A Mound Over Hell Read online

  “Puppy’s probably annoyed because Greta’s been nagging him about finding a new job.” Zelda clucked her tongue as Puppy landed on her Park Place hotel. He stared glumly.

  “That was a wonderful birthday present, thank you again.”

  “You’re very welcome.”

  “I could’ve used socks. Definitely underwear.”

  “I figured you needed some companionship.”

  She and Pablo exchanged mischievous looks.

  “I do fine,” Puppy snapped defensively.

  “Oh, tell us.”

  “Maybe there’s nothing to share.” Pablo smiled.

  “I don’t share everything.”

  “What’s her or his name then?” Zelda leaned forward dreamily.

  “I’m taking a break.”

  “The bitch ended six years ago.”

  “Not long enough from the Gates of Hell. How much fake money do I owe you?” Puppy snapped at Zelda.

  “One hundred bucks. Sometime tonight. I need to rest for a field trip tomorrow with the brats.”

  Puppy very, very slowly counted out the multi-colored bills. “And what about your romances, dearest Zelda?”

  Zelda glanced uneasily at Pablo, who unscrewed another beer bottle.

  “Nothing,” she said quickly.

  “You, the queen of the one-night stands?”

  “Are you pissed because I gave you an annoying, expensive HG, I’m winning again in Monopoly or because you haven’t been laid in a long, long time.”

  “All three,” he conceded sadly.

  “We’re all pretty celibate,” Pablo said a little too emphatically, Puppy thought.

  “Not exactly model citizens in Grandma’s House,” Zelda said. “Late 30s, no marriage, no children.” She let out a loud sigh. “If only we were dentists.”

  “Just wait until you get a toothache,” Pablo grumbled.

  Zelda clenched her groin in mock anger. Suddenly serious, the mercurial Zelda draped her arm around Puppy’s neck. “You have to line something up, Pup. Otherwise they’ll just assign you any old job.”

  “Or consider you don’t care,” Pablo added. “Baseball historian isn’t the most respected job.”

  “What do you think, they’ll send me back to the DV?” Puppy asked. His two oldest friends since he was thirteen frowned. They didn’t answer right away.

  Zelda and Pablo left around eleven; he waved off their offer to clean up. Tomorrow was an off-day. Three games a week, one hundred and forty game season. Then baseball was done. D-O-N-E. Forever. F-O-R-E-V-E-R. He polished off the last of his Cedar Creek bourbon and worked on the opening game’s official report.

  “An enthusiastic (the school-cutters boys had cheered) crowd (eight is a crowd, even excepting the two naked women frolicking in the bomb crater) came together as Family for the opening game of the 2098 baseball season. Harry the HG (he made up names for the holograms) pitched a strong game for the hometown Hawks, striking out six Falcons, who were shut down (and half asleep) by Harry’s tantalizing curve. Vernon Jackson, the Hawks slugging catcher (and the only one able to touch his toes) led his team’s charge with three hits.”

  Puppy stared sadly at the notebook. He used to write endless pages when he first started. Volumes, epics, describing the weather, clouds, a rare bird sighting, quality of food, conversations of the fans, his own rambling insights, categorizing the HGs, critiquing the batters, comparing everyone to the greats of the past. He gave up when he realized absolutely no one cared anymore. Least of all, him.

  Greta danced on his chest.

  “Perhaps Puppy would like a girl?”

  He peered suspiciously through the top of his bourbon glass. “I thought you just woke me up and ruined my mornings.”

  Greta laughed. “I have nighttime functions.” Zelda, I really hate you now. “Asian girl with small breasts?”

  “I don’t sex watch, thanks.”

  “Everyone does.”

  “Only to stimulate reproduction between married couples,” he recited mechanically.

  Greta laughed dubiously. “Blonde girl, big ass?”

  “I’m going to unplug you, Greta,” he threatened, standing up with a tipsy wobble.

  “Latina? Curvy butt like Annette?”

  “That’s it.” He chased Greta back into the bedroom and slammed the door. “Stay.”

  “I can go through walls,” she replied haughtily.

