The Fresco

by Sheri S. Tepper

  “All they have to do is look,” said Angelica, angrily. “Anybody can see it!”

  “Police show up, all the drugs disappear, just like magic. Police get here, all those no-goods, they’re just rappin, listenin to music. Police drive on, all those drugs, they just sprout back up outa nowhere.”

  “It’s frustrating!” murmured Angelica, turning to watch the bus that was now approaching.

  “It’ll get worse,” the woman said, stooping to button the toddler’s jacket. The boy regarded Angelica impassively, then turned his attention back to the youths on the sidewalk. The mother saw him, took him by the hand and turned him away, biting her lip. “When William gets to be seven, eight, those no-goods, they’ll get him holdin’ for them, just like those little boys there now.”

  They got onto the bus together, and took a seat side by side, the little girl on her mother’s lap, the boy standing at the window. Angelica bent to look across his shoulder. From the sidewalk, one of the young men flashed her a brilliant smile and an obscene body gesture, a balletic rape, an elegant violation. As she sat down, Angelica heard the young mother murmur, “You be careful comin’ down here. He was watchin’ you before.”

  Angelica nodded. Her mouth was dry. To cover her confusion, she opened the paper and let her eyes focus on it.

  DRIVE-BY DEATHS REACH NEW HIGH IN CALIFORNIA

  GOVERNOR SAYS DEATH OF TODDLERS IS “LAST STRAW”

  BOMBING IN JERUSALEM CLAIMS FORTY LIVES

  RETALIATION PLANNED AGAINST SITES IN LEBANON

  SERBIAN UNDERGROUND CLAIMS RESPONSIBILITY FOR BUS BOMBINGS

  TERRORISTS TARGETED SCHOOL CHILDREN

  JUDGE RULES MEGAN’S LAW UNCONSTITUTIONAL

  PEDOPHILE HAS PAID DEBT TO SOCIETY

  “I don’t look at the papers,” said the woman at her side. “I used to read them all the time. Now it’s just all, more and more of the same, you know?”

  “I know,” said Angelica.

  The mother and her children got off first. From Angelica’s stop it was a six-block walk to the apartment, their apartment, the one she and Carlos shared, and she found herself slogging, trudging, so tired she ached.

  The door to Carlos’s room was ajar, and he was still in bed. She stood in the doorway, staring at him. His schedule said he had English Composition this morning, and art classes this afternoon. His bed looked like a dog’s nest. His laundry was piled in the corner where it had been for two weeks. She went in and shook him, not gently.

  “Hey,” he said. “Let go.”

  “It’s noon!” she said loudly. “You’ve got art classes this afternoon.”

  “Yeah. Well, I had a headache. It’s better now. I’ll get up in a few minutes.”

  “Carlos!” She stood looking at him wearily. “Mom’s going to call at eight, tonight. Remember. I told her you’d be here.”

  “I know, I know. Stop yelling.”

  She left him there and went angrily into the tiny kitchen. She’d had to run without breakfast this morning, but Carlos had evidently fixed food for himself when he came in last night. Not only for himself. There were several pans, one of them burned, plus several dishes and glasses scattered in the tiny room. She put them in the sink, ran hot water on them and added soap. The sliced meat she’d intended to make a sandwich of was gone. The eggs were gone. The only thing left in the cupboard was a can of soup.

  While it was heating she decided to take her own laundry to the basement, but halfway down the basement stairs she sagged against the wall and slid down onto a step, face buried in the dirty laundry.

  “Hey,” said someone. “You all right?”

  She looked up into the sympathetic face of the apartment manager, Mrs. Gaines, a round-faced, crop-haired plain-talking woman whose apartment was at the back on the so-called garden level.

  “I’m so tired,” Angelica blurted. “He leaves it all on me. And I’m just so tired!”

  The woman sat down on the step beside her. “Tell you what, Angel. There’s a little efficiency apartment upstairs, just big enough for you. Lots cheaper than the one you have now. I’ll let you off your lease if you want to move up there and let Carlos find himself some other place.”

