Stablemates

The line of cars was a glistening steel worm inching down I-285. Lewis Clarke sat behind the wheel of his 2005 beige Volvo sedan, listening to the warbling of a Art Farmer jazz trumpet solo. He couldn’t turn it off. Sometime last month his stereo had malfunctioned and refused any command punched into its keys. Lewis had tried to persuade the machine politely.

“Come on, please,” he’d said, clicking eject, twisting the volume, and, finally, thumping the power button until it came off under his thumb. Since then, he’d been held captive by smooth jazz for weeks on his drive to and from work. He used to appreciate it, but after listening to the same CD seventy-five times in a row, he was starting to wonder if they played smooth jazz in Guantanamo Bay. If he ever got this CD out, he was going to mail it to the FBI to use in their interrogation rooms. He took a little solace in the thought that he might, one day, single-handedly crack the global terrorist network. Maybe someone would give him a medal.

Lewis cringed as the song neared its chaotic finale. He knew what was coming: a sustained high C that would crash down two octaves into a low F. It used to roll like clear water in a mountain stream. Now it sounded more like a car alarm falling down some stairs.

Light gleamed off the car roofs in front of him. Lewis flipped down his visor. He had forgotten his prescription sunglasses. He squinted soft, brown eyes at the harsh light; eyes he’d gotten from his mother, a kindergarten teacher who used to tell him that he was the most well-behaved boy in the world. His dad gave him his other features: thin lips, a nose that was a little large, and dark hair, which was curly, but he’d gotten used to combing it neatly over to the side.

He could have swapped his own glasses for his wife’s, in the glove compartment, but that would have made the headache he was getting from the traffic and the jazz worse. He thought about just putting hers on top of his. He was only one exit from his off-ramp anyway. The moment he did, however, he knew a beautiful redhead in a flashy car would saddle up alongside him and, seeing him, burst into laughter. Lewis would feel like a jackass. As he was thinking this, a black SUV full of noisy, high-school kids edged into his lane, almost crushing his headlight.

“Excuse me.” He raised his voice in the vacuum of his car.

The driver, a skinny boy with a shaggy haircut, smiled into his rearview mirror. He waved a hand back in Lewis’ direction. Lewis thought about getting out and knocking on the kid’s window, but Lewis didn’t like confrontation, so he sat and inched along behind him, twisting the rubber of the steering wheel in his hands.

He was heading home from Midas Investments, where he worked as a stock analyst. He did research on technology stocks, then made suggestions to the fund managers as to which to purchase and which to sell. Most days he enjoyed his job, but today wasn’t one of those days. His boss had called him in during his lunch break about his last three suggestions. They’d all tanked on the stock floor and he’d cost Midas over two million dollars. Lewis had known this was coming. He’d walked into the office with a sharp pain in his ribs from the sandwich he had eaten too fast. His boss stood behind his desk, red-faced and slurping at his coffee. Lewis spent the next ten minutes being told just how bad he had screwed up and how many people were calling for his head. His boss finished with, “Get your shit together, Lewis.” Lewis knew the rest of that sentence was, “or start looking for another job.”

“It wasn’t my fault,” he’d wanted to say. “The brokers put my reports at the bottom of the pile and didn’t get to them for a whole week. Of course things had changed by then.” But Lewis didn’t say that. He’d just swallowed it up and apologized.

The taste of that conversation was still bitter on his tongue, and it had gone sour in his stomach. At least it’s Tuesday, he thought as he finally edged up the exit ramp, paid his toll, and turned right. Traffic had sucked up an extra thirty minutes of his time, but this little detour was well-worth it.

As he walked through the doors to the Grand Hyatt, he called his wife.

“Hi, baby,” her voice picked up, “working late again?” His two kids screamed in the background.

Lewis sighed hard. “Sorry, honey. Winston wants to go over the next month’s prospectus tonight before he meets with the board members tomorrow.”

It was this way every Tuesday. If he didn’t have a meeting with Winston, it was a conference call or a strategic planning session. He always impressed himself at his creativity when it came to making up a reason for his coming home late.

“Okay, I’ll keep your dinner in the microwave. What time will you be back?”

“Probably two hours.” Two hours was good. Any longer and she’d ask questions.

“Would you mind running by Walgreens on Williams when you head out? I went ahead and printed those photos.”

“Williams?” Williams Street was the road that ran right in front of his office.

“I figured I’d just have them sent to the one in the city so you could pick them up before you headed home.”

Lewis gritted his teeth. That meant he would have to double back to work, pick up the photos and then get back in that snarl on I-285 to get home. He’d have to cut this short.

