by Joe Ide
His heart was pounding so hard he couldn’t hear himself panting. What now, Billy? He had no money, no credit card, no phone, and he was driving a stolen car. He was hungry too. He’d skipped breakfast and lunch out of nervousness. Ava had probably called ten times by now or maybe Crowe had strangled her and left her body in a dumpster. Billy pulled over into a grove of trees. He didn’t know what to do. How would he ever find Ava? The feeling of helplessness was overwhelming. He started to cry.
Chapter Six
Are You My Dog?
Isaiah was on the front stoop, reading the classifieds. He wanted a dog. It would be nice, having something around that liked him and didn’t talk. The Ortegas’ daughters were playing in the yard. Alicia was six years old and Juana was eight. They were outlandishly cute, funny and sweet. Isaiah was a little awed by them. He’d never had such close contact with children before. They seemed to be from a faraway land where toys came alive at midnight and mischievous elves put acorns in your shoes.
Tentatively, Juana came over and asked if he’d like to play with them. He surprised himself and said yes. They played a game that consisted of the girls running around randomly and shrieking with laughter while he chased them and made boogeyman noises. They collapsed on the lawn with hilarity.
Tired now, they sat on the back steps and drank lemonade Alicia had made. It was so sweet Isaiah nearly spit it out. Juana had to go to the bathroom and as soon as she left, Alicia started crying in little hiccups, copious tears spilling out of her eyes. Isaiah had no idea what to do. This was an entirely new situation for him. She kept crying and crying, her tiny face scrunched up. Isaiah thought she’d wind down, but her sobbing got louder and more intense. It began to sound forced, but she didn’t relent. Isaiah had a sudden epiphany. He realized she was asking him to comfort her. Having no moves of his own, he did what he’d seen parents do on TV. He edged over and put his arm around her. Instantly, she leaned into him and cried even louder. He was in a near panic. He was the only adult around. It was his responsibility to soothe her. Say something, dummy!
“What’s wrong, Alicia?”
“I don’t know,” she said. Great, Isaiah thought. She wants me to dig it out of her.
“It’s okay, you can tell me,” he said, cringing inside. He sounded like Mr. Rogers except stupid.
Alicia shook her head, sniffling, more tears cascading down her cheeks, mixing with the mucus streaming out of her nose, the shiny goo running over her mouth and dripping off her chin. She didn’t seem to mind, but Isaiah couldn’t stand it. He had no tissues, so with great reluctance, he offered her the sleeve of his brand-new T-shirt. “Here,” he said. Without a moment’s reservation, Alicia took the sleeve, scrubbed her face with it and blew her nose. It looked like a colony of snails had exploded.
“Alicia, please tell me what’s wrong.”
“The lemonade. It tastes bad.”
“No, it doesn’t,” he said radiantly. “It tastes great! You did a good job!”
“How come you didn’t drink more?”
He paused. He’d taken two and a half sips. “I’m not thirsty. I’ll have some later.”
“No! Have some now!” she insisted. She looked at him with hurt, sad eyes. He suspected she was neither.
“Okay! Can’t wait!” He picked up the ridiculously tall glass, took a gulp and immediately felt his molars dissolve. His tongue was trying to crawl into his esophagus. “Good! Really good!”
“Drink more!” she said. He drank more. Every time he paused, she shouted, “Drink more!” The sweetness was so sweet it ached, throbbed, coated his organs with caramel and made him sweat. When he finally finished the glass, the sugar rush put on track shoes and ran circles around the yard. He thought he’d lose consciousness.
Alicia seemed satisfied but not at all grateful. “I’m going to watch SpongeBob,” she said, and she went inside. He sat there a moment, trying to uncross his eyes.
“Are you all right?” Mrs. Ortega said. He turned around. She’d been watching through the screen.
He coughed. “Yes, I’m fine.”
She smiled at him, warm and affectionate. “Thank you. Alicia is very sensitive.”
After the sugar rush had subsided and he’d brushed his teeth three times, he sat at his tiny breakfast table and resumed his search for a dog. It was a meager compensation for his recent losses, a penny dropped into an empty well of needs.
