City of Angels

by Kristi Belcamino

  I’ve worn steel-toed combat boots ever since.

  I looked around for a weapon. I shoved a small paring knife I’d bought at the thrift store into the zippered pocket of my leather jacket. Maybe I couldn’t stop a bunch of homeless guys attacking me, but I could go down fighting.

  The Fourth Street Bridge was a few blocks away from the American Hotel. Besides housing a small homeless city underneath, the only thing I knew about the bridge was that Danny had told me it was one of several bridges crossing the dry L.A. River bed connecting downtown with East L.A.

  When I first stepped underneath the bridge, the sun was starting to dip closer to the horizon, coating everything in glowing gold light. The first arch under the bridge was empty, a dirt lot. I let out a big breath I hadn’t even realized I’d been holding. Maybe there wasn’t a homeless camp here after all. But when I rounded the second wall of concrete, I stifled a gasp.

  A small village lay before me. I shrunk back against the wall.

  In a space the size of a baseball infield, at least a dozen cardboard shelters had been built against the colorful graffiti-covered walls under the bridge. Ratty rugs were placed in front of some of them. Broken chairs held drying clothing items and books and canned food were stacked on other boxes and crates. It was like a band of crows had collected shiny things and scattered them everywhere in the camp, which made it oddly colorful and cheery.

  Several men stood huddled around, warming their hands over black metal trashcans with smoke pouring from them. One man sat in a corner cross-legged, unscrewing a jar and singing some old Johnny Cash tune my dad used to like.

  A horrid stench drifted over to me—the combined smell of unwashed bodies and urine and feces. I realized I was standing right by a small garbage can used as a toilet, so I scrunched away a few feet.

  My legs were shaking. Part of me wanted to run away and never look back. But I owed it to Rain to try to find her, apologize, and bring her back home.

  Besides, while part of me was irrationally terrified by the homeless camp, a small part of me—the photographer in me—was intrigued and wanted to document this small city that lay beneath the bridge, hidden from passersby. But today I had to leave my camera in my bag. Instead, I took in the small hidden world before me. Somewhere along the line, maybe because I was so intent on taking in the scene before me, I forgot to be afraid.

  Then someone noticed me.

  It grew silent. The men nudged each other and looked my way. Menace filled the air. My instinct was to bolt, to turn and run as fast as I could. But I steeled myself. I needed to ask about Rain. The shadows were growing longer and I wanted to be far away from here when the sun set.

  “I’m looking for my friend,” I said, my voice shaking and too loud in the silence. “Her name’s Rain. She’s twelve.”

  The whites of more than a dozen eyes stared at me in the silence.

  I stood straighter and tried again, making my voice sound more confident, even tough. “If anyone knows anything about her, I can make it worth their while.” One man snickered. I worried my words would be taken the wrong way, that they would think I had cash on me right then. “I can get money for you later. Please tell me if you’ve seen my friend.”

  Again, nothing. My blood raced, but I fought the urge to run.

  One guy with a dingy scarf looped around his neck took a step my way. I shrunk back as he got closer. “Maybe you should ask the guys farther down under the bridge. Maybe they know sumpin’ about your friend.”

  Everyone sniggered. I hesitated. If I hurried, I could check it out before nightfall. I started to walk toward the other side of the concrete wall that separated this part under the bridge from the next. My neck hairs tingled as the men watched me. When I was nearly to the wall, a man stepped out of the crowd. I braced as he approached, ready to kick and scratch, but when he got closer, a glimmer of kindness in his eyes confused me and then relaxed me at little.

  He spoke in a quiet voice. “Young lady, you need to leave. Everything is different now because of Rodney King.”

  That guy who got beat up by the cops. My eyes widened. “Because I’m white?”

  He shrugged. “And because this is no place for a young lady like yourself. You shouldn’t be down here alone unless you have a gun.”

