Mule (27 page)

"I like to think I'm big, but what I move is a joke. This city puffs away a thousand pounds an hour. Imagine the scale of it. There's plenty of room to grow, but you have to have a reliable and cost-effective source. Tell me something, James. Everyone's always in the market for talented people. If we could clear it with Eric and you had the free time, would you want to do some interesting side work for me?"

She had this idea, a way to slip around suppliers, cut costs. "The Niagara River. The border between Ontario and New York State. There are places where it's narrow enough to navigate in a kayak. State parks, frontage roads. We'd have to do it at night because they run patrols. Maybe we could even shoot an arrow across."

"An arrow?"

"Yeah, an arrow," she said and started laughing, her champagne flute raised in her hand like she was making a toast. "With a string tied to the fletching. We'd pull the weed across in waterproof bags. Sounds silly, right? People jump out of airplanes. They parachute across the border with hundred-pound bales strapped to their backs. People four-wheel for days through the woods, they don't even know where they are. And what about the Mexicans and their tunnels? So why not get creative, right?"

I swallowed another mouthful of bubbly, thought about the pantyhose. The pantyhose had certainly worked for me.

"We should go up there, check it out. Cruise along the river, find the perfect spot. Stay somewhere nice, somewhere expensive. You'd do the driving, right?"

Then she said, "What about your wife, James? Does she know much about what you do out there?"

"Kate doesn't know anything about what I do."

Danielle said, "In my other life, nobody knows anything either. People I'm close to. People I'd like to be closer to. Then we reach the point where that's all they're ever going to know about me."

When we left the bar, it was evening. Danielle offered me her arm. As we walked across town on Houston, I felt that people were looking at us. Looking at me, looking at how beautiful she was beside me. The wind kept us close together. Shouldn't we hop in a cab? I asked. She said, Isn't it nice to walk? To be with someone you don't have to lie to?

There was a Moroccan place she hadn't been to in a while on the other side of NYU, should we go there? Sure. When we got there, it was shuttered. Okay, she said, there was a place for hand-pulled noodles not far away, somewhere on Bond, Mercer. When we stood in front of it a few minutes later, we saw it was out of business. We went back to Houston and Danielle put up her hand for a cab. She said as she did, "Do they expect us to fucking cook?"

At BLT Fish, we had oysters at the bar—Bluepoints, Fanny Bays, Yaquinas—and drank Bombay martinis, one after the other. The place was noisy and packed; the economy hadn't forced its way in here yet. Danielle and I had to sit close to each other the whole time because of the crowd. When Kate texted me, "where are you?" I texted back, "motel in sac."

"kids miss u. I miss u."

"home in 2 days."

"call before bed?"

"ok."

"That her?" Danielle asked when she saw me texting. I nodded, slipped the phone in my pocket, turned it off as I did. She rolled her eyes and said, "I wouldn't get married if they paid me."

"When you fall in love, they don't have to."

"Do you really love your wife?"

"Most of the time."

"And the other times?"

I was quiet. Then I said, "I wonder why she lets me do it."

I looked at myself in the mirror behind the bar. Was that what I looked like? My hair short? My face lean and innocent-looking? Even handsome? I knew it was the booze working its magic. Still, it felt grand. Danielle said, "Work stressing you out right now, James?"

"Work always stresses me out, Danielle."

"Ever think about taking a break?"

"All the time. But then I wonder what's left for me to do."

"Because of the money?"

"Because of the money."

"Then maybe this is what you were meant to do. Aren't you glad it found you? I can't believe I ever wanted to get out. I wouldn't give it up for anything anymore."

When I glanced at our hands on the bar, I saw she was letting me caress her fingers. If I was ever going to leave this place, I knew I had to do it now. Instead I put my hand up for another round. I said, "Do you really want to know how stressed out I've been?"

She said, "Tell me."

"My beard's been falling out. Almost two years. It started when we lost our jobs. It won't grow back no matter how much money I put away."

She took my chin in her hand, turned it up to the light. She stroked the bare places beneath it with her fingertips. She said, "Your skin feels so smooth where it's missing."

"It fucking embarrasses me."

