Ivan Denisovich reluctantly patted weeping Valentina on her broad undulant back and grabbed his boxers off the chair.
The sun was down and the apartment would soon fill with children’s laughter, regardless of what had happened.
“Do you want me to stay?” he asked, pulling on his pants.
“No, we’ll manage. We always do, we have to,” Valentina sniffled, wiping her nose on the discarded T-shirt. “You ain’t Grisha, don’t even try.”
She stood up and undid her rollers in front of the black lacquer vanity that had been purchased from the same store as Sofia’s. She suddenly seemed taller, more imposing, despite her bright pink bra and underwear. Her peroxide-blond hair slipped down her round shoulders in large stiff waves.
“Nuuh,
what are you staring at? Haven’t seen a naked woman?” she smirked, shaking out her curls like a girl.
“No, I’m just …” and he realized he hadn’t for some time.
“Sveta, pass the fish,” said Sofia Arkadievna to her daughter.
“Oy,
I still can’t get over it.” She squeezed Ivan Denisovich’s arm in sympathy.
The TV was on, a low hum in the back of the room. Sveta and her husband Alex had stopped by for dinner. Ivan Denisovich noticed they always came to eat at the end of the month, probably ran out of money. No wonder. Her husband was an idiot, spending money on stupid haircuts and designer T-shirts. He was not a husband, he was a liability.
“Pap,”
said Alex, chewing the fish and mashed potatoes with his mouth open.
Where did she find this treasure? Well worth immigrating for.
“I have a name.”
“Oh, c’mon,
Pap,
we’re all family here.”
“Grigory was family. And you …” Ivan Denisovich shook his hand.
“Stop it, Papa. What did he ever do to you?” whined Sveta.
She was not his Svetka anymore. His Svetka who used to jump and laugh until her braids were undone. She had lost her sense of humor, as if being dull meant being smart.
“To Grisha’s soul, may he rest in peace.” Sofia Arkadievna lifted her glass filled with vodka to the brim.
Ivan Denisovich thought it strange that his wife, who didn’t like vodka and rarely drank at all, was about to chug a full glass of the clear demon.
“A good man is gone.” She put down the empty glass and inhaled on a slice of brown rye. “Let’s go see Valentina. I don’t treat her right. I should give her something.”
Ivan Denisovich realized that his wife was already drunk, and acting out of character. He gazed around the room as if he had accidentally entered the wrong apartment. He searched for something familiar, something to hold onto, and was happy to see the little yellow-and-brown throw that Sofia Arkadievna had crocheted when Svetka was born. Russian newspapers and magazines were scattered on the glass coffee table, covered with fingerprints. The blue-and-white flowery china—one of the few things they brought with them when they emigrated—held the proverbial fried cod, mashed potatoes, and beet salad. Stolichnaya vodka in Czech crystal glasses with golden trim completed the setting. The curtains were drawn, shutting out the world, and on the TV screen an old black-and-white film with
Katyusha
missiles blasting against the night sky annihilated Nazi troops in the field. Ivan Denisovich almost believed he was back in Russia, and for a moment felt warm inside, as if the shot of vodka had spread slowly through his veins into the most remote areas of his body, pushing out the pain. He suddenly loved everyone, even his son-in-law with his idiotic spiky hair.
“Milaya.”
He hadn’t called Sofia Arkadievna “my beloved” for many years. He reached for her face and noticed she was crying.
“Milaya
, don’t cry. It will be all right.”
“How would you know, you old goat?” She sounded just like Grigory.
“Mama?” Sveta stared at her weeping mother from across the table. “Ma, what’s wrong?”
“Ma, ma!”
Sofia Arkadievna mocked her daughter. “That’s what,” and she grabbed the platter and threw it across the room. It hit the wall just below the family picture gallery, and the fish mixed with broken china slid down the wall and landed on the polished top of the bookcase.
Sveta jumped from the table, covering her mouth with both hands, as if afraid to release any sound. The men didn’t move.
On the screen, a hazy-eyed war heroine sang “Moscow Nights” to a room full of somber officers.
“I’m sorry,” cried Sofia Arkadievna, and plunked her head over her arms on the table. “I’m so sorry, Vanya. For everything.”
Sveta made a sign to her husband to help her clean up the mess. He wanted to finish his food, but she handed him a rag and a bucket to take care of the fish on the bookcase.
Ivan Denisovich remained still. Everything in his past had to be suddenly rearranged, like a Rubik’s cube when you moved one square and the whole thing collapsed and you had to start over. Only he had no time left to put it all together again. He stood up, unexpectedly sorry for himself, picked up his keys, and walked out the door.
