The Tracks
Matthew Ryan Fischer
The body hit the water a forceful impact, but he was mostly dead
already. A little bit of drowning in his final few moments wasn’t going to
change much of that. It was a final indignity. A final indignity after many
other indignities had been performed. Red leaked out staining the water all
around. He didn’t have any strength left to fight. Instead, he simply began to
sink.
Above on the patio, a figure peered over. Lost in the shadows, a
face hidden, a smirk hidden, but the sound of a satisfied chuckle could be
heard. The shadow stood and watched, waiting, making sure. Until it was done.
* * *
“You hear about Jackie? Right in his own home. Right in his own
swimming pool.”
Everybody had heard about Jackie. It was all anyone was talking
about during the last twelve hours. Not a simple break-in. Not a simple
dispute. It was a cold and brutal murder. There were signs of struggle inside.
Signs of a fight. Signs of torture. Somebody had done Jackie and made a great
big mess of it. Bobby had heard all about Jackie. Of course he had. He just
didn’t feel like talking about it.
Bobby and Hap sat in the hallway outside Mr. Z’s office, waiting
on their chance to talk to the man himself. Hap was a talker. Bobby had no
appreciation for that. Bobby could keep his mouth shut when he needed to.
“It’s messed up,” continued Hap. “Some major bullshit. A man in
his own home. A castle. That’s his castle. That’s the way it’s supposed to be.
A man in his own castle. Major violation. Big time. No respect. None.”
Bobby was tired. He had been up all night with no sleep but for a
moment or two when he nodded off waiting on the Red Line. He had been all over
town yesterday and only heard about Jackie in passing. He was on his way to The
Valley but promptly turned back around. He had to take a bus the rest of the
way to Santa Monica. There was supposed to be a rail line built to the coast,
but they had been saying that for decades. Time came and went and time just
kept rolling on. The coast was no closer and he always got a headache riding
the bus. Maybe it was the fumes. Maybe it was being cramped with all the other
people. Bobby was in no mood for nonsense today, but Hap couldn’t keep his
mouth shut. Sometimes Bobby hated Santa Monica.
“Talk talk talk,” replied Bobby.
“What? Come on?!”
“No, I agree. It’s all total bullshit. But what are you going to
do about it?”
“Yeah you’re right. What are you gonna do? Right? Life’s fucked up
like that sometimes.”
“No. I mean what are you
personally going to go do? Are you going to find who did this? You going to knock
heads around? You want revenge? Justice? Is that what Jackie deserved? Did you
even know Jackie?”
“Whoa. Jesus. What is it with you? I’m just talking.”
“That’s the problem. Everybody talks about the weather, nobody
does anything about it.”
“The weather? Wha’? Fuck?”
Bobby stood up and walked off. He was tired of waiting.
* * *
Amy poured the coffee. Or, what she called coffee. Bobby didn’t
mind. He could drink his coffee, but then again, there was drinking coffee and
then there was drinking this. Amy made shit coffee that was either too strong
or too weak. She never looked at what she was doing; she just dumped some
amount of some brand in and waited to see what would happen.
“Terrible thing last night.”
“Jackie was bum. Fuck that bum.”
“Okay. I’m just here to talk to you.”
“I know what you’re here for. You think you’re the first person to
come by here today? All you little idiots thinking with your dicks. Jackie’s
been dead less than a day.”
“It’s not like that...”
“So you’re here asking about the other thing?”
That kept Bobby quiet. He wasn’t sure Amy knew anything at all
about Jackie’s business. They were married but separated. Living in different
parts of town. But Amy still knew everybody. And she was smart. Can’t bullshit
smart.
Amy took Bobby’s silence to mean that she had guessed right.
“Figures. You think with your dick alright, but not as much as
those other assholes. Business always comes first for you.”
“Amy... your coffee tastes like shit.”
She looked at him cross, then laughed. Really laughed. Long and
hard.
“Oh... you’re such an asshole.”
