“You blow it, you go to jail for three years then?” Lonnie asks.
“Nah. The conditional sentence lasts three years.” Lane is annoyed to have to hold Lonnie’s hand through the whole explanation. “The jail time’s a different thing.”
“How long in jail then?”
Lane holds the thought as if summoning the courage to put the horrendous specifics into words. When he’s good and ready, he exhales. “Three months.” He nods his head to convey the gravity of the consequences. “Straight to Walla Walla. No appeal. No questions asked.”
“Three months?” Lonnie laughs. “I thought you had a suspended sentence. That’s a long weekend. I’m looking at twenty-four and consider that lucky.” Lonnie straightens up in his chair, thinks a second and says, “I mentioned my sentence to Nina. I bet that’s why she didn’t ask me.”
Nina told Lane it was because Lonnie is “about as seductive as toenail clippings.” But Lane doesn’t think it worth challenging him on the point.
Lane feels his cheeks burning hot. Lonnie may think that Lane’s darkest secret is trivial, but Lane’s pretty sure that he has a lot more to lose. Three months in Lane’s world translates to at least three years in Lonnie’s, and that’s being conservative.
“Either way: Nina’s deal, it isn’t illegal,” Lane deflects. “It’s a win-win. Or a win-win-win if you include me and Mia. And, I mean, let’s be honest, this whole situation is driven by institutionalized homophobia. We’re righting a social wrong.”
“You still gotta be hella careful, my dude. You might think I’m paranoid, and I’m not saying I see it this way, but someone could say you’re messing with conspiracy.”
“Conspiracy’s like Frank Sr. shit.” Lane tries a smile, but his jaw is too tight.
Lonnie adjusts his posture. “Look, I know I’m only just trying to get my GED now, but I was a foster kid. Between that and my more recent entrepreneurial endeavors, I’ve spent a minute in courtrooms. And I’m pretty sure that if there’s two people involved, it’s conspiracy. This is like conspiracy to like commit bribery. Or, I dunno, deprive this chick of her legal rights. Coercion. Or some sort of abuse of legal process.” He finishes his beer and lets out a long belch. “Defrauding her maternal rights? Is that even a thing? Maybe something with human trafficking or crimes with a minor if the prosecutor gets after it.”
“You’re getting your GED?”
“I told you that before.”
Lane shrugs.
“I’m trying to, anyway. Remember: I quit dealing. Weed, anyway. Coke’s too goddamn profitable. Hoping to start at North Seattle next year.”
“Community college?”
“Yeah, become a paralegal.”
“Wow. OK. Congrats. But I thought you were on my side on this thing. Or, at least, on Nina’s and my side. I mean, it’s clearly”—Lane pauses again for dramatic impact—“clearly in the kid’s best interest.”
“I’m one hundred percent on your side, that’s why I’m telling you this,” says Lonnie. “And, yeah, it’s probably in the kid’s best interest. Like I told you before, my birth mom’s a total loser, but there’s a lot of research now that says kids still do better with their biological parent, even if those parents suck. And drugs alone aren’t a reason to remand a child. A parent can get better.”
“Remand?” Lane’s not sure of the definition but would never admit to not knowing a word in front of an intellectual peer, let alone a guy who is struggling to get his GED a couple of years short of thirty. “Well, she wasn’t just using. She was dealing. Which is way more messed up. No offense, Lonnie.”
“Let me put it this way: It’s a vast legal ocean out there, and you might be wading into unsettled law. That kinda shit goes all the way to the Supreme Court. And if there’s one thing we should both know by now: if you give a cop a ledge, they’ll climb that wall.”
“So why don’t you loan me cash to get back to New York? I know you got it.”
“You’re joking, right? You know how much I lost on your fake-ass weed deal? You’re lucky I didn’t beat it back out of you.”
“Yeah, I was joking. Just now. I was.” Lane collects himself. “This thing is a slam dunk anyway. There’s no bribe. There’s no conspiracy. I’m not trying to pull a bait-and-switch. I’m facilitating what she already wants. Like a mediator. I gotta maneuver past her hard shell, all that socially induced scar tissue; establish trust and then, you know, mediate what needs to be mediated.”
