by A. J. Downey
“Hold up,” Officer Jones said with a smile. “Stay in the truck, I got you.”
Enrique pulled a spate of napkins and some plastic cutlery from the front of his stained apron pockets and handed them to me with a smile. I blushed faintly and accepted them with a quiet thanks.
“Hey, no problem. I gotta get back to the truck, but it was good seeing you, man.” He nodded to Officer Jones.
“Yeah, glad to see you’re doin’ alright,” Oz said with a nod.
“Better than alright, man. Life is great! It was nice to meet you Elka!” He waved at me and I had completely missed it when Oz had given Enrique my name.
“It was nice to meet you too,” I said faintly, and he turned and jogged back to his food truck.
Oz was eying me over his open clamshell, pushing the sauce on whatever he’d ordered within it around with his fork.
“You ain’t even here,” he said and it held a slightly amused tone, though I didn’t detect anything accusatory in it. “You’re like a million miles away, aren’t you?” he asked.
“I’m sorry…” I started and he sniffed.
“Don’t be,” he said, shoving a bite of food in his mouth.
He chewed and watched me steadily, his eyebrows going up behind his dark glasses. I opened up my clamshell and the smell that wafted up was divine. Meaty and green from the cilantro sprinkled on top. Rich and spicy, buttery and – and I was suddenly starving.
I tucked into my food and he smiled as he chewed his, as if he were pleased. He finished his bite, swallowing and said, “I got you one of each. Chicken, pork, and steak. Let me know which one you like best.”
I laughed slightly and said, “I doubt I will get through all three, but I think this one is the pork and it’s good.”
“Good deal,” he said with a smirk.
I made it through the pork and half of the chicken before I was too stuffed to continue. At least I had dinner if I wanted it later. We gathered up our things, tossed our recycling in the green drums off to the side marked with its stenciled triangle of arrows, and he walked me back to the museum.
“So, uh, we might still be at it when you get home. There’s no tellin’. Just wanted to give you a heads-up.”
“Oh, thank you. I’m sorry it’s being such a pain in the ass.”
“Not your fault. I’m the one that kicked it in,” he said, dragging open the lobby door for me.
“Well, thank you.”
“Have dinner with me!” he blurted out. “I mean, not tonight, but maybe sometime later this week.”
“I don’t know…” I said chewing my bottom lip.
“I do. No pressure but seems to me you need to get out a little bit. Bein’ some kind of a shut-in is the last thing you need right now.”
“How would you know?” I asked and immediately regretted how it came out, how it sounded. I was just becoming genuinely curious about him.
His eyes were unreadable behind the dark lenses and the glasses were starting to drive me crazy. His mouth quirked into this sort of half smile and he said, “Have dinner with me and I’ll tell you.”
I frowned. “Very well,” I acquiesced.
“Good deal. Call me. Have a good rest of your day,” he said and then he was gone, and I was left staring out of the tempered and UV protected glass of the lobby doors, watching the sun glimmer off the silver thread of the rays behind the indigo chess piece of the great big patch on the back of his vest.
It gave me a different flavor of food for thought as I returned to my work and before I knew it, it was time to wrap things up and to take the bus home.
My new door looked very new, the smell of freshly cut wood and new paint assailing me as I stepped through. There was a note on my dining room table and another one of Officer Jone’s cards with his cell number on the back.
The note read:
Good as new. Text me or call me to set up that dinner.
My cell is on the back of the card.
Oz
I went to the fridge and slid the rest of my tacos from lunch onto the shelf, my stomach suddenly churning for a completely different reason. I mean, I hope he wasn’t thinking this was going to be like… a date.
“God, get real, Elka.” I groaned covering my face with my hands and scrubbed, pressing my fingertips into my closed eyelids. I sighed and with a backward glance at the card sitting on the table, took myself in for a hot shower.
7
Oz…
The days ticked by, and it was finally on Thursday when I got my cell out of my locker to find that I had a text waiting for me from an unknown number.
