Orange County Noir

by Gary Phillips

  Hovis wasn't aware that McLaughlin knew where he kept the money. She'd spied on him once when she was working there. Though naturally he'd suspect her, she would aim his suspicions toward a fired employee. Or so she'd told Randolph.

  On the darkened factory floor, he removed his disguise of a bushy Afro wig, false goatee, and a Halloween rubber nose. McLaughlin, in her bra and panties, stilettos off so as not to make noise, came over and gave him a passionate kiss. He rubbed his hand between her legs.

  "Better get going. I'll meet you back at my place, Avery."

  "I like it when you say my name," he whispered back.

  "I know."

  He punched her hard, twice, in the face, while she held onto him for balance. Like a boxer clearing her vision, she shook her head, and then she broke off one of her heels. She put the shoes on and wobbled into the office while Randolph turned back toward the way he had come in.

  "Brice, Brice, are you all right?" she screamed, running into the office. McLaughlin's face rearranged itself from feigned concern to icy resolve. "Briiice," she drew out, hand beside her mouth but barely saying his name. "Briiiice, my demented shithead, can you get up?" She guffawed and removed a sharp letter opener from a pen caddy on the desk. She sauntered over, cut Brice Hovis's legs loose, and removed the ball gag and handkerchief. His hands remained bound.

  "Oh my God, are you all right, Steph?" His eyes were red and wet. He looked from her to the open ceiling and back.

  Her fingers trilled the tip of the letter opener. "I'm fine, Brice. Real fuckin good." She flicked the blade and nicked his thigh. Crimson ran behind the black mesh stocking material.

  "Hey," he gasped, backing up, "this is no time for that. Untie me, would you?"

  Swaying her body she stepped closer, waving the letter opener around like a drunk musketeer. "And what if I don't, Brice? What if I go too far this time?" She took another nick out of him, this time from his chest.

  Brice looked about, panicked, while backpeddling in his heels and skirt. "Quit fucking around, Stephanie."

  "I'm serious as a fever, Bricey. Come on, beg for your life." She placed her hand on her mound. "It makes me wet." She lunged forward and tackled Hovis, then straddled him.

  Down on the floor, he squirmed and bucked but ceased when she put the tip to his throat, letting it sink in a centimeter.

  "Why?" he pleaded. "Why are you doing this?"

  "Because I can, cunt." She made another cut and Hovis's eyes went wide.

  "Yo, Steph-is that your real name?"

  The woman looked up to see Randolph, his disguise back on, standing in the doorway. She chortled. "Yeah, so? What're you gonna do about it, homeboy?"

  "This," he said calmly, shooting her in the mouth as she laughed at him.

  The woman's body tumbled off of Hovis, her heelless shoe landing across his leg. Randolph tied up the terrified, bleeding exec again and walked out of the office.

  "There's something like ninety thousand in here," a woman's voice said behind him. He turned to Emily Bravera, who was dressed in slacks and a striped shirt. She was hunched on one knee, having counted the contents of the tackle box. She relatched the lid.

  "Not bad," Randolph said. "Plus, Hovis can't squawk to the law since he was hiding it from the IRS."

  "Well, he does have some explaining to do in that get-up of his and two bodies sprawled out." Her arm in the crook of his, he holding the strong box, the two strolled out to the parking lot.

  Laying dead under dim lighting on the uneven asphalt was the bartender, Alfonso Carlson. He'd been in wait for Randolph, to ambush and kill him. But Bravera, a one-time investigating officer with the Criminal Investigation Command of the U.S. Army, had done the bushwhacking. Inside was the bartender's daughter, Stephanie Carlson. The Command's motto was: Do what has to be done.

  Before they departed, Bravera put her face close to Randolph's, squeezing his cheeks in her blood-nailed fingers. Her tan was prominent against his burnished-copper skin. "You liked fucking her, didn't you?"

  "Only doing my job, cap'n."

  "Just remember, Thelonious, I know how to use a rifle with a scope."

  "I keep that information uppermost in my mind."

  "See that you do." She kissed him deep and long.

