“Who are you? And what the hell do you want with me?” Esteban asked. The sense of pride was growing. He spit on the ground in the direction of one of the thugs’ feet as a sign of toughness and even puffed up his chest a little bit.
“Shut the fuck up!” The taller one shouted and clobbered Esteban with a vicious backhand across the right side of his face. The other unidentified thug giggled. They wrestled Esteban to his feet and carried him back to the van.
The van sped down Lafayette, passing through a residential neighborhood. Lafayette came to an end at Passaic County Road 647. The van slid into a space in the parking lot of the Food Mart. The passenger hopped out and spent no more than five minutes in the store. From Esteban’s vantage point it didn’t look like the guy bought anything and was wondering the purpose of the pit stop. There wasn’t much Esteban could see from his lying down position while his wrists were tied to his ankles. The way his arms were drawn tightly against his body he thought he’d much prefer the chains.
“Fuck you!” Esteban shouted, his impulses returning. Before he could speak again, he heard the sound of a gun being cocked. The passenger casually turned around, pointing the muzzle of a Smith & Wesson at Esteban. He didn’t say anything because Esteban’s expression told the thug that the gun was enough.
The newfound sun felt warm but Esteban couldn’t tell if it was just the stifling temperature in the back of the van. Any other day would have been prime for skateboarding or hanging on the stoop. Today wasn’t one of those days. In Esteban’s mind, dark clouds had formed and had no intentions of ever leaving.
Out of the parking lot, the van made a left on to 647 and drove top speed to the corner of 647 and Market Street, pulling into another parking lot. This lot was for a Checkers fast food restaurant. The driver killed the engine and rolled down his window. Casually hanging his elbow out, he turned to his partner and spoke for the first time.
“Now we wait for the Chooch.”
PART II- Blame
TWENTY
The night is dark. But it’s almost a darker shade of blue rather than black. I haven’t figured out why I only have one shoe on. No idea where the other one is or how I lost it. I am walking on a beach. A beach I recognize from the boardwalk attractions but I don’t know where I am. I recognize smells from delectable boardwalk foods. I can taste the beach air. I can see the moon making a magnificent reflection on the serene Atlantic Ocean. I hear children screaming in excitement on the Tilt- a- Whirl. I also hear what sounds like fireworks exploding somewhere in the distance but I cannot see the color bursts anywhere. I smell carnival food again. Cotton candy. Funnel Cakes. Popcorn.
Suddenly, the children stop screaming and the fireworks fizzle out. I smell nothing but the salty ocean air. I stop walking, not feeling what’s underneath my feet. It’s almost as if I am levitating off the cold silky sand. The only thing I can hear is a voice. So soft and innocent. It sounds like he is crying for help. My vision shifted to a short distance into the ocean. And bobbing up and down and side to side like a lost beach ball is what my mind cannot quite fathom.
Jake is calling out for me to rescue him, holding my other shoe.
This is one dream I’ve had on numerous occasions. It took me a long time and many sleepless nights to finally reach the end of the dream. When I finally saw the vision of Jake encircled in the moon’s reflection, resembling an angel’s halo, I didn’t sleep for a week straight. Jake’s image was burned inside my mind. I still have the dream but my nighttime candies help treat me better. Dr. Sharper gradually analyzed the progression of the dream. She fed me the usual crock of cockamamie psycho- babble bullshit that left me questioning her credentials every time I left her office.
I had the dream again that Wednesday night and Lindsey knew it. She could always tell when I had a bad dream because I woke up with the same look on my face.
“What can I get you?” she asked. She kneeled behind me on the bed, rubbing my shoulders.
