The Unnoticeables

by Robert Brockway

  “Kaitlyn?” A skinny cop with pointy elbows poked his head out of the door at the far end of the room.

  I must have given some unconscious physical sign, because he had singled me out and was waving me over.

  Or maybe I was just the only logical “Kaitlyn” in the place: two old Mexican ladies, thick and bent into aged balls. A gigantic white dude with a two-foot beard and stars tattooed over both of his eyes. A homeless guy in intricate layers of stinking rags. A Latino kid dressed like a gangbanger, playing Mario Bros. on his phone. The rest of the age-cracked blue vinyl benches were empty. Looked like they always had been and always would be.

  I crossed the filthy white tile, holding my own private white-girl parade. All eyes on me as I self-consciously made my way to the door.

  “Room three, please.” The pointy kid gestured toward the far wall and vanished before I could ask any stupid questions.

  Which, to be fair, I was about to: Why a room? Like, interrogation room? Shouldn’t I be going to somebody’s office or desk? I was here to file a complaint.…

  But the rest of the office looked busy. The other cops were so aggressively avoiding eye contact that I thought I’d probably get tased just for coughing. I picked my way through the cluttered desks, every one overflowing with papers, fast food containers, half-full coffee cups, and knickknacks. Bobbleheads, action figures, and framed family photos in equal numbers.

  Room 3 was a plain white door. A giant faded-blue numeral stamped above the threshold. A fine patina of black smears from generations of shoes kicking angrily at its base.

  I knocked, and immediately felt dumb for it.

  “Come in!” a cheery voice said from the other side.

  I stepped into an unadorned room, the same shade of authoritative white as the door. Billions of little scratches and scuffs marred the hard white plastic furniture. An older man, in his fifties maybe, sat in one of four chairs surrounding a table that had been bolted to the floor. A mirror lined the wall to my left. There was another, unmarked door a few feet away from the one I was uncertainly standing in. So two-way glass, then.

  No, seriously. Why are you in an interrogation room?

  I pushed the thought aside. I had seen the crowded desks when I was coming in. It was probably too cluttered to meet out there. Or maybe this was standard protocol. Or maybe they just sent me to the wrong place. That was likely it: There was already a guy waiting in this room, and he sure didn’t look like a cop.

  He was chubby, carrying most of the weight in his gut and sides. An ill-fitting T-shirt with a faded iron-on photo barely covered his bulk. I squinted. The design was shattered like glass, riddled with little cracks and missing pieces that had come off over uncountable washes. The photo was of a vaguely attractive group of young people smiling up from a couch. There were nearly illegible words stamped above it: PARTY OF FIVE.

  Yeah, so … not a cop.

  If the attire didn’t give it away, his wild, bulging eyes and nervous smile would have.

  Jesus Christ, did they send me to a room with a child molester?

  “More the merrier!” he cackled, and drummed excitedly on his own thighs.

  No, surely they would have him in handcuffs or something if he was a criminal. The door wasn’t even locked.

  “What is—” I started, but somebody harrumphed behind me.

  I turned to find a police officer waving me forward with a handful of plain beige folders. He waved me all the way inside the room and then down into the chair beside Party of Five guy without saying a word. The officer settled, grumbling and creaking all the while, into a much nicer chair across from us. He opened the folders, placed them in front of our respective positions, and stared at each of us in turn.

  When I finally had enough of the silence, I opened my mouth to speak.

  “You’ve both filed complaints,” he finally began. He was just waiting to cut one of us off before doing it.

  “You”—he locked eyes with Party of Five guy—“Mr. Fennsen, have alleged that one Matthew Fox has repeatedly attempted to do you bodily harm and even forthright stated his intent to take away your life. Is this correct?”

  “Yes, absolutely.” Fennsen nodded solemnly, his manic energy temporarily subdued. “He hid in my toolshed yesterday and threatened to chop my Johnson off unless I stayed away from my girlfriend, Jennifer.”

  “Now, to be clear,” the cop said, “we are talking about Matthew Fox, the actor. Who played Jack, from the television show Lost.”

