The Other

THE

OTHER

A NOVEL

BY

DAVID L. RUGGERI

The Other by David L. Ruggeri

Copyright 2012 by David L. Ruggeri

Smashwords Edition

This one is for

FRANCIS AND GINNY BURGHARDT

Because: they are willing to read

and also

For my children, Kelly and Sean

Because: I want them to read more

"What seest thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?"

William Shakespeare

The Tempest

"O dark, dark, dark amid the blaze of noon,

Irrevocably dark..."

"The sun to me is dead

And silent as the moon."

Milton

Paradise Lost

CHAPTER ONE

Thomas really didn't know where he as going until he got there. It seemed as if his car, with all of its automatic controls and computerized devices had suddenly led him by itself to a rambling structure on Century Boulevard about halfway between the 405 freeway and Los Angeles International Airport.

TOPLESS/BOTTOMLESS, the sign proclaimed as a series of lights raced around it in a mad effort to burn themselves out.

His thirst had become a secondary discomfort to the sudden pressure of anticipation in his groin as he stared at the sign and its pronouncement that the place was filled with, ALL-NUDE GIRLS.

Thomas couldn't remember the last time he had seen a naked woman, other than Kathy, his wife.

Inside the club, the steady thump of a bass-driven sound system assaulted his ears in a darkness filled with the odors of old cigarette smoke, stale beer and cheap whiskey.

Thomas found the murky ambiance comfortably welcome, and couldn't comprehend why. He also couldn't understand why he didn't feel compelled to question it, but accepted this place and its lurid atmosphere as a part of his life—which it had never been before.

He took a seat at the bar, where he could see the small stage and the semi-nude girl gyrating around a brass fire pole as if it were a giant phallus of burnished metal.

The bikini-clad girl behind the bar sauntered over and asked, Whatcha want?

Scotch. Dewar's.

Call drinks are a buck-fifty more.

Dewar's.

You got it.

He watched the girl on the stage, unimpressed by her bored routine. Around him, the mostly empty club seemed to be inhabited by equally disinterested refugees from the nearby airport. He could see greasy flight line overalls mixed with skycap uniforms, a smattering of shirts and ties and an occasional suit or sport coat.

Dewar's, the voice behind him announced. That'll be seven-fifty.

Thomas didn't have the slightest idea what the average cost of a call drink was in a place like this, but nothing compelled him to protest the exorbitant tab. He fished a ten-dollar bill out of his wallet, laid it on the bar and picked up his drink.

Before the girl could pick up his money, he slammed his hand down on the bill.

I said Dewar's, he snapped.

The barely-clad bartender looked at him in the dim light. That's whatchu got. Her fingers grasped the corner of the bill.

This is a well drink; it's some kind of slop, but it ain't Dewar's. Maybe you made a mistake.

The girl's mouth opened, but before she could contradict him she looked at his eyes.

He could see her suddenly decided that perhaps she had made a mistake.

Sorry, she said, going through the motions of looking carefully under the bar at the source of his drink. I guess I picked up the wrong bottle.

I guess, Thomas replied with enough sarcasm to let her know that he knew she had tried to stiff him with cheap scotch for the price of the good stuff.

He watched as she went to the ranks of shelving loaded with mirrored bottles behind the bar.

She pulled a bottle of Dewar's Scotch from the visible inventory and carried it back. Placing a fresh glass in front of him, she tipped up the bottle and allowed the automatic pour spout to measure out California's legal one-and-a-half ounce shot. For just a moment she paused, looked up at the man watching her, and then tipped the bottle back over the glass to add an extra measure.

As Thomas's hand moved away from the bill, she again said, Seven-fifty.

Keep the change, he called when she was already five feet away, at the cash register.

Thomas looked at the brimming glass on the polished wood of the well-worn bar and ignored it as the music changed and a smattering of applause called his attention back to the stage in the center of the club.

The metal pole had disappeared into the ceiling, and a short girl climbed onto the platform, her body swaying rhythmically to the insistent beat of the recorded music.

Thomas watched with interest and realized that the girl couldn't have been more than a couple of years older than his sixteen year-old daughter, Christen, but where Christen was tall and willowy, this girl was short and compact.

