Olive Juice by T. J. Klune
But he’d never gone back.
Phillip had.
That was the last time, right?
Yeah. Except for the bow tie.
The chair scraped along the floor as he stands up quickly. His mouth was salivating in that way it does before he’s about to be sick—and God, didn’t he remember that feeling from year three—because Phillip hadn’t been there to tie his damn tie, why the hell had he even worn it to begin with?
“David—”
“Just have to use the restroom.” He smiled weakly. “I’ll be right back.”
He felt Phillip’s eyes on his back as he strode away. He didn’t look back.
The bathroom was empty and as lowly lit as the restaurant. The floor was tiled, the sinks clear glass bowls on concrete blocks. There were mints and complimentary mouthwash on a cart near the far wall, and if this was going to go like he thought it was, then he’d probably need them.
He was in one of the stalls, the door firmly latched behind him when his mouth felt flooded, and the toilet seat was up. He was on his knees and gagging, stomach twisting furiously, and yeah, this was what it’d been like for most of 2014, that acidic burn in his mouth, gut filled with booze, guilt just about crushing him. He’d vomit, and it’d come out in a brown mess, and he’d think to himself, Never again, never again, I’m not going to do this ever again, she would be so mad if she could see me, but then he’d finish, and the day would go on, and it would get harder and harder, and five o’clock would hit. Five o’clock would hit (when it became acceptable to drink, of course), and he’d want to be numb. He’d go on to the website that had been made for Alice, a clumsy thing with only one page, saying that on March 22nd, 2012, Alice had disappeared near the Foggy Bottom–GWU Metro stop, the only sign that she’d ever existed had been her purse on the ground, wallet and cell phone still inside. God knows how long it’d been sitting there. Had it been from that morning? Or had it been from later in the day? He might not have known anything was wrong if that Good Samaritan hadn’t seen the purse lying partially hidden in some small bushes next to the Whole Foods.
He’d been just a kid coming from George Washington University, backpack slung over his shoulder. He’d seen the purse and would tell David later he thought it was weird that it was lying there like it was and hadn’t yet been taken by a homeless person. His name was Maury “but everyone calls me Digger,” and he’d picked up the purse, looking around to see if anyone was coming for it.
Nothing.
He’d felt guilty about looking through it, remembering when he’d been little and had snuck some money from his mom’s purse. He’d been found out and had gotten into trouble for that, and it’d always stuck with him. That disappointed look on her face. So he’d felt wrong about it, but there was just something strange that this purse had been where it was.
He’d found the wallet. A few singles inside. A driver’s license. Credit cards. There was a bag of those Ricola Lemon Mint drops, leftover from a sore throat a couple of weeks before. Lipstick. Gum. A hair tie. A pen. Rubber bands. A Kindle. A smartphone that wasn’t password protected. He’d pulled up the last number dialed and had called it.
And at 3:37 on Thursday, March 22, 2016, David’s cell phone rang.
“Hey, what are you up to?” he’d said. “On your way home? I’ll see what I can scrounge up for dinner if you—”
“Uh, yeah,” a male voice had said, and David was confused. He’d looked at his phone, and yeah, it’d said ALICE was calling him, that ALICE should be on the other end of the line. “Sorry. Is this—”
“This is David. Who are you? Why do you have my—”
“Look, mister. I don’t know what’s going on. It’s like this, okay? I’m just walking to the stop, okay? And I seen this purse, okay? It’s on the ground. And I’m thinking, wow, that’s not cool, because it looks expensive, okay? So I pick it up and there’s a wallet inside, and it’s weird, because it’s all still there, okay? And there’s this cell phone, and now I’m calling you. You know? This is Alice’s stuff. Nothing was stolen, okay? I didn’t take anything. I’m just trying to do the right thing here. I felt bad about going in the purse, okay? I’m not looking for any reward that—”
“You found it?” David had said, already feeling that low twinge of dread at the base of his spine. “What do you mean you found it?”
“It’s like I said, okay? It was just on the ground. Near some bushes. Man, I don’t know. It just felt weird, okay? Like, if someone stole it, then why didn’t they take the cards, man? You know? The phone too.”
And that had been the thing, right? The big thing. Because if someone had stolen the purse, if the motive had been robbery, then why hadn’t any of it been taken?
How had it gotten there?
There’d been a punched Metro card, timestamped for earlier that morning, so they knew she’d at least gotten off at the stop.
But from there?
Had she been just leaving the Metro or coming back?
No cameras had picked her up.
And no one, no one had remembered seeing anything. Not inside that Whole Foods. Or in the coffee shop where she’d stopped earlier according to the swipe of her debit card. Or on the train. Or anywhere.
And that’d been the thing too, right? How could these people, all of these people who had been around her during that Thursday not seen what had happened?
He’d been so angry at that. Later.
