It was almost midnight when Internal Affairs told Hanson he could go home but they’d want to see him first thing in the morning. He’d done a good job, which was easy since he told the truth every time, except when he said that he’d feared for his life, and since almost anyone else would have feared for their life, it was an easy, almost foolproof lie. The most difficult part of the endless interview was not losing his temper, but that had been a big part of his everyday life since he’d come back from the war. But he’d described what happened exactly the same way each time and answered the individual, specific questions the same way, almost word for word, though that made them suspicious at first. On the trick questions he’d contradicted himself a few times, but that was what he should have done, what they wanted, it was built into the process. He might have been, well, friendlier, or tried to be friendlier, even though they’d have used that as a way to trip him up. They were sons of bitches.
They’d offered to let him use the phone, like any criminal, but he knew they’d record everything he said. The only person he wanted to call was Libya, and he didn’t want them to know anything about Libya, though they probably already did. Still, he didn’t want to just hand them her phone number.
They’d towed his Travelall and searched it, and left it for him in Transportation with all the patrol cars, comical looking, but no one made fun of it or so much as spoke to him, coming from IA like he was carrying a disease.
The safest thing would be to go home and get drunk. No surprises there.
Driving home, he saw that the little Korean grocery store, where he usually stopped on the way to work for a half pint of vodka, was still open. They might let him use the phone. Or they might not. Why should they? They didn’t know him, who he was, other than the fact that he bought half a pint of their cheapest vodka five days a week. Fuckin’ Koreans anyway. They were good soldiers, though, brutal motherfuckers. Good luck on finding a pay phone that wasn’t destroyed. If he went home, he could call from there, but IA probably had a tap on his phone. He pulled into the seedy little strip mall, broken glass all over the asphalt. Usually it was crawling with winos, junkies, fuckers trying to work up enough nerve to rob the place. You couldn’t blame the Koreans for facing the world hard-ass, he’d never really considered that before. But no one was hanging around tonight.
He’d have to beg to use the phone, then beg Libya to…what? Talk to him? Say “Poor baby”? Tell him he was on his own? Get it over with, he thought. Then you can buy a whole fifth of liquor to take home. Anyway, what did he think? What did he expect?
He sat in the van, looking at the junk for sale in the barred window of the store. He turned the ignition off and sat there looking through the window. Fuck it, he thought. There’s no good news to report here. He started up the Travelall to drive home, then killed the engine trying to jam it into first gear. It wouldn’t start again. The lights in the grocery began to click off. He got out of the van and walked to the door. Bars on the windows. Little blinking red lights that may or may not be connected to alarms. Pole-mounted cameras that might or might not be real. The armored door was locked, it always was. The owner had to buzz you in. He rang the bell. Most of the lights were off now. He rang again, looked through the window, spoke into the speaker phone grille.
“Hello,” he said, not expecting anything good to come of it. “Hello?”
“We close now,” a woman said from somewhere in the back of the store.
“Ma’am?”
“Close now. Too bad. Come back in morning.”
“I apologize, ma’am, for bothering you so late…” He took a breath and finished his sentence. “Could I use your phone, please? For just a minute. I’ll pay you. My car won’t start.”
When the door buzzed open, he jumped like he’d been electrocuted. He walked inside, closed the door behind him. “Hello?” The only person he saw was himself, in the convex mirrors mounted all over the store.
“I know you,” the voice said. “You come every day to buy small vodka. Okay. Police officer, I know. Use phone, okay. On top of counter. You use.”
The voice from the back of the store.
“Thank you,” Hanson said.
The old black phone must have weighed five pounds. He dialed Libya’s number that he’d written down on a piece of an assignment card he had in his wallet.
When she answered the phone, he began, “Hi…”
“That was you, wasn’t it?”
“Libya?”
“The shooting. In the cemetery. It was you.”
“Yeah. I probably woke you and Weegee up, didn’t I? I’m sorry.”
“We’re awake, we’re fine. Are you okay?”
Another light went out in the store.
“Are you okay?” she asked again. “We saw it on TV. Are you okay?”
Only a single light was still burning at the back of the store now.
“I’m okay,” he said. “Yes, yes, I’m okay. I’m okay. I have to go, though. This place is closing up. Tell Weegee I said hello. Tell him about us. Tell him…You two get some sleep now, and I’ll call in the morning. Everything’s fine. Talk to you when the sun comes up. I miss you.”
He hung up the phone in the dim light from way back in the store. “Thank you. Thank you very much,” he said. “I’m very grateful for your help. Good night,” he said.
He’d walk home, it was only a few miles, and dawn would be something to see. “Good night,” he said and went out the door. When he saw the Temple rabbit watching him from the trash-strewn strip of grass and weeds between the parking lot and the street he wasn’t surprised.