Mat Johnson - Hunting in Harlem

Coat lapels gripped around her neck to hide it from the nocturnal breeze, baseball hat pulled down over her head to obscure her gentler to any sexual predator, Piper stomped down Lenox and saw the Horizon office across the street, light on inside and its security grate still up. The company truck Bobby said he'd be using was parked right there in front of it and Piper was surprised at her wave of disappointment at having found him away from home and awake. The element of surprised will be diminished, was how she explained her reaction to herself, but that rational voice was drowned out by another, shriller one that sounded eerily similar as the one belonging to Mrs. Abigail Goines. You were going over there to screw that young man, weren't you? it said. All that righteousness, and this was just a booty call. You're just disappointed that his body won't be hot from sleep, that you won't be able to throw your own on top of it.

Piper rang the bell, but the Horizon door was open. She called out his name, several times, walked inside reluctantly when no voice answered it. See, this is how people get shot, Piper told herself. They show up unannounced in the middle of the night, just start walking around private property, and then bang, that's it. Piper kept walking, anyway. The only light on besides the lobby's was in Lester's office. Piper, unable to locate another wall switch among the tiles of framed photos of Congressman Marks standing next to major and minor celebrities, moved toward it.

Lester's office was big enough to fit a full couch, several rows of file drawers, and a desk that seem bigger than most kitchen tables. Regardless of how much space the desk offered, every inch of it was still completely covered in paperwork, specifically file folders. It was the photos attached to them that attracted Piper. Some were actual police mug shots, originals it looked like. Others were random streets shots, always taken from a distance, always with the subject staring off in another direction as if they didn't even know they were being photographed. How can I be expected not to open these up and read them? Piper asked no one. How could someone like me manage not to do that?

Horus wasn't following her. He lied, he wasn't following her. He just happened to be there when she came in. "Boss, I said to myself, something suspicious. From the get-go I was like, there's something ain't right about that one. Better keep an eye on her." This was bullshit. The only thing Horus had been following at the time was the swollen nose on his face. Horus had been in the office trying to pick his next special project, something to top Snowden's coup de grace, something to regain his lead. It was because Horus had been so excited he'd come down there in the middle of the night and laid those files out that Piper saw what she did in the first place. "Boss, I said to myself, better watch that bitch." Horus wasn't watching Piper as she went through the files in the office, not for most of that time. Horus was too busy sitting on the crapper, reading auto magazines, the fan too loud to even notice her arrival. He came out the bathroom without flushing or washing his hands, heard the sounds coming from Lester's office and thought it was a ghost in there. He sure did. "I'm on top of things, boss. I'm your man, I think that's pretty clear after these eleven months, ain't it?"

CONSIDERING HE'D MISSED the chance to get the truck's keys from Lester and was instead reduced to delivering them on his bicycle, Bobby Finley was fairly impressed with the amount of Great Works he'd been able to disperse in one night's shift. One milk crate load each run, fifty copies a milk crate, three newspaper boxes a run on a total of eight trips. By nine A.M. every Harlem Outcry box was filled to the brim. Bobby's legs were sore about the abuse, but in a couple of days they would forgive him. The exhaustion became evident as the adrenaline ebbed, but Bobby knew that even if he'd stayed in bed he wouldn't have slept in it. With her out there reading it. It was best to keep focusing on releasing The Great Work back to the world again and be thankful for a monumental task at a time like this.

What was obvious already was that in order to find a home for every copy, more direct measures would be in order. It would have been nice to stick with newspaper boxes, guaranteeing that The Great Work went to homes that at least made a habit of reading, but the feasibility of this plan was questionable, as well as the exclusivity of it. Pedaling around in the morning hours of Harlem, sticking to the center of the street to avoid the muggers and rats that populated the sidewalk, Bobby had decided that to truly make restitution for his artistic arrogance, The Great Work should be dispensed indiscriminately for all, with no care to whether they appreciated, despised, or were utterly indifferent to this most sacred of texts. I am repenting, Bobby kept reminding himself. Just hand them out at the 125th Street A train. Do it right: Reserve the truck in advance, get Snowden and some of the Little Leaders to pack it up the night before, then go down by the turnstiles during rush hour and hand them out like loaves of bread. At least that way, if someone didn't like it, he or she could leave it on the seat for a commuter with better taste.

This was the plan Bobby was prepared to pitch when he found Lester in his office after ten. "I need to ask a favor" was the sentence Bobby never got to utter after Lester motioned him urgently through his office door, closing it behind them.

"A very serious problem has arisen," Lester said, but he didn't have to. The nervousness he exhibited, the uncharacteristic bulging of the eyes, the thumbnail getting chewed off like there was a bomb attached to it.

"It's about the fire, isn't it?" That was Bobby's fear talking. It was his mouth, but it was his fear that was using it because the real Bobby didn't even want to say the F-word aloud anymore, and least of all with this man with whom he intended on seeing out these last weeks before the end of the program in joint denial, as if their shared crime was nothing more than an episode of regrettable sex.

"Well, in part, yes. It does deal with the fire, actually. You see, someone broke into my office. Somebody read my files and knows all about it. Worse, it's a reporter. That's how deep we're in the shit, if you'll pardon me."

Bobby thought, If only I'd given away all my books sooner, if only I'd sat the bottom row of the funerals and offered more direct solace, maybe I just might have karmicly avoided this.

"It gets messier, unfortunately. The good news is we know who the person is and it's doubtful she's had a chance to move on the situation, so this can still be handled neatly. The bad news is, this person touches a little too close to Horizon than is comfortable, even worse is that she's also connected personally to one of our own. Have you had the chance to meet Snowden's lover, Piper Goines, since she's been working with the kids?" Lester asked him.

"Yes," Bobby whispered, the rest of him screaming firmly in the negative. Lester could clearly read his intern's pained reluctance and wagged his head in solemn sympathy as he opened his desk drawer, pulled out a gun, and handed it handle first to him.

"I know this is a very difficult thing to ask of you. I'd prefer it to look like an accident, but I understand we're under a time limitation. I know this is not your style, Robert M. Finley, so let me add that at review time this act will not be taken for granted."

Bobby had never held a gun before. Even pointing away from him, it scared him. I was wrong. Bobby realized now that he had one in his hand. I'm not a killer, it dawned on him. If I was a killer I would just point this forward and shoot Lester in the head.