Wild World

by Peter S. Rush

  “Unit 14.”

  Rizzo picked up the mike. “14.”

  “Detectives Bouley and Jones request backup at 142 Pearl Street in 15 minutes.”

  “On our way. Bouley, my man, must be a drug bust. Detective is where the real money is.” Rizzo put the car in gear but didn’t turn on the lights or siren. He pulled the car over to the curb several doors away from the address.

  Detective Bouley, a thin, wiry Doberman, was wearing a cheap blue sport jacket and blue-and-white tie. His long, thin fingers, the nails bitten to stubs, had white spots, as if they had been bleached. He exited his unmarked car on the far side of the address and met the squad car on the other side of the street.

  “We’ve got this little shit on the second floor. I need you to cover the rear in case he tries to make like a rabbit,” he said to Rizzo, not looking at Steve.

  Rizzo nodded, and they took up a post at the bottom of the back staircase. There were a series of small landings on each of the three floors. Bedsheets and underwear waved from the clothesline from the window on the third floor.

  Rizzo drew his gun and nodded to Steve, who did the same. He felt the revolver in his hand as he scanned the back door and the windows like Roy Rogers watching for the bad guys. He felt like he was in a TV Western, waiting for someone to start shooting. It was surreal. Feeling his blood begin to race, his mind registered that this was real life. The gun in his hand was loaded with bullets. What did he do if someone runs out—yell stop? Shoot? What if the suspect had a gun?

  The ideas raced through his mind, but he kept his eyes scanning the windows and checking in with Rizzo to see if they should approach the rear door. He looked down at the gun in his hand. What was he thinking? Once he took the gun out, the only option was to use it. And he knew he wasn’t going to shoot whoever came out of the apartment. He holstered his gun and positioned himself at the bottom of the stairs, where he could use his baton to reach anyone fleeing.

  Steve heard Bouley shout “Police!” and the sound of the wood door shattering as the detectives went in the front. There was a loud crash and a heavy thump at the top of the stair as Bouley yelled, “We got a rabbit!”

  Rizzo ran to the bottom of the stairs, his gun drawn and facing the steps. Steve moved to the side so that they could intercept the fleeing suspect. As the man rounded the last steps, he froze on the landing when he saw the cops. He retreated up the stairs and leapt from the landing to the ground.

  “Shit! He’s getting away!” Rizzo yelled. “Police! Stop or I’ll shoot!” He raised his gun to shoot at the fleeing man.

  “Hold your fire,” Steve yelled as he sprinted after the man. Putting himself into full gear, he stretched his legs, devouring the distance. He was the cheetah with the prey in his sights. He could feel the oxygen pumping fuel through his veins as his legs burst with speed. The man kept looking over his shoulder as Steve gained on him. The man tried to cut down an alley to elude him, but Steve was on him, dragging him to the ground.

  “Stay down; you’re under arrest!” Steve shouted. The man rolled to his back, his black hair matted across his forehead, and kicked Steve hard in the shin and got up to run.

  “Fuck!” Steve screamed as he tackled the man harder, this time driving him to the ground.

  “You’re doing this the hard way,” Rizzo said and cracked the man across the back of his head with his stick once, twice, three times, four times.

  “Enough,” Steve said. He pulled the man to his feet, cuffed. Rizzo whacked the prisoner across the chest, bringing tears to his dark eyes.

  “You don’t run, asshole. You’re lucky this rookie can run. Otherwise, we’d be calling the coroner.”

  Steve lifted the cuffed man, walking him back to the stairs. “You were going to shoot him.” He turned to Rizzo as the rush of blood began to subside.

  “Shit, yeah. He failed to obey a lawful order to stop—fleeing the scene.” Rizzo shrugged as he led them up the back staircase.

  “But we don’t even know if he did anything.” Steve felt a sense of disbelief at the cavalier answer. Shoot first, then ask questions?

  “If he’s running, he’s guilty of something. That’s all I know.”

  “Shoot an unarmed man in the back—how does that make it—you’ll get brought up on charges.”

