Lust Demented

{III}

THE CHOKESMOKE NYC AIR HIT my lungs offering up a different lick of instinct. I had to watch my every impulse, as the people that would be doing the same were not to be trusted. Smooth survival was making sure to walk with purpose at all times. Detective Anderson followed me through Gramercy with the swiftness. He wasn’t undercover. He knew I knew he was watching me. He wanted me to know.

Percy’s designer clothes felt soft against my skin. I didn’t snatch them up today and I didn’t steal them. The old conniving bastard actually gave them to me. It was his idea. Absurd, that after all the years of trying to infiltrate the world Percy controlled, he was the one that approached me. At first I thought he was guilty about Missy choosing him over me. Then I came to my senses and realized he looked at her as more of a literary whore than myself. It was a competitive stable of a brothel: This incestual world of words. Percy, a writer himself, was under the same blessed curse. He wanted to give me a place to live. Give me clean clothes. Thing is: He forgot how he became what he was. I could live anywhere. I could wear anything. So I felt nothing about the Queens coffin he placed me in.

Detective Anderson slowed to my creep. Every time I caught his eyes a dozen ways to ditch him entered my mind. I wondered why he just didn’t cuff me to the scaffolding of Featherton Publishing. Was he nervous I would try to take the whole building down with me? Was he afraid I would wither away of starvation and heatstroke like a mangy hyena in the Serengeti? There are more convenient maneuvers to antagonize the grim reaper.

I didn’t have the key to Gramercy Park, but it was easy enough to hop that pathetic fence. I wasn’t sure if they were trying to keep people out or in. For some reason I expected Detective Anderson to do the same. Instead he just reached in his pocket and whipped it out, shutting the gate gently, so not to bring notice of his presence to the others patrons.

I was exhausted, overwhelmed. I collapsed in the first available spot that was more grass than dirt. Detective Anderson towered over me like a sentimental grizzly.

“Farrow most murderers return to the scene of the crime.” The statement made me want to lie down in the middle of the A-train’s tracks and chant doo-wop with the subway rats.

“This wasn’t the scene of the crime.”

“Close enough.” I could feel the Featherton townhouse radiating hellborn vapors beyond the gates. Shut your eyes and everything will go away. My head was a heavy shell. I was fading fast. Let the lids ease closed. A little bird was bouncing in front of me. They were all over the city. Easy not to notice. Squeaking and tweeting. Fade to inner silence… come easy dreams...

“I met someone that can help you.” Missy and I were on a rooftop somewhere in Hell’s Kitchen. It was summer, but not the summer of the current year. The buildings hanging in our shadows had a superficial incandescence. I already had my share of the conversation from the sharp breath of entry, but Missy wouldn’t let up.

“Oh yeah…”

“Featherton Publishing mean anything to you?”

“Who is it? An editor…? A mail clerk…? A family connection…? A friend of a friend of a friend…?”

“Featherton himself Farrow. He tried to pick me up. I didn’t realize who he was at first, until he told me, and when I did - I immediately thought of you. Percy Featherton…” I could feel her poking me as she moaned his name.

“Percy Featherton is de…” I woke up mid-sentence. The finger poking me belonged to Detective Anderson. He was standing over me with mysterious urgency. His jaw was clenched. His eyes were crossed in the most disturbing fashion.