FOURTEEN
Later that day a man visited my office. I had never seen him before. He was dressed like an American middle-class grunt of the blue brigade. A clean, pressed dressed shirt—untucked—hung over a clean, pressed pair of denim pants. His hair was short but dense. His gaze with neither. Two suspecting eyes regarded me from beneath the ridge of a well sculpted, speculative precipice. I put his age to be around thirty. A very cagey thirty, indeed.
“Mr. Trentinara?” he asked, stepping through an open door I’d forgotten to close.
I rose from behind my desk and asked if I could be of help.
“Well, I certainly hope so,” the man replied genially. Extending a hand to be shaken, he approached the desk. “My name is Detective Lopez. I’m hoping to ask you a few questions about the incidents that occurred here last week.”
“Incidents?” I asked, complying reluctantly with his amicable grasp.
“Oh, surely,” Detective Lopez nodded. “As I understand it, you had a fire in the parking garage. And then a rather unsightly mess in one of your storage closets.”
“Oh yes. I heard about those.”
The detective gave a short laugh. “Gross, right?”
Shrugging, I agreed with him that yes, what had happened in the storage closet was gross.
Here the detective’s speculative ridge went up. “Who first told you about it?”
“I can’t remember.”
“Man? Woman?” He paused. “Child?” This last arrived in the company of another short laugh.
“I can’t remember.”
“Too much chaos at the time, eh?”
“Something like that.”
The detective reached into his back pocket and produced a notepad. A pen lay coiled in the spiral binding. The pen was black, but I still pictured a damsel being asphyxiated by some water dwelling python from deep down.
Detective Lopez glanced up. “Excuse me?”
I blushed. Had I spoken the thing about pythons out loud? Apparently so. “Oh...your pen,” I said. “Sorry. My mind is on this idea for a new show we’re kicking around.”
“Snakes and girls?”
“Yeah. We like the premise but in all honesty, it’s probably out of our budget.”
“Yes. Well...honesty is a good thing.”
Sensing my visitor’s distrust (it was as Jupiter to Saturn in a season of conjunction, the red eye outshining, ever so slightly, the exhorting rings of its neighbor), I agreed that honesty was indeed a good thing. “For instance,” I added, “your English is very impressive. I wish my Tagalog were the same.”
“Both of my parents are English speaking,” the other said absently, jotting stuff down on the pad. “Where are you from, Mr. Trentinara?”
“Cleveland. Ohio.”
“How long have you been with PTN?”
“Since March of this year.”
Lopez kept jotting as I spoke. “What other projects have you been working on?”
“Lester’s Ghosts.”
The little damsel so recently freed from history’s symbol of death and rebirth stopped moving. “That one. Yes.” The detective smiled. “As I understand it, there have been some difficulties with its production.”
“Not at all.”
“No? I spoke with the show’s executive producer. According to him there were snafus galore. And now the pilot is getting bad reviews.”
Gritting my teeth, I reminded Lopez that art is very subjective. Opinions would always vary as to how good or bad a project turned out. “Take the movie Tommy Boy for example,” I offered. “Ever see it?”
Lopez shook his head. “I can’t say that I have.”
“Well, the professional critics despised it, while most audiences loved it. Now that’s just one example from one form of art.”
The detective wrote something else down in the notebook, then put it away. “Point taken, Mr. Trentinara. But there were difficulties with your most recent production. Correct?”
“Every project has its difficulties.”
A frown settled over the other’s face. Or perhaps a better description would be that his cheerfulness became hindered. Scudded by a fog of the crisp and curt. “Please answer my question.”
“I don’t have anything else to add.”
He looked at me for a long time, doubtless in attempt to erode my resolve. But I may as well point out right now that I am no great friend of law enforcement. Years ago I was once pulled over by a short female cop who accused me of stealing radios out of parked cars. That the trunk of my own car had no such merchandise in it didn’t seem to matter. She lied in her report about what I’d been wearing, and what she had found. Since that night I’ve held nothing but disdain for the uniformed finest.
“Okay,” Lopez said, throwing in the towel. “Well, Mr. Trentinara, thank you very much for your help.” He turned to go. Silently, I wished for the transom pane to fall from its frame and crack his head open. No such luck. In fact, he paused directly beneath it and said: “By the way, your little friend in HR also doesn’t seem to think much of the new show.”
