Cracker Bling

by Stephen Solomita

  Bubba’s shredding cheese in a Cuisinart, a genuine Cuisinart. He doesn’t pause, doesn’t even hesitate. Finally, he says, ‘Every great fortune begins with a crime. You give me thirty grand, I’ll turn it into three hundred. You give me three hundred, I’ll turn it into three million. Just like I’m gonna turn this cheese into the best omelet you ever tasted.’

  ‘I heard that song before, the one about the three million. From Amelia.’

  ‘I hear what you’re sayin’, Hootie. For all you know, I could be taking you for a long ride down a bad road. But I don’t know you, either. I’m going on pure instinct here.’

  ‘That doesn’t answer my question.’

  Bubba breaks five eggs into a stainless steel bowl. He adds salt and pepper, a pinch of fresh dill and a pinch of tarragon. Finally, he begins to whisk the mixture.

  ‘Hootie, you’re pushin’ me here. What happened before you came on the scene is not your problem. I shouldn’t have to tell you that.’

  Mind your own business. The first rule in the prison survival manual. If Hootie asks the question again, Bubba will have to react. Hootie’s not about to challenge Bubba, who killed a man over an insult. But he’s satisfied anyway. A convincing denial would have been easy for a scam artist like Bubba, whether he did it or not.

  ‘Tell me what I have to do, in detail.’

  ‘As it turns out, we’re on a tighter schedule than I expected. We need to purchase equipment this afternoon and that means you walkin’ into the store. It also means you when the time comes to contact the mark, and ditto if somebody has to meet the asshole face to face. Later on, if all goes well, you’ll buy those Cookinarts I told you about, and you’ll arrange to make the spot and buy the air time. You’re going to be the face of whatever corporation we create.’

  Hootie bristles. He’s wondering what Bubba intends to contribute. But then he admits that Bubba’s already taken the biggest risk of all. The punishment for murder is twenty-five to life.

  ‘So, what’s in it for me?’

  ‘In the beginning, no more than room and board.’ Bubba slides the whisked eggs into an omelet pan. He checks the light under the pan, then continues. ‘Remember what I said about thinking outside the box? The dudes I jailed with, the horizon of their lives doesn’t extend beyond the next job. They knock over a liquor store, split the money with their partners, go their separate ways. That won’t happen here. We’ll live where we can, buy what we have to, but most of the money goes back into the pot. I’m out to build a future, Hootie, living in the eternal present being a sure-fire recipe for spending most of your life in a cell.’

  Bubba’s right about one thing. The cheese omelet he serves, along with slices of onion rye bread, is the best Hootie’s ever had. Hootie eats quickly, then pours himself a second cup of coffee. It’s Bubba who picks up their conversation.

  ‘You got three choices, the way I see it. You can move back into the straight world, get your GED, maybe enroll in a junior college. Or you can do a few more third-rate burglaries before you get popped again. Or you can throw in with me and Amelia. We might crash and burn, I admit that, but it’s not too likely when you consider the circumstances. I mean, what’s the mark gonna do? Go to the cops and tell ’em, “Hey, I’m a chicken hawk and I’m being blackmailed with pictures of me screwin’ a little kid”?’

  Hootie knows he’s supposed to laugh, but he can’t. All Bubba’s done here is revive Hootie’s misgivings. Bubba the pimp, Amelia the whore, a pedophile free to prey on other children.

  ‘I got problems with bein’ a pimp,’ he says.

  ‘A pimp? Listen close, Hootie. The foster family Amelia grew up with? They passed her around as a party favor. Now she’s got a chance to get clear and she’s takin’ it. And here’s somethin’ else you might consider. Once the mark pays off, we’re gonna use a software program to blur out Amelia’s face, then make a DVD and mail it to the Sex Crimes Unit. Remember, the mark’s not committing a crime. Amelia’s as old as you are.’

  Outflanked, Hootie changes the subject. ‘How do you know the mark has the money to pay off?’

  ‘He lives in a section of Bayside, out in Queens, called Bayside Gables. His house, it’s gotta be five thousand square feet. I saw the place myself. Plus, I paid a friend of a friend to check his credit report. He’s triple-A, Hootie, with a credit score of eight-ten. He can put together a thirty grand pay-off with credit cards alone.’

