The Sacrificial Circumcision of the Bronx (9 page)

“Oh my God,” Paul said to his new girlfriend, Teresa, “it’s exactly what I’ve been waiting for!”

He thought about calling Robert to see if he could put in a good word, but Greene said that it wasn’t necessary—the appointment probably wouldn’t require the governor’s approval.

Paul shared the good news with his parents instead. The appointment would earn him the recognition he had always wanted. And since there weren’t a lot of qualified men in electrical engineering willing to work at a government rate, he was sure it would lead to some prestigious appointment. The colonel had told him that the only drawback was he’d have to commute regularly up to Albany.

Two days later, however, Greene called to say the appointment had fallen through. There was no explanation as to why.

“Where exactly does that go?” Uli asked as they passed the only hole in the chamber.

“Leads to a fallout shelter,” the mother replied. “They found gas masks and old body-protection suits and stuff like that.” She pointed to the black hose tracking up from the large sewer pipe into a corner where five large metal oil drums periodically spat out recycled water into a giant wooden barrel.

“And what does everyone eat?”

“Crates and crates of C-rations.”

“How long before the food runs out?”

She shrugged.

“If this is a shelter, there must be an exit somewhere.”

“They’re all sealed,” she replied. Casey’s mom brought Uli over to her corner, where a bunch of dirty, crumpled papers were scattered on the ground. He collected some into a small pile and lay back down. The place was a massive echo chamber, and above the nonstop prayer-a-thon in the back he heard low moans that sounded distinctly sexual.

15

T
eresa’s father steered Paul toward a promising investment: It was a popular swimming club called Llenarch in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia, and its central location appealed to the affluent locals. The previous owner had died and the family needed to unload it quickly to avoid what was shaping into a major probate battle.

Paul’s father, a savvy businessman in early retirement, looked over the books and was duly impressed. It was a solid investment with a steadily growing membership.

“The secret is,” Emanuel imparted, “if it’s not broken, don’t fix it. This place will keep earning you a profit as long as you don’t push it.”

“It looks a bit run-down,” Paul said. “Maybe I’ll just give it a paint job.”

His father gave him a check to cover the cost of the down payment. Two weeks later, before Paul could even bring his dad up for a weekend, Emanuel Moses suddenly died of a heart attack. Paul soon learned that he had left every cent of his fortune to his wife, Bella.

Finding a long strand of wire on the ground, Uli tied it around his arm so that a constant yet minor pain would keep him fully conscious. He figured that whatever was causing the visions of Paul Moses must also be afflicting all these other people. He remembered his sister Karen injecting him with a strange drug to keep him alive in the sewer tunnel. He also remembered that crazy pseudo-Indian hippie Tim Leary inserting two additional hypodermic needles for him in the cushions of the helmet he had discarded earlier.

Uli heard a thumping sound and feared another intrusion from Paul’s world. Peering up into the hole in the wall, he glimpsed a scrawny man with bony knees using a rope to carefully lower an overloaded hand truck down the forty-five-degree incline. Once safely level, the man wheeled over to the barrel of refiltered water where a dozen empty trash baskets were stacked inside each other. A group of men came forward, each one taking an empty basket. Bony Knees passed out boxes of C-rations, which turned out to be nothing more than crackers. Each of the men crushed the crackers in their garbage can, then filled them with the awful water. They stirred their buckets until the crackers became a thick paste. People from different parts of the dark shelter began shuffling forward like zombies, holding out metal cups. Each person moved into one of twelve lines as the men ladled out gruel from their garbage cans.

“Suppertime!” Casey’s mother announced, handing him a filthy cup. Uli got in line with the woman, who was once again entering her joyous cycle of believing Uli was her son.

Uli was famished and gulped the muck down. He hadn’t eaten since escaping from Rescue City—that bizarre replica of New York concocted as a refugee center, which now essentially served as a giant prison in the middle of the Nevada desert. When he rose to get in line for a second cup, he spotted a tall brawny man wearing his discarded helmet.

“Mind if I see your headgear for a moment?” Uli asked nervously.

