by Dan Taylor
He sits there, breathing heavily through his nose. His upper lip is also doing a funny little dance, like he’s a toothless OAP sucking on a breath mint. He’s thinking, and almost believes me, maybe on account of his sister, whoever she is, having told him a few lies over the years and her being a compulsive liar or mentally ill.
But at this point, I’m just guessing.
So I get out my cell phone, hold it out to him, and say, “Go ahead. Check my phone. Look through the contacts list and SMS messages. See if there’s anyone by the name Tracy Lucy.”
He taps a finger on his pursed lips a few times, and then says, “You could’ve deleted all evidence of your interactions with Tracy before I got here.”
“Unlikely. You’re an unexpected but welcome guest, just making sure what you think’s a wild-goose chase is in fact that. If I had deleted text messages, I’d surely have her number saved in my phone.”
“You could’ve written it down in your little black book.”
“I own an iPad and the corresponding cell phone. I could barely read my own writing in an address book, let alone organize my extra-marital love life with one.”
He snatches it out of my hand.
And diplomatically I say, “I’d offer you a drink, but this won’t take long.”
He looks up from the cell phone screen and says, “Is it new?”
“No. Note the battery life. It’s currently at around fifteen percent, and I charged it at lunch. But all you’ll find in there are messages to and from my wife. And a couple where I was prompted to remind my receptionist of office hours.”
He pokes at the screen, finds it locked, and then asks for my code. I take it from him, type it in, and then hand it back. “I take it you know how to navigate that particular model and iOS?”
He ignores me and spends the next five minutes looking through presumably the messages, contacts list, and my photos, as a couple minutes in he says, “Cute kid,” and I thank him for thinking so and letting me know.
He stops, sighs, and then does something unexpected: He gets up out of his seat and shakes my hand, even going as far as sandwiching it between his two hands. Third shake in, he says, “My apologies… Jacob, is it?”
“Jake, please.”
“Okay, Jake, I’m truly sorry for this misunderstanding. Sis, she’s a few crackers short of a world record mouthful. It’s just this time, with the person turning out to actually be a P.I. and all…”
“There’s no need to explain. We all face challenges in our day-to-day lives.” I pause. “Am I right in assuming she’s prone to suffering delusions of this kind?”
He nods yes, looking sheepish for having taken this ill-advised course of action. And I’m guessing not for the first time.
I say, “And does she happen to drive Blvd West regularly?”
His eyes narrow. “She drives that route every Wednesday, on her way to her therapist.”
I click my fingers. “Then we can probably assume she’s seen my billboard more than once. That sure seems like it might be the source of the details of this particular delusion.”
He looks up at the ceiling, looking weary and embarrassed. “Oh, boy. What a klutz.”
“Don’t be hard on yourself. If I were you, I’d have done the same thing. It’s one thing the boy crying wolf; it’s another if the boy just so happens to be facing the same challenges your poor sister is facing. If it makes you feel any better—and this is seeming more likely by the minute—I’d like to take a look at a photo of her, make sure she didn’t come here under a false name, just so you can gain peace of mind.”
“No, I don’t think that’s necessary.”
“If she’s seen my billboard, it’s possible she came here to act out her delusion. Please. Thirty percent of my female clients use an alias when they’re testing the water. And that’s thirty percent of the ones who go ahead and contract me for work. The percentage is surely higher when you factor in prospective clients who pass.”
“I’ve wasted enough of your time already.”
“I’m not busy, and I understand how it is to care for a family member who can’t tell their apples from their oranges some days. Show me a photo and we can tick that box, make sure she hasn’t been to my office. If it turns out she has, I’ll be sure to phone you the next time she comes. Here at Hancock Investigations we recognize the importance of amicably and effectively working alongside the real pros.”
He goes to get his cell phone out of his pocket and then stops. Says, “This is unnecessary. I must’ve had half a brain for believing her again.”
“If it makes you sleep better at night, not to mention it might be an important part of her therapy to have it proved to her her interaction with me was a delusion, I think you should go ahead and show me a photo.”
He sighs and takes it out his cell. After tapping the screen for a minute or so, he leans over and hands the phone to me. I expect to be presented with a Facebook profile photo, but instead I’m presented with a photo displayed on the Photos app. The woman I’m looking at has coarse chestnut-colored hair, a giant smile, and huge eyes, crazy, like the medication she took shouldn’t have been mixed with alcohol. I nod my head as I look at it, saying to myself, “Just as I thought.”
Surprised, he says, “So you do recognize her?”
I look at him and say, “I’ve never seen this woman in my life.”
“Then why were you—”
“Nodding my head and saying, ‘Just as I thought’?”
“Yeah?”
“That look her in eyes, it’s the same one I see in Aunt Gene’s when I go to visit her every Saturday morning. Breaks my heart to see such distress.” I hand the phone back to him. “I’m glad I could help.”
“I can show you another one. That’s a pretty old photo.”
“Unnecessary. Tracy, is it?”
