by M. Z. Kelly
She did an eye roll. “You have heard of sex, haven’t you?”
“I vaguely remember something about it. Doesn’t it involve a lot of groaning and bodily fluids?”
“You’re thinking of a homicide. Just tell Ronnie you want the girlfriend experience for you and your girlfriend.”
“A threesome.”
“Well, I’m not gonna sit in the corner while you and Ronnie play slap and tickle.”
It was my turn to do an eye roll. “This girl doesn’t slap or tickle other girls.”
I dialed the number and waited until I heard the recording of a woman’s voice. “You’ve reached Midnight Escorts, the place where all your dreams come true. Leave a message, and Ronnie will call you back shortly.”
“Ah, I’m…” I tried to gather my thoughts. “This is…Tanya. I’d like to get together later today.” I left my phone number and ended the call. I then told Amy, “I feel like a complete idiot.”
She smiled. “Let’s go get you a wig. I just changed my mind. I think I do wanna just watch you and Ronnie, after all. I need a few laughs.”
***
“Hi, this is Ronnie returning your call. What do you have in mind, sweetheart?”
The call from Billy Cornelius’s escort came on our way to Amy’s house. I mouthed the words, it’s her, to Amy, then said into my phone. “I was…wondering if maybe we could get together later.”
“I’m free around seven tonight. I just need to know what you like.”
I looked at Amy, covering the phone and trying to think of a response. She whispered, “Tell her we want a three-way.”
I took a breath and rolled my eyes, telling Ronnie, “My girlfriend and me…we would like…an experience.”
Ronnie giggled. “Sounds like fun. I charge two hundred an hour.”
Amy was listening in now, her features tightening. I got the impression she was expecting something cheaper, but she whispered, “Go ahead.”
I agreed to the amount and said, “Can you meet us at Chucky’s Motel, over on Johnson Drive?”
“See you at seven. I’m looking forward to it.”
“Two hundred,” Amy said after the call ended. “What do you suppose she does for two hundred?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t really want to think about it.”
“Maybe she’s like a plumber, and comes with an assortment of tools.”
“A plumber. Great.”
“All I know is that we’re definitely going back to Dr. C for expenses.”
Fifteen minutes later, we pulled up in front of Amy’s brownstone. “Stinky’s off at six, so let’s make sure we’re out of here before then.”
Amy had taken over the master bedroom, telling me that she’d moved her husband’s belongings down the hall to a spare room. I saw that she had a walk-in closet overflowing with shoes and dresses, and enough wigs to open her own store.
“I think I got just the ticket for you,” Amy said, coming over to me with a shoulder length blonde wig after I took a seat in front of her makeup mirror. “I wore this to a tenth reunion party, trying to catch a cheater.”
“Did you catch him?”
“Her. She was in the boiler room with her high school flame. ‘Fraid the marriage also went up in flames.”
After she put the wig on me and fiddled with it for a moment, I said, “I look like I should be the hooker.”
“It’s perfect. You look trashy as hell. Just the kind of girl who’s looking for a working girl.”
“Thanks, I think.”
Amy found her own wig: a brown beehive that she said was “trash from the past”, something she’d worn to one of Stinky’s Christmas parties a few years back.
We spent the next hour, finding slinky dresses that complemented our hairdos. We left just before six as Amy’s husband was pulling into the driveway. She gave him the finger as we drove away and yelled, “Douche!”
We chatted aimlessly as we made our way to Chucky Fucky’s one-hour stop ‘n’ fuck before Amy came up with a proposal. “What do you say we rent a place together? Life with Twisted Mister and his sister’s got to be wearing on you.”
The truth was, I’d been thinking about moving out of my aunt and uncle’s place for several months now. “I’m not sure I can afford it.”
“I’m gonna start looking for a place next week. I’ll let you know what I find.” Inspiration then struck. “Hey, maybe Ronnie needs a couple of roommates.”
I sighed. “Do you think it’s always gonna be like this?”
