by Brady Hammes
“I have a flight to catch,” Jonah said. “I don’t have time for sightseeing.”
“We’ll get you to the airport. But there’s something I must take care of first.”
Mateo led Jonah to an abandoned garment factory down the street. Inside, the skeletons of wardrobe racks were stalled between rows of postwar sewing machines and cast-iron blocks that reminded Jonah of car engines. At the other end of the factory floor, a group of men sat on rolls of uncut fabric, smoking cigarettes and listening to American hip-hop on a small boom box. An elderly man emerged from a room somewhere behind them. He appeared to be in his sixties, with the stoop-shouldered posture of someone stuck in a permanent flinch. Despite his meager comportment, he possessed an aura that suggested he was in charge of whatever the hell was going on here. When he saw Mateo he summoned him to his office, closing the door behind him. Jonah sat on the floor and picked at the rubber peeling on the sole of his shoe.
It was tempting to wonder how he ended up here, though he knew that line of questioning would only send him into an existential spiral. He was a long way from the elephants, a long way from the path he’d prescribed for himself. He’d made a choice, and that choice had informed another choice, and somehow, without much consideration as to how it would end, he’d gone from being a Ph.D. student monitoring elephants to a foot soldier in an ivory trafficking ring.
A few minutes later, Mateo reappeared from the office.
“Who was that?” Jonah asked, standing.
Mateo ignored him, walking toward the truck, his face indicating he was pleased by whatever he’d learned inside the office.
“I thought you were taking me to the airport?” Jonah asked, hurrying to catch up.
“Wait here,” Mateo said, charging forward.
Jonah was sick of waiting, sick of not knowing what the hell was going on. He looked back at the men smoking and laughing at the other end of the factory floor. He counted eight in total, most were in their twenties, all were wearing brightly colored soccer jerseys plastered with logos for cellphone companies. Jonah wasn’t sure if he’d stepped into the meeting of a West African crime syndicate or the postgame celebration of a victorious soccer club.
Mateo returned with the python around his neck, flaunting it like an expensive scarf. He dropped the snake in the middle of the room and the men gathered round, poking at it with lengths of metal conduit. Mateo finally parted the crowd and unsheathed his machete, lifting it high above his head and dropping it on the snake, removing the head in one clean slice. He peeled back a six-inch slab of skin and motioned for one of the guys to give him a hand. An eager boy with bad acne grabbed hold of the skin while Mateo held the snake’s body with both hands, and together they pulled in opposite directions, as if peeling a very large banana. Once the snake had been disrobed, it was hauled off to another room, then returned twenty minutes later in the form of breaded strips that looked like chicken tenders but smelled far worse. The group made quick work of the snake, and Jonah wondered why the obvious meal, the chickens, had been spared.
After their feast, the men divided up the guns and began departing in small groups. Jonah looked at his phone. It was ten till eleven and his flight was scheduled to leave at 12:20, which meant he needed to be at the airport very soon. When Mateo returned, Jonah politely reminded him of his time crunch and said that although he hated to interrupt whatever the hell they were celebrating, he really needed to get going. Mateo nodded, and together they walked back outside to the truck, where Jonah began transferring the tusks to his rolling case. “Don’t bother,” Mateo said. “It stays here.”
“What do you mean?” Jonah said.
“With me.”
“No,” Jonah said, shaking his head. “That wasn’t the plan.”
“It is now.” Mateo grabbed the tusks from Jonah’s case and began putting them in an empty duffel bag.
“Fine,” Jonah said, suddenly relieved that he might not have to follow through with this after all, “but I need to confirm that with Slinky first.”
“Slinky isn’t in charge anymore.” There was an uncertainty in Mateo’s voice, as if he wasn’t sure he believed what he’d just said.
“Says you?”
Mateo stared into the distance, and Jonah could sense he was struggling with his betrayal. “Yes.”
