Seven Ways the World Can End - Fifth Story - December 3, 2008
The Ululation of the Pursy Madonna
Latifo Hernandez couldn't seem to get the last dregs of his ice-cream out of the bowl. He scraped at them furiously with the sharp end of his spoon as though he were digging at an archeological site. Every last drop of precious liquid had to be reclaimed at the edge of the stainless steel cup to be sucked down by those muscular lips.
It's not as if Latifo was paying any particular attention to his ice-cream. The digging came naturally, an obsessive action he performed while carrying on a conversation with his partner. He was listening intently to that conversation, all the while compulsively scooping up the last of his ice-cream.
"But they've decided to settle," Alexander protested, weakly, his right hand outstretched towards the awning under which they were sitting. "They want what you want."
"No, they want what I wanted," Latifo corrected, pointing an angry finger at his partner. "That was yesterday. I got some new terms for these guys today."
Alexander's eyes rolled up briefly, but were quickly pulled down by the gravity of the situation. "Look, man, I hear what you're saying, but it's..." He was going to say "stupid," but he lost the nerve, and instead said, "...a waste of time."
"Says you, man," Latifo retorted. He continued to dig at what, as far as Alexander could tell, was a bone-dry ice-cream dish. "I'm out to get as much from these bastards as I can. They messed with me, now I'm gonna mess back."
"You got guts, man," Alexander said, not really meaning it. He looked away and put his arms straight out before him, as though frozen in the act of rising from his chair. Indecision marked his features.
"When I met with these guys yesterday," Latifo said, tipping his dish, "I told them that yesterday was a different day from today."
Alexander nodded, by way of heading off the rest of the conversation. The effect was lost on Latifo.
"And it's today, and, well, look at it!" Latifo raised his arms. "The sun is out, it's a beautiful day...and it's tomorrow."
"Yeah, man..." Alexander said, vaguely, looking around.
"We deal in todays, man," Latifo went on. "Not yesterdays. Those bastards should have settled with me while I was sitting across the table from them."
"Okay..." Alexander said, trying to restrain his friend from further elaborations on the same subject. "So you gonna meet with them today, or what?"
"No, you are," Latifo said, regarding the back of his spoon for further traces of dried sugar. "And you're going to tell them that the price is now seven-million and that I'll meet with them tomorrow to sign the papers."
Again, Alexander's eyes rolled into his head, briefly. "Hoo, man," he said, "Okay."
"I'll see you at the office," Latifo said, shoving his depleted dish and spoon aside and rising to his feet, in the haste of a single motion.
There were already several people waiting to use the bathroom stall by the time Latifo was making his last call. He heard them shuffling with casual disinterest, hardly noticing them, thinking of them as the victims of the circumstance of his cell-phone's dying battery, which he needed to use before the phone went dead. He had been sure that the battery should have lasted another day.
Someone picked up. "Marlon, Brandenwien and Hawes!"
"Yeah, hey, Toni!" Latifo said into the receiver.
"Hey, now!" replied the receptionist. "How you doin'?"
"Just fine, girl," Latifo said, smiling. His eyes swept over the people waiting impatiently around him, just out of arm's reach.
"I'll connect you with Allyson," Toni said with a pleasant turn of her voice.
"Okay, thank you."
There was a pause, then the voice of an attorney, flat, noncommittal. "Allyson Hawes."
"All-y-SON," Latifo said, intoning each syllable.
"Hey, Latifo," Allyson replied, with a degree of familiarity and appropriate distance.
"We talk?"
"Yeah, I have a few. What can I do for you?"
"Well, we're still on to meet on Thursday, is that correct?"
"Yes, but only for an hour."
"I know," Latifo said. "I'm sorry about last week."
"It's not as if I have a real problem," Allyson said. "I don't mind billing you for the extra, but I have other things to do on Thursday and I just can't..."
"Yeah, okay, okay," Latifo reassured her. "I gotcha. Sorry about that. One hour."
"Thank you."
"Anything happening on that other suit?" Latifo scratched his chin. His eyes flitted about the phone shelf. He ran over words scrawled into the shelf with his finger.
"The hit and run? No, Latifo, look." Allyson's pause seemed to be a means of getting her impatience under control. She went on hastily. "There's nothing going to be done on that for at least another month."
"A month!" Latifo exploded into the mouthpiece.
"I told you last week that was going to happen," Allyson answered, sharply. "I told you last week."
"Yeah, but Allyson, these moes just need someone to tweak them. We've got to get this thing on the move."
"Look, Latifo," Allyson said, holding him at bay with the tone of her voice. "I don't make these decisions. You're the one who wanted to press on with this thing. I told you if you did it would get very low priority, here, and in court."
"What's up with that?" Latifo demanded, although he knew the answer; it had entered his ears many times. "I pay you real well to take care of these things for me."
"Latifo..." Allyson said, straining to maintain her composure. "Look, what was it? A little dent? Five-hundred bucks? You've already paid me ten times that just to get your date in court moved up."
"It's not just the money..." Latifo began.
"Yes, I know," Allyson interrupted. "Look, I have to go. We'll talk Thu..."
"It's the honor of the thing," Latifo went on. "That guy that sideswiped me has got no business on the road. Man, you should have seen that guy. And taking off like he did...I won't stop 'til that fool is off the road or in jail."
"Latifo..." Allyson tried desperately to interject herself between the spaces of his words.
"You just don't do that to somebody," Latifo insisted, now mostly to himself. "You just don't..."
"Latifo! I have to go!" Allyson had resorted to raising her voice slightly.
"Okay," Latifo replied, and in that split second of acquiescence, Allyson seized her opportunity and hung up.
Latifo gazed at the phone for a second, still holding the phone in his hand, while the rest of his monologue drained out of him. Finally, he slipped the cell in his pocket, and he pushed the door to the stall open. "Sorry," he muttered to the person on the other side, who wore an irate expression on their face as they passed quickly to occupy the space.
Latifo buried himself in his paperwork. His desk was a never-ending deck of cards that were stacked in an infinite spiral, one upon another, all across the oaken surface. He had not seen that surface since he had purchased the desk.
The way they were arranged, with each paper peeking out from under the one above it, they could be regarded and considered simultaneously, almost without being manipulated. Latifo shuffled them about occasionally, to free a paper from the bottom of the pile to rest it on top. It seemed as though those papers never made it from the desk, as though they recycled continuously from the bottom of the pile to the top.
Latifo leaned back in his chair and regarded the mess. His mind worked like a scanner, regarding each paper in turn, miraculously sorting and collating it. He worked on several projects simultaneously, so that there was never really an end to his work, only an opportunity to take a lightened burden and make it heavy again.
Alexander passed by the door. "Man, it's five-thirty," he said, smiling. "You got to stop."
Latifo looked up and smiled back, without really meaning anything pleasant by the expression. He waved Alexander away.
"Man, we got to go to the game, right?"
Latifo regarded his friend with the gaze of a man who is not present in his own mind. "Teef…" Alexander prompted.
"Yeah, okay," Latifo said. "Only, I can't stop. Look, you go ahead, get us our seats, call me from there. I'll come in before the first quarter is over."
"What? Oh, come on, man!" Alexander's arms dropped down.
“What's wrong?" Latifo asked, mystified.
"Man, you working too hard again. There's no end to it with you."
"So what's it to you? You my girlfriend, now?"
"No, I ain't your girlfriend, man, I'm your partner, and you a drag to be working with."
"What do you mean?"
"It's always business, business with you. You done this before. Either you ain't gonna show up at this game, or you gonna come real late, talk business through the whole damn thing, and then get all mad an' stuff 'cause the game didn't run into overtime so you could get your money's worth."