  “I don’t know about any of that.” Fennsen giggled. “But yes, the actor who played Charlie Salinger on the excellent Party of Five.”

  Fennsen swiveled to face me with googly eyes and pointed at his shirt.

  “And to be clear again, Jennifer, your girlfriend, is referring to Jennifer Love Hewitt.”

  “My little Sarah Bear, yes.”

  Oh, shit. I just understood why they had me in here.

  “Wait—” I said, leaning forward, “I think there’s been a misund—”

  “Ma’am, please. We’ll get to your complaints in a moment. Let me finish with Mr. Fennsen. Now, sir”—the officer slowly flipped some pages until he found the information he was looking for—“last month you were in here alleging that Mr. Fox had the water company cut off service to you.”

  “The bastard!” Fennsen spat and sniffled.

  “And the month before that, you alleged that Mr. Fox had abducted your girlfriend, Jennifer Love Hewitt, and was keeping her in a—and I quote—‘rape garage,’ until you went on live television and renounced your love for her.”

  “That is correct,” Fennsen confirmed. He shifted around in his chair, writhing and wriggling his hips. “But they wouldn’t let me on Channel Six. For all I know she’s still trapped there!”

  “Mr. Fennsen, you are aware that Ms. Love Hewitt has had a civil harassment restraining order filed against you for several years now.”

  “It’s Fox! He poisoned her against me!” Fennsen squealed. He gripped the legs of his jeans in panicked, twisting hands.

  “Sir, you are not allowed within one hundred yards of Ms. Love Hewitt at any time,” the officer droned.

  “I know!” Fennsen said, “I haven’t! I stayed away, I promised! But Charlie is tormenting me! He stole my garden hose and whipped me with it! I’ll show you!”

  Fennsen got to his feet, knocking his chair over, and started ripping his pants off. He tore open the button and yanked down the fly but couldn’t get past the belt, which, in his desperation, he had forgotten to undo.

  “Sir, please sit, sir! SIT DOWN.”

  The officer came around the table, audibly groaning from the effort of standing. He twisted Fennsen’s arms behind him, secured his wrists together somehow, and then sat him down on the floor. I saw that Fennsen was not wearing underwear. I turned away as fast as I could.

  The officer took his seat again, his knees crackling like Chinese fireworks.

  Fennsen was wheezing from the struggle but otherwise quiet. I got the feeling this was a routine occurrence for both men.

  “Now, ma’am”—the officer closed the other folder and turned to face the one placed in front of me—“you allege that Mr. Luis has been making untoward advances on your person, is that correct?”

  “Yes, but I’m not crazy!” I said, and immediately regretted it. Somehow acknowledging the word aloud made me seem crazier than if I’d just sat here like Fennsen and solemnly confirmed the charges.

  “Nobody says you are, ma’am,” the cop said. He scanned down the page and put his fingertip on some bit of information there. “You state that you met Mr. Luis at a social gathering last week, where he made threatening remarks and attempted to take physical liberties with you.”

  “Yes.” I opted for Fennsen’s stoic, official demeanor.

  “Then Mr. Luis showed up at your place of work and continued with his threatening remarks.”

  “Yes.”

  “And finally, he broke into your home last ni
ght and threatened you with rape and other physical harm.”

  I paused. The other charges were technically true: I was just leaving out the weird parts. The cops would never help me if I insisted that Marco Luis put some kind of life-draining organ into me and threatened me with sexually transmitted nothingness. But forcing himself on me in his car after a party, showing up at my work—that’s standard crazy-boyfriend stuff. Totally believable. Last night, though, I had no proof any of that actually happened. The doors and windows were locked, barred, and unbroken. I knew it was real, of course, but …

  “Ma’am, is that correct?”

  “Yes,” I said, “sort of. I never actually saw him, only spoke to him.”

  “But he did force entry into your home?”

  “Well, no. I think … I think he was outside the window at the time,” I lied. But if they checked for signs of a break-in and found nothing?

  “You ‘think’?”

