Don't Order Dog (8 page)

“Peace Corps,” the pasty-faced young man mumbled, staring at the wall of the saloon in front of him. “The guy’s gotta be in the Peace Corps.” He turned to his college friends and raised his arm in the air. “Ready?”

The two other young men raised their arms and the three nodded a silent toast before slugging back the shots of vodka. A brief grimace etched their faces before turning into a conspiratorial grin.
“Whoa – shit!” His long-haired friend gasped, setting the shot glass on the bar before tightening the hair tie of his ponytail and adjusting his glasses.
“That’ll fuck you up!” 

“We’re doing another one in five minutes,” the third man replied, lightly punching both his colleagues in the chest. He was nearly a head taller than the other two, with thin, tattoo-covered arms. “And don’t even try to pussy out.” He looked again at the ‘shrine’ of letters pinned to the wall inside of Joe’s Last Stand Saloon, his expression thoughtful as he stroked his patchy beard. “H
e’s not in the Peace Corps, bro,” he replied. “Peace Corps people don’t move around that much. They stay in the same shithole place for like two years or something.” He squinted at the photos. “Can’t really see him, but I’d also say he looks older than most of those Peace Corps hippies. He’s probably in that Doctors Without Borders group. They’re kind of like the Peace Corps… they go to all these fucked up places and heal all the people that are shot and starving and shit. That’s my bet.”

His pony-tailed friend shook his head. “A doctor? You honestly think he’s a doctor?” he asked sarcastically. “No way man… he’s a reporter.”
He stepped closer to the tinsel-wrapped display of letters and photos, then turned and looked at his two friends. “I mean, think about it. He’s in places that no normal person would care about or even think to visit, but he’s only there for a short time.”
“True,” his pasty-faced friend remarked.

“And take a look at this,” ponytail continued, pointing at the Polaroids. “You can’t actually see his face, which makes perfect sense if he’s a reporter, because he doesn’t want anyone to recognize him and find out he’s sweet-talking some bartender in an old dive bar in Flagstaff.”
“Right, yeah… that’s
got
to be it,” his tattooed friend muttered sarcastically before edging towards the bar. “I’m ordering another round.”

“Seriously man, it’s so obvious,” ponytail’s voice rose with excitement.
“Look at the way he writes– he’s clever and charismatic, like all reporters are. I have an uncle who was a reporter for the Associated Press– well, I mean I
had
an uncle who was a reporter.”
“Like me, huh?” his pasty-faced friend asked.

“No man,” ponytail replied irritably, “he was a
real
reporter, not some wannabe college paper reporter like you. Anyway, he’s dead now, but he used to fly all over the fucking place on assignment. He was a smart motherfucker too.” He leaned towards the wall and squinted, as if finding a clue everyone else had overlooked, before adjusting his eyeglasses again. “That’s got to be it. Reporter.”

His friends stare
d at him vacantly for a moment. “Damn man, you’ve got me convinced,” pasty-face replied. “Maybe I should write an article in the paper about this guy.” 

“Sure, whatever bro,” his tattooed friend declared, handing both of them an ice-cold
shot glass filled to the brim. “So what happened to your uncle?”

“Bad shit man. Drove his car into a tree,” ponytail replied, a pensive frown clouding his expression.

“Fuck… no shit?”

“No shit. Kinda saw it coming though. The guy was a total alcoholic. Always drunk at the holidays and making passes at my other uncle’s wife. The cops that pulled his body out of the wreck said his BAC was like four percent or something.”

“Is that even possible?” pasty-face asked.

“Of course it is, if you’re a fucking alcoholic. Anyway...” He shrugged and nodded dismissively.

“Well, here’s to him,” his tattooed friend muttered, raising his shot glass.

“To crazy motherfucking reporters,” pasty-face chimed.

“Cheers to that,” ponytail added.

The three young men nodded and touched glasses. They threw back the shots and looked at each other in the weak light of the bar, shuddering and wincing with the wide-eyed grins of children. 

