by Renee James
She chews and thinks. “They were both at a party at Cecelia’s place once. I remember. It was after Mandy was murdered and Cecelia thought Strand did it. She was pissed that the police weren’t checking him out so she invited Strand and Officer Phil to her afternoon tea.
“Phil didn’t take the bait, but there were some interesting side plots. One was Bobbi Logan flashing her big tits in Officer Phil’s face, not that he was interested. And I remember seeing Strand follow her out the door when she left. I thought it was strange because they barely talked at the party.”
“What happened then?”
“He came back a few minutes later, so I don’t really know.”
“Anything else?”
“Not that I saw. I heard he went to her for a haircut once, and one of the girls saw her get in a car with someone who might have been Strand after a meeting.”
“Was the haircut at her salon?”
She nods yes.
“Do you remember who saw her getting in a car?”
She chews and thinks. “No. But I’ll keep thinking about it. If I come up with it, I’ll give you a call.”
Wilkins nods and smiles. Over coffee he asks if she ever saw Strand and Mandy together. She hadn’t, but she says the rumor in the community was that Strand was the sugar daddy who paid for Mandy’s gender surgery and her nice apartment.
Outside, he thanks her and asks if there is anyone else he should talk to about who knew Strand back then. She gives him some names, no guarantees.
11
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23
BETSY IS VENTING on the other end of the line.
This is becoming a nightly ritual. She holds it together all day, getting up at five thirty and getting herself and Robbie ready, dealing with an increasingly tense office situation at work, dashing home by way of the day-care center, putting together a meal, chatting up her exhausted daughter, reading bedtime stories, and the final goodnight kiss. She holds it inside for another five minutes to make sure Robbie falls asleep, then she calls me and as soon as I say hello, she starts to unload.
“I’m getting so much attitude from the other women.” Her voice is tense. “They think I’m sleeping with that weasel.”
She is referring to her boss and using an animal reference I haven’t heard in a decade or two. I think of him as a bastard, or when I’m really angry, a shithead. Betsy always did have more class than me. Still, I keep thinking this might be a situation for unleashed testosterone. I keep thinking that society would be very well served by this guy getting his genitals pounded by an angry boyfriend or husband of one of his victims.
Or sister.
“Would you like me to have someone deliver a message to this bastard?” I ask. It slips out before I can squelch the thought.
“What are you suggesting?” Her voice is angry.
“He would be easier to work with if someone put the fear of God in him,” I say. I’m upset, too, but not at her.
“Bobbi, keep out of this. This isn’t your problem. It’s mine and I’ll handle it. I can’t believe you’d say such a thing.” Hostile, almost belittling. I know it’s the frustration from her workplace getting directed at me. Because I’m safe. I won’t fight back. We fall silent.
I ask her how her projects are coming and the mood lightens up a little bit. She loves the science of marketing, and she’s one of the rare people who can apply the science creatively to the practice. I find it hard to believe her genius isn’t appreciated by at least some of those around her, but then corporate environments can be snake pits and her department is defined by the depravity of her boss.
She is silent again. She is thinking about something and whether or not she wants to say it out loud.
“Bobbi,” she says, “I’m losing the house.”
“Already?” I thought those things took time.
“I work like a dog for fifteen hours a day to take care of us and keep my shitty job and the fact is, I don’t make enough to pay the mortgage on this house, let alone the other expenses.”
“Can’t you draw it out for a while?”
“I don’t want to live like that. I have to do something positive, get started again.”
Betsy finally gives in to tears. “What am I going to do, Bobbi? I’m behind on the car payments, too. I have the worst job in the world and pretty soon I won’t be able to get to it. I’m going to have to move in with my parents. Shit!”
“Move in with me, Betsy.” All my vows to keep silent explode in a surge of anxiety at the thought of her wicked parents getting their venomous claws into Betsy and Robbie.
“Your parents would drive you crazy, Robbie, too. And they live in the middle of nowhere. Move in with me and you don’t need a car. You can quit that shitty job and take your time looking for a better one. I can help with Robbie.”
“I can’t do that,” she says. Her voice is firm. Resolute. To argue the point would be like trying to push a boulder up hill.
“Why?” I ask anyway. For transsexuals, pushing boulders uphill is part of an average day.
“Because I’m a mom. I’m supposed to take care of these things.”
“You’re moving in with your parents, for goodness’ sake. How is that better than moving in with me?”
“They’re family.” Her voice is riddled with exasperation.
I swallow and try to recover. This hurts. I am far more loving and nurturing than those old turds ever were.
“I’m sorry, Bobbi. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.” She’s sorry, but she’s not taking it back, either.
“I don’t believe that’s the real reason,” I say, finally.
“What do you think the reason is?” A challenge, like I couldn’t possibly know.
“I don’t know, Betsy. But we need to talk through it before you do something destructive.”
“Moving in with my parents is destructive?” She’s snippy, but I don’t think it’s because I’ve insulted her parents.
“You know it is. You trade your career for being a full-time fifties sitcom daughter and Robbie starts grooming for the life of a Stepford Wife.” I let her hear a little edge in my voice, too.