  He half-dozed during Grandma’s “Sweet Dreams My Darlings” sign-off at one AM, when the vidnews shut down for the night. Grandma had instituted this on the Day of Surrender when the country collapsed into an hysterical coma after losing World War Three to the Islamic Empire. Yes it’s over. Yes we lost thirteen million. Yes we will survive, and yes we will flourish again. Every night for the past twenty-five years, Grandma has ended the day by reading a banal story to a different group of children before tucking them into bed.

  Tonight’s story was about K’ana the Komb and the importance of grooming your hair. If you don’t look good for yourself, My Darlings, how can you expect your fellow siblings to respect you? And if we don’t respect each other, how can we have a loving Family? There was also some shit about K’ana taking an unwanted bath in the washing machine and losing a couple teeth which still made her a good Komb because it takes all kinds of Kombs to make a Family.

  Fortunately Puppy stumbled into a hole of dreamless sleep. Around six AM, Greta danced onto his chest. Little bitch, he mumbled sleepily, sprawled in his leather recliner.

  “Oh my, Puppy is a naughty boy, he has found a new toy.”

  Puppy punched his fist through her head and staggered toward the bathroom. He tripped over a leg and squinted unsteadily over his left shoulder. A beefy guy around sixty in shabby clothes lay curled up on the floor, clutching an empty beer bottle and snoring like a thunderstorm.

  “Isn’t he cute?” Greta sang.

  Puppy peered at the sleeping man. His broad face must’ve been handsome before the fleshiness swallowed the cheeks and chin. A snore paused, as if thinking all on its own before rumbling serenely. Something about the man was familiar. Too familiar. Puppy grew angry.

  “Hey.” He poked the guy’s muscular arm. “Mister.” The snoring deepened. Puppy pushed harder. “Hey.”

  The man sat up with a bewildered look which quickly gave way to irritation. “Who the hell are you?”

  “The guy whose apartment you’re in.”

  “Huh.” The man squinted, trying to focus. Not with those glazed eyes. Reinhardt’s Rum, Puppy decided. Greases your liver right out your butt in no time at all.

  “Yeah. Huh.” Puppy tried tugging the man upright, but he weighed a ton. Puppy slipped to his knee, their faces eye level. Putrid breath raked Puppy’s nostrils.

  “How’d you get in here?” Maybe he’d forgot to lock the door.

  “I don’t know.” The man’s puzzlement seemed genuine. Reinhardt’s usually got the brain soon after the liver. “Where’s the can?”

  “What?”

  “The can.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of the can,” the man shouted belligerently. “Can. Shit, piss.”

  He’d just cleaned the toilet. His sparkling tiles were a thing of the past because the old rummy staggered down the hall, lurched into the bathroom and retched all over the toilet. Puppy watched in disgust as the man used a white hand towel to wipe away the vomit.

  “Do you mind?”

  The guy slammed the door. Tinkle tinkle little pee. Puppy quickly made himself coffee. After more farts, belches and several absolutely inhuman noises Puppy didn’t want to begin to understand, the man weaved into the living room, dropping his smelly body onto the couch. He drained the last of the bourbon and made a face.

  “Cheap stuff.”

  “I’m so sorry, I wasn’t expecting guests.”

  The man glanced disdainfully around the messy room and put his feet on the table with a majestic wave of his thick hands. “Got any beer?”

 
; “I think you had enough.” Puppy laid a cup of coffee on the table.

  “I didn’t have anything. They wouldn’t let me drink in the hospital.”

  Finally, some facts. “Which hospital?”

  “Dallas Memorial. I had the cancer.” The man sipped the coffee and half-spit it back. “What is this?”

  Puppy’s eyes blazed. “Coffee.”

  “Sucks.”

  “Goes along with the cheap bourbon.”

  “Yup.” The man peered. “Where am I?”

  “I’m asking the questions.”

  “Why can only you ask and not me?”

  “Because you’re in my apartment.”

  The man considered that reasonable and made another half-hearted attempt to sip the coffee. “Sugar? Oh, wait, am I allowed to ask that?”

  Puppy muttered all the way back and forth to the kitchen, slamming a bowl of sugar on the coffee table. The man dumped in about four tablespoons.

