The Roaches Have No King

by Daniel Evan Weiss

  Down the hall I dragged the shell. It was thicker and heavier than I would have ever guessed.

  Vi said, "My sweet Hec." There were little slaps on loose flesh. "You're not enough of an asshole to get Letterman's job. Stay at the post office. Maybe stamps will go up."

  "Oh, Vi, you Magdalene!"

  The TV snapped off. There was loud kissing, and soon springs began to squeal. I raced to get out of earshot.

  THESE WERE STRANGE times that the safest place in my world was the public third-floor hallway, whose fluorescent fixtures lit me like a rock star. I had the food for my colony, yet I couldn't be sure that it and I wouldn't be barbecued together when I offered it. If they did accept it, what good would it do? A few more days of feasting, then a return to lethargy and futility? I wouldn't have another chance. I had to make more of American Woman's earlier self than that.

  I propped her between two bricks in a joint missing its mortar. When James and the mop came by the next day, I had to squeeze in behind her. Even dead, she filled me with rage and fear, and also, I'm afraid, lust. But it was useful torture: I realized how American Woman could help me in the long run as well as the short. Now I had to wait and be patient.

  Each day I checked the mail laid on Ira's welcome mat. The letter didn't arrive until two weeks later. I dragged American Woman to the threshold. I got under her like an Indian under a bison skin, and carried her into the apartment.

  "Invader, invader!" Krazy Glue screamed. I was flattered. The few citizens on the floor fled for the baseboard. I walked up the hall.

  Several of the Vibrams were tugging on a piece of dust stuck in the door hinge. The sole survivors of a hearty family, they were a lucky find for me. I trapped them against the door. In my deepest voice I said, "Do as I say or you're antipasto."

  Goosh Vibram looked at me carefully and said, "OK." I was disappointed.

  "Up there, to the mantel." I had them go first. For me it was arduous to climb carrying the shell, and also to preserve my disguise. On top I said, breathlessly, "That white pawn. Push it up one square."

  Legs slipped and scraped against the marble until the pawn crossed the line. My citizens shouldn't have been so industrious in the service of the enemy.

  I set them free. Goosh said, "Why don't we move them all, Numbers? That would really mess up the board."

  We all laughed. I pushed American Woman off the mantel and picked her up when I reached the floor. After stashing her in the bedroom I returned to the living room.

  THE MOMENT Ruth walked into the apartment, Ira said, "I got a letter from Lev Dubalev. I was just about to open it."

  "That was quick," said Ruth. "It can't be more than four months this time."

  "That's what worries me." He lowered the chessboard to the coffee table. "I'm afraid I missed something."

  "Don't be so pessimistic. It might just be a thaw along the Trans-Siberian burro trail."

  He opened the letter. Ruth stood behind him, hand on his shoulder. He stared at the board and started mumbling to himself. I was lucky—Lev had played in the center of the board, as we had. "I can't believe it. See this? Queen to bishop six. That's his move. I can take it and he's beaten. Five moves, tops. It doesn't make any sense."

  "Then what's the problem?"

  "He doesn't make mistakes. It's a ploy."

  "Russians make mistakes too, Ira. That's why they have Club Gulag."

  "Not this Russian."

  Ruth examined the envelope. "Maybe the KGB steamed this open and changed his move, so you'd lose respect for Lev and stop harassing your congressman." She kissed his bald spot. "Why not see how it looks after dinner."

  "I'll be right with you." As soon as she left, he pulled a stack of similar letters from the drawer of the lamp table. They documented every play of this game, from the first move. Ira reset the pieces to starting position, opened the first envelope— he had written little numbers on the corners—and made the designated move.

  Ruth left him alone until it was time to eat. By then he had gotten through about half of the moves.

  "How was your day?" she said at the table.

  "OK."

  "Findley found some obscure clause in the original leasing agreement that might destroy the entire acquisition I've been working on. Everyone was running around like chickens without heads, including me." She was very animated.

  Staring into his dish Ira said, "I can't believe it."

  "All right, Ira." Ruth put down her knife and fork. "But eat a little more first."

