by Sam Powers
‘Tell me what’s going on,’ she said. ‘Please! You’re really scaring me, Ben.’
He took a step toward her, then withdrew the pistol from the inside pocket of his jacket and pointed it toward her. Zoey’s eyes widened and she instinctively threw herself sideways, out of the path of the shot as he pulled the trigger, the bullet plowing through their front door.
‘FUCK!’ Zoey yelled, scared and shocked, her ears ringing.
His route unimpeded, he walked to the front door and opened it, ignoring her as she lay three feet away, breathing hard and frightened by the near miss. He picked up his suitcase, walked out of the apartment, and closed the door behind him.
Zoey lay on the cold faux-wood tile of the kitchen floor, trying to compose herself. What had just happened? One second they’d been eating dinner, and then it was like he wasn’t even in the same place as her. She got up and walked over to the hallway. The door had a bullet hole in it, right at the height of her forehead.
‘He tried to kill me,’ she said to no one.
It didn’t make any sense, any of it. She went back over what she’d said during dinner, anything she might have mentioned that could have deeply hurt him or offended him. But there had been nothing remotely close and his behavior was nothing like normal. She rose cautiously and went over to the door, intent on chasing him, then realized it would be futile; he’d taken his keys and would be out of the building before she could even reach the street.
She paced back and forth nervously, trying to figure out what to do. He’d left his phone in the bedroom, so trying it was a waste of time. He’d left his license, his credit cards… She realized she had no way to contact him.
‘What do I do?’ she asked herself. ‘I can’t call the cops. I guess I could tell them about the gunshot and maybe…’ She thought about her own record, a solicitation bust from one of the few times she’d had to turn tricks to make rent. Cops didn’t listen to the girls; they never listened to the girls. She’d worked at enough nightclubs to know that.
Who else did Benny know who could help?
Mark.
Zoey went out into the hallway and closed the door behind her before taking the elevator down one level. She knocked on 6 C, and a few moments later Ginny opened the door. ‘Hey kiddo, what’s up?’
‘It’s Ben,’ Zoey said. ‘I think he might be in trouble.’
Mark had taken another half-hour to get home, during which Zoey filled Ginny in on the sudden exit and gunshot. After Ginny had explained it to him, he’d hung his coat in the hall closet, a serious look on his face. ‘What about his phone?’ he asked, as they waited for him in the living room.
‘He took it. Everything else he tossed before he left. None of his own ID, no credit cards – I mean, not his normal ones.’
‘What?!?’
‘He had a couple stored away in a plastic bag. They looked new; I think one of them had a few years left before expiring. I’m telling you it was freaky; it was like something from a movie or something. He had this sort of focus.’
‘So, like... ‘crazy calm’? Like they talk about when someone disconnects and ... you know, does something terrible?’ Mark asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Mark?’ Ginny asked, watching him ponder the issue.
‘I’m thinking,’ he said. He walked over to the couch adjacent to theirs and sat down.
Ginny suggested, ‘Maybe he’s in witness protection or something. You know, like, from the mob?’
Mark gave her a withering look. ‘He’s a Jewish plastic surgeon whose family is from New Boston, Ohio. That’s about as far from the swamps of Jersey as you get.’
‘And it wasn’t like that,’ Zoey insisted. ‘It wasn’t rage, or anything. It was like he didn’t even see me, right up until I got in his way, and then he shot at me. He just…’ She trailed off, still not able to really believe it.
‘We can call his family,’ Ginny said. ‘I mean, he must have told someone what’s going on. If he didn’t think he could tell Zoey, maybe he told his mom.’
Zoey looked downcast. She was thinking about the gunshot, wondering how he could have even thought about hurting her. She felt confused. ‘I don’t have a number. I’ve never met them.’
Ginny looked surprised. ‘After six months?’
‘They live across the country. We were planning on visiting eventually but Ben just had things come up. Oh… damn. I’m so frightened.’
