[Gia Santella 01.0] Gia in the City of the Dead

by Kristi Belcamino

  I opened my eyes. He looked concerned.

  “Everyone else at Red Cross shelter. I take you there,” he said.

  “Thanks. But I need to find Django and Thanh-Thanh.”

  “They at the church. For now. Nobody knows where to go after that. I have insurance on building, but it’s not enough.”

  “You’re the owner?” I was shocked. I’d thought he was the building manager.

  He looked slightly embarrassed.

  “Yes. I’m owner. I don’t want my tenants to know. They think I too big for my britches, you know? I don’t want them to feel intimidated. All tenants – except you — old ladies my mom was friends with. I want them to think they are taking care of themselves and no burden to me. I only charge them two hundred dollar for their apartments. They think that is normal rent for people. My way of paying back my mother. She died, but she wanted me to take care of her friends so they don’t end up on streets. Now, I don’t know what to do. They too old to work. They can’t pay regular rent, prices too high, you know.”

  I blinked twice and drew back to look at Trang.

  “Jesus Fucking Christ. You’re a saint. A god damn saint. Right under the same roof as me and I didn’t even know. Trang,” I looped my arm through his. “I got a plan. I got money and I got a plan. Don’t you worry another second about where you and your mother’s little old lady friends are going to live. I got it all taken care of. On one condition, though?”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. “What?”

  “If I don’t go to prison for murder — and that’s a big ‘if’ — you let me and Django live in the same building as you guys again. I’ll take care of getting the building — it will still be in this neighborhood. Maybe we’ll raze the building and rebuild right here. But I want to live there, too with all of you. That’s my offer.”

  I stuck out my hand.

  He chewed his lip for a minute, eyeing my outstretched fingers. I waited. I stopped myself from rolling my eyes. Like there was anything to think about.

  “Deal,” he shook my hand.

  I needed to see Thanh-Thanh and Django. But first I had a stop to make.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  WHEN I WALKED OUT OF the police station, I slumped against the brick wall and waited for my heart to stop racing.

  Ethel had been strangled. And they had found something stuffed down her throat. A playing card. The detective asked me if the one-eyed jack had any significance to me.

  That’s when I knew. Her murder was a warning. For me.

  The warrior knows that despite physical strength and training, if one’s strength is solely physical and not interwoven with the spirit, then achieving a true state of Budo is impossible. Physical and spiritual strength must be equal. A peaceful heart is necessary to achieve full strength. A desire to protect the innocent is the foundation of all a warrior’s actions.

  Outside the station, my eyes began to sting. “I’ll get them for this Ethel.” I started to say I was sorry when I felt a tear slip out the corner of my eye. I angrily swatted it away. I looked around at the people who were walking by and eyeballing me. I didn’t have time to cry.

  Suddenly, I was filled with fear. I couldn’t get to the church fast enough and relief filled me when I saw Thanh-Thanh’s smiling face.

  A dozen cots had been set up in the basement of Saint Boniface church. All the rest of the little old Vietnamese ladies sat at a table playing cards. Django looked up briefly and wagged his tail when I walked in, but clearly Thanh-Thanh had replaced me as master. Fine by me. She was more responsible than I was anyway.

  “They let you keep dogs here?”

  Thanh-Thanh didn’t answer. But she was beaming. She leaned over and rummaged in a bag and came out with my mother’s box.

  Miracles of miracles. My mother’s box had survived the fire. It smelled like smoke, but it was intact.

  Her smile lit up her face. I held my hand to my heart and pressed my lips together tightly to hold back the emotions swarming through me. I took the box, hugged her wordlessly, and then turned on my heel to leave.

  “Gia? Okay?” she called to my back.

  I nodded and put up my hand behind me to wave goodbye. I didn’t trust myself to talk. I’d be back later.

  Sitting in the Range Rover, I flipped through my dad’s love letters, holding some of them up to my nose to see if they smelled like my mother. They didn’t. I held them to my chest. I felt something small and hard. In the middle of all the love letters was a blank envelope. With something inside.

