The light was flashing on the answering machine by his bed, and he hit the play button.
The first message was from the newspaper credit union, and he impatiently hit the button
again, then three more times, skipping past hang-ups. The last message was from Axel.
He was playing guitar, singing Hootie 8c the Blowfish.
“I only wanna be with you… Yo! Andy, it’s Axeldon’t axe-me. Maybe dinner? How
’bout Jack Straw’s … ?”
Brazil impatiently cut off the recording as the phone rang. This time the caller was live
and creepy, and breathing into the phone as the pervert had sex with Brazil in mind, again
without asking.
“I’m holding youuu so haarrrddd, and you’re touching me with your tongue, sliiiidiiing
…” she breathed in a low tone that reminded Brazil of psycho shows he sometimes had
watched as a child.
“You’re sick.” He slammed the receiver back into its cradle.
He stood in the mirror over his dresser and began brushing hair out of his eyes. It was
really bugging him, getting too long, streaks from the sun catching light. He had always
worn his hair one of two ways, short or not as short. He was tucking an obstinate strand
behind an ear when suddenly the reflection of his mother boiled up from behind, an
obese, raging drunk, attacking.
“Where have you been?” his mother screamed as she tried to backhand her son across the face.
Brazil raised an arm, warding off the blow just in time. He wheeled around, grabbing his
mother by both wrists, firmly but gently. This was a tired, old drama, an endless rerun of
a painful play.
“Easy, easy, easy,” he said as he led his besotted mother to the bed and sat her down.
Muriel Brazil began to cry, rocking, slurring her words.
“Don’t go.
Don’t leave me, Andy. Please, oh pleassseee. ”
Brazil glanced at his watch. He looked furtively at the window, afraid West might
somehow see through shut blinds and know the wretched secret of his entire life.
“Mom, I’m going to get your medicine, okay?” he said.
“You watch TV and go to bed. I’ll be home soon.”
It wasn’t okay. Mrs. Brazil wailed, rocking, screaming hell on earth.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry! Don’t know what’s wrong with me, Andyeeee!”
“W West did not hear all of this, but she heard enough because she had opened car
windows to smoke. She was suspicious that Brazil lived with a girlfriend and they were
having a fight. West shook her head, flicking a butt out onto the weed-choked, eroded
drive. Why would anyone move in with another human being right after college, after all
those years of roommates? For what? She asked no questions of Brazil as they drove
away. Whatever this reporter might have to say to explain his life, she didn’t want to hear
it. They headed back to the city, the lighted skyline an ambitious monument to banking
and girls not allowed. This wasn’t an original thought. She heard Hammer complain
about it every day.
“W West would drive her chief through the city, and Hammer would look out, poking her
finger and talking about those businessmen behind tall walls of glass who decided what
went into the paper and what crimes got solved and who became the next mayor.
Hammer would rail on about Fortune 500 yahoos who didn’t live anywhere near here and
determined whether the police needed a bicycle squad or laptops or different pistols.
Rich men had decided to change the uniforms years ago and to merge the city police with
the Mecklenburg County’s Sheriff’s Department. Every decision was unimaginative and
based on economics, according to Hammer.
West believed every bit of it as she and Brazil cruised past the huge,
new stadium where David Copperfield was making magic, and parking decks were
jammed with thousands of cars. Brazil was oddly subdued, and not writing down a word.
West looked curiously at him as the police scanner rudely announced this modern city’s
primitive crimes, and the radio softly played Eiton John.
“Any unit in the area,” a dispatcher said.
“BE in progress, four hundred block East Trade Street.”
West floored it and flipped on lights. She whelped the siren, gunning past other cars.