He reached the corner. The night was cool, but jasmine filled the air. The leaning palms looked like bottle brushes against the dark red glow of the evening sky. A young couple across the street laughed, drinking out of a brown bag and smoking. Ivan Denisovich approached them and demonstrated that he wanted a cigarette. They smiled, handed him a Marlboro, and offered to light it. He nodded in gratitude and limped away, his legs rubbery from the first puff.
Cars zoomed by, up and down Fountain Avenue. An older woman with a grocery bag struggled with her keys. A black teenager coasted on his bike, hands off the bar, just like Grigory used to, back in Moscow. A Latina beauty pulled her screaming son out of a beat-up Toyota; then a paraplegic rolled past him in a motorized wheelchair and disappeared inside an apartment building.
Ivan Denisovich shivered and regretted having forgotten his jacket. He glanced at the window on the third floor that framed the orange-tinted light from his apartment. The balcony was filled with old suitcases, geraniums in clay pots, and laundry hanging from the line. Two plastic chairs, his and Sofia Arkadievna’s, stood in the middle, facing the street. They often sat there in the evenings, drinking cold tea and watching neighbors down below. He noticed that the chair cushions were still there. How many times did he have to tell her not to leave them out overnight?
He threw his cigarette on the ground, crushed it against the asphalt with his slipper, and shuffled back home.
ROGER CRUMBLER CONSIDERED HIS SHAVE
R
oger Crumbler considered his shave. On this his fiftieth birthday, he was pleased that while his stubble became grayer each week, he still had a head of hair—and it was still dark.
The face in his bathroom mirror had held up fairly decently for half a century. Though not for the first time he considered minor cosmetic surgery to correct the bags under his eyes, a trait among the men in his family. Was it true that Preparation H reduced the puffiness? There was a kind of logic to that since hemorrhoids were what … ? An enlarged vein, right? But what caused those sacks under the eyes? Fluid? He’d have to Google that. It was always good to have something new to learn.
Working the shaving gel into his whiskers, Roger smiled, mentally outlining the day ahead. At the office he had to complete a final review of the Carlson Foundation financials. There had been no major blips on the radar save for some inconsistencies on a pass-through grant from a city agency. The Carlson Foundation funded reading programs for low-income youth, and the city of Los Angeles was a partner in that endeavor. Such inconsistencies were not unusual given the accounting procedures of the bureaucrats versus the private sector. This was a minor concern, and he would resolve it with a phone call or two to his City Hall contacts.
Yet it was because of those inconsistencies that he was able to do what he’d done. For him. For Nanette.
Roger turned his head this way and the other, making sure he’d covered his face evenly as he massaged the warm foam into his pores. At one of those precious west side fundraising dinner parties saving spotted owls (or maybe it was spotted actors), a dermatologist with skin flawless as plastic told him that you should allow five minutes for your night beard to soak properly. He didn’t adhere to this advice each morning, but he wasn’t going to be fifty every morning either. This was, after all, a big day.
After reconciling the financials, there would be the regular weekly staff meeting. He’d already written and copied his report earlier this week, so there should be no surprises there either. The company, Nathanson and Nathanson, was a boutique CPA firm that nonetheless commanded more than eight million in billing last year, with a clientele that ranged from old-line family foundations like Carlson to heavy hitters in the film and music business. Roger was senior vice-president and was up for partnership.
That in itself was something, considering the firm had been started in the ’40s, when there were still a smattering of orange groves along Wilshire. Run and grown by the founder, Sig Nathanson, then turned over to one of the sons, Gabe, and nephew Martin, in the ’70s. The only other partner outside of the family had been a member of the founder’s temple, and Roger was not a member. Unlike the late Sammy Davis, Jr., he’d only joked over drinks about converting. And what about Whoopi Goldberg? She wasn’t really a member of the tribe, was she? Something else to Google.
He dutifully stroked his double blade through the foam. The reassuring sound of whiskers being loped off were the low notes accompanying the chirping of birds in the tree outside his second-story bathroom window. Post the staff meeting he’d have a light lunch at his desk. He wasn’t actually much for diets, but when he’d had the irregular heartbeat detected at age forty-five, he finally quit smoking and resolved to loose the fat.
Roger guided his razor underneath his jaw. Initially he’d hated running. He’d tried the treadmill at the gym his wife belonged to, but found that boring. Yet jogging through his neighborhood—
Wilshire Vista
, the upscalers called it—he had sights and sounds, and this kept him occupied. In the five years of this regime, including regular sessions with weight machines, he’d lost forty pounds. He ran a palm over his handiwork. For a man his age, his wife and girlfriend both told him amorously, he looked reasonably fit and even a little buffed.
