“Ben.”
“Okay... Ben. Ben, I don’t want to lose my marriage and it’s sitting on a ledge right now and one more thing will toss it over and…” I heard him exhale and try to compose himself. “Ben, is my wife... is Suzy in any kind of danger?”
I closed my eyes and settled back in the swing. The still-hot night air and the booze were making my head swim. Back in Horowitz’s class we had studied men like this, men like me... and a hundred years of psychological study had yielded only one possible answer for the question Herndon had put to me: Is Suzy in any kind of danger?
“No,” I lied, “At least I don’t think so. This guy, this guy is not like you or me... not like anyone, really. He’s motivated by an illusion, an image. He sees the world through a distorted window so he’s stimulated by things that aren’t real... at least not real to you or me. That image he’s motivated by seems to be your Josh, my Lucas. So... no. No, I wouldn’t be surprised if this man doesn’t even know who you and your wife are.”
Was that frustration I heard on the other end of the phone? Herndon said, “Oh lord, I don’t know what to do.”
I said, “Hey man, all you can do is be there for your wife. That’s what you can do now. Put that beer guy and the cops out of your mind and take care of Suzy... you hear me?”
His voice was soft and distant. “Yeah... yeah. I’ll do that. Thanks, man. Thanks for letting me talk... it helps, you know? Goodnight…”
Herndon hung up without giving me a chance to respond, probably to swivel in his seat and order one for the road from Rolly. As for me, I had one more for the road as I swung back and forth, chastising myself for being a liar and a hypocrite. A hypocrite because I had counseled Herndon to “be there for his wife.” Had I done that for my own? One thing was crystal-clear: I was a liar for giving Herndon reasons to ignore the beer man... because I certainly wasn’t going to.
Freddie.
Chapter Sixteen
Finding Coulson’s Distributing in the phone book wasn’t difficult; the difficult part was finding a phone book. Jeanie and I have ignored and probably thrown out the last few years’ delivery of the yellow books but I found an old 2008 copy at the bottom of the kitchen drawer that’s consigned to hold everything-that-has-no-place-anywhere-else. Old ink pens, bottle openers, key holders; that thing that holds six or seven Allen wrenches that is now empty – how could we hold onto this stuff and not hold on to each other?
There were several distributors in the Austin area but it was child’s play to be Jolene from the Smithville Quik-Stop, inquiring about a late order and oh, I’m sorry... I got my deliveries screwed up and called the wrong number.
Freddie.
Tuesdays and Fridays. I doubt anyone making deliveries here actually lives here. Me, I’ve got the corridor from Austin and from the looks of you, I’d say you and me could be neighbors.
Today is Tuesday and the kind lady at Coulson’s informed me that Freddie Brown’s regular schedule put him out the door at 10092 Industrial Way, Suite 3-E no later than 10:00am so I should get my six cases of Lone Star by noon and thank-you-very-kindly-for-your-business.
With a thermos of “special” coffee and an old four-pack of cheese and crackers, I was out my own door with plenty of time to find Industrial Way and hide in the shadows of an auto repair building till Freddie pulled out of the warehouse loading dock and went about his busy day.
A few stops in North Austin, Austin to Rockdale, Rockdale to Smithville (where I hid in the parking lot from a helpful Tiny, holding the door open for an overloaded Freddie); on up to Breakline and then Plum and finally Horst – I followed the white step-van and chain-smoked cigarettes and drank coffee. I couldn’t believe how tedious Freddie’s line of work must be: hand truck in, hand truck out, each mile with the sliding door of the van open which I assumed meant no air-conditioning – almost torture in the above-hundred heat. When we left Horst it was only 1:00pm and I couldn’t figure out Freddie’s schedule because if it took two hours to make it back to home base, that would make his work day only six hours long, assuming his initial load-up was an hour. Perhaps some days are longer than others? Part of the solution came at 1:30pm when the white van took the Badger exit at Smithville and Freddie drove to Fowler Park, a three-minute drive, to have a late lunch.
He didn’t have to see his victim from a store – he saw the boy when he ate his lunch.
Freddie parked near the entrance and chose a picnic table in the shade of an oak and began salting a hard-boiled egg. I sat one hundred feet behaind the beer van in a more remote parking space, smoking and watching the red-haired man.
