Too Beautiful to Die

by Glenville Lovell

  “Good morning, gentlemen,” I opened.

  My greeting was flawlessly condescending. I smiled amiably, shifting my gaze back and forth between them. The smirks on their faces dried up. Clearly, these guys were not here to escort me to the White House. And I hadn’t made them feel very welcome with my contemptuous salutation.

  “Mr. Overstreet?” The tooth picker spoke.

  “Who’s asking?”

  He walked toward me. “Slate. That’s Bressler.”

  “Slate and Bressler? If you guys are from a law firm I already got a lawyer.”

  Slate coughed and his smirk returned, this time with a sinister edge. “That’s Special Agent Slate and Special Agent Bressler to you. We want to talk to you.”

  “About?”

  “Murder.”

  “I’m not for hire.”

  “Don’t get cute, guy.” Bressler spoke for the first time, his voice round and punchy like a circus announcer’s.

  “Not my fault if you think I’m cute,” I said with a snicker. “Blame my genes.”

  Slate spat the toothpick to the ground. “Look, we know you got a hard-on for the City; we don’t care about that. But if you try to clown with us you might end up with rocks in your jock. An FBI agent was killed over on St. Johns Place yesterday. His name was Ricardo Edwards. Did you kill him?”

  It wasn’t a particularly warm morning, but sweat was beginning to stream down my back. I could feel a twitch in my right leg, just above my knee, a sign that I was tensed. I could kiss my settlement with the City good-bye if the Mayor found out I had been within spitting distance of a dead FBI agent.

  “I don’t know what you guys are talking about,” I said.

  “Where were you last night?” Slate said.

  “In my apartment.”

  “Alone?”

  “No, I was fucking Jennifer Lopez. You want her number?”

  Slate took a step toward me. I stiffened and glared at him.

  “What?” I taunted. My teeth were set hard. I could feel the ache in my jaw.

  They looked at each other and smiled.

  “Let’s go for a ride,” Bressler said.

  “Where to?” I said.

  “Downtown,” Slate said. He dug his pinkie into his right ear, took it out and looked at the scab with a smile of morose pleasure.

  “Am I under arrest?” I said.

  “Not at all. We’re asking you politely,” said Bressler.

  I shrugged and followed them to a tan Buick parked halfway up the block on Hoyt. Slate got behind the wheel as Bressler squeezed his large frame into the backseat beside me. The car reeked of ketchup and stale coffee.

  I wasn’t alarmed when the dynamic duo turned down Bergen instead of continuing along Smith. My thinking was that they wanted to take the Manhattan Bridge. But when they ran the light and made a right on Nevins, I shot forward in my seat.

  “Where the fuck we going?” I said.

  “Relax, Blades,” Slate said. “You know the deal.”

  “Let me out now.”

  Bressler grabbed my neck and pulled me backward. “Just sit back and relax. We just wanna talk.”

  Realizing there was nothing I could do short of jumping out of the moving vehicle, I leaned back against the seat. We rolled past a solid block of warehouses. The street was deserted. Stray dogs straggled about the sidewalk like they were drugged, scrimmaging with garbage that had escaped the overstuffed bins. A woman with barely enough fabric on to cover her butt leaned against a shuttered-up pink building, in conversation with an older man. Unlike vampires, prostitutes never seemed to know when the sun came up.

  The street came to a dead end and the car stopped a few feet from a group of mangy dogs. The agents got out. I stayed in the car. Slate stuck his head through the open door.

  “Ain’t no bed in there, Blades. Get your ass out.”

  I slid out into a tiny settled pool of dark water. The sun hit the water sharply and the reflection dazzled my eyes. Slate was grinning.

  “Am I supposed to be intimidated now?” I said.

  Slate took a pack of gum and a fresh pack of cigarettes from his jacket. His grainy blue eyes were slanted toward me, squinting to avoid the red sun. He popped a stick of gum into his large mouth, then passed the pack over to his partner, who reprised the action.

