Mr. Monk is Cleaned Out

by Lee Goldberg

  “Because it’s a higher calling.”

  Ambrose shook his head. “That’s not why, Adrian.”

  Maybe I’d underestimated Ambrose. Perhaps he understood people and relationships more than I thought he did. He certainly understood them better than his younger brother.

  Ambrose looked at me, but when I caught his eye, he immediately shifted his gaze, suddenly self-conscious.

  “There have been times when I’ve imagined what it would be like if I sleepwalked out of the house and you rescued me.”

  “Is that one of your nightmares, too?” I asked.

  Ambrose shrugged. “That one might qualify as a dream.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Mr. Monk Has Style

  I wanted to break our record of always being fired after just one day on the job, so I tried to anticipate all the things Monk might do that could offend, infuriate, or horrify our new employer.

  On our drive downtown to the Bayview Mall the next morning, I ordered Monk not to round up or down any charges on the register, not to rearrange the clothing in the store to fit his own sense of order, and not to criticize the fashion choices of any of his customers.

  “Your job is to make the customer happy,” I said, “not yourself.”

  “That’s easy,” Monk said. “I’m never happy.”

  “Glad to hear it,” I said.

  “If people want to make foolish decisions, what do I care? I’m hydrated.”

  “Did you spend all night drinking?”

  Monk nodded. “We partied like I was back in college. It was unhooked.”

  “Unhooked?”

  “The Monk brothers aren’t as buttoned-down as you think we are.”

  Monk’s shirt was buttoned to the collar, his sleeves were buttoned at the cuffs, and he was wiping down my dashboard with a disinfectant wipe. He couldn’t have been more buttoned-up, literally or figuratively, if he’d tried.

  “You are two wild and crazy guys,” I said.

  “We went through an entire box of Cap’n Crunch,” Monk said. “With Crunch Berries, which are a synthetic fruit.”

  “That’s edgy.”

  “Don’t ever tell anyone that we’ve recreationally indulged in synthetic fruits. I wouldn’t want people to get the wrong idea about us. I’m sure you’ve got your vices.”

  “One or two,” I said.

  I found a spot on the second floor of the parking structure and we went into the mall, which was designed to look like an idealized version of an iconic San Francisco street. All the interior storefronts had bay windows and Victorian architectural flourishes. A cable car even ran through the mall on a winding track that ended up in a food court made to look like Fisherman’s Wharf, only without the panhandlers, the crapping seagulls, the souvenir shops, the gum on the sidewalks, or the smell of the bay, a heady mix of salt water and outboard motor exhaust.

  Monk loved the fake streets, of course. They were exactly the way he wanted the world to be—unnaturally clean, free of nature, sanitized and climate-controlled.

  But I wondered why anyone but Monk would trade the experience of walking down the real San Francisco streets outside for the fake ones in the mall. You might as well be in Owensboro, Kentucky, or Walla Walla, Washington.

  Fashion Frisson was a long, narrow clothing store tucked between a RadioShack and a jeweler. The store featured contemporary, brightly colored fashions with a slightly retro, ’70s feel.

  The layout of the store was straightforward, with women’s clothing on one side and men’s on the other. That even division appealed to Monk’s sense of order, symmetry, and separation of the sexes.

  Fashion Frisson’s proprietor was Kiana Claire, an energetic, overaccessorized brunette with a squeaky voice that made me wonder if she inhaled helium whenever our backs were turned.

  I’d brought our résumés along but she wasn’t interested in seeing them.

  “Randy’s recommendation is enough for me,” she said. “He’s a fantastic judge of character. Plus it saves me from having to run background checks on you both, which is going to be standard procedure for me from now on.”

  Not every crook and pervert has been arrested before, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. Nor was I going to admit that I actually had a criminal record, though not for anything major, mostly for civil disobedience. Monk was falsely arrested and convicted of murder once, but I wasn’t going to mention that, either.

  “How do you know Randy?” I asked.

  “He’s a longtime customer,” she said. “Have you ever heard him sing?”

  Unfortunately, I had. He’d only written and performed one song, at least as far as I knew.

  “Oh, yes,” I said. “It was unlike anything I’ve ever heard before.”

  “It’s a catchy tune,” Monk said. “But it’s no ‘867-5309.’ ”

  Monk liked the Tommy Tutone 1982 hit song, also known as “Jenny,” because the numbers added up to thirty-eight.

  “He’s got Bob Dylan’s depth and Pitbull’s party-hearty, raw sexuality,” Kiana said. “Randy has got a cult following in France, you know.”

  I did. The cult was a dozen French women with cop fixations. I’d seen them for myself and it was something I tried hard to forget.

  Monk raised his hand. “Excuse me, but I have a confession to make.”

  “No, you don’t,” I said. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good.

  “I have no fashion sense,” he said, ignoring my protests.

  “Of course you do,” Kiana said.

  “I do?”

  “Look at how you’ve dressed. It’s fresh and original. It defines your character and reveals a powerful awareness of how fashion can express personal identity. I’m blown away by it. You have style, Adrian.”

  Monk smiled at me. “I have style.”

