Venus began reciting poetry
again. "Life is that which passes like clouds," she said softly. She
didn't think of it so much as she simply heard herself say the words. The sirens
were pulling into the main entrance to the Camelot Apartment complex. First
the fire engine, followed by an ambulance and that was followed by two police
cruisers. Venus and Mars were still in a mild state of shock from the vortex
of events that had overtaken them. Things didn't seem to be about to slow down
yet either. Usually, things are the other way around at this point: a couple
of sad police officers, shaking their heads while turning away from a lump on
the sidewalk with a sheet over it. Not this time. The survivors were the ones
standing over a lumpy canvas, covering the bodies of two policemen who happened
to have stood in the wrong place at the wrong time. Ironically, these policemen
died in the line of duty but not by violent crime, or an act of bravery, or
even a stupid accident. No, it was mere coincidence. Unsuspecting bodies caught
in the gravitational pull of the mad vortex surrounding Venus and Mars. Two
planets who should never have come near each other.
Mars found himself lying on his stomach on a gurney in the back of an ambulance.
His wound was being tended to. From what he could see, it looked like a pretty
nasty gash cutting across his backside. He figured they must've given him a
local anesthetic because he couldn't feel anything back there. In actuality
it was more like a deep scratch than a cut. The EMT put some butterfly bandages
on it and covered the whole thing with a bandage. A policeman attempted to question
the couple but didn't get much. Mars was mostly oblivious to things going on
around him. This all seemed so unreal. His mind kept replaying the events leading
up to this moment as if to find something to explain it. It was all just too
weird. He noticed Venus was on another stretcher next to his. She was sitting
upright and gazing out the rear window of the ambulance. Her lips seemed to
be moving. Mars noticed the ambulance was moving. For a moment Mars wondered
how long they had been on the road. Then he was aware that they weren't moving
very fast for an ambulance. "We're not going very fast." Mars mentioned
to the emergency medical technician. To which the EMT replied, "You're
not hurt very bad." Mars was puzzled. "Then why are we going to the
hospital?" To which the EMT replied, "We're not going to the hospital,
we're going to the police station." Venus heard that and became frightened.
"We're going to jail?", she asked, tugging at her lower lip. The EMT
explained, "No, I don't think so. They have to make a report on the chain
of events that resulted in the death of those two police officers. Since you're
the sole survivors of that incident, you'll have to reconstruct it for them."
Then he said to Mars, "I'm done with you. And. . . here we are at the police
station."
They were let out in front of the police station. They were left standing there
wrapped in blankets as the ambulance drove off and a police car pulled up right
after it. Two officers got out and escorted them into the building. Once inside,
they were photographed and their fingerprints were taken. Forms were filled
out. They were offered cups of terrible coffee. Then Venus and Mars were each
led into separate small bare rooms so they could be questioned separately to
see if their stories match. Mars was very clear and accurate in his description
of the events. He spoke slowly and clearly so people could take notes and so
the tape recorder would pick up his words. Venus was less accurate in her report.
She had a hard time remembering what seemed to her to be a dream. She doubted
all of it and even told her interrogators so. However, their stories did match
in the places where it mattered. They were found to be not at fault for the
tragedy. The police finding was that their officers were killed in the line
of duty, even though it was an accident. No crime had been committed. For Venus
they recommended psychological counciling but had no power to enforce it since
she wasn't determined to be dangerous. Venus had lost a lot of her psychosis
since the incident.The couple was officially released from police custody.
There they stood, in the lobby of the police station, wrapped in blankets, looking
at each other in disbelief. "Are we supposed to walk the five miles back
to our apartments?" Mars inquired, as if there had been some mistake. The
officer behind the front desk, without looking up from his paperwork answered,
as if for the three hundredth time, "We are under no obligation to return
suspects to their original location." and, waving them away with the back
of his hand, added as drolly as possible, "Have a nice day."
"I don't believe the day I'm having." said Mars, "I get pushed
out a third story window, get my clothes torn off, tear my backside off, fall
down and kill two policemen. These guys have us brought here, of all places,
and now I'm standing here with a crazy lady, I'm wrapped in a blanket, I have
a ten inch gash on my ass, and these clowns want me to walk home in my bare
feet! It's five miles for cryin' out loud."
"I'm not crazy." Venus interjected.
"I'm sorry, but you can't stay here.", the man behind the desk reminded
them, trying to sound as bored as humanly possible. "I can call you a cab."
"And what am I supposed to pay him with, Sherlock?" Venus smirked.
"Let's go." Mars said as he turned Venus away from the police desk.
"Before something else happens."
They resigned themselves to the long but potentially pleasant walk home. At
least Venus felt that way. Mars was more agitated about the recent twilight-zone
type turn of events but was slowly being talked into a better mood by Venus.
