Page 93 of Two Marlboros

“Could we talk about something else?”

“Nathan,” he whispered and walked over to me, who had put down my cheese burger in the meantime. “If you keep doing this, it’s going to be like giving it to him every time. You have to learn to tell him to fuck off and cut all ties with him.”

“But that’s not what I want.”

“And what would you like? Make peace with him? You are such a naive little boy.”

My stomach also shut down and I felt a little sour. Harvey was watching me with his usual look, the one of someone who knows about everything, even situations that had never concerned him.

“First, I’m not a kid; second, I’m not naive; third, don’t think you’re going to come in and tell me what I should or shouldn’t do.”

The grit that had led me to answer him that way vanished the next moment, so much so that I found myself staring at my hamburger; he said nothing more, perhaps regretful or perhaps annoyed by that conversation.

“You’ve become quite a little man, yes.”

“And from year, I can also buy alcohol.”

“Oh, right. Be careful with what you do, then.”

Harvey wanted a win, and I decided to give it to him. I wanted to answer him in a thousand ways, but it was wiser to shut my mouth by taking another bite.

He received a phone call and pulled out an old-fashioned, chunky cell phone with a flap hiding the keys; I was amazed at the contrast between the nice clothes he was wearing and that outdated model of cell phone. He answered the call and immediately got up to go to the bathroom.

I was left alone with my bitterness and peered at the couple sitting at the small table next to me. He had an unevenly shaved beard and a smile revealed teeth that hadn’t seen a toothbrush in ages; she had a dull look, hollowed cheeks, and spoke as if she were intoxicated. I turned my head the other way and was presented with an entirely similar spectacle. As I wandered my gaze inside the bar, the scene repeated itself, so much so that I felt I was the only living being among those zombies.

I gave the last sip to the can of Coke I had taken and headed for the trash can to throw it away. As it sank into the trash, however, something familiar caught my attention. I stuck my hand into the trash and tried to work my way through it, touching as little junk as possible, until I came to what I was looking for. It was full of oil slicks and lumps of cheese, but it was just what I thought it was: a piece of paper with a meaningless symbol followed by handwritten pairs of words, numbers, dates and places.

I barely picked it up with two fingers and laid it on the counter in front of the bartender, a man who, despite his white hair, seemed to be the smartest one of all - or at least the only one who didn’t look lost.

I cleared my throat to get his attention.

“Excuse me, have you by any chance ever seen such a note?”

He looked first at the note, then at me. Perhaps he was trying to make me feel uncomfortable because I had placed that filth on his counter? He continued to look at me, after which he took a glass from under the counter and walked toward a dryer, ignoring me.

“Hey, I asked you a question.”

He turned back, not taking his eyes off mine. “Get that stuff out of here.”

“Did you ever see it or not?”

“I told you to make it disappear.”

I humored him, so I took a napkin and rolled the note inside, then shoved it in my pocket. Not exactly the most hygienic thing, but that business was beginning to intrigue me.

“Come get your baby back, come on.”

The man at the counter pointed his gaze behind me, where Harvey materialized. The man stared at him, and I seemed to catch an understanding. I then snapped toward Harvey, who nevertheless knew how to cover up inconvenient truths, so I found him smiling and patting me on my back as he turned to the man.

“Sorry if he bothered you. We’d better go.”

I looked around one last time. The people in that establishment had barely eaten and were making frequent bathroom stops. It would have been curious to go in and compare the entrances with the flushes; perhaps I would not have been so surprised by the result.

I cast a glance at Harvey.

How much did he know about what was going on in there? He seemed so different from that bunch of vegetables, yet I felt that showing him the note would not be a good idea.

He offered to pay for everything, and I didn’t let him tell me twice. We left the place and he tried again to hold my hand, but I had too many thoughts in my head to realize that he was trying to apologize.

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