The Cipher (8 page)

Finally, frustrated: "I'm taking this," shaking the tape at me like a fist.

"Go ahead."

And gone, ash fragments left behind, spoor that I swept into my palm and dusted out into the cold night air, imagined I saw it settle on the snow below to form patterns like the runes she always said she saw, insect wings, all the insects buried now in peace under this selfsame snow.

Nursing my hand, sitting at night—alone, did you have to ask?—and examining its growing soreness, the way the, what, infection seemed not to spread but to deepen, the gray edges of the wound now blackened. All my other, transitory souvenirs of that night had healed, even Nakota's bite marks, all of me good as new or as good as I was going to hope for. But not my right hand.

It wasn't getting better, either.

I kept it covered, no sense displaying the war wounds now is there, graduating from Band-Aids to gauze and tape for as it grew worse, it just plain grew: its circumference widening as gray went black, the skin there slick, now, as plastic,
expensive
plastic, nothing but the finest rot for me. Fluid still came from it; that was the part I hated most, goddamn fucking drippy stuff, mostly a dribble but at times such gush that it soaked the cuff of my shirt, and me sometimes at work and trying to make like I spilled my Coke or something, I mean how many Cokes can you spill? And it smelled, yeah, but not like you'd expect: a changeable odor, sometimes so garbage-rank it turned my stomach to change the bandage, sometimes so sweet it almost smelled—tasty. Even Nakota, on her cold infrequent visits—I caught her looking, nose wrinkled like a cat's, but too proud, certainly, to ask.

Which was another, much larger problem, far more painful than my stupid artificial decay, far less curable. She had left me: for punishment, of course, over the video, which she was assiduously watching elsewhere, had to be since I hadn't seen it, much less watched it, for over two weeks. (And where was she watching it? Had she actually gone out and bought a VCR? Not a chance. Then with whom? And how did she explain it, if she bothered at all? Swallow those questions, I thought, swallow till you choke but don't ask.)
God
how I missed her, and not when you would think, no lonely nights spent snuffling into my bachelor pillow, yanking at my stiff bachelor dick. Instead it hurt most at the times she was there, wrapped in the ratty sport coat she now affected constantly, pipestem jeans and -too big Keds jammed with men's ankle socks and always wet, her hands always cold looking, lips chapped past red to a nasty-looking ash color; occasionally they would split, I saw blood in the cracks. It made me want to cry, I realize that sounds ridiculous but that's how I felt.

She would sit back on the couchbed, knees crossed, staring at me and my constant prattle and me staring inwardly, wondering too at my own transparent jabber, all of it saying so clearly Come back. Come back and don't be mad anymore.

But still I couldn't give in.

Even though I knew she had to be watching it elsewhere, knew I was saving her from nothing and in fact maybe making it worse for her without me to watch her, then what? I was a pretty shitty guard dog but I was something anyway, to stand between her and her, own recklessness, I had kept her from so much already. Maybe that was the problem, too, or the backbone of it, my veto of the video the last straw for her. God who knew. All I knew was that even if it kept her from me, I had to keep saying no because I could not stand, could not
stand
to have to watch her constantly, wondering if tonight would be the night she would sneak off and me have to chase her, maybe hurt her, to make her stop. Or worst of all she might get away from me entirely. Kill yourself, Nakota, if you have to; I love you but I never could stop you, really, only slow you down. But I reserve the right not to have to watch. Anyway—trying to comfort myself, wretched notion but—anyway, she seemed much less zombified now, as if the hours (I supposed) of unsupervised addictive repetition had cost the video some of its cold hypnotic charm, what were once vices etcetera. Stupid—I keep saying that, don't I?—but a necessary fiction for me to keep going. If I failed her—again—if there was no way out of it, it was at least not as an accomplice.

This reasoning worked until she would stand, not smiling, and say, "Let's go." And she leading, me trailing, off to the Funhole.

