Stacking in Rivertown

by Barbara Bell

  Alleged?

  After all, it goes on to say, no body was ever recovered.

  I think of Ben reading this article, and I try not to panic. No one can possibly know where I am. My trail is cold, except, I have to concede, for my little excursion into criminal behavior at Dave and Betty’s. And then there was that incident at the hotel with all the puke.

  I grind my teeth. I’m going to have to call that little shit of a detective again and get him off my case, maybe have him retract this alleged crap.

  Later, I convince John to let me run the Chicago deliveries again, so they can spend more time with their horny son. It’s good I’m leaving anyway, since Susan is due to show up that evening. Utopia’s getting a little crowded for my taste these days.

  I have a hard time about not letting Tut come with me, but I worry that Ben’s on my trail. To distract him, I hand over the CD I bought for him the last trip. This makes him so excited, he forgets about me.

  Once I’m in Chicago, I buy a phone card, ringing up New Yor k.

  “Bates here.”

  “Hi,” I say.

  “Beth,” he says. “I’ve been expecting your call. Or are you going by Becky now?”

  “You little shit,” I say. “Are you trying to get me screwed up? Do you have any idea what Ben will do to me if he finds me? I thought the police were supposed to be nice to their witnesses.”

  “All I want is your cooperation,” he says.

  “Maybe you should look the word up so you know what it means.”

  “I need to see you and ask you questions.”

  “Nothing doing. Ask me your questions now. I’m listening.”

  “Beth, I’ll find you if I have to put your face on wanted posters and milk cartons.”

  “God, why don’t you go after someone like Ben this hard?”

  “I’m working on that one,” he says.

  That scares the shit out of me. “You should talk to some of the kids he gets and sticks in that basement of his. They’d give you an earful.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what he did to you in the basement, Beth?” His voice is soft. It’s got something in it so much like sorrow, I think I might go crazy.

  “Don’t ask me that, Bates. You want to put me in the loony bin? I never think about that anymore. You can’t. It’ll make you do something bad.”

  “Like jump off a bridge?”

  I’m crying now. I can’t stop it. I slide down to a crouch in the phone booth.

  “You can do this for Violet,” he says. “She was your friend.”

  “You don’t know shit,” I say, but I’m still crying.

  “Calm down, Beth. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything. I wish to hell he’d never gotten his hands on any of you.” He stops, waiting for me to quiet down. “So tell me what you remember. I need more of a description. Where did it happen?”

  “That’s the thing,” I say. “I only now started remembering it a little. I really thought I had a fucking appendectomy for five years. And near as I can tell, it happened at Ben’s, which is strange. Ben always stops that kind of thing. He doesn’t like to waste all his training.”

  “You were in the room?”

  “Yes .”

  “So the guy kills Violet and starts on you, but you get away?”

  “No. That’s the weird thing. I couldn’t move. I must have been strapped down some way, and maybe gagged. I can’t remember that part.”

  “Why didn’t he kill you?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t remember being stabbed. All I remember is him bending over Violet. Her hands are cuffed back, and her neck is . . . ” I begin to gag.

  He waits as I compose myself. “You said he was at a reception earlier that evening?”

  “Yes. I saw Ben talking to him. I don’t remember his face other than that I thought he was handsome, about Ben’s size. He had a nice ass. And long brown hair in a ponytail. Oh, and he wore black gym shoes even though he was in a tux.”

  He’s quiet. “Do you think you’d recognize the guy again?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Can I send you some pictures?”

  “No. I’m not telling you where I am. Your police force has too many connections with Ben.”

  “Beth, why do you think he let you go for five years? Ben never does that. He doesn’t just let go of his . . . players? Isn’t that what he calls you?”

  I rub my eyes and cover them. “He’s in love with me, Bates. Lucky me. That’s why I jumped off the damn bridge. He’d given me eight hours to get my things and come back to his great prison. I would have never gotten out again.”

  “Took a lot of guts.”

  “No. All it took was a memory of that basement and a whipping and a beating. That’s what it took. I’m not going back to him. I’m not giving anybody any clue as to where I am. I’ll do whatever it takes to stay away from Ben, even if I really have to kill myself.”

  He’s quiet now. “We have hypnotists here that can help you remember things. There’s probably some around where you are. It could help us to get the killer.”

  I chew a fingernail. “I’m scared to remember.”

  “I know. I can see why. But we’re trying to catch this guy before he kills someone else. I don’t care if they are prostitutes.”

  I find myself beginning to like him.

  “How can I get in touch with you?” he asks.

  “I read the Times every day. You can put a message in the classifieds.”

  “Okay. I’ll put it in the personals. What name do you want it under?”

  “Tut,” I say.

  “Tut,” he repeats. “I’ll sign it Beefy.”

  I laugh. “Beefy?”

  “Yeah. You can probably guess why.”

  “How about ‘crumpled’ or ‘in need of an iron’?”

