Agony. My God, I never knew what the word referred to before now. Words buzz out like a horde of mocking flies that I try to glue together into an elephant of meaning.
A gnarling oak coils clear to the stars from millions of vermicular roots in pain’s moist bloody footprints. This massive travesty of life that sucked its substance from the pitiful cringing mud that was my soul.
I who wish I did not breath, gasp for breath where hope has fled. Other than this I sense nothing. No sound. No aromas. And hell, there should be one serious stench of fear coming off of my armpits. Only this stranger, agony.
Norman this is very very much worse than anything not good. This is so not good it’s….yargh… I know you’re here.
Of course, Weasel. We are one now. Because now here is everywhere. You will be a super man. Beyond good and evil. The experiment is successful. And certainty is ours now.
Hold the phone. Stop the music. What’s with this we are one stuff? What do you mean we, white man? Cause if we feel like me, then being we sucks! This is pain coupled with horror that’s giving language the finger!
Indescribable, isn’t it? You’re right, words will roll the rock up this hill. You are now we, who sense the non-sensation that is beyond sense.
Welcome aboard. You, like unto a God. And you are we, who still possess flesh. The hands of flesh that will shape the suppleness of time and even the agency of will.
Fuck you, Norman. This sucks beyond sucking. I isn’t talking about this cause there’s no talk possible. Where’d you learn to use the word like? Bill Clinton?
Let’s try the optimistic route. You drugged me. That’s all. You’re a bunch of renegade Scientologists or something. You got me in one of those Black Boxes we used to sell Central American regimes. Where’d you get it? E-Bay, Costa Rica?
If you want my money , knock yourself out. You already have to have my wallet. Take the debit card! The PIN code is IM469. Funny huh? So look, laugh. The joke’s on me, but it’s on you too. Every dime I have probably can’t pay even half of what this snatch must have cost you.
I work for a company formed in the nineties by a Tel Aviv used car salesman using money he borrowed from a Japanese banking cartel. Putting it plainly, working for an operation like that, I’m fucking broke. Currently horny and miserable too. I should be ghost writing lyrics for Mick Jagger!
So look. I’m going to pretend I’m Dorothy. I’m going to close my eyes, not that that makes any difference right now, and I’m going to count to one hundred.
When I open them I want to find myself flat broke and thrown in a gutter, far from wherever this is you’re keeping me. Then I’m going to find my way back to my miserable apartment, make some kind of excuse at work, and pretend this never happened? Okay?
And if you know even half of what I’m sure you already know about me, you know I can pull it off. Remember when I took the fall for the two chicks with the joint outside of Doyle’s Den?
Those were organized crime cowboys that hit me with that arrest. I went through the whole system the long way, with them losing my paperwork, leaving me with a business card from one of the cops that went right on the desk every time they did the spot searches on the inmates each and every time we got transferred to another holding cell.
That was six fucking transfers across about thirty six hours with every asshole in every holding cell looking my way. Thirty six hours with four hundred dollars in gold around my neck that they somehow overlooked removing when I was strip searched and surrendered all property including valuables like cigarettes.
You know they even offered me money, a hook up and get out of jail free card on the way to Central Booking. I didn’t flip then. I wouldn’t flip you now. I’ll walk away and forget the whole thing happened.
And that’ll be easy. Half of this shit doesn’t make sense in the first place. It’s just been one long Rococo nightmare resulting from two six packs and a pizza with anchovies and pepperoni.
I’m closing what I assume to be my eyes. Get the blindfold, the shackles, whatever, but get rid of me.
I’m starting to count. My eyes are now feeling closed. Amazing. I’m seeing more with them this way than when I thought they were open. One, two, three, four-
Weasel, we can’t get rid of you. We are one with you. You are one with us.
Five six seven I’m not buying this. You injected me with a very high end hallucinogen, that’s all. I know the deal there. I got several doses of the real LSD-25 straight from an army laboratory. I did a heavy hit of that. I’ll never forget the terror that time dilation did with that stuff back in the seventies. Three minutes clock time felt like eighteen hours internal psychological time.
I’m sure you guys have better stuff now. Maybe this has somehow gone really badly wrong for you. Maybe you’re afraid I’ll suicide, like some of the army guys who were dosed without warning. But I am experienced with hallucinogens. I’ll do what it takes. Whatever-
We’re doing fine, Weasel. Quit sweating. We just have to orient, that’s all. This is no drug. This is it. We are the Artist of Time.