"Go on, man, I don't do that," Latifo protested, waving his friend off.
"Hell you don't!" Alexander said.
"Look, dude, I can't stop to argue with you. Go to the game alone, then." Latifo bent over his work and immediately was intent upon it again.
"No, man..." Alexander whined. "Don't be like that." He paused to watch his friend. Latifo was blind to everything except the little numbers on his calculator. He failed to see Alexander at all, anymore. "All right," Alexander said, slowly. "I'll see you there, right?" Latifo did not hear. His mouth was moving as he read a sentence from a particular paper. "Right?" Alexander said with emphasis.
Latifo, still reading, his lips still moving, nodded and waved his friend on. Alexander shook his head, threw his jacket over his shoulder, and walked on.
Alexander gloomily watched his prediction come true to the letter. First his partner paged him in the middle of the first quarter to let him know he'd be there by the second.
"And tell me where you put the Dawson file," Latifo instructed. "Do you like this guy? Do you think he’ll play ball?"
"Look, man, I'm done working for the day, okay?" Alexander stressed into the phone. His eyes flitted to the monitor which showed the crowds going wild over a beautiful shot that he had just missed.
"Okay, just tell me where the file is."
"Man, you're not going to look at that file now, are you? It's ten feet thick!"
"I'm just going to look it over," Latifo replied. "Real quick."
"It's still on my desk," Alexander said, intent upon the monitor. "You have fun, now." He hung up.
Instantly, the pager buzzed again. Exhaling deeply, Alexander dialed back.
"Man, you don't hang up on me!" Latifo yelled. "Don't you ever hang up on me!"
"I'm sorry…" Alexander said, quickly. "I thought the conversation was finished."
"The conversation's not finished until I hang up, you motherfucker!"
"Okay! Don't yell at me!" Alexander protested. "I'm sorry, okay? Okay?"
There was silence on the other end of the line. Finally, the muttered voice, "Mutherfucker..." and a click.
It seemed for a while, when Latifo finally made it to their seats, that he had forgotten the whole thing. Alexander hoped beyond hope. He almost welcomed the inevitable comments from Latifo about how they should start the games a little later or have a longer half. Latifo sat by him, drinking his second beer in twenty minutes. He seemed to be enjoying the game all right, but when Alexander asked him for a couple of bucks to go get food, Latifo looked at him balefully.
"Man, what's wrong?" Alexander asked.
"You want money from me? Buy the damn hot dogs yourself. I bought them last time."
"Oh, man..." Alexander moaned. "Not this again. I bought them last time."
"Man, fuck you!" Latifo said. "How many times we have to go through this? I buy on the even games, you buy on the odd. I ain't got no god-damn cash!"
"You forgot..." Alexander began, but he checked himself and shook his head. He began digging in his pocket for his wallet.
Latifo looked at him accusingly. "Forgot..." he said, encouraging Alexander to finish the sentence for him. "Forgot what? Why you shaking your head?"
Alexander kept his mouth shut.
"What, you all hurt or something?" Latifo said, slapping Alexander on the thigh with the back of his knuckles. "Quit moping like a little baby."
"Man, shut up!" Alexander snapped.
"You mad at me?" Latifo pressed, facing his friend full on. "That why you hung up on me?"
"God damn it!" Alexander cried, exasperated. "Man, you never get over nothing! And you forgot to bring cash last time, so you were gonna pay this time. Remember?"
"No," Latifo said, his brows down.
"But you remember everything else, don't you?" Alexander said, gesturing at the game as if it were a piece of evidence.
"Dude, sit down," said someone behind them.
"Sit down," Latifo said to Alexander, pulling him into his seat, "And keep your voice down. Man, what you making a big scene for, anyway? First you hang up on me like I'm wasting your time, now you want to let everybody know I owe you five bucks."
Alexander, somehow on the wrong side of the argument, tried desperately to think of something to say, then shook his head. "I didn't hang up on you," he tried to say.
"You did."
"I did not."
"You did, motherfucker!" Latifo said, insistently, but not angrily.
"All right," Alexander said. "I'm sorry. I said I was sorry."
"But you said you didn't do it. So you must not have been really sorry."
Alexander shook his head again, as if by shaking it enough, he could get all of the useless weight of these endless accusations off of his shoulders. "Yeah, you right," he muttered.
"It's not about 'I'm right,'" Latifo insisted, trying to sound reasonable. "It's just that I know what..." Latifo's monologue was interrupted, to Alexander's great relief, by a skirmish on the floor.
"Shit, what's that?" Alexander said.
The referee was in a heated debate with one of the coaches. The two of them went at it for a few minutes until the referee finally threw the coach out of the game with a triumphant punch of his forearm.
"Man, you see that?" Latifo said, watching the coach storm from the court.
"Yeah," Alexander said, nodding.
"Man, that coach was right," Latifo said, shaking his head. "Man, I saw that play. Mannn..." Latifo looked away, as if he were reading his lines on a cue card. "If I were that coach, man, I wouldn't be leaving no court."
"I know it," Alexander said, and he smiled a little, despite himself.
"Man, I'd be out there, arguing with the ref...man, it'd never be over."
Alexander tried to focus on the game, which had resumed.
"They'd have to drag me out," Latifo went on.
Alexander hardly heard him.
"Man, you see that liability clause in the Dawson contract?" Latifo asked, mostly to himself.
Five beers later, Latifo watched his friend drive away in the middle of his tirade about the botched call and how it probably would have meant an overtime game. Latifo, a little drunk, shook his head as he watched the car groan away down the street. Right in the middle of a sentence, he thought. Man, that guy is rude. First he hangs up on me, now he's driving away when I'm talking. I’m not gonna forget that.
He didn't really know where he was heading as he drove along the freeway, but his car could have told him. It knew the way to Rosalie's apartment as surely as a milk-truck horse could run a route by itself. It was almost of its own volition that it pulled up into a parking space before her two-story building. Latifo was almost surprised when he looked up and found himself there.
He needn't have been. Rosalie was hardly surprised, although she was also far from pleased. She answered his knock with the expectant dread of a woman who is anticipating a visit from the IRS.
"Buenos noches, Rosalita!" Latifo said, in his most romantic voice.
"Buenos noches yourself," she replied, nodding, looking him up and down. "What you want?"
Latifo's head bobbed once in surprise. "I want to come in. Aren't you going to invite me in?"
Rosalie looked up and down her second-story walkway. "It's eleven-thirty, Latifo," she said. The information did not phase Latifo, who stood there waiting for the next development. Seeing that he would not be put off, she stepped aside and let him walk by her.
He made himself comfortable on her couch and he flipped on the television.
"What are you doing?" she asked him.
He looked up, confused.
"What do you want?" she repeated.
"I want to talk," he said.
"Fine," she replied, going over to the TV and switching it off. "Let's talk."
He watched her walk, his head bobbing slightly as his eyes tracked her across the room. His face filled with an expression of desire.
Rosalie recognized the expression. "Look," she said, pointing at him. "I said, talk. Nothing else."
He looked up, embarrassed. "Okay," he said.
She sat down on the opposite end of the couch and faced him, her back pressed into the sofa-arm as though she were in a defensive position.
Latifo pointed the remote at the TV and switched it on again. Rosalie's face registered annoyance. "I talk better with the TV on," Latifo said.
Rosalie nodded, impatiently. "Fine," she said. "So talk."
Latifo nodded as well. "How are you?" he asked.
"I'm okay," she answered, briefly.
"How's the job?"
"It's working out," she replied, looking away.
