Insane City (27 page)

very muscular man with dark curly hair. This was Eddie Friedman, who held the title of head bouncer,

and who, in recognition of his Jewish heritage, was sometimes called, but only by his friends, The Big

Bagel.

Eddie saw Fig and The Planet on the ground. He said, “What happened here?”

Cyndi said, “There’s a gor—”

“Wait,” said Seth, cutting her off. “Let me try to explain it.” He had decided that the problem was the

word
gorilla
and wanted to try another term. “There’s a wild animal in the back of the car,” he said.

“What kind of wild animal?” said Eddie.

“We don’t know,” said Seth. “But when these guys tried to grab it, it knocked them down.”

The two men from the pickup truck were approaching the entrance. They saw Fig and The Planet

lying on the ground. They turned around and went back to their truck.

Eddie looked at Fig and The Planet, then the Escalade, then Seth. He said, “Why did you bring a

wild animal to a strip club?”

Cyndi started to speak, but Seth cut her off.

“It was a mistake,” he said. “We’re very sorry.”

Eddie started toward the open Escalade door.

“Don’t look in there,” said Cyndi. “That’s what happened to the other two guys.”

Eddie stopped, looked down at Fig and The Planet again. They were both sitting up now, still

looking shaky. Eddie moved to the rear of the Escalade and put his face to the window, but couldn’t make

out anything clearly.

“Wait here,” he said. He went back into the club. Thirty seconds later he came out again, holding a

flashlight. He went to the rear window of the Escalade, pressed the flashlight lens against the glass, then

pressed his face against it to peer inside. Immediately he jumped back.

“Holy fucking shit,” he said. Cautiously, he brought the flashlight to the glass again and leaned in for

another look. Seth and Cyndi leaned in next to him. Cyndi gasped. Looking back at them, from six inches

away on the other side of the glass, was the huge, weird, pie-shaped face of Trevor. He seemed to be

looking at Cyndi. He raised his left hand and pressed it against the glass next to her face, displaying a

thumb and four impossibly long, strong fingers designed for sure-handed swinging from limb to limb.

“That’s a
gorilla
,” said The Big Bagel. “You people have a fucking
gorilla
in your car.”

“We’re not sure it’s a gorilla,” said Cyndi.

“Well, whatever the fuck it is,” said Eddie, straightening up, “it injured these two men.”

“We’re very sorry about that,” said Seth.

“I’m sure you are,” said Eddie. “But I’m still calling the police.”

“Wait, no,” said Seth. “You can’t do that.”

“Yes I can,” said Eddie, pulling a phone out of his pocket.

“Please,” said Seth. “Listen. I can’t get involved with the police now. I’m getting married tomorrow

morning.” He looked at his watch. “Today, actually.”

“You two are getting
married
today?” said Eddie.

“Not
both
of us,” said Cyndi. “Just him. To a different woman.”

“But the wedding is today,” said Seth.

Eddie stared at him for a moment. “OK,” he said. “Just so I have this straight, for my own personal

understanding. You came to a strip club with a woman who is not your fiancée,
and
a gorilla on your

wedding day.”

Seth took a breath, raised his hands, dropped them at his sides. “I know it sounds crazy,” he said.

“It does,” said Eddie.

“But if you give me a minute, I can explain it,” said Seth.

“You can explain it to the police,” said Eddie. He started tapping the screen on his phone

“Please don’t do that,” said Seth. He reached out and grabbed Eddie by his massive forearm.

Big mistake. You did
not
grab The Big Bagel. In a lightning-quick, well-practiced move, Eddie shot

out an elbow, putting some weight behind it, driving it deep into Seth’s solar plexus. With a high-pitched

Unhh
, Seth folded like a cheap lawn chair and staggered backward, trying desperately to breathe.

Cyndi was on Eddie instantly, inches away, right in his face. “Don’t you hit him!” she said, stabbing

her forefinger into his chest.

“I won’t hit him if he stays away from me,” said Eddie. “You better keep back, too.” Eddie grabbed

her by the arm and shoved her hard sideways.

Big mistake.

Trevor shot from the Escalade, teeth bared. He slammed into Eddie, a furry red, 250-pound muscle

missile, knocking Eddie backward a good six feet and onto his back, his cell phone clattering across the

parking lot. All three bouncers were on the ground now. Trevor stood over them, showing his teeth and

making a range of scary noises that a male orangutan makes to let other males know he is prepared to bite

their faces off to defend his female. None of the bouncers spoke orangutan, but they knew they did not

want to mess with this hairy fanged banshee. All three scrambled backward toward the door to

Chuckletrousers.

Cyndi saw her chance. She ran to Seth, who was on his hands and knees, gasping and retching.

“Get up!” she said, putting her arms around him, pulling him to his feet. She dragged him to the

Escalade, pushed him in through the driver’s-side door, shoved him across the seat and jumped in behind

him. She felt for the keys—
Thank God, he left the keys in the ignition
—started the engine, slammed the

gearshift into drive and hit the gas. The Escalade lurched forward, the motion causing all the open doors

to slam shut. She glanced sideways, saw the bouncers on their feet now, shouting. She glanced into the

rearview mirror.

