Paintings of Empty Rooms

This story originally appeared in Dublin's World on January 21st. Since then it has been edited by my good friend Richard Handel and polished by myself. Many of the changes are subtle but contribute to the flow and, I feel, improve it very much.

1
Paul has always painted well but never introduces himself as a painter since his work has never sold or been hung for public enjoyment. He sits behind the counter at Best Regards Flower Shop, where he works, and day dreams of being an artist whos name people might one day recognize and possibly respect. Calls for flowers interrupt his thoughts, but once he has filled out the orders and passed them to Clare in the back for assembly he retakes his position behind the counter and falls back into the vision where he left off.
Six o’clock comes and he dons his black jacket and slowly walks around the lake in the center of the city to return to the apartment he shares with his girlfriend Helen. He walks slowly, dragging his feet, and takes his time because once he gets home he will have to paint. The problem is that he has no idea what. His mind is devoid of inspiration, dragging him down, his feet barely coming off of the ground.
When he gets in the door of the apartment he takes off the jacket, and after a beer, stands in front of a blank canvas on his easel. He’s proud of himself for the discipline he shows by always going to the easel and standing before it. He stares at the canvas for some time and then looks around at the rejects and half painted sketches that sit around the room gathering dust. Many of them are recreations of scenes from magazines with mythological themes added. He examines these failures for several minutes, waiting for their value to reveal itself, until he decides he will try something in a fresh direction and turns back towards the canvas. He stares again, looking deeper and deeper, probing into its very fiber, waiting for what he will paint to sprout from his imagination until he hears Helen’s key turn in the lock of the apartment and she is home from work.
Together, they sit at the small yellow dining table in the kitchen nook and eat dinner. They take turns cooking but have run out of ideas, their meals having become a limited series of five different dishes. They talk, at least Helen does, mostly about her job and her brother who is having problems with his wife and is suffering in a dysfunctional marriage. Paul listens but not closely because he has heard it before. He and Helen have been together for two and a half years and rarely go out for dinner because they have agreed to save money to get a house.
They go to bed after brushing their teeth and both of them fall asleep quickly. On occasion, they stay up, and Helen will turn towards Paul while he attempts to make love to her. He tries not to think of his painting and lack of inspiration but it always enters his head and he performs poorly. She looks away from him, at the wall, waiting for something significant to happen.

On his days off Paul walks to the park near the apartment and sits on one of the benches waiting for inspiration. He watches the Goldeneye ducks make their way around the park’s pond. He enjoys them but has no interest in painting them and he watches the mothers push the strollers and the children play along the grass and the old Filipino man drop pieces of bread for the birds. The park is comforting to Paul and he spends hours there but never leaves with any inspiration or an idea for a painting.
One day, while he is sits at his regular bench, he sees Alfred, an acquaintance from high school he has not seen for many years, jogging along side the pond. They realize what a small world it is when Alfred reveals he has a friend who works at the same company where Helen works. Paul is happy to hear that Alfred himself works as the manager of a new art gallery in the warehouse district, one that Paul has heard of but not attended. The two men discuss the current state of art with much agreement and shared passion and Alfred relates to Paul that he remembers his paintings from school and was always impressed by them. He is glad to hear that Paul still paints and asks to see some of his work.
They take the four block walk back to the apartment and every step is one of dread and regret for Paul. He wishes he had never mentioned his painting at all. He knows that as soon as Alfred sees his work he will recognize it for all its cliche and lack of inspiration. He tries to think of an excuse not to go home but his mind is as blank as the new canvas and soon they are in the main room looking over his old work.
Alfred stands very still and keeps a respectful silence with his arms crossed, rubbing a finger along the length of his mustache. When he speaks he is honest and describes the work as rather dull and uninspired. Paul is impressed by the frankness of the criticism and is grateful when Alfred tells him that, although it’s not ready now, he senses something developing in Paul’s work that just hasn’t arrived yet. He gives Paul a sleek looking business card with a phone number and an e-mail before leaving the apartment.
Paul is spurred on by Alfred’s criticism and begins to paint on the blank canvas. He randomly applies different colors and he throws strokes of blue and green within flares of yellows and reds and violets. He doesn’t hear Helen when she comes home and he doesn't smell the dinner she cooks or notice when she has gone to bed. He works all night and when the sun begins to creep up in the window of the main room he stops and looks at all the colors and random marks spread about the canvas and knows that he has not painted something good or original, just a mess of colors forced together in desperation.
He goes to work pale and bleary eyed and cannot concentrate as customers come in and the phone rings with orders. People order flowers for retirements and baby showers and birthdays and Paul is slow and overwhelmed. He is too tired to conjure up any day dreams or think of painting at all and each passing minute is torture. When six o’clock comes he is relieved to shuffle into his coat, but when he gets out the door and begins to make his way along the street he realizes that the bad painting will be waiting for him in the apartment. He slows his pace and decides to take the long way around the lake even though it is cold outside and he is very tired.
When he gets in the door he expects the painting to be the first thing he sees but is surprised to find Helen’s face looking at him from the main room instead. She has come home early and Paul senses something strange in the room. She does not kiss him but instead takes a deep breath before informing him that she is leaving him. He can stay in the apartment, she will find her own place, but she wants no drama and doesn’t want to discuss it.
Paul demands to know why and she waits to answer, looking him in the eye, trying to decide if he is worthy of a reason. She says that it is time for a change and they both have become complacent in the relationship. Paul tries to argue, tries to think of something that will prove that he at least has not become complacent and is therefore not at fault. He stutters over his words and as he stutters he comes to realize that he doesn’t much care if she leaves or stays. He stops short and tells her that he is unhappy with her decision but accepts it and they hug awkwardly, both proud of the maturity they show the other.
That night she sleeps in the bed and he sleeps in the lazy boy chair in the corner of the main room, among his unfinished paintings. He has vivid fantasies of himself as the spurned lover, the tortured artist, and he can not sleep, almost giddy with the possibilities. He will paint beautiful models and they will spend the night with him and talk about art; not their job or their brother’s awful marriage.

The next day is Saturday and Helen moves out with all of her belongings including the small yellow dining table that they have always used for their dinners. She says she will store her things and stay with her friend April until she finds her own place. April stands at the door, waiting as Helen looks at Paul with a forced smile that fails to mask her disappointment. Paul resents the look. It’s not his fault she feels like she has wasted the last few years. He was put on earth to paint, not to be a boyfriend.
He watches through the window in the main room as the two women drive off in April’s Scion and then he goes to the easel. Now it is only him and his painting. He walks to the art store downtown, buys a new canvas, and marches it back to the apartment. He places it on the easel and the whiteness of the new canvas makes him feel refreshed and ready for the future. He doesn’t want to just throw colors together like he did after Alfred’s visit. He stands in front of the canvas and waits for a real idea to come. He watches it, waiting, and then sits in the lazy boy chair to rest his eyes. When he opens them again it’s the next day and he has to go to work.
He finds himself enjoying the flower shop, chatting with the customers, and being pleasant and steady with Clare. The idea of going home and painting is always waiting on the perimeter of his mind but when he returns to the empty apartment he is exhausted. He looks at the canvas and then looks around the surrounding room which seems larger now without Helen’s belongings. When the apartment no long interests him he goes to the window and watches the people go in and out of the bar across the street.
On his days off he goes to the park and although he enjoys it there he still does not leave with any ideas for a painting. He eats his meals alone in the lazy boy chair in the main room. He finds it boring eating alone and drags out some of the books about artists that he bought in school. He reads them while he eats. Some of his favorite artists lived lives filled with adversity and tragedy and it makes him wonder if that is why he can not paint, that his life has been too easy and monotonous.

2
A month goes by and the canvas remains blank. Paul continues to enjoy his time at the flower shop but realizes the enjoyment comes from the job distracting him from painting. The neighbors down the hall in his building, Adena and Raul, invite him to dinner and he is glad to go since it will take him away from the blank canvas. At dinner Adena describes the preparations for her and Raul’s wedding in the spring and then becomes solemn because she thinks it may depress Paul after his break up. He appreciates her sentiment but thinks it silly. Their wedding does not upset him because he is free and soon he will be painting.
Without someone to help with the rent and other expenses Paul is forced to live on an even tighter budget. He gets some satisfaction out of this because his school books describe many of his favorite artists as living modestly. He eats noodles out of Styrofoam and watches the canvas, waiting for ideas. He moves all his old paintings and sketches into one corner of the main room and piles them up on top of each other which makes the apartment seem even bigger and makes him feel freer.
One day, while sitting at his regular park bench, he sees Alfred jogging by the pond again. When Alfred asks about his painting Paul lies and says that it is going well. Alfred tells him he was sorry to hear about his break up with Helen through his friend at the company and Paul says it’s fine, it’s freed up his time to get more work done. Alfred asks if he has met Helen’s new boyfriend and Paul has to take a moment before saying no. It’s obvious to Alfred that Paul was unaware of the relationship and he apologizes.
Paul walks home, letting the idea that Helen is seeing someone new fully develop in his mind. He tries to tell himself that he’s happy for her. For a while he doesn’t feel much of anything and then, with a pang, he thinks of the little yellow dining table that they always ate on and he pictures someone else sitting with Helen, talking over dinner. He tells himself that it is just his ego that is hurt, nothing else. Sure, she is talking to someone, but all she is talking about is her work and her brother’s bad marriage and at least he doesn’t have to listen to it. When he tells himself this he feels better.
That night he goes to the little bar across the street and has a few drinks by himself. There is a girl sitting by herself just down the bar from him and he starts a conversation with her. She is nice enough to smile and nod and reply to his questions and statements. He orders them both a round and then another and then another. Paul moves to the stool next to the girl and he is speaking loud when he tells her love is a myth that was created by movies and advertising. He tells her that he is free and that others lock themselves into prisons made of delusions and false expectations.
Paul has two more drinks before he realizes that the girl has gone and the bartender is telling him that they are closing. He stumbles home, his vision going in and out of focus as he climbs the stairs of his building. He passes out in the lazy boy chair. When he awakes the next morning his head pounds and his tongue feels and tastes like a piece of leather. He is too hung over to paint or do much of anything and when the sun goes down he goes to bed as well.
He wakes up at five o’clock that morning thinking of Helen. He has the distinct impression that he was dreaming of her but he can’t remember. He lies in the bed, sweats, then feels cold, and then sweats again. He has never been unable to sleep before and it irritates him. The sunlight gradually begins to stream into the apartment and the dread of the morning forces him up and out of the bed.
He goes to a coffee shop and has to wait for it to open because it’s Sunday and nobody is up or on the street. While sitting with his coffee he decides to call Helen, and on the way home, he does. It goes to voice mail and he hangs up. He sits in the apartment and waits for her to call back. He goes to the park and sits with his phone on the bench next to him. He goes home in the evening and sits in the lazy boy and tries to remember what Helen was really like as a person but he hadn’t paid enough attention the last year or so and it’s hard to remember.
He wakes up the next morning and checks his phone but there are no missed calls. He is paralyzed in the bed and calls into work sick. He stays in the bed until he forces himself up to make coffee and to send Helen an e-mail. He writes that he is sorry about what happened and that he would like to talk about it. This makes him feel good enough to eat ramen noodles and macaroni and cheese and he spends the day looking out the window at the people walking by. Some of the girls look a lot like Helen with similar hair and walks. He turns away from the window and the apartment no longer seems big, just cold.

