Shelf Monkey (28 page)

I’ll finish this up later, Eric. One or two more. Then I’ll pull my D.B. Cooper routine. Promise.

Yours truly,

Thomas

DOCUMENT INSERT: Note found in inside left
suit jacket pocket of Munroe Purvis (exhibit #139).

Eric:

Got to finish the story. All eyes on the bus follow me as I fumble my way down the aisle. The grocery clerk asks too many innocuous questions as to my plans for the weekend. I’m running out of places to type, FBI agents are lurking on every corner. Pictures of Munroe in the hospital still adorn the magazine racks. It’s my fault, I know, drawing attention to myself instead of just withdrawing into obscurity. If I had disappeared, I could have passed into the stuff of myth. Legend has it, if you so much as crack open a Barbara Delinsky, you can hear the tortured screams of Thomas “Mad Monkey” Friesen echoing through the air.

You’ve seen the program, of course. It was never shown on television in its unedited entirety, but even if portions of Munroe’s Winnipeg appearance hadn’t already been broadcast on
60 Minutes
and
20/20
, bootleg copies are not hard to find. Try eBay. It’s a big seller.

It was vintage Munroe. Page kept her promise to the producers; the program was a closed set, and no ne’er-do-wells would be crashing the festivities. Learning from the ruinous example of Agnes’s appearance, attendance was permitted by pre-approved voucher only. A select group of Winnipeg business people and politicians known to be Munroe aficionados were comped in, with the rest of the three hundred seats going to a mix of radio contest winners and individuals wealthy enough to afford the two hundred dollar entry fee. Even at that price, tickets were snapped up as soon as they went on sale. The mayor was in attendance; fan or not, I can’t say, but politically savvy enough to realize that being seen even peripherally in Munroe’s presence could help him in future elections. There was a rumour, only a rumour, thank Christ, that he’d be renaming a street or a bridge in Munroe’s honour, but I guess Queen Elizabeth’s earlier visit to the city exhausted all available landmarks. An aging rock star or two made the list. Representatives from all major political parties. A few Blue Bombers and their wives. A disgraced former member of the city
council. A local radio talk-show host. From a Winnipegger perspective, it was quite the show.

Munroe was in rare form, waddling to and fro, a bionic host bestowing upon his audience the sweat, saliva, and sycophantia of ten normal men. Everybody was a target for his patented blend of hugging and sharing. He forgave the former city counsellor for his sexual harrassment conviction, tears flowing on both sides of the embrace. Norman Lawton, local boy and Munroe’s newest “authorial discovery,” gave a spectacular, gut-wrenchingly awful reading from his novel
Picking Up the Peaces
. Fitness expert Reverend Donald McAdams led the audience in a vigorous set of jumping jacks to promote his new manual
The Holy Body and Spirit: Putting the Fundamentals BACK into Fundamentalism
. Watching Munroe, Lawton, and the mayor perform rigorous squat thrusts as the reverend shouted inspirational Psalms at them is entertaining for all the wrong reasons. In sum, it was an excruciating test of one’s tolerance for saccharine, an assault on good taste, and an event everyone involved could be proud of.

Now, what was
not
picked up by the cameras; that was the important stuff. Protesters from the Manitoba Writers’ Guild, picketing outside with signs proclaiming
WE RECOMMEND MUNROE LEARN HOW TO READ! AND DOWN WITH THE PURV!
Meh. Barely worth a mention in the next day’s papers. Lawton’s book signing afterward rated a five-second clip on the late news, completely innocuous. And yet, in the background, just behind and to the left of Lawton as he chatted up the mayor, isn’t that Munroe standing there, and doesn’t he look a tad distracted? Flushed, even? Did he lick his lips? He was crumpling a slip of paper into his suit pocket, what could that have been, do you think? And that momentary flash of red on the periphery of the screen; could that have been the briefest glimpse of a dress, its wearer just beyond the camera’s range? And wasn’t Munroe tracking it with his eyes?