One ad said: Black lab, obedient, 6 yrs., all shots. Free to good home. He called the number.
“Hello?” A woman’s voice, hoarse and wary.
“Hi. I’m calling about the dog.” She didn’t say anything. “I’d like to come and see it,” he added.
The address was twenty miles from town, a sketchy, hardscrabble area. The houses were far apart, stretches of thick woods between them, no borrowing a cup of sugar around here. There were lopsided trailers on cinder blocks, laundry on clotheslines, broken toys scattered in uneven yards. Isaiah parked the Mustang in front of the address. An abandoned car was parked next to the house, vines and skinny branches growing out of its eyes and ears. The house was in bad shape. Roof shingles missing, cardboard covering a dormer window, the plank siding gray and warped. But there was no trash around, the porch was swept clean, the footpath bordered with white rocks. A man and a dog came out.
“Hi, I’m Isaiah.”
“Ned,” the man said. He looked down at the dog. “Well, there he is. Go see if you like him, Duke.”
Isaiah kneeled down and put his hand out, fingers down. Something Grace had taught him. Let him sniff you first, check you out.
“Hey, Duke, how are you?” Isaiah said. The dog trotted over, his mouth open, panting, pink tongue hanging to the side. He looked like he was smiling. Duke gave him the sniff test, and apparently he passed. Isaiah scratched him behind his ears, and the dog nearly swooned. Isaiah wished he could be that happy getting his ears scratched.
“Named him Duke because we thought he looked a little regal,” Ned said.
“Yeah, he does.”
Isaiah expected Ned to come forward and shake hands, but he sat down on the porch steps. He was wearing old jeans and a flannel shirt with the sleeves cut off. His chest and arms were thickets of tattoos. They covered his bald head too. From this distance, they looked like a really close, really bad haircut. Maybe Ned was forty, maybe he was sixty. He wasn’t friendly or unfriendly, just doing what he had to do.
“Helluvah car,” he said.
“Thanks,” Isaiah said. “A friend loaned it to me.”
“Some friend.”
A woman came out of the house. She wore a faded Led Zeppelin T-shirt and cutoffs. She was younger than Ned, in her thirties. There were tats on her bald head too. Hers were larger and more distinct than Ned’s, lots of curls and curves and swoopy lines.
“My wife, Cherry,” Ned said, like he was admitting to a burglary.
“Hello,” Isaiah said. “I think we talked on the phone.” Cherry stood with her head tilted to one side and her arms folded across her chest. She gave a slight nod but that was all.
Isaiah tried not to stare. Ned and Cherry were a striking pair, like a Watusi couple in full native costume, strange and startling but obviously human beings. He took Duke for a walk. He was easy on the leash; alert and he didn’t bark when he saw another dog. He was calm in traffic. Isaiah kneeled down and looked him in the eye. “Are you my dog?” he asked.
“I’m sorry,” Isaiah said when he got back. “He’s a great dog, but not the one for me.” He didn’t have a reason really except he felt no connection. Cherry was staring at him. Her light blue eyes were intense and appraising, like she was calculating his usefulness in a dark scheme.
“Yeah, it happens,” Ned said. Without a word, he went inside but Cherry lingered.
“Nice to meet you,” Isaiah said. Cherry was a stone effigy, a steel castle, a bulletproof vest.
“Yeah, me too.”
Cherry watched Isaiah drive away. The Mustang disappeare
d down the road, and she listened to its engine fade in the distance. She went inside. Ned was where he usually was, molded to the beat-up yellow couch with his head back and his feet stretched out. The beer bottle looked like part of his hand. Overall, he was a useless bum, but he was King Kong in the sack and he could read her moods. She started to say something but stopped and stared into the unlit fireplace.
“What?” Ned asked. She didn’t answer. “Cherry? What’s up?” he said, his tone rising. “You’re making me nervous.”
“Isaiah,” she said. “I’ve seen him somewhere before.”
Chapter Seven
Where’s My Samitch, Bitch?