Before we work this we stuff, all I or we are is this eyeless, earless voice in a colorless - no correct that - less than colorless brooding abyss of…void? No. Non-presence?
Potential presence is more like it. This is what your sensations are designed not to see.
Well, I can see why not. It’s not like I’ve been missing anything. In fact I’ve seen enough of that which can not be seen in all its glorious certain unseeability-
Just so you know what awaits us if we fail. Just a demonstration. A tiny sip.
Of what? A glass of poisoned wine with a spider at the bottom?
And where are my quotation marks? Is this some infernal internal monologue??
That’s the point, Weasel. You don’t feel any quotation marks in your head because four dimensional separations flatten out in a five dimensional frame. And this is actually more than that. But, hey, you have plenty, better said, all the time in all worlds to figure out.
Nothing to figure out, Norm. I quit. Send me home.
This is home, Weasel. And I am not Norm.
Well, you sound like Norm. So what are you? A Norman the Neck impersonator?
There’d be no money in that, would there?
So, who are you?
I told you in the first place we are you.. And actually you know everything now. You just are still figuring it out.
You’re telling me I’m trapped in myself, huh?
No. Ourselves.
I’ll assume the worst. I’m dead. This is one of those Jacob’s Ladder scenarios where I just don’t know it yet.
It’s called losing identity to reintegrate all identity.
So who am I talking to now, my Krishnamurti identity?
Think about that temporal slice business. How many slices are there?
Infinite. So what?
Each one is still a particularity of identity. Each one is a little life and death. It’s easy to see that you do not identify with all of yourself of five years ago. That same lack of identity applies to five nano-seconds.
Wait. Wait. For all this lack of identity I’ve always been me. There’s a continuity to any existence that cannot be denied.
Think it through. We already know the answers. A tree has several continua of aspect. Starts as a seed, comes to full development-
And ends up as a newspaper used to wrap dog shit.-
Among other things. Piece by piece we decompose the original entity and shape it to our designs.
If design should govern a thing so small as a single tree.
Or that designs so small as ours should govern a thing as vast in design as living matter.
Each slice of lumber is something more and less than the original tree.
Too cute. Elaborate.
Less in the case of the shit tormented New York Times. More if it is the timber of a ship that saves the life of the shipwrecked.
Okay. So it’s all relative. True. But so what?
A living entity is like that tree. We are the carpenter. We are the printer of the paper of your life. We are all manipulations possible rolled into a continuous potentiality. And the mere Darius Wheeler III existence will be our can opener to human time. We are now the agency that can shape free will, entering through the back door. The living can serve the non-living. The long awaited new democracy.
Why am I supposed to be happy about this? I already serve the non-living. GSI is nothing more than some Japanese software in a California database. Bagelman is its well paid rubber stamp..
But now you have joined us. You are we.
Fuck you. You sound like John Lennon, and I never liked that I Am The Walrus stuff.
You are we and we are all together.
Stop that!
You stop me. I’m you. We are.
Good enough. I know when I’m licked.
All over.
Where’s the express lane? The only slicing I see in my future is a certain con named Kenny. I may not know who I am anymore, but I think I know why I’m here, and I’ll bet on where I’m going.
I check my watch. It’s 3:33pm in the programs section of the middle security ABCC facility, where the inmates still get their own clothes, not the search friendly jumpsuits mandatory in maximum. It’s hot. So it must be summer. I’m seated at one of the steel office style tables in one of the folding chairs. I’m sweltering in nothing more than my casual slacks and polo shirt. It’s summertime on the Rock, for certain.
I’ve got my inmate folder open in front of me. I make some final notations on the yellow legal size pad with my favorite pen, a sleek chrome steel Cross model. A shadow glides across the page.
Kenny’s lanky frame looms over me. He’s just gotten up.
"This could probably be our last meeting. I’ve got a court date tomorrow."
"Good luck on that."
"Luck will have nothing to do with it. They’re going to railroad me down the twenty five to life track three times over."
"You’re still twelve people away from a verdict."
"My lawyer’s Legal Aid, and she’s applying for a job with the DA. What do you say my chances are, now?"
"Nobody knows the future, Kenny."
"I know mine. I’m somebody who wishes I was nobody. I’m somebody they can’t wait to wash their hands of."
I look over to my right and notice that the door to Siberia, ten by sixteen the book storage/mop closet I sometimes use as a classroom, is ajar. I could swear it was closed earlier.
