Smoke

by Joe Ide

  A fixer, he thought. Yeah, you can do that.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  The Itch

  Crowe was losing it. Warren kept ranting about EX; what he’d do, how he’d do it, and that it would take a long time. “Jesus Christ,” Crowe snarled. “Shut up, will you? Keep it up and see what happens!” When Warren wasn’t raving about EX, he babbled on and on about the girl who’d shoved dirt in his mouth and how he’d make her scream while he cut her into strips.

  “Knock it off, Warren, I fucking mean it,” Crowe said. The motel room was small and dark. You could only open the windows a few inches. The smell was like two naked men locked in a closet with spilled beer, a moldy pizza and a pile of dirty jockstraps. Crowe shut his eyes. His fantasies were filling him with a need that choked him, burned his eyes and made his dick hard. Right behind it was the anger, his blood sizzling over glowing embers; he was all hot steam and raving madness and he wanted Ava right now, right fucking now. He got up and roared, “RIGHT FUCKING NOW!”

  “What’s wrong with you?” Warren said.

  Crowe put his fists against his body and squeezed tight, trying to contain the need, the fucking need. If he couldn’t, everything would turn to shit, and he’d go back to prison. Warren was still babbling and groaning. Crowe had had enough. He yanked him off the bed.

  “Get up, you dumb shit!” Crowe hollered. “Do you want to go back to Quentin and get fucked in the ass by the niggers again?” Warren crinkled his forehead like he was trying to remember if that really happened. Crowe dragged him into the bathroom. He pushed his head into the sink, held it there and turned on the cold water. Crowe let Warren up, sputtering and choking. “Did you hear me, asshole?” Crowe shouted. “Do you want to go back to prison again?” He threw Warren to the floor and tossed some towels on top of him. “I don’t give a fuck if you’re hurt. You deserve to be hurt, letting that bitch fuck you over like that. She can rat us out, don’t you understand? We have to get her now.”

  “No, EX first,” Warren insisted. His bottom lip was stuck out like a stubborn kid’s.

  “For the hundredth time, that makes no fucking sense!”

  “It makes sense to me! It makes sense to me!” Warren sobbed. “You weren’t there! You don’t know, you don’t know how bad it was. You don’t know…”

  There was no point asking him what was bad or trying to argue him out of it. He looked like what he was, a child, beaten, abused, raped and left for dead. He was hugging himself and shivering, but Crowe knew he wasn’t going to crack.

  “All right,” Crowe said. “EX first.”

  Ava was taking a shower. Billy was in the kitchen making a sandwich. There was no place else to bring Isaiah but home. It was a small town, they had no resources, and Billy had no friends to take them in. Gretta came in, looking harried like she always did. She hesitated a moment before coming forward. She wanted to avoid this exact situation. Mother and son alone together.

  “Billy,” Gretta said, as if she were passing a coworker in the hall.

  “Mom,” Billy replied in the same way.

  Gretta started to make coffee. She seemed to be making a lot of noise, but it was probably no more than normal. Billy’s sandwich was complete, an enormous thing, made from a mishmash of incongruous ingredients. He thought about leaving, but didn’t want her to think he was intimidated.

  “You okay?” Gretta said.

  “Yeah, I’m fine.” He took a monumental bite of sandwich. He chewed, cheeks full and moving around, stuff spilling out of his mouth. She hated that. The coffee was done. Gretta poured herself a cup, brought it up to her mouth and blew on it.

  “Well, I guess we have to talk about this mess.”

  “No, we don’t.”

  “What are you going to do?” She took a sip, hiding half her face behind the cup. She was such a bullshitter, Billy thought, acting like she cared. She’d laid it on thick after the divorce. She felt guilty because it was her fault. He was only a kid but he remembered. She drove Dad away and kept her maiden name too. It bothered him. It was like she wasn’t committed, like she cared about herself more than anything.

  “I’m going to see this through,” he said.

  “See what through?” Gretta said. “What is this about?”

