The Fury - Jason Pinter [7]
around it. I'd never heard of a Stephen Gaines before.
The last name did not sound familiar. Gaines.
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Jason Pinter
On the street earlier, Gaines looked older than me by
four or five years. Of course, considering how strung
out he looked, it could have swayed a few years in
either direction. But if he was older, it meant he was
gone from my life long before I was aware of his exis
tence. I had too many questions to ask, and unfortu
nately Leon and Detective Makhoulian wouldn't be
able to answer them. At least not all of them.
I stepped out at the corner of Thirtieth and First in
Manhattan's Kips Bay. The medical examiner's office
had a facade of light blue, the stone dirty, as if the
building refused to modernize. It was a block away
from Bellevue Hospital, one of the more notorious
medical centers in the city. Prisoners from Riker's
Island, as well as criminals from New York's central
booking requiring medical attention, were among the
most frequent guests. And if you happened to be in the
emergency room late at night, you'd be in the company
of numerous men in orange jumpsuits and chains,
armed police at the ready. Just a few blocks away were
a coffee shop, a bookstore and a multiplex movie
theater. Scary to think that while you were busy
munching on popcorn, evil lingered so close by, cloaked
in formaldehyde.
I approached the entrance tentatively. Who was I
going to ID? I'd never met this man before last night,
and now I was expected to point him out, feel some
deep-down emotion like I'd known him my whole life?
I'd never bonded with this person. Never done things
most brothers did. Never played catch. Snuck a drink
from Dad's liquor cabinet. Never smuggled dirty maga
zines under our covers, or smoked cigarettes until our
The Fury
27
lungs burned. I was identifying a stranger, yet expected
to act like he was my blood. Impossible.
Pushing the door open, I went up to the receptionist.
He was wearing a white lab coat, and didn't look a day
over twenty-five. I figured he was some sort of medical
intern, manning the phones while studying for his
exams.
"May I help you, sir?" he asked. His name tag read
Nelson, Mark. He chewed on a pen while he waited
for my answer.
"I'm here to see Binky...er Dr. Binks," I corrected.
No sense ruining the illusion that Binks was a sane and
respected member of the medical profession.
"And you are..."
"Henry Parker," I said, taking my driver's license
from my wallet. "I'm here to identify Stephen Gaines."
The name felt foreign on my tongue, yet Nelson's eyes
melted with sympathy. He looked down at his desk,
pursed his lips.
"Right," he said. "I'm sorry for your loss."
I didn't bother to point out Nelson's faux pas. That
it was a little premature to console someone for their
loss before they'd actually identified the body. Or that
I felt no loss at all. How could I? Nevertheless, I told
him I appreciated it. He asked me to have a seat while
he paged Dr. Binks.
I took a seat on a light blue couch. It was hard. There
was a small table in front of me. No reading material.
This wasn't your typical waiting room. If you were
here, I supposed not even Golf Digest could take your
mind off of what lurked below.
After several minutes, I heard the ding of an elevator
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Jason Pinter
and out strode Leon Binks. Binks was in his late thirties,
graying hair matted against his brow. His eyebrows
were as messy as his hair, a collection of short pipe
cleaners bent every which way. The medical examiner
was perpetually disheveled, as though he cared no more
about his appearance than those corpses he worked on
would. His hands always seemed to be moving, offering
gestures that his dialogue (and lack of social skills) pre
sumably could not. I imagined that if, like Leon Binks,
my whole life was spent amongst the dead, I might
have some personality idiosyncrasies as well.
"Mr. Parker," Binks said, approaching me with his
hand outstretched. I went to meet him, and he shook it
vigorously. An awful smell wafted