The Way Home

by George Pelecanos

  “So?”

  “The money you stole was theirs. They killed Ben over it. It’s safe to say that Ben didn’t give you up. If he had, you’d be dead now, too.”

  “Did you give me up, White Boy?”

  “No.”

  “Why? All a sudden, you my friend?”

  “I’m gonna need your help.”

  “I guess we should meet, then.”

  Chris said, “Where?”

  TWENTY-FIVE

  THE NATIONAL Arboretum was situated on four hundred acres of trees, fields, and landscaped plants bordered by New York Avenue to the north and the Anacostia River to the southeast. Thousands of cars drove along its black fence every day, and the park was open to the public, yet it seemed underutilized by Washingtonians, perhaps because of its ugly gateway and the overinflated reputation for violence of the neighborhoods around it.

  Chris Flynn drove his van past the information center and gift shop, located near the New York Avenue entrance, noticing the many Jeep security vehicles parked in the lot. It was in his makeup to take note of such things, and to rank private cops in a low position on his police scale. Private security meant they must not have any serious trouble back here, beyond kids smoking weed.

  Couples were hiking along the shoulder and on trails, and cyclists were taking their bikes off the racks of their cars. Chris went down Ellipse Road and saw the Corinthian columns, twenty-two sandstone structures that had once been located on the east portico of the Capitol, now standing in an open meadow. He remembered his parents taking him here as a child, water running under the shadows of the columns down a graduated channel to a reflecting pool, his father grabbing his collar as Chris had attempted to jump in.

  He took another road, squeezing by a groundsman hauling hay in a motorized cart. He saw employees but fewer visitors as the van climbed up into more thickly forested areas, the Conifer and then the Dogwood collections. He followed the clearly marked signs and drove up the winding Hickory Hill Road, then parked beside a Chevy Cavalier in a shaded lot near a brick structure that he reckoned housed men’s and women’s bathrooms. He locked the van and headed toward a trail, passing a woman who was carrying a bucket and wearing an Arboretum shirt. He had arrived at the Asian Collection, a section boasting a variety of plants imported from China, Korea, and Japan, now thriving in the hilly woods.

  Chris walked down a steeply graded wood-chip-and-dirt path lined by beveled railroad ties. At the bottom of the grade was a wooden bench in a clearing, where Lawrence Newhouse stood waiting. Lawrence wore an LRG T-shirt with a matching hat, and Nikes edged in red to pick up the red off the shirt. His cap sat high and cocked atop his braids.

  They nodded at each other but didn’t shake hands. Lawrence sat down on the bench and Chris joined him. Several feet before them was a ledge, and there the land dropped off precipitously. They could see the tops of trees and below, on the ridge floor, the brown ribbon of the Anacostia River, sun glinting off its water.

  “This here’s my spot,” said Lawrence.

  “I don’t know this place,” said Chris.

  “That’s what makes this shit so special. I used to ride my bike here all the way from Wade Road in Southeast. It’s far, but I was young, and I had mad energy. I came all that way to look at this. To sit here and have that kind of peace, it was worth it to me. You ever see where me and Ali come up?”

  “Ali drove me up Stanton once.”

  “Then you know. I was round the corner in Parkchester. Ali was down at the bottom of the Farms, near Firth Sterling Ave. What they called the dwellings. Not houses or apartments or homes… dwellings. Anyway, Ali and his mom got out. I’m proud of that boy.”

  “I am, too.”

  “He tryin to help all them young niggas who think they got to be one way. I thought he could help my nephew Marquis.”

  “I know Marquis. He’s a decent kid.”

  “He’s smart. Talented, too. He just needs to get out of that fucked-up environment he’s in. Before it does to him what it did to me.”

  “Ali was gonna hook him up with a fast-food job, wasn’t he?”

  “But I wanted Ali to put him someplace better. A place where he could learn a trade. That’s why I reached out to him and asked him to get up with you and your pops. But he wasn’t willin to do it. Maybe ’cause it was me askin. So I contacted Ben. I thought Ben might speak to you about it. I didn’t know nothin about no money until Ben’s tongue got loose behind that Popov and weed. I wasn’t tryin to do my boy dirt.”