  “You wouldn’t get it. You never get anything.”

  “If you’re not going back to the hospital, I’ll have to call Cannon.”

  Billy huffed. “Better think about it. He’ll take me out of here in handcuffs. What will the town think?”

  “I said that one time, and I was angry,” she said. “Try and understand. I’m responsible for you. I have to do what’s best for you even if you don’t think so.”

  “You mean like committing me to a fucking insane asylum?”

  “It’s not an insane asylum and it kept you from doing something else ridic—” She stopped herself but it was too late. Billy sneered and wiped his mouth with his forearm. “That’s not what I meant,” she said. Billy was tempted to press the argument but he needed something from her.

  “Will you do one thing for me?” Billy said.

  “What’s that?”

  “Give me a little time before you call Cannon and I go to jail.”

  Gretta held back her first response. “How much time?”

  “How much can you give me?” He could see the struggle in her eyes. She could be a hard-ass, but that would prove everything Billy thought about her.

  “I’m going back to court,” Gretta said. “I’ll be home later. Irene and I are going camping. You have until then.”

  Billy was in the backyard, sitting on the wrought-iron bench. Sparrows were drinking from the birdbath. The air was still and smelled like warm pine needles. He knew Gretta had her own problems. She never got over Dad leaving, even if it was her fault. Bitching all the time, busy all the time. Drunk drivers and bank robbers needed her attention way more than her own kids and deserved more care. Some people shouldn’t be parents, Billy thought. If you’re that wrapped up in yourself, fine, but don’t have kids just to ignore them. He’d never have kids. Unless it was with Ava.

  Eventually, Cannon would come, arrest the three of them, and he’d go back to Schizo Central. An escapee who got caught, led to his cell in shackles and shame. He’d be the object of Nathan’s sneering taunts, and Dickie would feel sorry for him. Dickie, for God’s sake. Ava would be furious. The pursuit of her sister’s killer would be over.

  Billy read David Copperfield when he was still in middle school. It made a lasting impression on him, that line: “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.” It seemed so self-evident it was stupid. Isn’t that what everybody wanted? To be the hero of their own lives? Why did people do things at all if not for that reason? To overcome the odds and triumph over extreme adversity, preferably on the evening news cycle. If you didn’t do it in front of an audience why do it at all? If you didn’t get love from the general public, what was the point? Everything was like that now. Why get married, have a party, have a baby, play a sport, travel, get a puppy, be bipolar, commit suicide or shoot up a classroom full of kids unless you thought it was going viral? Glory and acclaim were happiness. Billy really believed that, although he conceded there were other kinds of happy.

  He was with Irene, paddling a canoe across Snowshoe Lake. It was fall. Cool and sunny, bright white clouds drifting across a robin’s-egg sky. The maple and aspen trees were turning red and orange, their leaves dancing, the scene pulsing with color and beauty.

  Irene stopped paddling and pointed. “Look!” An eagle was swooping low over the sparkling lake, its enormous black wings spread wide and unmoving, gliding without effort, without sound, its world as valid as yours. The eagle ascended on invisible currents, rising steadily, a child of heaven beckoned home, vanishing over the green mountains as silently as it had arrived. It was an amazing moment. Revelatory and profound, yet there was no triumph, victor
y or applause. It was an experience and nothing more. It resonated with Billy, Irene feeling it too, neither of them talking even as they drove home. The feeling lasted until he got to his room. He sat down on the couch, pressed the remote and the TV came on, and in that split second, modern life reclaimed him and brought him back to the fold.

  In all of Billy’s fantasies he was the hero. The lone believer who stuck to his beliefs, suffered humiliation and injustice and saved the day. The guy who everyone said was crazy was proved to be right after all. Wouldn’t it be amazing to be the hero just once?

  Ava appeared next to him. They didn’t talk for a while. The backyard was so big it might have been a small park. People had big lots around here, space for the sake of space, a perk of living in a rural town. The smells were a perk too, clean, cold, accented with pines and firs and woodsmoke from someone’s chimney.

