Closing Time, page 20
She nodded.
“Okay, now go on about your business. And Claire? Don’t even think about trying to run out that door. I know you really want to very much right now but here’s the thing, it takes too long to open the door, throw it back and then go through. Believe me, I know. You’ll be dead before you hit the sidewalk. And I’m already up for Murder One in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut so it won’t mean a thing to me one way or another.”
He clicked off the safety.
“Do we have a meeting of the minds here, Claire?”
“Yes.”
“Good. You know what you’re supposed to do?”
“Yes.”
“Then go.”
“The keys are in my bag. The door keys.”
“So? Get ’em.”
He watched her, trying to gauge her reaction as she stooped down to the floor for her bag and set it in front of the speed rack and opened it and fished out her key ring. Her hands were shaking as she fumbled for the right one and that was good. Her color was off and that was good too.
But she kept glancing up at him—just before she stooped to retrieve her bag and then as she set it on the speed rack and then again as she turned the corner at the service station and a fourth time as she passed him headed for the door. He thought, this one’s a wiseass, she’s trying to memorize what I look like, but there were ways to minimize that possibility and ways to wipe it out almost completely.
It was called shock therapy.
The night had turned chilly and David was unprepared for that, dressed only in a light tan jacket and even with it zipped to the chin the wind off the river along West End Avenue was enough to send him immediately east all the way across to Central Park West where the packed-together rows of high-end residentials blocked it. He walked from 63rd all the way up to 78th Street wondering what he was doing, keeping to the west side against the buildings both for the shelter and because you never knew about Central Park and who you might encounter this time of night. It was a lonely stretch though pretty well lit—a few people out walking their dogs or on their way home from somewhere or other and light two-way traffic. He supposed the street matched his mood. Lonely and at least half-lit.
At 78th he crossed three blocks over to Broadway though her bar was back on Columbus. He meant, he guessed, to describe a wide circle around her and only then, if he hadn’t managed to shake this feeling by then, narrow in. He hoped the feeling would just go away. It was stupid, what he was doing. Even just standing across the street from the bar watching her through the plate-glass window would be stupid because if he could see her then there was also the possibility that she’d see him. Never mind that it was easily as humiliating as standing under her apartment window. To go inside and try to talk to her, which was what he really wanted to do, which was what he was aching to do, was bound to cause more hurt for both of them.
There could be no good ending to this.
But he was doing it anyway.
He headed down Broadway, hands shoved into his jeans against the cold. Some of the bars were still packed mostly with kids in their twenties and he heard music and loud laughter and other bars were still and dark, closed already or just about to close and the thought came to him suddenly that he had no idea how business was over at her place. She could easily have locked up and gone home by now. It was a definite possibility.
The thought filled him with a kind of dread and he picked up his pace so that by the time he crossed against the red and passed Grey Papaya at 72nd Street his heart was pounding so he slowed again. It wouldn’t be good for her to see him this way, if he was going to be seen at all. He still wasn’t sure about that. Wasn’t sure what in the hell he was going to do.
But this feeling hadn’t been mitigated being out here. The night air hadn’t cleared his head or cured him. Not by a long shot. He was so close. To seeing her at least. To something.
He turned east at 70th and walked slowly toward Columbus.
She was going to keep this under control. He wouldn’t use the gun.
He wanted the money, that’s all.
Fine.
“I cashed out already,” she said. “The money’s in back.”
“What’s in the drawer?”
“Two hundred startup money for tomorrow.”
“Put it in the briefcase. Cash box or safe?”
“Cash box, locked in the desk. They wouldn’t trust me with the safe. I’m still new here.”
“Oh? You’re not trustworthy?”
“I’m new here.”
She stacked the money in his briefcase. She watched him sip his beer.
“You already said that. But what I asked you is, are you trustworthy?”
“Y-yes.”
Stop that, she thought. Shit! You don’t want to show him fear. Not the slightest bit of fear.
“Should I trust you to go in back there and get the box for me?”
“Up to you.”
He smiled and looked her up and down and she wished she’d worn something a little less clingy than the thin scoop-neck blouse.
“I don’t think so,” he said. “You’re a woman. And I wouldn’t trust a woman on a short leash with her fucking legs cut off. Nothing personal. Walk me back. And keep your hands down at your sides. Move.”
She walked back through the tables and chairs stacked for the night back to the office and opened the office door and thought of slamming it in his face but that was only a thought and nothing she’d consider for a moment because all he wanted was the money. She found the right key for the drawer and opened it, took out the cash box and put it on the desk beside the printer and computer.
She turned.
And he was so close. The gun only inches from her chest. She lurched back and her hip hit the desk. It hurt. Her mouth was very dry all of a sudden.
“You want me to…I mean, should I open it? Or you want to just take it as it is?”
“Open it. I like to see what I’ve got.”
He was smiling again and the brown eyes seemed to jitter back and forth and she thought strangely of ants or bees, of insects.
And there was no smile in the eyes at all.
