Wild World

by Peter S. Rush

  They entered a nautically themed restaurant with rope handrails on the pier. Because it was early spring, it was not crowded. The table overlooked the harbor, which was filled with a mixture of fishing boats and a few pleasure-sailing vessels waiting for commissions.

  “I’ve been looking at law school again. Maybe Boston; that way, I can commute. With my schedule,” Steve said, trying to judge her interest. “I could go full-time in the day and still work. That way, I would stay in Providence but not just be a cop. I’d be back into the academic area, so we could be more in the same . . . have study dates again.”

  “Can you afford it? It would be good for you. You can’t waste your life being a cop.”

  “Only nineteen and out,” Steve smiled.

  “What?” she said.

  “Only nineteen more years, and I retire at full pension. I’ll be only forty-three. That’s how my one partner thinks. What do you say?”

  She smiled at his little joke. “Yeah, right. Nineteen more years in Providence?”

  He shrugged. “They have lobster on the menu. You ever have it?”

  “Yeah, we have it all the time in Columbus. Generally with mayo. What does it taste like?”

  “Never had it either, but it’s supposed to be the best. When in Newport, eat like the rich people.”

  “Okay,” she said and turned serious. “You know how much I want to get into a good med school. To be a doctor who discovers cures for people, who doesn’t let people die young.” Her hair fell over her left eye as she shook her head. “I don’t want people to be left alone. I will not let good people like my sister die.” Her eyes became misty.

  “I know you do.” He reached for her hand, but she pulled it back.

  “What are you doing with your life? Are you becoming one of them? Have you given up on your other dreams?”

  “I’m trying, but it is more complicated than I thought it would be.” Next time, he would tell her about the money, the locker room, and his plan. Tonight was about them.

  “I will help. I will be a doctor. You should go ahead with law school.”

  “I can wait to apply, see where you get in, and find a school close by. Until then, I can work and save money.” He wanted her back with the unconditional first love they had. It was what he wanted, but they had to get to the next phase of love, where it broadens and deepens. He needed her thoughts as much as her touches.

  “Don’t put your life on hold for me,” she said, reaching across the table and touching his hand.

  The waiter arrived at the table with two whole lobsters, which looked like giant orange insects on plates. He put a plastic bucket containing two bibs and nutcrackers on the table. Steve and Roxy looked at each other and broke into giggles that they tried to subdue.

  “What do we do now? Are there instructions?” She was choking on her giggles. “Ask for a side of mayo?”

  Her smile banished the tension.

  “You are my life. I’ll do anything for you,” he said.

  “I know. Let’s keep talking. I would love to see Paris.”

  Driving back to Providence, the AM radio played Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Who’ll Stop the Rain?”

  CHAPTER 12

  I’M NO FUN ANYMORE

  “You really fucked up again. No one has done this walking post in years. What did you do this time?” Crowley asked, letting Steve out of the car.

  “Ran some Italian guy off who was trying to fuck a waitress behind the restaurant.”

  “Guess he was connected.”

  “So he said.”

  “You won’t run into anyone here. At night, nothing’s going on.”

  Steve looked out over a stretch of barren land and three empty buildings with no windows or roofs. “I’ll bring you coffee at two and four. Pick you up at seven. Captain Lynch is sending you a strong message. They’re out to get you, kid. I think the dicks may be on you at home, so watch yourself. They protect themselves. If you’re a threat, they will eliminate it.” He nodded to Steve in his fatherly fashion. Steve thought he looked tired, as if weary and counting the days until retirement.

  Steve acknowledged that Crowley had gone as far as he could in counseling Steve. He wasn’t going to provoke the captain. “Some days, it’s your turn in the barrel,” Steve said. Crowley looked at him with puzzled eyes.

  “Long story,” Steve said.

  Walking the barren landscape, a Grateful Dead song came out as a whistle. He knew he was tough enough to endure this type of harassment shit. His wasn’t going down without a fight. But it was the stuff that they could do and not knowing who might be coming. He was glad that Roxy was safer. Were they going to set him up, plant shit in his locker? He didn’t use the locker room anymore, and it was beginning to worry him. Did Crowley know more?

