Canals

by Everett Powers

  “Pretty ballsy, if you ask me. What if I’d turned you down?” he said, without conviction.

  “It was worth a chance.”

  He sat a little straighter in his seat. “Still, why me?”

  She sighed. “I’m going to have to answer that question, aren’t I? You’re not going to let it go.”

  “I just wanna know, that’s all.”

  “I like you. You’re just a little —” she struggled for the word “— off-center. You’re not ordinary or normal. I’m tired of normal. I see you around HQ of course, once in a while at the courthouse, but when we talked the other morning by the canal, I could see something ... different in you. Men around here are so boring.”

  Lawless was stunned; it had never occurred to him that someone might be attracted to him because he was different. Then he thought, Wait until she hears the opera.

  He turned into the hospital’s parking lot, surprised at how quickly the trip had gone, parked somewhere he shouldn’t have and shut the car off.

  “I’d like to see you again,” he told her. “I’d like to see you tonight if I can.”

  “It’s not your bowling night?” she asked, smiling.

  He turned and smiled back. “No, it’s poker night, but I can squeeze you in during one of the beer runs, if you can keep your motor running.”

  “Great,” she said. “Can I wear my tight shorts and tank top, make sandwiches and bring you guys snacks and beers when you call?”

  “That’d be nice,” he said, getting out. They grinned at each other across the top of the car.

  He fought the urge to take her hand while they walked to the hospital.

  Inside, Lawless flashed his badge at the information window and asked for Tony Fruega’s room number, was told his name wasn’t in the computer.

  “Is it possible he’s got a room but it hasn’t been put in the computer yet?” he asked the thin woman behind the desk. Her hair was cropped close to the scalp on the sides, but on the top sprouted like a clump of wild grass; a bad style for her as it emphasized her long narrow head and left bare big floppy ears. A large mole on her left earlobe sprouted hair like the top of her head; she stroked the spiny mole hairs with a finger when she talked.

  “No, sir. It goes into the computer as soon as they get the room. It’s hospital policy. Otherwise we wouldn’t know where everyone is and someone might get the wrong medication.”

  “Yeah, like that never happens,” he said, then looked at Jensen and drummed his fingers on the counter. The woman frowned at his finger-drumming, while stroking her hairy mole.

  “Are you sure he checked in today?” Jensen asked Lawless.

  “He should have been brought into the emergency room this morning, at about eight.”

  “It’s only ten thirty-five, sir. He’s probably still in the er,” Mole Lady said.

  “For two and a half hours?”

  The woman rolled her eyes.

  “Of course,” he said, turning from the desk. “What was I thinking? Average wait in the er is, what, four hours? Five?”

  They left the window and Jensen whispered, “All these doctors in here, you’d think at least one of them would offer to take that mole off for her.”

  “I’m not sure she’d let them. Did you see how she pets it?”

  They strode down the corridor, heading deep into the hospital. They’d entered the building on the north but the emergency room was on the south; they followed signs pointing the way through a maze of hallways.

  As they made yet another turn, Lawless said to Jensen, “I might need you to talk to the mother, if she’s still here, or to the boy, if I can’t get him to open up. Hopefully he’s talking by now.”

  She nodded.

  They walked through a set of swinging doors and entered the emergency room. Two dozen people turned and looked at them; some sick-looking, some obviously injured, some crying, most bored from the wait. Other than a crying child and a woman yelling at a nurse, it was relatively calm; everyone sat in their seats and watched the window, waiting to be summoned.

  Back in the corner, an obese Hispanic woman had an arm around a thin Hispanic male, who looked to be about nineteen or twenty. The male was rocking back and forth in his chair, moving his lips. Lawless tapped Jensen on the shoulder and nodded toward the pair.

  As they approached the woman, Lawless said, “Excuse me, ma’am. Are you Mrs. Fruega?”

  Without looking up, she said, “Thank God! We’ve been here all morning and my Tony hasn’t seen a doctor. Why can’t you people get some more —” She looked up and stopped. “You’re not doctors.” She had a round face with pillowy cheeks and soft eyes hidden in folds of skin.