  “It’s not my fault my wife left me.”

  “That’s what they all say.”

  “You take care of yourself, Beth.”

  I think of my Uzi, my pistol, my shotgun. “I’m giving it my best shot, Bates.”

  I dream of Violet in the Dumpster. Her eyes are open like in the picture. I have kissed those eyes. They were warm. They were wet. Kissing them now and touching her again, I see how much she’s changed, how far she’s gone beyond my sight.

  When I look at the pavement beneath her Dumpster, I see streams of red. Violet is bleeding again, I think. When will she ever be done?

  Violet sleeping in the Dumpster. We would be wrong to wake her, to make her remember that night, wouldn’t we? Shouldn’t we let her sleep in peace?

  Policemen lean forward and take pictures. They draw back the blanket to reveal nothing but all my love heaped over her skin. They see her ruined body, her imperfection, and imagine her to be different from them.

  I’m overcome by the drape of her fingers, her hair dark and rich like night, and how deep she is sleeping. In this moment, her needs become clear to me. I gather the policemen together.

  Let us all leave quietly.

  8

  Berkeley

  I arrive at the farm late, having stopped to guzzle a few shots of Southern Comfort on the way back. Everyone’s out on the porch, laughing. I stumble out of the van and trip up the steps, falling down flat.

  I’m introduced to Susan, then I pass out on the porch, where they leave me all night. When I wake in the morning, I can hardly move. As I roll over and stretch, Sue comes out of the house with a cup of coffee for me. I stare at her lips, wondering what they would taste like. Tom walks out after her, and the three of us sit watching the sun come up.

  That afternoon, Tom and I load extra produce into the van, and we putter into Joliet, hitting a couple vegetable stands. After we’re done, we stop at the silver diner. We aren’t there very long when I notice that a guy looks to be watching us.

  “Let’s blow this place,” I say to Tom, throwing some change on the table and making for the door.

  He shoots me a funny look, but follows me out. Once we�
��re on the road, I keep my eye out behind. Tom’s staring at me.

  “There was a guy in there watching us,” I say.

  Tom’s waiting, still staring at me.

  “My husband might have hired somebody to kill me.”

  Tom hits the gas. We sputter down the road in our great escape vehicle.

  I sit and brood about Bates, thinking it’s time to move on again, but I have no idea where I’m going or what the hell I’m doing.

  “You know, Becca,” Tom says. “My girlfriend and I decided to live together this year, so I need to find someone who’ll sublet my apartment from me.” He shoots me a winning smile and adds, “But don’t tell Mom and Dad.”

  I lean back against the seat. San Francisco. It has a nice ring.

  “You’d love it out there,” he says, “And I’ve got this great job at a classy restaurant on the bay. I might be able to get you a job there. Have you ever been a waitress?”

  I consider the possibilities. Can’t be any harder than being strapped down and whipped for a living. “Oh, sure,” I say, remembering Jeremy and his morning coffee. “Women are born with waitress order pads in their hands.”

  He looks me up and down like he did at the airport terminal. “You’ve got all the qualifications you need.”

  I smile, looking out the window, wondering what great shops await me in San Francisco. “We can drive through in the Taurus,” I say.

  “Great,” he says, staring at my breasts.

  That night, after Tom and I are done, I stay up late listening to Miriam, but Violet intrudes.

  I see now that it had to have been Ben that threw her in that Dumpster. Just another cleanup after a play. And as I go over and over it, the trout beginning to rise, I swear that I smell blood. It’s all over me. I smell Ben, and behind that, I catch a hint of Kat’s perfume.

  My skin goes haywire like I’ve got bugs all over me. I scramble up and run out into the night, not stopping until my throat is raw. And after I’ve calmed, I climb up in the haymow and watch the night pass, my finger on the trigger of the Uzi. In a half-dream, I see Miriam’s eyes. Way back inside her dark pupils, I watch the moving of the river. It’s flowing rough and the undercurrent is wicked. But Miriam is smiling. I think she knows something that I don’t. I wish she’d tell me, because of Violet and how she haunts and how she won’t let me be.

  Violet is whispering, wanting me to know everything.

  I want silence and a simple appendectomy.

  During breakfast that morning, I break the news of my departure to John and Joan. They start obsessing about the farmwork.

  “I’m worried about my husband. He’s very violent,” I say, getting in some good practice on that particular lie. “Don’t tell anyone about me, even if they say they’re a cop. My husband’s a cop.” I should get an Emmy. “If anybody comes around asking questions, call Tom so he can tell me.”

  Tom and I pack the Taurus that evening, and we buzz out of town before sunup the next morning. It’s somewhere in the middle of Utah two days later that Tom’s groping around for something on the floor of the car. He comes up with the Uzi.

  “My God, Becca,” he says. “ Just a little paranoid?”

  Just a little.