Two days later Helen replies to his e-mail. She writes only two sentences; the first saying it is good to hear from him and the second saying it would not be a good idea to see each other. He goes to the bed and stays there until the morning but can’t remember if he slept or not. He curses Helen out loud and is ashamed. He forces himself up and off to work. He sits behind the counter and is able to distract himself with orders until they run out and the day becomes slow.
It begins to rain outside and at six o’clock, he dons his black jacket and walks around the lake in the rain. When he gets home he removes all of his wet clothes and stands in the main room. The rain has picked up and is pounding against the window. He feels thin and empty but not hungry. He thinks of Helen and feels like he is wasting away.
It is very cold in the room and he takes a few steps forward and begins to sketch on the blank canvas with a pencil. He sketches out three walls of a room and then mixes some paints together and begins to color it. He paints until he has created an empty room but it doesn’t look quite right. He paints in the yellow dining table with two plates, one clean and the other covered in a half eaten meal. The sun is up when he finishes and he looks at the canvas in the morning light and recognizes that he has painted something very sad. It makes him feel better; like a weight lifting inside him.
He goes to work and counts off the hours until he can return to the apartment. When he gets home he paints over one of his old sketches and creates another empty room, this one with the slight shadow in the corner of someone leaving. He works all night again and when he goes to the flower shop the next morning he can barely keep his eyes open. He makes mistakes on orders and receives harsh words from Clare in the back who has never raised her voice to him.
He spends money he doesn’t have on new paints and brushes and fresh canvases. Weeks go by as he paints through the night and comes to work late, bleary eyed and always exhausted. This goes on for almost a month until the owner of Best Regards shows up and tells Paul that he is being let go. Clare comes out from the back to tell him that she will miss him but he barely notices, his mind already taken up with the next empty room he will paint.
He works all day and night now, coming up with ideas on how to create scenes of people’s loneliness and failures with out showing the people themselves. He paints books left open on chairs, empty bottles neglected under tables, photographs on dressers left face down in their frames, and he continues to play with the shadows of human figures leaving the frame.
He has no income and is dangerously low in his savings but all that matters is the work. He goes to the park for fresh air and thinks of painting and when he is not thinking of painting he thinks of Helen. He imagines her in her new relationship and that she is unhappy and lonely and that she thinks of him.
One night he paints another empty room but adds a photograph hanging from the far wall. He paints Helen’s face onto the picture, half covered in shadow. He makes her look sad and dejected and realizes that the face looks more like his own and less like Helen.

3
One day Paul sees Alfred again in the park, jogging alongside the pond. Alfred is surprised by Paul’s appearance, he looks much thinner and more pale than he looked the last time they saw each other. Paul tells him he would like Alfred to take a look at some of his new work. Alfred is hesitant at first, saying that he doesn’t have a lot of time, but Paul is desperate, almost begging him until he agrees. They go to the apartment and the main room is filled with paintings. Paul makes his way around, taking in each scene individually, rubbing his finger along his mustache. At first many of the new paintings seem similar, some almost identical, but as he takes his time and concentrates on each one individually he sees that every scene is intriguing in its own way with its own unique life and story.
Alfred does not speak for a long time and finally looks away from the canvasses and sits down in the lazy boy chair. He continues to sit in silence and Paul becomes overcome with shame, realizing he has allowed another person to see his fears and pathetic loneliness. He is surprised when Alfred finally speaks and tells him it is some of the best work he has ever seen. He offers Paul an exhibit in a new art show going up that very week. He reveals that by presenting Paul’s work he will be bumping another artist who is more established and better known than Paul but that he thinks it is important that people see the paintings of empty rooms.
In the few days leading up to the gallery show Paul is filled with doubt. He looks at his new paintings and tries to imagine if anyone will understand them. He’s not sure if he understands them himself. He wonders if Alfred is letting him into the show solely out of pity. When people see the paintings, what will they think of him, the person that created them? Will they think his is pathetic, wallowing in self pity and fear, even crazy? He thinks about calling Alfred to ask if it is necessary that he be there at the opening but decides against it. He thinks about calling Helen and asking her to come and even picks up the phone with her number on the screen but decides against it as well.
The night of the opening is heavily attended. One of the other three artists featured in the show is well known for his paintings of animals made out of machines and many people come to view his work. The crowd streams in the door, queues up to the flinty wine, and then files towards the established artist’s work before scattering around the gallery to view the lesser known paintings.
As the night goes on, more and more people gather around Paul’s paintings, until there is a congestion in that part of the room. Older men look the paintings up and down until they seem to have some sort of realization and they go back to the first painting to start the series again. A young woman looks at a painting of a room with the shadows of an adult and child in the bottom corner and tears begin to flow down her cheeks. A group of students get into an animated discussion with an older couple about the meaning of one of the paintings until the couple become angry with the students and buy the painting out of spite.
Three of Paul’s painting are bought before Alfred suggests that they knock the price up. Even with the higher price four more paintings are purchased until there is only the painting with the photo of the girl left. An older woman approaches Paul and asks if he is the artist and when he admits that he is she takes his hand and looks into his eyes for a full minute until black tears are pushing through her mascara. Other people seek him out as well and use words like “profound” and “honest” when praising his work. He nods in appreciation and swallows, trying to dislodge the lump of disappointment in his throat that has developed from Helen not showing up.
Alfred introduces Paul to a man that wants to show Paul’s work at a private function in his home the following month and Paul agrees. He works tirelessly for the next twenty days, creating new paintings of rooms that feature the same mysterious and indefinable loneliness that defined his previous work. He is paid handsomely for the gallery show and is paid well again for showing his work at the man’s home which is a loft in a high building overlooking the lake.
Paul has bought a new suit and stands around drinking champagne as people with expensive clothes and jewelry mill around the loft conversing and taking long looks at his paintings. He notices a woman watching him from across the room and when they make eye contact she approaches him and introduces herself as Christine. They talk about his work and she confides to him that it is hard for her to describe it except to say that it evokes a deep rooted sense of loss and yearning that she has not felt for years that she thought was buried long ago. She half jokes that she’s mad at him for unearthing that feeling in her and they drink champagne together for the remainder of the evening.
He goes home with Christine and, while lying next to her in bed while she soundly sleeps, he watches the moonlight stream through the window blinds. He thinks of Helen and imagines her doing simple things in her new home, like sweeping and cooking breakfast. It makes his chest hurt.

Although Paul and Christine begin to see each other regularly, Paul slowly realizes that she irritates him. She is very beautiful but she comes from money and speaks in a flamboyant way, using words that Paul isn’t familiar with. She sometimes accompanies him on walks to the park but instead of enjoying the day in silence and watching the ducks she feels the need to talk about a restaurant she went to or a pretty dress she is going to buy. Too often, when he is alone and painting with inspiration, she interrupts him with a call just to say hello. This is especially irritating because he is stuck on a new painting that he can’t quite finish. It is of an empty room, and just as good as his past work, but there is something missing.
They have been seeing each other for two months when Paul has some of his work shown at a large exhibition downtown. Christine stays on his arm all night and her voice and topics of conversation grate on him. At one point the gallery owner and her partner are speaking to them near the entrance and Paul thinks he sees Helen coming in the front door. He steps away from the conversation in a panic and when he gets near the bar he sees it’s another girl with dark hair.
He does not pick up or return Christine’s calls after that night. He continues to work on the new painting but there is still something missing. He stands in the main room of the apartment staring at the half finished painting for a week before putting it to the side and starting on a new one.
A month later the wealthy man with the loft overlooking the lake asks Paul to show his work at another event and he agrees. He regrets it when he sees Christine in attendance. She makes her way over to him and demands to know what happened to them. He almost tells her about Helen but it has been nearly a year since Helen moved out and it feels ridiculous to admit how much her leaving has isolated him. He stands mute and Christine continues to wait for an answer until the stone in her face breaks away and Paul recognizes the unmasked devastation in her eyes as she leaves the room.
That night he picks up the canvas he had put to the side and paints in a mirror on the wall of the empty room. He paints a woman’s reflection into the mirror and he tries with all his skill and talent to recreate the look Christine gave him at the loft. The next day a journalist from the city paper comes to write a profile on him and she takes a picture of the painting with the mirror in it and Christine’s face. She asks him what he will sell that painting for and he tells her that he will keep it for himself.

