by CJ West
Cortez sold credit card numbers in the old days. He did it on his computer and on the phone. Sitting outside I’d never see him sell anything. And to make things worse, credit cards didn’t exist anymore. Everything was done through the bank and I wasn’t smart enough to catch him cheating the bank. Even if I knew what he was doing, I was helpless sitting outside his house. He was sleeping in there and I was wasting my time. I didn’t know anything about catching criminals. What I did know was that Cortez got me into this mess. If he hadn’t ratted me out, I wouldn’t have the ankle bracelet, the black box, and the little camera in my pocket. Best of all, I would never have met Wendell Cummings and Dr. Blake.
For a moment I thought about crashing through the door and bashing Cortez’s head in. That’s what he deserved. That’s what the guys back in the old neighborhood would have done. But it wasn’t the old neighborhood. Every step I took was tracked by the cops. If something happened to Cortez while I was within three blocks, I’d be blamed. I needed to stay outside and stay out of trouble.
When I couldn’t wait anymore, I walked down to the corner and bought a sandwich and a soda from a convenience store. What I needed above all was the bathroom, but I really enjoyed the roast beef and American cheese at the small table in the corner.
Cortez walked past the window. He didn’t look inside the dark store, but I saw him clearly through the glass. He looked better than he had in the diner. He’d been shifty-eyed back then. Maybe that was just him working. Breaking the law, knowing he could be caught at any time must have made him nervous. He looked completely at ease, but I was pretty sure his wife hadn’t stopped buying things and making him crazy. Cortez was cutting corners somewhere. If I could catch him, I could put things right for Wendell and for myself.
He went into the barber shop but didn’t get a haircut. He talked to the barbers and the customers for half an hour instead. From there he walked to a little outdoor produce stand and talked with the owner for twenty minutes. For the next two hours, I followed, Cortez talked, and I realized I would have been better off at home reading my book.
When the little girl in farmer jeans stepped off the bus, I walked over a few blocks and hailed a cab home.
CHAPTER FIFTY
My first day as a crime fighter would have been a total ruin if not for what happened next. I was exhausted after getting up at four o’clock. I barely dragged myself out of the cab and down the walkway to the long brick building. Even tired as I was, I stayed alert for anyone moving nearby. It wasn’t long ago that someone tried to take me out with that shotgun, and I hadn’t done anything to smooth things over with Nick or Nathan Farnsworth. I had to be ready for another attempt. Getting a gun would have been like buying an express ticket to the cat baggers, so I was ultra alert whenever I walked in public, especially near the apartment.
That’s when I saw the scraggly-haired guy lugging a box down the concrete path parallel to the one I followed. If this was one of Wendell’s videos, I would have trotted over to help him no matter how tired I was. Maybe that was the right thing to do, but that wasn’t why I offered to help.
It was the flat nose.
When he nodded my way, I remembered that white ball whizzing along the top of the grass only to pop up and hit the strike zone. The man moving into my building seemed to have control over the laws of physics. I started over to him to talk about his pitching, but by the time I reached him I realized he was a resident in Stephan’s building and didn’t belong here. If he was in trouble again, it should be costing Nathan Farnsworth not Wendell Cummings. Why was he moving in?
I wanted to grab the pen camera and get a shot of him, but I knew I could do better. I bided my time, lugging boxes up two flights of stairs until he was as tired as I was. He didn’t have any food whatsoever at his place, so I invited him over for a Coke and whatever else we could find. It turned out to be microwaved pizza and Devil Dogs.
The food brought me back to life and having the flat-nosed pitcher there in my apartment gave me hope. When he turned to throw the plastic Devil Dog wrapper in the trash, I set the pen camera on the table, pressed the red button, and pointed it at him. I did it carefully even though he had his back turned in case one of my counselors was watching. They’d sell information to Nathan no matter who they hurt. Wendell was too focused on saving the disadvantaged to look out for himself and he was too naive to realize his own counselors were taking advantage of him. That made getting the evidence in my own apartment dangerous, but I had no choice.
“Think you could show me how to throw that riser?” I asked.
“Sure.” To my dismay, he got up and stepped over toward the oven. He pretended to hold a ball and make a low arc with his arm, releasing down near the floor. The holes had to be down to make the ball rise and with practice you could make it rise and curve at the same time by tipping the ball to one side or the other when you released it. The camera caught none of it. Turning it would have been too obvious.
The pitching clinic took several minutes in front of the oven, which I had never used the whole time I’d lived here. I stopped asking about Wiffle ball and soon he sat down again. I’d really enjoyed my time over at Stephan’s, and if things had worked out differently, I would have been back to play again. I would have enjoyed learning to throw that riser.
“Did you like living over there?” I asked skeptically.
He caught the implication in my voice and hesitated. He knew he shouldn’t have been transferred. I could see the guilt in his face and Wendell would see it, too, when he played the recording.
“It was great,” he said with finality in his voice.
“Why move here?” I asked as innocently as I could.
He shrugged and pushed back in his chair to get up and leave.
I ducked down close to the table and whispered, “It’s not that bad here.”