The atrium lobby of the Garden Landmark hotel bustled with the noise and activity of mid-morning check-ins and check-outs as the concierge made her rounds. Gliding across the mirror-polished granite with a confident, seductive sway, her tall dark frame cast an exotic reflection over the black stone as she moved. She stopped briefly at one of the tables to adjust the stargazer lilies and cymbidium orchids in one of the massive flower arrangements on display; their sweet, cinnamon fragrances mixing with those of expensive European perfumes in the cool conditioned air. A guest approached her and she smiled instinctively, nodding at his question before tapping her phone and making a call. By 8am she had already made more calls for the hotel’s elite guests than she could remember. Everything from cab rides and flight confirmations for the departing to spa sessions and dinner reservations for new guests had been quickly and deftly handled. Now, seeing that the girls at the registration desk were becoming overwhelmed, she moved quickly to intercept new arrivals strolling through the massive glass entry doors.

She smiled with flawless grace, tilting her head with a welcoming expression as a group of men in tailored suits and polished Italian shoes stepped into the lobby with several bellhops in tow. “Good morning gentlemen, and welcome to the Garden Landmark. May I assist you in checking in?” she asked. The men nodded as they collected around her. One of the men barraged her with questions while the others stood and stared conspicuously at the curves of her body beneath her tight blue uniform. She recognized several of them. In her four years at the hotel, she’d come to know a good many of the hotel’s clientele on practically a first name basis. The majority were regular guests like these – executives from large petrochemical companies with operations in the country’s oil-rich Niger delta. They were middle-aged, mostly European and American, with graying hair and soft bellies and the curt politeness of men used to getting what they asked for. But despite their egos, she admired and envied these men– or at least their wealth and power. They were refined and well-mannered, a stark contrast to the hotel’s other oil-feeding clientele – the large, bawdy, loud-talking roughnecks from Texas or Russia who dressed in outdated Tommy Bahama outfits and spent long hours drinking at the bar, killing time and money until their rig contracts were renewed.

She found these men to be both humorous and dangerous, especially at night. It was then that they would come stumbling collectively from the bar to the lobby, red-eyed and volatile, prowling for the seedier offerings of the city that sprang up like mushrooms in the night. They would collect on anything in their path that they fancied, including her or any of her female co-workers, and on more than one occasion she’d had to apologetically but firmly remove the arm of a roughneck from around her waist. If personalities had a sound, she imagined that of the roughneck being the
tick
,
tick
,
tick
of a timed explosive.

Last in the social hierarchy of the hotel was the media; a disheveled, sleep-deprived fraternity of international reporters who had settled on the town like an irascible swarm of tsetse flies two years ago when the conflict between the large multinational oil companies and the local paramilitary resistance groups turned particularly bloody. Like the roughnecks, the reporters also hovered near the bar, though the two groups rarely mixed, and she’d quickly come to recognize the mutual disdain both groups held towards the other. From her own tribal roots she understood this paradoxical nature of men all too well; the animosity that was born from similarity. Both were tight-knit groups of badly-dressed, egotistic, womanizing alcoholics. Both hated their assignments in Port Harcourt almost as much as they hated the oil industry’s executive elite. And perhaps most ironic of all, both groups ultimately earned a living from the very same source– the oil industry itself.

She escorted the group of executives to the registration desk, handing each of them her card and nodding politely before heading back towards the entry doors. Moving quickly, she glanced at her watch and noted that it was just before nine as a tall, blonde-haired man she didn’t recognize brushed past her and slipped quietly out through the hotel’s glass doors. Curious, she watched as he stepped quickly through the entry gate towards the street, a large satchel slung over his broad shoulders as he disappeared into the gray gasohol haze of morning traffic. It was rare for someone to be staying at the hotel she didn’t know about, especially someone as good-looking as this man. He was too casual to be an executive, too well-dressed to be a roughneck, and, having failed to place a hand on her ass as he passed, too well-mannered to be a journalist. She was about to head back to the registration desk to inquire about him when a large black Mercedes suddenly pulled up to the entrance.

