THIRTY-FOUR

I stepped on the accelerator so hard the car shimmied in place, no forward momentum, tires squealing.

Red lights didn’t stop me. Stop signs meant nothing. I was in fourth gear over eighty miles an hour on Foothill Boulevard before I was aware of any other traffic. A yellow Cadillac Seville with a row of holes in it where the chrome strip had come off swerved over to me, two grinning guys saying without words if I wanted a contest I was in the right place.

I cut across the four lanes of city street and into a neighborhood, switching back and forth for several blocks, and the three hundred horsepower Cadillac attempted to follow in a half-joking, half-menacing way, blundering behind me until I careened around the back of a strip mall, Dumpsters and bales of flattened cardboard.

I wasn’t sure where I was, parked cars crammed along the curb, broken glass on the pavement. A Doberman on a chain ran along with the car until his leash yanked him. I slowed way down, feathering the brake. Two police cars were in conference, back to front, the drivers nearly touching elbows.

I kept driving, past the Oakland/Alameda County Coliseum, a street sweeper gliding along in the distance, its headlight illuminating the empty parking spaces.

The Oakland Airport is at the end of a plain of dry grass and ditches, reeds and sleeping mallards. I ran the car off the road, over the shoulder, broken glass and trash crackling. I wrenched open the door, and ran up an embankment. The rumble of a jet receded into the sky as the night air hit me.

I took a step back, swept the gun behind me, and threw it. I didn’t just toss it or skim it across the water. I sent it with all the strength in my body. I could see the light from the runway glinting, spinning.

I didn’t hear the splash.

I got on the freeway heading north and rolled down the window. I was sweating, wet with it, breathing hard. I wrestled out of the heavy jacket and shucked it over the back where it made noises as I drove, collapsing its empty arms and body further down into the dark.

A restaurant commanded the freeway with its sign, TWENTY-FOUR HOURS A DAY, a place Chief and I had passed but never visited. I found the off ramp, parked at the edge of the lot, and found myself outside the coffee shop. Newspaper machines sold USA Today, the Sacramento Bee. The night air was unfamiliar, heat and farm smells, manure, and something else, irrigation, water among orchards.

PLEASE WAIT TO BE SEATED. Three people were ahead of me, shuffling along to a side table where they had a good view of Highway 80. Someone turned a chewing face in my direction. I was still cold. It was a mistake to come in here, all these eyes, and these weathered faces.

Half the coffee shop must be looking at me by now. I found an empty place at the counter. My wallet was jammed with crumpled money. The currency was stuck and would not respond to my spastic attempts to pull it out.

“Coffee, hon?” said the waitress.

I nodded, please.

She poured the Farmer Brother’s brew fast, a method I admire, throwing the coffee into the mug all at once. But I rarely drink coffee, thinking of it as a drink for people so addicted the caffeine has little effect. She set a glass crammed with ice on the counter, and I drank until the ice made a noise when I sucked it.

“Are you okay?” asked the waitress. Concerned—interested, even. But there was a hint of criticism, too.

“Do you have Cobb salad?” I asked.

I could have gone to the men’s room but I didn’t want to see my face. I left before my order arrived, leaving money beside the knife and fork.