Wtf

by Peter Lerangis

  A uniformed cop was clomping down the stairs into the living room. Behind him was another cop.

  Handcuffed to him, and weeping, was Jimmy Capitalupo.

  17

  10:46 P.M.

  Key: Lincoln. Car: Lincoln. It all checked out. No other Lincoln in the garage. This had to be right.

  Once again Byron tried turning the key in the ignition. It wouldn’t budge.

  This was not how things happened in his dad’s car. That one started when you turned the fucking key.

  He hit the horn by accident. He banged the steering column. He tried to move the shift. The sleeve of his robe caught on the shift and pulled it to neutral. He stepped on the accelerator. He stepped on the brake.

  VRRROOOMMMMMM! The engine echoed through the garage. Byron nearly screamed.

  He breathed deeply, slowly. He tried to remember the lessons his dad had given him the past summer in Vermont… in a parking lot… on a dirt road…. He tried to blot out the part where he’d plowed into a mailbox.

  Voices screamed inside his head: Why were the cops after Jimmy? How could they have possibly traced him to this house? If they wanted him, did they want me, too? Jimmy would tell them. Jimmy would break down crying and give them a description right down to the number of pimples on Byron’s face.

  Concentrate. Pull it together.

  He started flicking things, looking for the light switch. The left turn signal flashed. Water sprayed onto the windshield. The wipers wiped. The doors locked. The doors unlocked. The hood popped open an inch.

  Finally he found the switch and the garage erupted in bright light. Calmly, he stepped on the brake, slipped into reverse, and stepped on the gas.

  RRRRRRROMMMMMMM…

  The car tore out of the garage backward, tires squealing. The edge of the house loomed closer in the rearview mirror. Byron yanked the steering wheel the other way. The car rocked, skidding back on the driveway. He slammed on the brake to avoid a tree and found himself diagonal on a small basketball court.

  Oops.

  “Nice,” someone yelled from behind a bush.

  “You killed a squirrel,” someone else said.

  Byron caught his breath. Steam wisped from the hood—and beyond it, he could see the road.

  The gearshift gave him a choice of 1, 2, 3, 4, and D. He shifted to 1, gave it gas, and nosed down the driveway.

  And they’re off.

  The car inched forward. Model T speed. A few minutes later, he thumped over the lip of the driveway onto the road. He turned in the direction they’d come, from the left. He edged into the lane. A pair of headlights suddenly glared at him from the other direction, coming closer, fast.

  “Aaaagh!” He turned the steering wheel to the right, bouncing up onto a shoulder, steered back into the road, and just missed a head-on collision.

  “You fucking drunk, get off the road!” a voice bellowed as the other car whizzed past, honking loudly.

  Byron threw him the finger and steadied the car.

  Another car passed. Second gear, then third. Twenty-five miles an hour… thirty… thirty-five…

  He kept his eye on the left side of the road for the deer. How far away had they been? It was impossible to tell.

  Not too far ahead, a red pickup had pulled over to the opposite shoulder. Someone wearing a bomber hat and a red-checked hunting jacket was loading something onto the rear. Byron pressed the brakes to slow down.

  HONNNNNK! Behind him, an Expedition was flashing its brights, then roaring past him on the left.

  Byron gulped, glancing back into his rearview mirror.

  He was past the pickup, and now he could see exactly what the person was loading onto the flatbed.

  A very large, very dead deer.

  18

  11:01 P.M.

  Byron slammed on the brake.

  EEEEEE…

  He hated driving this fast. If you moved the steering wheel just a little bit, you went swerving like a maniac.

  The guy was getting into the pickup now, pulling away.

  Who the fuck picked up roadkill and brought it home?

  Maybe this was how they hunted in Westchester, New York. Maybe it saved the hassle of actually getting a gun permit, of having to spend hours in the woods. Country living without the muss and fuss.

  It wasn’t long before the pickup had sped out of sight. Luckily it left tracks in the rain, easy to follow, and no one else was on the road to mess them up. The road became hilly after a couple of miles, and the tracks turned up into a narrow gravel road cut into the woods. He followed the road as it wound past a swollen stream. Ahead of him, he could see a clearing and a light. He heard a distant door slam.

