The line to the deli counter snaked along one wall, nearly to the door. Those who had ordered and paid clustered in a small scrum by the display of bagged chips, keeping an ear peeled for their number and an eye out for projectiles. Here, your sandwich was literally thrown over the counter, so you had to be ready.
One of the Puerto Rican cooks bellowed, “Twenty-four, turkey club.” An oblong in white paper sailed into the crowd. Its owner was reading a newspaper and nearly missed the catch. He fumbled, but Javier Landes caught it up in time.
“Thanks, bro,” the guy said to Javier. “Want the paper while you’re waiting?”
Jav, whose number was in the forties, took it. The cover of the none-too-subtle NY Post demanded attention in three-inch letters:
MODERN MENGELE.
Below, in only slightly quieter type: PORN RINGLEADER - PIMP GROOMED AND TARGETED TWINS. MANHUNT CONTINUES.
The leader of a child prostitution ring is still at large, despite a manhunt by U.S. Marshals in four states and the FBI.
Anthony Fox, 32, fled his house in Heading Monday when police arrived to investigate two missing 17-year-old twins from Stockton. The brothers were discovered at the scene, one dead, the other held captive in the basement.
Police arrested two men at the house, Milton Johns, 27, and Carl Ferri, 35, now being charged with multiple felonies. A third suspect, Ty Pelletier, 33, was shot dead by police. The FBI found evidence of child prostitution and seized pictures, video, computers and flash drives, which police said fetishized twins and, in some instances, triplets.
Police said the material has been linked to a larger, international child porn ring busted by Austrian authorities earlier in the year…
Jav grimaced at the sordid details, the newsprint slimy in his hands. A horrific story in general, yet his eyes kept sliding back to one word in particular.
Prostitution.
The word was a vocal workout. Pushing the klutzy double-consonant “pr” took effort. The “sti” and “tu” blocked the way like bouncers, trying to get you to stutter or trip. The “shun” sound was an apt ending. Soft, almost genteel, yet loaded with judgment and disdain for the world’s oldest profession. The lowlifes shunned from decent society.
Javier Landes would know. He was in the business.
Prostitute, he thought, his mind hefting the syllables like dumbbells.
Hustler. Gigolo. Rent boy.
Or, as he preferred to call it, escort. A high-end, highly paid, highly sought-after escort who did business in extremely decent society and made a boatload of money.
Pimp.
Now that word was ugly. Swollen and unproductive. Like pump, but no air or water for your trouble. A pimple that wouldn’t pop. Jav never had a pimp. He’d been in control of his own destiny since he started escorting at age twenty-one.
As his eyes skimmed over the newspaper again, his stomach curled in a nauseous realization he was a there-but-for-the-grace-of-God escort. He was lucky to have such control. Lucky he could count up dates with sketchy clients on one hand. Lucky he could be picky about the clients he chose and had the mature judgment and strength to diffuse or abandon a bad situation.
But what if he didn’t have that luck? What if, after being thrown out of his home at seventeen, he bounced off the dirty sidewalks of Queens, straight into the hands of a modern Mengele?
Such retroactive, hypothetically dire scenarios weighed heavy on his mind these days. He had a nephew in his care. The only son of Jav’s late sister, Naroba. If Jav hadn’t been around to take guardianship of Ari when Naroba died, who the hell knew what might’ve become of him? Jav’s overactive imagination had zero trouble what-if-ing worst possible scenarios. Especially since he adored his nephew. He freaking loved that kid, his one and only blood relative. His sister-son. A magnificent eighteen-year-old boy on the cusp of manhood. Ari was no sheltered innocent, but he looked to Jav for direction. And now he knew what Jav did for a primary living.
“Don’t tell me what I know and want, Jav. I don’t take life advice from a whore.”
Whore. Another word that took effort to eject from your mouth. One Jav never heard applied to him personally. Certainly not one he expected coming from his nephew. Ari went pale and apologized, genuinely contrite. Jav brushed the outburst off as impulsive passion in the heat of the moment.
It was actually kind of funny now.
Yet the word hung around. It went along on Jav’s next date, tucked in his heart like a suit’s pocket square. Glaring at him when he slid the envelope with the evening’s earnings beside it.
You whore.
The word never bothered him before. Now it made him flinch. Not with shame, but with dread. He was forty-five years old. Late to the party already.
You’re nearly halfway through your life. What are you doing?
You’re worth more.
His friend Alex had thrown the remark out in passing. You’re worth more. Like a spot of spilled Crazy Glue, it stuck in Jav’s mind and he couldn’t pick or peel it off.
Worth.
You have worth.
You have more value than this.
He tossed the newspaper onto an empty table, unable to read what a modern Mengele had done.
It’s not only about you now.
The counter man’s call interrupted his thoughts. “Forty-five, roast beef sandwich.”
That’s me all right, Jav thought.
He took a step and deftly caught his lunch.