“Move in here, Betsy. It’s not forever. Only until you get your feet on the ground again.”
We bat this ball around for another ten minutes. In the end, she agrees to think about it. I hang up thinking there’s something else going on that she won’t talk about.
As I tend to my evening chores, I reflect on the reality of my own mortgage and business situation. A good definition of “awful” would be both of us losing our houses and our jobs at the same time.
Not the kind of thought you want to take to bed with you, but this has been a long, dreary day and I can’t muster the energy to do anything but tumble into bed and hope for a long, dreamless sleep.
* * *
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 24
Wilkins views the pathetic wreck in front of him, trying to hide his contempt, trying to appear sympathetic.
In his day, the man was a cruel, merciless brute. His sheet told the story of a man who made his living assaulting people and got his jollies off the same way. He had worked off and on as a laborer, but he also hired out as muscle. Strictly small-time, strictly freelance. Debt collecting, intimidation. Arrests for assault, most charges dropped. Did time for a weapons violation once, and serious time after a series of sexual assaults on both men and women.
His last arrest looked like he would be put away for a long, long time. He had raped a male prostitute and beat him to within an inch of his life. There was a witness. There was physical evidence. Then a high-priced criminal lawyer takes his case, the physical evidence disappears, and the witness can’t remember things clearly anymore.
Where did the money for the lawyer come from? Wilkins figured that’s when Strand entered the picture. A friend who knew how to make evidence disappear and witnesses forget. It must have seemed like a Christmas miracle to Andive, getting saved like that. Until it all w
ent wrong five years ago.
Andive is a shadow of the hulking goon in his arrest photos. His beefy body has run to fat. He has trouble walking, leaning heavily on a cane and limping badly on both feet. His face is slack with sad, deep rings under his eyes. His cheeks fall in fatty folds. He sits heavily at the kitchen table, grunting in pain. Wilkins puts a twelve-pack of beer in the refrigerator and two cartons of cigarettes on the counter, the agreed-upon price of his audience.
He sits opposite Andive, popping a couple of breath mints in his mouth, offering the box to Andive who shakes his head no. Not much chance Andive would even notice his breath, the shape he’s in, but no sense taking chances.
Andive’s kitchenette apartment is as claustrophobic as a jail cell, white walls, white ceiling, broken white and red tile on the floor. A single room with a bed, a dresser, a television set, a kitchen table with three chairs, a sink half-filled with dirty dishes, a full garbage can scenting the air with the stink of bad food rotting. A place where animals come to await death. And Andive had been an animal in his day. Mean, stupid, no conscience. The kind of man where, after you arrested him, you wanted to go home and take a shower.
Wilkins stays focused on the job at hand.
“Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Andive.” Wilkins is in strictly “good-cop” mode for this visit. Andive doesn’t have to talk to him if he doesn’t want to. It has taken weeks to get this far.
“I want to say again what I told you on the phone, Mr. Andive. I’m investigating the murder of John Strand and not any other crime. I’m looking for background information that you might be able to help me with. I’m not going to record this interview. You are not on record. Nothing you say can be used against you because it’s not on record. If you have information that’s helpful to my investigation, I may ask you at a later time to state that information for the record. That will be up to you.”
Andive’s eyes register some degree of comprehension. Wilkins repeats that he is not trying to make a case against Andive for anything. Andive nods.
Wilkins produces a photograph from his folder and puts it in front of Andive. “Do you know this man?” he asks.
Andive stares silently for several long counts, thinking about whether he wants to answer or not.
“I repeat, sir,” Wilkins interjects. “This is not about you. I’m not setting a trap. I’m trying to learn some things that will help me solve a murder.”
Andive nods. “I did know him. He’s dead now. His name is John Strand.”
“Thank you, Mr. Andive. Can you tell me how you knew Mr. Strand?”
“He helped me out when I was in a jam once. After that, I’d help him out when he needed things done.”
“What kind of things?”
Andive shrugs. “Messages delivered. People watched. That kind of thing.”
“What kind of messages did you deliver?”
“Mind-your-own-business messages. He liked his privacy. He didn’t like people talking about him.”
“What kind of people?”
Andive spreads his thin, tight lips in a malicious smile. “His tranny whores and lady-boys.”
“What would they say about him?”
“Nothing after I paid them a visit.”
“Why did he need you to see them?” Wilkins flashes a warm smile. “It’s okay, this isn’t about you.”
Andive collects his thoughts. “He was a big shot. He couldn’t have people knowing he liked getting it on with trannies. And . . .” His voice tapers off.
“And?” Wilkins coaxes.
“And he liked to get rough with them.”
“How rough did he get?”
Andive shrugs. He’s not going that far.
Wilkins reaches in his folder again and produces another photo. “Have you ever seen this woman?”
Andive’s lips curl back in a silent snarl. He looks up at Wilkins, his eyes suddenly alive with rage. “What are you after?” he asks.
“I’m just trying to find out if this person and Mr. Strand knew each other and if they did, what the nature of their relationship was.”
