Harmless (17 page)
If you’ll refer back
to Item 1e, narrowing the list of possibilities was the only logical approach.
But how? Confrontation? Reading body language?
Old school footwork?
I came to the
conclusion that I’d figure it out. Some way, somehow. I had time, money,
motivation, and will. Whatever it took, however long it took, I knew I’d
eventually hang up a “Mission Accomplished” banner on my front porch and
announce to the neighborhood that I’d been victorious.
Next, I searched for “private
investigator equipment” and found a list of the items I’d need for a successful
stakeout.
Can I just tell you
how thrilled I was with the whole idea of sneaking around, spying on members of
the police department behind dark shades with a five o’clock shadow that would
rival Ryan Gosling’s? You’ve seen his, haven’t you? The guy can really rock
the beard stubble. Respect, Gosling. Respect. Regardless, handsome private
eye qualities aside, I’d begun to think I’d found my calling.
I spent hours doing
research on techniques and tips and tricks. I ignored my phone when I saw
Thrifty’s name on the caller I.D.
His message: “Wish
you’d given me a little more warning, but good luck, Pendragon. I never did
figure out why you’ve got a thing for the post office. Anyway, check’s in the
mail.” I’d explained it to him countless times—apparently the depths of my
amazement never rooted themselves inside his desolate noggin.
I read. I took
notes. I forgot to eat lunch, such was the depth of my focus.
Learn. Accomplish.
Punish.
L.A.P.
I almost considered
replacing “Be the victor” with “Take a L.A.P!” but changed my mind.
Finally, when my
brain could handle no more input, I set out to stock up on supplies and the
proper investigative equipment. I had to visit three different stores to
collect everything I needed, but I came home with the following: a handheld
parabolic microphone, a GPS locator, a dashboard-mountable camera, a handful of
memory cards, binoculars, portable food and water…and, well, a pee jug. When
you see “Nature” on the caller I.D., you can’t ignore it. Not forever.
That evening, I was
eager to get started but aware that I was still unprepared, that my
transformation was far from complete. Instead of pulling a stupid stunt like
prematurely jumping into my new life as a self-proclaimed investigator and
tracking my first suspect, I went for a run to clear my mind. I hadn’t been in
days and my usual eight-lap loop reduced itself to six fretful, struggling
ones. My legs held up, but my lungs were filled with viscous concrete and my
head remained ensconced in quicksand.
When I got home, I
showered, and then I slept. I dreamed about driving a car—Clarence’s litter
box Volvo, actually—down a long stretch of highway, somewhere in the desert.
The road was so straight it reached a vanishing point in the distance, miles
away. Blue sky. Hills like brown elephants. Beige sand. I approached a
railroad crossing and watched as the gates lowered in front of me. I slammed
on the brakes, but the car accelerated. I jammed harder; the car went faster.
Picking up speed, I hurtled toward the red and white gates as a freight train
shot across my path, blurry from momentum and velocity. I checked the
speedometer—over one hundred and twenty miles per hour—and no matter how hard I
pushed on the brakes, the car went faster.
And in the split
second before impact, the view switched. I was outside the Volvo, standing
beside the tracks as the train blazed past, wind blowing my hair and t-shirt.
I watched as the other me, the one inside the car, collided with the train and
exploded into a giant fireball.
The next day,
Tuesday, was crammed with more preparation and learning to use the items I’d
purchased. Researching the ins and outs of a successful stakeout attempt.
Using the parabolic mic to listen to Mrs. Epstein curse me—for some unspecified
reason—from her living room. I traded in my sleek, smooth-lined BMW coupe for
a used, 1994 Chevy Cavalier.
But not with
Thrifty. I chose a different used-car dealership on the far side of town.
One, I didn’t feel like facing Thrifty, and two, I didn’t want him asking
questions about why such an esteemed member of the Pendragon clan had chosen to
go from the supple designs of my BMW back to the boxy, glorified go-kart of the
Cavalier. Don’t get me wrong—that’s not to disparage the Cavalier in any way.
It’s a dependable piece of machinery. If you care, I still drive it. I never
went back. These days, I’ve learned to favor reliability over aesthetics.
I also did something
I hadn’t attempted since I was in my early twenties. I shaved my head bald,
slicking it smooth as glass with shaving cream and a razor. I sculpted my
stubble down to a goatee.
(You win, Gosling.
Keep your perfect hair and your unintentionally perfect five o’clock shadow.
You’ve got the market cornered there, anyway. The rest of us don’t stand a
chance, and we know it.)
For a couple of
hours, I didn’t even recognize myself. I’d walk past a mirror and do a double
take, then follow it with a quick, “Oh, right,” before I moved on. I was sure
that if I had trouble recognizing me, then the man in Kerry’s house, whomever
he may have been, would have an even harder time.
