“I’ve got a message for you,” Batman said, reaching into his utility belt and pulling out a small silver automatic. “From Max.”
25 ~ Paragon (3)
The gun was aimed at my abdomen, where a bullet would do harm anywhere it hit.
“You put your mask on crooked, Darryl,” I said. “Your hair is showing.”
Wilder reflexively put up his empty hand, stopped it at chest level, and grinned at me. His teeth were white and regular. The grin, even beneath the mask, was friendly. “Darryl?” he said. The grin got wider. “You got me confused with someone else.”
“I doubt it. Mrs. McCarvey remembers you very vividly.”
“Mrs. McCarvey,” he said, shaking his head. “Old Auntie Sarah. She drinks, you know. Don’t you think it’s terrible when a woman can’t control her drinking? Such a waste of potential.”
“Did you kill him?” I asked, glancing down at Batman’s feet.
“Not enough time,” he said regretfully. “Those jug-heads just couldn’t wait to get inside. No finesse.”
“Pleasure postponed,” I said. “I guess you know all about that, Darryl.”
The gun made a tiny circle. “So you know my name. So what? Names are easy. And I don’t know much about pleasure of any kind. Take off your mask, and do it real slow.”
I lifted my mask to the top of my head. Someone came out of the women’s room behind me. I heard her sniffle as her heels clacked their way down the hallway, and then the sounds were swallowed up in a new burst of noise from the ballroom.
“Wondered what you looked like. That was cute, leaving through the window. Scared you, didn’t I?”
The door opened out. There was no way I could get my hands on it and pull it closed without giving him time to perforate my insides. “You’re crazy,” I said. “Crazy people scare me.”
“I am crazy,” he said calmly. “It’s smart of you to recognize that, Simeon. I hope you’ll keep it in mind as we negotiate our way through our next fifteen minutes together. Have you got a boyfriend?”
“No,” I said.
“Well, there’s someone for everyone in this world, so there’s certainly someone for you. Just be glad it isn’t me.”
Henry was up on the stage. Spurrier and his cops were probably in the middle of the fracas. The Seven Dwarfs were God only knew where. “Go away,” I said. “I’ll give you ten minutes to get clear.”
He made a kissing noise, two times, fast. “Is that a promise? Like ‘it won’t hurt’? Or ‘I won’t come in your mouth’?” Darryl Wilder laughed. Then he stopped, like someone turning off a tap. “Back up,” he said. “Just three paces. Stick your hands in the front of your pants and keep them there. Don’t do anything stupid, okay? You probably won’t believe this, but I’d really hate to hurt you.”
I did as I was told. The pressure of my hands against my stomach was oddly comforting, as though they might slow the bullet. Wilder put his free hand against the door and pulled, shoving Batman’s bare feet back across the asphalt. He stepped inside, forcing broad shoulders through the opening, and tugged the door closed. The gun was rocksteady.
“Bathrooms?” he asked, looking at the doors to my left. I nodded. “And that one?”
“Office.”
“Is it empty?”
“It might as well be.”
“In there, then. In a straight line, okay?” He shielded the gun under the black cape and followed me into Mickey Snell’s office, closing the door behind him. It had a little latch on the inside, and he threw it into the locked position.
Snell snored stuporously on the desk. Wilder barely glanced at him. “I used to think all faggots were handsome, you know, men who took care of themselves and put a little effort into how they look. But those are just the ones you’re aware of, right? The ones that put on a show. You see a fat bag of shit like this, you never think he might be a fruit.”
“Was Jason McCarvey handsome?”
“Uncle Jason?” He gave it some thought, dividing his attention between me and the comatose Snell. “You know, I don’t know. I grew up with the man. And he looked like my father, and I guess you never really know what your father looks like. He was a real skunk, though, Uncle Jason, I mean, although my father was no bargain either. No wonder poor Auntie Sarah drinks.”
“Where’d you get the skinheads?”
“I was tagging along after Max’s boyfriend when they showed up. I followed them to the jail and bailed them out. I thought it’d be fun to bring them to your party. Take all their IQs and add them up, and you’ve still got a centigrade temperature. Who’s got my tags?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, sure you do.” He sat on a corner of the desk that Mickey Snell wasn’t using, fished in one of the pouches of the utility belt, and extracted a package of Marlboros and a heavy military Zippo. He seemed to have all the time in the world. “Do you smoke?”
“No.”
“Mind if I do?” He waited for an answer.
“Darryl,” I said, “I wouldn’t mind if you ate the lighter.”
“I guess not.” He shook a cigarette loose, placed it between his lips, and put the package back. Then he fired the Zippo and inhaled. “Uncle Jason’s,” he said, showing me the lighter before he dropped it into the pouch. “Who’s got the tags?”
“I told you-”
He waggled the gun. “It’s noisy out there. I could shoot you and no one would hear a thing, except for our fat friend here. Empty your pants pockets.”
“There aren’t any,” I said. “Donald Duck doesn’t carry stuff around.”
“Donald Duck doesn’t wear pants, so let’s not pretend to be purists. Lift your shirt and turn around.”
There didn’t seem to be anything to do but obey. The air felt cold on my stomach and back.
When I was facing him again, he said, “Open the shirt at the neck. The first four buttons. Pull it open.”
“You won’t get out of here,” I said, “unless you go out the back door now.”
He put the gun against Mickey Snell’s belly and pushed it in. “No one will hear a shot through all this fat,” he said. “I could pull the trigger just for fun. Open the shirt, like I told you.”
I showed him my neck and chest, and he sighed. “You’re making this difficult. Help the kid out, and I’ll be out of here. No one will get hurt.”
“Until the next time,” I said.
He drummed the back of his heels against the desk, the first sign of impatience. “I’m finished. I thought there would be a mystery or something when they died, something special. I thought I would feel something. Just like I thought faggots were different. But they’re not. They’re just like everyone else. They live stupid, disgusting lives and they die messy. When they’re dead, they’re dead. Nothing to get excited about, nothing interesting there at all. Just another shitty life and a lot of blood and bones.”
The noise outside was dying down. “You mean that?”
“What? That I’m finished? Sure I do. I want a life, a job, kids.” He smiled at me. “I’ve got a girlfriend now. I can’t go on with this. I get home, she asks me what I did today, and I’m supposed to say, ‘I killed a queer’? I want to go back-back somewhere-and be a person.” He turned his head toward the door as though he’d heard something and then brought it back around to me. “I don’t want to be crazy anymore.”
“And you’re telling me you won’t hurt anybody here if I help you get the tags.”
“Nope. Honest Injun.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I’m surprised. People usually do. It doesn’t matter, though. I could just shoot you here and go get them myself.”