The bellhop and valet immediately converged on the vehicle as a huge, heavily-muscled man stepped from the driver’s seat and promptly opened the back door to release his passenger. The small, salt-and-pepper-haired head of a fifty-something gentleman popped up from behind the opened door and nodded at the driver before glancing anxiously at his surroundings.

The driver quickly assisted the bellhop with the luggage as the gentleman stood beside the vehicle, clenching the handle of a black briefcase with both hands as he shifted his small frame impatiently. Then, as if on cue, both men turned and marched towards the door. The driver walked directly behind his passenger, his square, blonde-cropped head fixed forward while his eyes darted left and right. His towering frame loomed in cartoonish scale above the older man as they entered the hotel.

As
the concierge turned to greet them, the driver’s attention immediately focused on her, his face drawn tight in a menacing stare. It was then that she realized he was also the man’s bodyguard. She stepped forward and flashed both men her warmest smile. “Good morning gentlemen, and welcome to the Garden Landmark. May I assist you in checking in?”

“Please,” the
gentleman said, bowing slightly. He pulled a folded reservation confirmation from his breast pocket and handed it to her. “You should have a reservation for Al Dossari.” His baritone voice was measured and kind.
“Shahid Al Dossari.”

She looked at the printed confirmation briefly and nodded. From the corner of her eye she could see the gentleman’s massive bodyguard scanning the room.
“Excellent. Thank you, Mr. Al Dossari,” she said, handing the confirmation back to him. His eyes snapped from her chest to her face, a brief hint of surprise filling his expression. She smiled brightly. “As you can see sir, we’re quite busy this morning,” she waved her arm towards the line of people at the check-in desk. “So please allow me to assist you directly.” The gentleman nodded with gratitude as she clicked a button on her cell phone and adjusted the small headset in her ear. She smiled with a fixed stare as she waited for someone to answer.

“Good morning. This is Nnenia,” a soft voice answered with polite curtness.

“Nnenia, this is Abeje,” she responded, her voice ripe with practiced friendliness. “Could you please assist me with a special guest this morning?”

There was a pause on the line, followed by an audible grunt. “We’re very busy this morning as you can see. Why can’t he wait like the other guests?”

She turned and glared directly at her colleague sitting at the check-in counter a short distance away. “Our guest would certainly appreciate your assistance.”
Her eyes flickered briefly over at the two men. The older gentleman anxiously clenched his briefcase while his bodyguard watched her with a questioning stare.

Her colleague glared back.
“Fine. And of course that will be at the normal rate?”

Her sm
ile returned. “Yes, of course.” She knew Nnenia’s normal rate was half of any tips. The front desk girls weren’t allowed to take tips, but the concierges certainly were – an advantage she’d quickly learned to exploit when it came to assisting the executive clientele. And an executive important enough to have a bodyguard was almost certain to be a generous tipper.

Nnenia sighed loudly into the
phone. “Name?” she asked.

She recited the man’s name and waited patiently for her colleague to check him in. A few moments later a bellhop walked over and handed her two keycards.

“Mr. Al Dossari, you are checked in sir,” she said, handing him the keycards. “Suite 805 – one of our most beautiful executive suites – located just above us and to your right.” Both men looked up silently as she pointed her thin sculpted arm towards the eighth floor hallway that ran over their heads in the atrium. “Now, is there anything else I can assist you with, Mr. Al Dossari?”

“No, thank you,”
the gray-haired man responded quietly. “You are most kind.” He glanced at his bodyguard, who immediately stepped forward and grabbed her forearm in his giant hand. She tensed nervously as he pressed several crisp bills into her palm. He then smiled and softened his grip, his blue eyes staring intently. She felt herself blushing at the scale of his presence. “Thank you, Abeje,” he said with an American accent, his voice surprisingly soft. “And please thank your friend Nnenia too.”

“Indeed I will sir,” she responded, the heat in her face intensifying.