  It wasn’t his smartest move, staring down the captain. He thought he had put it in the past, being compliant and not putting up any more fights. But tactically, he hadn’t thought through the consequences. The isolation in the station house was growing, as if he were infected with a disease. It wasn’t any overt act, but conversations were shorter, the group at the bar was smaller. No one wanted to cross the captain, especially not for him. That was clear. The captain was making life hard for him, but so were the lifers. He understood the facts and had less and less to lose now. It was bigger than just the dollar payoffs for not seeing things. He and Roxy would get back together and . . .

  Maybe Lieutenant Kreiger—now Captain Kreiger—could help. He’d done Kreiger a big favor, taking on the school assignment. Maybe he’d arrange a transfer, or at least turn down the heat. He stood in front of the abandoned building and looked up North Main Street as it rose up the hill. “I will get by. I will survive.” The words came out quietly.

  Driving his green car with a peace sticker on the back bumper after his four to midnight shift, he slowed down for red lights before driving through them, making sure no cars were coming. He knew it was bigger than just the payoffs—it had to reach to the top. He would have to do more digging and take some chances. Talking the plan over with Roxy would help him sort out his strategy. He drove to his old apartment and looked up at the window. The light was still on in Roxy’s room. She was still studying so it might be a good time to talk. Pulling over, he climbed the stars, knocked on Roxy’s bedroom door, and then opened it with his key. No one was there. He went down the hall to the living room and put on some water for instant coffee. He heard stirring in Cal’s room and voices, male and female. Steve listened and then moved to the door and opened it violently. Roxy and Cal were in bed, naked.

  “Shit, fucking shit. What the hell!” Steve roared as he looked at Roxy. “What the fucking . . .” He moved aggressively toward Cal, clenching his fists. The rage had overcome his confusion as the adrenaline pumped into his muscles.

  Cal stood up, his eyes wide and his mouth pulsing and pleading, “Steve . . .”

  Roxy shrieked, “Steve! No!”

  Steve hit Cal with his closed fist, knocking him back across the bed, blood spattering from his face onto the wall. He drew his off-duty .38 and jumped over the bed toward him. Cal didn’t move. Putting the gun in his face, Steve was trying to process what he saw before him. Betrayal, treachery, the snake. Never did he dream, think . . . Tune him up the way Bouley would, teach him a lesson he would never forget. Maybe he should pull the trigger and end it here.

  Roxy scrambled on all fours to grab and hold onto his arm, but she was unable to move him.

  “No, no. Steve, it’s not what you think,” she cried.

  Steve looked hard at her and turned the gun to her. His hurt and confusion froze his ability to think. He looked into her pleading eyes. What could he do? He looked back at Cal, who had retreated to the wall, curling into a tiny ball. Steve stepped toward him, watching him duck his head in fear of another blow. He hit him with an open hand, ready to pistol-whip him. He should have let him jump off that fucking ledge all those years ago.

  But he turned an
d slowly walked to their room. Wave after wave of guilt mixed with anger tossed his mind. How did it get to this? How did he let it . . .? Ambushed, alone . . .

  He sat heavily on the bed and looked down the barrel of the .38 in his hand. End it here. What was the point? He didn’t belong in either world. His life had all come apart. Noble idea—a bunch of crap. It seemed like a good idea to shake things up from the inside. Now what was left for him? Roxy ran naked down the hall to the room and jumped on the bed behind him.

  “It was nothing.” She was still crying. “We were studying, and then we got high. Steve, I love you.”

  “Yeah, sure. You and everyone in the world loves me. I’m quite the package these days.” He studied the gun in his hand. In the mouth and it was done. Ended here on their bed, where it all started. She would have to clean up the mess and have one more death to carry around.

  “No. I mean, forgive me.” She wrapped her arms around him and began kissing his neck. He could feel the warmth of her body penetrating him. Her scent, so soothing, held him. How did it happen—why did he let it happen? If he hadn’t moved out . . . He should have fought harder to stay. He looked at the muzzle of the gun pointed at his face. Would it make a difference to anyone? It just hurt so much.

