Breaking the Bank

by Yona Zeldis McDonough

  “I had a little visit from the police,” Fred said. “Detective Costello and a couple of officers.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “I wish.” His thumb rubbed the surface of the radio. “They came to Juicy.”

  “That doesn’t sound good.”

  “It isn’t. Nothing puts a damper on a crowd like a couple of uniformed officers strolling up to the bar. It was like Moses parting the Red Sea.”

  “So what did you tell them?”

  “The truth, Mia. Which is that Weed’s dealing was total news to me, and I don’t know where the hell you got that bill.”

  “So that should be it, right? They won’t want you for anything else.” Even as she said this, Mia knew how naïve she sounded.

  “That all depends on what happens with Weed. The investigation’s just started.”

  “Well, we’re both in the same boat then, aren’t we? We’ll go down together.”

  “No, we’re not,” Fred said. “As long as you keep holding out on me, we’re not in anything together. I thought we were,” he said, putting the radio back in his pocket, “but I was wrong.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to tell you—” Mia began. “Save it,” he said, standing up and reaching for his coat, “for your lawyer.”

  “You’re leaving?” Mia asked. Though of course it was obvious; that was just what he was doing.

  “Yeah, Kyra’s got to be at her mother’s first thing tomorrow morning. She wants to drive her to some mega-mall in Jersey and spend more of my money.”

  “Oh,” said Mia. “I thought maybe you could stay over. Like last time. I still have Julie’s air mattress.”

  “Let’s take a rain check, okay?” Fred said, flashing her the puppy-dog look again. Then he started walking toward Eden’s room. “Kyra, honey? We’ve got to be wrapping it up.”

  AFTER THEY LEFT, Mia was utterly deflated. But she tried to hide it from Eden, who was psyched enough about her upcoming trip not to mind. She helped Mia clean the kitchen, and then they found the perfect movie on TV—It’s a Wonderful Life—and curled up together to watch it. Even the reception, so often spotty, cooperated. Eden brought in what remained of the vanilla ice cream, which they polished off right from the container. But Mia could not quite banish her sadness. She was sorry that Fred had gone. There, she had admitted it. And wasn’t that a kick in the teeth? Still, Eden’s fluffy hair was close to her face—she was in a touchy-feely mood tonight, which was unusual for her, but Mia wasn’t complaining—and Fred’s roses opened, their heady, dense odor mingling pleasantly with the sharper smell of the tree. Mia closed her eyes for a minute, inhaling. Then she must have dozed, because the sound of the buzzer startled her, and she nearly dumped Eden, who was also dozing, to the floor.

  At first she thought it was Fred; he changed his mind and decided to come back. But it wasn’t Fred at all. It was Detective Costello and her sidekicks, Choi and Roy. Roy nodded, the slightest dip of his chin, and Choi stomped lightly, wiping his feet on the doormat.

  No, thought Mia, no, no, no. Still, she was hyperaware of Eden sitting just ten scant feet away. She had to remain calm for Eden.

  “Can I help you?” She was aware of how stiff and uselessly formal this sounded, but it was better than shrieking at them to go away or bursting into tears.

  “You’re under arrest,” said Costello. “You’re going to need to come with us.”

  “Under arrest? What for?” Mia’s voice scaled up in proportion to her panic and disbelief; Eden gaped.

  “I think we should come in,” said Costello, and Mia stepped aside to let them pass. Costello’s hair and overcoat were dusted with glittering droplets; for a second, Mia was so frightened she couldn’t process what she was seeing. Then the words snow, it’s snowing came into her mind; she wanted to weep with relief.

  “All right,” she said. “Now can you tell me what this is all about?”

  “Wedeen’s been shot.” Costello tugged the belt of her coat while Choi and Roy shifted, like a pair of restive ponies, beside her. “Once, right through the back of the head. His hands were bound and he was blindfolded. We think you may have been involved and we need to bring you in.”

  Mia vomited, a small and almost perfect milky circle on the floor. Shot in the head. Executed. How horrible. She took a deep breath and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

  “Excuse me,” she said to Costello. “I’d like to get some paper towels.”

