Flying Blind Page 2

  She giggled. “Actually, I’m from Puerto Rico. My family moved to New York City when I was thirteen.”

  “What does Juarez Properties do?”

  “We’re a national and international real estate firm. When I started, I was an agent. I worked with Latino families in New York who wanted to buy real estate in Florida. Now I mostly work with wealthy buyers from Latin America. I show high-end properties and translate between the buyers and sellers. That’s why I’m in Washington this week. I was supposed to work with a client from Honduras, but he had visa problems and was delayed.”

  At the time, that sounded reasonable. I pictured Maria walking into a condo and explaining the features, in Spanish, to an older, overweight couple while the selling agent looked on and smiled.

  In fact, I didn’t care how she earned a living. My gaze dropped from her face to her chest. I saw just a bit of white lace peeking through her partly unbuttoned blouse. The cross rested directly above the lace reminding me that everything below was forbidden territory.

  We finished the wine and walked to the elevator together. We said “good night” when she got off on the second floor. I continued on to the third. After she had left, I could still hear the lilt of her accent and see the way her teeth showed when she smiled.

  Then Richard called.

  “Hello, Daniel. Did you enjoy your supper?”

  “Oh, hi, Richard. I’m glad you called. I’m still thinking about your offer.”

  “Relax, Mon, no problem. Look, Daniel, what time you need to be at your work tomorrow? I come pick you up.”

  “I need to be there at 8:30. You need to pick me up at 7:30.”

  “No problem. I be dere in plenty of time. And, mon, when you done work, I need a favor. There’s a man in New Jersey dat owe me money. I want you to fly me there and bring me back. And I pay you mon, how about dat? The taxi driver, he pay for a ride!”

  Richard was delighted with his joke and laughed. I didn’t. “Where in New Jersey do you need to go?”

  “It be near Atlantic City. Me friend, he owes me money, and I give you half.”

  I wanted more details, but Richard was done. “We talk together in the morning, mon.”

  Later that night, when I got into bed, I was still thinking about Maria. I went through the whole evening in my mind and remembered she was eating a salad. Why would a person eating a salad ask for ketchup? My God, was she flirting with me? That had never happened before.

  In my dream, I began to see Maria again — not all of her, just parts of her. I remembered her light brown skin. I remembered the hem of her skirt where it lay just above her knee. My mind followed the curve of her thigh from the hem of her skirt to her waist. In my half-sleep, my hand traveled that path and imagined pulling up her skirt. She responded by closing her eyes and catching her breath. Then her skirt evaporated, and I found she was wearing my wife’s white cotton panties. I was hoping for something black and silky.

  In that weird space between waking and sleeping, I created a second draft featuring black satin lingerie. Happy with my edit, my dream hand continued to explore Maria’s body while my real hand traveled to my crotch. The rest of her clothes melted away and my imagination manufactured a composite woman made of Maria’s hair, face, and legs and Beth’s familiar crotch, breasts, and neck.

  Like a demented child playing with plastic toys, I combined and re-combined the body parts. In my fantasy, the Maria-Beth creature was on top of me. Her breasts and her hair dangled in my face. As we moved, her hair whipped my face. I surrendered to the fantasy and could almost feel her breasts on my chest. The crescendo grew and grew and finally climaxed dropping me into a deep and dreamless sleep.

  Chapter 3

  Bad news

  I found Richard in the lobby the next morning chatting with the restaurant’s receptionist.

  “Hello, Daniel,” he said with a smile as bright as the morning sun. I began to like this guy with his ever-optimistic outlook. “Let me introduce you to my friend, Cora. Cora, dis here be Doctor Daniel Goldberg, da world’s leading expert at sumptin’ he teaches at da Parklawn building.” Cora and I awkwardly shook hands. We both knew that Richard was full of it, but neither of us wanted to leave the jovial cloud he carried with him. Cora led us to a table, and I signaled for coffee.

  I was just finishing my second cup when Maria came in. She smiled at me, and immediately I forgot where I was and began a re-run of last night’s dream. Then Richard broke the spell.

