Against Nature

by Casey Barrett

  I went back inside, got in the shower. Turned on a blast of cold for a shot of clarity. Opened the curtain and regarded my wet, naked body in the mirror. Somehow my genetics had helped it beat back time and sustained abuse. But I knew it wouldn’t be long before the entire structure started to crumble. I needed to get back in the pool on a regular basis, needed to return to the dojo and stay on top of the aikido. I made the usual promises to my reflection, then dried off, dressed, and forgot about them.

  I looked up BioVida on my phone. Its offices were less than a mile away, according to Google Maps, at the corner of Ponce De Leon and Alcazar. Without any sort of plan I left the hotel and followed the blue dot on the app in that direction.

  The heat hovered over the sidewalk like a curse. Sweat seeped from my forehead. The sky was baby blue with wisps of clouds and no wind. There were few pedestrians, and those I saw moved slow and deliberate, reconciled to the sun’s rule. The boulevard was a faceless stretch of low-slung office buildings and bland condo developments. BioVida was located a few blocks before the Miracle Mile. I’d do some exploring later. Find a bite and a bar, and watch the natives.

  Past an elementary school on the corner of Alcazar, I found the address. The building was a black, mirrored cube about ten stories tall. The directory in the lobby listed BioVida on the fourth floor. The security guard at the front desk didn’t look up as I walked past. I rode the elevator up and was deposited into a lobby full of bright pastels, fit middle-aged men, and a few strapping teens accompanied by fathers. I lingered in the doorway.

  “Can I help you?” asked a blond receptionist.

  She looked like she’d been created in a beachside lab. Her lips and chest were enhanced to an unnatural degree. Her tan, the product of years of worship; her hair was the color of salt and sunshine. I looked above her at the company logo on the wall and pretended to squint at it.

  “I’m sorry, is this Sun Lasik?” I asked.

  “Sixth floor.” She smiled. “Two more up.”

  “Whoops, my bad,” I said.

  I turned toward the elevator, but paused as I heard a door open behind me. I looked back to an attractive black nurse scanning the waiting room. She was tall and curvy and her dark skin seemed to glow against her white nurse’s uniform. She called for an “Alex Nestor.” One of the teens stood up and looked down at his father. The older man winked at his son and gave a knowing smile. The nurse regarded me with a hand on a hip; the kid, Alex, turned with her. The rest of the room followed their gaze and stared at me.

  “Have a good one,” I said, holding eye contact with the nurse.

  * * *

  I rode the elevator down and returned to the blinding sunlight. In two blocks I found a bar called The Bar. Its white exterior was as plain as its name. But inside it was dark and cool and Loretta Lynn played on the jukebox. I found a stool at the round bar and ordered a Beck’s and a burger. It was a little after three p.m. I’d go back to the BioVida building at five, around the time the doctor’s staff should be getting off. If I wanted to follow anyone, I’d need to rent a car, but with any luck one of them would leave on foot, perhaps for a nearby happy hour. That was the half-ass plan anyway. I ordered another Beck’s when the food arrived and inhaled both. I thought about Stevie and Juliette. I pictured Terrance and his partner from Warrior Security lingering around the apartment, stealing peeks at Juliette’s ass while she flirted and soaked up the attention.

  I told myself I should forget this nonsense and return to the city. Lay low for a week or two, to prove I wasn’t interested in pursuing this further. Whatever happened to Wingate or to Carl Kruger wasn’t my business. I should be grateful I’d gotten off with warnings. I needed to get back and do what I could for Cass and those bullshit charges. What was I supposed to accomplish, playing snoop down in South Florida, a thousand miles from the folks that needed my help? Had this really been set in motion over a couple doctors distributing performance-enhancing drugs? Was that enough to kill for?

