by Baxter Clare
“What’s for lunch, Watson?” Frank asked.
He just shrugged, concentrating through the flapping wipers. Frank twisted around with a sharp glare for Kennedy. “Are you ready for this?”
“You know it,” Kennedy grinned, making three loud pops with her gum.
She apologized sheepishly when Jill said, “If my kid does that, he’ll never chew gum again.”
“How come he’s called Tunnel?” Kennedy asked.
“Cause he’s long and black,” Johnnie chimed.
As they approached Reston, Frank went over the plan one more time. The detectives squinted through the rain at the crumbling apartments. Five units stacked over five, spalling gray concrete dotted with bullet holes, rusted stairs at either end providing access to the upper apartments. Some of the windows were covered with tin foil or cardboard. Some were intact but cracked. A few held sagging Christmas decorations.
They parked on the street and scrambled through the maze of crumpled lawn chairs, sprung couches, and garbage. It was hard not to step on shattered Olde English or Cobra bottles. While Jill and two of the cops scrambled around to the back of the building, the other two stayed with Frank’s group. They took their positions under the balcony at the apartment’s door, hands loosely next to their holstered weapons, radios on. Johnnie pulled the warrant out with a flourish and winked at Frank.
She knocked loudly, and a woman’s skinny face peered from behind a sheet in the window. They heard muted voices, then after an inordinate amount of time bolts were slowly drawn back. The woman who’d appeared in the window opened the door a few inches and peeped out from under a chain lock.
“We have a warrant for the arrest of Timothy Johnston,” Johnnie growled.
“He ain’t here.”
“We have reason to believe he is. Unchain the door and step outside.”
“I gotta get my coat,” she said fearfully, starting to close the door.
“STEP OUTSIDE NOW!” Johnnie bellowed.
The woman glanced over her shoulder, then closed the splintering door and fiddled with the chain. Like a high-speed computer, Frank’s brain processed reasons for the delay—getting rid of a stash, trying to get out the back, hiding, positioning for fire. The former seemed the most likely scenario. As the door started to open, the radio blared that a black male, not the suspect, had jumped from a rear window and was in custody, but that there was at least one more black male inside the apartment.
As the woman stepped through, Frank flung the door open. It bounced against the wall. In slow motion she saw Johnnie step inside. Frank followed. They’d walked into a small entry in front of a kitchen. A figure—black/male, Frank registered—had slipped down a hallway off the cluttered living room to their left. Johnnie yelled at him to freeze, but his shadow slid down the hall. He and Frank drew their pistols at the same time. She was vaguely aware that Noah and Kennedy had done the same. Her peripheral brain acknowledged a greasy pile of rock on a coffee table. A cold drop of sweat splashed onto her ribs as she stepped long-legged across the open doorway to the hall. Their suspect had turned, facing them. He was unarmed, but not Tunnel. Where the hell is he, she wondered?
Frank’s adrenaline rush made each word coming from the radios crisp and distinct. “We have a second black male in custody. Not the suspect.”
Two, she thought, neither Tunnel. Stealing a terrified look to his right, then back at the cops with 9mms drawn on him, the man at the end of the hall slowly raised his hands.
“I didn’t do nothin’,” tumbled breathlessly out of his mouth. Outside, the skinny woman started crying, wailing to be released.
“Okay,” Johnnie soothed, walking toward him with gun lowered. “Be cool. Just keep your hands behind your head and kneel down for me.”
Frank held her gun on the man until Johnnie cuffed him. Noah was just inside the hall, gun drawn. Kennedy was next to him, a step behind. Johnnie hustled his man between them, out to a waiting cop. The skinny woman’s wailing increased. Frank distinctly heard her scream, “Timmy! Come out, baby,” and the hair on Frank’s neck stiffened.
He’s still in here.
She motioned Noah to take the door to his right, and Kennedy the room to her left. Frank stepped into the bathroom. Rain water was blowing in from the open window. She reached toward the closed shower curtain.
“GET OUTTA HERE MUTHA-FUCKAS! GET OUTTA HERE OR I CUT THE BITCH! GET YO FUCKIN’ ASSES OUT NOW!”
Frank froze, but her brain screamed, Kennedy. Fuck! He’s got Kennedy!
