by C. D. Payne
“Like a man, naturally. The guy is so emotionally together. And he looks so sexy when grief-stricken. I felt like dragging him under the table right there in the jail visitors’ room.”
“I know what you mean,” I said. “I feel powerfully attracted to Sheeni whenever she’s especially distraught or heartbroken.”
“We’re a couple of rescuers, Rick. People should thank their lucky stars we’re around to pick up the pieces!”
SUNDAY, April 25 — My cellular phone vibrated in my pants while I was doing my morning Dogo exercises.
“Good morning, Sheeni,” I said cheerily.
“Who is this?” demanded a voice. It was Sheeni’s 5,000-year-old mother!
“Expectant mothers’ help line,” I replied, disguising my voice. “How may we assist you?”
“Stay away from my daughter!” she screamed. Click.
Damn. My Love should have been more careful. Now she’s lost her expensive cellular phone, cutting off a vital communications link. Her busybody mother must have pressed “redial” to find out with whom Sheeni had been conversing. I just pray Mrs. Saunders doesn’t start using that phone to make free long-distance calls around the world at my expense.
6:30 p.m. I spent most of the day apartment hunting. It was pretty discouraging. Landlords take one look at me and think wild parties at 3 a.m., irate neighbors, broken plumbing fixtures, holes knocked in the sheetrock, and bounced rent checks. Treating teenagers with contempt may be the only form of housing discrimination that’s still legal.
I did find one place I really liked in Fuzzy’s neighborhood. It’s a nicely private in-law apartment over a garage; the rent is a semi-affordable $525 per month. It had a real bathroom with actual hot water. I told the lady renting it that I was looking for a place for me and my mother, who was away right now on combat duty in the United States Marine Corps.
“Your mother is a Marine?” the woman asked.
“Yes, she’s a major,” I replied, “and boy is she strict. She makes me go to bed at nine o’clock and keep my room as neat as a pin. The only music she lets me play are Frank Sinatra tapes turned down low. I guess it’s for my own good though. I’ll probably be going away to Stanford anyway next year. I’m in the accelerated program at Redwood High.”
The lady let me fill out an application, but she seemed pretty skeptical. I wrote down Mr. Frank DeFalco and Ms. Lana Baldwin as my references. I trust they’ll give me a glowing recommendation.
9:45 p.m. It’s been two whole days since I’ve spoken with My Love and incalculably longer since I’ve held her in my arms. These separations are unendurable. I’m looking forward to some extensive class-cutting with her tomorrow. I’ve washed my sheets and may even shower in gym for her. Another painful sacrifice for love, but I’m used to it.
MONDAY, April 26 — No sign of My Love in school today. I’m hoping she had another routine doctor’s appointment in Santa Rosa and hasn’t had to maintain a bedside vigil at the hospital because her father took a sudden turn for the worse. I’d call the hospital to find out his condition, but those nurses can be such snoops.
Too depressed to write much. Got a nasty letter from my sister accusing me of miscounting the money she sent and berating me for not calling our mother in her time of need. Right. We could compare notes on how it feels to shoot people.
I went to all my classes except gym. Started a maple breadbox in wood technology class. Hope Sheeni likes Early American kitchen accessories. Saw Vijay the Vile in the hall and we both ignored each other. His sister was pretty frosty toward me in driver’s ed. She must have heard a one-sided account of the fight from her brother. I informed her that I merely had been defending myself against attack, but apologized anyway. Apurva said she thought it was unfortunate that Sheeni Saunders felt the need to keep every intelligent boy in town in a state of constant agitation.
TUESDAY, April 27 — My Love was absent from school again today! I haven’t heard from her in four days. In desperation, I called the hospital. Mr. Saunders had been discharged yesterday, they said. The guy is definitely on the mend. So why isn’t his daughter in school?
9:27 p.m. I broke Sonya’s record. I walked by Sheeni’s house six times today. No sign of My Love. I strolled by twice tonight and both times her bedroom window was dark. This is not good. I am getting a very bad feeling about this.
WEDNESDAY, April 28 — When I saw My Love wasn’t in homeroom this morning, I immediately dialed her home number from a school pay phone. Her mother answered.
