Start Shooting

by Charlie Newton

  Kevin Nance says, “Sarah tells me you’re up for Chicago and Toyland.”

  First I’ve heard—and highly unlikely. Big grin, fingers crossed, like the possibility isn’t complete agent-sales-job fantasy. “We’re hoping this is my year.”

  “Would you prefer Toyland over Streetcar?”

  My shoulders and ponytail ease into Blanche DuBois. I wilt her accent, a Southern patrician on a hot day. “I know Blanche, Mr. Nance, in the way I know my mirra’ on a woman’s sad day. And would be pleased, proud to portray her for this comp’ny more than anything on God’s earth.”

  Mr. Nance grins as his eyes widen. “I always felt you were quite good.”

  I half curtsey in my Cubs cap and ponytail.

  Mr. Steffen’s arm stays around my shoulder. He says, “Let’s all go to N’awlins, gumbo and sherry at the Napoleon House.”

  Sarah brightens. “I’m free.”

  Mr. Steffen says, “Wish that I could, but I’m due back at the hospital.” He grimaces, explaining to me, “My son was shot—he’s a policeman.”

  I don’t have to make my eyes go wide. Poise, Arleen, own the ground.

  “He’ll survive, thank God, but it will be touch and go for a while. I did want to meet you, though. This production of Streetcar is crucial to the Shubert Theater Company and our plans for its future, the entire theater district for that matter.” He touches his Olympics pin. “A great asset we have that Tokyo doesn’t.”

  “I’m so sorry about your son.”

  His arm tightens slightly and lets go before my trembling is obvious. “Thank you, and thank you for coming by.”

  Kevin Nance adds, “It was a pleasure, Arleen. Go Cubs,” and shakes my hand. “Let’s hope it’s their year, too.” He and Mr. Steffen return to the alcove bar and Renée Zellweger. She beams a stunning movie-star smile. Sarah pats my shoulder. “That’s us one day very soon.”

  “I’m ‘thirty-nine’—better be Sun-day.”

  Sarah turns us away and toward the front doors. “Glenn Close couldn’t have played those five minutes any better.” Sarah doesn’t mention how unfortunate it was that a megawatt movie star dressed for the evening was here, too, not the comparison any girl would want—taffeta prom queen versus sandlot baseball fan.

  “Who’s the other actress? She here yet?”

  Sarah stops us at the front doors, puts both hands on my shoulders, and stares. “She doesn’t matter. You matter. All your energy—fear, hope, love, anger, death, life—all of it goes into Blanche tomorrow morning. You will win this role if you do that. I feel it here.” One hand pats between her breasts. “Arleen Brennan will go on to Broadway and then … anywhere she wants.”

  I glance through the doors for Ruben Vargas and complications Sarah couldn’t quite fathom.

  Sarah kisses my cheek. “I’ll step back to the bar to chat, keep us on everyone’s mind.” She winks. “Go on home, chil’, and think those New Orleans thoughts.”

  I smile, turn and wave to Mr. Nance waving from the bar group, then use both hands to push open the doors. The marquee lights are on and illuminate the sidewalk. I stand underneath, bathed in the fire and let it incinerate Ruben’s horror world. One actress to beat and, finally, this fire will be mine. I’ll walk out here after a show—maybe opening night—into a crowd, and cameras, and flashbulbs like the ’50s … and people love me, love my work. And inside I have a family that bet their present on me and won. Me.

  My phone rings. Bobby Vargas says, “Been thirty minutes, just wanted to say hi.”

  I pirouette into my answer, the glorious future that—Ruben Vargas, ten feet away, staring at me. Shit! No, chill, he can’t, won’t shoot me out here under the lights. If I don’t get in his car he can’t try to kill me again. I tell my phone, “Can’t talk.”

  Bobby’s voice goes to static and the call drops.

  Ruben scans my face, posture. I don’t show him fear or rage, nothing but control. Two brown fingers remove his toothpick. “How’d our meeting go?”

  “Couldn’t get within a block because every squad car and news van in Chicago was there.”

  “You weren’t there?” Ruben eyes my purse and his gun in it.

  “I just said I wasn’t. That means I. Wasn’t. There.”

  “First good news I’ve had today. Our Korean friends are smokin’ opium.” Ruben Vargas, Homicide cop, homicidal criminal grins his pimp smile. “But I think I can put a lid on ’em. Let’s go somewhere and I’ll explain—”

  I jump at him, halfway across the wide sidewalk. “I talked to Tracy Moens, she already explained. I didn’t tell her about your little party, but I could’ve. So, yeah, you explain how that alley’s full of dead people and why I wouldn’t have been one of them.”

