The Heart Goes Last

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Or Jocelyn has the advantage of knowing about Ed’s plan. So far she hasn’t shared too much of it with Charmaine. She’s reading on her PosiPad, making notes. Charmaine has tried for an in-flight movie – how amazing it would be to see a movie that isn’t from the fifties, she hasn’t been able to watch anything like that for ages, and it would take her mind off things – but her screen isn’t working. Neither is the Recline button on her seat, and someone’s ripped most of the pages out of the in-flight magazine. In her opinion the airline people do things like that on purpose, to rub it in that you aren’t in Business. They most likely have a special team that goes through the planes at night, ripping out the pages and messing up the screens.

Charmaine looks out the window: clouds, nothing but clouds. Flat clouds, not even puffy ones. At first it was so exciting to be on a plane – she’s only ever been on one before, with Stan, going on their honeymoon. She reads the remaining piece in the magazine. What a coincidence: “Honeymoon on the Beach.” Stan got such a sunburn the first day, but at least they did one thing he really wanted, which was having sex underwater, or the lower parts of them were underwater. There were people on the beach too. Could they tell? She hoped they could, she remembers hoping that. Then they had to get their bathing suits on again, and Charmaine couldn’t find her bikini bottom because in all the turmoil she’d dropped it, and Stan had to go diving for it, and they laughed and laughed. They were so happy then. It was just like an ad.

Out the window it’s still clouds. She gets up, goes to the washroom for something to do. How thoughtless, the last person didn’t clean the sink. Really, they don’t appreciate their privileges.

It’s better to close the lid when you flush: Grandma Win told her that. Otherwise the germs fly around in the air and go up your nose.

Coming back along the aisle, she wonders which the security man. Right near the exit, Jocelyn said. She glances around but can’t see the heads back there. She reaches her seat, squeezes in past Jocelyn, who smiles at her but doesn’t say anything. Charmaine fidgets some more; then she just has to ask.

“What in the heck was he planning to do?”

Jocelyn looks over at her. “Who?” she asks, as if she doesn’t know.

“Him. Ed,” Charmaine whispers. “How was he going to …”

“Hungry?” Jocelyn says. “Because I am. Let’s get some peanuts. Want a soda? Coffee?” She looks at her watch. “We’ve got time.”

“Just a water,” says Charmaine. “Please. “

Jocelyn flags the flight attendant, orders some peanuts and a couple of cheese sandwiches, and the bottle of water for Charmaine with a glass of ice cubes, and a coffee for herself. Charmaine is surprised at how hungry she is; she wolfs down the sandwich in no time flat, gulps down a glass of the water.

“He has it all thought out,” says Jocelyn. “I’m supposed to knock you out on the plane, just before we land. A little something in your drink; a bit of Zolpidem, or GBH, or similar.”

“Oh,” says Charmaine. “Like, those date rape drugs.”

“Right. So you’ll go under. Then I’ll say you’ve fainted, and we call a perimedic ambulance to meet the plane and have you carried off on a stretcher. Then you’ll be taken to the clinic at Ruby Slippers Vegas, and after the brain intervention you’ll wake up, and Ed will be right beside you, holding your hand. And you’ll imprint on him and smile at him like he’s God, and throw your arms around him, and say you’re his, body and soul, and what can you do for him, such as a blowjob right there in the clinic.”

“That so totally sucks,” Charmaine says, wrinkling her nose.

“And then you’ll live happily ever after,” Jocelyn continues in her neutral voice. “Just like in a fairy tale. And Ed will too. That must be what he thinks.”

“How do you mean, he will?” says Charmaine. “The first part of it’s not even happening! It’s not happening! You won’t let it happen. That’s what you said.”

“Correct,” says Jocelyn. “That’s what I said. So now you can relax.”

And Charmaine does feel relaxed; her eyelids are drooping. She nods off, but then she’s awake again. Awake more or less. “Maybe I’ll have that coffee after all,” she says. “I need to wake myself up.”

“Too late,” says Jocelyn. “We’re about to land. And look, I think I see the ambulance, right on cue. I sent them an email before we took off. Feeling a little sleepy? Just lie back.”

“The ambulance? What ambulance?” says Charmaine. It’s not just sleepiness, there’s something wrong. She looks at Jocelyn and there are two Jocelyns, both of them smiling. They pat her arm.

