Dirty Old Men [And Other Stories] (Zane Presents)

by Omar Tyree

  Jill hung up the phone and shook her head again. “I’ll just let my superiors handle this boy,” she grumbled to herself. She planned to pass his case on and go on about her life as a Baltimore City Police officer.

  More than a month later, Officer Jill Jacobs spotted Derrick Wilcox walking out of the Baltimore Public Library downtown with books in hand.

  “Well, looka’ here,” she told herself from behind the wheel of her squad car. She happened to be heading north from the precinct downtown.

  She stood idle for a minute at the street corner and watched the college student as he headed back in the direction of Johns Hopkins University. But his walk wasn’t as pronounced as the first night she had seen him. And it wasn’t as late at night.

  “I guess he’s learned his damn lesson,” she presumed. Then she became curious. She wondered if he still had a sour-ass attitude. Was it because he was embarrassed at being beaten for his sexual orientation that evening on Pennsylvania Avenue, or did he have personality issues?

  She sped up the street in his direction to catch up to him, and alerted his attention with her siren.

  WHUURRPP! WHUURRPP!

  Derrick turned to his left and spotted the Baltimore police cruiser pulling up beside him in the street. He frowned at it and wondered what he had done.

  “I know she’s not stopping for me,” he told himself.

  Inside the squad car, Officer Jacobs rolled down her passenger-side window.

  “Derrick Wilcox,” she called to him, remembering his full name.

  Derrick stopped and eyed the officer in confusion. Once he realized who she was, he mumbled, “Oh my God, it’s her again. Yes?” he spoke to her, still with obvious resentment.

  Jill read his face and attitude. “You know what, what is wrong with you? I’ve only tried to help you out, and all you give me is constant beef. Now do you have a particular problem with me or what?”

  “I mean, what is it that you want from me?” he asked her snidely. “That incident is like, so over with.”

  Oh, he is such a fucking BITCH! Jill incensed. Just drive the hell away from him, RIGHT NOW! she tried to tell herself. But the young man was so irritating that she felt like slapping him around, for the hell of it.

  She grumbled, “You know what? Fuck it!”

  She climbed out of her squad car to get up close and personal with the boy to figure out what his problem was.

  Derrick backed up as soon as she approached him on the sidewalk, as if the officer was ready to give him another beat down.

  “All right, now what is your problem?” she asked him. She was right up in his face on the sidewalk.

  “I don’t have a problem.”

  “Yes, you do. And you act like you got a damn period.” As she studied his face up close without the fresh bruises this time, she couldn’t help but notice how pretty he was. The young man had girlish features without alterations— naturally sharp eyebrows, long and curled eyelashes, long sideburns, baby hairs; soft, pouted lips, and smooth, hairless skin.

  Shit, he actually looks like a damn girl, she told herself. He made her feel like a man, especially while she was still in uniform. He makes me want to pull this fucking shirt up, she snapped.

  “Why can’t you speak to me with any respect?” she asked him. “Everything that comes out of your mouth is smart-aleck.”

  “That’s just your perception.”

  The young man happened to smell good, too, with a mix of sweet cologne, cocoa butter lotion, and fruit-flavored ChapStick.

  “Are you walking back to campus?” she asked him out of the blue. She figured maybe she could soften him up with a ride back to school.

  But Derrick frowned at the question. “Heck no,” he answered. “I’m catching the bus up the street.”

  “No you’re not,” she told him. “You’re going with me.”

  She would simply drive his ass back to campus, whether he liked it or not.

  “Am I under arrest?”

  The thought seemed interesting. Maybe he did need to be under arrest to correct his foul attitude. “I can put you under arrest, if that’s where you wanna be. Now walk on over there and get inside the car before I do arrest you,” she ordered.

  He studied her serious demeanor. “Well, do I even have a choice?”

  “Yes, you have a choice. You either climb into the car without handcuffs, or be pushed into the car with handcuffs.”

  Understandably, Derrick didn’t like the sound of either one of his options.

  “And what’s option number three? You leave me alone, and let me go back home to mind my own business?”

  “You wish,” she told him. “Now get inside the squad car before I have to arrest you.”

  Derrick hesitated again. Is she for real? he asked himself. But when the officer moved to grab him, he quickly picked up his feet and scampered toward the squad car before she could reach him to do it herself.

  “You want me in the back?” he asked timidly.

  His complete recessiveness and stance led Jill to think a few inappropriate ideas about him. She even acknowledged the ill intent of her thoughts to herself.

  Yeah, he’s the kind of person who just makes you want to do foul things to him. I can’t even lie, she admitted.

  Derrick climbed inside the back of her squad car, looking like an edible gazelle who had just been trapped by a lioness.

  Oh, my God, he looks like such a little pussy back there, the officer thought. The college student was giving her a lot of crazy-ass thoughts. As soon as she popped the car in drive, she asked him a personal question.

  “Have you ever been with a woman before?”

  Derrick looked totally floored. “Excuse me.”

  “You heard me right. Have you ever been with a woman?”

  The college student hesitated and stuttered, “What, what does that have to do with you driving me back to campus?”

