Slow Motion Riot (6 page)

"Let me ask you
something," Richard Silver said. "I was sitting in here before and I
was looking around—and it's a very nice bathroom, I admit. I paid a lot of
money for it. And there's mirrors on the ceiling and there's mirrors on all the
walls. Right? There's mirrors everywhere you look. Right?"

Both he and Jessica Riley looked up
at their reflections on the ceiling.

"Right," she said.

"So why do I wanna watch
myself take a crap?"

"I don't know."

"I don't know either." He
seemed genuinely perplexed. "I see myself sitting on the toilet and I
think of death."

"Why?"

"Because I look fat sitting on
the toilet. I look like Elvis Presley just before he died."

"You're not fat."

"I'm the same age as Elvis
Presley."

"No, you're not," Jessica
said. "Elvis was forty-two. You're forty-eight."

"I'm forty-nine. Thanks a
lot."

"What're you wearing
tonight?"

"Green Armani suit, red tie,
black shoes I just picked up at Church's." He looked at himself in the
medicine cabinet mirror. "Maybe I don't mean like Elvis Presley. Maybe I
mean like a Roman senator about to expire in the baths. You know?" He
looked at her. "What're you making that face for?"

"You're thinking about death a
lot."

"No, I'm not. I'm thinking
about the value of things."

"What?"

"Look at this," he said,
taking a gold-backed toothbrush out of the medicine cabinet. "My secretary
got this for me the other day as a birthday present from Hammacher Schlemmer."

"Yeah. So?"

"So look at it. Half the
bristles are gone already."

"But, Richard," she said
with a sigh. "This is a joke. This isn't a real toothbrush. She got you
this as a joke."

"Yes, it was a joke, but
there's a serious point underneath."

She waited three beats before she
asked what it was.

"Society is falling apart from
the bottom up," he said. "We can't even make a toothbrush with
bristles that stay on and people expect us to maintain the infrastructure of
the greatest city on earth. It's madness. The fabric that holds society
together is tearing."

"You are in a bad mood."

"Yeah, I guess I am." He
shrugged. "Get outta here a second, will you. I gotta take a leak."

She stepped outside and let him
close the door. She paused at a mirror and pulled down the top of her terry
cloth robe to see if her shoulders got tanned. There were faint white stripes
where the bikini straps had been. Inside, the sound of his piss hitting the
porcelain was like a xylophone solo echoing through the bathroom.

"So how'd things go with that
guy downtown today?" she asked.

"That's just what I was
talking about."

Jessica stepped back into the
bathroom. "What?"

He shook his head. "This kid
at probation. I go down there. And it's the bizarre universe, I swear. Twenty
years ago I would've had somebody like this guy getting me coffee. Now he's
telling me what to do. Like I said, society's coming apart. I gotta get an
angle on this guy, though. He's power-mad."

"What does Larry say?"

"Larry says I gotta deal with
the guy, otherwise we're gonna have problems." He finished buttoning his
shirt and his shoulders heaved in resignation. "Speaking of Larry, he
still didn't close that
Long Island
deal. I'm gonna be an
old man before I see any money off it. Jimmy Rose would've never let this thing
drag on so long."

"Is that what's been bothering
you?" she asked.

"What?"

"That Jimmy isn't around
anymore."

He looked hard in the medicine
cabinet mirror as though he thought he'd find the answer there. "I don't
know," he muttered. "There's just some days ..."

"Some days what?"

He turned sideways and looked at
his stomach in the mirror. "There's just some days I believe life is not
what it was." He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

"You worried about getting
old?"

There was a long silence. He
loosened the belt of her robe and reached inside. "You know
something," Richard Silver said. "If I wasn't making a lot of money
and getting laid regular, I sometimes think I'd be a miserable sonovabitch."

The sound comes from very far away,
moving slowly toward the edge of hearing. A deep, resonant voice describing
terrible, nightmarish things. A house on fire. Children with guns. Blacks and
whites at each other's throats.