The woman was screaming louder now. Frank heard Noah say very calmly, “Okay. We’re gone. We’re outta here. Just relax, man.”
“GET OUT! GET OUTTA HERE! GO ON, MUTHA-FUCKA, ‘FOR I CUT YO’ ASS TOO!
Frank stood in the little bathroom, barely breathing. Automatically she clicked off her radio, abstractly noting the cracked, faded linoleum, the dirty white towel hanging on the bathroom door, the old toothpaste scum in the rusty sink. She heard scuffling in the hallway, Noah’s easy voice, in the living room now. She couldn’t hear him clearly, the woman’s crying was drowning him out.
“GO ON! GET OUT!”
Then Noah’s voice, louder than it had to be, for Frank’s benefit. “Okay! We’re all gone! We’re all out of here, man. It’s okay now.”
A door slammed and the woman’s screams receded. Through the open window radios bleated for back-up. In the living room, a man she assumed was Tunnel was repeating, “Aw motherfuck, aw Jesus, aw fuck.”
“Hey, it’s alri—”
“SHUT UP BITCH! I WANT YOU TO TALK I’LL TELL YOU. SHUT YO’ FUCKIN’ MOUTH!”
Kennedy said something quietly, then Frank heard Noah talking through the door. It sounded like he was trying to reassure Tunnel that he was going to be okay, that this could be worked out if he just stayed cool. Frank strained to hear him asking Tunnel what he wanted.
“JUST BACK OFF!” Tunnel shouted, then said more to himself, “I gotta think ‘bout this.”
Noah replied they couldn’t back off without Kennedy.
“You understand that, don’t you? You wouldn’t leave one of your homies and we can’t leave ours. So what do you want us to do? Talk to me, Timmy.”
Noah was engaging him, keeping him occupied. Tunnel had no idea Frank was in there with him. Her gun hand started to shake and a completely irrational memory flashed through her head of driving up Highway 101 in the sunshine, Mag laughing and getting whipped by her own hair.
Okay, she ordered, steady up, goddamnit. Despite a clamoring heartbeat and an incredible desire to take a leak, Frank forced herself to breathe deeply and smoothly, focusing on the present. Noah was talking soothingly through the door, and she thought, Good boy, No. She was glad he was out there.
Stepping carefully and without sound, she peered around the door. The hall was clear. She couldn’t see Kennedy or Tunnel in the living room. She was grateful for the commotion in the apartment complex—anxious neighbors talking to each other, catcalls and insults, sirens, radios, cops in motion. A chopper was thumping overhead, and the rain fell on, a somber motif to the cacophony. Frank was acutely aware of sights and sounds, the smells of old grass and cigarette smoke, fried food and musty carpets, the texture of the 9mm, warm in her damp, cold hand.
Tunnel was telling Noah that he wanted a car, a black Explorer. Frank could hear him by the door, explaining he wanted a fully loaded vehicle.
Frank sucked in a deep breath. No one was in the hall. She darted into the bedroom on her left. It was dim and windowless and she froze beside the door. Holding her breath, heart thudding, she listened for Tunnel. He was still talking to Noah, who asked how Kennedy was.
Tunnel said, “Your bitch be fine unless you fuck wit me.”
“How do I know you haven’t cut her?”
“Fuck that. She my insurance. I cut her when I’m good an’ ready.”
“Then how come I can’t hear her?”
“Tell your homie, you alright.”
“
I’m fine, Noah. I really am.”
Kennedy’s voice was strong and steady. Her confidence encouraged Frank. Okay, she ordered again, breathe easy. Willing herself into a quiet spot amidst the chaos, Frank envisioned herself moving up the hallway, hugging the wall. She remembered the sheet hanging over the window in the living room. No reflection. Good.
Tunnel was nervously telling Noah that this was bullshit, like the cops were really going to let him get away.
“Hey man, I’m not saying we’re gonna let you get away, but at least in a car you got a chance. I gotta tell you it’s not a good one. The best thing you can do right now, the safest thing for yourself, is to send her out, and you follow, hands up.”
“I can’t do that!” Tunnel pleaded. “I can’t be locked up again.”
