He yells after her, but his voice grows distant as she races along Ninth and cuts a sharp right on Mount Vernon Place and past the historic Carnegie Library building that’s tragically been converted into an Apple store.
She manages to dial Simon’s number as she steers the scooter. It goes to voicemail. Of course …
a call from an unfamiliar line. When she’s a safe distance away, she skids to a stop and furiously thumbs a text.
It says only two words, but Simon will understand:
Alas Babylon.
CHAPTER NINE
DONNIE
Donnie adjusts the angle of the hospital bed upward, laces his hands behind his head with his elbows sticking out. He got lucky: The fishermen were 1990s boys and fans of Tracer’s Bullet. They gave him some whiskey and a blanket to get his body temperature up, bandaged the gash on his head, and brought him ashore.
Now he has a half circle of fans around his bed at the University of Miami Hospital. TMZ got wind that Donnie Danger survived a fall from a cruise ship and it didn’t take long before his room was filled with flowers and women with big hair. Tracer’s Bullet had been one of the only hair bands to emerge—and thrive—during the grunge era, a novelty act that scratched the itch of early Gen Xers not swept away by Kurt Cobain, Pearl Jam, STP, and the rest.
“Could you sign my CD?” a lady asks. She’s in her forties with an orange hue to her skin and prominent lines around the eyes from too many years in the sun. With her, a girl in her teens whose eyes are glued to a phone.
“Sure, sweetheart,” he says, taking the Sharpie someone gave him. He’s in the gown, his skinny white legs tucked under the sheets. “What’s your name?”
“Crystal,” she says. Like always, he writes: “To beautiful Crystal, stay close to Danger. DD.”
She examines the CD cover and cups it to her chest like a treasure.
“And who’s this?” He looks at the girl.
“My niece.” The girl barely looks up from her phone. “She was at my house when I heard. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“You and me both, darlin’。”
“How did it happen? I mean, your fall…” She says it uncomfortably like she shouldn’t ask.
“That is the million-dollar question,” Donnie says as he signs a poster for a man with sleeved tattoos. And it is. The last thing he remembers is Tom firing him. And Donnie retrieving his emergency bottle of Jack from his cabin.
The nurse arrives, a look of distaste on her face. “Mr. Danger, you have a visitor.”
“The more the merrier,” Donnie tells her. He’s in full rock-star persona, the only time he feels comfortable in his own skin. The only way to mask the anxiety baked into his bones.
The nurse says, “I’m afraid we need to ask everyone to step out.”
“Boo,” one of his fans says playfully, and the small crowd shuttles out.
A man in a dark suit enters. “Mr., ah, Danger,” he says, like it pains him. But it’s actually
Donnie’s last name; he changed it legally after their first album went platinum and he had money burning a hole in his pocket. His real name is Donnie Johnson, but Tom told him, Don Johnson?
You’ve gotta change that. This isn’t Miami Vice .
“That’s me,” Donnie says.
The man is tall, olive skinned, his part defined, his posture arrow straight. A lawyer, possibly.
Maybe the cruise-ship company thinks Donnie’s gonna sue. They’ve already sent over a giant bouquet of flowers and a perky woman called and told him they’d set him up in a suite at the Fontainebleau hotel so he can recover in style.
He should fall out of a boat more often.
“I’m Special Agent Rodriguez with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.”
“The FBI?” Donnie says. “No shit.”
The man nods. Doesn’t elaborate. “I have a few questions, if you’re up for it.”
“Sure, boss,” Donnie says, his accent thick and folksy when he’s Rock Star Donnie.
“What happened?” the agent asks, an open-ended question if there ever was one.
“Afraid I can’t tell you much. I hit my nugget on the way down, it seems.” He knocks lightly on the side of his head. “Last thing I remember is the show. We killed it.” He remembers a little more but doesn’t want to get into Tom firing him. His solo pity party afterward with the bottle of Jack. But what came after remains a complete blank.
“You don’t remember how you went over?”
Donnie shakes his head. “The doc says it may come back to me, but right now, nothin’。”
The FBI agent doesn’t seem surprised. He’s probably already spoken with the doctor, a pretty Black lady immune to Donnie’s charm.
Donnie adds, “There’s cameras all over the boat, I imagine the cruise line can—”
“We have the footage,” the agent cuts him off. “Mr. Danger…” He pauses, cracks his neck. “Is there anyone you can think of who’d want to hurt you?”
Donnie guffaws at that. “Maybe one of my ex-girlfriends.” He smiles. “Oh, you’re serious. No, I can’t think of anyone who’d want to hurt me. I mean, why would they?”
The agent doesn’t respond. He pulls out his phone, displays a grainy video. It shows Donnie, his gait unsteady, a bottle clenched in his left hand as he pulls along the stair railing up to the promenade deck with his right.
The agent says, “This is the last footage of you they could find. We think you went over on deck four.”
Donnie nods. He has absolutely no recollection of it. “They got cameras there, don’t they?”
The agent nods. “The two were disabled, vandalized.”
He studies Donnie, like he’s looking for a reaction. Maybe they think Donnie disabled the cameras himself. If they’ve talked to the band, they’d know he was fired. Maybe the FBI thinks he was trying to kill himself. But the agent doesn’t ask.
“You were friends with Benjamin Wood?”
This takes him aback. Why would this agent be asking about Benny? Donnie supposes the Feds would be on the case—the murder of a federal judge must be something the FBI covers. But what in the hell does it have to do with Donnie falling off a boat?
“Yeah. We were tight since we were kids. I’m the godfather to his daughter.” This reminds him, he needs to call and check in. He called Benny’s wife, Mia, several times from the ship’s satellite phone, but they all went to voicemail.
“When was the last time you saw him before he was killed?”
“About a month ago. I’ve been on the road.… I visit him in Philly whenever I’m back east.”
The agent nods.
“Hey, you mind me asking what this has to do with my, ah, accident?” Donnie asks.
“I don’t mind you asking,” the agent says. But he doesn’t answer the question. Instead, he asks,
“Any idea why Judge Wood would have been in Chestertown?” The newspapers said Benny was last seen leaving work, but his body was found in a Dumpster in an industrial area of the dreary Pennsylvania town where they’d been in foster care together. The reports speculated that he’d been the victim of a carjacking.