After my experience with the Carlyles, I finally screwed up my courage and approached Freddie cautiously, carrying the thermos and a package of crackers. There was a second picnic table adjacent to Freddie’s and as nonchalantly as I could I sat and made a big production of pouring myself a large cup of brandied coffee.
Eyeing some ducks in the creek that once held Josh’s flip-flop, I said, “Hot enough for you?”
Freddie’s eyes looked languid from the heat and his freckles seemed more prominent than before. He replied, “I tell myself every year: next year I’m moving to Montana. I’ve been here since there were dinosaurs and every year I bitch and moan about the bugs and the heat.” He laughed. “Some people never learn, I guess.”
Perfect. My newly-grown beard kept him from remembering me and Freddie was a naturally gregarious guy.
I said, motioning to the white van, “Must come in handy on a hot day like today: being able to reach back and get a cold one anytime you like.”
Freddie was opening a tuna sandwich. “Oh no, sir. We got strict rules about that kind of thing. Not to mention the cops. The last thing I want is to get pulled over by some Nazi and have my license yanked. I just stick with this.” He held up a chocolate Yoo-hoo.
With his skinny posture, red hair and freckles, getting called “sir” by Freddie was like being addressed by Mickey Rooney’s Andy Hardy. I said, “Well, you probably get some free chips, right? Peanuts? That sort of thing?”
Freddie raised his Yoo-hoo. “Wrong company, buddy. We only do beer – beer and wine coolers. Why do you think I bring a snack lunch?”
“Wow. Well, don’t you get some freebees or a discount from the potato chip guy?”
I was fishing but Freddie was eager to talk. “Who? The Bono’s guy? Hah! He’s so tight I bet his ass whistles when he walks. Besides, I hardly ever see him – he’s on different days.”
Sometimes you just know. This was not the guy. I made polite talk for several minutes and heard all about his wife and three (!) kids, all three with his red locks, and started eyeing my wristwatch. Once the last bite of tuna was consumed, Freddie got up from the table, pried his sweat-stained work shirt out of his armpits, and said, “Well, got to head on out. Today’s inventory and I got to bake in the warehouse for an hour or two. I got to finish up by five – Spurs are in Oakland tonight.”
I was nervous. Nervous about over-playing my hand and having this guy spill the beans about a sweaty bearded guy, probably half-drunk, who had way too many questions about the product delivery business. I lit up a smoke and that’s when my road was made smoother.
“Hey, could I bum one of those from you?”
“Sure.” I handed him the pack of Camels.
“That’s another thing about Arnie. If I do bump into him, he gives me shit about smoking. He says it’s a dirty habit. Well, He’s probably right…” Freddie exhaled a big puff and handed the pack back, “…not that I smoke more than a couple a day. Big deal.”
I said, “Arnie’s the chip guy?”
“Chips, cookies, snacks, candies... you name it. Anything in the handy pack.”
“Handy pack?”
“Yeah. You know... the travel size?”
I nodded and tried to act cool. “This Arnie – he doesn’t do Tuesdays?”
Freddie blew a perfect “O” smoke ring. “I told you – he’s Wednesdays/Saturdays.
.. at least on this route.”
Freddie thanked me again and sauntered to his vehicle. I stood there, taking in the afternoon heat and smoking till I was sure he was at least five minutes ahead of me and then I got in the Volvo, found the highway, and accelerated till I got two car lengths behind my new Yoo-hoo-drinking friend. I followed him all the way to Austin, leaving him only when my exit appeared. My paranoia meter was pegging red and I watched my rear-view mirror for a late-model grey/green Ford all the way.
Later, while Freddie was probably watching the Spurs and sucking on something a little stronger than Yoo-hoo, I made deeper tracks in the playground and had imaginary conversations with Jeanie.
Honey, I’m close. I can feel it. I don’t have motive but I’ve got means and opportunity. He’s close and unsupervised. And – he has the Keeley’s.
My mind created a Jeanie that told me once again that I was grasping at straws and argued that I was drowning in a sea of alcohol-infused depression.
