P.J. Morse - Clancy Parker 01 - Heavy Mental

by P. J. Morse

  “I hope she doesn’t,” Anmol grumbled.

  “—tell her to wait. Please? Pretty please?”

  Neither of them replied, but I knew the Cho-Singh Answering Service would take Sabrina’s messages.

  I took the N line to Wayne’s cave-like apartment in the Haight, where the Marquee Idols—me on lead guitar, Shane on drums, and Wayne on rhythm guitar usually gathered on Saturdays. The Saturday sessions were more relaxed, largely due to the quantities of pot we tended to smoke in the backyard in between songs.

  However, during that particular Saturday’s backyard festivities, I couldn’t stop worrying about the gaping hole in the band, and no amount of pot was going to stop that. Our bassist, Larry, jumped ship just before we got booked for a show at the South of the Slot. We were going to open for Highbrow/Lowbrow, a band from Chicago. One of the big-name indie-rock producers produced their debut record, which meant, for the first time in ages, the Marquee Idols would have a real audience.

  Shane and Wayne were tops, but Larry tied everything together for the live shows. His bass lines helped our songs fill the room, and his thundering notes, each one as strong as an army general, kept everyone in line so we didn’t stray off into jam-band noodlings. We were pretty good musicians, but we got distracted, and we needed Larry’s help. Alas, a few months before, Larry broke up with the band—and with me.

  Right before practice that day, Wayne, who was missing a vital conversational tool known as a filter, announced, “Hey, guess what? I saw Larry.”

  Shane, whose filter was somewhat more advanced and whose romantic experiences were slightly more sophisticated, gave Wayne a heaping helping of stink eye. “You know you’re not supposed to mention him, right?”

  I looked down, pretending to tune my guitar so no one noticed that I was blushing. “I appreciate your concern, Shane, but I am an adult. So, how is our former bassist?”

  Wayne barreled on. “He’s at Hastings Law!”

  “Hastings?” I stopped tuning. I wanted to know what the hell Larry was doing at the law school.

  Shane played a ba-dum-ching on his drums. “So, he picked Hastings after all?”

  I turned to him. “What? You knew about this?”

  “Yeah,” Shane replied, guiltily. “I saw him at a cafe with the LSAT book. It’s not exactly leisure reading. You didn’t know he was studying for the test? That was a while ago.”

  I turned a knob on the amp hard. Up to 11 hard. I looked at Wayne. “And did he have anything else to say?”

  Wayne thought a moment, and a light turned on behind his eyes, like he finally realized he was discussing a touchy subject. “You’re not gonna like it.”

  “What?”

  “He said he’d grown out of the rock and roll lifestyle.” He started shifting around like his pants didn’t fit right. “Um, can we change the subject?”

  “Too late,” I replied.

  Grown out of the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle. Larry had been gone for over seven months, but those words stung me, as I thought I had a perfectly legitimate day job. Larry always told me being a private detective was “dangerous” and that he fretted about me getting hurt, especially after a guy I was tailing followed me back to my apartment and informed me that he would scalp off my pretty red hair if I told his wife he was sleeping around. I successfully karate-chopped him into submission. I was proud of myself. Larry was less enthused. After that episode, he suggested that I might want to consider a straight job.

  All that time and all that talk, and he didn’t even bother telling me about his own plans. Chicken. If anything, he was trying to bend my plans to suit his. I was pissed, not really about the law school thing, although that revealed how boring he really was. I was even more pissed that he didn’t tell me himself.

  I cursed myself for not picking up the clues that were right in front of my eyes. Of all the people in the world, surely I should have noticed Larry had changed. Private eyes were trained to notice sudden shifts in behavior. I gave myself credit for noticing that he was reading the New Yorker all of a sudden, which was definitely out of character since he barely read at all. If he ever did read, his reading material was usually the TV Guide that Wayne left on top of his toilet tank. But Larry was such a good bassist that I ignored his non-rock behavior until he dropped the bomb that didn’t want to be in the band anymore.

