Down the Side

Short Story for https://substack.com/@choosefiction and Macabre Monday

It was New York City and the first thing you need to know is what you think of the city is how you look at it. Gabriel looked at it like this: his father had been a poor Muslim Egyptian with no concept of what it looked like to stare the city at on till he was transported from Cairo to New York. As he looked down at the city, he saw three things: there was water everyplace, the second is the skyscrapers jutting out from the island, and the third is beyond the cityscape there were trees. He had never seen any place like the Big Apple.

Gabriel was still a small baby and could not remember anything at first sight, but he had scored extremely well on everything that he touched at school and was sent to Columbia to study engineering. He even got a Ph.D. he was converted to Christianity because it was easier. He believed he was blessed.

Then he got a good job with a defense contractor and moved up to the sky in an apartment all to himself.

So, in other words, he thought the city was the fountain of opportunity from almost birth. It had not failed him yet in life.

One day he was down at the base floor where his apartment stood. It was Central Park Tower and he looked up and down West 57^th Street with the theme of 225 straight overhead. It looks good going down. He jingled his St. Jude on his neck. He even saw a New York Post, in the flesh. I’ve never seen such a beautiful day in my life.

He looked down the side of the apartment building and after a few minutes, he was on the nearly top floor. It was a long way down.

Then there was a crash, and he was moving between two men who were not taking it easy on his two arms and his feet were sliding.

One of them said, in an Eastern Mediterranean accent: “You are going with us.”

He thought to himself well that’s obvious. But then he sat up: “What is going to happen?”

“To you? That’s for somebody else to say.”

And a car drove up. But there’s traffic here.

But then from out of the driver’s seat: “Everybody gets out of the way, or this man is going to be shot.” Rapidly a space cleared in the was shoved into the passenger side with no grace and very little style.

Then the mask came down over his head and he did not see anything as they drove. Then he was extracted, again with little grace, and walked into somewhere and was smashed into someplace. Then he thought he was being driven up in an elevator.

He was brought in still wearing the mask and added to that were a pair of handcuffs. He heard a voice. It was to his front.

“I promise you it will be unharmed if you’re father gives me the cash I want.”

“I think my father’s poorer than me give you cash.”

“Trust me your father has enough cash. Do you know who your father is?”

“He’s a poor nobody.”

“That all depends on when retelling the story takes place. I suppose when he got the US was a poor nobody. But then his reparations came through and he was set for life.”

“I don’t understand.”

“He was from the old regime.”

“So, what if he was?”

“He sold out several people. Got a pretty penny from the State Department. Used some of it to get you into Columbia. And the rest, as they say, is history.”

“So, what do you want?”

“I want some of that cash directed my way.”

“So, you are the squeaky wheel?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

Anwar struggled at the mask hoping to see his accuser.

“It won’t do you any good. We have the mask tightened up. Who do you think we are Greenstreet and Lorre? There is no next picture this time.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I am going to have a phone call with your father. Then I will put you on. And if he sends me the money, I will be let go. Otherwise, there is a window here. I will take your mask off so you can see the view.”

In his desperation he blurted out: “O.K. O.K.”

That’s when he heard a dial and some ringing.  The conversation was inaudible, but he was shoved forward and he could feel the phone to his ear.

Then he heard his father’s voice: “I’m sorry I can’t pay for what the man is asking for.”

The phone line went dead.

At that point, the mask came off and Gabriel was hurtling to the ground. All the sights you would expect to see from the launch off a tall building were Kaleidoscope into a collage.

He hit the ground.

But what was unexpected was that he still looked upwards and then a man came over to him and said: “You know that you have been dead for at least half a day. Don’t you read the papers?  You are in the obituaries section.”

“What happened?”

“I imagine that someone was trying to get money for not tormenting your soul. They have ghouls that can catch you. But if you hurry, they might not catch up in time. Hurry now, get along!”

Sometimes you must count your blessings where you find them.