  “You think I—” Ruben shakes his head. “No, no, that’s crazy talk, niña. We’re in this together.” He gestures toward his passenger door. “Hop in.”

  “Can’t. Toddy Pete Steffen’s inside, one of the show’s investors, don’cha know. He wants to talk to me. Again.” I want to spit “Furukawa” at Ruben—Toddy Pete’s gigantic sponsorship victory that Ruben and Robbie are willing to risk destroying—but don’t because I wasn’t in the alley, so Robbie couldn’t have screamed “Furukawa” at me; that “the Jap motherfuckers would eat us alive” if Ruben and his Vietcong partner cut Robbie out.

  Ruben stops smiling and replaces the toothpick. “Careful, Arleen. Careful with my little brother, too. Bobby’s in a fair amount of trouble. Don’t get him thinkin’ you two got some kinda reunion comin’.”

  “Your brother’s a cop. He can probably take care of himself.”

  “Read tomorrow’s paper. It won’t be about Coleen”—Ruben shakes his head—“it’ll be about Bobby and another kid from the Four Corners, Paulito Cedeneo.”

  I don’t know what that means, want to ask, want to know how Ruben knows I talked to Bobby, but don’t want Toddy Pete Steffen or anyone else to see me here with Ruben. And I don’t want Ruben Vargas to corner me anywhere and “explain” the alley or his blank papers in the envelope. And I don’t want him to grab my purse—find a gun with my fingerprints that killed a man five hours ago. If I hail a cab he can stop it wherever he wants. “Okay, meet me at Hugo’s in thirty minutes.”

  Cop fish-eye. “Gonna be there?”

  “As soon as Mr. Steffen and I are done.”

  “Better you get in the car, give me back the envelope and that protection I lent you. We talk, I bring you right back.”

  “Sorry.” I step back. “Mr. Steffen’s waiting.”

  Ruben stares, not believing, then points one finger at the marquee above me. “Looks like you might belong here, shame to blow it now. Age ‘thirty-nine,’ doors startin’ to close …”

  “Keep that in mind, asshole, next time you hire an errand boy to front your lies. If I’m lucky enough to have something to lose, you and your partner have nothing to worry about.”

  He accepts the threat like he didn’t hear it. “Always good not to worry.” Both Ruben’s hands push him off his car.

  I jump back, showing fear I wish I hadn’t.

  “Girl, we can work things out, but what we can’t do is walk away, just pretend we ain’t where we are. Choa—and others—ain’t having that. And we got business to do.”

  “Not we, Ruben. I already covered that with you.”

  “Saying it don’t make it true.” Movement at the corner. Ruben’s hand slides fast to his gun. He hard-eyes three Asian men a hundred feet away; crouches like he might draw but doesn’t. Still fixed on them, Ruben says, “We get the business done, this thing cleans itself up,” then nods at the marquee. “Bright lights, kid. Your turn maybe. Hope so, but the wrong people can see these lights, too, know right where you are.”

  “You heard me, right? Who’s inside this theater? Who has money in this show? That was his son in the alley. And it’s your fault.”

  Horn. A red Jaguar turns the corner at Dearborn. We both guess who it is. Ruben taps his watch, angry,
off-balance. “I’m trying to help you not be stupid. Thirty minutes. Tell your good friend Toddy Pete I said, ‘Qué onda, vato?’ ” The Jaguar tries to change lanes but can’t. Ruben’s tone drops to ice as he turns to open his door. “Be there, Arleen. We get our business done, now, or it swallows you.”

  I focus on the Jaguar, then the three Asian men on the sidewalk … Ruben lunges and rips my purse off my arm. I scramble for it with both hands, miss, and he throws it through the driver’s window into his car. We’re three feet apart, close enough he could grab me or me him. He can’t have the purse; I swing; he ducks, pivots, but doesn’t grab me.

  Horn. Horn.

  Ruben doesn’t look. “Be at Hugo’s.” He jumps in his car and accelerates east before Tracy Moens can cut through the traffic.

  I watch his taillights. A Homicide cop has a murder weapon with my prints. But I wiped the gun, didn’t I? When I was behind the bar at the L7. Used a bar towel stuffed down in my purse. How much wipe is enough? I wanted to dump the gun in the trash but the bins were overflowing with cans and bottles.