  “It was very dark. I only heard him speak. I know how this looks.” I turned and gestured behind me to Fensenn. He looked to be trying to masturbate himself with his feet. He was, of course, failing. He was nowhere near flexible enough. I snapped back to face the cop so quickly I think I pinched a nerve in my neck.

  “And do you have others who have witnessed any of this behavior?” the officer said.

  “No, I…” I thought of Carey. Yes, officer, an old alcoholic, homeless punk who takes my recycling believes me. “No, I was alone.”

  “Ma’am, I’m very sorry, but this is Los Angeles. We get a lot of complaints about a lot of celebrities.” The officer’s eyes roved to Fennsen. I heard a squicking sound. I opted not to follow his gaze. “Without witnesses, we simply cannot take any action here.”

  I felt the floor drop away from me. Cold waves broke across my skin.

  “Please, he’s insane.” I knew the desperation made me sound worse, but I couldn’t help myself.

  “Further—” the officer began, but something had uncorked in me now, and words came spilling out.

  “I can’t stop him! There’s something wrong with his brain. I think he hurt my friend!”

  “Furthermore,” the officer asserted now, more forcefully, “our records show that Mr. Luis has already taken a restraining order out against you.”

  “I—what?” I think I physically reeled. I felt myself tip backward in my chair.

  “You are not allowed within one hundred yards of Mr. Luis at any time. You are not allowed to contact Mr. Luis by phone, mail, electronic communication, or other means.” The cop was dully reciting from the information beneath his fingertip.

  “That’s impossible,” I said. “He must have known I would report him after last night and—”

  “Ma’am.” The officer sighed. He pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation. “This order was filed over six months ago.”

  I tried to push sounds out of my throat. Tried to explain somehow—if not to the cop, then at least to myself—but nothing came.

  The policeman fidgeted and began to close the file.

  “That’s impossible,” I finally said. “I only met him two nights ago. At a party.”

  “We have several witnesses that confirm you have shown up on Mr. Luis’s property, uninvited, on many occasions. That you have … let’s see…” The cop flipped my folder out again on the table. He shuffled back a few pages and read: “… that you have ‘stolen his mail and other personal belongings, have vandalized his vehicle, have made personal threats to his wife and child—’”

  Jesus Christ. He has a wife? A kid?

  “‘… have, on more than one occasion, tried to blackmail him with rape charges if he did not agree to impregnate you—’”

  “What the fuck?” I moved to snatch the folder away from the officer, but he slammed his hand down atop mine and stood.

  “Ma’am, I understand that you may be mentally imbalanced and not entirely aware of reality as it stands—”

  “No!” I stood now, too, and yanked my hand back. “He’s a psycho! He’s deranged! He threatened to hollow me out; he tried to poison me; he can get into my house no matter how many locks I have! You have to help me! He must have paid somebody here, falsified the report—”

  “Ma’am.” The officer held up a finger to silence me.

  He collected the files and composed himself carefully. When he spoke again, it was calm, even, and angry: “I took that report personally. I remember Mr. Luis. My granddaughter loves his work. I asked him for his autograph. Nice guy. He took a picture with me, for her. So I’m only going to tell you this once: Do not come in here again. Do not waste the time of this city’s police force. And do not, under any circumstances, attempt to violate the order of restraint filed against you. Confused folks, people like you and Mr. Fennsen here—”

  “Hey,” Fennsen protested, trying to wiggle his genitals free of his still-belted but otherwise undone jeans, “don’t involve me with this. That bitch is crazy.”

  The cop actually laughed, just once, before opening the door and waddling out of the interrogation room.

  No. I will not accept this.

  I stormed out after the policeman, ready to grab him, scream in his face if I had to; I didn’t care what they thought of me. But if Marco had Jackie …

  He wasn’t there.

  The man had left the room not one step ahead of me, but I looked around the office and saw only strangers in crisp blue uniforms. He had to be standing right in front of me. There was nowhere else to go. He was one of these cops here, leaning on their desks or hunched over their papers. He was …

  He was a big guy. Old. Maybe a mustache. Right? I tried to picture him but could only think of that bald guy from NYPD Blue.