  It took him another half-hour to reach the current move. "The pawn!"

  The Vibrams had made Lev's move into a pointless, graceless sacrifice: his actual position was sharp, dominating the area in front of Ira's king. Ira smiled, for the moment more relieved by Lev's competence than threatened by his own predicament. That would soon change.

  This was the crucial moment. Fault had to be assigned. Had he misread the letter? Had Rufus, or maybe Oliver, moved the piece?

  Ira rose from the table and walked to the kitchen. Ruth was drying dishes. "Well, is his goose cooked?" she said.

  "You never did take the game very seriously, did you?"

  "Of course I take it seriously. I know what it means to you. I just let you walk out on my best dinner of the week."

  "Then why did you move the piece?"

  "I don't even play the game. Why would I do that?"

  "That's what I'd like to know. It's the only thing in the whole apartment I ask you to leave alone."

  "Ira, you're being ridiculous. I never touch that board."

  Ira looked at her suspiciously. "Then how do you dust it?"

  "I don't. I just told you, I never touch that board."

  Ira strode back to the living room and drew a finger across the marble. He looked at his fingertip, then rubbed off the grime.

  A few minutes later he returned to the kitchen. "I didn't mean to accuse you. I guess I'm a little too caught up in the game."

  Ruth dismissed it lightly. Once again she refused to play her part by issuing a just reprimand. I would make her see reason tonight.

  Ira turned off the lights after a vapid evening. I moved a piece of cellophane, peeled from Rufus's cigar pack, from behind the sofa, where I had stored it, and put it into the middle of the hallway.

  Ruth was sitting in bed in one of her nicer nighties, a white lacy number that made the most of the line of her breasts. It was as if she thought he would be unsettled by his accusation, and require extra incentive.

  But Ira's routine was on my side. He always stood on the same spot beside the night table as he undid his watch, and this is where I pushed American Woman.

  Preceded by a wave of mouthwash, Ira entered the bedroom. Ruth said, "Forget about Lev. Come on in here and make a few moves."

  A moment later his large toe split American Woman down the center with a violent crack; if only it were her in the flesh. He grabbed his glasses. "There's a fucking waterbug in here!" He jumped onto the bed. I loved the term "waterbug." So demeaning. I wished I had remembered it down the hall. "Ruth, I have lived in this apartment for twelve years, and I have never seen a waterbug here before."

  "What is that supposed to mean?"

  He was trembling. "I am only stating a fact. This is not the first incident. Since you moved in, vermin have taken over the bedroom."

  Ruth returned to her side of the bed. I pulled American Woman back into the shadow of the bed leg.

  "And since life does not generate spontaneously..."

  "Yes?" Finally, after all these months, anger was rising in her voice.

  "You want me to spell it out? OK. Then we must assume that it has something to do with your hygiene."

  "My hygiene? How dare you! How about that slob who lived here before me? I'm still cleaning up after her. My hygiene!"

  "Don't you talk to me about her," yelled Ira. "There were no waterbugs while she was here."

  "No, she was so petite she probably brought crabs."

  Ira
said, "Let's not change the subject. Why don't you see your guest out of the bedroom."

  Ruth snorted. I had her now. "If that will spare me any more of your juvenile hysterics. Get out of the way." She slid across the bed and looked over the edge. "Where is it?"

  "Right under your nose."

  That covered a lot of area. "Well, it's gone."

  "I stepped right on it. It's got to be there." American Woman was safe; Ruth didn't care, and Ira wouldn't go down on all fours to look for a live waterbug. "I'm not going to sleep while some disease-carrying vermin walks all over me. I'm getting the spray."

  Teeth gritted, he made an impressive leap from the bed toward the door, then strode down the hall as if playing Giant Steps. His feet were angled perfectly so that on his fourth step my cellophane shot up between his toes. Ira's scream brought Ruth running heavily down the hall.

  He jumped onto the living room sofa. "That does it!" He snapped on the lamp and held up his sole for examination. Then he lowered it perplexed, even disappointed that it wasn't tattooed in red and brown.

