The Art of Disposal (9 page)

“Oh brother,” I said.

“How's that?”

“Dan the Man told me.”

“I doubt he told you everything.”

“Ricky was banging his daughter,” I said, and took a swig of coffee.

“He knocked her up.”

“That's what happens,” I said.

“This ain't funny,” Eddie said. “Ricky's gotta go.”

And the way he said it, like a doctor delivering bad news to a patient, will stick in the back of my mind forever. Five syllables never felt so heavy. Ricky's gotta go.

“What do you mean he's gotta go?”

“Frank called me up last night. There's nothing more to it than that. It's either we do it, or one of his guys does it.”

Eddie seemed so calm about it, like it was just swapping out some old floor-mats in a car.

“Can't she get rid of it?” I said.

“Her old man is two steps ahead of you, Champ. I told Ricky to stay away from that broad. You think Jim Steeves wants his little college sweetheart taking it from some greaseball like Ricky C?”

I didn't say anything.

“Of course he don't,” Eddie said. “And her getting pregnant—that was the straw.”

Eddie's eyes got soft and sad, like he was remembering an old friend who was already gone.

“I told him. Yeah, I told him. He should've listened to me.”

I realized, staring into Eddie's droopy eyes, that you have to do it that way if it's someone you care about. You write them off. The decision's been made, so you make like it's already happened. Like you never had any say in the matter.

Eddie took another sip of coffee and then he finally struck a match. The smell of blue cigar smoke sweetened up the cold room. Eddie looked at his watch and then he looked back at me.

“Tomorrow night,” he said.

“Tomorrow night?”

“Sooner the better.”

Eddie spit out some dry flakes of tobacco, examined the cigar, and puffed away again.

“Ricky Cervetti,” I said with a subtle question mark, shaking my head in doubt.

“Jim Steeves is heavy, you hear me? He wants it done. We can let Conese do it his way—you ever met Mudcap?—or you can help Ricky out. Make it fast and painless.”

Eddie blew out a great puff of smoke, and I watched it float upward and gradually come undone until there was nothing left of it.

The sky was streaked with purples and reds as I drove back home from the office. It was that golden morning hour when the world feels clean and new; when the birds are barely awake on the telephone wires, huddled together to fight off the last of the cold.

All I could think about was how good it would be to get back home and dice up a potato, an onion, some garlic—make hash browns, over-medium eggs, and a cup of strong coffee. Watch the morning news and use some buttered toast to clean the yolks off the plate. I tried not to think about the job, but Eddie's plan played on a loop in the theater of my mind, and Ricky's sharp oily face hovered like an unwelcome guest. I could see him like he was right there in front of me, gold chain and all. That chain drew your eye to the nasty red mark that took up a lot of real estate on his neck. His mother burned him with a curling iron back when he was a kid. On purpose.

I pulled into my apartment parking lot, wondering why I still lived in such a dump. I was making good money. Too damn lazy to move. In a rut. Who wants to pack up a bunch of boxes, unbolt a bed-frame, take all your books off the shelves? I decided then, as I walked up the tired stairs, that I would move right after this job.

And something happened that reaffirmed my decision. I could hear the fat broad out there screaming again. I pulled back the drapes and watched. Her old man had a beer bottle in one hand and a cigarette in the other—the standard uniform—and he was shouting at her. Then the unwashed kid rode up on his BMX bike, stopped, and stared at the two of them as if to say to the universe, “these are my parents? What a goddamn shame.”

The hillbilly husband smashed the beer bottle onto the pavement. A cop car eased up like a piranha, its red and blue lights flashing silently. A neighbor must have called a little earlier. Doors around the apartment complex opened and heads peeked out. Soon they were cuffing and stuffing my beer-bellied neighbor while rows of unsavory onlookers wearing dirty tank-tops, sweatpants, and bent-up baseball hats huffed down cigarettes and watched the show.

Sometimes you really are too good to live in a certain place. Some people really are better than others. Easier to deal with. Classier. Quieter. I don't believe in cultural relativism. If one tribe eats human babies and another tribe doesn't, which tribe are you joining up with?

They won't teach you that kind of stuff in college. Some professor with elbow patches on a tweed coat will try to sell you the idea that the culture who eats the babies is just as good as the other one. “They're merely following their own set of customs and values. Neither is better or worse,” he'll say.

