Justin Tussing - Vexation Lullaby

“If this is because you don’t have insurance, you should know the hospital won’t turn you away.”

“I’ve got too much insurance.” Jimmy cleared his throat. “What do you say? Can we do this face-to-face? This feels a bit too Catholic for me.”

The green LED on his microwave told Peter it was nearly midnight. “I’m just trying to save us both some time.”

“Me, too. Here’s my offer: come see me and I’ll pay you Ogata’s rate. I’d consider it a personal favor.”

If Jimmy was willing to pay him, what was the purpose of the favor? And if he wanted a favor, why had he offered to pay? “How do you know my mother?”

“You could say personally and historically.”

It was not the answer Peter expected, but it was the sort of answer a friend of Judith might give. Another thing: Peter felt elated. Despite the threat of rockslide, runaway trucks, and the improperly vented kerosene space heater that glowed all night in her kitchen, his mother was almost certainly okay.

Peter had been home since six with nothing to show for it except a dent in the sofa cushion, a sofa — tufted, tan leather — he’d selected because it resembled one he recalled Lucy pointing out in a catalog. “Okay.”

“Don’t stand me up.”

“I’m a doctor.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m on my way.”

The hotel’s glowing white marquee read: Welcome 14th Annual Helping Peoples Conference.

Neon letters inside a neon arrow spelled Garage. Peter followed the sign around a corner and down an alley. A white gate barred the entrance. Beside the control box, a big guy in a yellow Windbreaker, a lineman gone to seed, stood sentinel. One of his giant hands pinched a walkie-talkie and a D-cell flashlight.

Peter opened his window. “I’m here to see a guest. I’m a doctor.” He patted a backpack on the passenger seat — its contents: a first-aid kit Peter had put together years earlier in preparation for a hike through Wyoming’s Wind River valley. That trip, a reward for finishing medical school, was to have involved white-water rafting, packhorses, and a bear-proof plastic barrel he would suspend from a tree each night. Planning the trip had been the most adventurous thing he’d ever done. In his closet Peter kept a pair of glossy Italian hiking boots that had only known tile and carpet.

The guard barked something into his walkie-talkie. “They’re expecting you on the top floor,” he said, turning to feed a card into the machine.

A ball of light exploded against the passenger-side window. Peter’s attention jumped to a gaunt figure in an ankle-length duster approaching his car; the man held a camera out before him like a dowsing rod. The flash detonated again.

“I told you to get lost,” barked the watchman.

The camera lens clacked against the window, like a lover’s teeth. A capacitor released its charge and the xenon gas painted the doctor with white light.

“Somebody about to get a camera up his ass,” said the guard.

When the gate lifted, Peter goosed the throttle. Checking his rearview mirror, he expected the photographer to chase after him, but the man was nowhere.

He corkscrewed his way up the structure. Fluorescent bulbs gave off a jaundiced light. Emerging from beneath the low ceiling, Peter reached the top of the garage and parked.

A small glass atrium, like a miniature greenhouse, connected the garage to the hotel. Inside, a man in a black-satin bomber jacket frowned at Peter’s fifteen-year-old Subaru.

The man slapped a blue pad on the wall, causing the atrium door to yawn open.

“You Peter?” The man was short, oval-shaped. An overturned bowl of black hair (or was it a toupee?) cupped the top of his head. He had to be sixty.

“I am,” Peter said, grabbing his backpack. “Some weirdo took my picture.”

“That’d be Pennyman. You know ‘Jerkwater Blues,’ the ‘ tangle of Coney Island jetsam ’? Supposedly that’s Pennyman. He thinks he’s Jimmy’s biographer.”

“You’re not Jimmy.”

“I’m Bluto,” the man said. “Pennyman’s at every show. It’s not clear if he’s following us or if we’re following him.”

Bluto pushed open a fire door, into a quiet hallway where a custodian in a blue jumpsuit agitated a section of carpet with a steam cleaner.

Peter sifted through what the man had said. Only after a solution occurred to him did he realize he’d been trying to solve a riddle. The answer was absurd, but acknowledging the absurdity didn’t dismiss it. “The person who called me, that wasn’t the singer Jimmy Cross.”

“Folks don’t usually accuse him of singing.”

“But, that was him?”

“Did you think you were going to see some regular shmuck? ”

“What’s he doing in Rochester?”

“Shit, Jimmy loves this place. He’s crazy about your cinnamon rolls, middle-brow architecture, and perchy tap water.” Bluto reached up and patted his own hair, as though soothing a pet. “Why do you think he’s here? He played a show.”

Up ahead, a door opened and a guy emerged wearing a narrow tank top, leather shorts, and a neoprene knee brace. “Bluto, don’t forget I need a king bed in Bowling Green. Moira’s meeting me there.”

Bluto held his BlackBerry out, tapped a finger on the screen. “King-sized bed for king-sized appetites. I sent you a confirmation half an hour ago.”

The man assessed Peter. “You the new Kev?”

“The new Kev’s meeting us in Buffalo. This is a friend of the Big Man.”

“I thought you were someone else,” the man said, retreating into his room. “I’m Fletcher. I’m in charge of sound.”

“Be sure Moira leaves that dog at home,” Bluto said, sliding his phone back in his pocket.

The guy responsible for sound looked stricken. “She can’t go anywhere without that dog; it’s for her anxiety.”

“Not my problem,” Bluto said. “No pets. No companions with pets. It’s in your contract.”

“She won’t come without that dog. You never heard of the Americans with Disabilities Act?”

“We’re not going down the pet road, Fletch,” Bluto said, dragging Peter away.

When the two men had turned a corner, Bluto said, “Fletch is sober now, but he’s the only guy Black Sabbath ever fired for partying too hard. One time he passed out in the monkey enclosure at the Berlin Zoo.”

Bluto stopped next to a door and held up a finger. He knocked. The door opened partway and an Asian guy in a yellow knit hat stuck his head out. “I need you to pull Fletch’s contract and make sure we put in a ‘no pet’ clause. If there isn’t one, add it and backdate it.”

“You got a baby in there?” the man asked, pointing at Peter’s backpack.

Peter hugged his bag. “Diagnostic tools.”

“Excuse Wayne,” Bluto said, “he doesn’t have a filter.”

Wayne said, “I’m just pointing out how he’s carrying it in front of him instead of, like, on his shoulders. You know those fathers in Brooklyn who bring their babies to a bar, order Belgian beer, and play Dolly Parton on the jukebox? That’s the way you’re presenting yourself.”

Bluto shook his head. “Dr. Silver is here to see the Big Man.”

“No offense meant,” Wayne said, tugging his hat down over his eyebrows. “I figured you were someone else.”

Bluto repeated that the new Kev would be joining them in Buffalo.

They passed another elevator, turned a corner, and ran into a giant, pumpkin-faced man in a navy pinstriped suit.

“Cyril, meet our mystery guest.”

The large man stepped toward them, eclipsing the overhead lights.

“You the doctor?” Cyril asked.

Peter said he was.

Cyril sucked on a lower lip as dark and plump as a plum. “I still got to wand you and look in that bag.”