As often , all the Officers are busy covering the female instructors’ classes. I have no idea whether this is the opportunity. No operations manuals when you really wish they were here. When in doubt, play it cool.
"Say, Mister Wheeler, would it be all right if I took some books out of Siberia? To be honest with you, I don’t know when I’ll be able to get them back."
"Kenny, feel free."
I lie.
"I hope you don’t mind if I accompany you. They’ve been tightening up on supervision."
Now there’s a whopper. If there is one thing that the programs section represents to the creative con, it is the armory. There used to be about thirty metal bookshelves six feet in height laden with a sizable if motley collection of volumes. Probably estate tax write-offs. Nothing up to date.
The Nation of Islam set up an Inmate Literacy Program with a Federal Education Grant. Nobody gave the slightest thought to a second agenda going on, until one lovely April morning six of the Bookcases buckled in their respective middle shelves and collapsed. The Steel end panels almost formed peaks at the top.
Six Nation of Islam Inmates were engrossed in researching their cases at nearby tables. They were regulars, whom I knew by name. To a man equipped with prison muscles of terrifying size and Olympic quality tone.
The two officers who happened to be in the library entered maintenance reports on their respective logs. Not long after the Imam led his skulking flock off to prayers. Nary a glance at their departure.
The books still lay open on the tables. Curiosity took over. I saunter over. Hmmm. 1947 Oregon railroad statutes regarding lumber transport. What else? A 1961 Supreme Court ruling on the constitutionality of some of New Jersey’s quirky local blue laws. Does the prohibition on Sunday liquor store sales constitute a violation of the separation of Church and State?
"What you looking at?" It’s Officer Napier. The master of the log books. A bullet headed five foot three ebony fire hydrant of coiled menace. His eyes are hostile slits above a pug nose and perpetual icy smile exposing perfect carnivorous teeth.
"I thought I’d put the books away, that’s all."
"Leave that to the maintenance inmates. It’s their job, not yours."
"No problem."
He’s never liked me. But he probably never liked anything that does not represent either money in his pocket or an orgasm. I qualify for neither in his world, so at best I am a potential bumbling do-gooder inconvenience.
Word is that he is heavily on the take, and is a sadist with a Napoleon Complex. He likes provoking larger inmates so he can beat the crap out of them. A bit of a rarity, he is a high end black belt with a very big mouth about it. Small as he is, his baseball fists look like they routinely splinter two by fours.
My guess is the Imam is paying him off. Meanwhile the Nation of Islam soldiers have been pilfering the foot long flat steel slats that underpin the shelves. A little duct tape and a lot of love spent sharpening these bad boys on the ever present concrete, and you have a sword fit for a Roman soldier.
When a Quixotic officer confronted the Imam with these non-literacy, issues, he threw the racism card. His Nation of Islam would not dream of fashioning a sword after the pig eating Roman infidel model.
If they were going to be making swords in the joint, they would have the graceful curve of Allah’s justice, not the flat arrogance of the traditional Christian oppression. White inmates must have done it to make his rehabilitation program look bad.
It was a brilliant move. He demanded that the book cases be replenished, and that all inmates other than the Nation of Islam be searched on exit. Especially whites and assimilated afro’s.
Another eight metal bookshelves came in. Over three months ten more collapsed. Plywood bookcases came in their wake. Nation of Islam Soldiers of Literacy were only given cursory exit searches despite their traditional loose fitting upper garments. Even a teacher like myself had to shake out his jacket. Nothing was ever found. They had simply slipped them up their sleeves. The racism card aced common sense.
The prevailing wisdom was that the Nation of Islam kept better order in the pods anyway. Corrections Officers preferred doing absolutely nothing because there was nothing effective available to them.
There were only two per sixty inmate pod per shift, and at any given time any one of them probably was either sleeping or lunching. On top of that, more money might come from a sale/rental business. The Zen of Prison Management: Don’t get caught so we don’t have to take the trouble to crack down. But nobody’s talking.
Of course neither was I. Took one for myself, of course. It was such a no-brainer that I was tempted to make it an even dozen. But, in case of a dreaded confrontation, one piece of steel, not love, is all you need.
However, given the number of checkpoints a civilian has to pass through, I could not take it home for modification. Nor could I very well spend a few hours sharpening it against the cinderblocks without plenty of undue attention.
