A Changed Man (36 page)

“That would be fine,” says Bonnie. “That’s a wonderful idea. By the way, did you know that Vincent and Meyer Maslow are going to be on
Chandler
this week?”

“On
Chandler?
Really?” says Armstrong. “Oh, my Lord, that’s terrific. I’ll tell all the folks here at school.”

“All right, then…Unless there’s anything else,” says Bonnie.

“We’ll talk next week,” says Armstrong. “And meanwhile, thank you. Thank you again.”

“Thank
you,
” says Bonnie. “I’m looking forward to it.”

Bonnie hangs up just as Vincent walks into the kitchen. Is Bonnie imagining it, or does he look relieved to find that she has finished a conversation? Has he also been unnerved by the silent breather?

“Who was on the phone?” asks Vincent, getting a beer from the refrigerator in a way that’s meant to seem relaxed. In fact, he’s a nervous wreck. Vincent’s gaze tracks toward the kitchen window and out over the driveway.

“Danny’s school,” says Bonnie. “Danny’s assistant principal.”

“Don’t tell me,” says Vincent. “They hated his Hitler paper.”

“How do you know?” Bonnie can’t conceal her surprise and—well, jealousy, really. Her son is telling Vincent things that he doesn’t tell her. At the same time she’s grateful that Danny is confiding in anyone at all, that he’s got a male presence in the house, someone he can talk to in the absence of a father with any interest in the hard work of raising a son.

“Danny told me,” says Vincent. “Poor kid. I think he was pretty freaked out.”

“What did he say?” Bonnie will ask Danny to print out a copy of the paper and give it to her
tonight.

“Not much. I think those morons at school decided that writing about Hitler means he
is
Hitler. Or wants to be. So how hard are they going to make this?”

“It’s not as bad as it could have been. They’ve offered us a plea bargain.” How funny, that
us
should mean Bonnie and Danny and Vincent.

“Time off for time served?”

“Not exactly. They’ll go easy on Danny if you and I give a speech at their high school graduation.”

“You and me? Graduation? You’re kidding.”

“That’s the deal,” says Bonnie. “And what makes it harder is, Danny’s probably going to be there.”

“We can do that,” says Vincent.

In the silence that falls, they look at each other from across the kitchen. Bonnie likes the sounds of that
we.
Sexy. Conspiratorial. Well, okay. Here they go again. Maybe. The power of that one word draws them back toward wherever they were—or wherever she imagined they were—the night of the benefit dinner. But where is Bonnie going with this? Her son’s assistant principal suggested that she and Vincent speak at graduation—not that they have sex! Bonnie’s not heading back down that road.

“Guess what happened today? I had lunch with Laura Ticknor.”

“That woman from the benefit?” Vincent says. “The one with all the money?”

“Bravo,” says Bonnie. “I got her to pledge three hundred grand.”

Vincent pumps his arm in the air. “Excellent!” he says. The difference between Vincent’s response and Meyer’s is not lost on Bonnie. At least Vincent’s not obsessed with his upcoming TV appearance.

Bonnie says, “And you know what? The lunch was all about you. Really, it was all about what happened at the dinner, and what you did, and what happened later.” She means his nearly dying. Don’t let him think what happened later refers to what happened here in the kitchen.

“It’s not about me,” Vincent says. “It’s about the foundation. About that Iranian guy. And all the amazing things we can do with Laura Ticknor’s money.”

T
HE LINE IS A PROBLEM FOR
R
AYMOND
. Is he really supposed
to fall in with these mongrelized mutants loitering out on the street, begging to watch some eggplant dandy chat with Cousin Vincent? How grateful is Raymond supposed to
be
for this public disgrace, the chance to join the other race traitors waiting to see Chandler, to be herded into the studio with the mud-race crowd, rubbing up against them and catching all their diseases?

Raymond should be an invited guest, like one of those experts they get to gas about global warming and the Middle East and Tim McVeigh. Raymond’s field of expertise is ARM and Vincent Nolan. They should have sent him a ticket. In fact, the tickets were free. Raymond called and ordered his as soon as Lucy told him that his cousin was going to be on
Chandler.
He probably should have brought Lucy. At least he’d have someone to talk to. Raymond and Lucy should both be here as special guests of Chandler.