  Bubba collects the dishes and carries them into the kitchen. ‘I was hopin’ to give it a few more days, so we could get to know each other better. Unfortunately, the mark’s heading off on an extended business trip next week. We don’t hook him now, we’ll have to wait a month. That’s not in the budget, my man. Which means you’re gonna have to make a decision.’

  The sharp clack of a key turning in a lock interrupts their conversation. Amelia walks into view a moment later, her smile lighting the room. Hootie stares at that smile. He’s telling himself that Amelia’s smile is way too bright for a girl who was passed around as a party favor. He’s telling himself maybe that foster care family resides only in Bubba’s imagination. Maybe there’s no mark, either. Except for Judson Two-Bears Hootier.

  ‘I’m down,’ he tells Bubba. ‘All the way.’

  Bubba fills Hootie in as they drive through the Holland Tunnel and out to Newark. Hootie doesn’t know where Bubba got the car, an ancient Crown Vic with a sun-faded hood, and he doesn’t ask. The vehicle’s main virtue is its size, big enough to hold Bubba whose knees bump the steering wheel even with the seat pushed all the way back. They’re on their way to buy a pair of video cameras from a shop called The Crow’s Nest.

  ‘The owner’s name is Larry Anderson,’ Bubba explains. ‘He’s a real jerk, but he does high-quality miniaturization, the best around.’

  Hootie’s expecting a hassle when he comes through the door, but the old man with the scraggly beard seems entirely unconcerned. He barely glances at Hootie, content to produce the two items Hootie requests, a small clock in a mahogany frame and an equally small air purifier, both of which conceal a video camera.

  As per Bubba’s instructions, Hootie demands a demonstration, there being no time to work out any bugs. He’s got three thousand dollars in his pocket and it’s giving him all kinds of confidence. Though he’s sure there’s a surveillance camera somewhere in the store and that his face is now on it, he finds himself comfortable with his role.

  The video turns out to be superb, as good as cable TV. Hootie maintains a straight face, only nodding from time to time, though he’s pretty amazed. The clock and the purifier are only about six inches high and they look exactly how they’re supposed to look. Like a clock and an air purifier, both working.

  Satisfied, Hootie adds a final item to his order, a parabolic microphone concealed in the body of a digital camera. Then he peels twenty-seven hundred dollars off the roll and lays it on the counter. The old man’s eyes light up and he doesn’t even mention the sales tax.

  Back in Manhattan, Hootie strolls into Washington Square at five o’clock in the afternoon. He passes beneath a massive arch honoring the first president, then cuts left to a quiet bench at the eastern edge of the park. All the action is at the western end, where a string band competes with an acrobatic troupe for the attention, not to mention the donations, of onlookers. The acrobats are the clear winners of this competition. Their leader’s spiel has the crowd shaking with laughter. Which is a good thing because the troupe only has four or five moves. If they performed them one after another, the show would be over before it began.

  But Hootie’s not in Washington Square to observe the festivities. Amelia’s to meet the mark (whose name, finally revealed to Hootie, is Sherman Cole) for the first time. The public nature of the meeting comes at Amelia’s insistence. Naturally, being young and inexperienced, she’s apprehensive.

  Hootie slides a tiny speaker, an ear bud, into his right ear. He turns the little camera dangling from a strap around his neck until it’s p
ointed at a bench perhaps fifty feet away. Two young women sit on the bench. Young and attractive, they lean together, co-conspirators in the adventure of New York. The shorter of the two shakes out her dreadlocks. When she speaks, her words are shockingly clear to Hootie.

  ‘Work all week, party all weekend? It’s getting tired, Karen. Bob and I might be headed for the burbs.’

  Hootie turns the camera around so that the microphone lies against his chest. Great, now he can hear his heart beating, ka-boom, ka, boom, ka-boom. He takes the ear piece out, then as quickly replaces it when Amelia enters the park. She’s wearing pink cotton shorts with matching sneakers and a yellow top. A pink barrette lifts a shock of her blond hair away from her scalp.