It was a relief to turn back to the desk. Not to have to look at the eyes. She used three fingers against the box to steady her thumb and forefinger and finally found the keyhole and turned the key and turned and stepped away a little to her left. He lifted the lid.
“You had a good night, Claire.”
He shut it again and took one step toward her, his face only inches from her face, directly in front of her.
“You really don’t know CPR?”
“What?”
“You really don’t know CPR? Just from what you see on television?”
“I never…”
“So what happens if some customer throws a fit or something? I’m just curious. Aren’t you supposed to be in charge of this bar, Claire? Isn’t that you? It’s not the waiter who’s in charge, it’s not the fucking busboy. Is pouring a goddamn beer the only thing you’re good for? What about responsibility? Suppose I pitched a fit or something! What would you do for me? Call 911 while I’m dying here? Jesus Christ!”
He’s crazy, she thought. He’s a goddamn fucking lunatic and god knows what a lunatic will do.
Maybe it isn’t just the money.
And for the first time now he really scared her.
He had her now, he could tell by the look on her face, time to put the real fear of god into the bitch and see if she remembered anything but fear after that. He put the gun against her temple and backed her ass to the desk again.
“Open your mouth.”
“What?”
“I said open your mouth. Do it, Claire.”
She did.
“All right, now keep it open, understand? I’m gonna show you something. I’m gonna show you how to do CPR.”
He reached over and pinched her nostrils shut. Her eyes skittered. He took a deep breath and put his mouth over hers and exhaled hard and heard her gasp when he pulled away and try to catch her breath but he did it again before she could, emptied his lungs into her and this time when he let her up for air she was coughing and her eyes were gleaming with tears.
She tasted like smoke and tequila.
The coughing stopped. She leaned back against the desk, chest heaving.
“There you go. Of course you’d be on your back, normally. But you get the idea. Grab the cash box. Come on.”
He marched her back the way they’d come and saw her wipe her cheek with one hand and thought, good start.
David sat on the steps of a brownstone across the street from the ornate blue-and-gold Pythian building, a lit cigarette in his hand, trying to will his heart to stop pounding. He’d gotten halfway down the block when it felt like somebody had put a hand to his chest and said, asshole, don’t you take another step further. Don’t even think it.
He had no business being here.
Not on the steps, nobody would care about that—but being here. This close. Thinking what he was thinking.
She’d said she didn’t want to see him, period, and no hedging this time, that she couldn’t see him, that seeing him had become a kind of grief played over and over again and that they simply had to stop, get away from one another and go lick their wounds until maybe in time they could be friends again or something like friends but that now they could be nothing.
It was the act of a willful selfish child to be this close to her.
What he needed to do was go home. Be an adult.
He’d made his choice. He should live with it.
He gasped at a sudden unexpected rush of tears. That he should have to choose at all. Not fair.
He wiped away the tears and drew on the cigarette and sat there, slowly calming.
“Pour me another Amstel, Claire. This one’s gone flat. Use one of those good frozen mugs you’ve got there.”
She did as he told her to do while he transferred the contents of the cash box to his briefcase, poured the beer and set it in front of him, trying to keep her hands from shaking, trying not to spill it, not to show. The taste of him was still in her mouth. He handed her the empty box.
“Put that on the floor or something, will you?”
She did that too, bent over and set it beside the garbage can and when she stood up again something hit her in the chest and she gasped, something freezing cold sliding down off her chest and over her belly.
He was laughing. The frosted glass was empty.
“Ooops. Little spill there. Gee, sorry.”
“You…!”
He leaned in close over the bar.
“You what, Claire? You what? What do you want to call me? You want to call me names? Pour me another beer you dumb little shit and keep your fucking mouth shut. And I want a new glass.”
She looked down at herself, arms out to her sides. She didn’t know what to do. You could see almost everything through the thin material and the bra was thin too so you could even see her nipples puckered by the cold. He could see them, goddammit. If she brushed at it that would only make it worse, plastering the material to her body. She wanted to cry. She wouldn’t cry. She turned to the freezer to get the glass and that was when she brushed herself off because then he couldn’t see.
She drew the beer and set it in front of him on the bar. And almost wasn’t surprised when he lifted it and threw it all over her again.
But when he laughed the second time, then she did cry. She couldn’t help it. It just happened. Whether it was humiliation or frustration or fear or all of these together she just stood there, eyes closed and quietly sobbing.
“Look at me,” he said.
She wouldn’t. If she couldn’t see him then she could almost pretend he couldn’t see her.
“I said, look at me, dammit!”
She opened her eyes. What she saw was a man enjoying himself immensely. She couldn’t understand. Why was he putting her through this? Shouldn’t he be running away right now? Wasn’t he at all worried about the cops?
How could anybody be like this?
“You stink of beer, Claire. Clean yourself off. You smell like a slut. Use that hand towel there. Dip it in some water. That’s right. You have nice nipples, Claire. Say thank you, sir. I’m the customer. The customer’s always right.”
“Thank you.”
She plucked the material out in front of her and wiped at it with the wet rag. The blouse was going to be stretched and ruined.
