I Am the Messenger (4 page)

I leave for work and think about it.

That evening, after delivering Ma’s coffee table, I go to Ritchie’s place and we play cards. I tell them. All at once.

“You got it here with you?” Audrey asks.

I shake my head.

Before I went to bed last night, I placed it in the top drawer of the cabinet in my bedroom. Nothing touches it. Nothing breathes on it. The drawer is empty but for that card.

“It wasn’t any of you, was it?” I ask. I’ve decided I can’t skirt around the question.

“Me?”
asks Marv. “I think we all know I don’t have the brains to come up with something like this.” He shrugs. “That, and I wouldn’t invest that much thought into the likes of you, Ed.” Mr. Argumentative, as usual.

“Exactly,” agrees Ritchie. “Marv’s far too thick for something like this.” Now that he’s made his statement, he becomes silent.

We all look at him.

“What?” he asks.

“Is it you, Ritchie?” Audrey questions him.

He jerks a thumb over at Marv. “If he’s too dumb, I’m too lazy.” He holds his arms out. “Look at me—I’m a dole bludger. I spend half my days at the betting shop. I still live with my mum and dad….”

To fill you in, Ritchie’s name isn’t even really Ritchie. It’s Dave Sanchez. We call him Ritchie because he has a tattoo of Jimi Hendrix on his right arm but everyone reckons it looks more like Richard Pryor. Thus, Ritchie. Everyone laughs and says he should get Gene Wilder on the other arm and he’ll have the perfect combination. They were a dynamic duo if ever there was one. How can you argue with movies like
Stir Crazy
and
See No Evil, Hear No Evil
?

Exactly.

You can’t.

Just, if you ever meet him, don’t mention the Gene Wilder thing. Trust me. It’s the one thing that sends Ritchie into a bit of a frenzy. He can’t stand it. Especially when he’s drunk.

He’s got dark skin and permanent whiskers on his face. His hair is curly and the color of mud, and his eyes are black but friendly. He doesn’t tell people what to do and expects the same in return, and he wears the same faded jeans day in, day out—unless he’s simply got several pairs of the same type. I’ve never thought to ask.

You can always hear him coming because he rides a bike. A Kawasaki something or other. It’s black and red. Mostly he rides it without a jacket in summer because he’s ridden since he was a kid. He wears plain T-shirts or unfashionable shirts that he shares with his old man.

We’re all still staring at him.

It makes him nervous, and he turns his head now, with all of us, to Audrey.

“All right.” She begins her defense. “I’d say out of all of us, I’m the most likely to think up something this ridiculous—”

“It isn’t ridiculous,” I say. I’m almost defending the card, as if it’s part of me.

“Can I go on?” she says.

I nod.

“Good. Now, as I was saying—it definitely isn’t me. I do, however, have a theory on how and why it ended up in your letter box.”

We all wait as she gathers her thoughts.

She continues. “It all stems from the bank robbery. Someone read about it in the paper and thought to themselves,
Now there’s a likely-looking lad. Ed Kennedy. He’s just the sort of person this town needs
.” She smiles but turns serious almost immediately. “Something’s going to happen at each of the addresses on that card, Ed, and you’ll have to react to it.”

I think about it and decide.

I speak.

“Well, that’s not real good, is it?”

“Why not?”

“Why
not
? What if there are people kicking the crap out of each other and I have to go in and stop it? It’s not exactly uncommon around here, is it?”

“That’s just luck of the draw, I guess.”

I think of the first house.

45 Edgar Street.

In a shithole like that, I can’t imagine anything too good happening.

For the rest of the night, I push thoughts of the card away, and Marv wins three games in a row. As usual, he lets us know it.

I’ll be honest and say I hate it when Marv wins. He’s a gloater. A real bastard of a gloater, puffing on his cigar.

Like Ritchie, he still lives at home. He works with his father as a carpenter. In truth, he works hard, though he doesn’t spend a cent of what he earns. Even those cigars. He steals them from his old man. Marv’s the maestro of meanness with money. The prince of penny-pinchers.

He has thick blond hair that stands up almost in knots, wears old suit pants for comfort, and jangles his keys in his pockets with his hands. He always looks like he’s laughing with sarcasm at something, privately. We grew up together, which is the only reason we’re friends. He’s actually got a lot of other acquaintances, too, for a few reasons. The first is that he plays soccer in winter and has mates from there. The second and main reason is that he carries on like an idiot. Have you ever noticed that idiots have a lot of friends?

It’s just an observation.

None of that helps me, though. Slagging off Marv doesn’t solve the Ace of Diamonds problem.

