by Tony D'Souza
I stuffed the duffel bags in the closet, went back out to the Mazda, drove around town; I needed a drink right now like goddamn fucking hell. The convenience stores were already closed. I sucked it up, went in and bought a six-pack of Corona at a Mexican polka bar, where the prettied-up big girls were dancing for dollars. From the second I walked in, mustachioed ranch hands in their beautiful clothes and Stetson hats stared my gringo ass down.
"Quieres limón?" the lady bartender shouted at me over the brassy music.
"Quiero partir," I told her.
"That's probably the wisest idea," she said, flashing her gold tooth at me.
San Angelo, Texas, in the middle of the night. JoJo Bear dead. Crazy red lights in the sky and a bad, bad feeling. I would bounce from this shithole at the butt crack of dawn. I'd get myself to Austin and force Mason to finish the drive.
But when morning came, JoJo Bear was still dead and I didn't get out of that bed. I turned on the TV; it was all in Spanish. Those duffel bags were in the room with me, the plates on the car, California. Nice fucking work on those plates this time, James. I couldn't do this anymore. How had I ever done it? How had I ever fucking done it?
Then it was afternoon, and I was still in that bed. The phone started ringing and ringing. Then there was a pounding on the door. It was the East Indian. Was I staying or was I going? he asked. I told him, "I don't know."
"You don't know?" he said, raised his eyebrow. "You are feeling all right?"
"I think so." I coughed and nodded.
Maybe I needed to see a doctor, he said. No, it was nothing like that, I said. Maybe I was driving too many hours from California? Yeah, maybe that was it. If I was going to stay another night, it would be $150. I gave him another bill and the change from before. He tried to look past me into the room as I closed the door on him.
Here are all the things I knew I was doing wrong from the motel guy's point of view: I showed up late at night in a car with California plates. Strike one. I hadn't bothered to peel the stickers from the car's windows, so he knew at a glance it was a rental. Strike two. I paid in cash. Strike three. I was acting weird. Strikes four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. I fit the profile of a drug smuggler to a tee. If he was in cahoots with the cops for a percentage of the takedown, all he'd have to do was call. They could kick down the door anytime they wanted. If they did, everything in my life would come to an end in that filthy room.
I hopped on a TracFone to Mason. He didn't pick up. I called his regular cell. He didn't pick that up either. Who else could I call? My wife? Scare the fuck out of her? Eric Deveny? If he caught one whiff of the fear in my voice, who knew what his crazy Iraq-combat ass would do? Billy was in California, there was nothing he could do. Even Nick was three long days away. Couldn't I just get in the goddamn rental car and gut the fucker out? I could not. There was nothing left in me that could take another second of that kind of fear. This kind of fear in here? I could do this kind of fear. That kind of fear out there? No fucking way. Even my bones felt dead. I was going to lie in this bed until they kicked down the door. Then I was going to let them end it and haul me away.
How bad would prison be? Didn't I quietly chew it over all the time? Wonder if it would be peaceful, the stress over at last? Push around the mail cart. Get cozy in the prison library. Lots of time to read. Maybe even write again.
Or would it be something else? Something hellish? Would they try to punk me in there? Would I spend every moment fighting for my fucking life?
I had one last number to call: Emma.
Emma answered. She said right away in a whisper, "James? Is it happening? Did Mason get picked up?"
"Mason didn't get picked up. It's me, Emma. Something's wrong with me. I'm in a motel room in San Angelo."
"What are you doing way out there?"
"I don't know."
"Aren't you supposed to be coming here?"
"I can't get in the car."
"Why can't you get in the car?"
"I'm scared."
Emma was quiet for a minute. I could hear restaurant sounds in the background behind her. Then she said, "I'm leaving work right now. Don't go anywhere and don't do anything. I'll be there in three hours."