Yeah, right.

Go take a look at Professor Elbow Patch's million dollar house on the hill. Ask him why he doesn't go live in a one-bedroom ghetto apartment with screaming trashy neighbors right on the other side of his plywood walls. Oh, he'll write papers about class disparity and the inherent cultural biases of our system. He'll wax about a utopian world where the wealth is spread out as thin as margarine on toast. But he's not about to give up
his
giant piece of the pie to make it happen. No Sir. His money stays far from his mouth.

I let the drape fall back into place to block out the world.

I pulled
Gulliver's Travels
off of my bookshelf and read the inscription on the front page…
To Ron, From Emily. I love how you love these old boring books…

Any time I'm feeling blue, that inscription puts a grin on my face. Emily was quite a lady, but her taste in books ran solely toward romance and paperback thrillers.

I can go right back to that day when she bought it for me, at a little seaside bookstore in California. She said she needed a minute longer, so I walked outside to enjoy the maritime breeze. She bought the book secretly, having seen me thumbing through it. It was an old, hardback illustrated
Gulliver
. Thirty bucks: more money than we had to blow on things like books. But she bought it for me anyway.

She lost her silver wristwatch that same day. It fell off while we were getting into the car, and she didn't notice. When she realized it was gone, we both panicked and drove back; looped around and around the block near the bookstore. We parked again, and Emily got out and put her hand up to shield her eyes from the sun. There was the watch, shining like a mirror, in the middle of the road. No cars had run over it. Nothing was shattered.

I thumbed through the book. Then I got up and fed Vern, and all of my other fish. Checked the temperatures in all eleven of my aquariums. Did a partial water change on the tiger barbs. Swept the kitchen floor. Turned on the television and watched the opening minutes of
Wheel of Fortune
, not even caring that I hated
Wheel
and had clearly missed all of
Jeopardy!

My arms were itching something awful. I couldn't sit still. I put some frozen lasagna in the oven, then turned it off because I wasn't hungry. I poured myself a scotch, but the smell of it made me sick so I dumped it down the drain. Everywhere I looked I saw outlines of Ricky Cervetti. There he was, rising up like Nosferatu's shadow on the wall behind my tall lamp. If I peeked out the window, he was under the streetlamp looking up at me. When I flipped on the light in the bathroom, he ducked and ran away from the mirror. Soon I was on my knees and having it out with the toilet bowl, not being able to throw up anything of real value, but with a piercing sharp knot in my stomach all the same.

It was Al Da Paolo all over again, only worse.

When I got up the next morning, I left a message on Doc Brillman's machine. Then I paced around until nine, when they open. I called back again. Marcia was off, and I was glad of it. The other lady, Minnie, answered the phone.

“I need to see Doc Brillman,” I said, running my hand along my neck and throat, feeling around for lumps and other signs of impending doom.

“Do you have an appointment?” Minnie said, a little bit rudely I thought.

“No. No. But it's me,” I said, “it's the fish guy.”

“What's a fish guy?” she said. I could picture her large flat rump and her weird braided hair. It made me even sicker.

“Aquarium,” I said, like the word was some kind of anchor. “Aquarium guy. Fish guy. You know me. I clean the cichlids.”

“Sick what?”

“The fish!” I said, a little out of breath and getting sweaty. “I clean the goddamn fish tank once a month.”

“There's no need for that,” she said, like a Sunday School teacher.

“You remember me?” I said.

“Fish guy, bird guy—whatever kind of guy you are—you still need an appointment to see the doctor.”

“Put Doc Brillman on,” I said.

“Sir, he's not going to—”

I cut her off. “Put the doctor on the phone.”

There was nothing but a wonderful airy black silence for a few seconds. Then a flute started up a pleasant melody, and a drum beat and supple bassline kicked in. I listened hard and swore I heard Ricky Cervetti laughing and singing along with the muzak. Then the concert ended with a swift push of a button.

“What is it?” Doc Brillman said. “You're scaring my assistant.”

“She's no Marcia,” I said. “She's three of her easy, and a personality to match. At least Marcia looks good when she bends over to get the paperwork.”

“I'm not legally allowed to notice such things,” Doc Brillman said.

“Sorry to trouble you, Doc. It's this rash on my arm,” I said.