A little ingenuity and duct tape came to the rescue. Courtesy of my steel toed work boots that were now part of the routine going through the metal detectors, eight old fashioned double edged safety razors blew straight through without a hitch. I taped them together into a flat package, dropped them in, and put the shoe on. I was more worried about the edge of one working free and slicing my toes open than I was about being caught. No problem.
The tricky part was figuring out the best design, and the fastest way to accomplish the job and re-secret the weapon. The slat itself was about twelve inches long and one and a half wide. At the end of the day, a defensive weapon like this would be a one shot only deal. I wanted an edge that could deliver one good slash. I agonized about different ways to attach the razors to the steel until I had a sudden sanity attack.
If I wanted a weapon, why not just walk in with a good solid Japanese street blade? I only own five of them. Four inches of Nippon steel in a folding knife copied from the same template as a good old American Buck. However, the Japanese deserve real credit for urban design innovations.
It’s much flatter, not much more than three eights of an inch, including the grip stock.. The blade opens silently with a flick of the thumb. And it’s faster than most switchblades, assuming a modicum of practice and maintenance. Easily rotating into a combat grip, it locks as tight as a Buck, so it won’t collapse once in place.
Razor sharp. Easily acquired and untraceable. And best of all, a great tool for whittling and cutting rope. Its attractive sleek design makes it a great addition to any knapsack, toolkit, or back pocket in a dark alley.
Following Kenny into the mop closet known as Siberia I take a quick stock of the stacked boxes. My stomach tightens when I see that the Math book box is not in its usual spot at the bottom of a stack of three boxes. It has been moved to the top of a stack. Two inches of the slat that I had carefully hidden at its bottom protruded from the top. The claustrophobic quality of the sixteen by twelve room kicks up a notch.
"While we’re at it Kenny, I need a couple of books too."
The Japanese knife is my only hope now. That was hidden down the spine of a thick ancient geology text in the science book box.
No time. Kenny’s already coming at me with the steel slat in his hand. And the door is behind him. Prison velocity can make the Olympics look like slow motion. For a moment I surrender to a wave of resignation. It’s a set up. I’m dead. I unfreeze.
My treasured Cross pen is in my hand in an attack grip. It is holstered right underneath Kenny’s larynx. The tip is poking out the other side. I snap the fist back, disconnecting his entire windpipe with a mere three inches of its length. I feel my feet land back on the ground. My knees go jelly and I roll towards the door.
Somewhere in the distance I hear the clatter of the slat on the concrete and Kenny’s final gurgles. I am back on my feet, but I feel like my head is insulated with a thick cotton buzz. Memory starts its fitful return in fragments.
TV shows where policemen talk about violent confrontations always seem to emphasize that time seems to slow down. I guess that account makes for good TV. It has nothing to do with my experience. I have experienced an acceleration almost to the point of blackout.
I thank God for every moment I cursed in the moment sparring, grounding forms, and meditating with Dirty Pancho on the roof of my apartment building in Chelsea. Relaxation in adversity brings accuracy. Accuracy brings velocity. Waste nothing except the mother fucker in question.
When someone big comes at you with a weapon, even then they operate with disadvantages. Psychologically they overestimate their position, and swing rather than thrust with the weapon. They also expect you to retreat. This will provide them with a greater mechanical advantage, torque being what it is. This is the time honored method of mighty meaty thugs who usually succeed, and will reduce their victims to protoplasm. But close quarters allowed no retreat other than a few steps back into a yellow cinderblock wall.
So I did the opposite. I came in under the swing. It’s the only opportunity the situation affords you. Training is necessary because it would never occur to you in the moment that the best gauge of safety is where the weapon is not. And that includes a lot of space close in on the opponent. Stick fighting teaches you that the aggressor has the least control over an implement at a point somewhere a little past their grip.
However, I took no advantage of that principle at all. There is a second more lethal pattern. Skip the fancy stuff. Come in under, get behind the hands, snake up and jab the throat. If they are expecting the move, of course goodbye incarnation. They’ll take you with the elbows or knees.
But the odds are in the smaller person’s favor because such aggressors rarely are grounded like practiced pros. Kenny certainly was not.
Neither Pancho nor I were large or threatening. We gained our street credibility by wasting a couple of these types. Word gets around. Which is good for business, because you don’t want to have to risk a violent felony arrest every time you come around to shake down somebody who’s a couple of grand in arrears.
We practiced that lethal move the way basketball players practice lay ups. When you think about it, the body language is very similar. Especially that final leap up from a coiled position. Say goodnight Kenny.