“I don’t think you want to do this,” Jonah said firmly but without judgment, as if talking a stranger off a bridge.
“That’s not your concern,” Mateo said, removing the last piece of ivory from Jonah’s case and placing it in the duffel.
“What am I supposed to tell Slinky when he asks why I didn’t deliver the ivory?”
“Tell him it got lost.” Mateo zipped the bag shut.
Jonah shook his head. “I don’t think he’ll buy that.”
The factory doors swung open and Jonah turned to see the old hunched guy motioning for Mateo to come near. Two heavily armed men stood at his side.
Mateo handed Jonah his passport. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”
Mateo left the duffel in the back of the truck and walked over to shake the crippled man’s hand. Jonah’s instinct was to run, but he knew he wouldn’t make it far on foot, so he hesitated, waiting to see what happened. Though he couldn’t hear the details of their conversation, Jonah could see that Mateo was speaking quickly, gesticulating in the manner of a desperate salesman, pointing back to the duffel. The old guy allowed him to finish his speech, then nodded to the taller of the two bodyguards—a heavyset young man with light, freckled skin—who grabbed Mateo from behind and ran a knife across his neck. Jonah involuntarily released some hybrid of a whimper and a dog bark.
It was a shocking turn of events and his immediate reaction was to flee, which he did, his legs carrying him into the cab of the truck. The men began chasing him, but Jonah locked the doors, turned the ignition, and stepped on the gas, charging the truck down a narrow alley lined with dumpsters. He checked the side mirror and saw a quick succession of muzzle flashes before the mirror exploded and his pursuers disappeared in the shattered glass. Another shot ripped through the tailgate and a couple more wheezed past the driver’s-side window. He drove erratically, weaving back and forth in a clumsy attempt at evasion, a useless tactic he’d picked up from watching too many action movies. When he reached the end of the alley, he made a hard left onto a busy street and slipped into the camouflage of midday traffic. A heavy rain had begun to fall and people darted through the streets, seeking shelter. He couldn’t find the lever for the wiper blades, so he rolled down the window and wiped the windshield with his hand. He’d been in this city only once before, when he first arrived four months earlier. He hadn’t paid much attention during the taxi ride from the airport to his hotel, and he now found himself wishing he’d been a little more cognizant of the city’s layout. He eventually found the L101, the main coastal boulevard, and saw a sign with a picture of an airplane pointing north out of town. Finally, he thought, pictures, the language of idiots.
He looked in the rearview mirror to see if anyone was tailing him, but there was only the water-blurred shape of a city bus. He eventually arrived at what appeared to be either a long-term parking lot or a car dealership. It made no difference really. He ditched the truck next to a decommissioned taxi and began loading the tusks into his rolling case. He then shouldered his backpack and pulled the case of ivory through an archipelago of parking lot puddles. He finally saw the DÉPARTS sign and made his way to the Air France desk, where a surly Gabonese man checked his luggage through to Chicago before presenting him with two boarding passes. He cleared security and hurried to the gate, where the last of the passengers were filing onto the plane. Jonah handed over his boarding pass and settled into his seat. His hands were shaking, and he kept expecting the police to storm the plane and apprehend him, but minutes later the doors closed, the engines charged to life, and they were q
uickly rising through moisture-thick clouds. Jonah finally took a deep, satisfying breath, knowing that somehow, despite everything, he had made it out alive.