  “I’m not the one for you, Billy,” she said.

  “I know.” Billy shrugged. “I don’t even know why I thought about it.”

  “It’s not because of your past or that something’s wrong with you.”

  “Oh, really? Come on, Ava, it’s okay. I know what I am.”

  She grabbed his arm and turned him toward her. “Listen to me, Billy. I’m not the one for anyone right now and won’t be for a long time. Are you listening to me? Are you hearing me? Really hearing me? I’m a wreck, Billy. I don’t even think about relationships. The idea never enters my mind.”

  “You don’t have to make excuses. I understand.”

  “Damn you, Billy!” Ava shouted. She was livid. “You have got to get over yourself! Being weird does not excuse you from being a grown-up. I know you’re hurting, and there’s stuff going on inside you, but that doesn’t mean every fucking thing that happens or doesn’t happen is about you! Jesus, you’re frustrating! You have feelings for me without once considering mine or what it’s like to be someone else besides you! You know what you need to do, Billy?”

  “I’m afraid to ask.”

  “Grow the fuck up, okay? Grow the fuck up or we’ll never truly be friends.” Then she got up, crossed the yard and went into the house.

  Isaiah’s sleep was more like hibernation. When he awoke, he was wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt. There was a bottle of water and a box of Fig Newtons on the bedside table. It was sometime in the afternoon. He was still sore from his tumble off the Electra Glide. He drank the water and tried to orient himself. There was a knock, and a woman entered.

  “Hello, Isaiah. I’m Gretta. Billy’s mother.”

  “I apologize for imposing like this,” he said.

  “You’re not imposing. You took care of Billy and I’m grateful.”

  “What happened last night?” he asked.

  “You were in pretty tough shape. I was a medic, served on the aircraft carrier USS America. The experience came in handy.”

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “I did a search on you. Apparently, you’re one of the good guys.” Gretta pulled up a chair and sat down. “I’d like to know what’s going on. You were weak, dehydrated, and you’ve got bruises all over your body.”

  “That part isn’t really important right now,” he said.

  “Then what is?”

  “Do you believe the killers are here?”

  “Killers? What killers?” she said. Oh, my God, Isaiah thought. Billy hasn’t told her.

  “Two serial killers, William Crowe and Warren Long, are in Coronado Springs.”

  Gretta was startled and then confused. “I don’t understand.”

  “They’re here to kill someone, but we don’t know who,” Isaiah said. He could see it in Gretta’s face, struggling to understand, too many questions to ask all at once.

  “I know Warren. He’s a basket full of snakes,” she said. “Who’s Crowe?”

  Isaiah hesitated. Better now than later. “Crowe is AMSAK.”

  “AMSAK,” Gretta repeated. She shook her head. “I’m really not following.”

  “I know, it’s almost impossible to believe,” Isaiah said. “I’m happy to tell you the story, but it’s a long one. The main thing is, Crowe and Warren are here. Crowe tried to kill me with a knife. Warren attacked Billy and Ava but they got away. It’s real, Gretta.” She was looking at him differently, skepticism narrowing her eyes.

  “Billy didn’t say anything about being attacked,” she said.

  “I guess he didn’t want to.”

  “You don’t have any knife wounds. I examined you pretty closely.”

  “My injuries are from something else.” He was sounding less and less credible and he knew it.

  “Let’s say you’re right,” Gretta said. “Why would two serial killers be here?”

  “When Cannon arrested Warren, he beat him up bad. Warren wants to kill him.”

  “I’ll have to talk to Cannon.”

  “He doesn’t believe the killers are here.”

  “Why?” she said.

  Isaiah was reluctant to say, but if he didn’t, Cannon would. That would be worse. “Cannon called Crowe’s probation officer. He said Crowe was in Sacramento. He’d seen him, talked to him.”

  “I’m not getting this.” She was frustrated.