“Oh?” I replied, feigning ignorance. “Who’s that?”
“Lysette Roxas. The two of you are dating?”
“Yes. We are.”
“For a long time?”
“A few months.”
“I see.”
The detective’s eye went to the waste basket. In it was the newspaper I’d thrown away earlier that morning. Here I thought for sure he would make some witty remark about critics being the target of their own targets. The paper was crushed into a tight ball. I didn’t remember doing that, but whatever. Detective Lopez didn’t say anything about it. He bid me a good afternoon, smiled, and left.
6PM. It was time to leave. I rode the elevator downstairs and went directly to the front desk. It sat in a large, open room that was supposed to be friendly for visitors. This evening it looked friendlier still. The lights were low, and there were giggles coming from a far corner set all aglow with fairy lights. Here two men were busy setting up a Christmas tree. I wasn’t taken aback. Setti had warned me months ago about this Filipino trait of getting a head start on the holidays. What did take me aback was the absence, today, of that very same girl.
“She left early,” one of the other HR ladies told me.
Had I even asked her? Yes, I’m pretty sure I did. “Thank you,” I said. “Did she go to Greenheights?”
“She did say Greenheights, yes.”
More giggling came from the two men. We both looked at them for a moment. “Merry Christmas,” I told the girl, who laughed and wished me the same.
I tried calling Setti before leaving for the day. Her cell rang but no one picked up. Here I became faced with a dilemma: go back to the condo where, despite what I’d been told, Setti probably was, or get a cab down south to Greenheights? The ride would be far, the traffic bad. And if my girlfriend wasn’t there, I’d need to come all the way back. Bad odds. Silly, even. A risk for people who cared too much, or perhaps not enough.
I took a cab south.
An hour later, as the car approached the village, a wind got up. The trees outside my window bowed like dignified hosts doing their best to make lesser company feel at home. We—the cabbie and I—passed through an outdoor market I already knew well. People stood on the side of the street. They bought bananas and rice and chicken and fish. The wind whipped little bits of paper around their feet.
“Sila ay manatiling bukas din dito?” the cabbie asked, steering the car around a dog.
And in my stilted Tagalog I answered: “Yes. At maaga.”
We cruised the streets of Greenheights. At my instruction the cabbie turned left down the steep hill that led to Setti’s house. I’d tried calling her twice during the ride, with no joy. But when the cabbie turned left again, and the house swung into view, I knew I’d made the correct choice. Window lights twinkled through the bending trees.
I paid the driver and got out, taking some time to watch his tail lamps disappear around the far bend. But for Setti’s house, the road wasn’t well developed. I stood listening to the wind for I’m not certain how long. Duhat leaves fell through the shadows. They ducked and dodged in the manner of butterflies at play before the sun’s repeal. A car horn blew in the distance. A dog barked.
I let myself into the house. The living room, still decorated with heavy, expensive furniture, idled in a suspended twilight. Since Mark’s death no one had been around to wind the grandfather clock. His old world was dead quiet. Silently as possible, I proceeded up the stairs. A glowing candle on the landing confessed that I was not alone, though I found Setti’s bedroom to be empty, the counterpane neat. Nevertheless there was evidence of her presence—a travel bag on the desk chair.
I went to the bathroom door, which was closed, and knocked lightly. “Setti?”
Water splashed. The sound of a girl sitting up in a tub. Her response created a chill.
“Dad?”
“No, sweetheart. It’s me. Fredo.”
More water. Lighter, less frantic. She had settled back under. “Oh. Fredo. What are you doing here?”
“I was worried about you. May I come in?”
“Kung gusto mo.”
That wasn’t especially inviting. Still, I could not resist opening the door. More candles had been lit here, the scent of their wicks—lavender and cypress—holding court. Setti lay in the bathtub, her nakedness concealed by a mountain range of soapy bubbles. The tub, large and deep, totally dwarfed her pixie frame. With a deep breath she could lie prone beneath the surface and never be caught shy of her physical limits.
“Please leave the light off,” she said, lifting a knee.