  “Hey, mon, you all right?” He followed my gaze and smiled. “She’s pretty, but take me advice Daniel. She be trouble! Remember your family.”

  A Hispanic-looking man dressed in a suit joined her, and I felt a jolt of crazy jealousy. I concealed it by gobbling my eggs.

  After breakfast, Richard helped me retrieve the boxes of textbooks from my room. When he saw my rumpled bed, he said, “Daniel, you dog! You and your big bamboo had a time wit that lovely lady downstairs. My, my you do not move slow, mon! But don’t you worry, your secret be safe wit me”.

  Just what I needed right now — a witness to an affair I didn’t have. I never had an affair. I had enough trouble keeping one woman happy, let alone two.

  “I slept alone last night. She wasn’t here.”

  “Ok, mon. Have it your way,” he said laughing.

  Richard and I were just a bit out of sync. He was living in a hopeful future while I was stuck regretting the past.

  Richard put my stuff in the trunk of the yellow taxi and, with a flourish, he invited me to join him in the front seat, signalling a change in our relationship.

  “Richard,” I said, “I’m happy to take you to New Jersey this evening, but I need to know exactly where we’re going. And I’ll have to charge you eight hundred dollars for the round trip. Do you still want to go?”

  Richard laughed as the taxi found the entrance to the Beltway. “Hey, Daniel, don’t worry. Here, look at dis.”

  He handed me an envelope containing ten one-hundred-dollar bills. Scrawled on the outside were the words, “Berlin, New Jersey.” Berlin was a small town about ten miles north of Atlantic City. It had a well-maintained public airport for private planes. The runway was long, wide and flat.

  “There’s a thousand dollars here. I only need eight hundred.”

  “Don’t worry, Daniel. It’s okay. The man I need to meet, he owes me two thousand and, as I say on the phone, I give you half.”

  It was a little after nine by the time Richard, the boxes, and I made it through security and up to the computer-equipped classroom on the sixth floor. Bertha Roberts, the training officer, was pacing the hall, obviously annoyed. A heavyset woman in her mid-fifties, Bertha normally wore her glasses on a silver chain around her neck. That morning the glasses swung back and forth like a metronome.

  “Dan, where’ve you been? The class should be starting now.” Looking over her shoulder, I saw some of the students sitting at their desks. One of the students, an attractive African-American woman, was even studying a copy of my textbook. That was unusual. Most of the government employees who took my class had little interest in statistics and were there only because their supervisors forced them to attend.

  “I’m so sorry, Bertha,” I said, “Traffic was terrible.” In answer to her silent question, I continued: “This is Richard, my taxi driver.”

  Richard focused his thousand-watt smile over the boxes in his hands. “Dat is right, Misses. Da traffic, it be horrible on da Beltway. But how you get to look so pretty so early in the morning?”

  Bertha blushed and waved him away. Turning to me, she said, “Dan, we need to talk. Please stop by my office at lunchtime, okay?”

  Richard put the boxes on my desk and said, “Don’t forget, mon, I pick you up at 4 p.m. Den we go to New Jersey.” Then he left, taking my happy feelings with him.

  As I unpacked my laptop, the African-American woman came to my desk. “Hi, I’m Michelle; I just joined the staff of the training department. Do you mind if I sit in on you
r class?”

  “Not at all. I’m happy to have you.”

  The morning went well, and we stopped for lunch at 11:30. It felt good to be back in the classroom. I missed teaching.

  I went to the basement and used my bank’s ATM to increase the Goldberg family’s net worth by five hundred dollars. I bought a sandwich from the “grab and go” line and went back to my desk. I had just taken the third bite when Bertha came in. “Dan, are you done with your lunch?” It wasn’t really a question.

  “Sure,” I responded. I threw most of my lunch in the trash. Something in Bertha’s tone made me wonder if my career would follow the same arc.

