This Side of Night

by J. Todd Scott

  A big net had been thrown out for the old cartel leader, but so far it had come up empty. Garrison had to think it was only a matter of time, although things would get a lot bloodier until then.

  That was the conclusion he planned to put in his report to Chesney. He suspected the SAC wouldn’t ask too much beyond that, but in the quiet of his own kitchen, he couldn’t help wondering where in the hell the old son of a bitch had gone. Few people understood how hard it could be to find one man in the world—even when most of the world was looking for him—but with Fox Uno, you really didn’t need to look all over the world, only the northern states of Mexico. Chihuahua, Coahuila, maybe Nuevo León. Those were Fox Uno’s traditional strongholds and he’d never been known to move out of them.

  It was still a hell of a lot of territory, but not impossible. Not the whole world.

  But . . . Fox Uno did have one other traditional stronghold—right here in Texas, in the Big Bend.

  Was it possible he’d try to slip over the border? No, but it wasn’t unheard of, either. Back in 2008, DEA’s McAllen office arrested a high-ranking member of the Gulf cartel buying a watermelon in a local H-E-B supermarket. An agent just happened to be in the store at the same time and recognized Carlos Landín Martínez from the agency’s long-running investigation. It was pure luck, a joke, but it had happened.

  Garrison had to ask himself: Could it happen again?

  Not the same way. This wasn’t like Landín Martínez—DEA didn’t have a great photo of Fox Uno, and nothing current, so no one would recognize him wandering the street. Unless that person was Deputy America Reynosa, who Garrison was convinced knew a hell of a lot more about her alleged uncle than she’d ever admit to Chris Cherry or anyone else.

  Could it happen again?

  Even if the possibility existed, Chris’s unwillingness to help, and Garrison’s refusal to run any more unilateral operations in the Big Bend, meant it was a dead end. It was such a remote chance anyway, it probably wasn’t worth raising in his report to Chesney. But for the sake of completeness—he was still a goddamn investigator, after all—he’d put it in. One sentence, no more.

  After his talk with Chesney about Sheriff Machado’s Tejas unit, his SAC already thought he was jumping at every shadow . . . seeing goddamn ghosts everywhere.

  What the hell was one more?

  * * *

  —

  GARRISON SWEPT THE REPORTS back into his briefcase and poured himself another shot of bourbon, three fingers of Garrison Brothers, no relation. It was an old joke, one Darin would always laugh over when they were sharing a bottle after work. Darin used to come over all the time after his own divorce to grill out or watch a game or have a few drinks. Anything so he wouldn’t have to go back to his own empty apartment.

  The house was quiet, as it was all the time now. No TV, no stereo. He’d always loved mellow classic rock, and although the girls used to make fun of him for knowing all those old songs by heart, he sang them on surveillance all the time—an audience of one, sitting in his car alone. He was even caught on an open mic once, and Darin wouldn’t let his boss live it down—he bought a fake plastic microphone that mysteriously appeared and disappeared around Garrison’s office for nearly two years. He had no idea where it was now, packed away after Darin’s death, but the memory still made him smile.

  Karen had left the kitchen radio behind for him, but just like with the TV, he hadn’t turned it on since she’d left, and he wasn’t going to start now.

  When he’d visited Chris Cherry out at his house on the Far Six, he’d told the young sheriff he wasn’t sure he could ever get used to all the stillness and silence out there, but that had been a lie.

  Garrison had gotten used to it just fine.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  The deputy was taking Eddy home, back to his trailer in the canyon. Charity was still pretty pissed at him and had refused to do it (and his spic lawyer, Paez, had said it probably wasn’t all that good an idea anyway), and that’s when Eddy realized he didn’t have anyone else to call. Sure, when he was holding some shit, he was everyone’s friend, but when he was in some deep shit, those “friends”—a loose collection of fuck-ups like himself—mysteriously up and disappeared, like cockroaches scurrying from the light. Truth was, without Charity around, Eddy had no one, and other than his trailer, had nowhere else to go, which was how he now found himself being given a lift home by the deputy he’d attacked.

