In the Heat of the Light

by Stephen Kearse

  Sol’s mother stood still as she returned to the ground. Her curls were undisturbed, but it was clear that they were on her mind. Her arms were holstered to her sides, pinned, but her eyes kept shooting upward.

  Equally tense, Sol surveyed her parents, her dad in his APD uniform, her mom in her church garb. Jerry used to call them “The Law and the Word.” Sol had always wondered what that made her.

  The standoff continued, rain pouring, steaks cooling, air conditioning humming. Her father’s face matched his institutional tone: drab, straightforward, opaque. He’d initially opposed Sol moving in with Nana, his mother, when she started high school, but that opposition had quickly become thick, impenetrable silence.

  Thunder shook the house, rattling Sol’s mother. Maybe that’s why they haven’t kicked me out yet, Sol realized. Her mom was from the Florida Gulf Coast, the land of storms with names and body counts. Sol used to love when it stormed because that meant her mom would pick her up from school. “You won’t need that umbrella,” her mom would tell her time and time again, advice she still lived by.

  Sol retrieved her poncho from the kitchen counter and headed toward the front door, shaking it as she walked. She reached the door quickly, but hesitated to exit, listening for footsteps or voices. All she heard were shifting plates and clanging utensils.

  Outside, the rain continued. Sol considered taking an Uber, but suddenly money seemed tight. Draped in her poncho, she drifted down Melrose, back toward Dekalb, scowling at a street sign that informed her she was on West Howard; she preferred to call it Dekalb. The East Lake MARTA station offered refuge, but she strolled past it, horrified at the thought of returning to a home that might no longer be hers.

  Parallel with elevated MARTA tracks, she continued west, her head cloudy, paranoia blooming. Was she really being extorted by a cop and a minister? Somehow that seemed like a more urgent question than why she was being extorted by her parents. She’d heard too many stories in juvie to think that parents were the noble citizens they were supposed to be. Beatings, burnings, pimpings, stabbings, shootings, rapings. Degeneracy and parenthood were far from strangers.

  Sol’s parents weren’t saints, but hiring a PI was a new low, an order of magnitude away from the shouting and strict punishments that she’d been raised on. What in the hell did they need more money for? Pa was a captain, and Ma was second-in-command at her church. Their money wasn’t good—it was great. Sol felt there was something otherworldly about her situation, something cosmically amiss.

  Choked by the humidity, she removed the poncho and slung it over her arm, retreating under an overpass to escape the rain. The ground was wet, so she crouched, her back against a concrete pillar. Raindrops danced around her, paratrooping into puddles and vanishing forever. Sol breathed deeply, the smell of wet crabgrass and red clay filling her nose. Mindlessly, she dug into her pocket and retrieved her phone. She opened the contact list and swiped down and up, names wheeling past like fruits and numbers on a slot machine. She didn’t need anyone, she felt. But she wanted someone, a friend.

  “Meet me at Variety?” she texted Theo. He texted back quickly, asking for a time. “40 min?” she responded.

  “Coo,” he said.

  Sol rose and put on her poncho. She hated Little Five Points. Too many try-hards and harassers, too many aspiring yuppies and actual yuppies, the worst combination. Of all Atlanta had to offer, why did people persist on frequenting this nub of a neighborhood?

  She hated concerts in Little Five Points even more. Because it was one of the few places in town that featured good acts for good prices, she had to go. Things normally went well, but on those few occasions she’d seized an ass-grabbing hand and twisted back its desperate fingers, she had been the one who was restrained and thrown out. Still, for her purposes, it worked. The beauty of the Variety Playhouse and Little Five Points in general was that you always knew who was supposed to be there and who wasn’t. Tourists—in all forms, whether they were visiting a new place, a new scene, or a new version of themselves—were always visible. If she really were being tailed by a PI, this would be the place to find out. Sol just hoped she wasn’t the tourist. Variety lived up to its name, so this could easily turn out poorly. She stepped out into the rain, headed toward Mclendon.

  Theo was outside when she arrived, packed among a mob huddling under Variety’s small rain cover. On sight, Sol laughed at his inexplicable hoodie. He really didn’t get it.

