The Red Zone

by Tim Green

  Now, Skupper was a gray-haired crust of a man. His Topsiders, once white, were yellowed with age, constant wear, and his refusal to wear a pair of socks. Everyone who ran a dive boat or a fishing charter out of West Palm Marina knew Skupper, and Skupper knew them. It was no secret that he could barely see through the set of glasses he wore, so thick they gave the impression that his eyes were the size of fifty-cent superballs. It was also no secret that Skupper sold tanks of oxygen to anyone who could pay his "no questions asked" prices.

  Three days before Madison McCall was to begin negotiations on Luther Zorns contract, a man entered Skupper s shop early in the morning to buy two tanks of oxygen at his price of two hundred dollars a tank. Normally a tank cost no more than seventy-five, but that was when the buyer could demonstrate that he was certified. "No questions asked" oxygen also had to be paid for with cash.

  He had never been concerned about an uncertified diver being injured and coming back to sue him because he had nothing to sue for, nothing anyone could get at, anyway. Skupper s home was a small shack at the edge of the marinas scrap yard. His hoard of cash nearly filled the three plastic garbage cans buried beneath the floor of his shack. Nobody knew the money was there, and Skupper knew that the dirty lawyers could only sue you for what you had in the bank.

  Skupper welcomed the tinkle of the bells at his shop door that morning with a disdainful grunt. He wasn't ready for any customers. It was five A. M., too early for even the most zealous charter captain to be up and about. Skupper looked up from a bait tank in the back. In walked a black man. It was still dark out, but he wore sunglasses, no less. Skupper s heart skipped a beat. He thought the man was there to rob him. But although he was scared, it also made him giddy to know that every dollar in his register had been carefully removed the night before and was now resting safely beneath his floorboards. That sense of security made Skupper bold, and he scowled at the man. "What'ya want?"

  The mans smile made Skupper want to spit. He couldn't express with words how much he despised blacks. This was the second one this fall. He couldn't tell for sure, because he was too far away to see, but Skupper wondered if it wasn't the same one. Black men weren't supposed to scuba-dive. They didn't like the water. Skupper knew that. He'd been around. He peered intensely through his thick lenses to take in the man's appearance. He wanted to see clearly. He leaned forward to study the face carefully and rudely.

  "I want two tanks of oxygen," the black man said, and then added, "no questions asked."

  "No questions asked?" Skupper raised an eyebrow and his voice cracked slightly.

  "That's right," the black man said, holding forth four freshly printed hundred-dollar bills.

  Skupper could actually smell the ink. It made his nose twitch and he breathed in deeply. The bigotry lacing Skupper's entrails like frosted outdoor piping melted at the sight of the money. He snatched at the four bills without noticing that the smile had left the black man's face.

  "There's some tanks by the door there," Skupper said dismissively.

  Skupper rubbed four flattened fingers over the bills to thoroughly soak up the ink scent before stuffing them into his pocket. He looked up when he heard the bells that hung from his door tinkle a second time. The man was already gone.

  It was dark before the day was over and Skupper got back to the shack. He muttered to himself as he carefully removed his floorboards and unearthed the least full of his three cash-filled garbage cans. Skupper glared about his hovel suspiciously imagining eyes where none could be. He laid his newest bills on top of the heap, then took the liberty to sink his hands deep into the dirty green bills. After replacing the top to the can Skupper fussed for some time, shifting his rickety old linoleum table and battered rusty chair until he thought the money was again well hidden.

  Skupper then opened a can of peaches and gobbled them down with three stiff slices of Wonder bread. With his stomach full and his money safe, Skupper lay back on his ratty cot and fell asleep almost at once, a broad smile on his lips.

  He awoke with a flash several hours later and felt the hot spray of blood covering his face. Skupper tried to scream, but the air only gurgled in his bloody throat. His eyes popped open and he could see a dark form above him in the light that fell through the window. A wet steel survival knife gleamed in the moonlight. In a panic, Skupper s body lurched from the bed toward his money. Someone held Skupper s head high in the air by his long greasy hair and hacked at his neck until his head pulled completely free. For an instant Skupper could actually see his body thrashing on the floor beside his bunk, its fingers groping instinctively for the familiar feel of the bills, before his brain ceased to function and his face froze in a horrible mask of death.