"That's good," he said. "That's good." She did not prompt him. She let his words die out to be covered by the sounds of the television. After a few minutes between them with nothing said, she asked, "How are you?"
She should not have given him the encouragement. A spark lit in his eye and, although his body remained stationary, it felt like he moved closer to her on the couch. "Workin'," he replied. "Workin' hard."
"Yeah, well, that's nothing new," she said, getting up quickly.
"Hey, look, what's wrong with you?" he asked, unhappy with the rebuff. "You don't respect a man who works hard?"
"I respect you," she said, trying to think of something else to say, quickly. But he was already launching into his next sentence.
"I treated you right," he said. "And all I ask is that you give me one good reason why you won't answer my phone calls."
"'Cause you slept with another woman," she replied, simply.
"Man, that was four months ago!" he protested, brandishing his hand like an iron glove.
"Keep your voice down," she admonished him.
"I said I was sorry," he said.
"So?"
"I haven't slept with anybody since!" he went on, in a slightly lower tone.
"Good for you," she replied.
"Man, you know what your problem is," he began.
"No, what?" she asked, putting her hands on her hips.
"You just can't forgive and forget."
"Oh, that is perfect!" Rosalie said, forgetting her own admonition and speaking in a great volume. "That is perfect."
"What?" Latifo asked, still brandishing his iron glove.
"You never forgot a thing in your life," she said.
"And what is that supposed to mean?"
"What were the names of my first five boyfriends?" she asked him.
The names sprang to his head, but he did not answer her. He regarded the television while he regrouped.
"And my next five? And my last five? You knew them all! And you were always checking up on me to see that I hadn't gotten a call from them or anything."
"You got a call from one of them, didn't you?" Latifo snarled.
"Oh," she said, her eyebrows sailing up. "Here we go."
"How's Antonio?"
"What's it to you?" she challenged him.
"You get all mad at me for sleeping around, then you go and let Antonio come in here and sleep with you."
"That is none of your business," Rosalie said.
"It is my business!" he cried. "We were going out!"
"We were through," she retorted.
"We weren't through!"
"You slept with another woman, we were through. At least I waited..."
"But not for long," Latifo said. "Not until the bed was cold..."
Rosalie gave him an expression of such disgust that he momentarily lost his train of thought. But he quickly found it again. "I said I was sorry," he went on. "That should have been..."
"It wasn't just that!" Rosalie said, exhausted. "That was just the icing on the cake! That was just what did it for me! Believe me, it was over!"
"Why?" Latifo said, his burning eyes looking down into the couch.
"Aw, c'mon, honey!" Rosalie said. "We been over this a million times! I'm tired. I want to go to bed."
"Tell me!" Latifo insisted.
"Why? You never hear me!"
"I'll listen this time."
Rosalie looked at him out of the side of her eyes. After a moment, she said, "I told you this ninety times. You come out here all the time and I tell you again and again that it's over..."
"Tell me why!" Latifo shouted, rising to his feet dangerously.
"Because you impossible!" Rosalie cried. "You always was impossible! You know what it's like to live with you? One long stream of crap from morning until night. Nothing's ever over with you. You never know any peace."
"What do you mean?" Latifo said, still standing in front of the couch, as if he were ready to walk somewhere.
"No argument is ever over. No deal is ever closed. Nobody can ever give you any satisfaction."
"That's not true," Latifo said.
"It isn't?" Rosalie shouted. "You still in that court case about the side-swiper?"
"Yeah, but..."
"You still trying to protest that parking ticket?"
"Man, that wasn't..."
"You ever pay Alexander for that bet you lost?"
"Man, he lost that bet. I just..."
"It's always the same with you, Latifo!" Rosalie said. "And I'm tired of it. You can't hardly stop your day to sleep, much less to make love."
"If that's the problem," Latifo said, a gesture of love occurring to him.
"No, Latifo!" Rosalie said, cutting the idea off, stillborn. "It's not a little thing. It's a big thing. You miss the point, Latifo. Not just of this argument. Of life."
Latifo stared at her. After a moment of silence, he managed to ask, "What do you mean?"
Rosalie shook her head and collapsed into a chair. Her hand went to her forehead and she gazed with melancholy at her lap. "I can't explain it to you, Latifo. I don't know who could. I just know you can't waste your life fighting the same battle again and again."
"Why not?" Latifo asked, without really understanding the gist of what she had said.
"Because, Latifo," Rosalie managed to say, "life's not like that. We only got so much time on this planet. Don't you see that?"
"You've been going to confession, haven't you?"
Rosalie's eyes came up and burned a hole in Latifo's head. "I got one thing to say to you." Her tone was acidic. "And one thing only. And you better listen good, 'cause I am never letting you in this apartment again."
"You're just tired," Latifo began. "I should come back tomorrow."
Even as he had risen and was heading towards the door, she was speaking to him, unconcerned with whether her words reached him or not. "One day it's all going to be over," she said. "Maybe for you, maybe for everybody. Somehow. Maybe an asteroid hits the planet, maybe a building falls on you."
Latifo had paused at the door, fumbling for his keys. The words were entering into his ears, but he held them at bay, feared the tone of voice that they were carried along upon.
"When my mother died, I swore that I would never waste another moment," she said. "I didn't get to tell her I loved her even, before some punk shot her up. I lost friends, I lost family, bad stuff has happened to me. And you know how I survived?" She waited for an answer, something to prompt her on. When nothing came, she continued. "I just moved on. I took the day. I found a way to be happy."
"I got to go," he said, trying to intercede between her monologue.
"I don't know how I got hooked up with you," she continued. "You seemed to be so full of life, I guess, I just thought we'd have a great time. But I was wrong. You're not full of life. You're full of death."
He stared at her, uncomprehending.
"You never let anything drop. You're always trying to breath life into something that already died. It's like you do CPR on zombies all day long."
He laughed at the image without seeing it, heard the absurdity but did not catch the content. The sound of his voice brought her up to gaze at him. She spoke now without emotion, the words falling out of the corners of her mouth. "One day you aren't going to be able to do it anymore. One day the door will close. And then where will you be?"
Latifo stepped through Rosalie's apartment door and closed it behind him with a click. He stood outside her apartment and did not move, for a time, the remnants of his conversation with her draining from his head.
He was in a particularly foul mood when he met the partners from Regis and McPherson the next day. Alexander sat next to him as they faced their buyers across the table and tried to keep his mouth shut while Latifo browbeat the two gentlemen, walking the line between being aggressive and being overbearing.
"Of course we're interested in purchasing the site," Mr. McPherson said. "That's why we agreed to come back and talk to you today."
"Then you'll pay what we're asking," replied Latifo.
"But surely you see that you're being unreasonable!" Mr. McPherson insisted. "Comparative values indicate that our newest offer is a generous one."
"At least we agree that your first offer was too low," Latifo said, shortly.
Mr. McPherson's lip twitched and he said nothing. Alexander cut in. "Excuse me, Latifo, can I talk with you for a second?"
"Sure, Alexander," Latifo said, nodding. "Gentlemen, maybe we could take a few minutes break?"
Alexander waited for Latifo to light his cigarette. "How you doing today, man?" he asked.
"Okay," Latifo said, nodding. "Why?"
"You seem kind of testy."
Latifo nodded again. "I'm okay."
"You get enough sleep last night?"
"No," Latifo admitted. "I rode around after I got out of Rosie's..."
"You went to Rosie's again?" Alexander asked.
"Yeah," Latifo said, without looking at him. "We had this long intense discussion about something. She was upset or something. Anyway, I have to go back there tonight and see if I can figure things out."
Alexander looked away. "Look, man, I'm sorry for your troubles and everything, but you've got to get your head straight."
