by Fante, Dan
“Right. A couple of people asked about you. Look, pal,” Woody went on, “once I get squared away with Lexus, I’m putting in a word for you there with the used-car manager. Rhett’s a fucking gorf. A jerkoff. And big Max is his gofer bitch. They’ve chewed through a thousand salespeople like us. They’ll never change. Best thing for you is a gig at a decent, high-end store. From what I can see so far, the guys at Lexus are okay. The leasing manager, Manny—hey, you met Manny at the meeting where I popped that weird stalker guy—remember?”
“Right, Manny. I remember.”
“He’s a straight-up dude and sober three years. Look, when I’m on board I’ll mention that you’re looking for a new car gig.”
“Hey, Woody,” I said, “I’ve got something I need to ask you. Something I think you’d be interested in. Do you still want to write that screenplay with me?”
“Are you kidding? Hey, my man, anytime you say!”
“Okay, so here’s the deal: My living situation just took a dump. I’ve got to get out of my mom’s house by this weekend. That’s the downside. The upside is that I made a decent hit on a 4Runner and some other cars and I’ve got over three K coming on payday. If you can front me fifteen hundred to find a new place, I’ll get the money back to you immediately when I get paid, and I’ll help you write the script. A fifty-fifty split on screen credit. How’s that sound?”
I could hear Woody’s breathing. Then, after a long pause: “And I get the money back a week from Friday, right?”
“A hundred percent. No problem,” I said. “The day I get paid.”
“When do we start the screenplay?”
“On my first day off after payday. Wednesday. We’ll make the schedule work. I’m pretty good at screenplays. It’s a promise. Okay?”
“Okay, deal,” Woody said. “But hey, JD, you sound all wound up. Easy does it, my brother. You okay?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“You just sound edgy, is all. I mean, more edgy than usual.”
“Hey, if you just found out you were out on the street in favor of a nursemaid and six overfed mongrel cats, you’d be edgy too.”
“You’re right, I would. One day at a time, pal.”
“Right. I’ll start to look for a place on my lunch break. How about coffee on Friday? We’ll talk over the screenplay and I can pick up the money?”
“Sure, sounds okay. I’ll meet you at that coffee place on Wilshire and Tenth. That’s close to you. Okay?”
“Deal. Thanks Woody. I appreciate your help on this.”
“No sweat, brother. I’m looking forward to getting into the screenplay.”
AFTER MY CALL to Woody, I refilled my coffee cup for the fourth time that morning, then walked out to the lot to guard my sales area from Fernando.
There was no foot traffic and, after checking the showroom floor, I stepped up close to my lot partner, pushed my finger into his chest, and whispered, “Hey shithead, someone burned up my Honda. What do you know about it?”
“Jou tink I dee it? Jou acuzin’ me?”
“If you were the guy, we can settle it right now. Right here.”
“Majn, I done do thisa kinda chit. I neber seen jour car? I deen know jou had a fukkin’ Honda.”
I looked him in the eye. There was no tell in his expression—even with my finger in his chest. I decided to believe him.
THAT AFTERNOON ON my lunch break I drove east on the Santa Monica Freeway, got off at the Centinela exit, then turned south. In five minutes I was in West L.A. I copied down a few for-rent phone numbers, then returned to the Sherman lot.
Two hours later, on a break, I began a Google search on Sherman’s main showroom’s computer that had a search engine, typing in “West L.A. apartments for rent.” There were two dozen on the list.
ON MY DAY off, which had now changed to Thursday (Rhett got a bug up his ass and switched everybody’s day-off schedule for the second time), I went to Santa Monica court, showed the clerk my proof of car insurance certificate, and had my No Proof of Insurance summons dismissed.