“What d’ya mean?”
“You and me, trying to patch our lives together.” I looked at her. “Sometimes I feel like I’m just treading water, barely staying afloat. Do you think there are women out there who have normal lives and relationships?”
“All that junk you read in those magazines at the supermarket checkout counters about women having perfect lives is a myth just to make you feel bad. Corporations got a shitload of marketers, who dream up that crap just to make you try and lose weight and buy their clothes.” She nudged my shoulder. “Suck it up. Things will get better.”
“Yeah, you’re right. An hour with a prostitute, and I’m sure I’ll feel like a new woman.”
Chucky’s Motel was on the outskirts of a poor neighborhood in the Bronx. In the dark, the place looked even worse and more forbidding than the last time I’d driven by. There were a couple guys on the sidewalk, selling drugs, as we pulled up to the curb. After turning down offers for everything from weed to heroin, we made our way over to the manager’s quarters.
A guy who looked like Norman Bates with Billy Bob teeth greeted us from behind a glass partition. “If you girls want to work the entire night, we’ve got a special,” Norman said. “You can get a room until ten tomorrow morning for a c-note.”
“We just need an hour,” Amy said, smacking her gum.
“That’ll be forty, then,” Norman said.
“Your sign says it’s twenty bucks an hour.”
“Sign’s broken. It’s forty, unless…” His bloodshot eyes took in Amy’s figure. “…you wanna negotiate.”
Amy peeled two twenties out of her purse, pushed them under the glass partition. “I’d sooner fuck a rat.”
Maybe it was because of Amy’s mouth, but Norman gave us a room at the back of the property, in the darkest section of the motel grounds. We had no sooner managed to get the key in the lock and the front porch light turned on, when Ronnie called me, asking for our room number.
Five minutes later, a tall black woman took a seat on the bed in the shabby little room and demanded payment. Ronnie Powers was a large woman, with breasts that were barely contained by her little black dress.
“This is your lucky day,” Amy said, trying a negotiation tactic. “All we need is your mouth for a half hour. We’ll pay you a hundred bucks.”
“My mouth and my time are worth far more than that.” She stood. “Are you two cops?”
“We just want some information about a john you were seeing,” I said. “A guy named Billy Cornelius.”
“Billy.” She smiled. “Two hundred and I’ll tell you everything I know.”
I looked at Amy and shrugged. She sighed and gave up the original fee that we’d negotiated. “Billy’s gone missing,” Amy said. “When was the last time you saw him?”
Ronnie’s gaze moved between us after she tucked her payment in her cleavage. “I’ll ask again before we start, you cops?”
Amy shook her head. “Just working girls, like you, working for somebody who’s looking for Billy.”
Ronnie regarded us, smiling. “Working girls, huh?” She took a seat on the bed, then said, “Billy and me had a regular thing going on about once a week. He was just a lost kid, needing someone to talk to as much as sex. I used my mouth for both.”
“During your talks, did Billy ever mention having problems with anyone, maybe someone who was threatening to harm him?” I asked.
Ronnie shook her head. “Not in so many words, but the
last time I saw him he was acting strange.”
“When was that?”
“About a month ago. He was nervous and, despite lots of work, he couldn’t get it up.”
“Sounds like Stinky,” Amy said to me. She said to Ronnie, “Go on.”
“We had a little talk afterward, and Billy said he’d won the lottery. I asked him how much he’d won, and he said it was another kind of lottery. He claimed he found out something that could either make him a lot of money or get him killed.”
“Did he explain what he meant by that?” I asked.
Ronnie yawned. “Not really.” She stood. “That’s all I know.”
“Wait a minute,” Amy said, going over to her. “We paid you two hundred bucks. You must know something more.”
“I’m a whore, not a shrink. Billy didn’t explain what he meant, and I didn’t ask.” She stepped around Amy, heading toward the door, adding, “Sometimes it’s not healthy to ask too many questions.”
