Tuesday night, at Bouley, in No Man's Land, a fairlyunremarkable marathon dinner, even after I tell the table, "Listen,guys, my life is a living hell," they utterly ignore me, the groupassembled (Richard Perry, Edward Lampert, John Constable,Craig McDermott, Jim Kramer, Lucas Tanner) continuing to argueabout allocating assets, which stocks look best for the upcomingdecade, hardbodies, real estate, gold, why long-term bonds aretoo risky now, the spread collar, portfolios, how to use powereʃectively, new ways to exercise, Stolichnaya Cristall, how bestto impress very important people, eternal vigilance, life at itsbest, here in Bouley I cannot seem to control myself, here in aroom that contains a whole host of victims, lately I can't helpnoticing them everywhere—in business meetings, nightclubs,restaurants, in passing taxis and in elevators, on line atautomated tellers and on porno tapes, in David's Cookies and onCNN, everywhere, all of them having one thing in common: theyare prey, and during dinner I almost become unglued,plummeting into a state of near vertigo that forces me to excusemyself before dessert, at which point I use the rest room, do aline of cocaine, pick up my Giorgio Armani wool overcoat andthe .357 magnum barely concealed within it from the coatcheck,strap on a holster and then I'm outside, but on The Patty WintersShow this morning there was an interview with a man who set hisdaughter on ɹre while she was giving birth, at dinner we all hadshark ... in Tribeca it's misty out, sky on the verge of rain, therestaurants down here empty, after midnight the streets remote,unreal, the only sign of human life someone playing a saxophoneon the corner of Duane Street, in the doorway of what used to beDuPlex, which is now an abandoned bistro that closed last month,a young guy, bearded, white beret, playing a very beautiful butclichéd saxophone solo, at his feet an open umbrella with adollar, damp, and some change in it, unable to resist I move up tohim, listening to the music, something from Les Misérables, heacknowledges my presence, nods, and while he closes his eyes—lifting the instrument up, leaning his head back during what Iguess he thinks is a passionate moment—in one ɻuid motion Itake the .357 magnum out of its holster and, not wanting toarouse anyone in the vicinity, I screw a silencer onto the gun, acold autumn wind rushes up the street, engulɹng us, and whenthe victim opens his eyes, spotting the gun, he stops playing, thetip of the saxophone still in his mouth, I pause too, then nod forhim to go on, and, tentatively, he does, then I raise the gun to hisface and in midnote pull the trigger, but the silencer doesn't workand in the same instant a huge crimson ring appears behind hishead the booming sound of the gunshot deafens me, stunned, hiseyes still alive, he, falls to his knees, then onto his saxophone, Ipop the clip and replace it with a full one, then something badhappens ... because while doing this I've failed to notice the squad carthat was traveling behind me—doing what? god only knows,handing out parking tickets?—and after the noise the magnummakes echoes, fades, the siren of the squad car pierces the night,out of nowhere, sending my heart into palpitations, I startwalking away from the trembling body, slowly, casually at ɹrst,as if innocent, then I break into a run, full-ɻedged, the cop carscreeching after me, over a loudspeaker a cop shouts uselessly,"halt stop halt put down your weapon," ignoring them I make aleft on Broadway, heading down toward City Hall Park, duckinginto an alleyway, the squad car follows but only makes it halfwayas the alley narrows, a spray of blue sparks ɻying up before itgets stuck and I run out the end of the alley as fast as I can ontoChurch Street, where I ɻag down a cab, hop in the front seat andscream at its driver, a young Iranian guy completely taken bysurprise, to "get the hell out of here fast—no drive," I'm wavingthe gun at him, in his face, but he panics, cries out in mangledEnglish "don't shoot me please don't kill me," holding his handsup, I mutter "oh shit" and scream "drive" but he's terriɹed, "ohdon't shoot me man don't shoot," I impatiently mutter "fuckyourself" and, raising the gun to his face, pull the trigger, thebullet splatters his head open, cracks it in half like a dark redwatermelon against the windshield, and I reach over him, openthe door, push the corpse out, slam the door, start driving ... in an adrenaline rush causing panting, I can only get a fewblocks, partly because of panic, mostly because of the blood,brains, chunks of head covering the windshield, and I barelyavoid a collision with another cab on Franklin—is it?