Мариам Петросян - The Gray House

“Two years and ninety days,” Noble said. “And he still calls me a newbie.”

Tabaqui reached over and patted his arm.

“Sorry, old man. I know this grates on you. But if you were to compare your two with my twelve, you'd understand that I have every right to call you that.”

Noble scrunched up his face as if all his teeth had started aching at the same time. Tabaqui seemed to enjoy that. He even pinked up a little. He lit a cigarette and looked at me with the all-knowing smile of a veteran.

“So... We haven't really learned anything new except how much learning Noble has ahead of him. And still you’re silent.”

I shrugged. Good coffee. Funny Tabaqui. Friendly Noble. I relaxed and decided that it wouldn't be too dangerous to tell them the truth.

“They threw me out,” I confessed. “By a unanimous vote. They drafted a petition to Shark and he agreed. I'm being transferred to another group.”

The wheelers of the Fourth put their cups down and exchanged glances.

“Where to?” Jackal said, trembling with anticipation.

“I don't know. Shark never said. Claims it hasn't been decided yet.”

“Asshole,” Noble spit out. “Lives like one and will die like one.”

“Now wait a minute!” Tabaqui frowned, made some quick calculations in his head, and gaped at us. “It's either us or the Third. No other way.”

They exchanged glances again.

“That's what I thought too,” I said.

We were silent for a while. Rabbit must have really liked saxophones. The boombox on the counter was wailing continuously. The paper lanterns swayed in the breeze.

“So that's why you went asking for Moon River,” Tabaqui mumbled. “I see now.”

“Have a smoke,” Noble said in a pitying voice. “Why aren't you smoking? Tabaqui, give him the cigarettes.”

Jackal absently proffered me the pack. He had very long fingers, like spiders' legs. Very long and very dirty.

“Right,” he said dreamily. “Either/or. Either you find out the color of Vulture's tears, or we all witness the lamentations of Lary.”

“You think Vulture's going to cry?” Noble said.

“Of course. Copiously! Just like Walrus when eating the Oysters.”

“You mean he’ll eat me,” I clarified.

“But with deep sympathy,” Tabaqui said. “He in fact possesses a very gentle and tender soul.”

“Thank you,” I said. “Very comforting.”

Jackal wasn't deaf. He sniffled and reddened a little.

“Well... That was by way of me exaggerating. Slightly. I like scaring people. He's actually a nice guy. A bit out of his head, but only a bit.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“You know what? We should invite him over to our table!” Tabaqui exclaimed suddenly. “Why not? It's a good idea. You can get to know him better, have a little talk. He'd like that.”

I looked around nervously. Vulture wasn't here in the Coffeepot. I knew that for certain, but I still got scared that I might have been mistaken, or that he'd appeared while I wasn't looking, and now Jackal was going to ask him over to meet me.

“Why are you so jumpy?” Tabaqui chided me. “I told you, he's really nice. You get used to him quickly. Besides, he's not here. I meant to invite him over through Birds,” he added nodding at the next table, where two of the sour-faced mourning brigade were playing cards.

“Tabaqui, stop it,” Noble said. “Leave Vulture alone. Our chances to land a new one are much better than the Third's, so if you are really in a hurry go invite Blind.”

Tabaqui scratched himself, fidgeted, grabbed a roll, and swallowed it whole.

“Drat,” he said with a full mouth, showering himself with crumbs. “So much anxiety ...” He picked up all the dropped pieces and stuffed them in too. “I am so anxious! How, oh how would Blind react?”

“Same as always,” Noble said. “He won’t. Whenever has he reacted to anything?”

“You're right,” Tabaqui admitted reluctantly. “Practically never. You see”—he winked at me—“our Leader, may his Leadership days last and last, is blind as a bat and so has some trouble reacting. He usually entrusts it to Sphinx. ‘Do me a favor, react for me,’ he says. So poor little Sphinx ends up reacting double. Maybe that's why he went bald. It must be very tiresome, you know.”

“You're saying he wasn't always bald?” Noble said.

Tabaqui sent him a withering look. “What do you mean, ‘always’? Like born with it? Maybe he was born bald, but by the time I met him, Sphinx had ample hair up top, thank you very much!”

Noble said he could not imagine it. Tabaqui countered that Noble always had trouble with his imagination.

I finally lit a cigarette. Tabaqui's antics made me want to laugh out loud, but I was afraid it would sound like hysterics.

“And besides!” Tabaqui remembered suddenly. “Sphinx christened you. How could I forget? You see how nicely it all fits together? Since you are his godson, he's going to react to you like he's your loving mommy. Happy ending all around.”

I seriously doubted that a bald snitch like Sphinx feeling motherly toward me looked like a happy ending, and I said so.

“Your loss,” Tabaqui said crossly. “Really your loss. Sphinx would make a decent mother. Trust me.”

“Right. Especially if you ask Black.” Noble presented a fake smile. “There he is, by the way. Call him over. He can tell Smoker what kind of mother Sphinx makes.”

“You're twisting my words,” Jackal protested. “I never said for everyone. It goes without saying that as far as Black is concerned, Sphinx is more like a stepmother.”

“An evil one,” Noble said sweetly. “From those German fairy tales that make children scream at night.”

Tabaqui pretended not to hear that.

“Hey! Over here, old man,” he shouted, waving his arms. “We’re right here! Look this way! Hello-o! I'm afraid his eyes are completely shot,” he said with concern, grabbing the last of the rolls. “That's because of all those weights. Pumping iron is not as healthy as it's cracked up to be, you know. And what's more important,” he continued after consuming the roll in two gulps, “he needs to watch his calorie intake. So it would be a good thing not to leave too many carbs lying around. Isn't that right, Black?”

Black, a morose fellow with a blond buzz cut, approached with a chair that he swiped on the way, placed it next to Noble, sat down, and stared at me.

“What's right?”

“That you shouldn't overeat. That you're heavy as it is.”

Black said nothing. He really was heavy, but certainly not from overeating. He appeared to have been constructed that way. Then he had bulked up his muscles on various pieces of equipment and become even more imposing. A tank top left his biceps exposed, and I was studying them appreciatively while he was studying me. Tabaqui informed him that I was being transferred, and most likely to the Fourth, to them.

“Unless it's the Third, except it's not, because it's obvious that when you have a choice you always choose where there's more free space.”

“So?” was the extent of Black's response. His arms looked like hams, and his blue eyes seemed unblinking.

Tabaqui was crestfallen.

“What do you mean, ‘so’? You are the first to get an exclusive scoop!”

“And what am I supposed to do with it?”

“You're supposed to be astonished! Surprised, at the very least!”

“I am surprised.”

Black got up, bumping a paper lantern with his head, and went to sit at an empty table two spaces over from us. There he proceeded to extract a paperback from his vest pocket and transferred his attention to it, blinking myopically.

“There,” Tabaqui fumed. “And to think we were denigrating Blind's responses. Compared to Black, he is vitality incarnate!”