  Quickly he shut off his headlights and pulled over.

  Stopping the car was a lot easier than starting it. He closed his door silently and tiptoed the rest of the way.

  Before long the stream’s roiling sound gave way to a more placid, controlled splashing just ahead of him. Through the night air he detected the cozy warm scent of a wood-burning fireplace. He edged along farther, following the road as it veered off to the right, into a clearing. And he realized the long winding road hadn’t been a road at all.

  It was a driveway.

  At its end, the path widened. Lit by low, mushroom-shaped lights, it circled around a vast manicured lawn. In the center of the lawn was a giant marble fountain with a winged statue. Just beyond, at the top of a small rise, a sprawling, colonnaded brick mansion loomed over the grounds.

  Byron ducked behind a bush and peered carefully over the top. Near the house, the driveway forked. Its right-hand path disappeared into darkness, broken only by the glint from a pair of reflectors.

  Keeping to the underbrush, he walked closer to the source of the reflection—the rear lights of the pickup. It was parked in front of a much smaller house that stood a short distance away from the mansion.

  He eyed the flatbed intently. He could see the curve of the deer’s furry flank peeking over the top. Good.

  He figured he had about thirty yards. If he was quiet enough, if he stayed in the brush until the last possible moment, this could work. The wetness of the ground helped muffle sound. All around him raindrops fell from branches, making soft plup-plups on the fallen leaves.

  When he was close, he stepped out of the woods. He padded softly over the gravel. Now he could see the deer’s face. The slightest hint of something white inside its mouth.

  He fought back the revulsion in his gut, the odd tastes that were beginning to well up from his stomach. Take it. Take it and go.

  As he reached in, he heard a sudden sharp click.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” came a voice from behind him.

  Byron spun around to face down the barrel of a shotgun.

  19

  11:20 P.M.

  “Th—that’s my d-deer!”

  The words sounded stupid the moment they emerged from Byron’s lips.

  At the other end of the shotgun, the eyes crinkled. “Your deer?”

  “Well, not mine, but—”

  “Do you have a license for this deer? Does it answer to a name? It’s eleven o’clock at night, you perv. Why were you following me in your bathrobe?”

  The eyelashes, the voice, the stubble-free face—they didn’t belong to a he, Byron realized. “I—I thought you were a guy.”

  “Whatever floats your boat, sweetie,” she replied. “Sorry to disappoint, but—”

  “I didn’t mean that! I meant I wasn’t following you. I want the deer!”

  Her eyes widened. “Oh, that is sick. That is just too sick—”

  “Would you put that thing down and let me talk? Just give me two seconds. I need something… inside the deer. I put it there. In the mouth.”

  She lowered the gun, a smile growing across her face. “You put something in its mouth?”

  “Two seconds. Please.”

  “You put something in the mouth of dead deer… and then left? What was it?”
/>   “I—I had to hide something from cops, okay? There was an accident—”

  The girl’s eyes widened. “Ohhhh. So you were involved in that, too. I met your friend at that party. Was it something you were bringing—like alcohol?”

  “No!”

  She glanced at the deer’s mouth, leaning closer. “That looks like an envelope… drugs?”

  God, he hated her guts. “Look, this is none of your business.”

  “Ha! That is so straight-to-DVD!” She leaned over the back of the truck.

  “Let me do it! You can get… rabies!”

  Byron tried to run ahead of her, but she blocked his path with the barrel of the rifle. “Uh-uh-uh. I’m from a place where we put the Second Amendment first, dude. You know, that big empty field that stretches from the Hudson River to the edge of L.A.? We know something about sticking our hands inside livestock, Yankee.”

  She placed the rifle down into the flatbed and used both hands to pull open the deer’s jaw. Byron lunged after her but she reached in, yanked out the envelope, sprang back, and held it high. “What’ll you give me for it?”

  “Come on, this isn’t a game!”