  Theo greeted her with a hug and a smile, quickly stepping back to wipe his forehead. Sol wasn’t sure if it was sweat or rain.

  “Are we really about to see a Mystikal cover band?” Theo asked, scanning the bill. “I know we haven’t hung out in a while, but this is pretty weird.”

  Sol grimaced; she hadn’t even liked regular Mystikal.

  “No, let’s just get something to eat,” she said, stepping back out into the rain, the ridiculousness of her plan settling in. A PI could be anybody, anywhere at any time. She wasn’t going to catch anyone spying, especially a professional. If she wanted to get her parents off her ass, she’d have to get personal. Zed, Apollo, and Kai had vetoed her request to tag Derrick’s houses. Obviously, they’d have to change their minds.

  “So, what’s up with you?” Theo asked as they slid into opposite sides of a booth in a smoke-filled restaurant. “You’ve been pretty quiet since we left Variety.”

  Sol stared at her menu, recalling fragments of her last trip to the Vortex. She had ordered a burger of some sort, but it had been a burger in the most generic sense. It had all the burger elements—meat, salt, cheese, bread—but not any lasting bonds between them. She’d dressed it carefully, placing the lettuce, tomato, onion, and Texas Pete in perfect harmony, but defense didn’t win games.

  Before she could answer Theo, the waiter, a white woman with a tattoo of Wyoming on her forearm and burgundy lipstick smothered over thin lips, appeared and asked for her order. Sol hated when people didn’t know what they were ordering, so she ordered the same thing she had last time. Theo didn’t seem fazed by being rushed. Good.

  “Not much,” Sol finally answered. Theo shrugged and eagerly chatted away, asking about everyone and everything except Kai. Sol didn’t fill him in. There wasn’t much to say.

  Their food came quickly. The waiter informed them that she’d told the cooks to give them priority. “I like the way you look,” she’d answered when Sol asked why. Sol watched the slow shuffle of her hips as she walked away. She didn’t trust her.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Theo asked as he prepared his burger, drenching it in hot sauce.

  Sol glared at her meal. An oversized burger embedded in a sea of fries glared back at her. There was something pathetic about how stylish the burger looked: toasted brioche bun, crisp romaine lettuce, fresh mozzarella, heirloom tomatoes. It was supposed to be a goddamn burger, not a pageant contestant.

  “I’ve been dealing with some stuff, heavy stuff.” She paused. “But you know what? I’m good. I’m like, really good,” she declared, exiting the booth. “In fact, fuck this place and their mediocre, overpriced, overrated burgers. I want a fucking steak.”

  “These prices really aren’t that bad,” Theo muttered, removing his wallet.

  Sol groaned as he lingered to count out the money for their deserted meal. Theo never missed a chance to do the right thing. It was so annoying.

  Outside, the rain continued, pattering softly on the trash-strewn sidewalk. Sol held her breath as she stepped over an army of roaches that was thorax-deep in a pile of discarded french fries. “Roaches are the worst,” she said, exhaling and pointing at the repulsive orgy of potatoes and chitin.

  “Those are actually water bugs,” Theo said. Sol grimaced into a smile. That was something Nana would say.

  They stopped at the intersection of McClendon and Moreland. Sol had never ordered a steak in a restaurant before. She wasn’t even sure where steaks
were sold. Clueless, she pulled out her phone and searched “steakhouse.” The nearest and most highly rated result was Kevin Rathbun Steak, off of Krog. She hated Krog Street. Before juvie, she had made it her life’s mission to slash every wholesome mural on the street. But she’d since given up and ceded her mission to Zed. Those Living Walls murals never seemed to die.

  “Where are you parked?” she asked Theo, who was facedown in his phone.

  “Right across from Variety,” he replied.

  “Cool, I found a place.”

  He nodded and pocketed his phone. Sol knew calling Theo was the right choice. He never asked questions.

  The drive was brief, maybe not even five full minutes. They parked in an empty lot and stepped back into the rain, which had slowed to a trickle. A repurposed warehouse stood before them, worn brick and high ceilings, a fort of a building, squat and sturdy. Theo reached the door first, stepping to the side to open it for Sol. “Such a charmer,” Sol joked, bowing before stepping inside.