“I know. Look, I won’t bullshit you. I know I can’t do that. I’m
not here for business or for the business. I like you, but Jackie was a friend
and that’s not my style. And I’m not going to poke around asking what Jackie
was up to or what he had done for whomever. But Jackie and I had a thing. And
he was a friend. You don’t know anything about him having something for me?”
“I look like I was there last night? I look like I live there
anymore?”
“No. I was just hoping maybe he had told you something.”
“What was it?”
“What was what?”
“What did he have? What are you looking for?”
Bobby took another drink from his mug.
“This coffee really is shit.”
“I know. I make it like that so all you numnuts will stop coming
around.”
* * *
Jackie kept an office in the backroom of a dive bar that was next
to the bowling alley near Pico and 3rd. For a beach town, with
tourists all over mere blocks away, the place was a real hole in the ground.
Dark and dirty. That was how Jackie liked it. Just a dump. A dump that nobody
outside of the neighborhood would go into. A real dump.
Bobby had his spare key, left over from a job from a long time ago,
and he let himself in through the back alley. There was a desk and a safe and
banker boxes everywhere. Bobby ignored the safe. There was never anything in
the safe. It was just there to look good. Jackie used to have a system – he
would hide his money and anything important in banker boxes full of random junk
or office supplies. He figured if he got robbed, people would go for the safe.
Nobody was going to dig through a hundred boxes of trash hoping to find
something.
Bobby was willing to.
But he didn’t find anything.
Obviously the system had changed in the last couple of years.
Bobby went out front and ordered a beer. Lou didn’t seem surprised
to see Bobby appear from the back room. Very little surprised Lou. That was a
good quality to have in a place like this.
Bobby drank his drink and thought about his options. It was
getting late and he was pretty sure the buses were going to stop running soon.
He wished he had his car. He really needed to get that thing fixed. Or
replaced. Buses and trains and cabs were not a long term solution in a city
like this.
Some old-timers came and went. Bobby had a few too many and he
found himself staying longer than he had planned. At some point a couple of
guys came in that Bobby recognized. Maybe they had suffered Amy’s coffee as
well.
“You guys seen Vincent around?”
“No.”
They weren’t the friendliest sort. Bobby considered paying his
bill and leaving right then. But he had to find some things out and this day
was lasting too long.
“You run that coffee shop over on 20th?
“24th?”
“Yeah, 24th, whatever. You see Vincent around, you tell
him I need to talk to him.”
“You heard about Jackie.”
“Yeah. I did. But I’m looking for Vincent right now.”
“Shame about the pool. It was a nice pool. Gonna have to drain it
and everything. Somebody messed up. Somebody messed up bad.”
The kid stressed his words when he spoke. Messed. Up. Bad. It was
almost like separate sentences. It was almost like he was digging at something.
Accusing Bobby of something. Bobby was going to get upset, but then the jukebox
kicked it. It was loud and full of pounding bass. Slow and methodical. Beat after
beat after beat.
Bobby turned to the music. A woman danced next to the jukebox. Not
many people ever danced in a rotten bar like this, but she did. Dark hair,
darker dress. White skin like she had never seen the sun. Or maybe she powdered
it that way. Bobby didn’t know. Bobby didn’t care. She stood out, slow dancing,
rocking back and forth. She stood out. In a place like this she sort of looked
like perfection, but Bobby was pretty sure she would have stood out no matter
where they were.
Bobby stood there and watched her sway. The whole bar watched her
sway. He forgot about Jackie and Vincent and the asshole kid who ran the coffee
shop. All he could do was think of her.
Bobby didn’t dance. It didn’t matter. Not tonight it didn’t.
Sometime later, Bobby realized he had had too many beers and it
was time to go.
* * *
Bobby woke up to another cup of Amy’s terrible coffee. He didn’t
quite remember the end of his evening, but he was pretty sure he hadn’t been
the one to call Amy. It turned out Bobby drank the night and Lou had called Amy
when last call came around. Amy didn’t appreciate being woken that late at
night. Bobby was pretty sure she intentionally made her coffee even worse to
pay him back.
