McInnes had resigned the day before. The word was his pension was under review for such a sudden departure. I figured the union rep would make a noise about that—but what would Jack do? You don’t just quit a job like this. It’s a life. Not much of a life, but not something you throw away either. It was too much of a coincidence, coming on the heels of my problems, but I didn’t have a chance to dwell on it because Padgett arrived, looking downright dapper. I shuddered to think what I looked like to him, and when he got a good look, he shuddered too.
“You going to tell me about it?” he asked when he’d gotten settled in across the desk. “What’s the diagnosis?”
That term threw me. He was just responding to my appearance. If he knew what was going on in my mind …
“Rit, you look like hell. Actually, you look a little better today. But your clothes—you working the bins? Something’s up, Dog. Yesterday I said to myself he’s either using or there’s some medical condition. Which is it?”
“I’m just going through some changes,” I said, and my voice sounded so different to me and my answer so lame I had to look away. The way he said, “using,” made it sound like he’d listened to some of the rumors about me. Maybe he really was babysitting. Maybe my paranoia was something I still could trust.
The official word came in on the Whitney case. Suicide. Matter closed, the DNA discrepancy notwithstanding. It was a big relief. I was still dealing with the news about McInnes. Of course once the Whitney update blew over, I could tell Padgett would want another bite of the cherry. I was beginning to think maybe the medical angle was my best bet. He’d given me the out. If I looked even half as fucked up as I felt, maybe I should take some time off. See my doctor—see a specialist. I was owed the time, and now with the money from Jimmie I had some extra cushion. But I knew that not having the job to go to would only send me whirling down into the dungeons or fantasy rooms I imagined that lay hidden in Eyrie Street—or some nightmare hall of mirrors inside my head straight into the cold, cold arms of El Miedo. What would I do if I didn’t have this chump dump to come to each day? I started to panic. Who was I without the job? I could end up like Slippery Will.
But how much longer could I bluff my colleagues? I wasn’t able to concentrate for even a few minutes at a time. The only thing that was clear in my mind was her. My need for her—the hold she had on me, and the potential she held out. Four o’clock seemed like an eternity away. Her words kept echoing in my mind … That’s the time your mother used to expect you …
Lance Harrigan rang. He prodded me again about the visit to the therapist. I tried to blow him off even as I reached for the envelope in my drawer where I’d written down the details. Ordinarily, an appointment with a psychologist was the last thing I would’ve wanted anyone to know about. But I could see now that having one on my record could be played to advantage. It wouldn’t help my career any, but I wasn’t sure I’d have much of a career left. And what would the cop chop matter if I scored with Genevieve—she was rich.
Nah, check that—that was stupid. That really was insane. I made up my mind I would go. Sometimes you just need to talk to strangers. Those have always been the people I know best.
When I got off the phone, Padgett started in on me again.
“Go home, Rit,” he said. “I think maybe your pal Jimmie’s deal has gotten to you. I’ll cover for you. You’re not well. You need a break.”
Boy, did I. “Keep me posted on the Laotian thing.”
He nodded, somewhat sadly I could tell. I ducked out before I had to speak to anyone else. Even in the wild white-knuckle days I’d never skipped out on work officially. I was sneaky—I was often sick as a dog—but I had some honor. Now it felt like I’d cut my own nuts off. But I didn’t know what else to do. Sooner or later we’d be called out to something heavy and if I wasn’t in the game, someone like Chris would get hurt. That wasn’t going to happen. Not because of my personal shadowplay.
But I couldn’t go home. So I drove around for an hour, lost in my own city. Then of course I ended up in Cliffhaven. For the life of me, I couldn’t stop thinking about her. I knew she was trouble. Maybe even evil, if you want to use that word. Something I couldn’t understand anyway. But she was all I had. As pervy and twisted as the deal with the rats and Sophia had been, I had to admit it turned me on. I mean it actually scared me and made me feel like I’d fallen through a manhole in reality, but it charged me too—in ways way beyond electricity. I’d never known anything to do with sex that had so much show business to it—so much planning—so much stuff I couldn’t believe—and yet had to believe because it was happening to me. Because I’d become part of the show.
