Searching for the moon
I saw instead
a shooting star—Onomato
The sword that kills the man, saves the man.
Sister Clyde’s cryptic comment still makes no sense. It’s not swords I’m worried about, it’s shotguns. The blast behind the Metro makes it clear the one at the bookstore was meant for me, as well as Heidi. It’s damn hard to aim a shotgun, even a sawed-off, and drive at the same time, which might explain why the shooter missed but I’m not sticking around while he improves his aim. How did he know just when and where to find me? Had he been following me all night? If so, he had several other, better opportunities to take a shot at me. He couldn’t have known when I left Nikki’s, and that I’d be in that alley. Not unless she told him.
The Metro is dark. Nikki is gone. A setting moon tells me I am already well into today. I lurch home in Old Paint, thinking I will get some rest, knowing I will get none.
In the bedroom, pre-dawn light sifts through half-open vertical blinds and turns the white walls, the beige carpet, to mottled gray. Over a drafty window, the blind’s slats sway gently like piano keys pressed by invisible fingers. The neglected zafu languishes in its corner, its stolid lump both sternly disapproving and humbly beseeching. I sit on it but could no more meditate tonight than fly to the moon.
“Sit, rest, work,” the Buddha prescribed, “Alone with yourself, never weary. On the edge of the forest live joyfully, without desire.”
On the edge of the forest. Yes. With a nice girl, maybe a pretty gemologist. Become a farmer or an accountant, something tame. Live to be a hundred and one and pass away peacefully, asleep in bed, not breathless and cowering in the street at the business end of a gun, heart squeezed by fear and guts turned to water.
I awake from a dreamless Nearvana-deep sleep to discover I fell asleep on the floor, my head on the zafu, which is no more comfortable a pillow than it is a sitting cushion. My neck is stiff. I scrounge around in pants pockets and junk drawers, on dresser tops and under seat cushions for stray singles and spare change. Unshowered, unshaved, I dash up to the convenience mart for coffee, which I no longer have in the house, cigarettes, and matches. I don’t plan to smoke, but when I lost my topcoat, I lost the pack of Verves Overshort left me and I need a new talisman. Home again, I take the coffee out to the stair landing and sit, sipping. Forty yards away, dead leaves cruising on the river’s surface belie the swift currents that roil underneath.
It’s time I got busy. I’m not looking forward to what I have decided to do. But I fix my gaze on the promise of freedom at the end of it.
It takes a nerve-wracking hour on the phone to report my stolen credit cards to the appropriate companies, a laborious task made no easier by a stiff neck. By the time I get to the last one, I’m slamming the receiver down, teeth throbbing from grinding them.
The next call promises to be almost as painful. I dial Heidi’s private number. A recording in a man’s voice tells me I have reached the intended number and instructs me to leave a message.
“Heidi, it’s Will Mansion—”
“Will!” It’s Heidi, sounding somewhat out of breath.
“Oh, you’re there.”
“I was, you know, screening calls.”
“Well, I got that man’s voice. Your husband?”
She giggles. “No, Will, I’m not married. I got a friend to record that for me. Cuts down on the number of obscene messages that get left. Why advertise a woman living alone?”
“Good thinking. I called to tell you, I’m not looking for Hector anymore.”
“You’re quitting?”
Why did she have to say “quitting?” I can almost hear her thinking, “Will Mansion, gutless wonder.”
Instead, she says, “Glad to hear it. I think that’s very wise.”
“You do?”
“Yes, I do. Why take unnecessary risks?”
“Yeah. Uh, exactly. Anyway, I have a few loose ends to tie up, but then, uh, I wonder if we could get together later.”
“I’d like that. Call me.”
I hang up the phone with a somewhat lighter heart and head for the freeway and Haviland to jump through the hoops at DMV. Traffic makes the nineteen miles of rain-slick I-91 travel like ninety, especially without a smoke. More than once I go through the motions of lighting up, stopping just short of actually doing so. Trees which should be in full autumn glory have already lost their leaves; penitent prodigals, they reach for the sky with naked limbs. Drivetime radio is buckshot with commercials. The cell phone companies offer to sell me time, as if time could be sold in slices, like pizza, of which I could order more if I didn’t have enough. If only I could sell my past, buy my future.
At DMV, a big wall clock authoritatively segments time into minutes past, minutes yet to come. The minute hand never lingers long enough for me to acknowledge the present moment. When a flashback descends, the past is more real than the present and the future doesn’t exist.