There was a pause, then Noah, ever patient, saying, “I understand you gotta do what you gotta do. It’s on you, man. Do you still want the car?”
“Hell yeah! What other choice I got?”
“You can come out, man. End this right now, before you get hurt or a cop gets hurt. You know that’d be as good as the chair, Tim. If you stop now it’ll go a lot easier.”
“I done it now, cain’t stop. Done set it rollin’,” Tunnel said pragmatically.
That was when Frank made her move to the edge of the hall. Now Tunnel was talking softly to Kennedy.
“I should just bleed you just like I’d bleed a Crab, and let your brothers take me out. Yeah,” he said wistfully, “I go out a ghetto star and there be one less pig bitch in this fucked-up world.”
Again Frank felt the panic brush against her, like a huge, winged shadow, and she knew she had to do something. She knelt quietly and peeked around the wall. Tunnel was standing with his back to her, facing the door and holding Kennedy against him. It looked like he was holding something to her neck, but from her angle Frank couldn’t see what it was. She retreated behind her corner, weighing her options. Sneak out the bathroom and continue negotiating. Stay hidden and continue negotiating. Pull a gun on him and hope he’d surrender. Not likely. Johnston’s rap sheet was extensive and included numerous aggravated assaults and two murder charges, both of which he’d beaten. Clearly he was capable of violent and aggressive action.
“Get me that shit,” he was ordering Noah. “And I want it now, like in ten minutes and—”
“That’s impossible, Tim,” Noah interrupted.
“DON’T TELL ME WHAT’S FUCKIN’ IMPOSSIBLE!” he exploded, “CUZ IF I DON’T HAVE ME A FUCKIN’ RIDE IN TEN MINUTES I START CUTTIN’ THE BITCH! SO DON’T TELL ME WHAT’S FUCKIN’ IMPOSSIBLE!”
Frank squeezed her eyes shut. His height made his head a clear shot. There’d be no wounding him, only the one clean shot. It would kill him. Oh Jesus Christ. She thought about aiming for his right shoulder and disabling him, but Kennedy was too close against him. Christ, if she’d just step a little to the side, I could get his arm.
She held her breath for a moment, trying to hear where Tunnel was.
She had to look again. Johnston still had his back to her, was still hugging Kennedy against his chest. If I go wide I hit Kennedy to the left, to the right I go straight through the front door.
Frank resumed her squat against the wall. Shivering threatened to overtake her again and she backhanded drops of sweat off her brow. Fuck, this is so sideways! She heard Noah’s assurance that a car was on its way, but because they didn’t have enough time it wouldn’t be a black Explorer.
“What is it?”
Noah’s reply was muffled. Frank couldn’t hear it, but Johnston seemed satisfied.
“Alright. Yeah, that’ll work.” Then to Kennedy he said, “Yeah. You an’ me gonna go for a long ride, baby.”
Frank could see this getting out of hand, another OJ ride down the freeway, but the difference was OJ had everything to lose and Johnston had nothing. The fear in her gut told her to just end it, take him out while she still had a smooth, clear target. Only one shot. Part of her wanted to giggle insanely as Robert DeNiro’s face from a scene in The Deer Hunter swung crazily before her. Underneath her agitation, an older voice born of years of training and experience urged her to be calm and wait it out, get the negotiators in to slowly diffuse the situation with no one getting hurt. The problem was, she didn’t know if Johnston could be reasoned with. While she weighed this she could still hear Noah’s soothing voice and Johnston’s tense one. Then she heard another sound, like scuffling, quick steps, and Johnston swearing. Then with a hint of panic, he urgently whined, “Bitch, don’t fuck with me.”
She thought for a moment that Tunnel had seen her, then realized Kennedy must have broken free. Frank heard more steps, then Kennedy saying, “Come on, man, you’re not stupid. You gotta know this ain’t gonna work.”
In a freeze-frame moment Frank would never forget, the earth stood perfectly still and every clock in the world stopped ticking. Words and sounds murmured around her, but all she could distinguish was the rush of blood in her brain, like surf breaking smoothly on sand. Summoning a breath and holding it, she harshly willed her body to cease its trembling. She wiped the sweat out of her eyes and stood swiftly. In one smooth motion she swung a leg into the living room and took a stance, aiming the 9mm with both hands. Frank’s vision had narrowed and all she could see was Johnston closing in on Kennedy in the small kitchen, an open pocketknife in his hand.
