Wonder Valley

by Ivy Pochoda

“Now what’s this about your mom?” Blake angled his chin up and blew smoke away from the camper, like it made a difference.

  “The way I see it,” Ren said, “you’ve been scamming her for a while now. And I’m here to put an end to it.”

  “Listen, kid,” Blake said, “back in the day you might have made your case but it’s been years since I scammed anyone.”

  “I saw you just yesterday. You got off the bus, met my mom, went around the corner. Next thing, your pockets are fat with her pills and she’s got a roll of cash in her pocket.”

  “You’re talking about Laila?”

  “Yeah,” Ren said.

  “Well, it’s not exactly a scam if I’m buying what she’s selling.”

  “She’s broke, living on the street. My guess is she’d do anything for money, selling her meds if necessary. So from where I’m sitting, it looks like a scam. A con. You’re taking advantage of a lady who doesn’t have any other options.”

  “Well, you’re right about that. Laila is out of options.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Didn’t you say you were her son?” Blake said. “Well, then, I don’t need to tell you that she’s dying.”

  “The fuck you talking about?”

  He knew, but then he didn’t. Ren had hoped to get Laila out of downtown before someone put this truth into words, made it real, solid, permanent. And now this dude—this Blake—some tenth-rate con artist had been the one to do it.

  “I asked, the fuck you talking about?” Ren repeated.

  “Come on, son. She’s half the woman she was a month ago and about a quarter of the person she was when I first met her. She doesn’t need her meds. So she might as well turn a profit on them, buy herself whatever comfort she wants.”

  Ren’s stomach was rising, his fingers tingling; every nerve in his body seemed on fire. “You let a dying woman sell you her medication?”

  “It’s her choice,” Blake said. “When you’re dying, they give you the good stuff for your sleeplessness, your anxiety, your depression. That’s what keeps the kids happy these days.”

  “How come you know she’s dying?” Ren said.

  “She just got finished a monthlong stint in the hospital. I’m guessing they told her there wasn’t anything more they could do. Gave her the meds, sent her on her way. It’s her right to die at home.”

  Ren had been pretty sure Laila was blowing smoke about her sojourn at the beach, but he never figured she’d been in the hospital. The desk sergeant at Central P.D. was right—he should have checked.

  “The streets aren’t home.”

  “Listen, I’m not one to judge who lives where. All I know is, we’d all be blessed to get to die where we choose.”

  For a second, Ren thought the guy sounded choked up. But he must be tripping, his brain in free fall.

  “Okay. Okay, okay, okay. So she’s dying.” The words tasted foul. “I’ll make you a deal. You leave her alone till she passes. And any meds she has left, I’ll give to you for free. I don’t need you profiting off Laila’s last days.” What he didn’t tell Blake is that both he and Laila would be gone before she died. Because no way in hell was he letting her pass on the streets.

  Blake ran his hands though his matted hair. “A deal?” he said. “All right if I counter? There’s this white kid I’ve seen hanging around Laila’s camp. I don’t think he lives there.”

  “There are a couple of white boys on the corner.”

  “About your age. He’s got dirty blond hair and his eyes are some sort of strange gray.”

  “That sounds like Flynn.”

  Blake gave a crooked smile. “It certainly does sound like Flynn.” He drew the name out. “If you tell me where to find him, I’ll leave your mom be until . . .” He trailed off.

  “Yeah, until.”

  Blake pulled out another smoke and held it in his mouth without lighting it. He looked expectantly at Ren.

  “He lives at the Cecil Hotel,” Ren said. “Top floor.”

  LATE AFTERNOON AND THE SUN STILL HADN’T FOUGHT THROUGH THE gray-washed sky. It had been the same shit for a week now, like a wool blanket had been thrown over the city, damming the light, casting a ghostly pallor over the streets. Back east overcast meant rain and promised some sort of release. But here rain didn’t come and the heavy-hung sky did nothing more than raise a whole bunch of expectations it couldn’t deliver. Folks downtown had their theories—some said it was the start of an El Niño, others prophesied an earthquake, and some even called it the June Gloom although summer was still months away. Whatever was coming, Ren wasn’t going to be around to see it.