  Dappled light through the leaves of an overarching sycamore plays across Amelia’s hair and shoulders as she passes from shade to sunlight. Amelia’s doing her bit, looking around self-consciously, at once anxious and excited as she dodges a pair of young mothers pushing three-wheel strollers. A homeless man extends a coffee container, which he shakes as Amelia walks by. Hootie can hear the jangle of the coins and the scuffing of Amelia’s sneakers. He watches her reach into the pocket of her shorts to produce a quarter, watches her drop it into the coffee container.

  ‘God bless you, miss,’ the beggar says, without looking up.

  Amelia finally settles on an empty bench. She draws one foot up on the bench and runs her finger inside her sneaker. Hootie wonders what she’s feeling. Is she dreading the encounter, knowing what happens next? Is she excited by the challenge? Is this merely a job?

  He’s hoping it’s the latter, but there’s no way to know. Amelia’s expression doesn’t change when she’s approached by a man wearing khaki pants and a short-sleeved shirt. Blood-red, the shirt is imprinted with gray leaves connected by twisting vines.

  ‘Veronica?’ When Amelia doesn’t respond immediately, he says, ‘I’m Sherman.’

  Amelia scoots over to one end of the bench. She drops her foot to the ground and tugs at the cuffs of her shorts. ‘Hi,’ she says.

  Hootie’s too far away to read Sherman Cole’s expression. There’s a mustache, thick eyebrows and a full head of hair that seems too uniformly dark for a man approaching forty. What’s clear is that the mark’s in excellent shape, the humped muscle apparent in his shoulders and back when he drops on to the bench a few feet from Amelia.

  The mark begins the conversation by asking about Amelia’s abusive stepfather. This is a bit of fiction that Amelia and Bubba fabricated in the weeks before the meeting. A drunk, Amelia’s stepfather is quick to lash out, whether at Amelia or her chronically-depressed mom. Worse yet, twice he came into the bathroom while she was in the shower, taking advantage of a broken lock. He didn’t pull back the curtain or anything. He just stood there for a moment before walking out.

  The question up for discussion is whether she should say something to her mom about the two incidents. Amelia pretends to be afraid. Suppose her mom tells her stepfather? That would only make things worse.

  The conversation goes back and forth for a time, until Amelia looks down at her feet and says, haltingly to be sure, ‘When Ernie came into the bathroom … something happened.’ A giggle, followed by a sideways glance at the mark. ‘I mean, oh, my God. I didn’t want to do it with him or anything. But … but I felt excited. I felt like if he pulled back the shower curtain, I wouldn’t be able to stop him.’

  ELEVEN

  Hootie’s thinking that Amelia’s aged fifteen years. He’s studying her across a table located toward the back of a Greek restaurant on 7th Street. Bubba sits to Amelia’s right. He’s plating the appetizers, stuffed grape leaves, sautéed halloumi cheese and an artichoke moussaka. Bubba describes the dishes while he carefully assembles their plates. The patter is by now familiar to Hootie, and admittedly comforting, but he finds his attention focused on Amelia. She’s no longer the perky pre-pubescent, quick with a grin or a mocking quip. Instead, her memories seem to dance in her eyes and he senses an aching, bone-deep regret in her slumped posture.

  The deal is going down on the following night, in a borrowed apartment that supposedly belongs to Amelia/Veronica’s older sister, now vacationing in Cape Cod. The apartment is located in Kew Gardens, an upscale Queens neighborhood of single-family homes and squat brick apartment buildings, with the occasional luxury high-rise near Queens Boulevard, the main drag.

  Hootie finds himself wanting to comfort Amelia. But what’s can he say? I’m sorry you have to take one for the team? He slices a piece of cheese with the side of his fork and slips it into his mouth. Of course, the food is great. Of course.

  Bubba commands the dinner conversation. His tone is relentlessly upbeat as he describes a must-win prison basketball game at the minimum security Menands Prison Facility. ‘This was right after I was transferred down from Attica. We lost two games in a row and somehow I caught the heat, even though I played well. The deputy warden who managed us told me that my transfer papers were filled out and ready to be signed.

  ‘“We can lose without ya,” was what he said.’

  The story catches Hootie’s attention. Rikers Island is a rough place, but it’s not like doing hard time in one of New York’s maximum security prisons. First thing, the Rikers Island complex of prisons and jails is only a short car ride from Manhattan, while the big institutions are out in the country, most of them hundreds of miles away. Hootie’s mother had visited every week for the length of his incarceration, his sister almost as often. That wouldn’t happen if he was upstate. If he was upstate, he’d be on his own.

