The Essence
Jon Fain
The Center for Life Research was housed
in a new building, a mostly-glass structure in the city’s outskirts, an area filled
with fast food restaurants, car dealerships, and discount houses. There were
landscapers working the grounds as I pulled into the parking lot, deeply tanned
young men unrolling long strips of green grass and laying them onto the bare
brown dirt. Others were digging holes, and planting shrubs. Both inside and
out, these people were concerned with making things grow.
It was a sperm
bank. I wasn’t there for myself, however. I had been hired by Mrs. Gloria
Eaton, whose son Alan had recently passed away, and whose “essence”—as she put
it—was in the bank’s possession. She and her daughter-in-law Liza were not
being allowed to withdraw this particular deposit, due to a legal technicality.
Alan Eaton and his young wife had not been married to each other when he had gone
to the sperm bank. Since he had neglected to leave any provision in his will,
there was no proof the sperm he had left in the bank’s care was for her. I had
done some work for Alan Eaton while he was alive, and he had left his mother my
name as someone she could trust.
Mrs. Eaton had
turned to me because she was unwilling to see the case go through the courts.
Even though she had an army of lawyers, she had grown impatient; she wanted a
grandchild before she died herself. She was a blunt, rich lady, and a practical
one. I had ten grand in my pocket, and I was at the sperm bank to approach its
Director with a rather obvious and time-honored business proposition. If I
succeeded in bribing the man, I was to receive the same amount myself. For an
ex-cop, getting by on a modest disability and the occasional job like this, it
was an easy assignment to accept.
Inside, the
Center for Life Research’s waiting room was filled with men, mostly
middle-aged, but a few younger, sitting on comfortable chairs, reading magazines,
or tapping on their phones. Some seemed nervous; a few of them were talking,
making jokes. There was an attractive receptionist, good-looking enough to get
the men in the mood, and I gave her my name.
I’d decided to go
in as a prospective donor. From what Mrs. Eaton had said, and with the lawyers
involved, I doubted the Director of the facility would see me if he knew why I
was really there. With a phone call, I had discovered that any man who wanted
to make a deposit had the option of meeting with him. Behind closed doors I
would show the man the money and see what happened. If he agreed to do
business, I would get what I came for and take it to the Eatons. If he was
stubborn, I would take it from there.
As I waited, I
found myself thinking about Liza. I had about twenty years on her, but that was
all right, so had Alan Eaton. I had expected to see a grieving widow at the
Eaton estate, but the woman I was introduced to was a smiling, long-legged,
athletic blonde in a tight-fitting black halter top. She said all the right
things about wanting to have a child by the man she had (and still, she claimed)
loved, no matter what it took, but by the way she was looking at me as she
spoke, I had my doubts. My guess was that Mrs. Eaton had threatened to hold up
any inheritance Liza was to get, if she didn’t go along.
Finally, after
about a twenty minute wait, I was called in. Following a female aide of some
type, I went down a short, carpeted hallway with a series of closed doors on
either side. At the end of the hall, she knocked at the corner office. She
opened the door, and then stepped aside to let me enter.
A man sat behind
a desk that was covered with papers and crammed manila file folders. He had a
large desktop system and monitor set-up. There was a couch against one wall, a
large abstract painting above it. Through the window behind him, I could see a
shimmering pond. The man’s name was Paul LaFleur.
He wore
dark-framed half-glasses that he took off when he stood up and we shook hands. He
put his glasses back on for a moment to look at something on his desk. He wore
a well-tailored, expensive looking blue pinstriped suit and a custom-made white
shirt.
“Mr. Stuart
Roman? I’m glad you’ve chosen the Center.” His accent, while noticeable, was
slight.
“You might say
the Center chose me, Doctor,” I said.
“Please,” he
said, as I sat down in the chair he motioned to, “I am not an M.D. merely a—”
“Banker?”
LaFleur laughed.
“Caretaker, I was going to say. In France there are dozens of institutions like
our modest one here, all run by the government. Here in America, we get to make
a little profit. Over there we were known simply as... ‘conservationists.’”
