“I can’t imagine you get much opportunity if that’s an example of your small talk.”
He sighed. “You think you’re smart? We’ll see how smart you really are,” he said and walked out of the restaurant.
I didn’t think of a snappy comeback until he’d been gone five minutes. “I’m only smart in comparison to some.”
It was happy hour, so I ordered a Negra Modelo and considered him for a while, but I didn’t have enough information to work up many hypotheses. And besides, I had other tasks.
I found the phone Esteban had left for me.
“Hello.”
“Who is this?” Esteban asked.
“María.”
“What’s up? You wanna borrow the car?”
I did want to borrow the car. I needed the car tonight, but that’s not why I was calling.
“No.”
“Good. Fucking walk to town. Fed up with people using my property for their personal convenience. You all have it easy. Twenty years ago you’d all have had to work for a living. Don’t know what I was thinking. Don’t even try it. I’ll have them check and see if it’s in use with the GPS. Same to everyone else-no one uses the car until I get back on Monday. Give them an inch they take a mile.”
“I haven’t used it at all.”
“Somebody’s been driving it. I’ve logged it. Abusing their privileges. Oh yeah, and what’s this I hear about you asking questions about some accident? Briggs left a crazy message on my voice mail.”
“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“What?”
“A private investigator’s been asking everyone questions about an incident that happened here in May. He’s been hired by the Mexican consulate in Denver. Apparently someone killed a Mexican on the Old Boulder Road and he noticed that your car was involved in an accident around then. He thinks you might be implicated somehow.”
I took the phone from my ear while Esteban threw out a complex series of curses involving the man’s mother and all sorts of unlikely forms of intercourse.
When he was finished I pressed home the point. “What should I tell him? He wants to have your car towed to a lab for a forensic examination.”
“My God, I leave town for one day and Briggs is going crazy and they’re towing my car? What the hell is happening out there?”
“Look, Don Esteban, it’s ok. I can handle this. He seems to be a little taken with me, but what should I tell him?”
“This is so fucked. I hit a deer. And that was a week before that accident. I was with Manuelito and Danny Ortega. We swiped an old doe. Jesus. And besides, everyone knows what happened to that dead Mex.”
“Oh-”
“Oh yeah, that’s no secret, one of our friends up the hill killed that poor bastard. Those fuckers. Briggs covered it up for them, I’ll bet my life on that.”
“One of the Hollywood people?”
“They can do anything they want in this town. That’s why we gotta squeeze a big tip outta them. Has anyone mentioned tips to you yet? Christmas isn’t far off.”
I ignored the sidetrack. “So I should I tell the investigator it was one of the Hollywood people?”
“No, no, don’t tell him anything. This isn’t our concern. Say nothing.”
“Ok.”
“But I know. Oh yeah, they think they can keep me out of the loop? That’s bullshit. Yeah, and just between you and me I’m pretty sure I know who did it.”
“Who?”
“Well, I can’t say over the phone. It’s not exactly confidential formation. You remember him. He smashed up that big white Bentley. You know who I’m talking about? From the party? I think he’s one of the houses you clean. No big secret.”
Silence.
Youkilis.
And everybody knows.
And no one cares.
“Are you still there, María?”
“Yes.”
“You sweet-talk him, María, don’t let anyone touch my car. I’ll fucking kill them.”
“Ok.”
“Ok. Good. Hold the fort. I’ll be back. See you Monday.”
It wasn’t late. The room clock said nine but Paco was already asleep, exhausted from a day’s overtime.
I needed sleep too.
Quietly I stored my supplies in the backpack and wrote a quick note for Paco. It didn’t convey much of anything. “Paco, you’ve been more than a friend, but this next step belongs to me alone. If all goes well I will see you tomorrow before I take the bus to Mexico. If all does not go well, I want to thank you for everything. Love, María.”
I read it, reread it, thought of crumpling it, left it.
I laid out my clothes, the backpack, the keys to Esteban’s car.
I climbed under the sheet. Closed my eyes.
My head hurt. The wires were all fucked.
Next door a man stumbled in, drunk. He pushed his bed across the floor with an ugly screeching noise. He started to sing. Paco didn’t stir. Poor kid. I examined his face. The bruise on his cheek from New Mexico had turned yellow. He looked young, vulnerable. We were all vulnerable. We were all on the box here. Above the trapdoor.
Time went past without sleep choosing to descend.
I looked at my watch. Ten minutes to eleven.
Fuck this. Call Ricky. Talk to him.
The lobby. Deserted. Early for America but late Mex time. Everyone up since four digging ditches or removing brush or cleaning rooms or minding kids or making food.
I took out the calling card and rang him direct. Please be in, just this once, hermano.
“Ciao,” he said.
“Isn’t that goodbye?” I asked him.
“Honey, it’s you!”
“It’s me.”
“How are you?”
“Good… Listen, Ricky, I thought I would let you know, I’m going to try for it tonight.”
A pause. “Is it our boy?” he asked cautiously.
“Yes. You were spot on, Ricky. I’ve wasted enough time.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t want to say over the phone.”
“Of course. Sorry.”
A longer pause. My phone card minutes being eaten up.
“I talked to Mom yesterday. She sent you a message,” he said at last.
“From Mother? There’s a message from Mom?”
“Yeah.”
“What is it?”
“Well, you know how she is,” Ricky said sheepishly, preparing me for something about Yoruba gods or a warning about rapists or a request to pick up some oranges for Dad so he could sell them at the Pan American Games.
Ricky cleared his throat. “She says to tell you that she cast the fifty-second hexagram. You’re to study the fifty-second hexagram. I think it’s a reference to the I Ching.”
“Yeah. I know. Did Chinese my first year, remember?”
“Yeah.”
More silence, more talk without words.
“What happened to her, Ricky? Do you think it was Dad leaving or the time in jail?”
“Nah. It’s just one of those things.”
A voice in Ricky’s apartment asked him something. “Hold on,” Ricky hissed with his hand over the receiver.
Let him go. He can’t help. “I have to run. I love you, Ricky.”
“I love you too, big sis. Remember, you don’t have to do anything, you can just come home.”
“I know.”
“Be careful.”
“I will.”
“Bye.”
“Ciao.”
I hung up, looked at the phone. Ricky hadn’t helped. I didn’t feel validated. I felt worse. I felt bad and cheap, as if this whole thing was some monstrous vanity project. Jack and I weren’t that far apart. I should have seen it in the desert. Should have seen it before now.
The script fluttered in the wind: Mercado walks back to her room. Close-up on her face. She looks tired. She turns the door handle. The door creaks. She goes inside. The room is filled with moonlight…
Too slow. Skip to the end. Is that me walking on Malecón or am I on some slab in the Jefferson County Coroner’s Office?