The Last New Year (7 page)

Zee:
So you reckon they've shot missiles at it?
To try to stop it?

Me:
Probably. That's what they do in the movies.

Zee:
You think the president made a speech?
Something
inspirational about the American spirit prevailing against incredible odds?
Coming together in this time of tragedy?

Me:
Hm. Maybe. What about nukes? You think they've tried to nuke it?

Zee:
They'd
shoot a nuke at it sideways?

Me:
Or
drop it next to it.
Real dangerous mission, for a tough but
likable maverick of a pilot.
Someone with a good
jawline.
Get in a jet and sidle up to the wall and drop it and say
something like, "Eat this, you fiery son of a bitch!"

Zee:
You
watch too many movies, mate.

Me:
Yeah.

Zee:
Or
not enough of the right ones.

Me:
See, that's
always
bugged me about you. What is your
obsession with a movie being "good"?
What's the
criteria
? Who says
it's
"good"?
You?
Is it good because you say it is or do you say it is
because it's good? I'd like to know, because I think a movie where a likable
maverick called the fire wall—

Zee:
Phen
—

Me:
FIRE WALL. Called it a son of a bitch and dropped a nuke on it would be really
good.

Zee:
If
you say so.

Me:
Well that's it for my ideas.

Zee:
What
about a big fire extinguisher?

Me:
Maybe it's God. I mean, this obviously isn't a naturally occurring event.
Unless I missed a very important special on The Weather Channel.

Zee:
They
had a scientist on the news earlier. He just kind of sat there looking pale and
kept saying he didn't know anything.

Me:
I
guess he picked the short straw.

Zee:
It's
a pretty good argument for the existence of the G-word, actually. It fits His
M.O.

Me:
I
wonder what we did to piss him
off?

Zee:
Gays,
probably.

Me:
That's a shitty reason to kill everybody.

Zee:
No
doubt. Ok, this door's sticky. One sec.
Hrnk
!

We spill out into the alley. The air is cold and I
immediately regret not putting on a coat. I listen for a moment, but don't hear
anything out of the ordinary, except for the absence of cars and pedestrians.
For some reason I can hear a lot of birds yammering away at each other. There
is a light scent of smoke in the air.

"Doesn't look too bad," I say to Zee. He nods
grimly. I start to walk toward the street but he pokes my arm, points his thumb
over his shoulder down the alley.

I glance in that direction and see a figure lying face down
on the pavement next to the dumpster, arms and legs at odd angles. I look at
Zee. He shrugs with resignation and we carefully walk over to the person.

"Hey," I say, not holding out much hope, "Are
you ok?" There's no response, but there is something in the way the figure
is situated there on the ground that makes me certain no answer is forthcoming.

When we get close I recognize the robe and bad haircut. I
saw it earlier in the apartment across from my bedroom. It's Ape-Head.

I kneel down and turn him over. It's definitely him. Blank
eyes stare up from the simian face, the features are squashed and off center as
always. Though, in death, there is a certain relaxing of features that makes
him look almost normal, like part of the ugliness was what he carried with him
when he was alive. This makes me incredibly sad somehow.

"Oh, Ape, what have you done?" Zee mutters. He
shakes his head and turns away, arms crossed over his chest.

"I guess he jumped." I say. I can see above the
open window, the curtain reaching out and fluttering in empty space.

"Not much of a fall, only five stories."

"It was enough, apparently." I look at Ape's wide
eyes and feel like I should do something. I reach out to close them, but Zee
grabs my arm.

"Don't be melodramatic, mate. Let's go."

So we leave him there.
Poor dead guy in an
alley.
Ugly in life, less so in death, but I always felt
a kind of kinship with him.
Across the divide, both of
us living our lives behind panes of glass.
He would watch the news
obsessively, and I always imagined he was one of those conspiracy nuts,
watching out for us against whatever unknown and unknowable terror lay just
below the surface of normalcy. Looks like when the unknowable terror finally
showed itself it was too much for him, or maybe the fulfillment of a lifelong
obsession made continuing his existence a useless notion. Or maybe he just
wanted to be done with things.

Zee and I walk back out of the alley toward the street.
Garbage in slow drifts to either side us as we trudge along, the joy sapped
from our journey for the moment. I hear the sound of a car horn a few blocks
away.

"I wonder why we're not freaking out
more?
"
I ask. It's not so cold now that I'm getting used to it.

Zee grunts. "I don't know why you're not. Me, I figure
we all have a last day coming. I always assumed I would face it alone. Having
it
be
everyone else's last day makes it less horrible
somehow."

I guess that makes sense. We emerge from the alley, Zee a
few steps ahead on the street. He stops and looks back, his eyes bright.

"Christ
forgive
me, but he
does look like an ape."

Then a car smashes into him and he is thrown 30 feet down
the street in a ragdoll tumble of arms and legs and one shoe that flies off and
away on its own journey. He crumples to a stop and lies there, motionless. The
car screeches to a halt.