“Hello, Mrs. Saunders. This is Vijay Joshi,” I lied.
“Oh, hello, Vijay,” she replied, unenthusiastically. “I think your sister should know that if she persists in this unnatural union with Trent Preston, we’re prepared to file suit against her. My husband is an attorney, you know.”
I pretended to take seriously this blatant bluff. “Please don’t do that, Mrs. Saunders! I’m certain she’ll listen to reason in time.”
“Time is something we don’t have a lot of, Vijay.”
“I understand, Mrs. Saunders. I am somewhat concerned about your daughter. She hasn’t been to school this week.”
“She’s fine, Vijay. You needn’t worry.”
“Would you like me to bring over her homework?”
“That won’t be necessary, Vijay. Sheeni has been withdrawn from Redwood High School. My husband sent them a letter yesterday.”
Total panic.
“And where will she be going to school?” I croaked.
“You needn’t concern yourself about that, Vijay. And I wouldn’t bother calling us anymore. Sheeni isn’t here.”
Panic on top of panic.
“Oh, where is she?” I asked as nonchalantly as possible.
“She’s away. And don’t worry. She’s being well taken care of.” Click.
Nightmarish anguish and despair. My One and Only Love has been ripped from my arms and sent to God knows where!
THURSDAY, April 29 — Too depressed to write, to think, to hope. No call from my hoped-for landlady either. Now I understand why they say April is the cruelest month.
FRIDAY, April 30 — François’s had enough. He told me to get off my butt and find out what the hell is going on. So at lunchtime I sought out Ukiah’s best-informed teen gossip queen—Sonya Klummplatz. I swallowed my pride and took a seat beside her at the zaftig’s table. She didn’t seem very pleased to see me.
“Hi, Sonya,” I smiled. “Where have you been keeping yourself?”
“Oh, it’s the standoffish and stuck-up Rick Hunter. You must want something.”
“Just the pleasure of your company, Sonya,” I lied. “I had a great time at the dance.”
“That’s some late-breaking news. What has it been, two weeks?”
“Are you busy tomorrow night?”
“Maybe. What’d you have in mind?”
“Well, I thought we could go to the movies. There’s that new teen sex comedy in town.”
“I don’t know if I like those, Rick. I was in one myself—about two weeks ago.”
“Sorry about that. Do we have a date?”
“I’ll think about it. Are you sure you didn’t come here just to ask me if I know where Sheeni Saunders is?”
“Of course not.”
“That’s good. Because I know where she is, and I’m not going to tell you.”
“Why not?”
“I have my reasons.”
“I bet you don’t even know where she is,” I scoffed.
“I do so too. My mother is friends with Mrs. Tondo whose sister cleans house for Sheeni’s mother. I got the whole story, which Vijay Joshi has already tried to pry out of me without success.”
“Why won’t you tell me, Sonya?” I whispered. “I mean, we’re practically lovers.”
“We are lovers, Rick. Or were you too drunk to notice? OK, I will tell you this: Where Sheeni has been sent, the people who are holding her prisoner have been instructed to be on the alert at all times for certain teenage b
oys. So you can forget about rescuing her. What time are you picking me up tomorrow?”
“Sorry, Sonya. I just remembered I have a previous engagement.”
“Who with, rat boy?”
“With Nick Twisp. We’re planning a few murders.”
“Liar!”
4:15 p.m. Seventh period found me loitering outside the girls’ gym, from which Sonya and Lana emerged in a freshly showered state. This looked good on Lana, who I knew was still alluringly moist and pink under her clothes. Sonya may have been sopping under hers for all I care. I managed to separate Lana from her jealous friend for a private hallway chat. Lana told me all she knew, which, as usual, wasn’t much.
“Well, Rick, from what Sonya says it’s like this combination home for unwed mothers and Christian prison camp for problem girls. Sonya says it’s real strict. I guess Sheeni’s like totally locked up.”
“What’s the name of the place, Lana?”
“Oh, what’s the name? She told me too. Oh, I remember, it’s the Ingenious Home.”
“The Ingenious Home?” I asked skeptically.
“That’s right. Kinda funny name, huh?”
