A Naked Singularity: A Novel (40 page)

“Can I talk to my attorney?”

“That’s perfect. We’ll leave you guys in here alone for as long as you need and meanwhile we’re going to be discussing all of this. Okay? We’ll be right back. Come on Gans, bring the soda.”

“Right if I tell you something you can’t tell anyone else unless I want you to? That’s the doctor/patient privilege right?”

“Similar but you mean attorney/client right?”

“Yeah, that’s it. I don’t trust these guys at all man. I’m not giving them shit till I get the fuck out of here.”

“Sounds to me like you just gave them quite a bit, no?”

“Look man I know you said tell the truth and shit and I basically did but I lied about where this shit is going to happen.”

“Why’d you do that? I mean you either want to cooperate or you don’t. If you do then you have to tell them the truth or else how will they benefit and, more importantly, how will you benefit?”

“I know but I don’t want them to get what they want then leave me hanging. I don’t trust these guys. They’re worser than the guys I deal with on the outside.”

“Listen I can appreciate your paranoia but what happens when they burst into 368 and find some guy watching
Married With Children
in his underwear? Think you’ll get a good deal then?”

“No man, I can’t get caught in this lie. This thing really is as quiet as I’m saying. If they do what they’re supposed to do and get me out then I’ll just tell them the location was changed and give them the real place.”

“What if they check out 368 before then?”

“I know 368. If they check it out it will look like I told them basically. It actually could have been the location so it’s not that big of a lie.”

“What else?”

“It’s just like an average house.”

“No, what else did you lie about?”

“That’s it, everything else is true.”

“I don’t buy that Ramon.”

“It’s the truth man!”

“Why wouldn’t you just let Escalera bail you out? It would be months before the case went to trial and during that time you could have done the deal with Flaco.”

“No man, it’s just, nah.”

“It’s just what? Give me the explanation for why you chose to stay in jail.”

“All right man, you got me there. Remember though, you’re not allowed to tell anyone.”

“I’ll try and remember.”

“All right. Truth is the deal’s really far along and it’s going to go down whether I get out of here or not. I can’t make no twenty-five thousand dollar bail. I have to get the fuck out of here or else I’m not going to get my part of the deal. This is the only way I can figure to get out.”

“What are you talking about your cut of the deal? You just said that if they hook you up and you get out you’re going to tell the cops the real address”

“I will man!”

“Well at that point there’s not going to be any deal right?”

“I don’t know.”

“No, I’m telling you. There’s not going to be any deal. They’re going to be there and seize everything. So you’re not going to be getting any money right?”

“Oh I see what you mean. No, see, the deal I cut with Escalera is that I get a hundred thousand. I get fifty when we get confirmation the stuff is in the U.S. and another fifty after he’s picked up the stuff from the house. Everything I said about me being the key to getting this deal done was true. Believe me, why else would I be getting a hundred thousand for my part knowing what a cheap bastard E is? The lie is that I’m not supposed to be going to the house to pick up the shit and the deal is already set up for ten days from today whether I’m a part of it or not. I know Escalera. If I’m in here when the deal goes down I get nothing, that’s why he hasn’t offered to get me out.”

“I see, unless D’Alessio and these idiots think the deal’s only going to be consummated if you’re out, in which case you’ll be free with your dough and everyone will live unhappily ever after. Of course then you’ll have something else to explain besides just the change of location.”

“What?”

“Why it is you’re not going with Escalera to make the pickup.”

“Listen I won’t have to explain anything. I’ll be out of here and I’ll have fifty thousand in my pocket. My days of explaining anything to anyone including those morons Escalera and Red Bags will be over. You understand what I mean?”

“Yes and no. Yes, I think I do but no I’m not interested in discussing it in much detail with you because it would put me in a delicate situation.”