A prestigious gallery dedicates an entire wall to Paul’s work and he attends the opening with Alfred who now serves as his representative. People Paul has never met approach him throughout the night and praise his work. Everyone explains to him their own interpretations of his paintings and they are much more complex and interesting than anything he could have thought to say. One man says it invokes a family and the collective grief over the death of one member. An old woman tell him that it seems that they are all about searching for a true home. More and more explanations are brought to his attention, all of them different and personal to the individual offering them up.
Paul drinks wine until his lips are numb and then makes an excuse to Alfred that he is not feeling well. He escapes the gallery through the front entrance and while he is preparing to cross the street he finds Helen walking up on the sidewalk.
“Hello,” she says.
“How are you?” he asks.
“Pretty good. You?”
“Not bad. Doing alright.”
“I was coming to see your show.”
“Really? That’s nice.”
“Are you leaving?”
“Yes.”
She nods and he wants to hold her close and explain all the pain and emptiness he has felt for the last year and how much he needs her and how much he regrets having ever lost her at all.
“I guess I’ll see you later.”
He turns and begins to walk away but she calls out to him and suggests they have coffee. All the cells in Paul’s body fall into place and he feels whole and renewed as they walk through downtown. They find a diner where they order coffee and pie and Helen talks in length about her job and her brother who’s marriage is still dysfunctional yet still undissolved. Paul takes in every word and responds with answers he’s thought about late at night when he couldn’t sleep and Helen is surprised by his insight and renewed interest in her life.
They laugh like the old friends they are and the world makes sense to Paul again. He feels like he felt when he was a young boy and his whole life was ahead of him and full of possibility. It doesn’t bother him when she mentions the boyfriend she is returning to that night. He doesn’t want to know the man’s name or what he does or what he looks like, all he cares about is the person in the booth with him. They talk for an hour, until Helen leaves, and Paul watches her disappear down the street and wonders to himself why he didn’t tell her anything.
He walks through the city alone and the world is as terrible and as beautiful as he ever imagined it to be. He enters the apartment and can’t remember how he got there. His mind is overcome with thoughts of a long and pitiless future. He doesn’t know what to do with his hands so he fills them with a brush and paints a new picture, a new room, all gray with the light of early morning. He paints himself in, sitting in the chair, alone in the corner, and he paints a sun in the window, red as blood. The sun could be coming up or it could be setting, Paul has no opinion, and the painting is his masterpiece.
When morning arrives he walks to the park and watches the Goldeneye ducks push their way through the pond, the mothers push the strollers, the children play along the grass, and the old Filipino man drop pieces of bread for the birds. Everyone is alone he decides, it is only how you deal with it that matters. He walks the long way home and picks up a new canvas, an afternoon of painting laid out in his mind in the day ahead.
He is surprised to find Helen waiting outside the apartment. She blurts out that she has left her boyfriend to return to Paul if he’ll have her. She follows him up to the apartment where he places the new canvas on the easel in the main room and they spend the next day and a half in bed. Helen takes the next week off from work and Paul uses some of his earnings to pay for two plane tickets to Miami where they take a cruise around the Caribbean. They lie on the beaches of the Cayman islands and hike through the Mayan ruins on the Yucatan peninsula. They spend two days in Jamaica where Helen asks him how he spent his time away from her and he explains that he did nothing but paint. She says that she is proud of him and he believes her, and for the first time Paul feels that they are equal in their relationship, both in love with the other for the first time.
They spend the last few days in their cabin, floating in the boat together. When the ship gets into port they catch a taxi to the airport and spend the flight back home drinking and enjoying the present moment. When they return to the apartment they make plans to retrieve Helen’s things from storage so that she can move back in, then she prepares and dresses for work. He kisses her at the landing and watches her descend the stairs, disappearing through the front door and out into the street.
The apartment feels more empty than it has ever felt before and Paul picks up a brush to make himself feel better. He stands in front of the blank canvas and holds the brush up but does not touch the canvas. He lets the brush fall. He waits for an idea to come, staring into the canvas. He waits and stares into the very fiber of it, oblivious to the noise outside on the street and his own hunger. He stares until the sound of Helen’s key can be heard from the door as she returns from work. The canvas continues to sit, blank.

THE END

Four: Crime SuspenStory

OUR STORY SO FAR: Detective Claudia DeLa Cruz is on a deadline to build a case against Leo McCarthy, the unofficial king of Vice in the City. Meanwhile Jimmy Vaughn has been flown into San Francisco by McCarthy to find and punish whoever stole from him in his own crew and restore order. The list of suspects is narrowing down and the smell of blood is in the air.

Based on true events.
The only light on in the office was the desk lamp, Dan and everyone else had left and Claudia was alone, sifting through the files in front of her, eyes exhausted, unfocused, but refusing to close. She was determined not to leave until she could see the path forward clearly, without having to depend on luck or Judy.
She opened the folder with the profiles they had collected, peering down at the picture and the report typed next to it. Bobby Flores sat on the top of the stack. The picture was old, dating back to 2002, but she had seen Flores since then, when she and Dan had spent the first two weeks scoping out the paint store and snapping pictures. He still had the mustache back then, a relatively good looking guy she thought.
She scanned over the report: five years for transporting methamphetamine was the big one, but that had been ten years ago. All they had pulled up since then was a couple parking tickets and the extortion of a hydroponics store in the Haight where his name had come up. Nothing beyond that. Like so many others the case had fallen apart and Bobby Flores seemed to get smart. She turned the page.
Ray Richardson, AKA Cabbagepatch. The big dark head smiled out from the mug shot clipped on to the report. Convicted for attempted murder when he was nineteen, that was out in Florida. Held in suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon there in the City in 2005 but it didn’t stick. Ron Harvey had made sure of that. Good old Ron Harvey. The esteemed lawyer had represented four of the men on the McCarthy Paints payroll in about eleven separate cases over the years.
Bill Rodasavitch, AKA the Croat, or Croat. A few minor drug offenses. A year for auto theft. Assault when he was twenty. Shortly after that was when it was believed he was recruited into the group. Most likely recruited by Pat McCarthy, who was his high-school pal. McCarthy had done eight months for a decent amount of cocaine as a first offense. DUI in 2002. Six months for an unlicensed firearm. Drunk in public a few times which probably should have got him another DUI. Suspended sentence for fighting at the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade. The picture was from that day, a black eye and a wobbly grin.
Claudia flipped the page and came to Oscar Rayne. Multiple robbery charges as a minor. Assault as a minor that put him in the Boy’s Camp twice for a combined sentence of almost two years. As an adult he had been fingered for assault by a businessman from Chicago but the charges were later dropped. Claudia looked down and studied the face.
Judy had never really mentioned anything about this one. He had the right look about him, in the picture he showed a steely mug with a faint scar that came down from half way through the forehead and down through the brow, stopping at the right eye. It was a mean face, almost ugly, except for the eyes, the eyes had softness about them. Claudia found herself studying them longer than she meant to.
She flipped the page, coming to a face that was anything but soft. Richard Fagin, better known as Dick Fagin, born in Belfast Ireland in nineteen seventy two. Did three years for aggravated assault in the eighties right after he got off the boat. Did six more for attempted murder in nineteen ninety four. Charges dropped in the beating of a Chinese Immigrant at Golden Duck in Chinatown when-
Claudia stopped short and reread it. Golden Duck. Judy might have misspoken. Claudia had meant to follow up on it but hadn’t had a chance. She woke up her laptop and typed the name Golden Duck San Francisco into Google. The name came up, showing the location. There was no web-site or photo or much of anything except a few yelp posts that described the place as a true dive but “not quite cool enough to be a real dive”. There was no mention of a casino. Claudia felt foolish. When in doubt just Google it, she needed to remember that for future police work.

They had been watching video footage for almost three hours. Pat had to look away again, his eyes strained and watery. He had tried to look away all night, letting his eyes rest, his mind wander, but then Vaughn would ask who that was or if they had seen that person go out the exit already. Pat would have to lean forward, Charlie would rewind the video. Then Pat would identify the person or answer the question and Vaughn would scribble in his note book. This had gone on for nearly; check that, three hours exactly as Pat looked at the time on his phone.
There was a knock on the door and a voice said: “Charlie. C’mon, it’s me.”
Charlie looked from the screen over to the door, then got up, making his way bleary eyed.
“What are you doing?” Vaughn said.
Charlie unlocked the door, revealing a heavy set man with a mustache. The man blinked, looking around the room. His mind was so numb it took Pat a moment to focus and recognize O’Neil in his cheap suit and tie.
“What the hell you guys doing? Watching a porno?” O’Neil cracked.
Vaughn looked up at the mustache and the double chin. His eyes steeled up, irritated.
“I’m gonna ask you once,” he said. “Get out.”
“Whoa now,” O’Neil grinned at him “You must be new around here.”
“Did you hear what I said?”
“Relax. I got my VIP pass right here.”
O’Neil went in his pocket, his hand coming out with the detective shield. He held it a foot from Vaughn’s face. The other man barely glanced at it, keeping his steel eyes directed on the mustache.
“Is that supposed to mean something to me?” Vaughn asked the fat man.
Pat watched the confrontation, mildly curious about where it would lead. He disliked both men immensely. He hoped the moment would stretch out and end with the two of them destroying each other right there. Then the reality of the situation took hold, Pat realizing he had to take some responsibility if they were ever going to get out of there.
“Listen Bobby, we’re caught up in something right now. What do you need?” he asked O’Neil.
The cop had returned his badge to his pocket, still locked into the battle of wills and steel eyes with Vaughn. He adjusted his tie, looking over at Pat.
“Shoot Pat. I was just coming around to shoot the shit. See if Mai Ling was in tonight.”
“No. She off,” Charlie said.
O’Neil nodded, the good humor returning.
“Okay, well maybe I can spend some time with one of the others up there?”
“Go up. Have Maggie give a room,” Charlie told him.
“With Mai Ling gone I think ought’a get a little discount-“
“No discount. We don’t run charity,” Charlie replied.
Pat sighed, wishing the fat man would disappear. Vaughn still stared with murder in his eyes. O’Neil seemed unaware of it, impending sex distracting him.
“Its fine,” Pat said “Go upstairs Bobby. It’s on the house.”
“Good man. You all be good now. You especially,” O’Neil said, nodding his wide head at Vaughn.
The fat man went out the door and Vaughn turned his gaze towards Charlie.
“What the fuck are you doing you stupid chink? I don’t care who’s knocking on the door. You don’t answer it unless I say you do.”
Charlie simply nodded, unfazed. He clicked play on the screen and all three of them watched as Fran Flores made his way down the hall and out the motel entrance on the monitor. Vaughn wrote on the note pad. Pat could see that the only names remaining on the page without lines drawn through them were Oscar and Bill.
Vaughn told Charlie to fast forward. They watched the video stretch and ripple until a figure flashed across. Charlie rewound it a bit with the mouse. They watched as Oscar come out of Golden Duck’s front entrance on the monitor.
“You see anything in his hand?” Vaughn asked.
“I don’t see shit,” Pat said coldly.
“No,” Charlie agreed.
Vaughn put a line through Oscar’s name and Pat felt anger boil in his chest.
“What did you expect?” he said. “You thought one of our boys would just pop out with a fucking bag?”
Vaughn ignored him, telling Charlie to fast forward. All the video panels stood still, the minutes zipping by as seconds on the time code. The frames of video brightened as the sun came up on camera. The three men watched as Tek walked up in panel three and unlocked the Golden Duck’s front entrance on November twenty first.
Vaughn leaned back in his chair and said: “I never saw the Croat come out.”
“We probably just missed it,” Pat replied.
“No. I didn’t.”
“Garage exit,” Charlie said.
“He probably parked in the garage. You’re not supposed to but he might have. That’s why we didn’t see him,” Pat said.
“Why would he do that?”
Vaughn lit a cigarette.
“I don’t know. He just might have.”
“And he’s the only one?”
“So what? It doesn’t prove shit.”
“It proves everything.”
Vaughn turned around in his chair and looked at Pat.
“You’re guy’s disappeared. Usually the most obvious answer is the answer. No matter if you want to believe it or not,” he said.
There was another knock on the door. Charlie looked over at Vaughn warily.
“I’m trying to get out of here,” a voice said through the door.
“It’s the drop,” Pat muttered to Vaughn.
Vaughn nodded at Charlie and the other man got up and unlocked the door. Javier came in and handed an envelope over, rubbing his eyes. The right side of his head was a slightly different color than the left. He looked around the room, taking in Pat and the video monitors. When he got to Vaughn his eyes widened and he took a step back towards the door.
“How game?” Charlie asked him.
“It was just two douche bag tourists and a couple of immigrants. Brown gave them the number from the St. Francis. They had some money. The immigrants won a little and then we put Ping in the game to clean them out.”
Pat noticed Javier staring at Vaughn.
“Javey, this is the guy from out of town,” he said.
“We’ve met,” Vaughn said. “How you doing Javey?”
Javier didn’t say anything.
“You hear from Bill yet?”
“I’m going home,” Javier replied.
He exited the room as quickly as possible.

