The bullet unzips a crease in the pavement within an inch of Radford’s foot.
Radford doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t move at all.
Within a single broken instant of time all three cops fire simultaneously, and the dude is physically blasted off his feet by the combined firepower. The bullets drive him down hard …
In the wake of it, the echoes of the gunshots fade into a stunning silence.
In the parked van the two guys sit up and appraise the situation with scientific interest.
From their various directions the three cops cautiously approach the dude. He lies broken across the curb. Guns out, two of the cops walk past Radford with only a glance; they’re intent on the dude, whose brains are all over the sidewalk. One of the cops mutters dispassionately, “Angel dust. Laughing his head off.”
His partner says, “Where’s it say a spaced-out maniac can’t have a sense of humor?”
Radford trudges to the side door of the cafe as if there’d been no interruption. He knocks.
One of the cops is saying, “Get Forensics.”
Charlie the cook, who owns the cafe, opens the door from inside and stands in his apron, peering out cautiously. Charlie has a prosthesis in place of one hand. He recognizes Radford—they go back a long way together—admits him.
The two guys in the van consult rapidly and the driver turns the key and crams it roughly into gear. The van lurches. The passenger’s voice is pained: “Hey—Easy with my van.”
One of the cops is calling in on his car radio. The partner is swiveling full-circle on his heels, gun half raised, waiting for another shoe to drop. The foot-patrol cop strides across to the dude and kicks open the attache case that the dude dropped. He looks dryly at the dead dude. “You have the right to remain silent.”
Charlie the cook holds the door open. Several sleazeball waiters trail tentatively out to study the carnage.
Radford moves past them and goes inside. He pulls down an apron off a peg, ties it on without hurry and proceeds to stand all alone washing dishes.
Later in the day Radford, still in his apron, swabs the floor. Two or three scuzzy waiters move past him, carrying trays in and out. Cooks and other kitchen staff are at work—the place is busy.
Radford keeps to himself, talks to no one, looks at no one. A beer-bellied bruiser named Don—pack-leader of the waiters—sneers at Radford. Other kitchen staff are watching. Knowing he has an audience, Don picks up an open can of tomato juice, then steps on Radford’s mop, stopping it. Radford just looks at him. Don deliberately pours tomato juice on the floor. No reaction; Radford merely begins to mop it up.
“D’you used to mop up for the I-raqis like that?”
Don reaches for the side of Radford’s waistband, pulls it out past the apron and pours tomato juice inside the front of Radford’s pants. Radford pulls away but does not fight.
Don shouts at him—“What’s with you—fuckin’ coward?”—trying to get a rise out of Radford.
It’s loud in the room but Radford barely hears what Don says; what he hears, interspersed with clatter of dishes and silverware, is the growing sound of explosions and automatic weapons and the dreadful screams of the injured and dying.
Radford picks up a tray of dirty dishes. Don sticks out his foot. Radford can’t see it—the tray blocks his downward view. He trips over Don’s foot. In his head the sound of battle fades as dishes tumble with a loud clatter.
Don waits, taunting, hoping Radford will fight. Don’s one of your martial-arts types and he just knows he can beat up anybody—especially somebody who won’t fight back.
Radford is picking up the scattered dishes. He doesn’t even look up at Don.
Charlie the boss strides across the aisle and grips Don roughly by the arm. “Hey, bozo. Bust my dishes, you pay for ’em … I told you leave him alone.”
Don gives him a look, decides not to make anything of it right now, and walks away.
Charlie helps Radford to his feet. “You got to remember to fight back.”
Radford thinks about it, visibly. He has to marshal the things swimming around in his head before he can formulate an answer. Finally he says, “Don’t want to hurt anybody.”
“C.W., you gotta look out for yourself.”
“Doesn’t matter.” Radford resumes picking up dishes.
Charlie pulls him up straight and makes motions as if dusting him off. “Go get yourself cleaned up.”
At the sink of the tiny employees’ washroom Radford stands in his shorts scrubbing tomato-stain out of his trousers. Then he locks the door. His head aches terribly. He takes that same insulin kit out of a pocket and injects himself with painkiller. He’s hearing again that sound of sporadic combat fire.
He sees a Middle-Eastern town, arid, devastated by war, and a gaunt undernourished teenage girl moving silently through the night, alert, weapon ready, her face lit by sudden distant flashes; we hear continuing sound of combat fire. The girl takes a step forward—steps on a mine—abruptly Radford’s memory explodes in a white flash as the girl disintegrates …
He sees himself, then, watching from up in the gaping skull-like third-story window opening of a bombed-out shell of an apartment house. He holds a ’scoped sniper rifle. He’s very young (22), in camouflage uniform, face blackened, revealing no feelings except fear. Scared … sweating in the bitter cold, frightened, he aims his rifle at something in the distance. He can hear its approach, the Iraqi helicopter, and he squints into the scope, aiming up into the sky—steadies his aim and fires. The recoil rocks his shoulder gently; he’s used to that. When he lowers the rifle, his expression has gone blank—he seems no longer afraid. The sound of the helicopter rotors changes, becomes rattly and uneven, and Radford watches while the machine begins to sway from side to side as if on a pendulum before it shatters against the slope of a jagged rock hillside. The explosion lights up Radford’s face like daylight and he shrinks back into the shadows of the bombed-out building.
… In the cafe bathroom he puts the syringe and bottle away in the case, and pockets the case, and straps on his grease-stained uniform. In his aching head the sound of combat fades. He tries to open the door. It won’t open. Won’t budge. He shoves hard at it. Nothing now, except after a moment he begins to hear men chuckling beyond the door. He kicks the door. The voices outside begin to laugh aloud.
The harder Radford tries to open the door, the louder they laugh.
He feels as if the room is closing in on him …
Outside the door, in the cafe hallway, are grouped several waiters, including Don. They’re the ones who’re laughing. A chair is propped under the door handle, wedging it shut.
Don opens a fuse box on the wall. His finger flips a circuit-breaker from “on” to “off.”
Inside the bathroom Radford is plunged into darkness and panic overtakes him. He thrashes at the jammed door.
Out in the hallway the waiters’ laughter stops abruptly when the door is kicked out in splinters.
Radford comes exploding out through the smashed wreckage.
They gape at him.
In a sweating panic Radford stands panting.
Don backs away in sudden fear.
—And Radford walks away.
The waiters try to laugh again, but it’s uneasy and it trails off …
After nightfall the cafe’s trade changes. More of an upscale crowd now—thrill seekers looking for something they won’t find behind a velvet rope in the more trendy sections.
In a corner booth sit the two guys who earlier were in their van watching Radford on the street. Their names are Conrad and Gootch. Conrad’s the dapper dandy who likes to smoke cigarillos but he can’t smoke inside here so he’s drumming his fingers on the Formica tabletop, an unlit cigarillo between his fingers. He’s watching Radford swab the floor, mopping under tables. Conrad, the body-builder, is facing the other direction, intent on something or someone. Conrad asks, “What you lookin’ at?”