by Peter Plate
THREE
San Francisco squats on forty-seven square miles of foggy peninsula in the Pacific Ocean. The town has the highest population density of any burg west of the Mississippi. Cantonese, Mandarin, Spanish, and Tagalog are spoken in the streets more than English.
Christmas is always hot. There’s never any snow or cold winds. In a city with fewer children than anywhere else in the country, the holidays are a crapshoot. Killings are frequent. So are hit-and-run accidents and heroin overdoses.
The heat wave had turned Market Street into a savage god. There was no shade, not a sliver of it. Pedestrians floated over the sidewalks, their heads bowed in worship to the unholy sun. A shoot-out by the Thai restaurant at Sixth and Market had left one fatality. The dead man’s corpse was left to bake on the curb for three hours because the coroner’s wagon couldn’t get through the traffic—fire engines were battling a three-alarm blaze at a tenement on Jones Street.
The tourist information center in Hallidie Plaza at the Powell and Market cable car turnaround was overrun with nickel bag dealers, hookers, and evangelical preachers. A needle exchange worker handed out packets of bleach and rubbers to the junkies by the Gap store. A blind man in the BART hole belted out gospel.
The intersection of Market and Van Ness was a tableau of SRO residential hotels, fast-food joints, emptied-out storefronts, a Honda dealership, the Bank of America building, a Rite Aid drugstore, nouveau-retro furniture shops, liquor stores, and more winos than sand at the beach. Two homeless men panhandled in front of a café. Commuters queued at the trolley car stop.
The Greyhound bus was mired in traffic on Van Ness. Twisting in his seat, Robert Grogan looked out the rear window. A rundown warehouse next to the Honda showroom on Twelfth Street, half visible in the superheated midafternoon haze, caught his eye. The industrial structure had barred and tinted windows. Its chipped brick walls were emblazoned with spray painted gang graffiti. A sunburned Christmas wreath hung from the rusting steel-plated security gate. A phlegmatic surveillance camera was posted above the eaves. A sign on the door read: Parole Unit Number Four.
Robert whistled under his breath. Fucking hell. Seeing that place was a curse. Ex-cons reported there and never came out—they became lost in a jungle of atonement. Closing his eyes, he fretted. What if he were arrested at Christmas, had his parole revoked, and was sent back to prison? You’re scared now, he told himself. This isn’t shit. Just wait until Slatts gets here. That’s when things will get weird.
Someone on the bus had a boom box. It was playing an Etta James cassette. The singer wailed her guts out to “I’d Rather Go Blind.”
Rounding the corner onto Market Street, the Greyhound sailed downtown.
The interior of the parole unit was a maze of spic-and-span offices. Red and blue holiday lights were strung from the ceiling. The air conditioning was going full blast. An anorexic green plastic Christmas tree stood sentry next to the restrooms. The Peggy Lee classic “Fever” was on the sound system.
Senior agent Athena Diggs was anchored at a military surplus desk in her cubicle, poring over the day’s caseload. She sported a floor-length maroon silk caftan with enough bracelets and bangles on her arms and wrists to supply a belly-dancing troupe. A mushroom cloud auburn Afro framed her chiseled ebony black features. Open-toe leatherette sandals graced her pedicured feet.
She’d been assigned a couple of new jackets. Two white dudes from San Quentin. One had just been released. The other was pending. Like she wasn’t working hard enough already. Removing the convicts’ mug shots from the files, she had a look at their pictures. White boys were paroling out of the joint in bigger numbers than a plague of locusts. Many of them were ganged up—had joined the Nazi Lowriders or the Aryan Brotherhood. Typical profile: first-time offender and public school dropout from a town with a high unemployment rate.
The guy in the first photo had no hair, a big nose, well-formed ears, a defiant mouth, and ashy skin. His eyes were two brown whirlpools of confusion. His chin was larger than a boat’s prow. His jaw line was pugnacious, indicating belligerence. He mocked the camera, as if he were dueling with it. Daring it to catch him. She double-checked his moniker. Robert Grogan. Born in the Tenderloin. Didn’t know his mother or father. Was raised by his maternal grandparents in the Richmond district. Contracted tuberculosis as a child and was placed in a sanitarium to recuperate. At sixteen blew off two fingers on his left hand with a stick of dynamite. Had done three years for weapons.
