PALINDROME (8 page)

It was a good thing I loved my new shades so
much. I threw them on before I ventured outdoors and was determined
not to take them off for any reason.

Anyway, with the discrepant eyeballs and all,
I really needed something to cheer me up; you know, buy yourself a
little bauble to help wash away the blues.
What the hell
, I
reasoned,
let’s put a deposit down on a new BMW.
Now if any
of you can shoot a hole in logic like that, speak now or forever
hold . . . didn’t think so. Game on with Plan A.

Gabi met me just after eleven, which I
figured was a good time for a member of the nouveau riche to be
picked up. The agenda was BMW shopping and then I would treat Gabi
to a chic meal. Gabi and I didn’t get the opportunity to eat in
many swanky restaurants, so I figured it would be a thrill. By the
way, Gabi didn’t know about any of this, not about the new infusion
of cash or my plans for the day. As far as she knew, we were just
hanging out.

Gabi was smartly attired in her warm-weather
best, which consisted of jeans and a loose fitting top. She did a
spin to show off her outfit. “What do you think?”

“Totally fashionable. You’re the quintessence
of Suffolk County couture.”

“Girlfriend, I’m digging the new shades.
Tar-zhay
?”

“No,” I said pretending to have been
offended. I answered in my best
gansta
voice. “These ain’t
no Target Store bargains, these be Bollé.”

“Get out, really? They knockoffs?”

“No, they ain’t knockoffs.”

“Where’d you score those?”

“At the mall,
sista
. Used my debit
card and everything.”

“You hit the lottery and not tell me?”

“Small windfall. Hey, you want to do
something crazy? Let’s go car shopping. I totally want to check out
a convertible BMW.” I pushed up my boobs. “I didn’t wear the Wonder
Bra for nothing. Let’s have some fun.”

“Girl, have you lost your mind? French
sunglasses and German sports cars: what’s going on here?”

“I can’t tell you; just go with it okay? And
I’m thinking about hitting Pace’s for lunch.”

“I can’t afford that place.”

“I got it, I got it. No worries, your BFF be
picking up the tab today, no worries, my
sista
.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I am so sure. Let’s just have some fun
for once. We’re either working or studying all the time—I just want
to feel like a rich girl for one day.”

Gabi smiled this full-moon smile; I mean it
stretched ear to ear. “Okay, I can dig it. Where are we heading,
the BMW dealer over in Smithtown?”

“Absolutely. There’s a hot little Space Gray
128 convertible I’ve been drooling over. Let’s drop the top and
take it for a spin.”

“You think they’ll let us take a BMW for a
drive? I mean we’re driving up to the dealer’s front door in a
smart car. It doesn’t exactly scream discretionary income”

“Really, you don’t think two Suffolk County
girls pulling up in a red Cozy Coupe is going to give the car
salesman a woody?”

“Nah-ah!”

“Bitch, I got the fancy sunglasses, the
knockoff Prada bag, and my outlet center Seven Jeans. I got
cleavage, pumps, and a willing smile—ain’t no way they’re gonna
turn us away.”

“I love it when you scheme like that.”

“A sick mind is a terrible thing to waste,” I
giggled and settled back in my seat. Gabi put the smart car in
gear, and we rolled away from the curb. “I just need to blow off a
little steam. Been a rough couple days.” I sighed. “At least the
criminal case is over.”

Gabi mashed the brakes. The car screeched to
a stop, and her head spun around as if it was mounted on ball
bearings. “What! So fast? Why didn’t you tell me? What
happened?”

“We settled.”

“You settled? You let him off? How could you?
He needs to be taught a lesson.”

“Look, don’t judge, okay? The bartender never
got it out of his pants. He spent a couple of nights in jail, and
that’s all I wanted. I’m sure I scared the crap out of him.”

“I have to tell you, I’m still unclear about
why you went out with him in the first place.”

“I told you, Gabi, I thought he was
cute.”

“He
was
totally flirting with you at
the bar.”

“I know, I know, I’ll have to pick out my
next date more carefully, and I will, but for now can we just have
a little fun?” Gabi had no idea that Cooper’s attempted rape was
not against me but against Allie, the woman that I had copied. She
knew nothing of the fact that Ax and I had framed Keith Cooper to
teach him a lesson he would never forget. We had hoped that the
arrest and a few nights in jail would keep him from ever slipping
drugs into another girl’s drink again. Gabi didn’t know that Keith
had drugged me. This was justice as Ax and I had chosen to
administer it.

