Gail Bowen - One Fine Day You’re Gonna Die

Robin shakes her head in disgust, but I jump in.

“Gabe, our show is pretty loose, but we have two rules: no straying from the topic and no hitting below the belt. So far you’re two for two.”

“I apologize,” Gabriel Ireland says, and he sounds genuinely contrite. “I’m a hollow man.”

“You’re a bore,” Robin Harris says sharply. “Gabe, hang up and let someone with real problems call in. I’m not here to deal with your adolescent angst.”

“I’m aware of that, my dark star. I’ve been listening. As always, you established the boundaries brilliantly. You said your job is to help people deal with the day in their lives when they are most vulnerable-the day when they’re about to die or when someone they love is about to die. I qualify on both counts.”

Robin flicks off her microphone. Her creamy skin is blotched with anger. “I told your producer this would happen if she put his call through. Gabe is hijacking your show, and he’s making me look bad.” Her eyes meet mine. “It’s either Gabe or me,” she says. “Cut him off or I leave.”

Nova’s voice on the talkback is tight. “Stay with Gabe, Charlie. I know voices, and Gabriel Ireland is in real trouble. We have a caller named Boomer on line two. He thinks he can help. At the very least, he’ll give everybody a chance to take a deep breath.”

I shrug. What the hell? It’s Halloween- the night for trick or treat. I switch my mike on.

“Gabe, why don’t we chill awhile and listen to what another caller has to say.”

Gabe laughs.

“I’m not going anywhere, Charlie.”

Robin takes off her headphones and starts jamming her notes into her briefcase. I give her an apologetic smile, open line two and glance at my computer screen.

“Good evening, Boomer.” I say. “I see that you identify your hometown as wherever your Harley will take you. So are you on the road now?”

“Nope, getting too old to drive in the dark.”

Boomer’s rumbling bass makes me reach for the volume control.

“My pattern now,” he says, “is to ride the Hog until sundown, pull into a motel, crack open a cool one and wait until you come on the air.”

“Proud to be part of your day,” I say.

“Thanks, Charlie D. Anyway, I just wanted to let Gabe know that I had a dark star of my own. I was with this lady for two years, and it was stellar-especially in the dark. This lady and I were cut from the same cloth. We both loved to ride our Harleys. We both loved the band Pantera and the Meatlovers Pan-Scrambler at Humpty’s. Most of all, we loved taking long showers together. There was a little place on my lady’s back that she couldn’t reach, and she liked me to soap the spot with Zest. She and I had a lot of fine moments, but there was something about the smell of Zest on that woman that was so good it made me cry.”

Robin has put on her coat and is knotting her scarf. It appears that my apologetic smile has lost its charm.

I keep my focus on Boomer.

“I know the feeling,” I say.

“I kind of figured you did,” Boomer says. “Anyway, long story short, my lady found a biker with a bigger Hog, and she moved along. For a long time, I was kind of where Gabe is now. After my lady left, I soaped a lot of backs, but none of them passed the Zest test. I was beginning to think I’d lost something I would never find again, then along came a lady with a bar of Dove.”

“And soaping your new lady with Dove was good?”

“Transcendent,” Boomer booms.

I wouldn’t have figured Boomer as a guy who’d describe his love life as “transcendent,” but life is full of surprises.

“So your message to Gabe is that somewhere there’s a lady with a bar of Dove that has his name on it?”

“You got it, Charlie D.” Boomer’s laughter is as generous and enveloping as a bear hug.

“Thanks for calling,” I say, and I mean it. The light on line two goes out, and I’m back to line one.

“ So, Gabe, think you can hang on until your Cinderella appears?”

“I’ve pretty much given up on happily-ever-afters,” Gabe says. “When my radio came on this morning and I heard the announcer say that Robin was going to be your guest, I saw the shape of my day. I’d drive to the hospital, listen to jokes from my colleagues about turning forty, open a couple of gag gifts and pretend to be surprised when someone brought a cafeteria cake into the staff lounge. And that would be my birthday. At the end of my shift, I’d go back to an empty condo and life without Robin and Kali. I couldn’t face it.”

Robin levels a last lethal look at me and walks out the studio door. She doesn’t wave goodbye.

I turn my attention back to Gabe.

“So you decided to call in to our show tonight,” I say.

“Only after picking up the one thing I needed to make my birthday complete,” he says.

My heart is pounding.

“And what was that?” I ask.

“A vial of saxitoxin.”

Robin has entered the control room. The space is brightly lit. I see everything, but hear nothing. It’s like watching a silent movie. Without even a glance at Nova, Robin strides through the door that leads to the hall that will take her out of CVOX.

I open the talkback to Nova.

“We can’t lose Robin,” I say. “Go after her. Unless I’m mistaken, Gabe is playing for keeps. Tell Robin that if she saves Gabe’s life on air, she’ll be able to write her own ticket for her call-in show.”

When the control-room door closes behind Nova, my pulse begins to race. It’s just me and Gabe now. I turn on my microphone.

“Okay, Gabe. You’ve got my attention. What’s saxitoxin?”

Gabe is clinical. “Saxitoxin is a poison,” he says. There is no hint of emotion in his pleasant tenor. He might be delivering a lecture or reading an entry from a textbook. “Some people call it shellfish toxin,” he says . “It kills quickly. And there’s no antidote.”

“So if a person changes his or her mind, nothing can be done,” I say.

I stare at the door that separates the CVOX control room from the world where no one can control anything. Gabe continues his lecture about saxitoxin. The seconds tick by on the studio clock. No one comes through the door to the control room. Nova is smart and persuasive, but Robin’s egotism may be a rock that cannot be cracked.

Just when I reconcile myself to flying solo, the door opens. As she resumes her customary place on the other side of the glass, Nova gives me a discreet thumbs-up. Robin sweeps back into the studio, takes her chair and slips on her earphones. She listens long enough to hear Gabe say that death from an injection is painless, and then she turns on her microphone and pounces.

“Gabe, you’re not interested in injecting yourself with anything. You’re not interested in dying. You’re just interested in making my life a living hell.”

“If your life is a living hell, why not join me?” Gabe says. “The vial is full. Saxitoxin for all.”

Robin shrugs off her coat. Seemingly she’s back on the team.

I turn off my mike and switch on the talkback. Nova is tense, but she’s in command. “Get Gabe’s address from Dr. Harris and keep him talking until we can get a police shrink there.”

“Will do,” I say. “Dr. H., what’s Gabe’s home address?”

Robin’s face flushes with anger. She reaches over and flicks on her microphone.