by Tyler Dilts
The LBPD would take his report and at least run the plate of the Camaro. Maybe they’d come up with something. And it had to have been four years since he made the last inappropriate call—back when the paranoia was still a problem and the anxiety poorly managed. Still, though, he knew they’d have him flagged. Half a dozen false alarms, imagined home invasions, break-ins, and prowlers. Nothing too serious, but more than enough for him to be considered a nuisance. And they always recognized him. Always. He wondered if everyone would still know who he was. The reporters never called anymore. Maybe the cops had forgotten, too.
He thought about the boundaries again, and almost managed to convince himself he was overreacting. Almost.
A few more hours, he thought. I’ll wait a few more hours.
You thought it was odd, Rob wanting to check the place out himself before he told you anything about the prospective tenant. Especially since he lived more than an hour away. But, you told yourself, what did you know about renting apartments? Besides, if he was being this careful, wasn’t that a good thing for you, too?
You told Peter that Rob was coming, that you thought he’d met him a long time ago, but it was okay if he didn’t remember.
When you let Rob in, he shakes your hand, smiles at you. He looks older than you expect him to. Grayer. Still has the old-school mustache. More tan. Must be the desert, you think.
“How you doing, Ben?” he asks.
Before you can answer, he looks at your father, smiles at him, too. “Peter. It’s good to see you again.”
“I’m sorry.” Peter lowers his eyes, looks down at the floor. “I don’t remember.”
“That’s okay. It’s been a very long time.” Rob looks at you. “How long ago was the wedding?”
“You want something to drink?” you ask. “Just made a fresh pot of coffee.”
“Sure,” he says. “Sounds good.”
You sit at the patio table with him and catch up, which mostly involves him telling you in detail about San Bernardino and how working for the sheriff’s department is much worse than working for the LBPD. It’s not that he’s trying to dominate the conversation, he asks about you and how you’re doing, but you stutter and have trouble getting the words out. Like you always used to. You feel your stomach churn. You don’t know why. You do a little better when you tell him about Peter. It’s easier to talk when it’s not about you.
“It’s good to see you, Ben. To see how good you’re doing,” he says.
You know what you want to say. It’s easy—It’s good to see you, too—you can hear the words in your head. But you can’t seem to remember how to make your mouth form the It’s sound. So you nod.
After what seems like a long time, you say, “W-want to see the studio?”
“Yeah,” Rob says. “Let’s take a look.”
You take him in the back. Show him the little porch, the walkway to the gate that opens onto the single parking space.
“People have trouble with cars getting stolen, broken into, in the alley here?” he asks.
You show him the light with the sensor that comes on at dusk. “Not much more than on the street in front.”
He looks at the back of the house across the alley. Points up at the eaves on the side of the garage door. “That a real video camera?”
You shrug. “Not sure.”
“Could she park in front of the house on the street if she wanted to?”
“Of course.”
Rob nods, as if that answer quells his concerns.
Back inside the gate, you hand him the key, let him open the door. He examines the deadbolt, the heavy-duty strike plate. Nods again, steps inside.
You follow him.
He looks around, sees one decent-sized room, sixteen by eighteen, with the three-quarter bath and kitchenette alcove to the left along the alley side. “It’s nice. Pretty small, but nice.”
It is nice. Hardly been used at all. It’s almost the same as it was when your mother remodeled it. Before everything turned around.
Rob looks up at the two skylights, nods in approval, then starts testing the appliances. The water pressure. The garbage disposal.
“Everything works . . . great,” you say, hoping he didn’t hear the pause. You should have just let yourself stutter. The pause made it sound like you didn’t really mean it. You might as well have held up your fingers and made ironic air quotes around “great.”
He looks at you and you know you were wrong, that he didn’t take it that way at all. “How much?” he asks.
“A thousand?” You know you could get more. The other guesthouses in Bixby Knolls—even some of the studios—are going for twelve or thirteen now.
Rob grins. “You cutting me a break?”
“Yeah.”
“Thanks.” He sounds sincere.
You wonder if he’s ever going to say anything about the tenant.
It felt wrong. As soon as Ben was inside her studio apartment, he knew he’d made a mistake and crossed a line he shouldn’t have. But what should he do now? He was already inside. Maybe he should just take a quick look around and see if he could discover anything that might ease his anxiety.
Grace hadn’t brought much furniture with her. She was happy to keep the small dining table and the daybed. The one thing he’d added before she moved in was the TV. He’d gotten a new fifty-five-inch in the living room so Peter could see it better, and had put the old one out here. It wasn’t really that old, though. A forty-two-inch with Netflix built in. Ben had had a guy come in and mount it on the wall to give her more room.
All she’d brought in, though, were a small upholstered chair and a bookcase filled with books. She’d put a few framed photos on top—of her family, she said. An older woman, who Ben thought must be Grace’s mom, was in two of them. One with Grace herself, and the other with another young woman, mid to late twenties. Grace’s sister, maybe?
Now the sleeper sofa she’d bought a few weeks after she moved in, to replace the old daybed, was folded up, the cushions tucked neatly in place and the coffee table slid back in front. She didn’t always do that. It seemed like the few times when he’d come back here during the day, the bed was left folded out. Did that mean anything?
