Nerve Damage (10 page)

Were there systematic ways of going about this?
Probably, but Roy wasn't systematic, had always been more of an experimenter; and besides the sun was shining brightly, the air warm enough for cracking the window open a few inches—the softness of that air, even in winter, reminding him of how it had been to live here, he and Delia. He confined his research to a quick listing of Starbucks addresses in upscale commercial parts of Washington and drove by them, waiting for the right one to pop into view. It took an hour or so, and then, on the other side of the street, the triptych he was looking for rolled into place like a strip of film: newspaper box, Starbucks, wineshop. Now he could see the whole display window, read the lettering on the glass:
WINE, INC.
Roy pulled into a parking space.

Where was he? Roy spotted a street sign: Twenty-second Street NW, probably a block or two from George Washington University—in fact, not far from that first apartment in Foggy Bottom. He got out of the pickup, crossed the street, and as he did saw his image reflected in the Wine, Inc. window; an image that didn't look exactly like him, more like a slightly older, more slender brother. Roy went into Starbucks.

No one inside who resembled Tom Parish: two workers behind the counter, some college kids at a back table, a smartly dressed woman checking the CDs on the rack. Roy ordered coffee and the biggest choc
olate chip cookie they had; cookie for calories, coffee to prevent any of that crazy nodding off.

He sat in the pickup and waited. A woman came out of Wine, Inc., set up an easel beside the door, placed a sign on it: Tasting Today, 5:00—
KILLER PINOTS FROM OREGON AND CENTRAL COAST
. She was tall, with smooth café au lait–colored skin and straight hair, glossy black. The angle of the easel didn't seem right to her. She changed it three times, then saw that the sign itself was tilting a few degrees from straight and fixed that, too. She glanced up and down the street, her movements a little too quick to be graceful. Her gaze fell on Roy, stayed on him for a moment, then slid past. She turned and went back in the shop.

Two hours later, coffee and cookie long gone, Roy was still there. Any point in continuing? All he knew was that Richard Gold had taken a picture of Tom Parish from just about this same spot. Was Tom a regular customer of this Starbucks? Possible, but also possible that he seldom came this way, or had been waiting for a cab, or—

Tom Parish appeared, walking into Roy's line of sight from the left. He wore a dark suit and a plaid bow tie; Roy remembered those bow ties of his. Tom wasn't moving quickly. Roy got a good look at him in profile—prominent nose and chin, that blond hair not only fading to white but receding, too—had no doubt about his identity. Tom passed the newspaper box and Starbucks and went into Wine, Inc.

Roy got out of the truck, crossed the street. All at once he felt a little breathless. No reason to be nervous, he told himself—he was about to wrap this up. He calmed down, or maybe hadn't been nervous to begin with, but still couldn't get enough air. Roy took a deep breath, or tried to, and opened the door to Wine, Inc.

Wine, Inc. was a long, narrow shop with a sales counter on the left and rows of wooden wine bins on the right. There was no one inside except the tall woman, behind the counter, and Tom Parish on the other side, talking to her. Roy caught the phrase “not in writing, of course, Lenore.”

“Funny man,” she said; but she didn't laugh. Up close, Roy saw she was older than he'd thought, maybe his own age. They both noticed Roy.
Roy looked at Tom Parish: Tom Parish, for absolute sure. His character—worldly, assured, rooted deep in privilege, prep schools and the Ivy League going back for generations—was still written on his face, even more so.

“Hello, Tom,” he said.

Tom and Lenore exchanged a quick glance, perhaps puzzled.

“Excuse me?” said Tom, turning back to Roy.

“Tom,” Roy said. “Hi. It's been a long time.”

Tom's brow furrowed. “I'm afraid you're making a mistake,” he said. “My name's not Tom.”

“Thomas,” Roy said, taking a step closer. “Thomas Parish. It's me, Roy Valois.”

No recognition on Tom's face. “Sorry, friend. Mistaken identity.”

And the voice: cultured, detached, distinctive—a voice easily remembered. “Oh, come on,” Roy said. “Roy Valois—Delia Stern's husband.”

Tom spread his hands. “I'm afraid we're no further ahead.” Lenore, eyebrows raised, looked from one to the other.

