Tom Piccirilli - Every shallow cut

Under protest, my brother let Church stay with him while I took the train into Penn Station and walked over to my agent’s office.

Of course my agent hadn’t been expecting me. When I walked in he put on a false broad smile and went three shades of pale. He still had three of my novels circulating. At least he’d had them in the slush bins up until I’d had to disconnect my phone and sell my computer. He asked me how I’d been.

“Any word?” I asked.

It was a stupid question. I’d been compelled to ask it anyway. I wondered why I even cared anymore. Maybe I didn’t. I could feel my time running out, and I liked the feeling. I’d had two mentors in my life and they’d both died at their desks. I wasn’t going to go out that way. Their sales were still good and their royalties kept their families comfortable even now, years later. Me, I was going to die with my hands wrapped around someone’s throat, maybe my own.

“No, we haven’t had any offers yet,” he said. “We came close with

… ah… with…” He dipped his head trying to remember which publisher might’ve shown the slightest interest in my work, but he couldn’t come up with it. “Anyway, they balked because they felt it wasn’t commercial enough.”

“Do we even know what the fuck that means?”

“It means not enough middle-age women or tween girls are going to like it.”

“Is that the only audience left?”

“The only one that counts.”

His phone rang and he held up a finger to shush me while he took the call.

I got out of my chair and looked through his bookcases. The same old feeling of envy began rising inside me, but it was muted this time, so deep that it couldn’t seem to break the surface anymore. I saw books that were massive bestsellers yet showed no style or originality. I didn’t blame the authors for writing them. I didn’t even blame the readers for reading them. I plucked a novel up and flipped through some pages and found a sentence: I was so angry I kicked him in the shin.

I wondered how angry that might be. I wondered just how mad the author had to feel in order to kick someone in the shin. Everything was relative. Was that the culmination of his fury? Was he worse off than me? Did his wife have to leave him for a sweetie before he would kick someone in the shin?

My agent was giggling, saying, “Right right right, oh yes, yes! Yes!” It sounded like phone sex to me. He quivered in his seat. He was in love with his other clients, at least the successful ones. I still hadn’t cashed my royalty cheque for $12.37.

When he finally hung up his eyes shimmered with genuine affection. I almost asked him who he’d been talking to. But when you got down to it, I really didn’t want to know.

I asked if there’d been any film interest in my novels. He just pursed his lips and shook his head. I asked if there was any other work to be found. Writing comics, being a ghost writer. Anything.

I’d asked these same questions a year ago, and six months ago, and three months ago, and six weeks ago, each time the strain of desperation growing in my voice. Now though, I was surprised to hear myself sounding quite calm. Bored even. I wondered what would have happened if he’d said there was a producer interested in turning one of my books into a movie. Would I have shouted yippee? Did I have the ability to shout yippee anymore? Had I ever?

“I’ve been working on a new novel,” I said.

He was busy checking his daily planner and nodded without interest. “Good good. What’s it about?”

“I don’t want to ruin it for you. I think you should go in cold and unbiased.”

I opened the rucksack, reached in, and brought out four of the full legal pads. They weren’t numbered. I wasn’t certain if it mattered. I put them in the order that I thought I’d written them in, and I put them on his desk.

“What’s this?” he asked.

“Like I said, my new novel.”

“It’s not even typed.”

“I don’t have a laptop anymore.”

“Why not?”

I knew he hadn’t really been listening to me over the last year. I knew that he didn’t fully grasp my situation. He didn’t know my wife had left me. He wouldn’t remember that my house had been taken away. He had no real idea I was homeless and destitute. He never would.

“Have your girl type it up,” I told him.

“That’s not her job.” He glanced through the pages. He made faces. He looked at me from time to time. “This isn’t how we do things.”

“No, it’s not,” I agreed. “I’m trying some-thing new.”

He started to argue more. Then he looked at the rucksack at my feet and his eyes opened wide and he pushed away from his desk.

“Is that a gun?” he asked.

The righteous answer would be to say, No, I’m just happy to see you. Instead I just said, “Yes.”

“What are you doing with a gun?”

That was the fucking question, wasn’t it? Did I tell him I wasn’t sure, that I had no idea? Or did I go a little deeper with this man who had promised to do his best professionally to protect my work and make me enough money so that I could at least keep a roof over my wife’s head? Had he failed me or had I failed him?

I wasn’t completely mad dog yet. I wasn’t going to pull the trigger on everyone who’d ever crossed me or pissed me off or written a bad review of my work. I wasn’t going to put one in my own ear just so my sales might spike a little the way they did for all dead authors. Besides, who would get the royalties? I wasn’t even sure. I was divorced, I was alone. I had no will or executor. I supposed the rights would go to my brother. He would look down at the paperwork, squinting, and not want to be bothered. Everything would go out of print practically overnight and in twenty years some kid with some taste might be crawling around a second hand shop or thrift store and find one of my titles in the corner of a dark shelf. He’d draw it out and turn to the first page and find the paper had been chewed on by rats and was speckled with spider eggs and fly shit.

“I don’t know,” I said.

“I think… I think maybe you should…”

“Don’t worry, I’m not here to punch your ticket. I’ve been on the road for a couple of weeks and needed protection.”

“Protection from what?” he asked.

It was a list that had no beginning or end. “Let’s not get off point. I think you’ll like the new book. I think it will move fast for us. I think it will be a big seller.”

I wasn’t sure how straight I was playing it. Maybe I came off as absurd as I sounded, or maybe I had more faith in those words, whatever they were, than I realized.

He decided to patronize me. He stuck a hand out as if to touch my shoulder but he never made contact. “Okay, that’s good. That’s a good thing. I’m glad you feel that way. If you feel that way, then it must be true. I’m sure something will break for us soon. I’ll have my girl get right on it.”

“Thanks.”

“And I’ll keep pushing the others.”

“You’re the man.”

“Something will break. Keep the faith.”

“Do my best.”

“We’ll get you a nice fat cheque soon.”

“Terrific.”

“Hollywood is always after new material.”

“That’s inspiring.”

“This new book, I’ve got a good feeling about it.”

“Right.”

“Everything is going to turn around. We’ll get you back on top.”

I’d never been on top but I smiled pleasantly at him. When I picked up the rucksack he backed up to the far wall and cringed against the window. The blue sky burned around his silhouette. I wondered if I was angry enough to kick him in the shin. I wondered if I was angry enough to shoot him in the head.

The phone rang and he turned his back on me. I couldn’t hold it against him. It was his training, it was instinct by now. I wasn’t there anymore. Perhaps I never had been.