Duplicate driver’s license finally in hand, I leave DMV and return home, my shoulders heavy with the task that faces me next. Carlotta Trephino expects me to bring her a fifteen-hundred-dollar packet of heroin, a packet I no longer have. Though I’ve thought about it throughout the interminable wait at DMV, I can see no other course of action.
It takes hours to disconnect the stereo, gather up mountain bike, skis, camera, binoculars, camping equipment, fishing tackle, hunting rifle. The work is hard and painful; torn muscles and nerves not completely healed protest the bending and stretching. On an upper shelf in the closet, the Beretta lies wrapped in its holster. I take that down, too, and load it with the other gear into Old Paint. I work up quite a sweat doing it, but it doesn’t matter. Where I’m going, they’re not likely to care about my disheveled appearance. The air is cold on my now damp shirt, though, so I return to the closet one more time to unearth an old leather bomber jacket.
*****
The squinty-eyed proprietor of the Miracle Mile pawnshop removes his thick-lensed glasses and peers through my binoculars, fiddles with the focus. “Nice stuff. What did you do, knock over a sporting goods store?”
“It’s my stuff.”
“That’s what they all say.” He writes a figure on a scrap of paper, examines the camera.
“It is. What are you telling me, that you’d accept stolen merchandise?”
He replies, “Didn’t you just tell me this is your stuff?”
“Yes—”
“See?”
Beaten, I ask, “So, what’s it all worth?”
A lot less than what I originally paid and a lot less than what the gear is worth to me, but it nets me the fifteen hundred I need. Though my pockets are full of cash, I leave the shop feeling denuded. One robe, one bowl, is all a Zen monk needs, but that’s little consolation.
No sooner am I out the door than a hooker sidles up to me with a suggestion as to how I might spend some of the newly acquired capital. I send her away only to be approached by a pusher. He’s harder to turn down but I do.
On a Friday afternoon, business is brisk at ‘Lotta Cars for Less and the sales staff is out in force. I barely set foot on the lot before the burly salesman-slash-bodyguard approaches. I tell him I’m here to do business with Carlotta and have to be insistent about it before he disengages his teeth from my ankle and escorts me to the trailer.
“Ah, Will, come in, honey, come in,” Carlotta says and dismisses the salesman. “You took your time about getting back to me.”
“I’ve been busy.”
She eyes the wound on my head. “I’ll say. Bet that hurts. Can I offer you a little ... anaesthetic?”
I accept, telling myself I earned it, I deserve it for having turned the pusher away. She takes two panatellas from a pack, holds out her hand and says, “Well? Where’s the dope?”
“I didn’t get it, Carlotta, and I won’t. You can have your money back.”
She paces in front of her desk. “I’m disappointed in you, honey. We could have had quite an enjoyable little partnership.” She lets out a heavy sigh. “First Hector disappears, now you quit on me. Hmph. It is so hard to find good help these days.”
I hand her the money. “It’s all there, you can count it. We’re even now.”
She does count it, down to the last bill. “It’s here all right. But even? Not hardly. There’s still the matter of the two hundred you owe me.”
“Well you’ll just have to wait for that. I’m not running any of your little errands.”
She steps up to me and grabs a handful of my shirt. “Honey, life’s too short and I don’t wait for what I want. You will settle up with me now.” She puffs on her cigar, once, twice. “Take off your clothes.”
“Huh?”
“Your clothes. Take them off.”
“Forget it!”
“I think it’s you who has forgotten.” She rifles around in her desk, comes up with the plastic zipper-lock bag containing a cigar stub and a shot glass, and dangles it in my face. “Ah, it’s all coming back now, I see.” She shoves the bag back in her desk. “Take ‘em off. Or do I need a member of my sales staff in here to help you?”
“You can’t be serious,” I say, but my protest withers under her unflinching stare.
I start in on belt and buttons.
“Take it slow, honey, I’m enjoying myself,” Carlotta says.
I’m not. This is weird, this is embarrassing. I find myself thinking about Nikki St. Clair. How does she do this every night? It’s a performance, I remind myself, and detach myself, let the actor put on the show. I focus on Carlotta the way Nikki focused on me.
With her forearm, Carlotta sweeps clean the top of her desk and pats it. “Make yourself comfortable.” I lie back. The wood is warm and smooth against my bare butt. Carlotta strips off her clothes and straddles my hips. “Make this good and I just might give you your marker.”