Ben wondered if there was any contact information for the women from the pictures, anywhere in the studio. Probably not. Everybody had everything in their phones now. Or on their computer. He looked around. Saw her MacBook on the table. It was closed. He thought about opening it but quickly dismissed the idea. That would be too much of an intrusion.
This felt wrong. But he couldn’t be sure if it was just his own sense of inquisitiveness or if something seemed out of place. He took a quick look around. Checked the bathroom. Nothing seemed wrong. Nothing obvious, anyway. He had to remind himself that was good, that signs of a struggle or blood on the floor would have made deciding whether or not to call the police easy for him, but would have meant very bad news for Grace.
When she’d moved in, Ben remembered, she had most of her personal belongings in a rolling suitcase and a backpack. He didn’t see the backpack anywhere, but he knew she used it fairly regularly, so that didn’t tell him much. What about the suitcase?
If it was in the closet, that would mean she probably hadn’t planned on going anywhere for any length of time.
Ben decided he’d take a quick peek and see if it was in there. Just to be sure. His hand twitched as he reached for the knob.
“What are you doing?”
Ben felt fear cut into him as his whole body tensed. The sun seemed to grow brighter in the skylights. Something smelled bad. Like burning plastic. A guttural noise, half-scream and half-moan, burst out of him.
“Oh no!” Peter rushed across the room.
Ben was hunched over, hands on his thighs, trying to breathe, as if he’d been punched in the gut. His father put an arm around his shoulders. “I’m sorry,” Peter said. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay.” When Ben began to calm down, Peter pulled him into a hug.
“Shhhh,” he said. “It’s all right.”
They stood like that as the cloudy winter sky spilled light down on them from the skylights over their heads.
FOUR
They went for their evening walk a little early. It was only about four. The city was replacing some sections of the sidewalk on their usual route, so they cut over an extra block to Walnut. Halfway up the block, Ben heard the rumble of a jet taking off, so he paused as Peter turned toward the sound and watched to see where the plane would emerge over the rooflines of the houses. His father pointed when he saw it and then waved as it flew over them. They were only half a mile away from the end of the runway, so they had a good view. Ben watched his father’s outstretched hand as Peter spun with the passing plane.
“What kind was it?” Peter asked.
“JetBlue.”
“JetBlue,” Peter repeated as if trying to make sure he wouldn’t forget. “Is that the good one?”
“Yeah, Dad. It is.” Ben wasn’t sure how long he’d be able to keep saying that. The airline was behind a push to add international flights to Long Beach Airport. No one in the community around the airport wanted that, but most of the city council didn’t seem to give a shit what the community wanted. They just saw money. Peter was probably the only one in the whole neighborhood who’d be happy with more departing flights.
“Do you think they saw us?” Peter said, still watching as the plane continued beyond the treetops, out of view.
When Ben didn’t answer, he asked, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, why?”
“I’m sorry from before,” Peter said. “Sorry I scared you.”
“That’s all right, Dad. You don’t have anything to be sorry for.”
“I know, but I’m sorry.”
As they approached the corner, Peter stopped to gaze at the purpling sunset. “Look at that,” he said. Ben marveled at his father’s capacity for simple wonder, the way he would stop to run his hand along the bark of a tree or examine a flower. Maybe he even envied it a little. As he looked up to the west, he was impressed by the colors—they really were unusually pretty—but he saw the clouds rolling in, too. The weather report said rain overnight and into tomorrow.
They were almost home when Ben saw Bernie, a few houses down the block, walking toward them with Sriracha on her leash. They’d known Bernie for decades. The Bellos had lived up and across the street when the Shepards moved in. Ben was just a few years ahead of their oldest son in elementary school. He still saw Jorge, who took over the family welding business when Bernie retired, once in a while when he brought his family over to visit.
Peter was about to turn and go up the front step, so Ben tugged on his elbow, pointed, and watched his father’s face light up again. The little terrier tugged at her leash when she saw him, and Bernie pressed the button on the plastic handle to let out more slack.
“Hi, girl! Hi,” Peter said as she jumped up on his shins and he bent over to pet her.
Bernie nodded and said to Ben, “You look worried. How you guys doing?”
“We’re hanging in there. Some days are just a little rougher than others.”
“I know what you mean,” he said. “You know if you need anything, all you gotta do is ask.”
“I do know. Thank you.”
They watched Peter, still bent over and scratching Sriracha’s belly, say “Good girl” over and over.
“I wonder if I should get a dog for him,” Ben said.
“Might be good.”
“I’m just not sure about adding to the load, you know?”
“Yeah,” Bernie said. “I do. Why don’t I bring her over more? Maybe let you guys dog sit a bit, see what you think.”
“That would be good. Thanks.”
“No sweat.”
Ben had a thought. Bernie was out walking Sriracha at least three times a day, and he talked to everybody. If there was anything happening in the neighborhood, they either heard it from him or they didn’t hear it at all. “You don’t know anybody around here with a red Camaro, do you?”