Tuesday evening came
and went. I watched the news for any more developments on the Thomas and
DeShazo incidents. There were none. I searched for “Kerry Parker murder”
online and found nothing new. The same headlines popped up as they’d been for
days.
“Local Woman Dead: No
Foul Play Suspected.”
“Suicide Without Answers.”
“When Society Fails
Someone, We All Lose.”
I slammed my laptop
closed.
I would not—
would
not
—fail Kerry.
Officer Planck
“So you’re admitting
to falsifying your first report, Officer Planck? The one where you claimed
that you had approached Mr. DeShazo under suspicion of driving under the
influence and then shot him in self-defense?”
“Yes. It doesn’t
matter how it happened. I still say it was in self-defense and stand by the
original assumption that DeShazo was going for a weapon. That’s my story.”
“And ultimately, you
decided to tell the truth after what happened?”
“I didn’t have a
choice. It would’ve come out sooner or later. A reporter would’ve dug
something up, maybe Clarence Oliver would’ve caved—who knows? I figured it was
best to get it out there—on my own terms—before…before somebody did it for me.”
“You’re aware that
falsifying a police report is a crime?”
“California Penal Code
118.1, penalty of perjury, punishable by prison time. Yeah, bro, I’m aware.”
“
Hmmm
…interesting.”
“What does ‘hmmm…interesting’
mean? What’re you writing down?”
“Just notes. Nothing
to concern yourself with.”
“Nothing to concern
myself with? I’m
here
, aren’t I?”
“I just find it
interesting that you’re willing to put your career, your freedom, your life, and
your family’s life all on the line for a guy that you claim to have no
relationship with.”
“I’ve been wondering
the same thing for days.”
“And have you come up
with an answer?”
“Not one that
satisfies anybody. Especially not my wife—she thinks I’m nuts.”
“I’d like to hear
it.”
“I don’t know…I guess
maybe it’s because of what they tried to do to him. He loved that girl, man.
She barely acknowledged he was alive, but you could see it in the way he talked
about her. Heart and soul, and maybe a little pushy and weird about it, but he
was all-in for Kerry Parker. I had to help. I couldn’t let him take the fall
for something I was absolutely positive he didn’t do.”
“So you warned him.”
“Hell yeah, I warned
him. Write that down. Write it! Officer Planck admits to warning Steve
Pendragon of some fucked-up frame job. Don’t strike that profanity. Leave
it. Leave ‘fucked-up frame job’ in there.”
“We’ll make note of
it. Okay then, Officer Planck, we’re just about done here. We’ll review the
items we’ve discussed and get back to you. You can leave your badge and your
gun.”
“That’s it?”
“Well, there is one
other thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Thanks, we’ll keep
these in a safe place for you. Last question: at any point during this whole
process were you aware that Mr. Pendragon suffered from some mental health
issues?”
Sometimes life comes
at you in funny directions. Sometimes memories hit you twice in a week and the
first time it does nothing, because you’re involved in something like meeting a
man who was hired to murder the love of your life and it doesn’t have a chance
to affect you. But the second time—oh, the
second
time—it catches you
in the middle of breakfast because you decided to cook your eggs a certain way,
and then it sends you reeling around the house like a mobile home caught in a
tornado.
I don’t know why I
decided to go with eggs over-easy on Wednesday morning. I’m strictly a
scrambled-only kind of guy. Toss in a little turkey bacon for some extra
healthy protein and you’re good to go. But no—I
had
to have them
over-easy.
The idea popped in my
head and I couldn’t make it disappear. It was more like a single firefly
lighting up in an abandoned field than a light bulb turning on, yet I was
unable to ignore it. And just as a firefly illuminates and fades, illuminates
and fades, the notion throbbed on and off way down deep where I couldn’t get to
it, couldn’t cover it up. Maybe it was the first memory a couple of days
earlier sputtering back to life that spawned this need to modify My Routine.
Whatever caused it, call me “ruined” for a good twelve to sixteen hours.
Shauna was her name.
(I realize how close that is to Shayna—I’ll get to that later.)
She liked her eggs
over-easy.
College sweethearts.
The captain of the baseball team dating the hottest girl in her sorority. We
were in love for a time, and then one day I changed my mind. I wish there was
a specific reason, because that would make the memory easier, but there
wasn’t. I was in love and then not in love. Call it youthful failings, call
it cold feet, whatever you want—it doesn’t change the fact that I was in
something that I no longer wanted to be in and I didn’t have the balls, the
guts, or the courage to break it off.
For two years.
It was tough. I’m
sure you’ve been there before. We all have. Did you let it go on as long as I
did? Or were you a better person? Did you allow yourself to make the proper
decision in an adequate amount of time?
