Last Looks

by Howard Michael Gould

  The Palisades Posse. For fuck’s sake. He pictured these wannabes swagging around the toniest parts of L.A., walking badass and letting everybody at Whole Foods and Sam’s by the Beach know whose turf it is, and maybe on Saturday night getting itchy and blasting 2Pac from the Priuses their daddies paid for while they cruised past Mandeville Canyon looking to mix it up with some Brentwood Boyz.

  “You could’ve saved yourself the gas money,” he said to Dreads, who seemed like the leader. “I got nothing to do with Alastair Pinch.”

  “Bullshit—you’re workin’ for the network! It’s in the trades!” Dreads pulled something out of his back pocket and threw it on the ground in front of Waldo. He said to Tattoo, “Gimme ’at flizzay.” Tattoo made a dismissive cluck but handed Dreads a flashlight and he shined it downward so Waldo could read. It was an issue of Variety, with the usual hype about box office and pilot orders, but near the bottom of the front page there was a picture of Waldo—younger, cleaner Waldo—and the headline:

  EX-COP PINCH HITS FOR PINCH

  “What the . . . ?” Waldo started to skim the article, about how some network president named Wilson Sikorsky was more confident than ever this would get straightened out quickly for Alastair and was pleased to be adding former LAPD detective Charlie Waldo to the team. Lorena must have told them he was in.

  But he didn’t get far into the article before Dreads said, “Just keep yo’ mountain ass outta L.A., bitch,” and Grill wiped the blood from his face, grabbed the frying pan and paid Waldo back for the bloody mouth with a wallop across the base of his skull. He dropped face-first on the paper.

  Tattoo said “Let’s slide, yo, ’fore he gets up,” and they all made for the car. Waldo looked up, just lucid enough to see that, yeah, it was a Prius.

  * * *

  —

  Waldo aroused the next morning with a stiff elbow and a thick knot at the base of his skull, cursing that he didn’t own an ice pack because he hadn’t let himself consider it part of his first aid kit instead of its own separate Thing.

  He sat in his one chair and read the article in Variety twice. It referred to Waldo as “the controversial former LAPD detective” and overstated his promotion history, but at least there was no mention of Lydell Lipps. This Sikorsky character alluded to conversations they’d supposedly been having, as if Waldo had been on the case for a week. The issue was dated Friday, the same day Lorena came up the mountain.

  Waldo looked up the network’s Burbank headquarters on his iPhone and got through to Sikorsky’s assistant. She said Sikorsky would return the call but Waldo had to stop her from hanging up before he could even give her his number.

  The morning’s chores still undone, Waldo went online and Googled himself and Alastair Pinch together and found to his chagrin that a score of other publications had picked up the story over the weekend. The L.A. Times went a lot further, with a full rehashing of the Lipps scandal and Waldo’s meltdown, with a dozen hyperlinks to old articles. Waldo passed on these trips down memory lane but read up on the suspect.

  Pinch, Waldo learned, was an English stage actor, legendary for his work at the Royal Shakespeare Company, who’d gone international with turns as a sadistic villain in a superhero movie and its sequel. For the last three seasons he’d been the center of a hit network procedural as a cantankerous southern judge with a complicated personal life, some show called Johnny’s Bench, apparently a financial windfall like nothing he’d ever see playing Iago or Lear. One of the articles linked him to the tradition of storied British thespians like Burton and Harris and O’Toole, apparently hell-bent on matching them not only role for role but drink for drink and brawl for brawl. Judging by news accounts Waldo found on YouTube, when the police discovered him in his house at nine in the morning with a blood alcohol level of 0.103 and the doors locked and the burglar alarm set and his third wife bludgeoned to death on the living room floor and he claiming not to recall how it happened, friends and neighbors were surprised, but maybe not too surprised.

  Before Waldo knew it he’d been surfing for an hour and realized that even if it weren’t for half-assed Crip wannabes bashing his skull with cookware, he’d want to disassociate himself from this asshole as quickly as possible. He tried Sikorsky again, got the same assistant, and could hear her eyes roll through the phone.