Oscar pulled the whisky from the glove box, sipping it, looking out at the lights of South City. The twinkling and illusion of calm took the edge off the stale tension in his stomach. He had been waiting there in front of Javier’s house for two hours and every minute that ticked by increased the distinct feeling that he was going to miss something, or was missing something at that moment. It made him jumpy, on edge. He took another pull from the whisky.
His phone rang on the seat, the number blocked. He answered and heard Vaughn say: “What do you have?”
“Nothing,” Oscar replied “His mother said she hadn’t seen him in weeks.”
There was silence on the other end. He thought the call may have been dropped before he heard one of Vaughn’s sighs.
“You believe her?” the man asked.
“She seemed worried.”
“Worried because you were there, or because he was missing?”
“Because she hadn’t seen him.”
Vaughn went silent again for a moment, then just hung up. Oscar put the phone back down in the passenger seat, watching as the headlights of a car came up along the street and pulled into Javier’s driveway. He waited to make sure. When he saw Javier gets out of the car he got out as well.
He had hoped that Javier would notice him before he got to the car but the idiot’s head was bowed as he made his way towards the house, off in his own world. Oscar called out to him from the street. Javier almost jumped out of his skin and looked ready to sprint for shelter. He twisted his head around, jerking like a bird to pinpoint the sound. When he saw Oscar he stopped short.
He stood very still before blinking the surprise out of his face, replacing it with anger. Oscar could see him square his shoulders before coming forward.
“You mother fucker,” Javier growled “You mother fucker!”
Oscar could see the man’s hands had turned to fists. He stopped back into the street and let Javier approach him until they were fifteen feet apart, then pulled the gun from his coat and pointed it at Javier.
“Take it easy,” he warned.
Javier stopped and began to pace back and forth, the gun stopping all forward progress but the anger not allowing him to stop moving.
“I ought to fucking kill you!” he cried. “You come in my house and fucking-“
“Shut up. You want the neighbors to hear?”
Oscar kept the gun on him but lowered it slightly. Javier watched, still pacing. He spat on the ground between them.
“What the fuck did I do to you?” Javier demanded.
“Nothing.”
“You brought that piece of shit in my house!”
“He told me to.”
“Fuck you.”
Javier stopped moving, he looked around at his neighboring houses, finally realizing how he and Oscar might appear. Oscar took the moment to lower the gun completely, holding it at his side.
“Did Bill call you?” he asked.
“No,” Javier said
“I know Bill didn’t have anything to do with what happened.”
Javier watched as Oscar spoke. He spat on the asphalt again and said: “Bill would never steal from Leo. He’s like a father to him.”
“I know that.”
“Leo stepped in when that cop tried to fuck Bill over last year. You remember that? Bill would never do nothing to Leo.”
Oscar nodded
“He would never do a fucking thing to anybody with Leo.”
“Did you talk to him?” Oscar asked again.
“If I did would you go run off and tell your cousin? The sick fucking bastard.”
“He’s not my cousin.”
“I thought you were my friend until you and that piece of shit stuck that gun in my face.”
Oscar shoved the gun behind his belt along the small of his back.
“You could have done something,” Javier muttered.
“Did you talk to Bill?”
Javier looked down at his feet, then back at Oscar with contempt. He sniffed at the night air. A car came up behind him and they both had to move out of the street. They stood on the sidewalk watching the car drive off before Javier said: “I talked to him.”
“And what’d you say?” Oscar asked.
“I said get the fuck out of the Bay. I said there’s some crazy bastard that’s going to come around looking to shoot your balls off.”
“And what’d he say?”
“He said he couldn’t but that he was going to stay low.”
“Do you know where he is?”
“No,” Javier muttered.
“Does he have a girl? A black girl?”
Javier turned his head, his round brown eyes squinting into the light of the street lamp.
“I’m pretty sure he was messing with that chick Shimiya, I don’t know for sure. He mentioned it once. A while ago.”
“Who is she?”
“She works at the Nip.”
“There’s a few black ones there,” Oscar said.
“She’s the one that isn’t fat.”
Oscar tried to place her. He did pick ups at Cat Nip rarely and hadn’t worked there in years.
“You speak to him again you have him call me.”
Javier nodded but Oscar could tell he wasn’t listening. He was off in his own world again.
“I’m done with this shit. Who needs it? Me and Anna are gonna head down to Mexico and live our life.”
Oscar left Javier on the sidewalk and walked back to the Cadillac.

Three: Crime SuspenStory

OUR STORY SO FAR: Jimmy Vaughn has flown in to San Francisco to find out who in Leo McCarthy’s crew ripped off the Golden Duck. Oscar Rayne, enforcer and bagman for Leo, is serving as Vaughn’s driver and guide. Meanwhile, Detectives Claudia Dela Cruz and Dan March have a young stripper named Judy Collins working as their snitch in the McCarthy crew’s club, The Paradise Lounge. What the two detectives don’t know is that the girl is stringing them along due to her relationship with Leo McCarthy and the fact that she is carrying his baby. For more see parts 1-2.

Based on true events,
Collin “Murph” Murphy stood with Pat in front of Paradise Isle and smoked, lighting his own cigarette before reaching over and giving Pat the flame. They were both hung over, Murph more so with the usual red of his cheeks drained and his chubby face turned a pale yellow.
“This guy called you?” he asked again.
“No. Leo called. At eight in the fucking morning.”
Pat blew out the smoke and spat on the sidewalk.
“And said what again?”
“That the guy wanted everybody down at the club by noon.”
“It’s noon now.”
“I know.”
“Who is this guy?”
“Leo wanted to go outside for this thing, I told you.”
Murph belched, the night’s indiscriminate alcohols, whisky, tequila, various beers, Yager, all mixed and lingering there on the sidewalk. He gagged a moment, forcing a drag of smoke down his throat.
“I just don’t like being told what to do by some guy I don’t know,” he said.
Pat grimaced.
“I told you. Leo is the one who called and told me to round everybody up. Not this guy,” he said.
“But the guy told Leo right? He wanted us down here so he had Leo tell you to come down here.”
“Nobody tells Leo anything,” Pat muttered.
He threw the butt down on the sidewalk. They began to move towards the door to get out of the cold when Murph caught sight of Oscar walking towards them with another man. Pat followed his gaze, watching the man from the day before approuch them, the dark glasses in place.
“You don’t have a hit or a bump or anything?” Pat asked Murph.
“You kidding? I would have done it by now.”
Murph went inside, Pat waited in front of the door for Oscar and Vaughn to reach him.
“Everybody here?” Vaughn asked.
“Everybody I could get a hold of,” Pat replied.
“How many?”
“Most of them.”
“Is the Croat here?”
“He’s one of the guys I couldn’t get a hold of. He went home sick yesterday.”
Vaughn looked over at Oscar and Pat wondered what it meant.
“You got a back room?” Vaughn said.
“It’s an office but there’s plenty of room.”
“Have everybody get back there and we’ll talk.”
Pat began to head in but Vaughn stopped him, beckoning for him to come closer.
“You swept it?” he asked, the dark glasses less than a foot from Pat’s face.
“For bugs and shit?”
“What do you think I mean?”
“I had Cabbage and Dick sweep it yesterday morning before you came by.”
Vaughn nodded and Pat continued into the club. The stale room lights were on, revealing the old thread bare carpet for everything it had become over the years; skuff marks and stains and a dull orange color. All the men were gathered near the bar talking, Dick leading them in discussion of a bar fight he had recently been a part of. Cabbagepatch sat next to Dick in a stool, his wide frame threatening the wooden legs with implosion.
The Flores brothers, Bobby and Fran, were sitting next to each other listening to Dick. They looked like twins, the same hair cut and similar clothes, the same stupid expressions, but Bobby was a few weathered years older and sported a mustache. Vlad, the youngest there that day, sat by himself at one of the tables, punching buttons on his phone, while Murph had made his way behind the bar to help himself to a beer.
“Let’s bring it to the back,” Pat announced.
“I’m in the middle of a fucking story eh!” Dick said, his face reddening.
“Let’s do this so we can get on with our day,” Pat replied flat.
The rest of the men followed him through the door and took positions around the room, Dick bringing up the rear with a red grimace. He flopped down on the couch with his eye on Pat.
Vaughn made his entrance with Oscar coming in behind him. All the eyes followed Vaughn as he walked through the room steady, calculated. He took his position in front of the TV and removed his glasses, the blue eyes scanning over the seven men in front of him.
“I’m not here to make judgments about how you run your thing here,” he said “I’m not here to say it’s the sloppiest shit organization I’ve ever seen and that it would be the laughing stock of the whole country if anybody gave a fuck. I’m just here to find a rat.”
The men glanced around, measuring the reaction. Dick turned an even brighter red.
“Now I respect Leo. Leo has set something up in a city that’s been in a strangle hold from the Triads and the Mexicans and everybody else for a long time. Some how he keeps it going using you bunch, which must mean you’re worth a shit. I respect Leo. Leo and I go back. When I tell you something I don’t want any bullshit. It won’t happen a lot but on the rare occasion I tell you something you do it.”
Vaughn’s eyes made their away around the room as he spoke, taking each man in and exposing them to his will. When he came to the end of his speech his eyes fell on Dick. He let them linger there, cold and blue, until the Irishman gave in with sniff, letting his gaze fall to the floor.
“Who knows where the Croat is?” Vaughn asked.
Pat was as surprised as anybody, not quite getting what the question meant.
“What do you mean,” he asked.
Vaughn looked at him coldly before spreading his gaze back around the room.
“I know a lot of you consider this guy a friend and as a friend it would be best that you get me and him together as soon as possible. You understand?”
“He’s supposed to be sick,” Fran Flores said.
Vaughn looked down at the El Salvadorian, a dismissive look, barely acknowledging his existence.
“You go by his house?” Vlad asked.
Pat put his hand to his forehead, trying to soften the pounding, and said: “Maybe he’s at his mother’s?”
Vaughn looked down at him from the desk.
“Where’s that?” he asked.
Pat opened his eyes, regretting that he had spoken. He glanced at the other guys, wondering what they were thinking.
“She lives in that little shitty town. The one by the coast. Pacifica,” he said.
“Do you know where?”
“Not really.”
“Do you?” Vaughn asked turning his gaze up towards Oscar in the back of the room. Pat turned his head as well and found Oscar staring back at him with disgust.
“Yeah,” Oscar said, still looking at Pat
“Good, you’re going to go over there.” Vaughn said. “The rest of you: if the Croat contacts you or you get word of where he is you let me know with the number Charlie gave you. If you talk to the Croat you don’t mention me, just get his location and let me know.”
The men began to murmur and get up from their seats. Pat was determined to get behind the bar so he could start working on his hangover. He began to walk towards the door before Vaughn got in his way.
“You and me are going over to the place,” Vaughn said.
“What place?”
“Golden Duck.”
“Right now?”
Pat waited for an answer but Vaughn had moved off and left the room. Oscar stepped up, taking Vaughn’s place in front of Pat.
“Why’d you mention Bill’s mother?”
Oscar’s tone was thick with irritation.
“What do you mean why did I mention it?” Pat said. “I’m just trying to get this over with. Get everything back to normal. The guy just wants to talk to him.”
Oscar shook his head.
“You think Bill had shit to do with this? You really think-“
He stopped short when Vaughn came back into the room. Vaughn reached into his coat and pulled out a small silver P32, handing it over to Oscar.
“If the guy turns up, get him back to the paint store by whatever means you gotta use,” he said.
Oscar put the gun into the inside pocket of his jacket and left through the door without saying a word. Vaughn watched him go and then looked back at Pat.
“Let’s get going. We got a lot of movies to watch,” he said.