  “No grand jury is going to indict a cop for doing his job. Besides, ‘unarmed’?” Rizzo stopped and turned, drawing his lips tightly together. “I’ve always got a drop piece.”

  Steve was processing what he was hearing. Was Gaeta right in the police academy—a cop can shoot an unarmed person? That wasn’t right. It was against regulations. But it happened, and it was condoned—by whom?

  More shouting came from the apartment, and then Bouley yelled out the window, “Got another one!” Rizzo and Steve pushed the prisoner up the back staircase. A skinny twenty-two-year-old kid with a pockmarked face was handcuffed and sitting on the floor next to the metal kitchen table. On the Formica counter was a black suitcase full of marijuana. Beside it was a briefcase filled with cash.

  “That’ll get these dirty hippies five years unless he cooperates,” Bouley smirked. The kid scowled, but the dark-haired man kept his head down.

  “Got to be a couple of kilos there, and twenty thousand in cash.”

  “Whew,” Rizzo whistled. “Almost had to shoot this rabbit, but Rookie here chased him down.”

  “Fuck, he saved you some paperwork.” Bouley looked at Steve, who felt like he was in a friend’s apartment: plastic bead curtain separating the rooms, beanbag chairs, and a lava lamp turning over purple liquid in a languid loop. He had to make certain their apartment was kept clean. He could imagine the captain’s glee if they found a bag of pot sitting on the table in the living room.

  Bouley took cash out of the briefcase and put it into a paper grocery bag. He gave Rizzo a large handful of bills. Then the detective put a couple hundreds in Steve’s top pocket. “Nice job, Rook.”

  “Rizzo, thanks for the backup.” He looked critically at Steve. “Let me know next time if we have fresh meat.”

  Rizzo nodded.

  CHAPTER 8

  ONE TOKE OVER THE LINE

  In the apartment, Steve, Roxy, Cal, and Bill were passing around a joint with Suzi and Liz, two close friends. They were listening to the Doors.

  “Now, with Joplin and Hendricks dead at twenty-seven, what’s happening to the music? The Doors are going to be on campus in a couple of weeks. We should go before Morrison is dead, too,” Cal said in a slightly stoned stupor. They all nodded slowly to the idea except Steve.

  “I may have to work that night,” he paused. “At the concert. Crowd control.”

  They all laughed, “No way.”

  “And I’ll be looking for any punk-ass kids smoking dope or doing drugs.” He passed the joint.

  “Yeah, you’re the fascist patrol, brown shirt and all. Bust hippies and Blacks. Have you starting rounding up the Jews yet?” Cal asked.

  Steve looked slowly around at the faces, knowing each one had a different hold on the present. “What an asshole thing to say. What do I do? Uphold the law? Guess it depends who I am looking at. If you see me at the concert, stay the fuck away from me so I don’t crack up.” He was realizing how fungible the enforcement of the law really was. Busting hippies or Blacks for drugs was high on the list. Busting stores running numbers for the mob wasn’t worth the paperwork. It was exactly the immoral situation he’d hoped to find and change, and yet it was also perfectly normal.

  He told himself to let it go for the night. He was relaxed with his friends, almost feeling like he was back in college. The night off felt good.

  “So we get this call. Public intoxication. I’m with my partner, Crowley—who’s been on the force for twenty years and is still a patrolman. Not setting any speed records with his thought process,” Steve started his story, having the attention of the group.

  “Is this a true story?” Suzi, a very pretty, athletic girl from Denver, asked. St
eve was impressed that only a knee injury kept her from the skiing in the winter Olympics.

  “Yes, it’s true.” Steve pulled his head back as if hurt by the question. “Crowley is a bit of an old woman at times. So we arrive in front of this apartment building at two a.m., and there is this old guy, in filthy clothes, lying on the sidewalk. Crowley says, ‘Ah, shit—it’s W.C. again.’

  “‘Who?’

  “Crowley points to the man on the ground. ‘We call him W.C. because he looks like W.C. Fields and is always drunk. Call the drunk wagon; we can bring him in, let him sleep it off, and feed him in the morning.’ So I made the call. By the time I get back, Crowley has this old drunk sitting up against a tree so he doesn’t drown in his own puke.

