Джеффри Дивер - Nothing Good Happens After Midnight - A Suspense Magazine Anthology

“I hope you find what you’re looking for,” the guy said, flashing a smile that lingered briefly. “I think this might be the night.”

“For what?”

Before he could answer, the doors whooshed open and a swarm of riders swallowed the man up. Venn stepped onto the platform after him, looked one way and then the other, but the man was gone.

Venn needed cash. Money made for the best disguise. Guys in a bar seeing you paying for your own drinks took the hustler thing off the table until he put it back on. Same thing for clothes and in Venn’s case, that meant dressing like a college student. Khakis or jeans to go with the right button-down and jacket courtesy of North Face or something like that.

The problem tonight was that his bank account was closing in on zero, all of fifty bucks left to his name which in his case was “Venn” and nothing more. Using his last name meant acknowledging his past, something Venn avoided at all costs given there was nothing there worth remembering. So why not avoid his surname as much as possible? He never used it when introducing himself, and the people he normally introduced himself to didn’t much care.

Still, fifty bucks was fifty bucks and Venn set out in search of an ATM machine to take forty of it out, leaving him ten unless tonight proved to be a profitable one assuming he could find the right trick. Venn could have ventured a bit further uptown to where deeper congestions of bars were clustered. He could have hit the bars frequented more by Columbia students. But he only did that when he needed a place to crash for the night, maybe poach some food for breakfast the next morning, seeing those students as different kinds of marks since any college student worth seducing wouldn’t need to pay for what Venn was offering.

ATMs were normally everywhere these days but not so, apparently, here in the area of Broadway and 207th Street. He found two banks but slipping his card into the exterior slot failed in both cases to make the glass door snap open. Since Venn carried the card loose in his pocket, maybe the magnetic strip was fucked up or something.

He walked about in search of an ATM held inside a bodega or all-night coffee shop or convenience store, starting to get anxious when he spotted one on a darkened stretch of Sherman Avenue just off 207th Street squeezed between a shoe repair shop and a cut-rate men’s clothing store, both with steel grates bolted down over their facades. The ATM was unique because it was squeezed inside an old-fashioned phone booth of all things which had faded from use around the time Venn was born. The glass was cracked in spider web fashion by what looked like well-placed rocks, reducing previously scrawled graffiti to fractured letters.

Venn unfolded the door after encountering some initial resistance; a single overhead lightbulb flickered to life after he’d folded it back closed. The ATM, too, looked old and beaten down, if such a thing could be said about a machine. In the outdated listing of the various cards it accepted was a selection he’d never seen before: CURRENCY OF with the final word scratched over except for part of the first letter, probably an O or maybe a G. The slot to the right swallowed Venn’s card and the ATM’s ancient looking screen flashed to life, asking for his password, fresh letters scrolling across the screen after he entered it.

HELLO, VENN.

When did these machines get to be on a first-name basis? Something all wrong about that in Venn’s mind, but he was too relieved his card had actually worked to ponder that further.

DO YOU NEED CASH THIS EVENING?

There was a Y and N trailing the question, so Venn clicked on the Y.

I’M OUT OF SERVICE RIGHT NOW.

Well, give me back my card, motherfucker , Venn thought.

SORRY, VENN, I CAN’T DO THAT RIGHT NOW.

Had he spoken the words out loud instead of merely formed them?

Venn found the CANCEL button and pressed it a whole bunch of times to no effect.

I NEED YOU TO DO SOMETHING FOR ME. THEN I’LL GIVE YOU YOUR CARD BACK.

What the fuck was this shit?

A TRANSACTION, VENN, THAT’S WHAT THIS IS. DIFFERENT FROM THE ONES YOU’RE USED TO, BUT A TRANSACTION ALL THE SAME.

The light-colored letters scrolled across the screen and froze there, leaving Venn wondering who was messing with him and why. Maybe this was like one of those hidden camera things for some kind of prank show, so he figured he should just go along with it. What choice did he have anyway, since the machine had already swallowed his ATM card?

I’M GOING TO GIVE YOU AN ADDRESS, the scroll resumed. YOU NEED TO GO THERE.

THEN WHAT? Venn used the keyboard to type, the two words appearing beneath the machine’s last scroll on the screen.

YOU’LL KNOW WHEN YOU GET THERE. WHEN YOU’RE FINISHED, COME BACK AND I’LL RETURN YOUR CARD.

PROMISE? Venn typed, minus the question mark yet it appeared anyway.

PINKY SWEAR.

That gave Venn a chill because it was his classic follow-up to any lie he formed at the shelters and group homes that would have him. He’d probably said it a thousand times over the years but had never heard another human being utter it even once. Then again, this was a machine.

Venn didn’t do drugs, other than weed, because they messed with his head. Had he taken something earlier in the night and forgotten about it? Could he have ingested something without knowing it, maybe been dosed unwittingly? Seemed like that would be something he should remember.

WELL? the ATM machine prompted.

Venn decided to keep going along, typing WHAT’S THE ADDRESS?

9TH AVENUE AND BROADWAY. NOT FAR FROM HERE

A half mile to be covered on foot since the two bucks in his pocket wasn’t even enough for another single ride subway ticket.

WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WHEN I GET THERE? Venn typed.

But the screen went dark at that point, leaving him to recall the machine’s previous response that he’d know once he arrived.

WHEN YOU’RE FINISHED, COME BACK AND I’LL RETURN YOUR CARD.

Venn could only hope.

He was nervously brimming with anticipation when he reached the intersection, recognizing it as one of those listed to be the most dangerous in the whole city from a driving standpoint. There wasn’t much still open in the immediate area, save for a Dunkin’ Donuts and all-night laundromats. Venn could hear the whirring sound of the driers shuffling clothes about, the scent of drier sheets and fabric softener pouring from the vents and warming him a bit when he passed by. On those occasions when circumstances forced him into the street on a chilly night like this, he’d seek out just such a spot, so the smell didn’t carry a lot of happy memories with it.

A steady stream of vehicles flew through the green light even at this late hour, nothing new here in the ‘city that never sleeps’ which, in Venn’s experience, had proven much more than a slogan. It switched to yellow, the oncoming vehicles slowing in reluctant fashion, like bucking horses, eager to get to their destination.

Venn gazed about, no idea what he was looking for exactly since the message scrawled across the ATM’s screen hadn’t told him anything beyond that cryptic: YOU’LL KNOW WHEN YOU GET THERE.

That’s when Venn noticed the woman, early thirties maybe, striding toward the intersection. New York was not lacking for beautiful women and this one certainly qualified, with blonde hair bouncing past her shoulders and leather pants shiny in the streetlights’ spill. Venn was free to stare as much as he wanted, since her attention was riveted on her phone screen, her thumbs busy tapping out a text or email.

Not noticing the cross-street traffic light she was approaching switch to red, about to be plowed over by oncoming traffic that would be powerless to stop.