Chapter Seventeen
Mike Nell pushes his mustached face, then his entire stocky self, out through the plastic strips in the staff doorway. “Noone? A word.”
Simon doesn’t like the sound of that, but he walks over. “Something else you need me for?”
“Not exactly.” Nell’s face is impassive. “Some fella came around last night asking about you. Said he owed you money, but I didn’t believe it.”
Simon finds a smooth, cold pit has opened up in the middle of his stomach. “That’s good to know.”
“Look, I’m not gonna ask if you’re in trouble, because I honestly don’t give a shit. But if you’re planning on skipping town or something, do me a favor and let me know so it doesn’t fuck up the roster.”
“I’m not skipping town,” Simon says immediately. “If I have to take a break, I’ll tell you.”
“Good,” Nell says. “I hate having to deal with new hires. Also, you’re the best cutter I’ve got for the morning slot, and I’ll be pissed off to lose you.”
“If that guy comes again—”
“Don’t worry, I know how to say ‘fuck off.’” Nell turns and walks back to whatever he was doing.
Simon strides home after his shift, mulling things over. So here it is: the inevitable consequence of his own stupid actions on Tuesday night. Wonderful. He’d even given Ameche his name. What on earth had he been thinking?
There was no thought, you didn’t think, you just acted—Nomi’s words from their very first meeting roll back, hammer home. Simon feels like the worst kind of fool.
He checks the lobby of the tenement, and the stairs as he climbs them.
There’s no one lurking on Nomi’s floor or his own.
He lets himself into his apartment, closes the door, flips the deadbolt.
If Nomi’s trick with the lock picking tools is anything to go by, the deadbolt isn’t a serious obstacle for someone trying to break in, but unfortunately, it’s all he’s got.
Simon strips out of his boots and clothes, takes a shower.
This situation reminds him so much of his first years of recovery in Guatemala: this impulsivity, the lack of self-control, the urge to lean into his instincts, despite being shown again and again that his instincts could be wrong.
So many times, he would come to and find himself standing somewhere—outside at the edge of the forest, inside a room of the clinic house—and Flores would take his elbow gently and say, “Whatever you are seeing, it is not there, my friend. Close your eyes and reach out your hand. Touch the tree trunk. Touch the tabletop. That is solid. That is real.”
Simon assumed he’d learned this lesson, but like everything these days, he has to learn it again: that his memories and instincts and thoughts aren’t always reliable, that even his senses aren’t always reliable. That he isn’t reliable.
He crawls back into bed, sets his alarm, and in this state of mental agitation, falls asleep and dreams again.
The details might shift, but the dream never changes: A girl with white hair .
. . A suffocating whirlpool that sweeps him away .
. . His limbs won’t move, his whole body heavy .
. . He’s drowning, a crown of white daisies on his head, water flooding his nose and mouth, blocking his ears, turning his eyes into pearls—
Simon jerks awake.
It’s one thirty. He’s overslept. He must’ve slapped off his alarm; he doesn’t remember.
His head is rattling, but at least he’s not in pain.
He finds clothes to dress and goes to the kitchen, scratching at his hair.
Drinks coffee by the window, peering between the curtains to observe people on the street.
It would be great, Simon reflects, if he could rewind Tuesday night like a video movie and scrub out the part with Ameche on the stairs.
The damage to his relationship with Nomi has been repaired, but it’s still left both of them exposed, maybe left other tenants in this building exposed as well, including Sofia Rosa.
Brittany Jackson is already in danger, but she may also suffer blowback.
Listing all the potential disastrous consequences proves fairly depressing; instead, Simon tries to consider solutions. But unless he includes things like homicide, or fleeing New York City, his options appear to be limited.
If this were Guatemala, things would be more straightforward.
The year before he left, a man in a neighboring village had stolen a pig and a dozen chickens from the local market, assaulting the woman who owned the chicken stall.
The woman’s relatives, as well as their friends and other stallholders, had gathered together, found the man, beaten him half to death, and set his house on fire.
That is how you handle matters in Guatemala, but Simon suspects that natural justice may not cut it here in America.
At about two o’clock, he gives up on ruminating and goes downstairs to see his landlady and give her a pound of ground beef.
“Ah, this is good.” Sofia Rosa has a cigarette in the side of her mouth as she slaps the paper-wrapped package, testing for firmness. “You are doing good things, Simón—you give me mincemeat, you help No-mee. Many good things.”
