Crooked Numbers (23 page)

“Yeah, I know. I realized my mistake when I got to the hospital and before I could get out of there, I got into a conversation with the sister.”

“Just couldn’t help it, huh? Couldn’t just walk away?”

“I guess I could have, but we got to talking and I noticed she was high on something and needed help, so I used her phone to call her father.”

“Who’s also the father of the kid in the hospital?”

“Yeah. And a client of Douglas Lee, Dougie’s uncle.”

“So let me guess,” he said, holding his cigar so the smoke streamed out the car window. “All this is too much of a coincidence to you.”

“Yes,” I said, accenting the point by gently slapping the top of the car. “And we’ve also got Paulie Sherman, the kid killed by the bus. That’s three kids—three friends—all from the same school. Two are dead and the other’s … who knows?”

Uncle Ray stuck the cigar in his mouth and shut his eyes. I knew this was his way of processing what I’d just said, so I stayed quiet.

“And Murcer knows all this?” he said after a half minute of silence.

“He does now that I’ve told him.”

“Careful with the sarcasm, Ray.” He opened his eyes. “Murcer’s right. You’ve done good, but that’s as far as your involvement in this case goes. Understand me?”

“Yes, Uncle Ray. I understand.”

“Good.” He graced me with a smile, and then it was gone. “What’s this other story about? The school safety officer. Paper said the kid goes to your school?”

“He’s one of ours, yeah. I spoke with the dad. Told him to get his supervisor or the cops involved, but he thought he could handle it himself. He was wrong.”

“Big-time,” Uncle Ray said. He closed his eyes again. When he reopened them, he said, “You know where the bus stop is?”

“The one where Angel was having trouble?”

“That’s the one I’m thinking of.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Why?”

“I’m just thinking—since I’m out this way—we might want to take a ride over there. See if we get lucky. Talk a little sense into the kid pressing charges. Maybe convince him to give Officer What’s-his-name a break.”

“Rosario,” I said, slightly wary of my uncle’s definition of “a little sense.” “You okay with doing that?”

“Hey,” Uncle Ray said, as if he were offended by the question. “School Safety’s a division of the NYPD, and we gotta look after our own, right?”

“Absolutely.”

“Then get in.” He opened the back passenger door and slid over to make room for me. “Let’s go for a ride.”

*

About five minutes later, we pulled in front of the bus stop where Angel and his dad had their problems. It was empty, which shouldn’t have come as a big surprise. School had been out for almost an hour, and there were no businesses open in the area. This was one of those Williamsburg blocks that used to be busy with small factories and a couple of tiny restaurants serving breakfast and lunch to the workers. That seemed like a long time ago. Right now, it looked like an urban ghost town.

“Not much going on,” Uncle Ray said, getting a firm grip on the obvious.

“Nope.” I looked over at the whitewashed wall behind the bus stop, where some local artist had spray-painted a penis with something dripping out of its tip. Below the drawing were the words
IT
’
LL COME WHEN IT COMES
.
Brilliant.
“I guess we should have had this idea half an hour ago.”

“Give it time, Nephew.” He slapped my left leg twice. Hard. “You seem to have forgotten one of the first lessons of law enforcement.”

“And what is that, Uncle Ray?” I could hear the pain in my voice.

Uncle Ray now slapped the back of his driver’s seat. “Tell him, Smitty.”

Smitty cleared his throat, but again did not turn around. “Half of this job is waiting around for shit to happen.”

“And the other half?” Uncle Ray prompted.

“The other half is cleaning up the shit,” Smitty concluded. “Sir.”

“And so we wait.” Uncle Ray lowered his window and let some of the cigar smoke out. “Tell me about this kid of yours, Raymond.”

“Which one?”

“The one who was getting harassed. Why didn’t he just get off at the next stop?”

“He told me he tried that for a while, and after a few weeks he thought the problem was over.”

“Why’d he think that?”

“He’d stay on the bus and not get off here. For a couple of days he didn’t see the guys who were bothering him. He figured they moved on to some other location. The day he got his iPod jacked, there was no one at the stop when he got off.”

“And…”

“Soon as he got off, they turned the corner and he ran right into them.”