Schonberg’s office was cramped and tossed and pretty much just a straight up mess. There were files piled up all over the desk and the waist basket was full. The pen holder was jammed with pens and Claudia noticed many of them were chewed at the end from where she sat with Dan in front of the desk.
The door burst open and Schonberg himself walked in, late as usual, scrolling through his Black Berry and adjusting his tie. There were multiple stains on the tie, one barbecue and a few mustard spots as far as Claudia could tell. Schonberg nodded at them both in silent apology, sitting down in his chair. He put the Black Berry on the desk next to the files, entwining his fingers in front of him with his elbows on the desk like he was about to pray before he spoke.
“It looks like a done deal,” he said “They’re going to do raids on Catnip and Hotties, all in one night.”
Both Claudia and Dan were caught by surprise, for a moment only able to look dumbly across the desk at the Lieutenant. Dan found his voice first.
“They can’t do that! We’re building a case here,” he said.
Schonberg nodded and pressed on.
“I know that. You both have been working hard. But they got the election in the news cycle now. Ferris is going in to succeed McDougal and she doesn’t have shit to run on. She needs something solid that shows results. Your work has established that both of these clubs are places of prostitution and she needs something current. Something for the cameras that shows people the police force is being effective I guess.”
Claudia glared down at some old French fries rubbed into the carpet, unable to look at Schonberg’s face without losing her temper.
“She needs something that looks effective?” she muttered. “Jesus Christ, your talking about going in, popping a couple girls and fining the place. We’ve been building something in the last few months that could very well break up Leo McCarthy’s whole operation. A raid won’t do it. He’ll get word, duck down a little bit, and that’ll be that, back to business a week later.”
Schonberg watched her speak then looked over at Dan for a confirmation. It made Claudia’s blood boil
“It’s true,” Dan said. “We’ve got these guys scoped out for meth, stolen goods, extortion. A lot on top of the prostitution. This stuff is being operated from places outside the clubs-“
“Like the paint store?” Schonberg interrupted.
“Well…” Dan sputtered out.
“I’ve been reading your reports and I haven’t seen that paint store mentioned once. Isn’t that what got this whole thing started in the first place?”
“We think that’s because we involved another department in the surveillance,” Claudia said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means every time information of any kind is spread around in the department on this crew there’s a change in pattern and behavior on their end.”
Schonberg finally broke his hands from prayer, sitting up straighter in his chair.
“Detective, I think it is imperative that we hold back from jumping to conclusions, especially when it comes to the character of this department.”
“It’s not a matter of character Lieutenant,” Claudia said. “It’s a matter of getting results.”
“Well, that I can agree with. Where are we with the murders? I haven’t heard that mentioned once. How about the Martinez case? Anything on that?”
“We don’t have anything confirmed as of right now,” Dan answered. “But McCarthy is into it all. There is no doubt this crew threw Martinez and probably a couple other people in the Bay.”
“That’s why I tell my family when they visit: don’t eat the crab,” Schonberg cracked. His face creased into a smile that was half forced, half self deprecating, all ugly.
Dan nodded but didn’t smile, Claudia kept her scowl intact, not giving Schonberg an inch. Schonberg’s face decreased and he sighed, ready to give ground.
“Listen, these raids are going to happen regardless. There’s nothing me or anyone can do. Things are about to go in motion in the next few days.”
He watched them, trying to gauge if he was getting through. He sighed again when neither budged.
“Do you still have the girl inside?” he asked.
“Yes,” Claudia said sharply.
“Just her?”
“As of now, yes.”
Schonberg glanced around the office, looking at the mess, weighing the future in his mind.
“If you had one more inside I might be able to get them to hold off,” he said.
“For how long?” Claudia demanded.
“I’m not sure. But having another person inside would be a clear sign of the case moving forwards. They would probably want to wait on the raids until they could see results.”
“How long do we have?”
Claudia projected a fierce calm toward Schonberg, he tried to break it’s intensity by glancing down at the stains on his tie.
“Ferris wants to meet with me since the supervisor suggested the raids. That’s in two days. That’s all you got. I have to present any new developments at that meeting.”
“We’ll get somebody,” Claudia said.
Dan looked over at her, unconvinced.

Pat had tried to be patient but after thirty minutes he couldn’t take it anymore and he threw a finger up towards Tek.
“Hey! Whisky here.”
Tek nodded as he poured shots for three baby faced frat boys that had obviously stopped by Golden Duck on their way to another destination. Vaughn glanced over at Pat but stayed silent, the slight swivel of his head the only movement he had made since they had sat down at the bar.
Tek finished with the frat boys and brought over a glass with some ice and the bottle of whisky. He poured with the tight drawn face he always had.
“How much longer we gotta wait man? Charlie know we’re up here?” Pat asked him.
“He know. He be up soon,” Tek replied.
“He better,” Vaughn muttered but Tek acted like he didn’t hear and went to check on the dice game the two old Filipinos had going on the other side of the bar.
Besides the frat boys and the Filipinos the only other people inside the bar were two drunks sitting side by side a few stools down from Vaughn and Pat, swaying in the invisible breeze of drunkenness and staring out across the bar with drooping eyes like two aged hound dogs. The place was a tiny dive, just a bar and some stools, with two paintings on the wall: one of a topless female tennis player and the other of a bear swinging a San Francisco Giant’s flag in the woods. The place was unremarkable in every way.
“I don’t drink when I work,” Vaughn said with a flat voice.
Pat slurped his drink and placed the glass on the bar before he answered.
“Leo’s my uncle you know?” he said and looked over at Vaughn with a challenge.
Vaughn nodded.
“Yeah, I heard that. Makes me feel bad for the guy.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Vaughn looked amused and seemed to be making his way towards another comment when Yellow Charlie finally popped out of the passage door. Pat and Vaughn got up from their stools and Charlie waited until they got to him before leading the way down the hall to the stairs. The three men came down to the passage way and Vaughn passed Pat to walk next to Charlie.
“I saw two cameras in the bar and one outside. Is the whole place wired up?” he asked.
“All wired up,” Charlie replied “Everywhere. Camera in every room.”
“And you got feeds for all of them?”
“All go in computer. They got different fees.”
“Feeds?”
Charlie nodded and Vaughn pointed towards an elevator entrance at the end of the passageway.
“That goes to the rooms upstairs?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“This all got built over a hundred years ago,” Pat said “It used to be a dance hall upstairs and this was opium dens.”
“And you got cameras in all the rooms?” Vaughn asked Charlie.
“Not all. Just rooms we have games.”
“What about the exits?”
“Yes.”
“Not the garage,” Pat threw in.
“That true,” Charlie said “No camera at garage. We put one in tomorrow.”
He stopped and unlocked one of the doors in the passageway, leading them all into a badly lit office. Pat had only been in the room once before a few years back. He marveled at the fact that nothing had changed. The old beat up table still sat in the middle surrounded by a set of equally beat up chairs and a desk, pushed to the side with three different computer monitors lined up on top of it. The rest of the room was packed with various goods still in their boxes: TV’s, microwaves, crock pots, video game systems.
Charlie sat down at the desk and began to maneuver a mouse in front of the computer. Vaughn dragged a chair over from the table, sitting next to him.
“What are you doing?” Vaughn asked.
“Pulling up the file from the day,” Charlie said.
“November 20th?”
Charlie nodded his head firmly, not looking away from the monitor as different files began to appear on the desktop.
“Didn’t Charlie already go through all this shit? I thought he watched the tapes,” Pat said from where he was leaned up against the wall.
“Did you? What did you find?” Vaughn asked Charlie.
“Not me. Charlie, White Charlie. I’m Yellow Charlie.”
“I want to see for myself regardless,” Vaughn pulled out a small notebook from his coat and turned towards Pat. “Tell me everybody that was working that night.”
Pat looked up at the ceiling and thought back. The whisky had helped a little but the hang-over was still very present in his skull.
“Patch was working the small games. They go on in the two rooms connected upstairs,” he said with effort.
“Who’s Patch?” Vaughn asked. He scribbled on the pad.
“Cabbagepatch. The big black guy.”
“Who else?”
“Javey was working the high stakes game with Bill. Dick was there. He was keeping an eye on everything. I think he was bringing the girls in too.”
“Dick. That’s the Mick with the red face?”
“Yeah. I was hosting. Just bringing drinks over and joking around with the players. Keeping it light.”
“So you weren’t doing much of anything.”
Pat glanced dead eyed over at Vaughn. He desperately wanted to make some sort of retort, something that would show the asshole that he wasn’t just one of the other lugs to be pushed around and treated like a dog. Nothing was coming. He decided it was best to let go, let the night get over with so he could get back to the bar.
“Fran was watching the front and his brother Bobby was driving some people in. They don’t work upstairs usually. I guess that’s it. Oscar was moving the cash up and down-“
“Oscar?” Vaughn interrupted. He looked up from the pad.
“Yeah. Oscar.”
“Is that the guy driving me around?”
“Yeah.”
“And he was moving the cash down? From where to where?”
“He would just bring cash down to the safe here and if one of the players wanted to get credit from the house he would bring some cash up to the game.”
Vaughn sat silent, the pad sitting in his lap. Charlie clicked around with the mouse until twelve separate squares of video came up on two of the monitors and he finally muttered: “Vember twenty right here.”

