by Joe Ide
“Answer him,” Casper breathed. “What’s wrong with you? Answer him!” Dodson didn’t move, the operators holding their breath, urging him on with their eyes.
“Ted?” Matthew said. “Are you there?”
The man said, “Come on, kid, hand over the check. You want the dog, don’t you?”
“Ted?”
“Close the door, Matthew,” Dodson said.
“What the hell are you doing?” Casper said, the operators muttering their alarm.
“Close the door?” Matthew said. “But you said—”
Dodson cut him off. “I said close the door, Matthew.”
“Are you crazy?” Casper said.
“Hey, stop fooling around and gimme the check,” the man demanded.
“SHUT THE GODDAMN DOOR!” Dodson roared. “DO IT NOW, MATTHEW!” The door slammed.
“You don’t have to be mad at me,” Matthew whimpered.
“I’m not mad at you,” Dodson said. “It was my fault, that was the wrong man. Now tear up the check and throw it away.”
“What about my dog?”
“I’ll get back to you,” Dodson said, and he ended the call.
“You’re fired.” Casper looked up at the ceiling tiles for an explanation, and then he walked away. The operators dispersed and went back to reading their scripts. Dodson got up, put on his hoodie, and left.
The house was a two-story traditional in Bixby Knolls. A young man with Down’s syndrome opened the door and saw the cardboard box set on the stoop. Wary, he opened it and cried out joyfully as he lifted the beagle puppy into his arms and hugged it. Dodson waited until Matthew went back inside, and then he drove away.
That was the end of it. The end of the game. And for the first time since he was eleven years old, Dodson thought about the future. What would he do next week, next month, next year, and the years after that? All he saw was himself in rags, begging for change and living under a bridge. He felt pitiful and stupid. He was pitiful and stupid. The swaggering, too-cool hustler that the ladies loved and that was always flush, reduced to living in his Auntie May’s second bedroom, cleaning her house and cooking her supper. He went out but only to fool her into thinking he was looking for a job. The whole time he was convinced people knew he was menial and useless. It went on like that for weeks. Auntie May was getting suspicious, Dodson feeling pressure to the point where he was going to leave and live on the street. Then he met Cherise and his orbit reversed and he spun off into deep space as uncertain as he’d ever been; Cherise guiding, encouraging, and yelling at him until he crash-landed in a life he’d not only never imagined but had never occurred to him. He was a husband and a father with a loving wife and a beautiful baby boy and all of it was threatened by Chester fucking Babbitt.
Cherise was taking a bath. Her mother had gone home and Dodson was carrying Micah in his arms. He smelled like milk and Motherlove. Dodson couldn’t believe the baby was so tiny and fragile and seemed to weigh less than his seahorse pajamas. For all the trouble it took to get him here he should be a full-grown man with a job and a driver’s license.
“How you doin’, kid?” Dodson said in his inside voice. “You don’t worry ’bout nothin’, you hear me? Your old man got it all under control. Ain’t nothing he can’t handle. I faced down nig—people ten times worse than Chester. You watch and see. I’ll take care of everything.”
Dodson was already in bed when Cherise came out of the bathroom wearing nothing but her wedding ring and toenail polish. He was about to say something, but she shushed him and slipped under the covers. Over the next hour and a half, Dodson said Praise God so many times she had to tell him to stop. Afterward, when they were breathing normally again and the sweat had dried, she said, “Did you enjoy yourself, Juanell?”
“Did I enjoy myself? I’m not sure. I don’t remember nothing but gunfire, a couple of tsunamis, and floating up to heaven.”
“Would you like that to happen again?” she said.
“Yes, I would.”
“Then tell me what’s been troubling you or the next time you float up to heaven it’ll be for real.”
Dodson explained about Chester, the blackmail, and Junior. Cherise looked at him for what seemed like a long time. “You are incredible, Dodson,” she said, not in a nice way. “You are really incredible.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Did you tell Isaiah?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I messed up and I want to fix this on my own.”
Cherise sighed. “I know you better than you know yourself, you know that, don’t you?”
“Yes, I know,” Dodson replied regretfully.
