The Mark

5

I grimaced at my latest statement, and wondered if the bank laughed every time they saw my meager deposits. I could pay half my current rent and find a studio twice as big in Brooklyn or Queens, but as long as I didn’t mind crackers and an apple for lunch, the aura of living in the city made it all worthwhile.

Getting used to the random, spooky noises in my apartment was a different matter. Every night I heard the scratching of tiny claws, water dripping from invisible pipes. Work allowed me to focus. Thank God, because everything else would drive me insane.

I was living the life I’d wanted ever since the first time my father told me I wouldn’t amount to shit. My mother standing in the kitchen, smiling like we’d just returned from a fishing trip with nothing but tall tales. Always smiling, like a wax sculpture with a pulse. Distant. Not uncaring, just removed from reality. Some people get lost in their demons. Me, I preferred to turn the tables, let anger fuel my fire. Every word my father said was gasoline. My own resolve was the match.

And now I had the chance to work with a legend. O’Donnell was well into his sixties, but his face was full and bright, cheeks lined and reddened by age. At the keyboard his fingers flew and his eyes were like gateways into another world. By trusting me with an assignment, Jack had given me a taste. And once I got a mouthful, it would bring out the best in me.

When I arrived at the Gazette I grabbed a tape recorder from the A/V room, went to my desk and dialed Luis Guzman.

A man with a thick Hispanic accent answered, “Hello?”

“Hi, Mr. Guzman, this is Henry Parker from the New York Gazette. Did Jack O’Donnell tell you I’d be calling?”

“ Si. He said a young associate would be getting in touch about an interview. Would that be you?”

“That’s me. Do you mind if I stop by today for a few minutes? It won’t take long.” There was a pause, hesitation.

“I don’t know, Mr. Henry. Today’s not so good. I have an appointment later.”

He was evading the conversation, just like Jack said.

“What time is your appointment?”

“My appointment? It’s, ah, seven o’clock.”

“So you won’t mind if I come at six then.”

I heard mumbling in the background. A woman’s voice said something that sounded like No. Then Luis came back.

“Mr. Henry, I can talk for just a few minutes if you come over at six, but you can’t stay for long. I cannot miss my appointment. Is for the doctor.”

What kind of doctor had appointments at 7:00 p.m.?

“It shouldn’t take long, Mr. Guzman. You’ll have plenty of time.” More mumbling. A door slammed.

“If that’s so, then come on over. My wife and I will be here.”

“Great, see you tonight.”

At a quarter to six I left the office and flagged a cab. As the cabbie zigzagged through traffic, I read the quickie bio Jack had given me.

In 1997, Luis Guzman was arrested for armed robbery after he and an associate named Jose Ramirez Sanchez walked into a Chase branch and pulled two semi-automatics. Sanchez got nervous and shot a clerk. Both men were sent to Sing Sing. Guzman did three years. Ramirez Sanchez was stabbed to death in his cell.

When I arrived at 105th and Broadway, I rang the buzzer, wondering why Luis had seemed so agitated on the phone.

The building didn’t look as if it met the hand of a janitor too often. The floors were dusty and smudged, and the lobby decor consisted of three flower pots whose flowers had come from needlepoint rather than seed. I checked the directory encased behind a dirty pane of glass. The superintendent, Grady Larkin, lived in apartment B1. I jotted this down, just in case.

I rode the elevator to the second floor. The hallway was wallpapered in light green with vertical beige stripes. The doors were gray and most of the hinges looked old and rusted. The light fixtures cast a soft glow. There was a strange quiet in the building like a hospital waiting room, awkward and forced. Walking down the hall I noticed that several doors lacked nameplates and the carpeting in front wasn’t dirty like the others. The apartments were obviously vacant.

I found apartment 2C and knocked once. Before I had a chance to collect myself, the door opened.

“Mr. Parker?”

The man in front of me was big. That was my first thought. Damn this guy is big.