About a block from the police station a police car pulled up beside them. For
an instant Mars thought they might have had a change of heart and decided it
was cruel and stupid to make them walk back home. But no . . .
"Alright you two," said the driver of the car as he got out, "going
to a costume party?"
Mars rolled his eyes. "No officer, we're on our way home from a visit to
your lovely police station and . . . "
"I think I better see some I.D." the cop interrupted.
"We don't have any. Just call the police station and they'll explain everything."
Mars pleaded.
"Why don't we just go there and we can straighten this out." The policeman
said as he motioned them to get in the car.
"You're an idiot, you know that? Why won't you pick up that mike and call
the station?" Without waiting for an answer, Mars grabbed Venus' arm and
headed briskly back to the police station.
The cop hollered after them, "Hey come back here." and got back into
his car to go after them.
Of course Mars and Venus beat him back to the police station since it was only
a block. They were inside at the front desk by the time the other cop was pulling
up in front of the station. "I want you to get on the radio right now and
tell every one of the police on duty that we are on our way home and we are
not to be bothered!" Mars ordered in a soft but barely controlled voice
with enough authority to get a bill through Congress. "You idiots have
already put us through enough! I'm going back out that door and I don't want
to see another cop all the way back to my apartment!"
The cop who stopped them on the street was now standing directly behind them
ready to subdue them if necessary. "It's O.K. Bill, let them go. I'll explain
it to you later." said the cop behind the desk. "O.K., you two, I'll
get on the radio. Go ahead and go home now."
Mars opened his mouth and was about to say a thing or two more to the policemen
but Venus grabbed his arm and led him out of the building. She pulled him along
for a couple of blocks before they even slowed down.
"You can let go of my arm." Mars said. "I'm O.K. now. Thanks
for getting me out of there. I might be in jail right now if you hadn't. I need
to get back home and get into bed so I can wake up from this crazy nightmare."
"Yeah," said Venus, shaking her head. "It is pretty weird, isn't
it?"
And so they gingerly made their way home on the hot sidewalks of suburbia, past
the apartments and townhouses, the tract homes and mini-marts. At one of those
mini-malls they stopped for a few moments to rest in the shade between a Chinese
restaurant and a dry cleaners. They sat wrapped in their blankets leaning up
against the building. Mars had to lay on his side because of the gash on his
butt. They were only there a few minutes when an elderly woman stopped in front
of them and said sadly, "You poor people. There but for the grace of God
go I." She shook her head. "I'd like to help. Where's your cup?"
"Cup?" asked Venus.
"You're begging cup." clarified the old woman. "You know, where
people can put their coins."
"Wait a minute lady," Mars piped up. "You are mistaken. We're
not homeless. It's very nice of you, but we don't need your money. We're just
on our way home and . . ."
"What! You're not indigent!?" The old woman gasped, "Then what
are you doing out in public dressed only in blankets? What kind of twisted deviants
are you people anyway!? Why, that's positively indecent! You ought to be ashamed
of yourselves!" She looked around. "I ought to call the police!"
"Let's get out of here before the old bird has a fit." Mars said as
he got up and helped Venus to her feet.
"Alright, grandma, we're leaving. Don't forget to tell your friends about
this experience." Venus added as they walked away from the still ranting
lady. When they got to the corner and were waiting for the light to change,
she asked Mars, "How much further?"
"I'm not sure," He said, "We're maybe halfway there." The
asphalt was hot on their bare feet as they sprinted across the street. This
is suburbia. Small, neatly trimmed lawn carpets in front of tiny little houses,
row after row. Kids on bikes. Winding streets, some ending in cul-de-sacs, every
few blocks there were apartment buildings and townhouses. The couple stood out
in stark contrast to their surroundings. They looked like refugees. No one stopped
to ask if they needed help or a ride. People in suburbia don't know their neighbors.
Or anybody else. This was also the reason Venus and Mars had nothing to be embarrassed
about. Nobody knew who they were. If nobody knows who you are, what's there
to be embarrassed about? Well, that was before that dog came out. A very large,
playful Labrador retriever came bounding out of a garage straight for them.
This dog obviously belonged to a family with children. Children who like to
use a blanket to play tug-o-war with the dog. That's what the dog figured Mars
and Venus wanted to do. Why else would they have those blankets outside? The
Lab snatched Mar's blanket as he ran by him, tearing it clean off. He came right
back to Mars with it. Mars grabbed it and the dog started to play. Venus was
afraid if she helped, the dog would grab her blanket so she stood off a ways
hoping the dog wouldn't notice. She was right on both counts. Mars was afraid
to shout at the dog because it might attract the attention of the nearby residents.
