The Last Breath

by Danny Lopez

  He turned to face me.

  “You think anyone would want to hurt him?”

  “Liam?” He snorted and tossed his head back a little. “Fuck no. Liam was boss, brah. Like with everyone. I can’t imagine—” Then he paused and stared at me like he’d just figured something out. “You think someone killed him?”

  “No.” I forced a smile. “I’m just checking.”

  He shook his head and started back to the front of the house.

  I followed. “It’s just that he was a good swimmer, right? They say he was out kayaking on the Intracoastal,” I said. “I don’t really see how that could happen. I mean how does that happen? Water’s calm. He’s on a kayak.”

  “Dunno, brah. But I guess shit happens.” He gathered the bungees from the roof rack and tossed them across the front seat to the passenger side of the SUV.

  I tried to focus, think of questions, of what I needed, but it was all getting away from me too quickly. The back of my head throbbed, throwing me off. I just wanted to close my eyes and sleep it off.

  “Was he living on his father’s dime?”

  Keith laughed. “No way, brah. Liam was indy all the way. Besides, those two didn’t get along.”

  “Really?”

  He seemed to consider this for a moment. Then he said, “It’s not as if he talked shit about him or nothin’, but you could just tell, you know?” He moved his hands in front of him as if he were caressing a bowling a ball. “Like there was a vibe. You just knew …”

  “I understand.”

  Keith tossed his head to the side, squinted at me. “Yeah, just a vibe, brah. Like he had a chip on his shoulder about the old man.”

  “Did you ever meet him?”

  “The old man? Can’t say I had the pleasure.”

  He opened the door to his truck. The sign on the door read: Sun n’ Surf Adventure Kayak Rental.

  “Wait a second.” I pointed at the sign on the door. “Why’d you borrow Liam’s kayak if you …”

  He stepped back and glanced at the sign, then ran his hand over his golden locks. “That’s business, brah. I had a friend working my gig while I was away. Matter fact, gotta book and pick up my boards.”

  “Is there anything else you could tell me about him?”

  He lowered his head, moved his bare foot lightly over the crushed shells. “I dunno. Liam, man. He was … he was cool.” He raised his eyes at me and smiled, tapped his chest with the side of his fist. “Open hearted. Like with everyone.”

  He hopped in the Land Cruiser and shut the door. He stared ahead for a moment. Then he said, “All the good ones die young.”

  He started the engine. John Fogerty’s voice screamed out of the speakers. He backed out onto Midnight Pass Road, then lowered the volume on the stereo and leaned across the passenger side. “Yo, brah, can you do me a solid? If you see Jaybird, tell him to swing by Turtle Beach tomorrow so we can toast Liam. Give him a proper good-bye.”

  “Who’s Jaybird?”

  “Jaybird, brah. Everyone knows Jaybird. Dude leads the drum circle at Siesta Beach.”

  CHAPTER 5

  THE SIESTA BEACH drum circle happened every Sunday at sunset. What had started as a casual gathering of beach bums and hippies over twenty years ago was now a huge beach party with a bunch of rules about participating, reserving a place, or entering the circle, and taking photos. Just as with everything else in this town, the fun had been sucked out of something nice.

  Today was Tuesday. I wasn’t sure what I would find. I pulled up to a space in the middle of the Siesta Public Beach parking lot. The sun had not yet reached the horizon but was already painting the distant storm clouds gold and stretching shadows over the powder white sand across the beach. I could hear faint drumming in the distance, sporadic, disorganized.

  I was still fuzzy in the head as I walked along the wide stretch of beach. It was insufferably hot. People were still out, mostly couples and older people walking for exercise, wading in the shallows, lying on towels. A flock of seagulls stood together, all of them facing the same direction like soldiers.

  Farther to the north, a dozen drummers formed a crescent facing the sun and ocean to the west. In front of them, a handful of dancers hopped and swayed and gyrated to the disjointed rhythms. It was nothing like the giant Sunday drum circle. This gathering was just a small contingent of diehard hippies doing their thing. Felt nice. Like in the old days.