  After Eddy spilled his guts, Danny Ford had declined to push the assault charge from their little run-in—just like he promised—and Paez seemed to think the sheriff’s department wasn’t planning to put the five bodies floating in the river on him, either, so for the moment, he was both free and sober.

  The world was a goddamn funny place.

  Funnier still to think that, right now, this Danny Ford might be the closest thing Eddy had to a friend in the whole world.

  “Them bodies ain’t there no more, right? They’re all gone?” Eddy asked.

  Danny nodded, keeping an eye on the road for the turnoff to Eddy’s place. It was still early, with a mix of sun and shadows spread across the road. The sky was blue, though, the blue of no clouds and no rain. Of emptiness. “They’re all gone, Eddy.”

  “You believe in ghosts?” Eddy said, chewing a fingernail.

  “What are you getting at?”

  Eddy shrugged. “You know, like when I’m using, like on a three- or four-day bender, I see all sorts of shit. Crazy shit that ain’t there. But I’m never quite sure, right? I get all spooky, yelling at empty rooms.” Eddy tapped his fingers on the dash. “Now that my head is kinda clear, I hope I don’t see any real ghosts. You know, pissed-off spirits of those dead wetbacks or something. I’ve seen movies about shit like that.”

  Danny smiled. “Those are just movies, Eddy. They aren’t real, either.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I figured. That’s what everyone says. That’s what everyone in those movies says, too, right until something horrible grabs their fat asses and drags ’em away . . .”

  Danny laughed, but it was a serious laugh. “Do ghosts out here have some reason to be angry with you?”

  Eddy slid deep in his seat, not wanting to get Danny all spun up and asking a bunch of questions again. “Naw, it’s nothing like that. I already told you everything I know.”

  “Then you should be fine, Eddy. Nothing to worry about.” Danny slowed down and made the turn onto crushed quartz and dirt—an opening cut into some low, twisted trees and ocotillo. “Welcome home . . .”

  * * *

  —

  AS DANNY PULLED UP TO THE TRAILER, Eddy could see the yellow police tape, just like in the movies. It was strung around the front door, another long piece fluttering on some of the rebar out in the yard, near that big Admiral fridge. Eddy couldn’t remember how most of that junk in the grass had gotten there, or where it had come from. It was stuff that might have been important once, that maybe he thought he could resell or make something useful out of, but nothing had ever come out of it. It had all gone to shit, rusting away. Like his goddamn life. That police tape had come loose from somewhere else around the trailer and was now waving around like a bright flag. Like NASCAR. It reminded Eddy of those weird balloon men bouncing around in front of car dealerships.

  Even when he was sober those things freaked him out.

  Danny stopped in the grass, but left the truck idling. He rolled down the window to let some air in, turning to Eddy, who couldn’t take his eyes off that winding police tape.

  A yellow flag in NASCAR meant caution.

  “Charity is still up at the family crisis center, so don’t go there. Don’t even look that direction. If she wants to see you, she’ll come back. But if I get word you’re up there messing with her, not only am I going to knock the shit out of you again, I’m booking you on that assault charge, got it?”

  “Yeah, we�
�re good.”

  Danny seemed even more distracted than when he and Deputy Reynosa had questioned Eddy. But he reached around to the backseat and pulled up a heavy brown bag that he put in Eddy’s lap.

  “That’s some of the stuff we took out of the trailer. Wallet, phone, things like that. You signed for it all back in lockup, but you can check it now if you want. It’s all there.”

  “Naw, I don’t need to do that.”

  “If someone tries to call you, this Apache or anyone else, or if someone tries to find you out here . . . threaten you . . . whatever. You call me.”

  “Okay.”

  The deputy pointed at the bag. “There’s some other stuff in there. Bologna, bread. Maybe potato chips. A carton of eggs.” Danny smiled at that, and Eddy did, too, remembering those damn eggs. And the skillet. “My number is written on the inside of that carton, tucked away. You need it, that’s where it is.”