He released his grip and gave her a quick nod before falling in step behind his boss. She watched the two men stroll towards the elevators before discreetly glancing at the money concealed in her hand. As expected, her headset chirped the announcement of a call. She turned and stared wryly at the check-in counter as she clicked the answer button on her headset.

“Yes Nnenia?”

“I was just calling to confirm the rate on room 805.”

She glowered at her c
olleague from across the lobby. “Normal rate, as discussed.”

“Of course, but what did you quote as the rate?” she pressed, her voice calm and friendly. Both women, ever-suspicious that their humorless manager was monitoring their calls, always followed a strict script when discussing their side business.

She pushed the four fifty-dollar bills into her pocket and began walking back towards the entrance, quietly delighting in the crisp texture of their newness. “One hundred per night,” she said flatly. An incredulous snort crackled in her ear.

“That sounds low.”

“That’s the normal rate, Nnenia,” she retorted. She glanced towards the desk as she passed and smiled as her friend craned her neck around a customer to frown at her.

“Fine. Well, Mr.
Dossari got a very nice deal.” The line immediately clicked dead.

“And so did I,” she quietly said to herself as she stood by the glass doors and watched the chaos of morning traffic slowly snake its way along the street. She rarely paid “normal rate” to Nnenia, who was undoubtedly distrustful of even her, her friend since childhood
. But then again their little side business was her idea, not Nnenia’s. And neither could complain about the money. The four bills curled in her pocket represented more than what most of the people on the street in front of her would make in six months. She made it in less than six minutes.

Her smile faded as she stood there, watching the women and children and men and vehicles that choked the streets of her poor, desperate city. Her childhood memories of quiet peacefulness felt painfully distant to this horrible new world; an overrun, avarice-infested version of her cherished
Igwe Ocha
, as her people affectionately called it. She reached into her pocket and rubbed the sharp edges of the bills, swallowing hard as she fought against the mixture of guilt and self-loathing that were beginning to swirl like acid in her stomach. Her eardrums suddenly popped – a side effect she might have attributed to her current feelings were it not for the glass doors in front of her immediately snapping inward as a strong blast of dry, gritty air ripped through the lobby. She instinctively closed her eyes as she turned and fell to the floor, the gasping sounds of surprised voices barely audible over the shriek of the entering wind. It was then that she felt the explosion, a concussion of energy that knocked her flat against the black granite floor with the crushing force of a mob as a flash of white light filled the atrium. She wrapped her head tightly in her arms as a pelting rain of debris fell upon her, tapping on her back and legs like the fingers of pesky children. Something larger and heavy slammed hard into her back, forcing a quick scream of terror from her as she flinched in pain. Then the rain stopped.

She lay still for the long moment of silence that followed, blinking her eyes rapidly as the first wave of moans and screams echoed through the atrium. She rose slowly to her knees, catching the gaze of her own terrified reflection in the dark polished floor as she assessed her condition. Around her, guests and hotel workers lay motionless, paralyzed with confusion and fright, vacantly watching her as she rubbed the shards of debris from her arms and legs.

“Holy Jesus! Holy Jesus! Abeje! Abeje!” Her friend screamed at her from beneath the check-in desk.

She raised her hand and nodded as she stood, wincing at the pain in her back where the heavy object had struck her. A high-pitched tone filled her ears with a deafening volume, and her head felt oddly detached from her body, as if suspended from a string.

“Get down Abeje!” Nnenia shouted, her eyes wide with terror. “Get down!”

She stumbled forward a few steps, her legs shaky. Around her, dazed guests and uniformed hotel employees began slowly moving and sitting upright.
“I am fine. It is over,” she muttered. She looked up at the swirling blue-gray cloud of smoke that filled the atrium and watched as a current of wind tore at its center. There, on the eighth floor directly opposite and above her, muted rays of sunlight poked limply through a jagged round hole in the marble-veneered hallway. She knew instantly which room stood in the path of that horrific hole, but counted and recounted the floors beneath to be sure.