“Mine,” the guy replied, his face covered with muck. Quickly and gently, Uli slipped the helmet off the man’s skull. From between the insulating cushions in the top of the apparatus, Uli removed the two syringes that Leary had taped there. The large man’s hand slowly rose, so Uli carefully fixed the helmet back on the guy’s head. Uli then went over to one of the bonfires and located a dark vein in his right arm. He injected himself with both syringes, then tossed the needles into the open sewer hole. Near the barrel of refiltered water, Uli found a bag that had been made from an old shirt. He slung it over his shoulder and discreetly slipped an unopened box of C-rations into it.

“Is there any way to get some clothes?” Uli asked Casey’s mom.

“Shub had no right!” she said. Her thoughts had shifted elsewhere.

“Look what he did to us,” another lost soul roaming nearby joined in.

“By any chance, is anyone else thinking about someone named Paul Moses?” Uli called out into the large empty room.

“Moses, Charlton Heston,” someone free-associated.

“Best clothes are on the dead,” said some shorter beard, responding to Uli’s first question. “But you have to get them before they start rotting.”

“Where would be a good place to find some?”

“In the Mkultra, it’s loaded with dead bodies. Just don’t go too far or you’ll never find your way out.”

Coming across some shredded cardboard and frayed twine scattered among the litter, Uli fashioned himself a pair of basic foot protectors. It was difficult to walk more than ten feet without stepping on hardened human excrement.

“Does anyone know what’s down there?” Uli asked, pointing toward the hole in the wall.

“The first floor of the Mkultra is called the Lethe; it’s made up of secretarial pools,” the short man replied.

“What the hell is the Mkultra?”

“Subdivisions and sections of some government agency. Our leader learned those names from documents he found. He’s in there looking for a way out.”

“He’s probably lost or dead by now,” someone else lamented.

“Anyone know what this guy looks like?” Uli asked.

“Black—he’s black all over,” a voice replied.

“Anything else?”

All were silent.

“Does anyone remember his name?”

“Blaster!” someone shouted out.

“No, not Blaster—Bomber, cause he bombed that hole!” someone else said, pointing to the jagged hole that led to the Mkultra. And he had caring people with him.”

“Caring people?” Uli asked. “You mean like a family?”

“Yeah, a wife and a kid, I think.”

“Fucking Shub ruined all our lives!” another lamented.

“Can anyone tell me who this Bomber leader is, or where I can find him?” Uli was becoming increasingly exasperated with the filthy, mentally impaired congress around him.

“Who’s this new voice inquiring about the leader?” A long-bearded man shuffled up to Uli. In the dull glow of a distant fire, Uli could see that in place of eyes were dark empty sockets.

“Here,” Uli replied. The blind man delicately touched Uil’s naked chin to confirm that he didn’t have a beard.

“I remember the leader. He had some strange name like Play Dough. I never saw him, obviously, but I heard he was slim and black. He had a young wife and they had a child here.”

“The EGGS epidemic from Rescue City doesn’t affect people here?”

“I suppose not. People can still reproduce, but I heard the kid was born with a horrible birth defect—I’d be amazed if he was still alive.”

“Why was he elected leader?”

“Aside from his memory and his great positive attitude, he was the only one who could read and make sense of all these forms.”

“What forms?”

“If you go in there, you’ll see them. Documents are scattered all over the place. Play Dough the Bomber seemed to believe the forms came from different departments and through them he could piece things together. He thought these may have been recently evacuated offices.”

“How long after people arrive here do they start to lose their memory?” Uli asked.

“Who knows? This disease affects some people faster than others. I also know that here in the Streptococci River we look out for each other. This is your best bet for surviving until he rescues us.”

“But suppose he doesn’t. I stopped putting my trust in leaders when I woke up in a detainment center that they had the gall to name
Rescue City.”
In a loud voice, Uli called out, “If anyone has any advice on the best way out of here, I’d love to hear it.”

“Across to the Sticks!” someone shouted back.

“What’s that?”

“Some place filled with caves where people are trying to dig their way out.”

“Where is it?”

“All I know is that it’s called the Sticks cause it’s out in the sticks.”