She came, of course, not for me but for the Funhole, and this was maybe the most mystifying; I was sure there were many times, most times, she visited without me, her schedule could easily permit this, she could have rented a flat in the building for all I knew. For me the wonder was why she bothered taking me along at all. No questions from me, though. See her rarely, touch her never, but if that was all I could get, then I was going to take it and be, if not glad, then sorry, but in silence.

Down the hall. Staring into that dark mouth, closer now, both of us, she hands in pockets or on her knees (always, always a chill for me to see her do that, remembering) and me behind her, her knight in twisted armor, awkward picking at his bandaged hand as his lady fair beheld her grail.

In silence, always, and always parting at the stairwell, she hurrying off brisk and wordless, me to trudge upstairs to try to concoct a distraction, something, once I even pulled out my pathetic roll of poems. Beer, too, but you know? I didn't want to drink it. Instead I would sit at the window, eyes closed, breathing cold air until I fell asleep. Waking with cramped shoulders, piss-full, my hand hurting, hurting.

Nothing got better.

The doctor's office, faint bleachy smell, nervous on the red plastic sofa and reading a
Redbook:
"Is Your Mate A Workaholic?" No, but my lover—ex-lover has an annoying habit of trying to stick her head where it doesn't belong. Or is that more of a
Cosmo
article? Ho, ho, ho.

"Mr. Reid? Nicholas?"

Follow the nurse, his ass round and womanly, his uniform baggy and blue and clean. Blood pressure, pulse, temp. "I understand you're having a problem with infection? A hand wound?"

"Yeah."

Reaching for my clumsy cover-up job, bandage palimpsests and I shook my head, pulled my hand away, hiding it like a little kid behind my back: 'Td rather, you know, if the doctor just see it. I mean," lame little smile, "it kind of hurts, to touch it."

"Fine." It wasn't but I got my way, which is what counts. If I had to put on a one-man freak show it was going to be by invitation only, thank you very much.

The doctor, skinny hands the color of weak coffee, grizzly gray hair. Bluff and bored, let's get this over with. Cheer up, doctor, I thought, peeling at my bandages, this ought to make your day. A medical marvel.

He didn't say a lot, at first, asked questions a little then a little more, touching my hand with those bony fingers, pressing my knuckles, the meat below the thumb.

"Hurt here?"

"No."

Press, press. "Hurt here?"

"No."

"How about here?"

"No." I felt I was disappointing him. On the wall behind him was a calendar, peaceful winter scene brought to you by Searle: Please Buy Our Dope.

"How—"

The pain was so unexpectedly blunt that I jerked my hand away, tears in my eyes; some of the wound's fluid splashed him, honey-colored drops on his fresh white coat. Cradling my hand against me, unconscious soothe of outraged flesh, and he asked me again, "How did you say this happened?" Not, note, how did it, but how did I say it did. A distinction, but I pretended not to make it and patiently told my lie again: a puncture wound from a very dirty metal rake handle. Why I said rake, living in a flat, I don't know, but it was my bullshit and I stuck with it.

"Uh-huh." He wasn't buying it but wasn't going to call me on it either. "Well. This is a very unusual infection, Nicholas. It has to be kept very clean. I'll have the nurse give you some instructions for care," as if my wound was a temperamental tropical pet whose very rarity demanded my attendance. He gave me a prescription for something, cephlasporin, sent me on my way. I paid cash, which made me further suspect, wandered off like a criminal with my spandy new bandage and my guilty pain.

It snowed all the way home, dull relentless flakes, more and more against my windshield and my wipers not up to the job, driving through a landscape smeared and troubled and my sore hand aching, aching against the wheel. Back home I tore off the new bandage, let my hand sit palm-up on the open windowsill to touch without catching the steady reach of snow. I slept there, and when I woke, in the early dark, my hand instead of being cold stiff as the rest of me was a lustrous pink, the flesh pliant and warm and I touched it, wonderingiy, and as I did a spurt of fluid as thick as jelly burbled out on the iced inner sill and in its yellow clot I thought I saw swimming a bright and winking eye.

