No Sleep till Wonderland (4 page)

He says, “There are plenty of small-timers in Southie who sell this stuff, you know. He’s not the only one.”

“So I’ve heard.” I take out one of my own cigarettes and put it to work. I don’t know what to think or how to think. There should be a manual or a training film. Our words are forming complicated crossing circuits in my head. I need to regroup. I need a nap. I do think he’s telling the truth about the amphetamine conversation that I don’t remember. The stuff about Desoxyn and the side effects, particularly the diarrhea, has the ugly ring of my truth. The Eddie connection, though, I don’t know.

Gus isn’t in the client chair anymore. He’s standing at the side of my desk, tugging gently on my sleeve. I must’ve gone out for a bit, and he waited. Don’t know if that counts for or against him.

“Hey, Mark.” He waits until I move my arm and adjust in my seat, then he adds, “I understand everything you’re saying. But I don’t know what else to tell you. I didn’t invite you out to set this up. There was nothing to set up. I promise.”

I don’t ask,
Why did you take me out?
I want to know the answer so desperately my teeth ache, but I won’t ask. I’m not that needy. I say, “All right, I’ll do the job.” I am that needy. I don’t say it aloud because I’ve already made my neediness quite apparent. “Write down the details for me.”

Gus slaps me on the shoulder. My shoulder is going to hit back eventually. “Thanks, Mark. You’re a lifesaver.” Gus brightens considerably. The eclipse of my mistrust has passed. He’s practically dancing in place as he pulls a folded check out of his pocket and tosses it on my desk. It lands like a betrayal.

“Not necessary. I’m not a charity.”

“Stop it, Mark. Take it. You’re doing work for me. Like I said, you’ll be helping me and Ekat out, big-time.”

I unfold the check. Five hundred bucks.

He says, “Is it enough? If it isn’t, I—”

“It’s plenty.” I fold the check and throw it at his chest. A strong throw.

Gus tosses it back. “I’m not leaving here with this check, Mark. I mean it.”

He wins. Again. I tell him, “I’ll be at her bar tomorrow night.”

“Great!” Gus claps his hands, then shakes one of mine and says, “All right, I’m out of here. Call me tomorrow night.” Still standing, but swaying side to side, he writes down his cell number and the other details I’ll need for tomorrow night.

“Thanks again, Mark. I’ll talk to you soon.” He backs out of my office, pointing at me like everyone should be looking here, at me, hiding behind my desk, the not-so-incredible shrinking man in his shrinking office, same as it ever was.

When the door shuts, I give the check my hairy eyeball. I might cash it, or I might lose it. I open my top drawer and put the check inside, wedge it under a cigarette lighter shaped like a handgun. It was a gag gift from my late best friend George, the one who died the night of the van accident. I don’t want to think about that now, so I won’t.

Instead, I think about turning on the computer and checking e-mail, but I decide to call it a day. My days usually end early anyway. The bag of amphetamines, almost forgot about the little fellas. They’re still on my desk. A bag of promises. A bag of threats. I don’t know which. Probably both. I pick up the amphetamines and tuck them inside my suit jacket. They make a lump on my chest.

Maybe I trust Gus. Maybe I don’t. I really want to, though, and it’s the want that scares me.

The next day comes like it was supposed to, though I suspect it won’t one of these days. I sleep in, cash the check at the bank across the street, and hit the office late—1:00 p.m. late. No one visits or calls.

There’s no real work to do until this evening, so I try verifying Financier CEO Wilkie Barrack’s Commonwealth Avenue apartment address by calling the building’s rental agency. No go there. Then I call the
Boston Herald
’s Inside Track pretending I’ve just spotted Madison and her lacrosse accessory coming out of a building, and I give Madison’s address. The wonderfully helpful intern with the asthmatic voice tells me that it’s covered; they already have a freelance photographer stationed outside that address.

So I had the right apartment, anyway. Not sure if that’s good or bad, but after experiencing a modicum of success I celebrate by sleeping.

It’s 7:00 p.m., and I wake up thinking about how I’m getting to the Pour House. Transportation is always an issue, an incident waiting to happen. Instead of a cab, I could pick up the number 9 bus at the stop right across from my building, and ride the 9 all the way in to the Prudential. It’d be easy and much cheaper than a cab, but I don’t do well on buses.

I take out Gus’s gift bag and dry swallow an amphetamine. Yeah, just like that. There is no soul-searching or deliberation. I summarily dismiss the nagging question,
What if these aren’t amphetamines?
because I can. Swallowing the pill is a complete what’s-the-worst-that-could-happen gesture on my part. Amphetamines are essentially the same stuff I tried before, and probably only have a little extra hot sauce. So why am I clutching the edge of my desk, expecting a
Wolfman
soft dissolve and transformation?