Then I stopped off at several apartments in West L.A. and finally settled on a smallish studio on Short Avenue off Centinela. The rent was $721. The place was clean, on the second floor, and bright, with a big window facing the street and two eucalyptus trees just outside. There was no A/C but good cross-ventilation from the main room and the bathroom. But the big bonus (for a low $721 rent) was the furniture it came with: a convertible couch, a coffee table, and a bookcase, along with the stove and refrigerator that were standard. The left-behind living room stuff saved me several hundred bucks in furniture expense. The place also had venetian blinds and even a shower curtain left by the last tenant, a woman. The building was on the old side but the apartment came with off-street parking for my demo Corolla.
I gave the manager, a baldheaded guy named Norm with melanoma scars on his blotchy noggin, a postdated check for the first and last month’s rent: $1,442.
THREE DAYS LATER, still a week away from payday, I had sold three more cars. None of them were home runs like the 4Runner deal, but I’d made another five hundred dollars. Woody was right: pitching used iron had come easy to me. Even Max, who’d reminded me again that he didn’t like my attitude, assured me that I was doing well as a car guy. The good news was that I’d stayed clean after the gin and tonic scare and even squeezed in a couple of AA meetings when the store closed early after more rain.
Eventually, dreading the deed, I telephoned my old sponsor, Southbay Bill, to check in. Before I could say anything, he fired me as a sponsee for not calling in for several days in a row. It was a relief. I hadn’t had to cop to anything. I had come to loathe Southbay Bill and his Jesus racket anyway. Old Bob A. was my new guy, a total straight-shooter.
Later that morning an adjuster from Mom’s insurance company came by Sherman’s showroom to tell me that her Honda was a total. The value of the car was set at $660. I told the guy to mail the check to Mom at her address.
I met Woody three blocks away from Sherman at Pete’s Coffee on Wilshire Boulevard. We’d changed our meeting because he was officially starting at the Lexus dealer the next day.
For the last couple of months we’d been talking on the phone at least a couple of times a week and e-mailing each other frequently. Woody was a good friend, and as much as I hated the idea, I told myself I would do my best to help him with his screenplay.
When he saw me at a table, Woody flashed me his eleven-dollar car salesman’s grin, ordered his double espresso at the counter, then sat down. “Heya, JD. You look like shit,” he said.
“You know, new schedule. Workin’ my ass off.”
“But hey, now you’re an official car guy: sellin’ cars to movie stars and tellin’ jokes to all the folks. How’s that feel?”
“It’s a job, Woody. I’m glad I’ve got one.”
Woody nodded and smiled. “Look, I’ll tell you this; I’m a hundred percent glad I did what I did with Rhett. It was the right move, no question. I even did a mini-inventory on Rhett and Max and talked to my sponsor. The AA program works, pal, that’s no shit.”
Woody pulled a white envelope out of his jacket pocket and pushed it across the tabletop.
Opening it, I saw a sheaf of hundreds. I folded the envelope, then stuffed it into my pocket. “Thanks, my friend. You’re bailing me out here. Now I can cover the deposit check I gave to the manager at my new place.”
“Glad to do it. No sweat.”
“You’ll get it all back next payday. That’s a promise.”
Then I saw that there was something different in his eyes. “Hey,” I said, “you look more up than usual. What’s going on? You just get laid or something?”
“Pal, if I was any better I’d be twins. I’m sober six years next week, and starting a new job. And ba-boom, I met someone. I mean I’m not talking about some ex-crackhead bubble-brain like mos
t of the tail we bump into in the program. I mean, a real nice lady.”
“So, you’re actually dating again? I thought you only did one-nighters.”
Woody’s grin was ear to ear. “Last night was our first real night together. I kid you not, Laighne’s a class act, in the program for over a year, dresses like a winner, and the girl has her own business. And, get this, she’s in her early twenties.”
“Gee-zus,” I said, “a kid almost thirty years younger than you. Sounds like you hit the jackpot. So, what’s her business?”
“Matchmaking of some kind. She runs a dating deal for rich gay boys in Hollywood. And here’s the good news: she’s a real tiger in the sack. She’s into yoga and all that stuff.”
“Jesus, I’m jealous. Is she a switch-hitter or something? Is that how she got into the gay matchmaking thing?”