She took an instant dislike to him. It wasn’t hard. That face of his—it was a foreign planet. Nowhere you’d want to visit. Athena’s take on him was instinctive. He was the type of fast-talking punk that would put a trick bag on her. He’d never keep his appointments. Never see his counselors. Never take his meds. Never submit to urine tests.
The second mug shot belonged to a penny-ante dope dealer, a twenty-year-old two-time loser named Slatts Calhoun. His file indicated no family. Both of his felonies were for marijuana sales. His innocent face with the teardrop inked under the left eye was remarkable for its lack of scars. That alone set him apart from the rest of the mob. Convicts were always scarred up. He possessed luxurious blonde hair, a model’s bones, and a flawless, tight-pored complexion. It made him suspect in her book. He was too handsome for his own good. He would need disciplining.
A mug shot was the key to a man’s spirit. It was a portal into his inner nature. It was an X-ray of his soul. The eyes were the giveaway. A convict’s eyes were ferryboats over the waters of limbo. In every batch of parolees, there were a few bad apples. It was the law of gravity. It was the devil’s handiwork. Like Robert Grogan and Slatts Calhoun.
Putting down the files, Athena sighed. There had been a time in her life when she would’ve laughed at the thought of becoming a parole officer. It was the last thing she ever expected to do. The only consolation she got these days was in her plot at the community garden on Twenty-fifth and Potrero. It was a lovely patch of turnips, parsnips, potatoes, and squash.
On the spot, she made a decision about Robert Grogan. He had twenty-four hours to report to her. If he failed to show up and went on the lam—which she expected—his ass would be shipped back to the penitentiary.
FOUR
A weatherman from the local evangelical AM radio station attributed the heat wave to the city’s sins. The high temperatures were machinations of the devil. Only Jesus Christ could stop the heat. Listeners were asked to pray for rain.
At the bus station on First and Mission the lazy wind did a mazurka with the sidewalk’s trash. A dozen sea gulls loitered at the curb. A band of homeless guys corralled their shopping carts in the parking lot. The custodian was sweeping the doorway with a broom. The clerk in the ticket booth played Christmas jazz on a tape machine.
Harriet Grogan leaned against the soft drink machine in the lobby, styling a madras cotton shift and low-heeled yellow patent-leather mules. A pea green ribbon held her ash blonde hair in a lank ponytail. A dab of mascara and a touch of scarlet lipstick accented her deep-set brown eyes and generous mouth. She had waxed her slender legs to celebrate Robert’s homecoming.
She’d been a prison widow for three years, one eighth of her life so far, which was no victory, especially at her age. The only good thing about it was Robert had been in San Quentin. A visit was just a short ride over the Golden Gate Bridge. It didn’t cost much. Which had been a break. Most pens in California were hundreds of miles from any city.
Pelican Bay State Prison was the bottom of the barrel. The maximum-security penitentiary was in the boondocks near the Oregon border. Greyhound had discontinued its bus routes into the area. It took a week to get there.
Her counselor at the Haight-Ashbury Psychological Services Center on Hayes Street said she and Robert were codependent. That was the word the shrink used. Codependent. Made it sound like an infection. Which wasn’t far from the truth. Harriet had tested positive for tuberculosis because of Robert. Her mother was on the warpath about him. “Your h
usband is a goddamn loser,” she claimed. “Drop him and move on before it’s too late.”
Maybe she’d do that and maybe she wouldn’t. It wasn’t like she hadn’t thought of divorcing Robert’s ass. It had crossed her mind more than a million times. For now, Harriet didn’t know what to do. That depended on him.
A tiny girl in an oversized Brown University sweatshirt, cut-off jeans, and sneakers looked up at Harriet and blinked twice. Her round knees were knobby and scraped raw. Her almond-shaped eyes were the color of muddy water. Her blank white face was painted with freckles. Her straight flaxen hair was shaved to the scalp. She chirped, “Mommy?”