  “But you did it anyway.”

  Lawrence narrowed his eyes. “That’s right. I stole that money. What, you thought I was gonna let it sit there like you? I’m not that kind of sucker. But I didn’t know Ben was gonna get done behind it. Ben was my boy.”

  They sat there and listened to the birds, and the wind moving the leaves on the trees.

  “Who did this?” said Lawrence.

  “Trash,” said Chris. “Two white guys, older than us. Seemed to me that they’ve been in the system a long time. No one who’s lived on the outside looks like that. There was a little guy with a big mustache and heavy ink. Looks like he kissed a train. His partner’s a beast. Clover tat on one hand. Big gut, big chest. The little guy’s the blade man. I’m guessing he murdered Ben. The big one carries a gun.”

  “Then we gonna need to tool up, too. I can do that.”

  Chris nodded slowly.

  “You know what you’re fixin to do?” said Lawrence. “I’m sayin, are you up for it?”

  “Are you?”

  “I ain’t never killed no one,” said Lawrence. “But when they do one of your own, you got to come back hard.”

  “That’s right,” said Chris, with no enthusiasm.

  “Unit Five,” said Lawrence, and he held out his fist. Chris did not raise his hand. “You too good to dap me up?”

  “I’m not about that anymore, Lawrence.”

  “You done put it all behind you, huh. But you here, though. Right?”

  Chris looked away.

  “Okay,” said Lawrence. “How we gonna contact them?”

  “I’ve got a cell number on my caller ID. I’ll set up a meet. I’ll tell them I’m ready to give up the money.”

  “Let me have the number. I’ll make the call.”

  “Why?”

  “ ’Cause I took the money, White Boy. Like you said, it’s on me. I’m runnin this shit or I’m out.”

  “I’ll do it alone, then.”

  “No, you won’t. You ain’t hard enough, Christina. You just think you are. But you don’t get to the kinda hard that me and them other boys at the Ridge were at, comin from where you did. With your home and your library and your pet dog.”

  “I did the same time you did.”

  “But you never did the real time. I’m talkin about the time I did as a child. All the beatings I took, from the men in my mother’s apartment to the boys out on the street. The beatings I took in my heart from the teachers who told me I wasn’t shit and never was gonna be shit. Then in Pine Ridge, feeding me meds just to make me normal.” Lawrence shook his braids away from his face and stared down at the water. “I was in Lorton before they closed it. So crowded you were living on top of men who would punch you in the face for nothin. Know what I did to get out of there? I screamed like a baby. I smeared my own shit on myself and I ate it, too. They took me outta there. Put me in Saint E’s for a while. They had me in one of them jackets with straps. I musta took everything they had in their medicine cabinet, boy. I couldn’t tell the difference between who I was and who I was pretendin to be. When I got released? Wasn’t nobody with their arms out and a smile on their face. But when you came out the Ridge, I bet there was someone there for you.” Chris did not answer, and Lawrence said, “Bet your mother made you a real nice dinner, too.”

  She did, thought Chris. His father had put three New York strips out on the grill, and his mother had made onion rings and a big salad to go with the steaks. She had set the table
in the dining room with candles, and for dessert had baked him his favorite cake, a rich German chocolate. The dog had flopped down under the table while they ate, resting against Chris’s feet. They did not speak much during dinner, but it was not uncomfortable, and afterward Chris went up to his room and slept on clean sheets that smelled of spring.

  “We about to do a murder, son,” said Lawrence. “Who you want in charge of this shit? You or me?”

  Chris reached into his pocket, retrieved his cell, and flipped it open. He scrolled through his contacts and found the number he had taken from caller ID and saved. He handed the phone to Lawrence, who transferred it into his own cell.

  “Where they gonna put Ben?” said Lawrence.

  “As soon as the police release his body, we’re having his ashes buried at Rock Creek.”

  “That was Ben’s thing,” said Lawrence. “Me, I want to be right here.”