  As he waited for the bus, he tried to figure what dying meant. Days? Weeks? Months? Maybe years. Because we were all dying, some slower than others; it was only that Laila’s deadline had been moved up. And if they’d let her go from the hospital, didn’t that mean they expected she’d have some living to do? Otherwise, they’d have kept her around, let her pass supervised. Had to be, right?

  It didn’t seem fair that he’d made his way cross-country, found his mom down in Skid Row just in time for this messed-up finale. He tried to be good but the world treated him bad. He tried to atone and the world turned away.

  So what the fuck? What did he have to lose? Folks imagined he was bad—he might as well do bad, especially if it helped him get on the up-and-up and get Laila out of downtown. If it helped her die dignified, why the fuck not?

  He got it now—how the boys in the PJs and the tougher kids in juvie kept a spring in their step. They owned their choice not to play nice, abide by the rules. They’d taken control, chosen a path they knew they could stick to, bad as it might be. And there was power in ownership. It gave you something in a world that denied you the rest.

  That’s how it happened. That’s how easy it is to step over the boundary of good and bad, to stop pretending to be one thing and decide to be another. Now he was walking faster. He felt lighter. In control.

  He began to look for Puppet.

  The cops were doing shakedowns on Skid Row, which only made Ren’s anger harder. Some of the police were mounted on horses, towering over the people in their tents. Others, wearing plastic gloves, even masks, worked the sidewalks, rousting folks from their camps, shaking out tents and sleeping bags, confiscating shopping carts and other things they felt the homeless shouldn’t have.

  Health hazard. Safety hazard. Pedestrian hazard.

  Abandoned property. Discarded belongings. Waste material.

  Any excuse.

  The hood was chaotic. People stood on the streets, watching their possessions torn through, piled willy-nilly as if everything was trash not personal property.

  Activists and community organizers had arrived, shouting at the cops, pulling aside the people whose stuff had been taken, trying to explain their rights and where they needed to go to file a complaint.

  A few folks were taken away in handcuffs. Several dogs were hauled off to a shelter, their owners howling and spitting after the police. Some people chased after the trucks carrying their stuff. A few shouted coherently about civil rights, illegal searches, invasion of privacy. Others just yelled freestyle curses.

  A man in an army jacket and red cap jumped up on an overturned shopping cart. “We gonna get your stuff back, but first we gonna paint a mural right here.” He pulled two cans of Krylon out of his backpack. “Private Property. That’s what it’s gonna say. Tell the police they can’t be messing with our possessions. Can I get a crew with me?” He uncapped one of the cans, rattled it, and sprayed it on the wall.

  Ren was too far away to hear the shake and hiss of the can as it released its paint. A day ago—that morning even—he’d have rushed over, asked for one of the cans, eager to leave his mark, let folks know that he had been here before he split town. But now he just pulled his hood low over his eyes and hustled off.

  He found Puppet in the third spot he checked, on some steps on Fifth Street watching over the action in San Julian Park. Puppet
sure kept his shit obvious, but Ren assumed he had his reasons.

  “My man.” Puppet bounced to his feet when he saw Ren. He was wearing a pair of shorts so long they might was well be pants and a T-shirt that could be considered a dress. He had his black baseball cap pulled at a right angle to his face, the straight brim knocking against his shoulder as he bobbed and dipped.

  “Whoa-ho, my man,” he said as Ren stopped in front of the steps. “You didn’t walk on by this time? You stopped for me.”

  Two of Puppet’s minions came down the steps, joined up with a kid on a bike, played a quick hand game then retreated.

  Puppet gave Ren the once-over. “You don’t look so good, you feel me? You look motherfucking abused.”

  “Your offer still good?”

  Puppet smiled and swiveled his hat round to the opposite side. “The man’s looking to do business, is that it?”

  “I need some bank.”

  “That’s a cold game, coming up to a man and straight-up asking for some cash.”

  “Yeah,” Ren said. “But call it an emergency. Extenuating circumstances.”

  “Ex-ten-u-a-ting.” Puppet drew the word out. He turned to his crew. The boys behind him nodded, then returned their gaze to the streets. Their eyes looked dopey, but chances were they didn’t miss a move over in the park. “This boy’s got a lot of big talk. A lot of hundred-dollar words. But he needs to get his paper up.”

