12 Bliss Street (7 page)

“When they were in the middle of the river the crocodile suddenly dived under the water and nearly drowned the monkey. As he came up sputtering and coughing the monkey cried, ‘Why did you do that?’ ‘To kill you,’ replied the crocodile. ‘My mother wants monkey heart to eat.’ ‘Well, I wish I had known,’ said the monkey, ‘because then I would have brought it with me.’ ‘What?’ cried the crocodile. ‘You left your heart back in the tree? We must go straight back to get it.’ And at that he turned around and swam back to the riverbank.

“‘Now go get your heart and bring it back to me,’ the crocodile told the monkey. ‘Then perhaps we’ll visit the island.’

“‘All right,’ said the monkey, and he scampered up the tree.

“The crocodile waited a long time but the monkey did not come back down.

“‘Oh monkey, where is your heart?’ he called out at last.

“‘It’s up here!’ the monkey replied. ‘And if you want it, you must climb up and get it. Then perhaps we’ll visit your mother!’

“And,” Chorizo said, “the little monkey laughed and laughed and laughed, and the crocodile had nothing to do but swim away.”

The girl’s eyes were still closed. The color of her skin was beginning to change. Chorizo ran his hand up her arm to the rope. He touched each of her fingers then ran his hand back down to her shoulder.

“I like that story,” he told her. “Because it shows what you need to succeed. You need heart—courage. It was courageous of that little monkey to climb on the crocodile’s back.” He was still stroking the girl’s hair. “Now you have courage, I can tell. You came with me here, you took a chance. But heart is not all. You also need strength and cunning. The monkey had all three. He clung to the crocodile when they were underwater and did not drown. And he used his wits to save his skin.”

The girl struggled for a moment. “I like it…” she said.

“You liked the story?”

She plucked at the nylon camisole. “I like this thing I’m wearing.”

Chorizo smiled. She was not paying attention. Well, she was not that bright; he knew this even before. As he sat on the bed, touching the girl’s forehead, the door opened slowly and he saw Ricky peek in. He signaled to him: yes. Ricky stepped all the way into the room, then closed the door softly behind him.

“But what you are lacking,” he told the girl, “is cunning. A woman especially needs cunning. She needs cunning and courage and strength.” He thought about his wife. “Mostly strength.”

“It’s a good color for me,” said the girl, and she closed her eyes again. Her forehead was pale gray, a bit grainy. She was fading away.

“You’re not listening. All right. That’s all right.” Chorizo looked at his watch. “Why don’t you turn your head this way. I have someone I’d like you to meet.”

*   *   *

Dave reached into
his pants pocket and took out a miniature steel multitool—twelve components for cutting, turning, gripping, holding, twisting, measuring, opening, pulling, slicing, filing, cleaning, and scraping. For a few minutes he opened and closed this or that tool, testing the sharpness of one, the grasp of another.

“This is something I always keep with me,” he was saying. “Ever since I got tied up that time. In addition to tweezers and a pager, it also has a lock pick. See that? But right now I’m looking for a weapon.”

“Aggressive,” said Davette. She was beginning to sound tired and cranky.

“My cousin gave it to me. His stepdad’s in the CIA. And look what I have here, your twin companion.” He threw her an identical tool and Davette looked at it with the expression of someone who had never seen a toilet before—my what goes
where
?

“In case she gets all feisty again. See?”

He pulled out a knife blade the size of a thumbnail.

“Well that will be useful for picking your teeth,” Davette snapped. She turned the gizmo around in her hands. “What’s the monitor for?”

“That’s the coolest part; it has a built-in GPS thing. A global positioning system. Like, you know, what they have in rental cars? The map things that show you where you are all the time? And here, you can use this button to signal me, and my tool will act as a receiver. You don’t even have to know where you are, the satellites will pick up your location and signal my map. You can be anywhere on earth and I’ll find you.”

“I can be anywhere?”

“Mine has parallel multichannels,” Dave said. He put the tool back in his pocket. “I have no idea what that means.”

“So have you tried it?”

“Um, I still don’t get the whole longitude thing,” he admitted.