“You’re the Ivy League guy, not me. If anybody can make something good outta this, it’s you. I mean, even eggs Benedict once came out a chicken’s pussy, right?” Lonnie orders them another round.
AS WITH MOST EVENINGS OUT in Lake City, they wind up hanging out in a car. Tonight, it’s Lonnie’s truck: the Rimrock after party. Lonnie busies himself racking out lines on a Bone Thugs-n-Harmony jewel case with the edge of a Subway gift card and rolling up a ten-dollar bill over and over until he obtains optimal cylindrical tension. The cocaine gleams blue under the digital equalizer on the Alpine.
“When you were a kid, you never tried that foster-to-adopt? Like Nina?” Lane asks.
Lonnie waits to come up from his first line. “There was no cutoff then. No timeline for the birth parents, you know.” He massages his nose between his thumb and forefinger, choking back the drip. “I drifted through like twenty foster homes while my mom was trying to get off smack. And once you’re a teenager, you’re outta the game. Done . . . unless you’re like a hot sixteen-year-old white or Asian chick.”
He offers the jewel case, but Lane keeps to his no-drugs pledge and passes. Lonnie puts up no argument and does the rest himself.
“Foster-to-adopt though, that’s a pretty hilarious scene.” Lonnie breathes through his mouth. “It’s probably the only place on earth a bunch of gays and evangelicals all sit around in the same room and hang out, taking parenting classes and talking the finer points of child rearing ’n’ shit. It’s rent-to-own, so they’re all looking for newborns from the worst, most low-down, nastiest family scenarios, ’cause those’re the ones who don’t get reinstated.”
He runs his fingers over the jewel case collecting the fine dust. “Nina shoulda done a regular adoption or gone to the sperm bank or found some horny interstate truck driver or something,” Lonnie says. “Hey . . . I mighta done her myself . . . for the right price, you know?”
“Yeah, you know she’s got the loot to go the traditional adoption route. But she says the agencies are all homophobic. And her wife’s a liberal do-gooder. Wanted to save a kid in need, you know, like getting an old dog from the pound.” Lane half invents as he goes along. “But no good deed goes unpunished, right?”
He does know that Nina and Tracey brought Jordan home before he was a year old. The boy spent a few months with Inez, and then a few more with a foster family that was in it for the cash and avoided any level of emotional attachment.
“Do you know what that does to the human psyche?” Nina asked Lane as they drove back from Fred Meyer to her place. “To have that kind of connection snapped clean off? And then denied in your neediest hour?”
He shook his head, not wanting to compare himself to a baby, but still felt like he could relate.
In order to ensure a sense of continuity, Nina and Tracey kept Jordan’s birth name. Even though they’d wanted to name him Atticus, Milo or Henry, after Tracey’s father. They battled to be certain that he felt like part of the family: He was on the Christmas card, Tracey got his name tattooed on her shoulder and they even sold the Belltown condo for the Green Lake house in order to create more space for the little guy. He was behind in every development indicator, except his weight, which was bloated with a diet of Ruffles and McDonald’s hash browns. The poor kid screamed every time he was left alone in a room, even for a few moments.
For the first six months, they didn’t hear a word from or about Inez. Didn’t know much more than her first name. She and her baby daddy were both in jail for dealing, and she mis
sed her first two supervised visits with Jordan after her release.
Tracey stayed at home with Jordan while Nina transitioned from software to real estate. They got Jordan’s weight under control, improved his gross motor skills through toddler gymnastics, worked on his English—and Spanish too—and, with the help of a specialized sleep consultant, they were able to get him to relax, if not sleep, through the night.
Tracey incorporated leafy greens and root vegetables into his food in inspired, hidden ways. He got haircuts from the salon where the kids sit in Disney-themed chairs and watch their choice of age-appropriate DVDs. New clothes came next, including matching light-and dark-colored Patagonia jackets to go with different pants and hats for the colder months. And there were the shoes. Shoes for playing, shoes for the rain, rubber boots for the mud, shoes for the house, shoes for dress-up and shoes for playdates were purchased and purchased again in bigger sizes to keep up with his growing feet. That doesn’t even get into the books. The books that poured out of his bedroom and into the hallway and were layered atop the furniture in the kitchen and TV rooms and playroom. They had to make up for his lost time, and it was essential that Jordan consume a steady diet of thirty thousand written and spoken words per day—minimum.
