Broken Monsters (15 page)

Gabi is
going over the photographs again when a cardboard folder slides slowly down over her screen, complete with sound effect. “Sha-bloooooop,” Mike Croff says, leaning over the edge of her cubicle, like the cat who got the canary
and
an airtight alibi.

“Better be good, Mike,” she says, taking the folder. It's the one thing she misses from Beaubien—offices with doors.

“Are you prepared to have your mind blown?” Croff pops his fingers in a slow-mo simulation of an explosion.

“Sure, blow me.” She means it too, after what Luke told her.

“That's funny. You said ‘blow me,' and you don't have a dick.”

“Unless you have the other half of my kid, it's going to have to be pretty damn spectacular.” She pushes back on her chair. Her old chair had give, it would let you lean right back; this one is ergonomically designed with lower lumbar support that somewhat ruins any attempt at don't-give-a-shit cool.

 “I got something
beautiful
from forensics.” He takes Boyd's chair from his desk and straddles it the wrong way around, setting his chin on the backrest and watching her.

“About time,” she says, tapping the folder, not opening it, not wanting to give him the satisfaction.

“It's not superglue and it's not Dermabond, which plastic surgeons use to glue together skin edges, especially on kids who have face-planted into the edge of the table. It's also not fibrin, which you would use to seal blood vessels.”

“Thank you for that.” She opens the damn file already and skims it, trying to get ahead of him. Amino acid chains. R group bonding. Denatured. Enzymes.

“What the fuck is ‘transglutiminase'?”

“That's where it gets really interesting. Ever hear of Wylie Dufresne or Heston Blumenthal?”

“Jesus Christ, Mike.” Gabi sits upright in her chair—easier with lumbar support. “You got an ID?”

“Don't you wish. You want me to hand you your whole case wrapped up with a bow? No, they're chefs who make seriously pretentious food. Molecular gastronomy.”

“You
are
wasting my time.”

“Ah, but it's the trickle-down effect. Except, unlike the economy, it actually works. Cooking techniques make it down the food chain.”

“Can we skip ahead to the good bit?”

“Transglutaminase. Also known as meat glue. Fancy restaurants, the kind you and I can't afford, my dear, use it to make concoctions like, I don't know…bacon shrimp crème brûlée. The nasty steakhouse on the corner uses it to stick raw scraps together. Tell me if this sounds familiar: ‘It works by melting the proteins, bonding the muscle and fiber together seamlessly.'''

“What's the availability? Have you run down local transglutiminate suppliers?”

“I can't do all your work for you, Versado. And by the way, it's transglu
ta
minase. Call yourself a detective.”

“I'll call you something in a minute.”

“Is that Spanish for thank you?”

She gives him the finger.

“Oh, that translates in any culture.”

It turns out you can order meat glue the same way you can order dead rabbits for taxidermy—via the Internet.

The rain clatters on the metal of the containers on the trucks packed in tight formation with the rat-a-tat of automatic gunfire, forming puddles under the tires, with rainbow slicks of oil. It drips down the back of Gabi's neck, because the supervisor at Halston & Sons: Protein Specialists is not enthusiastic about the idea of letting them in, especially because they came through the yard, because sometimes you don't want to go through the front door.

“This again?” J. Halston (according to his name badge) is not happy to see them. One of the sons, or more likely a grandson. “All our workers are registered and union. And we had a health inspection last month. I got the certificate above the front desk in reception. If you'd come in that way, you'da seen it.”

He has an accountant's face and a boxer's build, as if his job description includes being able to pound a side of beef into submission with his fists. His shaggy eyebrows under the hood of his raincoat have descended right down over his glasses, like storm clouds in corn country.

“We're not here about that,” Boyd says, rubbing at the collar of his jacket where the cheap fabric is clinging to his neck. “You could be serving up rat meat and that'd be none of our business.”

“What did you say to me?” Young Halston is electrified with outrage. “We provide the meat for six out of ten of the best-rated burgers in the whole damn country. You check the reviews. Those are our white tablecloth customers in New York City and LA.”

“I'm sure your meat is exactly what it says on the label,” Gabi soothes.

“Damn right it is.” He shakes his head. “Rat.”

“You're on the list of customers in the Detroit area for Tengu suppliers, for a product called ActivTG.”

“Yeah, so? Flavor of the month. That's FDA-approved. A lot of the meat industry uses it.”

“Traces of it were found on a murder victim, and we're trying to trace where it might have come from.”