  The man’s voice was that of an orator, like the kind you’d hear reading eulogies or telling family stories. It was precise and clipped, yet also deep and languid as if he had spent a lifetime reading poetry out loud. I didn’t know if he was the only clean homeless guy under the bridge or whether my nose had gotten used to the odor, but he didn’t smell, seemed clean, and didn’t frighten me. He was more like someone’s grandpa. And his face—it was striking. I kept my distance, but couldn’t stop staring at him. He was old. Really old. He had soulful eyes and the most magnificent wrinkles crisscrossing his mahogany face. My fingers itched to photograph him, maybe in the late afternoon, using the long shadows to highlight the contours of his face.

  The man in the scarf yelled, startling me out of my thoughts. “If she ain’t gonna go down there, then she needs to get the hell out of here. I ain’t gonna tell her twice.”

  The older man said to me in a low voice, “Go on now. It’s time for you to go back where you came from.”

  “Tell her to turn around and keep walking until she sees all white people,” someone yelled, the words sending a ripple of laughter through the crowd.

  “I can’t. I have to find my friend.” My voice let me down. I stuttered with fear. “You said yourself it was no place for a young lady.”

  “She’s not down here,” he said.

  The men were now moving around and I could hear arguing and heated voices. The older man lightly touched my elbow, only for a second, but I still cringed. I was ashamed of this reaction. But he didn’t seem to notice. He leaned in, his voice low and urgent. “Where might someone find you if they possibly had information about your friend?”

  The way he said it gave me hope. I started to answer. The other man with the dirty scarf was heading our way. The man in front of me saw him, too.

  “The young lady was just leaving,” he said with steel in his voice.

  I only had a few seconds. I didn’t want this stranger to know where I lived so at the last second I blurted in a whisper, my voice so low it was like an exhaled breath, “I work tomorrow night at Little Juan’s.”

  He gave a small wink. He’d heard me.

  I race-walked out from under the bridge toward the street, looking behind me every few feet. Nobody was following me. The man with the kind eyes and mahogany skin give me a nearly imperceptible nod as he warmed his hands over the fire in the trash can, keeping his gaze on me. After seeing I was safe out from under the bridge, he took a step back into the shadows, disappearing.

  The dark streets were full of ominous shadows and strange noises as I walked back to the American Hotel, making me glance back behind me at every block. Thinking about Rain—out on the streets, maybe hooked on heroin again just like my mom—filled me with a heavy dread and overwhelming guilt.

  With a ferocity that surprised me, everything that had happened since that night in Malibu hit me like a shock wave, flooring me, stopping me in my tracks. My new life was exhausting. Waitressing itself was tiring—not only being on my feet for hours, but smiling at assholes so they would leave me a tip. Simple tasks necessary to survive, such as buying toothpaste and feeding myself, seemed overwhelming. I wanted to be a normal seventeen-year-old worrying about pimples and who was going to ask me to the prom. Not thinking about paying rent and having clean clothes and food to eat.

  The sob that rose up into my throat also made me weak in the knees. I sank to the curb and put my head between my hands. I missed my mother so badly it was hard to breathe. I wanted everything to go back to the way it was before. I didn’t want to be in L.A. anymore. I wanted to be back in my bedroom in the suburbs with the smell of lasagna wafting upstairs as my mom called me down to dinner. Having that nurse
ry full of coos and giggles and life and my mom laughing and folding and stacking baby clothes. Instead, two small headstones on a grassy hill had shattered that dream.

  I was fooling myself if I thought I could survive in L.A. on my own. I thought I was tough, but I was wrong. I was playing a game, and now the jig was up. I didn’t think I had it in me anymore to go on. I sat there for a moment with my head in my hands until a noise startled me and I stood, brushing myself off.

  What was I thinking by taking in Rain and making promises to her? The truth was I could barely take care of myself. I went through the motions, but terror raced through me late at night when I was alone in my room. I wanted my dad. I wanted him to tell me that everything was going to be okay. I wanted him to take care of me. I wanted the man he was before my sister and mother died, when he was sober. I wanted him to tell me he loved me. I turned toward the gas station where the payphone booth was lit up like a beacon. I listened as the operator asked him to accept my collect call. His voice rose as he answered yes. We spoke at the same time.