"What do you mean?" Latifo asked, flicking the ashes from his cigarette.
"Look, man, I don't want to get on the subject of your ex, but..."
"She's not my ex," Latifo corrected.
"Oh, really?" Alexander said, hardly hiding the sarcasm in his voice. "Last I heard, that was over four months ago."
"What the..." Latifo did a double take. "Man..."
"All I'm saying is, you can't let a fight with a woman you broke up with four months ago affect a seven-million dollar deal..."
"I did not break up with her," Latifo said, angrily, pointing the cigarette at the floor accusingly. "She broke up with me! And anyway, she didn't really..."
"Look, I don't care..." Alexander tried to say.
"No, look, man," Latifo went on, growing angrier. "I've had enough of this shit with you. You brought this up and now you want to drop it? No way, man."
"Whatever, man..." Alexander muttered.
"You been on my ass about my behavior for weeks, man, and I'm sick of it!" Latifo said. "What are you, my mother?"
"Look..."
"No, you look," Latifo said.
"No, I'm tired of looking," Alexander snapped. "I'm tired of looking at your ugly face."
"What?" Latifo cried, stunned.
"I've had it with you, man! You just never shut up. You never shut up for five minutes. You know what? I'm tired of this. I'm tired of working with you. If you want to blow this deal, then fine. You blow it alone."
"I'm not going to blow any deal!" Latifo said, angrily. "You're an idiot! If you try and walk away from this you'll never work with me again."
"Oh, big threat," Alexander said, bitterly. "I'll save you the trouble. I quit."
"Make that, you'll never work in this business again!" Latifo went on, pointing the diminishing butt at Alexander's back. Alexander had gone into the conference room to collect his briefcase. As he came out, Latifo came over to him. "I'll ruin you!" he spat.
"Do your worst," Alexander snarled. "I don't care."
"Don't you walk away from me," Latifo said, following him. He grabbed Alexander on the arm. Alexander, reflexively, gave Latifo such a shove on the shoulder that he slammed into the wall. Latifo, stunned, held his sore shoulder as Alexander made it to the elevator.
"Look..." Latifo tried to say. The elevator doors closed in front of Alexander. "I'll call you later..." Latifo muttered.
He stared at the closed elevator doors for three minutes. The cigarette butt finally burned down to his fingers. Startled, he let it drop upon the carpet. The voice of Mr. McPherson came from behind him. "Mr. Hernandez?" the gentleman said, laying a hand on Latifo's good shoulder.
"Yes?" Latifo said, turning. "Yes. I'm ready."
"Well, sir," said Mr. McPherson, "we appreciate your time, but I don't think there's any reason to go back to the table."
"What?" Latifo asked, helplessly.
Mr. McPherson glanced at his partner. "Mr. Regis and I have been talking about it and we simply don't feel that we can communicate with you about this. We appreciate your time."
"But wait a minute!" Latifo said, hotly. "We can work with this! You don't have to leave like that! Let's talk together for a moment..."
"Actually, sir," It was Mr. Regis that now spoke. "We have to be somewhere by eleven, so we really can't stay. If you'll excuse us."
"Another meeting, then!" Latifo cried. "We can talk about this tomorrow, next week. Gentlemen, let's not let it end like this!"
"Good morning, Mr. Hernandez," replied Mr. Regis.
"I'll call you this afternoon!" Latifo shouted after them.
"We'll be..." Mr. McPherson seemed at a loss for words. "All right," he said, nodding, putting a distancing hand on Latifo's shoulder. "Thank you. Until then..."
Latifo heard their laugh from behind the elevator doors. His fists clenched in fury. "You sons of bitches!" he yelled at them. "I'll show you! I'll sell the plot to someone else for less than what you offered! I'll run you motherfuckers out of business!"
He had stormed back to the conference table. He sat before it, regarding himself in the cold, black fiberglass. A figure looked back at him, furious, calculating. It was a handsome Chicano face with a fifty-dollar haircut, a solid torso hidden in a blue silk shirt, tied up with a sharp looking tie. The figure that glared up at him from the table was wealthy, attractive, plainly miserable.
He got to his feet and straightened his shirt. It didn’t matter. He would figure out what to do tomorrow.
As he gathered his jacket and briefcase, his attention was drawn out the window. People were running about in the building across the street; he could see them through the large windows, looking up at the sky, pointing, and shouting.
He felt the floor trembling. An earthquake? But it was not trembling in the way that resembled two great crusts slipping over one another, the earth grinding its teeth. Rather, it was a trembling like the humming of a train platform. More a vibration. And then Latifo became aware of what he heard.
Music, such sweet music. Like the Salsa his father had played over the radio in the kitchen and the orchestra concert his mother had taken him to that one time; like a Paul McCartney ballad and a Nirvana knell, all in one. It captivated him, it confused him, and it pulled him.
He could see the people in the streets, wandering about confusedly, like ants that have had their nest kicked over. Cars had parked in the middle of the street. Already there was a din from the honked horns and the shouting that came through the conference-room window. And yet it did not interfere with the trembling, with the music that seemed not to come in through the ears, but through another opening.
He followed its trail, almost visibly, into a stairwell and up seven flights of stairs, which he took easily, hardly noticing the pools of sweat that expanded around the armpits of his silk shirt. He came out on the rooftop and let the door slam against the wall as he stepped out into the sunlight.
He was alone on the rooftop, but he could still hear the two kinds of noise, the traffic and shouting, and the music, each coming in a kind of unreal stereo, as though through two channels that did not correspond with the ears. As he listened, the channel that contained the music grew and predominated, and the noises of the street slowly faded away.
He looked around him, confused, dazzled, into the unreal sunlight, the clearer than clear air. Upon the low wall of the building, he spotted her, standing there, facing him but not seeing him, her chest expanded proudly, her head back, her mouth open, her dusty throat vibrating back and forth.
She was singing in the voice of a thousand singers, and she was singing of such sorrow, of the end of things. She was portly, about forty inches around her waist. Her hands were folded at her navel. She was draped in delicate gauze wrappings that wafted in the breeze coming back to her from her own singing. Her hair seemed of the deepest black, red where the light came through it, blond where the light bounced back from it. Upon her head was a huge helmet with horns that extended outward like stag's antlers. Her face was angelic and wistful, and she sang like she was singing to the entire world, like the entire world was a huge personage that stood right before her, and listened, and nodded with each phrase.
Latifo recognized her instantly. He knew her with a memory encoded in his genetic material, captured in his soul's resonant pattern. He knew without being able to put it into words, who she was, what she was doing, why she was here. He knew as everyone who stood upon that earth on that day knew.
"Please," he said to her, hardly hearing his own voice through the ever-increasing sound of that beautiful music. She did not respond to him. She sang ever more to that invisible person, the great personage who stood right before her, and nodded, and listened.
"Please," he said again. "I'm sorry! I see it now!" But if she understood him, she made no sign. The music had grown to a different place, now. It's drama had sent it along the chute, a turn towards a climactic slope. He who knew so little about music could feel it in his bones, could sense the shape of that song, could foresee its ending.
"If I could just have a little more time," he begged, tears streaming down his cheeks. "I didn't really live!"
Her voice grew more strident with the force of the song, but she did not strain; rather, she grew loud, so loud in fact that Latifo could no longer hear himself protesting to her, only feel himself calling to her, feel his own voice vibrating within his chest, his lips making the words, asking for another chance, another day, another minute.
The music reached its peak. The woman, rapt in the act of making a perfect gesture, flushed with exuberance and gave a high note, born on the last breath she would need to take. That note sailed high upon the skies and it tore down the buildings, it unmade the earth, it sent all the little souls back to their maker.