“Saving Humanity,
huh?” I said, keeping it light.
“In our small way,
Mr. Roman,” LaFleur assured me. “In any event, I am glad you came here today.”
He nodded toward my cane. It was a
bullet in the foot that had taken me off the force but I didn’t really need it
anymore. It was mostly for show.
“Nothing too
serious there I hope?”
“Won’t keep me
from making a deposit if that’s what you mean.” I was waiting for an opening.
The envelope with the Eatons’ money was in the inside pocket of my jacket. It
was beginning to bruise my ribs.
LaFleur outlined
the Center’s work, then moved off the sales pitch and got into the process. I
would provide them with my “product,” pay them a one-time fee, and they would
hold it until I requested it. I could even arrange to have it destroyed if I
wished. The sperm would be frozen, and kept that way through an intricacy of refrigeration
fail-safes. Now, if I was ready, a private room would be provided—after I
completed the required forms, of course. And was I aware they took both
MasterCard and Visa, and even Discover, although a personal check was
acceptable? With proper ID, of course.
“Ever hear of
Alan Eaton, Monsieur?”
LaFleur’s
expression fell like a young pastry chef’s first chocolate tort. “I have heard
of nothing else for weeks,” he said, in a suddenly tired voice. His attention
was on me in a way that indicated I was no longer so welcome.
“Alan recommended
your fine organization to me before he passed on. Said you in particular were a
man of high intelligence.”
LaFleur grunted
something. I reached into my jacket and took out the envelope and tossed it
onto the desk where it smacked down with authority on the man’s paperwork.
I looked at the
condition of my fingernails. They could have used some work. I was about to be
able to afford some upgraded personal care.
“That’s good money for doing nothing
more than making a rich old lady’s day.”
LaFleur let the
envelope sit there, pushed his chair back from the desk. He spun and watched
some ducks float around on the pond outside.
“Tell me, Mr.
Roman,” he said, turning back to me, “if that’s even your name. What is preventing
you people from simply coming in and stealing this poor man’s sperm, if it
means that much? Why don’t you just send in the Marines?”
“This is easier,”
I said, nodding to the money. I thought if he took a look at what was in there,
I had him. In my experience, they were all high-minded and moral, until they
saw the green. You could now pay with your phone and all that, but a wad of
cash was still as inviting as a warm summer breeze.
“I shall tell you
why,” said LaFleur. “Because, even if you managed to get through our alarm
system, and found your way into the proper room...do you think it is all so
easy? No, our file system is quite intricate. We have so much product it takes
time for our trained staff to process an impregnation request. And there must
be the participation from a licensed physician. Do you think anyone, even a man
who has just done business with us, that man can arrive at the door the next
day and make a withdrawal? That we tell him to wait a moment, and come back
with his frozen sperm in a nice container, and he brings it home to his wife
like so much ice cream?”
“Come on,” I
said, “just count it. You’ll turn what Alan left here over to the widow, they’ll
get a doctor on it and we’ll have a happy grandma.”
“And what about you, my friend, what is
in it for you? Money, I assume. Surely, it is not out of love for the late Mr.
Eaton that you are doing this.”
I was growing
weary of the man. His nice clothes, his holier-than-me attitude. I twirled my
cane so that its tip left a mark in his plush carpet.
LaFleur glanced
at the envelope again and I thought I might have him.
“Our charter is
quite clear,” he told me. “It must be established without doubt that the use of
the sperm conforms to the wishes of the deceased. In the case of Mr. Eaton,
there is no written evidence to support the claim it was to be for his wife. He
came here early in his illness, when he thought the treatments he was about to
undergo might make him sterile. This was before they were married.”
“Look,” I said,
“you seem to make a big deal about how what you’re doing here is so wonderful,
but it’s not. You think you’re helping people, but here, when you have a real
chance to do it, you’re backing down, you’re hiding in the courts. You take a
piece of a man and put it aside and you forget about the man himself.”