  “When the wagon comes, the driver says to me, ‘We can’t take him unless you cuff him.’ Crowley nods to me, I put my cuffs on W.C., and we lift him into the wagon.”

  Liz and Suzi were leaning forward, and Steve was enjoying their attention to his adventures, knowing he was telling them stories from another planet. He looked at Roxy, who rolled her eyes.

  “Not the end of the story,” Steve said.

  “So what happened?”

  “It was a setup. We get back to headquarters to do the paperwork, and the driver of the wagon is waiting for me. ‘Come get your prisoner,’ he tells me.

  “‘What?’ I ask.

  “‘Your cuffs, your prisoner. You have to take him out of the wagon.’ So I go downstairs and the wagon is in the garage, and about eight cops are standing around the open door. As I go over, there is W.C., all covered with greenish-yellow vomit. I look around, and all the cops are smiling. I go over to get him off the floor of the wagon, and I see he has peed in his pants; I could smell he had completed the trifecta.

  “‘Could someone give me a hand?’ I asked the cops surrounding the door.

  “‘Your collar, Logan,’ one of them says. ‘I’ve had my W.C. collar. Don’t need another,’ another cop says. So I have to grab this guy and put him in a fireman’s carry over my back, down to the detention cell with all sort of fecal matter and other stuff running . . .”

  “Enough details.” Liz held up her hands. Steve saw Roxy playing with her hair as she listened.

  “Well, it seems W.C. has been doing this for years—but only lately has it been three for one. And rookie cops get to have the initiations—three showers later, how do I smell?” He got up to let people smell.

  “Go away,” the girls cried, pushing him back with their feet, to everyone’s amusement. Roxy, who was at the door, rolled her eyes at him, and they retreated to their bedroom.

  “You don’t need to tell these stories. I know you want to be the hero, but . . .” Roxy said as she pulled the peasant blouse over her head.

  “I’m not the hero,” Steve said, but he knew she was right. Tonight, he felt more like part of the group than he had in weeks. He knew the job was pulling him further and further away from his friends. And he was feeling more alone. “I’m trying to tell them how this city really is, not just up here on college hill.”

  She shook her head, pursing her lips. “Sure you are.”

  “But there is stuff. The cops beat the shit out of this mental guy. There was nothing I could do about it. And it was just plain wrong.”

  Roxy froze and looked at Steve up and down. “You couldn’t do anything?”

  “No,” he said, embarrassed at his answer. “There is more shit, too . . . they just take it for granted, how things are done. I’m starting to take notes, you know like a diary . . .”

  “Okay,” she said, sitting on the bed and moving her chemistry book. “Nothing?” She arched her left eyebrow.

  “I tried,” he said, cuddling next to her. “I tried.”

  Steve watched a new Pontiac GTO pass a parking spot on the street below, stop sharply, and execute a perfect parallel park. He turned around to Roxy and Bill, who were reading on the couch and in the easy chair with the permanently broken springs.

  “Steve, Steve? Anyone?” a man’s voice called from the stairs.

  Roxy walked out into the hall as Steve followed. She was dressed in a pair of shorts; Steve could see the tight t-shirt outlined her braless breasts.

  The man, still partially concealed in the shadows, raised his sunglasses and stared suggestively at Roxy. “Now, this is worth a thousand-mile drive to see. Woman, you are a beauty to behold.”

  Roxy’s face went dark and strained to see the young man’s face on the staircase.

  “You going to ask me in, or do I have to stand here and stare at your great body?”

  “Tommy?”

  The young man came up the remaining stairs.

  “What are you doing here? Why are you here? Does Steve . . .” Roxy moved forward and hugged him tightly.

  “Holy shit.” Steve embraced Tommy with a full bear hug. “Is the semester over in Florida?” he asked.

  “I like surprising people.” He was dressed in a tight-fitting silk shirt and designer jeans and was carrying a black leather travel bag.

  “Can’t you afford real furniture?” Tommy entered the living room behind Roxy and stopped to critique his surroundings. “And what kind of bad acid were you on when you painted that thing?” He pointed to the flaming Miro-like mural on the wall.