I stand there, a response dying on my lips. The car idles,
then tires squeal and it peels off. A very old black man is behind the wheel,
and I see the car weaving side to side as it continues down the street, past
Zee, who doesn't react.

I think for a moment that this guy probably shouldn't be driving
at his age, but then my mind clicks back on to the present situation and I'm
running. I nearly trip and fall as my foot comes down from the curb but I right
myself and in a few seconds I'm standing over Zee. I scratch the back of my
neck, feeling helpless. What do I do? What the FUCK do I do?

I kneel down.
"Zee!"
I
shout. He doesn't move. I don't try to move him. I don't think I'm supposed to
move him because he might have a spinal injury. His face is bleeding and his
left arm is bent awkwardly behind his head.

"Zee!"
I shout again.
"Are you ok?"

His eyes flutter
open,
he looks at
me and grins lopsidedly through the blood.

"No, mate," he says, and dies.

I kneel there for about five minutes until I realize he's
not going to get up and I should probably do something. Absently, I dial 9-1-1,
trying to ignore the fact that it's my best friend cooling on the ground in
front of me.

A ring, a half a ring and a click.
A tired voice says, "Yeah?"

I am not prepared for this. Stupidly, I say, "Is this
9-1-1?"

"Yeah."
A long, drawn out
sigh on the other end.

"Ok," I say. "My friend got hit by a car. I'm
pretty sure he's dead." For some reason this reminds me of a joke and I smile.
I immediately feel guilty for the smile but then I realize that Zee would have
liked the joke if he hadn't heard it before and wasn't dead.

A pause, then a sad chuckle.
"Well first off, let's make sure he's dead."
A
pause.
Then I hear a click and a loud BLAM!
on
the other end of the line and the sound of a body slumping forward and a
headset sliding away from deaf ears. I hang up the phone, a little shocked but
mostly annoyed.

That isn't how the joke is supposed to go.

I stand up. Obviously no one is going to come help me deal
with this. The sky has turned very gray, and it looks like perhaps it will snow
after all. This cheers me up, slightly, so I decide on a course of action. I
grab Zee by the shoulders (after moving his arm to its original angle—crackly
bone against bone sounds turn my stomach) and drag him to the sidewalk. I prop
him up against
a the
front of the building. His eyes
are closed, but he doesn't look like he's sleeping. He looks dead. Like a dead
Pakistani boy, frowning slightly as if annoyed by this turn of events.

I look both ways, fetch his shoe from the street, and place
it next to him. I don't put it on his foot because it doesn't seem right
somehow to go to the trouble. I realize as I'm standing there, looking down at
my friend, that I've been crying for the past five minutes. After all the death
of the day, this is finally what gets me. It makes perfect sense but it still
makes me ruminate on the calluses that develop on all our hearts when we are
remote from suffering.

I laugh, suddenly, at my own bullshit, and know that Zee
would have poured a beer on my head for even entertaining such thoughts. He's
done it before, after all. A sob escapes me at the memory but then it's all
dried up and I'm ok to continue I think.

There's only one thing to do, and that's to do what I set
out to do. It sucks that this had to happen, and it certainly doesn't portend
well for the rest of the quest, but since I don't believe in portents I guess
that doesn't matter. We were going to split off when we got to road the liquor
store is on anyway, this was just a little earlier and more violent. And it
feels more final, even though any parting at this point is probably the last.

But none of that matters. I have to go on. Zee would want it
that way.

"No I wouldn't, you cunt," I hear Zee say
sarcastically in my head. "I'd want you to sit here and cry over a pile of
meat. Get moving."

I get moving.

I still have to get to
Thwacker's
place, which is approximately six blocks from where I am standing. Such a little
distance normally, but the things I've seen and the suddenness of Zee's
departure has hammered home the knowledge that this is not a normal situation.
I have to be aware of my surroundings. I have to make sure
I
—

"Do you know what time it is?"

"
Gah
!"

I spin around and a middle-aged guy is looking at me, a
slack quizzical expression on his face. He's wearing a dark suit, with a
loosened blue tie around his neck. His hair is gray and is almost the exact
same color as the sky. He carries a pocket watch at the end of a gold chain
loosely in his hand. He looks very tired.

"What?" I say. Why do I always do this? I know
what he just asked. Why do I always say "What?" when I'm surprised by
a question?
To give myself time to comport myself?
Why
am I so pusillanimous?
(Hey, good word.)

Actually though, considering my friend was just violently
murdered in front of me, I should probably give myself a little slack. I'll put
it on the list of things I need to work on as a person.

The man just looks at me. His eyes are droopily patient.

"What? Oh, I'm sorry." I still have my phone in my
hand from the 911 call.
"The time.
Right, it's
uh, 3:25.
PM."

"Thanks," He brings the watch up to his face and
fiddles with the dial for a moment. He puts it to his ear and attempts a sad
smile. Then he shuffles past me, looks over at Zee on the ground. "Is he
okay?"

"No, he's dead."

"Oh. Good for him." He continues his slow way down
the sidewalk.