NOM

 

I’m changing my name. “Carmine Bisque” comes to mind. I think it has a mystique. But does it sound too much like a soup? I worry about that. Do you think it sounds ‘soupy’ ?

Carmine is not quite sanguine…oh, my god, is it too bloody? I don’t want the first impression to be “Oh… a…BOWL…of…bloody BLOOD.”

 

Wrong impression, that. I’ll have to ponder it a bit…play with it…“Carmine Bisque…Bisket…Basket…

Basquet…BASQUETTE !!”

Carmine Basquette! It shall be!

That deserves another glass of wine, it does.

In the meantime, let’s move on with the story.

I simply ask that you’ll just allow me to mull…

Perhaps that’s a story to be told on a different day, from a different perspective. Any perspective…

The nom de plume is pointless, without the story. Now, where to begin…? That’s a painful point to ponder, or, do you just take-the-Plunge?

I’ll have to sip on this awhile…

allow it to percolate.

...and perhaps a 'story' is premature.

THE DRIVER

 

He had a nightmare. That’s all he had anymore, and he had grown tired having them. He wanted some respite, some quiet relief. What haunted him?…possessed him? What drove him to the point of desperation and found him crying, curled fetal in the night. He can’t accurately recall, but the sheets, his bed, the nightstand, the room … all were in disarray, even though the evening before he took such pains to make it all just ‘so’. But always in the morning he’d find that sometime in the night a beast had entered his tiny flat, and destroyed the fabric of his reality.

His mornings came too soon, he wasn’t ready for them, but there was no masking the harsh light that invaded his room. It was dawning and you had to go on. You just can’t stop…can’t stop the Workings. The Workings don’t depend on you, they neglect you. And should you dally, they crush you. That’s how “it Works”.

So he bundled up, bolted down a breakfast of whatever was available…cold can of beans, if that’s all that’s in the cupboard…and went about his business. 

City bus. Number Nine. The Uptown, in the morning, and Downtown, late at night. He preferred the double shifts because they kept him busy, and when he wasn’t busy he found he had too much time on his hands, and he would wash them compulsively.

On the route, no one paid him particular attention. Oh, there were always three or four passengers who’d say, “Have a nice day…”, but that echoed hollow, on a quick entrance, or exit, from the bus. 

Most riders were too preoccupied to pay him much attention, and besides, he had a schedule to keep and they didn't pay him enough to "make with the chitchat". The day will come, and soon, he speculated, when the bus would drive itself in automated syncopation. There would be no need for driving skills, they’d be a thing of the past. 
Then came ‘the Rider’. The Rider didn’t care where the bus was bound, if the driver was running late, or even if it broke down. The rider would sit, fourth row back, opposite, window seat, and wait her turn. Day in, day out, she became his constant companion.

“We’re stopping now. I need a break.”

“That’s okay. I could use one myself,” she’d respond.

He wondered if the cart she dragged behind, contained all of her worldly possessions. Was she homeless, or just aimless? Surely, she could take another bus, and another driver, but she honed in on him and trusted he would deliver her, to where, he had no idea.

Two lost souls, with nowhere else left to go. Did the dreams  start with her? When did the nightmares come? Was she the witch that cast the spell, or an illusion he created, to fend off his loneliness? 
Either way, she was bound to take his bus.

V

NEWTON'S WINDOW

V

GOODBYE EVIE

 

I know you don’t want to talk about the weather, but it was a factor. Icy conditions, up and down the Eastern Seaboard and points inland, as well. Traffic had halted in many states.

A truck-stop outside Athens turned into a haven for a wide assortment of vehicles, and displaced drivers and passengers of all types. Most were families, solo truckers, delivery, and business people, a girls basketball team…a handful of drifters …and homeless folk, with nowhere else to go. Like I said, “…all types.”

Eighteen hours, and counting, in the dead of night. Kitchens always open, plenty of assistants offered, and were taken. But provisions are getting slim, considering ‘rationing’ if this keeps up, and it’s supposed to.

One of those ‘kitchen girls’ was this girl, Evelyn Fields – “Evie” to us. She’d been traveling alone, headed to St. Louis, to start a new life. She was a “handsome girl” – fit, strong, sinewy – not soft, never soft. She was a bundle of energy, which I took as ‘a nervous tension relieving itself’. It served her well, and she was a big help.

