One Foot Off the Gutter (9 page)

“Don't worry, sugar. This is a good plan.”

“Coddy, you know we can't afford a house. You know that.”

“Don't be so negative,” I said smartly. “Things can happen.”

“I'm not accusing you of anything, Coddy. I'm only being practical. I'm not afraid to gamble with what we have. But if that's what we're going to do, we can't make mistakes We don't have any margin for error in our lives. Be realistic, Coddy.”

If Alice felt trapped, how did other people feel? I was afraid to put a title on what I saw in her.

A current was riding the air. Not only in the city, but in the suburbs, as well. A current that cut across the fields and the countryside. Wherever there were people hassling to make a living, there was scarcity in the air. I looked at Alice.

“Honey, I've got to go to bed. Got to go down to the station at a reasonable hour tomorrow.”

I didn't have the courage to tell her that for the first time in my life, I was beginning to see the writing on the wall. Some people were never going to get their share of the pie in the sky. The country was divided into two camps, winners and losers. I was crossing my fingers and betting that we weren't among the latter. I hoped that we could improve ourselves, pull ourselves up and out of misfortune's pit. I prayed we'd be among the lucky few who got under the wire, who got to move along a little further toward the better things in life. Ambition would not rest; it was becoming a question of do or die. For Alice, I had to keep trying.

 

 

 

 

 

 

i
t was amazing how bad the city smelled. Mission Street was stinking like a slaughterhouse; flyblown meat spiced the air. The heat was riding up the thermometer faster than anyone could remember. The church bells of Mission Dolores were tolling long, monotonous peals that reverberated throughout the neighborhood. Salvadorean women dressed in faded black dresses were walking toward the church, past the caravans of German and Japanese tourist buses heading in the same direction.

Police helicopters were circling over a Muni bus stuffed to bursting with passengers on Mission Street. Dope dealers and
evangelicos
were peddling their wares at the corner of Sixteenth Street and Mission. With its brick pavement, news vendor booths, the dopemen selling drugs, and with the
evangelicos
droning out songs about redemption through their tinny two watt portable amplifiers, screeching the lyrics into feedbacking microphones—the
devil was having a lively day at the intersection.

What was the point of everything? Bellamy had to stop and ask himself that question. He watched a horny beetle crawl over the windshield of the squad car. He was entranced by the bug's inexorable, timeless, unceasing movement. On the hot glass surface the beetle's swarthy carapace gleamed in the sun. It was the closest he'd ever come to experiencing a moment of meditation. Then the beetle flew away, directly into the traffic, and with it went Bellamy's question.

 

I steered the squad car onto Mission Street, driving past Irma's Papanga Restaurant, the Leandro Soto Apartments, the Wang Fat Fish Market, the Red Tiger Discount Store, and a Public Health Service ambulance loading up a pair of winos who'd been baking like bread on the sidewalk.

“Hey...pull over.”

Bellamy's voice was low, heated, constricted by a sense of recognition and longing. I scanned the street in front of me, but I didn't see anything.

“What is it?”

“Got some assholes at five o'clock startin' shit on the sidewalk.”

I wrenched the wheel sharply to the right, cutting off oncoming traffic. A dozen car horns honked in unison, protesting my authority. The smell of burning rubber filled the air in a second. The squad car came to a smoking halt at the curb. Before I could ask him what was up,
Bellamy reached for his baton, opened the door and leaped out, shouting, “Hey, dirtbag! Don't move! Stay right where you are!”

 

Bellamy advanced on three men standing in front of a hardware store. The place that used to be a bar, a rocking joint patronized by drag queens and bikers. I didn't like the looks of the situation. It was one of those things. Bellamy was going to roust two young guys and an older fellow. It was the young blood that worried me: they had icewater flowing in their veins. But it was my partner's call.

“All right!” Bellamy roared. “I saw everything! Which one of you motherfuckers has the rocks?”

He scowled at the first man. A middle aged black guy wearing an army jacket and a baseball hat squashed down over his forehead. The suspect's eyes were sunk so far back behind his cheekbones, it was like staring into the mouth of a cave.

