The Crocodile-Skin Case
Ooooh, he’d better not be a farter, I think. The tall, broad-shouldered man entering the suite holds the door open with his foot. That foot is big and enclosed in a gleamingly polished brown leather wingtip. He slips his rolling luggage through the doorway with one well-manicured hand while the other clutches a crocodile-skin case. It is brown, and worn in a way that says that it is an antique rather than a hand-me-down. Its corners are ever-so-slightly battered. Its handle is smooth-polished by finger oils. It is a nice case. An expensive case.
The man steps into the room, now that his luggage is past the door, and lets the door swing shut. It just misses slamming his arm by an inch. The man is not fazed, he doesn’t flinch and he never stumbles as he wrestles his bags through the narrow entry. He doesn’t even look awkward. I looked awkward when I came in. He’d just better not fart in his sleep, I think again. Or snore.
“Howdy!” the man bursts with friendly exuberance. I frown a little in my head, but outwardly I smile big, my whole face lifting in a bright and endearing welcome.
“Hello!” I burst back, not feeling it. Not feeling it at all. “Check-in go okay? They gave me a bit of the runaround. You know how they do. This and that and another thing, and them trying to get me a room that’s clean. Got here a bit early, I guess. You here from Specsco, too? I guess you have to be, or we wouldn’t be sharing a room, eh? What’s your region?” I’m rambling.
“Not too bad, no trouble at all, actually. They were nice as could be downstairs. That girl at the counter was as sweet as pie. Got a daughter just a few years younger than her back home. Home’s Dallas. I got most of the Dallas area and just a little outside the city. How about yourself, buddy, you get to stay close to home?”
“Oh, no, I don’t really have any place I call home.” Buddy, I think, who you calling Buddy? I ain’t your buddy. “I travel all over. Not just to conferences like this one. I sell dental chairs. Most of the Midwest, actually. Not too many reps, so our territory’s pretty big. It’s a pretty sweet gig, really. Commission’s not too shabby. Dentist’s are all closed weekends, so I never have to work a Saturday. How about you? Whatcha selling? You got watches in there, or something?” I almost finish my question, but the phone rings. Briing, briing! I jump, it’s so loud, and my voice goes all funny in mid-sentence so I sound like a preteen boy, voice cracking.
We both look at the phone for a second, neither one sure who should pick it up. Briing, briing! Just as I’m about to grab the receiver, he strides forward and picks it up. He has left his luggage in the entryway, but he still holds that crocodile-skin case. I think I smell coffee and traces of cigar smoke, but I can’t be sure.
“Hello,” he announces. He doesn’t turn it into a question like most people do. Buddy, I scoff in my head. “Uh-huh,” he acknowledges. And then, “Oh, copy that.” And finally, “Thanks so much, little lady.” The way he says ‘little lady’ makes me sure that he was raised in Dallas, too. He hangs up the phone.
“That was the sweet little lady from the check-in desk. She says she’s sorry the room wasn’t ready when you checked in this morning, and we get a free dinner for the trouble. Isn’t that nice? Great service in this hotel.” He seems genuinely impressed. I wonder why he gets a free meal for my trouble.
“You military?” I ask.
“What’s that?” he replies.
“You said, ‘copy that,’” I say.
“Oh, no, sir. Just something I picked up somewhere.” As if that explained anything.
“Oh, I was wondering. I was in, see. Marines. Wondered if I’d run into a fellow Devildog.”
“Oh, oh no. But hey, I guess it’s your weekend, huh? Memorial day and all that?”
“I guess,” I say. He’s lucky I don’t punch him in the gut. I decide to let it pass. I’m still smiling. I open my mouth to ask again about what’s in the case, but he talks first.
“Well, I’m going to head down to the hall. Make sure they all know I’m here and all that. Maybe I’ll see you down there, huh?” I don’t bother to reply as he heads out the door. He moves his rolling luggage into the little niche by the door before going out. He takes the crocodile case with him.
The conference is good, as far as conferences go. They’re all the same, really. The regional managers get up in front of everyone and give their reports on sales numbers and blah blah blah. I’ve never yet actually listened to any of it. I get the gist. Sales are up, Good Job! Sales are down, let’s go over sales strategies. Pep talk, motivational speech, importance of communication. I’m waiting for my free dinner. The company gives a buffet, but a free dinner in the hotel restaurant might actually be good.
I catch sight of my roommate a couple of times during the mingling time we get. I never asked him his name. He doesn’t know mine, either, I guess. Buddy, I manage to make a snorting sound inside my head as I leave the conference hall. I get held up just outside the doors by the saleswoman from the southern Midwest region. She wants to know how my numbers were. Do I have any war stories from the past year? She’s about to launch into her own year’s worth of mind-numbing nonsense, so I cut her off with a mumbled excuse. I can’t think of anything good, so I just trail off with some noise. I assume she heard something reasonable, because she doesn’t seem offended.
