Motherless Brooklyn

“What-becausewhich, besideswhich-what sandwiches did he buy?” It was my suddenly ravenous appetite that steered this inquiry.

“Ah!” Zeod rubbed his hands together. He was always ready to savor his own product on someone else’s behalf. “Turkey with Thousand, very nice on a kaiser roll, pepperoni-and-provolone hero with peppers inside, two roast beef with horseradish on rye bread.”

I had to clutch the counter to keep from falling over, this storm of enticements was so heady.

“You like what you hear, I can see that,” said Zeod.

I nodded, turned my head sideways, took in the fresh-gleaming slicer, the elegant curve of the fender that sheathed the bla.

Zeod said, “You want something, Crazyman, don’t you?”

I saw the counter boy’s eyes roll in weary anticipation. The slicer rarely saw this much action at two or three in the morning. They’d have to sluice it down with suds again before the night was done.

“Please-ghostradish, pepperpony, kaiserphone-please, uh, the same as Tony.”

“You want the same? All four the same?”

“Yes,” I gasped. I couldn’t think past Tony’s list of sandwiches. My hunger for them was absolute. I had to match Tony sandwich for sandwich, a gastronomic mirroring-tic-I’d understand him by the time I was through the fourth, I figured. We would achieve a Zeod’s mind-meld, with Thousand Island dressing.

While Zeod rode his counter boy to complete the large order I hid in the back near the beverage cases, picked out a liter of Coke and a bag of chips, and reorganized and counted a disorderly shelf of cat-food cans.

“Okay, Lionel.” Zeod was always most gentle with me when handing over his precious cargo-we shared that reverence for his product. “Put it on Frank’s tab, right?” He gathered my soda and chips in a large bag with the paper-wrapped sandwiches.

“No, no-” I rustled in my pockets for a tight-folded twenty.

“What’s the matter? Why not the boss man pick it up?”

“I want to pay you.” I pushed the bill across the counter. Zeod took it and arched his eyebrows.

“Very funny business,” he said, and made a chuck-chuck-chuck sound with his tongue in his cheek.

“What?”

“Same thing as Tony, before you,” he said. “He says he wants to pay. Same thing.”

“Listen, Zeod. If Tony comes back in here tonight”-I fought off a howling sound that wanted to come out of me, the cry of a sandwich predator over fresh kill he has yet to devour-“don’t tell him you saw me, okay?”

Zeod winked. Somehow this made sense to him. I felt a thing that was either a nauseous wave of paranoia-perhaps Zeod was an agent of Tony’s, absolutely in his pocket, and would be on the phone to him the minute I was out of the shop-or else my stomach spasming in anticipation of food. “Okay, Chief,” said Zeod as I went out the door.

I came around the block the long way again, quickly confirmed that the giant and Tony were still in their places, then swerved across the street and slipped up beside the Tracer, key in hand. The giant’s compact was six cars ahead, but I couldn’t see his clifflike silhouette from where I stood as I unlocked the car. I only hoped that meant he couldn’t see me. I plopped Zeod’s bag on the passenger seat, jumped inside, and slammed the door shut as quickly as I could, praying that the brief flash of the interior light hadn’t registered in the giant’s rearview. Then I slumped down in my place so I’d be invisible, on the slight chance he did turn and could make anything out through a thickness of twelve darkened windshields. Meanwhile I got my hands busy unfurling the paper around one of Zeod’s roast beef and horseradish specials. Once I had it free, I gobbled the sandwich like a nature-film otter cracking an oyster on its stomach: knees up in the wiring under the dashboard, my elbows jammed against the steering wheel, my chest serving as a table, my shirt as a tablecloth.