by Wendy Heard
A pinch in Ricky’s neck. A bee sting.
A hand—a body, crouched above. Something shiny and slender touches Andrew’s neck.
And then the burning, shimmering pain.
TUESDAY
6
JAZZ
THE LAWYER’S GLASSES are dirty like the Plexiglas covering his beat-up desk, but behind them, his brown eyes are kind. “Can you prove she’s not giving him his insulin?”
I sit forward, elbows on knees. “It’s kind of hard to prove something is going to happen in the future. Which is what brings me to you.”
“Say she doesn’t give him his insulin and he does get sick. Can’t you just call in DCFS then?”
I say, “Juvenile diabetes isn’t like type two diabetes. With type two, you can live with it untreated for years, and you can go without your insulin for a while if you watch your diet. Joaquin has type one, and his is especially unstable. If he goes a few days untested, untreated, he could die fast. There isn’t time to wait for him to get sick. He already almost died once, and DCFS didn’t do shit to Carol, just told her to be more careful.”
“All right. Give me a moment to review.” He bends his head forward to examine my paperwork, and the strands of hair he’d combed across his bald spot tumble forward in front of his glasses. He pushes the hair back into place. Embarrassed for him, I let my eyes drift around the office, from the seedy vinyl client chairs to the crooked bookshelves to the vintage phone on his desk. I drum my fingers on my knees, catch myself and fold my arms across my chest. Outside the window, faint sirens wail a plaintive song. Their volume squeals to a crescendo as they pass us, and then it fades into the distance as they continue west.
He turns a page. “So you have a criminal record.”
I feel my hands tighten around my biceps. “Yes.”
“Lots of fighting.” He points to something in the paperwork. “Jesus, girl. How many bar fights have you gotten into?”
Shame and pride vie for my attention. “Some.”
He shakes his head and flips the page. “You need to go to anger management.”
“I’ve been.”
“Maybe you should go into boxing or something, try to channel that energy toward—”
“I’ve done all that. I used to teach jujitsu. Now I play the drums. I’m all chilled out now.” Kind of. Sort of.
He returns to the paperwork, reads through a page and snorts. “You kidnapped your brother. That’s great.”
I’m not going to punch my lawyer. That would be bad. “There were extenuating circumstances.”
“The judge didn’t see it that way.”
“The judge was an asshole.”
He looks up. “You want to run the clock out acting like a teenager, or you want to tell me what happened so I can help you?”
He’s right. I am acting like a teenager in the principal’s office. I look down at the tattoos peeking out of the wrists of my Trader Joe’s sweatshirt. I wish I could scrub them off. I wish I could scrub every word off those papers in front of him.
“Tell me why you kidnapped your brother,” he says, gently this time.
I pull the folder toward me and shuffle papers until I find a faded manila envelope. I pull a single piece of paper out of it and slide it across the desk toward him.
He reads it and his eyes go wide. “Oh.”
“Yeah.” I rub my mouth with a hand to hide the expression on my face.
“I’m sorry.” His voice is soft and compassionate. “Tell me what happened.”
I have to blink hard to keep my eyes dry. “Carol beat my ass. It was a really bad one. I freaked out. I grabbed Joaquin and ran. I thought I could keep him away from her. Keep him...” Tears threaten to consume me. “Keep him safe from her.” I clear my throat. “But anyway, I was nineteen, and I already had some shit on my record, so, yeah. Five years’ probation.”
“Did they charge Carol with assault?”
“Carol?”
“If she assaulted you, I assume they charged her.”
“No. She was the victim. I was the one who took—” I can’t say the words her kid. I won’t. Instead, I say, “She denied it. She said I had gotten into a fight, that I was drunk, and that I just, you know, snapped. They believed her.” I search for a joke, anything to get the pitying look off his face. “I mean, I didn’t exactly inspire their confidence. You should’ve seen me at nineteen. I was like the Tasmanian devil.”
