Arthur Nersesian - The Fuck-Up

“I’m sorry he died.”

“What I mean is, I’m not sure if he would’ve approved of you. But he always separated issues from individuals. He could disagree with you about something and still like you.”

“Oh?”

“He lived here for years. What do you pay in rent, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“What did Helmsley pay?”

“He paid something like sixty-two-fifty a month or something.”

“Holy shit!” The guy finally woke up. “I pay more than ten times that.”

“You should go to the Rent Stabilization Board. I don’t think they can raise it that much.”

“Thanks, I will,” he said, shutting the door. Fuck him, that fucking yuppie living in Helmsley’s house. I kicked his door with all my might and raced down the stairs and onto the street. I kept running until I reached Angela’s house.

There, I opened the door with relief and disbelief. Clutching the key in my hand, I walked over the threshold, and then I locked the door behind me. Immediately I slipped the key back into my shirt pocket. I was behind a locked door with a key in my pocket. I felt comforted, happy, kingly. Next, I walked very quickly through each of her rooms and made sure the windows were locked and no one else was in the house. And then I returned to the kitchen and inspected the cupboards, making sure that everything was in place so that she wouldn’t suspect I had rifled through them. I spaced cans evenly apart so that telltale gaps weren’t apparent. I even spent some time thinking about topics I could talk about with her to subtly drain away the time. I tried to remember the names of popular television shows, but could only come up with “Starsky & Hutch,” “Macmillan & Wife,” “The Night Stalker,” and other seventies stuff. So I decided that I would talk and try to guide conversation only if she initiated it. And then I sat down and tuned out awhile.

Angelacame home eventually, and we watched TV; there wasn’t much conversation. She made us spaghetti, and then she went out. She came home late that night, loaded. I could hear a muffled sound coming from her room, and then I fell asleep. The next morning, she asked me if I wanted breakfast, and I said yes and ate everything and wondered if she was going to throw me out. Afterward, she asked me if I was thinking about getting a job (my reply was a grunt), and then she left the house.

It felt as if things stopped again when she left. I sat for a while, decided to steal some more food, went on a walk, hid the food in the bushes, and walked to another place where I thought I might have parked my Mercedes. It wasn’t there. Then I walked a few blocks toward Brooklyn Heights, but I panicked and ran home. I put the police lock—the kind that you can’t open from the outside—on the door. I got a piece of paper and made exact notes of the order of everything as I went through all her drawers. I took out her jeans and T-shirts and some of her underthings. In one drawer I even found a battery-operated massager with different attachments and smelled it. And then, exactly following the instructions I wrote, I put everything back in the correct order.

I moved on to some file cabinets that had records of utility bills and was amazed by how methodical she was. I found a copy of a very well-written letter responding to a phone bill for which she felt she was unjustly overcharged. I put back the files and went into a closet and took some cardboard boxes down from the top shelf. I went through old papers and found something that blew me away: her name written in Latin on a bachelor’s degree from Sacred Heart College, on the bottom of which was written cum laude. She had a fucking B.A. in sociology with honors! I put everything back.

I watched TV until she came home that night. She made a dinner and ate it quietly. While she washed the dishes, I watched some TV She came in with a six pack and handed me a beer.

“What you watching?”

“’Dallas.’”

“What do you do here during the day?” she asked out of the blue.

“I’m recuperating.”

“Well, how much longer are you going to be recuperating?”

“I don’t know Why?”

“I think you ought to get a job and a place of your own.” The idea seemed inconceivable and I told her so.

“Why were you like that, anyway?”

“Like what?”

“You were a bag man.”

“Who?” I asked, feigning ignorance.

“How old are you?”

“Why?”

“In your early twenties or something?”

“Yeah, so?”

“Helmsley said he thought you were very intelligent.”

“Yeah, so?”

“He said that you had some kind of fuck-up in life and you had to get back into the swing.”

“What are you talking about?”

“He said that something happened back home. Where you from, California or something?”

“Yeah, so?”

“I’m just trying to help. Helmsley and I used to talk about you a lot.”

“You and Helmsley? You and Helmsley! You destroyed the man and you sit there calmly like you were talking with him a couple of hours ago.”

“I was just trying to help you, asshole!”

“Where was all this help the night Helmsley stepped off the Brooklyn Bridge?”

She got up, left the room, and slammed the door behind her. It was only about ten o’clock at night, so I got dressed and went out for a walk.

I walked down Clinton Street to Pierrepont Street, to Glenn’s house. It was a cold walk, but after living on the street I knew that it could never get too cold. Her house was a flicker of lights. Someone walked by the window, and then just as instantly was out of view. I wondered if she had reconciled with that guy, the fellow she caught cheating on her. It seemed like years had passed. I wondered about her kid, I wondered if she had gotten the Mercedes back. It was okay if she did. It served me right. I felt very sorry for her. And although I didn’t really care for her, I was curious how it all turned out. Soon, when the cold got colder, I walked back to the house.

I locked the door, stripped down, and went to bed. As I lay in bed, I was able to just barely make out the sound of someone crying.

The next morning I awoke before her. Looking at the clock, I realized that it was well after nine, which was when she usually awoke me before going off to work. I thought that maybe to be tactful about using her, I should make her breakfast for a change. I gently knocked on her door. When I got no response, and since the door was slightly open, I pushed it open a bit more. She was sprawled out on the floor in a pool of what looked like blood. When I went over, I saw that it was vomit. There was an empty quartsize bottle of gin. I felt flustered and left the room, closing the door behind me. I quietly made myself some breakfast.

While eating, I thought about what to do. To me she was still the killer of Helmsley, and despite the charity I still didn’t like her. I hated the fact that I needed her, and revenge was something I still desired. Opening a window, I noticed it was unusually warm out. On a shelf in the kitchen cabinet, I found a jar filled with coins. I extracted a bunch of quarters and left.

I went to the F train and lingered awhile looking at the posted subway map. When a Manhattan-bound train came into the station, I opened the gate, crossed the platform and boarded. The token clerk deliberately looked away; none of them cared anymore. I got off at the Second Avenue stop and walked northward. I reached Saint Mark’s Place just as the police were arresting a group of street vendors. I saw Flowers, my old friend, standing across the street, looking sadly at his compatriots being ushered into police-cars.

“What happened?” I asked him. “I never saw them arresting anyone before.”