BOOM (7 page)

He knocked on the room door
and waited for an answer. Nothing. He tried again and when there was no answer
he took out his access card and swiped it through the door reader. The little
light flickered green and he entered the room. His card gained him access to
every room in the hotel, one of the perks of being the handyman.

The room was empty and Punchy
was relieved no one was renting it. It became a challenge when guests were in
the room. They always began talking really fast and it became awkward when they
learned of his disabilities. They would nod slowly after reading the small note
card Punchy carried with him and then look at him sadly. After that, they left
him the hell alone. Which he was grateful for.

He went to the bathroom and
pulled the leaky pipes. After about twenty minutes of work, he was finished and
the pipes were sealed again. He cleaned up the excess water and left the room.

*****

There was someone standing at
the door to room 532. Punchy rounded the corner and was surprised to see a man
leaning beside the door. The man was dressed in a polo shirt and dress slacks
and was reading a magazine. Punchy stood before the stranger and made some
noise by arranging his tool belt.

The man looked up from his
magazine and said something. After seven years of being deaf, Punchy had gotten
skilled at reading lips, but the stranger was talking to fast and now seeing
that Punchy wasn’t responding to his words began to move towards the handyman.

Punchy reached into his back
pocket and brought out the info card. He handed it to the man who looked at it
warily and then read it:

Hello. My name is Punchy
and I am the handyman for the Liberty Hotel. If I do not respond to your
questions it is because I am a deaf mute. If you need to communicate with me,
please talk slowly and I will be able to read your lips.

Thank you & have a
nice day.

 The man handed the card back
to Punchy and then leaned in really close. This time Punchy understood what was
being said:

“What the fuck do you want?”

The man’s breath smelled of
cigarettes and stale liquor. Punchy took a step back.
What was this guy’s problem?
He brought out the service request and presented it to the man, who looked
it over and then looked back at the handyman.

“Wait here.”

The man went into the suite
and closed the door. Punchy looked around the hall at the other rooms but no
one else was up and about. The man came back out and waved Punchy in.

There were four other men in
the suite. They were sitting around the oak coffee table in the living area.
They had raided the suite’s mini-bar, downing the brown liquid in the clear
tumblers and then refilling them again. A large order of Chinese takeout sat on
the table and the men stuffed their mouths with Lo Mein noodles and fried rice
between sips from their tumblers.

Three of the men did not even
look up as Punchy entered but the fourth did. This one was the oldest by far,
maybe in his sixties, with slicked back grey hair. Punchy noticed him
immediately, not because of his age, but for the exquisite gray three piece
suit the man wore. The others were young, in their late 20s, and dressed much
the same way as the man who guarded the door was: polo shirts and slacks or
jeans.

The older man addressed the
guard.

“Were you rude, Russell?”
Punchy watched their lips move.

“Maybe,” Russell replied, “It
don’t matter none anyways. He’s retarded. He can’t hear or talk.”

Everyone chuckled at
Russell’s insult. Everyone except the older gentleman.

“That’s not funny, assholes.”
The laughter quieted immediately. “Just because he is deaf mute does not make a
man stupid.” He glared at his younger accomplices, daring each one in turn to
challenge him on this statement. When none did, he continued. “Every man has
his weakness,” the older man looked at Punchy, “and every man has his
strengths.”

“You came to fix the
disposal?” the man asked. Punchy nodded. “Good. I apologize for my younger
compatriots. They wouldn’t know where to piss unless someone told them.” Punchy
remained still.

The man motioned to the
kitchen. “Please, if you would, fix our garbage disposal.” Punchy nodded again
and headed for the kitchen. He began pulling tools from his belt and taking
apart the disposal, all the while keeping one eye on the hotel’s guests.

Eventually he learned all
their names. The older gentleman was Weston. He was obviously the leader of the
group as the others took their cues from him. The younger ones were: Russell,
the doorman who was back outside the suite, Billy, who seemed to talk a lot
even when no one listened, Crow, who was quiet and only talked when he needed
to, and Hayden, who kept flicking a butterfly knife open and closed over and
over again and did not seem particularly bright.

Most of the talk in the room
centered around horse racing. It seemed Weston liked to bet on the horses and
they were glancing at the forms, trying to pick the winners. No one paid any
mind to Punchy which made it easier for him to eavesdrop while he worked at the
counter. He was curious. Who the hell were these guys? They were not the usual
travelers the hotel catered too. And what was up with having someone stand
watch in the hall?

Billy stepped to the bar to
pour Weston another drink. “Pop’s Galore is the favorite in the fifth, boss.
But the betting odds are on Groovy Gravy at 8-1.” He handed the drink to Weston
and plopped back down into one of the plush chairs.

Weston shook his head.
“Vincent told me Gravy hasn’t run good since early June. The inside is on
Ricochet to win. That’s the bet.”

“What inside?”

“My inside,” Weston answered,
“and my inside is never wrong. Take Ricochet in the fifth, Stormy Roses in the
sixth, and Sleeping In Sunday in the last. Call them in.”

Billy dialed a number on his
cell phone and went out to the balcony. Hayden continued flicking his knife.
Punchy sat the disposal in the sink. He needed to take the top plate off to
check the teeth and see what had stopped the disposal from working. The sink
was a good place to work because usually water and nasty grime spilled out. He
reached for an Allen wrench and started removing screws, all the while watching
the living area.

Weston turned to Hayden.
“Hayden.”

The young man kept flicking
the knife, twisting it and making it dance open and swing shut in a blur.

“Hayden.”

