The Cleaner Read online

  I sit down in the living room and stare at the TV. There’s a news bulletin on. Something about a dead body. Home invasion. I change channels. Finally Mom comes through to the living room carrying a cup of tea for herself and nothing for me.

  “It seems my whole life was spent cleaning up after your father, and now I’m spending the rest of it cleaning up after you.”

  “I offered to help, Mom,” I say, standing up.

  “Well, it’s too late now. It’s done,” she snaps. “You should learn to appreciate your mother, Joe. I’m all you have.”

  I know this speech, and have apologized as many times as I’ve heard it. I say I’m sorry once again, and it seems offering apologies to my mother makes up fifty percent of my conversations with her. She sits down and we watch some TV-some English drama about people who say nuffink instead of nothing, and I don’t even know what in the hell bollocks really means.

  Mom watches it as if she can’t already predict that Fay is sleeping with Edgar for his inheritance, and Karen is pregnant from Stewart-the town drunk and her long-lost brother. When the commercials come on, she fills me in on what the characters have been up to, as if they’re part of the family. At least she isn’t offering to cook them meatloaf. I listen and nod and forget what she says within seconds. Like a goldfish. When it comes back on, I end up watching the carpet, finding more entertainment in the brown, symmetrical patterns that were all the rage back in the fifties-proving that everybody was completely mad back then.

  The drama ends and the highly depressing theme music starts to play. As sad as the tune is, I’m feeling in high spirits because that music means it’s time for me to go. Before I leave, Mom tells me more about my cousin Gregory. He has a car. A BMW.

  “Why don’t you have a BMW, Joe?”

  I’ve never stolen a BMW. “Because I’m not gay.”

  I’m the only person on the bus. The driver is old, and his hands shake as I give him the exact change. As we drive along, I start to wonder what would happen if he sneezed. Would his heart explode? Would we career into other traffic? I feel like giving him a dollar tip when he gets me safely to my stop, but I figure the excitement will finish off what the Grim Reaper started years ago. He wishes me a good night as I leave the bus, but I don’t know if he really means it. I don’t wish him anything back. I’m not looking to make any friends. Especially old ones.

  When I get home I step into the shower and spend an hour washing away my mother. When I climb out, I spend some time with Pickle and Jehovah. They look happy to see me. A few minutes later and it’s lights out. I slip into bed. I don’t ever dream, and tonight is going to be no exception.

  I think of Angela and Fluffy, and finally I think of nothing.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Right on seven thirty, I wake up. I don’t need an alarm clock to pull me from sleep. My clock is internal. Never needs winding. Never breaks down. Keeps on ticking.

  Another Christchurch morning and I’m already bored. I look at the clothes in my wardrobe, but it’s pointless. I get dressed, then start breakfast. Toast. Coffee. Doesn’t get more sophisticated than that. I talk to my fish and tell them about Karen and Stewart and the rest of the nuffink squad, and they listen intently to what I have to say, and then they forget it. I feed them as a reward for their loyalty.

  I head outside. It’s another summer day in autumn. There aren’t many people around. Unfortunately I don’t have a car. Angela’s I left parked on the other side of town. I left the keys in the ignition in case somebody else wanted to take it for a spin. Stealing keys is a lot easier than hot-wiring the thing, though I’ve got plenty of experience when it comes to both.

  I am at the bus stop with my ticket in my hand when the bus pulls up. The side of it is covered in advertisements for vitamin pills and contraceptives. The doors open with a swish. I climb on board.

  “Hey ya doin’, Joe?”

  “Joe’s fine, Mr. Stanley.”

  I hand Mr. Stanley my bus ticket. He takes it from me and, without clicking it, hands it back. Winks at me like old bus drivers do. The whole side of his face crushes down like he’s having a stroke. Mr. Stanley is probably in his sixties, and looks like he gets a kick out of life. On mornings like these, he always likes to say, “Hot, ain’t it?” He wears the uniform all bus drivers wear: dark blue shorts, a light-blue short-sleeved shirt, and black shoes.