  I was just looking at him. Why couldn’t I remember his face?

  * * *

  Wednesday night, 6:30 P.M.

  I was sitting on the edge of my couch, holding my blinds apart with one hand, while the other nervously flicked a Cobra open and closed. I watched the recycling cans.

  I couldn’t believe it had only been two days since I first talked to Carey. He swore he knew what was happening to me, and I have no idea why I believed him. I’m not entirely sure I did, actually—but I couldn’t think of anybody else that would even listen to me right now, much less offer any kind of explanation.

  And if the old guy turned out to be crazy, well, that’s what the Cobra was for: a telescoping baton comprised of seven inches of dense, hardened steel that, with the flick of a wrist, fluidly extends out to a sixteen-inch hybrid of a blackjack and a spring-coil whip.

  It slides out like wet soap. To close it, you flex the shaft while pushing in and down. I don’t know what psychological mechanism the repeated opening and closing of it was exploiting inside of me, but the action was intensely satisfying.

  With the right permits, you can carry a gun pretty much anywhere in California. But Cobras are straight-up illegal.

  I felt much better holding it than the misogynistic devil-girl Mace. I had to dig through my spider-infested outdoor storage for half an hour to find the Cobra. My ex-boyfriend Dean gave it to me after I had a bad scare while out on a jog one night. Some guy with cracked lips and bloodshot eyes tried to drag me into the bushes on one of my laps around the hospital by my apartment. I broke free, ran half a block, then turned around and stormed back. I stomped on his balls until he passed out.

  It was a very stupid thing to do, in retrospect.

  But it felt amazing.

  I nervously flicked the Cobra out. Tapped it on my running shoe. Pressed it against the wall and slid it closed. Flick, tap, close.

  Every time a homeless person wandered down the alley beside my apartment, my heart skipped a beat. I’ve never noticed it before, but there are a surprising amount of homeless people milling about my neighborhood on garbage-day eve. It was like watching a migration on one of those National Geographic shows.

  Yes, Kaitlyn. They’re just like animals. Jesus Christ, what kind of thinking is that
?

  A hunched shape approached.

  Flick.

  It glanced at the recycling, started to move toward it.

  Tap.

  It looked around nervously, and I got a glimpse: younger woman, bundled up in a parka. She seemed to reconsider.

  Close.

  I waited through three more false positives before I finally caught the silhouetted spiked shoulders of Carey’s jacket. He sauntered up confidently, a kind of old-school Mick Jagger cockiness in his walk. With equal arrogance, he bent and started rummaging through my garbage.

  Am I really going to go out there? Talk to an old, drunk, almost certainly crazy homeless dude because he pinky-swore to believe my own insanity?

  The argument was apparently moot. My body was already making the decision. Hand on the knob, deep breath, and out into the surf-and-trash-scented L.A. night. Carey was gently humming to himself as he tossed cans and bottles into a garbage bag.

  “Hey,” I said.

  I wished I had a more appropriate opener.

  Hey, so you wanna chat about the inhuman monsters stalking me now, or what? Totally! Let’s keep it casual.

  Carey grunted and looked up, then spotted the Cobra in my right hand. When closed, the baton just looks like the broken handle of a jump rope, or maybe a light dumbbell. Most people wouldn’t have a clue it was a weapon. Carey knew it immediately.

  He held his hands up in the air, dropping a bottle of Mountain Dew in feigned terror.

  “Take whatever you want,” he said shakily, “I’ve got a few empty beers, a half rack of Coke Zero, and I think there’s even a Faygo in there somewhere. Just don’t ruin my pretty face!”

  I forced a laugh, but the more I looked at his sideways nose, squinty eyes, and cracked skin, the funnier it got. I managed a genuine chuckle; it was the first time I’d laughed since Jackie went missing.

  “You look like you’ve been wearing shit glasses,” Carey said, spotting my eye.

  “Thanks, just what a girl likes to hear. Burst a blood vessel.”

  “So, this probably means you want to hear more,” he said, and let the lid of the can swing shut. He stashed his recycling bag between it and the wall of my apartment building.