  ‘You wanna talk about motivation? Hootie, I played like a demon. I was on the court for the entire forty-eight minutes, scored thirty points and picked up twenty-two rebounds. By the time the game ended, my knees were hurting so bad I was limpin’ on both legs at the same time. Meanwhile, the dep was beside himself. Over the two weeks until the next game, he was slipping me pork chop sandwiches from the warden’s dining room.’

  In the silence that follows, Hootie finds himself wanting to comfort Amelia as he’d comfort a child. Don’t worry, it’s gonna be OK. Or, worse yet: You don’t have to do this, Amelia. Fortunately, he keeps his impulses under control, because when Amelia finally opens up, her misgivings have nothing to do with the sexual act.

  ‘There’s somethin’ off about this scumbag,’ she informs the table over cups of espresso. ‘I’m talkin’ about Sherman.’

  ‘Tell me.’ Bubba’s anxiety is apparent. He’d skipped the encounter, sacrificing his control-freak needs to the realities at hand. Now he’s paying the price.

  ‘There’s an edge to him that’s just doesn’t fit. Don’t get me wrong, if Sherman was any hotter, he would’ve melted. He’s a chicken hawk for sure.’ She pauses long enough to swallow down a spoonful of chocolate mousse. ‘Engineers are supposed to be flabby little nerds with scrawny necks and sissy handshakes. They’re supposed to wear glasses and carry calculators. That’s not Sherman, Bubba. Sherman’s built like he spent the last ten years in a prison weight yard.’

  Bubba doesn’t hesitate. ‘You wanna cancel, just say the word. We can always go back to one of the jerks you blew off.’

  The biggest problem, from Bubba’s point of view, is that the apartment they’ve borrowed for the day is on a side street, well away from any bar or restaurant. In a perfect world, he’d have a surveillance van equipped with hi-tech gear. Or better yet, he’d be in an adjoining apartment fully prepared to ride to the rescue. But it’s not a perfect world and if Bubba wants to keep watch, he’ll have to do it from the front seat of the Crown Vic, an option not in play. Like any experienced pedophile, the mark will be wary of a police sting. If he spots Bubba, he’ll most likely split.

  ‘I don’t mind if the mark is a little rough,’ Amelia says after a moment. ‘For a lot of these guys, dominance is what it’s all about. But I’m going in strapped, Bubba, so if the scumbag gets out of hand, you’re gonna have to dispose of his fucking body.’

  Hootie
gets a look at the check before Bubba grabs it: $187.30. He watches Bubba count out the money, then add a tip generous enough to impress the surly waiter. It’s nine o’clock, but their evening is far from over. Bubba drops Amelia off at the apartment, then drives Hootie to a storefront on Broadway just north of the George Washington Bridge. Wooden panels hanging from a chain behind the windows reveal the nature of the business:

  ENVIOS DE DINEROS

  DOCUMENTOS

  IMMIGRACIóN

  ABOGADOS

  One stop shopping for immigrants, legal and illegal. Send money home, acquire documents, retain a lawyer to fight La Migra.

  As they come through the door, Bubba’s greeted by a Latino with a pair of teardrops tattooed beneath his left eye. He clasps Bubba’s hand and they bump chests, two refugees from the institution, then fixes Hootie with a hard look. The look’s a matter of habit and not meant as a threat, but the implications aren’t lost on Hootie. There are people in this world, one glance and you know they’re not to be fucked with. Another lesson from the Rikers Island School of Hard Knocks.

  Ninety minutes later, Judson Hootier has a new identity, an identity he can verify with a driver’s license, a social security card and Department of Buildings ID that bears his photo. Hootie examines the driver’s license under intense light, comparing it to Bubba’s legit license. After a long look, he decides that the document will pass muster, though the blue on the state seal is a bit off. He is now a twenty-five-year-old Filipino named Judson Binay.

  On the way home, Bubba asks Hootie about the mark. He wants to know if Hootie found the man to be menacing.

  ‘Amelia’s was right about one thing,’ Hootie replies after a moment. ‘The guy’s fit. But so what? Where is it written that an engineer has to be soft?’