Biceps are a misleading measure of strength. You can tell a person’s true power from their forearms. Luis’s looked like half a dozen ropes had been wound together and then singed.

He was wearing a white undershirt, tucked into a pair of gray suit pants that looked freshly ironed. A small piece of tissue was matted to his chin where he’d cut himself shaving. A thin scar, barely noticeable, ran horizontal over one eyebrow. A prison wound sewed up poorly. His goatee was perfectly groomed, his cheeks smooth and moisturized. He smelled like a botanical garden had thrown up all over him. There was a kindness in Luis Guzman’s eyes, as though all evil thoughts had been sucked completely dry. Then his eyes flickered, and Luis glanced into the hallway. For an instant, I swore there was fear in his eyes. I checked the hallway; it was empty.

A layer of flab had settled like frosting over his midsection. Luis Guzman had probably been well-toned in prison, where months were counted in dumbbell repetitions, but since being released Luis’s appetite had returned.

I eyed his natty attire. Must be an expensive doctor to warrant this kind of dress code.

“Hi, I’m Henry. We spoke before.”

“Yes, so nice to meet you, Mr. Henry.” Suddenly Luis’s hand was gripping mine. Tight. I gritted my teeth and hoped he’d let go before my knuckles were ground into paste. When he eased up I made sure my bones were intact. Luis’s iron grip was effortless, easy as a pat on the back. “And that beautiful mamacita is my wife, Christine. Say hello, baby.”

“Hello, baby,” she said with a sly grin. Christine had honey-colored skin, with long brown hair and deep green eyes. She sat on an overstuffed couch, holding a pair of knitting needles, her hands working fervently on what looked like a baby’s sweater.

“So, Henry,” Luis said, a contemplative look on his face. “Senor O’Donnell tells me you have a few questions about my jail time.” Luis smiled. His teeth were perfectly straight, a little too white for a man who had eaten nothing but prison food for three years. He must have had serious dental work.

“That’s right,” I said.

“Well, come on in, make yourself at home.”

He draped a trunk of an arm around my neck and led me to a freshly varnished pine table. The apartment was tidy, well kept, but it had a sterile cleanliness. There were no photos, no trinkets, no paintings or posters anywhere in sight. Except for Christine’s knitting, it felt more like a place of business than a residence.

Luis pulled a chair out for me as I set up the tape recorder. For a moment he seemed unnerved by its presence, then calmed a bit.

“So, Mr. Henry, what you want to talk about? Let us begin, I have only a few minutes before my appointment.”

“No problem, thanks again for doing this.”

“Oh,” he said, laughing. “I don’t do this for Jack. My parole officer tells me it keeps me respectable looking.”

“Of course.” I clicked the recorder on. “First off, would you state your name and date of birth for the record?”

Luis cleared his throat theatrically.

“My name is Luis Rodrigo Guzman. I was born on July 19th, 1970.”

“Okay, Luis, what’s your most vivid memory of your time in prison?”

Luis sat back in his chair, then suddenly stood up. He went into the kitchen, poured a glass of water. He offered it to me. I politely declined. Taking a long sip, he rested his elbows on the wood and spoke softly.

“That’s a tough one. But I have to say the RTA.”

“RTA?”

“Rehabilitation through the arts. It’s a program they have up in Ossining. They bring in instructors to help us to get in touch with ourselves by being creative. Not in a dirty way.”

I nodded. “Go on.”

“Once a year the inmates, almost all guys in maximum security doing twenty-five-to-life, but a few others thrown into the mix, the RTA helps them put on a play. My first couple years I made fun of the guys who did it, said prison made them into fags.”

I noticed Christine’s gaze harden, her brow furrowed.

“So my last year inside I said what the heck, if I did it I might get points for good behavior. So I auditioned for a Kentucky Williams’s play called The Glass Menagerie. ”

“Tennessee Williams,” I corrected.

“What’s that?”

“Nothing. Go on.”