I craned my neck and looked up at her. She knew I didn’t have to answer. There was nothing she could get me. Nothing would bring Jake back. Nothing would change the night that he used a gun and attempted to rob a convenience store while doped up on LSD. It was just something I’d have to live with forever. There’s this crazy rationale that gets tossed around my brain that tells me there is no way the incident could be my fault. It’s so irrational that I find it comical and laugh it off. Here I am attempting to rationalize what happened that night by placing blame on someone else. The real blame should be placed on me. I see the flashes of the muzzle- both of them- every time I close my eyes. It’s like staring at the flash of a camera. It gets stuck in my irises and there’s no way to shake them off and make them disappear.
In previous sessions with Dr. Sharper, I would mention this line of thinking and, like always, Sharper remained neutral to my thoughts and attempted to let me figure them out on my own. Some fucking doctor. At the same time, I guess I can’t blame her own irrational analyses since I won’t let her piece together the entire story.
Lindsey took a seat across from me at the kitchen table. Neither of us drank coffee so I had orange juice while she had a cup of herbal tea.
“I still can’t believe Fitzy wanted to give me Esteban’s case,” I said. Whenever I had a dream that would keep both of us up I never liked to talk about it. Besides, we both knew why we were up. Why beat a dead horse?
In your case, Jake, right?
“I still can’t believe Esteban is missing,” Lindsey replied. “What did you find on your trip to Paterson?” she asked.
“Nothing. I drove around for a while, just sort of getting the lay of the land from Esteban’s perspective. I was on my way to Esteban’s house when Fitzy called me. There wasn’t much else to do; I was shocked at the coincidence.”
“God, I hope he’s ok,” Lindsey said, once again showing her emotional passion for her students.
“I’ll find him. I promise.”
TWENTY ONE
Like any normal- and I use that term loosely- married couple, Lindsey and I had our fair share of problems and fights from time to time. Who didn’t? And we fought over your typical marital issues: money, house cleaning, bills, money, social events, and money. But within the last six months we fought over one issue: Jake. I could do nothing but blame myself and loathe in my own self- pity, feeling sorry, not only for myself, but for Jake, too. Lindsey tried as much as she could to be sympathetic and convincing herself that it was just as I pleaded, an accident. She, too, had her own grieving to do, regardless of the incident, Jake was still dead.
The incident. That’s all we use to discuss Jake’s death. We hardly mention his name or how he died. I certainly knew how he died and Lindsey certainly wanted to me to tell her and fill in the blanks. It was an ugly battle for months and I just outright refused. I wanted to let it die with me. Let it fester inside of me. Eat away at my insides and let me wither away to nothing.
She knew about the LSD and the attempted robbery. She also knew the fact that Jake was shot- twice. There are some other minor details about how and why Jake was shot but that was it. There was no more I could tell her. No reason to have her relive the same nightmares as I do.
I always had a feeling that Lindsey, deep down, blamed me for what happened to him but she never said it outright. As soon as I told Dr. Sharper about how I felt sorry for myself and for Jake, she immediately asked why I hadn’t felt sorry for Lindsey. I couldn’t answer because I didn’t know. Or did I know the answer but didn’t want anyone to know how I felt about her anymore? I mean, shit, she wasn’t the one that handed him the gun. She didn’t show him how to load the gun. She didn’t lace his bloodstream with LSD, send him out into the ghetto, and point him down a path of crime. So why didn’t I feel a certain way about my wife?
Lindsey and I never knew why the incident was always where our arguments always ended up but we had a pretty good idea. Sorrow. Grief. Blame. Even back in high school, when Lindsey and I started dati
ng, she always suppressed, rather than let loose, her feelings. In those days, our biggest fights were over her being jealous when Amanda Blanch, the cheerleading captain, would hang around my locker. Or the fact that I chose to hang out with my buddies rather than watch a chick flick. Or how I didn’t return her phone call or spend two hours on the phone with her so she could blab on about teenage gossip. Now that I think about it, the trend of being blamed started way back then.
Here we are now, fifteen years later, and Jake is now the root of blame in the Barnes household. I have always felt, despite how much I loved Lindsey, she always held me responsible for the many burdens in her life. And I consistently find that I am convincing myself that the burdens are nobody’s fault- certainly not mine.