We both knew it was much better where they had Wiffle ball games and movies instead of a walled courtyard, impossible math problems, and electric shock therapy.
“You screwed up, didn’t you? What’d you do?” I asked.
He didn’t want to say, but I prodded him a few times and he finally opened up to me and the camera. “I lifted a fifth of Johnnie Walker.”
I didn’t get it at first. Everyone had enough cash to buy whatever they needed if they were careful. Johnnie Walker wasn’t cheap, but it wouldn’t break the bank. He told me he was in for DUI and couldn’t buy booze. I remembered seeing him drink soda in the bar. The thumb scanners stopped him from buying alcohol anywhere just like Stephan.
“I made it three weeks, but I couldn’t take it anymore.”
I felt bad for him. He told me he’d been drinking when we played. He wasn’t addicted, but it steadied him. He lied to me and himself. Neither of us believed it. He couldn’t stop and his trouble with law enforcement wasn’t over. That’s why Farnsworth dumped him.
I whispered again. “Aren’t you supposed to go back to the program you came from if you get into trouble?”
He leaned close and said, “Not me.”
I didn’t understand what he meant.
“They weren’t going to take me back. They said I could come here or I could go to the cat baggers. At least here I’ve got a chance. If I stay clean I’ll get out in a month or two.”
“They can’t do that, can they?”
He looked nervous. He whispered so the ankle bracelets under the table couldn’t pick up his voice, but the recorder was right in front of him. He told me they had erased his record. It was like he’d never been there. Like he never screwed up. It worked for him. It worked for Nathan Farnsworth. The only guy getting shafted was Wendell Cummings.
He left me with a recording that should have secured my freedom.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
I was pulled in two different directions. I wanted to get the pen camera to Wendell as fast as I could, but I knew someone was always watching and if that someone was working for Nathan Farnsworth, he could already be plotting wa
ys to get the camera away from me. It was getting late. After the attack outside the donut shop, I felt safest behind the brick walls, especially at night, but there in my apartment I had no place to run if they came for me. They could find me anywhere, thanks to the tracking devices, but if I hid the pen somewhere outside where they didn’t have cameras, it would be safe until I got it to Wendell.
I had my hand on the doorknob, but detoured back to the phone. Wendell had given me his card after I was caught breaking into his house. He’d want to know what I’d found no matter how late it was. I called his house. The phone rang ten times. No answering machine picked up. I imagined the weak electronic buzz in that sprawling place of his. I imagined the dogs perking up to alert him to the call. I imagined the fat lady struggling to get up from a low recliner. But no one answered. After fifteen rings I hung up.
A glimmer of hope hit me on the stairs. Maybe Wendell was in the control room and that was why he didn’t answer. Maybe he was holding out hope that I’d save him so he was staying nearby to help. The butter knife in my pocket argued otherwise. If I believed I’d find Wendell in the control room, I’d have no need to jimmy the lock. I rumbled down the stairs. My hope dimmed the closer I got to the bottom, as if my mood were tied to my elevation. When I reached the ground floor, I decided I couldn’t go to the control room with the pen camera. I had to hide it first in case Morris Farnsworth or Dr. Blake was in there. I really had no idea who else might be working in that control room, but if the person inside could lead me to Wendell, I could stop hiding.
I went the long way around the building, following the sidewalk to the corner opposite the control room, and then around back to the parking lot. Most of the cars here never moved and any one of them would make a good hiding place for my pen. I chose one with tires so deflated the rims rested on asphalt. I remembered the big display in court that showed exactly where I went and when I stopped somewhere. I didn’t linger around the car. I chose my path to look like I was crossing through the parking lot to get a view to the control room door. When I got near the car, I sped up. I only hesitated by the back tire long enough to balance the pen on top of the worn rubber treads, and then I sped my pace again. To the computer it would look like I kept a steady pace across the parking lot to the clump of trees I used to spy on the control room.
I waited there long enough to make it convincing to those watching me, but it was hard to stay still. Behind that door I’d find a man eager to save me or any number of men eager to silence me to save themselves. I was strangely drawn to that room despite the danger. Could Wendell really be there at this time of night? He should be out to dinner with his wife or home watching television. Still, as soon as I’d been in place for ten full minutes, I crossed the parking lot with a stealthy walk that was more show for the cameras than anything else.
There wasn’t a single window into the room. No way to tell if there were twenty men inside with machine guns, or if Wendell was there waiting to help me, or if this was some urban paradise built to reward those who sought it out.
I banged the door with my fist. Banging alone wasn’t a problem. Seeking Wendell out, reaching out for help was a good thing. It was what I did next that caused me big trouble.
No one answered the door. Nothing moved inside no matter how loud I pounded. I swiveled around, looking for anyone who’d seen me knocking. I knew what was going to happen next. It was automatic. I didn’t even think about it. I should have. I needed help, but I needed to know what was behind that door even more.
The butter knife slid from my pocket and was between the door and the jamb instinctively. The lock worked open in seconds. It was too easy. I should have known it was a test, but I was only thinking about busting Nathan Farnsworth and getting out of this program. I knew when no one responded to my pounding that Wendell wasn’t inside. If someone was there, they would have at least come and shooed me away.