  “This one’s on the city this morning, Joe,” he says, still winking, just in case I hadn’t noticed. “Sure is a hot one today, Joe, ain’t it?”

  I figure if I smile back, I’ll get more free bus rides. “Gee. Joe’s thankful, Mr. Stanley.”

  Mr. Stanley smiles at me and I wonder how he would look if I opened my briefcase and showed him what’s inside. Putting the bus ticket into my pocket, I walk down the aisle. The bus is fairly empty-a handful of school kids scattered randomly, a nun in one of those stiffly starched black-and-white outfits, a businessman with an umbrella even though it has to be ninety degrees outside.

  Regular people. Like me.

  I sit near the back behind two sixteen- or seventeen-year-old schoolgirls. I prop my briefcase up on the empty seat next to me. Nobody is sitting behind or opposite me. I thumb the combination on each side of the case. Slide the latches. Open the case. I have my knives stored away carefully inside-three in the lid, and three in the base. They’re held in place by strands of material that loop over them and snap into place with metal domes. The gun is the only thing that floats around free, but it’s in a black leather pouch to protect it, and the knives. The gun has three internal safeties, so I’d have to be three times unlucky-or stupid-to have any sort of accident. Ahead of me, the schoolgirls are giggling.

  I take out a knife with a blade only two inches long, which cost twenty-five dollars. It takes a lot of stabbing to kill somebody with a knife that short. Once, about eighteen months ago, it took me a good forty or fifty goes. Small cuts. Lots of blood. I was sweating like a pig afterward. My shirt was pasted to me. He deserved it, though.

  Mr. Stanley is a much nicer bus driver.

  I’m absentmindedly running the blade up and down the back of the seat of the girl on the left. I’m thinking about women in general when her friend, the blond girl, turns around at the sound. I hide the knife behind my leg. Smile innocently as if I have no idea where I even am, as if all I’m doing is singing mentally to myself: The wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round. She glares at me. Watching her, I can feel the beginnings of a relationship.

  She looks away without comment, and they return to their giggling. I tuck the knife away in my briefcase. I’m not even sure why I got it out. I stare out the window and watch as the bus approaches the central city. More traffic, more smog, more aggravation as people get caught up at traffic lights. We pass a guy sitting on the side of the road next to a mountain bike, the front wheel all buckled up, both of his knees are bleeding. He catches me staring at him and gives me the finger.

  I have the briefcase closed up by the time my stop appears. Mr. Stanley makes a special exception for me, stopping the bus directly outside my work. I give him a smile from the end of the bus. We exchange waves as I step off from the back exit.

  Christchurch. City of Angels this isn’t. New Zealand is known for its tranquility, its sheep, and its hobbits. Christchurch is known for its parks and violence. Throw a bag of glue in the air and a hundred welfare recipients will knock each other over in an effort to sniff from it. Despite the blue skies, Christchurch City is still mostly gray. Many of the buildings date back a hundred years, some even more, gothic architecture imported from England along with the population back then. Gray buildings, gray roads, lots of office and shop windows reflecting it all. However there is the occasional splash of greenery: trees, shrubs, flowers. You can’t take twenty paces without passing something out of nature. Walk ten minutes to the west, and you’ll find the Botanic Gardens; more than twenty hectares of land dedicated to showing the rest of the world how clever we are at tu
rning seeds into plants. In these gardens are thousands of flowers and hundreds of trees, but you can’t go there at night without getting stabbed or shot, becoming fertilizer.

  I take a few paces forward, and my boredom does nothing to let up. It’s this city. Nobody can feel excited surrounded by buildings that date back a hundred years. Between the buildings is a warren of alleyways that any self-respecting drug addict can walk with their eyes closed. Christchurch patients live down these alleyways. If a businessman or businesswoman were to venture down one, they would have more of a chance of finding Jesus than getting out of there without being molested or urinated on. As for the shopping, well, shopping here is going out of style, and that’s reflected in the empty stores with signs hanging in the windows saying For Lease or For Sale. Even so, you can never find a damn parking space anywhere.

  Christchurch is voted one of the friendliest places in the world. By who, I have no idea. Certainly not anybody I’ve ever met. But despite all of this, Christchurch is my home.

