The Wolves of Fairmount Park

by Dennis Tafoya

  “Open the cases, let’s see.”

  Chris crossed to where the cases lay on the floor and opened each one, fumbling with the hasps while Asa watched from the stairs. When he opened the case with the money he paused for a minute, finally taking in what he’d been driving around with all that time. He flipped a bill with one finger, as if testing its reality.

  Asa shifted on the stairs. “A lot of money, yeah?”

  Chris looked up at Asa, squinting in the glare from the front windows. “I brought it back. And I got the dope.”

  Asa stepped slowly down the stairs. “So the African made a move? Tried to grab the cash?”

  “Yeah, I thought we were going to get jacked. We had to shoot our way out.”

  “Right. The African guy shot at you?”

  “No, somebody else. We couldn’t see him. Angel came in and looked for him, I guess, but the guy got away from him.” Chris screwed up his face, a little gesture of exasperation at Angel Riordan’s incompetence. Asa smiled and looked sidelong at him so that Chris could see his ploy was getting him nowhere. “It was pretty crazy, I guess. The guy was blasting away, so, you know, Angel had to back off. I had to get Gerry to the car, get him out of there. He was bleeding all over the place.”

  “So where did you take Gerry?”

  “Right, well, then Gerry wouldn’t get in the car. Because of his brother. So I didn’t want to hang around until the cops showed up and threw a net over everybody. Took your money, right?”

  Asa came down to kneel in front of Chris at the cases. He picked up a bundle of cash, rifled it, turned to the dope case and stuck his finger through the bullet hole Gerry had put in it. “So, you walk in, the African’s there, sitting there with the dope, and you come in and some guy just opens up on you from wherever?”

  Chris moved his head this way and that, like he was trying to work out how to see his story in a way that didn’t look ridiculous. He stood over Asa, who barely looked at him, and thought about the gun tucked in the back of his pants. As far as he knew, the little redheaded freak never carried one.

  Asa closed the cases one at a time, then sat back, staring off into space for a minute. Something about watching him snap the cases closed put the thought into his head that he was being shut out of something, some door was closing to him. Chris actually put his hand behind him, touching the cold butt of the pistol, a little SIG SAUER he’d bought off a kid in a bar.

  The door opened and Angel Riordan came in. He let the door close, looked behind him out into the street, and moved to stand in the shadow with his back to the wall.

  Carmody smiled again, that weird smile he got when there was no joke Chris Black could see. “Angel.” He cocked his head a little. “Chris was just telling me why somebody brings six kilos of heroin to a hotel when all they plan to do is beat you out of your money.”

  Angel looked off, not interested in any of it. Chris watched him carefully, like you’d watch an animal with its cage open, waiting to see what way he moved.

  Angel lifted a corner of his mouth. “Ah, bullshit.”

  “Hey, he wasn’t in there. He doesn’t know how it went.”

  Asa stood up and turned to him, reaching up to pat his puffed-out chest. “Chris. Forget it. I asked you to do something that was too hard. It’s my fault, not yours. I should have known better.”

  Chris backed up, freaked by the proximity to Asa. “I never let you down.”

  Asa shook his head, “Don’t run away with yourself. You fucked this up, and every thing I’ve asked you to do, yeah?” He grinned again, that weird thing he did where his lower jaw dropped open like he was going to take a bite out of something. Jesus. He leaned in even closer, and Chris backed up involuntarily. “It’s what you do, now I think of it. You fuck up. You hang around, waiting to be told what to do. And the one time you think for yourself, what happened?”

  “The guy made a move.”

  “What happened?” Asa put one soft white hand out, and Chris backed up again, aware of the empty garage behind him, all that black space.

  “I told you.”

  “Stop that bullshit.” Asa shook his head fast, his hands twitching a little.

  Chris shifted his eyes back and forth between the top of Asa’s red head and Angel, who at least stood still at his post against the wall. Sweat began to form on his back, like a line pointing to where the little gun was wedged. In another second he’d reach behind him and end this shit. “I don’t know what you want.”

  “I want you to stop thinking you can lie to me. Ever.”

