A Hole in the Universe (3 page)

“C’mon, Gordon, just give it a chance, will you? I know people. Lisa’s dad—I got all these contacts. I’m not going to let you down. You know I’m not!” He turned too fast into the narrow driveway, annoyed yet again with the hard bounce over the concrete berm, their father’s barrier against rainwater surging in from the street, even though the driveway was pitched higher than the road: his life’s energy squandered on petty projects, meaningless chores like his beloved rosebushes overrun now with weedy vines.

“I know,” Gordon said before he got out.

A curtain moved in the window of the house next door. Gordon looked away quickly, but Dennis waved. “Always on duty, the old bitch,” he said through a smile as Mrs. Jukas peered from the side of the curtain the way she used to when they were kids.

“She must be lonely without Mr. Jukas. He was a nice man,” Gordon said.

“Yeah, nice man, always bird-dogging Mom.” He didn’t tell his brother, but after their mother died Mrs. Jukas had cornered him at the funeral home to say she hoped he wouldn’t be selling the house to Puerto Ricans now the way everyone else had done. It wasn’t his to sell, he’d said, enjoying the sour pucker of her mouth. His parents had left it to his brother.

Even freshly painted with new blinds and curtains, the wallpaper borders, and Lisa’s delicate stenciling in the kitchen, it still looked the same. Tired, cramped, the kind of place you’d live in only because you had to. When Gordon had seen it last week, he had been amazed by the changes, the furniture, the big television on its laminate wooden stand, the cordless phone. Even the metal storm door, he had said, entering the kitchen, overwhelmed to think they’d bought all this for him to live here. Dennis had to explain that things seemed new only because he had never seen them before. Most of it had been bought by their parents after he went away.
Went away,
the euphemism, their code for imprisonment, for the wrenching turn their lives had taken. Gordon had gone away, taking along laughter and whatever good times there had been. Now they were gone and he was back.

Gordon’s big feet thudded up the stairs.
He can’t wait to get out of the suit and tie. What was that all about?
Dennis wondered.
Just a favor he had to do for me? Go through the motions, never being honest so people won’t get mad at him? So they can’t get too close?
Dennis called up to remind him that Lisa was expecting him for dinner Friday night. “She wants to know if you’re bringing Delores,” he added.

“It’ll be just me.”

“But you said you were going to ask her!” When Dennis had run into Delores the other day, he’d mentioned dinner, foolishly saying that Gordon would call her.

“I know, but I didn’t.”

“So call her now. She’s dying to see you. She told me.”

Looking down from the top step, Gordon shook his head. “I don’t want to.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know. I just don’t feel like it.”

“Jesus, she’s your friend! I mean, she’s been writing and going up there for how many years now?” Not much to look at, maybe, but she was exactly what his brother needed right now, a good woman and a good job. Gordon’s impassive stare was maddening.
Goddamn sphinx, he should consider himself lucky Delores even cares. Lucky she’s so desperate.
“You gotta call her, Gordon. It’s the least you can do.”

“What time should I come?”

“Anytime.” Dennis grinned with the rare concession. “We’ll probably eat at six-thirty or seven, but you know Lisa, the earlier the better!”

As Gordon came down Nash Street, he wondered if the Dubbin family still owned the Market. He had been the same age as the Dubbin twins, Cynthia and Cornelius, though he’d hardly known them. They lived in Dearborn and seldom came into the store. He remembered their white-columned brick house from Sunday drives through Dearborn’s tree-lined streets while his mother pointed out her favorite houses. First on the route belonged to the Dubbins, whom she felt she knew because her son worked for them. Next came her doctor’s house, her principal’s, Mrs. Jukas’s sister-in-law’s, and others she had never met but had read about in the paper.

Faded paint was peeling off the Nash Street Market sign. Warped green roof trim arched over the plate glass like an enormous eyebrow. A web of duct tape patched the shattered lower half of the exit door. Gordon pushed the door open, relieved it wasn’t automatic. He always had the feeling he had to hurry through before they swung back and hit him.

The old smell of damp fruity dust seemed to grow right over him. He paused by the rusted office grate. One thing was different: the quiet, the strange emptiness for midmorning. No cashiers at the registers. Maybe it hadn’t opened yet. He froze; only his eyes moved. What if something had just happened, and here he was, a week out of Fortley, first on the scene? Who would ever believe him? He started for the door when he saw a tall man with long curly hair stacking pasta boxes at the end of an aisle.

“Excuse me!” Gordon called with a weak wave. The man didn’t look up. Remembering Miss Jamison’s startled reaction, Gordon jammed both hands into his pockets and cleared his throat. “Umm, I don’t mean to bother you, but is the store closed?”

