Brick House

by Daniel Nayeri

  RANDY BIEMAN [male, Caucasian, thirteen years of age] hated his parents so much that he wished they’d die.

  So they did.

  Or they would have, if the APB hadn’t hit the wires in time, rerouted through dispatch in Special Divisions, ordering homicide detectives out to patrol the crime scene — crime to come.

  More specifically, the subject had wished for his whole family to die. He lay in bed three hours before curfew, on the night in question, the night his parents grounded him. Cause for grounding? Punching his little sister [Clara, five years old, likes yellow, dislikes peas]. Randy stared up at the Glo-Lite glow-in-the-dark star system stuck to his ceiling. His dad [Neville Bieman, occupation: pharmaceutical scientist] had tried to teach him about astronomy back in the fifth grade. Instead, the boy had grabbed the stickers and spelled “Randy Rocks!” out of the stars and planets. The sun was the dot on Randy’s exclamation point.

  Prior to perpetrating the murderous act, Randy was under considerable mental strain. The grounding had caused him to miss playing in an online death-match tournament in his favorite first-person shooter. The subject became even more agitated as texts poured in from his buddy list, labeling his rival, Jared Chen, as the “sexy-time god of pancakes,” with rocket-launching skillz described by witnesses as “wikka wild, wikka-wikka wild.” Randy, however, was universally flamed as “teh suxor grand general.”

  Randy directed his hostility at his family. I don’t need them, he thought. No, I hate them. He chuckled in the dark, because it was the first time he’d thought such horrible things about his parents. It would be his little secret the next morning at breakfast. When his mom asked him if he wanted another waffle, he’d say yes, but he’d be thinking, I hate you. And he would be the only one who knew. That made Randy feel much better and made his parents seem much smaller. With his sister, Clara, it would be no different from usual. Randy told her he hated her once a week. He also microwaved boxes of her crayons and told her she was adopted from a circus family and would never grow past three feet tall. [Bieman’s list of prior crimes is available upon request; the victim: almost exclusively his sister, Clara.]

  Randy shuffled under the covers. His mother [Sandra, occupation: eBay] had come in to say good night and tucked him in, even though he was too old for that. She had thrust the sheets under his mattress clear up to her elbows and then leaned over him and said, “I love you. You disappointed me today. I love you.”

  As soon as she left, Randy kicked at his bedding until all the sheets went sailing up and his feet were uncovered in the cold room. He turned on his side and looked out the window. Everything was black and blue, as if it had been scorched by a rocket launcher. The only stars were the ones that said Randy rocked.

  Meteorological records for the evening reveal clear skies over the city at the time of Randy’s premature tucking in. Bieman reportedly spotted a single speck through his window, twinkling in the night. It was as though the star was winking at him, about his secret, goading him forward. Randy thought, They didn’t even ask why I punched that little rat. There could have been a perfectly good reason.

  At approximately 1900 hours, Randy Bieman realized that the speck was the first star he had seen that night, and he thought, I wish they were all dead. [Motive, opportunity.]

  At the exact moment that Randy Bieman made his wish for multiple homicide [murder weapon: starlight, star bright] not a thing happened. The speck didn’t flicker out, and Randy didn’t even think twice about it. Instead he yawned, rolled over, and closed his eyes to go to sleep.

  THE CITY STREET was quiet, a residential drag, cozy even from outside the brownstones. The first freeze of the year had preempted the coloring foliage. If it snowed in the early morning, the green trees would look like chumps, left holding the check for both fall and winter. A figure stood leaning on a lamppost, his face hidden by the turned-up collar of a pea coat and a pearl-knit skullcap. His three days’ scruff was equal parts white and black and could sand a coffee table. His hands were bunched in front of his mouth, and when he breathed out, it looked like he was billowing a curl of Ardestani diamond dust.

  A married couple had divorced each other for the rushed walk home, declining to expose their hands to the chill. After making eye contact with the dark man, they reconciled. An engine missing a filter rumbled from two blocks down. A stray tabby leaped and knocked over a trash can in an alley behind a wrought-iron fence.

  A voice spoke from the man’s coat pocket: “I’m telling you, Saul, she ain’t coming.”