  “Happy?” Puppy asked.

  “I could use some eggs.”

  “So could I. Where’s Dallas Memorial?”

  “Texas.” The man growled at Puppy’s stupidity.

  “You came all the way from Texas with cancer?”

  “I died there.”

  Puppy told himself not to laugh. “Then how’d you get here?”

  The man shook his head in deep sadness. “Damn do I know. And where am I that I don’t know how I got here?”

  “New York City.”

  The man brightened. “I lived there. A hotel on Central Park. The memory ain’t terrific. Must be the dying and all.”

  “You have a name?”

  He paused, thinking. “Mickey Mantle.”

  “Mickey Mantle.” Puppy smiled carefully. “Like the old baseball player?’

  “I am the old baseball player,” Mickey shouted.

  “Okay, okay. You are.“

  “Except I ain’t anymore. Except here I am. So I must still be. ” Mickey swallowed down the rest of his coffee and polished off Puppy’s cup.

  “Nice to meet you, Mickey.”

  “That’s better.”

  “I’m Puppy.” Better not to give out last names.

  “What kind of retard name is that?”

  “Ask my parents. They’re both dead.”

  “Like me.” Mickey burped. “I want breakfast.”

  “How about a shower first?”

  Mickey’s eyes narrowed. “Why? You a fairy?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Fairy. Fag. Queer.”

  Grandma’s bra straps. “No. I mean, I’ve…” Puppy thought best not to answer too deeply. “No. Just girls. Take a shower. I’ll find food and then we’ll figure out where you belong.”

  “I belong in Heaven,” Mickey yelled.

  Puppy laid out an old towel and washcloth on the sink, turned on the shower water and tried to find fresh clothes while the old guy scrubbed away, singing some country song Puppy recognized by Merle Haggard, Okie from Muskogee.

  Mick came out with two towels Puppy would never use again wrapped around his waist. He plopped back onto the couch.

  “I left you clean clothes.” Puppy put down some bacon and toast.

  “They’re ugly,” Mickey snorted.

  “Yours stink.”

  “So wash them.” Mick bit into the bacon and looked up with wondering disgust. “What is this?”

  Puppy sighed. “Bacon.”

  “No, it ain’t.” Mick tossed it on the plate.

  “Because it’s not really real. It’s AG bacon. Alleged. Or SC. So-called. Most of the foods are synthetic. Because of the radiation. From the war. Any of this ring a bell from your life before you took a bath in rum?”

  “I hate rum.” Mick took cautious, displeased bites of the toast. “Best you got?”

  “It’s the best anyone has,” Puppy yelled.

  The DV Community Center on East 163rd Street was a long, open portable building inside a wire-fenced playground which had been originally built for the Allah Deportations of the late 50s. It took a while to get the stench out and some felt it still smelled of goat, but that made it perfect for the DVs. Nothing had changed since Puppy had shot pool with Zelda or flirted up Noreen Delgado. Same eager kids with suspicious eyes. Same glistening floors and squeaky polished windows. Same long bulletin board with endless index cards advertising work or asking for work, announcements of after school programs, tutors available.

  Help me any way I can, said Grandma’s Eleventh Insight running along the far wall. Basketball courts echoed with loud grunts. An entire wall of books, about forty feet long and twelve feet high, occupied a wall; kids sat on the floor studying, whispering advice. No one screwed around. If they did, one of the matrons, always fat, always a woman, always ugly, Puppy had no idea why, would bounce their butts onto the street and it would take weeks, sometimes months, sometimes never for the kids to be able to return. There was little room for error in the DV.

  Always the kids were here, except for the adults dropping them off with hopeful embarrassment. The parents, who knew painfully they were responsible for this situation, leaving with a quick kiss to hurry back to their shop, store, business, whatever proliferated along the shopping streets like desperate pleas. Give us another chance.

  Puppy led Mickey to the front table. The matron raised up her black glasses from the chain around her neck.

  “Morning, madam,” Puppy said politely. “This is my friend Mickey Mantle.”

  “Hiya cookie.” Mickey winked.

  The matron reddened indignantly.