  Chapter 8

  Luther Zorn didnt plan on being with anyone forever. His mother had died in his junior year of college. She never knew that he had made it, that all the wildest dreams of his life had come true. At the time, he had nothing but a scholarship, a used Toyota that broke down about every fifty miles, and enough pocket money to buy pizza and beer. It made him ache when he thought about all the things he could do for her now. If only she were alive, she would have everything. Luther would have made her a queen. Worst of all, if she had fallen ill only a few years later than she did, he could have gotten her the medical treatment she needed and deserved. Medicaid didn't pay for certain tests, so the extent of her illness had gone undetected until it was too late. Her death had killed something inside Luther, and the damage left only a sliver of compassion in his soul.

  That sliver, however, had a focus that was as clear as it was intense. Luther found a boy. His name was Jamal King. He was nine now, but when Luther first found him he was just seven, standing in a doorway. Behind Jamal dirty children ran through the cots that lined the walls of a decrepit schoolroom.

  The kids screamed and played their games with a viciousness beyond their years. It had been three days before Christmas. With about ten other Marauders players, Luther had visited a shelter in Broward County for homeless women and their children. It was pathetic. As impoverished and destitute as Luther and his mother and brother had been, they never approached the misery that flourished in that shelter.

  The players did what they could. They donated money, they brought food and presents, they signed autographs for the kids. They even sang Christmas carols. But it was only for a few hours, one day a year. As suddenly as they came, the athletes and their wives would slide into the leather seats of their European cars and return to their comfortable homes armed with security systems. Those battered women and their children would remain in that run-down abandoned middle school, eating Cream of Wheat three times a day and sleeping in rooms that had once held classes.

  While his teammates and their wives toiled decorating a ten-foot tree, and the bleary-eyed women wearing worn-out robes and mens slippers watched with skepticism, Luther locked eyes with Jamal. Even though he was only seven, Luther could see from his eyes that Jamal knew exactly where he was and exactly what had happened to him. Rage and shame burned bright. He also seemed precocious enough to know that his future wasn't going to be much better. Jamal was tall and skinny. His hair was long and unkempt. Luther couldn't help being reminded of himself. Then he saw the mother.

  When he was all alone with himself late some nights, Luther would try to honestly answer the question of whether or not the mother had anything to do with what happened. He didn't know. He hoped he was a better person than that. Either way, Luther had returned to the shelter the next week after the season had ended. He talked with the director about getting the boy and the mother out of there. It hadn't been difficult. Money was all that was needed, and Luther had that. He intentionally feigned disinterest in the mother, instead focusing his questions and concerns on the boy. The director, a Catholic nun, seemed never to suspect he had any ulterior motives, and maybe he hadn't.

  However, in a very short time, Luther ended up in the same place with the mother that he ended up with most of the attract
ive women who crossed his path. In bed. He couldn't help himself. Once he'd fixed her up with some nice clothes, a little makeup, and some self-respect, no one could fail to see Charlene's physical virtues. Her skin was a light creamy chocolate only slightly darker than his own, and her eyes, catlike, were emerald green. Luther bought a house for her and the boy to live in, a small two-bedroom ranch off Sunrise Highway in Fort Lauderdale. It was close enough for Luther to visit, but far enough away not to invite trouble.

  He didn't always sleep with Charlene at the beginning, but after several months, he dropped all pretenses. She had come to expect to satisfy him with every visit, no matter what the time, day or night. And Luther believed, correctly, that she was more than pleased to do it. Luther treated the boy like a nephew, and the mother like an easygoing girlfriend. He could come and go as he pleased without a hitch. If he needed a sexual fix, he knew where to go. The arrangement seemed to work for everyone, in part because Luther was careful to make sure the mother kept her expectations low.