And then it was over.
(C) Adam Cole
Latifo Hernandez couldn't seem to get the last dregs of his ice-cream out of the bowl. He scraped at them furiously with the sharp end of his spoon as though he were digging at an archeological site. Every last drop of precious liquid had to be reclaimed at the edge of the stainless steel cup to be sucked down by those muscular lips.
It's not as if Latifo was paying any particular attention to his ice-cream. The digging came naturally, an obsessive action he performed while carrying on a conversation with his partner. He was listening intently to that conversation, all the while compulsively scooping up the last of his ice-cream.
"But they've decided to settle," Alexander protested, weakly, his right hand outstretched towards the awning under which they were sitting. "They want what you want."
"No, they want what I wanted," Latifo corrected, pointing an angry finger at his partner. "That was yesterday. I got some new terms for these guys today."
Alexander's eyes rolled up briefly, but were quickly pulled down by the gravity of the situation. "Look, man, I hear what you're saying, but it's..." He was going to say "stupid," but he lost the nerve, and instead said, "...a waste of time."
"Says you, man," Latifo retorted. He continued to dig at what, as far as Alexander could tell, was a bone-dry ice-cream dish. "I'm out to get as much from these bastards as I can. They messed with me, now I'm gonna mess back."
"You got guts, man," Alexander said, not really meaning it. He looked away and put his arms straight out before him, as though frozen in the act of rising from his chair. Indecision marked his features.
"When I met with these guys yesterday," Latifo said, tipping his dish, "I told them that yesterday was a different day from today."
Alexander nodded, by way of heading off the rest of the conversation. The effect was lost on Latifo.
"And it's today, and, well, look at it!" Latifo raised his arms. "The sun is out, it's a beautiful day...and it's tomorrow."
"Yeah, man..." Alexander said, vaguely, looking around.
"We deal in todays, man," Latifo went on. "Not yesterdays. Those bastards should have settled with me while I was sitting across the table from them."
"Okay..." Alexander said, trying to restrain his friend from further elaborations on the same subject. "So you gonna meet with them today, or what?"
"No, you are," Latifo said, regarding the back of his spoon for further traces of dried sugar. "And you're going to tell them that the price is now seven-million and that I'll meet with them tomorrow to sign the papers."
Again, Alexander's eyes rolled into his head, briefly. "Hoo, man," he said, "Okay."
"I'll see you at the office," Latifo said, shoving his depleted dish and spoon aside and rising to his feet, in the haste of a single motion.
There were already several people waiting to use the bathroom stall by the time Latifo was making his last call. He heard them shuffling with casual disinterest, hardly noticing them, thinking of them as the victims of the circumstance of his cell-phone's dying battery, which he needed to use before the phone went dead. He had been sure that the battery should have lasted another day.
Someone picked up. "Marlon, Brandenwien and Hawes!"
"Yeah, hey, Toni!" Latifo said into the receiver.
"Hey, now!" replied the receptionist. "How you doin'?"
"Just fine, girl," Latifo said, smiling. His eyes swept over the people waiting impatiently around him, just out of arm's reach.
"I'll connect you with Allyson," Toni said with a pleasant turn of her voice.
"Okay, thank you."
There was a pause, then the voice of an attorney, flat, noncommittal. "Allyson Hawes."
"All-y-SON," Latifo said, intoning each syllable.
"Hey, Latifo," Allyson replied, with a degree of familiarity and appropriate distance.
"We talk?"
"Yeah, I have a few. What can I do for you?"
"Well, we're still on to meet on Thursday, is that correct?"
"Yes, but only for an hour."
"I know," Latifo said. "I'm sorry about last week."
"It's not as if I have a real problem," Allyson said. "I don't mind billing you for the extra, but I have other things to do on Thursday and I just can't..."
"Yeah, okay, okay," Latifo reassured her. "I gotcha. Sorry about that. One hour."
"Thank you."
"Anything happening on that other suit?" Latifo scratched his chin. His eyes flitted about the phone shelf. He ran over words scrawled into the shelf with his finger.
"The hit and run? No, Latifo, look." Allyson's pause seemed to be a means of getting her impatience under control. She went on hastily. "There's nothing going to be done on that for at least another month."
"A month!" Latifo exploded into the mouthpiece.
"I told you last week that was going to happen," Allyson answered, sharply. "I told you last week."
"Yeah, but Allyson, these moes just need someone to tweak them. We've got to get this thing on the move."
"Look, Latifo," Allyson said, holding him at bay with the tone of her voice. "I don't make these decisions. You're the one who wanted to press on with this thing. I told you if you did it would get very low priority, here, and in court."
"What's up with that?" Latifo demanded, although he knew the answer; it had entered his ears many times. "I pay you real well to take care of these things for me."
"Latifo..." Allyson said, straining to maintain her composure. "Look, what was it? A little dent? Five-hundred bucks? You've already paid me ten times that just to get your date in court moved up."
"It's not just the money..." Latifo began.
"Yes, I know," Allyson interrupted. "Look, I have to go. We'll talk Thu..."
"It's the honor of the thing," Latifo went on. "That guy that sideswiped me has got no business on the road. Man, you should have seen that guy. And taking off like he did...I won't stop 'til that fool is off the road or in jail."
"Latifo..." Allyson tried desperately to interject herself between the spaces of his words.
"You just don't do that to somebody," Latifo insisted, now mostly to himself. "You just don't..."
"Latifo! I have to go!" Allyson had resorted to raising her voice slightly.
"Okay," Latifo replied, and in that split second of acquiescence, Allyson seized her opportunity and hung up.
Latifo gazed at the phone for a second, still holding the phone in his hand, while the rest of his monologue drained out of him. Finally, he slipped the cell in his pocket, and he pushed the door to the stall open. "Sorry," he muttered to the person on the other side, who wore an irate expression on their face as they passed quickly to occupy the space.
Latifo buried himself in his paperwork. His desk was a never-ending deck of cards that were stacked in an infinite spiral, one upon another, all across the oaken surface. He had not seen that surface since he had purchased the desk.
The way they were arranged, with each paper peeking out from under the one above it, they could be regarded and considered simultaneously, almost without being manipulated. Latifo shuffled them about occasionally, to free a paper from the bottom of the pile to rest it on top. It seemed as though those papers never made it from the desk, as though they recycled continuously from the bottom of the pile to the top.
Latifo leaned back in his chair and regarded the mess. His mind worked like a scanner, regarding each paper in turn, miraculously sorting and collating it. He worked on several projects simultaneously, so that there was never really an end to his work, only an opportunity to take a lightened burden and make it heavy again.
Alexander passed by the door. "Man, it's five-thirty," he said, smiling. "You got to stop."
Latifo looked up and smiled back, without really meaning anything pleasant by the expression. He waved Alexander away.
"Man, we got to go to the game, right?"
Latifo regarded his friend with the gaze of a man who is not present in his own mind. "Teef…" Alexander prompted.
"Yeah, okay," Latifo said. "Only, I can't stop. Look, you go ahead, get us our seats, call me from there. I'll come in before the first quarter is over."
"What? Oh, come on, man!" Alexander's arms dropped down.
“What's wrong?" Latifo asked, mystified.
"Man, you working too hard again. There's no end to it with you."
"So what's it to you? You my girlfriend, now?"
"No, I ain't your girlfriend, man, I'm your partner, and you a drag to be working with."
"What do you mean?"
"It's always business, business with you. You done this before. Either you ain't gonna show up at this game, or you gonna come real late, talk business through the whole damn thing, and then get all mad an' stuff 'cause the game didn't run into overtime so you could get your money's worth."