Now the biggest, maddest bit of stage magic I wanted to believe in was that it all actually meant something—that in some way beyond my dumb bum straight line thinking—she cared for me—enough at least to be doing what she said. Trying to help me. Maybe she saw in me something I’d missed. Call me a sucker. But a lifetime of dealing with some serious shit had taught me a few things about people and the games they run. How well that applied to her—well, that was the whole point of this new game—the new dark ride I’d found myself on, not even knowing when I’d bought my ticket. How could I call myself a tough guy and not ante up?
I assumed an observational position, pretending I was on a stake-out. My having driven around aimlessly might’ve been a good thing. From years on the job I can verify that it’s much easier to shadow someone when they know where they’re going than someone flittering around at random. It was possible that she, along with McInnes, might’ve had me in their sights for a long time. She had to have a way of finding out things about me. And she couldn’t just have been bugging my phone, although I’d been tempted to call my old bud Nat Bandler, who was a TSCM consultant, and have him give my place a good sweep. Something told me that wouldn’t help though. Hers was a much more subtle kind of wiretap. It was the M.O. I couldn’t work. Who was she really? She couldn’t have been around for long. The city was laced with webs. She’d have triggered a vibration before this if she’d been in town. One way or another, our paths would’ve crossed. And now? Through any two points in space there is only one line, I remembered that from school. Like a laser sighting to reveal the path of a sniper shot.
Nothing seemed to be happening at the house. It was like one of those enchanted kingdoms under a spell. No figures passing in front of the windows. The iron gate closed. Nothing. Until … I saw a figure coming up from the path around the seawall that made me sit bolt upright. Even at a distance I recognized him. It was that kid with the tattoo from the ferry boat. He climbed the stone stairs and waltzed through the garden gate and up to the front door like he’d been there before. More than twice.
The door opened and a giant African stepped out onto the porch. My eyes were out on stalks. I forgot about how off I felt, all I could do was stare, trying to take in every nuance. The African had on a tribal patterned shirt—but black pressed pants that had a uniform look to them. I couldn’t decide if he seemed more like a lover or a servant. Or both. I’d found it hard to believe a woman like Genevieve wouldn’t have had some muscle around. Maybe he’d been on tap and waiting to be poured both times I’d been in the house. I was glad to be in the know now. I had to work out a strategy—as useless as that might be in her presence. If I could just understand what it was I was expecting. Wanting. Because I knew it was more than sex. Although that would’ve been a damn fine start.
The boy got ushered in, which didn’t surprise me. He’d come for a reason, not a chat on the porch. I’d gotten all the counter-surveillance I could stand and I drove off. I hadn’t been on the Antabuse for several days and I needed a bit of Dutch courage. I hit a place around the spit called Romeo’s Bar & Grill, an upmarket new joint where no one knew me, and ordered some Vitamin Beam with the gusto only a recidivist can understand. That was followed by a tapas plate of salt and pepper calamari. A bit hoity-toity, but that was what appealed. That old Four Tops song “Wor
king My Back to You” played while I made some notes on a cocktail napkin. Over the years I’d have written an encyclopedia on cocktail napkins—a Bible of private midnights. This was a new page—a whole new chapter.
Genevieve was the first woman I’d ever feared—and I wrote off her voodoo aphrodisiac effect to that. She might’ve been involved in the deaths of at least two men—maybe more. She might’ve been involved with seriously mind-altering drugs. For all I knew, she could’ve had psychic powers for real. She was certainly adept at over-the-line sex practices. But she had something to teach me. Something to give. And that made me want to risk all I had. However taboo. How much more did I have to lose—truly?
The head of the Gang Unit rang. Asked me if Padgett was on track with the Laotian shooting. I knew he was feeling me out. I tried to play it cool but gave Chris a thumbs up. Maybe my instincts were screwed up too. Either way, I wasn’t going to piss on my partner.
I drove back to my apartment. I was sweating bullets about what to bring her. Then I saw the wrestling trophy. At 3:40 I left for Cliffhaven. Again.