  Charlene had never been an addict or a drunk. She was simply a product of the projects, a girl with no particularly outstanding attributes. What she did have was more than her share of bad luck. Her husband, Jamais father, had been involved in some shady business that she had never asked about or wanted to know about. They found his head one day in the Dumpster outside their apartment building, inconveniently burdened with three 9mm slugs. That was all there had been to bury. They never found his body Except for her son, Charlene was left with nothing. She then went from man to man, never finding anyone who really cared about her enough to accept her son in the bargain, and ending finally with a handsome animal who beat her senseless while Jamal hid under the bed in tears.

  To Charlene, Luther Zorn was a savior, and she worshipped him accordingly.

  Tonight, however, Luther's thoughts weren't on Charlene. He was going to deliver a gift. It was something he wanted to do, and anyway it took his mind away from the upcoming morning.

  When Luther came in from the practice field earlier that afternoon, he was greeted with another telephone message from her. Its meaning was clear, and left him with a high-octane mixture of anxiety and thrills.

  As Luther rolled up into the small semicircular driveway in his Viper, he made a mental note to have someone paint the house. It was something Charlene, with her job as a salesclerk in a department store, probably couldn't afford. It was also something she would never ask for. But it needed doing. Luther let himself in the front door and was not surprised to find Charlene and Jamal sitting at the kitchen table working through math problems. Both of them beamed when they saw him.

  "Luther!" the boy yelped, jumping from his seat to slap Luthers hand and then hug him around the waist.

  "Hello, Charlene," Luther said politely, then gripping the boy's thin shoulder tightly: "Hey, my man!"

  Charlene rose and accepted Luther's kiss on her cheek before getting a can of beer for him from the refrigerator.

  "Luther, you were great on Sunday! You were the greatest!" the boy crooned. "Wham! Right into the quarterback! Four times! You won the whole game! Everybody at school said so!"

  Luther couldn't help his smile.

  "And what about you?" he said. "I heard you got something to crow about yourself. I heard you got straight As. Is that right?"

  Jamal was rifling through a drawer looking for the report card as he spoke. "It's right here, Luther! I did! See it! See it!"

  Luther smiled at Charlene. He admired what she'd done with the boy. Luther had helped, of course. He bought Jamal books and gave Charlene strict instructions to read. A year ago he bought a computer and every kind of educational program available. Luther didn't see the boy without talking to him about the importance of education. But it was Charlene who was there day to day, helping Jamal to study, drilling it into him.

  Luther sat down at the table and sipped his beer as he studied the report card. He fussed over the details of it for some time while Jamal looked on with a smile that left his cheeks aching. Finally, Luther set the report card down and began shaking his head.

  "I'm proud of you, Jamal," he said seriously. Luther took a box out of his pocket. It was a small present, wrapped in colorful paper with a red ribbon around it. "This is for you."

  Jamal looked at the gift with wonder. If Luther brought anything, it was usually something that Jamal needed. Except for his birthday and Christmas, Luther didn't bring trifles.

  "Open it," Luther said, "it's for doing good."

  Jamal tore into the package and pulled a gold chain from the box. He held it up to the light, marveling at the golden, diamond-studded "1" that hung from it. It was the most extravagant thing Jamal had ever held.

  "Luther," the boy whispered, "it's the coolest!"

  He'd seen the same type of chain around his mother's neck, and he knew that it also had come from Luther. Charlene's was more ornate, and the diamonds were bigger, but toJamal, the pendant he held in his own hand might have been a crown jewel.

  "That T stands for you. It stands for your mom. It stands for me," Luther said, looking intently at the boy. "When I was a boy your age, I didn't have a lot of friends, Jamal. I wasn't in a gang. I was a gang of one. That's what the one means. It means you're a gang of one. When someone tells you to do something wrong, you put your hand on this one and remember what I'm telling you. It's like a club. I'm in it. bur mom's in it. Now you're in it. It means you can be stronger than everyone else, Jamal. If you want to be like me, you have to be tougher than any gang member you'll ever meet. You have to be tough enough to be a gang of one. Anyone gives you any grief about that, you tell them Luther Zorn said that's the way it is. You tell them Luther said so . . ."