They decided to give Nicola some water before they left. Dave untaped her mouth then held the cup to her lips. The cup was cold, and the water tasted slightly metallic. Nicola swallowed, then said, “You can’t be in a building.”

“What?”

“If you’re using a GPS tool. You can’t be in a building, in a cave, or underwater. You said you can be anywhere on earth, but that’s not true. The receivers need clear air space to receive the satellite signal.”

“God, where’s the duct tape?” Dave said.

“The signals travel on a super low frequency,” Nicola continued. She was a little surprised at herself. Maybe this was the effect of being gagged so long? She was irritated and wanted to irritate back.

“They can go through clouds or glass or plastic, but nothing solid. Did you know that radio waves travel at the speed of light? I learned that just the other day.”

“Oh shit,” Dave said.

Davette looked up. “What now?”

“There’s only, like, this much tape left.”

Unreal. Could they do anything right?

“Where’s the tape you just took off?” Davette asked.

“Squished.”

They decided not to worry about taping her mouth. Together they took Nicola down to the van, but this time Davette got into the driver’s seat.

“Is there any more of that chocolate?” Nicola asked.

“Our plan is to pretend you’re still gagged,” Dave said.

“Because I did pay for it, you know.”

Davette started up the van and immediately began quarreling with Dave about the best way to go.

“You know the new stadium? It’s like a block away,” he said.

Nicola guessed they were taking her to India Basin. For a while Davette drove south alongside the CalTrain tracks, but she kept having to back up when the roads ended in water. She was young, Nicola thought; she should not be driving, she should be lying in bed staring at a rock poster taped to the ceiling. It was hard to understand how the world could be so heavily populated by creatures such as the Daves with their grand ideas and their total lack of sense. Scooter, her ex-husband, included. And Guy. And half of her clients, middle-aged guys with lofty technical agendas who couldn’t program their way out of a speed-dial menu. Meanwhile, Nicola thought, where were the women like me? Tied up in a minivan no doubt, or roped to a desk chair.

But at last they got to wherever it was they were trying to go, and Davette cut the engine. It was windy and dark out and they were only a block or two from the water. The Daves took Nicola out of the van. Just like before they removed her blindfold and took up their places behind her and like before they pulled down their cut-up watch caps even though there wasn’t a body in sight. But when Nicola saw that they were walking her to another ATM machine, she just could not believe it.

“This is it?” she said. “This is your big crime?” She didn’t mean to say anything, but she was so hungry and annoyed and she so didn’t think the Daves could do anything meaningfully bad to her that she just couldn’t keep caring.

“What do you mean?” Dave asked.

“I mean, you’re doing all this for my daily limit? You’re going to starve me before you can get very much out,” Nicola told him.

“Starve you how?”

“The way you usually starve someone—lack of food.”

She could not believe how insanely stupid they were, what a huge risk they were taking for this petty amount. Her fingers were cold. She blew on them, then punched in her code furiously.

“I don’t know why you need me out here anyway,” she said. “You could have come alone; you have my code.”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot; we were going to do that,” Dave said.

Nicola gave him the money and curled her fingers into her closed hands. She was beginning to feel as though nothing would surprise her. “Here you are, go wild,” she told them.

Dave became peevish. “You know, you’re really testing our limits,” he said in his high, raspy voice.

“Oh, just take me back to the van. Let me guess, you’re supposed to keep me for another day, get out another wad, then tie me up somewhere on the beach just before dawn.”

Dave and Dave looked at each other through their cut-up watch caps. This is absurd, Nicola thought.

“So you do know the script,” Davette said. But her voice sounded a little uncertain.

“I
don’t
know any script, Dave,” Nicola said. “I haven’t been playing any kind of game with anyone. Whoever told you that was lying in order to get you to…” Nicola paused for effect.

“To get us to what?”

“Commit a serious felony.”

The Daves looked at each other again. Dave said, “Is she like improvising?”

Davette laughed a short laugh in relief. “That’s it.”

“Where’s the guy behind all this?” Nicola asked.

“You mean the guy you work with?” Dave asked.