Unknown: It’s Elka, about that dinner... what did you have in mind?
Good question, what did I have in mind?
I set my phone on the locker’s high shelf and changed out of my uniform and into street clothes while I thought about it. The guys I worked with drifted through here and there, grabbing their shit and taking off and I made passable small talk, but I wasn’t really feeling it. I had this urge to go for a long ride just to get out of the city when it hit me…
I picked up my phone and shot back,
Me: What are you doing on Saturday?
Tucking my cell into my back pocket, I shrugged into my jacket and cut before slinging my big ass waterproofed messenger bag across my chest. I had some laundry to do when I got back to my place if I wanted clean uniforms. I dropped my work boots into the bottom of my locker and kicked it closed with my Harley boot. My cell buzzed in my back pocket as I ducked out of the locker room and headed down the hall to the jail’s employee exit to the garage.
I checked the message and would have to wait to answer whatever it is until I got street side. Cell service was shit in the garage. We barely got two bars in the locker room as it was. No good for calls but texts did alright depending on your network.
Unknown: Nothing actually. Paint, maybe. Put on a movie. I hadn’t really thought about it.
First, I fixed it so instead of ‘Unknown’ my phone read ‘Elka’ then I got on the front of my bike and stuck the key in the ignition. I let her rumble to life beneath me and settle into that regular chugging purr I loved so much while I stowed my phone and pulled on my fingerless gloves. My lid on and some clear safety glasses on to cut the wind in my eyes, I pulled out and made my way up the ramps and out under a sky to match the city’s name.
I worked swing shift most of the time, so it was late by normal people’s standards. I pulled over a few blocks from the jail where there was room, so I didn’t keep her up much later.
Me: Sorry, I wasn’t ignoring you. I was at work. Just got off shift and had to get out of the garage. What are you still doing up anyway?
I sat for a minute, glad the response was pretty quick.
Elka: Was just cleaning up, about to go to bed. I have a hard time sleeping since… you know.
I sighed. Yeah. I knew.
Me: Yeah. About Saturday. Come take a ride with me.
I was half afraid she’d say ‘no’ the other half of me afraid she’d say ‘yes’ as I shoved my phone back into my pocket and hit my signal to pull back out into traffic. I made it over six blocks before the damn thing buzzed again and I almost missed it from the thrum of the bike. I didn’t pull over again, opting instead to take my ass home.
I pulled into the spot for me down the alley and behind my old brick building and took the rickety old wooden staircase up the back to the rear door. It was further away, my place being at the front of the building, but I’d rather do that than have to hurt some useless fuck lookin’ at me like I was some easy target.
The neighborhood I’d moved into after the divorce was shitty, but it was all I could fucking afford. My lawyer had been next to fuckin’ useless and where he hadn’t wiped me out, Regina, my ex-wife, had. She’d taken the house, half my fuckin’ retirement, and had left me all of the fuckin’ tax bill on that plus her fuckin’ credit cards.
I’d declared bankruptcy, which pretty much locked me into this sh
ithole for at least a few more years. I’d barely hung on to my fucking bike in the split. Vindictive bitch had gone after that, too. I wasn’t a violent dude for all my posturing – had never hit a woman in my life – but that? That’d made me want to put a fist to her smug face so hard. I’d resisted. Walked away. Thank fuck Skids and the rest of the squad had been there for the worst of it.
Their presence had held my ass in check. Not proud to admit that’s what it took – but it did.
I’m not a good man. I’m just alright, I thought as I unlocked the three locks holding my apartment door shut. Which was why I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing where Elka was concerned. I certainly didn’t know what the fuck I was thinking in inviting her out to ride.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and checked.
Elka: I’ve never ridden before but sounds intriguing.
Intriguing? Huh. Not the word I would have picked, but alright.
Me: All you gotta do is dress for the slide not for the ride and hang on.
I waited. Staring at my screen, but after several drawn out moments gave it up. She was probably in bed and asleep.
