The Parallel Apartments (41 page)

Murphy read on the commode. Maybe the book would have a steamy passage he could masturbate to.

But no. Dr. Slarchj's book concentrated on what the thinkers at Quantico had known for years: that the childhoods of virtually all serial killers have three things in common: bed-wetting, animal-torturing, and fire-setting. Dr. Slarchj examined the twisted formative years of such giants in the field as Dahmer and Gacy and Bourke. She spoke with psychiatrists trained to watch for these despicable symptoms in children, in slim hopes of being able to prevent the formation of a serial killer. Did Dr. Slarchj offer any hope for future generations? Can one learn to not be a serial killer? Or was it a destiny, unalterable?

Yes, says Dr. Slarchj, it is one's lot.

Yes.

Murphy reviewed his life. Fires, check; bed-wetting, check; those Quince and Renée toads he'd killed. And countless insects. Check.

It was clear. Murphy had a purpose. A career. A meaning. An excuse. For the first time since Travis Waelder stole his pants at the playground in 1978, Murphy could
be.

Murphy emerged from the bathroom, walked behind the cash wrap, and slapped Sousou on the ass twice, once per buttock. If Mandune sought to avenge the assault, Mandune would suffer bloody dispatch at Murphy's hands, maybe with his grandfather's war bayonet. Murphy, his hand buzzing from the force of the spanking, walked into the little office by the literary-journals wall, where he encountered Embree sitting, like a minor Caesar, cross-legged on the floor and squinting contentedly at a first edition of
In a Narrow Grave
that Murphy himself had bought from some ignorant relic for a dime. Embree looked up and was promptly advised by Murphy to go fuck himself. Murphy left Crammed Shelf for what was to be the last time.

* * *

A year later, Murphy Lee Crockett was watching out of a crack in his blinds for a delivery truck to pull into the parking lot of his apartment building, the Parallel Apartments.

Delivery trucks brought Murphy things all the time, mostly books he planned to resell. Today, though, he was expecting something special: Murphy had told the eBay cutlery vendor SlicenDicenJulian that he'd needed his reproduction Nazi dagger immediately, that's why he'd fucking used the fucking Buy It Now option of $29.95 and had also PayPaled an extra thirty bucks to pay for overnight shipping. But that had been four days ago; SlicenDicenJulian hadn't answered his emails, and no razor-sharp reproduction Nazi dagger with a spring-action Nazi flag feature had been placed in his hands by any of the great, heaving courier services.

Maybe when I get my dagger I'll just hunt the fucker down and lance him into little meat cubes.

Because Murphy didn't want to miss his package, he hadn't walked down to H-E-B for Rolos and pork skins, and he hadn't gone down to the mossy washing machine in the apartment complex next door to wash his underwear, and he hadn't gone over to the East Side to visit Granny in the Home. Granny had gone downhill over the last year, ever since he did the Take This Job and Shove It at Crammed Shelf. Granny had survived two recent mastectomies, and a bad, rib-snapping fall, and had confided in Murphy that she'd begun to cough up blood. She didn't have to tell him what that meant. She did make him promise not to tell the Home's doctor, and he had kept that promise: the sooner Granny died, the sooner he got his inheritance, whatever that might be.

A UPS van shot down the street in front of Murphy's apartment, disappearing around a corner.

He jumped up, opened the front door, leaned over the flaking iron balcony railing, and shook his fist.

“Where's my parcel, you United Parcel Service driver bastard! You have my dagger. I hate you.”

The door to the apartment next to Murphy's opened and a young, wiry man of twenty-five or so, also in his boxers, emerged holding a bottle of Miller in one hand, and in the other a fierce little dog of mixed provenance. It barked.

“Stop shouting, man, you're freaking out Tom Mix.”

“You shut up, Porifiro, or you'll be next.”

Tom Mix barked and barked.

“You
shut up.”

“No,
you
.”

“You
, man.”

“I hate Tom Mix and your beer and you, too, Porifiro.”

“Man, you need to get laid. All that gnarly rage'd dry right up.”

“I need my dagger, to stick in your ass.”

“I know someone, Murphy Lee, she's fi-i-i-ne, and she likes independent-bookseller bachelors.”

This was the third time Porifiro had tried to set him up with a girl. Maybe Murphy'd take him up on it one day. It had been a long, long time. Never, that's how long.

“I get plenty of pussy,” said Murphy.

“Brother, you've never had a piece like this.”

It was not clear to Murphy why Porifiro wanted to set him up. He didn't like Porifiro, and made that clear whenever he got the chance. Maybe he was just a nice person. No; more likely it was a way to get back at Murphy for the years of belittling and slander. Maybe the girl was a man, or had AIDS, or worse.

“Wanna see a picture, Murphy Lee?”

“Go stick Tom Mix up your ass!”

Murphy was just about to go back inside and slam the door when a big orange, white, and blue van pulled into the parking lot.

“Look, said Porifiro. “
Somebody
's getting something.”

“Me. Me.”

Murphy ran down to the FedEx truck and danced lightly from toe to toe waiting next to the driver's door for the driver to climb down with his box. The driver was preoccupied with some kind of paperwork, and did not even look up. Murphy tapped on the window.

“Sir? Sir? Sir? You should have been here three days ago.”

The driver opened his door. He had dark brown, unblinking eyes and hands like catchers' mitts. He held a single, thin, overnight express envelope in one mitt.

“Just a minute.”

He scribbled on his clipboard. His pen looked like a thermometer in his huge hand.

“That's not mine,” said Murphy. “Mine's thicker and at least a foot long, and…”

The driver glared down at him, eyes turning yellow-black. He bared his teeth.

“Say again.”

It didn't sound like a question.

“My box?” said Murphy, beginning to jump up and down. “Please, god, don't tell me you don't have it.”