“Mighty hot day to be wearing a coat, ain't it?” Bellamy snickered. He narrowed his eyes until they were mere glints caught in two boiled pouches.

“You didn't have to call me a motherfucker,” the black man protested.

His voice was no more than a hoarse whisper. He shifted from one foot to the other, then stepped back an inch, edging his way toward the front door of the hardware store. Several black faces were watching Bellamy through the store's windows.

“Don't give me that tired shit,” Bellamy complained. “I'll call you a motherfucker whenever I feel the need to.
It's part of my first amendment rights. Freedom of speech. You know what I'm saying, homes? Now what about you two? What do you gentlemen have in your pockets, ha? Let me have a peek. It'll be like going on an Easter egg hunt. We can turn it into a game for the whole family to enjoy.”

The two men were Salvadoreños. One of them had his hands in the pockets of his baggy pants. A nappy watch cap was pulled low over his eyes; neither Bellamy nor I could read the expression on his broad boned face. The other guy wore a white, sleeveless t-shirt over a muscular chest covered with tattoos. His mouth was set in a thin line under a carefully manicured mustache.

Straight out of the pen, all pumped up like that, I thought.

“What's the matter with you, homes? Are you fucking deaf or what? Whatcha got in your pockets? C'mon, pull your hands out so I can see what kind of goodies you got in there. Or maybe you're jerking off and you want me to wait until you're done. Why didn't you say so? I can wait. I've got the time. Go ahead. Give your pud a good yank for me. Courtesy of the San Francisco Police Department. Paid for by the taxpaying citizens of the city. Just don't come on your khakis, man. What would your girl friend say?”

It was a tactic of Bellamy's designed to make the assholes nervous. And it worked like a charm. The Salvadoreños' faces were flushed with ill-concealed rage. I could tell they were dying to climb all over Bellamy, but they didn't move a limb. It was a feat of self control; I had to admire them for that. Then the older
vato
folded his
arms over his chest and gave Bellamy a sneering curl of his lip. A vein pulsed dangerously on his neck. That was not a good sign. Maybe it was time for me to get out of the car, go over there and back up Bellamy.

It was too hot for this bullshit. I opened the car door, stood up, and strapped on my riot helmet. The sun was blinding, reminding me that I'd left my sunglasses on the bus ride into the city from Novato. A massive headache was creeping down my temples. Alice said I'd been gnashing my teeth at night. It actually woke her up. That's why my head ached all morning long. I placed my right hand on the squad car's roof. I rested my left hand on the butt of my revolver. The three suspects stood dead quiet on the pavement. Bellamy tried to provoke them to do something rash.

“Okay. I guess we have to play games. But I like playing games. It gives me a thrill like you wouldn't believe. Because if you think you're bad, imagine how bad I am. Playing games is my favorite pastime. I'm good at it. Better than you, believe me. But that's what I like about you assholes. You like to play games, too.”

“You don't have to call me no asshole,” the black man stammered.

The guy's voice resembled the contents of a beer can slowly draining itself. Bellamy lifted his billy club and pointed it at the sky. His face was congested with indignation.

“If I want to call you an asshole, what's the big deal? I'm sure it's not the first time. Haven't you gotten used to it by now? Why can't you shut up and show me the dope?
All I want is the fucking dope. I don't care about you. But if you want to play civil rights, I can play that, too. I'm versatile. I can say the pledge of allegiance. I can do anything.”

The black man gazed at Bellamy with pain leaking out of his sunken, rheumy eyes. There was little those eyes hadn't seen. Bellamy was one more bad dream. The kind that you remembered with your eyelids pinned back against your skull.

“Answer me, asshole. You hear me?” Bellamy said.

The culprit nodded, swallowing his Adam's apple in a slow, painful gulp.

“That's better. Now we're getting somewhere.”