  “Yeah, I forgive you. Sure, why not.” He let his arm and gun drop limply in front of him. It happened. He let it happen. What should he have done? With Cal, with Cal—that fucking snake. How could she? He was to blame. He never should have moved out. Give her space. Fuck it.

  He tried to get up from the bed, but Roxy clung to him, silently pleading with him. He gently removed her arms from his neck, looking at her tear-streaked cheeks and her face covered with pain. He stood and slowly walked to the door. Turning to Roxy, whose eyes were pleading for forgiveness, he felt the fracture in his heart, the betrayal, the loss of his world. She was the only girl he had ever loved. He would never love like that again.

  The cat’s eyes were on both of them, but he could see and feel nothing but pain. Moving through the door, almost sleepwalking, he entered the hallway. Heather opened her door, dressed in a sheer nightshift. Her eyes met with his, and she mouthed, “I’m sorry you are hurt.”

  Steve nodded and sprinted down the stairs as Roxy sat on the bed, crying.

  The next day, Steve was working the midnight shift. Having consumed a quart of Wild Turkey the night before, his head was pounding when he rolled out of bed at noon. Pulling on some gym shorts and a grey t-shirt, he stretched, trying to chase away the image of Roxy naked in Cal’s room. How did it go so wrong? Lacing up his sneakers, he started at an easy pace toward the athletic fields. A few laps would sweat the alcohol from his system, he thought, but the image of the two of them kept returning.

  He sped up the pace, pumping his arms hard, almost in sprint mode until his stomach began to spasm and his throat burned. Stopping, winded, he folded in half and nearly collapsed as the alcohol and eggs from the night before poured out his mouth in yellow waves, each one slightly less intense than the one before. He breathed through his nose, pushing the air down into his diaphragm while the yellow acid smell of his vomit caused dry heaves. He took a more leisurely pace back to his apartment, and after his shower, his body felt cleansed, but the images still turned over in his mind.

  Retrieving his service revolver and holster from the hook, he threw them in his blue gym bag with his nylon windbreaker and badge. The police firing range was in the basement of the small shed next to the academy. Since graduation, Steve had tried to go once a week to shoot. Having never handled a gun before joining the force, he wanted to be good, and the only way he knew to get better was to practice. He called Tom Donohue, the range master, to make certain he would be there this afternoon. It was never crowded except before recertification.

  Having the range to himself, he put on the sound control headset and settled into the second of five practice slots. With a box of one hundred rounds, he set the target of a man twenty-five feet away. With his loaded .38, he looked over the sight of the barrel, seeing Cal’s head at the end of the range. Squeezing off six rounds in rapid succession, the bullets smashed into the paper.

  He reloaded and pumped twelve more holes at the torso before pulling the target back and replacing it with a new one. Now he saw Roxy, and he slowly tried to plant bullet after bullet in the target, not wanting to spoil her beautiful face but to needing to inflict as much pain in her as she had in him.

  His anger flew with each shot, but he knew it was his own pain that he was projecting on the target. With the third target, he could see himself, Roxy shooting the bullets at him, wounding him in the arms, shoulders, and head before putting six bullets dead center on his heart. When he finished the box of ammunition, he holstered the gun and removed the headset.

  “Look at you,” Donohue said from behind him in the observation booth. “You usually barely hit the target. You’ve been practicing?”

  Steve felt self-conscious at the hatred he had just leveled at the targets. “No. Guess I was concentrating better. I wanted to hit what I’m aiming at.”

  Coming on duty on Rizzo’s day off, Steve was partnered with Crowley. After coffee, they took a leisurely drive through the district, writing parking tickets for cars left on the street overnight. The parking fine revenue was worth over a million dollars a year to the city, and Captain Lynch was on a tear to break the record this year. They were also counting street lights that were out; it was going to be a night of high-value police work.

  “Car 28, report of a fire. 288 Thompson.”