"Don't be embarrassed. I wouldn't have noticed if you hadn't told me.

"You know what?" she said eagerly as she waved to the bartender for the tab. "I might have something at my place that will fix it."

The thing she had at her place was the Baby Quasar, a small handheld device of LED lights that looked like a ray gun from the future, lying on the marble counter in her white-tiled bathroom. Then I was sitting on a stool in front of her huge lighted mirror drinking a Red Stripe from the six-pack at my feet I'd pulled from her fridge as she smoked a Newport and switched on the Baby Quasar. Blue light shot from it like a laser beam. "They didn't say when I bought it that it would make hair grow back," she said as she turned the beam toward my face, "but I paid too much for it not to." Then she stopped and squinted at me in the mirror. She let out a puff of smoke and said, "You're going to have to take off your shirt."

"What's my shirt got to do with it?"

"Would you relax and trust me already? Or do you not want your beard to grow back?" She lit another Newport, tapped the ash casually to the floor. She was so fucking cool. I knew someone would come and clean up the ash in the morning, someone who wouldn't be her. Because someone else had come while we'd been out, had taken away the suitcases and left behind a gym bag stuffed with cash. I pulled off my T-shirt, tossed it on the floor. Danielle looked at my body in the mirror in that bright room. She ran her hands along my shoulders, then down the sides of my chest. She tapped her ash on the floor and said, "You'd look even better with a few tattoos."

The light of the Baby Quasar felt warm against my skin. I grew drowsy, closed my eyes, didn't notice it anymore. Danielle took a break to open her medicine cabinet, brought out a small, dark vial. I knew what it was right away. She tapped a line onto the counter beside the sink, tucked her long hair behind her ear to clear her face, and snorted it. Then it was my turn to snort a line. Would I? I did. Then it was her turn again. Then mine. We sniffed, pinched our noses, looked at ourselves in the mirror together. I knew I shouldn't be there, shouldn't have done anything I'd already done that day. At the same time, I didn't care. The aspirin flavor was dripping in the back of my throat. I could finally breathe again. When was the last time I'd done blow? A couple of years ago? No, more. Because I'd married, had kids. God, remember them? Danielle turned on the Baby Quasar; now it pulsed like a strobe light. She worked it slowly over my face, stuck Newport after Newport in the corner of her mouth as she did. When I reached down for another Red Stripe, I found that they were all empty. I closed my eyes, rolled my head in a circle, and she called on her cell for more beer.

"What do you think of my place, James?"

"I think it's pretty fucking great."

"Did you know the park's private? You have to have a key to get in."

"That's pretty fucking cool."

And somebody did bring more beer. But who? When? Because then there were Stellas on ice in the sink when only a second before there hadn't been. There was cash on the counter now, too, crumpled dollar bills.

"Who brought up the beer?" I leered at my shirtless self in the mirror and laughed.

Danielle laughed. She said, "You didn't see that kid?"

"Oh yeah. He looked scared."

"He was scared."

"Where was he from?"

"Some country. Hey, why did you tell him what you did?"

"What did I tell him?"

"'Drive fast and swerve a lot.'"

"Did I tell him that?"

"Yeah. You even made him say it. What is that?"

"That's rule number one."

"What's rule number one?"

"Don't get caught."

"Eric taught you that?"

"Other people taught me that."

"What other people?"

"My people out in Cali."

"Who are your people out in Cali?"

"I can never tell you."

"Then that must be a rule, too."

"That's not a rule. That's how you stay alive."

Danielle said, "What's your favorite place to run through?"

I didn't have to think about it. I said, "Northern Arizona. From the moment you cross the Cali border. You leave the desert, go up into these forested hills. Snow deep into the spring. Sometimes elk on the side of the road. The Grand Canyon somewhere just to the left of you. It's like that all the way across to Flagstaff. Then you've got the San Francisco Mountains. Beautiful fucking mountains. Like pyramids. Then you're in Indian territory. Hopis and Navajos. I used to worry when I was a kid that all the Indians were dead. But there are plenty of them out there. They even work in the gas stations."