  “What were you doing in that apartment?” Slate asked.

  “What apartment?”

  Slate tapped the cigarette box twice in the palm of his left hand, then tore the top from the Winston box with one pull. He put the packet to his mouth and deftly removed one cigarette with his lips and teeth. He felt around in his trousers for a lighter, coming up with a green Bic. After lighting the cigarette, he hitched his right pants leg and rested his foot on the car bumper, puffing vigorously.

  “We got a tip that you might’ve gone to that apartment,” Bressler said.

  “You should get your money back from that snitch.”

  “We could shut down your business in a heartbeat,” Slate said.

  “I don’t care if you stopped the rain from falling.”

  “Don’t lie to us, tough guy. If your prints turn up at that apartment, you ain’t gonna be talking so tough,” Slate growled.

  I took a step back and spat. “Fuck ya’ll. This conversation is over.”

  Slate grabbed me by the neck and slammed my face onto the hood of the Buick. “We’re not your uncles from out of town, get what I’m saying?”

  “My aunts never scared me either.”

  “If you whacked Agent Edwards, there won’t be a sewer dark enough to hide your black ass.”

  He released me. I backed off slowly, anger roiling inside me.

  “Hey, Blades,” Bressler said, his jaws moving swiftly to pulverize the gum in his mouth. “I know your reputation. You were a tough guy, but a good cop. The City is trying to screw you. I know that too. But don’t let that cloud your judgment here. We’re not your enemy. We don’t work for the Mayor, so don’t try to fuck us over. You don’t know what you’re dealing with here.” He flipped a card in my direction. I snatched it out of the air.

  “If you know anything about what went down in that apartment, call me,” he said. “But make it soon. If shit starts falling on your head, you can’t say we didn’t give you a chance to buy a hard hat.”

  They got into the car. As the car rolled away, I kicked black water on the wheels.

  6

  MUMBLING TO MYSELF, I began the walk back to Smith Street. Morning had quickly turned overcast. As I crossed the bridge over the grimy, oil-slicked Gowanus Canal, the gray clouds matched my mood.

  Slate was right. My hard-on for the City was the size of the Empire State Building, as much for my shooting as for what happened afterward. I remember it like it happened yesterday. The nine-millimeter slug, which passed through my left shoulder, came from the gun of Troy Pagano, the lone white officer in our crew. Had it struck lower, I might be dead.

  It was a bust-and-buy operation in Harlem. Burdened with fog and steady drizzle, the night was cold and damp. Cars moved like hearses through the wet streets. I’d been working with this undercover team for about a month. There were four of us: Nelson Rodriquez, a young tattooed Puerto Rican; Evan Miguel, a Dominican from the Bronx who swore he slept with Madonna; Troy Pagano, a leather-wearing gym rat who was using steroids to morph himself into Arnold Schwarzenegger; and myself. That night I was wearing the same long black leather coat I always wear in cold weather. After I made the buy from a skeleton-thin black youth in a gray Kangol hat and brown leather jacket, I called for my backup to move in, then I ran from the scene so as not to blow my cover.

  I was about to turn down a dark alley when I heard shooting. Instinctively I ran faster, looking for cover.

  I heard Troy’s voice behind me: Stop, nigger, or you’re dead!

  I kept running, sure that he couldn’t be talking to me. The next instant I felt a sharp burning in my left shoulder. I stumbled, but did not fall. Troy kept
shooting. I ducked and zigzagged as I raced away. My back was ablaze. It felt like someone had stuck a firecracker in a nerve. I could feel the blood rushing down my side like an army of angry ants. I heard a car approach and with my badge in my hand I stepped into the street and collapsed.

  The driver loaded me into his cab and took me to the hospital. His name was Jimmy Lucas.

  Before I was out of surgery the news broke that a fellow officer had shot me. But the Mayor and the Commissioner, trying to head off a public-relations disaster, began to spin the shooting as a tragic accident.