“I didn’t think it would be too much trouble. Is that alright?” came his wife’s voice.

“No, it’s no problem. I’ll pick them up and see you tonight.”

“See you soon.”

“Love you.”

“Love you, too. Parker, put down your sister’s co — ” The line cut out.

Lewis picked up his pace and caught the elevator with a, “Pardon. I’m sorry.” as he squeezed on. He tucked his kit under his arm, aware of the smell of stale day-working sweat clinging to him, and anxious to get to his floor. He stared at his loafers as the steel box glided up four levels and dinged open. Finally, he thought, looking at the desk where Wendy, the pretty brunette receptionist worked.

“Mr. Clarke, how are you today?” she asked as he signed in.

“I’m fine, thank you, Wendy.”

“The usual?” she asked.

“Yes, the usual,” he answered.

“One of these days, you should try my Bikram yoga class. I think you’d enjoy it. It’s very relaxing.”

He smiled nervously. “Yeah, I’ll try it one of these days. It’s just — well, I’d love to — I’d love to come some time.” He smiled again and nodded, then turned and headed for the locker room. Once safely inside, he undressed and stowed his belongings in his locker.

His face felt stiff as he walked through the room. He passed the mirrors, taking a second to check himself out. It was a disappointing experience, as usual. In the mirror, walking beside him, was an average, thirty-eight year old man with a below-average body. The hair on Lewis’ chest clumped together at the center and thinned out from there. Without the benefit of prominent collarbones, his chest blended shapelessly into his shoulders. A blue vein traced its way down milky white arms till it was covered by more dark hair at his elbows. Lewis’ mouth was a straight line. His eyes, behind rectangular glasses, were harried. He reckoned he looked uptight, even by his own standards. “This is good. I need this,” he said to himself as he turned to find a shower stall.

Lewis always showered before using the facilities. It was the policy, after all. He stepped out, towel cinched around his waist, and headed straight for the dry sauna. It was his favorite. He usually started with the hot tub, then the cold pool, and then the dry sauna. From there, he’d alternate between the cold pool and the dry sauna until his body felt like silly putty that had been left out in the sun too long. He reasoned he could handle anything if he could just spend two hours a week by himself right here in his hot, perfect, little cave. If he was going to head back into the city and pick up those darn photos, though, he wouldn’t have time for his ritual. He’d have to skip the meal and cut straight to the pudding.

Peering through the small window into the dimly-lit hot box, he caught sight of a leg, gleaming with sweat. He had picked Tuesdays because no one came to the spa on Tuesdays. Most weeks he could slip in, spend two hours making his rounds, and slip back out without bumping into another human being. Lewis liked it that way and hoped the owner of that sweaty leg was leaving soon. He breathed in and pulled open the door. The heat welcomed him.

Trying to avoid eye contact with the man, Lewis sat at the other end of the wooden bench. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back. The wall singed his shoulders as he laid them against it, so he sucked air in through his teeth and got through that first contact. In a moment, the tension in his body began to uncoil. He breathed in the spicy, dry scent of cedar through his nose, but he inhaled too fast and burned the inside of his nostrils. Opening his mouth, he took in the rest of the breath.

“Hot, isn’t it?” came the heavily Chicago-accented voice of the man to his left.

Lewis thought about pretending he didn’t hear him, but he knew that wouldn’t go over well.

“Yes, it is,” Lewis opened his eyes, staring straight at the wall in front of him. The orange and red boards were laid in perfect rows. Of course it is. It’s a dry sauna, you dope, he thought. That’s not nice, he corrected himself. “Do you mind?” Lewis asked, reaching up for the empty hourglass set on the wall.

“Be my guest,” the man replied.

Lewis tipped the hourglass over. Dull, brown sand slipped through the top chamber into the bottom. On a normal day, when Lewis was alone, he could almost hear the whisper of the grains.

“Name’s Richie,” the man said from over Lewis’ shoulder.

Lewis met his extended hand in a slick and uncomfortable shake while squeezing his lips together in what, he hoped, the man would take for a smile.

“Lewis,” he said.

“Lewis, huh? Don’t meet many guys named Lewis these days,” the man observed. He was Italian-looking — black hair slicked back, sharp eyes, goatee. He wore a cross on the end of a gold chain that got lost in the fold of his neck as he rested his chin on his chest. Lewis saw a tattoo of two lizards chasing each other around the man’s bicep. He had a tribal design stretched across his shoulder blades and some kind of mural with a lot of 1940’s pinup girls on his other arm.

