‘My brother will never have to work again if he doesn’t want to,’ Stoney said. ‘You don’t worry about him. Now. You can play tough, try to rough me up some more, and completely fuck yourself over. Or you can crash here with me and see if Danny shows up tonight, and then we’re home free. What’s it gonna be?’
Alex crossed his arms. ‘I don’t sleep on couches.’
18
Gooch thought the Bayou Mee was appropriately named, as the two girls near its parking lot might say, Buy. You. Me. The Tulane Avenue open-court motel was grimy, the dive more residence than family fun stopover. It was a few blocks from the New Orleans Criminal Courts Building and nearby were several bail bond businesses, and Gooch wondered if maybe the Bayou Mee catered to those recently released from jail. He’d seen two women go from the darkened parking lot to rooms with new friends and return in a half hour, but they weren’t shimmying hot-panted rears on the street corner; rather, the two looked more like regular girls, T-shirts and denim shorts, just hanging out in the motel lot, gossiping, and maybe if you knew the password, you’d get a date. Gooch spotted one police cruiser go by, not even tap on its brakes. Late Thursday night, the girls not too busy yet.
He’d paid for his room and said, ‘I’m looking for a friend of mine.’
‘What’s her name?’
‘Alex.’
‘Don’t know an Alex.’
‘You know a man named Alex?’ Gooch laid a fifty on the desk. ‘You know any Alex at all?’
‘What’s he look like?’ The clerk was a bony kid, dirty-blond hair, sullen, his nose pierced with a thin hoop of gold. He scooped the bill into his jeans pocket.
‘Alex was here about a month ago.’
‘But what’s he look like? Names don’t matter much here.’
‘He might have had some phone calls back to Texas on his bill. Does that ring a bell?’
‘You a cop?’
‘Do cops give money for answering questions?’
‘Sure, sometimes.’
‘I’m not a cop. Or a PI’
‘Alex don’t ring a bell. Most of the guys here have classier names than Alex, like Bubba or Hoss. Or John.’ He laughed.
‘Thanks,’ Gooch said. ‘Think about it.’
He went back to his room, started watching the girls. A truck pulled in, the taller girl leaned down, chatted, laughed. The shorter girl walked over to a plastic crate two doors down from Gooch, sat, lit a cigarette.
Gooch opened the door, walked past her. She glanced at him, made a little frown. He fed coins into a decrepit Coke machine.
‘It’s broke,’ she called to him. His coins rattled in the machine.
‘Works good enough to take money,’ he said. ‘My friend told me this was a real nice place to stay, and here you can’t even get a sody pop.’ He glanced at her, grinned.
She grinned back. ‘Who’s your friend?’ she asked.
‘You know Alex?’
‘I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure.’ She flicked ash off her cigarette.
‘How about a guy named Jimmy Bird?’
‘Nope. You sure have a lot of friends,’ she said.
‘Don’t you?’
‘I’ve always been popular because I see the best in people.’
He stood near her. She glanced at his face, which wasn’t ever going to make a girl smile. She looked at his worn jeans, his gray T-shirt, scuffed boots, trying to make if he was a cop.
‘The Alex I’m looking for might be in Texas now.’
‘Better than here.’ She was looking down at the ashes at her feet, stubbing at them with her sandal.
‘Any Alexes ever work here?’
‘No,’ she said.
‘Alex might have stayed here a month ago, for at least two days, maybe more.’
‘I said I don’t know an Al-’ But her voice broke off and she looked back up at him with fear and a bit of confusion, as though she’d just understood a joke. She stood.
‘What’s your name?’ he asked.
‘I got to go.’
‘Alex isn’t a friend.’ He’d seen fear in her face now. ‘But I want to find him. Or her.’
‘Baby, I love chatting, but any more of my time, you pay.’
‘How much for an hour of your time?’
‘Seventy-five.’
‘I just want to talk to you,’ Gooch said.
‘Costs the same.’
He nodded.
‘We should go to my room. I got some Comfort there. I could use a drink.’
Her room was on the opposite side of the court, the window missing, plywood up in its place. She said her name was Helen and she made them both drinks, Sprite and Southern Comfort, in little plastic cups. She didn’t have ice cubes and the Sprite was a little warm.
‘You’re quite the hostess,’ Gooch said. He gave her the seventy-five bucks, all of it. She counted it and sat down.
‘I said something that scared you,’ he said.
‘Alex I don’t know. But I know an Albert Exley. That was the name he used here. I called him Al ‘cause I don’t like Albert as a name. That’s close to Alex, isn’t it? He was here about a month ago.’
‘What’s he look like?’
‘Wiry. Way stronger than he looks. Wears glasses. Brown hair, about six one. I saw him come in here, I figured, all I need, another social worker trying to get me to work at Popeye’s Chicken. Or a Jesus freak.’ Helen sipped from her cup. Gooch thought she couldn’t be more than twenty-five, already faded, her skin pale and her hair a dark lank. ‘Yeah. He’s a social worker like Hitler was.’
‘What did he do?’
‘You a cop?’
‘No. I’m a concerned citizen.’
‘Someone needs to concern Albert Exley’s ass off the street.’ She pointed at the plywood. ‘He put me through that window.’ She raised her arm and he could see a web of healing scar threaded along her skin. ‘Tore up my arms, my back, bad. And I’m practically his girlfriend.’
‘Explain.’
‘He’s here for four or five days. I can’t figure him out, why a guy looks like a professor is here. He hires me a couple of times a day, like he’s passing the time.’ She shrugged. ‘I kept feeling he wasn’t just hanging out here, he was in New Orleans on important business of some sort. But I know better than to ask. Just keep my mouth shut. Well, open, but you know what I mean.’ She laughed.
Gooch wanted to give her a Greyhound ticket, say, Just go somewhere else and start over and don’t do this anymore. She’d look at him like he was one of the Jesus freaks.
‘We’re getting along fine. One day he’s gone most of the day, most of the night. Comes back in a bad mood. I think, he’s been nice, I’ll see if I can relax him. This was his room then, not mine, so I do him how he likes and he gets in the shower. He says I can watch TV if I want, ’cause there’s not a TV in my room, and he knows I’m not gonna bother his wallet. His cell phone rings when he shuts off the shower, and so I click it on, thinking I’ll just hand it to Al, be cute, and a guy calling starts yelling, all panicked. I’m telling the guy to calm down and suddenly Albert yanks the phone out of my hand, listens, then throws me through the window. I’m lying there, naked, bleeding like nobody’s business. He grabs his stuff, jumps in his car, he’s gone.’ She shook her head. ‘Cops looked for him, but I guess not too hard. I don’t pay taxes so I don’t pay their salaries. Jerry, the owner, he makes me move into this room, says it was my fault the window got busted. Cheap asshole won’t put in a new window yet, and it’s too hot.’ Helen looked ready to cry.
‘I’ll speak with Jerry. You’ll have a new window,’ Gooch said.
She stared up at him.
‘The caller. What was he upset about?’
She shrugged. ‘I wasn’t sure. I had trouble remembering real clear after I went through the window. I lost too much blood. But when I think about it, I think he was saying something like, “You dumb fuck, you got the wrong guy.”’ She finished her drink. ‘You don’t want to mess with Albert. He’s nuts. He’d kill a person over answering the phone.’
‘When I find him,’ Gooch said, ‘I’ll put him through a window for you.’
‘That’s sweet. But you better grab him from behind,’ Helen said, and despite the sticky heat she gave a shiver. ‘Don’t let that man see you coming. You don’t get no second chance with him.’