Jack O'Connell - Box Nine

CORTEZ: Bouza.

ROURKE: Right, right.

CORTEZ: He’s agreed that I name the spot?

ROURKE: He could be happier. But he’ll live with it.

CORTEZ: Fine. We’ll go with his original location.

ROURKE: Okay. I know right where you mean.

CORTEZ: Is two A.M. agreeable?

ROURKE: Couldn’t be better. Could not be any better.

CORTEZ: I’ll be deducting the cost of the third sample from the payout. There won’t be a problem with this?

ROURKE: I’ll cover it. It’ll come out of my commission. Off the top. Everyone’ll be happy.

CORTEZ: Then I’ll see you, Mr. Rourke.

ROURKE: Done.

There’s one hang-up click, a pause, then a second click. Lenore waits a beat, then shuts off the recorder and removes the head-phones.

Woo stares at her and she holds the headphones out to him, indicating that he can listen to a replay if he wants. He shrugs, but takes the headphones, puts them on, and spends several seconds adjusting their placement on his head. Lenore rewinds the tape for him and when the counter numbers fall back to zero, she hits the Play button.

Then she steps back and leans up against one of the brick walls and watches Woo’s face closely as he listens. She’s not sure what she’s looking for, but she knows it’s important that she watch. Possibly, some look will kick in at the eyes, or the whole head will shake upon hearing something significant. She knows she’s being ridiculously greedy. She’s gotten every piece of information she needs in one call. She’s gotten Cortez as a buyer. She’s gotten someone named Mr. Rourke as a broker. She’s gotten someone named the Paraclete as the producer. She’s gotten the time of the transaction. But she wants more. This doesn’t surprise her. She knows, no matter what she came away with from the tap, no matter how wise and prepared she emerged from the cellar, she would want more.

Woo’s face gives her nothing. He sits in a rigid schoolboy position, eyes straight ahead, focused on brick and mortar, lips primly together. He’s even got his hands folded on the table in front of him. He’s a blank sheet.

There’s nothing to read.

Ike feels as if he’s in a high school play, maybe a drama club production of Twelve Angry Men , done in the gym, a hundred parents trying to get comfortable on the wooden bleachers. He feels like he’s missed every rehearsal since the play was cast, but they’ve kept him in the role anyway. Now it’s opening night and he doesn’t know a line. He can’t even seem to find a script.

Eva knows her role. She’s a born actress. She walked into the locker room like it was any other day. She read routes and names off her clipboard. She told Rourke if he had a problem to spit it out. She stared Wilson down in seconds and walked back to her office like her mind was already on requisition forms for a new bulletin board in the rental box area.

Ike’s having more trouble being convincing. When Bromberg tossed him the first insult of the day — something about dogs on his route running from him — he just froze and stammered until he felt like he would choke. Wilson got a real kick out of this, spitting out a laugh and slapping Rourke’s shoulder, but Rourke just stared at Ike without a word, then squatted down to retie his boots.

When Eva assigned Ike to sorting again, Rourke said, in a quiet voice, that his foot still wasn’t completely healed and he’d go to the union if she refused to give him indoor work. Eva said that was his right and she’d wait for the call. Rourke organized his trays like a mute, sulky, but hyperactive child and was out on route before any of the other carriers.

There’s no float available today and Ike is thankful for this. It means he’ll have to sort and handle the customers at the counter, but he’ll be alone with Eva and he needs to talk. He waits a few minutes after the last carrier, Jacobi, leaves, then moves to Eva’s office.

“What do you think?” he blurts. “You think they know we know? You think we’re in trouble here? You decide who we should talk to?”

Eva smiles and raises her eyebrows. “Number one. You calm down. I don’t care how. Find a way.”

“Okay, all right. You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m not good under pressure. I’ve got a terrible gag reflex.”

“Deep breaths. Over and over.”

“Takes a lot of concentration.”

“Did you sleep?”

“No way. Not five minutes. Terrible. My sister was working all night. Never got home. I watched Johnny Belinda on cable, then about an hour of rap videos till I was going nuts, then I put in a tape and watched The Frozen Dead.”

“You should’ve come over. I drank a dozen cups of tea and watched Orson Welles in The Stranger.”

“So what have you decided?”

“I’m not sure who—”

“We’ve got to talk to someone—”

“What I’m saying is we’ve got very little information.”

“What are you talking about? You told me, remember? You said they’re selling some weird drug—”

“We don’t know what they’re selling. It could be some pathetic gimmick Rourke dreamed up. The Mailman’s Miracle Diet Program. Starch blockers and vitamins.”

“This isn’t what you told me. This is not what you said.”

“The other thing is, you tell someone on this, you’re an informer.”

“Oh, for God’s sake.”

“Tell me you’re not. It makes you an informer, Ike, you’ve finked on co-workers.”

“I don’t believe this.”

“I’m just saying. I’m playing devil’s advocate. You want to review all the information before you make a crucial move.”

“They’re criminals, for God’s sake, Eva.”

“You don’t know that, Ike. You don’t know anything. You’re going on what I told you.”

“Exactly. What you told me. Listen, I still think the thing to do is to call my sister in. We call Lenore. We say, ‘Lenore, this is what we know.’ We let her decide what’s what. She’s a professional. She’s my sister. She’ll know what to do.”

“I don’t know.”

“I’ll be honest with you. This surprises me. I’m pretty surprised here.”

“What do you mean?”

“To be honest, nothing personal, but I always thought you were like the picture of good judgment, clear thought. You knew what to do. Take-charge person. Responsible—”

“I think I’m being responsible. We wait and we see. I think this is the responsible route.”

“I’m as scared as you are, Eva.”

“This has nothing to do with fear.”

“Yeah, it does.”

“I’m asking for a little time.”

“How much?”

“Things just don’t seem as black and white to me.”

“C’mon. Please.”

“That’s the truth. Sorry, but it is. Give me today. I’ll work it out today. Tonight I’ll come by your place. We’ll talk with your sister.”

“Tonight?”

“Let’s just get through the day. Let’s just act like it’s a normal day. Like any other day.”

Ike pauses, breathes, nods, starts to walk backward. “I’ll be at the cage. Sorting.”

Eva nods back, looks down at her desk blotter, and says, “Thanks, Ike. Will you close the door going out?”

He walks to the cage and turns on the fluorescents mounted over the sorting boxes. He thinks that with the lights on, the cage looks like a miniature baseball stadium during a night game — the main wall of slots and its two hinged and angled wings are the bleachers. Sometimes he thinks of each letter that he sails into the correct slot as a home run. But he never thinks of himself as the batter, more like some unknown contest winner, called upon to croak out the national anthem.