“No, you don’t, do you?” Lewis responded softly, discreetly wiping his hand on his towel.

“French?” the man asked, leaning his head back.

“No, my dad just liked the name,” Lewis said. “It’s from the explorer,” he explained.

“Huh?” the man turned his head back to Lewis.

“The explorer: Meriwether Lewis. Do you know Lewis and Clark?”

“Uh, yeah,” Richie said, obviously lying.

“They were two guys who explored the Louisiana Purchase from 1804 to — ”

“I said ‘yeah, I know who the guy is’,” Richie said, his eyes narrowing.

“Of course, I was just giving you som — “

“Look, if I said ‘I know’, then I know, okay?”

“Alright, well — my dad, he liked them. He’s a big hunter and outdoorsman, and my last name is Clarke,” Lewis knew he’d made a mistake the moment he said it. He almost winced. “So… Lewis Clarke.”

“Yeah, I get it,” Richie said.

What Lewis hadn’t said was that his dad had thought his son was going to grow up just like him. He gave him the name of the two adventurers that he’d idolized from childhood, and, to carry the pun a little further, he granted him Nelson for a middle name — Lewis N. Clarke.

His father thought it was clever. Everyone else thought it was a joke. It stopped being funny in the sixth grade, when his dad, Richard, took him on a fathers-and-sons camping trip with his friends. Lewis hated camping. He hated the outdoors. He threw up twice on the car ride down to Kentucky. He spent most of the trip in the tent, and, when he did go hiking, he tripped and fell down a slope, gashing his leg on a tree stump. His dad had to carry him back to camp. Lewis cried the whole way. That was the last time Richard ever took his son into the wilderness. It was the last time Richard did much of anything with Lewis. Lewis had pulled up his towel a little when he’d taken the bench. He looked down at the scar that stretched across the top of his right knee. It was the only scar he’d ever gotten.

“Hell of a game, last night, huh?”

“Pardon?”

“The Cubs-Phillies game. Just when you think they’re gonna zig, they zag, am I right?”

“Oh, yeah,” Lewis said, having no idea what game Richie was talking about.

“I mean 5 and 0 this season; then they face a Phillies team that takes the field on crutches. I mean, they couldn’t have had it better if it was served to them on a silver-fucking-platter.” Richie was quiet for a moment and Lewis thought he was finished. Then he started again, talking faster. “Two to eleven, how the hell do you lose that game two to eleven? That’s bullshit, that’s what that is. Somebody must have bought that game — must have bought that whole team. Bullshit, I tell you.” His eyes rattled back and forth over the boards on the walls. They came to rest on the glowing red and pink coils in the furnace.
Lewis looked from him to the rocks on top of the coils.

“You’re not a gambling man, are you, Lewis?”

“No.”

“Good for you,” Richie nodded, his eyes staring blankly into the heater. At that moment, a blue light glowed from inside Richie’s towel and the voice of a Hispanic rapper started shouting along a hip-hop beat. “Oh shit,” Richie said, pulling the cellphone out and pressing it to his ear.

Lewis settled back against the boards, thinking that Richie would leave, and he might finally get some quiet.

“Hello?” Richie said, sharply.

Another voice, a man’s, low and muffled, came across the line.

“Yeah, I know, I watched it,” Richie replied. “I was gonna call you.” He put his hand on his forehead as the man on the other end talked.

“That’s bullshit, Manny. You know that game was frickin’ rigged or something.”
The voice started to say something. Richie interrupted, “Manny, you just gotta cut me some slack, okay?”

The voice didn’t sound pleased.

“I know. Shit. I know.”

Manny said something else.

“No, I don’t need to talk to him. Look, I can get it for you. Just give me a week.”

Manny, apparently, didn’t think that would work.

“Well, you can come down here and search me if you want. I don’t have it, you greedy bastard. Give me a full fuckin’ cavity search, if you want.” Richie stood up. He stepped off the bench and pushed the door open. “Oh, and while you’re at it, you can lick my balls. I got cousins too, you know what I mean?” He stepped around the corner and continued to raise his voice as he walked away.

Cool air filtered in. Lewis was about to relax when someone caught the open door. It was a younger guy. His face was made up of sharp angles, but he had a round nose and dark lips. He smiled, self-consciously, at Lewis, who nodded with the same pinched lip he had given Richie. The man sat down a foot from him with a loud sigh.

Lewis knew he was being looked at, so he avoided eye contact. He did not want to get into another conversation. He glanced up at the hourglass. It was half empty, and he still didn’t feel any less tense. A trickle of sweat ran down his forehead, over his cheek and the ridge of his top lip. He took his lenses off and wiped them on his towel.

