Castle Danger--Woman on Ice

by Anthony Neil Smith

  I could do that.

  I was in the car before Joel. He dropped into his seat and said, “Well, that was nice.”

  “I did my job. The rest was a waste of everybody’s time.”

  “Mostly mine.”

  Another noseful of air.

  The woman in the CR-V was beginning to pull away.

  I said, “Weren’t you supposed to be observing? Weren’t you supposed to have my back, rather than ignore me?”

  “You think I wouldn’t?”

  “I’m supposed to be training you. God knows you need it.”

  “It was a fucking traffic stop.”

  “You don’t even know how to do one of those.” I flicked the lights and siren, caught up with the woman. “And one day you’ll be a fucking Captain or some shit, soon from what I hear, and at least I can say I taught you to make a traffic stop.”

  The woman braked hard and I stopped inches away. Threw the car into park and left the sirens and lights on as I opened the door. “Come on, let’s do this.”

  “Fuck’s sake, Manny. Leave it alone already.”

  “No, seriously, get out and do this.”

  He crossed his arms and looked out the passenger window. I could already hear the woman shouting, leaning out of her open window and straining to keep her head turned my way.

  I said, “Get out here and do your goddamned job before I taze your ass.”

  “You know they record us? They can hear you losing your shit. You’re so fucked right now.”

  “Get. Out.”

  He shook his head, but he did it. He got out of the car and walked around to meet me. I stepped up to the CR-V and said, “Let me have that ticket I just wrote you.” She looked confused, then reached over to the passenger seat for it. I took it from her and tore it in two. “I apologize, but I forgot that my training partner here was supposed to write the ticket instead of me. So we’re going to call it a warning instead, okay? No fine. But let’s go through the routine again. Okay?”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  I took a step back and very primly, very Downton Abbey-like, waved Joel towards our victim. “Officer Skovgaard? Please.”

  His cheeks were the purple of bar fights.

  But he did it.

  License, registration, proof of insurance.

  Informed her of our reasons for stopping her.

  Gave her a warning. Of course, he had to go back to “check” on her DL. He had wanted to skip it, but I shook my head. “Not officer thinking, young man. Play it for real.”

  By the time the CR-V drove away, I was sure Joel would never be my friend. Never regale me with stories of his psycho-bitch girlfriend again. No war stories from the desert, either. No, none of that. Our shifts would be hours upon hours of loathing, silence, looking for the slightest of reasons to make stops, so we could empty the car of the toxic air between us.

  We both dropped into our seats.

  “Faggot” he said.

  “Daddy’s favorite mistake,” I said.

  He pounded the roof again. He left a dent.

  I pulled out of the parking lot, knowing I was in for a load when the shift was over, if not sooner.

  But I still said, “Daddy’ll write a check, the dent goes away.”

  We made three more stops before it was time to call it a day. Two tickets, one warning, and who the fuck cares?

  10

  Three more goddamn weeks of that shit, and I considered quitting. The only thing stopping me was that I couldn’t imagine starting over somewhere else, where I didn’t know anyone. It was hard enough in Duluth, which I loved madly in spite of the fact I had few friends and no family here. Was it worth it? Was my bond with the lake so much stronger than my need for love? For someone to drink and eat burritos with?

  Maybe it wasn’t about the case at all. Maybe it was about me. Maybe all the self-loathing I’d been trying to shove down into a deep, dark hole in my head just erupted when that body showed up on the lake.

  Maybe getting the hell out of there was the best thing for me. I mean, I was off the case, I didn’t belong in the cop world, and I was outed, even though I’m not really gay … I don’t think. So why stay? Why spend most of the day in a car handing out tickets to assholes, while sitting next to this … goddamn it, Joel was an asshole, too. A hateful, selfish, lazy asshole who spent most of the shift texting his psycho-bitch girlfriend, and since whatever she was telling him wound him up tighter than his at-least-I’m-no-faggot-asshole, he ended up calling her on breaks, all sorts of vitriol passing between them. But I didn’t give a shit, as long as I didn’t have to hear about it. As long as he did enough of his job to not piss me off.