Except for the bandage he wore, he was naked. He lost his patience and punched
the Lab right in the head. The dog took the hint and retreated whining, walking
kind of sideways, back to the garage. What was once a blanket was now a bunch
of loosely connected rags and dog-slobber. It was a feat of prestidigitation
to get Mars decent again with what they had to work with. While Venus was helping
Mars strategically place bits of the blanket around him, he thought; "This
woman is a jinx."
Meanwhile, the owner of
the Camelot Apartments, an Englishman named Carruthers, had arrived at the complex
on one of his surprise visits. He had intentions of replacing Mars as superintendent
with his nephew, Tim. He wasn't sure how to go about it since Mars hadn't given
him any reason for dismissal. Mr. Carruthers was completely satisfied with Mar's
work, in fact, he was the best building superintendent he ever had. Never-the-less,
in a simple case of nepotism, he intended to "let him go". Upon arrival,
he immediately noticed the collapsed canopy that used to cover the entrance
to the main building. It was now in a heap next to the sidewalk. He tried to
imagine what could have caused it's total destruction. There was some sort of
cloth streaming out of the window of what he knew to be Mar's apartment. There
were chalk outlines of two bodies on the sidewalk.There was nobody around to
question. He went into the building and up to Mar's apartment. There he saw
the door that Venus had smashed the candelabra into. He knocked. There was no
answer. He knocked a few more times. He wondered, "could one of those chalk
outlines be Mars?" It would solve the problem of having to fire him. "No,"
He scolded himself, "don't even think that." He decided to take a
look around the grounds. Maybe he'd run into Mars. Perhaps, he thought, Mars
had gone to the store. In any case he knew that Mars never strayed far from
home and never for very long. He knew Mars would be back soon.
And so he was. It was almost sunset by the time they shuffled up to the front
of the main building. Tired, dirty, bleeding, hurting, hungry. Mars was not
in a good mood. All he wanted was to go to bed for about 48 hours and hope this
was all a bad dream when he woke up. Venus was tired too, and hungry. She was
long past any feelings about her situation. She just wanted to eat something
and then go to bed.
Mr. Carruthers was somewhere else on the grounds and didn't know of Mar's arrival.
What he did know now was what had happened here today. After chatting with some
of the gossippy neighbors, who pieced together an exagerated tale of naked cliff-hangers
and dead policemen, he was sure he had good reason to fire Mars. Even though
he himself had a hard time believing the story. It didn't matter. He didn't
even want to know Mar's side of the story. It might make sense. This was his
way out and he didn't want to spoil it.
Once inside his apartment, Mars wanted to close that big window but he couldn't
bring himself to go near it. Not yet, anyway. He needed a shower badly and wasted
no time getting into one. The hot water was a welcome relief even if it did
sting the cut on his backside. Just when the cleaning was done and he was about
to soak in the hot rain, Curruthers started knocking at the door. At first Mars
ignored it, hoping whoever it was would give up and go away. Carruthers persisted
with his knocking, he could hear Mars in there. He knew he was home now. Mars
decided to answer the door but he took his good ol' time doing it. He dried
off and put on a robe, then went to the door. He habitually peeked through the
peep-hole before he opened the door. "Carruthers!"
Mars swung the dented door open. Carruthers eyes followed the splintered area
of the door just below the peep-hole as the door swung open. Then he looked
at Mars and without a word, stepped into the disheveled apartment. "Mr.
Carruthers, I didn't know it was you. I wasn't expecting you. Pardon the disarray
sir, I've had a really bad day."
"So I've heard." Carruthers returned as he look about for a clean
place to sit. Finding none he remained standing. There was an awkward silence;
Mar's stood silently not knowing whether he should waste his time trying to
tell that crazy story one more time, giving Carruthers time to summon the nerve
to do a spineless thing. "We simply cannot have that sort of thing going
on here at Camelot." Carruthers said with as much indignation as he could
muster. "It'll be on the front page, you know. This will taint our image."
"But it was an accident! A freak accident! It wasn't even my fault. You
can check with the police." Mars pleaded. Somehow he knew in his gut it
was falling on deaf ears. It fit right in with the rest of the day. So it was
no surprise when the next words he heard were those dismissing him from employment
at Camelot, effective immediately. He was given 48 hours to vacate the premises.
He would have his final paycheck in the morning. It was all over in a matter
of minutes. Carruthers was gone and Mars was left standing there in slack-jawed
disbelief.
Venus was mailed an eviction notice the next day. Evicted for reasons of "incompatability
with other tenants". She was given thirty days to vacate.
(to be continued)
Way Out West ©1993 Martin Scherer. Venus & Mars © 1995 Martin Scherer. E-mail: Scherer@tesserak.net