  I dumped it out. A key on a small gold chain.

  A tiny tag attached to the key had writing in my mother’s flowy handwriting.

  It said, “#25, City of the Dead.”

  A memory came zooming back.

  When Christopher and I were very little, around five, our father left on a long business trip. The day after he left, our mother had told us she was taking us on a field trip—a secret adventure to the City of the Dead.

  Christopher and I giggled with both fear and excitement, knowing that our mother would never take us anywhere truly frightening, only someplace fun. On the drive up from Monterey, when Christopher tried to ask about our field trip, she’d put her finger up to her mouth and gestured to the driver. Then she said something loudly about all the shopping we were going to do at Sak’s Fifth Avenue that day. She gave us large, exaggerated winks as she said this and we giggled, thrilled to be part of something secretive.

  Our driver dropped us off at Union Square and my mother said something to him about picking us up later that day at the same spot, but instead of heading into Saks Fifth Avenue, my mom looked around and then grabbed us, making us run until we got to a stairway that led to the BART train tracks.

  “This is going to be so much fun!” she said, but her voice was wavering. “We’re going to ride a train.”

  “Yes!” Christopher shouted, pumping his fist into the air. But the tremble in my mother’s voice scared me, so I clung to her side, for some reason struck with fear that she was going to run away and leave us on this underground train platform.

  Instead, we got onto the train.

  “When do we get off?” Christopher asked.

  “Not until the very end of the line. The City of the Dead.”

  People got on the train and gave my mother looks. She was a stunningly beautiful woman and I didn’t like the way the men looked at her. I clung to her arm and glared at the men in their smelly work clothes or their too big pants and big sneakers and headphones.

  Slowly people got off at their stops until it was just the three of us and one sad looking elderly lady with a push cart full of groceries.

  The announcer said something I couldn’t understand as we pulled into the bright sunlight from beneath the earth.

  “Here we are, my pets. Let’s go visit the City of the Dead.” My mother sounded like she was nervous but trying to sound cheerful, as if this were an adventure.

  We blinked as we came off the train into the bright sunlight. She held tightly to both our hands. As we hurried along, the large purse she had on her shoulder kept swinging and bumping my face. My usually calm mother was snappish and had a tense look on her face.

  “I just have one stop first.” I stopped and looked up at her. A large crease had formed between her brows. It frightened me. My mother was usually cheerful and always smiling. I rarely saw her frown.

  She led us into a small lobby of a post office. My eyes grew wide as she pulled a chain around her neck out from under her shirt. A tiny gold key was on the end of the chain. Her hands were slightly shaking as she stuck the key into a hole on a small box. She dug into her bag and was yanking out a stack of papers. She seemed flustered and some fell onto the ground. When I bent to get them for her, she pushed me away so I toppled over. When she realized what she had done, she clutched me to her chest and started crying.

  It scared me so bad that I started crying, too. I pulled away. “Mama, it’s okay. Please don’t cry.
I’m not even hurt.”

  “Shhhhhh,” she said, breathing into my hair and then pulling back, kissing my face. “I’m sorry my love. I’m sorry.”

  Christopher didn’t like the attention and pretended to slam his foot in the door, which caught my mother’s attention. She stood, brushing herself off.

  “Christopher, stai zitto e basta. I’m almost done here.”

  She shoved the papers inside the box and slammed it shut. For a few seconds, she closed her eyes and held her palm against the outside of the box. Her lips were murmuring as if she were saying a prayer.

  Then, as if nothing had happened, she turned to us, brightly with a large smile.

  “Let’s go. I can’t wait to see the City of the Dead.”

  But I was still confused and worried about how she’d been acting. “Did you mail something?” I asked.

  “Something like that, sweetie. It’s just a little errand.”

  By now, she’d led us outside. I looked around. It looked like anywhere else.

  “Why do they call it the City of the Dead?”