“Wrong place,” Uncle Ray said. “Wrong time.” He turned to the window and again let out a long stream of cigar smoke. “Common theme here, wouldn’t you say, Raymond?”

It took me a few seconds. “You’re talking about Dougie now?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Uncle Ray,” I started, but then I realized he was right. No matter what sent Dougie to those tennis courts after midnight, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. And obviously with the wrong person. “I think we’d do well to focus on the ‘who’ and not the ‘why’ at this point.”

“There you go again,” Uncle Ray said, tapping about an inch of his cigar ash out the window. “Using the word ‘we.’ There is no
we
here. There is Dennis Murcer, and there is the New York Police Department of which
you
are no longer a member.”

There are times I think my uncle just waits for moments like this to remind me of my current job. I know it’s partly because he wants to keep me from getting myself in trouble, but the other part is because he’s still smarting over my decision to leave the force after my accident. If he’d had his way, I’d be sitting behind a desk, telling other cops how to do their jobs. It’s not all that rare for cops who’ve been injured on the job to be given promotions and higher paychecks. It wasn’t how I pictured my career path, so I left. A lot of people—my uncle included—didn’t get that.

“Sir,” Officer Smitty said from the front seat.

Uncle Ray and I both answered, “Yes?”

Smitty clarified. “
Chief
Donne.”

My uncle looked up front. “I see them, Smitty.”

I turned to look out the windshield as well and saw what they were talking about. A group of three boys—young men almost—had turned the corner and were heading in our direction. They got about twenty feet from where we were parked and stopped. After putting their heads together and surely discussing the presence of a town car at the bus stop, they looked over at us and waved.

“Sir?” Smitty said again.

“Show ’em the lights, kid.”

Smitty leaned over slightly and flipped on the grill lights. The group of three seemed surprised—but when Smitty shut the lights off five seconds later, they started laughing.
It’s great to be young,
I thought.

“How do you want to handle this?” my uncle asked.

“Really?” I said. “You’re asking my advice?”

“Hey. Just because you’re not a cop anymore doesn’t mean I don’t respect your skills and judgment. You’re more experienced at dealing with this … age group than I am.” He let that sit for a bit. “How do you want to handle this?”

I stayed silent. First, I had to get over being complimented by my uncle. Second, I needed to make sure what came out of my mouth next made a whole lot of sense. I looked out the front window again and assessed the situation. There were three of them, all in their upper teens at least. Odds were, one of them had the scrape with Angel’s father. I couldn’t tell which one from the back of the car, but my money would be on the big guy in the middle. They’d seen the flashing lights, so there was no doubt in their minds we were law enforcement. Or two of us were.

“How about,” I began, “I go out and talk to them? Just me. They know I got backup, so I don’t think they’ll try anything physical.”

“What are you planning to say to them?” Uncle Ray asked, as if I were a new recruit and he was quizzing me.

“I’ll explain who I am, why I’m here, and see if we can come to some sort of mutual agreement where both sides feel they got something they wanted.”

My uncle grinned. “You learn that on the force or from some staff development the Department of Education made you take?”

“A little of both,” I said. “There are two sides to every conflict, but one thing is always the same: both sides want something. The trick is to figure out what that is.”

“And you’re representing Officer Rosario?”

I took a deep breath. “I know. It’s best to have both parties present, but given this small window of opportunity, it’s the best I can come up with.”

“I could just have Smitty go out there, show them his badge and gun, and politely ask that all charges be dropped.”

“There’s always that,” I said. “Let me try it my way first.”

“Okay, Nephew. You’re the expert.” He sounded like he meant that.

“All right,” I said, zipping my jacket and putting my hand on the door handle. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“We’ll be waiting right here,” my uncle said.

“Which is what gives me such unwavering confidence.” I pushed open the door and stepped out of the car. It seemed colder than before. Maybe it was the slight breeze blowing between the buildings. I leaned back inside and said, “Thanks.” I shut the door and walked slowly over to the group of three young men.

As I approached, the three of them spread out. I had my hands out of my pockets, palms facing out front: the international sign for “I come in peace.” I stopped when I got five feet away. At this short distance, I recognized the biggest of the three from the front page of the paper. It took a few seconds of staring and silence before I could summon up his name.