The man looked back and snorted. “Well, whaddaya think, you’re in here, aren’t ya?”

“Well, I know, but I didn’t see anyone, so I thought maybe I was too early or something.”

The man edged back with Gordon’s approach.

“I mean, it just seems to be the two of us. And . . .” He took a deep breath. Sweat seeped into his eyes, making him blink.

“And what?” The man glanced past him.

“Well, I . . . could I . . . ,” he stammered. “I . . . I need to . . . well, you see, I came in to . . . Are you the manager?”

“Christ! Another fucking holdup?” the man said, shaking his head. “Look, you don’t need the manager. The safe’s empty! They don’t even bother anymore. They just put enough in the registers to get started.” He pointed toward the office. “The register keys’re—”

“No!” Gordon shouted. “This isn’t a holdup! I’m not going to rob you! I just . . .” He started to take his hands out of his pockets, then stopped with the shock on the man’s face. They’d been robbed before; the man might be armed. Gordon stared and kept talking. Knowing what to do in a precarious moment was second nature now. “I just want a job. I saw the sign. That’s why I came in. That’s why I’m here.” He tried to smile. His eyes stung from the sweat.

“And that gun in there don’t mean nothing, right?”

“No! No gun!” Gordon raised his arms. “See! Just hands, that’s all.”

Eddie Chapman explained that he was the owner’s brother-in-law, as they walked to the rear of the store, past the meat counter into a sour-smelling storage area. One cashier was out sick, and the other was in the bathroom. He’d come in to help. “My wife’s brother,” he said with a rap on a black door. He shook his head, sighed, rapped again. “Neil! Hey, Neilie, you up?” he called, ear at the jamb. He lowered his voice. “His wife, she’s giving him one more shot at it. A week, she said, and then that’s it. Jesus Christ,” he muttered, and hit the door harder. “Neilie!”

“What? What?” a thick voice growled.

Eddie opened the door an inch wide. “There’s a guy here,” he called in. “He wants the job.”

“Later.” A moan. “Yeah. Later.”

“He’s big, Neil. Really big.”

“Oh, oh, oh,” came a groan as the man on the narrow cot struggled to get up. “But no lights. Jesus Christ!” He shielded his eyes from the opening door. “What’s his name?”

“What’s your name?” Eddie asked, then repeated it back.

“Loomis,” the man echoed from the murky darkness. “Loomis,” he grunted, straining to raise himself up on one elbow. The only light came from the half-opened door. He held out his hand. “Jesus Christ, Eddie, I can’t do this.” He fumbled through blankets on the cot, then turned back, wearing sunglasses. “So, what? You want the job?” He belched. “You wanna be part of the Nash Street Market family? You wanna be on my team? Cuz if you do, I gotta warn you, I’m a son of a bitch to work for, right, Eddie?” Neil laughed, and so Eddie did. “I’m a real ball buster. Oh, yes, I am. Eddie’ll tell you,” he murmured, groping his way back down onto the cot. “You tell him, Eddie! You be sure and tell him now!” He turned toward the wall in a tight curl.

“So what should I do?” Eddie asked.

“Whatever the hell you want to do, Eddie,” Neil Dubbin groaned.

 

 

The HELP WANTED sign stayed in the window even though his first day on the job had begun. There were two registers open. At the first was June, a tiny gray-haired woman with a hacking cough. She was the fastest cashier but couldn’t bag groceries because of her emphysema. In the lulls between customers, she reached down and switched on her oxygen tank, then slipped the clear tubing over her head and adjusted the prongs in each nostril.

Serena was at the next register. She was a tall, coarse-skinned woman with large teeth and tendrils of ivy tattooed up each finger of her right hand. A small silver hoop pierced her left nostril. She and June seemed in a constant state of annoyance with customers. So far they’d had little to say to their huge, clumsy bag boy who kept filling the bags until they were too heavy. The bottom of the last customer’s bag had ripped open, spilling cans all over the sidewalk out front.

“Hey, Gordon,” Serena called as he double-bagged milk, juice, and cigarettes for a fat, bearded man in a dungaree jacket. “We’re running low on plastic.”

“Bags. Out back,” June wheezed, then pushed a REGISTER CLOSED sign onto the belt.

Gordon hurried through the meat-cutting room.

“Whatever it is, tell ’em we’re out,” Leo, the butcher, called as he continued shrink-wrapping packages of ground beef.

Gordon stood in the middle of the poorly lit, chaotic storage area. He had already been back here on two previous futile missions for items customers couldn’t find on the shelves. Stacks of torn, half-filled cartons were everywhere. Some had fallen, littering the floor with cans and boxes. There were no plastic bags. He was about to knock on Neil’s door when he spotted them in a box by the walk-in cooler. He was filling a smaller box with bags when the wide double doors to the loading ramp swung open. Eddie Chapman pushed through a dolly piled with cases of milk.