Ma Cain raised a stubborn son. Ma Cain used to say that “pride goeth before a fall” was written especially for me because I was so filled with stubborn pride that I was bound to fall on my face or my butt in some spectacular fashion sometime in my life. Well, Rebecca Cain died before Lucas was taken so she couldn’t see that I no longer have any pride at all. I could still hear her voice, I could hear Jeanie’s imagined voice – but I have no pride.
And I don’t care if I fall.
All I care about right now, while a late-night hot sirocco wind rustles Rocky’s chestnut fur, is one thing:
Breakline.
*
When looking for Coulson’s Distributors I had embraced my Luddite tendencies, ignoring the technological advances designed to make our lives better and enrich our minds and had searched through the trash bin of my life for a phone book. Not this time: The computer said that there are three major hub locations for Bono’s that service nine subsidiary locations – the nine primary routes that feed over a hundred convenience stores, gas stations, and “variety” outlets in Clark, Williamson, Travis, Bastrop, Hays, Blanco, and Burnet counties.
I was only interested in one: Williamson. Williamson and the highway known to the old-timers as the “corridor”. Highway 29.
The internet informed me that Bono’s has a storage warehouse (wholesale to owners only) at 305 Knoll Hill Road, two miles out of Austin proper, and a handy quarter-mile west of Highway 29. It didn’t take a Stephen Hawking to figure out it was the one I needed. Not even a Gabor sister. Armed with the same weapons I had used to follow Freddie Brown, cigarette-moocher and Yoo-hoo endorser, I waited in the beginning daylight in the lot of a U-Haul Rental Center, across Knoll Hill Road, for the corridor’s main-man of snacks: Arnie.
I felt anticipation like it was a nine-cup caffeine rush.
Bono’s distributorship was housed in an acre-long industrial building and shared space with a mechanical part-wholesaler which I assumed is parts for things like washers, dryers, and other appliances. There was one driveway in and I assumed a loading dock of sorts in the rear of the building. One confident sign out front said Bono’s but there was no other adornment.
I got a chance to fully appraise Arnie when he drove in at 7:45am and parked his dark green Jeep Cherokee in front of the only door to Bono’s. As he got out of the Jeep I saw the same thin man, maybe five-eight, his Dutch Boy blond hair and prominent Adam’s apple as I remembered it. I now noticed that the ridges beneath his nose, the philtrum, were as deeply pronounced as his dimpled chin, giving him the appearance of having been shallowly cut from chin to nose. The fissures served to make his facial expressions dramatically more pronounced. The overalls, almost unnaturally white, held the oval Bono’s logo and the red stitching that said Arnie. Arnie tapped a set of light work gloves against one palm as he entered the doorway to his work.
I poured a plastic cup of my doctored coffee and lit a cigarette, thinking that it would take some minutes before Arnie left for the day but he must have prepared the day’s load the night before because two minutes after he entered the building the white step-van came around the building and roared down Oak Hill Road. A “Jesus!” escaped my lips and I spilled a little coffee on my lap as I threw the Volvo into gear and followed the van to the entrance to the freeway.
I was expecting the same journey that I had experienced with Freddie Brown so my heart began to pound as we passed exit signs for Rockdale, Smithville, Plum – until I realized that Arnie had scheduled his duties in the reverse of Freddie the beer-man. Arnie drove all the way to Horst, finally settling into an unloading space in front of a Wag-A-Bag store that must have been at least two miles from the Carlyle boy and Prete Lane. While Arnie unloaded his fresh items and loaded up the ones to be returned and discarded, I fingered the still tender spot on the back of my head where Mrs. Carlyle had tried to leave a divot and watched the road for any signs of the Horst police. It was already getting uncomfortably hot but my discomfort was multiplied by remembering my experience with the Carlyle father.
Horst to Plum, Plum to Breakline, Breakline to Smithville – we stopped at many more stores that I hadn’t factored in with my first study of the Highway 29 route but none of the extras were in visual sight of any school, park, or playground. I hid behind a big Chevy truck out on the curb as Arnie serviced Jolene or Tiny (got to have a root beer... one for the road!) in the Quik-Stop and felt my insanity validated when Arnie pulled out of the Quik-Stop parking lot, made a right turn on Western, and headed off in the direction of Fowler Park.
