Up in the Air Read online

  Chase Manhattan, solid as Gibraltar. Lutheran bishops. Evil NBC. This from a man who pays teenage runaways to do the watusi on his wizened johnson.

  I turn to Art’s partner, who’s leaving with her money. “That old guy across the way—is he a regular?”

  “I’ve seen him a couple of times. You want a show?”

  I shake my head and she jiggles off into the crowd.

  “You like that bird’s girl?” Art says. His nose is running. He’s fiddling with his trousers under the table. “She’s taken, it looks like.”

  “That man she’s with,” I say. “Famous Wall Street bigwig, Mr. Dow. He gave me a stock idea on the plane today. I phoned it in when I landed. Six thousand bucks.”

  Art watches him for a moment. “He’s hard core. His girl there’s a twisted sister. Toilet Terry. She uses guys as fire hydrants.”

  “Stop.”

  “She keeps an apartment over by the Hilton. She gets top dollar. Vinyl sheets, the works. If they leave through the side exit, he’s going home with her. I’ll bet he drinks it. I know a dancer here who’d tell you everything. Pay her enough and she’ll get you Polaroids.”

  Art thinks I crave information about this fellow, but his secret life bores me. I’m not the bloodhound type. That’s why detective novels are lost on me. Somebody did it—that’s all I need to know. The who, the how, and the why are just details. To my mind, there’s nothing drearier than a labyrinth. It’s just a structure whose center takes time to find, but if you make an effort, you’ll find it. So? The only mysteries that interest me are, Will I land on time? Will the pilots strike? There’s enough uncertainty just moving through space.

  I glance back at Wall Street, who’s sideways in his lounge chair, his head thrown back over one arm as the girl rides him. Soon, he’ll be looking right at me, upside down.

  “What style of donuts?” Art asks me.

  “I haven’t tasted them.”

  “You up for the VIP room?”

  “I have to sleep. Come to GoalQuest and meet this Marlowe. You’ll thank me, Art. And give me a nice reference if that guy calls.”

  “I made that one up to get you to come out here. I was going to off myself tonight.”

  “Sheer fabrication?”

  “I’ve been drunk for days. I think it was.”

  There—Wall Street sees me now. He seems to frown; it’s hard to read his features in reverse, with his lips where his eyebrows ought to be. Our eyes mix it up for a moment. Does he fear blackmail? I could bribe Art’s connection for all the dirt, but why? A mystery stated can be more powerful than a mystery solved, and no matter what she might tell me about this fake, he’ll never again be this vividly corrupt to me. And Art lied, too. At least he had a need.

  I push back my chair and stand to leave, still watching Wall Street hang there like a possum. I used to think there was a code up there. Not true. Well, let them all feast on each other; I’ll be out soon. I’ll look up at their contrails and I won’t miss it. Ever. Though it might be nice if some of them missed me.

  five

  homestead Suites has three classes of rooms, their specifications the same from Maine to Texas. I like to stay in the mid-range L-shaped rooms. You could fill me with morphine and pluck out both my eyes and I’d still be able to dim the lights, place calls, and locate an outlet for my noise machine.

  Not in Reno, though. This room is different. When I go to hang my jacket in the closet, feeling bloated and slow from too much beef and booze, I open the door on a shrunken, substandard bathroom lacking the usual double toilet-roll holder and equipped with a shower but no tub. Even worse, instead of a lamp beside the desk and twin swing-out sconces flanking the king bed, there’s a bare, fluorescent ceiling strip bright enough to interrogate a gang lord. And just one bar of soap: deodorant soap. Deodorant soap for the face! They’re kidding me.

  I call downstairs from bed but no one answers. I’m not so much angry as out of sorts, confused. Even the mattress seems tilted and out of true, while the blanket is one of those foamy nylon jobs that offer a trace of warmth but no security. I consider stripping the curtains off their rods for added insulation, but I need them to block out Reno’s all-night glare. It’s a madhouse out there, and louder by the minute as America’s seniors seek out cheap prime rib and six-figure jackpots on the nickel slots. I turn on the air conditioner to “high fan” and tuck myself in like a bum under a newspaper.

