archives

Witching Hour by Clay Waters

32 Hours

      The gleaming middle tower of the Freedom Center rose 212 floors, an exact and symbolic half-mile above the sprawling streets of Manhattan's financial district. Buzzing about the base of the shrine were the zealous worker bees of city, state and federal law enforcement. Heavy-jacketed security in various shades of black brandished rifles on every corner. Twitching visibly from the street were the antiaircraft guns mounted on every 50th floor of the more strategically situated skyscrapers.

      When Todd Wheeler surveyed the scene from the window of his 65^th floor corner office, the traffic pattern resembled a querulous caterpillar frustrated in a laboratory maze. An impressive view, one he hoped soon to lose.

      Companies in target-rich cities had begun installing their executives closer to the center of their HQs, leaving corner offices and their sheets of vulnerable windows to high-up-but-not-unexpendable employees. Todd enjoyed the view but wanted to be Unexpendable. By the time the market closed tomorrow perhaps he would.

      His Jaguar had Code Blue clearance, which meant he could park under his building at 5 Freedom Tower. As the Jaguar was waved through tighter and tighter bands of security, he felt winnowed, progressively distanced from the inchoate world outside.

      He got quickly in step with the rushing crowd, passing the memorial of the Wall Street wipeout, marking the day in 2011 when a Syrian with a swiped messenger bike ID planted an acetone bomb on the famous bronze bull, killing 45 -- eleven from his future company, Baselton & Broom. One of the horns had impaled in a nearby oak and had been installed at the trading floor entrance -- brokers rubbed it for luck before descending into the pits.

      He made a point to pass the spot every day, though it meant crossing a street and killing a minute or two in the process. Too many Manhattanites hunched around like mice, he thought, internalizing the threats around them, trying to be small. You had to confront the fear, wrestle with it, feel your stomach sing with every lurch of the plane or heart-freezing trill of the evacuation alarm. He went skiing when socially crucial, but the thrills felt cheap, redundant. And if it all went up tomorrow, or any day in the 12 months going forward (a prospect B&B's number crunchers estimated at 2.8%), it was a risk premium he was willing to take.

      Was compelled to take.

      He turned his lucky corner of Wall and Pearl St., lorded over by a chocolate-black man who bagged his hair in a puffy sack that made him look a bit like the Alien from the movie. There was about him an ineffable smell of the barnyard that was virtually pagan in the financial heart of the world. That was obvious even if one missed the real pagan details, like the string of small, pebbled amulets around his neck and the ceramic bowl, garlanded with horsehair, that served as a donation bucket. The man was an underground adherent of Santeria. Literally underground -- below the subways. Donations twice a week over two years had coaxed that information, and little else, out of him.

      Todd caught his eye and dropped a soft sawbuck in the bucket instead of the usual annoying golden dollars. The man nodded with the slightest possible trace of a smile, more a softening around the eyes than anything around the lips. Then the man did something strange: He spoke. "Bless you tomorrow."

      Todd felt a tingle from the back of his neck down to his wallet, where it stopped dead.

      He knew about the witching hour.

      Todd dropped another $5 in. "Buy your tribe a chicken."

      The look the man gave him in return put a chill in the August air.

      Maybe the alien's sect didn't engage in animal sacrifice. Or required a higher form. Or didn't like being patronized. Oh well. Whatever good luck gods were in the air, Todd wanted to be buffeted in them. Always good to hedge.

      Todd headed for the bank of elevators marked for floors 40 and above. B&B had gotten a sweet deal on space in the Freedom complex after the Wall Street wipeout.

      A heavily manicured hand blocked his striding chest. "Sir, step over here, please."

      Fuck.

      Some days security nabbed 1 in 20, then for reasons known only to them (or for no reason save unpredictability), they'd screw down to 1 in 5. The big blonde doxy he'd drawn for a checker still seemed halfway human, though slightly harried and in need of a smoke.

      "Tough day at the office?" he said, winking with his voice.

      Her initial smile revealed itself as perfunctory, rolling up like a tricky window shade toward the ceiling. "Just open your coat, sir."

