louder, his entire body hitching and jerking as the force of his tears racked his body. He looked like he was in agony.
Stephanie took a step toward him. He stepped back and his face twisted into a scowl then he began to laugh. His laughter rose louder and louder. It was the sound of a mind that had lost all connection with sanity. Tears continued to rain from his eyes as he doubled over with laughter. He turned abruptly and walked off down the street, still laughing.
The absurd irony of Stephanie carrying his baby while he was on a campaign to stop everyone in the world from having more kids was just further proof that no one had a more fucked up sense of humor than God. Todd had gotten his vasectomy too late.
Todd could feel Stephanie's eyes on his back, watching him walk off into the night. He could hear her painful sobs. He heard the door to their apartment open and Cathy storm out.
'It's your baby, Todd! It's your baby!' Stephanie's voice sounded hysterical. He had hurt her. It was the last thing he'd wanted to do when he'd decided to call her, the last thing he'd wanted to do when he'd pulled up in front of her apartment just minutes ago. But everything had gone wrong. She was pregnant.
Todd wanted to go back. He wanted to hug her and tell her that everything would be alright, that they would raise the baby together, and that they would be a family. But he didn't because he knew that if he went back there…he would kill her.
'Fuck you, Todd! You'd better never come back here again! I'd better never see you again, do you hear me?' It was Cathy and he knew she meant it. She'd try to kill him if he came back again. Unless he killed her first.
Chapter Sixteen
Work the next morning was surreal. The night before he'd been cutting open a young crackwhore and disposing of a man's body and today he was listening to an elderly woman talk to him about how Medicare wasn't covering her bills and she needed food stamps.
'I'm sorry but you can't be on both Medicare and food stamps.'
The woman looked impossibly ancient. Her body was thin and drawn and her skin was a maze of fissures and wrinkles. Her hair was completely white and her eyes looked yellow and rheumy. Her left eye was white with cataracts.
'Well, what am I supposed to do? I can't afford my medications and keep the heat on and buy food.'
'I'm sorry but I can't help you.'
Todd was exhausted and his head was pounding. He looked beyond the old woman at the endless line of applicants and then at the front door of the building, wondering if the police were going to burst in any minute and arrest him for what he'd done to Nicolene or for killing Terrence but there were just more welfare applicants streaming into the building in an endless tide.
I've got to get the hell out of here!
'I'm sorry but we're done here. I've got a lot of other people to see and I'm not feeling well.'
He rose and walked out of his cubicle just as his supervisor was preparing to walk in.
'The cops are here. It seems they had a complaint about you from some junkie whore. She says that you stole her baby.'
The woman seemed amused by it. As if she was enjoying the drama. Todd followed her back to her office.
They walked past all of the fat and morbidly obese people waiting in line for food stamps, the young able- bodied men and women lined up to apply for welfare checks when they ought to have been applying for jobs, the pregnant women on their third, fourth, or fifth child, standing in line for WIC food vouchers, the gangbangers, pimps, and drug dealers waiting by the front door for their whores to get their checks and bring them the money. Todd asked himself if what he had done was wrong and he just couldn't see it. He couldn't see how anyone could have blamed him. Even if they didn't know what we were doing to the environment, this should have been enough to convince them. Scum like this should not be allowed to reproduce.
The cops stood in front of Ms. Santiago's desk looking bored and annoyed. One of the cops approached Todd as they entered. He was about 5'9' and over two hundred pounds. Body by Big Mac. His gut hung over his belt hiding the buckle. He didn't appear to be much older than thirty and looked Native American. His partner was a skinny white guy who looked like he was in his forties. They both shook Todd's hand and smiled insincerely. Todd returned the smile.
'Todd Hammerstein, right?'
'Yes?'
'We've just got a few questions for you about a young woman named Nicolene De Marco?'
'The name sounds familiar. Who is she?'
The two cops studied Todd's face, looking for the lie.
'She came in with her husband a few days ago trying to get on public assistance. You took her application.'
'Oh, that's probably why her name sounds familiar. Is she wanted for something? If she just came in I should still have her application. I can probably get her address for you.'
'No, we know where she is. She's in the hospital. She claims that someone gave her an abortion against her will. She was six months pregnant at the time. It looks like they cut her baby right out of the womb.'
Todd turned white and began to look ill, as he remembered what he'd done.
'That's horrible!'
Todd looked over at his boss. She was still smirking.
'She thinks that you may have had something to do with it Mr. Hammerstein.'
'Me?'
'She says that you tried to talk her into having an abortion and getting her tubes tied. Kind of a coincidence since that's exactly what happened to her. Are you okay Mr. Hammerstein?'
'Not really. I was about to go home sick. I've been getting really bad headaches lately. Migraines.'
'Well, we won't keep you very long. What about what Mrs. DeMarco said?'
'Who?'
'Mrs. De Marco. The woman who was assaulted? Did you try to convince her to have an abortion?'
'That's not really what we do here. We don't have time for that kind of counseling. We just assess need and accept or decline the applications. We get so many applicants that we just don't have much time to spend with each one.'
'I told him the same thing,' Ms. Santiago said.
'So then why would she say that?'
The police officer with the big gut turned to Todd's supervisor, still looking annoyed.
'Are you serious? We hear all kinds of bullshit in here. Probably as much as you get in your job, officer. Saying that the government wants poor people to have abortions isn't really a new one. We hear that everyday around here.
Probably as often as you hear about racist cops targeting minorities.'
The cops nodded their heads, smiling as if to say 'touch''' and then turned back to Todd. Todd's eyes were closed and he was swaying back and forth, rubbing his temples with his index fingers. His head felt like it was being slowly peeled open like a hard-boiled egg.
'You really don't look so good, buddy. How about you come down to the station tomorrow when you're feeling better and we can talk about this some more then?'
Todd nodded his head.
They shook hands again and one of the cops, Officer Dickerson, handed Todd his card. After they left, Todd's supervisor was still standing there staring at him.
'Sit down, Todd.'
Todd took a seat in front of her desk. Unlike the cheap plastic seats the applicants sat in in his cubicle, these chairs were made out of metal and vinyl and swiveled.