  At the Seaside Lounge, Avery Randolph began a mournful rendition of "On Green Dolphin Street." At her table by the window, Emily Bravera sat and drank sparingly, appreciating his handling of the tune. The two had been working this area for more than a month now, pulling off several lucrative burglaries in Long Beach and south along the Orange County coast. Jewelry, a few spicy homemade DVDs, cash, and even gold bars horded against the next meltdown. For it wasn't only old hippies like Brice Hovis who failed to report all their income.

  The front they'd constructed involved Bravera posing as a general's widow living in Rossmoor. Real estate being what it was these days, the realtor was happy to rent to the widow on a month-to-month basis. She was personable, knowledgable on a variety of subjects, worked out at the local gym, and managed to get herself invited to this or that soiree or club event-thus being able to scope out various domiciles.

  Bravera had knowledge of security systems and Randolph knew a thing or two about safes. For him, tumblers and electronic lock sequencing were merely different sets of notes to master. Tomorrow they were going to take down the beach house of the matching-hair couple. Yes, they agreed, the two of them had one sweet hustle going.

  When the alleged Lori McLaughlin had come on to him, the possessive Bravera did some checking and turned up that she was Carlson's daughter. Randolph and Bravera didn't know what the pitch was, but figured the two were setting him up for an Oswald-be the fall guy. The piano player had hinted to the bartender that he'd beaten a dope charge in Baltimore. That was a lie, just part of the dodge, like his funky apartment near the track. But the Carlsons must have figured a footloose brother hiding out in Orange County, wanted on a criminal charge elsewhere, was a good fit for a robbery-murder here in town.

  Randolph and his older lover and partner, not wishing to pass up an opportunity for enrichment, had let the scheme unfold. In another month or so, not so foolish to push their luck, they'd move on.

  "Like Duke explained, man, you gotta play with intent to do something," the pianist said sotto voce, then hummed and teased the keys, ending his extended version of "On Green Dolphin Street." There was sustained clapping and several patrons rose and dropped large bills into the snifter. Before the tune, Randolph had announced he was taking up a collection to bury father and daughter. Bravera put in a fifty, smiling at him. He lifted the glass with both hands, bowing slightly to the gathered from his piano seat.

  he happiest place on the entire planet, my ass ... Derek called me into the office, his voice an out-oftune reed instrument in my earpiece, just as I was herding a dozen sunburned tourists and their jabbering children off the teacup ride, which had broken down for the third time in a week. "Carl, we need to see you immediately," Derek said. "Headquarters, now." He acted as if being a security day-shift lead made him Batman, or at least Commissioner Gordon. Sure, he had military and a little police experience on his resume, and since 9/11 that was all anybody valued in security. The downing of the Twin Towers changed everything at the park-not because terrorists have ever shown up on Huck Finn's Island or among the mannequin pirates on the splash-splash boat ride, but because the new security hires all thought they were better than the rest of its, especially me. My twenty-three years of experience counted for nothing to them. All that mattered was that I'd been hired during a "kinder, gentler" period of American history, sans military or police experience, when former school teachers like me were considered adequate for the job of herding tourists off broken-down attractions, managing crowd-control during the fireworks display, or busting preteens for smoking cigarettes on the sky ride. I knew the new breed thought of me as a middle-aged, hefty embarrassment, particularly after I became literally the last of the "old guard." I knew how much
they wanted to put rat ears on my head, shove a tail up my ass, and send me out the main gate forever. But I always did my job and there was nothing they could do to get rid of me-at least, not until the day Derek called me away from the teacups.

  When I got to the security office, Derek wasn't even involved in the inquiry.

  It was Jeffrey, the department head, former FBI, who asked me to take a seat in the conference room, which I'd visited only once before, in '98, to help plan a birthday party for one of the secretaries. The room hadn't changed. Dozens of large, framed photographs of the park's long-dead founder lined the walls. Two grim Anaheim city policemen entered, their handcuffs jangling on their polyester pants and their boots echoing across the linoleum floor. They sat at the long table, accompanied by a lawyer from corporate, a stenographer, two interns, and a video technician. Excepting the cops, everyone wore standard employee name tags-first names only. Bob, Tom, Steve ... Friendly, huh? But how else would you expect employee relations to be at the world's happiest place? The video technician made final adjustments to a small camera pointed in my direction, then indicated we could begin.