I was, and still am, one of those people who wanted to get the feelings out in the open and move beyond the situation that caused a hiccup in our relationship. I don’t have patience for unnecessary bullshit. With Lindsey it was different. She’d rather give me the silent treatment for hours on end and stew in her own emotions, leaving me to feel as if everything is just hunky dory.
“What’s up?” she asked. She was sitting across from me at the kitchen table. Lindsey had a look of concern on her face but it didn’t look like it was for my benefit.
I finally looked at her then said, “It’s just, you know, this thing I’m working on. Esteban.” She saw how fragile I suddenly became and knew, from prior experiences, where this was headed. And like always, she played right into it. Forced me to talk about it. We had been up for almost an hour, the clock was pushing past three in the morning and I knew Lindsey had to be up for work in about three hours.
“What about it?” she said.
“I’m not sure. You know, just being back in the police business, in some form or another, has really got me worried.” Lindsey cut me off before I could finish my thought. She knew I was then talking about Jake and not Esteban.
“Worried about what?” she asked.
“You were there for the panic attack,” I said.
She twirled her teacup between her fingers. So I continued.
“That the more I jump into this thing the less I’m going to allow myself to discover. I mean, I know Esteban and Jake are two different types of situations from two very different lifestyles but just the fact that I’m probably going to end up needing to talk to some people I’d rather not talk to and head into some neighborhoods that I’d rather not visit.” Lindsey could see where I was going with this. And I couldn’t tell if she caught the fact that I referred to Jake in the present tense.
She got up out of her seat and came to sit on my lap. She put her left arm around the back of my shoulders and her right hand across my chest, clasping her fingers at the opposite end. “Maybe this is what you, what we need. Maybe this is part of our healing process. Seeing that you can do something good for another family, despite how screwed up it may be. Do you think you should mention this to Dr. Sharper to see what she thinks?”
She knew I didn’t like Dr. Sharper. Sharper was somehow recommended as the best shrink that specialized in police officers. And since my official dismissal from the department, I was told that my free therapy sessions had ended. Lindsey periodically attempted to coax me into continuing my sessions. I told her the cost of her sessions was a primary concern but Lindsey instantly called my bluff saying that her insurance would cover it.
“Sharper’s an idiot. She doesn’t know her ass from a hole in the ground.” That got Lindsey to chuckle.
She turned towards me, looked me in the eye, and said, “I believe in you.”
TWENTY TWO
In hindsight, I think that’s why I left Paterson yesterday. I had gotten close to reaching a goal, albeit a very small one, in seeing Esteban’s neighborhood. Where he lived. What his home life was like. How he survived outside of the safety net of school. But I didn’t get the answers to any of those questions. At least not yet.
After Lindsey left for work, I set off again. From where we live in Wayne, Paterson is only a ten to fifteen minute trek, depending on where in Paterson you wanted to go. I headed down Alps Road towards Route 23, which eventually fed into Route 80 or Route 46. I chose the former. The weather was quite brisk but I had the windows down and the sunroof tilted on my beige Santa Fe. I always had my iPod with me, plugged into the car stereo through an auxiliary cable. My iPod, music in general, was my vice. The only moments I felt truly unrestricted and free from worry. It was one of the few connections that Jake and I had. That and sports. I connected Jake to the rock and roll of yesteryear while he kept me in the loop on the latest flash in the rap game.
My iTunes Library has over six thousand songs of quite a variety. My musical preference is all over the map. Jay- Z to Janis Joplin. Lynyrd Skynyrd to Lady Gaga. Eminem to The Eagles. Barry White to The Beatles. Two Chainz to Twisted Sister. I love having my library on shuffle, not having a clue as to what will come up next. A similar trend my life was beginning to take. A mysterious journey that someone knew what was about to come up next but kept hidden away from my eyes to see. When I started up my car, I hit play and was finishing a Hootie and the Blowfish classic.