“He told you I work with him?” A sudden gust whipped her hair into her face.

“Come on. You all play this game together. Your company. Building trust or whatever.” He squinted his eyes at her now, but he was looking a little uncertain. It was really cold out, and he put his hands under his armpits.

Nicola said, “This is what he told you?”

“It … isn’t it true?”

“No, it isn’t true. But let me guess: you’re giving him the money you get from me. Then he’s supposed to pay you, right? Well, I guarantee it he’ll disappear before you see a cent. Listen, use your heads; he’s using you to steal from me. You have kidnapped me and you have stolen my money and I
will
go to the police. But I’m guessing he plans to be gone before then. If anyone gets caught it will be you two.”

“But he can’t run away, he’s like a cripple,” Davette said.

Dave looked at her. “What?”

“Yeah, remember he told us he had only one liver?”

Nicola stared at her. She could hear a foghorn somewhere over the water. Her hands were even colder now and she wanted to get out of the wind. But she stayed where she was.

“Only one liver? He told you that?”

“He’s on dialysis, he said.”

“Are you sure he didn’t say kidney?”

“He said liver; he said it was from drinking grain alcohol when he was in grade school.”

“I don’t think we should be saying all this,” Dave said.

“It’s okay,” Nicola said. “But you know, Dave, everyone has only one liver.”

She waited two beats. The Daves looked at her, not understanding.

“Everyone is born with just one liver.”

They stopped looking at her and looked at each other. The wind whipped their hair in unison and Nicola watched them get it. Suddenly she felt this was easy; she could play it by ear.

“Is that true?” Davette asked. Her nose was running a little from the cold.

“Let’s just go,” Nicola told her.

She started walking back and in a moment the Daves followed her. The sidewalk was sandy and ripped up and the fog had thickened into something like suspended rain.

“If he lied about the liver, he could have lied about the other thing, too,” Davette muttered to Dave. She sniffed, and her hands were crossed over her chest as she walked. Dave said nothing but his face was pale.

At the door to the van Nicola stood still while Davette wrapped the scarf around her eyes again. Then she said, “It’s better to take Evans to Third. If you listen to me I’ll get us back quicker.”

The Daves said nothing but they took her advice. They were in something like shock.

“Get into the right-hand lane,” Nicola told Davette, who was driving. “At the first major light make a right.”

“On Third?” Davette asked.

“That’s it.”

She waited for the boy to speak. At last he said, “You know where we’re taking you.”

“Not really,” Nicola lied.

“That complicates things,” he said.

“Not really.”

They skimmed along making green lights. Nicola could feel when they were on wide streets or narrow. Traffic was light since the muni trains had stopped and the buses were on their night schedules.

“If you know where we’re taking you things will have to be different,” Dave said.

“Tell the guy to come,” Nicola said.

“Huh?”

“The liver guy. Tell him to come to the warehouse.”

“What for?” Dave asked.

“So we can talk.”

Davette sniffed again and wiped her nose on her sleeve. “We might as well, Dave. What if it’s true, what if he lied? And now she knows where she’s been.”

Dave thought for a minute. “You really fucked up,” he told Davette.

“Fuck you,” she said calmly. “I did not.”

“I knew we should have never untaped her mouth.”

“We had to sometime. For water and stuff.”

“He never said.”

“He said it to me.”

“
When
did he say?” Dave asked. His voice was like a cat’s, small and sleek. “Listen, I want to know this: when did he say so much to you when he didn’t to me?”

“He called me last night. He told me I was the lead role.”

“The lead role?
I’m
the lead role.”

“No, you’re supporting.”

“No way do I support!”

“Take a left at Mariposa,” Nicola told Davette.

Davette pulled at the blinker. “Do you want the blindfold off?” she asked.

“Dave!” Dave said.

“Well, what’s the point?”

“Actually I’m enjoying the challenge,” Nicola told her.

*   *   *

The girl was
dead.

He stood over the body, looking at it. The camisole was in pieces. A bad taste filled his mouth. It had all worked out.

The video camera was still running.

“Shambhala,” he told her, “is a way of life.”