ONG AGO I ARRIVED AT THE DOOR OF A FLEA-RUG apartment down near the old shipping yard about a suspected baby murder. A young junkie couple had reportedly slipped over the line and done something ugly. When I broke down that door and barged inside, I left everything I assumed about normal, human behavior behind. What they’d done to that baby doesn’t bear repeating.
I felt like I stepped across another kind of line just arriving at the door of Eyrie Street this time. At first I didn’t recognize the woman who let me into the house. She had a bouffant hairdo and was dressed in a floral pleated dress with a starched white apron wrapped around her waist—just like my mother long ago. It was uncanny.
The same henna dyed hair, which always seemed artificial to me because she had such lovely dark hair all her own … skin the color of hazelnut cream. I sure didn’t get mine from her. Her father had come from Puebla where his family ran an anise seed farm. Banditos, so the story went, drove them off their land, and they fled to America … some to El Paso and Albuquerque, others to California. Mom grew up on a strawberry farm in Coyote, her mother a tough white widow who gave birth to her at age 40. She’d moved south and studied to be a dental nurse before meeting my Dad and becoming a housewife. Most of the time she seemed like a typical white bread mother of the era, but she taught me and Serena Spanish, and every so often, in between the Swanson TV dinners and the Salisbury steak, she’d make bean tacos and barbecued chicken backs with salsa.
I tried to shake off my shock as Genevieve led me into the front room. It had been entirely redecorated and seemed bigger than on either of my two previous visits—very much like our old family living room, except for the fireplace. Ours had been made of clinker brick and had fake logs that you pressed a button to light up. Dad had been very proud of that.
On the mantel this time was a plaster bust of John F. Kennedy and a miniature mechanical robot that I recognized as The Great Garloo—“the bright green battery operated monster that picks things up here and puts them down there.” She must’ve got it on eBay. The detail of the scene was phenomenal. What wasn’t this woman capable of?
I presented her with my high school wrestling trophy—and found myself unable to say anything other than, “This is from my past.” Jesus, the whole room was something from my past. She put it up on the mantel next to The Great Garloo.
She had an ironing board set up, like my mother used to have—with the same daisy cover and Sunbeam steam iron. There was a corduroy sofa much like ours—and a butcher block coffee table. And a big brown Zenith TV in the corner exactly like ours. An old ad for Cap’n Crunch was on—the cereal that stayed sweet and crunchy and didn’t get soggy in milk. The Cap’n was having a swordfight with Jean LaFoot, the barefoot pirate. Then Mr. Ed the Talking Horse came on. She gestured for me to sit down on the sofa. In the background I heard the Robert Goulet record my mother used to sing to. I couldn’t sit still.
“You forgot your lunch box,” she said in a motherly voice—and I almost fell off the sofa because she handed me my old Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C lunchbox. It wasn’t simply a replica—it was my old one. The wax paper I wrapped my sandwiches in—carrot sticks in Glad cellophane, Orange Hostess Cupcakes or a Scooter Pie … the scents came rushing up out of the old metal, not just out of my head.
I’d given up that lunchbox and asked for a Man from U.N.C.L.E. one with Napoleon Solo on the side holding a pistol with a long silencer. Some kids had razzed me because they’d heard that Jim Nabors, the star of Gomer Pyle, was a fag. It was better to be a secret agent than a dumb Marine anyway. Later, when the rumors started that Nabors and Rock Hudson were a queer couple, I’d thrown out the lunchbox. It was rusting away in some landfill a hundred miles away. I couldn’t have been holding it in my hand. I kept my mouth shut and stared back at the television, as I always used to do when I didn’t want to look at my mother.
Wallace called from the Two-Four. Then Hartley, the wet-nosed n00bie prosecutor wanting to know if Padgett was good to testify in the Grimes case. I shut off the cell.
A rerun of The Rifleman starring Chuck Connors was coming on—Chuck Connors as homesteader Lucas McCain, booming away with his Winchester rifle with the large trigger ring. The same Chuck who played Jason McCord, the disgraced Calvary captain in Branded, who had his saber broken in half when he was dishonorably discharged. I remembered the theme song … Branded … scorned as the one who ran … what do you do when you’re branded … and you know you’re a man?