  Ruben turns at State Street. Meet him in thirty minutes means I have thirty-five to disappear and not die. But Ruben Vargas has the gun, and he’s a Homicide detective. He can get the real ballistic evidence and manufacture more, make up whatever matching story he wants. I check the sidewalk; the three men weren’t Koreans. The Jaguar pulls to the curb; not Tracy Moens. Voices gush behind me; I spin and five strangers exit the Shubert. Don’t stand here. Do something.

  I fast-walk east toward State Street, want to run, want to cry—Cry? My feet stop and I look east into the coming night, see all the way to Venice Beach, to the Four Corners, to my sister’s alley in Greektown. Cry? I turn back to the Shubert’s brilliant marquee. The thirty-foot illuminated wedge reaches to the street. On opening night it will cover patrons in suits and gowns, alive with laughter and anticipation. Photographers will pop and celebrities will arrive in shiny black cars. Backstage, the crew and my fellow actors will hold hands in a big ring. I know exactly how it will be; I’ve seen it almost every night since Coleen and I were kids.

  And this time, the dream is not a five hundred to one cattle call or a Palm Springs promise or a cocaine dream. I’m one director’s decision, one unnamed actress away from winning a starring role, a chance, a career, family forever. I can make all that happen. All I have to do is win. Stay alive, play my one chance to the walls, and win.

  Siren. A squad car wails east.

  And don’t be Coleen.

  We were so sure we would be famous, then Anton Dupree dragged you into his car. Do you see where I’m standing, Éire Aingeal?

  My feet plant the Shubert’s sidewalk like it’s mine.

  I’ll dedicate Streetcar to you from stage center every night. Chicago will know Coleen Brennan like they should have, the joyful, brilliant Irish girl from the Four Corners. I’ll get this part; you’ll live again, as a Brennan. Not a Dupree victim. I promise. My eyes cut to another siren; an unmarked car like Ruben’s racing toward criminals and their crimes. Both hands ball to fists; tears run down my cheeks. I fucking promise.

  OFFICER BOBBY VARGAS

  SATURDAY, 7:30 PM

  Wrigley Field gushes fans into a traffic jam/street party that will last another hour before it gets sloppy and people get arrested. Jason and I are in his Crown Vic, trapped front and back.

  Coleen Brennan! I mean, Arleen Brennan. Oh my God. On the sidewalk grinning at me and our future. I may be too dizzy to ride in a car. From the sidewalk, Tracy Moens yells for me to wait, to talk to her now. Jason pops the siren twice, jerks the wheel, and jumps us into oncoming. My guitar bangs to the floor in the backseat. I stare through the back window and say, “Easy, that’s my future,” meaning my guitar and the prettiest green-eyed, swimsuit-issue, strawberry blond ever to breathe.

  Jason stays on the siren, creating a middle lane. “Man, Moens wants you all the way.”

  Moens has Arleen cornered. They’re not together like Ruben said. Arleen’s eyes were so green I would’ve stood there all day, awestruck as my man Forrest Gump. Jason slams the gas. Cars and Cub fans blot Arleen out.

  She’s really back! Different name, which is weird, but she’s here. I twist back in the seat, grin like a schoolboy, and exhale deep.

  Jason waves “Thanks” at an oncoming car granting us room. “Moens honestly believes you did Coleen Brennan; that you and Ruben are the monster she’s gonna expose. And if Little Paul checks out she intends to—”

  “I was thirteen. How do you motherfuckers keep missing that?” Paradise to hell in two seconds. “Sorry.” I rub my face with both hands. Arleen can’t believe it, I won’t let her.

  “You’re definitely popular.” Horns. Bumpers. Siren. “Buff and I and Jewboy went by to see Sheila Lopez’s parents.” Jason shakes his head once. “Only daughter. Jo Ann Merica was there … bunch of other suits.” Jason floats one eyebrow at me. “But no Chicago FBI or DEA.”

  “None?”

  Jason makes a zero with his thumb and index finger.

  “Lopez and Hahn are feds, Ruben’s positive, but can’t figure what branch, and Merica won’t say.”

  “That ain’t kosher, Bobby, even for the G.” Jason brakes and pops the siren. “Now you got Little Paul—”

  “No way Little Paul checks out, not if Merica or Moens are interested in the facts.”

  “That’ll be brand new.”

  I think about dead cops and girls of your dreams coming back to life while Jason center-lines us through cars and buses, and … accusations that I molest and murder children. Me, focus on me ’cause there aren’t any real assholes out here; I don’t see those motherfuckers every single fucking day feeding on the weak.

