Will the Sun Ever Come Out Again?

by Nate Southard

  NOON

  2Bit wakes up with bricks in his head. He thinks his skull might split open, it hurts so bad. He moves to roll off his mattress and realizes he’s on the floor, his back against peeling linoleum. He wonders how he got there.

  “Muthafuck.” The word sends a spike of pain through his head. “Muthafuck” is right. He can’t remember the last time his skull hurt like this. Course, he can’t remember how the fuck he ended up on a hard floor or where he is or even what the hell he did last night. He don’t like that. It gets him scared, and he hates being scared.

  He groans as he rolls onto his belly and pushes himself off the floor. He don’t recognize this place. It’s a kitchen, but the shitty state of it means it could be anywhere in Compton. He just knows he don’t recognize it.

  Light stabs through a torn shade above a sink without a faucet. Must be pretty late. That’s cool. 2Bit don’t wake up before eleven most days. Let them business muthafuckas get up and go to work. He can sell his smoke day or night. Don’t make a never mind.

  He stretches his arms and legs. The knots in his muscles call him a bastard. He fights back, gets them to fall in line. A yawn follows, and somewhere in the middle of that big breath he catches a whiff of something that makes him want to hit his knees and cough up the breakfast he ain’t ate yet.

  “What the fuck?” He puts a hand to his nose to block out some of the stink. The whole house smells like a dead dog on a sunny day, only worse, like some brutha’s been stocking up on rotting mutts. His hand smells bad, too. And it’s kinda sticky. He pulls it away and sees the drying blood in his palm. It covers his hands, the stuff darker in the creases of his knuckles. What the hell? What did he do last night? He don’t remember any of this shit.

  He decides he needs to leave. More than anything else, he needs to get the fuck out of this place and get back to his mom’s house. He can wash up there, maybe head out and see what he got himself up to. More than anything, though, he needs to get gone.

  He looks for an exit. There’s a pot on a blackened stove. A whirlwind of flies hovers over it, and their droning tickles his ears. He knows he don’t want to see what’s in the pot. He knows he won’t like it. Just get out, get gone. 2Bit don’t give a shit about nothing else.

  He finds a doorway out of the kitchen, and he rushes through it. He moves in a stumbling run. His arms and legs fight him for control. He can’t remember a time he’s felt this way.

  He reaches the living room and stops cold. He stares at the mess there and tries to make sense of it. What happened here? Did he do this? Did Gray Street? What the fuck?

  He looks down at his hands. A lot of blood there.

  He wraps his hands in his shirt and wrestles the front door open. He runs.

  “Last time I checked, Gray Street were a bunch of gangbangers, not a cult of cannibals.” Walker stands in a corner of the Big Room with Rawls and Captain Thomas. Cops mill around without paying much attention. The morning’s shit storm keeps most of the station busy, and the desks at Walker’s back remain empty.

  “Well, it looks like something’s changed.”

  “Could be something new on the street,” Rawls says. “Gray Street deals like everybody else. Maybe they tried to cut their H with something and got folks freaking out.”

  “How many Gray Streeters use their own stash?” Thomas asks.

  “One or two, tops,” Walker says. He throws the tiniest glance at Rawls. Wants to make sure his partner is following along. “They’re profit oriented.”

  “Were these two known players?”

  “Neither looked young enough to be newbies, but I hadn’t seen them before.”

  “So maybe this was an initiation?”

  “Jesus, I hope not. You ask me, that wasn’t an initiation. That thing was a slaughter. Six dead, and I don’t even need to tell you about the rest.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Hungry Heart say anything on the way in?”

  “Not one word, according to the uniforms. They put him in interrogation room four.”

  “Great.” He gives his partner a slap on the arm. “You want first crack?”

  “Sure thing,” Rawls says. His rumbling voice doesn’t say anything that doesn’t need saying. Thomas shakes his head a little but keeps quiet. He knows how Rawls works. He might not like it, but he knows it gets results. Sometimes that’s good enough.

  “What was it the suspect said on the scene?” Thomas asks.