The young man on the left breathed in loudly, leaning back on the boards.
Unscrewing the cap of his eucalyptus oil, Lewis let a few drops fall into the bucket. He swirled it with the ladle, then poured a spoonful over the rocks. They hissed and spat the steam back up into the air, filling the room. Lewis felt the heat increase. He sat back.

The young man put his hand down on the bench, where his little finger grazed Lewis’.

Lewis pulled his hand away, saying, “I’m sorry.” The edge of it tingled uncomfortably.

The man swiveled to lean against the far wall, picking his feet up onto the bench and facing Lewis.

Lewis closed his eyes and let his head droop, hoping to just enjoy these last thirty minutes. He had an idea. Opening his eyes, he found the ladle and poured two more cupfuls of water over the rocks. The temperature spiked, heat prickling on his face.

A loud sigh came from his left. Lewis hoped the man was wilting under the heat. He glanced that way out of the corner of his eye.

The young man uncinched the towel from his waist. He laid both ends of it open, revealing a thatch of black hair around his groin, then dropped one foot down to the floorboards.

Lewis leaned over his knees, putting his head in his hands, trying to block out the sight.

The bench creaked and Lewis smelled a sweet, sporty cologne. He lifted his eyes to see the naked man reaching across him for the ladle.

“Sorry,” the man said, taking hold of the handle and scooping another cup of water for the heater. It sizzled on the rocks as the man sat back on the bench. A trickle of sweat gathered in a pool just below his prominent Adam’s apple. It dipped over the edge and raced down smooth, brown skin, curving around his belly button and, finally, getting tangled up in his thicket of black hair.

The lingering smell of the man’s cologne and the eucalyptus sizzling on the rocks made for a nauseating aroma. Lewis couldn’t stand it anymore. He grunted as he stood and stepped through the door. Lightheaded, he put his hands on his hips and breathed cold, musty air in through his nose. He closed the shuttered wooden door of a shower stall behind him, undid his towel, stripped off his Speedo and stood under the punishingly cold spray of water. He breathed heavily, trying to rid his lungs of that smell.

“One more try,” he told himself. “Ten minutes. Please, just ten minutes,” he hoped out loud.

His sandals squeaked and slapped water up on his calves as he walked to the water cooler and back to the dry sauna. He looked through the window. The room was vacant.

“Oh, yes. Thank you,” he breathed out, opening the door and stepping inside. Paper cup in hand, Lewis took his seat. He’d left his Speedo outside on one of the benches with his sandals. He’d decided that it was too constricting. The extra bit of freedom felt good, but he wasn’t ready to take the towel off yet — not by far. He poured water over the rocks and felt his sinuses open up again with the eucalyptus. Sitting straight, he laid his hands on his knees and closed his eyes. Lewis breathed deep, sinking down into the wooded darkness of the room. The last of the water squealed on the rocks in front of him, heat radiating over his face. He ladled more over it. A blanket of warmth wrapped around his shoulders. Tension dripped from his cheeks onto the bench. He breathed out through his mouth and felt the heat in his teeth.

Lewis took a sip of water from the paper cup in his hand. It was lukewarm now, but still cool enough to relieve him. He poured the rest over his forehead and into his hair. Sighing, he felt the tension deep down in his belly start to rise up through his throat and out of his mouth.

Wet footsteps slapped on the floor outside the room. They were followed by a nervous voice. “Guys, guys — this is — this is unnecessary.”

Lewis opened his eyes and glanced through the door’s sliver of a window. He saw Richie standing in his underwear beside one of the benches. He looked a pale, sickly shade of yellow in the fluorescents.

“I got nothing for you. I got — I got nothing right now. I mean, tell Manny I’m sorry, but I can definitely make good on this next week.”

Lewis’ breath stopped in his throat. The tension lodged there. “This is ridiculous,” he said to the empty room.

“That’s not soon enough,” a stocky guy with a shaved head said, stepping into view of the window.

Lewis scooted into the shadow a little more. His shoulders rose a few centimeters towards his ears. He looked at the hourglass. Three minutes left. He couldn’t believe this. Closing his eyes, he leaned his head back, trying to ignore the exchange going on outside.

Richie and the bald guy went back and forth, the pride in Richie’s voice disintegrating little by little each time.

“We didn’t come here to negotiate, Richie. Manny just sent us to give you a message.”

The water in Lewis’ hair was just about boiling. The tops of his ears were copper wires. He squinted in the heat.

“I got your message, okay? Loud and clear.”