There was no way I was going to chit-chat with Arnie during his lunch as I had done with Freddie. For a second I panicked at the thought of James Herndon, or Suzy Herndon, or even the Smithville Police’s Detective Craig showing up and having to explain just what in the hell I was doing here. Fortunately, Arnie and I were only joined by the ducks, squirrels, and one lonely old drunk down at the far end of the park. I parked as far away from the Bono’s truck as I could and watched Arnie eat a sandwich and drink a root beer (of course) through the tinted windows of the Volvo. Nothing of consequence happened during this lunch except Arnie walked to a drinking fountain, washed his root beer bottle thoroughly, and then washed the bottle and his hands completely once he had eaten. Arnie the Bono’s man is... fastidious.
Smithville to Breakline. The coffee and cigarettes had caught up to me and my nerves were on edge as we pulled into Breakline’s very own Gas-n-Go. Before Arnie could organize his delivery I parked, dashed to the restroom, and then snuck out the other door of the store. Angling myself close to the outside ice machine, I could barely see Arnie chatting with the counter person and fussing with a rack of snacks. I held back, trying to stay out of his field of vision, lighting a cigarette to appear as if I were just another customer, grabbing a smoke the required twenty-feet from the pumps. I let my eyes wander around and saw a small Domino’s Pizza, a Burger King, and one of those storefronts that look like they could have been a window-blind or carpet store although there was no sign to tell which. Moving into the shade from one side of the Gas-n-Go I could see the only connector street, Kennelly Way, and at the visible end of that street, a sign that read: Kennelly Park. Only two side streets existed between the main road I was on and the park at the end of Kennelly Way. I could barely read the little green street signs that said: Common and Prospect Ave.
My heart was a deafening pendulum and my trip to the restroom hadn’t given me much relief. Arnie came out of the far door jockeying his hand truck and proceeded to wrestle it into the van and get ready to leave. I was faced with a decision: follow Arnie back to Austin and whatever further stops he may have to make, or stay here and search for what my instincts say I’m certain to find?
I let Arnie drive off and went into the Gas-n-Go to ask for directions to Bass Elementary on Harmon Avenue. There were only four more days left in the school year.
*
Keeping in mind my experience in Horst, I waited patiently at the curb for 3:10pm to roll around on my
wrist watch. I played the radio, I eked out the last of the coffee; I smoked one more Camel and tried to stay cool. At 3:10pm precisely a bell rang out and kids started filing out of Bass and began mingling with each other around the few buses parked in the circular access lane.
Kyle Simmons’ blond thatch of hair stood out like a shiny coin lying on black velvet. I watched him board the bus, joking and jostling some friends from his class, and then the bus pulled out of the lot, belching gray smoke and making clanking, groaning sounds like an old man’s bones.
A small distance on King Road, a short pause to honor the stop at an intersecting railroad crossing, two more short turns on side streets and Kyle Simmons and three other students exited the bus. All four went in different directions but Kyle headed straight for Kennelly Way, walking two blocks and then turning right onto Prospect. I slowly followed Kyle to the end of Prospect, self-conscious and sweating, and watched him walk up to, and enter, the house at 1011 Prospect.
Kyle Simmons, who looks like the image of my dead son, lives at 1011 Prospect.
Idling at the curb adjacent to the Simmons home, I retrieved my briefcase from the back seat and scanned the nine photos inside. Two boys I had failed in Smithville and Plum. That left seven. Three in Austin, one in Rockdale, and Stemhagen and Carlyle in Horst – that’s six. Not even wanting to think of the boy in Oklahoma I was left with Kyle Simmons. Kyle Simmons, who looks like the other boys, who all look like my son, who lives within spitting distance of a Gas-n-Go and will soon be out of school and spending plenty of days in Kennelly Park wasting away the days of summer. Playing in the park and probably conning a few nickels out of mom or dad to go up to the corner gas station and maybe get some Red Hots or a Coke or something. After all, mom – it’s hotter than bejesus and I’ll look both ways before I cross...
It’s only a matter of time before Arnie sees Kyle on his twice-weekly route and fixates on him.
Arnie.
Candy from a Stranger Page 11