  “‘He stepped through.’ That’s it, and that’s all. Clammed up nice and tight after that.”

  “Mean anything to you?”

  “Could mean somebody new’s in charge of Gray Street. Stepped through the ranks? We haven’t heard any noise, but it makes a lot of sense. New leadership wants to shake things up, put on a show and display their balls to all of Compton.”

  Thomas nods. The look on his face tells Walker he’s proud to have any shred he can use. Rawls almost looks sad as he throws a kink in the whole thing.

  “But then there’s Malcolm Dobbs. He’s been running Gray Street for going on five years now, and that man’s a tiger. Outside of him driving a car into a phone pole, I don’t see him just giving up the reigns without making enough ruckus to draw the National Guard.”

  “Fuck.” Thomas follows it from a sigh, and suddenly he looks like he could use a month or so of sleep. Walker knows the feeling. He wonders if he could remember the last time he didn’t feel that way. Maybe if he thought about it hard enough.

  “You got any cages you can rattle?” Thomas asks.

  “Sure. I got a few CI’s in the Gray Street organization. Might take some time to get in contact, though.”

  “How long?”

  “Day or two at the most.”

  “Do better. If Dobbs or some successor is responsible for this shit, I want LAPD to roll on him by nightfall.”

  Walker looks to Rawls, receives a shrug. Thanks for the assist, buddy. “I’ll see how it goes.”

  “I mean it. Don’t drag ass on me.”

  “Never do, Captain.” He gives his boss a look that’s somewhere between sincere and shit-eating. He gives Rawls a pat on the back, one that’s just hard enough to tell the guy to lean on the prick up in interrogation four good and heavy. Then, he turns on his heel and saunters back into the sunshine.

  “Shit to do,” he whispers on his way out the door.

  Officer Megan Ricks shuts down the cruiser and shoulders open her door. She hears Christian’s door open. Normally, she’d remove her shades now. She likes to look people in the eye when she talks to them. The sun is hiding behind a layer of clouds that alternates between dark gray and black, though. No shades today. She’s been waiting for it to storm, but the rain feels like hiding some more.

  “Tease,” she says.

  “What?” Christian asks. He slides his nightstick into its leather loop. His uniform stretches tight across his chest, and Megan thinks again that she should really stop paying so much attention to it.

  “Weather. We can use the rain, but it doesn’t want to come.”

  “It’ll come,” he says. He gives her a smile that melts her a little. She likes it when he smiles. She returns the expression, and then she walks past him toward the faded green house. The street is quiet as she approaches the front door. The doorbell is nothing but a twist of wires, so she pulls open the screen and gives the door three raps with her knuckles.

  “Mrs. Yarbrough? LAPD.”

  A raspy voice approaches from the other side of the door. She catches the words, “About time,” but can’t make out the rest. Sorry lady, but with all the actual crime taking place in Los Angeles, bad smells and the like take a while to filter to the top.

  The door opens, and a withered black woman looks at her with narrow eyes.

  “I’m Mrs. Yarbrough.”

  “Yes, ma’am. We received a call about a suspicious odor coming from next door?”

  “More than two hours ago. Little girl, I got syrup don’t take i
ts own sweet time like you.”

  “I’m sorry about the delay, ma’am.” She feels Christian turn away to face the street, and she knows he’s smirking, trying to contain a chuckle. She longs for the luxury of turning away, but she has to deal with Mrs. Yarbrough and her mystery odor.

  “You been here twenty minutes earlier, you might coulda caught the boy was inside.”

  “Excuse me? Somebody exited the residence?”

  “Like the devil was biting his backside. Ran right up the street. Fast, too.”

  “About twenty minutes ago?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he look frightened?”

  “Little girl, that boy looked terrified.”

  She glances at Christian. Her partner raises his eyebrows for an instant. Worth checking into.

  “And which is the house in question?”

  Mrs. Yarbrough squints, and her eyes nearly disappear completely. She points to her right, indicating the house next door.