  “I’m just trying to figure out who you are, because you always seem to have a sour disposition with me. Do you have a thing against cops or is it against women?”

  “No, I don’t have a thing againt women. And my mother and I get along quite fine. Thank you.”

  “What about with every other woman?”

  “I have girlfriends.”

  “Girls who are friends, or girlfriends? Because there is a difference.”

  “I know that.”

  “So, which one is it?”

  “And why does this matter?”

  Jill stared at him through her rearview mirror. She thought, Okay, he just needs to get FUCKED good! That’s all there is to it. I wish I could take him down to the jailhouse for ONE night.

  “Okay,” she finally responded. “So, you want me to do this the hard way.”

  “What?”

  “You didn’t tell your mother you got jumped down here in Baltimore, did you?”

  “Why?”

  “Because she would have told your behind to pack up your bags and get back down to Virginia as fast as a heartbeat, that’s why. So I know you didn’t tell her. Otherwise, we would have heard about it down at the station, I’m sure.”

  You damn momma’s boy! she snapped to herself. Now she understood him much better, and she planned to use that knowledge against him…like a cop would.

  Before Derrick could respond to her, she added, “She probably didn’t even want you going to school in Baltimore. What do you have, a scholarship to Johns Hopkins, and you’re studying in the medical field?”

  She imagined that he was smart enough to have been awarded an academic scholarship. He came off like a spoiled, little whiz kid who still needed adult guidance.

  “Well, Johns Hopkins is one of the premier medical schools in the country,” he bragged. “And I get to do an internship at their prestigious hospital.”

  And what are you studying to be, an OB-GYN, so you can live the rest of your life with pussy envy until you can afford a sex change? She amused herself with a chuckle.

  She
realized that the young man could likely talk about academics all night, but not about sex—he hadn’t had any.

  “So, what were you doing down on Pennsylvania Avenue that night; trying to find someone to turn you out? What were you, in heat?” she asked brashly.

  “What? I don’t like your line of questioning, Officer…” He stopped and looked into the mirror to read her badge backward. “…facobs.”

  “But it’s the truth, isn’t it? You’re still a virgin. That’s why you were out there switching so hard, to get some attention. But you ended up attracting the wrong kind of attention, didn’t you?” She was pouring a psychological profile on him to break him down.

  “Whatever,” he responded weakly.

  “So, you can’t find anyone you like on campus? Or you don’t want them talking about you, especially since you like boys?”

  Derrick began to get all flustered in the back of her squad car.

  “Look, does this have anything to do with anything?”

  Jill was finally at peace with the boy as she continued to drive.

  His smart-ass mouth is all about getting attention, too, she pondered. This poor boy needs a kinky friend to help turn his hot-ass out. He’s flaming so hard he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

  “Well, I don’t want you catching AIDS out here just because you want a little friend to play with, Derrick. It’s very dangerous to start sleeping around with men you don’t know like that.”

  “What? I wasn’t trying to. I was just walking back to the bus stop,” he huffed at her, irritated by her hard truths.

  “Yeah, on Pennsylvania Avenue of all places, near ten o’clock at night. And why, because you thought you’d run into some action out there? And you just talked yourself into doing it?”

  She was really socking it to him now! Derrick had no defense for it.

  He breathed heavily in the back of her squad car. “Whatever.”

  She then received a police call on her radio.

  “Yeah, don’t you have to get back to work, harassing people or something? I guess I do have a thing against cops,” he stated.

  Jill ignored him and answered her radio call.

  “On a quick run, give me fifteen to thirty.”

  “All right. I’ll call Darryl on it,” the dispatcher told her.

  “Good, I’ll back him up in a minute.”

  Just like that, she was off the radio and back to Derrick.

  “What if somebody gets shot while you’re still in here harassing me?”

  Officer Jacobs shook her head and grinned. She was approaching the campus.

  “We know which calls are urgent and which ones are routine,” she responded to him. “Otherwise, we’d have a bunch of officers flying around the streets of Baltimore all day long. And that would be unsafe for traffic.”

  “Whatever,” the young man mumbled again.

  Jill looked back at him through her rearview mirror and smiled. I think I’m gonna make his day, she told herself. He just needs a private friend. But I can’t ask him about it. I have to tell his smart-aleck ass.

  “Well, it looks like this is the end of the road for you,” she announced.

  “Finally.”

  She ignored that as well. “You have early classes tomorrow?” she asked.

  “Why? You wanna take me hostage in your police car again in the morning?” Jill continued to smile at him. She was no longer bothered by his attention-getting antics.

  “No, I needed to see how late you could stay out tonight. I need you to meet me right back here on campus at eleven.”

  Derrick frowned. “For what?”

  “Because you need some damn lessons in etiquette. So think of it as a private outreach program.”

  The young man paused and considered it. “Which entails what?”

  “Which entails you doing what the hell I tell you to do,” she snapped. “Now, do you have an early class tomorrow or not?”

  “No, but that doesn’t mean that I’m gonna meet up later with you.”

  Officer Jacobs paused and pulled over her squad car to face him.

  “Why, because I’m a woman instead of a man?”