Thomas wondered why he was comparing this slut to his daughter, but the uncomfortable feeling passed as quickly as it had come and he concentrated on the dancer.

She was muscular, evidently a product of too many hours dancing, her legs and chubby thighs were corded with sinews. Augmented breasts, even at this early age, had already begun to sag with their unnatural weight and implacable gravity.

With the small, jaded crowd disinterested in any kind of teasing, the girl didn't waste any time on foreplay and dropped her top while she circled around the stage in a red sequined G-string. The front of the tiny garment formed a neat pouch over her genitals and a thin thong disappeared between copious buttocks.

Idly, Thomas wondered how far the sequins covered the material between her legs, certainly not all the way. He thought of the small, sharp plastic disks grinding away in the hot moist area, which those sitting directly below her alone could observe.

He took a perverse pleasure thinking about the possible salt-sweat sting of the sharp little cuts the sequins might cause; otherwise he didn't find the girl an attractive or an arousing sight.

Thomas turned to his scotch. He sipped the musky, amber liquid and allowed the pungent flavor of malted barley to lay on his tongue and then warmly against his pallet like fine wine before he swallowed.

Then he gagged.

He hated scotch! It was a nauseating and cloying taste that had always brought bile to the back of his throat, and this time was no different.

Suddenly, the dark club reeked of urine and stale semen.

The other drinkers' faces, glowing in the swirling lights from the small stage looked like a leering gallery of petrified statues, glazed with summer sweat. Thomas thought they all looked sickly in the unhealthy lighting and wondered: What the hell am I doing here?

§ § § §

An hour earlier, Thomas Henry Harper had been sitting in his office at Hawthorne First National Bank when he had a sudden thirst for a large scotch, which was an incredible occurrence since Thomas detested the taste of scotch.

He'd looked out across the bank at the large, ornate clock on the wall, directly opposite the great glass doors. Light rippled across the marble floor of the old building and splashed like a high tide against the base of the wooden writing stands that stood like small, dark islands in the otherwise empty space of the lobby.

It wasn't even noon, an inappropriate time to take his lunch. Well, actually, since he was the president of the bank, no one would question what was or was not an appropriate time for him to absent himself from the premises, therefore this need for a sense of propriety was a strange stirring in the back of his mind.

Usually, Thomas had luncheon appointments lined up: other board members, who might be coddled into voting for such items as remodeling, an extensive advertising budget for a new loan program, or the need for more equipment, good customers, who needed to be convinced that HFNB was still their best option for service and favorable loan rates, as well as new prospects to be wooed away from the impersonal environs of Wells Fargo and Bank of America.

Today, Thomas Harper hadn't cared whom he was scheduled to luncheon with. He hadn't even bothered to look at the calendar that his secretary, Greta Thurgood had prepared for him in her meticulous penmanship.

Greta, cancel my lunch appointment, something's come up.

From her desk in the carpeted and wood-rail defined space outside of his large glassed-in office, Greta Thurgood had picked up her appointment book and come to the door of his office.

You are supposed to have lunch with Francis Burghardt.

Cancel it.

Greta Thurgood was fifty-nine years old and had been an executive secretary for almost thirty-five of them. She was used to the whims and seemingly capricious orders of a long line of executives; she had learned not to react to anything they did other than with the most efficient and neutral professionalism. Her personal opinion regarding the suitability of her instructions had no effect on how she carried them out. But, being human, she was seldom able to avoid expressing her opinions by the slightest rise of an eyebrow, a twitch at the corner of her mouth, or the small inflections of approval or disapproval in her voice.

I believe Mr. Burghardt was going to discuss his need to restructure the financing on the Anderson Building.

I know why Burghardt was meeting me for lunch, Thomas had said, irritated. It's more goddamn whining for dollars. Let McCutcheon handle it. Tell Mac to take the old fart to lunch and not to back down from the Prime-plus-two interest rate.

Thurgood had blinked at her boss's language. Thomas Harper never cursed in public and usually expressed only the most benign opinions about anything or anyone in his secretary's presence.

Thomas had enjoyed Greta's discomfort as she had made an effort to hide her shock at his language and the uncharacteristic impatient tone of his voice.

I'll be out for a couple of hours, Thomas had announced.

Thurgood had taken the ever-present pencil from the flurry of gray hair behind her ear, and prepared to write. Where can I reach you?