“So you say you settled? How much?”

“Enough for an all-day shopping spree and a
fancy new ride.”

“You’re serious?”

“Ever so.”

“I don’t know, it may take me a little time
to get my arms around this. I mean—”

“No problem, but can we go look at cars and
grab lunch while you’re weighing in on world peace and global
climate change? I made a decision. I’m good with it, and I want to
move on.” I gave Gabi a needy look. “And I’m counting on you to be
there for me.” I poked her playfully in the side. She laughed in
spite of herself and put her foot back on the gas, glancing at me
furtively as the car accelerated. It wasn’t her happiest face, and
I knew that I had violated an ethical code that all women shared.
The bottom line is that I had been the judge and jury in the case
against Keith Cooper. I had set the stage, put him on trial, and
decided the outcome.

I reached over and hit the radio button. WBAB
was playing “We’re Not Gonna Take It,” Twisted Sister’s rebellious
anthem. Dee Snider, the lead singer was a Long Island boy, and the
regional radio station played the group’s marquee song about eight
hundred times a day. I looked over and Gabi was still cutting me
down with a disappointed glance. I accompanied Snider in my most
rambunctious singing voice ever, but Gabi did not look any
happier.

“Do you hear what they’re singing? ‘We’re not
gonna take it!’” she said.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, I folded. Look, do
you want to stop somewhere and smoke a joint because you coming
down on me like this is not exactly a mood-enhancing
experience.”

“Sound judgment: rock a joint and take an
expensive sports car out for whirl. And the hits just keep on
coming.”

“Holy crap, Gabi. Look, I’m not the
criminal.” I was getting choked up. “For God’s sake, would you give
me a break?”

“I’m just so surprised, Lexa.”

I turned my focus toward my toes and noticed
that my ruby-red nail polish was starting to wear away at the tips.
“Look, Gabrielle, I’m sensing a lot of tension, and I really don’t
need any right now. I’m not saying that you’re not entitled to your
opinion, but there’s a time and a place, and this isn’t the time
and the place for me. So, maybe we should call it a day.”

Though I hadn’t intended it, my suggestion
seemed to hit Gabi very hard. I saw the expression on her face turn
from accusatory to one of sadness. We drove for a few minutes in
absolute silence before turning off a residential street onto the
multilane mayhem of Nesconset Highway. Although I never verbalized
it, I knew that on some level Gabi had an issue with her
self-esteem and needed the company of a “popular” girl. Damaging my
best friend was the last thing I wanted to do. “What do you say we
blow off the current agenda and cruise out to Port Jeff? Let’s hit
the Steam Room for a bucket of fried clams and some cold beer?”

Gabi’s smile returned, not because she loved
the idea of guzzling a cold one and wolfing down mounds of fried
shellfish, but because I had reached out with the proverbial olive
branch. I may not be the wisest of souls, but I have the ability to
know what’s needed and to offer it when it will do the most good.
Gabi hung a
U-ey
at Browns Road, and we headed northeast
toward the Suffolk coast and a rendezvous with heartburn. In due
course, our conversation returned, and we were both careful to
avoid the sore subject, the one that had preempted an afternoon of
hoity-toity car shopping and fine dining.

After a couple of beers, Gabi managed another
smile, but the pall had been cast and would not lift that
afternoon. I knew in my heart of hearts that Gabi would dwell on
this for a long time. The mood was gloomy, though the sun burned
strongly in the sky. We hung out at the pier and watched the ferry
load and embark for Connecticut.

It was late in the afternoon before we headed
back home. Conversation was still not flowing easily. This time, it
was Gabi who needed a break from the silence. She reached for the
radio knob, and Dee Snider’s voice once again emanated from the
smart car’s tinny speakers.

Twelve: Guilt is a Son of a Bitch

Hemingway
once said, “All things truly
wicked start from innocence,” which was just the way I was feeling.
What had begun as a simple girls’ night out had now evolved into
something truly vile. I was thinking about the night when Gabi and
I had gone out dancing—just two close friends out to blow off a
little steam after a tough week of summer session. We had been
laughing and dancing and for once didn’t have a care in the world
when Vincent’s drugs found their way into my margarita. Vincent was
dead. Keith Cooper, the instrument of Vincent’s wicked plot, had
made a visit to prison, and now I was sitting with fifty thousand
dollars of blood money—money that had been extorted, money I had no
right to. Guilt is a son of a bitch.