He nods.
“She has chestnut-colored hair, with volume like an eighties’ underwear model. That’s my favorite color and density. Had I seen this woman before, I wouldn’t be able to expunge her image from my mind.”
He frowns, so I elaborate, “My mom had chestnut-colored hair before she passed from cancer last year. Colon. And she blow-dried it to the very end.”
“Her colon?”
“Her hair.”
“Oh, I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you for being so compassionate.”
Wanting to end the conversation, I don’t offer any other pleasantries, and after an awkward twenty or so seconds where we make fleeting, occasional eye contact, he rises from his seat, shakes my hand again, and thanks me for cooperating.
“It’s the least I could do. I hope the best for you and your sister.”
“That means a lot, Jake. Really.”
After Detective Lucy has left my office, I wait a couple minutes, enough for him to be out of the building, and then open the bottom drawer in the drawer unit by my legs. In there, the sole occupant, is my newly acquired little red address book.
I take it out, flip to the first page, and type the number into my cell phone and press the SEND CALL button.
When it goes through to voicemail, I wait for the beep and then say, “Hi, Tracy, it’s Jake. What the hell have you told your brother, you crazy bitch?”
3.
Ten minutes later I’m still sitting in my office, hitting a ball to and fro with a paddle that’s attached to it by a length of elastic. When I lose my rhythm, I lay it on the table, the ball lying under the paddle, and check my cell phone. Tracy Lucy hasn’t phoned back or sent a text message.
Office hours, as I’ve told Daisy on numerous occasions, are from eight AM till six PM, five-thirty on Fridays. It’s ten minutes to six.
I get up out of my seat and walk over to the office door, open it, and tell Daisy with a smile she can knock off early today. She deserves it.
It takes around five minutes for Daisy to leave. As she collects her things, which are strewn about her workstation, we make small t
alk: what she’s going to cook for dinner, the shows she’s going to catch up on on Netflix, and for the second time this week what her cat’s called.
As usual, before she completes the leaving process, she thanks me for employing her and asks for any feedback on how she can improve her performance. I suspect she’s had some shitty bosses over the years, and feels worthless, which is why, like usual, I tell her she’s doing a perfect job, and the only feedback I can provide her with is to keep on smiling, adding: “It lights up your face, and I never get sick of seeing it.”
I watch in the window down at the street for her, and a couple minutes later I see her get into her three-door car and drive off.
I’m wary of how it will go with Tracy, but I don’t own a gun, though I have the next best thing: a can of mace, which I keep under the desk, held in place by two strips of Velcro, for easy access in case of emergencies.
It came as a set with a rape alarm, which I discarded shortly after purchasing it.
I lock up the office, take the elevator down to the lobby, and then go out to the street. It’s one of those rare rainy evenings in Hollywood, and the rain is pitter-patting onto the leaves of the palm trees which line the sidewalk, like a shower cascading onto a snare drum.
Upon going up to my rental, I sigh, as there’s another parking ticket. I’m parked in the correct space, the one allocated to me by the Department of Transportation, the one I got free lease of through the rental of the office space, but the guy who made the sign denoting that space is reserved for me made a typo. The permit I have displayed on the inner side of my windshield says my name how it’s spelled on my birth certificate, but the sign reads, “Jake Hacock.”
I’ve been waiting over a week for them to change it, and assumed that the traffic guy who patrols this area would make the great leap of recognizing that Jake Hancock’s probably Jake “Hacock,” which I think we can both agree is really close to the name displayed on my parking permit.
I take it out from underneath the windshield wiper, unlock my rental, and get in the driver’s side.
After I’ve placed it among the others in the glove compartment, along with the can of mace, I open up my little red book and type Tracy’s address into the Sat Nav, which if I remember correctly is a duplex high in the Hollywood Hills.
The route that’s calculated is a twenty-five minute drive, which’ll probably take me around thirty-five at this time in the evening.
Two minutes into the drive, I dial my wife’s number and set the phone to speaker. I place the cell phone on the dashboard. She answers almost instantly and says, “Try to guess what Ellie did today?”
“Is this one of those rare occasions when people actually want you to guess, or was it a rhetorical question?”
“I want you to guess, silly dummy. It’ll be fun.”
I think a second. “She said her first word?”
“She’s seven months old, Jake.”
“Is that not around the age they start talking?”
“No. Take another guess.”
“She… Lied on her back looking all googly eyed.”
There’s a pause. “You sound stressed. What’s up?”
“Nothing.”
“Has Daisy started remembering stuff yet?”
“That’s what it is. Daisy. You know me so well.”
“I know you well enough to know when you’re lying. What is it really?”
“Can I go back to guessing what Ellie did for the first time?”
“I know what it is, and you don’t have to feel shameful.”
“You do?
“Yeah. You haven’t been the same since you became what you called ‘The sole bread-winning caveman.’”
“That was a joke. I feel fine about having the weight of our world on my shoulders.”
“Business will pick up, Jake. I know you can do it.”