—andGreenwich, veering the taxi sharply to the right, swerving intothe side of a parked limousine, then I shift into reverse, screechdown the street, turn on the windshield wipers, realizing too latethat the blood sprayed across the glass is on the inside, attempt towipe it away with a gloved hand, and racing blindly downGreenwich I lose control entirely, the cab swerves into a Koreandeli, next to a karaoke restaurant called Lotus Blossom I've beento with Japanese clients, the cab rolling over fruit stands,smashing through a wall of glass, the body of a cashier thuddingacross the hood, Patrick tries to put the cab in reverse butnothing happens, he staggers out of the cab, leaning against it, anerve-racking silence follows, "nice going, Bateman," he mutters,limping out of the store, the body on the hood moaning in agony,Patrick with no idea where the cop running toward him acrossthe street has come from, he's yelling something into his walkietalkie, thinking Patrick is stunned, but Patrick surprises him bylunging out before the cop can get to his gun and he knocks himover onto the sidewalk ... where people from the Lotus Blossom are now standing,staring dumbly at the wreckage, no one helping the cop as thetwo men lie struggling on the sidewalk, the cop wheezing fromexertion on top of Patrick, trying to wrestle the magnum from hisgrasp, but Patrick feels infected, like gasoline is coursing throughhis veins instead of blood, it gets windier, the temperature drops,it starts raining, but softly they roll into the street, Patrick keepsthinking there should be music, he forces a demonic leer, hisheart thumping, and manages quite easily to bring the gun up tothe cop's face, two pairs of hands holding it but Patrick's ɹngerpulls the trigger, the bullet blowing a crease in the top of theoɽcer's skull yet failing to kill him, but lowering his aim with theaid of the loosening grip of the oɽcer's ɹngers Patrick shoots himin the face, the bullet's exit casting a lingering pinkish mist whilesome of the people on the sidewalk scream, do nothing, hide, runback into the restaurant, as the cop car Patrick thought he evadedin the alley careens toward the deli, red lights ɻashing,screeching to a halt right when Patrick trips over the curb,collapsing onto the sidewalk, at the same time reloading themagnum, hiding behind the corner, the terror he thought hadpassed engulɹng him again, thinking: I have no idea what I'vedone to increase my chances of getting caught, I shot asaxophonist? a saxophonist? who was probably a mime too? forthat I get this? and in the near distance he can hear other carscoming, lost in the maze of streets, the cops now, right here,don't bother with warnings anymore, they just start shooting andhe returns their gunɹre from his belly, getting a glimpse of bothcops behind the open doors of the squad car, guns ɻashing like ina movie and this makes Patrick realize he's involved in an actualgunɹght of sorts, that he's trying to dodge bullets, that the dreamthreatens to break, is gone, that he's not aiming carefully, justobliviously returning gunɹre, lying there, when a stray bullet,sixth in a new round, hits the gas tank of the police car, theheadlights dim before it bursts apart, sending a ɹreball billowingup into the darkness, the bulb of a streetlamp above it explodingunexpectedly in a burst of yellow-green sparks, ɻames washingover the bodies of the policemen both living and dead, shatteringall the windows of Lotus Blossom, Patrick's ears ringing ... while running toward Wall Street, still in Tribeca, he staysaway from where the streetlamps shine the brightest, notices thatthe entire block he's lurching down is gentriɹed, then he dashespast a row of Porsches, tries to open each one and sets a string ofcar alarm sirens oʃ, the car he would like to steal is a blackRange Rover with permanent four-wheel drive, an aircraft-gradealuminum body on a boxed steel chassis and a fuel-injected V-8engine, but he can't ɹnd one, and though this disappoints himhe's also intoxicated by the