While waiting for the fangs to sprout, I do a Web search on amphetamines, which is something I should’ve done first. Apparently amphetamines are habit forming with both physical and psychological dependence. That’s nice. The drug has an impressive and familiar list of side effects that I jot down in my handy-dandy palm-sized notebook. I might need this list later. If I start freaking out, I’ll know why.

The list:

I wonder if diarrhea or constipation is user’s choice.

I close up the office and step outside. It’s another scalding-hot night, but lower humidity and there’s a coastal breeze. I limp across the street to the bus stop and light up a cigarette as the 9 bus surfaces and beaches itself on the corner. I make my first and only drag count before grinding it under my heel. What a waste.

Inside the bus, the lights flicker with the sputtering AC. It’s cooler in the tin can, but no one feels cool. I lay claim to a seat in the back, behind a couple of giggly teenage boys wearing crooked baseball hats, listening to iPods, and carrying on a loud semiverbal conversation. They’ll annoy me enough to keep me awake.

The bus rolls away from the curb, and we’re off. Should be a ten-minute trip. Fifteen tops. I’m growing more nervous that I’m too trusting of Gus’s little green pill. Is it too late to change my mind? I have a second pill in my pocket just in case I rechange it later. Gus never did tell me the recommended dosage. As a bike messenger/bartender, he makes a lousy pharmacist.

It’s a slow ride down Broadway with too many stops. I look out the bus window, but the interior lights reflect my mug on the glass. I’m having trouble focusing, a sentiment I should have tattooed on my tongue. My heart beats louder, knocking its Morse code against my chest. I check my pulse, and it feels quicker than normal, and seems to be gaining momentum, but I don’t usually check my pulse so I don’t really know what is normal.

I’m multiple-shots-of-espresso wired, but I’m also withdrawn, a step back from reality, whatever that is. My field of vision has a frame on it. I’m in a window. No, I am my own window, and I’m not making any goddamn sense.

The bus hits a pothole, and I almost scream out. Wait, there is no “almost” about my scream as the two teens turn and look at me, clearly a-scared of the hairy, sweaty, screaming man on speed. At least I’m not driving.

Okay, calm down, Genevich. I think we passed over Interstate 93 and are getting closer to Copley. I pull out my collection of side effects, and it reads like a checklist. I know some of what I’m experiencing is the placebo effect, me and my damaged gray matter simply cooperating with the list of symptoms, but it doesn’t make me feel any better.

I curl and pass the paper between my fingers. My fingers feel big and clumsy, and that’s because they are. The “may only hide symptoms of extreme fatigue” is a particularly ominous side effect.

Ten minutes past forever the bus stops at the Prudential. My fingers are vines, choking the seat in front of me, but I made it. I step off the bus on legs that are skittish and easily spooked. The fresh night air mixed with bus exhaust is a welcome splash of cold water on my face. Released into the expanse of the city, I relax.

The walk is short, two blocks, and I’m feeling good, confident, focused, the near meltdown on the bus already forgotten. The Pour House is a big place with an upstairs and a downstairs. It’s early, but most of the booths are full of late diners. Graffiti and collected kitsch cover the brick walls. The staff is dressed in black, with a few wearing neon plastic leis around their necks. I hate this place: it tries to be a dive, but it’s too happy, too young. The contrived spontaneity motif rubs me all the wrong ways. I need a smoke, but if I were to light up here the kids would throw their mojitos and appletinis at the grumpy old man.

I mosey downstairs. Here, it’s darker, and with less crap smeared on the walls. No crowd. The bar takes up most of the square footage with small tables for two tightly lined along the walls. TVs hang in the corners, each tuned to the Sox game, volume muted. Upstairs is the play room. This is the bar. I decide to lean on it.

Ekat works alongside a male bartender who is completely uninteresting. She’s pretty in an everywoman kind of way. Her face mixes a sharp nose with rounded cheeks. No makeup and her brown hair tied up tight. She sees me, jogs to my end of the bar, and says, “What can I get you?”

I’m doing okay, but I don’t know about mixing amphetamines, alcohol, and surveillance, oh my. I ask for a beer, Sam Adams. Can’t exactly sit at a bar and order water, now, can I?

Ekat is a few inches shorter than I am, but moves a hell of a lot faster. She drops my full glass onto the bar without spilling and asks, “Do I know you?” She doesn’t cock her head to the side or send her voice up a few unsure octaves. She says it like she’s mad at herself for not knowing the answer to a stupid question.