  The words branded a mark in the boy's mind. That was what Luther wanted. He knew that the odds were against a boy like this, a boy with no father. Luther wanted to give him an edge. He looked up at Charlene. She wiped a tear from under her eye and said, "Come on now, Jamal. Say thank you to Luther and let's get to bed. You've got school . . ."

  She looked to Luther to see if she was doing right. He nodded his head to her.

  "Here," he said to Jamal, turning him around, "let me put that on your neck and then you do like your mom says."

  While Luther fiddled with the clasp, Jamal held the jeweled "1" tightly. When Luther was finished, Jamal spun around and hugged him. Luther engulfed the boy in a mass of muscular limbs.

  "Thank you, Luther," Jamal said, his thin boy's arms squeezing Luther's thick torso with all their might.

  "Good night," Luther said, his voice uneven from the burden of emotion.

  "Good night, Luther."

  Charlene followed the boy with her arms folded carefully beneath her breasts, but stopped on her way out of the kitchen.

  "Are you going to wait for me?" she asked with a sultry look that stirred Luther's blood. Then he remembered the message in his locker. He'd need his energy. He glanced furtively at the clock above the stove and thought about it.

  "Yes," he said finally in a low guttural tone.

  She smiled, then she was gone. Luther got another beer from the refrigerator before sitting down again to wait. As he sipped from the can, his mind churned. He thought about the things she would do to him, and he to her. It was the thrill he craved, the thrill he couldn't get enough of.

  In twenty minutes, she appeared in the doorway to the kitchen wearing nothing but a black lace teddy. Luther stood, and they met in the middle of the kitchen floor. Slowly and gently, he ran his hands over her entire body, kneeling to touch her legs and buttocks. Then Luther kissed the soft flesh on the inside of her thighs and Charlene began to say his name the way he liked to hear it said. She implored him. She begged him. Suddenly, she felt herself being lifted off her feet as though she were nothing more than a flower. Luther carried her to the bedroom. After lovemaking that was as gentle as it was intense, Charlene fell asleep, wrapped in two strong arms with her face buried in the broad chest of the man who she thought of a
s a beautiful savior.

  Sometime during the night Charlene awoke. She didn't know if it was Luther's leaving that woke her, but he was gone. She didn't know why he had left, but she wished that one day she would wake and find him still there beside her, like some implacable boulder unmoved by the outgoing tide. She sighed deeply and reminded herself not to expect too much. Already he'd given her more than she'd ever had before, from anyone. She lay there for a while, watching the paddle fan spin slowly above her bed. After some time she looked at the clock. It was 4:07 A. M. She rolled on her side and clutched two pillows to her breast. Thinking of him, she closed her eyes and fell back to sleep.

  Chapter 9

  The surf pounded gently against the sand and rocks as the sun rose in a shoal of its own red blood. Even though it promised to be a warm fall day, Evan Chase felt a shiver scamper up his spine. He twisted his head this way and that with two sharp cracks and tried to shake away the goose bumps that had crawled to the surface of his skin. Chase looked up and down the beach. There was no sign of anyone, not that there should be. That was the beauty of Lost Tree Village: even in the heart of overdeveloped South Florida, you could still feel like you were the last person on earth. He turned back toward the house. It sat above him in the glow of the dawn, a fortress of wealth and prestige nestled in a lush growth of tropical vegetation. He thought he saw the brief image of his wife in a bedroom window before the heavy gray drape fell back into place. He wondered if it had only been his imagination.

  The water, although clean, gave no indication of what lay in its depths. The gleam of the rising sun kept its secrets hidden. Bottomless water was the one fear Chase had never been able to subdue completely. That was part of the reason he forced himself to endure it every morning. He relished the act of beginning each day with the conquest of the one thing that made his skin crawl. It was irrational, of course, like a childs fear of the dark. There was nothing there. There never was. This water was too clean and too clear to enable a shark, even if it did wander in past the reef, to mistakenly bump into him and attack. It was simply the fact that he couldn't see, that he didn't know--that's what got to him.