  After my job-related misadventures, Larry was beginning to sound like my dad, who enjoyed making impromptu phone calls from New England to lecture me that I was mingling with a “bad element,” as if detectives and rock musicians ever mingled with a good element. Plus, my dad has mingled with the Kennedys, and more than a few people would argue that clan was a “bad element.”

  Surely being a private detective was just as respectable as being a lawyer. My chosen profession was probably even more respectable. And the private detectives generated a hell of a lot of business for the lawyers and did their legwork half the time. As far as I was concerned, Larry should have been grateful to me.

  Wayne walked around me in an arc toward his guitar, as if he were afraid I was about to explode. He should have been. “You okay over there?”

  Shane was already tapping out a beat. “Let’s practice. Fuck ‘im.”

  I agreed. “Yeah. Let’s play.” We immediately launched into song. It didn’t sound right without the bass, but it was fast, loud, and mad, which was exactly how I felt.

  CHAPTER 4

  A GUEST AT THE GOLD RUSH

  WHEN I HOPPED OFF THE N train and started walking toward South Park, it was about time for the baseball game. There was barely enough room on the train for me and my guitar. The October air in San Francisco was still and soft, unlike the bracing air the city usually had, even in the summer. At that time, while other cities were sweltering in the heat, San Franciscans enjoyed summer for free—no bugs, no humidity, no sweat. And the sun had an orange-sherbet undertone that no other city could match.

  While walking along the Embarcadero, the baseball fans were riding a buzz, chatting about the Giants’ World Series chances, what kind of beer they would drink, the speed of the team’s outfielders, the expense of the beer they would drink, the abilities of the pitchers, and how much beer they would drink. I found myself forgetting about Larry thanks to baseball and beer, America’s most reliable distractions.

  I neared the entrance of the Gold Rush BBQ Restaurant, where people were gathering for a private political fundraiser of some sort. Puffy old men who were trying to look liberal and hip emerged from their luxury cars as the restaurant’s valets took their keys and searched for a rare parking space in the South Beach neighborhood.

  I heard someone shout, “Clancy!” and I immediately began scanning the scene for Jamal, one of the valets who occasionally relayed messages from clients who didn’t want to be seen at my place and busted by industrious reporters.

  Jamal worked in the perfect spot for gathering the latest news. The Gold Rush BBQ was owned by a former San Francisco mayor, and he often showed up at the establishment and found ways to give back to the community through the restaurant. Gold Rush served splendid food with a Southern twist, had a brilliant view of the bay, and attracted many of the types who eventually became my clients, including politicians and tech gurus. Many of them claimed they went to Gold Rush because the staff grilled the barbecue right behind the restaurant, but it was also an ideal place to grease a few political palms. Overhearing a few conversations in that place was far often more informative than reading the local paper.

  Jamal was manning the door while a fellow valet drove off. Jamal waved at me, and I got a peek at the fading tattoo that ringed his neck. That tattoo was the only hint at the gang activity and miscellaneous theft he used to engage in before he landed in jail. After his time behind bars, he scored a gig at the Gold Rush BBQ, who regularly hired ex-cons as part of its job-training program.

  Since he was an ex-con with bulging muscles and tattoos that peeked out of his shirt collar and cuffs, Jamal’s mere p
resence regularly made upper-class buttocks clench in terror. I first met Jamal back in May, when I took my father, Thomas Clancy Parker the Third, who was in town from Cape Cod to make sure his wayward daughter hadn’t been kidnapped by rock ‘n’ roll perverts or something, to Gold Rush BBQ for lunch. My dad, owner of the New England Parker’s Pantry gourmet grocery chain, was skeptical about a restaurant owned by a super-liberal politician and staffed by ex-gang members, and he didn’t think it could meet his exacting standards. As I prided myself on pushing my dad’s buttons, I considered it a prime lunch destination.

  I loved the way Dad raised up all tight-assed when Jamal, who was filling in as wait staff that day, dropped off the tasty corn muffins that came with every Gold Rush meal. Unlike most of the servers, ex-con or not, Jamal didn’t need a notepad and rattled off the special of the day, and he didn’t forget my dad’s multiple picky requests about putting feta cheese on the side, making sure the romaine wasn’t dripping with water and leaving the barbecue chicken juicy, yet not undercooked.