Lewis just wished they would shut up and leave already so that he could have one minute of peace before he had to crawl back into that traffic and go home to two screaming kids. He knew he’d have to work through the night just to try and save his job.

“Manny wants to make sure you remember.”

Just one minute, please — one damn minute, please. Is that too much to ask? Lewis stared through the window.

“Wh-wh-what about interest?” Richie said, wringing his fingers and looking from the bald guy to another man about an inch taller than Lewis. “How about five percent?”

“How about I break your legs?” the bald guy said and started in towards Richie, who backed up and tripped over the bench.

“No! Come on! Come on! Pleeeeease!” Richie shouted, lifting a hand in defense.

Lewis’ eyes widened, then they narrowed.

The two men grabbed ahold of Richie. Their fists came down, making dull slaps against his bare skin.

Lewis rested his forehead in his left palm. His thumb and middle finger pressed sharply into his temples. He squeezed, feeling the bolts of pain screw in to either side of his head.

Outside the sauna, the men’s shoulders and arms pumped up and down like pistons. Richie’s body thrashed under the blows. He cried, pleading with them.

Lewis gritted his teeth. He knew they were going to stop. They had to. This can’t keep going.

But they didn’t stop.

Richie’s head clanged off a locker. When he tried to get to his feet, the two men slammed him against it again and kicked him in the back.

Lewis couldn’t concentrate. He couldn’t close his eyes anymore. The beating outside took on a violent, arrhythmic jazz tempo. Fists hit flesh, hands slapped the floor, and lockers were kicked as Richie tried to get away. Sounds invaded Lewis’ sauna. They thumped off the walls and sizzled on the rocks in front of him. He looked at the hourglass. It was empty. Little flakes of grains hugged the sides of the funnel, refusing to let go. He stared down at the rocks, at the glowing coils deep inside the machine. He closed his eyes again. The heat seemed to ratchet up the noise outside — the noise in his head. His nostrils flared. He breathed in, burning out his sinuses. Something between a high-pitched whine and a growl started to boil up from his chest. Lewis’ eyes snapped wide.

The door to the sauna flung open. Lewis sprang, shrieking, wielding the bucket of water in his right hand and the ladle in his left. The taller of the two men looked over his shoulder to catch a face-full of scalding water. He screamed and crashed into a locker, clawing at his eyes. Lewis launched himself over the bench, towel snagging and coming loose.

The stocky, bald man had lifted a swollen fist to lay another blow into Richie’s bloody face. Lewis fell on him, screaming, and brought the bucket down on his head, rocking the man sideways. The bucket splintered into pieces. The bald man put his hand down to brace himself. He blinked bulging eyes. Lewis, still screaming, employed the ladle. The high-pitched growl vibrated in his chest. Eyes, wide and frenzied, his mind was a crash of cymbals, discordant horns and angry palms on piano keys. He rained down blows, smacking the bald man in the face with the wooden spoon over and over again.

The man tried to regain his feet, batting his hand, blindly, back and forth as though fighting off a swarm of bees. He staggered, stumbled and fell sideways, cracking his temple against the bench.

A pair of arms wrapped around Lewis from behind. He threw his head back and made contact with the taller man’s nose, which ruptured in a spray of blood. He released Lewis and lunged past him. Lewis snatched his towel off the bench and wrapped it around the man’s face. He struggled against it as Lewis fought him. Blood seeped through the white fibers, and the man finally passed out and fell to the floor.

A noise drew Lewis’ attention back to the lockers, where he saw Richie pulling himself to his knees. “Thank you, Lew — ”

Lewis dove at Richie, slamming the both of them into the lockers.

“What are yo — ” Richie tried to protest, but Lewis threw wild, half-closed slaps at his mouth.

Richie kicked Lewis off and scrambled to his feet.

Lewis latched his naked body onto Richie’s back, straddling him, and Richie stumbled backwards.

Lewis wrapped his arm around Richie’s neck, yelling in his ear, as his face turned red, then something closer to a deep mulberry. Richie choked and put his hand out to find a wall, but there wasn’t one. He lost consciousness, fell forward and sent Lewis’ naked body sprawling across the locker room floor.
The scream barreled out of Lewis’ throat like a freight train until the last car was free of the tunnel. He picked himself up. With blurry eyes, he looked at the three men lying bloody, unconscious, and silent around the bench. On the floor beside the bald man were Lewis’ glasses. He leaned to retrieve them and set them back on his face. The right lens was cracked.

The clock on the wall read six fifty-eight. Lewis walked back to the door of the sauna, stepped inside, and closed it behind him. He’d be late getting home tonight.