“Everybody’s going to be happy. I guess I never really thought it would work before, but now I’m like positive it will. They’ll get me out. Flaco will get the stuff here. I’ll get fifty large and poof. Even if Escalera figures out what happened who cares? He’s going to be caught in a house with ten million dollars and ten times that worth of cocaine. By the time he gets out I’ll be on Viagra and shit. I told you about Flaco, there’s nothing to worry about from there. I’ll be out of this fucking mess. Now you see why I had to cooperate. I’m not stupid man, I’m a fucking brainiac. Smart like a fucking fox!”

“What about Red Bags?”

“Now you sound like them man. He’s got nothing to do with this at all. From what them guys said at the precinct he’s gone have a federal rap soon anyway.”

“What do you think about their claim to having confirmed some of what you told them? Do you think someone else is talking?”

“No way,” and he pursed his lips in support.

“Because if they have independent information that allows them to catch you in a lie it won’t be enough to say you would’ve eventually told them the truth.”

“They don’t have shit man. I’m all they have. Everything they know about this comes from me. If I tell them the clouds are made of shit, they’ll start expecting it to rain crap!”

“They’re not going to let you out until you’ve pled guilty and left your sentence up in the air. This is how they’ll exercise control over you. If you take off or lie or whatever they’ll ask the judge to give you a huge number.”

“It won’t matter. I’ll stick around to get my fitty and to make sure them cops get what they want and also to see that E gets what’s coming to him for ostrich-sizing me like some piece-of-shit crackwhore. After that they can ask the judge for life and I’ll try to care from the beach. Fuck them! I’m going to be opening and closing those little umbrellas they put in your drink. Shit, fifty large over there makes me the brown Bill Gates!”

“You’ll be out for about a week and having meetings with these guys. What if they want you to wear a wire?”

“No way. They already talked about that last time and I said there was no way I could do that because Escalera is too paranoid and always frisks anyone he talks to about business.”

“Is that true?”

“Sort of.”

“Is that it? Any other lies I should know about?”

“There’s more money. Yo I’m going to be straight with you B because you’re my lawyer and shit. There’s going to be more than ten large there for sure.”

“What’s the reason for that lie exactly?”

“Yo here they come. What do you think of all this? My plan and shit?”

“You’ve thought about all of this obviously, I hope it works out for you.”

“So you think they’ll let me out?”

“I do. Maybe they have their doubts about everything you’ve said I don’t know, but right now it looks to me like they have visions of fame and applause heading their way and because of that they’re probably not too eager to take an overly critical eye at everything you’re telling them. So if your question is whether it’ll work in terms of you getting out, my answer is yes I think it will work. I think they’ll come in here and say they’re going to offer you a deal where you plead guilty and are released with your sentence to be determined at a later date. They’ll say that if you do what you’re supposed to do, such as testifying whenever they need you, you’ll eventually be sentenced to something like a misdemeanor and probation. That’s your status from a legal standpoint, which is something I know a lot about. But there’s another world at play here, and it’s one you know a lot more about than me. Assuming I now have the truth about this whole mess, it seems to me to involve an even greater risk on your part than I previously thought. You’re going to be responsible, if you aren’t already, for the break-up of a really heavy deal that a lot of people are counting on. In all likelihood, the people involved are going to figure out that you’re responsible. After all, they know you’ve been arrested and no one else who knows about this deal has been arrested recently right? So fine, Escalera will be in jail but what about Colon? And even if they’re both in jail, is everyone who works for them going to be in jail? Flaco’s not going to get his money. Will he be happy? Even if he is soft, as you say, can you be sure there won’t be some other lunatic over there who might somehow be connected to this deal and who might come after you? Have you thought all those contingencies out thoughtfully enough Ramon? Or are you so focused on getting out of here and your measly fifty-thousand-dollar payday that you’re putting your life in danger?”

“My life? What life man? I have nothing. My life is being thrown in and out of here. You want this life?”

“It’s the only one you’ve got.”

“No I’ve thought it all throughout man and I definitely want to do this. It’s going to work out for me too, I have a good feeling.”