“This is not the
case, Mr. Roman. And I assure you we feel for Mr. Eaton’s mother in this
situation as well. It is indeed unfortunate that she may never experience the
joy of having a grandchild.”
“Yeah and what about
the man’s wife?” I said, remembering how she’d winked at me when her
mother-in-law had left the room for a moment.
“If she truly did
love the man then it is unfortunate as well,” said LaFleur. “But tell me, you
and I both know that she is young, beautiful, and soon, I presume, rich.
Eventually she will find someone else and will no longer care.”
The visions of
the easy ten grand that I had thought I was going to get began to fade. I stood
up, my foot throbbing, as it usually did when I was angry. I picked up the
envelope of money from his desk. All that was left was the satisfaction of the
last word.
“Well, Monsieur,”
I said, “as long as I’m here why don’t I take advantage of your fine
establishment and make a little deposit of my own. Break out the magazines and
a sample cup, and maybe your assistant out there can—”
“Mr. Roman!”
shouted LaFleur, “Please! Your presence here is no....”
Then he almost
smiled.
“The Eatons have
chosen well... but perhaps they have gotten more than they have bargained for,
yes?”
“What the hell
are you talking about?”
“You leave us
product as you suggest…but then you pocket this money meant for me. You return
with a pliable doctor and he co-signs the proper forms...you pass your product
off as the late Mr. Eaton’s and collect your money again from the mother. They
drop the lawsuit...everyone is pleased. Brilliant, Mr. Roman, brilliant! If I
were another type of man I would perhaps be tempted to go along in such a
scheme. It would solve everyone’s problems, including mine. The old
double-cross!”
I shook my head and
headed for the door.
“And tell me...
Monsieur,” he called out. “What would happen when the long-awaited grandchild
arrived and looked like you?”
I gave it all a few hours thought in a
bar near where I lived, going over it while I kept the bartender busy. LaFleur
had been right, or at least held the proverbial cards. It would have to go through
the courts. Then I thought about how I might persuade my client to give me
something for getting nothing done.
I called up the
Eaton house and found out from the maid that Mrs. Eaton was with her lawyers
and Liza was at her penthouse apartment downtown. I got the phone number after
finally convincing the maid that I was who I said I was. As I tapped in the
numbers, I wondered what I was going to say.
When she
answered, her voice did something to me. There was the fit young body, the way
she had looked at me. The wink. I had had a few.
“It’s me,” I
said. “I got it.”
“Who? Is this Mr.
Roman? Stu?”
“Yeah. Listen, I
got to get it right over.” My mind latched onto something LaFleur had said.
“You got to keep it cold... keep it in the freezer.”
“You got it? He took
the money and gave you—”
I was getting used
to the weight of the cash in my pocket. “How ‘bout mine, you got that?”
“Well I don’t,
I’ll have to call Alan’s mother and the lawyers and tell them, and then the
doctor who—”
“Let’s hold off
telling CNN. You want it or not?”
She didn’t care
for my phone manner. “Who do you think you are?”
“Just get the
cash Liza and we’ll do the deal. Small bills, big bills, or something in
between. I’ll be right over.”
My foot was
throbbing again, as it did when I was thinking on my feet.
Her apartment was
in one of the more prestigious buildings in the city. The doorman gave me the
fisheye and he seemed especially interested in what I was carrying. But like
all those guys, if you looked halfway respectable, once you gave him a name to
call, it wasn’t their problem. I heard Liza’s voice come back on the house phone
and he pressed the button to the front door, and let me in.
In the elevator,
I felt the side of the bag. Still cold. It reminded me of the old days,
stupidly charging into buildings where someone waited with bad intent. At least
there would be no guns in this case.
No, not that. Something
better.
She stood in the
open doorway of her apartment, waiting for me. She was wearing one of those
dance-exercise outfits, the kind cut high up above the hips, showing long legs.
If she had ventured out on the street like that, she wouldn’t have stopped
traffic, she would have destroyed it.
