The Radiant City (21 page)

“Yes,” Matthew says, “I know that.”

“I had some pretty close calls. I was just telling Jack and Tony here about the time in Tuzla the mortar fire came in and me and a couple of German guys were so drunk, holed up in this fleabag hotel, we couldn’t tell if it was incoming or outgoing. This guy, Dieter, he was in his room with a hooker and the goddamn wall got blown out with him in mid-fuck. He ran out in the street with his ass hanging out, tripped over his own pants and passed out where he landed. We were pissing ourselves, man. Laughing, you know.”

Jack cracks his knuckles, shoots Matthew a quick glance and says, “That so” with a wink.

It is obvious now that the cause of Jack’s displeasure is Brian Dance and not, Matthew is relieved to conclude, himself. Relief is like fresh air, and he turns his concentration on Brian Dance. With each word, Matthew likes Brian less. He has met many young journalists like him. They popped in, interviewed all the top brass they could bribe, did a sound byte and ducked out again on the first convoy back to civilization. If they had stories to tell they were just as likely someone else’s as their own, but to hear them talk they’d hung out with every media-darling from Amanpour to Arnett. Their ignorance of the real issues went out over the airwaves as gospel truth and was more dangerous than the propaganda the government tried to spit out. Some had the humility to learn. Others did not.

“So Brian, when did you say you were in Srebrenica? What year?”

“Nineteen ninety-five.” He shifts in his chair. “There was this time a Serb guy . . .”

“You saying you were in Srebrenica in 1995?”

“Yeah. So? What’s your point?”

“Just wondering.”

Jack snorts.

“Matthew’s been just about everywhere,” says Anthony. “I’ll bet you guys bumped into each other and don’t even remember.”

“That’s probably true,” says Brian. “It’s hard to remember everyone.”

Matthew cannot help himself. He wants to shut up and leave the guy alone, for it shouldn’t matter to him one way or the other where Brian Dance has been and what he’s done or hasn’t, but it does. Matthew wants to form an alliance, him and Jack on the same side. “I’m really surprised I didn’t hear about you. You must be some kind of
wunderkind
.”

Brian looks at Matthew with outright suspicion, and he begins to sweat. Jack thumbs his nose and scowls impressively.

“No man, just trying to do a job.”

“You must be really good at it, because—you remember Tony Birtley?”

“Yeah, the British ABC reporter, right?”

“Very good. Because Birtley’s reports almost single-handedly saved Srebrenica back in 1993. Thing is though, Brian, the Serbs got pissed off about that and let only a handful of journalists back into the enclave in 1994, and then barred everybody the following spring. In July 1995, everybody, including Christiane and me, was in Sarajevo. The peacekeepers and the Muslims were alone out there, without any public scrutiny, which, let’s face it, is only occasionally effective anyway. One of the great fuck-ups of the war. The other, of any conflict come to think of it, is jacked-up little assholes who think they’re reporters just because they have a press badge.”

“You got a lot of fucking nerve,” says Brian, rising to his feet.

“Not nearly as much as you have, standing up like that,” says Jack. “I might mistake that move for an invitation to stand up myself. Which you wouldn’t want.”

“Gentlemen,” cautions Dan from behind the bar. He cradles his crowbar in his arms.

“Maybe you better go, pal,” says Anthony. “Might be for the best, if you know what I mean.”

Brian takes stock of Jack and Anthony. “Fuck you. You’re all fucking head cases.” He slugs back the last of his beer and, looking at Matthew, says, “You’re not even a real correspondent. Fucking stringer.”

Matthew grabs his chest. “Oh, you got me! Ya got me!”

Brian picks up this jacket and storms out. Dan replaces the crowbar behind the bar. “Matthew, drinks are on you.”

Matthew nods, bowing to tradition. He also notices that Suzi, and the bearded guy, are nowhere to be seen.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” he says.
Don’t we all have our lies?
Take Jack, Matthew thinks, if even half his stories are true, I’m the Queen of England.