“I don’t know, Auntie.” He leans against the doorjamb. “I think I did a very stupid thing on Tuesday night. The man who attacked Nomi here, outside her apartment . . . I saw him at the nightclub.”
“You had a fight?” Sofia Rosa’s eyes are round; she looks thrilled.
“Yes, I’m afraid so.”
His landlady shrugs, walks over to put the package in her refrigerator. “Well, I am glad you fought him. Any man would have this reaction, to defend his people.”
“Yes, but this man I fought, he is part of the mafia,” Simon admits.
“Ohhh.” Sofia Rosa stubs out her cigarette in a tin ashtray on the side table, smooths back her hair. “Yes, this is a problem. Now you are not the hero, yes? You are the young man tener mecha corta, who is quick to anger.”
“Yes, this is it. And he knows my name.”
“Hm, yes, this requires some discussion.” Sofia Rosa frowns and nods, removing her apron and hanging it on a hook, straightening her blouse. She collects her purse and a newspaper folded to the entertainment section. “We will talk about it as we walk.”
Simon is confused. “We are walking somewhere, Auntie?”
“Of course! Because I will discuss this problem with you, and you will take me here, to the cinema in this advertisement.” She shows him the advertisement in the newspaper, gathers her coat.
Which is how Simon finds himself escorting Sofia Rosa to the Bleecker Street Cinema, to see a 4:00 p.m. showing of a film called Singin’ in the Rain.
The film is a musical, and Simon quite enjoys it.
His landlady moves at a steady shuffle, and she also wants to stop at a small delicatessen on the way, so it takes them a while to go and come back.
But while he and Sofia Rosa spend time in discussion, much of that time involves covering old ground: His landlady has long-standing concerns about certain tenants in their building and disputes with other residents on Gansevoort Street.
Simon’s not feeling hugely enlightened about the problem with Claude Ameche when they finally make it back to the tenement.
Nelson is playing pop music again on the second floor, but aside from that, there’s still no disturbance in or around the building.
Once he’s inside his apartment, Simon switches on some lights, puts on the Sibelius cassette, makes himself dinner—steak, coleslaw, a glass of the merlot.
After he’s eaten, he opens one of his windows to let in some air as he sits by the sill, smoking and finishing his wine.
The sun has set; night has descended. Out the window, light from the streetlamps reflects off a sign and the roofs of parked cars. Across Gansevoort, a pale pink curtain blows from a fire escape on the third floor; hookers call to each other on the street, raucous and risqué.
This weekend will mark the two-month anniversary of Simon’s arrival in this country.
He should feel comforted by that. He’s here, he has a job, he’s fitting in.
He hasn’t been picked up by the immigration police.
But he also hasn’t found a useful occupation apart from work.
His search for himself provided some structure, but now Nomi has taken over that search.
Being at loose ends isn’t healthy. It gives him too much time to retreat into his head.
Maybe your soul will remember. Despite Flores’s fantasy, Simon tried hard not to have any expectations about America.
But part of him still clung to the idea that he’d arrive here and the cogs in his head would align, and everything would return.
That he’d find his real home, and slot back into his old life like he was a missing piece of clockwork.
Of course, it was never going to be that simple.
Sick of listening to his own internal monologue and plagued by a fidgety unease, Simon pulls on his boots and grabs his coat to go for a walk. But when he yanks open his apartment door, Nomi is standing on the other side—black jeans, black jacket, black beanie, fist raised.
“Hi.” She seems taken aback, as if he interrupted her as she was composing herself. “I was, uh, just about to knock.”
“So I see. Hi.”
She spies the coat in his hand. “You were going out?”
“No. I mean, yes. But no.” Good god. She looks confused, and he can hardly blame her. “I was just going for a walk. What do you need?”
“Look, you probably won’t love this idea, but how would you feel about coming to the Riverview with me?”
“What’s the Riverview?”
“Another nightclub?” Nomi winces. “I know, you’re probably allergic to nightclubs now. But this isn’t really a club, it’s more of a hangout, and I need to talk to someone there.”
“A bartender again?”
“A drug dealer.” She tries to sweeten the deal. “You don’t have to dress up. But we have to go now, because Mischa doesn’t stick around past midnight.”