  I had been in Bertha’s small, crowded office before. Most of her wall space was filled to overflowing with training manuals. A large whiteboard held the place of honor near her desk showing classes scheduled for the next three months. My class was listed among them. But something wasn’t right. My current class dates were written in red while the remaining class dates were black.

  At the start of our last meeting, Bertha pushed the mountain of file folders aside to create a clear space for us to work together. We became friends and, during breaks, we shared stories about our children. Today the file folders remained untouched. She was all business.

  “Look, Bertha, if this is about my getting here late, I apologize. This is the first time it’s happened in two and a half years, and it won’t happen again. We covered all the material we normally cover. The class is going well.”

  “No Dan, it’s not about you getting here late. You’re doing a great job. Your evaluations are excellent.” She paused. I knew there was a “but” coming.

  “You’re probably not aware of it, but we’ve been under pressure to reduce the number of outside contractors and bring the training in-house.”

  “I’ve heard rumors, but I didn’t think it applied to my classes.”

  Bertha turned away from me and looked out the window. I followed her gaze and saw only the neighboring parking structure and the hazy sky.

  “It didn’t apply, at least until recently. We’ve not been able to do so with your class because of the highly technical nature of your subject material.” She paused and looked for a file on her desk. She found the one we wanted and handed me three neatly-typed pages secured with a staple. I glanced at the top of the first page. It was Michelle’s resume.

  “Dan, as you know we’ve been able to hire Michelle. As you can see, she also has a Ph.D. She’s taught a course similar to yours when she worked at the community college.” Bertha pulled a tissue box from her bottom drawer and blew her nose.

  “Bertha,” I began, “I’m sure Michelle is an excellent resource. I’m sure we can work together.”

  She ignored my remark. “Dan, after this week, Michelle will teach your class. I’m sorry, but the rest of your contract is canceled. Here’s your formal notice. I was able to get accounting to cut your final check. It’s in the envelope as well.”

  I tried to find the words to respond to Bertha. The monthly check more than covered our mortgage payment. Without it, we would have to rely on my other contracts. The problem was, I had no other contracts. Beth and I would never be able to make ends meet even without the airplane expenses.

  The silence hung heavily in the room. A cold sweat broke out on my forehead. How would I explain this to Beth? I tried to find the words to further argue my case but realized it would be pointless. The decision had already been made at a bureaucratic level much higher than Bertha’s.

  Bertha sat in her chair waiting for me to leave. I wanted to get angry at her, but I couldn’t. Finally, she broke the silence saying, “Dan, you better get going. Your class is starting soon.”

  Michelle was waiting for me in the classroom. Somehow she knew about the meeting. She started to come up to my desk to offer sympathy, but I just looked at her and shook my head. I didn’t want her sympathy. I wanted her job.

  Chapter 4

  Cocaine in the afternoon

  The rest of the class went by in a blur. I’d taught the class dozens of times, and I wrote the textbook. On autopilot, I told the same jokes I had told before and got the same groans and titters.

  We completed the material I wanted to cover by 3:30. I mechanically asked for questions and was grateful for the students’ indifference. No hands came up.

  Michelle stayed after the others left. She came to my desk with the same sorrowful look she had since lunch. “Listen, Dan, I had nothing to do with this.”

  “I know that. That’s the way it works in contracting. Don’t worry about me, I have lots of other contracts,” I lied.

  She knew I was lying, and her face became even more sorrowful. “Well best of luck, Dan. Do you mind if I sit in on the rest of the class?”

  I didn’t care. I had my check. Maybe I should just blow off the rest of the class and go home, I thought. “Sure, no problem. In fact, why don’t you teach the segment tomorrow morning and I’ll give feedback.” That’s great, I thought with a mental scowl, I can teach you to take over my job.

  “Great, I’d really like that,” she said sincerely.

  Once she left, I went to the ATM in the basement to deposit the government check and more of the cash Richard gave me. Then I transferred $500 into Beth’s credit card account. I checked my email but didn’t find any new prospects for work.

