A Naked Singularity: A Novel (56 page)

“Perhaps—”

“Let’s not talk about that trial anymore Toomie, agreed?”

“Okay,” he said then looked around sheepishly only finally meeting my eyes when I conspicuously stared at his swiveling head. “Last week you said that once you had completed the trial, you would be available to fully discuss Jalen Kingg’s appeal. I believe the agreement was that I would assist you with Hurtado in return for a promise to reconsider your refusal to work on King because of the Skittles.”

“Right, an agreement I fully complied with. You helped me and I gave you a promise. What more do you want from me? I held up my end.”

“Fine, I misspoke. My help was in exchange not just for a mere promise but for the actual reconsideration.”

“All I can go by is the language you used. Precision in language is the most critical of human endeavors. If I were to ignore your plain language and provide actual reconsideration in exchange for your help I would be indirectly encouraging future sloppiness in your language, greater sin of which I am not aware. I consider you my portly friend and I could never do that to such a friend, meaning one who’s portly.”

“Well then, aside from our agreement, you did in fact make a promise. If you did not now actually reconsider you would be breaking that promise. What are your feelings on that?”

“Well, putting aside for the moment my admitted sophistry, what is the status of my promise in light of your dismal performance on Hurtado?”

“Dismal? The current state of the law is such that—”

“Don’t worry Toom, I just like to see your facial and other nonverbal reactions. You really think I would abandon you the way that Ledo bastard abandoned us? After everything we’ve been through together? Don’t ever forget that promise I made to you decades ago in the sweaty jungles of Vietnam as you lay dying from VC lead in your gut. Remember it?”

“No, but as I recall you placed it there in a friendly fire mishap.”

“I don’t think that’s accurate but truthfully that whole period was a drug-induced haze for me so you may be right. Anyway the reason I was calling you yesterday was my cousin.”

“Cousin?”

“Yeah I have this cousin who came here from Colombia about a year ago. Only I recently found out he came in illegally from Mexico and into Texas. Anyway he dressed some van up like a giant hot dog and started selling them.”

“He was selling vans that had been decorated to look like oversized frankfurters?”

“No he was selling hot dogs out of the van, its weiner-like appearance serving as a kind of automotive advertisement.”

“Got it.”

“Anyway he got arrested for selling them without a license.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Exactly.”

“INS?”

“Yup, there anything I can do?”

“He entered illegally?”

“Apparently.”

“I don’t know much about this area of the law, but my guess is there’s not much you can do, they just remand them and initiate deportation proceedings right?”

“Yeah but the question is can you fight it in anyway?”

“I doubt it because the bottom line is he has no arguable right to be here.”

“I know but c’mon there has to be something.”

“Most just come back, I believe, although re-entry does constitute a federal crime.”

“And he’ll certainly never be granted legal entry.”

“Correct.”

“So now what?”

“Well unless you’re going to break him out of the facility where he’s being held.”

“Great idea, there’s no other choice. You in?”

“In what?”

“I can’t do it alone for Chrissakes there’s bound to be
some
security. How about a deal? You help me break my cousin out and I’ll promise to help you spring any relatives of yours who may be incarcerated in the future.”

“You’ll promise or you’ll actually help?”

“Now you’re thinking Toom, maybe you are smart after all.”

“I’ll check on this INS thing for you but I’m fairly certain there’s nothing one can do.”

“How about more than
one
?”

“I’ll check. As for Kingg there’s a bit of a problem.”

“What is it?”

“Twenty days.”

“How many?”

“Twenty.”

“Good Lord.”

“How far along on your point are you?”

“I can get it done Toom. It’s just going to be brutal. How about you?”

“I’ll be fine. But one of us has to go down there very soon, this weekend at the latest.”

“Not one of us, me, right? It’s my point.”

“I suppose.”

“You’re right too, it has to be this weekend in case something comes up.”

“There’s a flight out of Newark Friday morning, I checked. We can set up attorney visits for both Saturday and Sunday and you can catch an early Monday morning flight back. I talked to Pat Haggerty, she’s in charge of finance and she says they’ll pay for it all.”

“Anything else?”

“That’s pretty much everything.”

“I commend you for your thoroughness. Why can’t we both go?”

“I have a wedding this weekend.”

“Congratulations but you don’t invite me?”

“I’m not getting married, I’m a guest.”