  Puppet bounced down to street level and clapped Ren on the shoulder. “You feel me?”

  “Puppet, boy, I always feel you,” Ren said.

  Puppet stopped bouncing. He stood on his tiptoes so his bug eyes were level with Ren’s. Then his eyes widened and how that was possible Ren didn’t know. Ren stared him down, unsure whether the kid was going to bark, bite, or back off. Puppet bumped shoulders with him. “You one funny motherfucker.” He sprang back up the steps, whispered something in one of his boys’ ears, then was down by Ren again. “So you want to get your paper up? Time to get up off those streets?”

  “I need three hundred and change,” Ren said. He figured that three C-notes plus whatever Laila had in her purse would be enough for the tickets and some vending machine feeds.

  “Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. How come you think I’m gonna pay that large? That’s a whole lot of paper, you feel me?”

  “It’s what I need.”

  “Well, now it seems like there’s a whole lotta room between what you need and what I can give.”

  Ren jammed his hand deeper in his sweatshirt pocket, reflexively feeling for a pack of smokes he was too poor to have. He looked over at San Julian Park—a dance of users, dealers, and folks just trying to enjoy a little public peace. “I’ll do whatever.”

  “And who says I got whatever for you to do?”

  Ren glanced down at his dirty jeans, his sockless feet. He wasn’t going to beg. He wasn’t even going to ask again. “Motherfucker!” Puppet hit him on the shoulder. “I’m just messing with you. I’m just playing hard to get. I don’t want people out here thinking that Puppet comes easy. That he’s a motherfucking fairy godmother. But matter of fucking fact I got a job that needs doing and coincidentally you the perfect dude to do it.”

  “How’s that?”

  Puppet laughed. “Because you look motherfucking homeless.”

  In his mind’s eye, Ren had held himself separate from the rest of the folks on the street but there was no mistaking him now.

  “But it’s cool, you feel me?” Puppet said. “See we got a few workers who live up in these SRO hotels and these subsidized buildings. Idea was, they’re supposed to be selling to their neighbors, keeping the business hidden from the streets. Problem starts when they begin keeping it all to themselves. Now they’re messing with the cash flow because me and my boys can’t get inside to make it right. We’re what you call a known quantity. Dudes at the security see us coming a mile away. What we need is a homeless motherfucker we can trust, you feel me? Someone who got half a head left.”

  “So you want me to get your money?” Ren asked.

  “Motherfucker, I need you to send a message. Not silence these fools but let them know they best never mess with my business again.” Puppet swiveled his hat again, then crossed his arms over his chest. “Then if you can get my money, that’d be the motherfucking bomb, you feel me.”

  “And you’ll give me three large?”

  “Hell no,” Puppet said. “I’ll give you thirty percent of the bank or product you recover. We got four instances of these motherfuckers in four separate buildings. Sum total, I’m guessing these fools owe nearly a G. That’s with the interest.”

  “What kind of message?” Ren asked.

  “Tomorrow I’ll have one of my boys hand you a piece you can borrow.”

  “No guns. I don’t do guns.”

  “How you gonna send a message? You gonna shout at them? You gonna ask them pretty-fucking-please? You do this with a piece or you don’t do it, you feel me.”

  Ren shook his head.

  “No one’s asking you to kill a motherfucker.”

  What had he expected? That Puppet would ask him to wash his car, fold his goddamn laundry? That he’d make three hundred by, worst case, carrying dope from one spot to the next?

  “So?” Puppet was bouncing less than a foot in front of Ren’s face.

  One thing’s for sure, Ren thought, if he was housed, if he had a roof and door, a bed and even a window no matter how shitty the mattress, how crappy the view, he wouldn’t ruin it by slinging drugs. He wouldn’t contaminate his space with all the sickness out on the street. His room would be precious, perfect, a place to escape the crazy instead of inviting the outside in. How folks could be so careless, so spoiled was a wonder. How they could ruin their SRO or hotel for others was a straight-up crime.

  So fuck it. Teach these fools a lesson. Knock ’em back to the streets so they might not have the bank to get back inside where things were supposed to be safer.