“And where is it, Lana? Is it around here?”
“Oh, Sonya wouldn’t tell me that, Rick. She knows too, but she ain’t sayin’. She’s gonna be mad at me anyways for talkin’ to you. I wish you two were gettin’ along better. Don’t you like her, Rick?”
“A guy can’t like someone who keeps secrets from him, Lana.”
“She’s only doin’ it ’cause you been ignorin’ her, Rick. I bet you could win her away from Trent if you tried. You already slept with her and that’s the hard part.”
You can say that again.
6:48 p.m. No “Ingenious Home” in the phone book. I also entered the name in a half-dozen Internet search engines, but turned up no prison camp for unwed mothers. Those Neanderthals must not have a Web presence. Why should they? Probably most of the parents they deal with don’t even have computers because they’re not sanctioned by the Old Testament.
Seeing no other alternative, I phoned Trent Preston and asked for a big personal favor.
“You want me to call Sonya Klummplatz?” he asked doubtfully.
“I’d appreciate it, Trent.”
“I don’t know, Rick. I’d hate to encourage her. I think she may be somewhat, uh, unstable. She has pictures of me pasted up all over the inside of her locker. It really bothers Apurva.”
“Trent, I wouldn’t ask if I thought there was any other way to get the information.”
“Maybe Sheeni’s better off in that home, Rick. They’ll take care of her until she has her baby.”
“I think so too, Trent,” I lied. “I just want to know where she is so I can write to her.”
“OK,” he sighed, “but my wife’s not going to like it. Apurva has a thing about Sheeni.”
Gee, I wonder why.
10:15 p.m. Trent just called sounding stressed. Sonya’s agreed to tell him where Sheeni is, but only if they discuss the matter in person.
“That’s great, Trent,” I said. “When are you getting together?”
“I’m picking her up in front of her house at 11:30 tonight, assuming my wife doesn’t brain me first.”
“That’s good, Trent. One piece of advice: I’d take her someplace public for your chat.”
“I intend to, Rick. I want bright lights and lots of people around.”
“The Burger Hovel?” I suggested.
“That’s a possibility. Or maybe the lobby of the police station.”
SATURDAY, May 1 — 1:15 a.m. The ringing telephone just jolted me awake. It was a worried Apurva calling to say her husband had not yet returned and she was thinking of alerting the police. I told her not to panic and just to be patient.
“But, Rick, my boy is out in the middle of the night with another woman!”
“He’s performing a valuable counseling service,” I pointed out. “You should be proud of him, Apurva.”
“I shall never understand you Americans,” she sighed, hanging up.
4:30 a.m. I just sent Trent home in a taxi. He washed up here about a half-hour ago stoned out of his mind. He was crashing about in the corridors with his clothes askew and waking all my neighbors. No sign of Sonya. She must have used a few of Lana’s giant spliffs on him. I fixed him some coffee and tried to make sense of his antic blubbering. Most of it had to do with obscure topics like the sanctity of marriage, but mixed in with the gibberish were two critical words: “Crescent City.”
My Love is being held prisoner in Crescent City, California. Fear not, darling, I’m on my way!
11:25 a.m. On the bus, heading north on Highway 101. I had a fortifying early donut binge downstairs, then loaded up my backpack, and re-sucked all the money out of my safe-deposit box after the bank opened. From the frequency of my visits to her vault, the bank manager must figure that’s where I’m stashing my dope. My money belt is now stuffed to capacity with over $30,000 in cash. The overflow I had to hide in my pack. I’m literally awash in hundred dollar bills, a comforting but also nerve-wracking condition. All my recently acquired household goods I left behind in my apartment, along with my bike, suicide rope, eelskin suit, cancer shoes, and flashy fedora. Who knows if I’ll be returning?
I’m not sure what the plan is when I get to Crescent City, but I’ll think of something. François wishes I hadn’t left that handy gun at the scene of his last crime. I don’t know, those things have a way of going off precipitously. I’d rather not subject my nervous system (not to mention my conscience) to another attempted homicide.