  “What about me?” I asked her. “How’s my fashion sense?”

  She hesitated. “We’ll work on it.”

  Kiana proceeded to explain our duties to us. They weren’t too complicated. We would help customers with their purchases, manage the dressing rooms, keep the place orderly, and ring up purchases at the register. She would be in the back office most of the day, taking care of the invoices and other paperwork that had piled up since she’d fired her salespeople two weeks ago.

  “I was afraid to hire anyone after what happened,” she said. “But I have complete faith in you. This job is ninety-eight percent people skills and I can see that you’re people persons.”

  Monk started to raise his hand again to make another confession, but I slapped it down, and held it down, until she was in the back room.

  The morning was slow, which gave Monk a chance to make sure that all the hangers were facing in the same direction, to wash the windows and vacuum the floors, and to arrange the clothes by size, while I handled the few customers who came in. It worked out nicely for both of us. It was certainly less stressful than going to crime scenes and questioning suspects. I didn’t miss seeing corpses every day, though I hadn’t had much of a break from that.

  “I love this job,” Monk said.

  “You haven’t waited on any customers yet.”

  “I hope it stays that way,” he said.

  I did, too, because it reduced the odds that Monk would do something that would get us fired. But business picked up around lunchtime. Luckily, most of the customers were women, who preferred to have me wait on them while Monk manned the register. I didn’t know anything about fashion but I knew how to kiss up. Mostly I told the women how nice they looked in whatever garment they tried on and how it made them look slimmer and yet curvier.

  My customers bought everything they tried on, which was a good thing, not only because it racked up sales but because, as I only realized in hindsight, it postponed a disaster.

  Monk cleaned and disinfected the dressing rooms after each customer used them, which should have been my first hint of the trouble to come. He didn’t offend any of the customers with what he was doing beca
use he didn’t start sanitizing their dressing rooms until they were at the register, paying for their purchases, their backs to him.

  The trouble started with the first customer who didn’t buy the clothes that she had tried on. Unfortunately, she was also Monk’s first customer of the day. She was a short, stout woman who dressed too young for her age, probably to the embarrassment of her children. (No sooner did I think that thought than I wondered if I was projecting just a little.) She handed three blouses to him with a dismissive frown.

  “You can take these back,” she said.

  “You’re not buying them?”

  “These make me look fat.”

  “You should have thought of that before you wore them,” Monk said, dropping them into a trash can.

  “Excuse me?”

  “You can’t just put on clothes and not buy them.”

  “There’s no obligation to buy when you try clothes on,” she said.

  “Of course there is,” Monk said.

  “How else can you see if they fit?”

  “Use your imagination,” Monk said. “We can’t sell these now. They’re contaminated.”

  “They’re what?”

  I quickly excused myself from my customer and rushed over to the dressing rooms, forcing a laugh.

  “Don’t mind him. He’s got a strange sense of humor,” I said and gave Monk a playful punch on the shoulder. “Just because there are curtains here doesn’t mean it’s your stage.”

  “These clothes will have to be incinerated,” Monk said.

  The woman laughed. “For a moment there I thought you were nuts.”

  “Would you like to try on something else?” I asked.

  “I’m thinking about that V-neck sweater,” she said, pointing to a display on the other side of the store.

  “Mr. Monk will be glad to get you one in your size.”

  “When was the last time you bathed?” Monk asked.

  She laughed again. “He’s actually pretty funny.”

  “He’s a riot.” I faked a laugh of my own, then shoved Monk. “Get the lady her sweater, Leno.”

  Monk went off. I excused myself again, and returned to the customer I’d abandoned.

  Before Monk returned to the dressing rooms, I intercepted him.

  “Do not say another word to that woman except thank you or good-bye,” I whispered.

  “I totally agree. She’s a psycho,” Monk whispered. “Who knows what she might do next?”

  Thankfully, the stout woman ended up buying the sweater. She was leaving the store when Kiana emerged from the back room to ask us how everything was going.

  “It was going great until she came in,” Monk said, gesturing to the customer.

  “Why? What happened?” Kiana asked.

  “Nothing,” I said. “She bought a V-neck sweater.”

  “And soiled three blouses that she wore without buying,” Monk said.

  “Soiled?” Kiana said.

  Monk nodded grimly. “Where’s your incinerator?”

  “Why would I have an incinerator in a clothing store?”

  “He is just joking with you,” I said.

  “There’s nothing humorous about the black death,” Monk said. “Who knows how many germs are swimming in the sweat that those blouses are drenched in?”

  “The black death didn’t come from people trying on clothes,” I said. “It was rats.”

  “Who lived in nests of soiled clothing and ate pizzas.”

  Kiana laughed and clapped Monk on the arm. “Stylish and funny, too. No wonder you and Randy are such good friends. Why don’t you two take off for lunch? I recommend the food court. Mall employees get a twenty percent discount.”

  “Sounds great to me,” I said. “Thank you for the tip.”

  We walked out, Monk rubbing his shoulder. “Why do women keep hitting me?”

  “Because you don’t think before you speak,” I said.

  “Maybe I should get shoulder pads.”