  Ruth said, "What happened?"

  "I landed on that disgusting thing again."

  "Let me see."

  "Take my word for it."

  Ruth had already reverted. Soothingly she said, "Whatever you stepped on is a long way from here now. Let's go to bed. If you want, I'll call the exterminator tomorrow."

  "I'm sleeping here. I'm not up for any more adventure tonight." Ira thrust his head into the pillows and rolled on his side.

  She stroked his back. "Come to bed, baby. You'll catch your death of cold out here."

  After several minutes she left. I ran to the bathroom and took position under the toilet seat; I had to gauge my effect on her. As soon as the buttocks landed, her sphincter whistled a happy tune, and the bowl smelled like the bayou. She had learned her lesson.

  I heard a click, like the clasp of her pocketbook, then the crinkle of cellophane. She had found it in the hallway. I didn't care; its job was done.

  A quick rasp, and I smelled a match, a cigarette. Once I thought I had seen a pack of Virginia Slims in Ruth's pocketbook, but she had never smoked in the apartment. Why now? Why do anxious women smoke?

  This was the unpardonable offense. If Ira drove Ruth away, Elizabeth, or someone else—it didn't matter—would have been present for the shiva. Even if he didn't, Ruth would be forever tainted in his eyes, and every other woman would look better, especially those who already did look better.

  I wished I could see that cigarette glow, a little pyre for their romance. But her beefy thighs sealed the bowl.

  Then I had a disquieting thought. These thighs were trapping methane. Her cigarette was burning down and there was only one place to dispose of the butt—in here. The second that ember hit the gas we would blast straight through the ceiling. Ruth's head would lodge in the toilet trap and she'd get a chance to watch the Howards in 4B the way I watched her. And I...

  How could I hide, where could I run? The last exhalation. The cigarette was spent. Her thighs were parting. I bolted. Her hand lowered between her legs and she bowed her head. Daven, please! Give me time! But she released it.

  I was dead. I listened for harps but I heard only this: hisss. And it was over. I shamefacedly ran back under the seat.

  Ruth stood up and turned to look at the floating butt, turning slowly in the bowl. She seemed to be debating whether to leave it as a gesture of defiance. But she flushed, opened the window, and sat on the edge of the tub, sniffing.

  It was up to me. I raced out of the bathroom and up the hallway wall. I was breathless by the time I climbed into the housing of the smoke detector.

  This was a photoelectric-type detector. Ira refused to let the landlord install the cheaper ionization type—which I could not have manipulated—because its element would have subjected Ira to about as much radiation as he got from a hot knish.

  I knew this would be a tremendous shock. I tensed myself and walked across the little mirror, blocking the light beam and setting off the alarm. The shriek hit me like a leather sole. My intersegmental membranes felt like fault lines that would reduce me to a family of little grubs.

  I fell from the violently vibrating mirror into the bottom of the housing; I knew from Ira's weekly tests that the torture would last only a minute.

  By the time my hearing returned the assault was already in full force.

  "You do this often?"

  "This is the first time."

  "It's vile, disgusting. How could you do it in my house. Don't you know my father died of lung cancer?"

  "Stop already, Ira. I'm sorry."

  "You're sorry. Great. First the waterbugs, now this, and you're sorry."

  "Stop it! You're so unfair!" And then she began to cry.

  That's it, honey. You don't have to endure this abuse. Leave him. Just let him try to replace you.

  But as she hunched forward to hide her face, her fat gathered at her sides and pushed out beside her thighs. She was a victim of the look of the times and a prisoner of the tardiness of her generation. It was too late to go. Poor Ruth.

  My plan was to open the cabinet, and I was pleased with my progress. I didn't care why, or for whom, Ira spent the money, as long as he did. Ruth had her own problems. Now that I had made my point I expected her cooperation, and I would involve her no more than I had to. I was taking no pleasure in causing her pain.