Bellamy smiled and lowered his cudgel. His right arm was throbbing with the need to hit someone. Whenever he was busting a perpetrator, he couldn't help notice what they smelled like. Salvadoreños smelled like fruit. Black men smelled like cigarettes and day old sweat. And white trash not only walked and talked shit, they smelled like it, too.

“Easy, partner. Don't push it,” I called from behind him.

“So what about you two?”

Bellamy spun on the Salvadoreños. He brandished the nightstick, waving it an inch away from the younger man's nose. The lad, to his credit, did not flinch. I was impressed.

“What about you junior? What have you got in your pants? Haven't I asked you this already? If so, what's taking you so long to answer? Do I need a long distance operator
to get through to you? I know, you're retarded. I understand, homes. It's a cruel world, and then you die. You shouldn't be out on the streets if you don't have any brains in your head,
ese.
Someone might take advantage of you. That could ruin your reputation. Now take your hands out of your underwear, nice and slow. It's the most simple game I know of. It's called cooperating with an officer of the law. I tell you what to do, and you do what I say. Simple and sweet. I want to see every finger come out of your pocket like it was greased with Crisco.”

“He's just a kid. Why don't you leave him alone?” the older
vato
lisped.

I flashed: here comes trouble. I hopped onto the curb, my headache escalating. I unsnapped my holster and eased out the revolver. The metal was cold in my hand. Everything beyond my face was a jail cell. Even the flawless Indian summer blue sky was a prison.

“Well, aren't you surprising? You're sticking up for junior. Homes, you've become a role model. Did you go to school to learn about the milk of human kindness?”

Bellamy cocked his chin, begging the
vato
to step out of line with his chilled down blue eyes. He measured the man's tattooed biceps with a wicked grin.

“If I'm not mistaken,” Bellamy needled. “I'd say you're a recent graduate of California's penal institutions. But what happened? Did they let you out for a holiday? From where I'm standing, it looks like you graduated with honors. I love you for that. Do you know why? Because when I bust your ass, you're going back to the pen faster than you can shake your dick at a dog, that's why.”

The cast in the Salvadoreño's eyes wavered between defiance and fear. Bellamy saw the expression, ephemeral but significant. He laughed with an insincere lilt that made my stomach turn, prompting me to think that I'd been drinking too much coffee lately.

“How I love it when you hard guys feel the pain. It's like ice cream for me. I think we're looking at a potential parole violation here. Am I right? What do you think of that, Coddy?” Bellamy called over his shoulder.

Bellamy was showboating for the crowd on the sidewalk. A bunch of old guys and a few junkies and whores. But then Bellamy got down to business.

“So who's got the rocks? The merry and wise rock that everyone in the neighborhood knows and loves. Rock is better than pussy, isn't it, gentlemen? Let's be honest now. It's nothing to be ashamed of. Pussy just doesn't compare.”

The kid in the watch cap pulled his hand out of his pants and dropped a small plastic vial to the pavement. Bellamy laughed again, this time with genuine pleasure. The things that rolled off Bellamy's tongue worked a perverted magic in the street. His cruel mouth just wore the assholes down to a nub.

When Bellamy got through laughing, he poked the vial with his boot. “That's real tasty looking. Yes, it is. My children, you are incredible. Say ten Hail Marys and go to jail without supper. Junior, you are a supreme fuck up. You can be proud of yourself.”

“Leave him alone,
cabron
.”

Bellamy locked eyes with the muscular
vato.
The moment built on itself. Junior fell into a crouch and
bared his teeth. Bellamy's face was warped into an ugly grimace.

“
Chale,
home boy. What's the matter with you? Do you want to throw some
chingasos,
ha? If you say one more word, I'm going to wrap this baton around your head. I will straighten out that big nose of yours, and when I'm done with my sacred task, there won't be a plastic surgeon on this planet who can fix it.
Comprende?”

The guy stared at Bellamy with molecules of murder spinning in his eyes. I took another look at the kid in the watch cap. The black man in the army jacket hadn't moved. It didn't take me more than a half second to see what was coming. It always happened that way. Everything moved slow as in a dream, then it blew up in your face with the compressed force of a time bomb.