“Done what?” says Jack, and the way he says it makes Matthew’s stomach clench. Suzi probably said nothing. Probably. But what about Anthony?

“That guy. Fuck, what the hell do I know? He might have been there.”

“It’s a distant possibility,” says Jack.

“If he was there he shouldn’t have been,” says Anthony. “Obvious.”

“Kid probably has more credentials than me.”

Jack slaps Matthew on the back and tells him to forget it, just forget it. “Let me buy you a real drink,” says Jack. “You look like you could use it.” And Matthew exhales, thinking everything is all right after all.

Several hours later, still feeling guilty, and on more than one level, Matthew drinks more than he promised himself he would. He is on his sixth beer and fourth scotch back. It is nearly midnight and Anthony has left about an hour before, off to see the lovely Paweena.

Jack is talking about God, about Islam, the concept of fate, and submission to destiny. Matthew does not know how they have arrived at this subject, or why Jack seems to be making such profound sense. He suspects it is the booze, but does not mind. Whatever it is, Matthew believes he has access to a clear window of truth. He decides they both do, that the moment is special, and should not be wasted. They need to talk about important things. It does not matter, suddenly, what happened between Matthew and Suzi, but it does matter what happened between Jack and Suzi. Matthew believes, as he views Jack through the topaz fog of whisky, that Jack must come clean, confess, make an amend. “You know who knows about Mohammed?” he says. “Anthony. You know, he has got some weird pockets of learning. And insight. A very insightful guy.”

“To Anthony. The only cop I can’t seem to hate.”

“To Anthony. May he gain insight into Paweena.”

“Amen.”

“Amen.”

“Women,” says Jack. “Fucking women.”

“You and Suzi on the outs, huh?”

“You could say that.”

“Anything to do with her split lip?” In for a dime, in for a dollar.

“Who told you what?”

Matthew shrugs. “It’s a small bar.”

Jack puts his beer down, leans back, folds his arms against his chest and for a moment Matthew thinks he is going to explode. He braces himself, all his surety of the moment before evaporating. Then, just as quickly, Jack uncrosses his arms, puts his head down on the table and bangs his forehead three times. The glasses rattle.

“Fuck,” he says, softly, once for every time his head hits the table.

Matthew realizes he has been holding his breath. He lets it out. “Yeah. Want to talk about it?”

“No.”

“Okay.”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

Jack pulls his great shaggy head up from the table, intertwines his fingers and leans forward. “I had sort of an episode.”

“An episode?”

“Yeah. A fucking
episode.
Like the kind some people get in crowds, at demonstrations, you know?” He chews on his moustache.

“Oh. Sure. Sure.” The guilt is back then, a giant ball of grey gum in his stomach.

“I used to get them all the time, but I’ve been better. A lot better in the last few years.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Don’t look so worried. Everybody’s different.”

“I didn’t mean that.”

“Right.” He sighs. “Fucking French and their fireworks. I don’t even go to sleep anymore, ever, EVER, before two a.m. because that’s when they can start, one o’clock in the morning because it’s the end of someone’s freaking birthday party or some shit. Goddamn!” He knocks back the rest of his drink. “I need a shot. You want one?”

“I’m good.”

Jack nearly turns over his chair as he stands up. He moves through the other tables like a bull moose through a swamp. When he comes back, he has shots for both of them.

“To mental health,” he says and they raise their glasses.

“Anyway. It’s like eight o’clock at night, right? We’re sitting down to dinner. Suzi made this real nice meal. But it was the day of the storm, remember?”

Matthew nods. There had been a bad storm and it had kept him pacing back and forth in the apartment, jumping at every clap of thunder.