But there were plenty of reasons he didn’t bring Lucy, most obviously the fact that he doesn’t have a clue about what he’s going to do when he finally sees Vincent. He knows what he plans
not
to do. He’s not going to come out swinging, which is what the Jewish media expects from guys like Raymond. Certainly that’s the media’s line on the white-power movement, ever since all those years ago, when the Aryan brothers went off on Geraldo Rivera. Raymond won’t play into their hands. He’ll stay focused and say what he has to say about ARM in general and Vincent in particular.

Raymond’s glad that Lucy isn’t here to see him wait in line like some jerk taking directions from the hot tamale in the
Chandler
T-shirt who thinks a pair of headphones clipped to her woolly head makes her superior to the white men she’s bossing around. But of course,
señorita!
Your wish is my command! He often fears that Lucy will stop being on his side, stop believing what he believes, as soon as she figures out how he stands in relation to all the people who don’t need to work their nuts off, twenty-four/seven. Lucy might split, like Vincent did. Any smart person would.

Raymond hasn’t been in Manhattan for five, six years. It wasn’t all that easy to drive into the city, which seems ten times more crowded, noisy, polluted, and crime-ridden than it was the last time he was here. He deserves the Purple Heart just for finding a parking garage, and for getting here by eleven, like they said. The taping starts at noon.

And where is Vincent now? Backstage with his head tilted back and his mouth open, sucking down the streams of champagne and scarfing the caviar that gorgeous chicks in spangled swimsuits keep bringing out for the guests. Which, when you get right down to it, is the truth about Vincent. He sold out the white race for pricier booze and food.

Raymond should get
paid
to be on this show. He should get compensated for the hours he has put in, the days he’s taken off from work to moonlight as Vincent’s stalker and the agent of retribution by which a traitor will be brought to justice. Tracking down Vincent has become Raymond’s second job. Those trips to the pay phones to call Vincent’s new family were fun, like being a kid again, making crank calls to strangers just to screw with their heads. Still, there were the phone bills, the coins wasted on broken machines, plus the sick day he had to take in order to stake out that house in Clairmont and give that kid the message. He’d wanted to tell the kid that Vincent stole his truck and money and medication, but he couldn’t predict how that would play. Some kids might think it was cool. That’s how kids are being raised these days. With no morals to speak of. When the truth is, regardless of what you might think about Raymond and ARM, doing something like that is wrong. People should know about it.

It was better not to act hastily, better to have waited for this chance to tell a national audience that their so-called hero is a punk shithead thief. Raymond wishes, as he often has, that his little band of ARM brothers had, just once, put their asses on the line, that they’d at least seen how it felt to fuck somebody up badly. Found some Paki working late at the convenience mart and whaled on him. Whaled on him good. Maybe they would have enjoyed it. Who knows? It would have been a
bonding
experience. Vincent would have got into it. Raymond always felt that if you told Vincent, Kick this scum, Vincent would have kicked. Vincent, not Raymond, is the one who got sent to anger management, the one who dumped that old lady into the swimming pool. Now Vincent is famous for having ditched his supposedly violent pals and gone to work for peace and love. But it was always Vincent who was the real loose cannon.

Let’s say they’d all lost it one night when the Paki convenience-store clerk told them to please not handle the petrified doughnut if they weren’t going to buy it. Let’s say Vincent was into it, just like everyone else. That would have given Raymond a little something extra to offer the
Chandler
audience. But Chandler’s people would never let Raymond tell the truth. It might interfere with Chandler telling white Americans how to live and what to think and how to turn their kids into homosexuals and abortionists.

Raymond lets his gaze mosey down the line of
Chandler
ticket holders, the fat Rican teen, the welfare mothers with zip to do but take their snot-nosed kids to TV shows for the free air-conditioning, plus the unenlightened white citizens who, under the illusion that this is wholesome family entertainment, are helping the darker races climb up on the white man’s back. Raymond’s been working on an article for the ARM Web site about how the Jews control the media. Just the facts, the list of CEOs, who works where, and what they do. He’s written seven pages, and he’s going strong. So he should have known better than to imagine that the Zionist media moguls are going to give him free airtime.