"Go on, man, I don't do that," Latifo protested, waving his friend off.
"Hell you don't!" Alexander said.
"Look, dude, I can't stop to argue with you. Go to the game alone, then." Latifo bent over his work and immediately was intent upon it again.
"No, man..." Alexander whined. "Don't be like that." He paused to watch his friend. Latifo was blind to everything except the little numbers on his calculator. He failed to see Alexander at all, anymore. "All right," Alexander said, slowly. "I'll see you there, right?" Latifo did not hear. His mouth was moving as he read a sentence from a particular paper. "Right?" Alexander said with emphasis.
Latifo, still reading, his lips still moving, nodded and waved his friend on. Alexander shook his head, threw his jacket over his shoulder, and walked on.
Alexander gloomily watched his prediction come true to the letter. First his partner paged him in the middle of the first quarter to let him know he'd be there by the second.
"And tell me where you put the Dawson file," Latifo instructed. "Do you like this guy? Do you think he’ll play ball?"
"Look, man, I'm done working for the day, okay?" Alexander stressed into the phone. His eyes flitted to the monitor which showed the crowds going wild over a beautiful shot that he had just missed.
"Okay, just tell me where the file is."
"Man, you're not going to look at that file now, are you? It's ten feet thick!"
"I'm just going to look it over," Latifo replied. "Real quick."
"It's still on my desk," Alexander said, intent upon the monitor. "You have fun, now." He hung up.
Instantly, the pager buzzed again. Exhaling deeply, Alexander dialed back.
"Man, you don't hang up on me!" Latifo yelled. "Don't you ever hang up on me!"
"I'm sorry…" Alexander said, quickly. "I thought the conversation was finished."
"The conversation's not finished until I hang up, you motherfucker!"
"Okay! Don't yell at me!" Alexander protested. "I'm sorry, okay? Okay?"
There was silence on the other end of the line. Finally, the muttered voice, "Mutherfucker..." and a click.
It seemed for a while, when Latifo finally made it to their seats, that he had forgotten the whole thing. Alexander hoped beyond hope. He almost welcomed the inevitable comments from Latifo about how they should start the games a little later or have a longer half. Latifo sat by him, drinking his second beer in twenty minutes. He seemed to be enjoying the game all right, but when Alexander asked him for a couple of bucks to go get food, Latifo looked at him balefully.
"Man, what's wrong?" Alexander asked.
"You want money from me? Buy the damn hot dogs yourself. I bought them last time."
"Oh, man..." Alexander moaned. "Not this again. I bought them last time."
"Man, fuck you!" Latifo said. "How many times we have to go through this? I buy on the even games, you buy on the odd. I ain't got no god-damn cash!"
"You forgot..." Alexander began, but he checked himself and shook his head. He began digging in his pocket for his wallet.
Latifo looked at him accusingly. "Forgot..." he said, encouraging Alexander to finish the sentence for him. "Forgot what? Why you shaking your head?"
Alexander kept his mouth shut.
"What, you all hurt or something?" Latifo said, slapping Alexander on the thigh with the back of his knuckles. "Quit moping like a little baby."
"Man, shut up!" Alexander snapped.
"You mad at me?" Latifo pressed, facing his friend full on. "That why you hung up on me?"
"God damn it!" Alexander cried, exasperated. "Man, you never get over nothing! And you forgot to bring cash last time, so you were gonna pay this time. Remember?"
"No," Latifo said, his brows down.
"But you remember everything else, don't you?" Alexander said, gesturing at the game as if it were a piece of evidence.
"Dude, sit down," said someone behind them.
"Sit down," Latifo said to Alexander, pulling him into his seat, "And keep your voice down. Man, what you making a big scene for, anyway? First you hang up on me like I'm wasting your time, now you want to let everybody know I owe you five bucks."
Alexander, somehow on the wrong side of the argument, tried desperately to think of something to say, then shook his head. "I didn't hang up on you," he tried to say.
"You did."
"I did not."
"You did, motherfucker!" Latifo said, insistently, but not angrily.
"All right," Alexander said. "I'm sorry. I said I was sorry."
"But you said you didn't do it. So you must not have been really sorry."
Alexander shook his head again, as if by shaking it enough, he could get all of the useless weight of these endless accusations off of his shoulders. "Yeah, you right," he muttered.
"It's not about 'I'm right,'" Latifo insisted, trying to sound reasonable. "It's just that I know what..." Latifo's monologue was interrupted, to Alexander's great relief, by a skirmish on the floor.
"Shit, what's that?" Alexander said.
The referee was in a heated debate with one of the coaches. The two of them went at it for a few minutes until the referee finally threw the coach out of the game with a triumphant punch of his forearm.
"Man, you see that?" Latifo said, watching the coach storm from the court.
"Yeah," Alexander said, nodding.
"Man, that coach was right," Latifo said, shaking his head. "Man, I saw that play. Mannn..." Latifo looked away, as if he were reading his lines on a cue card. "If I were that coach, man, I wouldn't be leaving no court."
"I know it," Alexander said, and he smiled a little, despite himself.
"Man, I'd be out there, arguing with the ref...man, it'd never be over."
Alexander tried to focus on the game, which had resumed.
"They'd have to drag me out," Latifo went on.
Alexander hardly heard him.
"Man, you see that liability clause in the Dawson contract?" Latifo asked, mostly to himself.
Five beers later, Latifo watched his friend drive away in the middle of his tirade about the botched call and how it probably would have meant an overtime game. Latifo, a little drunk, shook his head as he watched the car groan away down the street. Right in the middle of a sentence, he thought. Man, that guy is rude. First he hangs up on me, now he's driving away when I'm talking. I’m not gonna forget that.
He didn't really know where he was heading as he drove along the freeway, but his car could have told him. It knew the way to Rosalie's apartment as surely as a milk-truck horse could run a route by itself. It was almost of its own volition that it pulled up into a parking space before her two-story building. Latifo was almost surprised when he looked up and found himself there.
He needn't have been. Rosalie was hardly surprised, although she was also far from pleased. She answered his knock with the expectant dread of a woman who is anticipating a visit from the IRS.
"Buenos noches, Rosalita!" Latifo said, in his most romantic voice.
"Buenos noches yourself," she replied, nodding, looking him up and down. "What you want?"
Latifo's head bobbed once in surprise. "I want to come in. Aren't you going to invite me in?"
Rosalie looked up and down her second-story walkway. "It's eleven-thirty, Latifo," she said. The information did not phase Latifo, who stood there waiting for the next development. Seeing that he would not be put off, she stepped aside and let him walk by her.
He made himself comfortable on her couch and he flipped on the television.
"What are you doing?" she asked him.
He looked up, confused.
"What do you want?" she repeated.
"I want to talk," he said.
"Fine," she replied, going over to the TV and switching it off. "Let's talk."
He watched her walk, his head bobbing slightly as his eyes tracked her across the room. His face filled with an expression of desire.
Rosalie recognized the expression. "Look," she said, pointing at him. "I said, talk. Nothing else."
He looked up, embarrassed. "Okay," he said.
She sat down on the opposite end of the couch and faced him, her back pressed into the sofa-arm as though she were in a defensive position.
Latifo pointed the remote at the TV and switched it on again. Rosalie's face registered annoyance. "I talk better with the TV on," Latifo said.
Rosalie nodded, impatiently. "Fine," she said. "So talk."
Latifo nodded as well. "How are you?" he asked.
"I'm okay," she answered, briefly.
"How's the job?"
"It's working out," she replied, looking away.
"That's good," he said. "That's good." She did not prompt him. She let his words die out to be covered by the sounds of the television. After a few minutes between them with nothing said, she asked, "How are you?"