You can't.

Excuse me?

You heard me. I can't be reached.

Yes, sir.

Thomas appreciated that Greta knew better than to remind any superior of policies and procedures, especially if they were his own. Silence was a virtue; presumption was not.

It was Thomas's own policy that, during banking hours, all officers were to be reachable. It was also prudent internal security, especially considering the high incidence of bank robbery and extortion in the Los Angeles area.

A friend of Thomas's, who was a branch manager of a large commercial bank, had gone out one day to meet prospective clients at a restaurant without telling his secretary or anyone where he could be reached. While he was impatiently waiting for the clients, they were down at the bank, claiming to have kidnapped him, and were still in the process of making ransom demands when he walked back into his office. They should have made their phony luncheon reservations further away.

L.A. was the hold-up capitol of the world and Thomas didn't want either his or any other officer's unexplained absence to be used as a ruse for an extortion-kidnap threat to gain entry to the contents of the vault.

The craving for the smoky taste of good scotch had become almost overwhelming, and Thomas found it difficult to maintain his patience with this woman who was looking at him as if he were sprouting horns from the smooth skin of his slowly receding hairline.

The damn woman had an impertinent grimace of disapproval all over her face.

Was she actually criticizing his decision to cancel his luncheon and go do something for himself instead of the fucking bank? Who the hell did she think she was...?

Thomas had found himself becoming unaccountably angry at his secretary's attitude and vowed that he would replace her at the first opportunity.

Yes, that would be an excellent idea: supplant her with someone young and eager to do what she was told, someone who would be appreciative of the opportunity, someone better looking and easier on the eyes than this over-the-hill monument to stodgy conservatism.

And, Miss Thurgood, please contact maintenance and have them do something about the odor in this office.

Odor? Thurgood had taken a step into the office, her nose twitching in search of Thomas's complaint. I don't smell anything.

It stinks in here. I don't know what they've been using lately to clean the place, but I don't like it. Tell them to change brands or I'll change cleaning services.

Yes, sir, of course.

With a glare, Thomas had stalked out of his office and left his bewildered secretary in his wake.

§ § § §

In the acclimatized environment of the Town Car, Thomas took the quickest and shortest route back to the bank.

It was almost as if he were afraid to be out in the open after the nude club. He knew this feeling was ridiculous. He never thought of himself as being agoraphobic, but that was exactly how he felt with the current compulsion to get back into the marble sanctuary of the old bank building and its secure surroundings.

Regardless of his need to get back into the safety of his office, Thomas took a few moments, after turning the car over to the parking attendant, to go half way down the block to the small kiosk that specialized in newspapers, a few popular magazines, and a small selection of fresh flowers. He quickly selected a single rose and, without waiting for the vendor's offered baby's breath and green-leaf decoration, left a bill, and headed toward the office.

He placed the peace offering on Greta Thurgood's desk without comment and slipped quickly into his office before she could comment, question, or even read him his messages.

Startled, his secretary looked back at the closed door of her boss' office and he knew she must have been wondering what the hell all this was about.

That's what I'd like to know, Thomas thought.

With the door closed, it was her signal to leave him alone. Thomas seldom closed his door, reserving it for confidential meetings, private conversations, or just the need to have a few minutes of peace and quiet while he worked on a loan or budget problem.

Through the front window of the almost all-glass office, Thomas saw Greta start to rise, her fist full of blue and white telephone messages. He held up his hand before she could get out of her chair. He held up five fingers and flashed them at her twice: ten minutes.

That's all he wanted right now, ten minutes and then the could get back to the normal business of running one of Southern California's premier independent banks.

He picked up the phone and punched in number 19 on the speed dial. He could hear the automatic bleep-bleep as the device dialed his wife's number at Sagen/Century Real Estate. He had to smile at himself as he thought about the number. Three more weeks and he would have to change the speed dial code from 19 to 20.

The speed dial had been one of his special little talismans ever since he came to the bank. The number was always the same as the number of years he and Kathy had been married. Almost twenty years now. Twenty years of good, solid companionship and a loving relationship, the envy of their friends, and a continuous cause for prayerful thanks on his part. Not many people he knew could claim the kind of love and trust that he and Kathy shared. They had discovered in the rocky early years of their marriage that as long as they communicated openly and honestly with each other, almost anything could be worked out.