  I got my ass chewed for the stunt with the woman in the CR-V, but an ass-chewing is all it was. Almost as if the boss was willing to overlook it, rather than engage with me, punish me, inflict me on another department. They’d found the perfect hiding place for me up on the Hill, where we passed O’Dickey’s at least ten, fifteen times per shift.

  In the locker room, guys would leave when I came in. Some would cough or sneeze shit — “Ah-ah-AHfaggotCHOO” or “Hrmph hrmph AIDS DICK hack.” Some would go out of their way to make sure I knew they were going out of their way to avoid being within a few feet of me. At the station, even Joel did that. Caught him one time wearing latex gloves with “Magic AIDS Shield” written on them.

  At night, I would go home, boiling, shaking. Collapse on the bed and scream into the quilt. Squeeze my eyes as shut as shut could be and just let that shit out because it was over, man, this was my life. This was the whole of it, day in, day out.

  I would strip and sit at the computer, heater full-blast, sweat pooling at my feet. I would watch trannies tie up guys, then fuck the shit out of them. Afterwards, they would sit side-by-side, as the man told the camera what he thought of his experience. For that part, I would get up and kick the couch some more.

  I thought about the gymnast giving me the same sort of kicking. It hurt bad. But, what, was I getting hard now when I thought about it? Was I attracted to her? Or, if not attracted, at least intrigued? Did I want to be her?

  It hurts to cum.

  I risk infection if I cum.

  I have to disinfect after wet dreams.

  But, well, fuck.

  I went to the mall. Bought silk panties, boy-shorts, a nightie, thigh high stockings. Told myself I just wanted to hold them. Just feel them. Not wear them. But who the fuck knows what was really going on inside me?

  I watched trannies fuck men and men fuck trannies, and I came three, four times a night, fuck the pain, fuck it. Just fuck that pain and take it deep, take it hard, and imagine, if you can. Imagine. Remember what it was like, when you were a teenage boy in your sister’s panties, and get a good look at yourself in the mirror now, glammed up with lipstick and eye-liner, tears ruining the make-up, thinking, How did she feel? How did Hannah feel? How does the gymnast live with herself? What am I missing? What am I missing?

  Until I collapsed, had to crawl gingerly to the bathroom, pull myself into the ancient bathtub, all those rusty cracks, and turn on the hot water, hot as I could take it, and soak, an hour or more, to stop the pain and the burning and the shame of the release.

  I thought of Martin Luther flagellating himself over sin. Was that what I was doing? Punishing myself with fantasy? It was fantasy, right? Did I really want to be a “chick with a dick”? Thinking about it was confusing … but then again, it didn’t make feel sick anymore. I would curl up in the water until it went cold.

  And then I would go to bed.

  Meanwhile, Joel was being told how much of a pussy he was. His girlfriend informed him that becoming a cop was his way of making up for the non-killing he did in the desert. He’d be on the news one day, she said, after killing a man with a Coke bottle in his hand, or an iPhone, anything but a gun.

  “Jesus, you—” He blew out his cheeks.

  “Don’t say it. If you say it, we’re done. Don’t say it.” Finger in his face. C
hipped blue nail polish and scabbed cuticles.

  Them in bed together. Going on three hours. Just past midnight.

  Joel shook his head. “Why do you have to analyze everything I say? Why do you put me down so much?”

  “You’re doing it to yourself.”

  “How so?”

  “You let me get to you. A stronger man would’ve cut me loose by now.” She slid her thigh up his leg and left it heavy on his cock. “A stronger man wouldn’t worry about losing this.”

  “Have you ever thought maybe it’s because I—”

  “No no no.”

  “—I love you? There. I love you. I mean it.”

  She rolled her eyes. “How romantic. Can you add a little more whine to it, please?”

  He grabbed her by the hair, pulled back to raise her face.

  She smiled. “See? That’s as far as you can go, isn’t it?”

  He hated her. He truly fucking …

  Felt himself go hard again. Near enough choked on the mix of fury and lust. She felt the change and straddled him with a sneer. “It’s a pity fuck,” she said, reaching back to squeeze his balls, hard, as he thrust inside her. “If only I could show you what I’m really capable of.”