  The air shimmers with heat, and in the distance it makes the roads look wet. Cars have their windows down and drivers’ arms are hanging in the breeze, cigarette ash dropping onto the sidewalk. Plenty of traffic is racing by, too much for me to run through, so I push the button for the crossing signal and wait. When it flashes and beeps for me to walk, I wait a few more seconds for the red-light runners to speed by, then cross the road. I roll my sleeves up. The air feels good on my forearms. I can feel beads of sweat running down the sides of my body.

  Two minutes later I’m at work.

  I walk directly to the fourth floor, taking the stairs since stealing cars doesn’t provide any real exercise. The stairwell smells of urine at the bottom, and more like disinfectant the higher I get. On the fourth floor I enter the conference room and place my briefcase, locked, down on the table, and move over to the photographs pinned to the wall.

  “Morning, Joe. How are you this morning?”

  I look at the man I’ve positioned myself next to. Schroder is a big guy with more muscle than brain. He has those rugged good looks of an action-movie hero, but I doubt he has any heroism left. He hates this city as much as anybody else. He has buzz-cut graying hair that would look better on a sixty-year-old drill sergeant than on him, an almost forty-year-old homicide detective. His forehead and face are covered in stress lines, which I no doubt put there. He has bags under his eyes, no doubt put there by the new baby he has at home. At the moment he’s going for the hard-worked-detective look, and with his cheap shirtsleeves rolled up and his thrift-store tie loosened, he has certainly achieved it. He has a pencil jammed up behind his ear, and another one in his hand, which he was chewing on before he spoke. He is standing with one foot forward, slightly ahead of the other, as if ready to pounce at the wall and start pounding on it.

  “Morning, Detective Schroder.” I nod slowly toward the photographs like I’m agreeing with what I just said. “Any new leads?”

  Detective Inspector Schroder is the lead detective on this case, has been since the second murder. He shakes his head like he’s disagreeing with himself, straightens his back and massages out a crick by pushing his palms against it, then gets back to looking at the photographs.

  “Nothing yet, Joe. Only new victims.”

  I let his statement hang in the air. Pretend I’m thinking about what he’s saying. Thinking and processing. Has to take me longer when I’m standing in front of a cop.

  “Oh? Did this happen last night, Detective Schroder?”

  He nods. “Sick bastard broke into her house.”

  His fists are shaking. The pencil he’s holding breaks. He tosses it onto the table, where a small graveyard of other broken pencils lies, and then grabs hold of the one from behind his ear. He must keep a supply just for these occasions. He chews on it for a few seconds before turning toward me and snapping it in half.

  “I’m sorry, Joe. You’ll have to excuse my language.”

  “That’s okay. You said victims. Does that mean there was more than one?”

  “Another woman was found in the trunk of her car, parked up the victim’s driveway.”

  I exhale loudly. “Gosh, Detective Schroder, I guess that’s why you’re the detective and I’m not. I would never have looked in the trunk. Even now, she’d still be in there, alone and everything.” Like the detective, I’m shaking my fists now too, but unlike the detective I don’t have a supply of pencils to start breaking. “Gee, I would have let everybody down,” I add under my breath but loud enough for him to hear.

  “Hey, Joe, don’t beat yourself up. Even I didn’t look in the car. We didn’t even notice the second victim until this morning.”

  He’s lying. His rugged face is looking at me with pity.

  “Really?”

  He nods. “Sure.”

  “Can I get you some coffee, Detective Schroder?”

  “Well, okay, Joe, but only if it isn’t any hassle.”

  “No hassle. Black, one sugar, right?”

  “Two sugars, Joe.”

  “Right.” I make him remind me every time I offer. “Can I leave my briefcase on the table here, Detective Schroder?”

  “Go ahead. What do you carry in that thing anyway?”

  I shrug and look away. “You know, Detective Schroder, documents and stuff.”

  “Thought so.”

