language, he was going to write in a program. He was sure he’d seen this hacker’s modus operandi before. Yeah, he was going to set a trap for this guy.
It was a sunny cold day. Beautiful clear air. A perfect day in New York despite the forty-degree tag on the temperature. He thought of Lindsay and smiled. At breakfast that morning, while he ate a bowl of cereal and she a piece of dry toast, she’d said in the most natural way imaginable, “Let’s go out on Thursday night, okay?”
“Thursday night? Something special happening?”
She flushed and he frowned over his spoon of wheat flakes.
“Well, yeah, at least for me.”
He took another bite of his cereal. “Okay. Let’s call Enoch and Sheila and see if they’d like to do something. Good idea.”
“That isn’t what I meant, Taylor!”
“Oh?” He stared at her blankly.
She flushed more deeply, then saw the laughter in his eyes, and threw the half piece of toast at him.
“You’re awful and ought to be circumcised.”
“No, not circumcised! Anything but that, mistress.”
She frowned. “No, that’s not right.”
He was laughing so hard he couldn’t help himself. He rose from the table, grabbed her beneath her arms, and hugged her so tight she squeaked.
“Let’s stay in Thursday night and celebrate for about twelve hours.”
He was smiling like a besotted fool as he wondered how her ski shoot was going. At least it was a gorgeous day and she was wearing ski clothes, so she’d be warm enough. He would have thought the best place to take ski pictures would be at a ski slope. But no, they were at Washington Square.
Actually, the shoot wasn’t going well at all. Lindsay looked over at the director and sighed. He had an attitude problem, a common-enough malady, but he was both arrogant and ignorant, which made things nearly impossible because the photographer was good but mush. He had no control over anything. Lindsay was nothing more than a stupid bimbo, the crew a useless group of grunts, the makeup people faggots and hags. He was, in short, the nephew of the ski-clothing-store president. The ad people were biting their nails, trying to keep peace, trying to give the jerk suggestions couched in the most diplomatic phrases, but nothing was working. He was demanding and contradictory and just plain stupid. Demos had left, he was so pissed, just giving her a commiserating nod. She’d mouthed, “Coward,” at him and he’d agreed.
Lindsay sighed again, leaning against the set, waiting, waiting, waiting. The male model, Barry, had given the director the finger—when his back was turned—and was sitting over at one of the stone tables playing chess. Washington Square was an odd place. Serious chess players, most of them old as the square itself, played chess next to dope dealers who were even now conducting business as usual. Prostitutes eyed her to see what she had that they didn’t. Business appeared to be brisk for both sets of folk. And there was the crew, pissed as hell and bored and grousing. The elaborate set, for which the ski clothing company had shelled out over one hundred thousand dollars, was sitting there dark and heavy and towering some forty feet in the air, and so far unused. After endless hassles with the city, the ad agency had gotten the necessary permits, but the director hadn’t figured out yet how to get Eden and the ski lift together in the same shot. There was even a lift chair, but she hadn’t sat in it yet. The gondola swung in the light breeze above her head.
She moved away from the fake ski lift and went over to watch Barry. She played a little chess, but the thought of challenging one of the resident graybeards terrified her. She saw quickly that Barry was getting his ski socks knocked off. She stood quietly, enjoying the game, when one of the set men came and whispered she was to go back and stand against the lift and not move. They had to take some lineup shots. She wondered about Barry, but the man didn’t say anything to him. Lindsay walked back to the lift and obligingly leaned against the sturdy wooden beams at its base, wondering what Taylor was doing. She smiled. All she had to do was think of him and she’d smile like a fool. He filled her and made her happier than she’d ever been in her life. He was her life now.
She began humming, closing out the director’s whining orders, staring down at her ski boots as she wiggled her toes. They were tight. She looked up when one of the photographer’s assistants shouted at the director. Oh, dear, open warfare. The man told him the light would be gone in thirty minutes and to get his shit together. The waiting was costing a fortune and he was a shmuck.
The director raged on and on. The photographer’s assistant, an old-timer of immense experience, just looked sardonic and finally shut his mouth. Lindsay knew what he was thinking: Who the hell cared if this jerk cost his dear uncle three times what he should? Who cared if the photographer, a wimp of the first order, just stood there and bit his fingernails?
Lindsay wondered what had happened to the set man who’d asked her to come back here. No lineup shots? She didn’t see any movement. She looked up to see Edie, the makeup woman, striding toward her. Maybe, at last, something was going to happen. She started to call out a greeting, something light and funny because Edie looked like the rest of them felt. Then suddenly Edie dropped her bag and stared upward, a scream coming out of her mouth and another. Then she screamed, “Eden! Jesus, move!”
Lindsay started forward, then heard other screams, and she looked up.
The entire ski-lift structure seemed to lift off its base, then burst into flames like some sort of exploding oil rig, spewing orange fire and black smoke upward. The blast sent a rain of steel flying outward, then down, hard and fast. The noise was deafening. Odd, but the people’s screams around her were even louder. But this noise was different. It was stark and close and unreal because it was here, above her and all around her and soon—
“No,” she whispered, terror freezing her in place for an instant. She lurched away.
She wasn’t fast enough. A thick support beam struck her shoulder and bounced off, hitting the concrete beside her. She felt an odd sense of warmth, a blankness that was strange, but there was no pain, only this pressure seeming to come from inside her. It intensified, sending her to her knees. Another piece of debris struck her, full on the side of the face, knocking her sideways, her knees crumpling. Pain, sudden and fierce, made her yell. Planks of wood crashed down from the ruined ski lift, hitting her, flinging her about. She couldn’t do anything about it. Pain was there, full and deep and ugly, holding her. Then there was blackness, blessed blackness that was settling over her, blanketing the pain as one would blanket flames.
Odd about the screams. They went on and on. Had a lot of people been struck? Why wouldn’t they stop? The screams were closer to her now, she knew that; they were softer, more vague, and she could almost feel those screams touching her, feel them coming even from her, but somehow she was moving away from them toward that wonderful blackness that blanked out everything and left nothing in its place.
19
The sirens were shrill. They pounded into her head. She hated them. She wanted to get away from them but she couldn’t seem to move. Someone was squeezing her hand, she felt his fingers suddenly, warm fingers, blunt. A man was speaking softly and gently to her, but he was insistent, he wouldn’t stop. He was like the sirens. She wanted to tell him to be quiet, but she couldn’t seem to get the words to form in her mind. She didn’t at first understand what he was saying, but she recognized the pattern, the repetition, and despite herself, she began to pay attention to him, looking to his voice to force her outward toward him.
“Do you know who you are?”
She opened her eyes. No, just her left eye. Her right eye wouldn’t move. It was a young man speaking to her, his face very close to hers. His eyes were very blue and his ears were big. She thought he was Irish. She realized then she couldn’t breathe.
She gasped for breath and the pain seared through her. There was only pain, no air.
“It’s all right. I know you’re having trouble. Just take real shallow breaths. No, no, don’t panic. Shallow breaths. Yes, that’s right. I think you’ve got a collapsed lung. That’s why we’ve got that oxygen mask over your face. Just breathe, shallow and easy. Good. Now, do you know who you are?”
She focused on the mask that covered her nose and mouth. But it hurt so much. She kept trying, and she got air, but the pain nearly sent her into madness. He asked her again who she was. She was her, and she was here, and she didn’t know what was going on, what had happened, except she hurt and could barely breathe.
“Do you know your name? Please, tell me. Who are you? Do you know who you are?”
“Yes, I’m Lindsay.” God, it hurt to say those words, hurt so much she wanted to yell with it, but she couldn’t.