“Delia worked for you at the Hobbes Institute,” Roy said. “We used to go out on your boat.” He remembered the name.
“Bellissima.”

“I've never heard of the Hobbes Institute,” Tom said. He looked at Lenore. She shrugged. “Or owned a boat, for that matter,” Tom went on, “although God knows I wish I could afford to, and
Bellissima
sounds like an excellent name.”

Lenore nodded.

“She died in Venezuela—you called with the news,” Roy said.

“You're not making much sense,” Tom said.

“Tom?” Roy said, taking another step. “What the hell's going on?”

“Now, please,” Tom said, backing away. “This is starting to get a little tedious.”

Roy felt himself turning red, although he didn't feel embarrassed or even angry, just confused. “For God's sake, Tom,” he said. “You spoke at the funeral. It's not funny.”

“We're in agreement on that,” Tom said. “But for the last time, my
name's not Tom. Now if you'll excuse me.” He turned and walked toward the rear of the store, to a door marked
EMPLOYEES ONLY
.

Roy followed.

“Sir?” said Lenore.

Tom pushed open the door and went out.

Roy started running, but all at once felt very hot, his skin on fire.

“Sir?” Lenore ran after him, caught up in an instant. “You can't go in there. It says employees only.”

But Roy kept going; normally a pretty fast runner, but not today—so hard to run with no air, and his skin burning up like this. He tore off his jacket, tore off his shirt, banged through the employees-only door.

A storage room: a bank of floor-to-ceiling coolers, cases of wine, a portable display of plastic grapes wound around a trellis. Tom was reaching for the knob of a door—this one unmarked—in the far wall, a rough wooden wall, unfinished.

“Sir.”

Lenore grabbed Roy's shoulder from behind. The strength of her grip shocked him, or maybe she'd simply found some delicate nerve by chance. He cried out at the pain and shook her off.

“Tom!”

Tom heard him, glanced back, then banged open the unmarked door. Roy glimpsed a room on the other side, a room divided into cubicles, with workers in headsets at their screens, monitors hanging from the ceiling, big maps on the walls—the Balkans, Middle East, North Africa. The door closed.

Roy got to it, grasped the knob, felt Lenore's grip again, even harder this time. Pain maddened him. Tom was maddening him, too; and his whole life right now. He whirled around, lashed out with his fist, something he would never do to a woman; Lenore backed away, avoiding him with ease. She pulled a cell phone from her pocket.

Roy swung back to the door, tried the knob. Locked? Locked. He tugged at it, shook it, put his shoulder to the door, kicked at it, barely aware of Lenore's voice, a low murmur into the cell phone. At that moment, in midfury, he felt a slight tickle in his throat, almost impercep
tible. He coughed a gentle cough, a voluntary cough, just to get rid of that tickle. A gentle cough, but it caved in his chest for some reason, as though he'd been hit by a battering ram, and he tasted blood, and then it was trickling from his mouth, at first a thin pink trickle dripping onto his bare chest, then thicker and redder, and finally crimson. Roy sank to the floor.

Lenore gazed down, eyes narrowed, face puzzled. From the door to the shop came a woman's voice: “Hello? Anyone got information on those killer Pinots from—Hey! What's going on in here?”

Roy saw two women in the doorway, one holding a bottle of red wine. He couldn't answer because answering required air in the lungs, and he had none.

“I said what's going on,” said the woman with the bottle.

Roy shook his head, or tried to.

“This gentleman,” said Lenore, “appears to be unwell.”

“Stand back,” said the woman with the bottle. “I'm a doctor.”

“Then fuck you,” Roy said. But no sound came out. In fact, he couldn't even keep his eyes open. A fog rolled in, very cold, putting out the fire in his body, cooling him down. It felt good. “This is better,” he said.

“Did he say something?” said the other woman.

 

“Not unexpected,”
someone said; a voice Roy recognized but couldn't place right away. A man's voice, highly intelligent, a little stiff with the language, as though learned from books. “Reaction rates approach thirty percent, in theory.” Dr. Chu. Roy thought about opening his eyes.

“Reaction to what?” said someone else.