  Just then we passed a small plaque that said, “It’s great to be alive in Colma.”

  “Well, there are more dead people here than alive people,” my mother said. Now, for the first time all day, she seemed relaxed and back to her normal self.

  “Yuck,” I said and scowled. “Why did you want to show us this?”

  Christopher punched me in the arm.

  “Shut up, Gia. You big baby.” He hugged my mom. “This is awesome, mama. I love it. Let’s go look at the dead people.”

  My mother, who would always and forever break my heart, didn’t scold Christopher for hitting me, but laughed with delight. “Oh, sweetheart, there aren’t any dead people to see. Just gravestones.”

  As we walked, headed for a giant cemetery on the hill, my mother told us that in the old days people were not allowed to bury the dead within the San Francisco city limits, so they made this town on the outskirts, a burial spot.

  “The town was founded as a necropolis in 1924,” my mother said.

  “What’s a whatchamacallit?” I asked.

  “A necropolis is basically a cemetery. In ancient times, large swaths of land outside cities were set aside to bury the dead. But think about this, this entire town of Colma was made just to be a cemetery. They say that more than two million bodies are buried here,” she said, pointing to a population sign. “And look, only 1,200 people—who are alive—live here.”

  My mom blabbed on and on. I tried not to listen, but now, nearly twenty years later, I remembered everything she told us that day. She told us that Colma, which was only two square miles large, had seventeen cemeteries within its boundaries.

  But at the time, I thought it was all useless information I didn’t care about. She’d made such a big deal about this City of the Dead that I was supremely disappointed to find out it just meant a giant cemetery. Boring.

  We wandered through Jewish, Chinese, Catholic cemeteries, modest ones with small plaques in the ground and elaborate ones with angel and Virgin Mary statues. There was even a pet cemetery.

  We spent two hours walking up and down the rolling green hills, looking for the graves of famous people my mother had read were buried in Colma. We spotted the gravestones for Levi Strauss and William Randolph Hearst, but never could find Wyatt Earp or Joe DiMaggio’s graves.

  Later, after much grumbling on my part, we headed back to Union Square where my mother bought us lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, so I didn’t consider the entire trip a waste. When my father came home, she told him about our field trip and we were required to regurgitate what we had learned. Christopher did most of the talking. I didn’t say much. I was still thinking about how odd she had acted when she unlocked that little box and stuffed it with papers.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  WHATEVER MY MOTHER had put into that post office box years ago had something to do with all of this. Why else would she hide this key in her special papers? Like it was just yesterday, I remembered my mother’s distress on our visit to the City of the Dead.

  I looped the chain with the key around my neck, grabbed my jacket, and headed for the BART station on Market Street.

  The train had almost reached the Colma station when I realized I’d been followed from my parking spot in front of the church.

  Two men watched me through the doors dividing my train compartment from the next. One was on a cell phone.

  I counted to ten and made a mad dash through the train door in front of me. I ran past startled passengers as fast as I could without bothering to see if the men were following. I made it all the way to the front of the train, near the driver’s compartment, before I stopped to catch my breath. My arms were sore from shoving open the train doors between compartments. I looked behind me, but didn’t see the two men. That didn’t comfort me. I was sure they were back there somewhere. My plan was to jump off the train when it stopped and hide.

  Once I was sure I had ditched them, I’d sneak into the post office and then back onto a train before they knew where I’d gone. I didn’t take my eyes off the door connecting my train compartment with the one behind me, but didn’t see any movement. I tried to glance through the glass doors all the way back, but as the train wove on the windy tracks, I could not see very far back. Then, the train burst topside and the night outside, lit with streetlights, was visible.

  The driver of the train must have thought he was a comedian and was feeling chatty because as soon as the train pulled to a loud, screeching stop at the Colma station, he got on the crackling announcement system.