  The fucking guy was pushing him around the floor like a little kid on a playground. How did this happen? The little fuck didn’t even have a gun. He looked at Angel again, who was off in his own world. Why did Chris keep letting this happen? He dropped his head, his face burning.

  “You spent ten minutes alone with that retard Gerry Dunn and you got in front of the African and you started acting up, right?”

  “I don’t—”

  “You let that idiot into your fucking head and you thought you’d make some stupid fucking move and it got away from you.” Asa was talking fast, quiet, and it was somehow scarier than if he’d been screaming. “You reached over and grabbed the dope. Or he did. That idiot, Gerry Dunn. That idiot. The African was just sitting there, just sitting there, and it got into your head because you’re weak and stupid and can’t keep your fucking eye on the ball.” He tapped the side of his own head, hard, the end of his finger bending back with the force of it. Chris was breathing fast, almost whimpering. Asa pointed the finger at Chris, moving it closer to his chest, and he had the idea that if the finger touched him, he would die.

  “I’m going to give you one thing to do. You’re going to do it. If you want to keep coming back here, keep getting paid, you’re going to do it.”

  “What can I do?”

  “You know already.”

  “I don’t.”

  “I sent you to do something and you didn’t do it. On Roxborough Avenue.”

  “No, that went right. We hit that place hard.”

  “I’m not talking about the place. That’s not the problem.”

  “What was wrong?”

  Asa grabbed a handful of Chris Black’s shirt, twisting it in his fingers so that Chris had to bend closer. He turned to avoid getting his face close to Asa, who talked quietly and fiercely into his ear. “That girl. That fucking girl. You shot everybody on Roxborough Avenue except the girl.”

  CHAPTER

  15

  Ken drove Orlando down to a record store in a strip shopping center. He looked over at Orlando a few times on the road down, Orlando wondering what he saw.

  “You have to hit it more than once a day now?”

  Orlando kept his eyes on the street. “You think you know something?”

  “It wasn’t just Bukowski poems and good thoughts got me through school.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Rehab. Twice before it took. Pills and alcohol.”

  “You got any pamphlets?”

  “Okay, I’m not going to twist anybody’s arm. That’s one thing definitely doesn’t work.”

  “Yeah? What works?”

  “Fuck, I don’t know. Really, man, I don’t get in anyone else’s shit about it.”

  They pulled up to where a bunch of kids were clustered in a corner of the lot, sitting on the hoods of their cars. A Corvette, an S10, two BMWs, one a convertible. The dozen or so kids were wearing expensive clothes and wore jewelry that went with the cars. Ken and Orlando got out and stood by the car until Ken noticed Ryan, who looked startled and jumped off the hood of the S10 to move toward one of the BMWs with his keys out.

  Ken caught him fumbling with his keys and stood him up against the side of the car, Orlando ducking his head so if something stupid happened, maybe nobody would have gotten a fix on his face. Ken held Ryan easily against the door, using his free hand to push the kid’s fauxhawk down.

  “Ryan, that’s one fucked-up haircut, m
an.”

  “Really? I only got it ’cause your mom likes it.”

  The kids around them gave off a low moan followed by laughter, and Ryan looked over his shoulder at them, his tongue out. Ken grabbed his throat with a hand like a catcher’s mitt. His voice was low.

  “Ryan, man? You are so not that guy.”

  “Yeah. Sorry.” He dropped his head.

  Orlando kept his back to the crowd and moved closer to Ken and Ryan. Ken let go of Ryan’s neck and straightened the collar on his knit shirt. “You have George Jr.’s camera.”

  “What camera? I have one like his. It’s not his.”

  “Jesus, do you suck at lying. Pick one lie, dipshit. That’s how it works. Did you steal Geo’s camera?”

  “No. Fuck. That retard.”

  “Watch it.”

  “Shit, I knew it. I knew I was going to get in trouble for this. He fucking sold it to me. I didn’t steal it. I told him his father was going to fucking freak.”