  At the end of the bed the TV screen pulses blue. Still hungry for punishment, I click around and manage to catch the last few minutes of Wall Street’s daily show. Though he must have taped it in Reno this afternoon, the set features a lit-up New York skyline. It’s the little deceptions that no one catches that are going to dissolve it all someday. We’ll look at clocks and we won’t believe the hands. They’ll forecast sun but we’ll pack our slickers anyway.

  Feeling a need to halt the swirl, to stabilize, I dial Great West’s toll-free mileage hotline to check the running tally on my HandStar. I’m wading through the lengthy options menu when my mobile rings on the nightstand.

  It’s my mother.

  “Where am I reaching you, Ryan?”

  She feels this matters. My mother has a developed sense of place; her mental map of the country is zoned and shaded according to her ideas about each region’s moral tenor and general demographics. If I’m in Arizona, she assumes that I’ve spent my day among pensioners and ranch hands and driven past the Grand Canyon at least once. If I’m in lowa, sensible, pleasant lowa, I’m eating well, thinking clearly, and making friends. Though my mother gets around in her RV and ought to be more sophisticated by now about our American psychedelic rainbow, her talent for turning new experiences into supporting evidence for her prejudices overrides all else. Once, while gassing up in Alabama, a state she considers brutal, poor, and racist, she got to talking with a black attorney driving a convertible Mercedes. The man paid for his gas with a hundred-dollar bill and was forced to accept, in change, a roll of quarters and stacks of ones and fives. Instead of noting the man’s prosperity, my mother seized on the pile of coins and bills—an act of humiliation, she decided, by the station’s white clerk.

  “I’m in Portland,” I say. Nevada would worry her. “It’s awfully late. Is everything okay?”

  If it’s not, she won’t tell me—not at first. The worse the news, the harder she’ll work to counter it with cheerful tidings from the Busy Bee Cafe.

  “Did you hear about Burt’s medal?” The Lovely Man. “Our congressman finally cut through the red tape and it looks like the Navy sees things our way now. They might do a ceremony at Fort Snelling.”

  “Great.” I cross to the mini-bar for a pick-me-up, set the down the receiver, grab a beer, twist off the cap, and get back on the line, confident that I haven’t missed a thing.

  “It only took thirty years,” my mother is saying. “It all came down to the definition of ‘combat.’ ”

  “How’s the wedding coming along? Excited?”

  Throat clearing, nose blowing. I’ve hit on it.

  “We spent all day stripping thorns off yellow roses. My hands are all scratched. I’ll need gloves for the reception. Julie’s gone missing. They’re cabbage roses—beautiful.”

  It’s out, and she’d hang up now if she could. Now it’s my job to press her for details. So she can feel the pain all over again and I can fear I caused it.

  “How long’s she been gone?”

  “Ten, eleven hours.”

  “Are she and Keith fighting?”

  “No.”

  “You have to talk, Mom. This isn’t a cross-examination. Talk.”

  “Keith is here. Should I put Keith on?”

  “Please.”

  “What time are you getting here Friday? I need a flight number. There’s a special line that I can call to find out if you’re on time. I need that number, though. Our weather’s been crazy, hail and thunderstorms, so there might be delays.”

  “I’ll find it. Give me
Keith.”

  My future brother-in-law’s Minnesota accent—the one so many comedians make fun of and which I don’t hear in myself, though others do—prevents me from judging his level of concern. “Ryan, I’ll get to the point here: she took off. No, we’re not arguing. It’s about her job. She lost two dogs this morning at the rescue farm. They jumped the fence and ate some gopher poison and pretty much died in her arms, from what we hear. It got ugly, I guess: they coughed up lots of blood. She split in her van and no one’s heard from her.”

  “She hasn’t called Kara? She usually calls Kara.”

  “We think someone saw her in Rochester. A cop.”

  “Has Julie been eating?”

  “Like a horse.”

  “I doubt that.”

