In Nine Kinds of Pain Read online

  “Your call sounded urgent,” Father Bologna says. “Is that the case?”

  “It’s urgent, Father, yes,” Costa says.

  Father Bologna is a short man, but his dynamic Romanesque features define him more readily than his stature. He is handsome and engaging, and Father Costa always felt that if he had to cast Father Bologna in a gladiator film, he would make him the emperor. But Father Bologna is slowing with age, and his eyesight isn’t what it used to be, and the thought of having to live one minute on this earth without his mentor makes Father Costa want to curl up into the fetal position and die.

  Both men sit in the same pew, and Father Bologna stares straight ahead, taking the pressure of immediacy away from Father Costa.

  “I had to bring someone here, Father,” Costa says, “and I’m not exactly sure what I should do.”

  “I don’t understand,” Father Bologna says.

  “Well, I mean, this guy, see. . . .” Costa says. He unclips his collar. He looks at Father Bologna and sees that the man is already praying for him, a rosary and a travel-sized version of the Bible (the thing is at least fifty years old) clutched in his folded hands. Costa wishes he had a drink now. He would call out to the drink like a yodel into an open canyon and hope that the clouds would open to the magic of a Smirnoff rain shower.

  “Take your time,” Father Bologna says.

  A sound of the chapel door opening prompts both men to turn and face the aisle. A tall dark man in green scrubs (and the traditional stethoscope dangling from the neck) quickly approaches them. The doctor’s lower shirt is splashed in blood.

  “Which one of you is Father Costa?” the doctor asks.

  “I’m Father Costa,” Costa says, slowly standing. “Anthony. I brought the man in, if that’s what you’re going to ask next.”

  The doctor nods. His eyes are tense. “I’m Dr. Patrick Saenz. You told the police that the man just appeared on your doorstep?”

  “Yes.”

  “He’s no relation to you?” Dr. Saenz asks.

  “No, of course not,” Costa says. “Why would you ask such a thing?”

  “I don’t know. There’s a strong resemblance between you two. Didn’t you notice?”

  “No,” Costa says. “I just saw blood.”

  “Okay. And he didn’t say anything? He just collapsed?”

  “Yes.”

  Dr. Saenz nods. “I’d like to know if you’ve seen anything like this before,” he says. “You know, someone nailing someone to a cross, or someone purposefully stigmatizing themselves.”

  Father Costa shrugs. “Not in person,” he says. “Only in those, you know, shows about the Philippines and such, where fanatics do that type of thing, nailing themselves to crosses. But I’ve never seen it up-close. Why? Is that what this is?”

  “I don’t know,” Dr. Saenz says. “I mean, he has none of the usual markings for something like that. No nails driven through his hands or feet or anything.”

  “But isn’t that usually done on Good Friday?”

  “I guess,” Dr. Saenz says. “But I’m just telling you what I saw.”

  “Well, can I see him?” Costa asks.

  Dr. Saenz frowns, and then says, “I’m sorry. He passed away a few moments ago.”

  Costa looks over to the seated Father Bologna, whose mouth moves as he quietly recites his prayers, and then looks back to Dr. Saenz. He’s not sure what he should be feeling at this moment. He didn’t know the man. The man came from out of nowhere and intruded on his day, plopped himself right into Father Costa’s lap as he was about to head for the store. A nice stroll through the parish, now gone. He can never get that time back. It’s gone forever. Gone forever thanks to a dying stranger at his door, one who bled all over everything.

  “He died of what appears to be a severe beating,” Dr. Saenz says. “We found multiple deep contusions and some cuts that went well beyond the subcutaneous tissues. A lot of lacerations all over. Probably some circulatory shock occurred prior to you finding him. In other words, he couldn’t have done this to himself. And something else we’re looking into is the possibility of hematidrosis, which is a bleeding disorder where there’s a hemorrhage of blood into the sweat glands. But we don’t know yet. His skin was very delicate.”