  My gaze fell across the bar to a poster of a Miami Marlins slugger. He posed with hard eyes, bat propped on his shoulder like a weapon. His forearms were each the size of toddlers. He’d recently signed a contract for 250 million dollars. I didn’t know if his prodigious power was natural or came from some “supporting means,” as the East German party liked to refer to cheating, but I knew what a quarter of a billion dollars meant to people. And I also knew only a fraction of that fortune would end up in the slugger’s pocket. The rest would be distributed to extended family and friends, hangers-on, to agents and the small army that helped him put up the numbers necessary to earn that salary. The slugger was just one of an innumerable lot. World-class athletic performance was worth billions. Doctors that helped ensure that performance—it was hard to overstate their value as central figures in a dark market that operated under bright stadium lights.

  When I asked for the check, the bartender told me it was Whiskey Wednesdays that night. Starting at six, and going till two a.m., every bottle of amber behind the bar would be half off. He said I should come back. I couldn’t disagree. He poured two shots of Jameson as a teaser, offered me one, and we tapped glasses and knocked them back. The Irish swill fired my insides, burned away the rest of the hangover. I was ready to go now. Ten more and I’d be howling on the beach under the moonlight. I looked forward to it. But first, a bit more work to do. I told the bartender I’d be seeing him later, dropped thirty bucks on the bar, then slid from my stool and braced myself for another assault of sun.

  Back on the corner of Alcazar and Ponce de Leon, I lingered under a palm tree in the shade and eyed the entrance to the building. The exterior reminded me of Darth Vader’s eyes. The blond receptionist exited at 5:05 p.m. She moved with a jaunty walk on heels, wearing a red miniskirt and a tight low-necked white tee that demanded appraisal of her hard-earned body. The outline of nipples could be seen across the street. She stopped in front of a black BMW coupe and reached in her purse. The car blinked and unlocked and the blonde slid into her ride. As she drove off, I jotted down her plates.

  Another ten minutes passed before the nurse came out. She had changed out of her white uniform and was wearing a green sundress covered in palm fronds that clung to her curves. Her dark hair was tied back tight against her scalp in a ponytail. Her cheekbones were high and sharp beneath a set of watchful eyes. For a moment I thought she spotted me across the street as I moved behind a car. When I peered over the trunk, I saw her opening the door of a silver Camry. So much for following on foot . . . no one walked anywhere outside New York. I didn’t bother to write down the plates as I watched her pull out on the boulevard. Oh, well, at least I had Whiskey Wednesdays to look forward to. But then I saw the Camry break and signal at a parking garage a few blocks down. I walked toward her fast, feeling the booze sweat leap forth. At the intersection I spotted her exiting the garage and approaching a business under Spanish arches and a terra-cotta roof. Over a row of brown awnings, it read BOOKS & BOOKS.

  It was a brilliant bookstore, the kind that should exist in every town. Under the arches there was a newsstand full of magazines, mass and niche, along with a dozen different newspapers. In front of an interior courtyard there was a small bar run by an old-timer in a Hawaiian shirt unbuttoned to his navel. He gave me a nod as I entered, went back to sipping his rosé. The store itself existed in the rooms surrounding the courtyard. Some reserved for fiction, nonfiction; another for children’s books; another for art; a small coffee shop in the back, facing a section for local history. I almost forgot about the nurse. Wandering a well-done bookstore with a slight buzz, one of life’s great pleasures.

  Then I saw her. She was standing over a table of staff recommendations. I couldn’t see the title she was holding, but she looked down at the pages with an immersion I appreciated. She flipped the book over and read the back, gave private approval and pressed it to her chest. Sold. I turned and examined the nearest row. It was the YA section; a few teenaged girls eyed me with suspicion. S
he passed behind me toward the register. I watched her pay, chatting with the clerk like a regular. She had a bright, easy smile, a kind air about her. With new book in hand she went to the bar in the courtyard and opened it and ordered a drink.