  Dim lights, black metal, and rustic wood greeted them, followed by the host, a coiffed young white man. “Table for two?” he queried.

  Sol nodded.

  “Do you have a reservation?”

  “No.”

  “Hmm. That might be a problem.”

  “How so?”

  “We’re pretty full tonight. The wait could be up to three hours.”

  “This is full?” Sol asked, motioning toward a section full of empty seats.

  “Yes,” the host answered, his voice apologetic.

  “This doesn’t look full to me.”

  “Unfortunately, what you see doesn’t tell the whole story,” the host said, pointing at his iPad and smiling.

  Sol stared at him, her eyes fixed on his crabby faux smile. He was beyond words.

  Sol removed her poncho and thoroughly shook it out, the plastic cutting through the air and slinging water over the host, his podium, his iPad, the fresh mints, and even herself. The host remained silent throughout, his body as stiff as his coiffure. But Sol knew he had got the message.

  “Are you sure you can’t squeeze us in? Technology gets things wrong sometimes, right?”

  The host swiped through the iPad like a frenzied maestro then grabbed two menus and led them to a table adjoining a wall.

  “Thank you so much,” Sol exclaimed as he departed to his podium.

  “You know they’re going to put, like, AIDS in our meal, right?” Theo informed her as he unfolded his cloth napkin.

  “Probably. But that would still be better than anything I ate in juvie.”

  They laughed then peeled open their menus, two bound and embroidered booklets the size of a folded newspaper. The waiter came soon after, taking their orders and reclaiming their menus. Sol was sad to see them go. Even after she had decided what she would eat, she was fascinated by the odd combinations dashed throughout the menu: parsnips and peppercorns, pecans and parsley.

  They sat in silence, taking in the scene. Waiters shuffling from table to table, busboys boomeranging from the kitchen, the bartender bounding up and down the bar, hands always full, with either money or beverages. Sol could have enjoyed that silence forever, but she knew Theo was going to break.

  “So, what’s with you and steak?” he asked in a joking yet serious tone.

  “Just wanted to step it up, treat myself a little.”

  “I feel that. I’ve actually been keeping it low-key lately. Cutting grass, trying to save money to fix my car.”

  “Yeah? Sorry about that.”

  “No worries. You took control of things.”

  “Somebody had to. You really fucked up.”

  “I know, I know. The guy seemed legit, though.”

  “No one on Craigslist is legit.”

  “I don’t know. A few weeks ago, I picked up some books through Craigslist. They were pretty legit.”

  “Yeah? What’d you pull?”

  “It was a crazy haul. Some older lady out in Villa Rica—used to be a professor—was giving all her books away so she could move to California. Apparently, she hates both Amazon and her local library, and Goodwill, and Salvation Army—actually, I think they hate her, wasn’t clear. She refused to just leave the books on the street, so she was posting on the internet and hitting up the local McDonald’s and the QuikTrip and even the fucking car wash. She was determined.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  “Yeah, I picked up some music books and some Walter Mosley stuff and some comics, and Apollo picked up an original printing of the autobio of Malcolm X. Remember when Coach Greene made us read that?”

  “Sure do. Best book I’ve ever read. I read it twice in juvie.”

  “I don’t know about ‘best book,’ but that’s cool. You should talk to Apollo about it. He’s been reading it a lot lately.”

  “What are his thoughts? As usual, I’m sure he has a bunch.”

  Theo paused. “I don’t know, honestly. I feel like I understand that book pretty well, but Apollo is on some other shit.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He’s just been saying stuff about how Malcolm was brave to turn his back on the Nation of Islam and how we should all know when we have to advance the discourse. Weird shit like that.”

  “He’s kind of right, but that’s only one part of the book. It’s really about how in life, Malcolm comes to realize that being part of a movement or an organization shouldn’t mean becoming, like, a puppet. Malcolm turned his back on the Nation not because he was some forward thinker, but because he realized the world was bigger and that Islam itself was bigger than the Nation allowed it to be. And he didn’t really even turn his back on them. He stepped away for the sake of his own beliefs and growth.”