A thin string of bile was attached to his bottom lip as he dry-heaved into the fancy toilet, the tile cold underneath his hands. There was sweat on his forehead. His ears were ringing, and it was a lot. It was so much to take in, and he gagged again, but nothing came out. The string of bile broke and fell into the water. He spat once, twice, getting rid of the excess saliva. He breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth, again and again and again, and until his vision cleared and his stomach settled.
The bathroom door opened and closed.
He didn’t move.
Someone moved to the urinal, humming under his breath.
He waited.
The man pissed for a minute or two, then washed his hands in the sink. He coughed and started humming again as he dried his hands.
The door opened, the sounds of the restaurant spilling through.
Overhead, Perry Como sang about how he’d met a man from Tennessee who was heading for Pennsylvania and some homemade pumpkin pie.
David let out a dry sob but didn’t let it go further.
He pushed himself up, leaning his head against the stall door, the metal cool against his heated skin.
Digger had scrolled through the call list and had called the last number dialed. It’d been the night before, Wednesday, and she’d called him to say that she was going to be a little late getting in.
“Fire on one of the tracks,” she’d muttered. “Station is full. We’re gonna be packed like sardines in here.”
“Fire?” he’d said, a little startled.
“Way farther down the line, you old worrywart,” she’d said with a laugh. “Making everything run slower. Just wanted to let you know because of how you get.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Uh-huh. Love you!” And she’d disconnected the call.
She’d been an hour late, but she’d gotten home.
That was the last phone call she’d made.
David opened the stall door.
Oh, there’s no place like home for the holidays/cause no matter how far away you roam….
He stood in front of the sink, watching himself in the mirror.
He looked tired. He was pale. He looked… faded. Like he was the copy of a copy. All the pieces were there and they made a full picture, but it was blurred and somehow less.
He turned the faucet and splashed water on his face. He cupped his hands, letting them fill, then drinking from it, swishing the water around before spitting back in the sink, trying to get rid of that acidic taste.
<
He took the mouthwash, served in a little plastic cup. It burned a little as he swished it around. He spat it out and then crunched on a mint. It was better. He felt better.
He went back out.
Phillip watched him as he approached, brow furrowed, a little frown on his face.
“All right?” he asked.
David nodded, sitting back down in his seat. “Sorry. I don’t know what came over me.”
“Your swordfish is getting cold.”
David tried to smile. “Not too hungry.”
“You gotta eat something.”
“I do. I will. You don’t have to—”
“When was the last time you ate?”
That wasn’t— “I had my oatmeal this morning,” he said, trying to keep the irritation from his voice. “Even put some fruit on it. A little brown sugar.”
“And before that?”
“Why?” he asked.
Phillip shrugged. His own steak hadn’t really been touched. Half the potatoes were gone. Some of the broccoli. “I worry about you, buddy.”
David snorted. “Don’t.”
“Don’t?”
“You don’t have to.”
“That doesn’t mean I won’t. Someone has to. It might as well be me.”
“I’m fine,” David said, as if he hadn’t just been on his knees, face in the toilet.
Phillip sipped his wine. The candlelight flashed off the glass. “I’m not.”
David didn’t know what to say to that. So he said, “Oh?”
“Yes,” Phillip said. “Oh. Oh, David.”
“I’m sorry.”
Phillip laughed at that. It wasn’t the nicest of sounds. “For?”
“I don’t underst—”
“What are you sorry for? That I’m not okay? Or something else.”
He’d been gone for four minutes. Maybe five. He didn’t know what had happened. Things hadn’t been… comfortable, per se, but they’d been doing okay, hadn’t they? It’d been less stilted than he expected it to be. Granted, there were decades of history here between them, and he loved Phillip. God, he always had. Even after everything, he loved him. The same with Alice. She was six years gone and no one knew where she was, but he loved her as much as he had the day she’d called to say she was going to be late because of a fire farther down the line.
And yeah, he was sorry. Jesus Christ, he was sorry. He’d fucked up so many times since that Thursday. He’d taken it out on Phillip, even though he hadn’t deserved it. Then Phillip had had to put up with his shit as he spiraled out of control. As he became obsessed. As he spent so much money trying to find her.
At first, the police had been hesitant. She was an adult, they said. Are you sure she wasn’t at a friend’s house? Are you sure she wasn’t getting her hair done? Yes, sir, I heard you when you said her purse had been found on the ground, there’s no need to raise your voice at me, sir, but that could have been anything. She’s a woman in the United States who can legally go anywhere she wants to. Are you sure she didn’t just want to leave?
He’d called Phillip after that, enraged.
Hospitals didn’t have her.
She wasn’t in jail.
It took two days before the police had opened a missing person’s case, though he’d found out later that in DC, police were supposed to file a report no matter what when called, one of the few places in the country that did so.
By then, they’d gotten the purse back from Digger.
He was a nice kid, but David hadn’t had any qualms thinking that if Digger had been the one to do this, if he’d hurt Alice in any way, there wouldn’t be enough left of this boy to bury.