“You Porifiro Mirrin?”

“No.”

“S'me,” said Porifiro, who had followed Murphy into the parking lot. Murphy's misfortune seemed to change in direct proportion to Porifiro's merriment. The driver gave Porifiro his envelope.

“Orestes Minoso,” Porifiro said, transferring his beer to his Tom Mix hand so he could sign for the delivery. “Rookie card,
mint.
From eBay. Man, I motherfucking love eBay.”

The driver slid his door shut with a crunch, put his truck in reverse, and began to back up. Murphy gathered up a handful of pecans off the pavement and threw them at the FedEx truck. The driver grinned at Murphy, put his truck in gear, and drove slowly away.

Murphy headed up to his own apartment, planning to make a couple calls and send a few emails to that larcenous eBay fascist. Porifiro followed him up, balancing his FedEx envelope on his fingertips, like a pie.

In front of Murphy's next-door neighbor's door paced a gray and black bobtail cat, yawning and meowing passively. Murphy'd seen it before. The door opened and the cat squeezed inside at the same time a young woman's head peeked out.

“Hi, Porifiro,” said their neighbor, waving.

“Yo, April, how you doing?”

“Oh, you know.”

“You come bang on this door if you need anything,” he said.

“I will.”

“Don't go bang on
his
door, though,” he added, gesturing to Murphy. “He's liable to ruin your day.”

Porifiro laughed and went inside.

Murphy knew this woman was a student of music at UT. German arias sung with significant pulmonary force often found their way into his apartment. And, somewhat incongruous to his idea of practitioners of classical music, the woman also seemed to collect boyfriends. She had so many that sometimes three- or four-way fistfights between them erupted in the parking lot. More than once Murphy had been awakened in the middle of the night by the sound of whimpering, which upon investigation turned out to be a rejected boyfriend prostrate before her door, an empty fifth of tequila at his feet, weeping about love and death and need, and trying to force his body under the door.

Such a scene hadn't played out in a while. Maybe she'd gotten religion or something. Or a steady boyfriend.

Murphy ignored her. He hated her for no good reason. Well, maybe because she never invited him over to fuck her like all those other guys. Murphy had often considered making her one of his victims, but attacking a neighbor was asking for trouble: what do cops do first after a crime? Canvass the neighborhood. And they'd knock on Murphy's door first. What if he couldn't keep a straight face? Or had overlooked a dot of blood or gore stuck to his forehead? Besides, she had the wrong name. It did not fit with the theme he'd chosen for his first serial-killing program.

“You're Murphous Lee Crockett, right?” said the neighbor.

Murphy looked at her, appalled to hear his given name spoken aloud. He'd seen her only at night, really, when he watched all his neighbors come and go, doing fun, social things. She was sorority blond, Dallas blond, beauty-pageant blond. She wore a long, faintly stained white T-shirt she'd probably slept in, and wore one of those intolerable yellow Lance Armstrong rubber bands around her wrist.

“Yeah…”

“I'm April,” she said, slurring her words a bit, possibly from drink, probably from drugs. “A package came for you a few days ago, but they left it in front of my door. I should have given this to you earlier, but I kind of forgot about it. I was busy with a personal matter.”

Murphy did not ask what that might be. She told him anyway:

“I just lost my child. After trying to get pregnant for more than a year. I'm not feeling well.”

Murphy had encountered this type before, the one that immediately
upon introduction unpacks level-three personal information, and often asks the same of her respondent.

“I'm… sorry,” said Murphy, though a fuck not did he give.

“Thank you. She just came out, ten days ago, a little lump with eyes. It's my mother's fault. And my dad's.”

“Oh.”

“And Bryce's.”

April disappeared back into her apartment, leaving the door open. Murphy walked up slowly. The cat poked its head outside for an instant, then ducked back inside.

“It's here, come on in,” came her muffled voice. Murphy did.

A gapless tesseract of paintings and posters of classical musicians covered the walls, and the ceiling was decorated with a huge poster of an Eastern European peasant woman with her mouth open, obviously belting something out, perhaps
Matka, Maruša, Alois Hába,
which were the words printed along the top of the poster. In one corner stood a wicker bassinet on wooden wheels. In another, dozens—hundreds?—of cardboard Mutter's Crystal Lager six-pack totes were stacked, ready for recycling.

On a low futon lay a gigantic naked man, face up. A bust of Liszt tattooed on his chest stared up at a dormant, grime-caked ceiling fan.

“That's Ryan,” she said. “Ignore him.” She picked up a cracked jewel case of Phyllis Treigle's
Medea
and threw it at him. It bounced off his head with a pleasant tropical tympany, like a coconut. “He deserves to be ignored.”

The cat was rubbing itself on Murphy's bare leg. Animals are supposed to be able to sense evil, thought Murphy. What the hell's wrong with this thing?

Murphy hissed at the cat. “I. Am. Evil!”

“And that's little Clavamox,” said April. “She goes to the vet a lot.”

“Mmm,” said Murphy.

“I think I'm going to kill myself soon, maybe tomorrow.”

“Uh, don't do that,” said Murphy, worrying that this crazy chick might keep his package—his dagger, he hoped—if he offended her. “Just keep trying, you know.”

April bent down and pulled a long box out from under a knot of disemboweled audio components and stringed-instrument strings. “And here it is.”

She presented Murphy with a narrow, triangular cardboard box, more than four feet long.

It was a fairly heavy box, and solid—no movement inside. There was no reason to ship such a small thing in such a long box. Except to suck a higher handling/packing/shipping fee out of him. Greedy eBay hammerhead.

Ryan stirred. He rolled onto his side, drew his knees up to his chin, and threw up.

“God!” screamed April. “Pig!”

“I love you,” said Ryan, barely.

“You
poisoned my baby!”