Snowden had a plan, that much was clear. Snowden would do his absolute best to execute it as well, that was also evident. What was probably less clear, at least to Lester in his banana peel shoes, was that Snowden had no intention of killing anyone. Snowden had figured it out. Snowden had the answer. He would just tell the targeted bastard this time. I have been sent to kill you, he would say. Get out of town or be dead.
"This is exciting, isn't it? Gives you a sense of power, right? There are some real scumbags in there to pick from, rapists, there's even a guy who served for kidnapping at 209 West 118th and that's a really important block so that could work great."
First, Snowden's pick had to be somebody who wouldn't try to kill him just for breaking into his apartment, preferably somebody small with no violent history.
"You know, don't feel you have to limit yourself to felons. There are a lot of petty menaces in the pile as well. If you want, I can find you good a one."
A true criminal, but a puny, cowardly one, and just in case Lester decided to take a more proactive role than his assigned one as lookout, the chosen target had to be a complete and utter scumbag as well. Just in case — it was a dangerous mission.
"They don't even have to have a prison record. I mean, you yourself are proof that's not a defining factor in moral character. I've got a ton of 'quality of life' crimes in here. I've got a guy on this very block who gets in his car at six-thirty every morning and turns his radio on full blast — it wakes the children, it's just criminal. We've tried calling nine one one, stealing his radio, his car, he just pays the fines, replaces them, so trust me there's no other way. Not trying to push you in any direction, but you'd be doing us a real service. Otherwise I won't be able to fit him in till next Thursday."
There he was. Ryan Waters. Even among all those pictures of all those little weaselly bastards, this guy stood out like the refugee of another, elfin species. Ryan Waters. He looked like a jockey's runt son.
"Ryan Waters? OK. All right. I mean, I guess he's a good starter project, it being your first time going solo. He's not really much for sport, though, is he? The man can't weigh more than a buck twenty-five Thanksgiving night. He is a real lowlife, if that's what you're going by. Ryan Waters, then. Well, there's going to be a bunch of old ladies who're going to have to find a new way to get their groceries home from the Pathmark." That was because Ryan Waters would no longer be waiting for them in his car, volunteering to carry their bags up to their apartments and taking anything he could shove in his coat on his way out again. The less alert ones would no longer have him to thank for his repeated visits. The more alert ones, the ones who went to the police only to recant their accusations later, would no longer have to worry that Ryan Waters knew where they lived.
Outside, more banging, more uncharacteristic childish yelps. That was the first time it struck Snowden: For a building filled with children, he almost never heard them. It was like a school perpetually in class.
"So you saw her already, didn't you?" Lester asked the question like his teeth couldn't hold his tongue back anymore. "You saw her on the way in."
"Who?"
"Oh come now, no secrets here. You must have at least heard her thumping around out there. Let's call her." Lester picked up his phone, hit the line for Nina, and asked her to send in "Horizon's newest employee." There was a pause, orchestrated by Lester sitting there, smiling, hands entwined over the top of his folded legs. "To be honest, we took her primarily to keep a closer eye — she seems to make a habit of staring too long at things best ignored — but she's already proven herself to be a hard worker. You have good taste in women, Snowden. I can admit that."
When he heard the knock on the door, Lester rose to let her in, made introductions with the aside that they were not needed, then left the two of them. Snowden was the one who jumped up and shut the door, quietly locking it. Piper Goines. She seemed to Snowden so out of place standing there, an image clipped from one reality by dull scissors and pasted into another with too much glue. An image anxiety attacks were made of, specifically the one Snowden was having at the sight of her. Snowden didn't know the specifics of how she'd arrived at Horizon, but he was pretty confident he could guess the general reason. Piper had poked her nose into this world so deep that now she was in it, and that type of behavior is exactly why Snowden knew she shouldn't be there. So don't be. Don't be happy either. Don't offer answers to questions I specifically didn't ask.
"We're going to have our first issue up by next week, can you believe that? I'm teaching all the kids how to write articles, they're coming up with the story ideas, it'll be great. I'm talking a three-thousand-copy print run, that goon Horus is putting thirty-five-cent news boxes all over Harlem as we speak!"
"Piper, you shouldn't be here," Snowden begged.
"Are you kidding? This company's amazing! It's going to be called Harlem Outcry, you like that? It was my idea. This is nothing, this is just a favor I'm doing in exchange for things to come. You wouldn't believe the offer they made me." Piper winked at him like maybe he did know.
"This is going to end badly," Snowden thought aloud.
"No, don't be pessimistic. In a couple of weeks I'll have these little runts writing great."
Lester refused to talk to Snowden about Piper. They passed the Channel 9 News crew on 116th doing an editorial on the police shooting of Trevor Barber, but aside from shutting up until out of earshot, Lester was undistracted. Snowden was saying things, disparaging things, about Piper Goines, the obvious hazards of her inquisitive nature, her lack of moral character, her unsuitability to be left alone with children, slandering her as viciously as he dared without making her a potential hunting accident. Most of it was lies and Lester didn't pretend to take them as anything but, yet Snowden kept talking till they were almost at the building and it was time to kill someone.
Wrapped in trash bags and duct tape, Snowden had brought something big to hit Ryan Waters in the head with. It was heavy too, after a couple of blocks walking, Snowden was getting tired in both arms. The weapon of the evening was that lid that sits on the back of the toilet. The constructors of the building they were about to go up in had used the same manufacturer for the sink basins, toilets, and bathtubs. All three were made from the exact same East Rutherford, New Jersey, porcelain, so that even the closest forensic study could confuse a blow to the head from this toilet lid with a simple slip in the shower.
Lester was unimpressed.
"The blood splatter marks would be different," Snowden confessed. "But I thought I'd just leave the shower on to get rid of them."
"No, bad idea. It's not that it's not a good plan. It's just. . he's a puny thing, isn't he? Do you really think he deserves the A material? It's freezing, and it rained till two last night. That fire escape up there is going to be covered in ice; that's all the alibi you need. Just go up and throw his little ass out the window and then we'll go get lunch."
Snowden was not impressed, either, pulling his potty lid close to him like Lester might try to take it away.
At Waters's door the lock stubbornly resisted several turns before finally admitting that Snowden's key was the right one, and even still it barely opened for him. It was getting easier. It was getting mundane, Snowden heard the faint music inside and didn't once worry that Waters would hear the door opening. If black people just lowered their radios they really would be a lot safer. Lester motioned to his eyes to emphasize that he would use them, then went over to where Wendell was balled near the stairs, his cell phone out and dialing before Snowden could even close the door quietly behind him.