“How are you feeling? The network told me you came home early.”
“I’m fine. I just didn’t feel like hanging around.”
“You didn’t need to come all the way here. The condo’s much closer.”
She apparently didn’t find this observation worthy of reply. I heard her lungs fill with air. She slipped under for a few moments, then resurfaced with a tiny gasp. “Is Tikki with you?”
I spied a small, wooden stool by the towel rack and moved it over by the tub. “No,” I said, sitting down.
“So you left him alone? He’ll get scared and make a mess.”
“I’ll have the staff check in on him.”
There was a pink sponge on the ledge. I asked Setti if she would like help with her back. She told me no, but invited me to join her under the suds. I undressed slowly, then washed my more vital areas by use of a plastic ladle, this to prevent the day’s asperity from tainting the bathwater.
Setti insisted I lie on top of her, though she was ever so much smaller, and the water ambitious. Her legs came open as I knelt. I remembered how, earlier in the year, she would encourage me to be more forceful with our sexual encounters. To dominate her body. Leave it weak and exposed. That had been April. That had been May. And perhaps parts of June as well. Tonight her eyes made no such appeal toward what bestial tendencies I reserved. As I eased her down dangerously close to the steamy depths, her eyes roamed. First to the wall, then the ceiling. Such gestures of defiance normally put me off, and perhaps Setti intended for this to be the case once again. But the day had been a bad one, with the coming days promising to be even worse. My frustration served as a kind of sustenance for the beast. I was fully erect beneath the water. My penis easily located the opening of Setti’s vagina and pushed to the hilt. The action forced her to snatch a breath: HUHH! Before she could release it, I forced her body to the bottom of the tub and kept it down. Her lungs defended the attack. Through a scud of bubbles I could see one eye challenging me to draw the scene out, as if in strict confidence that it was I, not her, who would prove the weaker party.
So I waited.
A tic formed on Setti’s brow. Her lip twisted. The torque of one’s endurance is directly proportionate to the integrity of the landscape upon which it is turned. In Miss Roxas’ case, the terrain was soft indeed. I felt her shoulders go taut as she made an attempt to get up. One tiny hand, clawed with red nails, seized my bicep. By that point it must have been about thirty seconds since she’d last had a breath. She let loose a scream of bubbles, shattering the barrier between us. The barrier of life and death. When she tried to surface again I considered the appeal, but decided to wait for just a few more seconds. Setti’s legs kicked at the wall, splashing water everywhere. I wanted to keep her down for a full minute. Really put her lungs to work. Writhing in my grasp like a fish from the sea (paradox, paradox), Setti tried to scream again. Her bare chest lacked provision for the deed. Oh, and that little challenge she had laid down seconds ago? All gone. Setti needed air. She was now begging me for it.
Fredo! Fredo!
Who did you talk to today, little girl?
I brought her up choking and gasping. A fantastic number of ripe swear words gushed from her lips. Then she tried to hit me with one of those pretty little arms. I blocked the blow without feeling a thing.
“You!” her lungs heaved. “You!” More swearing followed. I heard insatiable things about such dubiously related topics as: My mother, my sexual orientation, my sexual organ, my intelligence quotient, my overall competency as a decent human being.
“Enough,” I warned her (Gentle Reader, I must insist that I gave her fair warning before letting what happened next...well, happen).
Either the girl didn’t hear me or chose to ignore the command. The command that I, her man, had given. Disrespect like that from a woman really tends to get under my skin. Unleashing all of my strength, I twisted her body. A tsunami wave crashed over the tub, dousing candles. This accompanied a rather piercing—and satisfying—scream from my fair damsel. Now with her back against my chest, my hand found her throat and put a vice on it.
“Shut up,” I said into her ear. “Shut...up.”
The instruction was wholly unnecessary. Setti could neither speak nor breathe.
“Who did you talk to today? Who?”
Again, unfair. With her larynx being crushed it wasn’t like the girl could answer. I was just so angry. So angry. I could never act like that today. Not with the Rainbird. But then rainbirds like the one I found don’t alight very often. Hardly ever at all.
“Answer me.”
“AH! AH!”
“Did you tell a policeman you think Lester’s Ghosts is stupid?”