  "We're videotaping for legal purposes," Jeffrey said, his smooth delivery more like that of a weatherman than a topcop. He was weatherman handsome too. All he needed was a name like Dallas Raines or Johnny Mountain and his toothy grin would have been on TV screens instead of here in my face.

  "What's this all about?" I asked.

  "We've had a complaint," Jeffrey said, indicating a manila folder on the desk. "A female guest in her teens filed a report that says you followed her around the park, leering at her."

  "What?" I recalled no particular young lady. How could I? Every hour of every day I saw thousands of girls in their teens walking around the park (just as I saw thousands of sour-faced, divorced fathers scrambling to keep up with their children, thousands of overwrought mothers toting handywipes and pushing strollers, thousands of obese tourists reeking of sweat and tanning lotion, thousands of school-age boys and girls who moved like flocks of birds from one "land" to the next, thousands of retirees in souvenir T-shirts and sun visors, thousands of foreigners in baseball caps, thousands of chattering children in pirate hats, thousands and thousands and thousands of everything ...). "One paranoid guest files a complaint and you call me in for this inquisition?"

  Jeffrey smiled. His manner remained friendly but coldblooded, doubtless a technique learned at Quantico. He turned his chair to face me directly. "Need I remind you that here at the park we do not tolerate dissatisfaction in any form from any of our guests."

  "Sure, but one report-"

  He interrupted: "Are you suggesting that following only one young woman around the park, bothering her with unwanted and aggressive sexual attentions, is acceptable?" He straightened in his chair, his expression growing stern.

  "Aggressive sexual attentions?" This was outrageous. The others at the table averted their eyes. At first, I assumed they were embarrassed to be part of this kangaroo court. But after a moment I realized they were embarrassed for me, as if I'd actually done something wrong. "Look, I don't even talk to guests, male or female, unless they talk to me first. So even if I happened to be following an attractive young woman, it would only have been out of boredom, nothing more."

  "Is following an attractive young woman `out of boredom' a part of your job description?" Jeffrey asked.

  "I was speaking hypothetically."

  "But if one actually did such a thing?" he pressed.

  "Well, no. Obviously, it's not part of my job description, if I did such a thing."

  He nodded, smug, and turned to the video technician across the table. "Run the video, please."

  Every square foot of the park is covered by cameras, primarily for the legal department's use in defending lawsuits (as opposed to the stated purpose of busting criminals or terrorists or nine-year-old boys pocketing souvenir pencils from the gift shops). The particular time-stamped surveillance footage compiled for our viewing showed me walking directly behind a nubile park guest who wore a revealing halter top and very short shorts. From the angle of the camera it appeared that I may indeed have been staring at her ass. But one angle proved nothing. Unfortunately, they had more than one angle-the video cut to another camera that picked up where the first left off, capturing the two of its moving in single file through the Land of Cliched Yesteryear to the Land of Harmless Adventures and on to the Land of Saccharine Fantasy, the footage from all the cameras edited together to form a single, incriminating sequence. I didn't remember the girl, though for a few minutes of a particular day she had undeniably engaged my attention. It was not pleasant to observe-the security guard uniform made me look heavier than I actually am (and everyone knows video adds ten to twenty pounds to anyone's appearance); additionally, I was old enough to be the girl's father and my attentions toward her, isolated and edited in this manner, were humiliating.

  Jeffrey turned to the stenographer. "Will you please read back to us what Carl said after I asked him if following young women `out of boredom' was part of his job description?"

  "There's no need for that," I interjected.

  The stenographer looked from me to Jeffrey, awaiting direction.

  At last Jeffrey indicated to the stenographer to remain silent.

  I'd had enough. "Okay, fine. I won't follow any women around the park, ever again. Okay?"

  Jeffrey was not satisfied. "Why don't you tell us why you left teaching?"

  "That's irrelevant ... it was in the late '80s, for God's sake."

  Jeffrey pulled a paper from a file. "On your application here you indicated that you resigned from your teaching position."

  "I did."

  "We dug a little deeper, contacting the school district, and discovered that you were pressured to go. Why don't you explain?"