  Elizabeth Gets Cold

  IT WAS ONCE again time to squeeze the bellows of discontent into the Wainscotts' hearth. I could pick out their apartment with my eyes plucked out. Their mark was blandness—the absence of spice, the soft odors of boiling and buttering, of frozen meals and canned goods. Undisturbed clothing, furniture, and carpets grew colonies of pallid WASP microorganisms. The small resident Blattella colony, chronic sufferers of spiraclitis, never welcomed visitors or word of the outside, where they were certain life was better.

  If undertaken in Ira's apartment, this expedition would have led me deep into the closet, through piles of neatly stacked boxes. It could have taken days. But here in the Wainscotts' apartment my objective sat clearly visible and easily accessible, atop a mesa of debris on the desk.

  I climbed a leg to the desktop. Dust lay thick and bitter. I scaled a pile of yellowing, unopened newspapers to the "Bernsteins'" box, which Ruth and Ira had given Elizabeth on her birthday weeks earlier.

  I slid into the box. The scarf was taupe, with the folksy-artsy kind of design Ruth loved. The pattern ran down the center, leaving plain borders on both sides. These were mine.

  I descended to the desk drawer. Behind the pointless pencils and topless pens was the rubber cement jar, with its cap glued on permanently askew. Lumpy lines of dried glue ran down the outside. I pulled loose the top end of one of these lines, where it was thinnest, and walked down the side of the jar, peeling the cement as I went. Finally it pulled free and fell to the drawer bottom, coiling like a watch spring.

  Though the outside was very tough, the underside of the glue was still somewhat moist and malleable. I tore off six small chunks and packed one around each of my feet.

  I did three sets of jumping jacks—which I'd learned from Elizabeth—twenty repetitions each. During the first I clapped my forelegs together over my head, while the back four jumped in and out. In the second set the midlegs clapped, and in the final set the rear legs clapped, while the other legs did the jumping. At the end I was an exhausted aerobic roach wearing rubber cement flippers. I felt ridiculous; I could barely walk. In the spell of the vapors from the glue I thought about leaving terra firma to return to my roots in the sea, as the whale had. But the idea passed quickly—I could never risk becoming a developmental blunder so pathetic that humans would beg for it on bumper stickers.

  I tripped over to a red pen and fell on my side in front of it. I padded my flippers over the tip as if I were walking a treadmill. The pen did not write first time or any time. I shimmied up and injected my potent piss into the tip beside the bal
l. Now the pen yielded like an oasis spring. I saturated all six flippers and walked off dripping red, as if onto the set of a horror movie.

  I quickly returned to the box and stomped around one of the borders of the scarf, leaving clashing red cuneiform that even charitable Elizabeth would be pressed to think of as folk art. When my steps faded I pulled off the flippers and left them in the box. I wished Oliver and Elizabeth were keen-sighted enough to find them; I would have loved to hear them argue about what they were.

  I WALKED ACROSS the wall to the thermostat. I could slip under the clear plastic face and pull over the setting needle, but Oliver would have seen it and easily corrected it. Instead I worked my way into the back of the thermostat, to the bimetallic strip that moved the room- temperature needle. The small metal pieces that connected the two were so fragile that I kicked them apart. The room temperature needle would read just what it did now, no matter what the actual room temperature was; the radiators would not come on. Wind blew through the myriad cracks in the aging window frames, and the apartment cooled fast.

  Elizabeth came home and immediately started cooking, which buffered her from the cold; Oliver's martini protected him. I was freezing.

  It wasn't until after dinner, when the stove cooled, that Elizabeth looked at the thermostat. "What's wrong with this thing?" she said, tapping the plastic. Glowing from his third drink, and swaddled in blubber, Oliver would not move. Elizabeth put on a heavy sweater and hugged herself.

  Finally she said, "Ollie, I don't think it's working."

  With a groan he rose from his chair, tipping a wave of his fourth martini onto his pants. He looked at the thermostat. "It's seventy-two degrees in here. What do you want, a sauna?" He rapped it so hard that the cover flew off.

  Oliver returned to his reading. Elizabeth sat beside him, feet curled under her tight little buttocks, rather than his capacious ones. Hands in armpits, she looked vacantly around the room. Finally she saw it.