It was perfect in its simplicity. How do you kidnap someone? Make him come to you. Lure him with an offer so tempting he’d be bound to come. Promise him an ever-so-discreet round of Olympic-calibre rutting, topped by numerous eye-popping orgasms. Shroud the offer inside a wrapping so luscious and delectable that refusal would be tantamount to insanity.

And so, fairly unsurprisingly given all that, Munroe Purvis lay unconscious on the floor. At our mercy.

“
WHAT THE FUCK HAVE YOU DONE?
”

That was me. I was screaming at my fellow kidnappers.

“
OH, CHRIST!
”

I had begun to scream the moment Warren took Munroe down from behind, the
clunk!
of Munroe’s head impacting the floor still ringing in my ears.

“
OH, SHIT!
”

I kept screaming as Aubrey quickly bound Munroe’s hands and feet with duct tape.

“
SON OF A BITCH!
”

I maintained my screams as Warren and Danae dragged Munroe into the living room and Aubrey closed the blinds.

“
AAHHH!
”

And then Danae slapped me, and kept slapping me, and made it abundantly clear that the slapping would continue for as long as the screaming did. I finally succumbed to her persuasive pain dispersal. My face burned. “What have you done? What have you done,
what have you done,
WHAT HAVE
—”

SLAP!

“Ow, stop that! Jesus!” I rubbed my cheeks.

“We need calm here, Thomas,” Danae said. She held up her hand, its reddened palm toward me, prepared for another go-round. I flinched. “Are you calm?”

“Calm,” I said. “Calm, I’m calm, stop hitting me.”

“Warren, if he freaks out again, could you shut him up?”

“No worries, babe.” Warren took a place next to Danae.

“I am
calm,”
I said, watching Warren’s meathooks warily. “I am an oasis of calm, I’m placid, I’m the freaking Dalai Lama, all right? Calm. I am calm. Calm I am.”

“How’s our boy doing over there, Danae?” asked Aubrey, busy propping Munroe into a sitting position on the couch. Margarita, irked at having to share her space on its cushions, began nudging Munroe with her nose.

“He’s fine,” Danae answered. The soothing massage of her hands on my cheeks kept me quiet. “Thomas is going to be just fine.”

“Good.” He stood up, wiping his hands on his jeans, leaving a
dark swatch of something thick and wet on the fabric. Munroe’s blood, I realized with queasy horror, which was still flowing from his mouth, two teeth having shattered upon impact with the floor. Hysteria began to rise inside again, but the sight of Warren flexing his fists, anticipating another freak-out, quelled the attack. I settled for simple outrage.

I pointed at Munroe. “What is this?”

“This,” said Warren proudly, plopping himself down aside Munroe’s body and putting an arm companionably about his shoulders, “this, dude, is a blow for freedom.”

“No no no, this, this is nuts,” I said. Danae began lovingly stroking my arm, cooing tenderly. I shook her off, furious. “Stop treating me like a freakin’ child! You knew about this? And you didn’t tell me?”

“Thomas, honey, you’ve been a little too aloof lately. The three of us agreed that you couldn’t be trusted.”

“But you can trust me now, is that it?”

“They wanted to leave you out completely, but I convinced them you would come around.”

“Don’t blame Danae,” Aubrey said. “If you had known ahead of time, well, I didn’t think you’d take to this too willingly.”

The enormity of what had just happened slugged me in the plexus, knocking the breath out of me. Black dots popped and zoomed before my eyes. “Oh . . . Christ, oh . . . the police —” The dots were swiftly congealing into one very large, very black, very inviting, all-encompassing hole in the middle of the room.

“Whoops,” Danae said. “Guys, he’s fading, make room!” She grabbed my arm before my legs could collapse beneath me. Aubrey grasped my other arm, halting my slide to the ground, and together they arranged me on the couch next to Munroe, shoving him over to the side so that his face was buried in Margarita’s fur. She didn’t seem to mind.

“Here, drink this,” said Warren, holding a beer bottle to my lips. I inhaled the liquid into my lungs, reflexively spewing it back in their faces. “Sorry, dude.”

I coughed, holding myself in a protective self-hug for a few minutes until reality decided to refocus itself. “The police,” I finally said. “They’ll be looking for him. We’ve got to get out of here.”

