, limping and burglarized? What kind of a friend would I be?”

  She guided me to the houndstooth couch. We sat there listening to the rain snick-snack against the front windows. The El rumbled into its station, which sounded like thunder at first.

  “I’m going to stay here tonight.”

  “There’s no lock on the door. You can stay here. Anybody can stay here, help themselves to anything in the apartment. What does it matter?”

  Her finger touched my chin, turned my face.

  “Nobody else is welcome.”

  She kissed me.

  We pushed the door shut to make sure it would at least stay closed, if not locked. We pulled out the houndstooth couch, made up the bed. We crawled in together and held each other, kissed each other, listened to the rain and the rumble of the El and kissed each other some more. We kissed until we faded into each other and it was hard to tell where I stopped and where she began and vice versa.

  It was everything I’d wanted, but assumed I would never get.

  At some point we fell asleep and then I woke up and gently touched the side of her face, just to feel her skin beneath my three good fingertips.

  And then a harsh voice said:

  “Hello, Mickey.”

  I could see nothing in the room. Just the streetlights, filtered through the front windows. Who was speaking?

  Then, by my right ear: “Sorry I didn’t come to the window. But I was sleeping. They make me sleep so much. But I woke up when I heard your voice. I’ve been waiting years to hear your voice.”

  I jolted and sat up in bed, looked around. And then I felt hands grab the sides of my head and pull me out of bed.

  I’ll admit it: I screamed.

  Meghan woke up a nanosecond later, pushing herself up from the mattress. But something pushed her back down, violently. The springs of the couch strained beneath her.

  “Stay out of this. This is family business, whore.”

  Then I saw him. He was a complete stranger, but I recognized the voice. It was older. It had deepened. But it was still the same voice.

  Billy Allen Derace.

  “Can you see me, Mickey?”

  Yeah, I could see him.

  But not quickly enough.

  His fist smashed into my face quickly followed by his knee to my balls, which I swear came heaving out of nowhere. The lower half of my body exploded in white hot pain. My legs trembled for a second before giving out on me, and my knees slammed into the hardwood floor. Gravity wasn’t working like it should. My internal compass was off—way, way off.

  I crawled forward a few feet, the tips of my three good fingers clutching at the uneven spaces between the floorboards. My lip was throbbing and my balls felt like they were the size of cantaloupes. I crawled on a single elbow and both knees toward the bathroom. Anywhere.

  Derace laughed at me. Walked toward me, ready to drag me back into the living room for more fun and games.

  “Where you going, Mickey?”

  Away from you.

  “Would you rather me spend time with your girlfriend here? I like playing with the girls. Wig wam bam, gonna make you understand…”

  Meghan screamed. I turned to see her
lash out at the air. Her eyes popped open as something grabbed her throat. No.

  “STAY AWAY FROM HER!”

  I spun myself around and crawled back toward the couch.

  “Wig wam bam, gonna getchoo if I can…”

  Meghan cried out again but her voice was a weak rasp.

  “But I think I’ll save her for later. After I deal with you.”

  Something hard slammed into the side of my head. I think by chance I’d moved at the right moment, otherwise I would have been kicked in the face. I saw a white flash and collapsed to the ground, rolled over onto my back. I reached out with my three good fingers and tried to find the bathroom doorway so I could pull myself up.

  Fingers tore at the back of my neck, then found the back of my head. There was a tug at the back of my waist…and then I was vertical again.

  And then I was hurtling into the cherrywood desk. My face slammed against the back panel. My useless hand fumbled for the edge of the desk to anchor myself, but Derace was right behind me.

  The next thing I knew the side of my face and my dead right shoulder slammed against the desk again, tilting onto two legs. Drawers opened, files gushed out.

  Then he lifted me up and spun me around.

  There was Billy Allen Derace. Nearly fifty years old. Wild red hair shaved down to nothing. Eyes sallow. Teary. Breath hot and stinking. I could feel him. I could smell him. He was standing behind me. This was no hallucination.

  “Such a handsome face. That’s not how I remember you. You had some scars. Nasty red-looking things. Maybe I’m supposed to give them to you.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I was young when I killed your father. I was just starting out with the pills, figuring it all out. I thought the old man up here had some money I could steal, buy my own pills. But then I saw he had his own stash. And it was goooooooood shit he had. Shit nobody else had. Shit that made me a superhero.”

  “You asshole—you killed my father.”

  “I was confused back then, you see. I thought he was you. I killed him because I thought he was you.”