Another cop shot, the radio
newscaster says. The mayor announcing a new budget problem. A water main
explosion on the
East Side
. A Brazilian tourist slashed
in a
Times Square
mugging. A real estate magnate's tax
evasion trial. A mother of two in the
Bronx
killed in
the cross fire between two drug dealers. Dow-Jones down seventy-five points. A
wealthy businessman calling for the death penalty and a tax break. A shooting spree
at a midtown disco. A famous fashion designer dead from AIDS. The Mets losing
to the Cubs, 5-4.

Another ninety-two-degree day in
the city.

Without even opening my eyes, I
reach back and slap off the clock radio. Then I just lie there for a few
seconds, the heat like a dog's breath coming down on my face.

Every morning you make a choice in
life. You can get up and face the world, like most people do. Or, if you're
really brave, you can roll over and go back to sleep. I turn on my side. Going
out into the world takes no guts really. Because you know no matter what you do
or how hard you try, the difference to everybody else is marginal. But to lie
in bed, doing nothing. That takes a real man. Like flying without a net.
Complete freedom from the dreary realm of responsibility. Or maybe you could
end up like my cousin Jerry who sits around the house all day, listening to
"I'm Henry VIII, I Am" over and over on the record player.

A long coughing fit forces my eyes
open. I look around the apartment and consider whether I could spend a whole
day here.

It's hard to believe the rent is going
up to $650 a month. What I have is one room, about twenty feet long and twenty
feet wide, with a small kitchen off to the side and a bathroom down the hall.
Pale blue walls, no air conditioner, and a single light bulb in the middle of
the ceiling. My one window looks out on Avenue B and
Tompkins
Square
Park
;
in the evening I can hear the pit bulls fighting and the skinheads setting off
firecrackers. My stereo and speakers are set up near the head of the mattress
on the floor so I can blast myself into unconsciousness on bad nights.

Lately I've begun to notice that
the floor is a little lopsided, causing everything that falls to roll eastward.
Including Barbara Russo's tiny turquoise-colored earring. The earring is still
lying under a chair in the corner, where it's been since Barbara slept with me
at some point during the Reagan administration. When I discovered it months
later, I made a conscious decision to leave it there. Not out of sloppiness or
bravado; it's merely a reminder that romance is still possible.

This morning, though, it just
depresses the hell out of me, so I figure I'm better off playing it safe and
facing the malevolent world outside. Sticking around here is too risky. I roll
out of bed, light a cigarette, and take the Sex Pistols record off the
turntable. With a rumbling stomach and a hung-over head full of cotton, I put
the cap on the half-empty Jack Daniel's bottle and get ready to spend another
day. straightening out my clients' lives.

Early in the afternoon I look up to
see Jack Pirone, my old training instructor and current union rep, glowering
down at me. Big Jack's eyes are darting back and forth, like they've become
frightened by the prospect of drowning in his grotesquely fleshy face. His jaw
is working furiously, though he doesn't appear to have anything in his mouth.

"Whaddya doing?" Jack
says.

"Nothing. Just filling out
reports."

"Whaddya doing?!!" Jack
says a little louder.

I go back to writing. "I just
told you."

"WHADDYA DOING?!!!!!!"

I slap my folder down on the desk
and give him my undivided attention. "Is something the matter, Jack?"

"What's all this bullshit
about you going to field service?"

I start to ask how he knows
already, but Jack has spies all over the office and good instincts besides. He
eventually figures everything out. He stops chewing and glares at me.

"The membership is not going
to be happy, Steven."

"The membership is going to
end up feeling whatever you tell them to feel," I say, dropping my pen.
"So why don't you just tell me why you're not happy?"

"Precedent," Jack intones
with the solemnity of a seminary student. He goes over to my blackboard and
writes the word out.