“Thank you, sir, Claire.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Better. Now hand me that spindle.”
“The what?”
“Jesus christ, Claire, you’ve worked in bars for how long? The spindle. The goddamn spindle. The spike you stack your checks on, for chrissake!”
“I…”
She didn’t want to do this. Her heart was suddenly hammering. She hated those things. Always had. Even just to look at them. The spike was maybe eight inches long rising straight up out of a thick coil of wire at its base. This one was set at the service station below one of the wine racks and whenever she had to climb up onto the counter to get to one of the more pricey wines up top she had visions of losing her balance and falling right onto it, of being impaled. She could see it. Ridiculous, horrible way to die.
The spike was as sharp and thick as an icepick.
“Please…I don’t…”
“Ah, begging. I like that.”
“Those things scare me, okay?”
“Why? You use it every day.”
“They just do.”
“Maybe I want to scare you.”
“What? Please…”
“Maybe I want to scare you. Maybe I don’t like you one goddamn bit, Claire, and maybe I want to scare you so much I could almost come in my pants just thinking about it? What if the money’s only a kind of perk? Maybe this is what it’s all about. You ever consider that, you dopey whore?”
“Why…?”
“Why? Because I want to. Because this gun tells us both I can. You hear me, you ugly fuck? You get ugly when you cry, Claire, you know that? You want to know why? Because after me you’ll never feel safe again, Claire. Never. Not at work, not at home. Nowhere. Because that’s my wish for the whole fucking world and for you, Claire, in particular. Now hand me the goddamn spindle!”
She could barely see him through the tears but she could feel the heat of his anger reach out to her across the bar. For a split second she imagined him bursting into flame. Where did all this come from? Why? What had she done?
David thought, if she hates me for it, so be it. I have to see her.
He crushed out the cigarette and stepped down off the brownstone.
“I want to show you how we’re gonna do this, Claire. Stop blubbering for chrissake. Take one of those cocktail napkins there. Wipe your goddamn nose. You’re gonna do it once first, just so you can see how hard it is, and then it’s my turn. See, I put my hand on the bar, palm down, just like this. Then you pick up the spindle. You raise it over the center of my hand to exactly the level of this beer mug, no lower and no higher. Lower’s cheating. Higher and it’ll never work. Then you try to spike me.”
“I can’t…”
“Sure you can. I’ll give you some incentive. You spike me and the game’s over right now and you get to keep whatever’s in your tip jar. I don’t think you will, though. Like I say, it’s hard. Assuming you don’t, then I get three tries. I miss all three, you keep whatever’s in your tip jar. I don’t miss…well, then you’re shit out of luck, Claire. Now pick up the spindle. And remember, the gun’s in the other hand so you don’t want to be thinking about doing anything else with it other than playing our little game.”
He watched her eyes. The eyes always flickered when they made their move. The eyes were a dead giveaway. But he didn’t even need the eyes this time. Instead of bringing it straight on down she raised it a half inch first so it was an easy thing to pull his hand away. Gave it a lot of force, though. She was game, he gave her that much. He freed the spindle from the bar.
“Okay. My turn.”
“No. Please. Just take the money. Just leave me alone, please? Enough, all right? All right?”
The husky voice had turned into a whine. The eyes were red with tears.
He smiled.
“Not enough, Claire. Not all right. But what are you worried about? You saw how tough it is. I’ll probably lose anyway, right? Of course maybe I won’t.”
“I can’t, please…”
“You can, Claire. You have to. See the gun? See this tubing at the end? It’s called a silencer. I made it myself. That means I can shoot you three or four times if I want to without even killing you, you dumb piece of shit and nobody’s going to hear it, the neighbors upstairs will never be the wiser. And that, Claire, is a world of pain, I promise you. You want it to go down that way? Fine by me. Different game is all. Nastier.”
“Oh, jesus! Why…?”
“You know the little pffttt sound silencers always make in the movies? Doesn’t happen. More like car door closing. So what’ll it be?”
She thought of her widowed mother in Queens and how in another month it would be Christmas and then of her sister married three months almost to the day and pregnant out in Oregon and that she’d never visited, thought of the paintings just finished and half-finished and of David still not free of her nor her of him and she thought about the kitten who curled between her feet each night and who would feed her and take care of her and apprehended something of what the world would be like without her in it, an almost impossible concept just an hour ago but glimpsed now for a moment and thought I’m so afraid, I’m so afraid of what I won’t get to see and she put her hand down on the bar.
…and now his control is complete. He can see it in her eyes. He can see she knows a truth he’s known all along, that there is no help in this world, that what will happen will happen and no amount of pleading to god or jesus or to the milk of human kindness will get you any goddamn where at all, that in the face of loathing as deep and strong as his is she is just another worker ant in an anthill he can bring down in a second, crush beneath his feet at any time he wishes—her hand on the bar says all of this to him, and the temptation is there to do it to her on the very first plunge of the spike, to bring it instantly into even more stark perspective for her, the perspective of flesh, of spilled blood, of pain.