  “No ma’am. We’re from the Sheriff’s Department. Is this Tony Fruega?”

  “He doesn’t need cops, he needs a doctor!” She started to cry. “Look at him. He doesn’t talk, he just rocks back and forth and says that awful swear word.”

  Lawless could barely hear the boy, but it sounded like he was repeating the word bitch.

  He said to Jensen, “I’m going to see if we can take him somewhere private, get him some attention. You stay here.” She nodded and sat down next to Mrs. Fruega.

  He flashed his badge, bullied a couple of nurses, and a small exam room opened up. They were still fussing with the room when Tony Fruega was led in. A nurse helped lay Tony on the bed and left, after telling them a doctor would be there in a minute. No one believed her.

  Tony lay on his back, looking up at the ceiling, babbling and gesturing with his hands. Most of what he said was unintelligible, but every now and then a word came out with its sounds in proper order. Usually it was bitch, but they also heard Bobby and ass. His mother stood at his side and fretted; fluffing the pillow, tucking sheets, pulling at covers. Lawless stood opposite Mrs. Fruega and Jensen waited at the foot of the bed, arms folded across her chest.

  “Has he said anything at all to you, Mrs. Fruega?” Lawless asked.

  “What’s wrong with Tony? Why won’t he talk to his mama?” She repositioned a pillow for the fifth time.

  “He’s in shock, Mrs. Fruega,” Lawless said. “The doctor will be here in a few minutes and I’m sure they’ll give him something to help him sleep. He’ll feel a lot better when he wakes up. Do you mind if I try and talk to him?”

  “He don’t say nothing.” She started crying again. “Tony, mi hijo, talk to your mama.”

  Lawless took her response as a yes, which it wasn’t, but she hadn’t said no either. Not that it mattered, Tony was an adult. “Tony, my name is Detective Lawless. I would like to talk to you about what happened to your friend, Bobby Gutierrez.”

  His words had no effect.

  “Tony, you’re in the hospital now and a doctor will be here soon. You’re safe. Can you hear me?”

  No response. Mrs. Fruega stopped crying and was clutching her son’s hand; she held it for a moment, then he pulled it away and waved it around, babbling.

  Lawless said to Jensen, “We might have to come back later. I can’t get anything out of him.”

  “You’ve barely tried,” Jensen said, frowning. “Let me.”

  She moved to take Lawless’s place at Tony’s side and took Tony’s hand in hers, which immediately calmed him. She spoke, soft and low, comforting; he stopped babbling, but continued to stare at the ceiling.

  She put a hand on his face and gently turned it until their eyes met. “Tony, you’re alright now. You’re safe. It can’t get you here.” She stroked his hair, keeping eye contact.

  Mrs. Fruega said, “What did you say?”

  Tony’s face softened. He blinked and sighed.

  Then, loudly: “Bitch ate Bobby’s ass! Bitch ate Bobby’s ass!”

  “Yes, I know. It’s alright now. Bitch can’t get you here,” Jensen cooed, still stroking his hair and holding his hand. Lawless watched, in awe.

  “Bitch ate Bobby’s ass,” Tony said again, whimpering.

  “I know, Tony. You’re safe now. Tell me ab
out the bitch.”

  “What bitch?” Mrs. Fruega asked.

  “Bitch was big,” Tony said. “Bitch was black.” His voice had changed, becoming flat and monotone, almost robotic.

  “Yes. Bitch was big and black. Where did the bitch come from?” Jensen said, stroking, always with the eyes.

  “Bobby was taking a piss. Bitch came out of the canal. Bitch ate Bobby’s ass!” He became agitated again and it took Jensen a minute to calm him down.

  “What did bitch look like?”

  “Bitch was black.”

  “Did bitch have eyes or a mouth?”

  “Teeth!” he yelled. “Bitch gots silver teeth! Shiny teeth! Bitch ate Bobby’s ass with her big silver teeth!”

  Mrs. Fruega started crying again.

  Jensen tried to regain control, but Tony broke eye contact and was gone.

  When Lawless and Jensen left the room, Tony was quiet and awake but unaware of where he was or who was with him. No doctor had come to examine him.