I head straight for the restaurant, keeping my eyes on the floor so no one else tries to distract me from my hunger. The restaurant is big and dark inside. The lighting is warm, dim, and confined to individual tables. Couples sit at all the smaller booths, and the bar is full of men whose eyes cannot be torn from the football game on the television screen over the bartender’s head. I’m just heading for one of those tall tables with the stool-chairs near the bar when I see my roommate at a booth with a petite red-head that I think I remember sells copy machines or fax machines or something. They’re having an amusing conversation. She is describing something animatedly while he smiles like a doofus. His crocodile-skin case is next to him in the booth. I look at it piercingly, but my eyes don’t seem to want to x-ray the case.
I sit at the table, my feet perched awkwardly on the chair’s lower bar. I feel like a toddler. I order a Long Island iced tea. When the waiter walks off, I realize I don’t have a menu. Crocodile-case guy’s face is buried in his. When my drink comes I ask for a menu. The waiter gives me one. It’s sticky.
I look up from the menu when I decide, but the waiter is gone. I wait some more. When I see him, I flag him down. “Porterhouse, rare,” I say.
“Oh, I’m sorry, sir. We just sold out of the porterhouse. I recommend the pork tenderloins, though. They’re excellent.” I frown, but I order the pork anyway. It’s free, after all. I can’t really complain. I make sure to tell the waiter about the meal comp before he walks away. He takes my room number to verify.
While I wait for my food, I drink my Long Island. I finish it and order another. I don’t realize it at first, but I’m staring at the crocodile case. What could be in there? Whatever it is, it’s probably something expensive. Crocodile man’s shoes look like they cost a small fortune. And something that small is probably easy to sell. It’s always easier when they can see the product in person. I can’t carry dental chairs around the country. All I’ve got is a briefcase full of full-color brochures. I have to sell on my talent alone. No samples for me, boy. No, sir. No, buddy.
As I stare, the waitress brings the two salespeople their meals. The bastard got a porterhouse. And it’s black as the inside of an old chimney. My nostrils flare.
I go up to the room after dinner. I stumble a little bit getting out of the elevator. When I get to the door I have to run the keycard twice before the little green rectangle flashes and I can get inside. I go straight to my bed — I’ve chosen the one closer to the window — and take off my shoes. I struggle out of my pants and my coat and shirt and climb under the covers with my undershirt and boxers on. I realize that the bed’s not too hard, for a change. I snuggle happily under the covers and sigh deeply.
Then I start to think about that case. Guy’s got it easy, selling watches for a living. I lie there brooding for a while, getting more and more irritable the more tired I get. After a couple of hours of thinking about what I have to do to make a sale, the croc-skin case guy comes in.
He opens the door slowly and tiptoes in as he sees that the lights are off. He creeps across the room considerately, which only makes me hate him more. He puts his case on the floor next to the bed before heading into the bathroom. I hear the water running in the shower.
Impulsively, I spring up from the bed. I cross the little room quietly, keeping an eye on the door to the bathroom in case he comes out. I grab the case with both hands and place it on my lap. I run my hands over the lumpy-smooth surface and then bring my fingers to the latches. I place both of my thumbs on the latch-releases and am about the click them open when the man opens the bathroom door. He steps one foot into the room and sees me sitting there with the case on my lap. He’s standing there in his underwear staring at me blankly for a moment, and I’m staring right back at him with wide eyes. Then his face changes and he’s frowning in shock and outrage.
“Hey!” he says, but I’m gone. I bolt out the door to the room with the crocodile-skin case clutched to my chest with both arms. I’m sprinting down the hallway in my boxers and undershirt with no shoes on my feet. I swing around the corner and toward the stairwell. Busting through the stairwell door, I almost drop the case as my elbow bumps the edge of the door, but I cling to it. It’s mine, now.
When I reach the lobby, I burst out from the stairway as though escaping a fire, but then I slow to a walk. I don’t want the whole lobby to stare at me. I walk nonchalantly to the glass doors. People are staring at me anyways, since I’m only in my underwear. And barefoot. And clutching a crocodile-skin case to my bosom like it’s got life-saving medicine inside. I reach the doors and go outside.
The world outside is cool, but the sidewalk is still warm under my feet. I look behind me as I near the corner of the building. No one is chasing me. I pop around the side of the building and head down a dirty alleyway. I see a crate by a side door surrounded by various brands of cigarette butts. I step on several of them on the way to sit on the crate, but they aren’t lit so I don’t care. I sit on the crate with the case once again on my lap. The plastic slats of the the crate dig into my butt cheeks while I pop the latches open with two almost-simultaneous clacks.
Nearly holding my breath, I rub the palms of my hands over the case’s surface once more before slowly opening it. The hinges make no sound. The case is lovingly cared for. I look down into the case expectantly.
And I stare for a moment. After that moment, I blink. Then I blink again. I have no response. Staring back up at me from inside the case is a simple old-fashioned shaving kit like the kind someone’s granddad might have used in World War II times. Maybe even World War I. The razor is immaculate, no rust, polished wooden handle. The brush is a little bit sparse, but clean. The little scissors gleam in the faint light mockingly. I think the strop is laughing at me.
I stare for a minute. I sit, and stare, and breathe. I have stolen a man’s granddad’s shaving kit. And I never even found out if he was a farter.
