Jake was about to ask why he hadn’t come straight home, but Eugene sighed and said, “Shit. I thought there was still a possibility, but I guess we’re both tired of it all.”
Jake said, “Tired.”
“I seriously feel like everything is going to hell. I mean everything. I’m pulling my hair out, I’m grinding my teeth, my career is fucked.” He looked up, and raised his voice. “My marriage is over. Jeez, is this a joke? Is someone playing a joke on me?”
“Hey, it’ll be okay. Maybe this is something good—”
“What?” Eugene said. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
Jake kept still.
“Good?” his brother said. “Are you joking? My life is falling apart and it’s good? Do you have any idea what you’re talking about? Do you have any idea what I’m going through?”
“No.”
“Of course you don’t. You’ve never held a real job, had a real relationship. What the hell do you know about anything? You just steal things and live off them while you can.”
Jake said, “Okay, maybe I’ll go out now—”
“Wait. No. Sorry, Jake.” Eugene advanced quickly, holding up his hands. “I’m sorry.”
“No, you’re right. I don’t know anything.”
“Forget it. I’m just not feeling too good right now.” Eugene walked into the kitchen. He opened the refrigerator and said, “Damn. Did I drink all the beer?”
“So, what will you do?” Jake called to him.
His brother was pale, drained. He leaned on the counter and said, “I guess find another job. Jeez. Eight years at that place, and I started when there were only six of us. I got fucked over big time.”
“Let me buy you a drink.”
“You’re on. How about dinner?”
They left the apartment, and in the elevator Eugene said, “We were actually going down in this elevator to look at the car. I was trying not to get mad about the accident, because it sounded like she was driving aggressively.”
“She was almost cut off,” Jake said. “It wasn’t really her—”
“And then, she just tells me that it’s over.”
Jake was quiet for moment. “Oh. Just like that?”
“Exactly like that: ‘It’s over.’”
“What did you say?”
“What could I say? It took me a minute to absorb it, then I said fine.”
They walked out of the elevator and through the lobby in silence. Eugene motioned towards a small steakhouse two blocks away. Jake saw his brother hunching over, shoving his hands deep into his pockets and sighing. He reminded Jake of a turtle. As kids Eugene would turn inward like this after being yelled at by their father. Jake suddenly had an image of his brother as a twelve-year-old, standing stiffly with his arms at his sides, his head hanging forward, as their father leaned over him and threatened him in a low voice. Eugene was crying. Then his father turned to Jake, who started running.
Jake said, “Do you remember Dad chasing me around the house at one point?”
Eugene was gazing down at the pavement as they crossed the street. He nodded slowly. “Yes.”
“What did I do again? I forgot.”
He turned to Jake. “You did?”
“I talked back to him?”
“Yes, but that wasn’t it.”
“What then?”
Eugene stared out onto the street. “You lost one of his tools. One of his gauges that you thought looked like a space ship. You took it out to play with somewhere and left it. He told you to find it, and you couldn’t. One his engine gauges.”
“Really?”
“You stayed out all day, trying to avoid him, but eventually you had to come home and say you couldn’t find it. He was drunk by then.”
“Oh.”
“Then you talked back. You told him it was just a tool.” Eugene smiled. “I think Mom fainted when you talked back.”
“Wait a minute,” Jake said. “Was that when I was yelling the nursery rhyme?”
“Yes, that was so weird.” Eugene let out a small laugh. “‘Jake be nimble, Jake be quick.’”
“Right. ‘Jake jump over the candlestick.’” Jake remembered letting out a deranged high-pitched laugh as he ran from his father, who was screaming at him. The world had blurred around Jake as he slipped out of his father’s grasp and made a mad dash for the back door, chanting the nursery rhyme to himself, but that seemed to enrage his father even more. At one point his mother tried to intervene, but his father smacked her away. What had happened next? Jake said, “Oh, wait. That was when he started beating the shit out of me. Mom was there too.”
Eugene nodded.
Jake had managed to reach the back door but before he could open it, his father had slammed it and grabbed Jake by the arm, lifting him up easily. Jake twisted and kicked the open air, like a snagged fish, flopping and arching; his shoulder socket seemed to wrench loose. He let out a yell as he ducked his head and tried to be a moving target. He was twisting so wildly that he didn’t see the first punch coming. He heard his mother shrieking.
Jake said, “Mom was still there.”
“That was right before she left.” They walked another block and passed a homeless man on the sidewalk. Jake recognized him from his first day here, the guy who had called him a chinaman. The man now pointed his crooked finger at Jake, who held up his middle finger. The man cackled.
Eugene said, “You know that guy?”
“I’ve seen him around here before.”
They entered the Ribeye House, and took a table near the window. Eugene ordered a pitcher of beer, and Jake, squinting at the menu in the semi-darkness—the lights above them dim and unsteady—asked for an appetizer platter. Jake turned towards the window and watched cars driving by.
Jake then noticed in the reflection Eugene staring at his hand. Jake turned back to his brother.
Eugene looked up. “Do you ever feel like you screwed up your life?”
