A Face in the Crowd

ready to be angry.
    I’m speaking of him in the past tense, Evers realized.
    “The guy I talked to said they found you at your place. Said you’d been dead for a while too.”
    The guy next to Evers nudged him again. “Lookin’ good, buddy,” he said.
    On the JumboTron, shocking in its homely familiarity, was Evers’s darkened bedroom. In the middle of the bed he’d shared with Ellie, the pillowtop king that was now too big for him, Evers lay still and pale, his eyes half-lidded, his lips purplish, his mouth a stiff rictus. Foam had dried like old spiderwebs on his chin.
    When Evers turned to his seatmate, wanting to confirm what he was seeing, the seat beside him—the row, the section, the whole Tropicana Dome—was empty. And yet the players kept playing.
    “They said you killed yourself.”
    “I didn’t kill myself,” Evers replied, and thought: That damn expired Ambien. And maybe putting it with the scotch wasn’t such a great idea . How long has it been? Since Friday night?
    “I know, it didn’t sound like you.”
    “So, are you watching the game?”
    “I turned it off. Fuckin’ cop—that fuckin’ ass-knot—upset me.”
    “Turn it on again,” Evers said.
    “Okay,” Kaz said. “Lemme grab the remote.”
    “You know, we should have been nicer to Lester Embree.”
    “Water over the dam, old buddy. Or under the bridge. Or whatever the fuck it is.”
    “Maybe not. From now on, don’t be so angry. Try to be nicer to people. Try to be nicer to everyone. Do that for me, will you, Kaz?”
    “What the Christ is wrong with you? You sound like a fuckin’ Hallmark card on Mother’s Day.”
    “I suppose I do,” Evers said. He found this a very sad idea, somehow. On the mound, Beckett was peering in for the sign.
    “Hey, Dino! There you are! You sure don’t look dead.” Kaz gave out his old rusty cackle.
    “I don’t feel it.”
    “I was scared there for a minute,” Kaz said. “Fuckin’ crank yanker. Wonder how he got my number.”
    “Dunno,” Evers said, surveying the empty park. Though of course he knew. After Ellie died, of the nine million people in Tampa–St. Pete, Kaz was the only person he could put down as an emergency contact. And that idea was sadder still.
    “All right, buddy, I’ll let you get back to the game. Maybe golf next week if it doesn’t rain.”
    “We’ll see,” Evers said. “Stay cool, Kazzie, and—”
    Kaz joined him then, and they chanted the last line together, as they had many, many times before: “ Don’t let the bastards get you down! ”
    That was it, it was over. He sensed things moving again, a flurry behind him, at the periphery of his vision. He looked around, phone in hand, and saw the spotted usher creakily leading Uncle Elmer and Aunt June down the stairs, and several girls he’d dated in high school, including the one who’d been sort of semiconscious—or maybe unconscious would be closer to the truth—when he’d had her. Behind them came Miss Pritchett with her hair down for once, and Mrs. Carlisle from the drugstore, and the Jansens, the elderly neighbors whose deposit bottles he’d stolen off their back porch. From the other side, as if it were a company outing, a second, equally ancient usher was filling in the rows at the top of the section with former Speedy employees, a number of them in their blue uniforms. He recognized Don Blanton, who’d been questioned during a child pornography investigation in the mid-nineties and had hung himself in his Malden garage. Evers remembered how shocked he’d been, both by the idea of someone he knew possibly being involved in kiddie porn and by Don’s final action. He’d always liked the man, and hadn’t wanted to let him go, but with that kind of accusation hanging over his head, what else could he do? The reputation of a company’s employees was part of its bottom line.
    He still had some battery left. What the hell, he thought. It was a big game. They were probably watching on the Cape.
    “Hey, Dad,” Pat answered.
    “You watching the game?”
    “The kids are. The grown-ups are playing cards.”
    Next to the first usher stood Lennie Wheeler’s daughter, still in her black crepe and veil. She pointed like a dark spectre at Evers. She’d lost all her baby fat, and Evers wondered if that had happened before she died, or after.
    “Go look at the game, son.”
    “Hang on,” Pat said, followed by the screek of a chair. “Okay, I’m watching.”
    “Right behind home, in