Nothing like a little pressure to cause my enthusiasm to flag. I close my eyes and think of ... think of ... I imagine being with Nikki Saint Clair. That gets the party started but this isn’t about me, this is about Carlotta. I take my cues from every shift in her position, pay attention to every little moan. Her skin slickens, her muscles tense, her breath quickens; I work to provoke another sigh, another gasp, a cry.
When it’s over, Carlotta says, “Now that was just about worth two bills.”
I decline her offer of a postcoital smoke and I ask if I might instead have the little plastic bag of evidence. Before, I was worried about looking guilty of having gone too far undercover. Now that I’ve resigned, I’m afraid I just look guilty.
She refuses. Putting her clothes back on she says, “I do believe I like having you in my thrall. I’ve got plans for you.”
“Carlotta, I won’t be your mule.”
Using a framed certificate as a mirror, she pats her hair into place. “I’m not asking you to. That was a mistake on my part, giving you that assignment. Clearly not work you’re cut out for. But here’s something that is: find Hector for me.”
I could refuse, could easily overpower her and take the evidence from her by force but I don’t. Her muscle would never let me off the lot.
*****
At this hour on a Friday there’s a good chance Grady and Swbyra will be in the office, trying to tie up enough loose ends to have a weekend. Before I can hit the security keypad, the dispatcher buzzes me in with a jovial greeting I cursorily return.
Swbyra claps me on the back. “Will, Will, good to see you, buddy. Say, about that loan—”
“What loan?” Grady asks with a scowl.
“I borrowed a little from Swbyra.”
“A little? Man, I could really use that money back.”
“What, are you in some kind of trouble?” Grady asks me. “You look a little strung out.”
“I’m not strung out!”
“That Zen shit ain’t doin’ you much good, is it?” he says.
“I haven’t been doing it that long, dammit.” Or at all, lately. When was the last time I sat? Not since I took up smoking Nearvana cigars with Carlotta Trephino. The memory makes me wince. “I’m not strung out. You’re right, though. I am in a little trouble. Someone’s shooting at me.”
That gets their attention. Swbyra looks dismayed. “Who?”
“When did this happen?” Grady asks.
“Last night, on the Miracle Mile—”
Grady frowns. “Nice fuckin’ neighborhood.”
“The Mile? What were you doing there?” Swbyra asks.
Looking for Hector.
Fondling strippers.
Dropping the dime on Ace and Spade.
Buying dope. Getting high.
My mouth suddenly goes dry. I can’t dump the whole miserable mess in their lap, can’t even ask them for help, can’t tell them a thing about what I’ve been up to.
Grady takes out his notepad and clicks on his pen. “Give me the details.”
“Why?”
He cocks an eyebrow at me. “You want us to look into it, don’t you?”
“Who’s shooting at you?” Swbyra asks. “Is it about Hector? Shrike? Did you find out something about Shrike?”
“No, man, it’s nothing. I’m telling you, I can handle it. It’s nothing.” I chuckle, and pray they don’t hear the ragged edge of nervousness in it. “It was the Miracle Mile.”
“You should stay away from there,” Swbyra says.
“I was just ...”
With raised eyebrows they wait for me to explain.
“Looking for this Hector.”
“Did you find him?” Swbyra asks. “Did you find Shrike?”
His face close to mine, Grady demands, “Did you?”
“I, uh, no.” God, if only I could tell him. “Hell, I don’t want anything to do with him. I’m not even looking for Hector anymore.”
“Good,” Swbyra says, “You stay away from him. Leave that to us. About my money—”
“Look, I will pay you back, but I don’t have it now. Guys, I got to go.”
“Mansion—” Swbyra gives me a pleading look
“You workin’ today?” Grady asks him.
“Sure, sure.” Lips pressed together, brow furrowed, Swbyra gives me one last look. “Take it easy, huh, Will?” he says, and slouches back to his desk.
A Zen riddle poses this puzzle: A man hangs by his teeth from a tree over a cliff. His hands can grasp no branch, his feet can rest on no limb. From below, someone shouts a life-or-death question. If the man in the tree doesn’t answer, he fails; if he does answer, he falls and dies. What should he do?
Hell, I don’t know. As for me, between Carlotta and Shrike, it seems I have to keep looking for Hector. The only way to stay alive is to find him.