“Nah, she’s straight, as far as I know. I really like the girl and she’s a full-on nine plus. Her friend, some guy who is gay, and went into advertising, started the company. The way Laighne tells it, he got busy with his job and then made her the managing partner. She’s in charge now. The girl’s a whiz on the Internet too. She can do anything. You want some chump’s background checked out, some producer or your ex-wife’s new guy, she can have the dope for you in twenty minutes—with a webcam up their ass. The girl’s for real—no joke. She used to be in security or something in Europe, but now that she’s in the program, she says she won’t go near ruining people’s careers or taking any cheap shots.”
“Nice,” I said. “Sober, sexy, successful, and single. The four S’s.”
“She’s got a pad in Santa Monica and a guest house on some big estate near Point Dume. I’m spending the weekend with her out there before I start the new job.”
“Moving right along,” I said. “Sweet.”
“I’m havin’ a ball. I also met one of her girlfriends, at a Brentwood meeting. She’s okay, I guess. Kind of an L.A. bimbo, actually. Painted nails and aftermarket knockers.”
“Okay, so what about me?” I cracked. “I’m single and sober and semi-sane. Maybe she can help me ring the bell too. This girlfriend might be dying to meet a broke, semi-homeless, fucked-up, ex-private detective with a nifty career in the auto industry.”
Woody shook his head. “Nah,” he said, “Laighne’s cool—straight up—but her gal pal feels high-risk. About fifteen minutes sober from what I can tell, all about glitz and all that Beverly Hills celebrity clubbing jazz. My bet is that you’d be better off continuing to date your old standby: Mrs. Thumb and her four daughters.”
I checked my watch. I would now be returning late from lunch and I still had to walk the two blocks back to work.
Woody followed me to the corner traffic light, then grinned his pearly grin again and shook my hand. “Okay, pal, stay in touch,” he said. “Good luck with the new place. Call me tomorrow and maybe I’ll e-mail you the script so you can read it.”
“Deal,” I said. “See you Thursday, your place, right?”
“Sure. That’ll work. The two of us together can make that screenplay a total ass-kicker.”
ELEVEN
When I reported for work several mornings later, the day before my new day off and move (Rhett had fired two salesmen and shuffled the cards again), Fernando and I had a decent conversation at the back of the car lot behind the company’s detail van. He was smoking a joint and said he wanted us to be friends. He again denied that he had torched my mom’s Honda.
As we talked I realized that I had misjudged my co-worker as an ignorant South American asshole thug. He was a step up from that. He launched into a five-minute tirade in Spanglish about Sherman Toyota—how he hated Max and Rhett and the management staff with a passion for bullying him and changing his day off three times.
Nando’s style was to attempt to intimidate everyone he met. Even his bosses. When I had not backed down, and instead punched him out, I had earned his respect and affection. That day I found out that my lot partner was also an avid computer-dater and was consistently misrepresenting himself as a surgeon on several websites to the women he hooked up with, saying that because of his out-of-country medical license he’d had to settle for a career in investment banking, or some other whopper-snot. Fernando, on his first phone call to these women, would close the conversation with the all-important question, “Jou dell me somezing, my sweetz: are jou busty?”
LATER THAT AFTERNOON, to amuse me and himself, Nando, who was freshly annoyed at our boss Max for making him split a commission because he’d arrived at work late that morning, decided to square accounts. My lot partner reasoned that he now had nothing to lose: “Fuk disa cockzooker. I gonna fix hisa chit real goo. Jou zee.”
Max kept his big brass key ring on his desk. It contained Sherman Toyota’s business keys and his own car and house keys. While the tall oaf was in Rhett’s office with the paperwork on a deal on a two-year-old Prius, Fernando walked in and snatched his keys.
Outside, my lot partner motioned for me to follow him around to the back of the building. He then heaved the key ring up onto the flat roof of the dealership.
An hour later, after discovering his keys were missing, Max spent two furious hours calling people. Even a locksmith. His annoyed wife, Margie, had to drive the fifty miles from their house near Magic Mountain to bring Max the extra sets of keys to the house and his Benz SUV.