  The man looked at his watch. His ears were both pierced, but he didn’t have any earrings in them.

  “What we do now is storm the house ourselves, flash some badge, knock some teeth. Take the perp into custody, give him a room to sweat in, you know what I’m saying?”

  Always, a blaring fire truck somewhere. The man had shoulders like a dresser drawer. His eyes were Persian almonds — and twelve times as black. He said, “Perp?”

  The other voice from his pocket said, “Yeah, perp, the perpetrator of the crime. You outta the shop or what? The hood, the con, the mark, what’s the mattah with you?”

  “With me?” said the man.

  “Yeah with you. I’m briefing you on location-entry tacs, running some apprehend protocols, and you’re picking on my shop talk.”

  The man smiled to himself. Crushed a fallen acorn under his boot. He said, “Let me ask you something, Ari.”

  “G’head, shoot.”

  “How much TV you watch when I’m not around?”

  “That’s not called for, man. How long we been partners?”

  The man rolled his eyes. “A dozen or something.”

  “Ten, ten centuries, Saul. We’re common-law married, you and me. . . .”

  His voice was drowned out by the rumble down the street. It turned up the block and accelerated toward them. A cone of light preceded it, the one center headlight of a 1950s Triumph Bonneville road bike. Saul put one hand in the pocket of his coat. “Shut up, Ari,” he said.

  “Don’t tell me to shut up, Saul. We talked about this. You’re not supposed to demean what I’m saying. You know how that makes me feel.”

  The man jangled his coat pocket, and Ari shouted, “Hey, hey! You of all people, Saul!”

  The bike thundered up to the lamppost and screeched to a stop a few feet past it. The rider wore a visored helmet, black leather pants, and a riding jacket. Across the back of the jacket was a Celtic pattern and the words Hogs ’n’ Bogs Motorcycle Club, Loch Ness Chapter.

  The pants were so tight they could have been airbrushed on, riding low enough to expose a little tattoo on the small of the rider’s back. It was a five-leaf clover. The man leaning on the lamppost said, “Whoa,” under his breath.

  “What?” said Ari. “What do you see? Is that her? Mmff-mmmfff!”

  The man pressed down on his pocket, and Ari’s voice muffled out of earshot. As the rider took her helmet off, her hair splashed into the night scene like a blood shot. It was cut at sharp jagged angles, shorter in the back and to her chin in the front. Red.

  She put the helmet on the handlebars and said, “You Sulaiman al Djinn?”

  “Call me Saul,” said the man.

  “You get my transfer sheet?”

  “Yeah, McClintock, used to be detective. Didn’t have a first name.”

  “Just Mack’s fine. What’s the holdup here?”

  Mack dismounted the bike, unzipped her jacket, and adjusted the snaps of her double holster. Saul said, “The site’s that brownstone with the red door. Bieman residence. Mom, dad, and little sister are all targets. Subject’s a male Caucasian, age thirteen. Hasn’t approached the scene yet.”

  “So. We hold our position,” said Mack. She pulled out one of her handguns, a
Desert Eagle, and cocked it back. Then she shoved it back into the holster and removed the other. “I was a first-grade detective, by the way.”

  Saul shrugged. He said, “I was a sultan’s general.”

  Ari’s voice interjected, “Yeah, well, I used to be the crown prince of Atlantis. Who friggin’ cares?”

  Mack looked at Saul, raised an eyebrow, then looked at his jacket pocket. “Is that your partner?”

  “Yeah, sugar, I’m his partner,” said Ari.

  Saul breathed out a gust as he pulled his hand out of his pocket and with it a Ziploc bag full of water. Inside was a goldfish, paddling its fins in angry little swipes. It said, “You heard me. And I read your disciplinary file, don’t think I didn’t. You got back in somebody’s good graces to get this case. But we all know about that hot water with the Major Case Squad. And you pack twin Magnums? What’re you, Tomb Raider?”

  When he got mad, Ari had a tendency to talk in scattershot bursts. His memory was the first thing to go when he lost his temper.

  Mack made the mistake of snickering. She put her hands together and held them out to the rabid goldfish so he could cuff her.