He had just come down the hill on Highway One when it dawned on Oscar that he hadn’t eaten in over a day. He pulled over at the first place he saw in Pacifica, a little café three blocks from the beach, and ordered a sandwich and a cup of coffee. He ate the sandwich mechanically, just to keep his stomach at bay, and then he ordered a second and a third cup of coffee. He knew very well that the drinking of the coffee was simply a way to put off going to Bill’s Mother’s house. He paid his bill and left.
Mrs. Rodasavitch lived right off the highway, in a compact yellow house. As he turned onto the road Oscar thought back to when he, Pat, and Bill had stopped off there after getting back from LA. Mrs. Rodasavitch had served them eggs and sausages and had let Pat and Bill smoke in the house. She had seemed like a sweet woman. He had liked meeting her, becoming slightly jealous Bill had a mother that he knew and could visit and be loved by.
Over the course of that evening the jealousy morphed into resentment. Here was a guy who had a sweet old mother, a place to call home, and yet he lived the life that he did. They had driven down to LA together to get out of the Bay for a few days and have a vacation but they had also gone on business, bringing a girl with them that they dropped off to an Armenian in Hollywood who had then handed them a suitcase to bring back to Leo. Oscar had sat in Mrs. Rodasavtich’s house thinking about if Bill was arrested or hurt and what that would have done to the sweet old woman that was cooking for them and laughing with them and doting over them. He had looked across the table at Bill and felt a smoldering irritation.
All Bill had going for him was that he was tall. He towered over people and had big over sized Yugoslavian features. Oscar had fought him twice when they were drunk and won both times, the last time being a few days after they had got back from LA. He blackened both of Bill’s eyes and the Croat had worn sunglasses around for almost a week. Oscar had felt bad about it the next day both times because he knew Bill was soft. The Croat didn’t have what a lot of the guys around them had, or maybe it was that Bill had something that most of them didn’t, Oscar wasn’t sure which it was.
He parked a few houses down from Mrs. Rodasavitch’s, placing the gun under the seat. He approached from the opposite side of the street and spotted a car covered in a tarp in front of the yellow house. He could tell just from the shape that it was Bill’s car but he went across and looked under the tarp to make sure. The sun was starting to go down when he unlatched the little wooden fence, making his way up the cement walk way.
“Oscar isn’t it? It’s been so long.” Mrs. Rodasavitch said when she opened the door.
“Sorry to bother you Mrs. Rodasavitch. Is Bill around?”
“No. Not now. He was.”
“I saw his car out front.”
“He asked if he could leave it here and take mine. I don’t mind. I won’t need to go to the store for a few days and even when I do I can walk it you know. It’s good to walk.”
“Is he going to be back?”
She looked up at him, the crease of her smile sagging a bit.
“Why don’t you come in? Don’t stand out there on the porch. Come on in.”
Oscar nodded and pulled open the screen. She led him down the hall to the kitchen, sitting him down at the table in the breakfast nook.
“You want some coffee dear?” she asked, and Oscar shook his head.
“When did Bill come by?” he asked.
Mrs. Rodasavitch watched him from where she stood in the kitchen, then she sat down at the table opposite.
“Is everything alright dear?”
“Everything’s fine.”
“You and Bill aren’t in any trouble are you?”
“No ma'am. Everything’s fine. What makes you say that?”
She watched him from across the table, the smile all drained out.
“I don’t know. He just seemed a little, you know, a little tense or jumpy last night.”
“That’s when he came by?”
“I don’t like seeing him like that. It’s not how Billy usually is when he comes to see me. He is such a character and he makes me laugh.”
“Did he say where he was going?”
“He didn’t tell me.I wish he had because at some point I’m going to need my car back. I don’t want to drive his car. Can you imagine me driving his car? Down to the market?”
“It’s a nice car. People will think you’re a movie star or something,” Oscar said.
“I don’t know about that. People would talk though. They love to talk. Have you tried calling him?”
“His phone seems to be off.”
Mrs. Rodasavitch swallowed, looking down at the table wide eyed.
“I’m sure he’s fine,” Oscar said. “He probably just wants some time to himself. I get like that.”
“Maybe he went off with that girl somewhere,” Mrs. Rodasavitch said.
“What girl?”
“She’s black. He brought her over a week or so ago.”
“A black girl?”
Oscar was shifting through his mind trying to remember ever seeing Bill with a black girl. He came up with nothing.
“I was rude. I mean I was surprised. I don’t know a lot of colored people and Billy didn’t give me any warning. In walks this girl. I could have been a lot nicer. I was used to his girlfriend. What was her name?”
“Susan I think.”
“Suzie, right. And in walks this girl. I was a little, sort of, stand offish, you know? And afterwards I felt bad because I could tell Bill likes her and here I was being, I don’t know, I’m a little ashamed about how I acted.”
Oscar tried to think where Bill could have met the girl. It must have been one of the clubs. And then he brought her here to his mother? Whatever it was it seemed serious, yet Bill had said nothing as far as she was concerned which made Oscar think it must have been a dancer.
“I better get going,” he said.
“And you’re sure you don’t want coffee?”
“No, I’m fine. If Bill calls you or shows up, please have him call me right away.”
He stood up and she stood up with him.
“You promise there’s nothing going on Oscar?” she said softly.
“It’s fine. Nothing to worry about. It’s just a business opportunity I want him to get in with me on and it’s important we do it soon.”
Oscar felt the words forcing themselves out of his mouth. He could tell from the look on her face that Mrs. Rodasavitch was trying to convince herself that what he said was true.
“Okay,” she said.
Oscar went out the front door and unlatched the gate. He walked by the Croat’s car and looked back to find Mrs. Rodasavitch standing on the porch watching him go. He nodded, waving good bye in the dim light. He saw her hesitate before she waved back and went inside.

To be continued................