I lay in the bed like an invalid. It was warm, felt like a womb. If Emma didn't come and get me, I'd never leave this place. There were so many things I didn't allow myself to think about anymore. Instead I thought about our trip to Europe. In Milan, we'd gone into the cathedral, seen the high columns and the stained glass. Then we pushed the baby in her stroller all through the square. An old woman stopped and talked to us, told us that the city had been heavily damaged by Allied bombs during the war. Over time many of the buildings were rebuilt the way they'd been. As we looked at those old buildings, I asked Kate, Where had the money come from? Immense and ornate structures, it must have taken thousands of people to create them. Laborers, artisans, carvers, masons. All that stone. All that glass. Who paid for all of that? Verona was like that, Venice was even greater. What did it mean to have that kind of money? In the face of that, who could we ever pretend to be?
America was like that, too. Yeah, the country was hurting now, but there was still money everywhere. Working the business had certainly brought us our share. More than other people had. But where were we going with it? Where would it take us? What about all the lies we were telling? What about all the horrible things we did?
As I lay in that room, I understood you couldn't stop to think. If you wanted the money, you had to put your head down and plow ahead. The moment you stopped to think, you'd know you were wretched. Evil. More than cops and robbers and prison and getting away with it as long as you could, the real crime you were committing was against yourself. It had been decided that you shouldn't have money, that was your path, so you should find your happiness on that path. But you'd decided that was wrong, you deserved more. That you were a god upon the land, better than everyone else.
That was my problem: I thought too much. Prosaic things like how the work we did spread the weed through the country, how a bud grown in a hidden field in the Siskiyou Mountains could end up being smoked by a college kid in Tallahassee. But I thought of other things, too. Like whether my wife really loved me. If my wife really loved me, why would she ever let me take the risks I did? To run the chance I'd get caught, go to prison? For Gucci? For decaf soy lattes? Pedicures? A house she could show off to her friends? So what if we hadn't really known each other when we plunged into life together? We knew each other now. If she really loved me, shouldn't she have put her foot down, told me no from the start? The fact that she let me do it, did that mean she must actually hate me? And so maybe I hated her, too. For not making me stop. For letting me do the things I did. And what about our kids, our precious, precious kids? The one we had with us, the one soon to be born. How could either of us really love them if we risked leaving them parentless just so we could buy them shit? Fancy toys, fancy clothes, maybe even fancy schools later? So they could think they were better than other kids who had less money than they did? And what about myself? Didn't I hate myself, too? To risk my freedom? To think I was so worthless only money could make me better?
In that room in San Angelo, I knew suddenly and finally I was not the kind of guy to be doing this. For all my bluster about being on the road, I'd simply been scared from beginning to end. Frightened by what could happen out there. Frightened by the things the business could make me do. Frightened by how special it made me feel. Honestly, anyone could do it. You only had to have the invitation to try. Most people would have turned their backs on it. I hadn't.
Why was I doing this? And how was I supposed to get out of it now? What would I say to Darren Rudd? I knew he didn't care about me, just the money I made him. And what would I say to Eric Dead Bodies Deveny?
A knock on the door brought me back to that vile room, my reality in it. What the hell was I doing dicking around in here? James, wake the fuck up, asshole! I had sixteen pounds of weed with
me.
When I opened the door, Emma was framed in it, a sturdy angel, a voluptuous goddess, a highway Joan of Arc who'd come charging across the battlefield to save me. I pulled her into the room, embraced her. I didn't really know her, but that didn't matter anymore.
"Not quite the five-star suite I imagined you staying in, James," Emma said as she looked around, tossed her car keys on the table. She gave me a Big Mac; I began to devour it. She pulled a Mickey's forty-ounce out of a brown paper bag; I twisted off the cap and chugged it like a prescription. "I think of you in some swank hotel, getting a massage, sitting in the Jacuzzi. Is this what it really is? Shitty rooms like this?"
"This is what it is."
"It's dirty," she said and made a face.