“Okay, so that had ended a few hours before, but then these kids from next door—Suzi’s got this apartment—weird fucking place with the bedroom below-ground—it’s on the ground floor, right, with this courtyard behind it—these kids they’re out there letting off these cherry bombs and I just about have a fucking heart attack, and I’m out yelling at them. I think I scared the hell out of them, but Christ! It was really loud. So, I drop a drink or two to quiet my nerves but I’m still wrangy, still twitching. And that goddamn wind’s rattling all the shutters. Spooking me out. I’m trying not to show that I’m so edgy, right? Then, just when I think it’s under control, some fucking kid lets one off right under the window and I swear the little fuck did it on purpose.” His hands grip the tabletop.

“It’s okay, Jack,” Matthew says, hoping Jack can hear him.

Jack’s hands relax their grip and he puts them to his eyes, rubbing hard. “Before I know it I picked up a lamp. Threw it through the window. I hear a kid screaming. The little snot with the firecracker. Musta been lurking around outside. Suzi flipped her nut. I slammed her up against a wall. I don’t know why. I was pissed. I don’t remember a lot after that. Next thing I know I’m in the apartment by myself, sitting in the fucking bathtub.”

“She took off?”

“Yeah. She was out in the street. Madder than fuck. I felt like crap, you know? I didn’t want to do that. I’m as bad as that rat-shit of a prick Joseph’s stepfather.”

“Saida’s ex?” It is Matthew’s turn to discover his hand gripping his glass tighter than is safe.

“I’ve never done that to a woman before. Never-ever.” He shakes his head slowly and his eyes keep moving after his head stops.

Matthew sees how bad Jack feels about it, but he also knows that, given his size, a good wall-slamming by Jack could kill somebody. Especially somebody as tiny as Suzi.

“You know, I’d moved my stuff into her place.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Jesus, what the fuck’s wrong with me?”

“Where you staying now?” Matthew hopes he has a place. He does not want to have to offer Jack a spot on his couch. He likes his windows and prefers not to have any lamps thrown through them.

“I got a room by the week, rue Veron, near Pigalle. For the time being, anyway.” He grins sheepishly. “You never know, we might get back together. Could happen. Yessir.”

This takes Matthew off guard. “She was here tonight. You talked to her?”

“Nah. What am I gonna say?”

“You might try an apology.”

“Think that’d do it? Ya think? Well, maybe. But I don’t know if I wanna start it all up again. You know what I mean? Maybe it’s better. Yup, better this way.”

Matthew says nothing.

Jack takes the tinfoil from the inside of his cigarette pack, folds it into a tiny square, then smoothes it out with his fingernail and folds it again.

“You ever think about death?” he says after a few minutes.

“Of course. Yes.” With all the bodies piled up in his memory, how could he not?

“No, no! Not somebody else’s death,” says Jack, reading Matthew’s mind. “Your death. The real death that’s a-coming, the one you absolutely are going to have to deal with. I mean that second, man, those last few fucking minutes when it’s coming down, coming at you, it’s going to happen. Do you consider that? Con-tem-plate it?” He waggles his head as he says the last word, broken up into three syllables, mocking himself.

Matthew does not want to have this conversation. Jack stares at him.

“Do I think about it? Occasionally.”

“And God? What about God?” Jack smoothes the foil out again, and keeps his eyes away from Matthew.

Matthew shifts uneasily in the chair, reaches over, jiggles a cigarette out of Jack’s pack and lights it. The alcohol slides around inside him, weighing him down, dragging him to a place below, somewhere entirely unsuitable for a discussion of metaphysical subjects.

“What about Him?”

“Do you think, you know, whazzit, you know, what it’s going to be like? Forgiveness, or Wrath of Judgment.” He tries to sound glib beneath the blur of booze.

Sometimes, especially this late at night and seen through the haze of alcohol, Matthew thinks that Jack’s face could be his own, with all his own malignant, unspeakable memories. Jack, more than anyone he knows, needs to believe in divine forgiveness, redemption. Peace. He wants to be able to offer him such things, but says only, “Maybe there’s just oblivion. You know—dreamless sleep.”