“Is this about the little boy? Who was found with, what was it, animal remains?” The storm cloud over his eyebrows lifts. Gabi can almost see his mind doing cognitive circus tricks. She heads him off before he grabs for the trapeze.

“Our victim was found in a dumping ground for all sorts of things. We're following up all the leads right now.”

“Oh man, that was awful. That little boy.”

“You have kids?” It's a cheap shot, but it works. Experience brings people together. War. Terrorist attacks. Parenting.

“Flew the coop already,” he shrugs.

“You got a photo?” she says, pushing her luck.

He takes out his phone and flicks through, realizes it's getting wet and finally summons them into the loading dock, where they don't need to shout over the drum of the rain, and—more importantly—it's dry.

The loading bay is stacked with refrigerated cases marked with the Halston logo, while workers in white overalls and hairnets and gloves bustle between them with packs of meat bound up in plastic wrap. It certainly looks FDA-approved, but it's more than hygienic: it's sterile, totally removed from the reality of the animals going in the other side.

He shows her a photograph of a blunt-faced girl in a slinky prom dress. “That's my oldest. She's working the phone lines in our depot in Chicago. My boy's just finished high school.” He skips to a photograph of a young man posing with his arms folded across his chest, going for hard-core and failing.

“Good-looking kids.” Gabi is ready with her reciprocal offering. “That's mine. She's a handful. Wants to be a Broadway star.”

“Grieg wants to be a nurse.” He grimaces.

“You bring them up to be independent-minded and look what happens,” Gabi commiserates.

“So, what kind of animal was it? The remains you found?”

“We don't have those lab results back yet,” she bluffs. “We're mostly interested in getting more information on this Activ stuff. You said you
do
use it here?”

“We do what our clients want. Bespoke meats. Whatever cut or portion size you want. We do private labels too. We've had more call for specialist products recently.”

“Like what?”

“Sausage without the casing. Things like that.”

“Turducken?” Boyd offers.

“Not yet. You think that's going to be a thing?”

“In medieval times they used to stuff suckling pigs with birds.” She only knows this because of Layla and her delight in choosing the most obscure history projects. Cat worship in Egypt, medieval torture devices.

“We don't do that,” although she can see he's considering it. She guesses you have to stay on top of the trends. There's only so much you can do with meat.

“But you do all kinds of animals here?”

“We slaughter our own sheep on-site, but we get in other meat from around the country.”

“Do you ever use bolt guns?” Boyd asks, because forensic tests have been inconclusive so far and they can't rule it out.

J. Halston Jr. swats the question away. “No, we stun them and then slit their throats. Bolts are for cows.”

“How about deer? Your website says you do venison too.”

“Sure do. We get the meat in. Same as beef and chicken and pork, and we've done ostrich on special order a few times. Less cholesterol.”

“But you don't get the actual animals in?”

“Not alive, no ma'am,” he says like he is explaining to a three-year-old. “We get the carcasses, already prepared, and then we cut them up.”

“You know, I've never seen a real live meatpacking operation,” Boyd says.

“We've got a video on our website you can watch. State-of-the-art machinery to get the right cuts and analyze the meat for impurities.”

“Would you mind if we had a look around?”

“That would violate our health code.” He widens his stance.

“We could get a warrant. How long would that take us, Bob?” Sometimes the word alone has enough weight to bludgeon through hesitancy.

“Dunno.” Boyd scratches at his belly. “Coupla hours? Real pain in the ass, though.”

“Come on,” Halston protests, “half the slaughterhouses in the state probably use Activ. Restaurants, too. Heck, you can buy it online. You gonna serve warrants on everyone?”

Gabi pretends to soften. “Well maybe you could give us a list of your employees who have access to it?”

“I can do that. But I can also tell you that it gets delivered to our front office in a box of sealed one-kilo foil baggies, straight from Tengu. Once that box is opened, it's possible someone could have lifted one of the bags without us knowing about it.”

“Kilos?”

“It's a Japanese company. They work in metric.”

“So almost anyone could have had access to it.”

“It's not hydrochloric acid. You don't even need gloves to work with it. Totally safe, which means we don't keep it under lock and key.”

“Any incidents in the workplace? Disgruntled employees? Unusual behavior?”

“Used to get guys in off the street to work a few shifts, but you know, we want to manage it better, work with the unions. Jobs are too precious.”

