Land of Shadows

by Rachel Howzell Hall

  Mom had made valiant attempts to end the friendship between Tori and Golden—like she had with Kimya and me. But Mom was always working, and so she had as much power as a light saber found in the discount bin at K-Mart.

  Hard living had taken its toll on the woman standing in the doorway of her apartment: blotchy skin, a stringy weave that had worn away her hairline, flabby arms with caked-on deodorant in hairy pits, and a perma-scowl that only Jesus could fix. But then, four kids ages two through twelve ran around in the filthy apartment. They were climbing on furniture with stuffing popping from its seams, watching music videos with half-naked video hoes wiggling fat asses in the camera lens, stomping on bags of Cheetos and Skittles, McDonald’s and Popeye’s, as far as the eye could see. And even though Golden had to be forty-three years old, her belly was swollen and the poor tired stork would soon arrive. Looked like Golden used birth control like I used Viagra—never.

  Hell, I’d scowl, too. And then I’d find a gun. Pop. One in the melon.

  Golden frowned at my badge. “Don’t tell me. JaVonte’s ass finally dead.” She said this as though I had just told her that she could save money on a new long-distance calling plan.

  I blinked. “I don’t know a JaVonte, ma’am.”

  She folded her arms. “Then it’s Kenyon? Ro-shaun?”

  “Are we talking about your children?”

  She rolled her eyes. “My baby daddies.”

  I said, “Ah,” then told her the reason for my visit.

  She suggested that we remain outside to talk. “Last time a cop came in, little Trey took his gun out his belt. Trey only six but he know his way ’round shit.” She said this with a glimmer of pride. Then she recited all that happened on that summer day in 1988: strolling down to the store, Tori being caught, her little sister Lulu running home.

  Lulu was standing in front of her—guess she didn’t recognize me, and after Napoleon Crase’s interview, I was fine with that. I had never liked Golden and had always felt like my guardian angel had abandoned me so that the Devil could drag both Golden and me to Hell.

  “I’m interested in what happened after Crase let her go,” I said, louder now since a stereo from another apartment began blasting Tejano music.

  “Me and Tori went off with these guys we knew,” Golden said. “We had just met one of them like the day before. We had sex with them at that park over by Dorsey High School. Man, that was a long time ago.” She laughed and shook her head. “Anyway, we went back to the store after that, to the parking lot. Tori and her guy, the new one, said they was driving to Baskin-Robbins for some ice cream.”

  “Ice cream. How wholesome. And then?”

  “That was the last time I saw that dude. Didn’t know something had happened until the next night when Kesha Tee called me.” She paused, then asked, “They ever find Tori?”

  “No,” I said and scribbled on the notepad. “What was the name of the guy you were with?”

  “Antonio Robinson,” she said. “He my oldest boy’s daddy. He in jail now. Tonio, not my son. Tonio always in jail. Like County got a rewards program.”

  I chuckled. “And the other guy? The one Tori was with. What’s his name?”

  She thought for a moment, then slowly shook her head. “I don’t remember his name. Like I said: that week was his first time he hung out with us. And the last time, too.”

  The apartment door flew open, and a girl of about fifteen stuck out her head and yelled, “Momma, Kobe busted his head open.”

  I moved faster than Golden into the apartment, being sure to first secure my gun.

  The living room smelled odd, uncommitted to just one type of stink. Pee, fried eggs, lilac air freshener, and a crappy diaper. The kids had turned off the television and were all huddled on the carpet around a two-year-old boy. Kobe’s chubby face was slick with tears, mucus, and a trickle of blood.

  Little Trey—I knew it was him because a barber had sheared LIL TREY into his hair—sidled closer to me.

  Golden took her time as she brought over a battered first-aid kit, its cover smudged with old bloody thumbprints. She yawned as though she carried a box of saltine crackers instead of lifesaving interventions. To baby Kobe she said, “Your momma gon’ kill me.”

  I paused. “Kobe’s not yours?”

  She crinkled her lips. “He one of my grandbabies.”

  Little Trey moved closer to me. “Hey, lady,” he said, his breath hot and wheezy. “Lady, what’s your name?”