  Troy Pagano claimed he thought I was the perp. Never mind the suspect was six or seven inches shorter and was wearing a brown waist-length jacket.

  I’d seen this rerun before and was not going to be played. My lawyer called on the Reverend Jerome McKnight, a firebrand civil-rights activist, who organized daily protest marches downtown demanding a grand jury investigation. After two weeks of testimony the grand jury determined that the shooting was an accident. A week later Detective Pagano was back on the job.

  The good reverend and my lawyer weren’t done, however. Renewing their daily protests, they pressured the U.S. Attorney’s Office to look at the case. Pagano was charged in Federal Court with violating my civil rights, convicted and sentenced to three years in jail and five years probation.

  Leading up to the trial, the Mayor began leaking information to the press. First came the claim that I was mentally unstable, since I’d spent some time in therapy. That opened the floodgates to articles about my father’s involvement with the Panthers, about my brother’s drug addiction and my parents’ arrest in the seventies for possession of pot and for taking part in demonstrations against the Vietnam War.

  I wasn’t surprised. The Mayor and the Police Benevolent Association were known for fighting dirty. But my family wasn’t prepared for a guerrilla war. Reporters ambushed my mother. She didn’t answer her phone for months. My brother laughed it off, when he wasn’t high. My sister ran off to California. First I got pissed, then numbness took over.

  There was a time when I got amped on rousting suspects and roughing them up. And because I made detective right out of the academy, I had an arrogance and swagger, which suspects hated. That swagger was gone. A civilian now, I was easy prey for over-eager FBI agents if I didn’t find Agent Edwards’ killer first.

  By the time I reached Smith Street, clear drizzle spotted the leaves and windows along the block.

  Unhooking my phone from my belt, I called Precious. Her voice came from the distance. I imagined she was on a speakerphone.

  “I never thought I’d hear from you again,” she said.

  “Let’s meet for coffee.”

  “There’s a café on Sixth and Tenth. Matisse. I can meet you in half an hour.”

  LOOKING LIKE A Modigliani model, she leaned against the wall near the café’s entrance in black leggings and a sleeveless white blouse. Around her neck hung a sterling silver chain; silver bangles jingled on her right wrist.

  “Hello.” She smiled and squeezed my arm when I reached her. Taking control, she guided me through the open glass door.

  It was crowded inside, the clientele a mix of students from nearby universities and would-be bestselling novelists dressed in shiny downtown black hunched over laptop computers and sipping frothy drinks.

  The walls were plastered with vintage ad signs in French. Below a large clock was an antique mirror. Dimmed chandeliers provided muted lighting. We sat in leather chairs facing the door. A waiter in dull black came over quickly.

  “The almond cappuccino is great here,” Precious said.

  Before I could answer, she ordered two almond cappuccinos.

  “Don’t worry,” she said, seeing hesitancy in my eyes. “If you don’t like it I’ll take you home and make you whatever you like.”

  Her voice reminded me of my grandmother’s, that mesmerizing musical dance between phrases where the pauses and spaces said more about harmony than any symphony could. She was either English-born with some time spent in the Caribbean or vice versa. That musical accent was one of the things that attracted me to Anais. In her mouth speech was an erotic fantasy come alive.

  “You look great,” was all I could stammer.

  “Thanks.” She smiled, exposing perfectly shaped teeth.

  “Where’re you from, Precious?” I asked.

  She laughed unpretentiously. “All over. I was born here. I spent my early years in London. Then Jamaica, before I moved back here. Does this line of questioning mean you’re going to help me?

  “Yes. I might need that money after all.”

  “Jimmy said you owned a business.”

  “A struggling concern.”

  “What kind of business?”

  “A music store.”

