From the Memoirs of a Non-Enemy Combatant: A Novel (3 page)

His hands.

His small, dexterous hands.

His hands were just like mine. And in his hands were menus, replicas of the giant board he wore like armor. “Take one, take one,” he said, rapidly. “Take one.” And then, “Please.” This was his job, to stand in front of the Sovereign Diner distributing menus. Had he come here hoping for something better? Of course he had. What he got served, however, was hard-boiled reality, the city’s ruthlessness, and he had to wear it every day, bearing the brunt over his shoulders as a sign.

PANCAKE SPECIAL $4.95
.

I took one of his menus and at the next corner threw it away with a hundred others. Bryant Park had suddenly lost its appeal. Instead, I went back to Ludlow Street to spend more time with Olya.

Look at how far she had come. The beauty and generosity this little Polska had was bursting from every invisible pore! She shared
her Icelandic yogurt and showed me all of the cable channels. We talked about movies, fashion, drive, ambition. She promised to take me with her to the week’s castings and introduce me to other models and designers, with the intention of getting me a job on a show somewhere. When we retired to the bed, she kept me up, tired as I was, in order to practice her English language skills. She was preparing to take a TOEFL exam and planned to study at Baruch College in Manhattan. Olya read to me the opening pages of
The Catcher in the Rye.
I had read the book in high school, but hearing it through Olya’s Polish accent, with her poorly timed inflections, gave it a new place in my heart. “If
you really
want to hear
about
it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know
is where
I was born, and
what
my lousy childhood was like, and
how
my parents were occupied
and all
before they had me…”

I wanted to make love to her then, but I am not an animal. You see, I respected the boundaries of our new friendship. A girl who would share her bed with a total stranger didn’t deserve to be taken advantage of. Plus, she had a new boyfriend, Erik, who she talked about constantly.

I had no delusions. In a city that could reduce a virile young man to dressing up as a menu on Forty-second Street, pleading, “Take one, take one, please, take one,” I understood the force I was up against. One needed friends much more than lovers and enemies. This city was cutthroat. This city, crossed with the exclusivity of the fashion industry, was a closed network to new talent. This city wasn’t hard on its newcomers—it was goddamn relentless. Don’t believe me, take a look outside the Sovereign Diner, and surely a walking, talking menu will be there—feast your eyes! Under that menu is a human being whose English is good enough
to have any job, but too many obstacles stand in his way, poor menu. Sure, the financial skyscrapers, the sprawling bridges, the underground love tunnels, the people in their park-side penthouses—these were physical proof of the impossible. Manhattan was a testament to everything being out of God’s hands and within Man’s. Dreams could be realized on these streets. Olya was hot smoking proof. But mostly, dreams were crushed in this city (menu man prime example). Ninety-nine percent of the time.

I knew a sign when I saw it, all right.

How did I end up in No Man’s Land? It has been two weeks since the Overwhelming Event of May 30, 2006. That’s right, just two weeks ago I was back in Brooklyn at work on a new line of women’s wear out of my studio in the toothpick factory. (It really was a former toothpick factory.) My latest collection was to be bought and sold in Barneys alongside Philip Tang 2.0, Comme des Garçons, Vivienne Westwood. Gil Johannessen had called my collection a “bildungsroman” in the pages of
W
magazine. A compliment. I had finally broken into Bryant Park after six seasons in New York spent struggling to get editors and buyers to show up at my showcases. I had come of age as a designer, and I was ready for the big leagues. Then, faster than you can say Sunni insurgents, it was all taken away from me. Bandits, Homeland Security’s henchmen, came bursting through my door in the middle of the night, ripped me from artistic slumber, and told me very explicitly to put my hands behind my head, and that I better pray to Allah that there’s no one else hiding in my shit hole, motherfucker.

I’ve asked for a lawyer. They keep delaying. One thing they’re very good at in No Man’s Land is delaying. I’ve shouted it from my cell, frantic; I’ve cursed it for days in a row—“Bring me a lawyer!” Still nothing happens.

My cell is approximately six feet by eight feet. I measured it heel to toe. The walls are steel mesh, and my bed is a metal plank affixed to one side. There is a barred window that brings natural light, though the outer pane is opaque. There is a squatting-style toilet—an Arab toilet—and a sink built low to the ground.

I am administered comfort items. One standard-issue blanket, one towel, one rubber exercise mat (my mattress), one inch-long toothbrush, one travel-size tube of toothpaste (Colgate), one roll of toilet paper, one plastic water bottle (Freedom Springs), one set of flip-flops for the shower. I receive religious paraphernalia: one standard-issue Qur’an (mine is in English; it once belonged to a D. Hicks,
¹
his name written on the inside flap like a child’s), one foam prayer rug, one white skullcap, one plastic vial of oil (patchouli). These items are completely useless because, as I keep telling them, I’m no Muslim! I was baptized a Catholic, and I’m barely that anymore.

The man who guards me from 0600 to 1800 hours is from Fort Worth, Texas. I had never before met a Texan. His name is Win. I’ve wondered if that’s his real name or if he’s given me a nom de guerre. Win.

In here I go by a nom de guerre of my own: Detainee No. 227.

Win wants to be a lawyer someday. He’s still quite young, only twenty, with an associate’s degree in economics. His plans are to finish college back in Fort Worth and then use what’s left of his
GI scholarship to go on to law school, studying the Constitution and arguing cases in mock trials.