Almost anything.

Good afternoon, Sagen/Century; how may I help you?

Suddenly, Thomas didn't think he was prepared to discuss today's strange adventure. He knew Kathy wouldn't understand or appreciate his strange foray into the naked darkness of the topless/bottomless club.

He hung up on the disembodied voice without identifying himself or asking for his wife.

What was he calling her for? What did he have to say? What was there he wanted to explain to her?

He couldn't even explain to himself.

He stared at the papers on his desk as if they were strange messages, the inconsequential detritus of someone else's life, someone else's responsibility.

What the hell was happening to him?

CHAPTER TWO

It was late August and the Southern California summer evenings were beginning to get shorter, but not enough to cool the heat of the day on the downhill side of the high ridge that divided the crowded urban sprawl of the Los Angeles basin from the luxurious environs of Palos Verdes Estates.

Thomas supposed that using the term Estates to identify the high priced subdivision helped provide its residents with just enough snob appeal to justify the premium prices of the lots and homes upon them.

The manifest benefit of Palos Verdes Estates was the possibility that, with the right location, you could have an ocean view.

Thomas and Kathy Harper loved their panorama of the sea. Perched upon a steeply slopping hill off of Paseo Del Mar, the upper deck of their three-tiered house provided a panorama of the silvery-blue majesty of the Pacific Ocean.

The six thousand square foot, tri-level home was a constant reminder of their combined success, the advantages provided by their two-paycheck choices of employment.

Kathy was a real estate agent, a partner in her own company who, five years earlier, obtained the listing for the beautiful house. When she saw it she knew it was exactly what she had always wanted; and what Kathy wanted, Thomas usually did everything within his power to see that Kathy got.

Between the two of them they were able to afford an unaffordable home.

Kathy waived her commission on the sale since it would be paid to herself. The company, Sagen/Century, an independent franchisee in which she was an equal partner with Freida Sagen, cheerfully waived its percentage also.

The bank's appraiser, noting that the loan for the mortgage would be under the bank president's own name, low-balled his appraisal and came in under the market value. It wasn't something that Thomas had asked for and he was totally unaware of this benefit--as was the homeowner, who was completely oblivious that there could have been collusion between the purchaser of his home and the bank that would finance it.

If Thomas, as scrupulously honest as he was, had even suspected that the appraiser was willing to do this secret favor he would have insisted on an independent appraisal just to insure that it was a fair transaction and that no one could ever claim a conflict of interest on the part of either himself or the bank.

Regardless of how it came about, this all combined, with a bank board-approved loan at an extremely low interest rate, to bring the dream house in Palos Verdes Estates well within the reach of the Harper family's budget.

One of the distinct advantages of working for a bank was a favorable loan rate for any kind of legitimate financing, whether it was the purchase of the house, or should Thomas decide to exercise his stock options and purchase a block of bank stock. As long as the loans were both Board of Directors approved and met all the disclosure requirements of the Federal Reserve Bank's Regulation O, Thomas would avail himself of the executive-employee benefit.

One of the distinct disadvantages of these in-house transactions was that everyone at the bank, from the note teller to the loan processor, and every member of the Board of Directors, knew all of Thomas's financial business. But, what the hell, he had thought at the time, he had nothing to hide.

He and Kathy always kept the finances of the real estate company in a separate account at another bank, far away from his own income and financial obligations at Hawthorne First National.

Thomas didn't mind that everyone at the bank knew that he owed his soul to the company store. It was an open display of his commitment to the bank and his belief in both its and his own intertwined future.

§ § § §

Back in the Town Car after work, almost six hours since his luncheon foray into what he came to think of as the dark zone, Thomas could smell the lingering stench of sweat and urine and stale beer in the air-conditioned vehicle.

Like the greasy slick of some ubiquitous petroleum essence, it had rubbed off on the leather upholstery and now seemed to permeate his clothing. Perhaps he hadn't smelled it in the office because of the strong odors that must surely have been left my some janitorial disinfectant, but here in the car it was a reminder of his strange lunch-time trip.