  “Okay, folks. This is the end of the line. The Colma stop. The last stop on BART and the next to the last stop of the night. And frankly, the last stop for thousands of other people. But you don’t need to worry about them. They’re all underground. I’m out of here, but there is one more train stopping at this station tonight. It will leave here at midnight. That’s forty-five minutes from now. So, if you don’t plan on staying the night in the City of the Dead, I suggest you be back here in time to catch the midnight train.”

  Forty-five minutes. That meant I had to run as fast as I could. Not only to ditch the men following me, but to get the last train back to the city.

  I glanced behind me as I stepped out the train doors. How fitting that the people who wanted me dead would find me here. At the end of the line. In the City of the Dead.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  I PUSHED THROUGH THE rush of people going through the turn style and ducked into a bathroom. I closed the door of the first stall and crouched on the seat, holding my knees to my chest so my feet were off the floor. I did a slow count to one hundred until the last echo of passing footsteps slowed. Then to be safe, I counted to one hundred again before I put my feet on the grimy bathroom floor and crept toward the door.

  Before I opened it, I held my ear to the door to see if I could hear any noises outside. Then, I cracked the door an inch and peered out. The platform was empty. I inched it open even more and then drew back with a gasp when another eye met mine. It was a cleaning lady.

  She held her hand to her heart and mumbled something in Spanish. I did a little bow of apology and slipped around her cleaning cart. There was not a body in sight in any direction.

  To be safe, I walked the length of the platform and exited at a door that was at the opposite end of where the train had pulled in. I poked my head out into the night and didn’t see anyone at all on the streets, which were lit with pockets of orange that glowed in the fog. I was grateful for the fog.

  After I got my bearings, I headed for the post office. I crouched in the doorway of the business next door, waiting to see if I’d been followed. The streets were deserted. I crept over to the post office and was grateful that the interior lights didn’t flicker on when I entered the lobby. It only took me a moment to find #25. Again, I looked around and looked for movement outside the big glass storefront windows, but didn’t see a soul. I fished for the ne
cklace and drew it out of my shirt. The key fit. I stuck my hand inside and closed my eyes, for some reason afraid of what I would find. My hand closed around a small bundle of envelopes. Letters? I glanced down. These were addressed to my mother in a different handwriting than the ones exchanged between my mother and father.

  With Italian postage.

  I shoved them into the inside pocket of my coat and then reached into the box to see if there was anything else. My hand felt only cold metal.

  I closed the box, leaving the key inside the lock. I had no use for it anymore.

  I glanced at my phone. Thirty-five minutes until the last train back to San Francisco. I needed to be back in Monterey before Sal found out I was gone.

  With my thoughts so much on the letters, I wasn’t as careful as I should’ve been and stepped onto the sidewalk without looking out the storefront window first. I’m not sure I would’ve spotted them, but at least I might’ve had a chance.

  Two men at the far end of the block emerged from the fog. I could see their arms raise as they saw me. I looked frantically around. The only place to run was into the graveyard to my left. I didn’t hesitate.

  In the silence of the night, I could hear heavy breathing and footsteps pounding behind me as I raced through the gated entryway to the graveyard. At first I ran in a straight line and then decided I better zig zag and head toward a corner to hide. The cemetery was on a hill a little bit above downtown Colma, so the fog wasn’t as thick. The night was lit up by an orange glow of city lights reflecting on a low layer of clouds above. Just light enough for me to see where I was going, but not enough light for anyone to see very far. I raced, heart pounding until I came across a stretch of giant structures, mausoleums and elaborate statues to honor the dead.

  The graveyard was massive — the biggest one in Colma. These guys could look all night and maybe not find me. At least that’s what I was hoping. I scooted up against the wall of one of the mausoleums, on the far side facing the big wrought iron fence that surrounded the cemetery. It took me a bit to catch my breath. I listened but didn’t hear any sound. How smart were these men? I had a feeling they knew what the hell they were doing. That meant one guy was probably hanging out near the entrance to the cemetery while the other one looked for me. I eyed the iron fence. I didn’t think I could scale it. I also couldn’t fit between the bars. I was trapped in a cemetery, being hunted by two goons.