  “Oh shit, young scholar on deck,” Theo announced, tapping his fork on an empty wine glass.

  “I know a thing or two,” Sol said.

  Silence descended again, this time more resolute, comfortable. Sol wondered whether strong-arming the host counted as a violation of her probation. She probably didn’t want to know the answer, she realized, settling back into silence.

  The food arrived unceremoniously, the waitstaff wordlessly sliding plates onto the table, metal and porcelain somehow mute despite dangerous proximity. Why was fine dining so damn quiet? Sol wondered, thinking of the unending noise of her own shift: that blaring jukebox, that rusty bathroom door, those squeaky, incessantly mopped floors.

  Patiently, she carved her steak into bite-size chunks, amazed at how effortlessly the browned flesh parted as the knife advanced through it, a Red Sea of tenderness. This was that upper echelon shit.

  She coated the morsel in a film of mashed potatoes and took her first bite. The taste was exactly all right. She took a bite without the mashed potatoes. Still just all right, maybe slightly worse. By her fourth bite, she was exchanging grins with Theo, who was also unimpressed.

  “Well, you got your steak,” he sighed.

  “Yeah, I guess I did,” Sol said.

  Tilly knew exactly what to expect when a subjectless email containing a YouTube link streaked across her phone. It damn sure wasn’t the latest Jimmy Fallon clip. Halting right in the middle of the Kroger, her basket unfilled, Tilly watched the video, sighing.

  “The destruction of a racist monument is a beautiful thing, but instead of talking about free speech and terrorism, how about we discuss the union of surveillance and weaponry? How about we talk about a weapon that can destroy entire neighborhoods? How about we talk about how looking up at the sky is now like looking down the barrel of a police gun?”

  Goddamn, she’s good, Tilly thought, admiring the impassioned activist, a young black woman, debating in the video. Too bad she represented Black Lives Matter. Quantico had been investigating them for some time. “Black identity extremists,” they were called internally, whatev
er the fuck that meant. In reality, they were just regular Americans with justified grievances. But once you were on that watch list, you stayed there until you were useful.

  The debate continued, but Tilly stopped watching it, plugging in her headphones and beginning to fill her basket. She’d seen all she needed to see. #FireAndBrimStoneMountain was a trending topic again, and Black Lives Matter had brought it back to life. Meddling fucking kids. Why were activists so damn impatient? The deluge of press emails had just slowed to a trickle a few weeks ago, finally allowing her to do her actual job—following leads and profiling perps—instead of doing PR.

  Tilly longed for her days as a junior agent, when work ended as soon as she shut down her office computer and life began as soon as she started her home computer. Rick called them her “Lisbeth” days, after Lisbeth Salander of Dragon Tattoo fame, but Tilly knew better. She’d hacked for the personal challenge, the thrill of expanding her skills. She didn’t have any political goal or business interest or vengeance to claim. Hacking, for her, was like running on a treadmill: pure artifice, no ambition, no destination, no stakes.

  Those days of hacking all night were long gone, along with her patience and her body’s ability to process copious amounts of Mountain Dew. After speeding through the beverage aisle, she hurried to the checkout lane, eager to get back to the office. Every second counted if she wanted to keep her boss, Fitz Houndum, off her ass.

  “I knew you had a secret mini fridge!” Rick exclaimed as Tilly barged into her office, grocery bags in tow. She knew she was on the losing end when she agreed to exchange office keys with him, yet she’d still agreed to do it. “Partners must be equal,” he’d argued.

  “I never denied it,” Tilly replied, placing her bags in the fridge in her closet. Rick better not have a key to this, too, she thought as she closed and locked the closet door. Exhausted, she collapsed into her office chair, taking a deep breath.

  “I have no idea how to handle the Black Lives Matter stuff. I know it will blow over, but I don’t know if this case can wait that long. Everything is cold, and we have no prime suspect, no motive, no leads. And Mr. Mystery Government Guy keeps blowing off Houndum.”