  Angelica regarded her blankly, mouth slightly open.

  The woman reached over and pressed her jaw up. “Don’t think it’s kindness. It’d help me out. We get complaints about noise and drunks, you know, people get unhappy, they move out. Your mama must’ve got him off the tit, now you’ve got to let him grow up. Here, I’ll start that load for you. You look like you need a nice hot cup of something.”

  And she was up, with the laundry load, trotting down the stairs while Angelica was still trying to think of something to say. Back upstairs she ate her soup, made a strong cup of instant coffee, and cleaned up the kitchen. At two she had to leave for her own classes, and Carlos was still asleep when she left.

  When she returned home at seven, bearing a pizza, Carlos wasn’t there. The phone call was scheduled for eight, but the phone didn’t ring until nine, just as Carlos walked in. She grabbed the phone, glaring at him.

  “Hello, Mother? Hey, Carlos is here. I’m going to put this on speaker phone. You’re late.”

  “I know. Some very nice people invited me to dinner and it went on longer than expected. They dropped me off, but they had to make a kind of…detour, so there was no polite way I could hurry things up.”

  “New friends, that’s good.”

  “They’re just acquaintances, but they know I’m new in town and they’re being kind.”

  Angelica asked, “So, tell us, are you looking for a new job?”

  “I have a new job. The arrangements were all made this morning. It’s very much like the one I had in Albuquerque, but the pay is better than it was there.”

  Carlos leaned forward, lips pursed, eyebrows raised importantly. “Mom, this afternoon I got a call from Dad. He’s wondering where you are.”

  A moment’s silence. “Carlito, I left him a note saying I was going away. I’m sure Angelica told you why I was calling. I’m not coming back, and as I told Angelica, I don’t want your father to know where I am.”

  Carlos frowned. “Where’s Sasquatch?”

  “I have him.”

  “And who’s this old lady who left you money? I didn’t know you had any cousins I didn’t know.”

  “Not anyone you knew. She was my mother’s cousin.”

  Carlos cocked his head, as though trying to see through the phone. “Dad could use some help with bail money. I mean, if you’ve got some extra cash.”

  Angelica turned on him angrily, but the chill of the disembodied voice that came through the phone stopped her. “Bail money? For what?”

  Carlos gave Angelica the look of superiority she’d grown to hate, the one that said, “See, I’m managing the family, thinking of everything.” He spoke into the phone, “He had a little accident. He says…well, he totaled his car.”

  After a considerable pause Benita said sadly, “My car.”

  Carlos had the grace to look slightly embarrassed as he said, “I just thought you’d want him out of jail!”

  Long pause. “No. Not particularly.”

  Actual surprise. “Well, sheesh, Mom!”

  No response.

  He took a deep breath and asked, all too casually, “What time is it there, Mom? You sound tired.”

  There was another pause before their mother answered. “I feel like it’s four in the morning, but it’s only a little after ten. I am tired. The long bus ride, mostly. A good night’s sleep and I’ll be rested.”

  Carlos leaned forward, brow knitted in concentration, opened his mouth only to have Angelica interrupt, “I haven’t told you about my jobs, Mom. Two mornings a week I’m working as a classroom assistant, plus I’m putting in a supper shift in the kitchen at the Union.”

  “Angel, do you have time for that and your school?”

  “The teacher’s aide work is required as part of a theory of education cour
se I’m taking, plus they pay me for it. I have to write it up and do a critique. Besides, I really like the teacher I’m working with. She reminds me of you.”

  A little laugh at the other end. “That’s sweet of you to say.”

  Carlos said, “Mom—”

  She cut him off crisply. “Another time, Carlos. I’m really tired, so I’ll hang up. I’ll call again, when I have some news. Goodnight, dears. I’ll talk to you soon.”

  Angelica leaned forward to cut off the dial tone, regarding her brother with dislike. “You had to bring up Dad and talk about bail money? When did Dad call you?”

  “I said, this afternoon. Phone woke me about four.”

  “You slept through your afternoon classes? Honestly, Carlos! You’ve already had one warning from the foundation. Did you tell Dad that Mom inherited some money?”