  Megan follows the old woman’s finger and sees a house that might have been white back in the sixties or seventies. Now it’s a color she imagines ashes would be if they could rot. A rusted chain link fence separates the two properties, but wild grass tall enough for a child to hide in looms through the diamond-shaped spaces as though it’s hungry and wants to snatch whichever poor fool wanders too close. She tells herself she’s seen plenty of homes like this in the city, but something about this one pulls at her. She can almost hear it whispering in her ear, daring her to approach.

  A breeze rustles the grass, and for an instant she can smell something. It’s a thick, meaty scent. It tickles her brain with cold fingers. She hopes she’s imagining things, but she doubts she’s that lucky.

  “Thank you,” she says a little too loudly. “We’ll check it out. Will you be available if we have any further questions?”

  “Little girl, I got no place else to be.”

  “All right, then. Sit tight, Mrs. Yarbrough.”

  She gives Christian a nod, and he follows her away from the door. As she walks toward the house with the wild yard, she thinks the city is unnaturally still. Compton’s one of the last places in the country where the kids are too poor to do anything but play outside, and it sure as hell isn’t a school day in early August. The street remains empty, though.

  “Maybe it’s the weather,” she whispers. She hopes that’s the case.

  The gate squeals on its hinges as she nudges it open. She unsnaps the holster on her service pistol. She doesn’t want to pull it, but she refuses to be caught with her pants down.

  The smell is stronger here. It reminds her of her childhood, when her mother used to take her to the butcher to get ribs and sausage. It can’t be a good sign.

  She feels colder as she steps onto the porch. She checks to see if there’s more shade there, but the lack of sun makes the difference all but invisible. Maybe it’s her nerves.

  Calm, Megan.

  She knocks on the screen’s frame. The metallic sound travels up and down the street, teases her spine.

  “LAPD!” she calls. A dying echo answers her.

  “Nobody home?” Christian asks.

  “Or somebody’s hiding.” She doesn’t think that’s the case. Not if some kid went tearing up the street not thirty minutes before their arrival.

  The door hangs open a foot or so, probably because the running kid didn’t take the time to shut it all the way. She cranes her neck in an attempt at getting a good look inside. The smell punches her in the nose and almost staggers her. The buzzing of flies follows hot on its heels. This isn’t the butcher shop; it’s something worse.

  She searches the shadows with her eyes, and she feels her hand reach for her pistol. There’s something dark smeared across the only visible wall in wide streaks that look like they might have been done by hand. She doesn’t need her eyes to adjust to know it’s blood.

  “Christian, call for back up.”

  She draws her pistol and pulls open the screen.

  Rawls rolls his powerful shoulders and then opens the door to interrogation room four. The Gray Street homie they pulled in looks about how he suspected. You bring in a banger for questioning, he plays it one of two ways. He either goes cocky or quiet.

  This one’s chosen quiet. He sits behind the steel table, wrists cuffed to the rails on either side, and he doesn’t move. His heads dips a little as he stares down at the lights reflecting in the tabletop. What Rawls can see of his eyes looks peaceful. There’s no anger or anxiety in the man’s face, just a flaccid calm, like a toy that needs new batteries. It stands out in contrast with the blood that still coats the man’s mouth and jaw, stains his throat and has soaked his gray T-shirt a darker color. If the homie notices, he isn’t letting on. Maybe he thinks nobody will see it if he doesn’t point it out. Bangers aren’t always the smartest kids on the block.

  “Hi,” Rawls says as he shuts the door behind him. He glances at the camera in the room’s upper corner. The closed circuit cable runs down the wall, leaving him one good yank away from complete privacy. Just the way he likes it.

  He pulls out a chair and sits down across from the blood-soaked man. “You have a name?”

  No answer. The banger sits there like he’s in a trance.

  “You want to talk about why you and your boy went certifiable this morning?”

  Rawls sits and waits. He tries to read the banger’s face, but he finds nothing he can pull. Guy’s about as close to asleep as a body can be without snoring. Or maybe his mind’s just up and gone. Maybe he’s realized what he was chewing on back at the Edgar’s, and now his brain’s gone haywire trying to make some kind of sense of it all.