“The reason you haven’t told Isaiah is because you don’t want to bring up that shameful part of your history. Isn’t that true?”
“Yes, that’s true.” He crossed his eyes and saw himself laid bare. A cheap watch with the case removed, all his moving parts in the open for Cherise to criticize and tinker with. She rolled over on top of him, the warmth of her titties on his chest.
“You are my everlasting love, Juanell, but sometimes you’re so stupid I want to pound a nail in your head. Now I want you to call Isaiah, do you hear me? Chester could endanger me and endanger our baby. Is that what you want?”
“No. But I want to talk to Chester one more time,” Dodson said.
“And right after that you’ll call Isaiah?”
“I will. I promise.”
She wiggled around a little. “You up for another round?”
“Can you imagine?” Phaedra said as she and Gilberto entered Isaiah’s living room. “That horrible boy, Malik, had the nerve to say I wasn’t black enough.”
“What did you say?” Gilberto asked.
“I said I was as black as midnight in Muddy Waters’s basement and furthermore, wearing big white T-shirts and overpriced sneakers and following every sentence with Know what I’m sayin’? didn’t qualify him as anything but a lemming.”
“Well, for once we agree. Of all the people, Malik gets to define who is and isn’t black? If it was up to him, being black would mean singing the national anthem as a rap song and throwing up gang signs at your graduation—oh, good morning, Mr. Quintabe.”
“Good morning,” Isaiah said. “How did the quarterfinals go?”
“We came in second place. Thanks to Phaedra’s boyfriend, Greg.”
“Oh, will you give it a rest?” Phaedra said. “My God, Greg missed one question.”
“No. He missed the question. What do you see in him anyway?”
“He’s smart, cute, and quite an athlete. He’s been swimming competitively since he was seven. Does that answer your question?”
While Isaiah made the espresso, Gilberto said, “We have a number of things to report, sir. Like everyone these days, Vicente left a trail of footprints on social media. He doesn’t have his own Facebook page but his organization—”
“It’s a gang,” Phaedra said. “Sureños Locos 13 is a gang.”
Gilberto ignored her and continued. “There are lots of photos of the gang smoking marijuana, showing off illegal firearms, and so forth. Most of the comments referenced Vicente’s personality and its similarity to female pudenda, or were threats on his life. However, we did find a number of entries made by a girl named Josefina Soto. They were all in the same vein. Vicente is hot, Vicente has a nice body, did you know I don’t have a boyfriend etcetera, etcetera, and at one point they agreed to hook up. We think Josefina could be harboring Vicente.”
“According to her page,” Phaedra interjected, “Josefina is single, parties a lot, and—”
“She works at Subway,” Gilberto reinterjected. Isaiah thought they were worse than him and Dodson. Gilberto continued, “There are seven Subway restaurants in the Long Beach area. We’ll have the correct one identified by the end of business today.”
“How?” Isaiah said.
“There’s a teachers’ conference. We’re getting out of school early. Subway emp
loyees work two shifts. Eight to three and three to eleven. A club member will arrive at each restaurant a little before three. Whether Josefina is leaving or arriving, we’ll see her.”
“Smart,” Isaiah said, smiling. “Remember the rules, okay? You see her, you call me. Nothing beyond that.”
“Not to worry, Mr. Quintabe,” Gilberto said. “Your rules will be obeyed and no laws will be broken.”
As they went out the door, Phaedra said, “Did you actually say no laws will be broken?”
“Excuse me, I forgot. You and Greg are regular outlaws. I think I saw your wanted posters in the post office.”
“And what’s with the end of business? What business?”
“My business, thank you very much,” Gilberto said. “And by the way, would you like to study at my house tonight?”
“Sorry, I can’t. Greg and I are robbing a bank.”
There was something else on Josefina’s Facebook page that Phaedra and Gilberto hadn’t discussed with the other club members. In one of the pictures, Josefina was sitting on a parking block behind a Subway restaurant, smoking and giving the finger to the photographer. In the background, you could see the top of a billboard advertising a movie, Guardians of the Galaxy. That billboard was right across the street from the restaurant on Long Beach Boulevard. The only question now was whether Josefina worked mornings or evenings. They waited across the street.