  “He was in a state, you know, so I may have mentioned it.”

  She angrily tore the crust off her cold pizza and drowned it in a half glass of milk beside her, vividly remembering Mrs. Gaines’s words on the stairs.

  He said, in a falsely casual voice, “I think we ought to find out where she is.”

  Angelica opened the oven and felt the pizza she’d saved for him. It was no warmer than her face, which felt fiery. “You already tried that. She heard what you were doing, asking her what time it was.”

  He gave her a condescending look, saying loftily, “I think I’ll get caller ID. I don’t like the idea of her off by herself where nobody can get in touch with her or help her or anything.”

  “Dad never wanted Mom off somewhere either. He wanted her right there, where he could help himself, like to her paycheck.”

  “Boy, that’s really loyal!”

  She bit her tongue. “Carlos, this isn’t working. I can’t live with you. I had my doubts about this sharing bit…”

  “I shared last year.”

  “So why not with the same people this year?”

  He stared sulkily at his feet. “They had other plans.”

  She took a deep breath. “See, that’s the mistake I made. I figured you knew how to do it, but my guess is you never learned and they didn’t want you back.”

  “That’s my business.”

  “That’s what I’m saying. It’s totally your business. Providing late-night suppers for people you invite in is totally your business. Drinking beer until midnight and not going to class is totally your business. Mrs. Gaines has someone who wants a two-bedroom, and she told me she’ll let me off the lease to this apartment if I switch to an efficiency upstairs. I’m going to take it.”

  “We won’t fit into an efficiency. It’s only one room!”

  “Exactly. I’m moving upstairs and you’ll have to make other arrangements.”

  “Aww, Angel!”

  “I don’t want to hear it.”

  “You can’t just move out on me. I’ll keep this place.”

  “My name is the only one on the lease. From now on, I’ll take care of my business, you take care of yours.”

  She went into her bedroom and closed the door, refusing to come out even to the sound of breaking crockery. When he left, twenty minutes later, she called Mrs. Gaines and told her she’d be moving as soon as possible.

  11

  local law enforcement

  WEDNESDAY

  In the university town where Angelica and Carlos were living, in a precinct house not far from the Morningside Project, a grizzled sergeant crouched over a pile of paperwork, chewing the end of his pen and trying to remember what it was his wife had asked him to bring home after work. She’d offered to write it down, he’d said he’d remember, now he didn’t remember. Like a damn ritual. Why didn’t he let her write it down, for crissake?

  A voice bellowed from the glassed-in office behind him.

  “McClellan!”

  “It’s right where you put it when I gave it to you,” the sergeant muttered, not looking up. “Top right-hand drawer.”

  “What is?” The cop at the adjacent desk glanced up from the form on the screen. He was booking a shoplifter. “What’s in the top right-hand drawer?”

  “The manpower stats for last month,” murmured McClellan.

  “Never mind,” bellowed the voice.

  “What’s got his shorts in a tangle?” wondered the cop.

  “I bet he’s all upset over that judge sayin’ you couldn’t move those pushers out,” said the shoplifter, nodding wisely. “He worked real hard to get that law passed.”

  “It wasn’t a law, it was an ordinance,” McClellan said, looking up. “How’d you know the captain was involved?”

  “I live down there at Mornin’side,” she said. “I was one of the marchers went to city hall. Me’n my kids.”

  “So you got kids,” said the officer. “That doesn’t excuse you walking off with birthday presents under your shirt.”

  “It was just candles!” she cried. “For the cake. A dollar niney-five for twenny-four lousy birt’day candles an all I had was a dollar fiffy an all I needed was twelve. An she wouldn’ split the box up, give me half!”

  The officer got up and moved toward the storeroom. “Watch her, Mac, so she don’t walk off with half my computer.”

  Mac shook his head. “I’m not watching. I’m not getting involved. Six more weeks, four days, three hours and I figure about forty-five minutes, I can say good-bye to it all.”

  “You quittin?” asked the shoplifter.