  In the kitchen, she quickly rinsed her mouth at the sink and then darted around, trying to locate a fresh roll. While she was looking, Eden appeared.

  “Why are they here again?”

  “They need to ask me some more questions, sweetie.” Mia stretched up to search the shelf above the fridge.

  “About what? Manny?”

  “In a way, yes,” said Mia. This was not so far from the truth. Manny was a dealer; Weed was a dealer. Manny went, presumably, to jail; Weed was . . . but Mia couldn’t think about that. There were no paper towels, so she grabbed a handful of napkins and returned to where Costello was waiting. Eden latched onto her hand—Mia didn’t think her daughter had touched her so many times in one night in a year—and followed close behind.

  Mia knelt to swab the floor. She had to remain calm. Calm and in charge. Bad as all this was for Eden, it would be even worse if Mia fell apart. The television was still on, and she could hear Donna Reed’s cheery, can-do voice in the background.

  “You can get your coat,” Costello said. “We’ve got a squad car waiting downstairs.”

  “You’re going somewhere?” Eden sounded panicky. “Where are you going?”

  “Would you please go and turn that off?” Mia said. Her outburst had scared Eden; she was going to have to rein it. Eden stared at her like she was nuts but went to do it anyway.

  “I want my lawyer present,” Mia managed to say to Costello. She was still holding the wad of smeared napkins, but tried balling them up as tightly as she could. Maybe, like a wizard, she could make them disappear. And then she could follow.

  “You can call your lawyer.”

  “And I’ll need to find someone to watch my daughter.”

  “Go ahead.” Costello looked at her watch. “We’ll wait.”

  Mia nipped into the bathroom, where she scrubbed furiously at her teeth to get the sour taste out of her mouth. Then she splashed water on her face and lathered up her hands.

  “Mom? Where are you going? Why do you have to go with them anyway?” asked Eden, who had followed her into the bathroom.

  “Don’t worry, everything’s going to be fine,” Mia said, depositing a kiss on Eden’s forehead. “Go get your pajamas; I’ll call Luisa’s mom, and you can sleep over at her house tonight.”

  Mia moved through the next few minutes on autopilot. Inez, God bless her, said they would be happy to have Eden spend the night. She would even send Hector down to get her. Her lawyer, Chris Cox, said he would meet her at the station house in an hour. “The directions,” he snapped, “give them to me.” Mia said good night to Eden, who was trying valiantly not to cry, and watched as she followed Hector— Petunia clutched under one arm, grocery bag stuffed with pajamas and toothbrush in the other. Then she turned to Costello.

  “I’m ready,” she said. She had her coat, her bag, and her new knit hat. At least she wouldn’t be cold. She had an urge to run through the apartment, making sure all the windows were closed, and that the taps and oven were off. As much as she had detested this place, leaving it to follow the trio of officers out into the night made her suddenly protective and even tender toward it, as if the rooms might vaporize in her absence. She double-locked the door and followed Costello, in her clumping black shoes, down the stairs; Choi and Roy brought up the rear. Outside, the snow was falling heavily. The police car, with its lazy Mars light circling, waited on Garfield Place. Costello got in up front, with the officer who was driving; Mia squeezed in back with Choi and Roy.

  They drove in silence and w
hen the car stopped, Mia got out and stood staring up at the wide limestone facade of the precinct. A pair of enormous green-globed sconces flanked the massive and ornately worked brass and copper doors.

  Once she stepped through them, though, into the squat, battered vestibule, she knew that whatever grandeur this building might have once possessed, it had long since vanished. The building, like so many lost souls who had passed through its portals, was just another casualty of the slow, creeping rot brought on by ignorance, poverty, and plain old bad luck.

  SEVENTEEN

  ONCE PAST THE gun-toting guard, Costello and Choi disappeared. Roy escorted Mia to the front desk, where she had to contend with the avalanche of paperwork her mere presence seemed to generate. Forms, forms, and more forms. She listened to the rotelike recitation of her rights being read, and reluctantly surrendered her bag and coat. At least no one asked for her shoes. She tapped her still-shod foot on the bald linoleum, just to reassure herself.