Ginny put an arm around her shoulder. ‘I know, sweetie. But maybe this is nothing, just some midlife crisis thing. I know Benny and there’s no way he’d ever hurt you. There has to be an explanation. We’ll probably get a call from him in a few hours saying he’s at some motel in Malibu pondering the direction of his life or something, and the gun wasn’t supposed to go off… or…’
‘Hmmm,’ Mark said. ‘Sure.’
‘What?’ his wife asked.
‘Well… it sounds like he really did try to shoot her. It just doesn’t sound much like Ben, that’s all.’ He turned to Zoey. ‘You know what he’s like. Is there anything that suggests he was unhappy…?’
‘No, nothing,’ Zoey said.
‘I think we should just call the cops if he isn’t home by the morning,’ Ginny insisted. ‘Just to be on the safe side. Or like I said the first time, his parents.’
Zoey didn’t have a number for them. ‘He talked about them a lot. His father is the longest-serving OB-GYN in the greater Portsmouth area, or something.’
Mark snapped his fingers. ‘His service. If he’s an OB-GYN, he’ll have a call forwarding service.’
‘Then we just need to find his clinic,’ Ginny said. “Come on, let’s go up to your place, you can show us where everything happened.”
A few minutes later, they gathered around the small computer desk that sat at the back of the living room and Zoey brought up a browser window. New Boston was a village within the city of Portsmouth and well-served medically. They spent several minutes searching, to no avail.
‘I don’t get it,’ Zoey said. ‘There’s not a single reference online to an OB-GYN named Levitt in New Boston, or even Ohio.’
‘And there are four clinics and two hospitals within twenty minutes, and there’s no one named Levitt on staff at any of them,’ Mark said.
‘He must have retired,’ Zoey said. ‘What about people named Levitt in New Boston?’ She brought up a white pages for Ohio and typed in Levitt for the Portsmouth area.
There were two pages of listings, including Leavitts, and Lovetts. But there was no one named Levitt listed in the area.
‘Must be unlisted,’ Zoey said.
‘Uh huh,’ Ginny said. She didn’t sound as certain. ‘It’s a pretty small place, right?’
‘Yeah, looks it.’
‘Then perhaps we can find another doctor there, after-hours. If Ben’s father worked there for years, they’d at least know about him. Who knows, maybe they’ll have a forwarding address.’
Mark had wandered over to the front door and was fingering the bullet hole. ‘It sure looks like the real deal.’ He turned to his wife. ‘You hear a shot, hon?’
Ginny shook her head. Mark frowned, his uncertainty sudden and stark.
‘I’m not lying to you,’ Zoey said. She held her arms across her, feeling defensive, that familiar sensation of feeling less than worthy, of knowing it must have somehow been her fault. ‘That wasn’t Ben. I looked right in his eyes and it was like there was nothing there. He was just … blank. Like he was acting on instinct.’
Mark nodded sagely. ‘We know. We know you wouldn’t lie about Ben, right Hon?’
Ginny smiled, and it felt genuine. ‘But you’re going to have to go to the police if we haven’t heard anything by tomorrow, and if we can’t get hold of his father.’
Zoey’s head dipped. ‘I guess, yeah…’
Ginny moved over to her and put her arms around Zoey, then drew her close in a tight hug. ‘Don’t worry, sweetie. You know what a great guy he is. Whatever happen
ed to make him freak out tonight… I’m sure we can figure this out. It’s…’ She looked at her watch, ‘… eight-thirty now. I’ll stay here with you until bedtime, and then in the morning, we can go to the police together. Okay?’
Zoey wasn’t so sure. Every instinct told her the police were the enemy; the only type of cop she’d ever dealt with either wanted to bust her, or take advantage of her, or hit the club up for bribes. ‘Okay,’ she said, unsure of what to do next.
Come morning, there was still no sign of Ben. Zoey woke with the sunrise, a habit she’d been trying to build for months, a new way of starting her day after years of late nights. She didn’t need time to think; she’d decided the night prior that there was no way with her record that she was getting the police involved until she’d scoured the city and was damn sure she couldn’t find him.