“I don’t think so. The old kind or one of the new ones?” Bernie asked.
“One of the new ones. Somebody was parked in the alley last night, but they took off when they saw me.”
“That doesn’t sound good. Any idea what they were doing?”
Ben thought about mentioning Grace, but he didn’t want Bernie to think he was being paranoid and jumping to conclusions, so he just shook his head.
Bernie said, “I’ll keep an eye out. Ask around.”
“Thanks.”
“No sweat.” He looked at Peter with the dog, then said, “Hey, you two. Either break it up or get a room.”
Peter laughed, and Ben wondered if he really got the joke. Just as they were about to move on, Ben saw something black buzzing along over the roofs of the houses ahead of them. At first he thought it was some kind of bird, gliding low, but as it came closer, he realized it was a drone. He turned back to Bernie and said, “You see that?”
“Oh,” Bernie said. “You know Tim over on Gardenia?” He gestured toward the next block over.
Ben nodded, even though he wasn’t sure who Bernie meant.
“He got a new toy. Saw him playing with it in the alley the other day.”
“I didn’t think people were supposed to fly those things so close to the airport.”
“That’s what I said. Tim just shrugged his shoulders and kept at it.”
Great, Ben thought. One more thing to worry about.
When he’d been a detective, Ben would spend hours on the phone without a second thought. But now, even the simplest of calls made him uncomfortable, even anxious. He had to take a few deep breaths to steady himself. Why hadn’t he called earlier? They’d be changing shifts now. By the time they sent a patrol car out and someone took a report with Grace’s information, it would probably be too late for them to do anything until the morning. Without a reason to suspect foul play, unless something significant came back on the Camaro—an arrest warrant or something else relevant on the registered owner of the car—beginning the investigation probably wouldn’t be urgent enough for anyone working an overnight shift.
He cleared the LBPD number from his phone and went out in the back again. Just as he expected, nothing had changed.
Then it occurred to him. Maybe Rob would know what to do. Before Ben let himself think of a reason not to, he found the number in his contacts and made the call. It started ringing and he didn’t know what to say. How should he start? But it just kept ringing. Finally, the voicemail kicked in and he heard Rob’s voice. “This is Robert Kessler. Please leave a detailed and specific message and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”
Detailed and specific? Shit. Okay. “H-hi, Rob. This is Ben Shepard. I wanted to talk to you about something. Grace, uh, Grace. She hasn’t been home in almost two days and I’m starting to worry? Thinking about filing a missing-persons report and—uh, should I do that? Call me back as soon as you can, okay? Thanks. This is Ben.”
God. He hadn’t felt this awkward and incompetent since the early days when he had to learn how to talk again, how to walk, how to feed himself and go to the bathroom. The helplessness he’d felt then was the worst thing he’d ever experienced. Worse than the pain. Worse than the nausea. Worse than the loneliness.
He was afraid, and not just for himself—for his father, too, and most of all for Grace. Could something horrible have happened? After eight years in Violent Crimes, how could anyone not imagine all the horrible things that could have happened. Dozens of horrible things happened literally every day in Long Beach.
Ben sat in one of the blue plastic chairs by the back fence, rubbing his fingertips across the indentation in the back of his head, and waited for Rob to return his call.
He was still waiting when it got dark and he had to go inside to give Peter his medicine.
The first thing you think is that she’s really cute. The warm smile, the brown eyes, the should
er-length curly hair. The second thing you think is that you’re a douchebag, because you’re going to be her landlord and you’re probably old enough to be her father.
“This is my dad, Peter,” you say.
She shakes his hand with both of hers and holds on to it while she speaks. “It’s really nice to meet you, Peter. Thank you so much for letting me rent the studio.”
“You’re so nice and pretty,” he says.
She smiles again, and you lead her through the patio doors and back along the narrow concrete sidewalk to the studio. “This is it.”
“Wow,” she says as you unlock the door. “This looks great.”
“We haven’t rented it to anyone before, so you’ll be the first person to live here.”
She turns and looks at you, and for a moment the smile disappears from her face. “I’ve never been the first person to live anyplace,” she says.
Sometimes they called it the office, sometimes the den. It was in the back of the house, next to the master bedroom. The same bedroom his father had shared with his mother from the time Ben was in elementary school. The same room she died in. The same room Peter now slept in alone. Ben could hear him snoring through the closed door.
He checked his phone again. Rob hadn’t called back, and the text message he’d sent to Grace had been delivered but not read.
The last thing Peter had said to him before he told him good night was, “Will she be back tomorrow?”
Ben made a decision. If he hadn’t heard from either of them by morning, he would call the LBPD and file a missing-persons report.
The desk lamp was the only illumination in the room, but it gave him enough light to go through his notebook and review the day. He wanted to be sure he remembered everything from today, and, honestly, he would probably need to clarify some things, because if he had to look at them in a few days or weeks, they might not make any sense. That happened sometimes. So he did this most nights. He might let it go if nothing significant had happened on a given day, but he knew the more careful he was now, the better off he would be down the road. For a while, he had tried rewriting everything into a journal on the computer, but he’d found that writing by hand was much more effective in helping him remember.