  "Look, I never touched anybody."

  "No one said you did. Please answer the question."

  "One of the girls needed a little watching over. She was just a freshman, a lonely kid. My concern was only for her safety. Would I be in this uniform if I didn't take an interest in the welfare of others?"

  "You `maintained surveillance' on this girl after school hours?"

  "Well, that's generally when the bad things happen. . ."

  He nodded. "Bad things, indeed."

  "Look, I'm not some kind of stalker, if that's what you're suggesting."

  Jeffrey shrugged. "It's not me who suggests it. It's you, Carl. It's your behavior."

  The silence and averted eyes among those gathered around the table suggested they concurred.

  In this manner, the security department had its way with me.

  Over the next half hour we arrived at a settlement that reduced my retirement benefits by 50 percent. The lawyer had all the paperwork ready. He was very friendly. I merely had to sign at the places he'd marked with colorful, sticky arrows. A child could have done it.

  "Why now?" I asked as the inquisition came to its inglorious end. "After all these years?"

  Jeffrey nodded. "You're right, it's our oversight. We should never have hired you. But at least we identified the problem before any serious harm was done."

  Harm? I never touched anybody-not in all these years.

  Happiest place on the planet, my ass ...

  So you can imagine my surprise when five weeks later I got a call at home from none other than supercop Jeffrey.

  "How've you been?" he asked, exuding his weatherman charm.

  "Fine," I said, though I'd actually not been so good. It's funny, but that overpriced, overcrowded, oversanitized amusement park, known the world over for its fairy-tale castle, which is actually made of plaster so thin that on that last day, as my former colleagues marched me across the park on my way out forever, I was almost able to punch my fist right through it ... well, despite all that, the place gets into your blood. The truth is, I missed the park as one misses a lover. Hell, more than one misses a lover. It's been three years now since Mandy went back to
her old job in Bangkok, where I'd met her on a humid night, paid her bar fee, and then won her heart with my tales of foiling the amorous antics, petty thievery, and juvenile pranks of park guests (everybody the world over has heard of the park, and being in its employ is almost like being a celebrity). The first gift I ever gave Mandy, the first acknowledgment of my deeper-than-mere-business feelings for her, was my spare name tag from the park, which I'd brought along on vacation in hopes I might indeed meet a young woman worthy of wearing it. So, sure, I suffered sleepless nights after Mandy left me. We'd had a good eighteen months and I really thought she loved her new country and our little apartment. Nobody likes losing a lover or wife or whatever. But losing the park proved harder yet, almost enough to make me start drinking again. There's no place like it, unless you count its iterations in Florida and overseas.

  "I want you to know I didn't enjoy doing what I had to do, Carl," Jeffrey said over the phone.

  What did he want from me, sympathy?

  "It's the bitch end of the job, let me tell you," he continued.

  I'd be damned if I'd let him know how bad I'd been feeling. "Well, I've been great, Jeffrey. How're things at the park?"

  He laughed. "As if you care anymore, right?"

  I pretended to laugh too. "Right you are, Jeffrey."

  It didn't make matters easier for me that my garden apartment, which I'd only recently cleared of the last signs that Mandy had ever inhabited it with me, was barely a mile from the park's front gate. Every night at 9:30, when the fireworks display started, the sounds of explosions would jerk me away from whatever TV show I'd been employing as distraction. Boom, boom, boom! I felt every sonic reverberation in the deepest part of my chest. I've always loved fireworks. Most nights I'd still walk onto my tiny patio to watch them-gunpowder flowers blossoming over the park, red, white, and blue. Boom, boom, boom! When that became too painful, I'd close my eyes. But even then I couldn't help picturing the thousands of guests lined along the park's main avenue or along the banks of its circular river, their eyes turned heavenward, a scene I helped supervise for years. Afterward, the quiet on my patio was even more painful than the display itself-silence and the drifting away of the smoke clouds into the night sky. Who wouldn't miss a place like the park, a place that offers to all (except me, now) a simulation of life designed to surpass the real thing. Losing it had made me almost angry enough to want to hurt somebody. But I'd be damned if I'd let Jeffrey know how I felt about these things.