  Bullshit. The bastard figures I have lunch in there, and maybe a comic book. Nonetheless, I walk from the room and into the corridor, where I move among dozens of offices and officers and detectives. I head past several cubicles, and straight to the coffee machine. It’s easy to use, but I make it look more complicated than it is. I’m thirsty, so I make myself one first and quickly drink it since it’s not that hot and because it tastes like dirt. Most of the other cops nod at me. It’s that dumb silent greeting that’s in fashion at the moment-the one where you nod abruptly and raise your eyebrows-and starts to get uncomfortable when you keep passing the same people. Then you have to make idle chitchat. Mondays are okay, because they ask how your weekend was. Fridays are okay too, because they ask what you have planned for the weekend. But the days in between really are a bastard.

  I pour Schroder his coffee. Black. Two sugars.

  For the last few months, the police station has been alive with the hustle and bustle of stressed and anxious detectives. The immediate day of a homicide and the day after are when that hustling and bustling are at their greatest. Meetings are held every hour of the day. Statements are pored over by eager eyes, looking for vital clues or discrepancies from anybody who knew one of the victims. Information is gathered only to become forgotten evidence the moment another killing takes place. After all these killings, they still have nothing. I actually feel bad for them in some ways-all this never-ending work that produces nothing. During the day, reporters keep showing up every time they hear a new piece of evidence has been uncovered, a new witness spoken to, or-their personal favorite-when a new victim has been found. The latter ensures them more sales of newspapers and of revenue from ads as the bulletins go to air. Reporters armed with microphones fire questions at anybody who looks like a policeman as they come and go. Cameras are rolling. All this and they ignore the one man who can give them the inside scoop.

  I carry the coffee back into the conference room. By now, a few other detectives are milling around inside. I can feel the anguish in the air-the desperation to catch the man doing this to them and their city. The room smells like sweat and cheap aftershave. I hand Schroder his coffee with a smile. He thanks me. I pick up my briefcase to leave and the knives don’t jingle.

  My office is on the same floor. Unlike the cubicles, mine is actually an office. It’s at the end of the corridor, just past the toilets. The door has my name on it. It’s one of those little gold plaques with black lettering. Joe. No second name. No other initial. Just Joe. Like an everyday average Joe. Well, that’s me. Everyday and average.

  I have my hand on the handle and am about to turn it when sh
e comes up behind me and taps me on the shoulder.

  “How are you doing today, Joe?” Her voice is a little loud and a little slow, as if she’s trying to break through a language barrier with somebody from Mars.

  I force the smile onto my face, the one that Detective Schroder sees every time he shares a pleasantry with me. I give her a big-kid smile, the type with all teeth, spreading my lips as far apart as possible in every direction.

  “Good morning, Sally. I’m fine, thank you for asking.”

  Sally grins back at me. She is dressed in a pair of black overalls that are slightly too big for her, but don’t hide the fact that she is slightly too big herself. Not fat, but somewhere between solid and chubby. She has a pretty face when she smiles, but it isn’t pretty enough for somebody to ignore the few extra pounds and slip a ring on her finger. At the age of twenty-five, it’s her chances that are getting slimmer, not her weight. Smudges of dust on her forehead look like the remnants of a fading bruise. Her blond hair is tied into a ponytail, but it doesn’t look like it’s been washed in weeks. She doesn’t look slow-it isn’t until she speaks that you know you’re talking to somebody whose parents kept dropping her on her head for fun.

  “Can I get you a coffee, Joe? Or an orange juice?”

  “I’m fine, Sally. That was nice of you to ask, though.”

  I open my door and get half a step inside before she taps me on the shoulder again.

  “Are you sure? It really wouldn’t be a problem. Not really.”

  “I’m not thirsty right now,” I say, and she looks sad. “Maybe later.”

  “Okay, great, I’ll check on you later then. You have a good day, okay?”

  Sure, whatever. I slowly nod “Okay,” and a moment later I get the rest of the way into my office and close the door.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Sally says hello to everybody she knows on her way to the elevator, and to those not in earshot she offers a small wave. She pushes the button and waits patiently. She never feels the temptation to keep pushing the button like others do. The elevator is empty, which is a shame, because she would have liked the company on the way to her floor.