I’ve never been to Crescent City, but I know it’s the last town on the north coast before the Oregon border, and the weather is supposed to be the pits. A nice summer day there is 55 degrees with a blowing fog. I seem to recall that most of its downtown got wiped out in a big tidal wave from an earthquake in Alaska back in the sixties. I hope My Love is safely away from the shore. They have a prison there at Pelican Bay where the nastiest dudes in the state system chill out. I may know it intimately someday, though I hope not within the next week or so.
I hope Trent takes my advice and lies through his teeth about last night to Apurva. What a wife doesn’t know can’t hurt her—or her husband. An obvious truism, yet damning confessions dribble out of guys all the time. And if anyone is prone to leak like a sieve, it’s Trent. You’d think this trait would have been bred out of humans by the failure of honest guys to achieve reproductive success. After all it’s a known fact that women are most attracted to rogues and rascals.
6:42 p.m. Crescent City was not living up to its reputation for bad weather when I arrived. It was sunny and fairly pleasant. Even the frigid Pacific was doing its best to appear a beneficent blue. From what I can see, the town’s main activities are lumbering, fishing, clipping tourists, and incarcerating the dregs of California’s criminal class. Lots of motels clustered around the forlorn post–tidal wave, low-budget downtown. On the recommendation of the bus-depot clerk, I got a room at the Fog Horn Motel. Pretty clean and only 28 bucks a night. The first thing I did was use up $27.50 worth of hot water taking the world’s longest shower. Then I checked the town’s comic-book-sized phone book for “Ingenious Home.” No such listing. Damn! It’s occurred to me that New Orleans, Louisiana, is also known as “The Crescent City.” But would the Saunders send their only daughter to a prison camp halfway across the country?
10:20 p.m. On my way out to dinner at a nearby Chinese restaurant, I stopped in at the motel office and asked the sari-clad Indian woman behind the counter if she knew of any local homes for unwed mothers. This question didn’t seem to phase her.
“You would be wanting the Eugenia Home,” she replied. “That is the big green house over on Walrus Street. It has quite a tall fence around it.”
“Ah yes, the Eugenia Home,” I said, greatly relieved. “And which way’s Walrus Street?”
“It is three or four blocks north of here, but you can’t go to the
home after dark.”
“Why not?”
“At night they have a pack of vicious attack dogs roaming wild over the grounds.”
“Oh, I see. Well, thanks for the information.”
Ten minutes later I was ambling past the Eugenia Home. I had to cross over to the other side of the street to quiet the half-dozen assorted slobbering German Shepherds and Rottweilers lunging at me through the eight-foot-tall chain link fence. Set on at least an acre of mangy grass, the sprawling old house once must have been some rich pioneer’s imposing mansion. It had been stripped of its Victorian finery, re-windowed with cheap aluminum sliders, and slathered in dingy green stucco. A stark two-story dormitorylike structure had been grafted onto the back with a notable lack of architectural finesse. There were lights in some windows, but all the blinds were pulled down tight.
What heartless sadism, to cage my sensitive darling in such a grim and forbidding place. Now I wish François had done a little more damage to Sheeni’s father—at least blown off an arm or two. He deserves it!
SUNDAY, May 2 — A quiet day in a quiet town. Even the seagulls were looking subdued and contemplative. I walked past Sheeni’s prison before breakfast, but saw few signs of life. In the early morning sunshine Eugenia Home appeared, you’ll pardon the expression, fairly impregnable. All the gates were chained and padlocked. A businesslike strand of razor wire looped along the top of the encircling rusty fence. No guard towers, but it wouldn’t surprise me if the jailers inside had a shotgun or two at the ready. Perhaps I’ll have to purchase a used armored truck and storm that fence at breakneck speed.
After breakfast at a downtown greasy spoon, I went back to my motel and called the Eugenia Home. Eugenia Fairchild herself answered the phone. I told her I was a concerned father looking for a facility for my sixteen-year-old daughter Deirdre, who unfortunately was in “the family way.”
Eugenia was brisk and all business. “We do have a vacancy at the moment, sir. Our rates are $1,800 per month, payable in advance on the first of each month. That covers everything except clothing, personal items, phone calls, and medical fees. I’m a trained midwife, but most families choose to use our local hospital. They have an excellent obstetrics department.”