  “It’s not about his father. This guy—” He swatted Orlando on the arm. “Geo owed this guy money. And this is a guy you don’t want to owe money to.”

  Orlando looked at Ryan through heavy-lidded eyes, and the kid shifted and made a pained face. “Man.”

  “Yeah.”

  Orlando held up a hand, the thug granting dispensation. “Just tell me what you gave him for it.”

  “Five hundred bucks.”

  Ken shook his head. “Ryan.”

  “Okay, seven fifty. Jesus.”

  “What did he need it for?”

  “A girl, he said.”

  “What do you mean, a girl?”

  “He told me this girl was in trouble. I don’t know. I was looking at the camera.”

  “Did he say her name?”

  Ryan shrugged his shoulders, and Orlando wanted to grab his throat, too. Something must have shown in his face that made the kid throw up his hands. “I don’t know! It was some girl he met at the homeless shelter or something. I said it sounded like throwing away money. Unless she was hot or something. Man.”

  They walked back to Ken’s car, stopping to look back at the kid, who was fumbling with his keys and trying to open his door. Ken said, “Geo is gone, and that little prick . . .” He lifted one shoulder and let his eyes go wide with the injustice of it. Orlando felt his stomach seize up and had to bend over at the car and spit. Ken waited patiently.

  Orlando stood up straight, his eyes red. He let his mouth hang open, breathing hard. “Okay, what did work?”

  “What?”

  “In rehab. The second time, it took. You said.”

  Ken looked away. “I told you, man, I don’t know. I just know, the first time it was work, it was a lot harder. The second time, I don’t know. I was ready, I guess. Like I was really there, paying attention.”

  “Okay.”

  “Why? You think you’re ready?”

  Orlando bared his teeth, his eyes red and bruised, his hands low on his abdomen like he’d been punched there. “No.”

  He had Ken drop him off at the library on Ridge and looked through the newspapers. He found articles about the shooting, pictures of George Jr. and from outside the viewing, quotes from Marianne Kilbride that didn’t sound like her and from staff at the homeless shelter in North Philly where Geo had volunteered. He took some of the pages and stuffed them in his jacket, then walked up the aisles for a minute, stopping to pull out The Day of the Locust and some old Ray Bradbury stories he loved.

  He had a library card. He’d spent a lot of time hanging in the libraries when he was between places to live, and after he’d hooked up with Zoe he got a card using her address. It was late and the place was closing, so he took the books and walked down to the apartment, hoping she’d be there, but there was no sign of her. Her clothes were still there, and he sat for a long time with a piece of paper and the little fine-line pen Zoe used to write poetry trying to think what to say, and in the end he just wrote that he loved her and stuck the note in the frame of the Frida Kahlo print near the door.

  He walked back up to the place where Sienna had worked and knocked on the door and braced himself. Mia answered, her eyes big, pointing over her shoulder inside and stepping out to pull the door closed behind her.

  “What you doing? You coming back alone without that little Cuban girl?”

  He reached into his jacket. “I’m a little short on cash right now, you know? But I wanted to ask you one more question.”

  “Oh, cops and robbers again. Like Monk on TV.” She hunched her shoulders and made a conspiratorial face, playing amateur detective. “You sure you don’t want to come in and have a party? You can even bring that girl.” She was high. He could see it in her heavy lids and the way she propped herself up in the door, and then he smelled it, the peppery smell of cheap weed coming out of her hair and her clothes and warring with her perfume. He thought about asking her if he could get high with her. It was on his lips to say it, but then he didn’t.

  “Thanks.”

  “Everybody says they’re broke, but you be surprised how many people find the money if they really, really want to.”

  He showed her the pictures in the paper, conscious of his shaking hands as he pointed things out. She made a sad face and touched the school picture of George Jr. “That poor boy. So young like that. Did you figure out what was going on? That night he was here?”

  “I’m trying to. But how about this guy? Did he come here? To see Sienna.”

  “I don’t know about saying. We got confidentiality, hon. Just like a priest, you know?” She giggled and touched his arm.

  “You know why I’m here, right? I’m not a cop, I’m not looking to get anyone in trouble. I want to understand how this mess happened.”