  “They don’t bury people here, Lawrence. It’s a park.”

  “I ain’t say nothing about being buried. Why you always got to act so superior?”

  “I wasn’t—”

  “Let’s just go.”

  They walked up the path together. They crossed the road to the parking area, near the rest room structure. Chris’s van was beside Lawrence’s Cavalier.

  Lawrence nodded to its rear doors. “Ben’s tool belt in there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Let me see it.”

  Chris unlocked the van, opened its rear, and handed Lawrence the belt. From one of its pouches Lawrence took Ben’s double-sided Crain razor knife and felt its weight and balance in his hand. The knife had a contoured wood handle and a heavy gauge three-inch blade that hooked at the end.

  “Can I have it?” said Lawrence.

  “Why?”

  “Poet’s justice,” said Lawrence.

  Chris nodded. “Hit me up.”

  “I plan to arrange this quick,” said Lawrence. “We don’t need to think on it too much.”

  “Right.”

  “Be ready, White Boy.”

  Lawrence back-pocketed the carpet knife and walked to his car. Chris’s blood pounded in his ears as he watched him drive away.

  SONNY AND Wayne had been partying all day in a white asbestos-shingled rambler on a generous piece of land bordering a community center in a place called Riverdale Park. Though the town was only a couple of miles off the District line in Maryland, there were trees and large lots as well as baseball and football fields visible from the backyard, and it felt familiar to both of them. They were comfortable here and relaxed. There were many Spanish in the neighborhood, and some blacks, but that didn’t ruin it for them. It was as good a place as they’d been in since they had come to D.C.

  The girls, Ashley and Cheyenne, had directed them out here via Kenilworth Boulevard, more miles of shit-laid road to their eyes, so it had been a nice surprise when they pulled into this neighborhood of quiet and green. Ashley said that she and Cheyenne were friendly with the boy, Chuck, who was renting the house. It was a group home for three undergraduates who attended the University of Maryland, and Chuck was the only one who’d stayed for the summer while his roommates had gone back to their hometowns. Chuck came from upstate New York money, had illegal habits, worked in a comic-book store, and was weak but sweet. He’d given them permission to crash there any time and told them where the key would be, under a flowerpot on the front stoop. They three-wayed him when he wanted it, and unlike most drug users, he shared, so it was a good arrangement. Chuck would be cool with them bringing their two new friends over for some fun. He wouldn’t mind.

  Sonny was outside the house, drinking a Jack and Coke from a plastic cup. Shadows had gathered and faded as night darkened the yard. Crickets rubbed their legs together, and the sound soothed him.

  Sonny was high, maybe drunk, but in control. He had taken Ashley into one of the bedrooms as soon as they got there, asked her to strip for him, and told her to walk around. Predictably, she had a rose tattoo at the small of her back and one that matched just above her pubic line. She had cat eyes, freckles on her nose, and melon tits. It took a while, but he became aroused and he called her over to the bed, where he pushed the twins together, made them Siamese, and gave her a friction hump. It never took him long, and when he was done he was done for the day. He sat with her for a while as she snorted meth and he drank his cocktails, and he became bored, listening to her talk about bullshit, faster and faster, and listening to Wayne give it to Cheyenne in the adjoining room, the skinny girl making a whole mess of noise, Wayne showing off to his old cell mate, sending plaster chips off the wall, bottom-knocking that gal fierce, like he was hitting a pound of raw hamburger.

  After, they all joined up back in the living room and commenced to partying group-style. The girls got down to panties and brassieres, which they no doubt thought was sexy, but to Sonny’s mind just exposed Ashley’s fat and Cheyenne’s birdlike build and acned back. Wayne had his shirt off, showing off his wiry frame, not an ounce of body fat on that boy at all. They were all doing the crystal except for Sonny, with Wayne pounding Silver Bullets behind the speckled white. Wayne had no bottom for beer when he did meth. Ashley and Cheyenne found a colored station on the radio they liked, and both of them were rapping together to what passed for a song these days, and they got up and did some kind of jungle-jump to it as Wayne clapped out of time and shouted them on. Eventually Wayne and Cheyenne went back into the bedroom, and Ashley drifted off, lit some candles, and drew herself a bath. Sonny took a nap.