“And they've had problems with immigration,” Boyd whispers in her ear.

“Can I speak to your personnel department?”

“If you insist,” he says, crabbily.

They come away with a list of employees for the past five years, including temporary workers (but not the illegals, Boyd points out), and a bag of meat glue for testing.

Patrick Thorpe
stands on the doorstep and listens to the electronic chime going off somewhere deep inside the house. Three times the charm. No one can say he didn't try to get hold of Clayton. The man doesn't answer the phone. He doesn't have an email address. He doesn't even come to the door.

The curator starts walking back to his car, a little ashamed that he feels relieved, and then annoyed that he should feel bad when Clayton basically forced his way into the show, begging him on his knees in the middle of Honey Bee grocery store, his arms full of piñatas. He felt sorry for him—someone who's been around the scene that long having to pack shelves at the Mexican supermarket. But pity isn't a good enough reason to sacrifice the overall caliber of the show, and although Detroit has its share of outsider geniuses, he's not sure Clayton Broom is one of them.

The door squeaks behind him and his relief pops like a bubble. Patrick puts on a smile as he turns. “Oh, hey, Clay. ‘Hey, Clay.' That rhymes.” He laughs to cover the awkwardness, Broom peering out at him through the crack of the door. There's something wrong with his face. It's gone slack, like he's had a stroke or contracted Bell's palsy. “I didn't think you were home,” he tries again.

Clayton opens his mouth, his lips goldfishing, as if he's dragging his brain up from deep underwater. “I was working.”

“Doing some welding?” Patrick guesses, gesturing at the mask shoved up on his head, the thick overalls and gloves.

“Other things, also.”

“That's wonderful.” He fidgets. “Listen, you got a minute?”

“I'm busy.” Clayton moves to close the door.

“It's about that.” Patrick puts a hand on the doorjamb. “The show. I wanted to talk to you. I don't have your cell-phone number.”

“Don't believe in them.”

“That's cool, that's cool. We get too hung up on them. All you see is people staring at their screens all day. Sucks us right in. Can I—?”

Clayton backs away reluctantly and Patrick steps into a gloomy corridor lined with teetering stacks of newspapers and arrangements of stones piled up on top of one another. It smells terrible, like damp and rust. There is black mold growing up the walls. “You, uh, redecorating?”

“It's Clayton's father's house,
my
father's house.” He chews on the words like tobacco, something he has to spit out. “It's his old furniture. He's dead.”

“I'm sorry to hear that.” He keeps talking, rattled. He didn't realize Clayton was so far gone. Maybe it's the claustrophobia of the house, the stacks of old magazines that have made him nuts. Maybe it's contagious. “Planning some papier-mâché? This stuff's a fire hazard. You should be careful, man.”

“I got an extinguisher.”

“So, talking about flammable,” Patrick squirms. “I've been discussing it with Darcy, you remember Darcy, cocurating on Dream House, and I have to tell you the truth, Clay, we're a little worried. The praying mantis dragon thing you're working on? Well, firstly, it's been done before. With the Gurgitator.”

Clayton lights up. Seems like somebody's home, after all. “I helped make that. I hinged the jaw so it could open and close.”

“Yeah, absolutely. Impressive. Fire-breathing dragon-bus stopping traffic all the way down Gratiot!” He shakes his head at the drama. “It was a huge hit at Burning Lakes, too.”

“They didn't invite me.” Clayton sinks back into himself.

“Oh. Well, I hear tickets have got real expensive. But hey, originality is tough. You know that, you've been on the scene long enough to see all the trends come around again. You're practically an art historian.”

Clayton's mouth tightens, like a twist of a screw. “You think my work isn't original?”

“No, no. We
love
your work, you know that, Clay. But we're worried about the fire. We've got installations going up in these old wooden houses, and call me crazy, but a sculpture with a propane tank that shoots seven-foot flames into the air might be a little dangerous. We don't want the party to get shut down for breaking some city fire ordinance. I mean, maybe, if you're willing to do it
without
the flame throwing, we can still consider it. But I'm not sure what your schedule's like, if that's going to throw you off?” He tries to downplay the hopefulness in his voice.

“I'm not doing the praying mantis anymore.”

“Oh.” Patrick wilts with relief. “Oh, that's a shame. Because the party's on Saturday. So…does that mean you won't be doing anything, after all? We'd still love to have you come along. I can put you on the guest list. No obligation, though. If it's too disappointing that you couldn't deliver something for the show, no one would blame you if you didn't want to—”

“I've been working on something else. I'll show you.”