Liza moved aside for
me to go past her into the apartment. She was perspiring lightly and instead of
thinking about what she may have been up to in that body suit, I tried to
concentrate on the interior design. The living room was a step down, and ringed
by a maroon sofa and matching chairs. There was mauve wall-to-wall, large paintings,
plants from rain forests, a long walnut bar, and a big plasma TV. A balcony
overlooked the prime real estate below.
“Is that it?”
asked Liza, shutting the door.
I switched hands;
my cane went to my right, the bag to my left. “You show me where the kitchen
is, I’ll get it right into the freezer.”
She came up to
me. She made a move as if to take the bag, and I stepped back.
“It looks like—”
“LaFleur said I
couldn’t just walk out with it... I had to disguise it... that was part of the
deal.”
As I talked I was
moving toward where I figured the kitchen was. She came right behind me as I
went in and opened the gleaming Sub-Zero and wedged the bag between a package
of tofu dogs and a frozen can of pina colada mix.
“Is it going to
be all right in there?”
“No problem. You
got my money?”
“Alan’s mother
wants to see it. She said she’s still at the lawyer’s but you should wait. The
lawyer couldn’t believe you did it.”
Liza looked at
the big silver refrigerator as if she couldn’t either. I figured she was
thinking about having a kid that way, with no real husband or father. She
turned and went back to the living room, went to the bar there, and started
mixing.
“Want one?”
“Whatever you’re
having,” I said.
I had decided to forget about the other ten
grand that was coming to me—why be greedy? I would have a quick drink, and
leave before Mrs. Eaton and her lawyer got there. The money that had been
intended for LaFleur, plus my savings, would get me out of town for a while,
maybe into the fresh start somewhere else that I’d been delaying.
I stood at the
glass doors to the balcony, admiring the view and weighing the options, and
Liza came up with the drink. She stood close beside me. I hooked my cane over
some sort of antique chair.
“You know, don’t
you,” she said, “that you just kept me where I want to be.”
“Oh?”
“They would have had
the marriage annulled, any claim to Alan’s money taken away...if I didn’t agree
to go through with...with all this.”
She raised her
glass to me. It hadn’t been too hard to figure that one out.
Then she said,
“You know, I really go for older men.”
“You don’t say.”
She put her glass
down. I watched the lime wedge in it float among the ice cubes, and when I
looked back, she was pulling down the straps of her outfit. She slid the tight
black material down, stepped out of the suit, and kicked it aside.
She pressed against
me, and her hands worked at my belt as I put my glass aside. My pants undone, I
kicked off my shoes and took a moment to look at her. Then I took her hand and
pulled her close. Our mouths met, our tongues jousted, and in no time we were
on the sofa, me and her working at my clothes. Then we took turns with our
backs buried in the soft and luxurious maroon.
I gave it longer
than I should have to take her leg away from where it had ended up. I was
starting to find gray in my hair, but with a woman like Liza—I shook the thought
out of my mind and turned away.
As I dressed, she
smiled up at me. If you were lucky, one thing that came with gray hair was
knowing when you were in the danger of doing something stupid. I tucked in my
shirt, and took my cane from its resting place. People always underestimate a
man with a cane.
“Where are you
going?” she called out in surprise.
I closed the door
behind me, and walked down the hall to the elevator. I hated to leave her like
that, but she would have to deal with her mother-in-law herself.
I went past the
dough-faced doorman and under the awning out front. It was a nice day, a nice
day for an airplane ride. I just had to go to the bank. Of course, some of us
liked what they called direct deposit. That was the difference between me and
the late Alan Eaton.
A limo pulled up,
and Mrs. Eaton got out of the back with the help of a well-dressed, middle-aged
man. I was around the corner before they got away from the car. So I hadn’t seen
her face, but perhaps she was smiling. Thinking about how close she was to her
dream of a happy, healthy grandchild, a rightful heir.
I hated to disappoint a nice lady.
That’s why I had stocked the fridge. I just hoped she liked chocolate chip.
###