Harriet studied the child, taking in her sharp features. Diana looked just like her father. Had the same bad posture, shifty eyes, and penal paleness, and the same ornery vibe. She’d been doing poorly at school. Lagging behind her classmates in reading and writing. Fighting with the teachers. If Harriet ever dumped Robert, the kid was going with him. “What is it, babykins?”
“Is Daddy coming soon?”
“Any minute.”
“Is he going to be nice?”
All nerves, Harriet searched her purse for a breath mint. “I can’t say.”
“Why not?”
“Because he’s a strange motherfucker.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we’ll just have to wait and see what he does.”
The bus from San Rafael thundered into the parking lot. The coach docked at a bay, and a string of passengers disembarked. First to emerge was a group of teenage mothers and their kids. Following them was a gaggle of Boy Scouts. Then came two longhaired bums with backpacks. Clutching his pillowcase, Robert brought up the rear.
He was in a white Hanes T-shirt and battered engineer boots, Ben Davis jeans and a motorcycle chain belt. A rumpled orange and blue polyester ski jacket was over his bony shoulders. Imitation Ray-Ban sunglasses were perched on his skinned head. Tooling through the lobby to Harriet and the kid, he planted a kiss on his wife’s cheek. “Merry Christmas, baby.”
She threw her arms around his waist and squeezed tight. “You glad to see me, daddy?”
He saw no reason to lie. Not yet. That would come later. As if it were raining buckets. He dropped the pillowcase at her feet. “Yeah, honey, I am.”
“Swear on it?”
For the second time in twenty-four hours somebody was asking Robert to take an oath. First Slatts and now Harriet. He wasn’t hip to it. It was an omen. It signified that certain people he was intimate with didn’t trust him. Kissing her again, now on the mouth, he said, “Cross my heart and hope to die.”
Robert reflected on the promise he’d made to Slatts. His boyfriend was getting out of the clink in fourteen days. Which was way too soon. It wasn’t enough time for him to get organized. How was he going to tell his wife about their affair? He didn’t know. Robert was diving into uncharted waters, and it scared the tarnation out of him.
Harriet plucked at his sleeve. “I want to reintroduce you to somebody.” The wind toyed with her ponytail and made it swish back and forth on her shoulders. She nudged the girl forward, presenting her to Robert. “This is your daughter. The fruit of your loins. Do you remember her?”
He was horrified. His old lady was a real comedian. She was funny enough to have her own show on television. Just because he hadn’t been around the kid for three years, didn’t mean he’d forgotten about her. “Yeah, I remember everything.”
“She just had her seventh birthday. I guess you remember that, too.”
The public address system in the Greyhound station announced the departure of a bus, an express to Reno. Beads of sweat glittered on Robert’s pate. He stared at the kid—she was no taller than his belt buckle—and saw a mirror of his own mug. She was his spitting image. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. A shiver ran the length of his spine. He had a hunch about Christmas. Much as he dreaded the holiday, it was a chance to bond with his wife and child, to be a husband and father to them. Then he had a fearful thought—Slatts wouldn’t cotton to it.
FIVE
The Trinity Plaza Apartments was a 377-unit building at the corner of Eighth and Market, a memento to Cold War architecture with a flat roof and functional Bauhaus lines. The tenants were retirees, restaurant and laundry workers, single moms on the dole, and low-end office employees. Typical of many older dwellings on Market Street, the complex was slated for demolition in January.
Harriet and Robert’s one-bedroom apartment was on the second floor. The living room was furnished with mustard-colored shag carpeting, a Sears and Roebuck couch upholstered in gray vinyl, a glass coffee table with brass legs, and a portable television. The kitchen had a four-burner gas stove, a self-defrosting refrigerator, a yellow formica-topped dining table, and four chairs. The balcony overlooked the UN Plaza, the Orpheum Theater, and the public library.
The parking lot at the Trinity Plaza Apartments was a graveyard of vehicles and dunes of trash bags. The buckled asphalt was littered with broken glass. In the center of it was Robert’s ride, a secondhand two-tone Hillman sedan. The car’s gray and red paint job glowered in the smog-encrusted sunlight.
In the afternoon Robert curled up on the living room couch with Harriet. The window shades were drawn. The air conditioner struggled against the heat. Robert had the parole lady’s number in his pocket, but a force field of lethargy stopped him from calling her. He just couldn’t get himself to do it. He had no energy. It was too damn hot. Talking to that broad could wait.