He worked the razor on his upper lip, recalling fondly the moustache he’d also shed five, no, more like four years ago. That’s when he’d met Nanette. Finished, he toweled off the excess of lather and dabbed on aftershave, then stepped back into the bedroom.
His wife, Claudia, was up and moving about. He watched with lascivious interest as she bent over to search in her underwear drawer. Usually she wore sweats or pajama pants and a top, but this morning, this birthday, she wore only lacy purple panties.
Roger sat on the bed, picturing himself as David Niven in
Raffles
. “Have I mentioned how spectacular your ass is, honey?”
“You always know what to say to a woman.” She pushed him back and straddled him, nuzzling and biting his neck.
“Glad you woke me up this morning,” he said, pulling her down and kissing her full on the mouth. He was going to miss her. Yes, he certainly was.
“You didn’t do too bad for an old dog.”
“Careful, I might have to show you my double play.”
She smiled, biting her lower lip. This always got to him, even after decades of seeing it. “I’d like to, baby, but I have to hit that inventory this a.m. You know how that tight-ass Pelecanos gets.” Claudia managed a heavy-equipment rental service.
“Forget your clown boss. He couldn’t find balls in a bowling alley if it wasn’t for you.” He slipped his hand inside her panty and caressed that wondrous backside. His wife reluctantly broke free.
“Tonight we’ll have all kinds of time,” she said.
“Well, I don’t know. At my age, Lord knows, I need my rest.”
She shook a glossy purple nail at him. “You just be ready and don’t drink too much.”
He chuckled. “I won’t.” Damn, she looked good.
The phone rang. He reached for it but Claudia moved quicker and plucked the handset loose.
“Hello?” Then, “Oh, hi, sweetie.” She listened some more, glancing once or twice at her husband, frowning.
Roger languidly reposed on the bed, but a spring was winding in the base of his spine. That had to be their daughter on the phone. She attended Cal Berkeley up north. Was there some emergency? If so, what would that do to his schedule? But he had to be cool.
Can’t let ’em see you sweat
, he reminded himself.
“All right, honey. We’ll see you tonight.”
“Why’s she coming home?” he asked as his wife hung up. “There some problem?”
“Not really …” Claudia began.
“Not really?” he said more shrilly than he wanted. “This is the middle of the school year, Claudia.” Now what did he just tell himself?
Keep it on low burn, man. Low burn.
He rose, clasping his wife’s shoulders. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to get all tense. You know how us pensioners get mood swings.”
Claudia Crumbler-Morris looked preoccupied, fooling with a towel. “Janice’s coming home because she doesn’t have class until Monday, and wants to talk to us about something.”
Roger wondered aloud, “Dropping out?”
“Or pregnant.”
“Aw, hell no.” He began to stomp around the room. “We’re too damn young to be grandparents.”
“No, we’re not.”
“Jesus.”
Claudia chuckled. “I don’t think she’s pregnant.”
“She’s twenty and we’ve both seen how them knotheads with their pants hanging down around their cracks drool at her.”
Claudia was heading toward the shower. “She’s not attracted to those kind of boys.”
“Even boys with slide rules like a little—”
“Roger,” she admonished.
“Taste,” he declared.
“Heathen.” She closed the bathroom door and ran her shower. He knew she wasn’t that sure Janice wasn’t pregnant, and neither was he.
And if she was with child, then what of his plans involving Nanette? It wasn’t like he could pull this off any time he felt like doing it. He finished dressing. It would be casual today, the pressed chinos, button-down shirt, sports jacket, no tie. It was his birthday and it was expected he’d be coasting once the Carlson file was closed out.
Putting his socks on, the ones with the blue hourglasses, he reveled in the simplicity and beauty of the virus he’d planted in his firm’s computers more than two years ago. At 9:24 tonight, his new life would begin.
By then he and Nanette would be heading east, toward Texas, in the used car they’d bought more than a year ago. He’d gotten the brakes fixed, the head gasket replaced and what have you, so that the vehicle was completely reliable for the getaway. And, most importantly, the final transfer of the funds he’d siphoned off, little by little, had been completed three days ago. The computer crash would cover his nefarious deeds for weeks, time enough to set up his new life with the younger woman.
Naturally, Roger would be a suspect, but he’d be gone, no forwarding. The cops and the firm would hammer at Claudia, give her a rough going over, but she was innocent. She didn’t have a clue about his plans.
“What time will you be back home? I know you’re going to have drinks with Wayne and the guys.”
“What time is Janice supposed to be here?”