  People paused to watch, many holding their beach chairs and umbrellas, then moved on toward the parking lot.

  There was at least an hour before sunset. And at the moment, the sun was half-hidden behind heavy storm clouds. It was raining to the north of us.

  Men and women danced around like flower children, free-flowing hair, light cotton skirts and beads, waving and playing with hoola-hoops like they were at a Grateful Dead concert. A couple of young guys danced in place, their eyes closed. A mild breeze blew. I got a sweet whiff of marijuana.

  I watched a young woman dancing alone. She had a nice tan and dark long hair and wore a colorful Indian skirt and a bikini top. She moved close to the drummers, smiling at them and gesturing as if her movements were having a conversation with their drumming.

  My head still throbbed from that vicious blow. And the drumming wasn’t helping. I tried hard to focus, take inventory of everything Keith had told me. And the silver Range Rover that had been parked in the driveway. I had to remember that. I had to remember a lot of things. But what I really wanted was to walk away and go home, lie down in the air-conditioning and sleep.

  The young woman I had been keeping an eye on stopped dancing and approached one of the drummers. They talked for a couple of minutes, laughed. She touched his scruffy goatee and then walked off to the side of the circle where a few bags and shoes lay in a pile on the sand. She opened a cooler and pulled out a plastic bottle of water.

  I walked around the circle to where she was. “Nice dancing.”

  She looked at me while she drank. “Thanks.” She closed the bottle and put it in a hemp bag, then tossed the bag on the pile with the others. “It’s the drumming. You really feel it, you know?” She made a gesture with her hands, like butterflies floating up to the sky. “It lifts the spirit, clears the mind, yeah?”

  “That’s awesome,” I said.

  She nodded toward the drum circle. “You should get in there. Let your spirit soar, man.”

  “Thanks, but it’s not my thing,” I said, leaning forward so she could hear me. “You know Jaybird?”

  She laughed. “Yeah, man. Everyone knows Jaybird.”

  I looked past her at the drummers. “Is he here?”

  She pointed to a skinny guy with a hawk nose and blond dreadlocks that reached down to his waist. “Right there at the center wailing on that djembe drum.”

  Jaybird looked like the poster boy for an aging hippie: torn shorts, an oversized wife-beater with the fading image of Bob Marley, and a big bead necklace that bounced on his chest as he smacked the hourglass-shaped drum like he was summoning the spirits. Every now and then he moved his head to the left and right as if to better hear his drumming, then smiled at himself. Yeah, he was in his own world. A grown boy and his drum—for real.

  The young woman I’d been talking with tossed her head to the side and sauntered back to the center of the circle where she extended her arms out and twirled like a child. I pressed the bridge of my nose, trying to relieve the pressure in my head. The sun peeked between the clouds, rays spread out like the hand of God. The drumming became stronger, louder, faster.

  It was fucking torture.

  The crowd of spectators grew. People leaving the beach and a whole wave of folks there to catch the sunset joined the spectacle. I moved away, feeling light-headed.

  Jaybird turned and said something to the drummer sitting beside him. He stopped drumming. A moment later he slung his instrument over his shoulder, waved to another drummer, high-fived another, and made his way out of the circle on the opposite side of m
y position, heading away from the water.

  I caught up to him just as he reached the path that led to the parking lot. “Jaybird.”

  He turned around, but kept walking backwards, a curious smile on his face. “All right. What’s goin’ on, brother?”

  “Can I talk to you a sec?”

  He pointed behind him, thumb over his shoulder. “I’m runnin’ kinda late, man.”

  “It’s about Liam Fleming.”

  “You a cop?”

  “Does it matter?”

  He stopped walking. I caught up to him. His smile dropped and his little red eyes moved up and down, suspiciously. He saw my ear, pointed to the side of my head. “Oh, gnarly, man. What happened?”

  I touched the scar, a souvenir from my trip to Mexico City. “Someone used it as an ashtray.”

  “No fucking way.”

  I nodded. “Listen—”

  “That’s fucked up, man.”

  “Listen, about Liam—”

  He shook his head. “I already told you what I knew.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Liam, man.”