Isaiah got home from Ned and Cherry’s, tired and disappointed. He wished Duke had been his dog. He was putting the key in the door when he heard a crash. He hurried inside and heard another crash. He rushed into the kitchen. The window and the fridge door were open. A young man was on the floor, trying to get up, slipping on the yam casserole he’d dropped.
“Stay there,” Isaiah said.
The kid was in his late teens, early twenties. Except for the yams on his clothes, he was neat and clean, a smiley face T-shirt, a complicated black watch and near new sneakers. Not a drug addict and not a punk vandalizing for fun.
The kid looked spent, desperate and afraid. His shirt was torn, there were twigs in his hair. “I’m really, really sorry,” he said.
“Who are you running from?”
“Me? I’m not running from anybody.”
“You have no money or you’d have bought some food and you have no phone because you didn’t call your family. What’s your name?”
“Billy,” the kid said, like it was the worst name in the world.
“Tell me what you’re running from, Billy, or I’ll call the police.” The kid was one of those people whose every emotion could be seen on his face, every intention in his eyes. “You’re about to tell me a lie,” Isaiah said. “Don’t. I wasn’t bluffing. I will call the police.”
Billy lowered his head and mumbled, “I was in the neuropsychiatric wing at the county hospital.”
“What for?”
“A ninety-day psych evaluation,” Billy said, adding quickly, “It’s bogus, completely bogus.”
Isaiah’s reaction was visceral, an immediate antagonism to anyone who needed help; anyone needing a ninety-day psych evaluation. Isaiah had encountered a lot of troubled people on his cases. He asked what he always asked when confronted by someone unstable.
“Did you take your meds?”
Billy was surprised, hesitating before he shook his head. “No, but I’m okay, I really am. I’m not crazy. Can I get up now?”
“Yes, but sit in that chair.” Billy obeyed. Isaiah tossed him a dish towel to wipe off the mess. There was only one option, Isaiah thought. Call the authorities and let them deal with it. “You have to go back,” he said. “You won’t last very long, running around stealing casseroles. I imagine your family’s worried about you too.”
“Please don’t call the cops,” Billy said, like he was pleading for his life. “I have things to do. Important things. My friend might be in danger and I have to help her.” Isaiah’s antagonism was growing into repugnance. Maybe that was true, maybe not, but it sounded like a case; one more pathetic soul in deep trouble of their own making.
He restrained himself from asking, What friend? What danger? Danger from who? Instead, he said, “That’s too bad, but you have to go back. I can make the call or you can.”
“Wait, let me explain.”
“I don’t want an explanation.”
“I’m not crazy,” Billy said adamantly. Anyone who has to tell you he’s not crazy probably is, Isaiah thought. “I didn’t belong in a hospital,” Billy went on. “It was a conspiracy.”
Conspiracy? Get this kid out of here, Isaiah thought.
Billy continued. “Cannon—that’s the sheriff—convinced my mom that I was”—he made air quotes—“a danger to myself and others. What a load of crap! And you wanna know why?”
Could this get any worse? Isaiah thought. Cannon was involved. That this was turning shitty wasn’t a surprise, it was the speed of it. “No, I don’t want to know why,” he said. He raised his hand to shut Billy up. “Make the call or I will.”
“Let me just explain.”
“I just said—”
Billy blurted out, “A serial killer is coming to Coronado Springs!” You could tell he didn’t want to say it; that it made him sound unhinged. Isaiah reminded himself not to ask the kid why he believes this or where he got the information or anything else. It would only make the situation more intriguing.
“You have to go back,” Isaiah said.
Billy started to cry. “I can’t. My friend is following him—the serial killer, I mean. Don’t you see? She could get killed! I have to help her! Please don’t make me go back.”
The kid’s fear and sense of urgency were real, Isaiah thought. But lots of things seem real when your mind is full of voices and the only solid ground is your imagination.
“His name is William Crowe,” Billy said. “He’s AMSAK. I can prove it. I have his records and everything!”