He was in a fetal position making bubbling, sucking, and wheezing sounds. His eyes gaped at me with a pleading panic that nauseated me with contempt. Stupid fucking bastard. You wanted to murder me, remember?
I surveyed the room and noted that overall it was a neat kill. I’d seen more blood at barroom beatings. His face was going blue.
"Hurry up. Eat him!"
"Huh?"
"You know how to do it. Breath it in slowly just before he dies. You can tell the guards you were trying to do Artificial Respiration for the asshole. Now!"
A wispy violet tendril was snaking out of his throat. I went over and crouched low. The scent of honeysuckle in July. Slowly came my inhalation. Electrical and delicious. Stimulation and luxurious stupefaction. The finest orgasms of delirious youth mere unsteady steps in the first direction of this. Nothing human to compare.
At least nothing human I have ever known. In fact, after this? Human? So what? My eyes are opened to the light beyond their eyes. New colors ancient as the sum of all time. Wonderful.
"What the fuck happened here?"
Oh goody, it’s Napier. Go collect a bribe or something, will you? I swivel my head and see his gleaming black boots inches away. What better answer than-
"Jesus, I don’t know. We went to get a book, and he just came at me."
"From the looks of it, you came at him."
His hand is poised on his radio, but not pushing the button. I feel the room shrink.
"I’m going to ask again. What the fuck happened here?"
"I’m telling you, Napier. I don’t know. The mother fucker just came at me with that fucking slat!"
"Looks to me like he tripped and fell on your pen Mr. Wheeler."
"I’m telling you. He must have had that fucking thing ready in Siberia. I didn’t even see him coming."
I get up on quivering legs. I’m flashing homicide charges. I’m thinking not being able to make or even getting bail. I’m thinking what the next week might be like in here. The bloody pen is still gripped in hand.
"Drop the pen, Mister Wheeler."
Frozen is the wrong word. I can’t move because I’m afraid I’ll lose my last shred of balance and teeter to the concrete floor.
"Drop the pen, Mister Wheeler. Now."
Amazing. Napier put more menace in lowering his voice than if he’d pitched it jet engine proportions. I hear a ping when it hits the linoleum before I feel that I let it go.
Napier smiles. With the insight of a hardened sadist, he says nothing for an eternal five seconds.
"What hath God wrought?"
He hits the radio button.
"Napier reporting a code Murphy five three over at the ABCC program area 4."
He taps the slat at Kenny’s hand with his boot. I know better than to say anything. He seems glad to know I know. Perhaps professional courtesy.
"It appears to me that you got very lucky, Mister Wheeler. But we need to look at a few questions. Why of all people did you have to have this kind of luck?"
He glances at the Cross pen on the floor. As luck would have it, its tip is pointing at me like the arrow pivoting the center of a Wheel of Misfortune.
"Unusual luck. If you stay lucky, play the Lotto today."
A cryptic chuckle.
The officer who seems to materialize at the door is clearly a high ranker. Black male. Early forties. White shirt not blue. A gold badge. Middling height, maybe five ten. Trim body with economically fluid movements. Military haircut on a chiseled shield shaped face. Aquiline nose widely separate cynical intuitive eyes. The three of us plus corpse in one room feels more like a multitude than a crowd.
"Whose fuck up is this, Napier?"
"Nobody’s. At least not as far as I can see, Captain."
"I’m looking at a dead asshole in an isolated section. Hey, let me start again. I’m looking at a dead piece of shit in an isolated section, and you’re telling me there’s no such thing as the asshole that squeezed it out."
"The inmate had been complaining of feeling faint earlier in the day, but insisted on coming to class anyway. "
"Don’t fuck with me, Napier. What’s that got to do with this? I’m looking at a dead inmate whose lawyer wanted protective custody. He’s dead the day before his fucking trial. I’m seeing a report that’s going to smell worse than he will in a few hours. So there’s something I need from you right now, Napier!"
Napier looks up at him, still with that poker smile.
"Whose fuck up is this? What happened? And most importantly, what the fuck up is little white Poindexter doing here? This is a restricted area."
"He had Clearance, sir."
"For what?"
"Adult Ed, sir."
"Oh shit."
Captain Code Murphy still has no name. He looks at me with eyes like chocolate colored lasers.
"They usually bring women in for that pork barrel. How long have you been working for the big easy money?"
"About eight months."
"Before that?"
"Musician. Self-employed?"
"What do you play?"