  I waited a few minutes, wandered the stacks, scanning for a suitable title, one that might spark some conversation. I settled on a Charles Willeford called Miami Blues. The back cover said that if I was looking for “a master’s insight into the humid decadence of South Florida,” then no one did it better than Willeford. That worked. I paid and strolled out to the magazine racks, examined the covers, before I moved to the bar and took a seat one down from the nurse. She was sipping a white, gazing down at the opening pages. Manicured orange nails grazed her cheek. I ordered a beer, received it in a frosted glass. I glanced around the bar and the courtyard. Every patron had a nose in a book and a drink at the elbow. I’d stumbled into a lotusland of readers and drinkers. Outdoor pools and a spot like this—the town was growing on me.

  I kept an eye on the nurse’s glass. I couldn’t wait until she asked for the check, and therefore missed my window, but I also couldn’t move in too quick. I polished off the Peroni after a page or two. The old-timer behind the bar placed a new one in front of me before I asked. He knew how to spot the thirsty ones.

  “Old Hoke Moseley,” he said. “That your first Willeford?”

  “It is,” I said. “You a fan?”

  “Guy’s a legend. You’re in for a treat. No one better to give you a sense of this town. You’re not from here, are you?”

  “How could you tell?”

  He laughed. “You’re either a Yankee or a shut-in,” he said. “No one around here’s pale as you.”

  I noticed the nurse smile at his comment without taking her eyes from the pages. I turned to her. “That obvious?”

  She looked up and appraised me. Her eyes glimmered with recognition. “It’s you,” she said.

  “You work at that place, what’s it called, where I stumbled in earlier?”

  “BioVida,” she said. “You find the Lasik office upstairs?”

  “How’d you . . .”

  “My girl at the desk told me.”

  “Ah. Yeah, I did, thanks.”

  She considered my reply. Let her eyes linger on my face, then down below my neck. Whatever she saw, her smile faded. She closed her book. The cover read Talent Is Overrated. She placed a hand on it, turned her shoulders toward me.

  “Why you pulling a shuck?” she asked.

  “A what?”

  “A shuck. Why you messin’ with me?”

  “I’m not,” I said.

  “That why you hit the ‘down’ button on your way out?” she asked. “I asked my girl Tiff what you were doing there and she said you were looking for Sun Lasik. ’Cept that’s on the sixth floor, and you went back down.”

  “I know. I forgot what she said and went down to look at the directory.”

  “Right.”

  “Why do you think I’m lying?” I asked.

  “Show me your contacts,” she said.

  “Why should I?”

  “’Cuz you ain’t wearing any, and I don’t see any glasses. Which tells me that you’re full of shit. So, like I was saying, why you pulling a shuck?”

  I nodded to her glass. “If I tell you, can I buy you another drink?”

  “From a lying stranger? Thanks, I’m good.”

  “What if it’s a really good story from a guy who’s not so bad?”

  “Tell it to the bartender. He’s paid to hear it.” She reopened her book. Eyes returned to the page, body language shut me down.

  I pointed to the cover. “You’re gonna like that,” I said. “I read it a while back.”

  Without looking up, she said, “Thanks, now if you’ll excuse me . . .”

  “Sorry to bother you. I just . . .”

  I waited, hoped she’d pick up my ellipses.

  With an exhale she said, “You just what?”

  “It’s funny, that’s all. Your book sort of relates to what I’m doing down here.”

  “Which is what? Wandering into offices and lying about your presence?”

  “I’m sorry about that. I had my reasons. Can I tell you about it?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I believe in kismet, and because I think anyone who buys that particular book would be interested in what I’m up to.”

  She looked from me to her glass, then raised it and swallowed down the rest. “Okay, fine,” she said. “Let’s hear it, big boy.”

  Chapter 23

  I really had read the book: Talent Is Overrated by Geoff Colvin, a Malcolm Gladwell-esque examination of “What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everyone Else.” Alas, it was not about performance-enhancing drugs. It was one of those feel-good, pop-psychology narratives that tried to make mortals feel a bit closer in potential to their sporting heroes. A nice idea, with a nonsense thesis.

  I really did believe in the kismet of a shared book too. Is there a better way to spark conversation, discover some common bond with someone new?