The Thursday morning air was chilly but it had a feel that it wasn’t going to last very long. A long- sleeved T- shirt was enough for me but as I drove I saw people bundled in wool caps and heavy sweatshirts.
I parked the Santa Fe in front of a three- family house on a dilapidated area in the heart of downtown Paterson. The siding of the house, or what was left of it, seemed to be, at one time, some shade of beige or tan or cream or whatever the hell people call it nowadays. To me, it resembled the color of monkey piss. The smell of the front yard was a close resemblance to the current shade of the siding.
I wasn’t working with much up to this point. All I had to go on was Esteban’s address, a class picture that Lindsey had given me, and, of course, my awesomely valuable instincts. I killed the engine and walked the length of the block, just to get a sense of what I was getting myself into and see what I was working with, which wasn’t much more than an entire block of houses in similar shape. I stopped my casual stroll, which didn’t do much to help me blend in to the neighborhood. I stood out like a Raisinet in a bucket of flour.
I didn’t want to knock on the door too hard, thinking it might fall over and I’d get shot by a neighborhood watchman for breaking and entering. Gently rapping on the filthy pane of glass, I could hear grown voices and a baby- or three- crying somewhere in the deeper confines of the house. I didn’t want to knock too hard thinking, one, that I might shatter the glass and, two, that my knuckles might become infected with whatever was growing on the window pane. The door was yanked open by a Hispanic woman, much more well-kept than anticipated. Certainly more well-kept than what I’d seen of the exterior house.
“Ms. Machado?” I asked. She looked me up and down but I couldn’t quite figure out the expression.
“You the cops?” she asked a little too loudly. Probably used to shouting over screaming babies.
“Sort of. My name is Chase Barnes. I’m a private investigator trying to find your son. Esteban is in my wife’s class at school and, by wild chance, I’ve been given his case by the Paterson police department.” I just then realized I didn’t have any proof that I was a private investigator and reminded myself that I needed to have fancy business cards made up. She was satisfied with my driver’s license.
“It’s about damn time. I called like a week ago and my name isn’t Machado. It’s Maria Velasquez- Cruz and Esteban is my second oldest son.” I wondered if Ms. Cruz had a poor sense of real time since Fitzgerald only contacted me yesterday. Maybe she really did call a week ago and it was not concerning to the police but I doubt it. Ms. Cruz invited me in and I didn’t know where to step. There were toys, newspapers, empty cardboard boxes, and magazines strewn about the floor. It looked as if someone had blown up a Wal-Mart stock room. Ms. Cruz asked me to sit in the living room. It was a very generous offering except that I
couldn’t find the couch. What I thought was the couch was covered in more magazines, newspapers, and fast food containers. She scrambled to clear a space, which only exposed a heavily stained seat cushion. Luckily, I was wearing long pants for fear of contracting whatever diseases might be festering in the upholstery. I wasn’t in the mood to contract hepatitis my first week on the job. Ms. Cruz was dressed in beige khakis and the standard- issue blue CVS polo with CVS embroidered in red stitching. She must’ve just gotten off her shift or was heading out because she still had her name tag on. Either that or she just kept it on in case she forgot who she was. She had jet black hair pulled tightly into a shoulder- length ponytail, deeply set dark eyes above thinly defined cheekbones. Her lips appeared to be pouty but I couldn’t tell if it was her natural look or the excessive red lipstick that conveniently matched the red in her CVS polo.
“I’m sorry about the delay but I want to assure you that I began looking into this case even before you contacted the police department to report Esteban missing. My wife said she was generally worried about his welfare and safety from some of the behaviors he’s been exhibiting at school,” I said. The first part certainly wasn’t true but she didn’t need to know that.
“Well, thanks,” was all Ms. Cruz replied.
Before I began asking questions about Esteban, I heard a loud crash from another part of the house.
The Incident (Chase Barnes Series Book 1) Page 6