  “You think I’m funny?” said Ari.

  “No,” said Mack, trying to stifle her snicker now.

  She looked to Saul, who mouthed, “His name is Ari.”

  “No, Ari,” said Mack.

  “Detective Ari,” yelled the fish. “DT second grade, but better than getting busted down to third, huh? How did you like that?”

  Mack lost her grin at the mention of her demotion to DT third grade. “I’m sorry, Ari. Have I offended you?”

  “Oh, don’t do that,” said Ari.

  “What?” said Mack.

  “Sprinkle your apology over my head, demean people by snickering at them. You don’t know how that makes goldfish feel. I’ll fight you right now. Step in here. I’ll jack you up.”

  Saul shook with suppressed laughter, but Ari couldn’t see it. Mack clamped her lips together.

  “What’s the matter? You chicken?” said Ari. He swam furious circles in his bag, dodging and feinting like a prizefighter.

  “I couldn’t get in there with you if I wanted to, Ari. And a chicken could still probably kill you.”

  “Says you, babe. You look like a stripper. And don’t think I can’t see you, Saul. I’ll drown the both of you flower pickers right here.”

  Saul held the bag at arm’s length. Ari charged repeatedly into the plastic lining at every possible angle of attack. Finally, Saul interrupted him. “I got a visual.”

  Ari stopped short. He circled near the top of the bag, letting his dorsal fin break the surface with a slightly melodramatic glare. Mack was already in step with their cover, just a hog queen and big Middle Eastern guy minding their own business and talking to their fish, no big deal. Mack ran one hand through her hair and slid the other up to her piece.

  The suspect was approaching the premises in brown sweats three sizes too small, unwashed. Dark hair. Caucasian. He was bare up to his ankles and elbows, no shoes. The cold didn’t seem to bother him. If he was breathing, it didn’t show. Except for a vertical scar running down his left eyebrow, he was a match.

  “What’s the play?” said Mack.

  “You take point,” said Saul, stuffing Ari back into his coat pocket. “I’ll close around the side.”

  Mack mounted her bike, put on her helmet, and flipped up the visor. It suited her just fine to take lead, but maybe it would’ve been better for her to go around the back, since she had the bike. But when she turned to suggest it to Saul, he was already gone.

  She put her hand to the comm unit in her ear and said, “Central post, this is DT Five-Leaf, proceeding toward suspect on vehicle. Detectives Ji-Ji and the Fisher Prince are proceeding on foot around back.”

  Static crackled in her ear, then the high-pitched monotone: “This is the Wishing Post. Five-Leaf, you’re all clear at Central. Mission is go. Repeat. You are a go.”

  Mack said, “Aye-aye,” and hit the light. The suspect stood on the stoop of the Bieman residence. He whipped around when the spotlight hit him. It didn’t blind him — Mack could tell because he was looking right at her.

  She turned the ignition. The boy nodded, then he puckered at her, a sick kiss, and a weird sneer. The boy whipped around, hurdled the iron gate, and ran out of the spotlight so fast he blurred in Mack’s vision.

  Mack clenched the handlebars and revved so hard the car alarms blared next to her. The suspect sprinted halfway down the block. Mack peeled out, a wake of fallen leaves trailing behind her. As she closed ground on the fleeing kid, Mack barked into her unit, “In pursuit, need backup! Saul, what is your location? I’m westbound on —”

  As the kid approached the end of the block, Saul appeared ahead of him at the corner, hands still in his coat pockets. The suspect almost stumbled over his own feet, then veered off the curb. He darted between two parked cars and into the street, but Mack was right there. She slammed her forearm into the kid’s rib cage and flung his body over the steering column. She pulled up to Saul at the corner. Saul got on the back of the bike, and Mack turned down the street before anyone looked out the window to see what all the rumpus was about.

  “Check that backup, Angie,” said Saul into his comm. “Suspect in custody. We’re coming in.”

  Crackle. Then, “Thanks, Saul. Tell your new partner to turn the volume down next time she takes point.”

  “Will do, Angie.”

  Saul didn’t need to repeat what both of them had heard in their earbuds. Mack said, “You could have told me your location. And what, you flirt up every old lady at Central Post?”