  I ignored the boy and applied gauze soaked with witch hazel to Kobe’s forehead. The gash wasn’t deep, more blood than bite.

  “Hey, lady,” Little Trey said again. “Lady. You got a gun?”

  More pressure applied to Kobe’s forehead, a swipe of ointment, a bandage, and a pat on the boy’s back, and I was out the front door.

  Golden thanked me for cleaning up the toddler, then said, “I wish I could remember dude’s name. Oh, well.” And then, she closed the door. The volume on the television returned to normal, and Golden screamed, “You just as stupid as your goddamned, jailbird daddy.”

  Grandmas never run out of hugs or cookies, do they?

  52

  Colin would fill out the profile on Max Yates since we now knew he had done the Hustle at his school’s homecoming dance. And I would prepare for my Monday morning interview with Napoleon Crase. I called Pepe, and he agreed to roll past Crase’s Baldwin Hills home every now and then, just to make sure that my very special guest didn’t get a late-night hankering for empanadas in Argentina.

  Home was where I had left it a day and a half ago: a mile from an ocean I rarely visited. That would change, though. With the new developments in Tori’s case, I would soon have the bandwidth to let the sun shine in.

  I grabbed the phone from the kitchen charger and retreated to the sun deck. Someone in the neighborhood was barbecuing—smoke mixed with the salty air—and I decided to invite Syeeda and Lena over for grilled steaks and wine after talking with Greg.

  It was now early morning in Tokyo. My husband would just be waking up. He would find cartoons to watch on the television, then complete a hundred sit-ups and a hundred push-ups. He would then drag himself to the bathroom, shave and shower, then pull on a T-shirt and jeans. He would eat waffles and corned beef hash for breakfast.

  His line rang … rang …

  Worry reared its head.

  Maybe he’s with Michiko. Ha-ha.

  Worry didn’t think that my joke was funny and cocked an eyebrow.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, you,” I said to my husband.

  Worry’s eyebrow remained cocked.

  “Hey, you,” Greg said.

  Was it the connection or was he whispering?

  “Did I catch you at a bad time?” I asked.

  He didn’t speak at first, said, “Huh?,” and then, “No. I just got out of—”

  “Honey, you coming back into the shower?” That was not my question, nor was it my voice asking that question. Had Japan’s version of Just a Friend just asked my husband to fuckin’ wash her back?

  “Who the fuck you with?” I shouted, already knowing who the fuck he was with.

  I was pacing around the sun deck now, a starving cheetah ready to throw herself at a stupid hippo. Don’t remember half of what I said, but the bulk of words heard by Greg and my poor neighbors had been the four worst profanities in American English, including the dreaded C-word.

  “Calm the hell down, Elouise,” Greg warned. “I can explain—it’s not what it seems.”

  “There’s some great explanation about why another woman just asked if you, who she called honey, were coming back into the shower?” I screeched. “She just busted you out, asshole.”

  I pictured him wearing his black Calvin Klein boxer briefs, hunched over in bed, his bourbon-colored eyes squeezed shut, his hand on the washboard stomach he paid too much attention to as a married man.

  “She’s just an associate,” he said.

  “She designs pur
ses,” I spat. “How the hell is that associated with video games?”

  He had no answer. Because those two things? Purses and video games? Not associated.

  After we concluded our vicious shouting match, after he admitted to sleeping with Michiko Yurikami, after he shouted six times, “It didn’t mean anything, it didn’t mean anything,” I pressed End Call and collapsed in the chair. No more strength. No more resolve.

  That was it. No more.

  I loved him.

  I hated him.

  What if he meant it, that it didn’t mean anything?

  No. It meant something, it meant everything. My husband was a liar and the truth was not in him.

  The phone rang, but it wasn’t a pinball machine and I answered.

  “What’s up, lovely lady?” Lena said.

  I opened my mouth to speak and a sob broke from my chest.

  “Oh, crap,” she said. “Lou, what’s wrong?”

  I squeezed out, “Greg … gurgle-gurgle.”

  “I’m on my way,” Lena said.