“Just the man I need,” Eddie said, and ordered Gordon to bring the cases up front and refill the dairy case. “There’s six more cases on the ramp, but I gotta go see a guy, so if you could just put them in the walk-in, I’d really appreciate it.” He zipped his jacket as he backed toward the door. “And for God’s sake don’t let anybody bother Neilie. He’s gotta get through this. But mingya, I got a life to lead, too. I got my own thing. I can’t keep doing this,” he said through the closing door.

Gordon started to push the loaded dolly into the store, then realized he probably shouldn’t leave six cases of milk out on the ramp to spoil or be stolen. He brought in the cases but couldn’t see another dolly, so he carried them two at a time into the cooler. He was wheeling the dolly out to the dairy case when he remembered June and Serena. Hands flying, he got the milk onto the shelves in just a few minutes, then raced up front with the bags.

Five customers were lined up at Serena’s register. June was gone.

“Is she all right?” he asked, and Serena rolled her eyes as she counted change back for a teenage girl with black lipstick and bright-red eye shadow. The girl pushed her cart through. In the baby carrier was a sleeping infant. Its tiny mouth opened and closed. He leaned closer. He’d only ever seen babies from a distance in the visiting room.

“Cute, huh?” Serena said.

“Like a little fish,” he said, gazing down.

“And what the fuck’s that supposed to mean?” the girl snapped.

His head shot up as she stormed by him. “I meant the mouth, the way it was opening and closing,” he said quietly.

“Bitch!” Serena said, just loudly enough to be heard.

At the door, the girl turned, held up her middle finger. Serena burst out laughing. Gordon’s face was red. He wasn’t used to hearing women swear.

 

 

On the top step of the house across the street, the frizzy-haired girl was hitting a stringed ball with a wooden paddle. She had been out there doing the same thing late last night, until a woman called from a second-floor window and told her to go inside, it was way past her bedtime. The girl hollered something back. The woman leaned even farther out the window and threatened to call Social Services. With that, the girl ran onto the porch, then ducked down behind the railing. When Gordon went to bed, the girl was still crouched in the shadows, knees up, back against the wall.

His instinct was to keep his eyes down, but he forced a smile and mumbled a low hello. The girl stared out from cold, dull eyes until he looked away. The paddle continued its steady beat. He paused by the roses. His father’s pampered shrubs had massed into a tangled hedge between his house and Mrs. Jukas’s. The inch of new growth made it easier to tell which were dead branches. Trying to avoid the thorns, thick and curved like black talons, he reached in and broke off a long dead cane. He broke off another, then more, almost lulled by the steady
thwack thwack thwack
across the street. His hands and arms were getting scratched, so he looked in the garage for clippers. A lump rose in his throat at the sight of all the empty hooks and shelves that had once held his father’s tools. The baby-food jars of nails and screws were gone, but their rusting caps were still nailed over the workbench. He went into the house and brought out scissors. Twenty minutes later, he had trimmed off enough to see which branch belonged to which bush.

The lowering sun was still warm on his back. A fat bee buzzed drowsily near his face. He had worked the last six hours a free man. He could do whatever he felt like, go wherever he wanted, could feel it pulse in his fingertips, the soles of his feet, electrifying, the shock of living, of just being here. The anxious chatter of squirrels rose to a high, quarrelsome pitch. In some nearby house, a baby wailed. A door squeaked open, then banged shut. Mrs. Jukas stood on her front porch, white-haired, dour as ever, tinier than he remembered, maybe not even five feet tall. Mr. Jukas had been a registry inspector. When Gordon failed the road test for his license, his mother called upon Mr. Jukas, who took him out every day, parallel-parking all over the city. By the end of the week, he could parallel-park better than he could drive. His second road test had been scheduled the day he was arrested. When the police pounded on the door early that morning, his mother first thought it was Mr. Jukas’s idea of a joke, some kind of private road test he had arranged, until they shoved the warrant at her, decreeing not just entry, but their bounding surge up the stairs, five of them, guns drawn, shouting his name as they pushed open the bedroom door, then darted back, but needn’t have because he was lying there waiting, still dressed in the clothes he’d worn the day before, eyes wide, waiting through the night, months, years to come, waiting for it to end, for it to finally be over. As they rushed him stumbling down the stairs, his mother’s face had turned old, her hair wild from tearing at it as she screamed at them.
Leave him alone and get out! Get out! What are you, crazy? You’re at the wrong house.You don’t know what you’re talking about. My son wouldn’t lay a hand on anyone, much less murder someone. Not Gordon! No! No! No!