Listless afternoon checkout at Video Hut, bandaged hand clumsy and cold, somehow, at the fingertips, was my circulation going or what. Learning to use the laser pen with my left hand. Learning to drink coffee with my left hand. Learning—it cost me some pinpricks—how to pin my badge on. My fellow grunts past asking now "what happened," ignoring me and my wound with equal nonchalance. Just the way I like it.

No snow today but cold, oh yeah, I could feel it coming off the big front windows, feel its demand every time the door opened. Beside me, new grunt in short brown braid and badge askew, asking under his breath, "What kind of dumbshits come out on a day like this to get
Booby Prizes?"

"Or
Mommy's Little Massacre."
Ignore the faint ooze beneath my bandage. Open door and "Look at this one," I said, clandestine nod at a definite damage case, big guy in cracked brown leather, pale all over, pale like a corpse. "Bet he's not here for the H&R Block tape."

"Scary looking," and just as he said it the guy turned, he couldn't have heard but he turned, came walking straight toward the register, closed stride, and my new buddy melted backward, me left alone with my laser pen and my fucked-up hand, saying, "Can I help you?" in a less than forceful tone.

"Are you Nicholas?"

Flat, flat voice, not especially deep, and when he leaned hands on the counter I saw the pitted skin, hilly nails with years of black grease beneath. Up so close he was paler still, so white I thought Albino, though his eyes were a watery gray. Weird long lashes. He blinked a lot.

"Yeah, I'm Nicholas," I said. "What can I help you with?"

Closer still, dull gas-station stink off the leather as he leaned down to me to say, "The Funhole."

I stared. I think my mouth was open, requisite dummy stance but I couldn't help it, I kept staring and he said, more flat and quiet still, "'S okay. Shrike told me all about it."

"Who's Shrike?"

Faint impatience now, which I suppose I can understand, here he was with his great mystic password and I was reacting as if he'd just stolen my brain. "You know,
Shrike.
You don't have to be nervous, man. She showed me the video."

Well. It wasn't a bad name for her, Shrike. And she'd showed him the video, had she. So: this must be my replacement. Talk about eclectic. Looking more closely, "Randy" stitched in that lumpy universal red on the shirt beneath the leather, a tiny bisected skull, gold-toned and grimy, hanging from one grimier ear. White-blond hair, very clean, the cleanest thing on him.

"So," I said. "What'd you think of it?"

"Oh man," leaning even closer, and now that flat voice had passion, "what a fuckin'
trip,
I couldn't believe it. We must of watched it twenty times. Shrike says the more you watch it, the deeper it goes, goes in
you,
you know?"

"Uh-huh."

"I watch it and I think, Now this is God, you know?"

"God. Yeah." Lord of the fried. I smiled, involuntary sour twitch and—man of many moods— Randy laughed. "I knew it," he said. "I knew I'd like you, man."

What an accolade. Shut up, I advised myself, he can break you in half. We stood there smiling at each other for a few more seconds, me wondering what the hell to add to this surreal bonhomie, but Randy had no worries, he knew exactly what he was about. Leaning even closer, one more inch and he'd be right in my face, con-spiratory murmur: "So when can I see it?"

"See what? The Funhole? Haven't, hasn't Na— Shrike taken you there?"

"Oh yeah, we saw the
room."

What the
hell
? "But you didn't go in?"

"Yeah, we went in, but
you
know what happens."

When absolutely cornered, I reach, always, for the truth. "I don't know what the hell you're talking about, I really don't. You went in the room, that storage room, but you didn't see it?"

Slightly affronted, leaning back and his gaze suspicious, was I fucking with him or what? "It's like Shrike says, you have to be there."

We stared at each other, this was making no sense at all to me when suddenly my mind translated his words into something even more senseless: not "you have to be there" but
"you
have to be there," meaning me, which meant nothing. What did I have to do with seeing the Funhole, and why would Nakota say I did? She was a liar, sure, a twister, but what could she possibly get out of such a silly story, and what exactly had she said to convince Randy that what he saw would somehow improve with my presence?