He doesn’t smile. I don’t blame him; it was a weak joke. He says, “Carol is his adoptive mother, correct? Not foster?”
“Yeah.”
“In that case, she does have the right to homeschool him. There’s not much you can do about that.” He closes the folder and consults the notes he’s been taking in a yellow legal pad. “At this point, I think the only thing you can do is work with DCFS directly about the diabetes. If they’ll create documentation, that will help your case later if Joaquin does get sick.”
“You’re telling me to call DCFS.”
He holds his hands up in a helpless gesture.
I stand up and start gathering the paperwork. It’s worn and tattered from all the handling. How many lawyers have I had look at this? They all tell me the same thing.
* * *
The policewoman holds a hand up. “Ma’am. I have already told you. This is not Minority Report. I can’t take action on a crime you think is going to be committed in the future. You understand?”
“Fuck!” I pound the counter with my fists. I back up, almost tripping over a woman in line behind me. She has a black eye and two toddler boys asleep in a double stroller.
I find myself on the top of the steps. I’m breathing too fast, sucking in the stale, trapped-fire air that tastes as bad as it smells. I have to get an Uber home, but is going home accepting defeat? Is there something else I can do? Across the street, tents have been set up against a chain-link construction fence. A man emerges from a tattered blue one and starts rifling through a collection of plastic bags he has hanging from a loaded shopping cart.
My purse buzzes and my heart leaps. Joaquin. I dig around inside it and pull my iPhone out, but the screen is dark. My purse keeps buzzing, and then I remember the flip phone I accidentally stole from that asshole last night. I find it in the deepest pocket and pull it out. I flip it open and press it to my ear. “Hello?”
A soft voice half whispers, “Are you alone?”
“Excuse me?”
“Are you alone?” the voice repeats, like a goth phone sex operator.
“Am I alone? No, I’m not alone. I’m standing here in front of the fucking police station. Are you that asshole who called me a bitch, like, five times? Did you learn your lesson?”
The line goes dead.
I snap the phone shut. “What a piece of shit,” I mutter. I shove it back into my purse just as my iPhone starts buzzing. Again I hope for Joaquin, but it’s a 310 number I don’t recognize. I swipe the answer button. “Hello?”
“Jasmine? Jazz?”
“Why? Who’s this?”
“This is Sofia Russo from Hollenbeck Middle School. I’m just now driving home, so I thought I’d call you on the road. Do you have a moment?”
“Yeah, I’m just leaving the downtown police station. What happened with DCFS?”
“I filed a report, and they’ll make sure someone checks in on Joaquin soon. I just spoke with them a couple hours ago.”
“What’s ‘soon’?” I ask bitterly. “Two weeks? A month?”
“They wouldn’t specify, but I made it clear we’d follow up tomorrow and we expected to see some progress. I gave them your phone number so they could check in with you as well.”
They won’t call me. They’ll do a home visit or they’ll do nothing. I wonder if Joaquin will tell them anything. Probably not; he doesn’t want to end up in some random f
oster home any more than I want him to.
“Jazz? Did I lose you?”
“I’m here.” My voice is small. I feel small.
“Do you need help? Is there something else I can do?”
“I’m fine. I need to go. I Ubered over here. I have to order one to get home. I’ll talk to you soon.”
“You said you were at the Central Police Station?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“I’m on the 5 near downtown. You want to get a beer? I can give you a lift home after.”
I pull the phone away from my ear, stare at it and then return it to my ear. “Are you allowed to do that?”
“What do you mean, allowed?”
“You’re a principal. I don’t know!”
She laughs. “I’m not a nun. Do you want a drink or not?”
A pair of police cars jolts out of the parking garage. Their lights turn on and their sirens whoop to life. They screech out of the driveway and down the street, swerving around cars, heading west.
“Jazz?” Her voice is tiny in comparison to the sirens.
“Hang on!” I wait for the cops to make it down the street, and then I say, “Sorry. What were you saying?”
