Posted Date : 17-02-2020
1 MITCH CUDAHY was a genuine all-American hero. Although he'd be the first to tell folks he'd only been doing his job, the 27-year-old Phoenix fire fighter had a medal from the mayor, a certificate of recommendation from the fire chief, and most impressive of all, he'd even received a letter from the President, written on official White House stationery. It hung on the station wall, right beside the crayon drawings from Mrs. Bingham's first grade class, which were a thank-you to Ladder Company No. 13 for a tour of the firehouse. In the weeks following his death-defying dash into a burning apartment building to rescue twin infant girls from the flames, Mitch had appeared on "Good Morning America," "The Today Show," "Nightline," and "Ricki Lake," making his very proud mother the star of her neighborhood. So with all that going for him, what the hell was he doing up a tree, juggling an open can of tuna fish while trying to keep from falling on his butt? "You're not high enough," the aggravated female voice complained from the ground. "You'll never reach Buffy from there." "I'm doing my best, darlin'," Mitch said through clenched teeth. He'd just reached for a neighboring limb when the one beneath his feet cracked. There was a chorus of gasps from the crowd gathered below him as he managed to grab onto a branch above his head. As he hung there, dangling high above the desert floor, Mitch didn't feel much like a hero. "Now look what you did," the 7-year-old girl scolded. "You dropped the tuna fish." Tempted to suggest the smart-mouthed little kid rescue her own damn cat, Mitch reminded himself that all-American heroes were not allowed to cuss at kids. But that didn't stop him from cursing beneath his breath-ripe, pungent expletives directed at Buffy the adventurous Siamese, the damn bureaucratic animal control guys who'd decided that rescuing treed cats wasn't in their job description and yes, even sexy, blond Meredith Roberts of KSAZ, for showing up with her TV cameraman to capture his indignity on videotape. Yet even as irritated as he was at most of the western world at that moment, Mitch saved his harshest condemnation for himself. Hero? How about chump? The muscles in his arms were about to give up and his hands were sweating. With a mighty effort, he managed to pull himself up on to the limp. Straddling it, he found himself staring into the oblique blue eyes of a seal point kitten. "You realize, of course, that you've caused a lot of people a great deal of trouble," Mitch said to the terrified kitten. The cat's tail, fluffed up to 3 times its normal size, was twitching back and forth like a pendulum. "But it's okay now. We're going to get all four paws back on solid ground." When he reached for the kitten, it backed up, arched its back and began hissing like a burst radiator hose. "Come on, cat." He was unable to keep the edge of frustrated from his coaxed tone. "Look, there's a little girl down there who's got a can of tuna fish with your name on it." Inching forward, Mitch forced down his irritation and began talking to the reluctant animal in the same rational, calm tone he'd used on more than one occasion to convince a frightened civilian to jump from a 3rd-story window into the net below. "And not just an ordinary old cat chow stuff." he crooned. "This is genuine, water-packed white albacore we're talking about, Buffy. The caviar of canned tuna." The closer Mitch got, the louder the cat's howling became-a grating, particularly Siamese complaint that affected Mitch's already touchy nerve endings like fingernails scraping across a chalkboard. "That's my girl." The kitten was inches away. Pasting a huge, false smile on his face, Mitch made a grab for it. Unfortunately, the cat was quicker. It leapt deftly out of his grasp and as he struggled to regain his balance, it landed, razor-sharp claws extended, smack in the middle of his back. "Dammit!" It was a roar, a bellow of fury mixed with pain that only made the howling kitten dig in deeper. Tempted to peel the cat off and fling it into the neighboring county, Mitch remembered-just in time-the television crew filming from the ground. "You're just damn lucky we've got witnesses, you miserable, mangy fur bag." Grinding his teeth against the needle-sharp pain, he gingerly made his way back down the tree, the kitten's strident complaints ringing in his ear. About 10 feet from the ground, the cat bailed out, abandoning the relative safety of Mitch's back like a teenage dragster peeling away from a red light. Buffy the Flying Kitten took a patch of Mitch's skin with her, and his bellowed curse made that scene unsuitable for the TV station's family audience. Unfortunately, the shot of all-American hero Mitch Cudahy's three-point landing in a spreading cholla did made the evening news. Mitch's mother, always eager to see her famous son on television, was thrilled. |
While Mitch was playing the reluctant hero, Sasha Mikhailova, recent immigrant to the United States, sat in a government office across the city, scared to death. She was also determined not to show it. Especially to the man who'd been a constant source of aggravation for the past month. Just as Superman had Lex Luther and Batman had The Joker, Sasha had been cursed with Mr. Donald O.-for obnoxious, she thought-Potter. Deported. "You can't possibly be serious," she said, but she knew she was. The word rolled in her mind like a death knell. Her lips began to tremble, she managed, just barely, to control them as she looked around the cramped office that offered not a single clue to the man seated across the government-issue black metal desk. There were no family photos, no newspaper cartoons taped to the side of the desktop computer, no personal mementoes of any kind. "The government doesn't make jokes, Ms. Mikhailova," he said, his voice as stiff as his manner. As she looked across the unrelentingly neat desktop of her nemesis, she couldn't help thinking what her employer-and friend-had recently called him when he'd first shown up at the diner during the lunch rush hour. Squinty-eyed weasel. The term, she decided, definitely fit. In all her 24 years, she'd never met a more mean-spirited individual. And considering all the bureaucrats she'd had to deal with to get to this country in the first place, that was really saying something. "A lack of humor seems to be a universal trait where governments are concerned." Although her nerves were humming, Sasha lifted her chin fearlessly. "However, your government has made a mistake." She decided, for discretion's sake, not to mention that the mistake was mostly his. "You cannot deport me." He arched a pale blond brow, licked the tip of his index finger and began flipping through the thick pages of her immigration file. "It states here that when you first requested a visitor's visa, you declared yourself to be a nurse-" "I worked as a surgical nurse. In St. Petersburg." She'd planned to attend nursing school here in the United States, to earn her license to practice, as soon as she'd settled down. Unfortunately the plan, like so many others, had turned out to be impossible, given the fact that she'd moved around like a Ukrainian gypsy since her arrival in New York one year ago. "And then you were an English teacher?" His voice was thick with disbelief. "Only part-time." They'd gone over the same things the half-dozen other times she'd been summoned downtown to his office. He had all the information in her file. So why was he torturing her this way? Sasha decided he enjoyed toying with her emotions the same way a fat cat enjoyed tormenting a cornered mouse. "My mother was a translator for the U.S. consulate in Leningrad.
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