Then it happened.
That overpowering gut
bomb that insisted (maybe “demanded” is a better word) that I shouldn’t get on
that airplane.
How do you define the
indefinable?
Dread. Fear.
Premonition. Ethereal instinct.
Throw them all into a
pot, add in a dash of “what if something happened” for flavor, let it simmer to
a thick reduction, and then drink it down. That’s what sat in the bottom of my
stomach.
Shauna got on the
flight. I didn’t stop her. The plane crashed into the ground and she died.
It seems so harsh to
reduce it to that, and I don’t intend to mitigate the overwhelming suffering
from that day. I don’t. But she was one of many.
“What if something
happened” hatched and came to life. I’d
given
it life. I’d created
it. And the thing, whatever it’d become, latched on to Shauna and flew away
with her.
It’s quite possible
that the day she died was the exact day I became a wretch. Was I born a
wretch, or was I created? That’s up to you or God to decide, but I’d say I
created myself.
***
Wednesday was a
drunken, slobbering, regret-filled wash.
Thursday forced its
way into the world with a pounding hangover, each pulse throbbing in my temple
like a carpenter with a nail gun.
Ka-chunk, ka-chunk, ka-chunk
.
I couldn’t have been
more thankful for the ultra-dark, wraparound sunglasses I wore as I sat in the
Cavalier, under the welcome shade of a maple tree. I was half a block down
from the police station, waiting, watching, hoping to spot the first black,
unmarked sedan. I sipped coffee and gagged on the syrupy sweetness of some
trail mix, too nauseated, too hung over to eat.
The first three hours
were a waste.
And so were the next
three.
I read the newspaper
when I could manage to focus my eyes long enough, but the words, even the
simple ones like “partly sunny and 87 degrees,” made my headache worse. I kept
an eye on the station and watched the dull comings and goings. Men and women
in suits, blue-uniformed officers dragging handcuffed criminals inside, distraught
family members entering to pay a visit, or perhaps pay a fine.
Cars came and went,
people strolled by on their way to somewhere else, and, admittedly, I got
bored. A lot of the research I’d done on being a private investigator pointed
out the fact that long, dull, mind-numbing hours were often involved.
Wait, wait, wait, and
wait some more. Wait for the cheating husband to meet with his mistress so you
could take a long-distance photo of them canoodling. Wait for the guy
collecting worker’s comp pay to climb up on his roof, carrying a fifty-pound
package of shingles on his shoulder so you can document it. Wait for a gang of
dubious warehouse employees to steal pallets of beer at three a.m.
I knew this going in,
yet I still got bored. It wouldn’t be a life I’d pursue beyond locating
Kerry’s stalker.
By the seventh hour
of my initial stakeout, I gave up and started watching female joggers through
my binoculars.
Yes, it was a
horrible, horrible thing to do—especially since I was there under the pretense
of finding the man that may have murdered Kerry—just horrible, and I realize
that, but you can only go without some form of mental distraction for so long.
I am not above shame, and in moments of personal weakness, let he who is
without sin cast the first stone.
At some point, even I
realized how creepy it was—and it’s not like me to admit such things and you
should feel privileged that you witnessed it—so I took one last, unfruitful
look at the police station, packed up my things, and drove home. I’d seen
bicycle cops, patrol cars, officers on foot, and an assortment of unmarked
sedans that came in various shades of beige, but no black ones. Had I been too
late to catch him that morning? Was he out working a case somewhere? Maybe it
was his day off. Maybe he’d offed Kerry and then taken his family on vacation
as a reward for a murder well done. I had no way of knowing, but I wasn’t
ready to quit, and tomorrow was another day.
And it would
definitely be hangover free.
I have to admit, I
did pass out for about thirty minutes a little after one o’clock. It’s quite
possible that I missed him during that time. Seriously, you should be writing
this down—Pendragons don’t admit fault this often. You’d have a better chance at
capturing a snapshot of Sasquatch having tea and crumpets with the Loch Ness
Monster.
My plans changed, my life
changed,
everything
changed when I got home.
Have you ever walked
into a room and gotten the feeling that something was amiss?
Let me give you an
example: say you come home from high school one day, you walk into your
bedroom, and for some reason, you know, just absolutely
know
, that your
mother found the hoard of porn magazines you’d hidden between your mattresses.
The air in the room
is unusual. The mass previously contained within that hypothetical twelve by
twelve unit is off and the gravity doesn’t feel the same.
Your voice
reverberates with a different sound as you shout, “Mom?!” and then immediately
run through a list of acceptable reasons why you’ve been stashing copies of
Playboy
and
Lesbian Lovers #4
.