  “I don’t understand. Tell me from the beginning.”

  Jaybird took a long breath and tossed his dreads to the side. He pointed at me with his index finger and thumb together like he was holding a joint. “There’s no beginning, man. Liam just vanished, like a ghost. Poof. Then you all show up asking questions.”

  “Jaybird,” I said. “Liam’s dead.”

  He looked at me as if trying to figure out if I was pulling his leg. “I know, man.” Then he backed away and shook his head. “And I told you all I know.”

  “I’m not a cop,” I said. “I know nothing.”

  He glanced back at the drum circle. The sun was just turning orange. And in his reddish eyes I saw this odd disconnect, like fear and sorrow and this flash of lucidity that seemed to record the gravity of the moment.

  “I thought he’d hooked up with some chick,” he said quickly.

  “Then the cops showed up asking questions?”

  “A cop,” he said. “Dressed like a fucking banker. I told him what I knew.” He shook his head, dreads dangling around his shoulders. The clarity, that moment of comprehension was gone. He started walking toward the road again, his head down.

  I followed.

  “This is fucked up,” he mumbled to himself. “Liam.”

  “Jaybird.”

  “I still can’t believe he’s dead.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Can you tell me about him?”

  “I don’t know, man. What can I say?” He turned around, and in a tone that seemed to teeter between anger and sadness, he said, “He was a class act. Got along with everyone. Like if you saw him, you’d think he was a square, you know, like some rich daddy’s boy. But he was cool, man. A good fucking friend.”

  He turned quickly and started again toward the road.

  “What did he do for a living? Did he have a job?”

  We reached the sidewalk, and he started north on Beach Road toward the business district of Siesta Village. I grabbed his arm and stopped him, turned him around. “Help me out here,” I said.

  He glanced at my hand gripping his bicep, then at me. “Why you asking me all these questions, man? The dude’s dead. Let him rest in fucking peace.”

  “I’m looking into this as a favor to his father.”

  “That’s a laugh.”

  “Why? Tell me about it.”

  “The usual shit, man.” Jaybird waved and started walking again. “Old man was too busy getting rich to play ball with his son. Liam still carried the grudge.”

  “Can you stop walking for a moment?”

  “Gotta get to work.”

  “You have a job?”

  “Dude.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  The walk was making me nauseous. My head was about to explode, bricks pounding against it one after another. “I just want to know more about Liam,” I said. “Who were his friends?”

  A girl on the other side of Beach Road waved. “Yo, Jaybird, whassup?”

  He waved but kept walking. I struggled to keep up. “Listen,” I said and offered him my business card. “Please. Call me? Can you call me tomorrow?”

  He took the card and shoved it in his back pocket without looking at it. We stopped where the road curved and became Ocean Boulevard. The heart of Siesta Village, half a dozen blocks of bars and restaurants and boutiques. Beach Road continued straight north and disappeared into the fine powdery sand.

  On the corner by the beach access next to the Terrace condominium building, an older man with a scruffy gray beard was having a heated conversation with a teenager who stood with one bare foot on a long skateboard. Next to them was a red, white, and blue sign: Keep Beach Road Public.

  “Yo, Cap’n Cody,” Jaybird called to him and held his index finger and thumb pressed together to his lips. “Come by later, man. We’ll light one up.”

  The old man nodded, glanced at me, and turned back to the teenager, gestured at the kid’s longboard.

  “Jaybird …” I said.

  He ignored me, checked both sides of the street. “Gotta clock in, man. Don’t want to piss off The Man.”

  He adjusted the strap of the drum over his shoulder and crossed the street toward the Siesta Beach Resort.

  “Hey,” I called after him, “where do you work?”

  “The Old Salty Dog.”

  * * *

  When I got home I took some Motrin, broke up some ice, wrapped it in a kitchen towel, and held it over the bump on the back of my head. I didn’t even feed the cat or put on any music. I just lay back on the couch and closed my eyes. I’d heard sleeping was bad for a concussion, but I was so damn tired. I had to close my eyes, told myself just a few minutes.

