Hosts

Joe's final words echoed off the hammered tin ceiling of Moishe's kosher deli where patrons and staff alike stared at him in stu

3

I'm going to have to make some assumptions here, Sandy Palmer thought as he leaned over his subway map. He sat at his cluttered desk in the front room of his apartment and traced the Broadway line through the Upper West Side.

One indisputable fact: the Savior had taken off at Seventy-second Street. But had that been his intended stop or had he been forced by the circumstances? Had he been heading home or heading to work or on his way to his girlfriend's? Trouble was, the Nine went all the way to Van Cortlandt Park up in the Bronx.

Sandy stared at the face on the Identi-Kit printout propped up against the computer screen before him. Who are you, my man? Where do you live? Where do you hang? Where do I find you?

He couldn't see much choice in where to search. He'd have to assume that the mystery man either lived on or frequented the West Side around Seventy-second Street or somewhere above that.

He leaned back and rubbed his eyes. A lot of territory. Millions of people.

Well, no one said fame and fortune would come easy. Good journalism sometimes required a lot of legwork. He was up for it. He just had to hope he got lucky and—

The phone rang. Oh, no. Not his mother again. He'd called his folks last night to tell them about the shooting and his story in the morning edition. Bad move. Mom had lost it, crying for him to come back home where he'd be safe; Dad had kept his composure but agreed that Sandy should come home, at least for a few days. No way. He wasn't a college kid anymore. He was twenty-six and this was where he lived and worked. The conversation hadn't ended on a happy note.

He debated letting the answering machine pick up but decided against it. He got out half a hello when a gruff voice cut him off.

"That you, Palmer?"

Sandy recognized McCa

"Detective," he said. "Good to hear from you."

"I thought we had an understanding about that gun, Palmer."

"What gun?"

"The second shooter's. We were go

"I haven't breathed a word about it being a Semmerling."

"Yeah but your piece mentions that he used 'a miniature .45.' That kind of narrows the field, don't it?"

Shit. He hadn't spilled that on purpose. Sandy felt like saying, I thought you didn't read The Light, but he wanted to keep McCa

"I'm sorry, Detective. I didn't know. I don't know anything about guns."

"Well, you should start learning."

"Look, I'm sorry. I'll be more careful in the future."

"See that you are."

And then he hung up, but Sandy thought he'd detected the slightest softening of the detective's tone before the co

The intercom buzzed. Someone calling from the foyer. What now?

"Yeah," he said, depressing the button.

"Is this Sandy Palmer?" said a woman's voice. Young, Tentative.

"That's me. Who's this?"

"Beth Abrams. From the… the train last night?"

Oh, wow!

"Beth! Come on up!"

He buzzed her in, then surveyed his apartment. What a sty! He scrambled around picking up the dirty clothes and junk mail that littered the place. He tossed everything into the bedroom and closed the door on it. The place still looked a shambles.

Should've showered, he thought. He gave each armpit a quick sniff. Not great, but not offensive.

The printouts! Shit, he didn't want her seeing those. He slipped them into a manila envelope just as she knocked. He pulled the door open and she looked awful as she stood on the threshold, her pale face tear-streaked and shadowy half moons under her big dark eyes.

"Beth," he said. "How in the world—?"

And then she was tight against him, her arms locked around his back, sobbing her heart out. Oh, man, did that feel good. When had any woman, let alone an attractive one like Beth, thrown her arms around him? He closed the door and held her as she cried, absorbing her shaking sobs.

It took her a good ten minutes to regain control. He wished she'd taken more time. He could have stood there all day.

"I'm so sorry," she said, backing up a step and wiping her eyes on her sleeve. She was still all in black, dressed in the clothes she'd worn last night. "I didn't mean to do that, it's just that I'm such a wreck. I mean, I can't sleep, I can't eat, I wanted to go back to Atlanta last night but there were no flights that late and besides no one's home because my folks are touring Scandinavia and are somewhere in fucking Oslo right now and I tried to talk to my boyfriend about it and I thought he understood but after a while he let it slip that he thought it was awesome. Can you believe that? He thinks it would have been so awesome to have been there! So I just walked out and I need to talk to someone who understands what it was like, someone who was there too."

"That's me," he said. "But how did you find me?"

"I saw your picture in the paper and remembered you saying you'd graduated from Columbia so I called the alumni office as soon as it opened and they gave me your last address. I hope you don't mind."

"Mind? Are you kidding? I was trying to figure out how to get in touch with you but I never got your last name."

"And I realized I never really thanked you for what you did."

"What I did?"

"Stop being modest. You shielded me with your own body. I'll never forget that."

"Oh, that," he said as guilt spiked him. "Let's not make too much of that."

"How can you be so calm?" she said, staring at him. "How come you're handling this and I'm not?"

He'd been asking himself that same question. "Maybe because I was able to write about it. I had to confront my terrors; maybe focusing and putting them down on paper was some sort of exorcism."

Not to mention how my being there is going to make my career.

"There's another way to look at it," he added—this had just occurred to him and it was pretty good. "You have to figure, with all the millions of people in this city and all the subway lines and trains that run every hour, what are the chances of being caught on a subway car with a gun-toting madman? A zillion to one, right?"

Beth nodded. "I guess so."

"So what are the chances of getting caught twice? Think about that. The odds of either of us ever having a gun pointed our way again has got to be eighty zillion to one. So the way I look at it, I just survived the worst moment of my whole life. Everything from here on is a cake-walk."

"I never thought of it that way." She took a deep breath. "I can't believe this, but I think I feel better already. Just seeing you so together after going through the same thing I did makes it easier to handle."

Did that mean she was going to leave? Hello, have a good cry, feel better, then back to the boyfriend? No way.

"Want some coffee? Tea? I've got some good green tea."

"You know," she said with a twist of her lips which, on a day like today, had to suffice for a full-fledged smile, "all of a sudden that sounds good."

He started toward the kitchenette. "How about something to eat? I don't have much but—"

"No. I still can't think of eating. Just some tea would be great."

Good, he thought, because unless you're into chunky peanut butter and stale Ritz crackers, I'm afraid you're out of luck. The cupboard is bare, babe.

"Have a seat on the couch there and I'll start the water boiling."

What do I do now? he asked himself as he filled the kettle.