“About 7:30, she said.”
“Alone?”
His wife dangled an earring from her lobe. “Good question.” She blew him a kiss. “You have such a suspicious mind.”
“I’ll be back here no later than 8.”
“All right. See you then, Rog.” She gave him a peck, then gripped his lower face in her hand. Using her tongue, but keeping her fresh carmine lips off his, she probed his mouth. “Love you.”
“Love you too.”
As she hummed and walked down the stairs, he stood at the railing, watching her go. He remained there, hearing her car start up and fade away. After tonight, he’d never see her or his daughter again. But he was resolved, he was going to spend the second half, well, really, if he was lucky and kept exercising and watching what he ate, the next thirty years with a woman twenty years his junior, plus some two and a half million dollars in ill-gotten gains richer.
That was an amount a bling bling rapper like 50 Cent or actor Tom Cruise might sneer at, hardly enough for them to get out of bed. But it was sufficient for a humble man like Roger Crumbler.
The down payment had been made through intermediaries on a condo in Port Saint Charles in Barbados. And through budgeting and living within their means, they’d be comfortable. They wouldn’t be driving Jags or Bentleys, nor vacationing on a whim, but it’s not like they’d have to subsist on Top Ramen.
And should the need or notion arise, Roger had also entertained money laundering for a select list of individuals. Certainly more than once over the years, several clients of the firm had hinted at such. Millionaires, more than the middle class, were willing to step over the line to hold onto that which they felt entitled to by birth or happenstance.
Wayne Wardlow, the Carlson Foundation’s executive director, was not a possibility in that department. Though it was Wayne who had inspired Roger.
“Hell yes, I’m tappin’ that ass,” he’d joked. Referring to a woman, a freelance writer Wardlow had met doing an article about socially involved foundations for
Los Angeles
magazine.
“Okay, P. Diddy,” Roger had remarked to the man whose face should illustrate
WASP
in the dictionary. They were in the locker room getting dressed after their basketball game and shower.
“I love black pussy—you don’t know what you’re missing, son.” Wardlow knocked him playfully in the shoulder.
“And you have lost your natural cotton-pickin’ mind,” Roger said, slipping into his trousers.
“Rog, getting some on the side at our age is cheaper than buying a sports car, and a damn sight more fun.” He then grabbed his crotch like an oversexed sophomore in high school and bucked his hips.
Okay, it wasn’t really fair to lay this at Wayne Wardlow’s doorstep. Roger was a grown man. He made the decision to kindle a romance with Nanette, who’d flirted with him that day at the Barnes and Noble in the Grove. A pretty woman like her browsing in the Social Science section, able to cite the specific failures of strongman Robert Mugabe’s policies in Zimbabwe, and argue the cultural significance of the late Rick James’s music. How could he not be hooked?
His cell phone rang, and he knew only too well the number on its screen.
“How does it feel to be a geezer who has two women panting to fuck the shit out of you?” Nanette said huskily.
“You have a way with a phrase, have I mentioned that?”
“Are you hard? Or did the old lady drain you?”
“I want you so bad.”
“Me too.”
“Everything ready?”
“Ready and steady.”
He hesitated—should he mention his daughter coming to town?
“What? Worried? Having second thoughts? That’s understandable, this is serious.”
“Don’t I know. Everything’s fine. I can’t wait to see you.” Don’t say anything, don’t put a jinx on this opportunity.
“I’ll be thinking about you all day, Roger. Wish you were here to find out how wet I am.”
“I will soon, baby.”
“You got that right.”
He pressed the cell off and nodded his head. They’d even accounted for this. For the last few months he’d been using disposable cell phones, also carrying his regular one for his wife’s calls.
Outside, Roger sat in his idling car, looking at the house he was not going to see again after today. It was far from a palace, but they’d lived in this two-story Spanish-Mediterranean since Janice had been three. The paint jobs, the patching, the lawn that needed re-seeding, staying here while Claudia took Janice to the Valley during the ’92 riots—a pint of Jack Daniel’s and a revolver he’d never fired, his false fortifications. There had been the hole in the roof beneath the tiles that had ruined their bedroom ceiling, those ornery possums prowling in the bushes in the backyard he’d chased off with a golf club, the time Janice learned to ride her bike up and down the block. The house was the touchstone to a vast chapter in his life.
He backed the car out of the driveway and made a slow tour along Curson, taking it all in as if for the first time—the old timers and the others, the newbies with their walls enclosing their front yards, the redone homes with the Southwest flare replete with landscapes of cacti and native plants—how his neighborhood, his part of Mid-City, had changed in the years they’d lived here.