* * *
—
IT WAS SNOWING IN Paris. He spent the first thirty minutes sitting at the gate watching flakes gather on the tarmac. It was close to 9:00 P.M. and his next flight didn’t leave until 8:30 the following morning, which meant that unless he ventured into the city, he would have to spend the night at the airport. If Sam were here, he could be talked into walking the Champs-Élysées or catching some obscure film she’d read about, but she’d never responded to his emails and he wasn’t about to venture into an unfamiliar city by himself. Instead, he went to a bar at the end of the terminal and drank two glasses of cabernet. Afterward, feeling pleasantly buzzed, he went searching for dinner, and ended up at a Pizza Hut in Terminal 2B. He ate with a speed and ferocity that astonished him. It felt good to be in this place that was not Gabon and not Chicago, this middle ground, where he could exist in a kind of suspended reality, far from the problems awaiting him in the States and those that had chased him out of Africa. Of course, tomorrow he would be forced to confront his actions, but tonight he was a man with no responsibilities, nowhere to go, and so he staked out a piece of real estate at Gate 21 and spread his sleeping bag on the floor. Before long the wine got the best of him, and he drifted off to sleep.
* * *
—
HE AWOKE TO A group of French schoolchildren dressed in matching blazers staring down at him. They spoke among themselves, like a congregation of tiny sophisticated assemblymen. Jonah slid out of his sleeping bag and retrieved a new T-shirt from his backpack. He’d brought seven shirts with him to Gabon, one for each day of the week, but he hadn’t the time nor the mental acuity to wash them before he left Laurent’s. As he changed, the kids began giggling and shooting disparaging looks in his direction. The chorus of giggles grew louder, the kids making exaggerated fanning motions with their hands, hiking their shirts up over their noses, alternately amused and disgusted with the foul-smelling American sleeping on the ground. One of the kids, a soft-spoken, curly-haired boy, approached Jonah. “Monsieur,” he said. “Tu sens mauvais.” The boy turned and ran into the giggling mass of schoolchildren, where his bravery was rewarded with high fives. Jonah felt an intense shame, not only about his moral failings, which were many, but also that he’d let himself become the kind of foul-smelling American ridiculed by French schoolchildren.
He gathered his belongings and went to the men’s room to freshen up. He washed his face in the sink and dabbed his armpits with damp paper towels. He brushed his teeth with hand soap smeared across his index finger. He went searching for deodorant, but was unsuccessful. He considered purchasing a small bottle of cologne from the duty-free store, but he didn’t have enough money, so instead he settled for a pack of chewing gum, which masked his odor very little. He spent his last two euros on a coffee, then hurried back to the gate and boarded the plane that would take him home.
He got stuck in the middle seat, between two of the kids that had teased him earlier. They were now flipping through the pages of the in-flight magazine, disinterested in the man they had once found so amusing. A flight attendant at the front of the plane was going over the emergency procedures when one of the boys finally set his magazine down and looked to Jonah. He had small metal-rimmed glasses and an intense side part. There was just something about the kid’s smug precociousness that reminded Jonah of Harry Potter. “You are American?” the kid asked in charmingly accented English.
“Yeah.”
“You live in Shee-cago?”
“Sort of.”
A flight attendant approached Jonah as they taxied from the gate. “Mr. Brennan?” she asked.
“Yes?”
“The airline would like to have a word with you when you arrive in Chicago. Apparently, there’s an issue with your luggage.”
“Uh-oh,” Harry Potter said with a wry smile. “You in beeeg trouble.”
GAVIN
THE MORNING BEFORE HE WAS to head back to Chicago, Gavin and Mariana drove to Albuquerque to look for costumes. They rummaged through thrift stores searching for clothes that could pass for twentieth-century fashions, then visited a used bookstore and picked up a few dozen ancient hardbacks to use for props. It all felt very domestic, just a normal couple out running errands, the only problem being that they weren’t a couple. He wasn’t sure what they were, because they’d never discussed their relationship. Gavin knew it would be an awkward and unpleasant conversation and so, like all the other awkward and unpleasant conversations in his life, he chose to bury it in the hope that it might magically resolve itself.
Back in town, they stopped by the theater, where Jesse and his team of contractors were hanging drywall, the floor littered with power tools and fast-food wrappers, a small boom box blasting top forty hits. The damage wasn’t as extensive as Gavin had imagined. The building, a large adobe structure, appeared unharmed from the outside, and most of the interior damage was confined to the lobby. It seemed to Gavin as if they’d already made significant progress since they began working a few days ago.