  He went outside and managed the chickens and the gardens and the wash, but without the serenity that had made the previous thousand days manageable. He could feel the stewing fury coming back, the pain in his elbow sharpening it, and he was ready to go at somebody, anybody, even before he heard yet another fucking car coming up the hill and before he could see it was a news van with CHANNEL 7 painted on the side.

  A young and blandly attractive African-American woman stepped out of the van and into the line of fire. “Hi, I’m Tiffany Roper, Eyewitness—”

  “This is private property, and I’m telling you to leave.”

  “You’re Charlie Waldo, right?”

  Waldo turned on the woman’s partner, a fat guy with a backward baseball cap and a beard as wild as Waldo’s who was already hoisting a camera onto his shoulder. “You’re trespassing, and I’ve politely asked you to leave. Turn that thing on, I’ll politely help you eat the lens.”

  Tiffany Roper gestured to the cameraman to put it down. “We weren’t even expecting you to be in town; we were just hoping for some footage of where you live now. But as long as you’re here, could we talk about Alastair Pinch, even off camera? Do you expect him to be indicted?”

  “I have nothing to do with Alastair Pinch. Put that on television.”

  “We’re probably leading with the story again tonight, and I have Wilson Sikorsky telling me you’ve been on the case since last week. Why are you saying you’re not? Is it an advantage to your investigation if people don’t know you’re working on it?” She dropped the contentious approach and went for ingratiating. “This can be off the record.”

  Waldo looked off into the distance and silently counted a slow ten, then took the iPhone from his pocket. “I have nothing more to say. Leave now or I’m calling the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.” He went silent and held the reporter’s eye until she turned to her cameraman and nodded him into the van.

  He watched them drive off, but this wasn’t going to stop by itself, not if a network president was out there talking to the press about him. He needed to get Sikorsky to correct himself publicly, to put out a release saying Waldo had turned down the case. But he probably couldn’t talk the man into that over the phone—if he could even get him on the phone.

  Waldo didn’t like it, didn’t like it at all, but there wasn’t a choice. Lorena had broken the peace and had brought on Cuppy and the punks and even the media, and the only way to restore the stillness that had made life bearable again was to go and reclaim it.

  He’d have to leave his woods and go down the mountain.

  FOUR

  Idyllwild was only ninety miles from L.A., but it might as well have been a thousand, a rustic haven for society’s peaceful misfits—artist colonies, Zen centers, Christian retreats, yoga retreats and motorcycle clubs drawn by Highway 243’s steep, twisting jaunt. Waldo lived about three miles outside the tiny town center, but that might as well have been a thousand, too, so rarely had he visited.

  He rode in on his Brompton folding bicycle, one of his more expensive Things, bought with an eye toward the possible need for a journey someday, having made the obvious commitment to permit himself only transportation that was public or self-propelled. He carried a bag for the compacted bike in his backpack, along with his other set of clothing, in case the trip spilled into a second day. Waldo could have bypassed Idyllwild altogether and headed straight to Banning to catch the Greyhound, but the trip to North Hollywood was three and a half hours including the change downtown and he could use something to eat on the way in addition to the two oranges he’d brought, taking
advantage of the expedition to enjoy a little variation from his daily salad and eggs.

  Though the town was happily free of chain stores and restaurants, he still hunted carefully for the grocery that looked most likely to offer truly natural food and chose the one with a hand-painted sign that read HARVEST MARKET in psychedelic Woodstock-era lettering and an aging, stringy-haired hippie type in a peasant dress behind the counter. Even with his rat’s-nest mane, in this town Waldo didn’t look threatening or out of place, and the hippie woman smiled warmly when he entered.

  It was the first store he had been in since his transformation and he froze, unsure what he wanted or even how to begin deciding. She asked, “Help you find something?”

  Waldo thought a moment. “What here’s locally grown?”

  “Everything. All local, all organic.”

  “Good”—he nodded—“good.”

  “Got sandwiches, too.”

  He hadn’t considered a sandwich; it was like a world opening. “I haven’t eaten a sandwich in forever.”

  She said, “I made a nice chicken salad this morning, if you like that. And we have some fresh twelve-grain bread.”