Jake said, “No. I don’t think about things like that.”
“About your life?”
“About doing well or not. Measuring things. I just go along.”
“Yeah, you’re like that.”
Jake cocked his head. “Like what?”
“You just move along, even-steven.”
“I survive.”
Eugene looked down at his hand again and said, “Did Mom ever tell you that story about the clay kid?”
Jake shook his head.
“The story about the bad kid who never listened to his parents, so they turned him into clay?”
“No.”
“So the kid became this soft clay, but he went outside into the sun, disobeying his parents again, and he began hardening and drying. Then he began crumbling.”
Jake smiled.
“That story scared the hell out of me,” Eugene said. “I kept picturing this kid’s arms falling off.”
“That is scary,” he said. “Mom told you that?”
“When she was mad at me once. I forgot why.”
Jake asked, “How come you never told me that stuff about Mom leaving?”
Eugene glanced up at him, then shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Do you think she’s still alive?”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Do you think about her?”
Eugene didn’t answer for a while. He eventually said, “Yeah. A lot lately.”
“You do? Like what?”
“I miss her.”
Jake was startled. “After all these years?”
“Yeah,” Eugene said. “It’s strange, isn’t it.”
Jake didn’t know what to say. He ran his fingers along the gouges on the table. “Sorry about you and Rachel.”
Eugene shrugged.
“What happens next?”
“We’ll separate, eventually file for divorce.”
“Already?”
“I guess this has been brewing for a while.” Eugene continued looking at his hand.
He said, “I’m turning to clay. I feel it.”
“You’re not turning into clay,” Jake said.
“I’m solidifying. Soon I’ll start chipping off into pieces.”
“Stop.”
Eugene looked up. “What’ve you been doing the past couple of days?”
“Raising a little cash. Thinking about my options,” he said. “Is it time for me to move out?”
“No. It’s fine. You’re not planning on anything illegal, are you?”
Jake tilted his head. “Why do you ask?”
“It’s when you keep a low profile that I worry.”
Jake didn’t reply.
Eugene said, “You’re not, are you? What did I say about staying with me—”
“Take it easy. I’m not doing anything—”
“But you’re acting like, I don’t know, something’s—”
“No.” Jake shook his head. “I’m just weighing my options.”
Eugene studied him, then waved this off and said, “What the hell. I don’t care. Maybe you should do something big and let me live off you.”
“You can be my partner,” Jake said.
“Does it pay well?”
“A few days ago I had one ring appraised. It’s worth thirty-five grand.”
“Thirty-five grand?” Eugene asked. “How many rings do you have?”
“Plenty, but none as good as that one.”
He shook his head. “I’d rather not go to jail.”
Jake sat back as the waitress brought their pitcher of beer and two glasses. He said, “Yeah, there’s always that downside.” He smiled.
Eugene hunched over and drank his beer. He sank into the booth, and Jake saw with surprise that his brother was solidifying. A spider web of cracks appeared in his arm as he reached for the pitcher.
44
Jake accompanied Rachel to view apartments the next day, since he might soon be doing this himself, but he grew bored after the second one, a studio in the Sunset district listed at $1200 per month. The apartment was clean and roomy with hardwood floors and large windows, but he told Rachel as they left that it certainly wasn’t worth $1200 a month. She smiled at him. “That’s not as high as you think.”
“It’s not?”
“Poor Jake. If you do stay down here, you’re in for a shock.”
He wasn’t sure if she was serious until he saw her face, and he said, “No wonder you guys are in debt.”
“You’re right. I should be looking at cheaper places.” They climbed into the car, which hadn’t been repaired yet. They had stuffed the deflated airbags into the steering wheel and dashboard, but the compartments rattled open. Eugene had said he didn’t need the car, and would try to take care of the repairs soon. Rachel added, “When we split up, I’m going to be taking on more debt. Boy, my life is getting rosier and rosier.”
“How’re you going to pay it off?”
“Simple. I’ll have to get another job.”
“What about your time off?”
She sighed. “That’s pretty much over.”
“That was short.”
“Unless you have thirty grand to give me, I have no choice.”
He asked, “Why don’t you live in a cheaper area?”
“Maybe, but if I want to get a good job, this is the place.”
“So you’re kind of trapped.”
She was about to start the car, but stopped. She thought about this, then rested her head on the steering wheel. “Holy moly, what am I doing?”
Jake watched her.
“I can’t afford these places. I can’t afford anything. I’m in trouble.” She raised her head. “Maybe I should go live with my mother for a while.”
Jake smiled. “You don’t want to do that.”
“No, I don’t.” She turned to him. “I had to do this, you know.”
He nodded.
“I was…losing myself.”
“Sinking,” he said.
She glanced at him. “All right. I guess so.” Jake asked, “Still?”
“I don’t know. But at least I’m doing something. Moving ahead.”
Jake nodded.
“You know, sometimes I wonder if I knew this all along. Him, too.”
“Splitting up?”
“From the beginning, we knew it might not work. We were so different, and it was obvious from the beginning. Our personalities, our interests.”
“Like what?”