  Derrick was speechless. Before he could gather and respond, Jill told him, “You meet me here at eleven o’clock. And if I don’t see your ass out here waiting when I come, then I’m coming to look for you. Do you understand me, Derrick?”

  “Well, I have homework to do,” he protested. “This is a university, you know.”

  “So you bring your books with you then. At eleven o’clock. Now get your ass out of my car and go.”

  The young man didn’t speak another word, in case the hard-nosed officer would decide to keep him hostage longer in her squad car. But as soon as he had climbed out and her police cruiser sped off behind him, he mumbled, “Whatever. I don’t know who she thinks she is.” And he began to walk back toward his dorm room.

  Officer Jacobs smiled to herself, while she watched him in the mirror, and sped toward her destination for backup in northwest Baltimore.

  “Yeah, he’ll show up,” she told herself. “And I’ll make sure to bring a couple of girl toys for him.”

  Right on time, Derrick Wilcox waited nervously near the edge of Johns Hopkins’ campus grounds in the same spot where Officer Jacobs had dropped him off earlier.

  “She’s just fucking with me, I know it,” he grumbled to himself as he paced. The police officer had screwed up his entire evening. The poor young man couldn’t concentrate on his studies without watching the clock every fifteen minutes, and contemplating whether or not he would show up that night to meet her.

  But when he thought about an insane, woman police officer, stalking around campus grounds looking for him, he figured it was best to find out what she wanted instead of trying to dodge her.

  I know she could find out where my dorm room is. She’s a cop! he reasoned. He felt there was no way around her. He even brought his books like she had instructed.

  “I know she’s just trying to scare me,” he continued to mumble. “This is stupid. I should go on home.”

  Nevertheless, he was terrified to leave. What if she actually meant what she had said to him. She could make his campus life a living hell. He would start looking for her everywhere. And every Baltimore police cruiser would then send his heart racing. He was forced to face up to her.

  Officer Jill Jacobs pulled up to the university in plain clothes, driving a blue and tan, special edition Ford Explorer from Eddie Bauer. She spotted Derrick waiting for her at the same location.

  “Like clockwork,” she told herself with a grin. “And he won’t tell anybody either.”

  She pulled up to the sidewalk, where Derrick paced back and forth, and rolled down her passenger-side window.

  “Hey you, get in.”

  Derrick looked at the SUV and cautiously walked over to it.

  “I thought you were coming in your squad car again.”

  She was wearing a blue jean set with pants and a jacket, and her long ponytail was out. She didn’t look half bad as a regular citizen.

  “The police force is my job, but it’s not my life. Now get in,” she repeated.

  The college boy climbed into her vehicle on the passenger side and fastened his seat belt.

  “I see you brought your homework,” she commented.

  “I needed to. I’m not finished studying. But where are you taking me to, and how long are you gonna have me out?” he asked.

  Jill smiled and took off driving. You’re gonna lose your virginity tonight, she told herself. But she didn’t plan on telling him that until she got him where they were going.

  “Hel-lo. I asked you a question.”

  “You’ll see when we get there.”

  Jill headed north and pulled into a hotel parking lot off the Interstate 695 beltway.

  Derrick looked around at their surroundings, confused.

  “Umm, what are we doing here?”

  “We’re going inside this hote
l,” she told him frankly.

  The college boy shook his head and responded, “Umm, no we’re not.”

  Jill sighed deeply. “Yes, we are,” she told him. “Now get your ass in there before I have to pull my gun out.”

  Derrick’s eyes grew wide as he stared at her. But he refused to move. Jill then reached for her purse before he got the message and jumped out of the vehicle in a hurry.

  “I’m not out here to play with you,” she told him outside of her truck. She handed him a key to room 611. “I’ll be up in a minute. So go ahead and get your homework out.”

  Derrick eyed her a second before he began to walk toward the hotel entrance. What is she up to? he asked himself. Private outreach, hunh? We’ll see.

  He entered the bare essentials hotel room on the sixth floor and stood. There was no way in the world he could focus there to study anything. He still wondered what the police officer’s purpose was in bringing him there.

  “So, what do I do now? This is stupid,” he repeated to himself.

  Before he could settle into the room and think things out, Officer Jacobs walked in and startled him.

  Derrick jumped back and whined, “Oh my God, you scared me.”

  “Why? I told you I’d be up.”

  “Yeah, but I was expecting you to knock first, or. I don’t know.”

  “Not when I have my own key,” she answered, showing it to him.

  “So, you checked into this place before you came to get me?”

  Jill pulled a brown rubber dick out of her large tote bag and casually tossed it onto the bed as if it were a sandwich.

  Derrick looked at it with wide eyes again. “What the hell is that?”

  At a glance, the big brown, rubber dick looked nine inches long and three inches thick. It was gigantic! Then she pulled out a smaller one, six inches long and two inches thick.

  “Umm, can I ask you what those are for?” the apprehensive college student commented.

  “That’s what you were looking for out on Pennsylvania Avenue, right, some dick? So I brought a couple for you. Or do you want some real pussy?” she questioned him.

  The college student was stunned by it. He didn’t know what to say. But the rubber dicks were turning him on. The officer then pushed him face-down on the bed and climbed on his back with her full body mass to hold him down.