A Naked Singularity: A Novel (59 page)

“Me too, I guess, but how do we get it?”

“That is the question.”

“How are you leaning?”

“The money will be inside 410 some time before 3:00. The mule only complicates things. We can go in and get the bag before she even shows up.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“What happens to the woman when she shows up?”

“What concern is that of ours?”

“No.”

“We’ll talk about it, in your packet is a description of the kind of guns we’ll need.”

“No.”

“It’s in there, trust me, you just haven’t looked closely enough.”

“No, I mean no guns.”

“What do you mean no guns? What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about neither of us having guns on that day.”

“You crazy? You know the eight people I was telling you about? I hate to break the news to you but they
will
have guns. And they will be jumpy and tense because they know security sucks.”

“Or they’ll be complacent, thinking there must be no danger if security is so lax.”

“That’s quite a gamble, don’t you think?”

“No, because even if you’re right and they’re super-jumpy I still won’t bring a gun or even go with you if you bring a gun.”

“You’re serious.”

“Of course.”

“We need guns.”

“I won’t do it.”

“We’ll be killed.”

“Doubt it, who would kill me?”

“Who? Someone who has a gun and isn’t keen on you taking their millions.”

“I can live with that risk Dane. After all we’re the ones creating this contentious situation right? It seems only right that we should take the brunt of the risk.”

“What exactly is your objection to the guns? You prefer a grave risk of death? I personally don’t fear death in the slightest, but the overwhelmingly majority do so I’m rather curious.”

“Guns are for the stupid Dane. A well-trained monkey can go in and fire a gun, big fucking deal.”

“You propose we just ask nicely for the money?”

“Violence is the language of the simple. You initially proposed that we formulate a plan using our intellects and execute it using our wills, but now you propose we go in with guns like a couple of high-school-dropout-liquor-store-robbers. That’s you’re idea of perfection? If you think we will fail without guns, if you think we’ll be killed, then let’s not do it.
You
wanted
me
to do it remember? Not the other way around. Did you think I would just be a passenger on your train to criminality? I bring my own beliefs about what constitutes a proper plan. That’s why you wanted me remember?”

“Is there anything else I should know about?”

“The chest.”

“Whose chest?”

“The Tansu with the drugs in it.”

“What about it?”

“I want it.”

“I see. Greed. How do you propose we turn it into cash while still paying extreme attention to avoiding apprehension as you have mandated?”

“I don’t want to turn it into cash I want to destroy it.”

“Destroy it? Why’s that?”

“You’re insane if you think I’m going to be even peripherally responsible for some two-month-old girl being left unattended and gasping around in search of a tit in some ratty apartment while her mother goes out looking for crack.”

“I see. But you’re not willing to bring a gun into that house lest one of these people, who
does
actively contribute to the creation of gasping, unattended babies, gets hurt.”

“Right.”

“Do I have it all now?”

“More or less.”

“Great, let’s review. You’re willing to come along on the heist but only if we go into an apartment where an extremely high-level drug deal is about to go down, completely unarmed, at precisely the moment the deal is to be consummated, so that the mule, who we don’t know, can’t be blamed, and take about fifteen million dollars and drugs worth seven times that from these undoubtedly heavily-armed fellows. We then destroy the drugs, in the process ensuring we’ve made mortal enemies of numerous violent people both here and in Santo Domingo. Do I present the general picture?”

“Yes.”

“I like it.”

Dessert was an espresso—is there a greater beverage?—which I willingly imbibed despite the fact it never failed to later create in me an inordinate anxiety, and a piece of cheesecake. The cheesecake was perfect, not that shitty New York crap, but Italian ricotta cheesecake. Light and grainy, barely sweet with the edges nice and brown at just the right thickness and topped with a sweet but natural tasting strawberry sauce swirl. Bliss.

“That was a brilliant meal my good man,” said Dane addressing the serious waiter. “I can’t speak for my tight-lipped friend here but I think everything was highly delicious. You work in proximity to a near-genius kitchen and by extension I’m prepared to label you, whether warranted or not, a man of extraordinary culinary gifts.”