  Byron swiped for it, but she pulled it away with a teasing smile. “You’re from the city, aren’t you?” she said. “You know how I figured it out? You’re a really bad driver. You nearly spun off the road three times. Anyone your age who can’t drive has to be from the city. Am I right?”

  “GODDAMN IT, GIVE ME THAT ENVELOPE!”

  “Shhhhh. The massuh be sleepin’. Grabbing him by the arm, she pulled him farther away from the house, back in the direction he’d come from. “He don’ like it when de slabe chillun be socializin’ pas’ dawk and takin’ de Lawd’s name in vain.”

  “That is so fucking racist and not funny,” Byron said. “Who are you anyway? You live in this house?”

  “The little one, not the big one,” she said. “With my dad. He works in the big house, for this Wall Street couple. We never see them. Dad calls them Mr. and Mrs. Paycheck. We’re from North Dakota originally. You can call me MC. For Mountain Chick. So, where in the city do you live? SoHo? Tribeca? NoLita? Alphabet City?”

  “Is this Twenty Questions? The Upper West Side, okay? Now give me the envelope!” He lunged, but she was lithe and fast.

  “Do you know East? The club?”

  “No!”

  “Then why should I give this back to you?”

  “What’s the point?” Byron shouted. “How do those things connect?”

  “In case you haven’t noticed, I am in the power seat, dude,” MC said with a cocky smile. “Possession, in cases such as this, is ownership. So, your fate is in my little hands, and all because I thought this head would look good on our mantelpiece.”

  “It doesn’t have antlers. You can’t mount it if it doesn’t have antlers.”

  “Says who? That is so sexist. Female deer are worthy of display too.”

  “I thought you were from Second Amendment land, anyway. You shoot the damn things, you don’t pick up roadkill.”

  MC shrugged. “It’s about time management. So, you don’t go to any clubs at all?”

  Byron rubbed his forehead. She was out of her mind. Play along. “I—well, sometimes. I know somebody whose cousin runs one of the clubs. Down by the Meatpacking District.”

  Her eyes widened. “No. Which one?”

  “Blowback, okay?” Byron said.

  “No-o-o-o…,” MC said, the word drawn out into a dis-believing gasp. “Blowback? Where Madonna and Leonardo go? And Idina and Taye? You can get in there?”

  “Sure. Yeah. Whatever. Anytime.” This was beginning to make his stomach curdle. “Look, you win. I don’t drive too well, and the car isn’t mine. I have to return it and I’m scared to get back in. I was supposed to sell this—that, what you’re holding—at this party, but the guy who drove us there totaled the car. Hence the deer. I’m pretty sure he’s dead, too, but my other friend and I ran away. We chickened out and watched the EMT guys take away the body. On top of all this, I… I need to pay somebody back, big-time. I thought I could go back to the party but there are cops all over it.”

  What was happening to him? For the first time all night, he felt tears welling up in his eyes. He fought them back fiercely. She was the last person he wanted to see that.

  “Look, Cam was—is—was—my friend. I have to repay, for his sake, at least.”

  “Wow, no wonder you’re such a mess….” MC said softly. “Hey, if you can get into Blowback, you can solve your money problems. That’s all people do there, buy drugs.”

  “Thanks.” Byron nodded. He hated, hated the fact that what she had just mentioned actually seemed like a good idea. “Okay, look, all I’m asking is for you to give me the envelope so I can go back to the city.”

  “How would you get there? It’s like two miles to the train station.”

  Byron sighed. “Could you drop me off? You could use the Lincoln. Then you wouldn’t even have the gas expense.”

  “And I could return it to the party for you,” she said.

  “You would… do that?”

  “Depends,” she said with a coy smile. “What do I get in return?”

  Byron thought about this. He was going to give Cam fifty percent anyway, so giving her something wouldn’t be unreasonable. “Okay, you found the deer, so I’ll give you a… finder’s fee. Ten percent of whatever I sell.”

  “Fifty-fifty,” the girl said.

  “Half? What are you, nuts?”

  MC glared at him with disgust. “You just told me your friend died. So you’re—you’re planning to skim off his percentage? Is that it? Profiting from… from that? That is despicable. Don’t tell me you were only going to pay him ten percent!”