“I was saying, if you don’t want a drink, that’s fine—”
“Oh, I want a drink.”
“I’ll pick you up. I’m, like, five minutes away.”
We hang up and I return my phone to my purse. I guess I’m giving up for tonight.
I can all but see Joaquin’s vial of insulin. I imagine it’s almost empty.
I push the image aside. What else can I do right now? Tomorrow I can call DCFS. I can go to their offices.
There has to be more. There has to be.
I start down the steps and almost collide with a woman rushing up. “Sorry,” we chorus.
“It’s all right,” she says in a British accent. She turns to continue up, and a gun and badge peek out of her open blazer.
7
PATEL
DETECTIVE PATEL ALMOST knocks the young woman over in her hurry to get up the steps. “Sorry,” they say in unison.
“It’s all right,” Patel replies. She jogs up the steps to the Central Police Station and through a side hallway. Nielsen, her partner, catches up with her outside the conference room they’ve taken over with their investigation. His cheeks are pink, corn-silk blond hair tousled.
“You got my text?” he asks.
“Yes. We got another one?”
“Santa Monica jurisdiction. They just called it in. It happened Saturday. You should have an email.”
“Saturday? What took them so long?” She pushes through the conference room door and flicks the light on. They’ve made a mess in here with files and photos and laptops. “And where’s Gonzalez?”
“She’s on her way over to Santa Monica. I was just downstairs talking to Forensics. These crimes scenes are a fucking nightmare. More DNA than a public bathroom.”
“I don’t think that’s an accident.” She sits in front of her laptop and flips it open. Nielsen comes to stand over her shoulder and watches as she opens her email. The victim is Devin James, age twenty-six, killed at the Santa Monica Pier at nine twenty Saturday. Poison. They’re waiting on lab work to confirm.
“You talked to the boss?” Patel asks.
“He’s gonna do a press conference. Too many calls coming in. Press is going nuts. You seen Twitter?”
“You know I don’t look at that shite.”
He shows her Twitter on his phone. “It’s trending. #LAMurders, #JusticeforDevin. I guess Devin James was the son of a director and he has an actor friend who’s making a stink. This is blowing up huge.”
She snorts. People are ridiculous.
“What?” Nielsen asks.
“Justice for bloody Devin? Really?” She gestures to the screen in front of her. “Do you see his record? The man had three sexual assault allegations and an expired restraining order.”
“The charges were dropped. Innocent until proven guilty.”
Thank you for mansplaining the presumption of innocence to me, twat. Nielsen collapses into the chair next to her, and they read the rest of the report together.
“Look at this.” Nielsen points to the bottom corner of the screen. “I was wrong. Former conviction of stalking. I guess he is guilty.” He gives Patel a meaningful look. “Is this a pattern?”
“I don’t know, but I’m already completely knackered.” They’ve been working this case for forty-eight straight hours.
Nielsen opens his mouth to say something, but a young man in uniform explodes into the room. Eyes wide, a grin of pure glee stretched across his face, he says, “Got another one. Number six! Someone poisoned in the Burbank Walmart.”
Number six.
“Goddamn,” Nielsen murmurs. “This is going to be huge. I can feel it.”
8
JAZZ
TRUE TO HER WORD, Ms. Russo pulls up in a beige Toyota five minutes later. She rolls the passenger window down and waves at me. I let myself in. The car is spotlessly clean except for the fine layer of ash on the hood. “Hi,” I say. I try to get my face to give her a smile, but I only get halfway there. I twist to get the seat belt and spot a car seat in the back. “You have a baby, Ms. Russo?”
“Yes. She’s almost two.” She pulls away from the curb. “And for the love of God, call me Sofia.”
That feels weird, but fine. Sofia. “You don’t have to get home to your daughter? It’s getting late.”
“She’s with her father.” The words draw her mouth into a pinch.
I study her profile, then guess, “Your ex?”