  “Veronica?”

  “Dad?”

  “Thank God.” He sounded sober. A sharp intake of breath and whispering. Was someone else in the room with him? It had to be midnight in Chicago. Was it that woman from his office? My stomach hurt imagining them together.

  “Veronica? I was so worried. I thought you were dead, just disappearing like that.”

  Guilt swam over me and I closed my eyes. “I’m sorry.”

  “Where are you?”

  “California.”

  “Oh, for Christ’s sakes.” He whispered something to whoever was in the room with him. “Listen, are you okay?”

  My body filled with relief. He hadn’t meant what he said.

  A homeless guy eyed me as he passed. I kept my eye on him as he walked into the gas station. I swallowed hard. “Dad, I’m sorry.”

  “I know.” He exhaled loudly.

  It wasn’t what I expected him to say. I wanted him to apologize back and tell me he loved me and missed me.

  “Listen, can we talk later? This isn’t really a good time. I’m glad you called to say you were okay.”

  “Dad? I think I need to come home now.”

  No answer, just the muffled sound of voices, as if he was covering the phone with his hand. “Um, yeah, listen, Veronica, that’s not really an option now. I don’t know if you heard, but I lost my job. But it’s okay because things are getting better. I’m in AA and NA and Julie and her kids moved into the house. I’m trying to get my act together, but the thing is…there’s not really any room here for you.”

  My heart sank. I closed my eyes. What had I expected? A heart-warming reunion? A plane ticket waiting for me at the airport?

  The homeless guy came back out of the gas station. He stood, staring at me, drinking his booze out of a paper bag.

  “Veronica? Are you there?”

  I didn’t answer. I glared at the creepy homeless guy.

  My dad kept talking. “I mean, maybe in a few months I can get some money and if you give me your address, I can send it to you to help or something, but right now I’m really struggling to just survive day to day. I’m working the program, you know, going through the steps. I’m glad you called. I was worried…”

  The homeless man wandered off, casting me a last look. I’d been foolish to call my dad. It had been a mistake.

  “Veronica?”

  “I’m here.”

  “Okay, then,” he said. “Call back in a few months. I should have a job then and can send you some money. Okay?” More voices and noises in the background. “Listen, I gotta go now.”

  “Okay. Bye,” I said to the sound of a dial tone.

  Gently, I placed the receiver in its cradle. That was it. Up until this moment, I’d always, in the back of my mind, thought that if things got really bad, I could swallow my pride and go back home to Chicago. Now, I knew that was not an option.

  I’d have to take care of myself.

  I angrily swiped away a few tears that were mutinously leaking from my eyelids. I closed my eyes tightly. No more crying. I took a deep breath and slowly let it out, squaring my shoulders as I opened the payphone doors. It was up to me now. I was on my own.

  The next day I slept in. I didn’t leave my room until I had to get ready for work. Right when I was about to open the bathroom door, it swung open. The band boy stood before me half naked in the doorway. A few drops of moisture still clung to his abdomen right above the white towel wrapped around his waist. A fleck of shaving cream clung to a spot near his ear.

  I instinctively backed into the hall. I had bedhead, smudged makeup, and morning breath that could drop a T-Rex to its knees.

  “Hey.” He grinned. I could barely meet his eyes. He was practically naked. When I looked down to avoid his gaze, his towel slipped a bit and revealed a sharp slice of hipbone. A sprawling tattoo curved around his ribcage—an angel with a lifelike face that I was sure had been copied from a photograph.

  “Nice towel,” he said.

  “You got something against seals?” I’d bought it at the thrift store down the road because it reminded me of going to the zoo with my mom when I was little and how she’d always wanted to watch the seals for what seemed like hours.

  “Nah, love them.”