“Rash, huh?”

“Rash. Red bumps. The whole thing.”

“Have you been scratching it?” he said.

“Of course.”

“Well don't.”

“But it itches,” I said.

“I'm sure it does. It's a rash. Anything else I can do for you?”

“I need to come in.”

“Not today, Ronnie. I've got real patients to deal with.”

“This is a real situation, Doc. No joke. My skin is crawling. I just threw up.”

“Are you stressed about something?”

“I think it might be Ringworm,” I said.

Doc Brillman paused. “Hmmmm, Ringworm… not likely. Probably Morgellons.”

“Morgellons?” I said, scratching at my red arms. I imagined a slew of microscopic worms taking over the major organs in my body; multiplying to such a degree that they'd spread to my arms and legs, and were practically bursting out to get some fresh air and sunshine. Then I remembered the under-cooked fish tacos I'd eaten a few days back at
Roberto's Taqueria
. That was how I'd caught Morgellons. No doubt about it.

“What's Morgellons?” I said.

“It's the new name for Delusional Parasitosis,” Doc Brillman said with joy. He even laughed, the way a comedian does when they're especially pleased with their set-up and delivery.

“Meaning you think it's all in my head.”

“If I was a betting man…” Doc Brillman said.

“Maybe you can give me a once over anyway, just to be sure it's nothing serious. Sometimes a rash is a sign of a deeper medical problem.”

“And most times it isn't.”

“I could stop by any time this morning,” I said with one great last effort to squeeze my way into the appointment book.

“Look, I'd love to hear about the latest thing that's killing you, but I'm too booked up today. I hope you understand.”

“Sure. I'm already feeling better,” I said. And it was true. Sometimes I just need a little conversation with someone on the outside. A guy with a wife and kids and PTA meetings. Someone who actually helps people.

“Worry is the real killer,” Doc Brillman said.

“There are things I hate doing.”

“So don't do 'em,” Doc Brillman said.

“I have to.”

“So do 'em and quit beating yourself up. Problems will keep showing up, over and over. Life is just one big series of problems. It's how we solve them—that's the key.”

“You sound like Deepak Chopra,” I said.

“If I was Deepak Chopra, I'd have a better assistant who wouldn't have patched you through.”

“How's the fish tank?”

“No casualties,” he said, as if it was all that mattered. “Goodbye, Ronnie.”

People think it's swell to be a doctor, but Doc Brillman has to deal with inoperable tumors, kids with scabies, irritable bowel syndrome, cases of chronic halitosis, and pill junkies fishing for easy prescriptions. One time he told me how he uses scissors to clip the dangling skin-tags from the armpits of elderly patients. No wonder they make good money. I guess if I was a doctor, I'd be a veterinarian. If I'm gonna clip off skin-tags, I'd rather clip them off a beagle.

I took two Advils and got back into bed. I pulled the sheets up over my head and pretended to be a baby, back in the womb. I even fell asleep for a couple more hours.

When I woke up again, I flossed and brushed my teeth—and when I was done, I brushed and flossed them all over again and rinsed with Listerine. My heart was ticking fast, and I didn't like who I was. Finally, when there was no more time to waste, when the last second of procrastination had come and gone, I got my stuff together and walked out the door to do the worst job of my life.

Eddie Sesto lives in a buttermilk-colored house with strawberry artwork in the kitchen and a cuckoo clock on the living room wall. His wife knits winter hats and scarves, and buys snow-globes from every shit-town she visits. She even has a collection of Thomas Kinkade “Enchanted Cottages” plates hanging above the stove. If that's not an outright assault on good taste, I don't know what is.

Irene knows where the money comes from, but she never talks about it. Eddie made a promise to her years ago that his work would never follow him home; that no violence would ever cross the threshold of her little strawberry world. That's exactly why Eddie decided to hit Ricky there.

“But why not just hit him at the office?” you say.

Simple. We got cops on the payroll, but there are a few goody-two-shoes who roll through the vacuum shop three or four times a year to give us the business. You can't shit where you eat; not if you're smart anyway. So nothing—and I mean nothing—illegal goes down at the office. One time Bullfrog lit up a joint in the office. Before he could even take a hit, Eddie ripped it out of his mouth and flushed it down the toilet.