  She tucked the envelope into her jacket pocket and headed to the pickup. “Wait!” Byron blurted. “Twenty-five!”

  “I think you are lowballing me,” she said, lifting the shotgun out of the flatbed, “I could, of course, cancel the whole deal and take this envelope to the cops.”

  Byron felt himself shriveling up inside. “Okay, okay. Fifty-fifty.”

  “Was that the deal with your friend?” she asked warily.

  “Yes,” Byron said, too tired to unpack how absurd and morbid this line of reasoning was.

  The girl pumped her fist. With a giggle, she turned and ran toward the house. “Stay here. I need to change. And you need to lose that robe. I’ll bring you some clothes too. You’re about my dad’s size.”

  “Change for what?” Byron shouted.

  She turned, with a beaming smile. “We’re going clubbing.”

  As she disappeared into the darkness, Byron felt his knees give way. He sat on the bumper of the pickup. The deer seemed to be eyeing him over it own flanks.

  “Fuck you, too,” he muttered.

  Dzzzzt.

  A sudden vibration in his robe pocket made him jump. It took him a moment to realize it was his Black-Berry.

  It was working again.

  He snatched it and looked at the screen. Nothing, just spam in his in-box.

  Glancing over his shoulder, he began tapping out a number.

  PART TWO

  BEFORE AND AFTER

  20

  WAITS BEFORE

  October 16, 4:07 P.M.

  Go ahead, child, make your eyes narrow—that’s it, just like mine. Did all those apartment buildings go away? Bravo. Now. Can you see it? Look hard. Can you see me?

  Waits squinted. Even now. It was a habit.

  On a foggy day in Eisenhower Park, he always thought about Iz. His great-grandfather had died years ago, but Waits could still feel the skin of his palms, cold and papery. The old guy had lost his eyesight, but when he took Waits’s hand they saw everything together—steamships coming into New York Harbor in 1924, immigrants gathered on deck before the Statue of Liberty. And, of course, the little boy Isadore at the edge of the ship’s railing, leaning over the sea in search of “dollah bills” floating in the
sea.

  I see him, Iz! I see him!

  ’Atta boy, little fella. See, that’s the magic!

  “Yo, yo, yo, yo—Waits, my man!” a voice blurted out behind him.

  Fade to black. Back to business as usual.

  He knew this voice: the pimply sophomore from Far Rockaway. Owed twenty-five dollars from last May. Big on apologies and promises, short on cash. “Fuck you,” Waits said without turning.

  “I’m just sayin’. Next week, dude.”

  “What part of ‘fuck you’ don’t you understand?”

  He felt for them. He’d been one of them. You couldn’t be going to Olmsted and not be a little nuts. The odds of getting in—top 800 scorers out of 25,000 applicants—were worse than Harvard. And then you faced a four-year battle with man-eating gladiator geeks who stacked the competition so bad that anything less than triple-800/98 GPAs could mean state school. The stress-outs were famous. Every few years they merited an article in Time or Newsweek and continued to be the basis for steady income to an army of local shrinks. But parents loved the Olmsted cachet, so rather than send their poopsies to another school, they cajoled diagnoses. They paid consultants.

  Waits had been there. Actually, he’d loved the Big O for the first two years, until his dad left the family to live in France with a flight attendant named Pierre. Somehow that seemed to knock things off track. Waits began seeing a few consultants of his own, for pain management.

  And now the students consulted Waits.

  Which was why he was here, a few yards away from the school building, a few minutes before the end of eighth period. Staring out over the Hudson, remembering.

  Can you see it? Look hard. Can you see me?

  It wasn’t working today. On the other shore, the New Jersey condos loomed defiant, and the dollah bills were pretzel bags floating on a greasy gray liquid highway. Nearby, the homeless guy the kids knew as “Fenster” farted quietly, asleep on a park bench festooned with a little plaque reading WE MISS YOU, ANDRE/9-11 NEVER FORGET/MOM AND DAD. The city gave, the city took away, and magic was for the desperate, the innocent, and the enfeebled—people at life’s entrances and exits.