Hayden was absorbed, looking
at a spot on the wall while the knife twirled over and over.

Weston leaned forward. “HAYDEN!”

The loud voice made Hayden
jump and the blade sliced open one of his fingers. “AAHH! What the hell,
Weston? What did you do that for?”

Hayden glared at the old man
who calmly returned the look.

“Something wrong?” Weston
asked. Hayden slowly shook his head and grabbed one of the restaurant napkins
to cover his finger. “Good. Did you order the girl some food?”

Hayden nodded. Weston turned
to Crow. “Mr. Crow, will you make sure our guest has her lunch?”

Reddish water began to spill
from the disposal as Punchy removed the plate. He watched the water pool into
the sink and slowly disappear down the drain. For a brief second, the water
returned him to the cold locker room and the drops of blood collecting in the
sink as he rinsed his bruised face off. He shook away the memory quickly and
continued his task. Punchy worked his fingers into the disposal and began to
clean the teeth.

He watched as Crow grabbed
two containers of Chinese and opened the door to the bedroom. There was a young
woman sitting on the edge of the bed, crying silently. Crow towered over her
and she looked at the floor. He sat the containers on the bed with a small pack
of utensils. As he walked from the room, the girl looked out at Punchy. She saw
him staring. Her lips moved and the handyman could barely make out what she was
saying. But he knew.

Please.

Crow closed the bedroom door
and returned to his seat on the sofa.

Punchy’s fingers gripped
something wet and solid in the disposal. He reached in and pulled out a mangled
mess of grapefruit, coffee grounds, and something else: a twisted piece of
plastic that turned out to be a driver’s license.

Punchy turned the license
around in his fingers. One half of it had been twisted up by the disposal but
the other half, the part with the picture, was readable. It belonged to a woman
and Punchy could see it wasn’t the girl in the bedroom. Where the one on the
bed had short blond hair and was college aged, the picture woman was a bit older
with long black hair and wore glasses.

Punchy could make out the
first name. Meredith. This license belonged to Meredith. She obviously was not
in the suite. So where was she? And why was her license in the disposal? Punchy
looked up to see Weston watching him.

“Everything okay, friend?”
Weston asked, his lips moving in perfect fashion.

Punchy nodded and reached
into the sink. He held up the mangled grapefruit mess. Weston nodded.

“Russell ate that shit,”
Billy quipped as he stepped back into the suite. “He screwed the damn thing
up.”

Weston nodded, still watching
Punchy. “I’m sure it was very
accidental.”

What the hell is this?

Deftly Punchy slid the
license into his pocket and then threw the pulped fruit into the trash. He put
the disposal together as quickly as possible. The men began talking about
hiring a car for the afternoon, and who was going to stay at the suite. It turned
out it was Billy’s turn to hang around and the youth groused loudly about the
bum deal.

“I don’t know why we just
can’t get the money today. You said Vladimir wanted the girl pretty badly,”
Billy whined.

Weston turned to him
seething. “Shut your stupid mouth, you useless little worm.” Billy recoiled as
if slapped hard in the face. Punchy acted like he did not see or understand
this exchange. He slapped the disposal back under the sink and tightened the
fittings. Weston was looking at him again.

He flipped the switch on the
disposal and the machine churned to life. He could feel the heavy vibration
through the counter and knew it would work fine now. As long as no one tried to
dispose of any more licenses.

Quickly, Punchy cleaned his
tools and stuck them back into the belt. Billy came to the kitchen and grabbed
a juice box from the fridge, not giving the handyman a second glance. Punchy
turned to the other men in the living area. Weston raised his eyebrows in
anticipation and Punchy gave him the thumbs up.

The garbage disposal was good
to go.

Weston waved him over. Slowly
Punchy made his way into the living room as Weston stood. The older man was
reaching into his inside jacket pocket. Punchy felt himself stiffen but forced
himself to remain calm. Weston reached out and shook hands with Punchy.

“Thank you so much, good sir.
The Liberty is everything we were told it would be.” The old man was staring
into Punchy’s eyes, studying him. Punchy forced a grin and nodded his thanks.
Then he turned and left the suite.

Russell stared at him in the
hallway. Punchy watched from the corner of his eye as the guard mouthed the
word
retard
but he pretended not to see. He walked around the corner to
the elevator. Only then did he look at what Weston had palmed him during the
handshake.

He looked down at a crisply
folded $100 bill.

*****

When Punchy returned to the
basement, he took off the heavy tool belt and slammed it on the workbench. He
leaned against the table, his brow furrowed in thought. He knew the girl was in
some kind of trouble and that Weston and his crew were bad news. He just didn’t
know what to do.

Do I call the cops? But
what if I am totally off here? What if I’m wrong? I could lose my job. And I
was lucky to find this one.
Somehow getting the cops involved seemed like a
bad idea. It would be him against them, five against one and his one was
serving with half a brain. No, they would be able to win out against him with
the cops involved. He was sure of that.

I can’t help her,
he
thought to himself.
I’m no good. Can’t do anything. I’m just a handyman.

He sighed deeply and his body
suddenly seemed to grow very small in the dark basement.
I can’t help her. I
am a retard.
He had never felt so helpless in all his life. He knew
something was not right, but couldn’t figure out how to help. He shook his
head.

The elevator doors opened and
one of the maids hurried in. Punchy watched her as she marched up and handed him
a slip of paper. The maid looked with distaste at the handyman and his
surroundings. It was another service request. This one was an emergency in room
301. A pipe had burst in the bathroom. Another faulty O-ring. Punchy nodded at
the maid and she hurried back onto the elevator.