  “What would cause that type of sweat gland bleeding?” Costa asks.

  “Well, it might not be that,” Dr. Saenz says, “but if it is, it’s usually caused by emotional trauma or something of that nature. But we’re looking at the possibility that it’s eccrine chromidrosis, so we don’t know for sure. But, really, that doesn’t matter. The bottom line is this guy took a hell of a beating.”

  “Thank you, doctor,” Costa says. “I’ll keep in touch.”

  “Well, there’s a chance some officers might want to speak to you,” Dr. Saenz says. “Will you be at this address the rest of the evening?” He pulls a slip of paper from his pocket and holds it up for Costa to see. Costa nods. Dr. Saenz shakes his hand, and walks away.

  “Father?” Costa says. Father Bologna whispers a few more words of prayer, then lifts his eyes to Father Costa. “Father, what does this mean for me?”

  Father Bologna gently squeezes Father Costa’s left arm and motions for him to sit. “I don’t know what this means for you,” Father Bologna says. “It could mean different things for different people. For me, it’s the harsh reality of the city we live in, this world we live in. For you, maybe it should mean something more. I’m not here to be your conscience, or to tell you what you should think or feel. I’m just here to support you. I’m here to stand by you. You have to be the one who looks deeply into himself, to find the answers that God might be trying to show you. Maybe your faith is challenged this very day. Maybe God feels your questions, and maybe these are somehow the answers. Maybe God sent you that boy this day, to help guide you. I don’t know. These are the things you’ll have to discover on your own journey. This is yours, it’s not mine. Not in the same way, at least. Now, you should go rest. You look feverish. Do you feel feverish? Maybe I should go get Dr. Saenz. I’ve never seen you sweat this badly before. Wait here.”

  Father Costa’s silence is like a scream. There’s nothing left to say. The only thing he knows is that he really needs a drink right now, now more than ever, if he is going to stop these walls from shaking and closing in on him, crush him to death beneath the weight of his own shaky convictions. He can’t decide which his alcohol-dependant life most resembles right now: a suicide, or an abortion, both of which are against the teachings of his failing, questionable faith.

  Dante’s Death

  Peeling the wet sheet from her thigh, she straightens, pulls her damp tank top back down to her flat stomach, and walks toward the bathroom door.

  “You g-goin’ in there, baby?”

  “Yeah, what you think? You want somethin’?”

  “Naw,” he says.

  “Why you stop me? There somethin’ in there? Tell me.”

  He smiles. He rolls his body toward the night table and pulls a cigarette out of Mysteek’s change purse. As Mysteek approaches the bathroom door, her ears fix on the sounds of life outside the room: the shuffling of feet in the hallway, the running of water next door, in the next-door bathroom that doesn’t have a surprise in it, the honking and drilling and motoring down on the street, outside the window, away from the bathroom that has the surprise in it.

  She pauses one last time to look at Dante—she watches him drill the butt of the cigarette into the tabletop, slip his green boxers over his feet and then over his waist, and stand. His pause is like a heckler, coaxing her, crying for her to leap into that unknown surprise that waits in the bathroom She’s sure that Dante wouldn’t deliberately hurt her, that he wouldn’t keep a mute pitbull (or a really, really quiet pitbull) in there or something. But her luck has been really bad lately, and nothing would surprise her, really.

  Does he have to stand there, devil-grinning at her? “C’mere, Dante. C’mover here with me.”

  �
��You scared?”

  She doesn’t reply to his question. She wants to yell at him to get over here with her, but doesn’t want him to slap her again. She steps back from the door that seems like a ledge hanging dark over the unknown, and decides she does not want to jump alone. She decides that Dante will jump with her. But it’s not fair; he already knows what to expect. So there must not be a ledge. Dante wouldn’t jump over a ledge unless he was pushed. He shoulders next to her (her shoulder slightly higher). He takes her face, the sagging brown velvet, and mauls her lips with his cracked mouth. He pulls back, and the spittle becomes a bridge that he sucks from her lips into his cracked mouth, some of the bridge careening into the ditch of her flat cleavage. He lets it fall.