  There was a noise in the house, voices.

  “I got to go.” She gave an apologetic smile. He smiled, too, and touched her arm lightly, but lifted the paper again so she could see it. She shook her head at him in mock exasperation, but then she touched the picture and nodded. She opened the door as if to check, then closed it again and dropped her voice. “Okay, yeah, he was here. Bunch of times and always for that same girl. Sienna. Some guys like the little crazy ones, I guess.”

  He thanked her, and she shook her head again. “You come back with that sweet little chula sometimes, okay?”

  He walked back out to the street. It was getting dark, and he took the articles and stood under a streetlight and looked at the picture again, the one Mia had touched with her manicured finger. George Parkman Sr. He looked back at the house and wished he’d let himself bum a joint off Mia. Why hadn’t he? Did he really think he was a detective, a man on a mission? With Parkman tweaked at him there was no way he was getting paid now. He should forget about it and concentrate on his own life.

  . . .

  Orlando wandered all night. He left home with a tire iron on a loop of rope inside his jacket and sixteen dollars he’d taken from where it was taped under the desk where Zoe wrote her poetry. He walked by the corners he knew and ones he didn’t, and it was the same everywhere so that he stopped even trying, sick as he was, and just wandered south. He rode the 21 bus out to West Philly and stood shaking on Fifty-second Street, watching the runners move between the cars and the buildings. A cop car went by, giving a short whoop on its siren so that all the traffic froze for a minute, the customers and runners, but the car kept moving and everyone unfroze again like in a children’s game and went back to business.

  Orlando stood in front of a shoe store near Ranstead, watching the corner. He was far from home and hadn’t tried scoring out this far west before. He started walking back north to catch the eye of a runner, but two kids appeared from between some parked cars. One kid was small and narrow and the other big, wide across the shoulders, so that the two of them together were like a cartoon and Orlando almost laughed. The small kid, dark, with a narrow, intelligent face, leaned into him and the big one, lighter skinned, with wide-set, frightened eyes, hung back, almost
shy.

  The smaller one said, “Lend me some money, white boy.”

  “Man, look at me, I’m broke.” Orlando pulled his jacket around him, letting his fingers touch the bent iron under his arm.

  “Nah, you got at least ten dollars, I predict.”

  “Nope, I got nothing.”

  The kid shook his head sagely. “No, you need at least ten dollars to score dope. You’re not down here one in the morning to buy shoes. Terrance, show him.”

  The big kid looked up and down the block, then lifted his jersey to show the dull gray butt of a pistol.

  Orlando sighed. “Man, you take that money, you’re killing me. I’m sick.”

  “Yeah, that’s a sad story.” He snapped his fingers in front of Orlando. “Come on, I’m not standing here all night. Come on.”

  Orlando twitched a little, rubbing the back of his neck. Up the block he saw a runner with a loose black T-shirt etched with white hexagons and connecting lines, the chemical formula for heroin. “You seem like a couple of good kids—”

  The tall one clapped a hand on his shoulder, hard, jarring the narrow bones around Orlando’s throat. The short one said, “Yeah, we’re not, though. I’m through with you. Give up that money or I’m going to start beating on you and I mean right now.”

  Orlando finally went into his jeans and slid the thin, almost weightless bills out, and the small kid took them fast and started walking away while Orlando still stood there with his hand out. After a beat, the big kid followed, hitching at his pants.

  He circled the drug corners like a hungry dog, thinking, thinking and coming up empty. His nerves were raw, his stomach periodically cramping so that he had to stop and breathe through his mouth. He could feel circles of sweat under his arms and kept running his fingers through the pools of moisture in the hollows under his eyes. Near Hazel Avenue he saw a rotted wooden door leading into an alley next to a little corner shop with barred windows and a weak, greenish light from the dying bulb left on after closing. He drifted right as he walked south, letting himself come to rest flat against the door and watching the street, motionless but for his head, looking first down the block at the dark street and then up, to see two men coming out of a tavern under a streetlight, swaying and calling to each other as if lost in a gale.