Of all the things to crave, scotch would be the furthest from his tastes, he thought. And then to indulge himself with the lurid display of tired flesh in a cheap nude bar was beyond his rational comprehension. Not that he was a prude by any means, but ogling naked girls in public was not his style.

It was almost, he thought driving up Hawthorne Boulevard, as if during that small segment of time he were someone else: someone with different appetites, and different methods of satisfying them.

The large Lincoln crawled on the steep incline of Hawthorne, one single unit in a long segmented metallic snake of brake lights. The evening commute traffic at this time, even off the freeways, was a burden for the wide, asphalt ribbon that wound up toward the expensive homes and their precious ocean views.

Ahead of him, the luminous glow of the unseen setting sun speckled the fluffy underside of cirrocumulus clouds with a golden glaze of still-bright light. As soon as he crested the hill he would be driving directly into the ball of heat that still hovered on the horizon over the water.

It was convenient working just five miles down the hill from where he lived. He seldom had reason to fight the freeway chaos, which by three in the afternoon became multicolored metal rivers fed by limitless cement tributaries. The side streets and mini-arteries like Hawthorne, Crenshaw, and Century, leading from the nearby airport were bad enough without breasting the rising tides of the over-flooded Los Angeles freeway system.

He wondered if Kathy and the kids were home already. That would be nice. But their schedules were all so divergent that sometimes it seemed impossible for them to get together without a formal appointment.

Kathy was usually out somewhere, showing a house or even a complex of offices to prospective clients. It was only in the last few years with the high-vacancy rate in office space that his wife had agreed to handle commercial placements in addition to residential ones.

Unfortunately, it was seldom her choice as to the timing of appointments. The constant juggling of multiple engagements with a number of potential purchasers was a definite art, but it also required a tremendous amount of flexibility on her part, and patience on that of her family. But they all understood that, within reason, the client came first. They appreciated their lifestyle too much to be impractical and selfish in this matter.

His daughter, Christen, a junior in high school, took little time or consolation in the comforts of home. For her, in the flower of full rebellion, it seemed any place was preferable to the confines of her own family.

Thomas understood his daughter. And to the degree that he could comprehend this phase she was going through, he tolerated her argumentative and constantly contentious attitude. He had been that way in his own middle teen years: combative, rebellious, critical of anything that smacked of adult authority. Surely, there had been more than one occasion when his adoptive parents regretted their decision to take in the three year-old orphan the county adoption society had finally offered them.

He could easily understand Christen's need to assert her individuality and push all the boundaries of parental control to the furthest limit. She would grow out of it. He had.

In the meantime, Thomas looked upon his beautiful young daughter with wary awe and continued concern that somewhere down the line, before she came to her senses and got her act together, she might make a mistake from which there would be no recovery: tattoos, alcohol, drugs, pregnancy.

Pregnancy. That was his biggest fear. Every time he looked there was a new and different boy either picking her up or delivering her home in the middle of the night. He knew that intrinsically she was a good girl, but even good girls make mistakes.

Richard, on the other hand, was a salmon who would never swim upstream. If his son could find a way around an obstacle, he would take that path of least resistance.

Rick was the antithesis of his sister. Actively involved in the football program, going into his second year of high school, he also enjoyed the family environment with an open honesty and candid communication that often astounded his parents.

Thank God Kathy provided them all with a common focus. Even Chrisy, who would seem to relate to no adult whatsoever, could be caught copying her mother's mannerisms, and hopefully absorbing, if even unwittingly, some of the maturity and purpose of her parent.

Regardless of his daughter's volatile nature during this painful growth process, Thomas still felt tender and protective toward her. He was willing to be patient.

§ § § §

Goddamn it! Thomas muttered, anger suddenly flaring as he pulled into the three-car driveway that led to the huge garage, which occupied half of the bottom level of the house.

A spray of dirt and grass clippings lined each side of the driveway where the gardeners had edged. Somehow in their haste to move on to the next--and probably less demanding job--they had forgotten to clean up completely after themselves. It wasn't as if they had to sweep up and dispose of the trimmings, for God's sake, they could blow them away with their obnoxious noisy devices, which frequently enough disturbed his Saturday morning rest when neighbors' yards were done by inconsiderate gardners.

Fuckin' Spics. Thomas didn't know if the landscape people were Mexican--more likely Vietnamese or Korean--but the need to