Understanding came into her tumescent stare. Loosening my grip, I gave her a bit of oxygen with which to answer. Desperate greed flooded the chambers beneath her breasts.
“Fredo!”
“Stop saying my name. Answer me, Setti. Answer me or I’ll hold you under for two minutes. Can you make two minutes?”
“Okay! Okay!”
She was terrified. From far away, just beyond the rise of some starlit hill I’d crested many years ago and could never revisit, a sad, lonely visage of shame regarded us with wet eyes. I looked back at it once, though only for a moment. It might have been too late to do anything else. Again I asked Setti about Detective Lopez.
“He”—her throat gave a little swallow—“He asked me about you! How you were feeling!”
“And what did you tell him?”
“I...I told him that you were feeling stressed! About the show!”
“Did you criticize the show? Make fun of it?”
“No!”
I squeezed her throat again until she gagged. “Don’t lie to me.”
“Ack!”
She took hold of my wrist and tried to pull it free. I let go of my own accord, to let her gasp that she had only professed the show to not be as good as anyone had hoped.
“Okay,” I said, with the air of a man agreeing on roast beef sandwiches for lunch. “But you must have left a bad impression. Because now this detective suspects me of arson and vandalism.”
“I...I think he j-just wants to, like, check all of his boxes.”
“Check all of his boxes,” I parroted, stroking her throat gently. “Well. Maybe. But you know what, Setti? You haven’t been a very good girlfriend.”
“I’m sorry!”
“First you slink into my office, being seductive. That was fine. Then you tried to confuse me by changing your persona. Aggressive, compliant.” I shook her body twice, hard. “Compliant, aggressive.” I shook her two more times.
“I’m sorry, Fredo!”
“Then”—another hard shake—“you float away almost completely. Act like I’m not here, even when I am. THEN”–go on, guess what I did to her—“you make a detective, a man who works for the police, think I’m a bad guy.”
Oh, I forgot to mention that she was crying. Had been for several minutes. I suppose that particular part of my memory is hazy because of the bath’s steam and humidity. Aside from Setti’s cheeks, everything else in the room dripped that night. Our passions were smeared. Blurred in time as if seen from a vessel traveling at the speed of light.
Her voice, quavering: “It wasn’t supposed to sound like that!”
“I know, baby,” I whispered. “I know. Do you remember Puerto Princessa?”
“Puerto Princessa? W-What about it?”
“You told me you like to free-dive there. Right?”
She was silent.
“Answer me, girl. Don’t make me choke you again.”
“Yes. I...I do.”
“How deep?”
“Fredo—”
“How. Deep.”
“F-Fifteen feet. I think.”
I nodded, impressed. “Oh, that’s pretty good. Are you sure two minutes is too long for...you know...holding your breath?”
“Yes!” she answered immediately. “I haven’t practiced for awhile!”
“Setti? I want you to make two minutes tonight. For me—”
“Oh no!”
“If you stay underwater for two minutes, I’ll forgive you.”
“Fredo, I can’t! I can’t!”
“Stop it. Stop being negative.” My hand left her throat to join the other beneath her breasts. “Let me feel a deep breath. Deep.”
Setti’s chest rose with what I supposed was all the air a petite Filipina in her early twenties could manage. I didn’t think it all that much. Something else: I have never once timed how long the Rainbird can stay underwater. I’ve never even wondered. These days being underwater just isn’t a thing I like to think about.
Setti let the breath go. I commanded her to take another, and then another. Oh, those pretty gasps! Like a rush of pink petals on a windy summer day. I once lived on a farm. This would have been in my boyhood. And when the wind blew I used to stand by my mother’s garden gate and watch the flowers nod in my direction from the other side, as if they could lead me away to secret places. Places only the flowers knew. Places where a boy and a girl could hold hands and fall in love.
I held Setti down quite easily for two full minutes. After that I carried her into the bedroom the way a prince might carry a rescued princess. Here I made her promise never to defy me again, or disobey me, or talk back. She agreed. One could have argued she was too exhausted to do anything but; I, however, meant to enforce every edict put down that night.
“You won’t be going to work tomorrow, either,” I said, adding another to the list. “In fact