Raymond needs to locate the
Chandler
robot in the T-shirt and earphones who knows what today’s show is about and will grasp the potential of Raymond’s contribution. In which case there’s a good chance that Raymond might be let in early and get the semi-VP treatment, if not the full monty Vincent’s getting. Isn’t today’s program about changing Raymond into Vincent? That’s why Chandler needs them both. Together they form a walking, talking Before and After.

Raymond’s body decides for him. He’s jumping out of his skin. He would rather get his ego whomped and his ass kicked around the block than stand here one more second. He susses out the station employee most likely to be persuaded, a Jewish kid, real hustler, his hair brilliantined in spikes, as if every brain cell is discharging an idea so hot it’s making his hair stand up. Not like that pathetic bar mitzvah boy in the house where Vincent is staying, the kid who just wants to get high and jerk off, or give drugs to innocent white girls so they’ll let him feel their tits.

Media Boy is a Take-Charge Jew who knows that Raymond’s input might make for some first-rate TV. Probably he’s heard about that brawl on
Geraldo.
He’ll be the one to get credit for having ushered Raymond inside. Even if the kid sees Raymond’s swastika, which he probably will, race loyalty will mean less to him than personal ambition.

Raymond leaves his place in line. It’s a gamble. But he can’t bring himself to ask the woman behind him—a skinny black grandma with ashy skin and a gray shock of straightened hair—to please save his place. The woman’s got a baby in her arms. A kid who could vomit on Raymond. Raymond glares at them both, then goes to the door where the future Michael Eisner lurks, sleek as a lizard in the sun.

Raymond says, “Excuse me, good afternoon. I’m Mister Mumble Mumble. I’m a friend of Vincent Nolan’s? He’s going to be on the mumble mumble today?” No need to speak intelligibly. The kid’s focused on Raymond’s tattoo. The tattoo is Raymond’s credential. Having it on his hand for so long has earned him the right to use it. And it works. The fire lighting up in the kid’s eyes is the rocket’s red glare of his career blasting off.

Certainly, Mr. Mumble Mumble. Come right this way.

He gives his coworkers meaningful looks, like
they’ll
know what he’s doing, and ushers Raymond past a few yuppie slackers with enough power to inquire, with their raised eyebrows, who the hell is Raymond. It’s just like the military: everything ranked by strict tiny gradations of clout. Raymond’s a friend of today’s guest. Barriers fall, one by one.

On TV, Chandler’s fake living room has always looked vaguely normal. In person, it’s psychedelic, a funhouse video arcade. The studio’s dark except for the purple, red, and green lights on the set and the control board. Rows of seats rise up from the sloppy tangle of cable and wires passing for a stage. Onstage are Chandler’s famous armchairs, the Chandler chairs, three of them today, the leather chairs—Chandler’s trademark—suggesting that Chandler’s family has belonged to the Harvard Club for ten generations. Which it probably has. It’s been centuries since the darker races began conspiring to use the white man’s institutions against him.

Raymond spots Vincent being led out to sit in one of the chairs. The sight of him takes Raymond’s breath away. It’s too early. He’s not ready for the gunfight at the OK Corral. Though he knows not to get excited. This is just the sound check.

Vincent has let his hair grow in. The fucker’s got a two-hundred-dollar haircut. He’s wearing an expensive suit, a white shirt, and a tie. He looks like some snotball you’d ask for a bank loan, and the guy would turn you down. Raymond’s first impulse is to grab that powder puff from the makeup girl and ram it down Vincent’s throat. In the other seat is the little old Jew whom Raymond saw in
People.
The Holocaust hero and fund-raiser for the New World Order and the Zionist fifth column. Both men are being fussed over by a crew of girls painting their faces. They look like two corpses getting a two-for-one special from the embalmer.

First Vincent and then the old Jew squirm as the techies run cords up their backs. If it was up to Raymond, he’d run those cords up their asses.