I looked him square in the eyes and said, “Hector, right? Hector Ferrer?”

“That’s right, officer,” he said, removing the earbuds to his iPod—probably Angel’s iPod—and draping them around his neck. He looked at both his boys and smiled. He was missing one of his top front teeth, but, to his credit, it did nothing to diminish the shit-eating quality of his grin. “What can we do for you?”

“Actually,” I said, “I’m not a cop.” I pointed over my shoulder with my thumb. “They’re the cops.”

All three looked over at the town car and then back to me.

Still smiling, Hector said, “What that make you, then?”

“I’m a teacher.”

Five seconds of silence. Then the three broke out into laughter.

As I waited for the boys to settle down, I watched a plastic grocery bag make its way down the street, blown by the breeze.

“That what this is about?” Hector said. “We ain’t been going to school, and they send a attendance officer with the cops? That’s some real bullshit, man.”

“I’m not an attendance officer. I’m a teacher.” I paused. “A dean, to be exact. Angel Rosario’s dean.”

The three of them looked at one another and did a group shrug. The short guy on Hector’s left said, “We supposed to know who is that?”

“He’s the kid whose iPod you took,” I explained. “And when his father came over to get it back, an altercation ensued.”

“Shit, man,” Hector said. “For a teacher, you talk like a cop.” They all laughed over that, then Hector spoke again. “So what about Angel Rosario and his pops? Came ’round here accusing me of stealing some shit. Old man gets all up in my face and knocks me to the ground.” He shook his head and placed his right hand on his chest in mock seriousness. Like a bad actor doing
West Side Story.
“Me … a poor little minor.”

After hearing that, the boys returned to laughing. This was one hell of a fun group. I stuck my tongue to the roof of my mouth as I waited for the laughing to stop. It took almost a minute.

“I came here,” I said, “to see if we could come to some sort of agreement.”

Hector made a big deal about considering my comment. He even rubbed the little bit of hair he had on his chin and looked to the sky as if deeply pondering the question.

“What kind of ‘agreement’ you talkin’ about?” he said.

“We can start,” I said, “by you telling me what you want.”

“What I want?”

“Yes.”

“What I want?” he repeated, and then playfully slapped both his boys on their upper arms. “What I want is to sue that fake cop for all he’s got. And I’ma sue the New York City Board of Education and the NYPD, because they in charge of security.”

“School safety,” I corrected. “Security works at Kmart.”

“Whatever,” Hector said. “I’ma sue
all
their asses, and then we see who pulls up in front of a bus stop in a town car.” He smiled again. “Funny, ain’t it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Here I is, a high school dropout, and I’ma have more money than all my teachers combined. That’s why they told me to stay in school, right? So’s I could find a good-paying job?” He slapped his boys again. “Well, looks like I found me one. Right here on this broken-down, busted-ass, bootleg street.”

That got the three amigos going again. I turned around to face my uncle’s car and gave an exaggerated shrug. A few seconds later, the left side passenger door opened, and Uncle Ray stepped out. His long, dark blue coat flapped in the breeze, and I watched as he slowly buttoned it closed. He began walking toward me. The laughter started to die down as the three young men noticed him approaching. Uncle Ray is a big man, and the way he carries himself says just one thing: police. He stopped when he got to me.

“Raymond,” he said. He then looked at the small group in front of us. “Boys.”

For a moment, a flicker of fear crossed all three faces. That look was quickly replaced with nervous smiles. Hector, again, was the first to speak.

“Now you,” he said, pointing at my uncle, “are definitely po-po.”

Uncle Ray smiled back. “Most definitely.” He looked around, and the grins disappeared. “You boys come to an understanding?”

“Not the one I was hoping for,” I said.

Uncle Ray shook his head. “That’s disappointing, Nephew. Very.”

“Nephew?”
Hector said and then looked at me. “You brought your uncle to watch your back, Teacher?”

“Actually,” my uncle said, “it was my idea to come around. See if we could come to some sort of arrangement.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “It was my nephew’s idea to do so diplomatically.”