"You're young," he says,
"you been here two years, you're not married, you don't know. Your average
probation officer makes—what?—twenty-three thousand a year? They're fuckin' fat
slobs like me. They wanna sit in front of the tube and eat pasta fazule. They
don't wanna run around the streets, looking for some sick fuck who is too busy
corn-holing eighty-nine-year-old females to keep an appointment. If your
average P.O. wants excitement, he watches Knots Landing with the wife, and
maybe gets a handjob if she's in the mood."

"So I'm not stopping
him."

Jack shakes his head and huffs
loudly. "No good, Steven. No good. You're setting a bad precedent for the
rest of us.

Office people shouldn't have to
risk being in the field. Just because the noble savage asks you to do
something, you don't have to jump through hoops ..."

"The who?"

"The noble savage—Ms.
Lang."

"Ah, knock it off, Jack,"
I say, frowning. He knows I hate shit like that. "It's not her idea
anyway."

"Who then?" Jack asks.

"I think it was this guy
Deputy Dawson ..."

"He's a fuckin' budget
manager! What the fuck does he know? I gotta ask around about this." Jack
stops and chews his nails pensively.

"That's all I know."

"So what're you saying, you
sold us out?" Jack grabs one of the empty wooden chairs, spins it around,
and sits on it backward. Its legs give a sinister creak. "You can't do this.
They're not giving us full insurance benefits for the field."

"I get something," I say
a little uncertainly. "Don't I?"

"You should get the same
benefits as if you were a cop," Jack says, starting to slip into one of
his standard union speeches. "The field job is just as dangerous. More, in
fact. Because all you're dealing with is convicted felons. You should get full
coverage—injury, auto collision, death. The whole shebang. God forbid one of these
bastards should put a bullet in your neck, you should be taken care of. Not
just half the cost."

"I'm sure the union will get
it straightened out," I say, glancing over at my desk, where paperwork is
beckoning to me. "You seem to be on top of everything else."

Jack slowly turns his head to the
right and snaps it back. It looks like an isometric exercise for people too fat
to consider sit-ups. "How much are they paying you for this move?" he
asks.

"None of your business."

"How much are they paying
you?!!"

"Never mind."

"HOWMUCHARETHEYPAYINGYOU?!!!!!"
Jack bellows.

"Not that much. Enough to
cover my union dues if they go up." Jack probably knows already. He's just
asking to intimidate me.

"Then why are you doing this
foolish thing, my boy?" His loud honk of a voice drops to an avuncular
timbre. "You know, this field unit is just another fuckin' publicity ploy,
so that people won't catch on how fucked-up this agency really is. Probation is
a joke. Why are you helping them perpetuate this bullshit?"

"I don't know," I say,
cracking my knuckles. "I'm a little bored here. I want a chance to go out
and do something. I mean, I talk to a lot of people here, but I don't know if
it does any good. Maybe it'd be good to see some action. You were the one who
told me that the only time the public is even aware of probation officers is
when a client goes out and kills somebody. And then it looks like we blew
it."

"Let me tell you
something," Jack says. He casts his eyes around the cubicle. "But
first gimme a cigarette."

I take a brand-new pack of
Marlboros out of my pocket, unwrap it, and offer it to Jack. Before he takes
one, he fishes the empty pack I'd thrown away out of the garbage can.

"You see this?" he says,
holding up the pack. "You should keep this with you. That way, the next
time some bum asks you for a smoke, you can show him the empty pack-and say you
haven't got any more and keep the fresh pack for yourself."

"What's your point,
Jack?"

Jack lights the cigarette, inhales
deeply, and blows out a roomful of smoke. "Look, you're a nice kid,"
he begins. "Everybody likes you and you've got a very good reputation here
already. You're obviously very bright and you mean well. I don't deny you any
of that."

"But?"

"But if you go out on the
street," Jack says slowly, "they are gonna fuckin' eat you
alive."

I don't say anything.

"And another thing while I'm
at it," Jack says, leaning forward against the top of the chair. "I
heard you talking to your clients the other day. 'I'm gonna violate you
personally .. .I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna do that.' Steven! Don't make it so personal.
You shouldn't tell clients you're the one who's gonna send them back to jail
and all that shit. Just tell 'em you're only doing your job. Some of these guys
are kind of sensitive, you know, and you might just get your fuckin' head blown
off." The chair legs groan loudly again under Jack's weight.