  But after that bit of sincerity, I told her a tall one. That I’d been hired by a divorcée troubled by what her ex husband was doing with their teenaged son, a budding baseball prospect. I’d stopped by the clinic in hopes of catching father and son in the waiting room. That kid she called, Alex Nestor, had he been going there for long? She shrugged, a few months maybe? She asked if I was sure I wasn’t a reporter. They had some problems in the past, journalists poking around trying to catch athletes procuring drugs. I promised her I wasn’t. Showed her my card, shared a bit about my pseudo private-eye business. Always lie with a side of truth. She started to open up a bit.

  Her name was Tasha. A New Orleans native, she had settled in South Florida after college. She’d been with BioVida for a few years now, and she knew damn well what they were up to. Not that it bothered her much. The way she saw it, sports were a dirty business all around. But the science of aging fascinated her. Her grandma used to moan that she was sick and tired of being sick and tired. After racing her way through a nursing degree at LSU on a track scholarship, Tasha learned about the boom in integrative medicine practices down here. She headed over the Gulf and found work with Dr. Lipke’s clinic.

  “How you like him?” I asked.

  “Herr doctor? He’s all right, he looks like a little German Santa Claus,” she said.

  “Sounds like he’s got plenty of goodies in his workshop.”

  “Ha. They all keep coming back for more, that’s for sure.”

  “And you don’t have a problem with it?” I asked.

  “What, his patients? He’s making ’em happy. Bunch of old dudes, can’t get it up no more. He’s helping ’em out. I don’t judge.”

  “I’m talking about the younger ones. The ones going to your clinic to cheat.”

  “I know who you’re talking about, but for the record, I’ve never seen or heard anything myself. Still, if you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’. Isn’t that the American way? Every white boy getting rich up on Wall Street knows that. If some jocks wanna pop some pills, get some shots that make ’em run faster or whatever, I mean, I get it. It’s gonna upset some people, but there’s a lot worse stuff to worry about in this country, you ask me.”

  “I’ve got a problem with it,” I said. “Things are unfair enough without folks cheating to get ahead.”

  “Says the privileged white boy.” Her eyes teased over the rim of her glass.

  “ ‘Privileged’? Not me.”

  “Hey, I didn’t say you got money. Maybe you do, maybe you don’t. You’re still a straight white male.”

  No denying that. I waved down the bartender, asked for a Bulleit. I was informed that it was wine and beer only. He added that there was a pub nearby, Whiskey Wednesdays if he wasn’t mistaken.

  “Already got it penciled in,” I told him. Then to Tasha, “How’d you like to join me?”

  “A date at a dive wi
th a lyin’ Yank?” she asked. “Be still, my heart.”

  “Who’s calling it a ‘date’?”

  “You sure you’re not press?”

  “I’d rather be a cop than a journalist,” I told her. “And it doesn’t get much lower than the boys in blue.”

  “Ah, I see,” she said. “What we got here is a bona fide hater. You go poking around, asking questions, judging like you do, but you say you don’t like the folks who do the same thing. Just different masters, is all.”

  “Gotta serve somebody,” I said.

  “Too true, honey, too damn true.”

  We clinked glasses and drained our remains. Held eye contact for a promising beat. Her eyes were wide set and deep brown with lashes so long they couldn’t have been real. She fluttered them.

  “So you’ll join me?” I asked.

  “I didn’t say that, no.” A fingernail traced around the rim of her glass. “So you’re not a cop or a reporter, just a pasty snoop with a thing for black girls?”

  “Just a book lover that likes a lively conversation,” I said.

  “What happened to your neck?” she asked.

  “Fight with a vampire.”

  She laughed at that, so loud and throaty that the rest of the courtyard turned and regarded us.

  “Tell you what,” she said. “I’m not interested in slamming whiskey in dive bars. I gotta work tomorrow. But there’s a Spanish place I like down the way. If you want, you can join me for some tapas and sangria.”

  “It’s a date.”

  “No,” she said, winking. “It’s just a nice fellow book lover who wouldn’t mind some company.”

  * * *