“The ambulance that will take you to Ed’s clinic at Ruby Slippers,” she says.

You promised, you promised, Charmaine wants to say. It must have been the water, something Jocelyn put in. Oh heck! You lying witch! But she can’t get the words out. Her tongue feels thick, her eyes are closing. She feels her whole body leaning sideways.

Bumpity-bump, they must be on the runway. She’s so dizzy. Voices, far away: She’s fainted. I don’t know what … she was fine a minute ago. Here, let me … That’s Aurora. She tries to call to her, but there are no words, only a kind of moaning. Uhuhuhuh …

Don’t let her head hit the wall. Jocelyn.

She’s in the arms of someone, some man; she’s being swung through the air. It feels lovely, like floating. Easy does it. There. He sets her down, covers her. Is that Max? Is that Max’s voice, so close to her ear? All tucked in.

Falling, falling. Gone.

XIV | SNATCH Snatch

It’s better for Stan not to return to the Elvisorium, says Conor, because although the guys in sunglasses who’d come looking for him were only Conor and his three pals, you never knew. Next time they might be more sinister, and better to have left no trails, because after the big snatcheroonie took place, leaving trails might turn out to be a fucking bad idea. If everything went as planned there wouldn’t be a problem, but if everything did not go as planned, then there would be police involved or security things, and then it would be all five of them on the red-hot barbecue.

Conor doesn’t seem very worried about this prospect. If anything, he’s excited. Break the window on the mobile home, talk Stan into sneaking inside with him, then, when someone comes, run away very fast, leaving Stan to explain what he’s doing with two steaks from the freezer and a lady’s underpants. Always Conor’s idea of a fun night out.

Conor and the boys have a two-bedroom Emperor Suite at Caesar’s Palace: whoever’s hired Con isn’t poor. Con says they can’t go out, to a show or a strip joint or the casinos, because he can’t run the risk of them fucking up so close to bingo. Budge says that’s fine with him, maybe they can watch a game, but there’s some grumbling from Rikki and Jerold. Con shuts that down by saying who’s running this, and if there’s a question about that he’d be happy to settle it. So the five of them end up playing Texas hold’em for grapes and pieces of cheese off the Cheese Assortment plate Con’s ordered in and drinking Singapore Slings because Con’s never had one and wants to try it, but they can only have three each because they have to be fresh for the next day.

Stan wins a moderate amount of cheese, which he eats; but after three Singapore Slings he’s out for the count and nods off on the sofa. Just as well, because there are only four beds, and he has no yen to be in any of them with someone else.

In the morning the five of them sleep in, shower, complain about their hangovers – all except Budge, who’d showed some self-restraint the night before – and order in breakfast. Rikki stands behind the door when the cart arrives, Glock at the ready like something in a cop show, just in case it’s a trap. But no, it’s only scrambled eggs, ham, toast, and coffee, wheeled in by a cheerful Caesar’s wench: they’re safe so far.

Then they get suited up and paint their heads green. Con’s hired a van; it’s in Parking with the Green Man gear already loaded into it. Before they leave, Con goes over Stan’s gong cues. Every time he points to his ear, Stan is to hit the gong. He doesn’t need to know fucking why, he only has to hit it. That shouldn’t be too hard. If Con should suddenly rush off toward, for instance, an ambulance that might, for instance, be pulling up in front of the facility, and if the other fake Green Men should rush off with him, Stan should hit the gong three more times so people think it’s all part of the show. Then he should wait for further cues. Then he should go with the flow.

Once they’re in the van Stan gets butterflies. What is the flow? Is this going to be another case of Con vanishing over the fence while Stan is left floundering?

“You missed some green at the back,” Jerold says to him. “I’ll paint it in.”

“Thanks,” says Stan. He has a crick in his neck: he’s sitting up very straight so the green from his scalp doesn’t rub off on the upholstery.

Con has a pass that gets their van in through the Ruby Slippers gate, with its motto: There’s No Place Like Home.

Inside, the road divides: Main Entrance and Reception to the left, Clinic to the right and around the corner. They park in the Visitors Disabled section at the front and lockstep inside; Con flashes his pass at the receptionist.