  “Maybe you should take a vow of silence.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Mr. Monk Returns a Favor

  The food court had the usual mix of franchised eateries, along with mall versions of local San Francisco restaurants offering a few of their signature dishes over the counter. The mall’s Chinese food place was an outlet of a Chinatown institution rather than yet another Panda Express. I had to give the mall credit for trying to add some genuine local flavor. It also meant that we actually had lots of good choices for lunch.

  “Which is the best place for toast?” Monk said.

  “That’s all you’re going to have for lunch? Look around, Mr. Monk. There are so many choices.”

  “Too many,” he said.

  “How about a hot dog on a stick?”

  “Mmm. That sounds so appetizing. Deep-fried, stuffed intestines impaled on a piece of wood. Maybe for dessert I could have some grilled donkey testicles served on a rock. Do I look like a Neanderthal to you?”

  “I don’t think cavemen ate corn dogs.”

  “I’m a civilized man. I don’t eat things with sticks. I use utensils.”

  “Technically, the stick is a utensil,” I said, just to be argumentative.

  “It is as if you are a savage living in a cave, a mud hut, or Captain Stottlemeyer’s apartment. Modern men use knives, forks, and spoons. You and Julie might want to try them. I could teach you how they are used.”

  “Maybe you could show us how to make fire, too.”

  I led him over to Yang Chow, where two young Chinese women stood at the counter with bright smiles on their faces, offering people samples on toothpicks. Monk scowled with disapproval.

  “How about a bowl of white rice and a teriyaki chicken breast?” I said. “All the grains of rice are the same shape and color and you can ask them to chop the chicken breast into a square.”

  “That actually doesn’t sound bad.”

  “And look,” I said. “They even serve bottled Fiji water.”

  That sealed the deal for him. Any place that sold Fiji water had to be good.

  “Just don’t go overboard on the water,” I warned him. “We still have half a day of work left.”

  While he ordered his meal, I went over to the Boudin Bakery outlet and got myself a turkey sandwich with havarti cheese on fresh San Francisco sourdough.

  Monk found us a two-seat table that was bathed in filtered sunshine from an enormous skylight and that overlooked the first-floor shops below. It gave us the illusion of being out in the open.

  The economic downturn had hit the mall as hard as everywhere else. The jewelry store below us was offering a 40 percent off sale on selected rings. Its neighbor on one side, a children’s clothing store, was offering a half-off sale, while the business on the other side was gone, the storefront boarded up, the wood flats covered with an advertisement promising “exciting changes ahead that will make your shopping experience more fun than ever.”

  The only change that would have improved my shopping experience was either winning the lottery or getting a better-paying job, neither of which seemed very likely for me.

  In front of those stores, in the center of the wide faux street, was a kiosk selling colorful umbrellas. It was one of many kiosks throughout the mall that sold things like personalized T-shirts, stuffed animals, cell phones, and popcorn.

  A security guard sauntered up to the umbrella kiosk, had some words with the young salesgirl, gestured to the stores around her, and then helped her wheel the kiosk a few feet away from where it had been.

  I guess the umbrella kiosk was impeding foot traffic, or was too close to a neighboring kiosk, or was blocking a storefront. I didn’t know nor did I care, but for some reason Monk seemed very interested in what was going on.

  “The security guard has dirty pants,” he said.

  “We should report him to the mall management right away.”

  “I agree,” Monk said and started to get up.

  I grabbed his arm. “I was jokin
g. Sit down. It’s none of our business if the security guards have dirty uniforms.”

  “It reflects poorly on law enforcement.”

  “They aren’t cops and neither are we.”

  He sat down and I figured that was the end of the matter. But I was wrong. After lunch, we took a stroll through the mall, and he stopped, stared up at one of the mall security cameras, and pointed at it, waving his finger as if admonishing a misbehaving child.

  “What, exactly, do you think that is going to accomplish?” I asked him.

  “I am putting them on notice that I am watching.”

  “I’m sure that will mean a lot to them.”

  We went down to the first floor and walked back toward our end of the mall. I did some window shopping and stopped to look at the big colorful umbrellas at that little kiosk. They seemed more decorative than practical to me. Either way, I couldn’t imagine anybody spending $39.99 on one of them in this economy.

  Monk peered around the kiosk at the security camera on the second floor and wagged his finger at that one, too.

  We returned to Fashion Frisson, Kiana went back to her office, and we worked the floor. There was a steady stream of customers throughout the afternoon and, for the most part, Monk kept himself in check.

  Almost all of our customers were women. The few men who came in browsed but didn’t buy. I think they were creeped out by Monk, who followed closely behind them and immediately refolded everything that they picked up and put them back on the shelves.

  A very hairy man wearing a tank top and shorts came in and admired some of the short-sleeved shirts. He picked one up and turned to Monk, who was stalking him.

  “Is there somewhere I can try this on?”

  “No,” Monk said.

  “Why not?”

  “Our dressing rooms are closed.”

  “They look open to me.”

  “They’re for women only,” Monk said.

  “No problem,” the man said. “I can try it on over this.”

  The man lifted his arms up to pull the shirt over his head and showed off more hair under his armpits than I had on my head.