Tick Tock

Chapter 28

IT WAS ALMOST EIGHT A.M. by the time Berger got back to his apartment.

Inside the high, dim alcove, he actually genuflected before Salvador Dali's first painting, praying to the great Spaniard for help and strength.

He remembered a quote from the Master. "At the age of six, I wanted to be a cook. At seven, I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since."

Berger stood, smiling. Each moment, each breath, came that much sweeter the closer he approached his death. In the beginning, he had been afraid when he thought about how things would turn out. Now he saw that it all made perfect sense. He was glad.

In the apartment's imposing library, Berger slowly removed all of his clothing. He lifted the remote control and stood before the massive screen of the $50,000 103-inch Panasonic plasma TV. He glanced at the butter-soft leather recliner where he'd sat to watch all his favorite movies, but he didn't sit down. For this, he preferred to stand.

He clicked on the set. There was a commercial for a feminine product and then Matt Lauer filled the wall of the room.

"Without further ado," Lauer said, "let's cut to the Plaza and The Show."

A young black man in a full-out orange prison jumpsuit covered in gold chains winked from the screen.

"Ya'll ready to make some noise?" The Show wanted to know. Behind him, a retinue of other prison-suited young male and female backup singers and dancers of every race were standing, still as Buckingham Palace guards, waiting for the first drop of bass to start kicking it freestyle.

Many of the young people in the crowd had cell phones in their hands and were recording the momentous occasion. Berger lifted his own phone, but it wasn't to take a picture.

It was to paint his own.

He pressed the speed dial.

"And one, two," The Show said.

"Show's over," Berger said.

There was a flash of light. A startling blast of sound followed by a long, cracking echo. The Show stood there, microphone to his gaping mouth, as the camera panned over his shoulder onto a plume of smoke. In 1080 HD with Dolby Surround, Berger was psyched.

He changed to Channel Two.

CBS's Early Show was on. The host, some slutty-looking bimbo, was grilling fish out on the studio's 59th and Fifth Avenue plaza with none other than celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck.

"Ja, you see? Ja," Wolfgang said.

"Ja, Volfie, I see, I see," Berger said as he thumbed another speed-dial button for the second device he'd planted next to the corner garbage can at the chef's back.

Another explosion, even louder than the first, happened immediately. Someone started screaming.

"That's what you get," Berger chided, clicking over to ABC.

Diane Sawyer was interviewing a sportswriter who was shilling his latest vapid tear-jerking bestseller. They were outside on one of ABC's Times Square Studios' roof plazas.

"Tell me, where do you get your ideas?" Diane wanted to know.

"On second thought, don't," Berger said as he dialed the third bomb that he'd left in the center of Times Square, down on the street beneath her.

The sound was softer, which made sense due to the elevation, Berger thought, looking down at the Oriental carpet. Had there been a little glass-shattering in that one? He nodded with a grin. Indeed, there had been. Exceptional!

Satisfied, he shut off the massive set. Watching the ensuing chaos would prove-What? People were afraid of explosives? He knew that already. Better than most. Now it was time to rest up before lunch.

He was actually pretty proud of the bombs. They were simple, Venti-size sticks of dynamite attached to a Wi-Fi antenna wired to a watch battery with a thin piece of detcord for the boost. Not huge, but just big enough to make everybody scared shitless. Big enough to make everyone start to carefully ponder their next step.

With high explosives, it was all about the real estate. Location, location, location.

He went into his bathroom and opened the tap. He dropped in the bubble soap and bath crystals and lit some candles. On the sound system, he put on a new CD that he'd gotten at Bed Bath amp; Beyond. He popped a couple of Vitamin P-is-for-Percocets and slid into the warm water as a woman's voice rang like an angel's off the glowing white Tyrolean marble walls.

"Who can say where the road flows?" Berger sang along.

He closed his eyes. "Where the day goes? Only time."