EIGHT
The telephone jingle-jangled in the apartment. Waltzing into the kitchen in her bathrobe, Harriet nabbed the horn, praying it was one of her girlfriends. She needed to talk to someone. Robert had been acting so peculiar. He was getting on her nerves and that made her skin break out. Her hopes evaporated when the automated voice came on. Then the operator’s drawl boomeranged in her ear. “We have a collect call from an inmate housed in a Department of Corrections facility. Will you accept it?”
Common sense told her not to take it. “Yes, of course.”
An irate, high-pitched voice shaved through the static. “This is Slatts. Is Robert there? I have to speak with him. It’s urgent.”
“Slatts?”
He replied with insincere friendliness. “How you doing, babe. Merry Christmas.”
His name was unfamiliar. Harriet riffed through her mind and came up short. She’d never heard of him. That was odd. She was acquainted with all of Robert’s friends. It made her realize something. Her mate was a distant country. There were dark passages in him. Places with no light. Places with no signature. It was evidence she could sleep with him, and it didn’t mean a thing. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t know you.”
“Come on.” He refuted her. “You have to.”
“No, really, I don’t.”
“Robert hasn’t said anything about me?”
“Why would he?”
“I’m your husband’s other wife.”
Harriet was boggled. “You’re his what?”
“Never mind, darling.”
She stammered, “Well, uh, he ain’t here.”
“Oh.” Slatts was deflated. “Where the fuck is he?”
When Robert was arrested for stealing guns, he phoned Harriet from 850 Bryant. Said he was in a bit of bother. All she could think about was how to feed the kid. There was no food in the refrigerator. No money in the bank. The laundry was dirty. The gas bill was overdue. Her mom had to step in and help her.
Then while he was in San Quentin she had panic attacks. They came in packs, each one worse than its predecessor. There were minutes, sometimes hours, often days, even weeks, when she was too afraid to do anything. She didn’t clean house or go to work. It was pointless. Her doctor prescribed Zoloft, an antidepressant with tranquilizing side effects. It didn’t help. Nothing did.
“He’s hunting,” she said. “Can I take a message?”
“Yeah . . . tell that motherfucker I’m counting on him.”
“Counting on him for what?”
“That’s between him and me.” The hardness in Slatts’s voice had enough heat to set fire to a house. “You keep your big nose out of it.”
“Who are you anyway?”
“I already told you, sister. I guess you weren’t listening. I’m his significant other.”
“His who?”
“You heard me, baby.”
Slatts hung up the phone, leaving Harriet with the dial tone buzzing in her head.
Somewhere between a convict’s cell at San Quentin Prison and a kitchen in the Trinity Plaza Apartments, battle lines had been drawn. A full-scale war was erupting at Christmas time. The prize was Robert Grogan.
Outside, the afternoon was roasting. The cadmium yellow sun simmered with malice. The fog was cinder gray and spreading over the roofs. The sky was eggshell brown. The abandoned buildings on Market Street turned their barren windows to the wintry light.