The Takedown(56)

“Five hundred feet until you have reached your destination,” my Doc calmly said.

“Excuse me, miss, you lost? You need some help?”

“You need a boyfriend?”

“Turn right at 245 Ocean View Avenue. Turn right, now. Welcome. You are here.”

What difference did the video make? As a female, I’d always be dealing with this sort of aggravation. For some reason, that thought calmed me down. But it didn’t make me feel any safer as I faced the RingScreen of Mr. E.’s building. The parkas stopped a few paces away and lighted smokes. It was a Sunday, the day after Christmas. Mr. E. was Jewish, but he could still be gone for the holiday at a friend’s or a girlfriend’s. I could also picture him, staring at his screen in horror, quietly tapping deny.

“Come on, Mr. E.,” I murmured, teeth chattering, as I pressed the button again.

“Don’t worry. We’ll keep you company.”

“I’m okay, thanks,” I said, pressing the button again, again.

The parkas laughed.

“You more than okay, sweetheart.”

“Looks like your boyfriend no home. You want a new boyfriend?”

I’d had enough.

“What is wrong with you?” I whirled on them. “I still shop in the juniors’ section at Macy’s.” (FYI, not really). “You should be looking out for me, not harassing me.”

“Baby, I am looking out for you,” Camo Parka said. “Or at least I’d like to.”

As he came and leaned next to me, I held my finger down on the buzzer. Why hadn’t I dragged one of the girls with me? Or Mac? Or my brother? Because Mr. E. wouldn’t be honest if you weren’t by yourself. Cheap cologne filled my nostrils.

“I’ll look out for myself, thanks.”

ADMITTED, the RingScreen flashed. Next to it was a smiling photo of Mr. E. As relief swept over me, so did the acute knowledge that this was a horrible idea. As I pushed into the lobby, I heard Mac calling me na?ve. Mr. E. actually might have made that video, meaning he wasn’t like these parka guys. He kept his creep hidden.

And maybe that was worse.

Either way, I was about to enter his lair.





“I’m guessing you’re not here to give me a fruitcake, Ms. Cheng?” Mr. E. shouted.

He met me at his apartment door. I think he would have kept me out in the hall, only the thudding music coming from the apartment across the hall made conversation, let alone thought, impossible.

“Sorry, what?” I shouted back.

With the same expression of resignation he wore when he packed up his desk the morning the video dropped, Mr. E. reluctantly invited me inside.

We awkwardly negotiated space in the hall as he locked the door behind me. Mr. E. smelled stale, like cigarettes and alcohol and unwashed hair, and like something else that wasn’t a scent as much as it was an aura. Mr. E. reeked of misery. I was also pretty sure he was drunk. I followed him into the living room. As a testament to shoddy building practices, the volume on the music across the hall only equaled one or two bars quieter. After scooping a pile of clothes off his ratty sofa, he gestured for me to sit.

The apartment probably listed as a one-bedroom, but the entire space wasn’t much bigger than our kitchen. Mr. E.’s living room fit a couch and a coffee table with only an inch between them. A wood-paneled bar separated that space from a kitchenette that was about the same circumference as our living room screen. Dishes were stacked in the sink. Apparently, considering the takeout containers that were piled everywhere—kitchen counter, living room floor, cheapo bar—the appliances either didn’t work or were never used.

Using his shoulder, he popped open a door off the hallway and tossed the clothes into an even tinier bedroom, onto an unmade single bed—a single bed! Then he grabbed a beer can off the fake-wood coffee table, rattled it side to side, and took a slug. An entire case of empty cans littered the apartment.

“Sorry to intrude, Mr. E.,” I called as he retreated into the kitchen, “but I’d like to know why you told Dr. Graff the video was a fake.”

“Because it is fake, Ms. Cheng,” he shouted back in order to compete with the bass that was now making the apartment throb. “Or part of it is. I mean, what was I supposed to say?”

When I’d imagined Mr. E. outside of Prep, I’d pictured downloads straight from an e-mag. Hot, intelligent twentysomething females sidling up to him at fancy Manhattan cocktail bars and ubercool, little-known Brooklyn speakeasies. Thick eyeglasses, ratty beard, dingy apartment didn’t compute. He was an adult. Get it together already.

Mr. E. picked up a sponge, sniffed it—winced—and lobbed it at the trash. It hit the floor with a wet thunk.

I was a stupid girl. This afternoon, I’d imagined us sitting at his fancy kitchen island—because who would want an apartment this far away from everything unless it was dope?—drinking espressos, syncing our Docs, and solving the SHT out of this mystery.

“Was it—you don’t have to tell me who—but was it another student in the video?”

There was no denying that Mr. E. was a flirt. Glancing around his crappy apartment, I couldn’t help thinking that the adoration Mr. E. received at school was probably the best thing he had going for him.

“I’d rather not discuss this with you.”