“Oh good, I’m glad you likeh. You come again no?”

“If I came any more I’d have to don an apron.”

“Hah, hah, hah! And you signor?”

“I also thought everything was superb, thank you.”

“Let’s go,” said Dane a bit later.

“Yeah,” I said and we split.

Outside, in the cold, was all the reality you could bear. I still had to go to Cymbeline to hear Soldera’s fate. Dane said he was going home to think so we parted ways somewhat abruptly. I looked up at the sky without real cause. It was true that the temperatures had unmistakably belonged to winter for quite some time but now the sky was finally reflecting true winter as well. And not early festive winter or dwindling late-stage winter either. This was exact midpoint winter, in appearance and fact, topped by a perfectly white firmament. Perfectly and uniformly White in a way that made me think Star Trek et alii had it all wrong when they portrayed the vast outer reaches of space as occasionally-interrupted black. It wasn’t black out there, it was white, and this was being revealed to me all at once without intervening gradations. You could climb high as you might and look all around but all you would see is missing color. Absence in every direction. Isotropic and sad White, nothing else and nothing more. And how could I have failed to notice until just then such an achromatic expanse? Such a vapid emptiness that precluded all matter and meaning. But those days it was true that a great many critical things were hidden from my view by their very prevalence.

There was a little girl

Who had a little curl

Right in the middle of her forehead,

When she was good

She was very, very good,

But . . 
.

—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Waiting for them to bring Raul Soldera down, and for Cymbeline to deign to return to the bench after the lunch break, I thought, surmised, conjectured, discovered, remembered, wished, guessed, intuited, researched, hoped, prayed, feared, speculated, theorized, recalled, learned, posited, and deduced that although Wilfred Benitez
was
born in the Bronx, as I said earlier, he actually lived most of his life in Puerto Rico.

His father Gregorio, or “Goyo”, was in agreement with Dick Van Patten that eight was enough. Enough children and probably not too difficult to get Clara Benitez to agree. Wilfred Benitez was eighth and last. Of Wilfred’s seven sibs, three were brothers and the three were Gregory, Alfonso, and Frankie. They weren’t just brothers either they were colleagues, because Goyo didn’t have sons, he had boxers. Boxers he managed and trained. His favorite boxer was his namesake Gregory. Gregory started boxing when he was eleven and if you’ve never heard of him, or of Wilfred’s other two brothers and their boxing careers, rest assured that, outside of this, you likely never will. Wilfred Benitez, about whom you
will
hear a lot, first began boxing, that is, first had his skull repositioned around his brain, when he was seven years old.

He did this in a ring located in the backyard of the Benitez home in San Just, Puerto Rico, a
barrio
hidden a couple miles east of the capital, San Juan. The Benitez family was split, some in San Just, some in New York, and it was Gregory Benitez’s misfortune to be in Puerto Rico, in that makeshift ring, in that sweltering backyard, across from his younger brother with the immense talent who repeatedly kicked his ass—a curious expression that rarely if ever involves an actual ass being actually kicked but which does seem to accurately reflect what it must feel like.

But Gregory was good too. Good enough that Goyo, whatever his level of ability at talent evaluation, could almost taste the distinct flavor of success nearby and so pursued it with his entire spirit. He threw himself into this. You’ve seen Goyos before. He was the mother teetering back and forth on her heels, at an angle from the stage, mouthing from memory all the lines her daughter will soon spit out to a receptive sea of docile heads wearing video cameras at the school play. He was that sagging father yelling at his son to pick up the back elbow as the little league ball approaches the vicinity of the plate, then reducing that batter to tears when, after being verbally paralyzed into inaction, he looks at a called third strike. He was them
in extremis
. And what was the result of that? If all the Benitez boys were given the Goyo treatment why did Wilfred become who he did and the others just his brothers?

I think Wilfred Benitez liked that backyard ring more than his brothers. But he wasn’t better than them
because
he liked the ring more, rather he liked the ring more because he was better. The ring gave him something it couldn’t give the others. And not because of Goyo or because of Wilfred’s overwhelming effort. Not in this case.