She nods. “We’re just... We’re still figuring out the custody situation.”
I lean my head back against the headrest, filled with gratitude at the solace and shelter of the car. We drive down the one-way streets in tired silence.
She points out the window at a corner pub. “Been there before?”
“I don’t think so, but it looks good to me.”
She finds a parking spot a couple of blocks down, in front of a gated-up newspaper stand. Self-conscious next to her polished work outfit, I shrug out of my baggy sweatshirt and leave it on the front seat. That leaves me in a black tank top and jeans, but it’s better than a Hawaiian-print hoodie with Trader Joe’s across the back.
I watch her with curiosity as she jaywalks across the street in front of me. So does a guy who’s walking down the sidewalk in the opposite direction. He actually does a double take and rubbernecks to get a better view of her ass. I can’t blame him, but he could be a little more subtle about it. She’s taller than me by a couple of inches, more with the heels, and has maybe ten or fifteen pounds on me, all in the right places. I can’t imagine having a teacher or principal like her; they were always old ladies, or at least old to my young eyes. Sometimes you’d have a dude, usually a perv with a mustache.
The tiny bar is just hipster enough to have rustic wood walls but not hipster enough to use mason jars instead of glasses. We settle ourselves at the bar under a small TV tuned to the local news and order drinks from a young bartender with a bow tie, suspenders and a belt, which seems excessive. His eyes flit back and forth between us, bright with interest like he thinks we’re on a date. Embarrassed, I scoot farther away from her and try to make it clear with my body language that I am not hitting on her.
He slides a wooden menu toward us. I have many choices of artisanal beer, and I pick a lager at random. She orders a glass of red wine, which seems to suit her.
When the drinks come, we clink glasses. We drink, eyes on the TV, which is playing a news story about a gas station robbery by USC, and then she rubs her forehead with her fingertips like she has a headache. Her hair looks a little tangled and her makeup is worn off, cracking the perfect veneer.
I wonde
r what Joaquin is doing right now. The image of him in his room, no Miley Cyrus poster, no phone, no music, no friends, no school tomorrow, brings up a wave of sadness, and I ball my hands into fists on the bar. I hate feeling so helpless. I want to do something.
Sofia pushes my pint glass toward me. “Less thinking. More drinking.”
I sip my beer. It does help. She finishes her wine and raises an elegant hand to the bartender, signaling for another round. A diamond ring on her middle finger glints in the low bar light. It’s not a wedding ring, not on the middle finger. I wonder how much it cost—thousands, probably—and who bought it for her.
She watches me above the rim of her glass. “What are you thinking about?”
“Joaquin.” I force my eyes back onto the TV. An anchorwoman is standing in front of the Santa Monica Pier. The banner beneath her reads Death Count Across LA County Grows. The bartender crosses to the TV, grabs a remote and turns on the volume.
“...right here at the Santa Monica Pier,” the anchorwoman says. Her face is drawn into an expression of deep concern. “The victim was the son of Austin James, director of the Oscar-nominated film Taking Over. The victim’s family asks that anyone with information reach out to LAPD or Santa Monica PD.”
“Did you hear about this?” Sofia points to the TV with her bling hand.
I shake my head.
The reporter says, “...the Burbank Walmart, the Santa Monica Pier, a club downtown called Villains, the Koreatown Metro station...these killings have one thing in common—they’re happening in crowded places.”
“Wait—did she say Villains?” I ask.
“I think so. Why?”
“I was there. A guy died, but he wasn’t murdered. He had a seizure or something.”
“You saw it?”
“I was right there! I play the drums and I was playing that show. I saw the whole thing.”
“Oh, wow. What was it like?” she asks in a hushed voice.
“It was fucked up. I’m telling you, there was...” I remember his screaming, the blood leaking from his mouth. “He was, like, squirming around. Thrashing. I can’t imagine someone could have stabbed him or something. It wasn’t like that.”