  “It was the dogs, I swear. They’d been abused. Two Border collies with collars grown into their necks. Should I be worried? She’s done this in the past, right? Your mom says this is typical.”

  She’s wrong. Yes, my sister runs when she’s unhappy, but there’s a novel element in play here: Julie’s attachment to the poisoned animals. This is a girl who assumes all bonds are temporary, who’s famously well-defended against loss. Her divorces were strangely painless; she skipped away from them, demanding no money, no car keys, nothing. The weekend after our father’s funeral, she sang in and won a karaoke contest at a supper club. She took the job at the rescue farm not out of pity or tenderheartedness, but because the vet in charge was a family friend who didn’t hold her history against her.

  “You call me as soon as you hear from her,” I say.

  “Kara’s flying up from Utah tonight. She thinks Julie’s probably crashed at some motel, crying things out.”

  “This isn’t wedding jitters? That farm must lose animals every other day.”

  “I know what you’re saying. Your sister’s changing, Ryan. Stuff affects her now. Pray for her, okay?”

  “I never stop,” I say. “Put Mom back on.”

  I finish my beer while I wait. It tastes like mucilage, that glue that’s used to paste photos into albums.

  “Is it raining there?” my mother says.

  “It never rains. It’s the desert. About this dog story: I don’t buy it, Mom.”

  “Portland’s not the desert.”

  “I’m in Nevada. This wedding is being rammed down Julie’s throat. Of course she’s AWOL. Can’t you people see that? This house Kara picked for her, the whole arrangement, it’s like you’re hanging Julie in some museum.”

  “You fibbed to me,” she says. “Where are you, Ryan? You’re probably not in Nevada, either, are you? You’re probably in Des Moines, a hundred miles from here, and you just can’t be bothered to come help out.”

  “You know that’s wrong, Mom. Whenever I’m that close to you, I’m there. The force field still works. Do we always have to fight?”

  “Kara says you got fired.”

  “Well, she knows better. You made that up.”

  “I wanted to be sure.”

  “I need people not to make things up this week.”

  “You told me you were in Oregon.”

  “Fight fire with fire. Can we go back to Julie?”

  “It’s you that worries us. She knows what she’s running away from.”

  “That’s so profound. Someone’s been reading a major woman novelist.”

  “I don’t like having to wonder where I’m reaching you. It puts me at a disadvantage, Ryan. For all I know, you’re in Japan and it’s tomorrow. I’ll see you on Friday. We’re tying up the line.”

  “I love you, okay? No matter what you think. Congratulate Burt and keep me posted on Julie.”

  “How long are you coming for? Just the weekend? Longer?”

  “I’m going in segments. I’ll get to that one soon. Are you crying?”

  “I’m crying a little.”

  “Me, too.”

  “I know.”

  I pour a glass of water to drink in bed but it tastes of chlorine, so I collect some change and step out into the hall to find a soda. Paper menus with early-morning breakfast orders hang from the doors, and I read a few of them. Coffee, juice, and muffins—they’re all the same. If the doors were to become transparent suddenly, the people behind them would all be the same, too: asleep with the news on, their bags beside their beds, their next day’s outfits hanging on the desk chairs. We travel alone, but together we’re an army.

  The Coke machine isn’t where it ought to be, in a nook by the stairwell. I’m disappointed in Homestead—they’ve let things slide. The soul of their business is predictability, and if I were consulting for them I’d yank the name off any unit caught screwing with the blueprint.

  I walk down a floor and resume my search. I normally avoid caffeine at night, but the news about Julie will keep me up. I’m half rooting for her to stay away, I realize. Wherever you are, my sister, just sit tight. Hug your pillow. Don’t answer the door. This Keith’s a good man, and Kara wants the best for you, but this is not their life. Just call me, will you? Do you have my number? Call me, Julie.

  At last I find a glowing red Coke machine and drop in my quarters. The can thunks into the slot. I heard once that if you immerse a penny in a cola drink the coin will melt. I could use some good strong solvents now.

  “You’re here,” a voice says.

  It’s Alex, from the plane. My fingers start to button my open dress shirt.