“Do I need to apologize for anything?”
Amy laughed at him. “For a lot of things. But not the way you
meant it.”
“Thanks for picking me up. And for letting me sleep here.”
“You go through Jackie’s office?”
“Yeah.”
“You find what you were looking for?”
“No.”
“You want to tell me what this is all about? Why Jackie got killed
and what it is you’re after?”
“I’m after something for the boss. I can’t tell you. Somebody
might have killed Jackie for this or for any number of other things.”
“Jackie was a bastard, but he wasn’t that bad.”
“I’ve seen you say different. I’ve seen you with the bruises.”
“Fuck you. Whatever Jackie and I might have done... Fuck you. I
gave you a place to stay. I was nice. How about you return the favor?”
Bobby needed to get out of Santa Monica. He needed to get out of
LA. But he really needed to get out of Santa Monica. He called Vincent again
and this time found him. One of these days he was really going to have to get a
car.
Vincent came to pick Bobby up and Bobby again thanked Amy for her
hospitality. Amy said she spit in the coffee. Bobby was pretty sure she might
have.
“You and Amy? You work quick.”
“Shut up Vinnie. She gave me a place to sleep.”
“Sure sure, whatever.”
“God damn it. I can’t take this shit today.”
“So you want to talk about the other
thing then?”
“I don’t know what happened to
Jackie.”
“No, but you know something. I hear
you been digging around. You been asking to talk to me too.”
“Jackie had something for me. I was
hoping he might have told you about it.”
“No sir. So how about you tell me?”
“How about you drive me out of this
dump?”
* * *
Bobby sat at the Red Line station at
Vermont and Sunset. He had read a story
about an old man getting hit by one of the trains on the Red Line. Maybe it was
an accident. Or maybe it wasn’t. Maybe the old man was tired of being old. Or maybe
he had problems. Bobby could relate to that. He didn’t know what it would take
to jump in front of a train, but he was pretty sure it would take a lot. Bobby
wasn’t sure how he felt about all that. Things were bad, but he wasn’t quite
ready to explore that possibility.
There were two directions to choose
from. One to The Valley and one to Downtown. Downtown he could go to Union
Station and maybe catch a bus or train out of town. But in The Valley there was
business. Business he should take care of.
He didn’t owe Jackie anything. He told
himself that over and over. He didn’t have to do anything. He didn’t have to
find Jackie’s killer. He didn’t have to cover Jackie’s debts. He certainly
didn’t have to care what would happen to Amy and her terrible terrible coffee.
He could just slip away and disappear.
Nobody was going to believe Amy didn’t
know something. Separated and living apart meant nothing. Everybody would
expect her to know something about Jackie’s business and where he kept his
money. People were already asking around. And it looked like he was doing the
same. Everybody would assume he knew something too.
Nobody was going to believe him, no
matter what he said. He had been to see Mr. Z. He had been to see Amy. He had
been all over Santa Monica yesterday. He couldn’t claim he wasn’t up to
something.
Fuck Jackie for dying, for getting
himself killed. Fuck him and his empty safe and his stupid system of hiding
money. Fuck that.
Jackie was a mule and mules had to
deliver their money, even if they were dead. Bobby would have to cover Jackie.
There was no excuse for your partner getting killed. The old man would laugh if
he tried to claim anything else. Bobby would be lucky if he only lost a finger
or two. He would probably lose a whole lot more. Suddenly he was thinking the
old man and the train made a lot more sense.
It would be so much easier to head
Downtown and never look back. Forget about everybody. Forget about Amy. Forget
about all of it. Let the old man punish whomever the old man wanted to punish.
But Bobby couldn’t help but worry a little too much about her.
It came down to what sort of man he
wanted to be. Bobby wasn’t sure. Instead, he sat and watched the subway trains
pass him by.
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