I stepped inside and closed the door behind me.
I called, “Hello,” as if the door had accidentally been left open and I’d stepped inside to make sure everyone was ok. Of course it wasn’t true. Coming in here with my ankle bracelet on was dangerous. Someone somewhere would know what I was doing was wrong. I’d tell them I was looking for Wendell. It had worked for me in court last time, but that ploy wouldn’t work twice. I knew bullshit and excuses didn’t play in the criminal justice system anymore, but I couldn’t admit it to myself.
The lights came on when I stepped forward. It wasn’t a new trick. I’d seen motion sensitive lights before. The work area was tiled with monitors set into a wall in columns of three, six across. The countertop housed banks of pushbuttons that corresponded to the monitors, but they weren’t labeled to show what they did. There were three keyboards on the desktop, too, but I ignored them to focus on the single chair and the myriad buttons. Someone sat at this desk and rolled back and forth on the tiled floor, watching what happened on the monitors.
I sat on the swivel chair and thought for a moment as if I worked there. I reached up and pushed a button trimmed with red at its base. Nothing happened. I pushed the button to its right and the monitor on the top row came to life. It showed an empty apartment much like mine, but it wasn’t mine because this one had a solid brown couch. Mine had a faint pattern to it. I tried the button beneath and to the left and the camera moved left. Then I started pressing all sorts of buttons. The camera moved right, up, down, then zoomed in. Then the picture changed altogether and I realized I was looking at the same living room but from a different angle. If the layout was exactly like mine, this camera was hidden somewhere in the window trim. I played with buttons all over. I saw guys sleeping. I saw one guy get mad at whatever he’d made on the stove and sling a pot against the wall. Sticky white goo sloshed all over his rug. I enjoyed myself until I realized that someone could come in and catch me any second. By then I understood how the buttons were arranged. I clicked off the three monitors I had been watching and stood up.
Even alone in the room I felt like I’d been caught. I didn’t remember really wanting to get in here. Yes, I was curious about what went on here and finding Wendell was a good reason to come down, but I felt like I’d been tricked into sneaking inside. I didn’t believe they could manipulate my thoughts and make me do things against my will. But at that moment part of me wanted to run out the door and back to my room. I knew I was being watched. I knew it was a trap, that there was a more sophisticated room built to watch this one. Part of me was too curious to turn for the door and go. I’d come this far. The damage was done.
The walls were blank, cement block painted a light creamy yellow. The ceiling was stark white plaster, swirled, but in patterns too fine to hide a camera. If there was a camera watching me, it was hidden in the panels that housed the monitors. There were two many crevices for me to check. It didn’t matter. Just stepping inside this room was damning enough. I hadn’t meant any trouble. Anyone watching the video would know that, but intentions didn’t seem to matter to the judges. My fate was predetermined, I was only acting out Wendell’s script.
I explored the far end of the room, expecting to find a way to get behind the monitors to see the tangle of wires that connected everything together. What I found was a hallway, this hallway I’m standing in now, hidden by the angle of the rear wall and the monitors. The long hall ended in cement blocks. There were two doors, one on either side. On my left was a large glass window. I stepped up, but stopped short of a dark line in the floor. It was a plate glass wall, like the one Wendell had used to trap me in his home office.
There was another thick black line beyond the window. Common sense was telling me I was walking into one of those animal-friendly traps, only I was the animal. I told myself I was alone, that no one was standing ready to spring the trap. Still, I expected it to close on me as soon as I crossed that first black line. It didn’t. I cupped my hands against the window, but couldn’t see anything beyond.
I shifted along tentatively, mindful that any step
could send the plate glass partitions jutting up to the ceiling to lock me in. The door was ten feet away and I couldn’t resist it. I hopped over the black line. As I did I imagined it flashing upward to cut me in half from below, like a dull, upside down guillotine.
I stepped safely to the door, opened it, and did a double take.
Inside were two rows of chairs facing the window. I leaned far enough inside to see that anyone inside could clearly see the hall even though from the outside I could see nothing of the room.
There were six chairs in the front row, seven in the back. Twelve jurors and one alternate. I dodged back into the hall. The two partitions would force anyone caught between them to stay in view of the window.
You know that of course because I’m trapped between the partitions now. The doors beyond the partitions are for you, so you can come and go without worry about what I might do once you’ve judged me. And of course the glass walls keep me right in front of you where you can see me, but I can’t see how you are reacting to my story.
That first time I stood here I realized the program that had me trapped was merely an accessory. What you decide is all important.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
I rushed out the door to the broken down car and felt the bald tire for the pen-shaped camera. My fingers found only the crown of rough tread. I got down on my knees and stuck my head underneath the bumper, thinking the camera had fallen behind the tire. The streetlights didn’t reach back there, so I leaned in and swept the rough pavement. It wasn’t there. Flat on my stomach, I felt the axle, the shocks, and even inside the rim. Someone had taken the camera and disappeared in the fifteen minutes I’d been inside the control room. I came away with greasy hands, a dirty shirt, and no record of my conversation with the Wiffle ball pitcher.