“Good point.”

“So you’ll go?”

“Well I won’t really know anybody except you, but sure I’ll go.”

“Not to the wedding, to Alabama.”

“Oh, sure, always wanted to see the resplendent beaches of Alabama.”

“You’re going to Atmore, no beaches.”

“You always screw me Toomie. Man I’ve got a lot to do before I get on that plane, expect a lot of late night calls.”

“That’s fine. I believe I’m in the mood for some coffee, would you like to join me?”

“No, I’m never again leaving this office.”

“Well I’m going to get some, would you like me to bring you back some form of beverage?”

“Yes.”

“Coffee?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“I’m easy, just get me one of those I think it’s called a fatslap-push-push-in-the-bush-consigliere-capillary-freezy-supremicious or something, extra non-decaf please. Now when the guy pours the espresso into the foamy milk please make sure that he pierces the smallest possible area of the upper foam. The result should be akin to a brown pin prick on a sea of white. Moreover, when he pours the espresso in he should do so at such a deliberate rate that the espresso and the milk, which incidentally should be foamed to no more than a seventy-five percent congealment status, will not mix but rather will form two distinct levels featuring two different colors, with a great deal of wavy quantum action taking place at the border where they conjoin. Once that’s done I shall like a fair amount of cinnamon sprinkled atop of the now pierced milk. Now when I say a fair amount of cinnamon I do not mean that the entire surface area should be covered. Rather the appearance of the cinnamon should be not unlike that of a distant nebula, such appearance with which I’m sure you’re familiar. Remember, a cinnamon nebula is the goal. A cinnebula if you will. As for sugar, enough should be added to combat the inherent bitterness of espresso coffee but not so much added that it overpowers all the other competing flavors the beverage brings to the table. Also do not stir the beverage, as such a stirring would undoubtedly compromise the dual-level system I just mentioned. Instead add the sugar at a rate where each individual sugar granule will have its component molecules sufficiently bombarded by surrounding molecules, traveling at a high rate of speed due to the extreme heat of the beverage, as to occasion the dissolving of the granule before it reaches the bottom of the cup. Lastly, please take care to walk the drink over with minimal bipedal concussion so as to not disrupt the dual-level system. Thanks man.”

“I’m just going downstairs to the gentleman with the newsstand so do you want from the orange-lidded dispenser or the brown?”

“Brown.”

Sweet silence.

“Hey remember me?”

“Sure, Derrin.”

“Darius.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, what’s up?”

“Sorry about your case, I heard what happened. That’s bullshit man.”

“Happens.”

“Anyway, everything turn out okay with DeLeon?”

“Not unless you know where he is.”

“What do you mean? Isn’t he still in?”

“No I got him out so he could be a CI but then he disappeared.”

“Disappeared how?”

“How do you disappear? I guess you stop returning the DA’s phone calls, miss a couple of meetings, then are not home when they come looking for you.”

“So he’s going to get—”

“Screwed he’s going to get, if they ever find him.”

“I heard, just a rumor, that you tried to punch Troie Liszt in the face.”

“You did?”

“Yeah.”

“And what happened?”

“He ducked just in time and you made a hole in his wall.”

“Amazing.”

“Is it true?”

“Somewhat.”

“What happened?”

“Actually he came after me, throwing punches with the worst of intentions after learning I was unwittingly sleeping with his wife.”

“Wife? I didn’t even know Liszt was married.”

“You’re surprised? Imagine mine.”

“But the hole.”

“Sure, that was made by me trying to get away from him. Notice how the shape of the hole conforms perfectly with the shape of my head.”

“Really?”

“I have to go to court now.”

“Okay I’ll get going.”

“Thanks. Listen tell anyone you want about what Liszt did, but leave out the part about his wife, that’s touchy stuff.”

“Sure.”

He left.

“Here you go.”

Coffee.

“Thanks, Toom.”

“I heard the strangest thing coming up here.”

“What’s that?”

“Did you swing a bat at Liszt’s head, miss him, and make a hole in his wall?”

“That’s generally true but it’s being taken out of context.”

“What possible context could justify trying to hit Liszt in the head with a bat?”

“Well what you’re not being told is that, at the time I swung that bat, Liszt was coming at me with a beer bottle he had just broken over his desk.”

“What?”