  “A chicken salad sandwich. God, that sounds better than you can imagine.” She put on a pair of cellophane gloves and smiled at him again even though he wasn’t anywhere near ready to reciprocate. The cellophane vexed him, but it didn’t explicitly break a rule so he let it go.

  Then something more problematic occurred to him. “Wait—how’d the chicken get up here? Truck?” The woman shrugged, yeah, probably. Waldo contemplated a second, said, “I guess you couldn’t help that,” and nodded for her to go ahead. She took out a couple of pieces of bread and started slicing a tomato. Then he remembered something else. “But it was wrapped too, I bet. Probably each chicken, individually?”

  The woman stopped. “Of course.” She wasn’t smiling now. “Our food is fresh, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  “No,” he said, shaking his head and waving for her not to bother. “I don’t eat anything that’s had any kind of packaging.” He had one more hopeful idea. “Did you make the bread yourself?” She shook her head. Waldo sighed, thwarted on all counts. The woman peeled off the gloves and gave him a peevish frown as he left the store, but Waldo couldn’t let that bother him; some people just weren’t as committed to preserving the planet as they thought themselves to be.

  Then it was on to 243, the twenty-four miles downhill to Banning. He’d never taken it by bike before in either direction. As he approached, the prospect of the brutal return daunted him far more than the curvy glide down. Hitting the first loop, though, he saw that this direction would be hairy enough, the grade so steep that simply keeping the bike under control took every ounce of his attention and will, cars suddenly roaring out of nowhere, terrorizing him with whamming horns.

  But he made it to the desert floor and the Greyhound station, flexed his fingers for a minute or two to get the blood flowing back into his knuckles and bought a ticket for North Hollywood. He folded and bagged his Brompton, conscious of a man studying him, all too interested in Waldo’s process. He was of indeterminate heritage, Asian or maybe Native American, and flaunted his boxer’s musculature under a tight white A-shirt. Waldo nodded at the man, who after all may just have been a cyclist himself, but the guy didn’t nod back or even blink. For most of his adult life Waldo would have made a point to amble over to a dude flagging menace like that, a quick social call to let the fellow know there was a badge around, but now he just double-wrapped the handles of the bike bag through his fingers and confirmed his decision to carry it onto the coach instead of trusting the stowage underneath.

  It was a straight shot west on I-10 to downtown L.A., then a change for the second leg up the 101 and then he was back in the city he’d never wanted to see again, the city that probably didn’t want to see him either, and only a mile or so from the epicenter of the worst of it. He sat on a bench to unbag and restore his bike, then headed off in the opposite direction from the precinct house, down Lankershim and east to Burbank.

  There were three cars ahead of him at the studio gate and Waldo took his spot behind the last one, a Lexus SUV. A guard with a russet mullet and Fu Manchu scoped him for a second but went back to his business, checking IDs and printing passes and raising the gate to let the cars through one by one. When the Lexus passed the drill, Waldo straddle-walked his bike to the gate, but the back of the mullet disappeared into the security kiosk, the door with its tinted window slid shut, and Waldo was left waiting in the sun by a five-hundred-dollar-a-week rent-a-cop who’d seen a shaggy bum on a bicycle and a chance to milk a power trip.

  Waldo waited patiently until the guy finally came back out, running a comb through his hair with long, slow strokes. “Help you?”

  “Tell Wilson Sikorsky, Charlie Waldo’s here to see him.”

  “Beat it.” Not even looking at him.

  Waldo said, a little slower, “Tell Wilson Sikorsky, Charlie Waldo.”

  “You expect me to let you in to see Wilson Sikorsky, the president of the network.” He kept combing.

  “No, Rapunzel, Wilson Sikorsky, the makeup girl. But if she’s busy, I’ll take Wilson Sikorsky, the president of the network.”

  The guard sneered. “ID?”

  “Don’t have one.”

  “Pal,” the guard said, seeming to enjoy his day better by the second, “you can leave on your wheels, or you can leave on your head.”