With the new Adoption and Safe Families Act’s shit-or-get-off-the-pot deadline approaching, Nina and Tracey’s lawyer drew up paperwork. They bought Tracey’s parents a flight from the Bay Area to come to the adoption party they had planned at the Chihuly Boathouse.
One Tuesday afternoon, two and a half weeks before the adoption party, the judge was to sign off on the paperwork. Instead, he reinstated Inez’s daytime visits. Now without supervision.
She had completed rehab again, sported a glittering Jesus piece around her neck and a caseworker was helping her get a menial job. And that was enough. Until that point, Tracey and Nina didn’t have any notion that she was interested in Jordan or repairing the relationship.
Their lawyer petitioned the judge about ASFA, but His Honor upheld Inez’s extension. There was no additional discussion. He made his decision and was on to the next appalling domestic scenario on his docket.
“There’s only so long a kid can drift without family.” Lonnie chews at the inside of his cheeks. “In the end, all you know is: alone. I know hella people, but none of them’d help me move or come visit me if I got sent to Walla Walla or even call me up and ask, ‘Hey, Lonnie, how’s it going?’ without some ulterior motive.”
Lane tries to put an end to the conversation. He knows where it’s going. “Not me.”
“I know, my dude,” Lonnie says with a jolt of animation. “Let’s go buy forties before the stores close. C’mon.”
Lane pictures them drinking in the 7-Eleven parking lot and Lonnie ranting about fractional-reserve banking and the true fact that he can’t meet any girls or maintain a romantic relationship. From there they’d end up at some random tweaker’s apartment doing lines and drinking Mickey’s until everyone is numb enough to finally stop talking about how the CIA created the AIDS virus, watch the sun come up, take some unidentifiable gelcaps to try to manage the descent and spend the next two days in bed dreaming up low-effort ways to commit suicide. In order words, an amplified version of how Lane’s felt every day since he got back to Seattle.
“Can you drop me off at home?” Lane says, making minimal effort to dress it up as a request.
ELEVEN
BLINKING HOLIDAY LIGHTS AND PLASTIC garlands ring the cold cut display case. Christmas crowds surge the store, gorging themselves on everything from recliner chairs and preassembled holiday cold cut platters to electric brooms and sale half-racks of Red Dog lager. Eight minutes have ticked off the lunch break, and Lane’s optimism stumbles. He searches for that synthetic confidence he’s used to bullshit his way to an A– without doing the reading in undergrad seminars or to get across Seattle on an expired bus transfer.
After three different smoke breaks with Inez in which he wore down her outer defenses with free Parliaments but still didn’t get beyond small talk and furtive eye contact, he spent two days strategizing for this first full lunch break together. He wrote out and rehearsed his messaging points but didn’t account for not being able to find her, that such a small detail could threaten his whole plan. He swears under his breath as he speed-walks around the store, trying to look purposeful but not desperate.
She’s not in the break room, now decorated with strings of Mylar snowflakes. He waits in the hidden smoking area. It doesn’t last long. The wind burrows through his black Dickies, drilling into his femurs. He still has sensitive spots on either thigh from where he used to donate marrow at $250 a pop for hospital research. His old friend Robbie had turned him on to that one with the irresistible pitch, “Great cash but like the worst pain you’ll feel in your life.”
He asks after Inez in the Home Essentials and neighboring School Supplies sections. A middle-aged coworker removes his glasses and says, “She’s probably busy convincing another sad bastard to loan her their paycheck.”
“For what?”
“Whatever. Her son. Christmas. Some crap.” The man cleans crust from his eyes. “Hard to refuse a cute chick with a young kid. You ever notice the ass on that one?”