And screamed.

Trevor was in the backseat.

She almost slammed on the brakes, but another sideways glance told her that the bouncers were now

running after the car. She looked into the rearview again. Trevor had not moved. She was on U.S. 1 now,

gaining speed. From somewhere behind her came the sound of a siren. She kept driving, her eyes darting

at the rearview every second or two. Trevor was looking at her, but he had not moved. Beside her, Seth

was still bent over but was breathing more normally and could finally speak.

“Thank you,” he said.

“I think we’re in trouble,” she said. “I think they called the police.”

“That’s all we need,” said Seth, slowly sitting up. “Maybe we can . . . HOLY SHIT THAT THING

IS IN THE BACKSEAT.”

“I know,” said Cyndi. “It jumped back in.”

Seth was staring at Trevor. Trevor gave Seth a look that Seth interpreted, correctly, as unfriendly.

“Jesus,” said Seth, “what’re we gonna do?”

“We can’t stop, at least not now. I think there’s police behind us.”

Seth was still staring at Trevor, who was squatting on the seat, his ridiculously long arms folded in

front of him.

“Holy
shit
,” said Seth.

“What?”

“He still has the ring.”

34

Quite a few of the guests in ocean-facing rooms at the Ritz-Carlton were awakened by the

helicopter. It sounded as though it was right outside their windows. This was because it
was
right outside

their windows.

Those who got out of their beds and went to the window to investigate saw the helicopter land on the

lawn behind the hotel. They saw a man leap out, holding a large brown paper bag. He ran toward the

beach, ducking down as he passed under the spinning rotors. The helicopter engine kept running. A minute

later, the man returned empty-handed. He climbed back into the helicopter, which immediately took off.

Those who were curious enough called the hotel’s front desk. They were informed that the helicopter

had been making an emergency medical delivery and the Ritz-Carlton regretted any inconvenience. A few

people wondered what kind of emergency medical supplies would need to be delivered to a beach in the

middle of the night. Eventually these people decided that this was just another one of those strange things

that seem to happen in Miami.

In the end, everybody went back to bed.

Except for Meghan. She’d left Tina sleeping soundly in the bedroom of their suite and gone to the

living room window to see what the racket was. She wasn’t particularly surprised to see a helicopter; she

lived in a world where people often came and went by helicopter. She watched it leave, but she didn’t

feel like going back to bed. She hadn’t been sleeping anyway; too much on her mind.

She’d started out by being angry at Tina for ratting out the Haitians to her father. But the more she

thought about it, the more she directed her anger at herself. In her mind she kept replaying Tina’s words:

And why the hell are you being so self-righteous about this anyway? When have
you
ever cared about

this kind of thing?

The truthful answer, Meghan knew, was: Never. Tina was always the one who cared about things.

Meghan had never really cared about anything. She’d always been perfectly content just being a rich

man’s daughter. She’d grown up knowing that she would never have to work, and she’d never given much

thought to what else she might do with her life. She had managed, thanks to a generous donation from

Daddy, to scrape through a mediocre college with shitty grades, and since then she had done . . . nothing,

really. She traveled wherever and whenever she felt like going, bought whatever caught her eye,

occasionally dated men as rich and shallow as herself, watched television, smoked weed. In fact the more

she thought about it, the more she realized that, in terms of time and effort, the main thing she had done

with her adult life was smoke weed. She had no interest in anything else. She didn’t really know what

else there was.

She thought about this, staring out the hotel window at the darkness over the ocean, and it made her

depressed. More and more these days, that was how she felt. But she knew what to do about it.

She crept into the bedroom, put on jeans and a T-shirt, slipped on some sandals. She opened a

dresser drawer and felt beneath her bras and panties, found the baggie and her lighter, stuck them in her

pocket.

Then she went out to smoke some weed.

35

Laurette had been asleep in the bedroom with her children when the two big men opened the

door, banging it hard against the wall. They turned on the bright lights, and one of them grabbed Laurette’s

shoulder and shook her awake. They were speaking to her in harsh voices. She did not understand their

words, but she knew she had to do whatever it was they wanted her to do or they would hurt her. There

were men exactly like these in Haiti.

They yanked her off the bed onto her feet. The baby woke and started crying, which annoyed the men.

Laurette picked the baby up quickly, tried to quiet her. One of the men went over to the other side of the

bed and yanked Stephane out from under the covers. He half fell to the floor, then scrambled over to stand

next to Laurette. He was crying, too, but quietly.

The men were talking to Laurette, but she didn’t understand them. This also annoyed them. She

struggled to understand what they wanted her to do so they would not hurt her or her children.

They were pushing her toward the bedroom doorway. They wanted her to leave. She wished she

could ask them to wait just a moment, to let her take the diapers for the baby, and some milk, but she

didn’t know how to ask them and she didn’t want to make them angrier. She held the baby in one arm and

guided Stephane with the other, gently pushing her terrified son ahead of her, whispering to him that he