She should not have given him the encouragement. A spark lit in his eye and, although his body remained stationary, it felt like he moved closer to her on the couch. "Workin'," he replied. "Workin' hard."
"Yeah, well, that's nothing new," she said, getting up quickly.
"Hey, look, what's wrong with you?" he asked, unhappy with the rebuff. "You don't respect a man who works hard?"
"I respect you," she said, trying to think of something else to say, quickly. But he was already launching into his next sentence.
"I treated you right," he said. "And all I ask is that you give me one good reason why you won't answer my phone calls."
"'Cause you slept with another woman," she replied, simply.
"Man, that was four months ago!" he protested, brandishing his hand like an iron glove.
"Keep your voice down," she admonished him.
"I said I was sorry," he said.
"So?"
"I haven't slept with anybody since!" he went on, in a slightly lower tone.
"Good for you," she replied.
"Man, you know what your problem is," he began.
"No, what?" she asked, putting her hands on her hips.
"You just can't forgive and forget."
"Oh, that is perfect!" Rosalie said, forgetting her own admonition and speaking in a great volume. "That is perfect."
"What?" Latifo asked, still brandishing his iron glove.
"You never forgot a thing in your life," she said.
"And what is that supposed to mean?"
"What were the names of my first five boyfriends?" she asked him.
The names sprang to his head, but he did not answer her. He regarded the television while he regrouped.
"And my next five? And my last five? You knew them all! And you were always checking up on me to see that I hadn't gotten a call from them or anything."
"You got a call from one of them, didn't you?" Latifo snarled.
"Oh," she said, her eyebrows sailing up. "Here we go."
"How's Antonio?"
"What's it to you?" she challenged him.
"You get all mad at me for sleeping around, then you go and let Antonio come in here and sleep with you."
"That is none of your business," Rosalie said.
"It is my business!" he cried. "We were going out!"
"We were through," she retorted.
"We weren't through!"
"You slept with another woman, we were through. At least I waited..."
"But not for long," Latifo said. "Not until the bed was cold..."
Rosalie gave him an expression of such disgust that he momentarily lost his train of thought. But he quickly found it again. "I said I was sorry," he went on. "That should have been..."
"It wasn't just that!" Rosalie said, exhausted. "That was just the icing on the cake! That was just what did it for me! Believe me, it was over!"
"Why?" Latifo said, his burning eyes looking down into the couch.
"Aw, c'mon, honey!" Rosalie said. "We been over this a million times! I'm tired. I want to go to bed."
"Tell me!" Latifo insisted.
"Why? You never hear me!"
"I'll listen this time."
Rosalie looked at him out of the side of her eyes. After a moment, she said, "I told you this ninety times. You come out here all the time and I tell you again and again that it's over..."
"Tell me why!" Latifo shouted, rising to his feet dangerously.
"Because you impossible!" Rosalie cried. "You always was impossible! You know what it's like to live with you? One long stream of crap from morning until night. Nothing's ever over with you. You never know any peace."
"What do you mean?" Latifo said, still standing in front of the couch, as if he were ready to walk somewhere.
"No argument is ever over. No deal is ever closed. Nobody can ever give you any satisfaction."
"That's not true," Latifo said.
"It isn't?" Rosalie shouted. "You still in that court case about the side-swiper?"
"Yeah, but..."
"You still trying to protest that parking ticket?"
"Man, that wasn't..."
"You ever pay Alexander for that bet you lost?"
"Man, he lost that bet. I just..."
"It's always the same with you, Latifo!" Rosalie said. "And I'm tired of it. You can't hardly stop your day to sleep, much less to make love."
"If that's the problem," Latifo said, a gesture of love occurring to him.
"No, Latifo!" Rosalie said, cutting the idea off, stillborn. "It's not a little thing. It's a big thing. You miss the point, Latifo. Not just of this argument. Of life."
Latifo stared at her. After a moment of silence, he managed to ask, "What do you mean?"
Rosalie shook her head and collapsed into a chair. Her hand went to her forehead and she gazed with melancholy at her lap. "I can't explain it to you, Latifo. I don't know who could. I just know you can't waste your life fighting the same battle again and again."
"Why not?" Latifo asked, without really understanding the gist of what she had said.
"Because, Latifo," Rosalie managed to say, "life's not like that. We only got so much time on this planet. Don't you see that?"
"You've been going to confession, haven't you?"
Rosalie's eyes came up and burned a hole in Latifo's head. "I got one thing to say to you." Her tone was acidic. "And one thing only. And you better listen good, 'cause I am never letting you in this apartment again."
"You're just tired," Latifo began. "I should come back tomorrow."
Even as he had risen and was heading towards the door, she was speaking to him, unconcerned with whether her words reached him or not. "One day it's all going to be over," she said. "Maybe for you, maybe for everybody. Somehow. Maybe an asteroid hits the planet, maybe a building falls on you."
Latifo had paused at the door, fumbling for his keys. The words were entering into his ears, but he held them at bay, feared the tone of voice that they were carried along upon.
"When my mother died, I swore that I would never waste another moment," she said. "I didn't get to tell her I loved her even, before some punk shot her up. I lost friends, I lost family, bad stuff has happened to me. And you know how I survived?" She waited for an answer, something to prompt her on. When nothing came, she continued. "I just moved on. I took the day. I found a way to be happy."
"I got to go," he said, trying to intercede between her monologue.
"I don't know how I got hooked up with you," she continued. "You seemed to be so full of life, I guess, I just thought we'd have a great time. But I was wrong. You're not full of life. You're full of death."
He stared at her, uncomprehending.
"You never let anything drop. You're always trying to breath life into something that already died. It's like you do CPR on zombies all day long."
He laughed at the image without seeing it, heard the absurdity but did not catch the content. The sound of his voice brought her up to gaze at him. She spoke now without emotion, the words falling out of the corners of her mouth. "One day you aren't going to be able to do it anymore. One day the door will close. And then where will you be?"
Latifo stepped through Rosalie's apartment door and closed it behind him with a click. He stood outside her apartment and did not move, for a time, the remnants of his conversation with her draining from his head.
He was in a particularly foul mood when he met the partners from Regis and McPherson the next day. Alexander sat next to him as they faced their buyers across the table and tried to keep his mouth shut while Latifo browbeat the two gentlemen, walking the line between being aggressive and being overbearing.
"Of course we're interested in purchasing the site," Mr. McPherson said. "That's why we agreed to come back and talk to you today."
"Then you'll pay what we're asking," replied Latifo.
"But surely you see that you're being unreasonable!" Mr. McPherson insisted. "Comparative values indicate that our newest offer is a generous one."
"At least we agree that your first offer was too low," Latifo said, shortly.
Mr. McPherson's lip twitched and he said nothing. Alexander cut in. "Excuse me, Latifo, can I talk with you for a second?"
"Sure, Alexander," Latifo said, nodding. "Gentlemen, maybe we could take a few minutes break?"
Alexander waited for Latifo to light his cigarette. "How you doing today, man?" he asked.
"Okay," Latifo said, nodding. "Why?"
"You seem kind of testy."
Latifo nodded again. "I'm okay."
"You get enough sleep last night?"
"No," Latifo admitted. "I rode around after I got out of Rosie's..."
"You went to Rosie's again?" Alexander asked.
"Yeah," Latifo said, without looking at him. "We had this long intense discussion about something. She was upset or something. Anyway, I have to go back there tonight and see if I can figure things out."
Alexander looked away. "Look, man, I'm sorry for your troubles and everything, but you've got to get your head straight."
"What do you mean?" Latifo asked, flicking the ashes from his cigarette.
