Chapter 45 Half Naked and Flapping in the Breeze
Half Naked and Flapping in the Breeze
Wearing nothing but boxer briefs, Evan sat cross-legged on his floating bed. Spine erect, hair damp from the shower, Mia’s sweatshirt tumbling in the dryer, the rest of today’s clothes smoldering in the fireplace in the great room.
It was time to call Joey.
And yet.
A splotch of bird shit marred the bedroom window near the top.
How could he talk to Joey with a distraction that pronounced smack in his visual field?
He tried to ignore it.
His efforts didn’t last long.
He fetched a paper towel from the kitchen, folded it into quarters, and dampened the edge. Back in the master suite, he cranked the window open, stood on the sill twenty-one stories up, and leaned around the outswung bullet-resistant polycarbonate-thermoplastic-resin pane.
Couldn’t reach.
It was an architectural window, significantly taller than he was.
The white amoeba was crusted on, floating just out of reach, a tactically positioned bombing.
He came back inside, shuddering, to regroup.
There was no way he’d be able to sleep, not with that stain blemishing the polished glass.
Into the bathroom, nudging the shower door back on its carbon-steel barn-door wheels.
It vanished soundlessly into its recessed slot in the wall.
He gripped the hot-water lever, waited for the hum of embedded sensors to read the vein patterns of his palm, then turned it the wrong way.
A concealed door parted from the tile pattern, opening into the irregular four hundred square feet of the Vault.
OLED screens covered three of the walls, horseshoeing an L-shaped sheet-metal desk stacked with hardware.
Windows populated the screens, countless law-enforcement databases that had been hacked into with methods and means that could be elaborately detailed in book chapters’ worth of exposition.
Reaching the row of weapon lockers in the back, he withdrew a length of military fastrope and snapped it once between his fists, its aramid fibers five times stronger than steel at the same weight.
Back to the bedroom, grown chilly with the night breeze.
He tied the rope to one of the steel cables anchoring his bed.
The other end he wrapped around his arm.
He got a yoga block from the back of the closet and set it on the windowsill.
Hopping up, he balanced on the block, using the rope to hold steady, and leaned all the way out and around the angled pane.
Now he could reach the bird shit. Straining, he swiped with the moist paper towel, then flipped it to clear the smudge marks with the dry side because no one needed water stains.
The yoga block buckled and almost popped free but he tensed his ankle and the arch of his foot and brought it back to solidity.
The thrice-wrapped fastrope cut into his forearm, holding tight.
It was bracingly cold up here in the wind current given his damp hair and boxer briefs.
As he swung himself back inside, he spotted an elderly lady in an apartment window across Wilshire staring at him, her mouth slightly ajar.
He pivoted back into the bedroom, jumped down, and cranked the window shut once more. The woman was still staring at him, holding the collar of her housecoat tight at her throat. How ridiculous he must have looked half naked and flapping in the breeze.
He waved.
She did not wave back.
The pane was now clear.
He lowered the innocuous-looking periwinkle sunscreen that was in fact woven of a titanium composite sufficient to halt a sniper round.
He didn’t want the sullied paper towel dirtying his trash can, so he tore it up into small sections and flushed them.
Then he washed his hands in water hot enough to turn his skin red, using three applications of soap to scour off any residual guano.
Back to bed.
He found his Zen seated posture once more.
Now for the hard part.
His eyes picked around the room for other imperfections to set right. Realizing he was seeking distraction, he tightened the vise on his OCD, picked up the RoamZone.
Her latest text peered out at him: what’d i do wrong?
He dialed.
“X?” She sounded nervous.
He cleared his throat. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
He kept his back straight, his breathing steady.
“Feels like I did.”
“You didn’t.”
“Then what went down?”
“Let’s talk in person. After the mission.”
“Why not now?”
“Finding these fucking guys, Joey? And getting them off the street? It’s all that matters.”
“Fine.”
Silence.
Then: “I hate when you’re disappointed in me.”
So bare. So simple. So pure. He had to remind himself to breathe.
“It’s okay,” she said quickly. “We don’t have to talk about it now.”
Good, he almost said.
“Oh, X?”
“What?”
“Can you go see Dog?”
“Why?”
“He needs human contact. P.S.: So do you. Plus I need you to send me a picture.”
“Why?”
“’Cuz I want to see him.”
He tried to process. “You already know what he looks like.”
“God. Really?”
“Yes.”
“Because it makes me feel good. To see him. It’s, dunno. Like a hormone release. Or brain stuff.”
“Brain stuff,” he repeated flatly.
“Fine! Dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens, serotonin triggered in the raphe nuclei, endorphin flood from positive imagery. Or in human language: It makes me happy.”
“Can’t you have the dog sitter text a picture?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because the dog sitter is not you. And I want you to see Dog.”
“Why?”
“Gawd! Are you seriously for real? Because he likes you! And he’ll be happy to see you. And I’ll be happy to know he saw you. And then you can send me a picture of that happy moment and it will make me happy because unlike someone I am a human person.”
“Oh,” he said.
“You are,” she said, “tha worst.”
“You, too,” he said, and severed the call with great relief.