The gifts Ax and I possessed, the way we
handled our day to day business—no one else in the world would
manage their lives the way we did. We never did anything in a
conventional way, and I doubt any two other people thought about
life the same way that we did. Ax and I could copy almost anyone,
and because we could, there were options available to us that were
unavailable to anyone else, and so we thought in this way and lived
in this way. Our solution to everything was to transform into
someone else. Subterfuge is a sinister-sounding word, but it was
the name of our game; though we never started out planning to hurt
anyone, sometimes people got hurt, and now for the first time, a
life had been destroyed. Yes, an unworthy life perhaps, but a life
nonetheless.

I had alienated Gabi, my sister in all
things; and now I was feeling very much alone. Ax was my other half
and was always there for me when things went badly, but he was
always so dark and aloof. I never knew where he was or what he was
up to. Gabi had always been my emotional rock, and now . . .

It was time for life as usual: work and then
school followed by more work and more school. But at the end of
this week, there would be no dancing at the Suds Shack and no
sisterly chat with my BFF. My life had really taken a nasty turn.
Fifty thousand bucks. It was true what they said, “Money doesn’t
buy happiness.”

I normally worked straight from eight until
two, and then wolfed down some chow as I drove to campus.

Hester Moffet, DDS, my boss and fine human
being, had been thirty minutes into a root canal—which, for a
dental assistant, was the most boring thing in the world. It was
slow, precision work, and all I could do to help had been to
suction the patient’s saliva that would have otherwise run over her
lip and down her chin. It was a pretty chin that came to a delicate
point. I focused on it and thought that one day I would use it as
some part of a face amalgam. Pardon the play on words, but I needed
some form of escape in order to cope whenever boredom was at the
max. This had been one of those times. I amused myself by picturing
this woman’s chin as part of an artistic challenge, pairing it with
someone else’s nose and yet someone else’s ears and hair. The
combination I was envisioning wasn’t coming out very well. It
looked something like Picasso’s
Guernica
, a juxtaposition of
unrelated facial features that struck me as comical. I giggled
inwardly before I wiped the vision from my silly little head.

“Suction, please,” Moffet said. He had been
cleaning one of the tooth canals for at least fifteen minutes. God
only knew where he found the patience. He glanced up at me. “That’s
good.”

I was still dealing with Allie’s one creepy
hazel eye. I couldn’t wear sunglasses in the office and had been
avoiding direct eye contact with Moffet all morning. The patient
moaned. “Did you feel that?” Moffet asked. The patient nodded.
“Lexa, can I have a fresh syringe of lidocaine, please?”

There were no refills in my cabinet drawer.
“Be right back.” I popped up and walked down the corridor to the
supply closet. I inserted a lidocaine cartridge into a clean
syringe and grabbed a fistful of supplies to replenish my empty
drawer. I saw Doc Moffet peering through the doorway into the
corridor. He appeared to be a bit impatient. I needed to avoid eye
contact, and so I turned my head as I reentered the room. As I did,
I tripped on the door saddle and went down.

“Jesus, Lexa, are you all right?” Moffet
jumped out of his chair to help me. He must’ve seen the hazel eye
because he winced, and I didn’t like the expression on his face.
The patient was sitting up in the chair but couldn’t speak because
of all the dental apparatus in her mouth. Moffet grabbed my arm and
put it around his shoulder. He helped me into an empty examination
room.

“I’ll be okay. So sorry, doctor.”

“Lexa, you’ve got—”

I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror.
The loaded syringe I had been carrying was sticking out of my
temple, and the plunger had been depressed.

“Hold still,” Moffet said. He pulled a
sterilized gauze pad out of one of the canisters on the counter.
“I’m going to pull it out. Try not to move.” I could feel him
putting pressure on the injection site as he withdrew the needle. I
could feel the needle being pulled out of my skin. “You’re going to
be all right, but I’m going to take you over to the hospital to get
checked out.” He took my hand and put my fingers on the sterilized
gauze pad. “Keep light pressure on this, okay?’