"Guitar."
"Cool. I used to play a little as a kid. Thought I’d be Jimi Hendrix. Guess you didn’t end up another Hendrix either."
"I guess not."
"So what’s your name?"
"Darius Wheeler the Third."
"The third, huh? Parents rich?"
"Not particularly, unless they were in a Third World country."
"Do you know the deceased?"
"Well, he’d come by enough to class that I’d recognize him, but beyond that, no."
I’m not a good liar at the best of times. I feel like he sees through me down to the final positron.
He glances at my left hand.
"What did you do? Close a door on your pinky?"
I look down and see the nail is practically jewel like in its lambent Amethyst . Time to give him my best shot.
"Jesus, I don’t know. This whole fucking day is turning into a blur. All I know is the guy came at me, I reacted, and I’m in the middle of this shit. I’m shaking like a leaf, and ready to puke. You could probably close a door on my head and I wouldn’t feel it till tomorrow."
That gets a chuckle. Ball’s in his court. I get the feeling that’s exactly where he likes it. He looks around the sixteen by twenty space with the air of someone surveying the Grand Canyon, looks down briefly at Kenny, flat on his back, splayed on the floor like a giant X. Then he stares directly at me, speaking in a slow, measured tone oiled with judicious premeditation.
"We have a homicide."
He lets that trail off. I have nothing to add. Volunteer nothing when in doubt.
He takes a long breath, cups his left hand under his chin and rests its elbow in his right hand whose arm is going straight across his tight solar plexus. He looks down at Kenny like he expects him to jump back to life and give us some answers. Getting none, he stares back at me like a cobra might survey a mongoose.
"We have a teacher." Another practiced pause. "I guess you really taught him a lesson of a lifetime."
I don’t know whether this is supposed to be funny, so again, I say nothing. However, my stomach is starting to do push ups against my diaphragm. I hope it doesn’t decide to volunteer all over our shoes.
Thank God I haven’t put anything in it lately. I do all I can to stifle the urge to gasp. He goes on in that tone that could only come from years of practice.
"I just don’t know whether we need to arrest you yet, Mister Wheeler."
So casually as if to be a question of whether or not to give me a ride home. I can feel a shot coming.
"We, and I do mean we, as in you and I, have a problem. Officer Napier understands this problem, so for the moment we will trust certain details to him. You need to come into my office."
So far no handcuffs. He turns and gestures lazily towards the door.
"Let’s go, Mister Wheeler."
When an officer who has no name above his badge tells me to do anything, here in the bowels of correction, I’m going to do it. I follow Captain Code Murphy out of Siberia like a spastic little dog.
Every click of our footsteps echoes like a giggling chorus of demented fates in the otherwise deserted library. The hundred foot high corridor is also empty. Those echoes are starting to clatter in my head like hammers on fifty five gallon steel drums. The whole area has been cleared. No witnesses.
The usually bustling wing check point is set at second story level. Its panoramic fifty foot wide Plexiglas compose one corner of the tee shape where the main entry corridor meets each of the wing corridors. They operate the three separate metal gates which control entry and exit. I see no one.
Officer Code Murphy has some kind of override key. We go through the steel like it was made of ice cream in August. His office is down the main corridor. He motions me in. All desks are empty. We blow past them to another door, which opens into a small but uncharacteristically cozy place done up in soft walnut tones and an immaculate pile carpet. There are none of the award placards that often crowd the wall behind a capacious oak desk devoid of dust and clutter. Nothing but an active computer terminal. The black leather padded chairs are comfortable and ooze high price.
It is obvious which chairs are for whom, and we each take them without a word.
"Welcome, Mr. Wheeler, to a place few obtain entry. Just so you know, this room is wired. However, none of the following is admissible in court of law. Unless I decide so. Do you understand?"
"I think so."
"Okay. I’m looking at your background here. Do you mind if I be perfectly honest with you?"
Yeah like there’s a plan B?
"Of course not, Captain. I’d prefer it."
"Good. I think you look dirty."
That sinking feeling just turned into a bottomless pit.
"What do you mean?"
"How does this stink to me? Let me count the ways. One. You’re the only male teacher in the Program for Harmonious Human Socialization Processes. Correct?"
"Well, my boss-"
"Cut the shit. Only male teacher. Correct?"
"Yes."
"Been here less than a year. Correct?"
Okay I know what’s supposed to happen now. Yes and no answers until he puts a noose around my neck. I suppose I should be asking for a lawyer, but-
"Yes."