What about those lights, those red lights in the sky? I asked her. Emma laughed. It was a wind farm, she told me. They were everywhere out here. Hadn't I seen any on my way in? The lights were to keep planes from hitting them at night. So it hadn't been something wrong with my head? I asked. No, she said.
"Are you going to carry the weight for me, Emma?"
"If you're going to pay me."
"But I haven't taught you how to drive it yet."
"It's a car, James. You drive it. I've been doing it my whole life."
I looked her up and down. Could she do it? Of course she could. "Let's go," I said. "Enough of this screwing around. And enough of this motherfucking San Angelo." I parted the curtains to peek out at the lot. Sitting behind my Mazda was a black San Angelo PD cruiser. I let the curtains fall.
"There's a cop out there."
"There wasn't when I came in."
Fuck fuck fuck! When I peeked out again, he was still there.
"Where's your car?"
"At the McDonald's across the street."
"You didn't bring it here?"
"I'm not stupid."
I took the duffel bags into the bathroom, threw them in the tub, shut the shower curtain over them. Like that would do anything if they came in. But it was better than doing nothing.
"I'm going to go out and drive away. Don't do anything until he leaves. If you have to leave the shit behind, leave it."
"Okay."
"And whatever you do, don't talk."
I left the room, pulled the door shut behind me so it latched like I was leaving it forever. I could hear the sounds on the cop's radio, the pops and beeps and voices and static. He looked at me and I looked at him. This one wasn't wearing mirrored sunglasses. But he was wearing everything else. When I took the key into the motel office, the East Indian was standing at the counter with his hands flat on it as if holding it for support. I took one look at him and we both knew. This slow-motion feeling began and I tossed the key on the counter. "That room was a filthy hellhole," I said. He didn't even twitch his mustache.
"Gonna let me out or what?" I mouthed to the cop from the door to my car; I was trying to be a dick. He looked at me a long moment with that flat face they wear, then nodded almost imperceptibly. I thought, I am a bait fish and you are a shark. I am going to flee from here and you are going to chase me.
I sat in the Mazda, started it. The cop backed up to give me room. Evening was settling down on the town. When I pulled onto the road, he followed me. I drove perfectly all through San Angelo. The cop was right behind me. I stopped at all the lights, kept to the limit. What would his reason be when he pulled me over? Scrupulously obeying the traffic laws? We left town on some highway, I had no idea which one. I had no idea which direction I was heading. I knew none of that mattered now. The cop was in my rearview every inch of the way. Was he weaving, or was that just me? What would the accommodations be like at the San Angelo jail?
Six miles out of town, his lights went on, his siren went whoop whoop twice. I pulled over to the side of the road. It was flat and dull in that part of the world—who in the hell would want to live out here? But he did. I was on his territory now. He was white and tall, a big bad boy. He rapped his knuckles on my window and I powered it down. "License and rental agreement, sir," he said. I said, "What are you pulling me over for?"
"Headlights."
"What about them?"
"You haven't turned them on."
"You could see around to the front of my car?"
"License and rental agreement, sir."
Headlights. I closed the window, sat in the car and waited. Why did they make you wait so long? Mind games. To make you sweat. I hurriedly grabbed my phones out of the glove compartment, wiped all the calls off them, all the numbers, all the texts to Kate, then I shut them off. Just like that, I was completely disconnected from my world. I checked around the car for anything else. There was nothing else.
He was back. I powered down the window. He shined his flashlight around me in the car. It was already nighttime out there.
"California to Florida?"
"One way across the country."
"But now you're heading back to New Mexico?"
"Yes I am."
"Why are you heading back to New Mexico?"
"I don't believe I have to say."
"Okay." An immediate change of tone in his voice, a long ratchet down in unfriendliness. "Anything in here you need to tell me about?"
"Nothing that I know of."
"Any large amount of money?"
"No, sir."
"Would you mind leaving the keys in the ignition and stepping out of the car?"
Just this once, I didn't mind. Still, I was fucking nervous. "Happy to," I said.