  “I also have a shotgun and three pistols,” I say. “And boxes of ammo. Let’s start a religious commune.”

  He thinks it’s funny. So we stop, set up Coke bottles, and practice shooting different weapons at them. What a gas. The shotgun knocks me back so hard on the recoil that I get a bruise on my shoulder. We’re terrible shots, which makes me determined to correct the situation once I get to Berkeley.

  The next day, we tool into town late. I bed down with Tom since his girlfriend isn’t back yet.

  Free love.

  In the morning, Tom and I make a pilgrimage into the city (as they call San Francisco out here, as though it’s New York for God’s sakes). I graze the shops of San Francisco with a wad of cash in the pocket of my rangy-looking jeans. It makes my head spin after so many weeks of grunging my way across the coun try. By the time I’m done, I’ve wasted a couple thousand dollars.

  After we cross back to Berkeley, Tom shows me my new apartment. It’s an efficiency on the fourth floor not far from the university, sporting three windows, one of which looks down on the street. The other two have great views of brick walls. The furnishings are reminiscent of the decor in the two-room so long ago. I feel right at home.

  Then Tom calls up the restaurant, Tutti, a pricey purveyor of California cuisine. After he has Burt, the owner, on the line, he gives me a good plug as a hard worker. I know he’s really thinking about either my tits or my ass.

  It turns out that Burt is short a waitress and a kitchen manager at the moment, so he tells Tommy-boy to bring me over in the morning.

  I’m up early the next day, worrying. I shower and prep, agonizing over my clipped, bleached hair.

  “Lots of people wear it that way out here,” Tom says when he arrives. “If you want to finish off the look, you should get your face pierced in about three or four places.”

  I’m beginning to like the West Coast already.

  Dressed to the teeth again, like Ben always expected, I’m armed and dangerous, concealing my holster and gun beneath a silk cardigan. Tom drives me over to Tutti while I fret. I’ve never interviewed for a job in my life.

  Burt is a solid man, looking me straight in the eye when I shake his hand. He takes his time checking me over. Burt’s dressed in a well-tailored suit, but something about him tells me he’d be more comfortable in jeans and driving around in a banged-up truck. It’s his eyes that catch me. He’s seen things he wishes he could forget.

  Once we’re seated in his office, he asks me a few questions, not really listening to my answers as I lean a little forward to give him a view of the tops of my breasts cupped in just a touch of lace revealed. I cross my legs, hiking up my skirt.

  He hires me on the spot, before I get a chance to make an asshole of myself, which is all for the better. He wants me to start that evening.

  The first thing I notice as I begin my new occupation is how much the people get on my nerves. They’re so indecisive about what to eat. And they make such bad choices. Wine coolers when you can order a vintage wine? And who would eat ranch dressing in a place like Tutti? I find out that Burt keeps a huge jar of it in his office, hidden from Larry, the chef, who would have smashed it on the floor.

  I begin to wander through the kitchen, checking out the produce, the cuts of meat, the fish brought straight from the boat. Larry and I become fast friends. We toss the items of which we don’t approve at Burt’s office door.

  The first night, I’m introduced to Josh, the maitre d’, a tall, well-built man of gorgeous black skin. He bows and kisses my hand. Then he laughs, telling me that I’m lovely in his Haitian French.

  As the days go by, I begin to refer to certain parties who are dining as “the dangers.” Josh likes that. We compare notes on them. Tom, who’s now working mainly as a wine steward, Josh, and I form huddles around Josh’s desk, gossiping and deciding which women are the best dressed. All Tom cares about are tits and ass.

  Josh and I peruse the accessories, with me occasionally making a comment like, “She could wear a gun beneath that,” or, “A twelve-gauge would slip in there easy as pie.” My best, “That’s a purse big enough for an Uzi.” Josh eyes me. Tom looks the other way and whistles.

  After a couple of weeks pass and I settle into the job, I find myself beginning to argue with people about their choice of food. “You wouldn’t like that,” I say about the salmon. “It’s only farm-raised today.” Or, “No, no. Beef is never cooked to medium, you should eat the chicken.”

  Burt keeps nagging me. “Just nod when they order. Don’t even open those lovely lips of yours, as they appear to be untrainable.”

  I try. I guess all those gags at Ben’s never allowed me the opportunity to learn verbal control.

  So Burt takes me aside after I’ve been
there about a month. “I keep getting complaints about you, Becca. You’ve got to stop bossing the clientele.”

  I sigh. “Nice tie today, Burt.” I stand close and adjust it for him. Burt’s cheeks flush and he escapes, sitting behind his desk. It makes me like him a lot.

  “If it were anyone else causing these problems, I’d have to let the person go, but I’ve come up with a better idea. My buyer is leaving next week, and I still haven’t found a good kitchen manager. Since you seem to be so picky about the food, and since you’re so good at being bossy, why don’t you take on both positions? I’ll take care of the wine.”