  Dante opens the door. She looks into the bathroom, then turns and tiptoes back to the bed. She hides her face in her damp cotton tank top, her head shrugged into her shoulders. “What is that fucking smell?”

  “Someone,” he says. He disappears into the bathroom.

  She pops up from the bed and follows him. The body that hangs in the bathroom is blue and naked.

  “Who someone, honey? Who’s that?”

  “Juss t-touch it,” Dante says to her. “Touch it.”

  Her forefinger stiffens and she plunges her arm into the bathroom. She pulls the damp tank top higher over her nose to cover her eyes, then turns her head away, her forefinger still pointed at the body.

  “I said touch it. I said t-touch it. Reach, baby”—she stretches—“reach, reach, that-that’s it, r-reach, you almost got it, reach”—he puts his hand on the cold blue hip of the cold blue man and swings the leg closer to her stiff finger—“reach, reach . . . there!” Her finger sinks into the blue cushion of the blue thigh, then snaps back into her fist.

  She looks out of her damp tank top. “He’s like a blue water balloon,” she says. With her forefinger stiff once more she touches the blue thigh again. And again. And again. A droning creak from the swing of the blue man. A smile creeps across her lips. “He’s like a blue water balloon, right, honey?”

  “Umm-hmm.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “His name is Mr. Mind-Yo-Own-Damn-B-Bidness. Why you ask me dat? You know mha-my bidness ain’t none a yo damn bidness.”

  “I know, honey-boo. You know me, though.”

  “I know you.”

  “Then let me give him a name,” she says, clapping her fingers. “That all right?”

  “You kin n-name him, baby.”

  “It’s all good, Dante,” she says. “I’ll name him my own self.” She sinks her finger into the cold blue thigh again and frowns. “Let’s say we name him . . .Whitey-blue. Let’s say he’s named Whitey-blue. You like Whitey-blue?”

  Dante devil-grins, and unsnaps the waistband of his boxers, allowing them to drop around his ankles. He pulls her toward the sink, the stench not the wall it once was, and hastily slips down her damp cotton panties. He barnacles himself to her backside, he on his tiptoes, jerking his pelvis like a spasm behind her, she waits for/wants him to finish. He stops jerking when there’s a knoCK-KNOck at the door.

  “Fuck!”

  “You expecting company, honey?”

  “Shut the fuck up,” he says. He runs her back into the bedroom while gathering the boxers from his ankles, closing the bathroom door, and getting his Glock from the dresser drawer. “Who is it?” he yells at the back of the door.

  “It’s me, Dante. Open up, please.” The voice was a deep thunderrrrr-roll. Dante smiles at Mysteek and unlatches the door. “It’s time to get paid, baby,” Dante whispers to her, smiling. He yanks the door open. A tall black man in a dark burgundy cashmere suit and dark glasses, lean and rigid, towering and cold, a pyramid, a leopard, walks in. “Hello, Dante. May I come in?”

  “Shnizzle my nizzle!”

  “Hmm,” Tall Black Men replies, “are we still saying that? As a People, I mean?”

  “Goddamn, nigga, what you wearin’ that foe? You must be burnin’ up in that ow-outfit!”

  The tall black man’s brow is dry. He looks to the bed, where Mysteek is holding the wet sheet to her chin. “What’s she doing here, Dante? I thought we discussed all this.”

  “We did, w-we did. She ain’t about nothin’, you know what I’m sayin’? I’m juss tappin’ that shit. You said B-Baby, though. You didn’t wanna see Baby. That ain’t Baby.”

  “Did you do what you had to do?” Tall Black Man asks.

  “Show did.”

  “Then . . .well, where is he?”

  “Bathroom.”

  Tall Black Man pivots and walks to the bathroom door. Jiggling the handle he opens it, paused by the stench coming from inside, and then continues into the bathroom. Dante hasn’t a second to whisper something to Mysteek when Tall Black Man comes back out. “He’s dead.”