Gavin walked over to Jesse, who was taping a section of drywall. “You’ve been busy.”
“As have you,” Jesse replied without looking at him.
“What do you mean?”
“With the play. Seems like you and Mariana have been burning the midnight oil. I hardly see her anymore.” The friendliness from a few days earlier was replaced by a more hostile tone.
“Yeah,” Gavin said. “There’s a lot to get done.”
“Apparently.”
Mariana approached from the stage area. “Are you planning to paint the walls in there?” she asked Jesse.
“We’ll do as much as we can with the time and money we have.”
“Okay,” Mariana said. “But I feel like it needs a fresh coat of paint.”
“Noted.”
“Come on,” Mariana said to Gavin. “I’d like to get your thoughts on the set design.”
“The salmon was delicious,” Jesse said as they walked away.
“What?” Mariana asked, turning around.
“The salmon,” Jesse said. “She did it with a nice honey-lemon glaze like we discussed.”
“Shit,” Mariana said. “I totally forgot.”
“We had an appointment with the caterer this afternoon,” Jesse explained to Gavin. “Final tasting before the wedding. I brought home a little platter for Mariana to sample, but feel free to help yourself. It’s in the fridge back at our place. There’s a cab franc in the wine cellar if you guys need something to pair it with.”
Gavin sensed a controlled rage in his voice, a violence awaiting release, and he figured it was best if he removed himself from the situation. Outside, he sat down on the steps of the theater and awaited the fallout of what he’d set in motion. If it involved physical violence to his person, then so be it; he accepted that as the just punishment for sleeping with another man’s fiancée. But part of him hoped Mariana would just do the difficult work of coming clean with Jesse, telling him everything so that they might settle into their own future together.
A moment later, she appeared. “I think you should probably go,” she said. “I need to do some damage control here. I’ll call you later tonight.”
* * *
—
GAVIN RETURNED TO THE house to pack up his things. His plan was to leave in the morning. He consulted the map on his phone: a touch over twelve hundred miles, nearly nineteen hours. It was three days before Christmas, so he’d have to hustle to make it in time. His mother had texted him twice in the last day, asking if he’d left yet, and he’d conveniently neglected to respond. Nineteen hours was too much to do in one shot, so he’d have to spend the night somewhere in Nebraska. As he was deciding on a good layover spot, his phone ran
g.
“Hey,” Mariana said.
“What did he say?” Gavin asked.
Mariana sighed. “He said he doesn’t feel good about what’s going on between us.”
“So he knows?”
“He suspects something.”
“Maybe it’s time to tell him.”
Mariana scoffed. “I can’t tell him.”
“Why not?”
“Because we’re getting married in less than two weeks.”
He hesitated. “What if you called it off?” He knew it was a long shot, but it was all he had.
“I can’t call off the wedding,” she said tonelessly.
“Why not?”
“I’m in too deep.”
Gavin felt something turn inside of him. This was the conversation he’d feared, because despite their time together—the mornings they spent skiing, the afternoons at rehearsal—Mariana had said nothing to suggest she wasn’t going to marry Jesse. And he’d resisted broaching the subject for fear of breaking the wonderful little spell they’d cast. “I’m sorry, but I think that’s a bit cowardly.”
“Gavin, I’ve got a hundred and twenty people flying here to watch me get married. I can’t just back out now. That shit only happens in the movies.”
“This isn’t about them,” Gavin said. “It’s about you.”
“I know that. But still…”
Gavin walked to the window and looked out at the skiers on the mountain. He felt something rising within him. “So this was just something you needed to get out of your system?” he said sharply. “You just needed to fuck another guy before settling into married life?”
A wounded silence. “That’s a horrible thing to say.”
“Yet true.”
“You know very well that isn’t true.”
“I don’t know. Apparently, I don’t know anything about you, because I thought you had feelings for me.”