  Dad’s meal came out just right, but I could tell Dad wanted something to complain about. Unfortunately for him, he found the feta in the correct position. He turned over the romaine and inspected it for sogginess. No luck there. He chewed the barbecue that was his main course and declared it flavorful. He seemed disappointed that he couldn’t find anything wrong with Jamal or the food, although he did say once Jamal was safely out of earshot, “That tattoo is going to look ridiculous when he’s an old man.”

  When Jamal moved outside to the valet position, I struck up a few conversations with him. He had the kind of memory that could help me out. At first, he was understandably skittish talking to a private investigator. He’d been talked into bad situations and didn’t need to be making money on the side, especially if he was trying to clean up his record.

  He liked the valet gig because he loved working with cars—he had stolen many of them, in fact—and was a “people guy,” as he told me, but he also wanted to be a high-school science teacher. He figured that the kids were already stealing wheels at that age, so they may as well know how cars worked.

  Once I promised him straight money, plus a glowing job reference, Jamal agreed to pay a little closer attention to the conversations in the Gold Rush BBQ restaurant and take a few messages for me. That was all he needed to do. Eventually, word got around that, if my customers wanted to be truly discreet, they should talk to Jamal first. Between Jamal and the Cho-Singh Answering Service, I had a better network than the Internet.

  By the time I got to the valet station, Jamal stored a few keys he had just collected while a few well-heeled dinner guests waited for their friends. When the guests were safely inside and he was alone, he stepped toward me and said, “Somebody asked for you by name today. Wanted to know if you were busy.”

  As a matter of fact, not only was I busy with Sabrina and her necklace problem, but I also had a bunch of small jobs lined up for the week. I had to leave a little spare time for the band, after all. But rent was high in San Francisco. “There’s always room for more. What do you know?”

  “Seems more important than your average customer.” Jamal proceeded to offer up one of his profiles, which started broad and funneled down into specifics. Since he’d mingled with hustlers high and low, he was an excellent reader of personalities. He also didn’t waste any time. He began to count off qualities on his fingers: “Blue BMW. White dude. Gray hair. Red eyes. Loud. Fat. Good suit. Didn’t see a wife. Had a wedding ring. He has wrinkles. Doesn’t sleep much. Dumb jokes. Shiny cuff links. Nails done. Shitty tipper. I mean shitty. Smelled like cigars. Scared of me. And he cannot drive for shit.”

  Jamal then twisted his face into the vague, beady expression worn by corporate types, and he launched an impersonation of the gentleman in question: “Huh-huh. Bet you had a joyride in the Beamer, huh, fella!” Jamal rolled his eyes. “Fella. My ass.” He scowled. “You should have seen it. His car was all over the damn road!” He held up his hands as if they were on a steering wheel and threw in some screeching sound effects.

  Then a Gold Rush BBQ patron drove up. Jamal’s face transformed into a stiff welcoming expression, which relaxed as soon as he had the keys and the patron walked inside.

  Judging from the profile Jamal provided, I thought that the potential case sounded like a breeze. An overweight rich guy with a wedding ring who liked to flash his wealth was likely being cheated on and wanted to catch the wife in the act. Along with the occasional insurance fraud case, adultery was my bread and butter. It was easier money than being the opening act at one of the local clubs.

  Most of my jobs involved sitting in my Mercury Topaz, which I had christened “Cherry 2000,” after the movie in which a red-haired Melanie Griffith played a sci-fi bounty hunter. The car was a beater, a mid-90s model that ran like it was made in ’85, but it was still a sexy maraschino red, a shade that isn’t too far off from my hair color. From Cherry 2000, I trained my binoculars on faceless suburban ranch houses in San Jose, hillside homes in Marin County, or leaf-shaded cottages in Berkeley, watching my targets do boring things like getting the mail and waiting to see the silhouettes of errant husbands frolicking with their mistresses.

  The number of adultery assignments I got peaked in October. The sudden, unusual warmth that invades San Francisco at that time melted brains and impaired otherwise decent judgment. Any other detective I had met in the area agreed that adultery—gay, straight, bi, animal, vegetable, or mineral—boomed in October. I could not even imagine what business was like in the cities that got really hot in summer.