  “I guess he musta h-hunged hisself some nights ago. My bad.”

  “Then I’m assuming he had the money and the stuff on him. So where’s the stuff?”

  Dante hunches over and scampers into the open closet. Tall Black Man keeps his eyes blindered on Dante (maybe a corner peek of an eye on Mysteek, to make sure she’s not packing anything that could drop him) while Dante unburies clothes, suitcases, shoes, hangers. And then he stops. “It ain’t in here,” Dante says.

  “Was it once in there?”

  “It was here.” Dante points to the empty space on the floor of the closet. Tall Black Man looks over at Mysteek.

  “Where’s the other one?”

  “Other what?” Dante asks.

  “The other girl. Baby. Where is she?”

  Dante doesn’t know. He hasn’t seen her since she left for the store yesterday. He shrugs.

  “Why you with this one and not Baby?” Tall Black Man asks.

  Dante shrugs again. “I d-don’t know. I was bent than a mutha fucker last night. I needed some pussy.”

  Tall Black Man, to Dante’s crimped knowledge, does not accept excuses. “You’re a bitch-ass punk,” he says. “You know that, Dante? A bitch-ass, stuttering punk. The man had the money and the stuff, and now he’s dead and it’s all gone. So what am I supposed to do now? You tell me. I want to know.”

  Mysteek sees Dante become physically ill; he always grabs his throat when he’s sick to his stomach. She knows that he’s in trouble, but trouble is his monkey, so this is nothing new. She realizes that it’s silly for her to be holding the wet bedsheet up against her chest. She really has nothing to hide. She has clothes on, a tank top at least and some panties, so holding the sheet up is kind of silly. And she’s uncomfortable in the wet bed anyway. She wants to get up. But she knows that if she gets up, they’ll probably tell her to sit back down, so she doesn’t move. She watches as Dante sits in the small chair next to the TV stand, still gagging with his hand at his throat. This is ridiculous, she thinks. Why not get on with this? So, he fucked up? So what? Dante will eventually make good. She knows that to be true.

  “Tie her up,” Tall Black Man says, pointing his large dark finger at her.

  He won’t do it, she thinks, will he? “Dante?”

  Dante takes his hand from his throat, his eyes red and teary, and looks around the room.

  “The cord over there”—Tall Black Man points to the lamp on the endtable—“use that cord over there.”

  “Dante-honey?”

  Dante whispers, “Don’t worry, b-baby. Don’t worry none. I’m just gonna make him happy’s all. Don’t w-worry. It’s all good.” Dante wraps the cord around her wrists first, under the hands and through the loop, which is smart because the cord is now very tight and she’s already reconsidering this course of action in order to make the beautiful black man happy. If Dante wants to make him happy, then why doesn’t he just . . . well, something else. And to top it all off, she’s hungry. What I wouldn’t give for some peanut butter, she thinks, as Dante ties the other end of the cord around her feet.

  “Done,” Dante says.

  “Now, don’t scr
eam,” Tall Black Man says to her, holding up his large beautiful oily hand. “Don’t scream at what I’m about to do.”

  “What’s up?” Dante asks.

  With the first shot, the tall black man tears off the right side of Dante’s head. A magnificent burst, like red fireworks. Dante’s body folds out-with-the-knees, in-with-the-arms, out-with-the-butt, in-with-the-chest, down to the floor with a . She thought she heard a second shot before Dante hit the floor, but it’s all a blur. Probably to Dante’s head again.

  She doesn’t scream, as she promised. She can’t.

  Tall Black Man puts the gun back into the void under his coat and walks over to Dante and hovers over him. She hears the tall black man mumble something to himself. She listens carefully, as these words will be included in with her statement to the police, she knows. She hates cops. She feels weak when she has to go to cops with her problems. But she has no other choice now, she knows. She doesn’t want to be tagged for this murder.