“Mock trials?” I said.

“Yeah, mock trials. Fake ones,” he said. “Something they do in law school to prep you for the real courtroom. There’s a judge, two counselors, just like in real life, and you argue the case to the best of your ability. Sure it’s fake, but you don’t know what the outcome will be. No one knows, and so that’s what makes them seem real. No one goes to jail or anything. At the end of the day, everyone gets to go home.”

“What kinds of cases?”

“Every kind, I imagine. Criminal cases, murders, civil suits, you name it.”

“And each man gets a fair hearing?”

“Oh sure. But it’s still fake. No one really did anything in mock court. It’s practice.”

“I’ve never been to Texas,” I told Win.

“It ain’t nothin’, really. Though there are a lot of other jarheads here who’ll tell you different.”

“That’s what they call Texans?”

“That’s what they call marines. Jarheads, grunts, leathernecks. Texans are Texans.”

“Leathernecks.”

“No one says leatherneck anymore.”

The man who relieves Win at 1800 is named Cunningham. He’s from a place called Government Mountain, Georgia. Cunningham’s not much of a talker. He’s a true jarhead, high and tight. He sits in his chair with his feet up on my cell door for the most part and rocks back and forth on its hind legs, reading a
magazine. Everything I do gets recorded in a logbook. Cunningham keeps the logbook at his side on a little table. He writes down whatever I do at night. The time I sleep. The time I eat. If I take a squat, this goes in the logbook.

He is very good at pretending I’m not here. He can go for hours like this, flipping through magazine after magazine.

Just the other night, while I was lying on my bed watching Cunningham read a
Maxim
, I caught a glimpse of my past on the cover. It was Olya. My darling Olya, who once shared a bed with me so openly and who would remain a dear friend over the years. I couldn’t believe it was her. Olya has walked the runway for every major designer—Marc Jacobs, Carolina Herrera, Lanvin in Paris, Burberry in London—and now here she was spread-eagle on the hood of a flaming Pontiac in a cheap patent-leather bikini. “The Hot Rod Issue” boasted a most offensive cover font. It’s been months since we last spoke, not because of anything that happened, but because I had been extremely busy with my collection before the Overwhelming Event landed me here. Cunningham turned the magazine on its side to look at a two-page spread, which I found especially irritating.

“May I take a look at that when you’re finished?” I asked him.

“Nope.”

He continued to look at the pictures, ignoring me. As I said, he’s very good at that.

I stood and went for a leak, knowing very well that Cunningham would have to stop reading and jot it down in the logbook. Which he did. But now I ached to get a better look at Olya. He had to share it with me!
He must
. I paced my cell back and forth, trying not to stare too hard at the magazine. Cunningham ignored
me as best he could, but soon enough I got him to pay attention. He let out a suggestive sigh.

“You know, I know her,” I said to him.

“Who?” he said.

“Her. Olya. The girl on the cover.”

“You don’t know her,” he said, as if it was totally impossible for a man like me to have known a girl like Olya.

“Of course I do. I’m a designer of women’s wear in New York. Olya is a friend. She’s even worked for me on several occasions.”

“Bullshit.”

“We’re friends,” I said.

This made him laugh.

“You really don’t know who I am, do you?”

“Sure I do,” he said. “You’re a designer of women’s wear in New York. Now go back to where you were before on the bed.”

“You don’t believe me,” I said.

“Go lie back down.”

I did as I was told.

Cunningham noted our exchange in the logbook.

“I want that book when I get out of here,” I said.

“When you get out of here it’ll be my gift to you.”

Some time went by when I tried to think of nothing.

“What’s she like?” Cunningham finally asked me.

“Who?” I said.

“Olya.”

“Ah, yes. Olya. She’s very beautiful.”

“What else?”

“Lovely personality.” I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

“What does she look like for real?” he said.

“When I knew her her breasts weren’t quite as full. They must have matured.”

“What else?”

“What do you want to know?”

“Did you fuck her?”

“I refuse to answer that.”

“You see. You don’t know her. You’re a liar.”

“Just because I didn’t fuck her doesn’t mean I don’t know her.” I waited, and then I admitted, “We slept together. For a week, actually. But nothing ever happened.”

“Let me guess,” he said. “Because she didn’t have a dick.”

“Because we were friends. I don’t expect you to understand.”

“I know what I’d do if she were my friend.”

“That’s the very reason you can’t be friends with a girl like that.”

“Is that so?” he said. “I know what I’d do. Have her peel open my banana.”

“You would.”

“Then I’d look under the hood. Take my time. Rev her up. Check out her headlights.”

“You lost me. You were talking about a piece of fruit?”

Cunningham went back to flipping through his
Maxim
. I sat back down on the bed and tried to think of something else, to no avail. It was now very important to me that Cunningham believe I knew her. I can’t explain why, but I needed him to acknowledge that I was telling the truth.

“I can tell you her real name,” I said, surprising even myself.

“What?”

“If you’re so interested in Olya, maybe you’d like to know her real name.”

“It’s not Olya?”

I shook my head no.

“What is it, then?”

“You won’t believe me anyway.”

“Fuck you. Tell me.”

“You’ll only think I’m lying.”

“Okay. I believe you. Okay? I believe you were some big shit in New York. Now spill it.”