She heard herself say, “Drop the knife,” and her voice sounded like someone else’s, from far away. She hoped he’d heard. He must have because he turned toward her. As he did so, Kennedy moved in on him. Johnston swung back, slashing the knife toward her. Frank moved when Kennedy did but stopped when she recognized the bright red spurt of arterial blood and saw Johnston reaching again for her. In slow motion she saw Johnston trying to drag Kennedy back against him, saw Kennedy grasping at her neck, the too-fast flow of blood, Kennedy suddenly white.
“LET HER GO!” Frank commanded. Johnston’s face was in her sights. He stared at her, still grappling with Kennedy, and Frank squeezed softly on the trigger. Like a girder in an earthquake, the tall man buckled and swayed as the right side of his brain flew into the ceiling.
Kennedy made a startled, incoherent sound and started to go down.
“Get an ambulance, get an ambulance!” Frank screamed to whoever was kicking on the door. Noah and Johnnie tumbled inside, drenched, hair plastered on their faces. They paused involuntarily, taking in Tunnel and Kennedy on the floor.
Frank had whipped off her jacket and was pressing it against Kennedy’s neck. Kennedy looked at her, eyes wide and dark against the sudden paleness of her skin. She tried to say something, but Frank hushed her. “You’re gonna be alright. Just be still, okay?”
Kennedy barely nodded, and Frank said quietly, “Atta girl.”
Noah knelt next to Frank. He took Kennedy’s hand. “You’re supposed to stay outta the way, idiot.”
Kennedy grinned weakly. She tried to shrug.
“Hang in there,” he crooned, “You’re doin’ fine, just fine.”
Kennedy glanced at Frank, as if for verification, and Frank smiled reassuringly, telling her to stay still. “It’s just a nick. Don’t worry. Ambo’s on the way.”
“What happened?” Noah asked. Their eyes locked over Kennedy, sharing a flicker of dread.
“They were scuffling. He cut her. I shot him. Where was he?”
Noah looked sick. “Behind the door,” he said pointing his head toward the hall.
Frank looked perplexed. She glanced at Tunnel, realizing he was skinny enough to have gone undetected on the other side of the hall door. For a second she thought she was going to puke, but she took control and said softly to Kennedy, “How you doing, sport?”
The young cop blinked a few times and shivered. Frank barked, “Get me blankets!”
A uniform covered Kennedy with a ratty bedspread, while Johnnie yelled on the radio for a fucking ambulance. Jill burst through the crowd, completely soaked, and gasped, “Oh, my God.”
“You’re doing great,” Frank assured, wondering where the goddamn ambulance was. With her free hand she smoothed Kennedy’s forehead, smearing even more blood on her. A siren grew closer and Frank silently exhorted, Hurry, hurry, hurry, fucking hurry.
Cops had gathered like flies on shit around the apartment.
“Get everyone out of here,” she said to Jill who seemed grateful for an order. Two EMTs rushed past her, and Frank and Noah scrambled out of their way. The techs wedged a foam block around Kennedy’s head and slid her onto a backboard, rising together on the count of two.
Frank and Noah followed them to the ambulance.
“I’m going to ride with her,” Frank shouted over the rain. “Get back to the office, find out who her next of kin is, brief Foubarelle.”
To the ambulance driver she shouted, “Where are you taking her?”
“King/Drew,” he yelled.
“No, tell Foubarelle where we are,” Frank said, as she jumped into the back. An EMT banged the doors together. She left Noah standing in the rain and swearing.
20
Everyday, in milliseconds, people make decisions that put them on specific paths with destiny. Some are good decisions, like taking the stairs instead of the elevator only to find later that the power went out just as you walked out of the building, or choosing tuna salad at lunch and watching all your co-workers who ate the egg salad get salmonella poisoning. Some decisions don’t have such good outcomes, like taking the freeway instead of the interstate and hitting gridlock that makes you miss an important meeting. Or doing something seemingly trivial that creates a fatal domino effect, like Frank did when she spitefully ignored the half-and-half on the grocery list.