"You’ve had more than two meetings with the deceased. Correct?"
"Yes."
"You accompanied the deceased to secured maintenance area fifteen in the Programs Wing. Correct?"
"If you mean Siberia-"
"The fucking room we just left, in plain English."
"Yes."
"You say you never met him before then. Correct?"
"Correct."
The eyes of the cobra look up from the screen and stare down my eyes for two beats."
"But you worked regularly at a place called Norman’s Nautical, didn’t you?"
Uh oh.
"Yes, I did."
I see this background includes a little more than my resume.
"You’ve been arrested too, although the charges were dismissed. Didn’t leave enough of the weed for them to find."
"Yes."
"And you never met the deceased back at Norman’s?"
"Not in any substantive way."
"But you just said you never met him before jail, Wheeler. Which is it going to be?"
"Look there were piles of asshole regulars that came in and out of that hell hole. He wasn’t even one of them. But the truth remains that I didn’t meet him, and only recognized his face from the club after several classes. I also never acknowledged it to him."
"Well, of course not. You were setting him up for the hit."
"What?"
"Seventy five large is a lot of junk classes in that garbage ed program of yours."
"What are you talking about?"
"I’m talking the reward money for capping the asshole before he stands trial."
"Hmm. Talk about a crossroads with eighteen different roads to take. Let’s try the truth.
"No I didn’t. And I don’t know whether to feel stupid, innocent, or both. But the last thing on my mind when I came in here today was killing the guy. Scumbag that I’m sure he was."
"Scumbag, huh? What are you trying to do? Justify the homicide?"
"What the fuck does that have to do with it? The fucking guy came at me!"
"Listen, we need ourselves a good story here, and you’re not giving me one. First you don’t know him. Then you do. Now he’s probably a scumbag. And meanwhile you tore his fucking windpipe out with a pen! A fucking pen!!! Do you have any idea of what a Mongolian clusterfuck this could be in the papers?"
"You got no priors short that chump weed charge, but your history here has more questions than three episodes of Jeopardy. "
"Let’s say we do this by the book and I arrest you. Convergence’s trial has been simmering under the front pages. So far spotty coverage. But now he’s dead. Killed by his teacher. All it’s going to take is one hungry little grub from journalism land to get a hard on about poetic lack of justice. Or some neo-con piece of shit on the other who’ll want to tear the Liberal do-gooder park barrels the new asshole you so rightfully deserve. "
"One op-ed will lead to another. You’ll have to go to trial. The DA will toss murder one. You will have to prove that your pen ended up so perfectly situated in his throat by accident. You will be guilty until proven innocent, and you’ll be tried in the press."
Like a teasing lover, he lets that linger.
"You won’t be able to make bail."
I’m sinking like the Titanic.
"You’ll spent the whole trial here. Maybe in Protective Custody, but given the kind of lawyer you can afford, you’ll be in General Population within a week. How long you think you’ll last?"
I just shake my head. I’d consider suicide, if it were offered as an option. Right now I feel like psychological silly putty. The Captain’s pummeled me into submission with the practiced elegance of a true pro.
"But the truth is you’re no hit man. You’re too pathetic. And this was no hit. Too sloppy."
Done by the book. He’s offering light in the tunnel of darkness. As manipulated as a Spielberg audience, I’m going to go for anything we got here. Here comes the bike ride with E.T.
"What I can’t figure out is how come he went for you at all."
"It really beats the shit out of me."
"The slat’s all wrong too. Where’s the duct tape handle? It wasn’t sharpened. What happened? Somebody hand it to him when he walked in?"
Uh oh. That was no light. That was a candle floating on a paper boat in the middle of a pool of gasoline.
"There was nobody."
"That’s what I mean. See now I’m wondering. Here you are, a musician teaching garbage ed in the middle of the biggest cash cow the five boroughs have to offer. You tell yourself you deserve better than this shit. And you know, you do. "
"I’m thinking you’ve been here just long enough to start figuring the angles. So what the fuck? You deserve a little extra bacon on the pig farm. You’re a smart guy, got some street. In fact, you’re a lot smarter than I would have given you credit for."
"I never connected you with those fucking bookcases, and neither did anybody else. I would have sworn on a stack of bibles that it was the Nation of Islam. But it must have been you all along. Give it up, Wheeler, how much have you been selling those fucking things for?"
"I wasn’t selling the fucking things."
No stopping him now.