Fernando, of course, was delighted. He took great pleasure in making his adversaries miserable.
THAT NIGHT, BEFORE quitting time, the showroom was empty. Nando had been instructing me on how to online date for free and I’d been chatting with a girl in Santa Barbara about us getting together for coffee.
The showroom PA blared. “FIORELLA! JD FIORELLA TO THE GM’S OFFICE. JD TO RHETT’S OFFICE.”
On my way there, Vikki, who had just finished up with an Asian lookie-loo tire-kicking couple outside on the lot, walked in. Her customers were now leaving the dealership with a brochure.
She motioned me to her desk. This girl, for two obvious full D-cup reasons, had become the sales leader at the dealership over the last several days.
I walked over to where she was sitting. Her makeup was perfect, as usual, and standing above her, I was able to see down her low-cut blouse that accentuated her pink bra and hefty knockers. The only thing that might put a man off about this girl were her wide hips. Most men find hippy women unattractive. I, on the other hand, have always enjoyed a wide ride. Vikki was at least twenty pounds too beefy.
“Hey, JD,” she cooed, “can we talk for a sec?”
“Sure,” I said, “talk. But you heard, I’ve just been summoned by the company’s brain trust.”
“So you and Nando had an argument out back last week?”
“It wasn’t a big deal,” I said. “A territory misunderstanding, is all. As you know, Nando can be a knucklehead.”
“I hear you’re pretty good at taking care of yourself. I like that quality in a man.”
“I do okay.”
“And you also know I’m a single woman, right?”
“I know you’ve got an ex-husband. I’ve heard you on your cell with your lawyer at least twice.”
Vikki smiled up at me, exposing expensive, pretty, perfectly capped teeth. “Divorces can be scary,” she cooed. “My ex is also a lawyer. It’s a nasty situation.”
“I hear that.”
“Well, okay. See, I was just wondering if you might like to have dinner with me sometime. Maybe after work tomorrow.”
This was the first time in eighteen months that a woman who was not a hooker or a member of an online chat room had come on to me. I’d already pigeonholed Vikki as a West Side gold digger. I had enough recovery in me and enough ex-private detective horse sense to know she could be trouble. Plainly, the girl was out of my league. I had no intention of having anything other than a work relationship with her.
“Hey, that’s nice,” I said, “maybe another time. I’m pretty busy these days.”
“Well, anyway—you just let me know, JD. The ball’s in your court now.”
Then Vikki pulled one of her business cards from the holder on the desk and wrote her private e-mail address on the back.
She handed me the card. While I was accepting it, she scratched the back of my hand with her half-inch-long red index fingernail. “It just might be fun,” she whispered.
WHEN I GOT to Rhett’s office I could tell that he and Max had been waiting for me—the room was silent and they were stone-faced.
Without saying anything, Max motioned for me to close the door and sit down.
When I didn’t move, Max glared at me. “Over there, Fiorella,” he ordered. “There’s something we need to talk about.”
I still didn’t sit down. I could feel that something was about to hit the fan, and I already smelled the stink of it in the room. “Look guys, if this about those keys . . . ” I said.
“Screw the keys,” Rhett said. “Max’ll find them or he won’t. This isn’t about the keys, okay? We’ve got a major problem.”
“Involving me?”
Max stood up. “We got some very fucked news this morning, Fiorella.”
Rhett lifted a hand to shut Max up. “I’ll handle this,” he said. “Look, amigo, we heard from our contracts guy at the bank. Turns out that your 4Runner deal went tits up.”
“You’re kidding!” I said. “What went wrong?”
“We got scammed, my friend. That beaner bitch used stolen ID and credit cards. The whole thing was a rip-off, from the get-go. I’ve been on the phone with the business office. The bank put a hold on their check days ago and then redeposited it. It bounced twice. Total flimflam. Pretty slick too. Christ knows where that 4Runner wound up. Probably some friggin’ chop shop in East L.A.”