“We should have told the others,” Gilberto said. “This isn’t fair.”
“It’s our case,” Phaedra replied. “We should get the glory.” Gilberto didn’t reply. A little after three, Josefina came out wearing her uniform and a look on her face like she’d just escaped a flogging. She walked north on Long Beach Boulevard.
“I’ll call Isaiah,” Gilberto said. Seeing Josefina in the flesh made him anxious.
“What for?” Phaedra said. “We don’t know if Vicente is staying with her or not. Oh look, she went past the bus stop.”
“And that’s important because—”
“What’s the matter with you?” she said. “Are you not eating carbs again? It means she’s walking home. We can follow her.”
“I don’t think so,” Gilberto said, actually taking a few steps back. “Remember the rules? We take no action without Mr. Quintabe’s expressed permission.”
“No action vis-à-vis Vicente,” Phaedra said. “Now don’t be such a tight-ass and come on.”
“I’m not a tight-ass—and that’s a very vulgar expression.”
Josefina led them to a small clapboard house with a sheet of plywood over the front window and a dried-out lawn. “She makes minimum wage so it can’t be her place,” Phaedra said. “Her parents’, most likely.”
“Good, we’ve got her address. We can call Isaiah now and let him take over.”
“We don’t know if Vicente’s in there or not. Why waste Isaiah’s time? I’m going to stay awhile. If you want to go, go.”
“Did I say I was going?” Gilberto replied. “No, I didn’t, and in the future, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t put words in my mouth.” They watched awhile, bored and restless, self-conscious about being out in the open. It was a sweltering day, Gilberto complaining that he hadn’t applied sunscreen.
“My skin is very sensitive,” he said defensively. “And this is turning out to be a big nothing.” Josefina came out of the house and walked off down the street.
“Great, she’s gone,” Phaedra breathed. “It’s time to take action.”
“Action? What action?”
“There are no cars around and as far as I can tell, no one is home. I’m going to take a quick look-see.”
Gilberto was flabbergasted. “A look-see? A look-see?”
“Will you please stop repeating what I say?”
“The things you say are so nonsensical they bear repeating, and we are not taking a quick look-see. This is a clear violation of Mr. Quintabe’s rules and furthermore, someone might be in there sleeping or watching TV. We have no way of knowing.”
“I need a lookout.” Phaedra eyed him like a promising candidate.
Gilberto was resolute. “No. I refuse and that’s final.”
“Okay, suit yourself. I’ll call Greg.”
Phaedra had two packages of Oreos and a box of Fig Newtons under her arm, Gilberto reminding her that he was recording them as an expense. She rang the bell. “Hello?” she called out. “I’m selling Girl Scout cookies. They’re on sale, fifty percent off.” No answer. She smiled brightly into the peephole. “I said they’re fifty percent off!” No answer. She glanced back at Gilberto, standing nervously behind a palm tree. “I’m sorry, I got that wrong,” she went on. “They’re actually seventy-five percent off! You can’t beat that, now can you?” Again, nothing. She trudged down the stoop. “This is very disappointing.”
“Can we go now?” Gilberto said, coming out of hiding. “I have a test to study for.”
“The computer science test? My God, you could give that test. Wait, I want to check something.” She went back up the stoop and turned the doorknob. “It’s open!”
Gilberto was aghast. “That means someone’s home!”
“Josefina forgot to lock it.”
“In this neighborhood?” Gilberto said. “People put locks on their cats. Don’t you get it? Someone’s home!”
“I want to take a look,” Phaedra said. “All I need is a clue, like a child’s toy or something.”
“No. I draw the line. Call Greg if you want to, but I’m not going.”
“Fine, stay here,” she said, hesitating a moment before adding, “Chicken.”
They crept in together. “This is positively the most idiotic thing I’ve ever done in my short but accomplished life,” Gilberto whispered. “This could cost me a scholarship, a career—my neck.”
“Shut up,” Phaedra whispered back.
“We need a cover story.”
“For what?”
“For why we’re in someone else’s house,” he said.