  “Why, why did you, when did you . . .” Steve asked.

  “I had business to do. Classes can wait,” Tommy said, perching his sunglasses on his head in his curly brown hair. Tanned, fit, and totally self-confident, he was wearing a Movado watch and had a gold-linked chain around his neck.

  “Business?” Steve asked.

  “On Long Island—back in the old neighborhood. I have some good connections in Tampa, so a little drive is worth my while. And I met a guy who has a few Providence connections, too.”

  “Guys, my little brother,” Steve said. Tommy nodded to each of them and then reached into his black bag and brought out a bag of marijuana, all the buds still compressed. He passed it around for everyone to admire. Steve shook his head. Here he was a cop, and his little brother is selling pot. Not that pot was bad, but it was illegal, and selling it was “criminal.”

  “Colombian Gold—best you can get. Got any paper?”

  They rolled a joint and passed it around.

  Steve tried to start the conversation again. “How’s everyone . . .”

  “Shit. Fine; they’re your brothers and sisters, too. Come for a visit. Big shot here goes off to a fancy school on a scholarship, and that’s the last we see of him.”

  “We came to visit once,” Roxy protested.

  “Yeah, in that shitty old foreign car. Lucky it was downhill most of the way.” He smiled a come and get me smile at her.

  They all laughed, enjoying the weed.

  “This is really good stuff,” Cal said, holding in his toke. He looked up and slowly exhaled the smoke, tipping his head back so he could watch it escape.

  “Any to sell?” he looked at Tommy.

  “I started with a key. Not much left; I have a lid or two.”

  “How much?”

  “One hundred twenty.”

  Cal left the room and came back with the money.

  “Did you drop out of school?” Steve tried to refocus his question. Tommy was wild, angry with the world. “You’re gonna get drafted, and you’ll be smoking this shit in Nam.”

  Tommy looked hard at Steve. “What’s school gonna do for me? I’m a poor kid from a shitty little town on Long Island like you. I’m out for myself. The war is about money—who’s making the money—defense contractors—and who pays—us little guys. You smart kids up on the hill don’t see this shit?”

  Roxy, a little lit with the smoke, said, “It’s about capitalism. Exploiting the people. You’re right.” She gestured with the joint. “We need justice and equality for everyone.”

  Tommy smirked. “Now, don’t get all communist on me, femma babe. Capitalism is good—making money is good. That’s why I’m here. I’m saying war isn
’t a great way for a little guy to make money, ’cause he gets shot doing it.”

  “But the capitalists will always oppress the people. Racially, socially . . .” Roxy searched for the next line.

  “Anyone starving like me?” Steve broke into the conversation. He didn’t want Roxy to go into a long speech that would probably set Tommy off as well. “Let’s go get some hoagies and wash ’em down with some beers.”

  “Hoagies on me.” Tommy stood, pulling out a roll of money.

  Roxy seemed distracted as Tommy put his arm around her, leading to the door.

  “How long you going to stay?” Steve asked, trailing them out the door.

  “Just the night. Have another stop on Long Island, then got important business in Tampa.”

  “You’ve got to be careful. We put people in jail here. And I hear it’s worse down south,” Steve said as they left the building. He was worried about Tommy. In grammar school, he had to protect him from the bullies because Tommy always seemed to want to prove something, getting into fights with bigger kids. Now Steve was afraid he was becoming more self-destructive. “Is it worth it?”

  “I’m always careful.” Tommy pointed to his new GTO on the street and lowered his sunglasses. “Yeah, it’s worth it.”

  Wearing loose, revealing pajamas, Roxy was studying at the desk while Steve was sitting propped against the pillows on the bed, reading. He came over to the desk and began nibbling at her neck.

  “Go to work; I have an exam tomorrow.” She hunched her shoulder with pleasure.

  “It’s midnight shift. I don’t get points for showing up early.”

  “Maybe you should. I have to study. Cal got into Yale Med School. He said he would help me with the microbiology. I need an A; I want to get into a good med school.”