Bicycle Days (26 page)

T
he police station was small and well kept, with an air of orderliness that reminded Alec of a suburban kitchen. Formica counters and desks stood throughout the room, bare and sparkling clean, as though waiting for dough to be rolled out on their surfaces. Ceiling fans quietly circulated the night air, casting a net of intricate, moving shadows. Three policemen sat at their desks, smoking and talking quietly. A portable radio was tuned to a ball game.

Alec was sitting in a square, white room, separated from the main area by a wall of clear Plexiglas. After endless misunderstandings with the officers who had brought him in, solitary confinement had been a relief. He could watch the policemen through the Plexiglas, and they wouldn’t bother him. There was no other activity in the station other than the lighting and puffing of cigarettes and an occasional trip to the toilet. Alec’s right foot fell asleep twice as he waited for the policemen to do their job and arrest some more people. Finally he stopped
waiting and turned his chair so that he faced the bare cinder-block wall.

He did not know what time it was. The crystal on his watch was cracked, the hands frozen at twenty-two minutes past eleven. But there was something about the stillness of his room, and the lethargy of the policemen, that made him feel certain it was the middle of the night or later, four or five in the morning, perhaps, the beginning of the day.

Whenever it was, he did not hear the first rap on the wall. The second one was louder, and Alec looked up, saw Boon dressed in jeans, an open shirt, and a checked sport coat. His face was still creased from sleep, his short hair stuck out from the back of his head. A policeman unlocked the door.

Boon stepped into the room. “Okay. Let’s go.”

Outside, the street was empty of people. It seemed wider because of it, and darker too, as if the street lamps with their dim yellow light were not used to such open space. It reminded Alec of his dream about dancing alone across the American heartland like Julie Andrews in
The Sound of Music.
But then he saw Boon staring fixedly at him, his mouth drawn in a hard line across his face, and he forgot all about the dream. There was something almost familiar in Boon’s disapproving look, in the judgment behind it. It pulled and jabbed at Alec until he felt his anger return, stronger this time. He breathed deeply and tried to stuff it back inside himself.

Finally he said, “I’m sorry Joe. I mean, sorry for calling, waking you up, everything. I couldn’t have called the Hasegawas. I didn’t know what else to do.”

Boon shook his head once. “Calling me was the right thing, so forget about it. Let’s talk about the rest.” He walked over to the curb, sat down on the hood of a parked car.

Alec remained standing; he had been sitting too long. “I guess there’s a lot to talk about.”

“I would guess the same thing. But that’s okay, I’ve got time—there are at least a few hours before work.” Boon smiled thinly, as if he wasn’t sure he had meant it as a joke.

“This was my first time in a police station.”

“I’m sure it was.”

“They handcuffed me. Did I tell you that?”

Boon looked right at him. “Quit dancing around it, Alec.”

“I don’t know what to tell you.”

Boon slapped the palm of his hand on the hood of the car. In the quiet of the street, the sound made them both start. “You’re trying my patience, Alec, you know that? It’s four in the morning, for chrissake, and I’m getting tired of waiting for you to explain yourself.”

Alec ran his hands through his hair, over and over again. He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again, afraid of what might come out. The silence formed a wall between them. Boon stood up slowly.

“Okay, Alec. You’ve got your wish. I’m going home. Be in my office at eight-thirty sharp.” He turned, started walking down the block.

Alec watched him go, feeling with each step of Boon’s as if something, some final bulwark, was collapsing inside him. He jammed his hands into his pockets. Boon was twenty feet away and moving, head down, his clothes all rumpled, looking for the first time like a tired, middle-aged man.

“Don’t!” It came out as if by accident, a sudden bark.

Boon stopped, turned around, his arms folded across his chest like a schoolteacher.

“What am I supposed to tell you?” Alec shouted. “That there’s some reasonable explanation for my behavior? That all I need is a good night’s sleep and everything will be okay—that I’ll be standing in your office first thing in the morning? That I won’t ruin the goddamn career you have planned for me? Is that what you want to hear?”

Boon’s expression didn’t change. “I’d change my tone right now, if I were you.
Right
now.”

“Maybe you would, but I can’t—not now. Now it just sounds like you telling me what to do all over again.
You
deciding when I should take trips, arranging them for me, planning my future.
You
telling me when I should talk to my own girlfriend. Organizing me as if I was a goddamn file.”

Boon came toward him, and Alec flinched for the second time that night. But Boon brushed past him and sat again on the parked car. Three times he slammed his hand against the polished hood, the noise reverberating through the street like a series of collisions.

“If you were a man, I would’ve already knocked you on your ass,” he said. “But you’re not. You’re just a selfish, self-absorbed little boy. That’s the way you act, that’s the way you’ll be treated. When you decide it’s time to grow up, you’ll do it yourself. Because I’ve had enough of it. Understand? You
will
be in my office at eight-thirty, and you
will
have the high-tech report on my desk in ten days. And then you’re free to do whatever the hell you want. I only hope for your sake that you manage to pull your head out of your ass and take a good look at yourself, because you won’t grow up until you do. But that’s not my business anymore.”

Abruptly, Boon got up off the hood and went around to the driver’s side. He opened the door and was about to get in, when he stopped.

“It’s lonely as hell to think that no one else can feel what you feel—to think that your anger against the world is the only real anger there is. Or to think that you alone have found growing up to be a confusing, painful experience. That’s lonely and sad, Alec. And if you ever open your eyes, you’ll find that it’s no way to live.” He ducked into the car.

Alec watched as Boon started the engine and revved it a few times, the white exhaust ghosting around them. The passenger window opened with a quiet hum. Boon’s face was in shadow.