  Those being our nights, you can imagine how we spent our days. Each of us sat in the squad car like a banged up furnace, smoldering. The snow was melting quickly now, turning the roads into pitiful symbols of our private hells — blackened sludge, mud, salt and dirt. Joel would begin the days humming “Cruel to Be Kind”, until the texting started. By the end of the shift, his thumbs were as red as his eyes.

  As for me, some mornings I had a hard time sitting in the car after yet another night of self-flagellation, or whatever the fuck I was doing to myself in front of that computer, so I’d stop a lot of drivers for small infractions, hand out a lot of warnings, piss off a lot of people.

  But before you feel too sorry for those innocent souls, let me hasten to add that just about every one of them thought being sarcastic to a cop was a good idea. Or that because they drove a Lexus, they were somehow immune to traffic fines. To me, though, it just meant they had all the more money to pay. So, Lexus driver with the humungous diver’s watch, here are two tickets. Because I can.

  I’d gotten used to Joel skulking in the background, making the drivers nervous, or talking on his phone, shouting, cursing, making the drivers even more nervous. But what did I care? I expected to be rid of him in another few months, once he got the promotion and became my boss. Something else to look forward to. He’d be like, “Tell me, is there an even shittier patrol than a speed trap on the Hill?”

  At lunchtime, he’d take off. Not even a “Later.” He was gone. I’d find a place to park with a sliver of lake or sky to look at — possibly, just no goddamn cars, please — and eat whatever sandwich or wrap or thermos of tomato & basil I’d brought along. Thinking about my nights. Thinking about the boy shorts I was wearing under my uniform right now and what would happen if the other cops were to find out.

  Also thinking about why I could only take it as far as the porn.

  Why couldn’t I look up websites about being a tranny — trans, it’s trans — every day? About making the choice to accept it, while appearing to the outside world to be a full, born-that-way woman? Like the ladies at the barn. Like Hannah. Hans.

  But I didn’t want to think about that case, because thinking about it made me remember the beating. The pain. And because the hairs on the back of my neck bristled whenever I pictured all those men living as women, an image that let the lock on the vault in my brain click open again, after so long of denying it …

  Listen, let me admit something else to you, while Joel’s not around.

  It might not have been an accident.

  I mean, I can’t make it make sense to you, that’ll never work. It doesn’t even make sense to me. Maybe I just wanted to get off that painful topic …

  And on to another: I could tell Whitney and I were heading for the splits, since neither of us seemed happy to be around the other. I couldn’t tell her about my fetishes, not even about the porn. That would be a game-ender right there (which, in hindsight, might have been the less painful option).

  At the farm, feeling sorry for myself, helping dad with the tractor, and thinking, you know, a little “vacation” for my boys wouldn’t be the worst thing, would it?

  I didn’t think …

  I’m not that up on anatomy. I’m not an expert of burnt body parts. I was thinking that if I had a burn and needed to recover for a few weeks, maybe I could hint to Whitney about some ass play. Maybe some role-playing. Maybe let her humiliate me in bed.

  Maybe I soaked my own jeans purposefully with carb cleaner. Maybe I even stuck the nozzle down my pants and let it saturate my underwear, my pubes, dripping down.

  And maybe I held the lighter and stared at the flame a few seconds, while my body was in flight mode — no no no —, flinching as I pushed the lighter down there and …

  I say maybe because I don’t remember how long it really took, I don’t remember if I put that much thought into it. I only remember that one moment the world was a sad but beautiful place, where I loved my family and they loved me, and the next moment the goddamned devil was roasting me for my dirty thoughts.

  I reclined in a hospital bed with my legs spread, creams covering my entire crotch, my stomach, my thighs. It wasn’t what I had planned. I kept apologizing, and Dad kept saying “It was an accident,” but maybe he knew, too. The amount of carb cleaner on me, there was no way that was an oops.