Two: Crime SuspenStory

Based on true events.
The dark green Cadillac crawled up the hill and parked across the street from Javier Mejia’s house. Oscar hadn’t been sure if he would remember where to go, he had only been there once or twice to pick Javier up. Then they had driven passed the In & Out next to Beckett's Funeral Homes off of the freeway, which brought it back, and he had driven on like he had known the route the whole time.
He turned the car off and they both got out, Oscar leading the way towards the single story house with it’s lights on, Vaughn a few paces behind. The sun had been down for over twenty minutes. Beyond the columns of houses that were built around them the lights twinkled from South City all the way out to the blackness of the Bay.
“I’m your cousin,” Vaughn said.
Oscar turned around and Vaughn removed the dark glasses, revealing the blue eyes that hid behind. He looked normal, finally fully human, but it didn’t put Oscar at ease.
“I’m your cousin,” Vaughn explained “Visiting from out of town. We’re looking to get a drink.”
“Me and Javey aren’t close friends” Oscar said.
“Does he live alone?”.
“He’s got a wife.”
“Make sure the wife isn’t here.”
The unease Oscar felt finally formed into a full on tension in his limbs, he felt stiff as he made his way up to the front door and rang the bell. They both waited, silent, their breath coming out into the cold air in thin clouds. The locks on the door finally popped and turned, the door swung open, revealing Javier’s face staring out. The eyes widened, the mouth with the dark black goatee surrounding it frowned.
“Oscar?” he said.
Javier looked beyond the light at Vaughn, trying to make him out.
“What’s up Javey?”
Javier looked at Oscar closely, waiting for more. The door was only open wide enough to see half of his face.
“This is my cousin,” Oscar said, motioning over his shoulder at Vaughn. “We were just driving around and I thought we’d stop by to see if you want a drink.”
“Yeah?”
“He just flew in. We were down at Joe’s of Westlake eating and then I thought ‘Javey lives right up there, let’s see what he’s up to’.”
Javier nodded grimly before swallowing and stepping back, letting the door swing open.
“That’s cool. It’s been a minute.”
There was football coming out of the living room and the smell of onions was fresh from the kitchen. They walked across the hardwood floor, all three of them. Oscar looked around at the big screen TV and the furniture and wondered what it was Javier actually did except open doors and freshen drinks for shit heals.
“Is Anne home?” he asked.
“Annie,” Javier corrected, he looked back at Vaughn again.
“Sorry. Annie. That’s right.”
“You guys were at Joe’s huh?”
Javier’s voice was tight, forced.
“He was hungry so we headed over there. I was a bus boy over there when I was a kid,” Oscar said.
“Oh yeah?”
“When I was a kid.”
“Is Annie home Javey?” Vaughn asked.
Javier stopped at the entrance to the kitchen and looked back at the stranger.
“What was your name again?” .
“I’m his cousin,” Vaughn replied.
“Yeah, what’s your name?”
Vaughn smiled, the moment stretching on for no reason at all until he said: “Jimmy.”
“Right,” Javier said, like he had already known it.
Vaughn nodded and Javier stood there a moment, a hundred variations on a decision going through his head before leading them into the kitchen. Oscar and Vaughn sat down at the dinner table as Javier opened up the doors to a cabinet and eyed the shelves.
“I got tequila you know. And some whisky,” he said.
Oscar looked over at Vaughn who was looking at Javier, silent.
“Whisky’s good,” Oscar said.
Javier pulled the bottle down and poured into three glasses. Oscar watched the hand that held the bottle, shaking slightly. Javier noticed it as well and tried to distract from it by talking.
“It’s been a minute Oscar. I don’t see you around that much no more,” he said.
“I’m here and there.”
“You doing good though huh?”
Javier placed two glasses on the table, too unsure of himself to hand them directly to his guests.
“Can’t complain,” Oscar said, sipping his drink “You still working most of the games at the Duck?”
Javier held his drink in his hand and looked over at Vaughn who still sat silently, his drink untouched. Oscar followed his gaze and shook his head.
“Don’t worry about my cousin. He’s good people.”
Javier smiled. He nodded over at Vaughn.
“Nothing personal Jimmy. I don’t like talking about work when I don’t know somebody.”
Vaughn let out a sigh, resetting his eyes on Javier.
“Were you working on November twentieth?” he asked.
Javier swallowed his drink, no change in his look.
“What are you talking about?”
“Were you working on November twentieth?”
Javier put his glass down on the counter. He looked at Oscar and then back at Vaughn.
“What the did you say?”
“Real simple. Were you working the big game room at Golden Duck on the night of November twentieth?”
Javier stepped back, then looked over at Oscar.
“Who the fuck is this guy huh? What the fuck is he talking about?”
Oscar kept his eyes steady on Javier.
“Just answer the question. It’s no big deal,” he said.
“Who the fuck are you?!” Javier said, rising up on his toes.
The revolver came out of Vaughn’s suit coat slowly, coolly. It was a good sized gun, dull metal, and he placed it slowly on the table in the center of the three of them.
“It doesn’t matter who I am Javey. What matters is whether you were working on November twentieth.”
Javier put his glass down on the kitchen counter.
“I was working. Upstairs at the high stakes game.”
“How late were you there?” Vaughn asked.
“Till around eight.”
“In the morning?”
“Yeah.”
“How many players were in the game?”
“Four.”
“Who were they?”
“I don’t know. Russians. I think they were with Yuri in the Sunset.”
“Did they throw around a lot of money?”
“Mostly they drank and spoke Russian, which pissed me off.”
Vaughn looked amused.
“Why?” he asked.
“All the drinking and bullshitting slowed the play down.”
“Who was working the game with you?”
“Bill and Tek. Tek works down at the bar but they had him up stairs for the night.”
“Who's Bill?”
“Bill Rodasavitch. The Croat.”
“He's with Leo?”
Javier looked at the table, eyeing the gun.
“We're all with Leo,” he said.
Vaughn didn’t reply. He sat silent, watching Javier with the trace of a grin around the corners of his mouth. Javier looked back at him and the color in his face increased. He scowled, turning away towards the sink.
“This is fucking bullshit. Let’s just get straight to why you’re here,” he said.
“Why am I here?” Vaughn asked.
“Because of the money.”
“What money?”
Vaughn shifted in his seat, lazily picking the gun up from the table. Javier watched him, fear mixing with the scowl on his face.
“What money?” Vaughn repeated and looked up at him
“The money! The money that got taken that night. Jesus Christ! Let's just get to it!”
“Which is?”
“Did I take it.”
Vaughn watched him, the grin dissolving.
“Of course I didn't fucking take it,” Javier said, pacing in front of the sink. “This is bullshit!”
Vaughn stood up abruptly, the barrel of the gun pointed up at the ceiling. He took a step towards Javier and the other man eyed him warily. Oscar stood up too without thinking.
“Stay there!” Vaughn barked at him and threw his gaze back to Javier.
Both men stood looking at each other. Oscar eased back into his seat watching them, waiting. Javier tried to look right into Vaughn’s face, leaning his head back. Vaughn took a step forward, then another. Javier’s eyes shifted towards the gun, watching it come closer, before Vaughn stepped in and smashed his other fist against Javier’s face.
The blow caught Javier by surprise, his attention still on the gun. Before he could react Vaughn had grabbed Javier’s left arm and twisted the man’s body around so Vaughn was behind him with the gun shoved up against Javier’s skull. Javier struggled and the two men slid awkwardly along side the counter top.
Javier’s right arm was free and Oscar watched it desperately flail along the counter top. There was a set of kitchen knives sitting on the counter, sheathed in a wooden holder. Oscar saw Javier trying to locate them but it was too far of a reach. Vaughn noticed as well and surprised Oscar by kicking Javier’s leg so the man fell against the counter, the flailing arm coming in contact with one of the knife handles.
Javier gripped the handle, ripping the knife free. Vaughn twisted the left arm and Javier screamed in pain as he began stabbing out behind him, underhanded, trying to catch a piece of his tormentor. Vaughn moved out of the way, watching the knife stab wildly, and Oscar saw a grin reappear on Vaughn’s face.
The knife stabbed left and right but Javier had no room to maneuver, the stabs all frustration. Vaughn let it go on for a few seconds, then brought the gun back with his left hand and cracked it against the back of Javier’s skull. The knife dropped to the floor. Vaughn let go of Javier, watching him fall to the floor as well in a sweating heap.
Vaughn dragged one of the chairs over and sat down. He placed the gun in his lap.
“You alright?” he asked.
Javier got to his knees, a hand held against the back of his head. He eased his back against the cabinet under the sink and took his hand away to look at the palm. Oscar could see blood from where he sat at the table.
“Ouch,” Vaughn said. He grabbed a dishrag from where it sat on the table and dropped it in front of Javier.
“You think you need stitches?” he asked.
Javier picked the dishrag up and put it to the back of his head.
“I don’t know,” he muttered.
“I doubt it. I didn’t hit you all that hard. But I am sorry I hit you. You believe me?”
Javier gazed up at him, his eyed blood shot.
“I don’t fucking know,” he said.
“Well I am. I know you didn’t rob Leo.”
Javier continued to hold the rag to his head with no reaction. Vaughn continued.
“If you had robbed Leo you would have stood there and took a beating, you would have accepted it. But you were pissed, you fought back. I think that’s a good sign.”
“I didn’t do it,” Javier mumbled.
“I know,” Vaughn handed his drink down to Javier. “Now tell me about Bill.”
Javier sipped the drink, the red eyes shooting back up at Vaughn.
“He’s a good guy. Bill didn’t do nothing.”
Vaughn let out another sigh and glanced over at Oscar.
“Listen, Javey, I can pistol whip you all night until Annie gets home and then tie her up, but what’s the point of that? I know you didn’t rob Leo but somebody did. So tell me about the Croat and quit wasting my fucking time.”

The janitor had come in to empty the waste baskets in the Vice office. He made his way methodically around the room then paused when he noticed Claudia sitting at one of the desks. He nodded kindly. She nodded back and tried to smile. He turned away and made his way back to the hallway, pushing the plastic recycling container in front of him.
Judy had been in the conference room for over an hour, looking at mug shots and surveillance pictures. The man that had appeared that day at Paradise Isle hadn’t shown up in any of them. Claudia and Dan told her to take her time and she nodded numbly, continuing to flip through the books until she was yawning and running on automatic. Dan was still in there, forcing her to look again, and Claudia had started to hear the annoying sound of Judy’s whining turn into a drone before Claudia retreated out to the office for a break.
The Judy angle was starting to run its course. They had worked her for over three months, ever since Claudia had fallen upon Judy’s case file when she started to run the names of the different dancers at Catnip. Nothing the girl had brought them or told them so far had produced anything of weight on Leo McCarthy or a ranking member of his crew. Even if she had given them something of real value, the day would come when they would have to present Judy to a grand jury and Claudia dreaded it. The eyes of the jury would look over at a twenty one year old high school drop out, a stripper and likely prostitute, who had been caught herself transporting a large amount of methamphetamine up the 101 North.
Claudia walked back into the conference room where Judy still sat at the table. Dan stood hovering over her as she continued to flip through a binder. Judy looked up from the pictures when Claudia entered the room and rolled her eyes.
“This is stupid. I told you I don’t see him nowhere,” she said.
Dan stepped away from the table and eased himself into the corner of the room with his arm propping his body up against the wall.
“Is there any reason a new guy would come into the fold?” Claudia said absently.
“What do you mean?” Judy asked.
“Has anything strange happened? Anything odd? Anything out of the ordinary? You know what I mean.”
“I don’t know.”
“Why would a new guy show up and pick up a package? Has anyone stopped showing up?”
“Stopped showing up?”
“Maybe disappeared.”
Dan pushed himself off of the wall. He started making his way around the table, frustrated.
“The guy was probably just another fucking dirt bag,” he said. “He was looking for some God damned afternoon delight. Something to take his mind off the recession.”
“There was something that happened at the Duck,” Judy said quietly, almost at a whisper.
Dan stopped in his tracks and Claudia brought her gaze in on Judy, forcing the exhaustion out of her eyes so she could focus.
“The Duck? What is that?”
Judy yawned again, seemingly unaware of the renewed interest in her.
“I don’t know. It’s a casino or something,” she said “I’ve never been there.”
“How do you know about it?”
“Some of the girls at Nip worked there sometimes. Just for a night or so. I guess you can make a lot of money.”
“Where is it?” Dan asked.
“I don’t know.”
“It’s in the City?”
Judy shrugged.
“I don’t know. I think so.”
Dan glanced at Claudia.
“A casino in the city?” he said “That’s bullshit.”
“Are you able to get a gig at this place Judy? Can you dance there?” Claudia asked.
“I don’t know. It’s all the working girls that go over there.”
“You mean they’re prostitutes?”
“I mean they’ll do whatever you know. They’ll do it all. It’s why they go over there.”
“And you won’t?” Dan muttered. Judy didn’t seem to notice but Claudia could have slapped him.
“The only extra gig I got right now is the Christmas party,” Judy said.
“When you say something happened there what do you mean?” Claudia asked.
“I don’t know. Some of the girls said that Leo’s guys were down there asking them all questions and none of them got paid. That’s all. I didn’t seem like no big deal.”
Dan dropped back down in his chair, defeated. Claudia looked down at him with disgust before training her focus back to Judy.
“Find out what you can about this casino place and call my cell phone. Otherwise you’ll hear from us in the next few days.”
“I might be out of town,” Judy replied.
“Where?”

Dan leaned across the table towards her, waiting for an answer.
“Santa Cruz. My Mom lives there and I want to see her.”
Dan and Claudia looked at each other briefly before Claudia said: “You can’t go Judy. You’re going to have stay put. At least till after the Christmas party.”
The girl showed no reaction, she just yawned and got up, sensing the end of the meeting.
“I’m serious Judy. Don’t try to leave town.”
Judy nodded and made her way out of the conference room. Claudia watched her continue through the office and out into the hallway and then looked back at Dan who said: “A casino in the City? Give me a fucking break.”
“Leo McCarthy leaves town and some guy shows up to get a package? Something is definitely going on,” she replied.