Ben Levitt was the man she loved, the key to her happiness; she wasn’t going to tell them he’d taken a shot at her. There was a good chance Ginny would dial nine-one-one anyway, as soon as she woke up and realized Zoey had gone looking for him on her own – or caught a dose of Mark’s paranoia and assumed she had something to do with Ben disappearing.
But maybe by then, Zoey figured, she’d have tracked him down.
Something was wrong and Ben was in trouble. She felt it in her bones. After a decade of being used, abused, pushed around and tossed away, Zoey had had enough. She got out of bed and went over to the walk-in closet, opening it and taking out her small suitcase. She was tired of life kicking her in the teeth, tired of everything being overcome with drama and crushing her spirit. Nothing she’d done in the past had seemed to matter, and any control over her own destiny seemed illusory.
Benny had changed that.
And she wasn’t giving him up without a hell of a fight.
11/
DAY 7
LOS ANGELES
It took Zoey less than an afternoon to discover that, though she loved Ben and was sure he loved her, she didn’t really know that much about her boyfriend.
She knew he went to the gym and so she had started there but was rebuffed by the counter staff. The guy at the comic bookstore was more helpful and recognized Ben from his description... but hadn’t seen him in two weeks, at least. After that, her options were more limited. She’d seen a country club membership in his wallet once but hadn’t asked about it and he’d later told her it expired; Ben was pretty humble, and she figured if he went to a snooty members’ only place, it was for work reasons only; plastic surgeons had to network in a certain financial sphere. He was fascinated by urban planning, but that mostly consisted of visiting environmental groups’ websites on how best cities could use space.
She was left with a single option: the train station. He’d talked about how much he loved it there, how he’d grown up wanting to take the train across the country. He knew the names of all the locomotives and the carriages and the companies, and he’d told them all to her at one point or another, each going in one ear and out the other, because... well... it was trains.
But after three hours of alternately walking the station’s marble-floored hall, browsing the magazine shops and people watching for any sign, she slumped onto one of the passenger benches, her head in hands. She took a deep breath, then let it out.
What had she said to him? What had she done to set him off? He’d never acted like that before, never been violent. It was like someone had thrown a switch...
The phone call.
It had been so short that she hadn’t really thought about it, but he took a call right before he freaked out. She tried to remember his side of the conversation but was pretty sure there hadn’t been more than a few words spoken. Whatever it was had driven him over the edge.
Had someone threatened him? That would explain the gun but not why he took a shot at her. That was a Ben she didn’t know. She gazed around the train station; a working girl near the stairs was greeting arriving passengers with offers and hadn’t yet been shuffled off by the police officers who periodically patrolled the hall. For a moment, she caught Zoey watching her and a smile crept across her lips, like she knew something, something deeply personal about the ex-dancer, a flaw that wasn’t easy to see, but was always there, something they shared. Zoey averted her gaze, feeling a flush of embarrassment.
Whoever had called Ben hadn’t had time to get out more than a sentence or two. So it had to be someone he knew, and it had to be either expected or so distressing it took over his ability to think straight. She wondered if she’d made a mistake by running, instead of letting Ginny and Mark take her to the police. Their neighbors’ intentions were good; but she’d had her fill of the law while working at the club. And they’d take one look at her record, she knew, and that would be an end to any serious interest on their part.
But... she had no idea what else to do.
‘You having troubles honey?’
Zoey looked up. It was the hooker who’d been standing by the platform steps a few minutes earlier. She shook her head. ‘It’s nothing, really. It’s fine.’
‘You’ve been crying,’ the other woman said. ‘Here:’ She reached into her purse and took out a tissue. ‘You should wipe your eyes carefully, or that mascara’s going to run. Believe me, I know: occupational hazard.’
Zoey smiled wanly. ‘Thank you. I’m just a little upset.’
‘Uh huh,’ the woman said. ‘And what’s his name? ‘Cause every time I seen a girl that upset, it’s over some guy.’
She had to smile at that, because Benjie so wasn’t like those guys... but he was still the reason she was crying. ‘You’re perceptive.’