“Don’t look at me. Something about the Yankees’ third starter being better than the ace of the Mets’ staff, I don’t know. You’ll agree I had to defend myself right?”

“Be serious Casi, what happened?”

“No, this is horrible!”

“What?”

“You don’t bring me a little snack to go with this coffee?”

“Sorry, should we get together tonight to discuss Kingg?”

“We should and shall.”

“Six?”

“Yes.”

“Here?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, I’ll see you then.”

“Yes.”

And he left.

And I stayed and nothing happened.

Until Dane came back and just sat there. Minutes passed.

“You going to say anything?” I finally asked.

“I heard you pulled a knife on Liszt. That’s good. It’s good for you to practice violence, which will be a necessary component of our heist.”

“I never
pulled
, as you say, a knife on Liszt.”

“Gun?”

“No for Christ, what are you possibly talking about?”

“That’s disappointing.”

“Besides, whether violence is or is not a necessary component of this fictional heist we’ve talked about is personally irrelevant because, as I’ve already indicated to you today, I am not going to be a participant.”

“I’ll tell you Casi, this constant vacillation is entirely unbecoming and frankly beneath you. You have to decide, this instant, who and what you are. Are you saint, sinner, or something in between, because nothing’s worse than in between. To disappear into the lumpy, undefined center when the lure is so clearly found at the edges. No one
aspires
to mediocrity. Mediocrity withers and dies with nary a notice; its practitioners rendered mute by their race to the middle. Sinner or Saint, that is your question. Although, to be fair, the question is so easily and intuitively answerable that it should hold little of your interest. Here’s what I mean. What do you see, what do you feel, when you look inside yourself? Is burgeoning Sainthood in there as best you can tell? Do you sense a placid patience, a humble acceptance of your inherent unworthiness? Do you feel a serene resignation that your base wants will go unquenched? And a gratitude that it is so? Do you somehow
just know
that your life was meant to unfold solely in the service of God and others, to the neglect, even detriment, of your own well-being? If these saintly elements don’t reveal themselves to you in response to your inward gaze don’t despair, at least not yet. This doesn’t necessarily mean your relegation to a brief life of anonymous toil. Because I’ll bet when you peer inside you see something else. I bet you see an impatient anger that threatens to engulf your very being. Anger that the stupid can rise, covering the talented in their wake, with only negligible dissenting cries. Anger that the sons and daughters of Dionysus are allowed to continually gorge on the blood and flesh of the cowering weak. Anger that some can drape their hearts in black robes as they toss another human away like a cumbersome bag of bones, can lock your cousin, your own blood, in a cage like a laboratory chimp. Anger that all this occurs against the unforgiving backdrop of never relenting time, the passage of which slowly robs you of your power to wield a remedy, shrinking you before every watchful eye. You feel that incipient rage right? Good because the first step is not some bullshit, new-agey acceptance that the anger exists. The first step is to bypass that altogether, pinch your nose, shut your eyes, and jump into a pool of that simmering fury. The frigid jolt on your skin will shake you alive and impel you towards action. It’s this very action I now offer you and what do I get in return? Indecision.”

“These observations might carry a scintilla of weight if you were proposing we rob an armored car, a bank, or a police evidence room. Instead you propose we rip off people who are themselves outlaws, maybe even subscribing to the same ethos you now extol.”

“The money we’re going to take is generated by the War On Drugs—that hypocritical, mass-produced mindfuck currently lining everybody’s pockets but ours. Besides this is just a first step. We didn’t choose this setup, it fell in our laps. Nonetheless, while planning this heist we’re going to be able to forget everything else through the thrill that comes from exhausting our abilities. When we do it, our bodies will be electrified by our naked displays of will. And when we’ve succeeded, you will not only
know
that you are one badass fuck, but you will finally and truly be free. The money will liberate you and give you power. Use that power however you wish. At the moment I’m weighing taking my share, going to Washington Heights, and using this tennis machine I have to shoot hundred dollar bills into the midday sky. The human roaches will have to flood the streets and scavenge for green paper, exposing the rotting foundation beneath society’s crumbling facade. How entertaining. Can you picture it, the beauty, the statement? What can you say about art where the medium is human bodies and their inanimate captors? But I do get your point. Armored cars and banks would be better. That can come later, after this first step. Meanwhile what do
you
plan to do afterwards? Because you said you were in.”