I sighed and pulled my messenger bag off over my head and dropped it on my clean if slightly tattered secondhand couch.
I lived in a one-bedroom and that was a joke. The bedroom, to its credit, was bigger than the kitchen and living room combined. Probably because the bedroom closet also had the water heater, the washer, and the dryer in it. Weird, right? Better than hauling my shit to the laundromat each week though. It’d been my one deal breaker when finding a place. Must have laundry in unit.
I plugged my phone in at the kitchen wall outlet and took my ass in to shower and get ready for bed. I had to get up early if I was gonna make it to work out with the hose boys at Backdraft’s station. A nice change of pace from the cop gym I went to. The place had softened up since Angel’s ol’ lady had moved into the back room making it her studio. The eye candy she had parading in and out the back for yoga and her circus shit was distracting. Pretty to look at but not much else. At least not for me.
If it was one thing Reggie had proven, females were trouble and it was trouble I needed to stay the hell away from. I know, I know… not all females, but after the constant shit with Reggie, I wasn’t lookin’ for any repeat performances and was happy to stay in my fuckin’ lane.
Of course, my cyclical thinking took me right back around off my ex-wife and back to Elka.
She was worlds away in difference. Cool, somber, and mellow to be around but with a hidden edge. By comparison, which I couldn’t help but make, Reggie was a walking disaster. Always bitching, always complaining; always yelling.
“Man, get your head off it. She ain’t lookin’ to hook up with your ass,” I mumbled, ducking my head under the shower’s spray.
When I got out of the shower, I dried off, stood at the sink and shaved my head. The entire time, I couldn’t help but keep listening for my phone from the other room. Hoping that she’d be up, still. That she would answer that last message and put me out of my misery. I felt like I was on pins and needles and kept second-guessing the hell out of myself on whether I should have even made the offer. Wondering if I’d scared her off the idea of going out with me on the bike with that last message.
I got nothing. She’d probably racked out.
“Ahhh, boy!” I shook my head at my reflection in the mirror and rinsed a washcloth under the tap to wipe off the excess shaving cream on my head and neck, making sure to get behind my ears.
I went to bed, but sleep didn’t come easy. Not in the least because I kept turning it over in my head wondering if I’d fucked up.
8
Elka…
I stared at the screen of my phone and sighed out, a rush of unsteady breath as I pondered his last words on the screen. I lolled my head on its pillow and checked the time. It was twenty minutes before my alarm was set to go off and I’d woken from another nightmare.
Another iteration of Mia’s death where my sister’s blood had coated my hands and no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t get them to come clean.
Even now, I switched from gazing at my phone to my hands that clutched it and almost had to will myself to believe they were clean. That nothing spotted them or stained them. That it was all in my head.
I went back to that last message… Dress for the slide and not for the ride… what did that even mean? I mean, objectively it meant to dress in protective clothing, but I didn’t own any. At least, not really. Also, did I really want to even try it? I mean, I had never been on the back of a motorcycle. It seemed dangerous.
Ultimately, I decided I was too afraid and quickly texted out: Maybe we should just stick to dinner first.
I hit send and squeezed my eyes shut.
“Well, that could be left open to interpretation, now couldn’t it?” I muttered.
Ugh. I should really make sure I had at least one cup of coffee before texting anyone back.
I sighed and tossed my phone down at my side staring fixedly at the ceiling for a full two minutes while my mind raced over possibilities on how I had just screwed that up. I needed to break myself out of this anxiety loop, so before I let it get much worse, I forced myself into a sitting position and swung my legs out over the edge of the bed, dropping my feet to the floor.
Shower. I needed a shower before I did anything. A proper start to my day was definitely in order.
I dragged myself under a shower spray that was almost too hot to handle and camped there until at least some of the tension left my shoulders and back.
It was partially through my setup to get to work finishing up the cleaning of the Inness canvas that my phone lit up and buzzed against my work table.