  We lapsed into silence. She spread her arms out and leaned forward in a movement that reminded me of a dancer stretching. I studied her face for what must have been the hundredth time now since we met. Her skin was bright and healthy looking; the area under her eyes appeared tender as if she’d been crying. She had a strong chin, almost masculine, which was balanced against wide, egg-shaped eyes, giving her a confident appearance.

  “Have you ever danced?” I asked.

  She smiled. “Is it that obvious? I studied ballet in England until I was fourteen. That’s when my mother died. I moved to Jamaica to live with my granny. I picked it up again when I moved back here.”

  Our waiter, a cheerfully chubby young woman wearing spectacles, brought our order. After she’d set the two cups down on the table, she stared at Precious.

  “Excuse me. Aren’t you Dr. Antonia Parker?” said the waitress. “I just love you.”

  Precious smiled graciously. “Thank you.”

  “Would you sign my book?”

  From her pocket the waitress whipped out a red, artfully decorated notepad, which I suspected she kept handy for such chance meetings with stars. Precious signed her book, and the girl left with her face lit up.

  “Do you have a last name, or are you like Madonna and Prince: one-name wonders?” I said.

  She laughed. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

  “Takes a lot of confidence to pull that off.”

  “How’m I doing?”

  “Better than most.” I tested the cappuccino. It was pretty good. “So why’d you become an actress?”

  “Dance took too much time for too little financial reward. Plus, I couldn’t keep my hips under control.”

  “That’s what my wife said.”

  “You’re married?”

  “And holding.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know myself.”

  “But you live alone.”

  “How could you tell?”

  “We can tell.”

  “Humor me. What? My socks don’t match?”

  She giggled. “My secret.”

  “That’s not fair,” I said, pretending to sulk.

  “Where is your wife?”

  “In L.A. She’s been trying out for the same movie for the last six months. I think the movie’s been made and released; only my wife don’t know it.”

  Leaning back in the seat she arched her thin eyebrows and chuckled. “So your wife’s an actress too. I figured your wife would be a lawyer or something like that. Something stern.”

  It was my turn to chuckle. “She’s stern enough without knowing the law.”

  We sipped casually while studying each other’s faces.

  “You’re biracial, aren’t you?” she asked, her eyes flushed with a buoyant smile.

  “I’m me, Blades Overstreet,” I said, my voice crusty with annoyance.

  She grimaced. “I’ve offended you. I’m sorry.”

  I leaned back against the leather seat and tried to make my voice sound ordinary, untroubled. “I’m not offended.”

  She retaliated quickly. “Yes you are. And I apologize. I know race is a very sensitive issue in this country. Som
e people don’t like being identified a certain way. People ask me all the time if I’m part Indian, or Brazilian. It hurts that I can’t tell them exactly what I am.”

  “You’re whoever you think you are.”

  “I wish it was that simple for me. We may both be of mixed race, but that’s where the similarity ends.”

  I smiled weakly. “We may have more in common than you think.”

  She tried to veil her skepticism with a sweet lilt. “Really? I’d like to be able to celebrate all of my heritage. Do you feel the same way?”

  “I’m a black man living in America. That says everything you need to know.”

  “Somehow I can’t believe that.”

  “Why not?”

  “For people like us, it can never be that simple.”

  “I didn’t say it was simple, but because we’re mixed doesn’t mean we have to be confused.”

  “You think I’m confused?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Were you ever confused?”

  I paused for a moment. I didn’t enjoy this probing. It reminded me of the sessions with the psychologist who tried to tell me that my dreams hid a deep resentment for my white siblings, perhaps even my mother. I told her she was talking crap. “Look, I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

  She leaned forward, her eyes luminous and shiny. “You’ve made a choice, it’s clear. But at least you were given a choice.”

  “I didn’t have a choice. That’s the point. That choice was made for me long before I was born. Written into the American constitution, in fact, and into the minds of most Americans.”

  “So you don’t really believe you’re whatever you think you are. It’s what society decides that you should be? I hate being patronized, Mr. Overstreet.”