  Eddy held on to the bag, thinking for a minute he might cry. He didn’t know why, couldn’t explain it, but the fact that Danny had gone to any kind of trouble hit him hard, right in the chest, harder even than the beating Danny had given him down by the giant cane. Maybe he was only doing it because he wanted Eddy’s help with his investigation or whatever, but it was the first time anyone had wanted anything worthwhile from Eddy Lee Rabbit in a long damn time.

  “You know, I used to run track,” Eddy said. “One season, when I was like a sophomore. I was skinny . . . I mean, not like now, but healthy . . . fast. So goddamn fast. I set a state record. Some black dude beat it a couple years later, but for a while there, I was the fastest man in the state. Look it up, it’s got to be in some book somewhere. It’s true, bet my life. Hard to believe, right? I wasn’t always like this.”

  “I know, Eddy.” Danny stared out through the open window. “So why’d you give it up?”

  “Shit, man, I just hated sprintin’ around that track. Runnin’ in a goddamn circle and never gettin’ anywhere.”

  “Makes sense. But you know, you could start again.” Danny waved out the window, at the scrub and the canyon walls. “Out here, you’re not running in a circle. Hell, you could run near forever. Straight on, just keep going.”

  Eddy thought about that. “Brother, I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”

  Danny smiled. “It’s easy enough. Just put one foot in front of the other.” Now both Danny and Eddy watched the yellow tape dance around the trailer. “Look, I can’t help you stay clean, Eddy, but you have to try. If you don’t, what you’re doing now will straight-up kill you. Or it’ll get you killed.”

  “I know. I understand. I appreciate this.” Eddy held up the bag.

  “Then don’t let it go to waste.”

  Eddy opened the door and slid out, still holding the bag tight. “You guys better not have fucked up all my shit in there. I’m particular about how I keep my things.”

  Danny really laughed this time. “Yeah, we could all see that. Good luck, Eddy. Remember, one foot in front of the other . . . and steer clear of those ghosts . . .”

  Eddy stepped back so Danny could pull away, and knew that the deputy wasn’t talking about ghosts at all . . .

  * * *

  —

  EDDY WAITED UNTIL DANNY WAS LONG GONE, and then put the bag on the trailer steps—he still hadn’t gone inside yet—and circled back out into the yard.

  He avoided the yellow tape twisting and turning on the rebar, giving it a wide berth.

  Caution, motherfucker, caution.

  But here he was all the same.

  He couldn’t remember where most of this junk had come from, except the old Admiral fridge. He’d grown up with it, but it had sat out here in the grass for years, getting rained on and occasionally dusted with snow. A knot of snakes had taken up in it once that Eddy had to burn out with some gasoline, and he put a couple of bullet holes in it one spring, goofing around. It was originally white, but now all discolored, like a tooth gone bad. Like Eddy’s own teeth. It even smelled bad, like it was still giving off the stink of spoiled food.

  Memories. Ghosts.

  But when he opened it, the door pulled back smooth, because he’d kept the hinges well oiled. And although the inside was dirty and filled with debris, it was all stuff he had carefully arranged there: paint cans and glass bottles and oil filters. He knelt to the bottom of the fridge, where he’d hollowed out a hole into the soil beneath it that he’d covered with some wood and greasy aluminum foil, and reached inside.

  He found it easy: a Glad freezer bag still heavy with a quarter pound of meth, still all glassy and yellow—big, chunky shards—as well as the plastic-wrapped phone hidden underneath it that Injun fucker Apache had given him.

  He thought it was funny: the freezer bag in the old broken fridge.

  He’d been keeping his stash out here for a year or more, afraid someone might try to rob him. Even Charity didn’t know it was out here, and she pretty much knew everything about him, but to be honest, when she was using, he didn’t trust her much, either.

  He unwrapped the phone and flipped it on, and while he waited for it to power on, he stood and stared at that clear bag a long time, as the shadows around him grew even longer.

  His hand was trembling.