Half of the lunch break has bled away. Lane runs out front to try to see if she’s in the lot. The smell of the deep fat fryers greases the air, trailing him for the first ten paces out to look across the great expanse of pavement.
He returns past the Coinstar machine and the Toy Shoppe game with its mechanical claw dangling above a treasure trove of malformed teddy bears and hard Pikachus. No Inez.
Lane considers giving up and thinks about how to best explain this failure to Nina. How to convince her not to cut him loose. Not yet. On his way back to the deli, he spots Inez standing in front of the Washington’s Lottery vending machine. The fluorescent lighting from inside of the yellow box washes over the curves of her cheeks and shines off of her dark lashes. In this light, he is able to distinguish the color difference between her pupils and her irises, as dark as her hair.
“Don’t do it,” he says. “Not during work hours.” He’s willing to bet that if she gets herself fired and that leads to her losing visitations, Nina will refuse to pay him.
“Lottery?” she asks. “No way, man.”
“Fireable offense.” He is not sure if he is lying or not. “Seen it happen before. More than once. And none of them won any cash either.” Now he knows he’s lying.
“Can you hook me with some lunch money then?” She stares deep into his eyes, piercing back to his brain.
He won’t see his first paycheck for weeks, but he waves her over. “I got something for you. But we only have a few minutes.”
As they walk toward the deli, Lane reassures himself that he is the one in charge and the unwelcomed racing pulse and tingling extremities he feels are because of the stakes of the situation. That and the tight time frame. That’s all.
IF INEZ IS UNCOMFORTABLE WITH the metallic finality of the walk-in door bolting behind them, she doesn’t let on. She blows into her clasped hands and watches the vapor burst from between her fingers.
“You sure you can’t loan me some lunch money?” She feels the chill working its way around her collar and down her back. “Cold as balls in here.” Lane yanks a Ziploc bag full of slicer scraps from behind the mayo drums. It’s all shredded chips and trim from the ends of the turkey loaves. The seeds and stems of the cold cut universe.
“Personal stash.” He smiles and passes her the bag. “I don’t share this with just anybody.”
She takes it in her arms, sits down on a crate of premade ambrosia salad and rips into the turkey, eating two and three slices at a time. He takes off his jacket and drapes it over her shoulders.
“Why you being so nice to me?” she asks through a mouthful.
He considers for a moment and decides to go for it. “You know you got all the guys here wrapped around your finger, right?”
�
�Right . . .” She rolls her eyes and digs back into the bag.
As Lane is about to ask her if she wants some cheese scraps, they both jump at the grinding clang of the walk-in door being unbolted from the outside. Inez hides the bag between her legs until they see that it’s Bizarro Lane from the deli counter.
“Don’t you know how to knock, dude?” Lane shakes his head, trying to build solidarity with Inez through mutual annoyance.
“Heck. Sorry, Biz,” says the kid, who then turns to Inez. “Hey, I thought I saw you come back here.”
She nods to him and smiles.
“How’s your son?” he asks.
She swallows. “Great. Yeah. Bigger every day.”
“Son?” Lane interjects, trying his best to sound surprised.
“Yeah, my little man. He’s two. Two and change.”
The clerk turns his shoulder to cut Lane out of the conversation and drops his voice. “Um, I’m not trying to, you know, pressure you or anything, but I was meaning to ask you, is there, uh, any chance you have that twenty bucks?”
“Yeah, for sure. But, remember, after Christmas.” She starts searching the bag for the most intact remaining cold cut.
“OK, sorry, that’s right. And your husband? He doing better?”
“It’s been a hard year. With the accident and all.”
“I thought he had cancer?”
“Well, yeah, but the accident, that’s what caused it. But, either way, your help means a lot to my son. He loves Christmas so much.” She turns on a smile with a humble charisma that Lane hasn’t yet witnessed. “You’re doing the Christian thing.”
The guy smiles back. She’s made his day even though he’s out the cash. “Mars Hill? Sunday? I looked for you there last week.”
“Weird,” she says. “You probably didn’t recognize me ’cause I dress real proper at church.”
Lane edges back in the conversation. “You go to Mars Hill too?”
Lake City Page 7