Deadline Y2K by Mark Joseph Page B

because no one believed anything was going to happen. Garcia understood politics and didn’t want to brand himself as an alarmist nut by shooting off his mouth. Not that it would do any good. Yesterday he’d uttered the phrase “Y2K” to a divisional commander who’d replied, “Why too what?”
    At 6:30 in the morning Garcia walked into Bernie’s Deli at 85th and Broadway, ordered scrambled and toast, and poured himself a cup of coffee. Forty-five, an inch over six feet, heavy and imposing in his uniform with double rows of brass buttons, Garcia dropped his hat and briefcase on a rear table as he did every day. It was a Friday, prelude to a long New Year’s Eve weekend, and the good citizens of Manhattan were making earnest preparations to drink too much and wear funny hats as if this were an ordinary New Year’s Eve. He’d seen twenty-five New Year’s Eves as a cop, but this year, besides the usual boozy amateurs puking in his radio cars, he had to face millennium crazies, space invaders, and religious lunatics predicting the end of the world, all before midnight when the electronic shit was scheduled to hit the millennium fan.
    He really loved being a cop, and long ago had learned that preventing a crime was far better than catching and punishing a criminal. In this case, the city, that anonymous bitch, was about to commit a sin of omission, a horrendous crime of neglect that he was unable to prevent.
    Garcia’s old friend Bill Packard arrived at the same time as his eggs.
    â€œHappy New Year, comandante, ” said Packard, a staff cardiac surgeon at Bellevue hospital.
    â€œFuck you, too, Bill.”
    â€œYou don’t look happy.”
    â€œI just want it over with,” Garcia said. “Walking over here I passed three liquor stores, all busy at six in the morning.”
    â€œWell,” Packard said with a big smile as he sat down, “today’s the day. You ready?”
    â€œGimme a break. Nobody’s ready.”
    â€œCopeland is.”
    â€œHe says he is,” Garcia retorted. “There’s a difference.”
    â€œWe’re gonna find out soon enough,” Packard said, looking at his watch. “In seventeen hours and fifteen minutes. Hey, Bernie!” he shouted. “Turn on the TV, will ya?”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œThe new year will arrive in the middle of the Pacific Ocean in a few minutes.”
    â€œSo what?”
    â€œJust turn it on, Bernie.”
    â€œYou want some breakfast, Bill?”
    â€œYeah, yeah, yeah.”
    The delicatessen owner grudgingly switched on CNN and scowled at a commercial for Budweiser, the official beer of millennium insanity.
    â€œExpecting a big night?” the policeman asked the doctor.
    â€œAre you kidding?” Packard replied. “I’m just glad I don’t work in the emergency room, but I got problems you wouldn’t believe. Do you know how many computers we have at Bellevue? Do you have any idea how many computers run every goddamn device in my ICU? Do you know how many have been checked out? None. N-O-N-E, that’s how many.”
    â€œYou’re supposed to work on the people, Bill, not the computers.”
    Grimacing, shaking his head with frustration, Packard poured himself a cup of coffee and stared at the TV.
    Jonathon Spillman, now the manager of the brand-new Safeway Store at 96th and Broadway, walked in and sat down.
    â€œDon’t say it,” Garcia warned.
    â€œDon’t say what?”
    Packard winked and silently mouthed, Happy New Year.
    â€œI’m Jewish, in case you forgot,” Spillman reminded them. “The New Year is in September, and the year is 5760, if you didn’t know. Where’s Copeland?”
    â€œNot here yet,” the doctor replied. “Tonight he’ll find out if all his fancy software works. Will Donnie boy save Chase Manhattan from extinction? As if I give a shit.”
    â€œCopeland