  Puppy shrugged helplessly. “That’s why I’m here. He wandered off and I’m trying to get him back to where he belongs.” Puppy whispered, “I think it’s a hospital.”

  “Hey, I’m dead, not deaf,” Mickey barked.

  The matron cleared her throat authoritatively. “Can I see your Lifecard, Mr. Mantle?”

  Mickey looked at Puppy, who said, “Lifecard. Identification.”

  Mantle patted his dirty pants. “I ain’t got one.”

  “He doesn’t have one,” Puppy said.

  “I am not deaf, either, sir.” The matron smiled. “Where were you living, sir?”

  “In Dallas Memorial Hospital. Texas. Where I died.”

  The matron’s smile tightened. “When was that?”

  Mantle looked up thoughtfully. “Must’ve been 1995.”

  She exchanged a worried glance with Puppy.

  “Do you know what year it is, sir?”

  “How the hell would I know?”

  “He’s been dead,” Puppy threw that in.

  “So he said.” The woman frowned. “It’s 2098.”

  “No shit?” Mickey took that pretty calmly. “No wonder I feel so rested.”

  The matron turned to Puppy. “Where did you meet Mr. Mantle?”

  “On his floor,” Mick grumbled. “Must be some elevator to Heaven.”

  Puppy leaned forward. “Him. Where.”

  The woman blinked at Puppy’s shorthand, smiling a different way now. “Home.”

  “DV.”

  She nodded. Puppy glanced at Mantle, leering at a busty teenage girl.

  “Just sign here, sir.”

  Puppy hesitated longer than he should’ve. They sat on a long wooden bench, waiting for the processing and sipping lemonade. A couple of kids skateboarded past.

  “They’ll take good care of you in the Facility.”

  Mantle frowned. “I ain’t staying with you?”

  “I’m not allowed. You don’t have any ID.”

  “Because I’m dead.”

  “These are the laws.”

  “If I wasn’t supposed to stay with you, then why the hell did I end up on your floor?”

  Good question, Puppy didn’t ask himself.

  2

  Busily scribbling on their pads, the six children in neat purple and white uniforms sat in a semi-circle on a tiny patch of brown grass four blocks from the traffic-choked Cross Bronx Expressway. Fr
om off to the side, Zelda carefully watched her class.

  “Okay stop.” She held up her left index finger, agitating the kids of PS 75 into feverish last-minute flourishes with their charcoal pencils.

  The kids mumbled nervously, anticipating elaborate praise or deep disappointment. Zelda took Marshall Diem’s pad off his lap. He looked up hopefully.

  “Is that what you see?” Zelda gestured across the Harlem River at the tall empty buildings.

  Marshall nodded uncertainly and pointed at his eyes. The kids giggled; Zelda cut them off with a sharp look.

  “Because I don’t see that.”

  “It’s there.” Marshall reached for his drawing as if it were a life jacket of creativity.

  Zelda shook her head. “Show me what you drew but not just on the page. Show me how you thought it.”

  The baffled Marshall looked at his classmates for help. They were equally puzzled.

  Zelda sighed impatiently. “Those buildings are ugly, right?” She held up the drawing, which showed a beautiful home with two parents, a child and trees. “This is not ugly. How did you get from that,” she jabbed past the holographic sailboats and seagulls at the squalid remains of Manhattan, still largely uninhabited after the chemical attack, “to this?”

  Marshall’s eyes watered. Zelda wasn’t particularly sympathetic. Maybe if she liked children more. Or at all. Zelda knelt in the circle, the children anxious, their turn at having their art disemboweled by this always stern and slightly scary woman looming any second. Look at Marshall; his cheeks dripped tears.

  “There is no right or wrong. But you have to explain what you do and what you feel. You can’t just draw shit and say, oh, this is my art.” She gave up on Marshall, his shoulders heaving slightly from terrified sobs. “N’ariti.”

  The girl with thick hair extending past her shoulders sat up straight, considering possible escape across the River. She could just walk across, but no one would tell her that.

  “Yes, Ms. Jones.”

  “What did you draw?”

  “I don’t know.” N’ariti clutched the pad to her chest, the charcoal smearing her uniform blouse.