  “I said I’d close around the block.”

  “You might not have made it —”

  The static crackled in their ears again. “Ji-Ji always makes it, honey. And turn off your mike when you want to be rude.”

  The suspect began to stir. Mack hammered her fist across his chin and knocked him out for the rest of the ride back to the station.

  “Hey, Angie, I don’t like her, either,” said a voice in their earbuds. It was Ari’s.

  Mack barreled through a stoplight and shouted back over her shoulder at Saul, “How does a carnival prize get on the comm channel?”

  “See?” said Ari’s voice.

  The static crackled once more, Angie at the Wishing Post. “Yeah, I see. Just turn your mike off, honey.”

  Saul leaned on the back wall by the door of the observation room, looking at the kid through the one-way mirror. The speaker was on, but the kid was just sitting there, shivering in his torn-up sweats. You could kinda make out the sound of his teeth chattering. The interrogation room was nothing but a metal table and a couple of chairs. The floor was cement. It had a drain at the center, mostly just to freak people out.

  “We should get him a hot cocoa or something,” said Ari. His bag was flat on the desk but high enough so he could see into the other room.

  “No,” said Mack. She was leaning back on two legs of her chair, holding a cup of coffee. “He’s faking it. Playing scared so we’ll go easy.”

  “Aw, c’mon,” said Ari. “He’s low-level. Just look at him.”

  “Would have killed the whole family, cold blood,” said Mack. Saul knew she still hadn’t put the safety on her firearms. “You didn’t see the look he gave me,” she said.

  Inside the interrogation room, the kid was eating the cuticles of his thumb. He’d ventured to say, “Hellooo?” and the echo from the bare walls had made him flinch.

  Mack got up from the officers’ desk and went over to Saul in the back of the observation room. He hadn’t taken his eyes off the boy. She leaned on the wall next to him. She looked at him sidelong, then said, “I could press him. You could be Papa Bear.”

  Saul shook his head no.

  “I’m telling you, he’s hiding something. He’s got more than a positive ID.”

  “All we need is a positive ID,” said Saul.

  Mack took
a drink of coffee to stop herself from screaming at Saul. It tasted like bean juice. She said, “Fine. We get the confession and book him. Happy?”

  “Not really,” said Saul. He pushed off the wall and grabbed the doorknob. “I know he’s hiding something. I just don’t want you beating the crap out of him.”

  “Ha!” said Ari from his bag.

  Saul opened the door for Mack and smiled at her. As she walked past him, she said, “If you’re wondering about why I lost my grade, it wasn’t because I roughed up a suspect.”

  They stepped into the hall connecting the two rooms. “I don’t care,” said Saul. “The file says you’re a hotshot.”

  “Not anymore,” protested Mack as they walked into the interrogation room. When he saw the detectives, the kid lifted his feet off the floor and tucked them under himself on the chair. Mack ignored the kid. She said, “Do you have any idea how awful eyelash detail can be? Had one kid plucking five of ’em and asking for Reese’s Pieces to fill up his math classroom.”

  A rare grin from Saul. Eyelash detail was as bunk as punishments got from the higher-ups. It was running grade-school interference on wishes for extra pudding cups or for bullies to explode. The two detectives ignored the kid’s sniffling. They sat down at the table, and Mack went on, “I did my time. Now I got my beat back.”

  Saul said, “But you don’t have your rank back.”

  “Soon enough,” said Mack. The kid gaped at them, then raised one hand in the air to ask a question.

  “I just wanna be a murder cop,” said Mack. She slammed her palm on the metal table right in front of the kid’s face. The kid fell back in his chair.

  “You Randy Bieman?” said Mack, suddenly fixing her gaze on him.

  The kid whimpered and chewed on his nail. “N-no.”

  “You were at the Bieman residence,” said Mack.

  “I wanted to say hello,” said the kid.

  “In the middle of the night. You expect me to believe that? You’re gonna stop by and say hello, middle of a freezing cold night in your pajamas?”

  The boy wouldn’t look up. The mention of the brown ratty pajamas seemed to embarrass him. “It’s all I own,” he said, fingering a hole in the sleeve.