  “Roger that,” Steve answered. He was at the wheel so Crowley could doze after a long day at his tow-truck job. He pulled the car to the front of a two-story wood frame house that once was a single-family residence, but Steve guessed it had been cut up into numerous illegal one-room apartments. Black smoke was coming from the front window on the second floor, and several people in nightclothes were milling about in front of the building. Steve and Crowley got out of the car, but there was no sign of the fire department.

  “Old Mr. Novak is still in there.” A stooped grandmother in a stained blue bathrobe pulled on Steve’s arm as he reached the curb. “He’s on the second floor in the back. He can hardly walk anymore.” Her eyes were wide, staring the house as little red flames licked near the roof.

  “You live here?” he asked.

  “On the first floor. I bring him soup and do some shopping for him.” The intensity of the smoke pouring from the building increased. The color was getting darker.

  “Where the fuck are the firemen?” Steve asked Crowley, who was busy pushing people back onto the sidewalk.

  “Fuck,” Steve said. “Second floor in the back . . . How many apartments are there?” he asked the woman.

  “Two on each floor.”

  “Fuck it,” he said to himself, looking at Crowley, who didn’t move to help. He sprinted for the house, holding his black flashlight in front of him. Entering the door, the wall of smoke slammed into his face, absorbing the light from his beam like a black hole. He crouched to a half run to get to the stairs, which were thankfully in front of him. He touched the railing. The wood was still cool, so he used it as a guide to the second floor. The dense smoke drove him even lower to the ground.

  “Mr. Novak! Mr. Novak!” he yelled, looking for some sound to guide his direction as he felt the steps level off at the second floor. The heat from the fire felt like the blast furnace at the mill in Ohio. It caused sweat to pour down his forehead. He coughed but yelled again, “Novak!” He hoped the man hadn’t already died from the smoke.

  “Here, here.” Steve could hear the whisper from his left. Now in a duck walk that he had last used in football practice in high school, Steve pushed forward, repeating the man’s name and following the sounds. When he reached the room, it was not totally filled with smoke yet, so with his flashlight, he found the man lying on a bed.

  “Can you walk?” Steve asked.

  “No,” came the feeble reply. Alrea
dy, the visibility in the room had been cut in half, and Steve felt his throat burn from the smoke. Having never been in a fire before, he searched for the flames. He was certain the century-old house had a kindling point where the entire place would burst into a giant funeral pyre for them.

  Grabbing Novak, Steve slung the old man across his back, holding Novak’s head in his right arm and his feet in his left. Returning with a quickened duck walk, the pain in his knees cut into his lower back. He realized he was now racing against his own ability to consume oxygen as the thick smoke caused him to cough and gag.

  Carefully, he felt for the stairs with his feet, not wanting to fall down the flight. He wondered what Roxy would feel if he never came out again, if he died a hero trying to save a man. She would cry, but would she understand? Would he rather die here than have to go back and face her again?

  He coughed again, gasping to hold onto consciousness as he slowly descended the stairs, the old man on his back, pain beginning to cut into him, but he refused to quit. There was noise in front of him, and he quickened his pace down the stairs, sprinting in his own mind to the finish line. Two large figures in masks and black coats were at the door; they grabbed his arms and pulled him and Novak out into the clean night air. He looked up at the firemen, giving them a weak smile.

  “Little smokey in there?” the fireman asked, pulling on his oxygen mask as he led the hose team into the house. A medic came over to Steve and gave him an oxygen mask of his own. The street was now filled with fire trucks, police cars, and a crowd of people from the neighborhood. The flashing blue, red, and yellow lights from the vehicles bathed the scene in a cacophony of colors. He stared weakly in the truck mirror at his raccoon mask of soot. He closed his eyes; he wanted to see her.

  The sounds of the fire grew with crackling and shouts from the fire captain. The hose brigade beat a hasty retreat as the captain directed the fireman to wet down the adjacent houses. Yellow flames shot from the front windows, black smoke pouring out from every crack in the building. The firemen poured water on the lost house to contain the damage as the sounds of collapsing walls sent fire flares high into the sky. Steve was transfixed with the power and the speed of the flames.