“Relationship.” Andive smirks joylessly. He looks around the room, at Wilkins, away, his eyes darting and dodging as he weighs his words. “I’ve seen her around,” he says, finally.
“Did you ever deliver a message to her from Mr. Strand?”
Andive’s face breaks into an evil smile. “Might have.”
“What was the message?”
“Don’t talk about Mr. Strand.”
“What was she saying about him?”
Andive shrugs. “Probably that he fucked her in the ass and pushed her around a little, but I don’t know for sure.”
Wilkins pauses, picking his words carefully so he doesn’t scare the man quiet. “Can you share with me what the message was that you delivered?”
Andive’s ghoulish smile would have made Wilkins gag if he wasn’t so focused on what he needed to get done here. “‘Be careful who you piss off.’ That was the message.”
Like the tumblers falling in a combination lock, Wilkins can hear a click in his mind. In Logan’s rape file she claimed one of her assaulters said, “Be careful who you piss off, you fucking freak.” He’s tempted to ask Andive if he delivered the message with a gang rape, but resists the urge. Andive might say yes, but either way he might very well shut up and stop helping.
“Did she shut up after that?”
“I don’t know. Strand had me and someone else following her around, letting him know who she talked to, where she went.”
“Were you following her the day you got mugged?” There it was, the question of the month. The year maybe. Wilkins braces himself for an angry response, a demand he get out of the apartment and never come back.
Andive stares at Wilkins, his face angry, but not at Wilkins. At the memory of the beating that ended his life as a predator in a few minutes. “Yeah. I was following her. She knew it, too. It was a setup.”
Andive’s hatred radiates from his eyes and face.
“Why didn’t you identify her to the investigators?”
“Strand wouldn’t like it. He’d have had me killed. Plus that was the same place I delivered Strand’s message to her. It could have gotten touchy for me, you know?” He smiles smugly. He just told Wilkins he raped Logan, but without saying the words. Sheer genius in his sick world.
Wilkins nods, trying to look sympathetic, trying to hide the revulsion he always felt when he got this far into the mind of a sick bastard like Andive.
“Do you really think Strand would have had you killed?”
Andive nods yes emphatically. “No doubt about it.”
“Did you ever know him to have someone killed or to kill someone himself?”
Andive shakes his head. “Ain’t going there, Detective.”
Wilkins swallows his emotions, puts the photos back in his file, scans his list of questions. “You’ve been very helpful, Mr. Andive. Just a couple more questions. Do you have any idea who might have killed Strand?”
Andive nods yes. “That fuckin’ tranny. No doubt in my mind. She might have had someone else do the dirty work, but it was her.”
“What about your partner, the other guy following her?”
“He disappeared after I got mugged. He didn’t have issues with Strand. Strand took care of him.”
“Do you know the man’s name?”
Andive shakes his head, no.
Wilkins thinks for a moment. “One last thing, Mr. Andive, do you know who Strand was seeing, if anyone, around the time of his death?”
“I heard he hooked up with a tranny hooker they called Barbi. I knew who she was. Everyone did. She looked like one of those Barbie Dolls, big tits, blond hair.”
“What’s her last name?”
“I don’t know. Everyone called her Barbi Dancer. She was a stripper and a whore. She hung out at a tranny pickup bar in Boystown. Chicago Sizzle. She might still hang there. If she’s still alive.”
Wilkins
packs his things, wishing he could ask Andive why he raped Logan when he delivered the message. Him and his accomplice. What were they thinking? Was it erotic for them? “How pure is a truth you find in a cesspool like that man’s mind?” he asks himself. “Calling him shit is an insult to feces.”
* * *
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 25
Danni and I make an odd couple sitting at a sidewalk table, sipping wine, watching commuters bustle home from work.
Me, born male, trying to look like a woman, clad in a form-fitting dress that shows off my legs and cleavage, wearing long, curly hair, painted nails, lipstick, and makeup. Danni, born female, dressed in male clothing, with a short, masculine hairstyle, genderless shoes, no makeup, not a hint of female breasts. I am a transsexual woman. She makes her gender choice day by day.
Today, by appearance at least, we are like two trains going in opposite directions.
“I thought the last committee meeting went better,” she is saying.
I laugh good-naturedly. “The only way it could have gone worse is if someone got shot.”
She smiles. “Really, though. I think the younger ladies are starting to accept you. And we need you on that committee.”
We bat that thought around for a while. I’m not convinced that I bring much. “I have experience, but they have ideas.”
“Not all their ideas are good ones,” Danni says.
“Any idea that results in action is a pretty good idea,” I answer. I tell her about the demise of the TransGender Association, the group that ushered me through my transition. TGA is dying under a tide of weak leaders, unable to change the group’s traditional venues even in the face of a changing transgender world and steadily declining membership. New ideas are treated like alien conspiracies.
“What about the Top 50?” Danni gets us back on subject.
“If they had kicked it around more they might have come up with something better, but the truth is, the Top 50 is better than sitting around the table sucking eggs.”
Danni shoots me a questioning look. “Are you just trying to shake free of the commitment?”