  CHAPTER 6

  MY PHONE WOKE me up. “Yeah?”

  “Dude, it’s Jaybird.”

  It took me a moment to come out of the daze of sleep.

  “Yo, dude. You there?”

  I looked at my phone. “It’s four in the morning!”

  “Yeah, no shit, man. I just got home. Someone’s been here. They’ve gone through the house, man. It’s a fucking mess.”

  “So? Call the cops.”

  “Oh yeah, sure thing. I thought since you were on the case maybe you wanted to check it out.”

  I sat up. “What are you talking about?”

  “Liam’s place, man. Someone came in and ransacked the place.”

  “You’re at Liam’s?”

  “Yeah, man. This is where I crash. I told you. Rent free.”

  “You didn’t tell me that.”

  “Well, I’m telling you now, man.”

  “I’ll be there in ten minutes. Don’t touch anything.”

  * * *

  When I got to Liam’s place, Jaybird was sitting on an old rattan couch in the small living room browsing through the pages of Curl magazine, a can of Siesta IPA on the side table. When I walked in, he tossed the magazine on the wooden cable spool that doubled as a coffee table and chuckled like a little kid caught in the act. “Hot chicks can surf, man.”

  “What happened?” I was thinking of the man I’d encountered the previous day—the man who pummeled me. I hadn’t tried the front door. I’d talked with Keith, the surfer-kayaker who said he’d been at Ten Thousand Islands, then I went to find Jaybird. Stupid move. But I’d been so out of it from the blow to the back of my head. I wasn’t thinking straight. My bad.

  “No idea, man,” Jaybird said. “I wasn’t here. When I came home, I saw the place was all messed up. Then I called you.”

  The drawers to a small desk were open, papers pulled out. A bunch of CDs lay on the floor in front of a shitty stereo component. On the corner a bureau had been rifled, contents tossed aside: a box with a Monopoly game, a few paperback novels, kitchen utensils, two detailed maps that looked like sea charts—all of it strewn on the floor. On the cable spool coffee table, there was a stack o
f real estate and surfing magazines and a purple plastic bong—all of it undisturbed.

  “Did they take anything?”

  Jaybird took a long drink of his beer. “There’s nothing to take, man. Look for yourself. Maybe the TV or the stereo?”

  But the old tube-style television and the cheap stereo were there. Untouched.

  “So nothing of value?”

  He shook his head, his dreadlocks dangling like golden ropes. “The house was like, always open to friends. That’s how Liam was, man. Everyone was welcome. Anytime, all the time.”

  I sat on the couch next to Jaybird and ran my hand over my unkempt hair. I didn’t even know where to start. I had rushed out of my house half asleep. Hadn’t given this a lot of thought. But something had to be going on. Not that Liam’s death was foul play, but something was not right—especially after yesterday.

  Jaybird pushed himself off the couch and walked to the other side of the room and leaned against the kitchen counter. He bit his thumbnail as he looked over the mess. “Man, I’m gonna have to clean all this shit up.”

  “You get out of work at four?” I said.

  He raised his eyes at me, smiled. “Nah. We all went over to Tessa’s place to party. Fucking Felipe got so drunk he kept trying to put the moves on Lisa, the new waitress at The Dog. He kept saying things like, ‘Come here my little-little.’” He laughed. “Dude ended up passed out in front of the neighbor’s apartment.”

  “Who’s Tessa?”

  “Bartender at The Dog, man. Cool chick. Liam used to date her a while back.”

  “You need to tell me more about Liam. Tell me everything. Tell me about his work, who his friends were.”

  Jaybird shook his head and looked at me with a sideways glance. “What’s your game, man?”

  “I’m just trying to find out if someone … I don’t know.”

  “Like, killed him?”

  “Yeah, something like that.” I stood and came around to where he stood by the kitchen. “When I was here yesterday, some guys were in the house, probably the same people who messed the place up.”

  “But you’re a cop, man.”

  “I’m not a cop. I told you. I’m working for Liam’s father. But that’s not the point. Those men must have been looking for something. You have any idea what?”