“The current study,” said Dr. Chu. Paper crinkled. “Here, with my compliments, an abstract. When he stabilizes, send him to us by ambulance.”

“What if he doesn't?”

“He will,” said Dr. Chu. “This is actually quite mild.”

 

Roy heard
gurgling water. Very pleasant. He could visualize its pulsing, shining surface, a flowing complexity of bumpy shapes, all governed in the end by gravity. He realized he hadn't paid nearly enough attention to gravity in his work, a shocking oversight that scared him. He opened his eyes.

“Hi, Roy.” Netty gazed down at him. He was in the feng shui room, on a gurney or rolling bed instead of the couch. “How do you feel?”

“Fine,” Roy said. He sat up, not in one easy motion, but he did it.

“Easy, Roy.”

Tubes were twisted around his arm. “What's this?” he said. “The cocktail?”

Netty shook her head. “Just some fluids to balance your electrolytes,” she said. “You had a reaction to the treatment.”

“Meaning I can't have more?”

“More?”

“More treatment.”

“No, no, nothing like that,” Netty said. “You're still scheduled for the twenty-fourth. These things happen. Dr. Chu is not particularly concerned.”

Roy looked around. No windows in the feng shui room, no way to tell day from night. Netty must have read something on his face.

“You spent the night at the G. W. University Hospital,” she said. “But you're stabilized now, and as soon as you feel up to it—”

“What day is it?”

Netty told him. “Don't worry,” she said, snapping on surgical gloves. “All perfectly normal for a reaction like this.” She took out his IV.

“I was in D.C.?”

Netty nodded.

Memories stirred in his mind, the details strange, abnormal, dreamlike. “Where's my truck?”

“Your truck?”

Roy stood up. He felt taller than usual, an inch or two maybe.

“You all right, Roy?”

“Fine. Can I go now?”

“No rush,” she said. “Whenever you're ready.”

Roy was ready. Half an hour later he was on a train to Washington. A slow train, much too slow. He tried to take deep breaths, testing himself on how deep he could make them. Pretty deep, he thought. Rain streaked the windows, the world outside reduced to two colors, brown and gray.

 

The pickup
was where he'd left it; five wet and ink-smeared tickets on the windshield, but it hadn't been towed. Late afternoon: the rain falling harder, a warm glow in the window of Wine, Inc., people moving around in the shop. The easel again stood outside:
TASTE THE WINES OF SUNNY SPAIN!
Roy crossed the street and went in.

“Hi,” said a man standing at a table near the front door. He had a round friendly face and a powerful build, a little soft in the middle, as though he was a decade removed from college football. A button on his jacket read:
I'm Westie. Ask me about wine.
“Like to try some Rioja?” he said.

“Rioja?” Roy said, taking a quick look around: ten or twelve customers in the store and two other clerks, one at a second table farther back in the store, the other ringing up a sale. No sign of Tom or Lenore.

“I've also got this really nice Priorat,” Westie said. “Earthier than the Riojas, but a lot of up-front fruit as well.”

“Okay,” Roy said. “I'll try that.”

Westie poured about an inch of wine in a small plastic glass—tiny in his big thick hand—then watched Roy take a sip.

“Nice,” Roy said.

“See what I mean about the fruit?” Westie said.

“I do,” said Roy. He took another sip.

“What happened to your arm?”

“Hockey.”

“My favorite sport,” Westie said.

“You play?”

“When I was a kid. Then I switched to football. But I missed it for a long time. The speed, you know?” He opened a new bottle. “Also a Priorat, but from old vines,” he said. He lowered his voice. “We're not really tasting it today—but for a hockey player.” He poured some in a fresh glass, handed it to Roy.

Roy tried a Priorat from old vines.

“Feel those tannins?” Westie said.

“I think so,” Roy said.

“I always say ‘feel' instead of ‘taste' when it comes to tannins,” Westie said. “Does that make sense?”

“You'd have to ask them,” Roy said.

A little pause; then Westie laughed. He reached for a clipboard. “Care to join our mailing list?”

“Maybe later,” Roy said. “Is Lenore around tonight?”

“Lenore?”

“Another salesclerk,” Roy said. “Or maybe she's the manager.”

Westie looked puzzled. “We've got no one named Lenore here.”