“But where exactly is it?”

The man smiled and shrugged. “Never been there, but I heard it has several levels. And some levels are more dangerous than others.”

“Dangerous how?”

“I heard there are warring gangs and ferocious animals in there.”

“What kind of animals?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are there any sources for food or water?” Uli asked.

“There are several caches for food,” the blind man explained, “but we don’t know where they are. And there are the drips, places leaking with water. People usually put containers down to collect reserves.”

“And if you find a way out,” someone else called out, “please don’t forget about us.”

Uli said he wouldn’t and thanked them.

Climbing up along the slanting side of the huge basin, Uli reached the jagged hole roughly three feet in diameter. Up close, it looked like someone had roughly hewed through the concrete. After crawling twenty feet in total blackness, scratching his back and belly in the process, he arrived at another large room. A tall, powerful man extended his hand and helped Uli inside, letting him pass. The bony-kneed guy and several others were standing about idly. As Uli walked past, he came upon dozens of stacks of empty wooden crates. He realized this must be the rations depot.

As he passed through the back of the depot into a dank corridor, he found himself completely alone. He followed a distant, unsteady light out to an even larger space with a vast oak floor—presumably the Mkultra. Inside, he quickly discovered that the only sources of light were the flickering tips of several distant fluorescent tubes. Moving slowly through the silent darkness, Uli found his focus dissipating.

16

I
n the spring of 1928, Paul’s mother fell ill and no one could figure out what was wrong with her. Paul told her maid Maria that he suspected it was just Bella’s relentless desire for attention.

But the woman became even sicker and increasingly cantankerous. Paul tried to be patient, but she began mentioning “that bitch Millie” and his “wasted years in Mexico,” and when he refused to react, she called him “another one of those goddamned bomb throwers who should’ve been shipped off to Russia.”

“She’s just feeling angry and threatened,” Maria told him, but he knew that she was simply disappointed in him. And she continued badgering.

Hard as he tried to resist, he was eventually drawn in, at one point declaring that Millie was more compassionate than she’d ever be, and fighting in Mexico against oligarchs like her was the noblest thing he had ever done. When Mr. Robert saw what was happening on a mutual visit, he started taking his mother’s side.

“Why do you always have to fight with her?” Robert yelled at him.

“This is between us,” Paul shot back. “Don’t butt in.”

Robert, who had just lost his coveted position as secretary of state when Franklin Roosevelt was elected governor of New York, refused to be swept aside. “I know she can be annoying, but she’s sick. Can’t you just be decent once, goddamnit?”

“It’s not a matter of decency,” Paul replied. “This has always been our way of communicating.”

“Oh, spare me the bullshit!”

“It’s not bullshit. I’m telling you, she does this to stir our feelings.”

But Robert would hear none of it.

Soon, Bella grew too weak to remain at home and was transferred to a private room at Mount Sinai Hospital. Paul escorted her there, along with Maria and her twelve-year-old daughter Lucretia. Initially the visit went nicely, but before long Bella made an obnoxious comment about the young girl not being dressed appropriately for a hospital.

“Mom, don’t worry about her dress not being expensive enough. This isn’t a social.”

“If it were up to you, we’d all be in rags,” Bella accused feverishly. Her face was ashen.

“Not everyone inherited a fortune.”

“You don’t need a million dollars to dress well!” she rasped, and started coughing.

Maria waved for Paul to calm down. While the little girl sat with Bella, Maria took Paul outside and said, “Go have a cigarette and cool down.”

“She’s so annoying!”

“She’s dying, Paul. There’s no need to fight anymore.”

The next shift of nurses arrived and helped Bella use the bathroom. As they prepared to give her a sponge bath, Lucretia, Maria, and Paul said goodnight and headed out. When Paul realized the maid and her daughter were walking to the subway, he offered them a lift.

“We’re all the way up in the Bronx,” Maria said.

“I don’t mind. In fact, I insist,” he replied. So the three got into his car and drove up to East Tremont in the Bronx. Once there, Paul commented on how nice the houses were. He had imagined them living in more of a shack.