Jeffery Allen - Holding Pattern - Stories

Ward gripped the arms of his chair and scooted to the edge of the seat, face extended over the desk, in breathing distance. Immobilized, the police superintendent continued to glare at him, even as the sun began to suddenly shift its position, a spotlight pivoting around the police superintendent until it took up a new station, where it beamed down at him from a furious angle and fired his face, brick like in ever-brightening colors. This police superintendent, singled out for illumination, his chest rising and falling, crashing waves on his chest. After some time, his posture eased, his shoulders relaxed. He cupped his hands underneath his belly and began rocking in the chair, his nose hairs visible one moment, gone the next, visible, gone, and so on.

“As you know, in this suspect we are dealing with a man who has been fortunate enough to travel in some of our most distinguished circles, not to mention the”—he stroked hairs curling out of his chest like barbed wire—“access he has—”

“I’ve been thinking,” Ward said.

At these words, the police superintendent rocked to a halt and fixed his gaze on Ward.

“Would you take my hand in marriage?”

The police superintendent grabbed the edges of the desk and leaned in close. “Look! I am appealing to your—”

“Don’t refuse me.”

“—better nature.” His nostrils blew hot air into Ward’s face. “A selfless act. Lives in the balance. After all, you gain as well. Your time to shine.”

“So thoughtful of you. Such abundance of caution and concern.”

The police superintendent poised over his desk, staring at Ward, indignation, abhorrence, annihilation.

It was cold where he lay, and under his head was a cold pillow. The yellowed glow of street lamps seeping under and around the edges of the window shade, frail wisps of light spinning like ballet dancers in the dark, with a reserved wind tapping modest applause against the paned glass. He shut his eyes and let the world spin free. The next thing he knew, he had spun out of orbit, his brain ricocheting off the black walls of his skull. He opened his eyes and found darkness in slow dissolution.

“Everything all right in there?” A hand pounded muffled words into the door. He turned the cold pearl of his pillowed face in the direction of the sound. Still no visual evidence that the door even existed, but he knew it was there, shadows crawling — black crabs — in the strip of light under its frame.

He listened to the wet whine of the rusty radiator. Snuggled under the covers, nose-deep in layered warmth, peeking over the top quilt at the shadowed ceiling.

“Hey!”

“Just relax.”

“The police superintendent will be here soon.”

“Just relax.” He turned back the bedcovers. Shivered to a cold greeting of air. Kicked his feet out from under the sheets. Sat upright in the bed — a cot, really, a narrow iron frame, small and set low — lax springs sagging under his insignificant weight. Placed his feet on the cold wooden floor. Seeing the thin window shade aglow with faint illumination, he tried unsuccessfully to convince himself that he felt its warmth on his skin. He bent forward and fingered the shade, which snapped back up on its roller, allowing morning light to rush into the room like a gate crasher — he shut his eyes.

“Hey!”

The shade spun and flapped. Some comfort in its sound.

“Relax. I’ll be right out.” He opened his eyes and reached up and pulled the shade, and a measure of darkness, down to its proper place. The window was completely frosted. Impossible to see through. He crossed his arms tightly about his chest and trembled as he stood. Circled the bed, arranging the bedcovers — folding ends, tucking edges, patting surfaces smooth. Removed two small plastic freezer-storage bags from the nightstand drawer, angled the fingers of one hand, then the other, inside each bag — translucent mittens — and lined the insides of his leather loafers, which were stationed on the seat of a wooden chair, the one black suit he owned draped over the chair back. He set the shoes on the floor between the chair legs. Rubbed his fingers diligently and carefully over a spot on the blazer’s collar. Satisfied, he folded the suit across his forearm and carried it over to the closet, where he squatted and took his thermal underwear and wool socks from a cardboard box positioned in a corner, with two additional suits, one brown, the other dark blue, hanging above it. He set the several items of clothing on the chair, removed the top blanket from the bed, wrapped the blanket around his shoulders, smoothed the bedcovers, and exited the room with the clothing bunched against his chest.

Hands shoved in his pockets, a young officer who had spent the entire night outside Ward’s door — his guardian, his warden — sat slumped over on a stool wearing his department-issued cap and jacket, the side of his young face barely visible in sixty-watt gloom. He turned his head and peered up at Ward, one corner of his mouth twisted as if he were biting down on something. The sight of Ward changed the look in his eyes, the angle of his chin, the red polish of his cheeks. He pulled his hands from his pockets, sat as straight as he possibly could on the stool, and redirected his gaze to a neutral wall.

Ward pulled one side of the blanket tighter about his shoulders. “Fine job,” he said.

The young officer remained perfectly still, like someone sitting for a photograph, though Ward detected a faint suggestion of some forbidden emotion rising into his face.

Some time later, Ward came down the hall in sock feet, fully dressed otherwise, with the blanket shawled (sprawled warmth) around his shoulders; he was saddened to discover the young officer still at his post outside his room, now leaning forward on the stool, hands stuffed inside his pockets, head bowed, teeth chattering. For a moment Ward’s hands and legs refused to carry him forward, his thoughts spiraling around him in dark constricting bands. Before long he was able to move close enough that, if he so chose, he could offer a full sentence or two of consolation and support. However, his thoughts were soft in his wet insides like the tissues of coral but petrified when they hit the air. He settled on putting a firm hand on the officer’s shoulder, a touch that altered the crumpled tone of the other’s body.

Ward entered the room, dismayed to find the police superintendent stretched out on his cot, arms folded, pretzel-like, behind his head — not unlike how Ward himself might have been positioned in times past, less somber days — the mattress sagging under him, white bottom almost touching the dark floor, and the high sack of his belly like some missile preparing for launch through the ceiling. His breathing, a labored wheezing, did not come easy, some beached sea creature. He adjusted himself, turning slightly, bed-springs straining and squeaking. It was only then that Ward saw a white derby adorning his windowsill, drawing attention like some ill-placed trophy.

He stood there, astounded. “Glad you see fit,” he said.

The police superintendent turned his head and looked Ward up and down, disgusted, an action of such surprising force that Ward’s lips parted like a budding flower, shocked air pushing through, the bones in his legs starting to crumble and powder.

“Have a seat.”

Ward collapsed into the chair beside the bed.

“Crazy damn hours.”

“Don’t blame me.”

“No, I won’t. I can send your friend a note of thanks and—”

“He’s not my friend.”

“Oh no? Then how would you describe him?”

Ward sat there watching his other.

“Please, hold nothing back. I wish to make every effort to understand.”

Ward shrugged the shawl from his shoulders, onto the chair back, and bent forward in the chair, the plastic-lined shoes at his feet. “There’s nothing to understand.”