She finally wound down, and with the kitchen quiet, she decided to take that break.

If I’d known better, and I did, I think she stepped outside, to have a hit or two. I don’t know ‘what’. Maybe just fresh air, but, whatever, it was well deserved.

I did not see her consume, but a couple of the ‘drifters’ came inside, through those same doors, coughin’ a lung, and laughing hysterically. The cloud followed. Some of the parents took issue, but held back. The moments ‘dissipated’ without incidence.

Was she part of it? I don’t know. People get tired, stop paying attention, try to find some private space, in a situation like this. You just have to. Each trying to find the solitude the occasion called for. In a couple more hours, it’ll be daylight, and we’ll see what the weather brings.

When it did roll around, and things started to get boisterous in the kitchen, it didn’t take long for someone to miss Evie. Word spread fast…lightning fast, and, no…no Evie. Where could she possibly go in this weather? How would she get out?

You couldn’t. You were stuck.

It wasn’t much later than that  "alien abduction" story started. It went on for years.

Town changed, and truck stop’s history. Some just, plain, forget. But then the dog found the bone…don’t blame me for it, it happened. A fellow walking his dog, a pincher… big dog…bounding over the country side, goes down this rabbit trail, and came to a screeching halt.

Evelyn Fields.

Scavengers have had their way, but DNA matched to a rib bone. So it could be yards…or some square-miles, to cover. Immediate results did not render hope and an extensive search seemed senseless.

At least there was something we could lay to rest, meager as it was. 

Goodbye, Evie. 

 V

BURY IT WITH THE BODY

 

It just had not occurred to him to make the connection.

 

You know, Howard knew about this all along?

That had to be the assumption.

We each took time to ponder our fates. One cannot throw caution to the wind, and blame the wind. This was a calculation, we each had to make.

 

…in our mutual, Best, Interest…

       

Of course…

There was something surreptitious about their meeting. Neither trusted the other much. Maybe that was it.  Or maybe some added protection for when you really need it? And you probably will. So go in with your eyes open, for Christ-sakes!

Your words are spoken aloud, as if they are thoughts. 

I…didn’t…

As long as you are aware, it is fine with me.

There is no need to keep them to myself?

None. ‘Eyes Open’.

I didn’t mean what it sounded like…

         Good. Now tell me about Howard.

Howard had a civilian job, an aeronautical engineer, and a damn good one, but he was also covert military. A spy working under the noses (and possibly the auspices of…) a ‘private military contractor’, with some ‘strong ties...’

There would be trips that required secrecy…sometimes one week, then three, five….and so on. If there was ever an emergency at home, whatever the reason or rationale, they had a phone number to call in D.C. They were to leave a message. That number would then alert the receiver to the call, with a callback number. Or, get it patched straight through, if possible. He was in the shit, chin deep. He was no mere engineer. He was in the shit.

That ‘old spy’ crap don’t fly in this day and age. “He got a number in D.C….?” So what? Anyone ever try it?

You’re doubting the man?

Probably an answering machine with remote access. Anywhere in the world…Probably had a second…maybe a third, marriage…Or he was an addicted adulterer.

I’ve seen pictures from the far east. Provocative pictures and Howard was in some. He had them, he showed me. I believe him.

Oh I believe him entirely when it comes to ‘the provocative’ nature of those photos. There is no doubt, but what do they have to do with him being a spy, or, maybe just a drunken businessman, acting a fool?

Howard was no one’s fool, sir.

         I said “acting a fool”, there’s a difference, a big one.

So you’re still suggesting he was a spy ?

         Am I?

Well, Yes. You lead me to believe that is how you’re thinking.

         It makes no difference, does it? 

Bury it with the body.

          Bury what?

        To Howard.

        To Howard.