“Get in. I’ll take you home.”

“I’d rather walk,” Alec said, and started off down the block as though he knew where he was going.

Behind him, he heard Boon shift into gear and pull away.

A
lec’s desk had become a battle zone of empty coffee cups and red-inked computer printouts. Sheets of adhesive yellow notepaper stuck to the monitor of his word processor like tear-away advertisements on a college kiosk. Footnote information was spread through three different drawers when he had planned on it being in only one.

The high-technology report grew from ten pages to thirty, and then to fifty. Alec figured out that he was averaging more than fourteen hours a day at work. He ate lunch in the office, alone in the spare conference room. His takeout
o-bento
was consistently cold, and he liked to think that was the source of the numbness he felt inside.

Every morning he remembered to bathe, shave, and dress. He had taken to skipping breakfast, leaving for the office before anyone else in the family was up. And then the day itself would take control. Most of the time at work, he didn’t think about
much. Writing was just organizing other people’s ideas. There was nothing personal involved.

And for the moment it seemed enough to be like that, uninvolved and unhurt, maneuvering his way through each day as though he were a bumper car. There were times when he almost thought he could reach out and touch the wall of protection around him, the dull weight of it numbing his senses like an anesthetic, giving him solitude in an office full of people.

From his desk he could look through the clear plastic wall of Kiyoko’s office and see her face in profile, her finger winding and unwinding the hair by her ear. He had hardly talked to her in the days since they had made love. She had tried at first, asking him questions. What was the matter? Nothing, he said. Nothing was the matter. Work to do. He didn’t know what else to tell her. And after a few days, there were no more questions. Instead he received anxious, confused glances when Kiyoko thought he wouldn’t notice. She left the office every evening around seven or eight o’clock. She left him alone.

Not everyone seemed so threatening. There were certain people in the office Alec thought he could handle. They didn’t look at him too closely, didn’t examine him and try to pin him down. He could talk to them without thinking. Like bathing, shaving, dressing. Like writing. Park gave the impression of being one of these people. One afternoon, Alec was almost relieved to hear his uncertain knock on the door of the spare conference room.

“I am not disturbing you, Alec-san?” Park asked, still standing in the doorway.

Alec looked up from his
o-bento.
“No, Park-san. Have a seat.”

Blinking rapidly, Park entered carrying his own
o-bento
and sat down across the table from Alec.

“It is my hope that the
o-bento
is delicious today. For, you see, today I am especially hungry.”

“It’s cold,” Alec said.

“You are not perhaps curious, Alec-san, about my sudden appetite?”

Alec checked his watch. “It’s not that, Park-san. I’ve got to finish this report. Maybe another time would be better.”

“I will tell you the reason,” Park said. “You see, I feel in great health today. Do you remember the club we visited that night in Kabuki-cho? Well, last night I made another visit. When I arrived there, I did not yet know what would happen. But I was a very lucky man, Alec-san. Very lucky. I won the game you call Rock, Paper, Scissors.”

Park paused dramatically in his story. At the mention of the game, Alec looked up from his food. “You
won
at Rock, Paper, Scissors? You didn’t …”

“That is correct,” Park said triumphantly. “I performed sex on stage with a woman who was naked.”

“Jesus Christ. Not the bald one with the scar?”

“Of course not. She was not the type for me.”

Shaking his head, Alec stood up. “You’re unbelievable, Parksan”.

“You are very kind.”

“Listen,” Alec said. “Since you’re hungry, why don’t you have the rest of my lunch. I’ve got to get back to work. Or else I won’t make my deadline. Okay? I’ll see you.” He waved, began walking out the door.

Park called to him in a stage whisper. “In reality, Alec-san, it was my hope to have a small word with you.”

Alec glanced at his watch again, then came back into the room and sat down.

“People are saying that the office has not been functioning properly this past week,” Park said. “Boon-san’s behavior has been unusual, I would say, even for a man such as himself. He is very quiet, and he does not leave his office to watch over us. Now he goes alone to all his meetings. Yesterday, Takahara-san was greatly upset because Boon-san went alone to a company they were supposed to visit together. This is bad for the office, I think. And bad for Boon-san. He does not look happy.”

Alec said, “I don’t think there’s anything I can do about that.”

Park held up his hand. “Please be patient, Alec-san. That is
only one part of what I would like to say. People have also worried about
your
behavior, saying that it is strange, even for a person such as yourself. At first, I did not agree with this. But I have watched you. These days, even when you are in the office, it does not seem as if you are here. Your face is always serious, and you do not talk to people. In an office such as ours, this can be a bad thing.”

“I’ve been working hard. You know that. And maybe I have a cold or something. I’ll get over it. But right now I’ve got to finish this report. It’s important.”

“In the past, you were often in Boon-san’s office. Now you are not speaking together.…”

“Look, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. I’ve got to go.”

Alec rushed out, leaving Park alone in the windowless room.

He was alone in the office the night he finally finished the report. After ten straight days of work, he had made the deadline with four hours to spare. The lights hummed and buzzed above his head. He opened a blank envelope given to him by Boon’s secretary earlier in the day. The key to Boon’s office fell out, along with an unsigned, typed note: “Leave report on my desk when finished.”

Alec unlocked the door to Boon’s office. He sat in Boon’s high-backed swivel chair, behind the glass-topped desk. A band of light jutted into the room from the open door but didn’t reach him. The report lay on the desk in front of him, looking foreign and worthless. The Venetian blinds were raised, and the part of the room where he sat was bathed in the violet night glow of the city outside.