  Then Roy took her into a small room for fingerprinting. The printing was not done with ink but with a scanner, and Roy had her roll her index finger around on a flat glass plate; the digitalized image appeared on a large Sony screen in front of her. Then he asked her to stand still, while her photo was snapped with a digital camera that was mounted to the wall. It was over in seconds, and none of it felt quite real to Mia. Her dream of the dirty jail with its lurking reptile had been much more vivid; right now, it was as if everything had been swathed in bubble wrap, insulating her from its true impact. She had an impulse to bite the inside of her cheek, just to get herself to react.

  “We’re going to go upstairs now,” Roy said. “Detective Costello’s got some questions for you.”

  “But my lawyer isn’t here yet.” She looked down at her wrist to check the time, but of course her watch was temporarily gone, along with her handbag, keys, and cell phone. Cox, she thought frantically. When was Cox going to arrive?

  Roy didn’t answer, so Mia followed him upstairs and down a cramped, hot hallway. There was shouting coming from its far end, and Roy stopped abruptly, indicating with his hand that she should stop, too.

  “. . . the fuck you are . . . !” said a loud, angry male voice. “I told him, ‘Man, don’t fuck with me, ‘cause I can fuck you up bad, do you hear me? Fuck. You. Up.’”

  “Keep it down,” growled another voice. “The fuck I will!” shouted the first voice. “Just fuckin’ try and make me.”

  Even Mia, no stranger to four-letter words in all their permutations, was shocked by this outburst—the volume of it, the intensity. In the next second, a man charged into the hallway, his rippling, shoulder-length blond hair streaming behind him as he ran. Mia instinctively pinned herself against the wall as he streaked by; she could smell him, the pure, rank smell of adrenaline and high-octane fury.

  “Stop right there!” bellowed the police officer who was right behind him. Another officer, even faster than the first, didn’t say anything but managed to catch up with the fugitive; there was a short, fierce scuffle, and then the blond guy landed on the floor with a nasty thud.

  “Fuck! You broke my face, you fuckin’ pig!”

  “Shut up,” said the first officer. “Unless you want to be gagged.”

  “That’s against the fucking law!” yelled the blond guy. “I’ll have you arrested, you fuckface swine. You’ll lose your badge, and I’ll make sure it’s shoved up your pig’s ass—”

  “Cuff him,” said the officer who did the tackling; he was getting to his feet, rubbing an elbow that he must have slammed in the struggle. “And then get him out of here before I do something I’ll be sorry about later.” Another officer appeared from the room at the end of the hall, and Detective Costello—now divested of her coat and wearing the sort of wool jumper and white blouse worn by parochial-school girls all over the city—stepped outside as well. She watched as the blond guy, still struggling, was cuffed and led away. He continued to swear, though more softly now. No one seemed to pay him any attention. Costello gave him one last look before going back into her office.

  “Come with me,” Roy said. Mia was so shaken by the scene in the hallway that she had forgotten he was there. She blinked at him before following him through the door.

  Costello was seated at her desk, an old oak thing with a broad, pitted surface. There were several small frames arranged along the back—one shaped like a heart, another an oval—but from her vantage point, Mia couldn’t see the photos they held, and she felt that this put her at a disadvantage. If she could see whose picture was in there—the person or people Costello loved—she might have a better handle on how to deal with her. But it looked like even that slight edge would be denied her. The room was hot, even hotter than the hallway, and the window was open a tiny bit, allowing a layer of snow to pile up on the sill.

  “Sit down,” said Costello, indicating a wooden chair that looked as if it had been gnawed on by generations of police dogs.

  Mia sat. Still thinking of the blond guy in the hallway, the rough hands that yanked and pulled him, she understood that her best defense was to appear cooperative and unthreatening. She repeated those words to herself, then realized, after only a few seconds, that Costello had been speaking to her and she had totally, but totally, tuned her out.

  “We’ve got some more questions about your connection to Wedeen,” said Costello. “And also to Fred Giordano. Is it true that Fred introduced you to Wedeen?” She held a chewed blue ballpoint poised over a yellow legal pad.