“So I audition for the part of the ‘Gentleman Caller.’ A week later the director, this big cholo named Willie who’s in for double homicide, tells me I got the part. The gentleman’s real name is Jim O’Connor, but the audience don’t really know him by that. So we’re rehearsing three hours a day, really busting our asses. At first things are kinda jokey, you know, ’cause we have guys playing the part of girls. So in the play, I’m supposed to go out with this girl, Laura-played by my buddy Ralph Francisco. Even go so far as to kiss Ralph on the cheek. Laura’s a cripple who’s been waiting her whole life for something good to happen, and spends her whole time polishing these little glass animals. So she finds out my character’s engaged, and it just kills her. Soon as I walked off stage opening night, I busted out crying. We did four shows. The first three were for the general population, but the last one we did it in front of five hundred people from the outside. I’m talking wives, parents, children. It was the best night of my life.”

Luis’s voice was soft, but the emotion was unmistakable. He dabbed at his eyes, took another sip of water, then continued.

“Anyway, this play, it’s about what you want and what you can’t have. Made me think about why I was inside in the first place. I always wanted something I couldn’t have, and then when I thought I had it, turns out it was nothing but bullshit. That’s my most vivid memory, Mr. Henry.”

For a half hour, Luis poured his heart out to me. He laughed, cried, but never asked me to turn the tape off. I learned how he met Christine at a Harlem poetry reading after his release. How she was knitting clothing for a child they hadn’t yet conceived. That he worked as a security guard and pulled in $23,000 a year, before taxes. I learned that he was the happiest man in the world because he was supporting the woman he loved under a roof he paid for.

When he mentioned the apartment, a small chime went off in my head. Christine didn’t work. The apartment, I estimated, based on my own home’s pitiful dimensions, was a solid thousand square feet, at least. Not bad for a guy barely above the poverty line.

At six-thirty, Luis stood up and clicked off the tape recorder.

“And now I need to get ready for my appointment.” I stood up as well. He took my hand and ground more meta-carpals into powder.

“Thanks, Luis, it’s been a pleasure.”

“All mine, Mr. Henry. So, Henry wants to write newspaper stories. Well, I wish you all the best of luck.”

As I left I watched Luis close the door, his eyes disappearing as the bolt latched home. Right before it closed I saw that fear again. And saw there was more to this man than even Jack O’Donnell knew.

Sitting in the back of a Greek diner, shoveling souvlaki into my mouth, I listened to the tape of Luis’s interview. Tomorrow I’d transcribe it for Wallace and Jack, highlighting the best parts. This was my chance to prove I could hunt with the big boys. Jack O’Donnell, a living legend of the newsroom, would review my work for his story. There was some great stuff on the tape. But the more I listened, I couldn’t help but listen to the trembling in Luis’s voice. Something was eating at him while we talked.

The more Luis spoke in that quivering tone, I knew he was holding back. He’d lied about the doctor’s appointment-hell, I’d done the same thing to get out of work before-but Luis was dressed to the hilt, like he was preparing for a wedding or a funeral. And I didn’t buy for a second that he could afford that apartment on $23,000 a year. There was more to this man than what I’d caught on tape.

I needed to know more, to pry out of Luis Guzman what caused the fear behind that voice. But Jack had given me an agenda. I did what he asked, no more, no less, but it didn’t sit right. There was more to Luis Guzman, and I had to find out what it was. Christine would be home. Maybe she could shine a light.

Stuffing the tape recorder and notebook into my backpack, I left the diner and headed back to the Guzmans’ apartment. I walked into the building on the coattails of another tenant who was kind enough to hold the door. I only had one chance to do this right. Christine might be reluctant. I might have to lean on her, tell her it was in Luis’s best interests. Hopefully she’d answer me honestly, thoughtfully, and then I could give Wallace and Jack the full picture.

The elevator opened and I strode toward apartment 2C with visions of a firm handshake from Jack O’Donnell and a pat on the back from Wallace Langston. I felt warm, invigorated, and knew I was doing my job right.

And that’s when I heard the screams.