  When he woke up, the house was quiet. He fixed a drink and went outside and saw that the Mercury was gone. He had a seat on the stoop and as night came he thought of his situation and what would come next.

  He tried to envision his future, but nothing came to mind.

  It occurred to him that he was where he wanted to be. A lifetime of incarceration, starting at the boys’ detention center in Sabillasville, continuing on through several adult facilities, leading to the last, the federal joint in Lewisburg. All that schooling, and what he learned was: Live in the now. Take what you want, have no dreams, ride free. Like it said in the song by that wild country boy he loved: There are those that break and bend / I’m the other kind.

  His cell phone rang. Sonny flipped it open and answered the call. When he was done talking, he put the cell back in his pocket and nodded tightly.

  The Mercury pulled up in front of the house. Wayne got out, carrying a bunch of supermarket daisies, and crept across the yard. He stood in front of Sonny and head-shook his center-parted hair.

  “You got that look,” said Wayne. “Somethin’s happenin.”

  “Outta the blue, I just got a call from some coon. Said he had my money and was lookin to give it back.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “Only Chris Carpet has my number. From the caller ID. So he’s got a partner.”

  “You think it’s a trap? Maybe he called the law.”

  “He didn’t even call out for the patrol car when it passed by his yard last night, and that was life and death. He ain’t that type.”

  Wayne grinned and his face folded in upon itself. “So it’s on.”

  “I reckon. Whoever I spoke to is gonna phone me tomorrow and tell me when and where.”

  “Huh,” said Wayne.

  “What are the flowers for?”

  “They’re for my girl.”

  “Your girl? We paid that little heifer to fuck you, son.”

  “She’s a nice young lady.”

  “She stinks.”

  “Watch what you say.”

  “She stinks like a menstruatin polecat.”

  “Your mother does,” said Wayne.

  Sonny snorted as Wayne slipped into the house.

  Not much later, an old Honda coupe stopped on the street and a white boy got out of it. He walked gingerly toward Sonny. He was overweight and had long hair and a black T-shirt stretched tight over an hourglass figure. He stopped in front of the stoop where
Sonny still sat.

  “Who are you?” said the boy.

  “Friend of Ashley’s. You?”

  “Chuck. I live here.”

  “So?”

  The boy named Chuck tried to hold Sonny’s gaze, but he could not. His shoulders slumped and he stepped carefully around the big man, opened the door to his place, and walked inside.

  Sonny smiled.

  TWENTY-SIX

  CHRIS FLYNN sat shirtless on the edge of his bed and used one hand to pop the joints of the other. He had turned off his cell and had no landline, but now there was an incessant knocking on his apartment door. His van was on the street, so he couldn’t pretend that he was not at home. He walked to the door and opened it. Katherine stood in the hall. She was lovely and agitated. Angry even, for her.

  “You don’t want to see me?”

  “I do,” said Chris. “Come in.”

  He stepped aside to let her pass. She came into the apartment and he followed her to the living room.

  “You want a beer, somethin?”

  “No, I don’t want anything.”

  Chris pointed to a chair. “Sit down.”

  She sat, and Chris took a seat beside her.

  “What’s going on with you?” said Katherine.

  “I need to be alone, is all.”

  “Your eyes are dead.”

  “It’s because of Ben. I’m all fucked up behind it.”

  “Something’s happening with you and it goes beyond Ben’s death. I need to know what it is. You’ve never shut me out like this before.”

  Chris stared down at the hardwood floor. Katherine had him. They were going to be together forever, and she was the one he could talk to. She was a piece of him and she wouldn’t do him wrong. He looked her in the eyes.

  “It is about Ben,” said Chris. “I know who killed him.”

  “How do you know?” said Katherine carefully.

  “It was two men. They came to visit me, right here in my backyard. They killed Ben over the money that we left in that house. It was theirs. They must have tried to get Ben to talk about who took it.”

  “Do you know who took it?”