When Nielsen Boy motions for him to climb the bleachers and take a seat, Raymond is paralyzed, half wanting to crawl up there and settle into the warm sheltering darkness and half sensibly paranoid that the house lights could come up at any minute, and leave him—the only guy in the peanut gallery—face-to-face with Vincent. That would spoil the surprise that, in Raymond’s scenario, will not happen until after the audience is seated and the cameras are rolling.

“Is there a restroom?” Raymond says.

“A restroom?” Is this iguana mocking him? Why not pop the kid and step over his limp body and keep going till he’s popped the tech crew and Vincent and Maslow? The makeup girl, if she gets in his way. Because that’s not what Raymond wants. His plan involves hanging out in the bathroom until the audience arrives. Then he’ll slip in with the others. He’ll listen, he’ll wait, he’ll control himself until that part of the show when they take questions from the crowd.

For one awful second, Raymond’s afraid that the kid is going to follow him into the can so they—the cut and the uncut—can bond over the urinal. But no, the kid’s got a job to do. Bye-bye, see ya later. Unlike Raymond, who can take his own sweet time in the
Chandler
toilet.

“You know how to get back?” Lizard Boy says.

“I think I can find my way,” says Raymond. “How long till showtime?”

“Twenty minutes.” The kid’s an idiot. No intelligent person would bring in a guy like Raymond and let him loose in the studio. If anyone finds out about this, the kid will lose his job.

Raymond locks himself in a stall. Someone comes in and pisses. Someone takes a shit, two stalls over. Raymond cannot believe that Vincent has betrayed him and robbed him, that Raymond is sitting on the public john inhaling a stranger’s farts while Vincent is backstage drinking mimosas and spearing boiled jumbo shrimp. If Raymond could only be sure of that, he could go back and sit in the bleachers.

The Klonopin he took seems to be doing the opposite of what it’s supposed to. So he’s wasting two pills—pills it took him considerable effort to get after Vincent’s raid on his stash—in a TV-studio toilet. The meds are supposed to cool him out. But his temperature’s rising.

If only this were the men’s room scene from
The Godfather.
He wishes he had a gun taped to the tank so he could come out shooting. But Raymond isn’t armed. For one thing, all he has at home is his deer-hunting rifle, which he’s hardly about to smuggle past Chandler’s army of bodyguards. And as for a little handgun, getting one—legal or illegal—would have been so expensive and such a pain in the ass that he would have felt compelled to use it. Raymond’s not going to kill Vincent. He’s known that all along. Raymond’s promise to his dying mother did not include shooting her nephew on afternoon TV. No matter what the guy did.

After a while Raymond takes a chance and leaves the toilet stall and goes back to the studio.

Vincent and Maslow are gone. In their place are two tech-crew grunts making small adjustments. The first two rows are marked “Reserved,” which is where—if there were any justice in this world—Raymond would be sitting. He takes a seat in the next row up, close enough to the stage so that when Vincent sits in the Chandler chair, Vincent can see Raymond—but only if and when Raymond chooses to be seen. Also he can easily make his way to the stage if Chandler decides, as he sometimes does, to invite an audience member to sit with the guests. You don’t want a lot of steps to fall down with the whole world watching.

Eventually, the crowd rushes in, like animals driven to slaughter, grabbing for the best seats, musical chairs for adults. You’d think they were going to some stadium-seating headbanger rock concert instead of a dull prime-time blabfest.

Raymond looks up to see one of Chandler’s yuppie slaves ushering the same black woman who was standing behind him in line to one of the reserved seats, directly in front of his. They must have a special place set aside for the Welfare Queen for a Day. As she sits down, the old woman smiles at Raymond, who puts all his creativity into giving her an even dirtier look than before. Does she think they’re old friends? Even the baby seems to recognize him, and twists around in the old lady’s arms, trying to crawl back and fling herself into Raymond’s lap. Naturally it’s the white man who’s got to make himself small, to assume the fetal position to keep from having his jeans drooled on by the infant, whose name—Dineesha—Grandma says over and over. You be still, Dineesha, you mind, Dineesha, you watch and see what happens, baby.