whirlwind of confusion, by the cityitself, the rain falling from an ice-cold sky but still warm enoughin the city, on the ground, for fog to drift through thepassageways the skyscrapers create in Battery Park, in WallStreet, wherever, most of them a kaleidoscopic blur, and now he'sjumping over an embankment, somersaulting over it, then he'srunning like crazy, running full tilt, his brain locked into thephysical exertion of utter, sheer panic, helter-skelter, now hethinks a car is following him down a deserted highway, now hefeels the night accepts him, from somewhere else a shot is heardbut doesn't really register because Patrick's mind is out of sync,forgetting his destination, until like a mirage his oɽce building,where Pierce & Pierce is located, comes into view, the lights in itgoing oʃ, ɻoor by ɻoor, as if a darkness is rising through it,running another hundred yards, two hundred yards, ducking intothe stairs, below, where? his senses blocked for the ɹrst time withfear and bewilderment, and dumbstruck with confusion he rushesinto the lobby of what he thinks is his building, but no,something seems wrong, what is it? you moved (the move itselfwas a nightmare even though Patrick has a better oɽce now, thenew Barney's and Godiva stores adjacent to the lobby ease thestrain) and he's gotten the buildings mixed up, it's only at theelevator ... doors, both of which are locked, where he notices the hugeJulian Schnabel in the lobby and he realizes wrong fucking buildingand he whirls around, making a mad scramble for the revolvingdoors, but the night watchman who tried to get Patrick'sattention before now waves him in, as he's about to bolt out ofthe lobby, "Burning the midnight oil, Mr. Smith? You forgot tosign in," and frustrated, Patrick shoots at him while spinningonce, twice through the glass doors which thrust him back intothe lobby of god only knows where as the bullet catches thewatchman in the throat, knocking him backward, leaving a sprayof blood hanging momentarily in midair before drizzling down onthe watchman's contorted, twisted face, and the black janitorPatrick has just noticed has been watching the scene from acorner of the lobby, mop in hand, bucket by his feet, drops themop, raises his hands, and Patrick shoots him right between theeyes, a stream of blood covers his face, the back of his headexplodes in a spray, behind him the bullet knocks out a chunk ofmarble, the force of the blast slams him against the wall, Patrickdashing across the street toward the light of his new oɽce, whenhe walks in ... nodding toward Gus, our night watchman, signing in, headingup in the elevator, higher, toward the darkness of his ɻoor, calmis eventually restored, safe in the anonymity of my new oɽce,able with shaking hands to pick up the cordless phone, lookingthrough my Rolodex, exhausted, eyes falling upon Harold Carnes'number, dialing the seven digits slowly, breathing deeply, evenly,I decide to make public what has been, until now, my privatedementia, but Harold isn't in, business, London, I leave amessage, admitting everything, leaving nothing out, thirty, forty,a hundred murders, and while I'm on the phone with Harold'smachine a helicopter with a searchlight appears, ɻying low overthe river, lightning cracks the sky open in jagged bolts behind it,heading toward the building I was last at, descending to land onthe building's roof across from this one, the bottom of thebuilding surrounded already by police cars, two ambulances, anda SWAT team leaps out of the helicopter, a half-dozen armed mendisappear into the entrance on the deck of the roof, ɻares arelined up what seems like everywhere, and I'm watching all of thiswith the phone in my hand, crouched by my desk, sobbingthough I don't know why, into Harold's machine, "I left her in aparking lot ... near a Dunkin' Donuts ... somewhere aroundmidtown ..." and ɹnally, after ten minutes of this, I sign oʃ byconcluding, "Uh, I'm a pretty sick guy," then hang up, but I callback and after an interminable beep, proving my message wasindeed recorded, I leave another: "Listen, it's Bateman again, andif you get back tomorrow, I may show up at Da Umberto's tonightso, you know, keep your eyes open," and the sun, a planet on ɹre,gradually rises over Manhattan, another sunrise, and soon thenight turns into day so fast it's like some kind of optical illusion...