  Whitney knew immediately. She sat at my bedside the first day, maybe the second. All smiles and concern when my parents, the doctor, or my nurses were around, but when they weren’t around it was as if she’d shut herself off in another room, curled tightly into the chair with her phone a better companion than me.

  I finally said, “I’m glad you’re here.”

  “Yeah.” She shrugged. She didn’t look at me. “Of course I am.”

  “What are you thinking?”

  She sighed, dropped her phone into her lap and looked at me. Finally. “What am I thinking? Really? Shouldn’t you be worried about your recovery? About skin grafts? Shouldn’t you think about your job? Jesus, what am I thinking?” Back to her phone. She shook her head. Okay, so then it looked like some tears were starting to roll. Eventually she looked up again. “What I’m really thinking is how long do I have to play nice now? I had an idea before. We both saw it coming.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Which was a total lie. Of course I knew. But let her be the one to say it.

  “Are you kidding? You thought we were fine? We haven’t fucked in, like, I mean, and you still don’t get it? It’s not like we’re married. You think it’s just going to get better?”

  I started counting her questions. Rhetorical or not.

  I shook my head. And the Oscar goes to … “Baby, please, what are you saying?” Puppy dog eyes.

  Instead of an answer, she bluffed her way through another week of passive-aggressiveness, same as I did, until she just stopped answering my calls, my texts, my emails … and I was okay with that. It was a relief.

  But burning my genitals, that didn’t turn out to be any relief at all.

  Back to the traffic patrols.

  Another week went by. I was too frazzled to wear the panties anymore. Just binge-watched documentaries on Netflix — not the trans ones, although I did look them all up and add them to my list, but I didn’t watch them, not a single minute’s worth. Distracted myself with one about sushi, one about The Amazing Randi, one about Ewan McGregor and his fat friend on a motorcycle. And more.

  Course I’d rather have been dancing at O’Dickey’s, right after scoring some ecstasy, but the only people I knew who had any were people I’d busted as a cop. So, no thank you. But the fact remained, I would rather have felt anything other than what I was feeling night after night: trapped.

  That month, I handed out mor
e tickets than anyone else in the department, almost all of them for not signaling a lane change.

  I hated myself. I fucking well hated how much of a pussy I was.

  Shift over, I changed into jeans, a flannel shirt and work boots, got bumped by Joel on his way out, his now customary “Faggot” as good-bye. My response always, “Daddy’s favorite mistake.”

  I had the next couple of days off and wanted to go out to the farm. The roads sucked, and it looked like we had another late blizzard bearing down — one with the heavy wet shit that not even the snowblowers can handle — but goddamn, I needed to get out of town.

  Slipped my pistol into my backpack — thinking I might pick up an extra box of shells at Fleet Farm and just blow the shit out of some targets behind the barn — and walked out to my car.

  Someone had stuck an envelope under the windshield wiper, the ones you get at bank drive-thru windows. I looked around. Another cop joke? Was it a “ticket” for “sucking dick”?

  I felt heavy, my shoulders barely able to take the weight. Pulled it free of the wiper anyway. There was a deposit slip inside. Fuck me, it was one of my deposit slips. Not for any major amount — just a birthday gift from my aunt, twenty bucks — but it was mine and no one else should’ve had it. I thought about it a second longer, went and tried the driver’s door. Unlocked. I was pretty sure I had locked my car. I always do. I don’t trust other cops. What can I say?

  In the end I usually tossed my receipts into the backseat. Okay, freak out averted. Just imagined that I’d forgotten to lock the car, or, yeah, someone had popped it with a cop hook — slid it in by the window. Shit, I’ve done that how many times the past few weeks? It made sense. Pissed me off, but still.

  Someone had written on the back of the deposit slip. A sharp pen, poked through the paper several times. It read: Check your email. But then it listed an email that wasn’t mine. An account with my name — HermanJahnke4664@hotmail.com — but not one I’d set up. And what was with the number? How many Herman Jahnkes were there in the world, really? The number meant nothing to me. And there was no password, so, unless they had a password-less account or had already snuck into my apartment and plugged it into my computer, this was pretty stupid.