  “Re-tire-ment! Captain says he wants to take me to lunch on my last day. Every guy that retires or gets transferred, the captain wants to take them to lunch on their last day, he says, but it’s just an excuse so the guys can throw a surprise party. Doesn’t he think I know that?”

  “They gonna give you a gold watch?”

  “I said no watch. They want to give me something, give me a new fishing rod.”

  “McClellan!” roared the voice.

  He got up wearily and shambled into the lieutenant’s office, stopping before the desk and leaning on it with both hands. “What?”

  “What’s this?” The lieutenant held out a sheet of paper. “It was in the manpower reports.”

  “It’s a tabulation of how many calls we get from Morningside, complaining about the dealers. I thought, when we appeal that judge’s decision…”

  “Oh, McClellan, you hadn’t heard,” the lieutenant said loudly, well aware that there were a dozen sets of ears listening from outside his office. “We are no longer interested in the dealers down at Morningside. The dealers at Morningside have civil rights. They are being represented by the ACLU in their suit against the mayor and the police force on behalf of all the upstanding young men who stand around on the sidewalk all day, every day, with no visible means of support.”

  McClellan stared at him, mouth slightly ajar. “You finished?”

  The lieutenant dropped his voice. “I am so close to finished, Mac, that I may retire before you do. Actually, tabulating the calls is a pretty good idea. Go on keeping a record.” He fumed, running his fingers through his gray hair, shifting his shoulders as though they hurt. “Not that it’ll do any good. How much longer you got now?”

  “Too long,” said McClellan. “I can remember back to when we got rid of guys hanging around on corners, giving the women a lot of dirty talk. I can remember when giving a little kid a gun would have put you away for a good long while.”

  “See, that’s our trouble. We remember too much.” He waved McClellan away and went back to his paperwork. “Way, way too much.”

  12

  chad riley

  THURSDAY

  Though it was past midnight, FBI agent and sometime White House liaison Chad Riley had his driver run by the office then drop him six blocks from his Georgetown house so he could cool down on the walk home. The business with McVane had rubbed him very much the wrong way, and Chad knew exactly who to blame. The FBI had started surveillance on Congressman Alvarez by midafternoon Monday, and Chad had just picked up a report saying he
’d gone to the Pentagon that afternoon. Monday. And by Tuesday, McVane had been named as liaison, and he had probably already known everything the congressman knew, which meant his cronies, if not already briefed, would be shortly. The congressman had been sworn to secrecy, but his loyalties lay elsewhere, which might have been deduced from the number of pictures of himself in uniform on the walls of his office. Major Alvarez here with General Tank, Major Alvarez there with General Missile. Military men! Damn it, they always thought in terms of hardware, black or white, our side or the other side. It was damned hard to get them to see gray at all, and getting them to tell dark gray from medium gray was impossible!

  And why in hell had the intermediary taken it to Alvarez in the first place? Why not the bureau? Someone used to handling secrets! Though he shouldn’t fault her in hindsight. She was a damned pretty woman, and a sensible one. He’d watched her during dinner. She’d been quiet, thoughtful, she’d listened, when she’d said anything, it had been intelligent and to the point. No, he couldn’t fault her at all.

  During the six-block walk he simmered down. He always tried to get himself into an easy frame of mind before he opened the front door on Merilu and whomever Merilu was being on the particular evening. Rarely it was Merilu the girl he’d married, full of laughter and bubbly charm, if one ignored that these days the laughter was more giggly than witty and the bubbles had originated in champagne. More often the woman who greeted him was Merilu the prosecutor, prepared to cross-examine him about everything he’d done since he left the house that morning. Or Merilu the alpha wolf, growling at him for not paying enough attention to the boys. Or Merilu the martyr to politics, who wanted to leave the corruption and clamor of Washington and go back to Montana.

  All of which multiple-personality stuff had started when the twins had reached school age. When Jason and Jeremy were born, Merilu had decided to take a year off to be with the babies. The year had turned into six. Now the boys were in school all day, and Merilu was bouncing off the walls, regretting that she’d given up her career for motherhood.