  Or maybe the guy’s crashing from whatever drug put him sky high in the first place. Reality’s crashing in, and his body and brain are shutting down in order to deal with it.

  Rawls rubs a hand over his face as he processes the thoughts and theories. He feels pressure at his temples. It’s all fine and dandy if this guy’s brain has turned to mush, but he needs to find out if there’s some seriously dangerous shit on the streets. If this is a new drug or the start of some serious dick-waving, he needs to know, needs to stomp it down before it gets out of control. He can’t let this piece of shit give him the silent treatment.

  “Last chance, homie. You want to talk to me, or are you just gonna sit there like a sack of assholes?”

  The banger doesn’t answer. If he’s even heard the words that echo through the tiny room, he gives no sign.

  “All right. We’ll play it your way.” He pushes back his chair and stands. He steps to the wall and wraps his fingers around the cable that travels to the camera’s rear. He pulls, and the connection is severed. The cable coils sloppily on the ground.

  He turns to face the Gray Streeter, who still refuses to move or even lift his eyes.

  “For the record,” Rawls says, “I’m going to enjoy the hell out of this.”

  2Bit nearly rips his mom’s screen door off the hinges as he charges into the house. It snaps back to bang against the frame, and his mom’s angry voice rips through the run-down home. 2Bit’s already in the bathroom, though. He throws the lock a split second before her fists rattle the doorknob.

  “Darrel, where you been? You don’t slam my doors, you hear me?”

  “Shit, Moms! I be out in a minute. Leave me alone!” He hears bravery in his voice, but he sure as hell don’t feel it. All he feels is cold and hollow and a growing terror like a feeling he’s being chased by something he can’t see yet. A dog that sticks to the shadows and growls just loud enough to tell you it’s there. It’s coming, though. He don’t know why, but he’s sure that dog’s coming.

  He examines his hands. There’s still some blood on them, though not nearly as much. He wiped most of it off on his T-shirt, ditched the fucking thing in a trashcan four blocks away. He knows it wasn’t the smartest move, but his brain tells him he’s got other shit to worry about.

  He turns the faucet on all the way a
nd starts scrubbing. He works the soap into his hands until his skin aches and stings. He can’t seem to get all the blood, though. No matter how hard he scrubs, a few deep trails of the stuff just won’t come clean.

  “Fuck!”

  He balls his hands into fists and brings them down on the sink. Pain travels up his arms to find a home in his spine. He stares at himself in the mirror and tries to make sense of what he sees. Spatters and streaks of blood mark his face, his neck. His eyes are wide and much too white. He stares into them and watches his pupils grow smaller and smaller until they nearly disappear. His lip quivers, and tracks of sweat race each other down his forehead. He looks scared, crazy. He don’t recognize this terrified homeboy looking back at him.

  Maybe the guy in the mirror is somebody new. Maybe the homeboy he used to be died last night. Maybe that’s why he don’t remember where he was or what he done.

  2Bit clamps his eyes shut tight and watches stars burst behind his eyelids. He presses his fingers to his eyes, and the stars grow brighter. They dance in pulsing fields of green and blue and red. It all looks crazy, like something from a different world.

  Then the stars disappear and an image flashes through his brain. He sees himself kicking a gagged and bound Mexican, a Loco, arms covered in ink. The man grunts into his gag, so he kicks him again. He has a knife in his hand. Other Gray Street Bangers stand next to him, blades in their fists. There’s laughter. And blood. And somebody starts screaming. Beneath it all he hears a voice, quiet and gentle and a little amazed.

  “He stepped through.”

  2Bit opens his eyes and gasps. He looks at his reflection and almost cries when he sees it pointing at him, smiling.

  Ricky keeps shop in a shithole apartment off Rosecrans. Walker knows the dealer can afford better digs, but the building with the central courtyard offers good security. Ricky rents four additional one-rooms, and he keeps soldiers stashed in each. Anybody tries to come in and start shit, they have to climb three flights of stairs with bullets flying at them from four different directions. Going on five years, and Ricky hasn’t been knocked over yet.