Phaedra handed him the cookies. “Say you’re a Girl Scout. If you see someone coming, whistle.”
“Whistle? Did you say—”
“Gilberto!”
Phaedra tiptoed into the hallway. She hadn’t been this unnerved since she rode her bicycle without a helmet all the way home from Gilberto’s house. A clock was ticking. It was obnoxiously loud. Cautiously, she approached a doorway. Ever so slowly, she peeked in. There was a messy bed and unisex laundry but no indication of Vicente or a child. She crept forward to another door, took another peek. A woman as old as the pyramids at Teotihuacán was asleep in a rocking chair, her chin on her chest, unpleasant stains on her robe. Phaedra went on, past a bathroom that smelled of shampoo and Lysol. That damn clock was getting louder, ticktocking her nerves to bits. Any second she expected to hear Gilberto whistling, assuming he hadn’t wimped out and gone home. Oh my God, I’m sweating. She never sweated. She didn’t even wear deodorant. She hesitated. What if Vicente returned? He was a member of the Sureños Locos 13. A gang. This was a stupid idea, she decided, but there was only one more door. Take a look or leave while she still could? She’d come this far, she thought, and she wasn’t about to let Gilberto win the day. She peeked in and gasped. “Oh no,” she said. She turned around to run but the old woman was standing right there in her gray bathrobe and hazy eyes and her lips curled in over her toothless gums. Phaedra yelped and nearly jumped out of her pumps.
The old woman rasped, “Qué haces aquí?”
“Sorry,” Phaedra said as she blew past her. “I’m all out of cookies.”
Chapter Nine
Tell Them Everything
It was late and Chester and Sylvia were on the pier in Rainbow Lagoon. It was high tide in a high wind, breakers crashing against the pier, hissing as they retreated into the dark; the damp air smelling of salt and the tar on the pilings. There was no one around, the businesses closed up tight. The area looked like it was waiting for a hurricane.
“I’m freezing!�
�� Sylvia said, clutching her white rabbit-fur jacket to her throat. “I want to go back!”
Chester’s teeth were chattering. “N-not now, my love, just a little l-l-longer. The fresh air is b-b-bracing, wouldn’t you say?”
“This is ridiculous!” Sylvia shouted. “I’m going back!” Chester was leaning over the railing. He pointed. “Look, darling, it’s Ichthys!” Ichthys, Chester had learned, was the pagan fish symbol for the Great Mother Goddess and represented the outline of her vulva, and goddesses of any kind were always of interest. He didn’t know how Sylvia got herself over the railing, but there she was, plunging headlong into the black, undulating sea, flailing her arms and yelling something that sounded like Fuck you, Chester! A curse on your—
Chester got an equity loan on Sylvia’s condo, remodeled the shop, expanded his inventory, and did more advertising, but the uptick in revenue was hardly worth the trouble. And then the police opened an investigation into Sylvia’s accident. Two homicide detectives called Chester in for questioning.
“Why did you decide to go for a walk in the middle of the night?” the bald one asked.
“My wife and I were vampires in another life.” Chester grinned to show his teeth. “The night is our milieu.”
“Uh-huh,” said the second bald detective. “Well, how did five-foot, one-inch Mrs. Vampire manage to fall over a chest-high railing?”
“She wanted to see Ichthys.”
They grilled him for three hours. He thought he was pretty convincing, but when they directly accused him of killing Sylvia he asked for a lawyer. The cheapest defense attorney he could find was a grubby little shyster who advertised on bus benches and had a grubby little office on the wrong side of Seventh Street. Nevertheless, for a murder case he wanted a ten-thousand-dollar retainer and promised there’d be more costs if they went to trial. Chester didn’t have ten thousand dollars and that’s when he remembered Nona telling the story about Deronda, Dodson, and Isaiah robbing Junior. A record search revealed their financial situations. Not promising, but Isaiah was a neighborhood icon with a reputation for being clever, creative, and relentless. Chester didn’t want to deal directly with someone they called IQ, so he went to Dodson, who would naturally tell Isaiah, and Isaiah would come up with a plan.