Things like:
“Everybody does it.”
“I was curious.”
“They’re not mine,
Scooter left them here.”
(Yes, I actually had
a friend nicknamed Scooter in high school. His real name was Andy Decker. He
volunteered for the Army after 9/11 and died a hero in Afghanistan.)
When I got home, I
walked into my living room and flopped down on the couch, exhausted,
frustrated, and famished, but before I could manage to peel myself away from
the cushions’ depths, I noticed something. And I hate to be trite by saying
the
feng shui
was off, even though that’s what it was. Something
intangible.
I mean, really, I
hate to keep coming back to the fact that I’m partially psychic and that I’m
operating on an elevated plane of existence, but I can’t explain it any other
way. I chalk it up to this: in certain situations, when your level of stress
is higher or you’ve been exposed to chaotic situations or the sense of
impending danger is waving at you from your peripheral vision, your aura begins
vibrating at a higher rate and you become more in tune with the unseen forces
that constantly affect us. I just happen to be more aware of it than you, so
you can either accept it and trust me, or shake your head in disbelief. I’m
good with either.
Similar to the whiff
of Old Spice that followed Edward Strout, I picked up on an unfamiliar scent.
Not aftershave, mind you. Initially, I thought it was maybe shampoo or laundry
detergent—like when you’re out jogging in a wide open space and somehow you
smell fabric softener on the woman twenty yards in front of you. The smell
could’ve drifted anywhere, it could’ve gotten caught in the wind and faded into
billions of miniscule particles, but no, you caught the whiff and realized she’d
probably washed her running outfit the day before.
It reminds me of the
post office, the way the scent is delivered out into the world and somehow,
someway, through a miracle of efficiency and everything operating in cohesive
unison, it manages to get dropped off in your nose from a great distance away.
Better yet, you’ve
worn the same deodorant for months, to the point that the Cool Wave scent no
longer registers. You go to the grocery store and decide to get frisky, to
shake it up a bit, and instead of going back to the trusty, crisp scent of Cool
Wave—what does a cool wave smell like anyway? The deodorant smells nothing
like the ocean, if you ask me—for some reason you decide to take a chance on Fresh
Mountain. And for the next week, its overpowering aroma penetrates your
nostrils. It’s different. It doesn’t blend in with the natural surroundings
that you’ve gotten used to. You notice it more because it’s new.
Same goes with the
aroma in my living room. It was faint, but it was there.
And then I realized…
pizza
.
It wasn’t that
permeating cloud that sits inside your car if you drive home with a pie sitting
on the passenger’s seat. Not that strong—call it a watermark, if you will.
It’s there, but a faded effigy of the real thing.
You know what I’m
talking about. It sits heavy in your clothes for hours after you’ve eaten
it—almost like you’re wearing cheese and tomato sauce and herbs as an edible
cologne.
You might be thinking
it could’ve come from anywhere. Maybe Mrs. Epstein was gnawing on a slice of
pepperoni and anchovies with those pink, toothless gums of hers and the smell
had wafted across the street.
Not so. My windows
and doors are perpetually shut in the summer; it keeps the air conditioned
temperature at a cool sixty-five degrees.
The smell was foreign
because I hadn’t had a pizza in the house in years.
I wrestled myself up
from the couch, enduring that full body ache that comes standard with a raging
hangover that lasts well into the evening of the next day. I tried to follow
the pizza scent with Sparkle caressing himself against my legs as I shuffled
from room to room.
It was present in the
living room. But not in the kitchen. I followed it down the hallway and into
the study where it tapered off. Downstairs bathroom, not so much. Then up the
stairs to the second floor. Nothing in my empty second bedroom. Nothing in
the office. The trail picked up stronger again in my master bedroom, and I followed
it into the master bath, where I noticed the first thing that was awry.
My toothbrush—the
vibrating sonic-blast kind—was on the wrong side of the sink.
I
never
put it
on the right side.
If you haven’t
figured this out by now, I have a whisper of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Not enough to affect my daily life; I don’t have to lock the living room door
twelve times before I go to bed—nothing like that. However, certain things
need to be a certain way or the whole balance of life is thrown off. The
toothbrush goes on the left side of the sink. The open end of the pillowcase
needs to be facing the bed’s center. Every clothes hanger and shirt must be
hung in the same direction. There are more, but you get the idea.
Then, in the
trashcan, the carefully folded sheets of paper towels containing the hairy
remnants of my shaved head were wadded up into a crumpled ball. I absolutely
knew I hadn’t left them like that. I had placed the paper towels over the
sink, shaved my head in such a way that the hair would fall onto them, then
neatly folded it into a perfect square, like wrapping a Christmas present, and
gently placed the package into the trash to prevent spillage.