I start rilling out my reports.
"We'll see," I say.

"You oughta be a lawyer.
That's what you should do." Jack grunts as he begins to get up. There's a
sudden squeak and a loud crash on the floor.

"Ah, fuck you, Jack," I
say. "Now I gotta get a new chair."

The steady stream of clients keeps
up until
3:30
, when Maria Sanchez
walks in. I call the reception desk and tell Roger, the guard, not to send
anyone else back until I'm done with her.

Maria is a seventeen-year-old
Puerto Rican girl living with her mother, two sisters, three brothers, uncle,
aunt, and five cousins in a tenement on
East 106th
Street
. She's a smart girl and the only person in
her family who speaks good English. She gets along with people in the
neighborhood and did well in school before she got in trouble. She's a little
heavy, but she has a beautiful face with a cloud-parting smile.

She's wearing a short denim skirt
without stockings, gold hoop earrings, and a little less makeup than usual. I
try to avoid looking into her wide brown eyes for too long. Otherwise, I know
I'll be lost.

"So did you go to that
word-processing job the counselor sent you to?" I ask as she sits down and
crosses her legs. I can't help noticing the way her skirt rides up a little.

"Yes," Maria says with a
mild accent and a smile. "It seems like a nice place. Thank you for
helping me set that up."

"How much are they paying
you?"

"Almost six dollars an
hour."

"And how fast can you
type?"

"Only about fifty-five words a
minute." She looks down at the floor as though she feels ashamed.

"Only?" I say.
"What's the name of the place you're working?"

She says the name of a prominent
textbook publisher. I tell her that she should ask for at least seven dollars
an hour.

"Please don't make me do that,
Mr. Baum," she says in a slightly panicky tone. "I need this job.
They won't hire me if I ask for that kind of money."

"If you can type fifty-five
words a minute, that publisher can certainly pay you the seven."

"No, but they won't..."

"They will," I insist.
"Listen, if they don't hire you because you ask for more money, then I
will take personal responsibility for finding you another job within a week
that pays at least six dollars an hour. Okay?"

"Okay..."

"You still don't sound
sure." I put her file on my lap and feel something stirring under it.
"Look, Maria, you've got to start having a little higher opinion of
yourself. Don't you think you're worth it?"

"I dunno."

"Well I do. You can't allow
yourself to be held hostage by your fears..."

I realize I'm gazing at her for too
long again. She smiles back at me and doesn't say anything for a minute. She's
beginning to see how attracted I am to her. I look away guiltily and squeeze
the Silly Putty in my pocket. It just shows the sorry state of my own love
life. Not only is it wrong to act this way around a client, but when I think
about what Maria actually did, I get a little sick to my stomach.

It happened on a fall night. Her
mother noticed Maria had been in the bathroom for a very long time. That's the
funny thing about Maria being bright—the rest of her family isn't.

The mother knocked on the door and
called her a few times. Maria didn't say anything. She just groaned. The mother
went back to watching Wheel of Fortune. She didn't understand what they were
saying or spelling; she just liked looking at the prizes. During one of the
last commercial breaks, Maria came running out of the bathroom, past her
mother, and threw something out the window.

An hour later, a neighbor found the
newly born baby girl dead in the alley five floors down.

They arrested Maria. The family
claimed they never knew she was pregnant. She wouldn't say who the father was.
Her lawyer said she was suffering from postpartum depression and the district
attorney charged her with manslaughter. The court gave her probation with
psychiatric treatment.

Within her first few visits, I
learned that her uncle had been sexually abusing her since she was eight and I
began to suspect that he was the one who got her pregnant. Then I found out he
beat her to make sure she wouldn't tell anyone, but I figure the rest of the
family must have known what he was up to and just didn't do anything about it.