  Maybe Greg’s affair was my fault. Being around me seemed to send people to far-off places where I’d never find them, emotionally or physically. Unlike Tori, though, I would not search for Greg, not this time. I would not beg him to be my love, beg him like I had begged my father to come back to me. Greg Norton would not break my heart. But then, he couldn’t break something that had been shattered years ago.

  53

  How can she afford to live in a fancy place like this?

  He sits on a park bench in the middle of Cielo. People perch at other benches and hunker over wrought-iron tables with their coffees, boxes of sushi, and copies of Fifty Shades of Grey. A jazz band plays “My Favorite Things” as the sun starts its descent behind the Pacific Ocean a mile away. And most important: her condo is right over there.

  He followed her home and parked down the block. In his rearview mirror, he watched as she eased the Porsche into the garage. Thinking about it now makes him simmer—as a taxpayer, he abhors seeing a public servant behind the wheel of a sports car.

  The band ends the song. A few people clap. Children splash in the fountain.

  Heaven.

  He takes a breath, exhales, breathes in, out, in …

  Something is wrong, very wrong, and in quiet moments like this, even when the spider is sleeping, he can smell it, taste it, see it.

  He doesn’t have much time.

  Stay cool. Keep it together. Be smart.

  But if he were being smart, he wouldn’t be here, at this place.

  At a bench across from him, a soccer mom in short-shorts and a tank top eyes him. Her son, a boy she calls Jack, is jumping off a lawn chair and into the shallow fountain.

  He yawns—women of a certain age bore him. They smell like slow-cooked pot roast and fading antiperspirant. They drive minivans and buy organic beets, fat-free yogurt, and firming creams. This one here needs to go home, redecorate her kitchen for the fifth time, and screw the UPS guy.

  The door to the detective’s sun deck opens and Elouise Norton steps out. Phone to ear, she looks beyond the courtyard where he sits. Her hands jab the air. She’s shouting into the phone.

  He wishes the band would can it with their jazzy Sound of Music selections just so he could hear. But they now play “So Long, Farewell,” and he can only wonder about the conversation Detective Norton is having.

  “You look familiar.” The soccer mom is now standing over him. This one smells of suntan lotion and coffee. A diamond pendant hangs in the cavern between her giant breasts. She flashes whitened and capped teeth, and asks, “Don’t you have a son that goes to WNS?”

  He blinks at her, annoyed. “What?” Why is she talking to him? And what the hell is WNS?

  Stay cool. Keep it together. Act … normal.

  He forces light into his expression and says, “No.” From the corner of his eye, he sees Detective Norton still pacing the sun deck like a madwoman.

  Soccer Mom says, “Oh,” and then chuckles. “You look really familiar.”

  Twenty years ago she would have been his type. Pretty. Racially ambiguous. A whore. Now, though …

  “Wish I could say yes.” He waggles his ring finger—he only wears the gold band on occasions like this.

  She peers at the ring but the flirtatious smile doesn’t dim. “You can say yes.” She bites her lip as little Jack pushes a girl half his size into the fountain. “I won’t tell if you won’t tell.”

  Desperate housewives, indeed.

  54

  After she sat bags of barbecue on the deck table, Lena poured me a glass of Riesling.

  In one gulp, I finished it and hiccupped.

  Syeeda sat in the Adirondack chair beside me and offered a tissue from the box on her lap.

  I shook my head—I wanted to feel the burn of tears against my skin. I wanted to feel the pain.

  Lena poured more wine for me, for her, and for Syeeda.

  “Are you surprised?” Syeeda finally asked.

  I muttered, “No,” and a tear plopped into my wineglass.

  Syeeda dabbed tissue against my face.

  “It still hurts,” I whispered. “I love him. I didn’t get married to…” I clamped my lips together—I couldn’t say that word. Had it come to that word? I drained the glass and hiccupped again.

  Lena sat a plate of ribs on my lap and this time poured cabernet sauvignon into my empty glass.

  I glanced at her. “You haven’t said anything.”

  She kicked off her snakeskin stilettos and settled into the chair with a glass of wine. “You know what I think. I told you after the second chick that he’d do it again. And he did it again. And now, he’s done it again after doing it again that time.”