  “Look, I don’t have an ID because I only have a hundred things and—” He saw in the guard’s slack-jawed indifference that this wasn’t going to get him anywhere, so he took his wallet from his back pocket and peeled a pair of twenties. “Make you a deal: call Sikorsky’s office and have his assistant tell him I’m at the gate. If he won’t see me, I got your next Supercut.” The guard eyed the bills, then went back into his kiosk and dialed the phone.

  While Waldo waited, a second guard sauntered toward him from a building on the lot, this one with mirrored sunglasses and flowing blond Thor locks. He passed the front wheel of Waldo’s bike and bumped it accidentally on purpose. Waldo said, “Hey,” and the guard took out his own comb and worked his own hair while he studied Waldo head to toe through the shades. Then the gate opened and Thor stopped combing and looked over at Mullet, questioning.

  Mullet told his partner, “He’s here to see Mr. Sikorsky,” and handed Waldo a pass and a lot map. “Admin Building, turn that way at the water tower and it’s three buildings to your right.” As Waldo pedaled in, he heard Thor ask the other one, “Who is that?”

  Waldo took the left at the water tower. A young woman with a headset and a clipboard flagged him down. Highly annoyed, she asked him, “Are you Wino Number Two? Why aren’t you on New York Street?”

  Waldo said, “I’m not Wino Number Two,” and she looked even more ticked off. He pedaled on until he found the Admin Building, newer and shinier than the others around it, with an oversize network logo by the entrance. He spotted a rack, walked his bike over and was still kneeling to chain it when he heard someone shout, “Charlie Waldo!” He turned to see a fiftyish man in an Italian suit bounding toward him with a smile and an outstretched hand. He had a strong Mediterranean face and dark curly hair and looked ready for his second shave of the day. “Wilson Sikorsky. Glad you made it.” An African-American woman with straightened and gray-streaked hair and wearing an easy ten thousand dollars’ worth of clothes and jewelry walked behind Sikorsky, frowning. Waldo knew her well from news channel appearances as the fire-eating lawyer Fontella Davis.

  Waldo came right at Sikorsky, skipping the pleasantries. “Why are you telling the press I’m working with you?”

  Sikorsky smoothly segued his rejected handshake into a two-hand the answer’s obvious gesture and said, “When you land a star, you don’t hide it under your ass, you tell the fucking world! You were the youngest captain i
n the history of the LAPD—did we get that right?”

  “I wasn’t a captain. I was the youngest Detective III—”

  “Close enough. Ever meet Fontella Davis?” Waldo shook his head and pursed his lips; Fontella tipped her chin just enough to signal acknowledgment. The two weren’t going out dancing anytime soon. “Let’s walk,” Sikorsky said, blowing past the friction and starting across the asphalt toward the soundstages, the others following. “Look, we want to start you right away, even though Lorena Nascimento’s unavailable—”

  “She’s missing,” Waldo corrected.

  “And thus unavailable. But you were the one we wanted anyway; she just came with the deal.” He handed Waldo a business card. “I’ve written my cell number here—don’t bother with my office anymore; my new assistant’s a fuckwit. Call me day or night—there is nothing more important to this network. I can get six mil an episode with what this dead wife thing’s done for ratings. But only if I can get the fucker to a hundred, and we’re at fifty-seven, so I need two more years of Alastair Pinch happy and healthy and off death row.”

  Fontella Davis finally spoke, telling Waldo, “You need to come on CNN with me tonight. I assume you know where to find a stylist, or at least a barbershop.”

  Waldo stopped walking. “I don’t give a shit about Alastair Pinch. I never told Lorena I’d do this.” The others stopped walking too. Waldo handed Sikorsky back his card.

  Sikorsky’s eyes flared, but he put on the you’ll pretend to love me because we both know I can kill you charm, which gets you to the top of one of the biggest companies in Hollywood. “I tell you my nuts are in a vise, you give it an extra turn. Fine: you want to negotiate first, have your reps give me a call.” He tried to hand Waldo the card again.

  “I can’t take that. I’d have to get rid of something else, and . . .” It wasn’t worth it. “It’s complicated.”

  Fontella Davis spoke to Sikorsky. “Let’s go with one of the other PIs. I know I said we need to create distractions, but this—” She gestured at Waldo, running a hand up and down. “Come on.”