The ability to hit and avoid being hit swirls around in the air, unattached and looking for a home. A little lands here, a little there. More here, less there, and an in-between amount elsewhere, all in an unpredictable dance of musical chairs. For whatever reason, a whole damn lot landed on Wilfred Benitez and beginning in 1965 you could see for yourself, and over the years many did, in that San Just yard. Those who saw,
knew
, and more gratifyingly Wilfred knew.

In the ring he knew what you were going to throw, from where and at what angle, seemingly before you did. A brilliant counterpuncher, he also knew you were going to pay for that punch. And after a while you knew it too and so became reluctant to expose yourself by throwing any more punches, a bad reluctance to have in boxing.

Outside of the ring he knew far less. When he wasn’t inhaling boxing, Wilfred exhaled it. School was only a mandatory respite from boxing so he stopped going after junior high. Later, multiple observers would comment on the childlike behavior that emanated from this unmistakably adult body and the difficulty he seemed to have emoting and processing complex thoughts. It was better those days when his mind matched his number and best when it was on that canvas, between those ropes, making instantaneous decisions that were never wrong.

Wilfred boxed every day. Every day of his life he threw punches. A left jab should shoot straight out from a rapid shoulder twitch. The straighter and stiffer the better. A good left hook, the kind any self-respecting Hispanic boxer aspires to throw, and the kind that serves as a perfectly appropriate counter to failed lead rights, ideally involves, whenever possible, a violently sudden hip twist. Uppercuts with each hand had to be learned in order to build the brilliant infighter. Overhand rights, right crosses, proper footwork, cutting off the ring and leaving it expansive. Fighting off the ropes, a future specialty, and in the lonely, contested middle. Every day for hour upon hour until the muscles remembered on their own. All this and the only real injury he received during this time occurred when he got his face tangled in barbed wire while chasing another boy near his house; the jagged scar raising from his nose to his jaw and always visible throughout his later career. He fought and learned: learned to fight. That was everything.

And Wilfred still only fifteen.

So there are finally those things that can only be learned by facing other lunatics who started boxing at seven or so years old. After 111 amateur bouts, Wilfred turned pro and had his first official fight on November 22, 1973, seventy days after his fifteenth birthday.

His first opponent owned the unlikely name of Hiram Santiago. The fight took place in Puerto Rico and was a junior-lightweight contest, meaning neither fighter weighed more than 130 pounds. The 130 pounds belonging to Santiago heard the bell signaling the start of the fight but never heard one declaring the end of the first round. Before that second bell could sound, Benitez, who would not later be known for his punching power, separated Santiago from his senses, from his ability to stand upright. The first-round knockout was not a contest; it was not a test in any meaningful way nor really any kind of learning experience. What it was was a confirmation. Hiram Santiago started to confirm what others thought they had seen in that backyard ring. Further confirmation came a mere eight days later in St. Martin against Jesse Torres. Torres lasted until the second round before getting knocked out.

After knocking out his next three opponents in a total of ten rounds, the fifteen-year-old must have felt as if his hands were made of stone. Then Benitez fought Victor Mangual in Puerto Rico. On April Fool’s Day 1974, Victor Mangual, despite being thoroughly outclassed and losing every round, became the first opponent to go the distance against Benitez. The eight-round fight was a necessary learning experience for a fighter who would later establish his greatness principally by outboxing his opponents not stopping them; although there
were
still plenty more knockouts to follow including one in the third round against Juan Disla later that month.

Enter the inimitable “Easy Boy” Lake. Benitez easily knocked out Lake in the first round on May 11, 1974, but it must have been the most compelling, competitive first-round knockout in boxing history because the public apparently clamored for a rematch and three months later, after three more Benitez knockout victories, they got one. “Easy Boy” entered the rematch an enthused fighter. He vowed not to repeat the pugilistic mistakes made three months earlier. This time, he thought, he was armed with valuable insight he had gained on his back. What’s more, he was a quantifiably better fighter now. Five times better it turns out, as he lasted until the fifth round this time before again being knocked out. (The Easy Boy Lake career would not be a stellar one, not helped, surely, by the fact that three of his first four fights were against Benitez.)