  I found Richard waiting at the curb wearing his familiar big smile. “Hey, mon, where you been? I be waiting. They make me move two times, but I come back.”

  He led me to an old black Cadillac two-door sedan. It once had a landau top, but most of the covering had worn away with at least twenty-five years of sun and weather. The back wheel sported an original hubcap, but the front wheel was bare. Duct tape strained to hold the headlight in place.

  “What happened to your taxi?” I asked as he put my laptop in the back seat next to a black, nylon duffle bag.

  “Da taxi? She be in da shop. This be me personal car.”

  I sat in the front as Richard turned into the afternoon traffic. “What da matter mon? You look like you lost you puppy.”

  “They told me that my contract was over. This is my last week teaching.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Daniel. Da money it comes, da money it goes. What be important is you take care of your family. Dere always be a way to make more money.”

  I ignored Richard and entered Beth’s number on my cell phone. I had to tell her the bad news, and I was dreading the task. I almost pressed the call button when I noticed that we were on the way to the airport, not my hotel. Oh, my God, I thought, I promised to take Richard to New Jersey tonight! I had completely forgotten about it.

  I needed to get back to the hotel. I was torn between a desire to drink myself into a stupor or start making marketing calls. I needed to make more money, and at the same time, I was sick and tired of trying to do it.

  Maybe I’m just not good at this consulting business. Maybe I should polish my resume and start looking for a real job. Maybe I can get a job with the government like Michelle did. Or maybe I should contact the community college where she was teaching. Now that she’s with the feds, there must be a vacancy. Screw the airplane. I’m not flying anywhere tonight.

  “Richard, no, I’m not flying anywhere tonight. I’m not in the mood. I’m tired and worried, and all I want is a beer and a bed — maybe more than one beer.” The thought of teaching the next three days on a lame duck contract turned my stomach. Richard didn’t reply.

  I extracted the remaining hundred dollars bills from my wallet. “Here is part of your money. I’ll write you a check for the rest as well as for the cab rides when we get back to the hotel.” Richard said nothing and didn’t even acknowledge my declaration with a nod. He made no move to collect cash. The little pile sat on the dashboard, a mediator to our dispute. Silently, he maneuvered the car into the left-hand lane. I assumed he would turn left at the light and take me back to the hotel.

  We were in the front of the line, waiting for t
he light to change when he finally spoke. “So, Daniel, you say you want to go to your hotel and drink da beer. But Daniel, me friend, dis not be a taxi, dis be me car, and I take me car where I want to go. And now we go to your plane.”

  I was scared and angry.

  Who the fuck does he think he is?

  I realized how little I knew about Richard. I was beginning to realize how his “no problem” charms had clouded my usual good judgment. I thought about dashing out, braving the four lanes of traffic to get away. Instead, I cleared Beth’s number from my cell phone and started dialing 911.

  Just then the light turned green. Richard floored the accelerator, making an illegal U-turn in the middle Wisconsin Avenue during rush hour. The force of the turn pushed me off balance and, as I tried to recover, he grabbed the cell phone from my hand. He ignored the chorus of outraged car horns then cut in front of a delivery truck with inches to spare as he swerved into the parking lot of a large shopping mall.

  “Where’re you going? Stop the car!” I demanded.

  He ignored me and sped behind the stores and into a service alley. I shouted to a group of workers relaxing with their cigarettes on a loading dock. They didn’t hear me.

  There was a high block wall on the right and the back doors of stores on the left. We started in the bright June sunlight. Each steel door had the occupant’s name in stenciled letters. After the tenth door, the alley was in deep shadow.

  The alley made a sharp left turn. I hoped it would empty into the parking lot at the opposite end of the mall so I could make my escape. But there was no exit. We passed a few more stores and came to a dead end. As he slowed, Richard directed the car against the right-hand wall making it impossible for me to get out.

  Then he turned off the engine. Until that moment, I hadn’t taken the jovial Jamaican very seriously. Now I was trapped in his car, down a blind alley, without my cell phone.