  They sat on opposite sides of a small table in the hospital cafeteria, drinking Cokes, mulling over the events in Tony’s room. Lawless was gloomy, disappointed they couldn’t get more out of him.

  They went round and round about what they should do; both agreed they needed to do something to prevent further deaths, but couldn’t agree on what. If they went to the sheriff with what they had, they were sure he would think them crazy. They had suspicious deaths, all next to canals, holes in grilles, and funky DNA; not enough.

  Fruega’s eyewitness testimony would strengthen their case. They agreed to come back tomorrow and try again.

  He looked at his watch. “It’s almost noon. You hungry?”

  She shook her head. “Lost my appetite. I better get my patrol car and check in. They’re going to wonder what I’ve been doing.”

  “Just tell Tingey I had you come to the hospital with me. He was the first one on the scene this morning, did I tell you that? Poor guy, I thought he was going to cry.”

  “Yeah. He’s one guy who should be married. He needs someone to take care of him, tell him when to cut his hair, zip up his fly.”

  “Fix him low-fat food,” Lawless added, as they got up from the table.

  The trip back to the canal passed in relative silence. They didn’t hold hands or make goo-goo eyes at each other, but they did make plans for dinner.

  Rachel Sandovich went back into the house to change; it was too hot to take Petey for his noon walk in sweats. She made a mental note to leave the house by nine tomorrow; it looked like it was going to be a hot spring. Petey was Rachel’s ten-year-old Irish Terrier, her sole companion for three years since her husband, Willard, died of a coronary.

  Petey waited patiently for Rachel to change. He knew he would get his noon walk, and probably at least one more before night fell. It was as regular as food in his dish and water in his bowl. It was their routine.

  Rachel came out of her room wearing shorts and a T-shirt, her legs as white as a bed sheet and covered with thick purple varicose veins, despite her daily walks and regular intake of fiber.

  She clipped a retractable leash to Petey’s collar and they left. They lived two blocks east of Modesto Junior College, in an older part of town where the homes were modest but well cared for. She liked the neighborhood; the houses, while not big, were unique, something that could not be said about the new homes being thrown up in subdivisions at the edge of town. She just wished they didn’t live so close to the college.

  MJC had enough on-campus parking for only one-third of its students, so there were cars parked in front of her house every day classes were in session. She wouldn’t have minded if they were polite and courteous, but they weren’t. They were rude. They threw their trash on her lawn and sometimes parked in front of her driveway, forcing her to call a tow truck so Willard could go to work. Before his coronary.

  Petey could have walked himself, he knew the route that well: south on North Olive to Terminal, named for the old railroad track it paralleled, across Terminal and along Lateral No. 4, a canal that cut diagonally through the neighborhood.

  The wide gravel pathway that ran next to the canal was ideal for walking dogs, or, if you were dog-impaired, for a stroll. It was a popular walk, Rachel and Petey had friends they hoped to meet along the way. On most days, Rachel had humans to chat with and Petey dogs to exchange sniffs with. It was part of the routine.

  Walking briskly, they followed Lateral No. 4 to Elk Park, where Petey was allowed to roam illegally without a leash. He left little Petey-squirts at strategic spots to let his friends know he’d been there. Rachel had a paperback, a western. Most days she took the Bee, but not today; she was on one of her kicks where everything in the paper was bad news, and she refused to read anything but the comics, the food section on Wednesday, and the gardening articles on Saturday. Her boycott of the news would continue until a scandalous story peaked her interest.

  Across the canal, north of Elk Park, sat a power transforming station, owned by MID. Rachel thought it was the ugliest thing she’d ever seen; all gray steel, black wires, and brown ceramic. She hated it and wondered why they had to put the thing in plain view, right in the middle of a residential area, instead of outside of town. To protest the affront to her visual senses, she sat at a picnic table with her back to the power station, snubbing the Modesto Irrigation District.

  It took Petey fifteen minutes to finish his business, and Rachel polished off another chapter.