  Jamal must have read my mind because he immediately altered that avenue of thinking: “I don’t think it’s the usual fuckery. He’s got something else going on. He kept looking behind him like someone was watching him, like he’s gonna get jumped or something.” He took a moment to hiss at his fellow valet and the restaurant host, who were busy making exaggerated hand gestures to approximate certain aspects of the female form as a curvy woman walked into the restaurant. “The fuck is wrong with you? You’re on the clock!”

  “So are you!” the host yelled. “You gonna park that car, or what? Hello, Miss Parker.”

  “Hello, yourself.” It was time to make my exit. “Did you get his name?”

  Jamal imitated the stuffy voice of a well-bred white guy. “Peter D. Buckner. Vanity plate of ‘Bucky.’” He returned to his regular voice and headed for the car. “You’ll probably find him before he finds you. You can’t miss this guy.”

  I was surprised by the last name of “Buckner.” It had to be Sabrina’s husband, but why would he want to see me independent of his wife? Was his presence in the neighborhood enough to make her run off before I could find out what she wanted? And, if that was the case, how did she know he was looking for me? “You sure no one was with him?” I asked. “No woman in a yellow dress? Skinny with Olsen Twin sunglasses?”

  “Just him and his stomach. He ain’t no Olsen twin.”

  “I’m getting home right now to wait for him.” When the other valets were distracted by another local lovely, I slipped Jamal five twenty-dollar bills. “You tell me when you want to go into business for yourself, you hear?”

  As I turned around to walk back to South Park, Jamal, who was already in the car, honked the horn, leaned out the window, and called out, “Hey, did you get a bassist for the band yet?”

  I cringed and shrugged. Jamal had talent. He remembered everything, even the stuff I’d rather forget. If I could have only solved the bassist problem, my late San Francisco summer would have been perfect.

  CHAPTER 5

  TWO SOCIALITES

  THE CHO-SINGH ANSWERING SERVICE HAD its hands full while I was indulging in catharsis with the Marquee Idols and picking up messages from Jamal. Not only did Sabrina return, but she returned with my mother. Anmol and Harold were sitting on the steps, just drinking. The chess game sat on a card table, ignored.

  “You two look like you’re up to something,” I s
aid.

  “She’s baaaack …” Harold said. “And your mother brought her here.”

  Anmol sighed. “Clancy, I believe your mother is more determined than you are.”

  I stood up straighter and started looking around. “Where are they?”

  “Your office,” Harold replied, jerking his head in the direction of the door. “She let herself in.”

  “She said you wouldn’t mind,” Anmol added.

  “Oh, boy.” Now I had not one, but two socialites in my office, and my mother was probably already trying to redecorate. I love my mother, but she requires an unusually high amount of energy.

  Katherine Charlotte “Kit” Parker Whitman, an heiress to a toothpaste company, was always flashing her pearly whites and tossing her blonde mane at San Francisco’s gala events. The “Whitman” came with her second marriage when she married an heir to a resort chain that featured golf-centric hotels. The guy didn’t last long, but the new last name stuck.

  Some of Mom’s frenemies said me and Mom were like Christmas—red hair, green eyes, and gaudy decorations. Mom had gone blonde so no one could deliver the Christmas tree insult again, but it was hard to change eyes so green they practically glowed in the dark.

  After my parents divorced when I was nine, I bounced from coast to coast, parent to parent, bad cop to good cop, eventually going to college closer to Mom. She always supported my unconventional pursuits, whereas Dad would just call a few times a month from the Cape and lecture me in a Kennedyesque braying voice. Sometimes I wondered if Mom was such a cheerleader and sent me clients because she loved nothing more than ticking off her ex-husband.

  I took a deep breath. “I’m going in.”

  Harold and Anmol applauded, and Harold started humming the tune from Rocky.

  When I walked into my office, I saw Mom with Sabrina, both of them sitting on the Barcalounger the wrong way. In the span of a few hours, Sabrina’s dress had wrinkled up, and the buttons on her jacket weren’t lined up. By contrast, Mom looked great in a navy shirtdress paired with a red sling.