He patted me down.
"Any sharp objects in your pockets?"
"No, sir."
"Anything else I should know about?"
"No, sir."
He put his hands deep into every pocket I had, pulled out my wallet, my phones.
"Why do you need three phones?"
I didn't say anything.
"Would you mind if I took a look in your vehicle?"
"No, sir."
"Stand over there and wait for me." Then he spoke into his shoulder radio, called for a K-9 as he lined up my stuff on the hood of his car like evidence.
I stood at the side of the road where he told me to, watched him look through all the windows in the car with his flashlight. He didn't talk to me, I didn't say anything to him. No other cars passed us on that road.
When the K-9 came, a second big bad boy came out, and the two of them met and talked. They were robots, no monkey business about them, no "Hey, how are you, Chuck?" The first one said to the second one, "California to Florida, one way. No luggage. Disposable phones. The rental agreement checks out, but now he's heading back to New Mexico."
"Sounds hot."
The first one came back to me and said, "I'm going to put you in the back of my car."
"Am I under arrest?"
"No, you are not, sir."
"Then why are you putting me in your car?"
"A safety precaution for us, sir."
From the cage he put me in, I watched them trot out the dog in the spotlights of their vehicles. I'd already given them permission to search, so why were they running the dog? Looking for secret compartments? Hoping to score some cash? The dog was a calm and obedient German shepherd; it kept glancing up like it was eager to please. I knew there wasn't anything in that car. But what if the dog found something anyway? The handler jogged it around the Mazda once, twice, then the dog jumped up against the rear bumper. The handler patted it, said something to it. When he popped open the hatchback, the dog immediately leapt in. It scratched the carpeting where the duffels had been sitting for the last fifteen hundred miles, barked. I settled into my seat while they called in a bunch more cars.
This went on for a long time. Hours? My heart was in my throat: they would tell me they'd found something, or they'd plant something, and I had no sense of time out there at all. What could I do if they did? They brought out tools, stripped the Mazda down. The paneling. The sideboards. They pulled out the air filter. They set the pieces down on the side of t
he road. After they'd finished putting everything back, the extra cops drove away.
The first cop let me out, gave me my wallet, phones, a ticket for the headlights. "Our K-9 alerted on the back of the vehicle, sir," the cop said. "At that point we had reasonable enough suspicion to conduct a thorough search."
I raced through the night to Austin. When I ran up the stairs, Mason let me in. Emma had already gone to bed, he told me. My weed was in the living room.
Now this thing with Micah, I'd included the weight to do it in the load I'd just brought across. After Deveny's in Tallahassee, I cruised down to Sarasota, dropped the pounds off at the 8th Street house, hid them in a closet there. I'd called Kate from Austin on Mason's phone after what had happened in San Angelo, told her that one of my Tracs had fried; she'd given me all my numbers back. Now I called Nick, told him to get the Orlando deal set up. I threw the duffel bags away in a supermarket dumpster, then went home to Siesta Key. There was a strange beat-up car parked at our place. Kate and Cristina were watching TV when I came in; Romana was in her highchair being spoon-fed by an older Hispanic woman.
Kate sat up on the couch. "This is Mrs. Jimenez," she said.
I said to Kate, "You can't fucking feed her? You're sitting right there."
"What do you know about it, James? Nice thing to say when you've just walked in."
I gave the Hispanic woman a hundred-dollar bill; she took her keys and left. I picked up the rubber-coated spoon, finished feeding my daughter her pureed sweet potatoes. I gave her a bath, put her in PJs, carried her into her room. She laid her head on my shoulder as I held her against me.
"Did you miss me, little girl?"
Romana nuzzled me, sucked on her binky.
"I love you more than you'll ever know."
When I went back out to the living room, Kate told me she'd had contractions while I was away. Cristina had taken her to the emergency room. That was why the nanny had been here, if I'd even bothered to ask.