There’s no avoiding it, as much as I try.

It always sidles up to me and makes me recognize it.

I come to a conclusion.

I tell myself,
You have to start soon, Ed. 45 Edgar Street. Midnight.

It’s a Wednesday night. Late.

The moon leans down on me as I sit on my front porch with the Doorman.

Audrey comes over, and I tell her I’m starting tomorrow night. It’s a lie. I look at her and wish we could go inside and make love on the couch.

Dive inside each other.

Take each other.

Make each other.

Nothing happens, though.

We sit there, drinking some suburban cheap-shit passion-pop alcohol she brought, and I rub my feet on the Doorman.

I love Audrey’s wiry legs. I watch them a moment.

She looks at the moon as it holds itself up in the sky. It’s higher now, no longer leaning. Risen.

As for me, I hold the card again in my hand. I read it and get ready.

You never know,
I tell myself.
One day there might be a few select people who’ll say, “Yes, Dylan was on the brink of stardom when he was nineteen. Dalí was well on his way to being a genius, and Joan of Arc was burned at the stake for being the most important woman in history. And at nineteen, Ed Kennedy found that first card in the mail.”

When the thought passes, I look at Audrey, the white-hot moon, and the Doorman, and I tell me to stop kidding myself.

My next lovely surprise is a nice subpoena. I have to go to the local courthouse and tell my version of what happened in the bank. This has happened sooner than I thought.

It’s set down for two-thirty in the afternoon. I’ll get some time off during my shift and drive back into town to the court.

When the day arrives, I show up in my uniform and they make me wait outside the courtroom. When I go in to give the evidence, the chambers are spread out before me. The first person I see is the gunman. He’s even uglier with the mask off. The only difference now is that he looks angrier. I guess a week or so in custody will do that to you. He’s lost the pathetic, luckless expression on his face.

He wears a suit.

A cheap suit. It’s all over him.

Once he sees me, I look immediately away because his eyes attempt to gun me down.

A bit late now,
I think, but only because he’s down there and I’m up here, in the safety of the witness-box.

The judge greets me.

“Well, I see you dressed up for the occasion, Mr. Kennedy.”

I look down at myself. “Thank you.”

“I was being sarcastic.”

“I know.”

“Well, don’t get smart.”

“No, sir.”

I can see by now that the judge wishes he could put me on trial as well.

The lawyers ask me questions, and I answer them faithfully.

“So this is the man who held up the bank?” I’m asked.

“Yes.”

“You’re sure?”

“Absolutely.”

“But tell me, Mr. Kennedy—how can you be so positive about that?”

“Because I’d know that ugly bastard anywhere. That, and he’s exactly the same guy they put in handcuffs on the day.”

The lawyer looks at me with disdain and explains himself. “Sorry, Mr. Kennedy, but we need to ask these questions in order to cover everything that needs to be covered, by the book.”

I concede. “That’s fair enough.”

The judge chimes in now. “And as for ugly bastards—Mr. Kennedy, could you please refrain from casting such aspersions? You’re not an oil painting yourself, you know.”

“Thanks very much.”

“You’re welcome.” He smiles. “Now answer the questions.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“Thank you.”

When I’m finished, I walk past the gunman, who says, “Oi, Kennedy.”

Ignore him,
I tell myself, but I can’t help it.

I pause and look at him. His lawyer tells him to keep his mouth shut, but he doesn’t.

Quietly, he says, “You’re a dead man. You just wait….” His words attack me, faintly. “Remember what I’m telling you. Remember it every day when you look in the mirror.” He almost smiles. “A dead man.”

I fake it.

Composure.

I nod and say, “All right,” and move on.

God,
I pray,
give him life
.

The courtroom doors shut behind me, and I walk out into the foyer. It’s caked in sunshine.

A policewoman calls me back and says, “I wouldn’t worry about that, Ed.” Easy for her to say.

“I feel like skipping town,” I tell her.

“Now listen,” she says. I like her. She’s short and stocky and looks sweet. “By the time that chump’s been through jail, the last thing he’ll want is to go back.” She considers it and seems confident in her appraisal. “Some people go hard in jail.” She jerks her head back to the court. “
He
isn’t one of them. He spent all morning crying. I doubt he’ll be after you.”

“Thanks,” I reply. I allow some relief to filter through me, but I doubt it will last very long.

You’re a dead man.
I hear his voice again, and I see the words on my face when I get back in the cab and look in the rearview mirror.

It makes me think of my life, my nonexistent accomplishments and my overall abilities in incompetence.

A dead man,
I think.
He’s not far wrong.
And I pull out of the parking lot.