I throw a five on the bar. “Don’t think so. But I get that all the time because I look like everyone else.”

I went into this assuming Gus wasn’t going to tell her about me. She lives in Southie, so maybe she’s seen me around, or she knows of me because the DA died in my stairwell. Everyone in Southie knows who I am even if they never see me. I’m their Sasquatch, only no one collects my footprints. It’s hard being so popular.

She laughs—at me or with me, I don’t know. “You’re right. I get your types all night long, usually only on Wednesdays, though. You’re off a night.”

“I’m usually off.” I retreat to one of the small square tables up against the wall. I’m going to be here for a while and don’t want to be more conspicuous than I already am. I’m the only person in the joint not wearing a tight T-shirt and tighter jeans.

I think about calling Gus but decide against it. I poke and prod my beer through a couple of hours, then have the waitress bring me ginger ale on the rocks and without a straw. The Red Sox lose. People come and go, and Ekat and her partner serve the drinks. Nothing new, and even the randomness of who orders what and who gets served first seems regimented and predetermined if you watch for too long.

All around me there are pockets of conversations, some animated, some quiet and subdued, whispers in a crowd, but all the participants are engaged, effortlessly so. They know what to do and how to act. It has all been done and said before.

As the evening moves on past eleven, my companion fatigue returns, coming back like it’s mad at me for ditching it. I hurt its feelings, and it will not be ignored. It’s been four hours since I took the first amphetamine. I can’t fall asleep here. Taking the other pill isn’t even a choice now. This one, I swallow with ginger ale. I’m sure the carbonation will make it behave.

Ekat waves at me from the bar. She wants me to come over. Did she see me take the greenie? She’s wearing an I-gotcha smile.

She says, “Aren’t you the private detective from Southie?”

“I’m Peter Parker, but I’m all out of special powers.”

“Come on…”

“Okay. Don’t know if I’m
the
”—and I pronounce
the
as
thee
because I’m so fancy—“PI of Southie, but I do work there.”

“I knew it. You’ve only had the one beer since coming in. I’ve been watching you. You’re on a case, aren’t you?” She points a finger at me.

Her act tastes a little hammy. I still don’t know whether Gus told her I was coming or not. Maybe now that the night’s getting later, the threat of Eddie showing up seems more real and she wants her presumed protection closer. Or maybe she’s just fucking with me.

I sit at the bar. There’s room. I say, “You’re my case.”

“If that’s a pick-up line, it’s terrible and not funny.” Ekat wipes the bar with a rag, angry at the spill that I can’t see.

“All my pick-up lines are terrible and not funny, but that wasn’t a pick-up line. Our mutual friend Gus…”

She throws her bar rag, and it bounces off my chest. I didn’t deserve that. “Gus? Gus sent you here?” She swears and talks under her breath, and I’m too polite to eavesdrop.

“He didn’t tell me there would be flying bar rags.” I think I’m speaking louder than normal, my normal anyway. The second amphetamine has kicked in. Its charge and voltage hum through my system. I’m itching in my stool, toe tapping, both eyes dancing in their sockets. This will work as long as my blood doesn’t explode from my veins.

She says, “I can take care of myself,” and points at herself with that finger. I’m much more comfortable with that thing pointing away from me.

I try to sound relaxed, even if I’ve been deported from the island nation of Relaxed. “Gus said the same thing. He also said he thought you could use a little help tonight, that’s all.”

“I don’t need any help.” Ekat stalks to the other end of the bar, but there’s no one to serve. Any customer would be scared of her anyway.

I hold up my empty glass, and she comes back with her arms folded over her chest. It’ll be hard to pour drinks that way. I order another ginger ale, no ice this time. I’m so sophisticated. She puts it down in front of me, and I ask her, “How are you taking care of it?”

“Excuse me?”

“The Eddie problem. You said you could take care of yourself, and I want to know what your plan is for tonight.”

Ekat pours herself a glass of water from the soda gun. It’s a good way to spend a pause. “I’m leaving early tonight, before closing, soon if they’ll let me.”

“Good idea. Mind if I follow you home? You could help me out, make sure I don’t fall asleep on the way back.” Oh hell, that sounds like a line when it isn’t. I shrug and hold up my empty palms as I really don’t know what I’m doing or saying.

“How am I supposed to do that?”

“I don’t know. But if you figure it out, please tell me.”

Ekat finishes her water and throws a quick, spinning look around the bar. “Fuck it. Let’s go now. You get to pay for the cab ride.”