Kids in school came up with a variation. Stranded … stranded on the toilet bowl … what do you do when you’re stranded … and you don’t have a roll?
Genevieve got up silently and turned the channel to a Doris Day movie called Move Over Darling. Mom had always adored Doris Day, especially Doris Day and Rock Hudson movies. She wanted to trade her beautiful chocolate colored filbert shaped eyes for perky blue ones. She sang that song “Que Sera, Sera” from the movie The Man Who Knew Too Much while she did the ironing—ironing even our underwear. I think she wanted to be Doris Day. Then when the truth was revealed, and Rock Hudson came out of the closet, she never mentioned either of those actors again. In a touch of poisonous irony, she died of a heart attack while watching the afternoon movie. It was Pillow Talk. She’d been grieving over stepfather Rod, who’d finally sundowned in his diapers in the raisin farm I’d help send him to. When the chest pain hit, she called her neighbor Mrs. Seymour from the bed, but it was too late by the time the ambulance arrived. Mrs. Seymour said that that when the paramedics gave up on the CPR, Tony Randall, who played Rock Hudson’s neighbor in the movie, was just pouring himself another drink on screen—as if that was a detail I needed to know.
Move Over Darling starred James Garner in place of Rock. Doris, his wife, had been missing for years and he was trying to get her declared legally dead. What I’d forgotten was that Chuck Connors was in it too—and there he was on the TV. He played the guy who’d been stranded on the desert island with Doris. What in hell was this all about?
“You know …” Genevieve said, and when I turned to face her—she’d changed outfits and hairstyles completely. She looked like Marilyn Monroe in a spaghetti strap summer dress. “This movie has an intriguing history. It was originally going to be called Something’s Got to Give, starring Marilyn Monroe and Dean Martin. This was at the time Marilyn was going to sing ‘Happy Birthday, Mr. President’ to JFK at Madison Square Garden. Then she mysteriously died less than a month later. Her last day on the set she shot a scene with Wally Cox. The film got canceled and then resuscitated as you see it—with such different stars in the roles.”
My head swam. I didn’t know any drug that worked so fast—and this didn’t feel like any drug trip I’d ever heard about. And …
Wally F’in Cox! He’d supplied the voice for the cartoon character Underdog—whose girlfriend was Sweet Polly Purebred! I suddenly remembered he’d also played the preacher in Spencer’s Mounta
in—it had been a family favorite. Mom liked it because of the romance between Henry Fonda and Maureen O’Hara. I think Dad liked it because of the shots of a young James MacArthur without his shirt on—and my sister Serena and I liked it because of the scene where the deaf grandpa gets crushed by the big pine tree. Memories roared through my brain. My mother. Marilyn. The scene in On the Waterfront when Brando does the “I could’ve been a contender” line. He’d probably been in a cab with Wally Cox at some stage. They might’ve been in bed together. Now their ashes were mingled together. I couldn’t hold it together.
Sophia came in dressed just as my sister used to be. Pig tails, a camel brown jumper and saddle shoes. She carried a tray with a plate of cookies on it and a tall plastic glass of milk. The sugar sprinkled butter cookies took a certain well-known male shape or the silhouette of a woman. She left the room without saying a word.
How lonely it must’ve been for my mother—loving a man like Dad—always wanting to be something she couldn’t be and yet still proud of who she was. She called my father Jefe. No wonder she was so hungry when Rod showed up. Those afternoons of ironing suddenly seemed heroic in a way I’d never seen before.
“Cookie, Sunny?” Norma Jean Genevieve goaded.
“What?” I kept trying to focus—but everything was too clear.
She passed me one of the penis-shaped cookies, which I declined. She bit the head off and handed me one of the female ones.
“Come,” she laughed. “Think of it as Communion. Eating the Host.”
Images and phrases stormed … Chuck Connors … Wally Cox … Marlon Brando … Rock Hudson … Jim Nabors … Doris Day … Marilyn Monroe … rifles … lunchboxes … broken swords … apron strings … stays crunchy … doesn’t get soggy … move over darling … something’s got to give …
Private Midnight Page 13