  I can’t help you stay clean . . . but you have to try . . . If you don’t, what you’re doing now will straight-up kill you. Or it’ll get you killed.

  He’d come to this moment again and again; a hundred, hell, maybe a thousand times in his life. His thoughts were as clear as that freezer bag itself. He could see straight, think straight, and it felt good. Like the old Eddy. The sun was warm and nice, and the wind was moving over him like Charity’s fingers on his skin, and Deputy Danny Ford had been damn decent to him, when he had no reason to be. This was a good day. The sort of day Eddy Rabbit could hold on to and remember—the first of many—if he just didn’t fuck it all up.

  If he just took the whole bag and tossed it into the river and never looked back.

  One foot in front of the other . . . and then he could be running again.

  But he continued to stand there . . . way too long . . . trapped in place, turning the bag this way and that in the sun. The meth inside glowed with its own yellow light.

  Like the police tape, waving like a flag.

  Caution.

  He was still holding the bag, staring into it, mesmerized, when the phone from Apache started to buzz.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Zita needed new clothes.

  Even after a couple of good, hot showers, and America trimming away the gnarls in her long, dark hair with some desk scissors, the fact remained that Zita only had the one shirt and jeans, and the girl was embarrassed by them. They weren’t hers and they didn’t fit right. Now that her initial fear had passed—a fear that had awoken the girl crying, screaming, in the middle of the night—Zita was animated, eager to talk. She was fascinated by everything in her new country. She was una pequeña urraca, as America’s mama would say—a little magpie—with a quick mouth and quicker fingers. America had found the girl’s tiny collection of stolen hair ties, gum, a TV Guide, a tiny black chess piece, and even a 9mm bullet—things she must have found in the couch cushions. Ben had played chess, and that lost piece, like the bullet, had been hidden in the apartment since his death. She turned it over and over in her hand for a long time before putting it back with Zita’s other treasures.

  The bullet, however, she slipped into her own pocket.

  Fox Uno was sitting at the tiny table in her kitchen, eating the eggs and tortillas she had made, when she told him she was taking Zita out.

  If he had any thoughts about not letting Zita leave with her, he didn’t share them. He kissed the girl on the forehead and told her to behave.

  America wanted to tell herself she was taking the girl shopping because it was the right thing to do, but she’d be lying. />
  There was another, more serious reason.

  She wanted to get Zita alone and see what she would tell her about Fox Uno and their life across the river.

  * * *

  —

  THERE WERE A COUPLE of clothing shops in Murfee, right on Main Street—expensive vintage and specialty shops, and a newer Target over in Nathan—but America didn’t go to any of those. Instead, she drove to the west side of Murfee, over the train tracks, to the place some people still called Beantown. It was where she had grown up, and where she had lived in the same tiny house before the fires. There were several businesses here that only the town’s Hispanics frequented: Mancha’s bodega, a restaurant tacked onto the back of a trailer that served traditional Chihuahuan and Sonoran food, and a sprawling ranch house filled with the sort of Mexican products one would find over the river in Ojinaga. The ranch house also sold clothes, most of them secondhand but some new, which had been bought cheap at the Walmart in Midland and then driven down to Murfee for resale. When she’d been no older than Zita, America had gotten most of her clothes from the place that everyone simply called La Tienda, so she knew it well, but was surprised how out of place she felt now, walking down its dark, cramped aisles, showing Zita one thing or another. Although the girl was polite, it was clear she was used to much nicer things.

  On the drive, and now in the store, Zita talked endlessly about all the fancier stores and places she’d been: Mexico City and Guadalajara and Monterrey. All about her brother Martino, who she did not like much because he fought with her papa, and someone called Gualterio, who she did. Also a woman called Luisa, who she’d loved very much, and who America understood was now dead, because whenever Zita said her name, she started to cry—small, hot tears that she fiercely wiped away. She talked about riding horses and having tall men with guns always bring her pieces of her favorite chocolate cake and sitting on Papa’s knee and riding in big black cars with windows thick and dark as smoke.