  “My lawyer,” said Mia, her tongue a fat, clumsy thing in her mouth. “I want my lawyer.”

  “Where’s he coming from?”

  “Scarsdale.”

  “Well, he’s not going to be here anytime soon. It’s still snowing out there. Have you looked?”

  Mia followed her gaze out the window, where the snow continued to fall furiously, in swollen white flakes.

  “I don’t want to talk on record without my lawyer.”

  “Okay,” Costello said, fiddling with her pen. “It’s your choice. But then you’ll have to stay until he gets here.”

  “Stay where?” Mia asked, fighting the panic that threatened to shoot up from her stomach and right out of her mouth. She had already tossed her cookies once in front of this woman, and she really, but really, did not want to do it again.

  “There’s a holding cell downstairs,” Costello continued, as if mentioning the whereabouts of the ladies’ room. “You can wait there.”

  “Cell?” said Mia. “You’re going to put me in a cell?”

  “What were you expecting?” Costello said. “A five-star room at the Ritz?”

  Mia rose from the chair and followed Roy, who seemed to have become, in this place, her shadow. She was frantically trying to weigh the alternatives—talk to Costello now, or cool her heels in a holding cell. The mere thought of the cell made her want to heave again, no matter who was around to see it. On the other hand, how was she going to explain the bill—the crazy, heaven-sent or Satan-spawned bill? She hadn’t even explained it to the lawyer yet; they had been planning to meet this week. So unless she was ready to spill the whole story here and now, she knew what she had to do. Meekly, she followed Roy out of the office and into the hallway. Mia sensed the echo of the blond guy’s curses; they were still hovering somewhere in the airwaves. Downstairs, they met Choi again.

  “Forget the holding cell,” he said to Roy. “Why?”

  “There’s a leak. In both of them.”

  “Leak?” said Mia. “Yeah, from the roof or somewhere in the wall,” said Roy, rubbing the back of his pink neck. “Happens every time it rains. Or snows.”

  “So you can’t put me in there?” Mia felt relief, warm and sweet, flood through her.

  “Nope. Against regulations to put anyone in a leaky cell. We’d have all kinds of negative shit to deal with if we did. Newspapers, TV, you name it.”

  “So you mean I can wait upstairs? In that office where we were?” Roy looked at her almost pity
ingly. “Hell, no,” he said. “We’re going to have to put you in one of the regular cells. You’ll be more comfortable back there anyway.”

  “I will?” The relief she’d felt only seconds ago was now like a buzzer concealed in a palm or a phony snake that popped out of a can—a stupid, practical joke.

  “Yeah, there’s like a toilet and sink in the back. And the bench is bigger. You can sleep if you want to.”

  “Sleep?” Mia’s voice was a squeak, and she thought of Mommy Mousie and her little mouse voice.

  “Come on,” said Roy, who clearly thought he had provided enough information for the moment. “Unless you want to go back upstairs and talk to the detective.”

  THE CELL WAS a cubicle at the back of the building, one in a long row whose end Mia could not see. Roy was right; there was a sink, a toilet—no seat though—and a wooden bench covered in brown, peeling paint. On her way, she and Roy passed the blond guy, who jumped up as they walked by.

  “Hey you!” he said, hands on the bars. Mia was surprised to see that they were beautiful hands—well shaped, clean, and very white. “I’m talking to you!” For a second Mia thought he meant her, then realized that of course he was talking to Roy, who ignored him as he took Mia to another cell and ushered her inside. “You let me out, donkey dick! When my people hear what you’ve done to me, you’re dead meat, you hear me? You’re burned toast, you’re scummy water down the drain. You’ve over, man, do you hear me? So fucking over.” When Roy didn’t answer, Mia heard him say “motherfucker” a few times, and then he was silent. Roy banged the cell door shut, and Mia was alone.

  Alone in a jail cell. How had she let this happen? Mia wanted to scream, wanted to cry, wanted to do something, anything, but she didn’t know what to do first. Cox is coming, she told herself, trying to calm down. He’s coming, and he’ll get you out of here.