  “Take me to my car.” My car’s five blocks the other way buried in Cubs-victory traffic and will be for another hour. I pull the Airweight I carry off duty, check the cylinder full, then slide it back clipped to my jeans. “Danny Vacco will back all this down or he’s dead defending it.”

  Jason nods. “No problem. Who’d suspect Bobby Vargas?”

  “I’m not gonna be guilty of being a child molester.”

  “Ease up, Bobby.” Jason backhands my shoulder. “We’ll get a beer, figure it out. The boys want to talk.”

  “The boys” is our gang team. “We can talk. After I find Danny Vacco. Drag that motherfucker to 12 where he can admit what he’s doing or die in our lockup.”

  “Let’s do the boys first; go by Jewboy’s basement, everybody’s there. Maybe they can slow you down, keep you out of Stateville.”

  Blink. “Everybody’s there? We figured the red Toyota? Who?”

  Jason shakes his head. “Buff said we ain’t spending another day wondering.”

  The headache that’s been chasing me since last night begins to pound. “Ruben thinks Lopez and Hahn were put in 1269 to hunt one of us, but not for the Duprees’ lawsuit—we weren’t on the job then.” I stare at Jason until he glances me. “Ruben can’t figure what Hahn and Lopez are after, but he thinks one of us gave up the Toyota to stop ’em.”

  Jason turns right, eyes three shapes peeing in the shadows. “Could’ve been the commander said something; she’s got the street sense of a watermelon. Could’ve been Hahn. They knew everything we knew. Hell, Lopez could’ve told someone. That adds everyone in the federal government.”

  “So, what, we’ll all take polygraphs?”

  Jason pulls us up in front of Jewboy’s bungalow on the far West Side, throws the car in park, and says, “Yup.” He exits the car and rounds the fender.

  I show him my phone through the windshield, then dial Arleen. Her voice makes me a schoolboy instead of cop in a sea of shit. I say, “Been thirty minutes; just wanted to say hi.”

  Silence, then a frigid “Can’t talk” and she clicks off.

  I blink at my phone. Thirty minutes ago we were going on a midnight picnic, gonna talk all night, probably hold hands. I’d get to kiss her again. I fold my phone. But not anymore. My s
tomach knots. Had to be Moens. Moens must’ve fed Arleen the exposé back at the L7. Bobby the monster.

  SATURDAY, 8:00 PM

  Jewboy has named his basement Walter’s Love Hotel, but as far as I know, no girl’s ever been here who wasn’t with Jason or me. The Love Hotel is state-of-the-art, unmarried-cop, wood-paneled hip—pretty much a copy of the old Saturday Night Live skit with the Czech brothers. Orange-felt Brunswick pool table, slot machine, Hamm’s OTB beer sign, beer-tap refrigerator Candy Cook painted as the paddock at Arlington Park, autographed life-size Girls Next Door poster he stood in line all day to get, bobbleheads of Earlie Fires, Mike Ditka, Ernie Banks, and Walter Payton; gun-range trophies because Walter Jewboy Mesrow may be more mascot than cop, but he can shoot; flat-screen TV and three outdoor, triple-strength chaise longues. My spare amp lives in the corner for our weekly repeat of the same three-chord lesson. I’ve never been down here when I wasn’t laughing. Till today.

  The polygraph guy is set up with a laptop and printer on the pool table. Jewboy’s three vinyl kitchen chairs crowd the five-foot bar. I’m on a stool next to Buff, having just told my cell phone and Ruben I’ll be an hour late for the Mambo.

  “Buey, Barlow ain’t a lightweight. Not the kind of man the brothers Vargas keep waiting.”

  “So buy him a drink. I’ll be there.”

  Harder tone. “Stateville’s a cold lifetime, esé. I want us to stay out.”

  “I said I’m coming. Barlow waits or he doesn’t.”

  Silence. Ruben lightens his tone. “Be cool, little brother. Don’t be getting all Mexican, not now. We got—”

  “Have two stops to make. After I’ve made them, I’ll be there. Bye.” I fold the phone and it snaps like teeth. Buff stares, his hand wrapped around a rolled-up Herald. The basement is tense with eight guys, each of us wondering who gave up the Toyota. Nobody asks about Little Paul. It’s an odd tension, a basement room filled with personalities, guys you thought you knew so well you could be them. All of us are armed.