“No one’s looking, sweetie,” Danae said, wiping the beer drool from my chin. “They won’t even know he’s gone until tomorrow, and even then, they won’t know where he’s gone. We’re clear.” Munroe snorted weakly beside me as Margarita shifted herself. “Warren, get his face out of her fur before he chokes on us.”

Warren rerighted Munroe, still unconscious, his face now a painting of blood and wisps of dog hair. I began to assess what had happened. “What’s he doing here, how —?”

Aubrey sat himself down across from us. “Thank Danae for that. She’s the genius.”

“Now, Aubrey, you laid the groundwork,” she said.

“But you provided the masterstroke.”

“Stop congratulating yourselves!” I snarled, grabbing the beer from Warren’s hand. I pulled a long swig, concentrating on the bitter taste to help clear my head. They watched impassively as I kept drinking, draining it with a gasp. “Just tell me how he’s here,” I sputtered.

Danae twirled herself around, the red dress rising fetchingly about her thighs. “You think you’re the only one who can’t resist this?” she teased. “Munroe, at heart, is a skirthound, like I thought. It wasn’t hard to catch his attention. An arch of the eye,” and here she wiggled her eyebrows comically, “a shimmy of the hips,” she bada-boomed her hips back and forth, “and he was putty.”

“But
how
is he here?” I asked, impatient with Danae’s cutesy act.

“She slipped him a mash note,” Warren said. “We cooked up a real juicy one, made it sexy, promised Munroe to take him to the moon if he showed up here after his show. If it didn’t work, no harm done.”

“Oh, Munroe, I’m such a
huge
fan of yours!” said Danae, putting on a sweetie-pie voice. “Gosh, I know it’s forward, but, I’ll never have this chance again!”

“We made sure to promise anonymity, to sweeten the proposition,” Aubrey said. “A night of mind-blowing sex in a guilt-free environment. All he had to do was get away from his people. Who could resist?”

“But,” I sputtered, “what if he told someone?” I strained my ears, trying to hear the wail of approaching sirens. Nothing. “He would have told
someone
. He had to.”

“Well, there’s always an X-factor,” said Danae, dismissing the problem with a perfunctory flick of her wrist.

I pulled my hair in anguish. “That’s one fucking huge X! He could have left a note, or told his handlers, or . . .” I struggled to get to my feet. “Jesus, the cops are probably already on their way!” Aubrey shoved me back down.

“Everyone,” Munroe moaned, coming around. “I told everyone, please, everyone knows I’m here.” He opened his eyes and took us all in. “He’s right, the police will be coming.”

“Ubf!” Margarita struggled herself onto Munroe’s lap.

Munroe licked his lips nervously, gagging slightly on the blood. “Please, I don’t know who you are, but they expect me back any minute.”

Warren crouched down, staring into Munroe’s eyes for a good minute, until Munroe looked down. “Nope,” he decided. “No, he didn’t tell anyone.” He grabbed hold of Munroe’s chin and pulled his face up. “Did you, Purvis? Who did you tell, big boy?”

“Everyone knows, they expect me back soon, I swear it, please!”

“He’s lying,” Danae said. “He couldn’t risk the scandal if they found out. Munroe Purvis out trolling for tail? Think of the headlines.”

“They forgave Oral Roberts,” I reminded her.

“Please, I . . . I don’t know you, I never saw you, not clearly,” Munroe pleaded. “I’ll never tell. I don’t know where I am, not really, I could never find you, even if I wanted to, please, please!”

Aubrey seemed to consider it for a moment. “Warren, gag the pig,” he said finally.

Munroe began to squeal, “No, no, please, I,
HELP! HELP! SOMEBODY HE
—” before Warren mercifully cut him short, applying a liberal swatch of duct tape to Munroe’s mouth. He moaned and kicked for a good minute before giving up. Margarita, undisturbed by his movements, set about falling asleep atop his legs.

“So, brother, shall we begin?” Aubrey asked me. “Warren, call the others, tell them to meet us by the pyre in an hour or so.”

Warren made for the kitchen, then stopped and looked back. “Should I tell them why?”