He explained his strategy to Harriet. “Now that I’m out of the joint, I plan to stay away from the police and the criminal element. I’ve turned over a new leaf.” Done with his speech, he asked for her approval. “What do you say to that?”
Parole was akin to reentering the stratosphere after being in deep space. There were several dimensions to it. There were the traps the cops placed in a felon’s path, hoping that he’d self-destruct. Then there was the process of getting reacquainted with one’s spouse. Either way, a dude couldn’t afford to make any mistakes.
Harriet held his hand and wondered when she and Robert were going to have sex again. It had been thirty-six months. She was concerned. “I hope so, daddy.”
A couple of hours later, Robert Grogan was steering the sedan east on Market toward the piers at the Embarcadero. A platinum moon hovered over Market Street. It welled above the fog and the heat and backlighted the Golden Gate Theater against a blue velvet sky. Half the storefronts between the Burger King on Eighth Street and Hallidie Plaza were abandoned. The shoe store at Sixth and Market was gutted. Merrill’s drugstore was closed down. Play Fascination had shuttered its doors. The St. Francis Theater was boarded up. Spear points of fog drifted offshore from Rincon Hill into the bay.
Robert had an open can of beer between his legs, driving with his right hand on the wheel and smoking a cigarette with his bad hand. Harriet was riding shotgun; her hair was pulled back in pigtails. Their daughter was in the backseat wearing tennis shorts and a Ramones T-shirt. Robert looked at her in the rearview mirror and did a double take. The brat had the grill of a hardened convict, colder than the bore of a sawed-off shotgun. Her eyes were ancient. She intercepted his gaze and flipped him the bird. He asked Harriet, nodding at the kid, “How come she has a shaved head?”
Harriet shrugged. “It’s what she wants. To be just like you.”
“Is she a tomboy?”
“Why don’t you ask her?”
“Because she ain’t talking to me.”
The floor in the backseat was piled high with weapons—a pump-action Mossberg shotgun, a bolt-action Winchester 30-06, and a Browning semiautomatic rifle. Robert had gotten his rifles from storage and put them in the car. Guns were his first love, hunting his vocation.
He hung a right and followed Third Street over the Lefty O’Doul Bridge, past the Mariposa Yacht Club, the dry docks in India Basin, and the nightclubs at Mission Rock. He drove south beyond the abandoned Potrero Hill police stat
ion, the pump house at Islais Creek, the post office in Bayview, the Hunters Point housing projects, and the Cow Palace.
A mile outside the city’s limits, he pulled the sedan off the road near the Southern Pacific rail yard. Lights stretched from Visitacion Valley over to Mount Davidson. The control towers at the international airport scintillated on the shoreline. The San Mateo Bridge was luminous with car headlights. Over the water the burgs of Fremont and Hayward were penciled yellow in the fog.
The faint grooves of a dirt track on the eastern slope of San Bruno Mountain were visible in the moonlight. Robert chased the trail to the mount’s bald crest. Off to the west Fort Funston’s ramparts and the streets of suburban Daly City were coated in mist. The ocean surf boomed under the bluffs for miles. At the top of the hill he shut off the ignition and let the sedan coast to a stop in a fallow cow pasture.
It occurred to Harriet that he was up to no good. “What are you doing? I thought you were taking us somewhere pleasant.”
Robert sat motionless behind the driver’s wheel. The salty air made him giddy, mad with glee. Prison hadn’t smelled this good. For a long time nothing had. Not even Slatts. He intoned, “There’s deer out here, babe. Millions of them.”
His wife wasn’t getting it. “What are you talking about?”
“You heard me. Deer.”
“Deer?”
“That’s right. They’re going to come out and nibble on the straw in this field. When they do, I’m going to get me one and shoot its ass.”
Harriet was skeptical. “The deer in these parts are dead. This is San Francisco.”
He rebuked her. “You forget you’re talking to a professional.” Her husband’s coarse skin was oily and prison pale; his brown eyes were electric in their sockets. “I can conjure up a deer. Just watch me.”