“Can I go back to guessing yet?”
I can hear her smiling on the other end of the phone when she says, “Sure.”
“Let me think.” I pause. “I was going to guess ‘crawled,’ but I haven’t seen her sit up yet.”
“Getting warmer.”
“By saying what she hasn’t done?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re making this too easy for me. I got it: She juggled three balls for the first time. Either that or swallowed a sword.”
“You nailed it!”
“I always knew that if I found the right woman we could produce a precocious child. It’s just a matter of finding the right mix of genetics. Did the crowd who watched her street performance stick around to cough up money, or did they move on without their fanny packs having been assaulted?”
“They stuck around. She had the good sense to ask them for donations just before she performed her climaxing trick.”
“When I watched her being delivered, I thought to myself, That little lady’s going to have some business acumen. I just know it. Silliness aside, what did she really do?”
“She grabbed my finger for the first time!”
“Wow! With her hand?”
“With what else?”
“What did it feel like?”
She lowers her voice. “It scared the shit out of me, if I’m going to be honest.”
For some reason, I lower mine. “Why? She did grab it too tightly?”
“No. It sank in for the first time.”
“What did?”
“I’m her mother, Jake. The person who she’s going to rely on to make her into a good person. The person given the enormous responsibility of keeping cool when she’s trying my patience, who’s going to have to explain the birds and the bees to her when she’s old enough, and the person who has to force a smile when she brings home a boyfriend that has no personality and has his jeans halfway down his ass.”
“Oh, Ellie won’t be having sex. Ever.”
“Be serious, Jake.”
“I am. Deadly. We haven’t discussed it, but I assumed we agreed on this. My bloodline ends with her.”
“How am I supposed to deal with this?”
“If you insist on passing on your genetics, you’re permitted to have a son.”
“No. The responsibility.”
“Do what everyone else does: Fail as little as possible, accept it when you do and move on, and have an affair with your yoga instructor when you’re feeling blue.”
“I don’t like yoga.”
“You’ll learn to love it, when you see all the asses in yoga pants.”
Changing topic, she says, “Sounds like you’re driving. Are you on your way home?”
I lean over and look at my cell phone to see if I’ve received a message from Tracy, and then say, “I’ve got to work late.”
“You do? Congratulations!”
“For what?”
“Getting a gig. Things are looking up already. I knew you’d nail this, Jacob Hancock. Phone five!”
I air-five the area around the phone, and I’ve been assured by Grace she does the same thing. And then I give a “Yay!”
I feel like a bastard.
Then I say, “Okay, I’ve gotta go, honey.”
“Can you at least tell me what the gig is before you go?”
“I’m tailing a guy, providing evidence he’s unfit to look after a dog of questionable genetics.”
“You’re shitting me,” she says too loudly, getting excited, and then repeats it, whispering. “It’s a start, I guess.”
“Hey, a man’s gotta come home with saber-toothed tiger on his back from time to time. Okay, bye, honey.”
“Jake, I love you.”
“Same here.”
I pick up the cell phone and press the END CALL button and place it back on the dashboard.
My mind’s racing, filled with thoughts of not being there to witness all the other things Ellie will do for the first time, of throwing away cash on a billboard that doesn’t drum up business, of receiving a text message in the middle of night from Daisy that she’
s going to be ill the next day, and of Grace picking up the phone one day, listening to what the other person on the other end of the line has to say, and realizing that the person she married isn’t the man she thought he was.
There’s still around ten minutes of driving to go before I reach Tracy’s shitty little duplex, so I put on the radio to distract myself. I flick through the presets till I land on a station that isn’t country, smooth jazz, or gangster rap.
I reach Tracy’s road, and some Roy Orbison number comes on. Roy’s singing about a breakup, feeling okay for while, being able to smile, until it all becomes too much for him, at which point he’s inconsolable.
Tears well up in my eyes, and I pull over, not able to go any farther.
I go to press the OFF button on the radio, but stop myself. I never can turn off a sad song, no matter how shitty it makes me feel. Roy’s singing about crying now, wailing it with a desperate, uneven vibrato, like this is the last song he’ll ever sing. And I’m doing the same thing. Crying, that is. I can’t sing for shit.
“Get it together, Hancock,” I say to myself, and open up the glove compartment, looking for tissues or, failing that, a chamois to dry my tears with.
I don’t find anything to use.
I lean my head on the steering wheel, gripping it tightly with both hands, the action reminding me of what Grace said. Her finger getting squeezed for the first time, and her feeling shitty about it when she should feel elated.
I take a couple deep breaths, searching for resolve, and only find more tears. I glance up and look at the duplex in the distance, the rain coming faster than it did before I pulled over.
The Elastoplast method.
I start the engine, and am about to pull away from the curb, when I think of something: I have no idea how to spray the mace.
4.
I park in her parking space, take a deep breath, thinking about what I’m going to say to her, and then, leaving the mace behind, march up to her front door. I knock a couple times, and then the hallway light comes on.