"Bullshit. The guy’s dead with his throat torn out with the economy of a pro. What do you think’s going to happen when the canoe maker looks at him?"
"So what really happened? Did Convergence balk at the price? I can’t see him going at you like that just for the weapon. And I can’t see you being asshole enough to lose your job fighting over it."
I’m sweating cold and clammy. He fixes me with those hooded cobra eyes, and tickles his chiseled onyx cheek with a ballpoint pen.
"You know arresting you would be hemorrhoid specialist’s problem. Whatever you are, you’re just a hanky load of shit. You ain’t worth the plumbing. Are you?"
I shake my head and look down at my feet. No massa, I ain’t worth the baloney you put between the slices of bread. Just gimme my whupping and send me back in the fields, but please don’t throw me to the lynch mob.
He’s tapping at the computer for a few minutes. I sit uncomfortably in the elegant leather chair. The phone rings.
"Yes? Okay. I need to know exactly when you’ll be ready. Good. That should bag it and tag it."
"That was Napier. Now Wheeler, This is your life. All answers will be final. I’m looking at the log entries for today, and I am one keystroke away from the records indicating that you never made it to work. Might that be right?"
I nod like a lap dog before a twirling fork with a meat ball.
"I am also looking at Officer Napier’s report. It appears that Mister Convergence met his untimely death with a brutality that equaled that which he showed his victims in life. A lot of damage you can do with one of those slats that support the sacred books of law."
He reaches into the desk and takes out a strongbox.
"But those books mean nothing. Right here and right now I am the law."
He opens it up and starts counting out minty fresh twenties.
"So I‘m giving you two thousand bucks and you are going to walk through the door behind me exactly when I tell to and get in a modest little black sedan that will be directly in front of you. Do you agree?"
He puts the money on the desk in front of me. My head nods another lap dog dance, and I look straight into the enigmatic twin lakes of darkness in eyes.
"Do you agree, Wheeler?"
I keep nodding.
"Then pick up the money and put it in your pocket. And lose the bobble head routine. It clashes with the furniture and makes me despise you even more."
I struggle not bobble another affirmative.
"Okay Captain." The cobra opens his mouth with a flat smile exuding joyless condescension. He looks at some place about a hundred yards behind my head.
"I make more money than the fucking mayor. You know why?"
He needs no response.
"Because I do more, and I’m smarter about it. Do you know why I accept your bullshit story?"
"No. At this point I don’t."
"Because if you were lying about anything that really mattered to the case, you would have tried to chisel me for at least ten out the seventy five. Truth to tell, I would have gone to twelve. But what’s done is done. Do you know why I know that you r lips are sealed?"
"You’re right. They are. But why do you know?"
"Because I scare the living shit out of you. If I ever ring your doorbell, you’ll wish I was the grim reaper."
The phone rings.
"Yes? Good."
"Okay, Wheeler. Out the door. Forever. Oh just one more thing."
Uh oh. What now?
"Don’t worry about your job. You don’t have it anymore. But, in two weeks the assholes we call educators will kick you up a stair or two. Congratulations. So now get the fuck out this back door behind me, and let’s make sure we never meet again."
His door opened directly to the sidewalk girdling the parking lot adjacent to the jail’s looming main entrance. Directly before me idled a black Lincoln Town Car with opaque shaded windows. It took me straight home.
My driver, wearing a black three piece suit and reflective aviator sunglasses, never said a word. With every turn he took further towards my house, I expected him to swerve in another direction and take me off to be shot.
The understated luxury of the black leather upholstery coupled with the smoothness of the ride only made the silence of the rolling coffin ever more strident. Without even asking my address, he stopped directly in front of my door.
I groped for the handle, but it was locked. Before I had a chance to feel the panic that would reduce my legs to jelly moments later, I heard the welcome thunk of the electronic locks. I don’t know whether I imagined a quiet chuckle from the specter behind the wheel as I made my hurried, fumbling exit.
I stood on the street and a soft balmy wind chilled me into shivers. My shirt was drenched. Rivulets of sweat ran down my hands and cut an icy trickle down the crack of my ass. My knees were knocking together to the point of pain. I stood a few more moments, gasping futilely for a full breath that I could not quite stuff into my lungs.
Finally I found the keys and managed to convince my fingers not to keep dropping them on the sidewalk. But it was no use. With a panic that was all their own, they refused to allow the keys to find their way into the locks, until that cursed machine was ten minutes gone.