I went over to the door as she opened it. “What about his brother? Did Billy ever mention his relationship with him? He’s a doctor.”
Ronnie shook her head. “The only person he ever mentioned is a cousin, Asia. You might wanna talk to her.”
“Do you know where we can find her?”
She opened the door. “Nope.” She turned back to us before leaving. “Just so you know, you both missed out on the best night of your life.”
SEVEN
The next day Amy and I were planning to try to locate Billy’s cousin, Asia, and also talk to Dr. Cornelius about expenses, when I got a call from Walt Turnbull.
“Can you meet at the office at one, so I can tell you where we stand?” Turnbull asked.
My thoughts immediately went to a dark place. “This doesn’t sound good.”
“I think it’s the best deal you’re going to get, but I want to lay it out in person.”
I sighed. “See you there.”
I then called Amy and told her we’d need to put things on hold for the day. She said that was fine because she and Stinky had gotten into a big argument and she’d thrown his belongings into their yard. She didn’t want to go outside as long as he was sorting through his stuff.
I was getting my things together to leave, when my aunt and uncle stopped by to see me.
“I’m glad we caught you,” Aunt Lucy said. “Marvin and me have a little situation.”
“Don’t tell me. You’re taking your act on the road.”
“We didn’t want to say anything until now,” Marvin answered, “but things didn’t work out so good at the Haven the night before last.”
“Mick had a little problem,” Lucy agreed, solemnly nodding her head.
“What kind of problem?”
My aunt’s eyes grew wider. “When Buzzie did the splits, something besides his legs split. He got a really bad hernia.”
“He’s out of action for at least eight weeks,” Marvin said. “Maybe longer.”
I got the picture. Mick stepped on his dick. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“That brings us back to our problem,” Lucy said. “We’re in some financial difficulties, and since we won’t be getting any gigs for a couple months, it’s only going to make things worse.”
“We need to increase your rent,” Marvin said, fixing his sad doggy eyes on me. “In fact, we’re going to have to double it.”
“Double it?” I took a breath, feeling like I’d been punched in the gut. “I can’t afford to pay much more than I already pay.”
“Then I’m afraid we’re going to need to subdivide the basement, turn the place into two units. You can keep your half, but you’ll need to share it with…” He looked at Lucy. “…with Mojo.”
“Are you kidding me?”
Mojo was a distant cousin on Uncle Marvin’s side of the family, someone who I was sure crawled out from under a rock in a swamp. He was a perverted meth addict, at best, and a sexual predator, at worst. According to family lore, he was named after a sex toy that led to his conception. There was no way I could share the basement with him, let alone a bathroom.
“I’m sorry,” Lucy said. “There’s no other way. Mojo’s moving in next week.”
I thought about Amy’s idea about moving in together. “Then it looks like I’ll be moving out.”
***
I got to Walt Turnbull’s office a little before one. While I was depressed and a little angry over my aunt and uncle’s decision to let their perverted relative move into my room, I also knew I’d overstayed my welcome there, and it was time to move on.
While I waited for Turnbull, I called Amy and told her about my predicament. “You remember Mojo. He was just a teenage boy when I caught him hiding under my bed one night.”
“He tried to have sex with you, if I remember right.”
“He was naked and said he wanted to do stuff with me that he’d seen on the Internet. I had to threaten to have him arrested before Uncle Marvin finally sent him back home. He’s older now, and I’m sure he’s even more perverted.”
“I’ve already started checking the ads for places to rent. It turns out Stinky didn’t pay the rent last month and we’re being evicted. I’ve gotta be out of here in a week. Maybe you and me will be living on the streets together.”
I saw Turnbull coming down the hallway and said, “I’ve got to run. I’ll call you later.”
When we got to my union rep’s office, I was surprised to see there was a man in a dark suit waiting for me. He had one of those know-it-all smirks that immediately told me he was a member of the rat squad.
“This is Stan Hawkins with the Internal Affairs Bureau,” Turnbull said.