Six months.

He got six months. Typical of the leniency these days.

I’ve told no one about the threat, choosing instead to take the policewoman’s advice and forget about him. In a way, I wish I didn’t read about his jail term in the local paper. (The only good fortune is that early parole was denied.) I sit like normal in my kitchen with the Doorman and the Ace of Diamonds. The newspaper’s on the table, folded over. There’s a sweet picture of the gunman as a child. All I can see are his eyes.

Days pass, and gradually it works. I forget about him.

Really,
I think,
what’s a guy like
that
going to do?

It makes more sense to look forward, and I slowly work my way toward the addresses on the card.

First up is 45 Edgar Street.

I try to go on a Monday but don’t have the courage.

I make a second attempt on Tuesday but don’t manage to leave the house, reading an awful book as an excuse.

On Wednesday, however, I actually make it out onto the street and head across town.

It’s nearly midnight when I turn onto Edgar Street. It’s dark, and the streetlights there have been rocked. Only one survives, and even that one winks at me. It’s light that limps from the globe.

I know this neighborhood quite well because Marv used to come here a lot.

He had a girl here, on one of these slummy streets. Her name was Suzanne Boyd, and Marv was with her back in school. When the family picked up and left, almost without a word, he was devastated. Originally he bought that shitbox car to go and look for her, but he didn’t even make it out of town. The world was too big, I think, and Marv gave up. That was when he became extra tight and argumentative. I think he decided he’d only care about himself from that moment on. Maybe. I don’t know. I never give Marv too much thought. It’s a policy I have.

As I walk, I remember all of that for a while, but it disappears as I edge forward.

I make it to the street’s end, where number 45 is. I walk past it, on the other side of the road, and head for the trees that stand up and lean all over each other. I crouch there and wait. The lights are off in the house and the street is quiet. Paint flakes from the fibro and one of the gutters is rusting away. The flyscreen has holes bitten into it. The mosquitoes are feasting on me.

It better not be long,
I think.

Half an hour passes and I nearly fall asleep, but when the time comes, my heartbeat devours the street.

A man comes stumbling over the road.

A big man.

Drunk.

He doesn’t see me as he trips up the porch steps and struggles with the key before going in.

The hallway explodes with light.

The door slams.

“You up?” he slurs. “Get your lazy arse out here now!”

My heart begins to suffocate me. It keeps rising until I can taste it. I can almost feel it beating on my tongue. I tremble, pull myself together, then tremble again.

The moon escapes from the clouds, and I suddenly feel naked. Like the world can see me. The street is numb and silent but for the giant man who’s stumbled home and talks forcefully to his wife.

Light materializes now in the bedroom as well.

Through the trees I can see the shadows.

The woman is standing up in her nightie, but the hands of the man take her and pull it from her, hard.

“I thought you were waiting up,” he says. He has her by the arms. Fear has me by the throat. Next he throws her down to the bed and undoes his belt and pants.

He’s on her.

He puts himself in.

He has sex with her and the bed cries out in pain. It creaks and wails and only I can hear it. Christ, it’s deafening.
Why can’t the world hear?
I ask myself. Within a few moments I ask it many times.
Because it doesn’t care,
I finally answer, and I know I’m right. It’s like I’ve been chosen.
But chosen for what?
I ask.

The answer’s quite simple:

To care
.

A little girl appears on the porch.

She cries.

I watch.

There’s only the light now. No noise.

There’s no noise for a few minutes, but it soon starts up again—and I don’t know how many times this man can do it in one night, but it’s certainly an achievement. It goes on and on as the girl sits there, crying.

She must be about eight.

When it finally ends, the girl gets up and goes inside. Surely this can’t happen every night. I tell myself it isn’t possible, and the woman replaces the girl on the porch.

She also sits down, like the girl. She’s got her nightie on again, torn, and she has her head in her hands. One of her breasts is prominent in the moonlight. I can see the nipple facing down, dejected and hurt. At one point, she holds her hands out, forming a cup. It’s like she’s holding her heart there. It’s bleeding down her arms.

I almost walk over, but instinct stops me.

You know what to do
.

A voice inside me has whispered, and I hear it. It keeps me from going to her. This isn’t what I have to do. I’m not here to comfort this woman. I can comfort her till the cows come home. That won’t stop it happening tomorrow night and the night after.

It’s him I have to take care of.

It’s him I have to face.

All the same, she cries on the front porch, and I wish I could go over there and hold her. I wish I could rescue her and hold her in my arms.

How do people live like this?

How do they survive?

And maybe
that’s
why I’m here.

What if they can’t anymore?