V

THEY LOST HIM

Last June she took a call for Harford. It was what she did, as a receptionist, and she did it well. It was her job.  Anyone meeting her the first time was ready to assume her efficiency without question, and she never gave them reason to doubt. She was professional and very keen. I trust she’s got her facts in order. As for Harford, she was more his personal assistant, given his position in the company, he dominated her time and she kept copious notes. Unfortunately, she is also quite tidy, and hates clutter, so the notes are routinely shredded. It’s her job and she’s good at it. So there is no trail to follow unless it goes through her. Her loyalties are just that, and she abides.
Harford's trip to Bermuda was spontaneous and out-of-character. Apparently there were jokes in the lab about secrecy, larceny, espionage,  peccadillos...everyone so amused at the sheer spontaneity of it all. That was the joke really: he's tarnished his predictability hereabouts! They jested about calling security.
In fact,  Security joked with him on his way out the gate, "you will be coming back, right Doc? you wouldn't be taking any intelligence with you, would ya' Doc? That's the last thing you'll need! Try rum and topless beaches - that should fix it!"
The banter was something Harford enjoyed on a daily basis. It allowed him a mental reset when entering or exiting the facility. Everything within the facility was tightly structured and controlled. No laboratory jocularity allowed, only focus and thoroughness.
And off he went. For a month.
She took the call. It was so unlike him. He wouldn’t be returning. He had no files, nor interest, he wanted to make that perfectly clear. He’d have his lawyer handle the Exit details. He thanked her for her loyalty and friendship, His voice cracked with sincerity. He then bid “goodbye”, and was gone.
There was the initial panic among top management, because that's what they do, damn it!
The mid-managers, many of them women (patronizing, but true), pulled the shit together. 
First thoughts were of an interference - a woman, or women, or a…man. 
Okay. Then, "medication"   - what was he taking? Prescriptions? Anything illicit? 

Mind control was considered, and noted. 

Blackmail.
 
“It’s gotta be sex!”
 
They came in on the weekend. They worked late. They needed to get Harford back and they determined that he never was in Bermuda. 

They also determined that he wasn’t even in the Caribbean…or, for that matter, on the face of the globe.
 


They lost him.

V

Whichever way the ball bounces...

 

Ray did not like his profile. Not the ‘digital profile’ that might contain a bio, and, had a face to it – he liked that picture, it was a good angle, and a fluke, at that. But the truth of the matter was, his ‘Physical’ profile, didn’t suit him.

He saw the slope of the forehead, bulging eyes, the sharp nose, wide mouth, and the ‘receding jaw line’. He had a wide head, with a mass of hair. It was abnormally large for his body.

 He took it all in. Standing, nude, before the mirror, he was not oblivious to the reflection, but, rather, resigned to the obvious. All in good spirits. But at his age…no way. Twenty years a virgin be…last encounter he could recollect… and, a hopeless cause since.

He spoke to himself, often:

Okay, everybody get casual, have a beverage, and relax. Don’t let me freak you out. I’m as normal as they come, and I know how to have a good time. We got tunes, snacks…and hey, Game’s on! Wanna’ watch the game?! Sure let’s watch the game! Great idea!

And such was the evening’s entertainment. It might vary, but only the channel or the event, but not the routine. The routine was set.

Then there came ‘a knocking’ on the door. At first, not recognizable beyond the din of the game, but it grew louder and so persistent, it became a distraction, and he had to turn the sound Down.

He found his bathrobe, threw it half-on, and opened up. Shit.

Standing before him was a striking brunette. (Striking by his standards, which amounted to nil, but in this case, a fair assessment). Finding her staring at his dangling…robe…still half-open, and not the best half, either, he set randomly about to correct the situation, and was ‘presentable’ in about …oh…a minutes time. She did seem to enjoy the show while it lasted. But, alas, he gathered himself,

“No ladies here, if you’re selling something…”is the best he could come up with.

“I’m not.”

“…Church Mission?”

“Ha! Hardly…”

“Then, what do you want?”

“Blunt, but hospitable.”

“Huh…? ”

“Was that the game I heard? That Beverly kid still pitchin’? Kid’s gonna’ carry them to the pennant.”

“The Game? Yeah, …yes, it’s on. Care to watch?”

“You kiddin'?  Pop me a brewski, and plop me down!”

It was the girl of his dreams, and his every desire.

“My, my, my…you know how to surprise a guy…”

“If my introduction has been too rude, I hope you’ll let me make it up. Seventh inning stretch is on me, Darlin’ ”

It was the top of the second, but he was willing to wait it out.

“Whichever way the ball bounces,” she says.

V