BLIND TRIAL Brian Deer (best novels for beginners TXT) 📖

maybe more a surprise. Drop it by his hotel room, later, I’m thinking.”

Hoffman dipped his fingers into a pocket in his shirt and fished out a plastic key card.

Twenty-two

CHICAGO FELT as hot as the old Comiskey Park bleachers with Carlton “Pudge” Fisk at the plate. On Wednesday evening at North Cleveland Avenue, Luke circled the apartment, opening windows and setting fans spinning, before showering in what passed for cold water. Since getting home from work he’d been painting the front bedroom. He hoped to bring Mario back.

The room looked great, although he said so himself, after only one rollering of white. A grease stain on the wall where Ben used to read in bed, and the shadow of a picture—a corny Che Guevara poster—were now buried under a coat of Glidden matt. On the weekend, he’d paint the shelf where Ben used to write his songs, obliterating forever with dark Behr eggshell where wrists once rubbed on wood.

Tonight, he’d be radical. He’d accept no evasions. He’d bring Mario back, show him the room, fuck him among the paint cans, sandpaper, and brushes, and make sure he signed the lease before he left.

Luke had taken down a mirror from the ceiling above the bed and so wouldn’t get to eyeball the action. The procession of women who’d sweated beneath it were so beyond memory and mental arithmetic that, with the mirror in position, he risked rolling over and catching Ben’s eyes blinking back.

Mario knew the story about where it began: at the Cozy Cleaners, round the corner on Menomonee. Luke was nearly seven; Ben was five and was climbing up the counter while their mothers stood in line, made a lunge, fell backward, and “Waaaaaaa.” Luke sidled over, consoled him with a hug, and their lives weren’t the same after that.

A teacher in the schoolyard first asked, “Is he your brother?” Then girls used to giggle, “They’re lovers.” Later, as roommates, all the guys hit on Ben—and, oh, how he rose to that. Luke never had a guest who missed the weight in Ben’s shorts, or a trick who didn’t make some sneaky move.

Mario was classic. He’d gotten the full Louviere treatment the first time he stopped overnight. At three in the ayem, Ben appeared “looking for rolling papers,” wearing white Calvin briefs and nothing else. He tiptoed through the living room, where they were fucking—actually fucking—fetched his Gibson and sang “The Man Who Sold the World.”

Mario was at the Howard Brown health center, Monday morning, signing-up for the WernerVac trial. “Any company to put your roommate through school,” he panted, “has my vote for saving the world.”

Luke stepped into the living room and gazed in the mirror, now leaning against the table by the window. He didn’t look bad. He knew he could cut it. He wore a vertically paneled shirt in gray and ivory check, plus pleated charcoal pants with cuffs.

He patted his pockets—keys, wallet, gum—and turned off his cellphone.

All set.

THE PLAN was to meet at Charlie’s: a Western-themed bar, a mile-and-a-half uptown on Broadway. When he parked his Fiat Spider, soon after eleven, the dance floor was thudding to a two-step. In Luke’s mind, country music should be put out to grass, but Mario liked the old stuff: Lucinda Williams, Rhett Miller. Ben’s thing was Son Volt and Uncle Tupelo.

Tonight, a few desperates sported comic book Stetsons, as did most of the heads in a wall of cheesy photographs: winners of Charlie’s Man of the Month. Second left, fourth row, hung Ben’s dopey mugshot. He’d entered back in March, and yeah.

He found Mario at the bar in grey cargo pants and a collarless white linen shirt.

“Right on time, as ever,” Mario said.

“And I’ve been painting as well. Hey, you gotta come back. There’s still time to pick out a color.”

“Take it easy. Only here ten seconds and you’re leaving already. You want a bourbon or an OJ tonight?”

“Time to move fast and get yourself a deal. You know I’m still shelling out on rent.”

“Put an ad on Craigslist. You’ll get a line halfway to Springfield.”

“Yeah, but you said you wanted it. That was the idea, so I’ve been holding it for you. Be a good set-up. Better than what you got now.”

“Maybe so.” Mario made for the restroom.

Luke checked his phone was switched off.

By the time his friend returned, the dancefloor had cleared for a Riley Green epic, with lyrics to break out the sickbags.

I wish the price of gas was low and cotton was high,

I wish honky tonks didn't have no closing time,

And I wish grandpas never died.

“Look, I got to tell you something.” Mario blew air till his cheeks swelled. “It’s been bugging me for weeks. I need to tell you.”

“Chicagoland is listening. This is Mario Bianchi.”

“No, listen, it’s not a gag. I need you to hear this.”

“Hang on.” Luke grabbed a stool.

“Look, I’m not as lily-white as you think.”

“What are you talking about? For five hundred dollars, Who is Lilly White?”

Mario stared past him. “Sometimes, you know, when I’m working late at the gardens.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, sometimes I’m working the big-G app.”

“What, Grindr? Okay. So?”

“Let’s get out of here? Let’s go.”

BACK AT Cleveland Avenue, Luke killed the ancient answering machine before Mario topped the stairs. Five incomings were logged, but he didn’t plan to listen. When his cellphone was switched off—which was quite a lot lately—it was only Ben who didn’t get the message.

Luke yanked on a cord to kill the draught from a fan, and poured two Early Times, straight up. Then he dropped into a rocking chair which creaked on floorboards that once pumped Ben’s band through the building.

Mario shed his boots and walked to the window as a scratching sound escaped the front bedroom. An enormous old locust tree leaned against the house, reporting every breath from the street. When the wind got going, it scraped, rasped, and bumped: a sail ship riding a storm.

“Look,” he said. “It’s not just Grindr.”

Then the landline rang.

Luke ignored it. “What, so you met