“Well, okay, I mean, I'll have to discuss it with Darcy,” he chatters, following Clayton through the house, stepping over a pile of black garbage bags by the door that have attracted flies even in this cold.

“What's in the refrigerator?” he says, spotting the Post-it on the door that reads “Do not open.”

“Nothing,” Clayton barks. “It's broken.”

In his head, Patrick is riffing that funk number: “Won't you take me to…crazy town.” He's going to lay this on Darcy and make his escape ASAP. “Clay, I don't think this is going to work out. You know how strongly Darcy feels about the cohesion of creative vision. We can't randomly slot in another piece like art is interchangeable—” And then he sees it. He puts his fingers to his mouth. “Oh. Oh my God.”

The garden is never going to recover. The yellow grass has been obliterated by cement dust and spark burns from the welding torch. The praying mantis languishes in the back, a crude thing lumped together from old car parts, with handsaws for claws and three pairs of mismatched mannequin legs protruding from its carapace, reflector-light eyes and mandibles that open on a hinge so it can blast fire from the propane tank in its belly. But that's not what he's looking at.

He hesitates and then steps forward, picking his way between the figures occupying every space in the yard. Twisted bodies made from cement or coils of wire or welded combinations of wood and metal or clay. An army of the beautiful deformed, from miniatures to monsters in every medium imaginable.

“Oh my God,” Patrick says again, taking everything back in his head, all the doubt, the cattiness. This could be huge. Clayton could be the new Tyree Guyton. “How long have you been working on this?”

“I don't know.”

He's already writing the catalog copy in his mind. Dehumanizing distortions, the obliteration of self, with a nod to Francis Bacon or Steven Cohen. Heck, David Bowie.

There are vaguely human shapes in clay, with gaping mouths, arranged in a cluster, half their heads sheared off. They are all twisting their necks like corkscrews to look toward the house. A flock of roughly cast bronze female figures, with jabbing birds' heads and disturbingly elongated arms flung back behind them, are arranged along an old log.

A Christ figure with a beatific expression raises one sculpted hand in blessing, but his mouth is fitted with hinges and gears, and his robes, made from rags, are flowering with mold from being left out in the rain. A woman created out of wire covers her eyes with her hands with black tar oozing between her fingers, frozen in place.

And then he comes upon the blob. It's a malformed lump of molten plastic and candle wax that has bubbled up in protest under the welding torch, forming blisters like plague boils, scorched and distended and pinched into the semblances of faces with wax layered on top: a fat man growing extra heads from his belly. His mouth is gaping wide with nails for teeth, rammed up through his jaw, the round metal heads jabbing out the bottom. There are toys and junk embedded in his flesh.

“This is…amazing, Clay.” Patrick is jagged with excitement. “We have to talk. After the Dream House show. There's a gallery in New York looking for new work. You should do a solo exhibition. It would have to be in the right venue, though. You'll need a big space to let the work breathe.” He hesitates, his mind racing through all the possibilities. “Has anyone else seen this?”

Clayton shrugs.

“Can we have
him?
The fat man? Does he have a name?”

“No.”

“Untitled? The Blob? The Man Who Ate The World?”

“Call it whatever you want.”

“He'll fit beautifully. There's an attic room in the Lust House—all the buildings are themed. We were going to fill it with a kiddie pool with condoms and plastic balls scrawled with swearwords. But this is so much more powerful.”

“Will people see it? It needs
eyeballs
.”

“Don't worry about that. We're expecting four hundred people. There's some video guy who wants to film it too.”

“Do you…” Clayton looks confused, struggling with himself. “Do you want to be part of it?”

“What do you mean?”

“I need someone. I could make you something.” He sounds so hopeful, it's almost unbearable. No wonder. All these years of rejection. And hey, getting in early before the market catches on? That's not a bad idea at all, Patrick thinks.

“You mean a special commission? I'd love that! But right now you need to keep your focus here. Don't second-guess yourself, okay? This is the best work you've ever done. Oh, wait. Will you need help moving him?”

“I got my truck.”

“That's great. That's amazing. I can't believe how far you've come. This is your breakthrough, man.” He claps Clayton on the shoulder and is repulsed to find that his jacket is crusty, the texture of cockroach wings. Patrick snatches his hand away and concentrates on not wiping it on his jeans. “This is your breakthrough, man.”