Peter Abrahams - The Fan

“Sir?” he said.

Pakistani or some damned thing. Gil hadn’t even noticed before. He couldn’t patch together a sentence out of the noisy fragments spinning in his head. All that came out of his mouth was, “My fucking car.”

“Sir?” said the attendant, half rising, closing the book but retaining his place in its foreign pages with his foreign finger.

It struck Gil then that the little bastard probably didn’t understand English, had taken the ten bucks without grasping a word he’d said. An innocent mistake, maybe, but it maddened him all the same: he had no time for mistakes, no time for translation. He took the attendant by the shoulder and pulled him outside, a little roughly, perhaps. Pointing with his free hand, Gil said, “Is that what they call unblocked where you come from, Slugger?”

“But, sir,” said the attendant in English only slightly accented, “it is.”

Gil let go. The attendant went to the back of the lot, unlocked a gate that Gil hadn’t noticed, swung it open. Then he got into the 325i, backed smoothly into the alley, swung around the lot, and came to a stop on the street, right next to Gil.

He got out. Gil got in, slammed the door.

“Do you wish a receipt?” asked the attendant.

Almost no accent, and he spoke a fancier English than Gil’s. Gil didn’t reply. He just floored it, glancing back once, to see the attendant’s dark and watchful image shrinking in his rearview mirror.

Two: in the tunnel, 2:51. Stop and go.

“Come on, come on.”

And without warning, Gil had to piss, bad. He squirmed in his seat, unbuckled his seat belt, looked around for a place to pull over. But there was nowhere: even the breakdown lane was jammed. Gil honked his horn, just like those asshole drivers he couldn’t stand; and someone honked back, long and hard, blaring through the normal tunnel din.

“Come on, come on.”

Long lines of brake lights flashed on, reddening the gloom. Traffic stopped.

2:51.

2:52.

“Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,” Gil said, rocking back and forth. So late; he should have been rehearsing his excuse, but all he could think of was the pressure building in his bladder. He unbuckled his belt. That helped a little.

2:53.

2:54.

2:55.

Still stuck deep inside the tunnel, and rocking again. Frantic to get to Everest and Co., frantic to piss. “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.” Gil put his hand on his crotch, squeezed the end of his cock through his suit pants. A mistake. His bladder, or some muscle or whatever it was, abruptly felt free to just let go, so nothing was holding in all that piss but the clamping of his hand. At that moment, traffic jerked forward and started rolling. But Gil couldn’t move before shifting into first, and he needed his hand for that. He let go and piss shot out of him, hot and uncontrollable, was still flowing as he banged through the gears and bumped up out of the tunnel and into bright light, feeling nothing at first except dumb relief. But: leather seat soaked, suit pants soaked, executive-length socks soaked, piss in his shoes, cooling fast. The noise in his head grew louder.

Three: outside Everest and Co., 3:07. Every meter taken, the nearest lot three blocks away. Gil swung the car in a U-turn and braked hard beside a hydrant on the other side of the street. Then he grabbed his sample case and ran: across the street, up the steps, through the door, into the lobby. Elevators all in use. He charged up the stairs, piss-soaked pants clinging to his cold skin, beery tie waving like a flag over his shoulder. Three flights. Down the carpeted, softly lit hall and into the outer office of the purchasing VP, the door banging open against the wall.

“Chuck here?”

“Excuse me?”

“Chuck. Two-thirty.” Gil sucked in a lungful of air. “Couldn’t be helped.”

“Excuse me?”

“Being late. The traffic…”

The secretary had a little turned-up nose. Not Angie, Chuck’s usual secretary, Gil realized, and let his words trail off. She sniffed the air. “You’re?”

“Gil Renard. R. G. Renard Fine Knives. Chuckie and I had a two-thirty meeting, should be there on your schedule, but like I said-”

She held up her hand, a stubby hand with bitten nails. “He’s not here.”

“Shit.”

“Begging your pardon?”

“He’s gone already?”

“That’s what I said.”

“What flight’s he on?” Gil said, a backup plan forming in his mind.

“Flight?”

“To Chicago. Unless he’s not going anymore?”

“He’s going,” the secretary said. “But not till tonight.”

Gil went closer to her desk, his backup plan already revising itself. “Then maybe I could catch him somewhere before he heads for the airport.”

“I don’t think so,” the secretary said. “He’s going straight there from the ball game.”

“From where?” He was leaning over her desk now, plan forgotten. His damp socks slipped down around his ankles. “From where did you say?”

She rolled her chair back a little. “The ball game. But he left you this note,” she said, holding up a sealed envelope.

He snatched it from her hand, tore it open.

Gil-

A supplier laid a couple of Sox tickets on me this morning. Not a big fan, but it is Opening Day, and why not be a hero to my kid? Tried to get hold of you. Sorry.

But this is probably as good a time as any to inform you that, due to the current economic climate, management has opted for a reconfiguration of our purchasing strategy. One upshot is that we won’t be renewing the Renard contract at this time.

Always interested in new product, of course, so keep in touch. Been good doing business with you.

Chuck

Gil read the note twice. The first time the noise in his head made him miss some of the details. Then he balled it in his hand and squeezed hard. The secretary was watching him, eyes narrowing in suspicion. “He didn’t draw a smiley face, did he?”

“What?”

“The previous assistant got him in the habit of putting a smiley face instead of sincerely. I keep telling him it’s not always appropriate.”

Gil tried to think of something stinging to say, but couldn’t. All he could think of were targets for the tight paper ball in his hand: Chuck’s window, the photograph of Chuck and his family on the wall, Chuck’s secretary’s hard little face. He dropped it on the carpet instead, like dog shit, and walked out.

Out. The irony had already hit him, but it hit him again. It hit him on the elevator, and in the lobby. And again when he got to the street: he’s going straight there from the ball game. Gil knew about irony; he went to the movies. He almost laughed out loud, might have done so if he hadn’t suddenly thought of something, a strange quote that he couldn’t place or understand: They kill us for their sport. Didn’t understand: but knew that only an idiot would laugh.

They kill us for their sport: he could fax that to Garrity, by way of explanation. Gil, standing on the sidewalk outside Everest and Co., was just beginning to think of how he would handle Garrity, when he noticed the tow truck on the other side of the street. It had already hooked a car, and, as he watched, it lifted the front end off the pavement with a jerk. A 325i, just like his. That was Gil’s first thought.

Then he was racing across the street, tearing off his tie.

“That’s my car,” he shouted at the tow-truck driver, through the rolled-up window of the cab. The driver, wearing headphones, didn’t hear. Gil banged hard on his door. The driver turned, startled, yanked off the headphones.

“That’s my car.”

The driver snapped down the door lock with his elbow. The window slid open a couple of inches. “You can pick it up at the pound,” he said, closing the window and putting the headphones back on.