I nodded but otherwise didn’t respond.
Hawkins motioned to a chair. “Have a seat, Detective, and we’ll explain the terms of holding this matter in abeyance.”
“Abeyance,” I said, finding a chair and looking at Turnbull. “What does that mean?”
“IAB has agreed to suspend any disciplinary proceedings…”
“It means we’re cutting you a break,” Hawkins said, interrupting him. “You play nice in Precinct Blue for a year, learn how to behave and act like a real cop, and any discipline regarding your behavior goes away.”
“A year?” I looked at my union rep again. “I don’t understand why I’m being punished for a full year for something I didn’t even do.”
“It’s the standard retraining period,” Hawkins said, again answering for Turnbull. “We’ve found that things take a long time to stick for people like you.”
“People like me.” I raised my voice. “What the hell does that mean?”
Hawkins shrugged. “People who don’t play by the rules, follow protocol.”
I was about to tell him where he could stick his protocol when Turnbull said, “I’m afraid he’s right. A one-year reassignment is standard.”
“This is the paperwork with the agreement,” Hawkins said, tossing a stack of papers in front of me. “I’ll leave it with Mr. Turnbull for the two of you to review and sign.” He stood. “Just remember, if you violate any of the contractual agreements, all bets are off. You’ll be fully investigated by IAB and subject to formal discipline.”
When he was gone, I glanced at the paperwork as Turnbull droned on about my reassignment being a good solution for all involved parties. “It’s a win-win,” he said, after I’d reviewed the agreement. “You get to keep your job, and any prospect of discipline goes away.”
“Providing I do a bullet in reform school,” I said. My eyes narrowed on him. “Where exactly is Precinct Blue located?”
“It’s in the Bronx, over on Walker Street. They’ve converted a basement. It’s not the most luxurious accommodations, but it’s only for a year. The time will fly by, and before you know it, you’ll be back in a regular assignment.”
“So, I’ll be working cases in the assigned precinct?”
Turnbull shrugged. “Probably. You’ll get all the details in the morning when you report
for duty.” He checked his watch, glanced at the paperwork on the desk. “If there’s nothing further, I just need your signature.”
I sighed, realizing I had no choice. If I didn’t agree to the reassignment, the department would probably find a way to say I’d been at least partially responsible for Stufflebeam’s death. Instead of getting a commendation for trying to save the alien’s life, I was being given another choice: either accept a stint in reform school or face losing my job.
I scribbled my signature on the paperwork and tossed it to Turnbull. I stood and said, “I’ve got just one thing to say about all this.”
Turnbull eagerly gathered up the paperwork. “What’s that?”
“I’m being punished for doing my job. That’s about as wrong as things can get.”
EIGHT
After leaving Walt Turnbull’s office, I spent the rest of my day packing my belongings while Aunt Lucy tried to make nice about Mojo moving in.
“I’m sure you and your cousin can find common ground if you decide to stay,” Aunt Lucy said. “Your uncle tells me he’s turned into a fine young man.”
“I’m sure he would make a swell roommate, providing I don’t mind being raped by a meth addict every night.”
“Madison!” She raised her voice. “Mojo’s not that bad. From what I hear, the time he did in that camp program worked wonders for him.”
“A camp program. What was it called, Camp Wannafuckya?”
“Madison!” This time her voice could have cracked the glassware in the china cabinet. After a ten-minute lecture about Mojo’s reformed personality, I excused myself and called Amy.
“Any luck finding us a place?” I asked after some chit chat.
“You’re not gonna believe this, but I think I got a lead on a place that’s not too far from here, with a guy I did some PI work for a while back. The only problem is it’s a little pricey.”
“Pricey, as in how much?”
“If we can find a roommate, it would be around a thousand apiece.”
“A thousand.” I exhaled, dragged a hand through hair that still made me think about my swim in the grease pit. “I’ve only been paying six hundred to my aunt and uncle.”