They’d interviewed him. Digger told the police the same thing he’d said to David. He’d been in class beforehand. He was heading to work. He’d found the purse, and that was that.
The police believed him. They didn’t even use words like person of interest about him.
Sex offenders in the immediate area were checked out.
Nothing. None of them.
They interviewed David. And Phillip. They understood why, that it was just protocol, but a great and terrible rage had filled David when the detective had asked if he and Alice had had any fights lately, if she had done drugs or was prone to leaving without telling anyone. Did she have a boyfriend? You know, anyone she was seeing?
“No,” he’d said to those questions, all the while thinking, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.
In the end, it hadn’t mattered.
She was just gone.
And late at night, when sleep wouldn’t come, David would stare at the ceiling and think about those two days it’d taken for the police to get their asses in gear. Two days it’d taken when even a layperson knew that the more time that passed, the less of a chance there would be to find them.
No witnesses.
No evidence.
Digger’s fingerprints were on her purse. But then so were David’s and Phillip’s and Alice’s herself. No one else.
She was pretty, and maybe that’s why they were able to get her on the news, because he’d find out later about the missing-white-woman syndrome. A black woman at the group meetings would tell him all about it, saying that her sister had gone missing, and no one had given two shits about her. “You lucky,” she’d said. “Latonya wasn’t—she had some johns, right? So, to them, to everyone else, she was just this prostitute. Just this whore who probably got picked up by the wrong person. You know what I’ve heard? That she probably deserved it. That she shouldn’t have been doin’ what she was doin’. They didn’t put her on the news. She didn’t have friends that handed out flyers. Her name wasn’t Dakota or Julie or Britney, so she ain’t gettin’ coverage. I got her kid now, right? She’s only three. She asks where Momma’s at. What the hell am I supposed to say to that? Sorry, kiddo, but Momma’s gone and people didn’t give a fuck about her because of what she done to make sure you had food in your belly. You lucky, David. Maybe not as lucky as you woulda been had your Alice been a white girl, but you lucky. I hope you find her. I hope we find them all.”
“David?” Phillip pressed.
“I don’t know,” David said finally. He didn’t look up at Phillip. “I just don’t know.”
Phillip sighed. “I know you don’t.”
“I am sorry, though.”
“I know that too.”
“Maybe I should—”
“I don’t think you should leave.”
Because of course Phillip would know what he was thinking. “Why?”
“Because,” Phillip said, “I haven’t gotten my fill of you.”
Fuck, that hurt. How long had it been since he’d heard those words? Before, to be sure. Maybe on one of their staycations when David had been above him, both of them panting, skin slick with sweat, muscles quivering in that way that showed they weren’t as young as they used to be. He’d probably said it jokingly, a saucy little smile on his face, chest and stomach covered in spunk, legs still wrapped around David’s waist.
And the first time, right? The first time he’d said that, David remembered very well. It’d been in September of 1992, and they’d been together for three days straight, and David was nervous that maybe he’d outstayed his welcome, that he was annoying Phillip. And when he’d fumbled through that, when he’d said, hey, if you want me to go, just tell me and I will, Phillip had squinted at him, that funny little smile on his face and said, “But I haven’t gotten my fill of you,” and David had maybe fallen a little bit in love right then. They hadn’t kissed yet. Hell, they’d only known each other for a few days, but it hadn’t mattered, not in the long run. Because Phillip hadn’t gotten his fill of David yet, and it became this thing between them. This mantra, this secret little code, and even when Alice had come crashing into their lives less than three years later, it still remained their thing. Like the staycations, it was there.
Here it was again, now. Like Phillip saying please, David
Yeah, he deserved it. Sure.
But that didn’t mean he had to like it.
“Goddammit,” he said hoarsely. “Goddammit.”
“Gentlemen,” Melissa said, apparently unable to read a fucking room. If so, she would have seen David’s posture screaming that right now probably wasn’t the best time. “How are we?”
“Fine,” Phillip said, never taking his eyes off David. “We’re fine.”
“Do we need to pack some of this up to go?” she asked.
“In my experience,” Phillip said, “fish is never good reheated. No offense, please. Our eyes were apparently bigger than our stomachs.”
“It happens,” Melissa said with a jovial little laugh. “I don’t suppose I could interest you in any dessert?”
“No,” Phillip said.
“Coffee?”
“No.”
“Would you like me to clear the plates?”
“That would be fine, thank you.”
And she did just that. She was about to leave when she frowned and looked down at David. “Sir, I seemed to have grabbed a receipt. Was it something you needed?”
Sure enough, the receipt with Matteo’s phone number was stuck partially to the underside of the plate. For a brief, vicious moment, David thought about snagging it back, maybe even saving the number in his phone right in front of Phillip. Hell, maybe he’d even use it. Maybe he’d fuck the kid who apparently had a fetish for sad middle-aged men with a receding hairline and sunken eyes. Or maybe Matteo had thought he was doing his good deed for the day, hitting on the old fart, making him feel good about himself. The number was probably fake.