AMSAK? Isaiah thought. Billy is either delusional, paranoid or both.
Billy read his expression. “It’s complicated,” he said. Crazy people are always complicated, Isaiah thought unkindly.
Billy went on. “Crowe killed my friend Ava’s sister. Ava is following him in her car and that’s why she’s in danger. He might catch her and then what? See what I mean?” Don’t fall for it, Isaiah. Get him out of here.
“You have to go back,” he said again.
“No, no, I can’t!” Billy shouted. “I’ve got to help Ava!”
This was getting worse, Isaiah thought. Like Alicia and her goddamn lemonade. Drink it and you’ll die of diabetes. Don’t drink it and you make a six-year-old girl cry her eyes out. Then it occurred to him. This wasn’t his decision.
“Look, I don’t care if you go back to the hospital. It’s up to your family. Is there somebody responsible you can call?”
Billy brightened.
“My sister, Irene! She’s the only one who listens to me.” Isaiah gave him his phone and Billy made the call. He turned away and talked in a steady stream, like he didn’t want his sister to think about what he was saying.
“Tell her to bring your meds,” Isaiah said. Billy ended the call and started to speak, probably a thank-you. “Don’t say anything,” Isaiah added sharply. “Just sit there and shut up.”
Twenty minutes later, the doorbell rang. Isaiah opened the door. He couldn’t hide his disappointment. Irene couldn’t have been more than fifteen or sixteen. She was very thin, not soft, sinewy, like a high jumper or a marathoner. Great, Isaiah thought, the only one who listens to Billy is a girl barely out of middle school.
“You’re Irene?” Isaiah said, hoping she’d say no, she was Sally, the little sister. Her big sister Irene was right behind her.
“Yes, I’m Irene,” she said forthrightly. “Is Billy here?” Isaiah let her in. “I’m very sorry about this,” she said. “It’s a big imposition. I’ll get him out of here as soon as I can.”
Billy came to meet her. They hugged for a long time.
“Talk somewhere else,” Isaiah said.
They went out on the back stoop. They argued, Billy shrill and beseeching, Irene stern and exasperated. She sounded like the older one. Billy shouted, “You have to believe me, sis! You have to!”
Billy believes in things that aren’t there, Isaiah thought. He remembered his clients, Lester Collins who stabbed a hallucination that turned out to be his neighbor and Missy Laws who drowned her baby girl in the toilet because she thought it was poisoning her milk and Jake Lamont who jumped in front of an Amtrak train because he thought he was Iron Man.
Irene returned. “I’d like to talk to you, Mr. Quintabe. Is that all right?” Irene was unassuming, obviously intelligent, in that space between plain and pretty, the kind of
standout you had to look for. Nevertheless, Isaiah really, truly didn’t want to hear what she had to say. He said nothing. She sat down.
“Billy told me about the serial killer. He thinks AMSAK is someone named William Crowe.” She sounded weary and frustrated. She wrung her hands, the long fingers wrestling with each other. “Frankly, I don’t believe him, but I want you to know, Billy is not mentally ill. He’s lost and confused but he’s not sick.”
“Your brother was in neuropsych. Doesn’t that tell you something?”
“It was a mistake. Well, not really a mistake.”
“What do you mean?” Isaiah said. Inwardly, he slapped himself in the face. Questions only encouraged her.
“Billy always wanted to be a hero,” she said. “You know, like the kid who stepped in front of the terrorist or went back into the fire to save the dog. Maybe it was because Mom was disappointed with him, and he got bullied a lot. He told tall tales. He saw a spaceship land on Sugar Mountain. He was going to catch the murderer, the politicians were trying to stop him from exposing corruption. Things like that. No one believed him.” She had a water bottle and paused for a drink.
“Then I think he got angry,” she continued. “He started messing with people’s heads, doing things for shock value and taking stupid risks. He rode his skateboard down Watershed Hill. It’s incredibly steep, hairpin turns. No one was crazy enough to do it except Billy. He nearly killed himself, but he got it on video. That was the important thing.” Irene stopped, sighed, readying herself for what came next.