“We never do the same things. He doesn’t like to read, he doesn’t like the gym. I hate watching TV and movies, and I hate centering my life around work.”
“So why’d you get married in the first place?”
She was quiet for a while. She finally said, “Because we were in love.”
Jake visited them once when they were still dating, when Eugene lived in the Richmond district. It was true: they had been in love. He had noticed it then, their giddy attention towards each other, the way they held hands in an unembarrassed way and she leaned her head on Eugene’s shoulder. He said, “I remember. You two were all lovey-dovey. It was strange seeing him like that.”
“That’s right. You came by before we got engaged. We were so young.” She stared out onto the street. “Young and stupid. We had all these plans, but nothing went quite right.”
Jake heard the wistfulness in her voice, and said, “You mean your jobs?”
“That and other things.”
“Like what?” he asked.
She shrugged. “I think I mentioned it. We tried to have children.”
Jake remembered that yes, she had told him. “Can I ask why?”
“Why we wanted children?”
“Why you couldn’t.”
She frowned. “It’s complicated.”
Jake waited.
Rachel said, “Euge wanted kids more than I did.” She explained that Euge wanted the clichéd family, with two kids, a house in the suburbs, and Rachel driving an SUV to take little Robert and Sarah (no chance of them being teased for their names, unlike him, he had said) to soccer practice and music lessons. When they thought they were going to be rich and were scouting towns in Marin, they stumbled across a public park in Mill Valley where there were three simultaneous soccer games—girls’, pee-wee, and boys’—on adjoining fields, the parents clapping from the sidelines and the parking lots filled with gigantic four-wheel drives sparkling in the sun. Rachel had watched Euge take this in, his gaze sweeping across the fields, stopping at Mt. Tam, the sky deep blue, the yells and whistles and clapping surrounding them, and she could’ve sworn she saw his eyes watering. He had turned to her and said, “Pretty nice.”
Jake said, “I think he’s into that whole thing. Family.”
“Of course. He’s never had it. A normal family, stability. Who has? I understand.”
“And you?”
“I didn’t feel the same need, no. I’m not sure why.”
“But you went along.”
“Sure. It could’ve been nice.”
“But…?”
“Endometriosis.”
“What’s that?”
Rachel told him it was an abnormality—a disease, really, that screwed up the lining of her uterus—and it soon overwhelmed their lives. She agreed to the laser surgery. She agreed to the drugs, the clomiphene citrate, the Pergonal, Humegon, and Fertinex. She handled the nausea, vomiting, bleeding, headaches, bloating, rashes, and all those lovely side effects. Of course their health insurance didn’t cover this. Of course it didn’t work. At one point they were going to induce false menopause with even harsher drugs to stop the endometrial cells from producing. Then they’d try implantation (again), and she said, You know what? Forget it. I’m done. We’re done. You want a kid? We’ll adopt.
But Euge didn’t want that.
“Why not?” Jake asked.
“He just didn’t. But then things started going wrong anyway. And we were at each others’ throats.”
“I didn’t know all this.”
“Wh
y would you?” She checked her planner.
“Come on, let’s blow off the apartments,” he finally said. “Let me take you out to lunch.”
“But I have appointments—”
“More $1200 studios?”
Nodding, she started the car. “You’re right. Screw those. Where to?”
“How about Cow Hollow? There are some nice places to eat on Union.”
She said, “Sure, why not. Let’s eat out. Let’s spend more money.”
After a quick lunch at a soup and salad restaurant, Jake and Rachel walked around the neighborhood. When they approached the corner near Franklin & Sons Jewelry, Jake guided them up the side street and glanced through the store window. A different person at the counter, a young man with gold-rimmed glasses, was wiping the display cases. Jake said, “Can we go in here?”
Rachel eyed him. “Okay.”
They stepped inside. Jake looked quickly at the alarm unit again, trying to see what kind of keyhole it was. Tubular cylinder. Shit. Those were a nightmare.
“Good afternoon,” the young man said. “May I help you?”
Jake smiled. “My wife is looking at diamond rings.”
Rachel began to turn towards him, but stopped herself.
“We have a great selection,” the man said. “Over here, you’ll see, are our gold and platinum rings, all set with very high-grade diamonds.”
Jake looked for cameras, but saw none. He said to Rachel, “Honey, why don’t you check those out? I’ll just look around.”
She nodded. The young man met her at the end of the counter and began pointing out different rings and telling her what they were. Jake took inventory: six floor display cases with varying amounts of jewelry, two wall-mounted displays behind the counter with diamond and pearl necklaces, a small display of watches in the corner, and a window display with a mixture of gems and jewelry. If the owner didn’t take these home, then the back room held it all. He checked the line of views through the window. He couldn’t see anything on Union; cars and people on that main street couldn’t see anything in here. It would be hidden at night from police drive-bys.
Jake heard Rachel playing her part, telling the man that she hated gaudy rings, but liked the diamonds large.
The back room was separated by a wooden door with a simple pin and tumbler, but Jake needed to see everything behind it. He approached the young man and asked, “May I use your bathroom?”
The Lockpicker Page 15