"You know what I used to worry about? That all the panda bears would die. Isn't it dumb all the things we worry about when we're kids?"

"Now I worry about all this other shit."

"Now I worry about getting cancer."

"You're not going to get cancer."

"How do you know that? Everybody gets cancer all the time. I want to make enough money to buy my way out of it. The Mayo Clinic. Nuclear medicine."

"Why don't you quit smoking?"

"Then how are you supposed to deal with life, you know?"

"I can really hear the Canada in you now."

"It's 'cause I'm high." She dumped more coke on the counter, cut more lines with her fingernail. "We have to shoot an arrow across that river. Or else scuba-dive. You want to do that with me?"

"How are you going to get me away from Eric?"

"I'll buy you."

"You'll buy me?"

"Yeah, man. Don't you know you're a commodity?"

She turned off the Baby Quasar at last. She set her warm face on my bare shoulder and we looked at ourselves together in the mirror. "Can you feel it growing back yet?"

"I can't feel a fucking thing."

Her cell phone started vibrating, then she was talking to people. Then we were out in the night in a cab. What time was it? I asked. Something in the morning, she said. I hadn't called my wife to say good night. Jesus Christ, she said, so call her now, who cared? I patted the pockets of my jeans. My phone wasn't in them. Where the hell had I left it? But I knew there wasn't any number on it but Kate's. Would Kate be mad I hadn't called? I'd make something up. I was good at that.

Then we were in the East Village, in one of those bars. Everyone was laughing, talking, going in and out to smoke. Then Danielle and I were making out up against the brick wall outside. I couldn't feel the cold. Later, we were with all these people in a dingy lounge in Alphabet City, and one of the guys was a comedian everyone was supposed to know. I didn't know him.

Everything started spinning; I had to flop on a couch beside a Sikh in a black turban. His beard was neatly folded and tied up under his chin. What if I could grow a beard like that? What did he do? I asked him. Software something, he said. What did I do? he asked me. I was a drug runner, I told him. Oh, really? Now that was very interesting. How was I holding up in this market? I was holding up fine. How was he doing? Pins and needles. Pins and needles. People were losing their jobs.

Then Danielle and I were in a bathroom stall, bumping blow off our fists. Graffiti and tattered handbills were around us everywhere:
Instant CASH!!!
She turned and hiked up her dress, I unbuckled my jeans, we started having sex in there. The toilet was broken, running and running. I couldn't believe I was doing this. God, it felt horrible. God, it felt good to be free. Then she said, "Stop! Just stop! This is too disgusting." We went out again, drank more. I wasn't even sure if that had just happened. Then we were making out in a cab. Back at her place, we snorted more lines off her coffee table on our knees. I said to her, "You always keep so much coke around here?"

"Only when you bring it up to me."

"I've been bringing you coke?"

"God, you're dumb. Yeah, man. You've been bringing me a little coke every time."

Coke? Fucking coke! How many years could I get for that!

"Who cares, right? Just ask him for more money."

Then I was riding her so hard on the Turkish carpet in her library that I was frightening myself. I threw her up against a chair.

"You want to own me?"

"Yeah, yeah."

"What if I owned you?"

I blinked my eyes awake in the morning. Where was I? Then the wretched night began reeling in.

Danielle was there in a gray dress. I was on the bed, naked. She glanced back at me through the full-length mirror where she was slipping on her earrings. Did I want a line to pick me up? I shook my head. Did I want her to leave the key to the park before she headed out? I shook my head again.

"See you in a couple weeks?"

"Yeah."

"Drive fast and swerve a lot."

 

Down in Tallahassee, in Deveny's den, I shouted, "Coke! Are you fucking insane!"

He laughed. "Give me your connection."

I unzipped the gym bag, whipped the bundles of money at him one by one. As I stormed out, he called after me in a happy voice, "Hey, my man, what about my lunch?"

***

Around that time, Darren Rudd began calling, just like Billy had warned me he would, texting and calling in the evening almost every day. He wanted to come and see me, inspect my setup, give me his insights on how I was running my loop. He'd had to hop over to Thailand without explaining every last detail of the business to me, he was saying now. And he'd felt really bad about that.