      32 hours, he thought, warming himself with thoughts of the woman hung upside down and flogged. "S. Thompson, Security" was just attractive enough to make it a somewhat pleasant angry fantasy and allowed him to pass the three minutes (far too long -- she really was new) she spent checking him on the portable scanner for powder; Anthrax; liquid explosive; elevated heart rate.

      He took a breath. He could take being stopped. It wouldn't do to waste his natural luck on small things like avoiding a pat-down-by-proxy, would it? There was a war on. Twenty years and going. And tomorrow afternoon the deal would be closed and he could be at ease in his Battery Park condo, Kaydence beside him.

      Or rather, below him.

19 Hours

      "Wow. That's amazing."

      "What?" His eyes were shut and they weren't opening again without damn good reason. Mowing down a row of charts before a lunch appointment, he'd plugged in a bad standard deviation and eight minutes later, a Chinaman quant with the can-you-believe-it-name Wong Wei barged upstairs to rail him out as if he'd just dishonored the man's family. Maybe he had, technically.

      Todd had nodded apologetically, alternating between fantasies of the man being water tortured or skewered through the abdomen via the rectum. Or was that Japanese? Maybe the guy was Japanese. He'd tried to memorize the facial differences once but couldn't keep them straight.

      After the witching hour, no more. He'd soar up the B&B incentive chart and they'd have to get him a core office -- maybe not right away, but soon. No more smiling at mail boys. No more waiting in coffee queues. Most assuredly no ass-reamings from quantitative analysts.

      But that was tomorrow afternoon. Three o'clock, to be exact. Now the Ambien was kicking in and he just wanted to sleep, but no: Kaydence thought watching PBS made her smart.

      "You remember the tsunami?" She was saying. "They say not a single animal got killed by it. They knew it was coming and ran away. Look, Todd. No animals!"

      With effort he focused.

      Archived footage of drowned villagers in 84-inch high-density color (he needed 96). Somehow soothing, knowing that amid the web rumors of suitcase nukes, the blackberry rumblings of alienated teens carrying explosion packs into cafeterias, that even worse things had happened once to wretched saps long ago and far away. The latest rumor: Terrorists pouring strychnine into the city reservoirs. He'd call Gristedes and get champagne delivered tomorrow.

      He closed his eyes again and slumped, trying to become one with his drool-inducingly soft Cuddle Ewe underquilt. "I'm like that with stock offerings," he mumbled. "I can tell the good ones from the bad ones."

      "You can like, smell them? With your nose?"

      She wanted to know if he could smell an IPO like a pig could sniff out a truffle. Well, he had brought it up. He blamed the Ambien.

      Then she asked, "Speaking of um, big deals, how's your problem?"

      Without opening his eyes again he could see her face -- ill-concealed disrespect mixed with amusement. He hated it when the stupid thought they were clever.

      "Ask me tomorrow night. After the market close. I'll have good news then." He knew, bone-deep, his option play would pay off big time.

      "You think you'll be cured by then, like magic?"

      Under the covers he clenched his fists. He really hated it when someone stupid thought they had something on him.

      While his fellow NYUers had dicked around in Russian literature and Renaissance art, Todd had gone full bore B-school. After graduation he'd spent his weekends staring at IPO prospectuses and earnings models while they swallowed oysters down the shore with real ones. Now he'd acquired a mind-bending glamazon, six-feet-one in stockings, a graceful burper. Not as bitchy as she could be, which would be the nicest thing he would ever think about her.

      And tomorrow he would seal the deal -- settle accounts with every liberal intolerant with cryptic tattoos who'd ever thought him shallow because he made a lot (a lot) of money. He was no uptight Republican, either. He totally supported abortion. Of course he did. He was dating a Guess model, for God's sake.

      Tomorrow he'd take Kaydence out to Jamm's for the afro-fusion cuisine she pretended to like, let her gargle all the champagne she wanted, and whisk her back in the hired car for some honest-to-god fucking. Then, if the roads weren't jammed with security, maybe detour into the lower reaches of Battery Park for some pot, to loosen things up on the back end in case the cuddling and KY didn't suffice.