  “What a surprise,” she says. “Wow.” She’s in pajamas, a baggy pair of pink flannels that smells of dryer sheets. She’s smaller than I remember, slim and kittenish, her hair clipped into a haphazard ball. Primed by the strip club, my nerves swell up with lust, and I take a step back to disengage our auras.

  I ask her about her cat.

  “He’s at a vet. You were right, he shouldn’t have come. I overtranquilized. I’m thinking I’ll return him to the breeder. I don’t have any business owning pets.”

  “I’m sorry. Hard lesson.”

  “How’d your meeting go?”

  “No casualties. Your thing?”

  “They raised a hundred K. The bitch gave a speech about Medicare. Big thrill. I goofed on the food, though. There’s half a cow left over.”

  The light of the Coke machine rouges Alex’s face. Down the hall, a door cracks open and a hand reaches out with a menu. We hush our voices. The building slips deeper and deeper into its dreams as my eyes slide down to Alex’s bare toes, curling and uncurling as we chat. She polished them once, but the color has chipped away except for a few red flecks around the cuticles. It’s a look I remember from high school and I like it.

  It seems obvious, suddenly, what’s going to happen between us; the only question is how. To move from the hallway straight to one of our rooms would be to forget we’re grown-ups, not college kids. We have standards, guidelines, rules of thumb. If we want to maintain our self-respect as wary, wounded, thirtyish survivors, we’ll have to go somewhere else and then come back here.

  We agree on a plan that only seems spontaneous; in fact, it’s as structured as a NASA countdown, designed to land us in bed by one o’clock so we can make our early-morning flights. We’ll dress, meet up in the lobby, and cross the street to the Gold Rush Casino. We pad off down the hallway to our rooms for a quick gargle and splash of soapy water. I can almost hear the guests’ sedatives kicking in as I pass their doors.

  I wear my boots. For once, they’re on my side. The angle of the heels and soles aligns my spine and firms my chest and shoulders. The problem is my khakis. They’ve lost their shape. I’m a hasty packer and hard on clothes; I roll them into tubes instead of folding them.

  Alex dresses mannishly and simply in jeans and a V-neck black T-shirt. And a watch. I know the maker—I outcounseled four men there—and I’m sorry she wasted her money. It’s ISM’s fault. To help the company move its wares upmarket, we urged it to license the prestigious name of a dead European industrial designer. The inferior guts of the timepieces, which are sold alongside Rolexes and Gucc
is in airport duty-free shops, didn’t change, but their prices quadrupled. Poor Alex fell for it.

  We link arms. The street is still crowded with hopeful oldies toting buckets of change and plastic drink cups. The important thing is to stay casual, stay light. We’re repeating ourselves—we’ve played this scene with others, and always with the same melancholy outcome—but we don’t have to draw attention to the fact, nor do we have to deny it. We’ll come through this. We stop on the sidewalk in front of the casino and count out our stake: four hundred dollars in twenties, all of which we agree to put at risk.

  The craps tables are packed. We try roulette. A band plays in a corner—a cover combo specializing in stodgy classic rock. I buy two hundred dollars worth of chips for each of us and note our different styles in stacking them. Alex divides hers into four piles, while I build a tower.

  “Red?”

  “Whatever you like. Just don’t bet a single number,” I say.

  Ten minutes later she’s richer, though not by much, and I’m on my way to doubling my buy-in. Make no mistake: good luck is always significant and earning is no substitute for winning. We’ve made the right choice in coming out tonight; the wheel confirms it. I raise my average wager and hazard a high-odds corner bet, which hits.

  A cocktail waitress arrives with our free drinks, two light beers, and I tip her with a chip. This always feels good, for some reason. Mr. Big.

  “I have a confession,” Alex says.

  “You’re married.”

  “I know you. We’ve met before. I heard you speak.”

  I look at her, keeping one eye on the wheel. To make the ball go where it needs to I have to coach it.

  “Three years ago. At a seminar in Texas. You talked on career development, remember? I think the event was called Prepare for Power.”