  “Sure,” Ren said. “I got you.”

  Puppet stood still. “My man,” he said. “I knew I could count on you. I know you’re gonna bring the hard logic to those fuckers, set them straight.” He reached into the pocket of his saggy shorts and pulled out a ten-spot. “Get yourself a feed. I need you on point, you feel me? You need to do me proud. You need to collect. Come back tomorrow night.”

  Ren swiped the bill.

  “You my boy now,” Puppet said.

  27

  JAMES, TWENTYNINE PALMS, 2006

  A week after the men arrived at the ranch, James woke up and saw that the Silverado was missing from the driveway. Without bothering to put on shoes or a shirt, he hurried to the cabins, hoping to find Blake and Sam gone.

  But when he got to Sam’s adobe, he saw the sick man lying on the cot surrounded by a ring of rocks and burning herbs. Patrick sat at his side, dressing his wound and pressing a compress to his brow. Underneath the smell of burning sage Sam’s odor hung heavy in the cabin. It smelled like death or what comes after.

  James watched him from the doorway. Sam’s matted braid hung over the edge of the mattress. His pupils were lost in his inky irises. The whites of his eyes were yellow. His gaze locked on James. “You,” he said.

  Patrick turned and saw James.

  “You?” Sam said. “You’re back.” He thrashed on his cot.

  Patrick placed a hand on Sam’s chest to quiet him, then gave James a look that told him he’d better beat it. He lingered for a moment, until Sam’s lids fluttered, his eyes rolled, and he slept.

  James backed out of the cabin and wandered over to the oasis. The palms were still. He took off his shirt and shoes and walked into the pond, letting his feet sink into the soft cool mud. He waded up to his knees, turning in circles to animate the stagnant water.

  He hadn’t been in the pond since the night Owen shot the hawk and he’d hidden, half submerged, trying to ignore the smell of the bird’s roasting flesh. The water seemed murkier. He kicked onto his back and floated,
staring at the sky through the trees.

  James dipped his head and went under, hovering just below the surface. The water jolted with a muffled sonic boom. He came up for air, waiting for an aftershock or the vacuum of silence that always seemed to follow a bomb test from the military base. He swam for shore, grabbed his shirt and shoes, and hurried to the house. He could see a curl of black smoke rising several miles from the ranch—a narrow, noxious-looking coil.

  James fell asleep in a glider and woke to steps on the porch. He opened his eyes and saw Blake. There were rivulets of sweat dripping from under the brim of his Ranger’s hat. He smelled of smoke and gasoline.

  “You don’t need to ask about the pickup anymore,” Blake said.

  “What happened to it?”

  “I told you, you didn’t need to ask. But seeing as you are, all you need to know is, I never liked the damn thing in the first place. It didn’t run smooth.” He brought a cigarette to his lips. His fingers were streaked with some sort of grease that he wiped on his pants before reaching for a match. “Fact is, you start to like some things better when they’re gone. Like that brother of yours.”

  “I don’t really like him,” James said.

  “You don’t wonder how he’s doing in the big city?”

  “Never.”

  “I like that,” Blake said. “A man of principles. Someone betrays you, you stick to your guns. You’ve got spine, kid.”

  THAT NIGHT THE PARTY AROUND THE CAMPFIRE STARTED EARLIER THAN usual. In fact, it seemed to be less of a party and more an outgrowth of an afternoon of smoking and drinking. By six, Anushna was dancing topless. By seven, Gideon had roared into town for more booze. At eight, Britt came into the house to find James.

  “Don’t you want to join the fun?” she asked, draping an arm around his shoulder.

  James wriggled free.

  Britt tugged on his arm. But he pulled away so hard that she stumbled backward. “I’m sorry,” she said, then grabbed some beer from the fridge and rejoined the party.

  Not even the TV could drown out the boom box, the shouts, the laughter.

  James went to his room. He pulled his curtains against the noise. He jammed a pillow over his head. But it was too hot and he threw it at Owen’s empty bed. The pillow bounced off the bed frame and something hit the floor. James turned on the light and saw the pawn Blake had given him down at the inn. He picked it up. He looked at the small Asian figure that had made Owen so angry.