8 Hours

      Friday morning.

      Briskly rounding the corner, wallet already out. Maybe a $20 today. A $50? No, too patronizing. You had to sidle up to luck, not let it know you --

      the man wasn't there.

      Rounded up by security? No -- he'd been grandfathered in. The authorities knew he disappeared down into the subway at night, and figured it helped to have eyes down there. Even alienated, kooky ones.

      He looked up. The sky was a clear, cloudless blue.

      Terrorist-attack blue. The city, maybe the whole country, was under attack, or would be very soon. He knew it like he knew Nordscan would go belly-up and that his witching hour option play on Nitex would pay off big time.

      He'd miss Baselton & Broom's chubby secretary with the porn-line phone voice. Anne's 50s-purple dress and ribbed stockings getup she naively thought suited her. The self-satisfied chart analysts that smelled of microwave popcorn and loamy leavings of furtive porn creamed into XXL silk underwear. He'd even miss Wong Wei and the other chinky quants. Soon all to be soot and skulls.

      Correction: Would have paid off big time.

      And his lucky charm? Five minutes away, buried under blankets. Bless her, on her off days she didn't rise before 11. And his phone signal was clear, for now.

      On the phone, he was very insistent.

      She arrived by taxi outside 5 Freedom Way, looking like a whore-assassin from a graphic novel, red dress, black hose, tottering in 4-inch heels. Supernaturally hot. And no way she could run in those heels without rupturing a vessel. Even better.

      "So where's this great brunch party?" she sneered. "I hardly had time to put makeup on."

      "You look great." She always did. "It's down here." Todd pointed to the stairs leading down to the A and C subway lines.
The incomprehension on Kaydence's face was followed, eventually, by disbelief. "We're riding the subway?"

      "Not exactly. Come on."

      After avoiding random patdowns at the entrance (more luck) he took her hand and walked briskly toward the end of the platform.

      "What kind of party is it?"

      "A rasta party. You know Santeria, the religion?"

      "No."

      "Well, it's very ethnic. Like chicken?"

      "I could eat chicken I guess. It doesn't break my diet. It's a little early. Is it baked or sautéed?"

      "Not sure. Hop down." They got down on the tracks, passing the medicine-red "Do Not Enter" sign, to where the white-tiled tunnel walls gave way to a shell of oppressing gray concrete and the smell of rust and dirt and decay.

      In the dim light the tunnel yawned toward the horizon in an endless series of corrugated iron rings embellished with graffiti, like a historical mural marking the failure of immigration laws. A row of rusty detritus separated the two tracks - usually the tunnels could accommodate four, but this line had been reinforced in the wake of the last attack. If he was at all susceptible to claustrophobia, this is where he'd start losing breath. Instead, he felt calmer.

      Rumbling, then faint screaming emanated from the City Hall stop at the far end. He -- well, they -- had escaped the attack by, oh, seven minutes. Ahead the light seemed filtered, as if obscured by clouds, or choked with smoke. No rush of people coming down the tunnel, but there soon would be.

      "I hear it's a great party," he said, keeping the banter light and his grip tight. "Quite suave. Every Friday morning."

      "Where'd you hear about it?" Kaydence said, knowing he wasn't hip.

      "There was a secret number to call for an invite. It's hidden in the SoDoku puzzle in the Observer."

      "I thought you were too busy for that stuff." Kaydence sounded petulant. "That's what you tell me when I call. Hey, is it really suave? Because it's really smelly down here." Strangely, she seemed mollified -- as if something this disgusting just had to mean authenticity awaited at the other end. "No rats, at least."

      He pondered. "No, there aren't."

      After her heel snagged twice they skipped off the tracks and walked along side them, so that the "mud" swallowed half a shoe with every squelchy step. "Ugh! I am so tossing these. What's all the noise?"

      It had only taken her two minutes to notice. "Manhattan's under attack. Nukes, maybe. Everyone up there's dead or dying. But we'll be safe. As long as find the doorway down."