  “Come on Petey, it’s time to walk under the giant trees,” she called to the old dog. “It will be a cool walk today, won’t it Petey, under the trees?” After Elk Park, their walk took them across Lateral No. 4 on a footbridge, into an old neighborhood shaded by Modesto Ash trees so big their branches converged over the street, forming a dark tunnel spring through fall.

  Petey licked Rachel’s hand as she clipped the leash to his collar, but when they neared the footbridge, he became agitated, pulling on the leash. He was such a mild-mannered dog and so rarely acted this way that Rachel almost sat down on the grass.

  “What’s wrong with you, Petey?” she asked, pulling him toward the footbridge. “Come on now boy, you’re not afraid of the water. We’ve walked over this bridge hundreds of times.”

  Then, when Petey still resisted, she took a stern tone, “Don’t make me carry you.”

  Petey was as loyal as any dog and so he gave in, despite the danger he sensed. Rachel pulled him whimpering onto the bridge.

  The canal was full, as it always was this time of year; the dark water came to within four or five inches of the top of the cement walls, seemingly threatening to overflow the banks and flood nearby streets.

  When they reached the center of the bridge, Rachel caught movement out of the corner of her eye. Still tugging on Petey’s leash, she looked into the canal, thinking something was probably floating by; an old tire perhaps, or a plastic soda bottle thrown in the water by one of those litterbug college students. The surface of the canal rippled as if something was moving beneath. A shape formed under the water and she frowned, now thinking maybe a large animal had fallen in and was drowning.

  She bent over the railing, looking for a hoof or a paw.

  What she saw instead was a large black head, rising up from the canal. It’s mouth opened, impossibly wide, and long silver teeth glinted in the bright sun. In less than a second it clamped down over the top of her body, the silver teeth slicing through ribs and muscle as if they were tissue paper, and took her head and chest to the heart, then slid back into the canal.

  Rachel’s torso, looking almost comical with its arms and breasts intact but its head and chest missing, slumped forward onto the railing. Her legs twitched spasmodically for a few seconds, then became still. Blood dripped from the huge wound into the water.

  Petey attempted to run off the bridge, but his leash caught on the rail. He pulled until the mechanism released and the leash extended its full length, just long enough for him to make it to solid ground.


  He stood at the end of the footbridge, straining against the leash, barking his soft bark.

  Twenty minutes later, Paul Langley came by with his German Shepherd, Max. Paul heard Petey’s soft bark fifty feet away and saw what he thought must be the dog’s owner, leaning over the bridge railing.

  He stopped at the footbridge, bent down to give Petey a pat on the head, but didn’t look up at the owner, thinking perhaps, from her posture, she might be sick and would appreciate the privacy. “Are you okay, ma’am?” he asked Rachel’s corpse. “Anything I can do for you?”

  When she failed to respond, he looked and immediately knew something was wrong, that something was missing. Moving to his left, he saw that the woman he was talking to had something terribly wrong with her.

  “Help!” he screamed, stumbling away from the bridge, fumbling for the cell phone clipped to his belt.

  “Help! Help!”

  Max began barking. Petey went silent.

  Chapter 7

  Lawless picked up a roast beef sandwich and a Dr. Pepper on the way to the office, to eat at his desk while he looked at digital images of the Sanchez, and, hopefully, Weston killings.

  He got to his office at a quarter to eleven and found the CDs and prints waiting for him in his mailbox. He threw the prints aside, inserted the Sanchez disc into his computer, and unwrapped his sandwich. The file viewing program started and soon he was looking at thumbnails of all the images on the disc. He clicked the magnify icon and the program displayed six, which, on his nineteen-inch LCD monitor, was about the same size as standard prints; good for flipping through until he saw one he wanted to examine in full-screen mode. The lab had processed the images so they were clear and sharp.

  He stared at a close-up of Sanchez’s wound, munching, and tried to imagine what it felt like to have such a large piece of your body bitten off. Even though the creature’s teeth must be razor sharp, it still had to hurt. The attack must have been quick, seconds at the most, but the floundering around in the canal with one arm while he died from a combination of blood loss, shock, and drowning, couldn’t have been fun. The phone rang.