‘It’s not that I think they’re all preoccupied with the opposite sex,’ the woman said. ‘It’s just that men are mostly stupid. If it’s something stupid enough to make someone cry, there was probably a man involved.’ She realized Zoey wasn’t sure how to respond and added, ‘You taking a train somewhere hon? You’ve been walking around an awful long time.’
‘No. I thought maybe he was here.’
‘Ah. He took off on you, huh? I’m Valentyna, by the way.’
She held out a hand and they shook. ‘Zoey. But he wasn’t himself.’
‘Let me guess: he was all sweet while you were just knocking booties, but now he gets mad at the drop of a hat? He a mean guy? He try to hurt you?’
She shook her head vigorously. ‘No! No, it’s not like that, really. Thank you, though.’
‘Oh...’ The prostitute got the sense that maybe she wasn’t needed and took a few hesitant steps away. ‘Well... okay then... I guess I’ll get on about my business.’
‘Thank you for asking, really...’ Zoey said.
The woman stopped. ‘Then what is it? It’s okay, you can tell me. I’ve seen and heard it all.’
‘He just... became a different person. One second he was Ben, the next he was pulling out a suitcase full of cash and credit cards and...’
‘What?’ The look on Zoey’s face was obviously pained.
‘He took a shot at me. With a gun. He shot at me.’
‘Oh no!’ the older woman said. ‘No, no, no. That is not okay, sweetie! You have to go to the police on him. Or else next time...’
‘No! I mean... I can’t; I have... I have a lot of baggage in my past. No cops.’
Valentyna put a hand on Zoey’s forearm, a gentle touch. ‘It’s okay. I know a guy, a vice cop. He works mostly missing persons, he’d know what to do. He’s a different sort of guy, you know? He won’t treat you bad. He might even be able to help. When I had a p... when I had a manager, he used to get tough with me sometimes, and Norm would have a word, and things would get better.’
‘I don’t know.’ Zoey’s uncertainty was obvious. ‘I mean... even if he wanted to help, I don’t know what I can tell him. I don’t have any idea what’s going on.’
‘Just tell him what you told me,’ the street walker advised. ‘Tell him about the money and credit cards and the gun, all that stuff.’
The dist
raught young woman’s eyes widened. ‘The credit card,’ she said. ‘I saw a name on the credit card.’
Valentyna smiled. ‘See? Now things are looking up already.’
But the optimism didn’t last long. Valentyna’s exasperation was written across her face as she leaned in and tried to get the desk sergeant’s attention one more time. The waiting room at the Burbank station was full, and the line to make a complaint went back to the stairs near the main doors. ‘Please, Sgt. Ohler, even if I could just leave Detective Drabek a message...’
The elderly sergeant shrugged. ‘Miss... what is it again? Vixen? Something like that...No! Don’t tell me! I don’t want to know. Miss, whatever problem you’re having with your pimp or a john, Det. Drabek is a very busy man with a very heavy caseload of things that are important to the people of Los Angeles. Next, please!’
‘You can’t just refuse to help us!’ Valentyna demanded. ‘I have a right to contact Det. Drabek...’
The sergeant pointed to the far corner of the waiting room. ‘If you’d like to call him and leave a message, there’s a payphone right over...’ Then he looked over and realized how much time had passed since there had actually been a payphone there. ‘Oh... right. Anyway... respectfully, sweetie, this line is for serious complaints, and we’ve seen you a few too many times. Next please!’
‘Oh no you did not just dismiss me!’ Valentyna exclaimed.
Zoey pulled on her arm. ‘Come on, let’s go.’
Behind them, the next man in line was getting anxious. Valentyna wagged a finger at him. ‘Y’all just cool your jets.’ She turned back to the sergeant. ‘Now just because a woman has a few scrapes with the law does not mean that she is not entitled to its full protection. And that’s the truth! Now I’d like to know what you have to say to that!’
Thirty seconds later, they were standing on the steps outside the station, Valentyna sporting a sullen look. ‘Y’all could have stood up for us a little more,’ she sniffed at Zoey. ‘You basically let him throw us out of there.’