      She shrieked once and then went silent, letting him drag her along.

      Once his family had gone camping in the Berkshires. Snuggled in a strange, soft bed somewhere in the mountains, he'd read a picture book about Noah and the Great Flood as rain hammered on a tin roof.

      On the way home, lying in the back seat and making out the constellations, he'd ended up in the middle of the road, staring up at a strange solemn woman beatified in a crossfire of headlights, a crucifix around her neck (was he in heaven?) with the mutilated car nearby, squeezed like an accordion, parents dripping red in the front seat.

      The emergency had never passed.

      "We'll be safe. We just need--" Then he saw it -- a plain white utility door set into the gray wall. It was balky, but with a harder pull it creaked open, revealing a forbidding flight of rusty stairs that they softly descended, streaking their hands with rust.

      "So there's no party?"

      He didn't deign to answer, just clutched her wrist tighter. Quiet as they'd been, they were surrounded by the time they touched bottom: Ten or twelve mole people, black as soot, with more filing into the vast, almost gallery-style space.

      "Oh shit." Kaydence reached for her Virginia Slims. He slapped them out of her hand and into the muck.

      "Not sure if it's cool here," he said.

      A noisy rivulet under his feet turned out to be a channel of dark thick sludge -- a shit-stream. Maybe a sewer line gone awry, more likely something jury-rigged by the moles to flow through their bleak Eden.

      A few tame dogs muddled around, and from somewhere came a cooking smell that didn't make Todd's stomach turn -- until he noticed a raccoon-sized rat roasting on a spit. Kaydence sniffed the air, as if still holding out hope for the chicken.

      He dropped a quarter into the running dark murk and didn't hear it clink bottom. Deep enough.

      A figure emerged from a makeshift shack of jury-rigged oilcans insulated with rags and bits of old tire. He recognized the afro-mass of hair, a darker shadow transposed on top of the darkness of the man-made cavern.

      His life was up for grabs. To preserve it he would put his soul in pawn to the madman in front of him, like the madmen now filing behind the madman had done. And if he had to go mad to prove himself, it was a price he would pay.

      "No more animals to sacrifice," Todd said. "No more pigeons. Not even rats. They all fled. Like after the tsunami."

      "What is that to me?"

      "A million people are dead already. I can feel it. Can you?"

      "Yes. But again, why do you belong here? What do you bring, Mr. Suit? Besides your silk tie and your girlfriend and insulting offers to gods of chance you don't believe in."

      "Most ties are silk ties, shaman. That's just a boring cliché. And I do believe. I can do anything that's required."

      Three years ago Todd had said much the same thing to B&B's headhunter, and when tasked had snagged the company's CEO four tickets to a sold-out performance of "The Aristocrats."

      He let go of Kaydence, whipping off his tie. "All her life she's had everything her way. She models 8 hours a week and makes money she doesn't even need because I pay for everything."

      Still holding her hand, he twisted the wincing Kaydence around.

      "But what does that do for us? We cannot use her."

      "I think you can." Todd pulled her closer, binding her wrists with his tie.

      "What the--" Kaydence looked into Todd's eyes. For the first and last time she achieved some understanding of her boyfriend, and screamed.

      He took her by the hair and dragged her down, ducking her head into the running stream of sludge and shit before she had a chance to say anything, if she'd ever had anything to say. Still, her surprisingly fierce shoulders bucked and strained for two full minutes, her frantic hair bobbing and spreading on the black waves of swift-running putridity, like a blonde slick. The shaman nodded, and his helpers dispersed. There was a clattering of chains and hacksaws being pulled from makeshift shelves.

      Todd's pants stirred. Yes. There it was. A stiff one. But too late. Too late for everyone. Everyone but him. He'd be alright. He'd offered the correct sacrifice, proven his worth.

      After the last twitch he dragged up the body, heavy after its drenching. The mouth and nostrils were caked up like filters, the empty glass cages of the eyes frozen with rabbit fear.

      Todd let her drop, lifting his arms heavenward but looking at the shaman.

      "Save me," he cried.

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