"Look, man, I don't want to get on the subject of your ex, but..."
"She's not my ex," Latifo corrected.
"Oh, really?" Alexander said, hardly hiding the sarcasm in his voice. "Last I heard, that was over four months ago."
"What the..." Latifo did a double take. "Man..."
"All I'm saying is, you can't let a fight with a woman you broke up with four months ago affect a seven-million dollar deal..."
"I did not break up with her," Latifo said, angrily, pointing the cigarette at the floor accusingly. "She broke up with me! And anyway, she didn't really..."
"Look, I don't care..." Alexander tried to say.
"No, look, man," Latifo went on, growing angrier. "I've had enough of this shit with you. You brought this up and now you want to drop it? No way, man."
"Whatever, man..." Alexander muttered.
"You been on my ass about my behavior for weeks, man, and I'm sick of it!" Latifo said. "What are you, my mother?"
"Look..."
"No, you look," Latifo said.
"No, I'm tired of looking," Alexander snapped. "I'm tired of looking at your ugly face."
"What?" Latifo cried, stunned.
"I've had it with you, man! You just never shut up. You never shut up for five minutes. You know what? I'm tired of this. I'm tired of working with you. If you want to blow this deal, then fine. You blow it alone."
"I'm not going to blow any deal!" Latifo said, angrily. "You're an idiot! If you try and walk away from this you'll never work with me again."
"Oh, big threat," Alexander said, bitterly. "I'll save you the trouble. I quit."
"Make that, you'll never work in this business again!" Latifo went on, pointing the diminishing butt at Alexander's back. Alexander had gone into the conference room to collect his briefcase. As he came out, Latifo came over to him. "I'll ruin you!" he spat.
"Do your worst," Alexander snarled. "I don't care."
"Don't you walk away from me," Latifo said, following him. He grabbed Alexander on the arm. Alexander, reflexively, gave Latifo such a shove on the shoulder that he slammed into the wall. Latifo, stunned, held his sore shoulder as Alexander made it to the elevator.
"Look..." Latifo tried to say. The elevator doors closed in front of Alexander. "I'll call you later..." Latifo muttered.
He stared at the closed elevator doors for three minutes. The cigarette butt finally burned down to his fingers. Startled, he let it drop upon the carpet. The voice of Mr. McPherson came from behind him. "Mr. Hernandez?" the gentleman said, laying a hand on Latifo's good shoulder.
"Yes?" Latifo said, turning. "Yes. I'm ready."
"Well, sir," said Mr. McPherson, "we appreciate your time, but I don't think there's any reason to go back to the table."
"What?" Latifo asked, helplessly.
Mr. McPherson glanced at his partner. "Mr. Regis and I have been talking about it and we simply don't feel that we can communicate with you about this. We appreciate your time."
"But wait a minute!" Latifo said, hotly. "We can work with this! You don't have to leave like that! Let's talk together for a moment..."
"Actually, sir," It was Mr. Regis that now spoke. "We have to be somewhere by eleven, so we really can't stay. If you'll excuse us."
"Another meeting, then!" Latifo cried. "We can talk about this tomorrow, next week. Gentlemen, let's not let it end like this!"
"Good morning, Mr. Hernandez," replied Mr. Regis.
"I'll call you this afternoon!" Latifo shouted after them.
"We'll be..." Mr. McPherson seemed at a loss for words. "All right," he said, nodding, putting a distancing hand on Latifo's shoulder. "Thank you. Until then..."
Latifo heard their laugh from behind the elevator doors. His fists clenched in fury. "You sons of bitches!" he yelled at them. "I'll show you! I'll sell the plot to someone else for less than what you offered! I'll run you motherfuckers out of business!"
He had stormed back to the conference table. He sat before it, regarding himself in the cold, black fiberglass. A figure looked back at him, furious, calculating. It was a handsome Chicano face with a fifty-dollar haircut, a solid torso hidden in a blue silk shirt, tied up with a sharp looking tie. The figure that glared up at him from the table was wealthy, attractive, plainly miserable.
He got to his feet and straightened his shirt. It didn’t matter. He would figure out what to do tomorrow.
As he gathered his jacket and briefcase, his attention was drawn out the window. People were running about in the building across the street; he could see them through the large windows, looking up at the sky, pointing, and shouting.
He felt the floor trembling. An earthquake? But it was not trembling in the way that resembled two great crusts slipping over one another, the earth grinding its teeth. Rather, it was a trembling like the humming of a train platform. More a vibration. And then Latifo became aware of what he heard.
Music, such sweet music. Like the Salsa his father had played over the radio in the kitchen and the orchestra concert his mother had taken him to that one time; like a Paul McCartney ballad and a Nirvana knell, all in one. It captivated him, it confused him, and it pulled him.
He could see the people in the streets, wandering about confusedly, like ants that have had their nest kicked over. Cars had parked in the middle of the street. Already there was a din from the honked horns and the shouting that came through the conference-room window. And yet it did not interfere with the trembling, with the music that seemed not to come in through the ears, but through another opening.
He followed its trail, almost visibly, into a stairwell and up seven flights of stairs, which he took easily, hardly noticing the pools of sweat that expanded around the armpits of his silk shirt. He came out on the rooftop and let the door slam against the wall as he stepped out into the sunlight.
He was alone on the rooftop, but he could still hear the two kinds of noise, the traffic and shouting, and the music, each coming in a kind of unreal stereo, as though through two channels that did not correspond with the ears. As he listened, the channel that contained the music grew and predominated, and the noises of the street slowly faded away.
He looked around him, confused, dazzled, into the unreal sunlight, the clearer than clear air. Upon the low wall of the building, he spotted her, standing there, facing him but not seeing him, her chest expanded proudly, her head back, her mouth open, her dusty throat vibrating back and forth.
She was singing in the voice of a thousand singers, and she was singing of such sorrow, of the end of things. She was portly, about forty inches around her waist. Her hands were folded at her navel. She was draped in delicate gauze wrappings that wafted in the breeze coming back to her from her own singing. Her hair seemed of the deepest black, red where the light came through it, blond where the light bounced back from it. Upon her head was a huge helmet with horns that extended outward like stag's antlers. Her face was angelic and wistful, and she sang like she was singing to the entire world, like the entire world was a huge personage that stood right before her, and listened, and nodded with each phrase.
Latifo recognized her instantly. He knew her with a memory encoded in his genetic material, captured in his soul's resonant pattern. He knew without being able to put it into words, who she was, what she was doing, why she was here. He knew as everyone who stood upon that earth on that day knew.
"Please," he said to her, hardly hearing his own voice through the ever-increasing sound of that beautiful music. She did not respond to him. She sang ever more to that invisible person, the great personage who stood right before her, and nodded, and listened.
"Please," he said again. "I'm sorry! I see it now!" But if she understood him, she made no sign. The music had grown to a different place, now. It's drama had sent it along the chute, a turn towards a climactic slope. He who knew so little about music could feel it in his bones, could sense the shape of that song, could foresee its ending.
"If I could just have a little more time," he begged, tears streaming down his cheeks. "I didn't really live!"
Her voice grew more strident with the force of the song, but she did not strain; rather, she grew loud, so loud in fact that Latifo could no longer hear himself protesting to her, only feel himself calling to her, feel his own voice vibrating within his chest, his lips making the words, asking for another chance, another day, another minute.
The music reached its peak. The woman, rapt in the act of making a perfect gesture, flushed with exuberance and gave a high note, born on the last breath she would need to take. That note sailed high upon the skies and it tore down the buildings, it unmade the earth, it sent all the little souls back to their maker.
And then it was over.
(C) Adam Cole