  My eyes dropped to the plate. Just an hour before, I had craved barbecue, and now that I had it … Fucking Greg. Ruined everything. My desire for ribs. My quest for a fairy-tale ending. “It’s my fault,” I said. “I’m never—”

  “Don’t!” Syeeda shouted. “No! There’s no excuse for his behavior. Don’t let him do this, Lou.”

  “And stop ignoring all the bullshit,” Lena added.

  “I’m not,” I countered.

  Syeeda rolled her eyes.

  “I’m trying to weigh the pros and cons—”

  “Con,” Syeeda said, “he’s cheated on you more than once.”

  “Pro,” I shot, “he knows what I’ve been through.”

  “Con,” Lena said, “he knows what you’ve been through and he still cheated on you more than once.”

  “If he didn’t want to be married,” I said, “why hasn’t he pulled the trigger? If he wants to fuck around, why is he married?”

  “You need to ask him that,” Syeeda said.

  “I wasn’t there for him,” I argued. “I’m barely home. And even when I am home, my mind is—”

  “No, it’s not,” Lena snapped. “Not once have you come to this house with one of those effin’ … dead people folders. Not once has somebody’s momma called here to ask about her murdered son. You never left his side even when he screwed around on you. When he got laid off and didn’t know what he was gonna do, you were there for him and this is such bullshit that … that…” She hopped up from the seat, pacing and flapping her hands. “I’m three seconds from exploding and ruining my favorite pair of python Louboutins. That’s how ridiculous this is.”

  “And his hours weren’t nine to five, either,” Syeeda pointed out. “He worked just as crazy as you. Except when he was fucking around.”

  “Maybe you should’ve fooled around, too,” Lena muttered into her wineglass.

  “With the new guy,” Syeeda said. “Detective Funny Face.”

  Lena nodded. “Especially with Detective Funny Face. Want me to call him?”

  “Bang, bang, that’s dead,” I said.

  “Why?” Lena asked. “You’re a man, he’s a—”

  “Easy, there,” Syeeda said, taking Lena’s wineglass.

  “First,”
I said, “I’m married—”

  Lena gave that point a raspberry.

  “Second, I’m Colin’s superior and—” I gave my own raspberry. “And sixth—”

  “Third,” Syeeda corrected.

  “I ain’t got where I am, fightin’ the Man all this time, to have a … a…”

  “A sexy, forbidden liaison amoureuse?” Lena asked.

  “Exactly. And with a guy I wouldn’t date in any other situation. If he was freakin’ … freakin’…”

  “George Clooney,” Syeeda said.

  “Or … or…”

  “Harry Connick Jr.,” Lena said.

  Syeeda and I gaped at her.

  “He sings so pretty,” Lena said.

  “Then I’d be all over that,” I said. “Quicker than a tick on a dog.” I poked at a rib, tore away a chunk of meat, and ate it. “It’s good,” I said, chewing.

  Lena said, “Yeah.”

  “Elouise,” Syeeda said, “go ahead and cry. Go ahead and give up. You don’t have to be the tough cop all the time. You’ll be okay. We won’t leave you. Right, Lena?”

  Lena nodded. “Shoop shoop, my sista.”

  My phone, lost in the mess of barbecue bags and wine bottles, rang. Not pinballs but Darth Vader’s theme from Empire Strikes Back.

  “Who the hell is that?” I asked.

  “I thought Greg deserved a new ring tone,” Syeeda explained.

  Tears filled my eyes. “But I like Darth Vader.”

  “Shit, Sy,” Lena said, holding out the phone. “Change it before she melts.”

  Syeeda fumbled with the phone, which rang again—whooping Ewoks. She beamed. “Everyone hates Ewoks.” And the Ewoks whooped again. Syeeda glanced at the phone’s screen and held it out for me to take. “It’s Greg again. Wanna talk to your devoted son-of-a-bitch?”

  I stared at it, then shook my head.

  She tossed the ringing phone back into the trash.

  “Eleven years,” I said.

  “I’m sorry,” Syeeda whispered.

  Lena stroked my hair. “Désolée.”