I heard the thump of a body drop. I rolled my eyes and could see Teena on the floor, her tank top already soaking in blood.
“KJ, it’s not my fault you can’t control your women. I have enough on my plate dealing with Cindy’s OD and keeping your ass out of jail as it is. Go grab the saw and acid from the car. Discreetly, if you don’t mind.”
I tried to move. Greg shot me in the stomach.
“I thought KJ told you there was stuff going on here that couldn’t be compromised, Red. I thought you were smarter than this. Then again, I’ve been known to be wrong about people.”
9.
I survived a ten-year stint at San Quentin. I did exactly what I was supposed to do, kept my head down, my ear to the grindstone, and my fucking mouth shut. I stayed alive and made it out. One week in West Berkeley and it’s all shot to hell. I’m fucking dying here.
Identity Theft
by Summer Brenner
What you are to do without me I cannot imagine.
North Berkeley
The first thing he did was cut her hair. He cut as gently as possible, but when she screamed and jerked away, nearly causing him to stab her cheek, he gagged her, then tied her hands to the back of a chair and her feet to a table leg. When he finished, there was a pond of hair at his feet. He swept and vacuumed and saved a few strands in an envelope. The second thing, he burned her clothes. The embroidered blouses and shawls, the hand-loomed pants and skirt, the head wraps, he had no choice. They were clothes that looked distinctive. They could easily be remembered. If she managed to get out, someone could identify her. People in Berkeley were curious about all things ethnic. No doubt a handsome young woman in ethnic garb, looking lost and far from home, would attract someone’s attention. If she didn’t stop them, they might approach her to ask where she was from. They might offer to get her help. Instead of her own clothes, he had bought jeans, T-shirts, and sweaters in the teen department at Macy’s. Dresses would have to wait. He’d bought socks in case her feet got cold, two pairs with rubber grips so she wouldn’t slip. A salesclerk picked out bras, panties, pajamas, and a fluffy robe. “Nothing sexy,” he told her. Later, when it was appropriate for her to go outside, he would get her a winter coat and a rain jacket. At the pharmacy, he purchased toiletries: sanitary napkins, rose-scented deodorant, dental floss, an electric toothbrush, etc. Next, he took away her flimsy plastic shoes. They aroused feelings of disgust in him which he couldn’t explain. Barefoot she was less likely to run away. He also locked up her jewelry (the gold earrings and shell and bead necklaces) and documents, including her passport. He couldn’t bring himself to destroy the documents. He told himself that entirely wiping away her past existence, like the name of her hamlet and family, was inhumane. He locked up the signed contract with her mother and the sales receipt for nine hundred dollars, which was a way to protect himself — that is, legally. Finally, he taught her yes, no, goodbye, hunger, and thirst in English and sign language.
In advance of her arrival, he’d had a portion of his attic renovated. The new soundproof walls had been painted pale blue, a color reputed to induce calm. He’d debated about a window, knowing that to gaze at trees and sky and hills was a great pastime, a source of spiritual renewal, especially for a child accustomed to the natural world. But in the end, he thought a window would only make her sad. The bed and dresser were new. The sheets were pima cotton, the duvet goose down, the pillows hypoallergenic. The bathroom had hot running water and a flush toilet, luxury conveniences for her. He’d considered installing a tub with the shower, but he feared she might try to drown herself. He placed a small bookshelf in the corner of the room with early readers, a pictorial dictionary, a simple atlas, and copies of National Geographic. He put a clock radio on the console and tuned it to KDFC, the classical music station. As far as he knew, she never changed the station or turned it off.
Most of the day, he sat near her at a small library table. They didn’t attempt to communicate, only sat. He read. He graded his students’ papers. He worked on the outline of a presentation he was to deliver at a conference in July. He wasn’t sure what she did. Eventually, he would find a way to have her tell him her earliest impressions. But for now, he hoped his presence was reassurance that he was taking care of her.
He prepared her meals himself. In the future, he might have to resort to frozen food, veggie burritos, Cheese Board pizza, or soup from Poulet, but the homemade fare was part of the way he welcomed her. He was a good cook, an avowed vegetarian since he read Lorca’s Poet in New York in college (“...the terrible cries of crushed cows fill the valley with sorrow where the Hudson gets drunk on oil...”). His students loved to be invited over for mushroom stroganoff and shepherd’s pie with green lentils. It was during his own lifetime that the preoccupation over food provenance had gone from fringe co-ops to mainstream. Berkeley had been in the vanguard of the food revolution. In the vanguard of many revolutions, he often said with pride.
She wouldn’t touch any of it. That he expected. His food and customs of eating were foreign. The last time he gave her something to eat, she’d slept for eighteen hours. Hoping to counter her fears, he set the table in her room for two. Two plates and bowls, two forks and spoons (no knives), linen napkins, glasses of water, cups of coffee at breakfast, iced tea at lunch, and a carafe of red wine at dinner with a single glass for himself. In the center of the table, he put a hand-painted vase with daffodils (in his humble opinion, the most cheerful flower in the world). At every meal, he demonstrated how to use the napkin and utensils. As he ate, he smiled. He made a grunt or two of pleasure. For three days, she ate nothing, but on the fourth morning, she unfolded her napkin and put it in her lap, then dipped her spoon in a bowl of hot buckwheat cereal that he’d mixed with manuka honey and roasted almonds. One spoonful, then another. After she finished, he patted her hand, conveying both approval and gratitude.
Meanwhile, he documented the details of their encounters in a database. He planned to write a book with the current working title of Pygmalion’s Paradox. But whether it was ultimately called Paradox or Plight was unclear. It was she who would determine the course of the relationship, and thus, the final title. She was the variable, he was the constant.
The long weekend was over. The days had passed without dramatic incident. She’d decided not to starve herself, which alone counted as success.
On Monday morning after breakfast, he made the sign for walking. On his fingers, he counted out the hours he’d be gone. Five or six. Then he pointed to the clock and tried to explain with the numerals when he would return. As he left, he bolted her door on the outside. It was a risk, he knew. If there were an earthquake, or fire, or landslide, she might not survive. Fire season was over, but with the recent heavy rains and flooding, and the ground hard from several years of drought, the runoff was tremendous. Two nearby streets had recently been blocked with debris. Asphalt had cracked and caved. A neighbor’s foundation had been compromised. Around town the roots of a dozen large trees had loosened, causing them to fall. There’d been one fatality when a tree crashed onto the roof of a moving car. Above Tilden Park, six families were ordered to evacuate before their houses slid down a hill. Where he lived, there were several tiers of houses above him, road after road that circled through the hills, each positioned with steep slopes into its downhill neighbor’s yard. And his house, built in 1898, was positioned at the lower end of the spiral with only brick pilings for a foundation. However, his house had survived earthquakes, fires, and landslides for over a hundred years. He trusted it would survive another day.