  “I’m saying this badly, but Crowe and Warren are here. I know they are.” Gretta stood up and turned away. She thought a moment before turning around again.

  “Was this Billy’s idea?” she said sharply.

  “It’s not an idea. It’s very real—”

  “You know you’re a fugitive, don’t you?” Gretta said. “Along with my son and Ava?”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “I’ll have to call Cannon and tell him you’re here.” Irene came in.

  “Hi, Isaiah. When are we leaving, Mom?”

  “As soon as you get home from school, assuming you’re packed,” Gretta said. “Irene, do you know anything about Billy and serial killers?”

  “Yeah, he told me about them,” she said. She shrugged and offered a weak smile. “You know Billy.” Gretta looked coldly at Isaiah.

  “I should probably stay around to see the end of this mess but I’m not. I’m going camping. Billy got himself into this and he can get himself out.” They left, Irene smiling over her shoulder.

  “Bye, Isaiah.”

  Gretta didn’t believe him. The alarm about Crowe and Warren had been raised in every possible way. They might be hunting down Cannon now. He couldn’t do nothing. He couldn’t let a man be slaughtered. Another painful task. He had to call Grace. She was on her way to a town where two serial killers lurked and he was wanted by the law.

  “I was hoping you would call!” she said. There was eagerness and joy in her voice. “I have so much to tell you but I’ll wait ’til I get there.”

  “Where are you?” he asked, hoping she was lost and heading for Mexico.

  “In Bakersfield. I’m on the 5. How long does it take timewise?”

  “Depends on—” He couldn’t go on with the pretense. He stopped talking. There was silence. She knew what was coming. He wished he knew the right words. “You can’t come yet, Grace. I’m not…I can’t…I’m not finished yet.”

  “And while you’re finishing, I guess it’s more than possible you’ll be killed,” she said. He didn’t answer. “This happens all the time, Isaiah. I know it’s your job, but you don’t know how much I worry about you, how frightening it is to—don’t say you’ll quit, because you won’t. I know that and so do you.” She was crying. “I can’t do this anymore. I love you, Isaiah, and I always will. I hope things turn out okay.” She started to say more and ended the call.

  He sat there on the bed, bloodless and struck dumb. You went all the way this time, he thought. You destroyed the best thing that ever happened to you. You crushed a bond so deep and singular you’ll be lost within yourself forever. And why? Because you’re inexorably drawn to the ruined cave of human perversion, where bats, red-eyed and chittering, twist and spiral around the rocks, their shit falling into filth and ste
nch and creatures blind and glowing because they’ve never seen the sun. This is who you are, Isaiah. This is who you’ll always be. And you will never see Grace again.

  Isaiah was in the kitchen, talking with Billy and Ava. He was nearly catatonic, dazed and unfeeling, here because there was nowhere else to be. Billy and Ava were leaning against the counters on opposite sides of the island. Something was up.

  “Cannon doesn’t know he’s in danger and he won’t talk to us,” Ava said. “And he’ll arrest us on sight.” Billy said nothing. Yeah, something was up, Isaiah thought.

  “We can’t let him arrest us. We have to watch him, warn him,” Isaiah said.

  “I’m not going,” Billy announced. He shot a look at Ava and walked out.

  She sighed. “I hurt his feelings.”

  Isaiah and Ava went to the police station and parked nearby. There were too many cops and Cannon was protected there. They went to his house and took a position a half block away. Ava’s car was a Chevrolet Spark. It was very small. Sitting side by side was like sharing the same lounge chair. She was remarkably self-contained, Isaiah thought. Hard to keep yourself together while hatred churned hot in your chest and every blood cell was screaming for revenge. Isaiah knew the feelings well.

  As they sat there, Isaiah felt an itch—not on his skin but inside of him. It was scratchy and slithery, like a snake with sandpaper skin or a tapeworm with scales. What disturbed him more than the itch was that he’d felt it many times before. He’d missed something.