They both sat in the car silent, Oscar in the front seat and Vaughn in the back. They had been waiting outside Bill Rodasavitch’s building for over three hours, not a word passing between them. Oscar could barely hear the man in the back seat breathing.
When they had left Javier’s house and pulled away in the Cadillac, another car had pulled into the drive way. Oscar had looked into the rear view and watched Javier’s wife get out of the car, walking towards the house. He had pictured her in his head as he drove, imagining her going into the house to find Javey in a defeated mess on the kitchen floor. She would demand to know what happened and he would be silent. She would panic and yell until she noticed the knife still lying on the floor. If she knew enough about what he did and who he worked for, she wouldn’t ask any more questions.
Vaughn had pulled Oscar out of his thoughts when he asked if he knew where the Croat lived. Oscar had nodded and taken the Potrero exit onto Cesar Chavez. The thought had gone through his mind to say that he didn’t know where Bill lived but what was the point? He would just be putting off the inevitable. He was at work, and when he was at work it was best to only concentrate on the matter at hand. He needed to remember that.
When they got to Bill’s street and pulled up in front of the building Vaughn asked which one it was.
“The blue door. It’s a flat.”
“Anyone else live there?”
“No. He had a girlfriend but I think she left.”
“You think? Or you know?”
“I know.”
“Good. There’s no point in some bitch getting hurt for no reason. Stay here and leave the motor running.”
Vaughn had gotten out and made his way across the street. Oscar had watched through the windshield, then a flash of Alex Martinez had gone through his head. Just a flash. It was the same moment that always went through his head: the look that Alex had given as he looked up at Oscar and Dick, sitting on his knees on the filthy floor of the warehouse. The moment came and went, less frequently as time went on, but it was enough to make Oscar’s spine tighten.
He didn’t notice at first that his phone was in his hand or that he was was scrolling to Bill’s number. The name had appeared on the screen and Oscar had stared at it. He could at least text, give a warning. But why would he? Because Bill was his friend. Because he had known him for over ten years. That meant nothing in this job. He could tell him to keep away. Just keep away. He put the phone back in his pocket.
Vaughn had returned to the car, told him to kill the engine, and there they sat; Vaughn in the back, silent as the grave, and Oscar in the front, trying to hear if the other man was breathing. Oscar still held his phone in his pocket, moving his fingers along the buttons. He watched the door to the Croat’s flat, time making the blue blur and the lights from the building turn into abstract swirls in the corner of his eye. He forced the fear building inside of him lower and lower, into the pit of his stomach. They were just there to talk to Bill, that was it. Maybe Vaughn would rough him up, intimidate him, but that would be it.
Long minutes of nothing passed before Oscar broke the stillness, reaching to the glove compartment and coming up with the whisky bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag. He had remembered the bottle during the second hour, telling himself he would wait until they left to have a drink, but the cold and the silence were getting to him. He unscrewed the top, looking into the rear view. All he could see was shadow.
“You want some?” Oscar asked.
“No.”
Oscar took a long pull and placed the bottle back in the glove compartment. He returned his gaze to the blue door, the whisky waking up his blood and allowing his eyes to refocus. He watched and began to almost forget why they were there until a figure walked up to the stoop of the building and stopped. Oscar sat up straighter, waiting for the figure to step into the light, he could hear the leather in the back seat adjust as Vaughn did the same. The person finally moved, walking passed the blue door, and they both watched as the shadow became a teenager who make his way on the opposite side of the street as he came into the light.
Oscar eased back into the seat, refocused on the door. The blue was already beginning to blur again and he thought about reaching back to the glove box.
“Your name really Jimmy?” he asked.
The shadows in the back seat moved slightly.
“Yeah,” the shadows said.
“You been doing this a while?”
“Long enough.”
Oscar could hear the end of the conversation in Vaughn’s tone. He moved his eyes from the rear view and back the Croat’s building. The blue went in and out of focus and Oscar blinked, trying to keep him self awake.

When Judy got into her apartment she sat down on the leather couch and didn’t move for ten minutes. She sat, not thinking or wondering or imagining anything. Her mind and her body were still and she wished the world would become still too, at least slow down so she could get a grip on what was happening around her. There was an intense anxiety pulsing through every frame of her body. In the last few weeks the anxiety had manifested itself in slowing her limbs and thoughts down to the point where she was nearing complete paralysis.
An ambulance drove by on the street outside and its siren pulled Judy back to the day she saw the red and blue lights in the rear view of the Mazda, the CHP cop starting to make his way towards her. He had looked into her face and saw her pupils and then had asked to search the car. She hadn’t protested, she hadn’t even thought to. She had felt like it was a dream and she retreated even more into that feeling when the cop had pulled the package out of the back and then got on the radio.
The dream had continued, she had given out her information at the county jail and had walked into court for her preliminary hearing. She looked into the face of the public defender as the woman talked on and on about things Judy didn’t understand nor care about. She had stared out from her dream at the other women in the cafeteria, the Cholas with their hairless brows and the black women with their weaves removed, all of them trying to hold on to the little dignity they could afford to have in a place like that. She had sat in a cell in her dream and in her dream she had looked up when the guard had beckoned her to an interview room to meet Detective Dela Cruz.
Claudia had talked in length about a man that she claimed was Leo McCarthy but it wasn’t Leo. Judy knew Leo, really knew him, and it was because she knew him the way she did that she denied she knew him by sight or was aware that he was the man that signed her checks. The man Claudia described abused people, took advantage of people, killed them when the time came. That wasn’t the man Judy knew. The man she knew, the man that had introduced himself to her at Catnip with a soft hand on hers, was kind and gentle and made her think of a grandfather, or a favorite uncle, not one that she had but someone else’s favorite uncle.
She wanted to see him, to at least hear him. She pulled her phone from the purse and studied it in her hand. He had given her a number to call before he left, had taken the time to come over to her when she was getting ready at Paradise Isle and he had spoken softly in her ear. He had given her the number, had talked in the same gentle tone he had used when they had laid in the bed at the hotel their first night together.
She had gone to the hotel fully aware of what was happening. This was how things worked in the world and you took advantage of the opportunities you were given. She had been dancing at the club for just over a month when Leo had given her the opportunity, speaking to her in the dressing room when they were alone, giving her a time and place. He had said it so calmly, a soft smile on his face, and for a moment she thought she had imagined it. Then she had gone to the hotel, and when she got onto the elevator she began to doubt herself. When she knocked on the door he was there, and knowing it was real spread an immense relief all through her.
He had been a gentleman. They had dinner brought up to the room along with champagne and when he finally led her to the bed she was more than happy to take her dress off and let him look at her even though he had seen her body many times at the club. He was much older than any man she had been with and part of her had been worried she would be repulsed by him but she went with it and in the end she found herself finding immense satisfaction in pleasing him. Unlike other men he looked in her eyes while he lay on top of her. She liked the idea that she might make him feel young.
She figured he had other girls on the side besides his wife, maybe even some of the other dancers at the clubs, but that didn’t bother her either. Their night became Friday night and that was a special night to her, the night that you spent with the one you cared about. One Friday she was scheduled to work but went to the hotel instead and when she got to the club the next night neither Marvin nor the floor manager said anything. She knew it was because Leo had sent word.
She finally gave in and dialed the number. The phone rang in her ear and the anxiety was overpowered by an excitement.
“Yeah?” a voice said.
She recognized White Charlie’s voice. She felt a sharp jealousy that the disgusting old man was with Leo and she wasn’t.
“Let me talk to Leo,” she said.
“Who is this?”
“Can I talk to Leo?”
She heard muffled chatter for a few moments before Leo took the phone.
“What is it darl’n?” he asked.
She was overjoyed. His voice put her at ease.
“I just wanted to see what you were doing. I miss you.”
Leo didn’t reply right away and her heart took a sudden plunge.
“I miss you too darl’n. I’m busy you know.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
She felt stupid and regretted the call.
“Everything alright darl’n? Everybody treating you okay?”
“Sure.”
“You can always go back to the Nip baby. I don’t see why you asked to be moved anyway.”
“I told you. I’m doing school.”
“That’s right. That’s good. I’m glad you’re doing it darl’n. A young woman needs to look out for herself. It gives her class.”
Judy thought of Claudia pushing school. The thought knocked her off of the conversation and she couldn’t think of anything to say.
“Listen baby, me and Charlie are busy right now and we must get going. You understand?” he said.
“Where are you?” she blurted out.
“That’s top secret information darl’n,” he teased. “But I should be back soon and when I am I will take you out for a good time and treat you right, you know that.”
“Yeah.”
“Good. Sweet dreams lovely.”
He hung up. Judy thought about Claudia and Dan listening to her call and panic seized her. She needed a drink and looked toward the kitchen but didn’t get up. She had to stop her drinking no matter what. Nothing really mattered anymore. Claudia and Dan and all the other fucking cops didn’t matter. Leo didn’t matter. Not even she herself mattered. All that mattered was the baby and Judy touched her belly gently and remained sitting on the couch with her feet pulled under her.

Oscar awoke with Vaughn slapping him hard on the shoulder.
“C’mon. He’s not showing him up today,” Vaughn said.
Oscar started the car and began driving blindly through the streets, still not quite awake. He tried to think back and figure out what had happened, realizing he had simply slept and Bill must have never showed up. He was relieved. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes with one hand while steering with the other.
“Where are we going?” he asked.
Vaughn rolled the back window down and lit a cigarette.
“I’ve got a room somewhere,” he said.
“Where?”
Vaughn went into his coat and pulled the phone out. He scrolled through it, absently taking drags off the cigarette.
“Holiday Inn,” he said.
Oscar nodded and turned the car towards the freeway exit. The sun was coming up over the City and it was lighting up the glass and metal of the buildings downtown. The traffic hadn’t started yet and Oscar drove the freeway with his mind somewhere between sleep and awake. He took the Fourth Street exit, looking into the rear view at Vaughn who was hidden back behind his sunglasses.
They pulled up to the hotel and Vaughn got out with his bag and the cardboard box. He began to make his way towards the entrance, then swung around.
“Pick me up right here at noon,” he said.
Oscar nodded but Vaughn had already turned back towards the hotel entrance. Oscar pulled away and drove the three blocks to his building. He parked the car and took the elevator up. He went through the door to his apartment, threw his keys and jacket on a chair, but didn’t turn the lights on. He went the kitchen, pulled a bottle of whisky down from the cabinet, and filled a glass by the sink. He thought of Alex Martinez on the warehouse floor, looking up at him. He refilled the glass and threw it back.

To be continued..