And in short order did the three—D’Alessio, Dacter, and Gans—after pausing to make sure it was okay, come back into that office to offer precisely what I’d predicted. And even quicker was Ramon’s breathless acceptance followed by a consensus that the case would be advanced to the following day in Part 49 for DeLeon to plead guilty in front of McGarrity, be released, and begin his career as de facto law enforcement agent.

Maybe what I should have felt then was dread or whatever comes immediately before it but instead it was relief washing over me, relief because I could finally leave that office where I’d spent my entire morning. But also a strange excitement had dawned in me during this telling and only then was it winding down. I liked hearing DeLeon’s story. I had done countless buy and busts without ever thinking of the machinery behind them. Not that it was the most complex or scintillating thing either but still I liked hearing it exposed and laid bare. This wasn’t some guy snatching an old lady’s chain. There was planning. I liked that. I responded to that.

Of course the planning was shit. I thought about Dane and his ruminations on the nature of crime. What if a truly talented person turned those considerable talents to the successful commission of crime? What did I mean
what if
though? Surely loads of such people were at that very moment devoted to successful criminality and I just never met them because a large part of being successful means not getting caught. DeLeon, and Escalera for that matter, disqualified themselves from that group by risking their share of upwards of ten million dollars by not only doing risky street sales but then getting caught.

I thought all that but mostly I thought about ten million dollars. I thought about each of those dollars all the way back to the office. In the warmth of that office, with Swathmore in front of me all animated and sounding like a Peanuts adult, it was the money I thought of. At my current rate, it would take me a little over two centuries to gross ten million dollars. Patience, it seemed, was all I needed. With ten million dollars I could return all my phone calls and answer all my mail without my heart tightening.

I would never ride the subway again and even if I did it would feel different. I would do very little I didn’t want to and lots I did. I would feel joy and relief.

I would have a library.

Well, first a house to put it in, not a glorified closet. And there I would sit, in a crazy regal chair made of fine Corinthian leather smoking a pipe for no good reason while draped in a crushed velvet robe. I would read until my eyes failed and my head overflowed. Any book that sounded even mildly interesting I would buy. And not cheesy paperbacks either, hardcovers only. Leather-bound collector’s editions if possible and appropriate. I would read everything of note ever written. Gilgamesh to Grendel, Gibbon and Gass, Goethe and Gödol, Günter Grass and non-G works too. I would devour them all. And when I tired of reading I would swim in my pool, parting the azure blue water like a veloce human knife. Or I would visit the equally lush home of my mother and her others, now swimming in the knowledge that I singly moved them out of their cramped quarters.

I would grow wings and shed the shackles that kept me tethered to this place and day. Thus freed, I would soar up and through the air, above the Earth, to exotic locales where I would be pampered
beyond my wildest dreams
. Venice, Paris, Rome, Sydney, Tokyo, Rio, Athens would be my homes.

No, better yet, I would be homeless. Owning and owing nothing and no one. I would exist well outside the norms and concerns of society, my only concern my personal advancement and evolution as a human being. As such I would only intake the very finest our tepid species had been able to produce. Only the finest foods in my shell, which shell would be subjected to only the finest medical care. Through my repaired ears and into my melon only the most angelic music would pass, which by now you know would include a healthy dose of live Ludwig. And along with those notes only the finest thoughts, arguments, theories, hypotheses, assessments, deeds, proofs, actions, creeds, kudos, slogans, phrases, sayings, limericks, and memories. Okay that last one’s tricky but beauty in, beauty out, as I would be transformed into a timeless yet evanescent superbeing who didn’t know what anything cost.

“Success Casi! Sweet success!”

I recognized Conley’s voice but didn’t see him. “Remember this date for it is truly a great one! Not this date actually, rather the date success was achieved. Today’s just the day I confirmed the findings.”

“The hell you talking about?” I said as I entered his jack o’ lantern office where he sat alone on his couch waving a newspaper.

“The Human Genome Project, what else?”

“Oh that, right.”

“The project has borne the sweetest of fruit my friend who possesses fine feathers and you’re one of the few people here who can appreciate the awesome significance of this.”