  “Me, too,” I said, and then for some reason, maybe because I was nervous, I blurted out something I would normally never tell a stranger. “My mom was crazy about seals. She had this little ratty stuffed seal she’d had since she was a kid. It was all matted and one eye was missing. One night when I was scared, she gave it to me.”

  “I always liked dolphins but my mom was crazy about seals. When we went to the zoo, she would squeal and get all excited like a little kid. If it were up to her, she’d have stood there for hours watching the seals, but I always wanted to move on and see the orangutans.”

  As soon as I said it, I could feel my face grow warm. But he smiled so I continued. “She had this little ratty stuffed seal she’d had since she was a kid. One night, I was really scared and couldn’t go to sleep so she gave me her seal to sleep with, to keep me safe. It was all matted and one eye was missing. ‘He’ll keep you safe,’ she said. After that, seals became my favorite animal, too.”

  I finished and clamped my lips together tightly, surprised I’d shared all that with a stranger. It was not normal. Not for me. Even though I had spent a month with Chad, I’d never told him about my family. I’d never volunteered anything personal about myself. Nothing. All I’d said was I’d had a screwed-up home life and wanted to leave Chicago as fast as I could. And he obliged. I’d never really had a real boyfriend, so it never occurred to me that his overwhelmingly lack of interest in me and my past wasn’t normal. At the time, it was convenient. Only now did I realize that Chad never wanted to know a single thing about me because he didn’t give a crap. I was a pawn in his sick child porn plans. I stared at my bare feet, now feeling totally awkward.

  “You still have it? The seal?”

  I shook my head. “I was in a hurry…I left it behind. I tried to get it back once, but all the locks on the house were changed.”

  He didn’t ask me why I couldn’t get back into my own house.

  “That sucks.” His eyes grew darker. “By the way, have you heard from your friend? That kid?” He stared past me.

  I swallowed and shook my head.

  “Sorry about that,” he said, still not meeting my eyes. “I’m sure she’ll turn up.”

  I didn’t answer. I was growing antsy, eager to have him leave.

  “Listen, I should probably take a shower so I can get to work on time.”

  He nodded, frowning slightly for some reason, and started toward his room. I stood in the doorway and watched him leave. He stopped and turned. He smiled when he saw me still looking. “Hey.” His voice sounded less cocky and maybe even a bit uncertain. “You doing anything Friday night?”

  His question made my mouth go dry. I had Friday off. I
managed to shake my head.

  “Cool. I still want to play you that song by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, but today I got this CD that will blow your mind. It’s from a Seattle band called Nirvana. It’s their first album. They played Al’s last year.”

  I waited a moment before answering. It would be better than sitting alone in my room, worrying about Rain. Better than spending another night like last—pacing and smoking in my room for most of the night, trying to figure out where she went, pausing every time there were footsteps or voices in the hall.

  I’d managed to avoid everyone on the fourth floor the past few days, especially Danny. My stomach bunched into knots when I thought about him. Maybe he would also be at Taj’s and we could talk, I could apologize. It wasn’t Danny’s fault that Rain disappeared, but I’d had no problem blaming him. And in front of everyone. It was my fault Rain was gone and about time I admitted it to everyone.

  “Okay,” I said, which prompted a huge smile from Taj.

  “Cool. Friday. My room. Eight?”

  I nodded and closed the bathroom door. It would be fun to hang out with him, even if he didn’t believe that someone had taken Rain against her will. Because although I didn’t want to admit it, a tiny sliver of doubt had crept into my own mind about whether she really had been kidnapped. I told her to leave. She only had one option to do so. That black car.

  Maybe she had asked to get in and I had imagined the scream as something ominous. Maybe it had been a happy laugh or playful scream. It was so hard to know for sure whether what I saw that night was real. It had been dark and I had been high on acid, of all things. Me, the girl who didn’t do drugs. How could I be sure of anything that night? With every hour that passed since Christmas, the less certain I was about whether Rain had willingly got into that car or been forced to get in.