With trepidation, I looked and sure enough the message was from Oz. I still thought it was strange calling him that, but it was what he liked to be called and who was I to argue?
Ofc. Jones: I’m cool with that. Dinner first. I’ll come by your place. Got anyplace you wanna eat in mind?
Wow. It was just that easy? No guilt trips? No passive aggressive sniping? He’s not your ex, Ellie, I reminded myself and the voice in my head sounded a lot more like my sister Mia than it did my own. Even using her affectionate and definitely more Americanized nickname for me.
I sighed and felt a knot of dread I hadn’t realized was between my shoulders loosen. I tapped out my reply…
Me: I know a place near my apartment. Do you like Thai?
I waited, holding my breath, and just as I was about to set my phone down the message came through.
Ofc. Jones: IDK, I don’t think I’ve ever had it before.
I smiled.
Me: Open to trying new things?
Ofc. Jones: Every damn day. When is good for you?
Me: Um, Friday or Saturday?
Ofc. Jones: It is Friday.
Me: Is it?
I turned red with embarrassment and checked my phone’s calendar. Sure enough, it was. Oops.
Ofc. Jones: It is, so is tonight good for you?
Me: Sure… I can do tonight.
Ofc: Jones: How late is that place open, I can try and get outta work early but I’m usually not off until around 10.
Me: Would tomorrow work better for you?
Ofc. Jones: Yeah, probably.
Me: Okay, because tomorrow works for me too. I don’t have any plans.
Ofc. Jones: I can do tomorrow.
Me: Seven work for you?
Ofc. Jones: Seven works just fine. I’ll see you then.
Me: Okay.
I let out a slow and controlled breath and tried to decide how I felt about things. I mean, I shouldn’t be this… excited, should I? I set my phone aside and went to lunch, finding myself back at the food truck grotto and smiling up at Enrique, shyly ordering a couple of chicken tacos.
He grinned back and said, “It’ll be right up.”
“How much?” I asked and he shook his head.
“Your money’s no goo
d here. Any friend of Oz is a friend of mine.”
“Oh, no! I can’t let you do that,” I argued.
“Too bad, I just did,” he said with a wink. “You want a Coke with that?”
“Depends, are you going to let me pay for it?” I asked.
“Nope.”
“Then no, thank you. Water is fine.”
“One Coke it is. Go on and find a seat, I’ll bring it out to you.”
I rolled my eyes but complied and when he came out with a clamshell and a bottle of Coke, he set them down and dropped onto the open expanse of bench beside me, pushing his sleeves up past his elbows.
“So,” he said with a grin, “you seein’ Oz?”
“Um… no. He just… um.” I was flustered and didn’t know what to say.
“He just what? ‘Cause I’ve never seen him bring a woman around.”
“He just was bringing me the new keys to my apartment,” I said.
“Why would he have the keys to your place if you aren’t seeing each other?” Enrique asked, bold as brass. I gave a long, slow blink in response.
“You sure do ask a lot of personal questions,” I said.
He shrugged one shoulder and gave a rakish grin. “I got my reasons.”
I frowned and opened up my food, pushing the taco filling around and mixing it with the plastic fork he handed over.
“He broke down my door. My dad couldn’t get a hold of me and panicked. I had my headphones on and didn’t hear him knock.”
Enrique laughed so hard he almost fell off of his seat. Slapping his knee, he said, “Yeah, that sounds like Oz, and it also kind of answers my question.” He stood up.
“What question? You haven’t asked me anything.”
He winked at me. “Not going to either, I know Oz. If you want, ask him about it.” And with that, he was gone, back to his food truck and serving the hungry masses. I stared after him mystified for the moment before returning to my food.
The curious exchange was momentarily forgotten by the end of the day but resurfaced on the bus ride home. I played it and replayed it in my mind and for the life of me couldn’t figure Enrique’s odd behavior out. It’d done well to distract me, momentarily, from thinking about anything else for which I was sort of grateful.