Crooked Numbers (3 page)

“Okay,” I said. “Maybe I’ll do that. You guys go on in. Dougie’s mom’s probably downstairs. Make sure you say hi. She’ll appreciate it.”

“Yeah, Mr. D,” they said.

“Be good.”

They both gave a quick laugh and went inside the funeral home. As the door closed, I couldn’t help but think that, statistically, one of those two was not going to make it out of high school. But today they both stood a better chance than Dougie.

“Yo, dude. You got a light?”

I turned to face two kids walking my way. Two white kids. They both had on ski jackets with lift tickets hanging from the zippers. Some people were enjoying this recent cold weather. The taller of the two kids had long blond hair and an unlit cigarette between his lips.

“A light?” he repeated, miming striking a match. Speaking to me like I was slow.

“No,” I said. “I don’t smoke. And you don’t look old enough to, either.”

“Yeah,” he said, grinning, and then putting the cigarette in his jacket pocket. “I get that a lot. I’m actually much older than I look.”

He gave his buddy, who was a good foot shorter than he and sported a militarylike crew cut, a playful slap on the upper arm. They both smiled.

I motioned with my head toward the funeral home. “You here for the wake?”

“Yeah,” the smoker said. “Douglas was a buddy of ours from school.”

“Upper West?”

“That’s the one.” He looked past me at the funeral home. “Fucking incredible, man, what happened to Douglas.”

“Yes,” I said and stuck out my hand. “I’m Raymond Donne. I used to be Dougie’s teacher, back in middle school.”

The smoker took my hand and said, “The cop, right?”

“Ex.”

“Yeah, Douglas told us about you. Said you were pretty cool.”

“I still am.”

“So how does that work?” the kid asked. “Going from one civil service job to another. You have to take a test or something?”

I was not in the mood to explain to this Upper West Side kid that neither job was “civil service.” For all he cared, I probably could have been a doorman.

“No,” I said. “I actually had to go to college.”

“Oh, sorry,” he said. “I’m Jack. Jack Quinn.” He looked at his buddy. “This is Paulie Sherman.”

I shook Paulie’s hand. He gave me a weak smile and an even weaker handshake. He was a bit jumpy and obviously uncomfortable in this neighborhood.

“We were real good buds with Douglas,” Jack Quinn explained as he gave the intersection a complete three-sixty. “Jesus. Is this where Douglas lived?”

“Close enough,” I said. “About ten blocks away from here.”

They both looked around. Jack said, “Cool,” as if he were getting a backstage tour of a movie set. “We took the subway here.”

“That was very brave of you.”

It took a few seconds for my sarcasm to sink in. When it did, Jack laughed. Paulie did not.

“Yeah,” he said. “We met the height requirement and all.” Again he gave his friend a slap on the jacket. “Paulie just made it.”

The three of us stood there for a while, hands in our pockets, trying to think of something else to say. I looked at my watch. “I gotta head out, guys. It’s nice to see some kids from Dougie’s school dropping by. Do me a favor and make sure you see his mom when you get inside.”

“Yeah,” Jack said. “We’ve done the wake thing before. We know how it goes.”

“Good. Then you shouldn’t have any problems with the whole respect thing.” I looked up at the red traffic light just as a truck rumbled by. “Be safe going home.”

Jack winked at me. “Yeah. You, too, Mr. Donne.”

When the light turned green, I crossed. Behind me, I heard one of the kids say something and then the sound of one of them laughing. Probably Jack.

Nice to be young, wealthy, and alive
, I thought.

“MR. DONNE ASKED YOU A QUESTION,
Angel.”

Angel Rosario held his father’s glare with increasingly watery eyes. When the first couple of tears hit the floor, Angel’s dad said, “Oh, now you gonna cry? Big man brings a box cutter to school.” He turned to me. “
My box cutter.
” He looked back to his son. “And now you gonna cry? Shit.”

The three of us were sitting in my office with me between the two of them, making a kind of stressed-out equilateral triangle. Experience had taught me not to sit an angry father next to the source of his anger. I reached over to my desk and grabbed a tissue off my desk for Angel. I kept a box there for meetings like this.

“Mr. Rosario,” I said, “I don’t really care much for the
where
in this situation. We need to concern ourselves with the
why
.”

“Yeah,” Mr. Rosario said. “I’d like to know that, too, Angel. What the hell were you thinking? I don’t tell you enough stories ’bout what I see at my job?”

Mr. Rosario was a school safety officer at one of the more undesirable high schools in Brooklyn. The sort of school where they can never find the money for sports equipment or art supplies, but always seem to have more than enough for the latest in metal detectors and security cameras.

“Angel,” I said, leaning toward the kid, “tell your dad what you told me.”

Angel sniffled and then wiped his nose. His eyes were back on the floor. He took a deep breath. He was having trouble speaking, but finally mumbled something that ended with the words, “bus stop.”

Now his dad leaned forward. “What’s that? Speak up.”

Angel looked up and stared at his father. “Those kids at the bus stop,” he hissed. “The ones I told you ’bout two weeks ago.”

“What about them? You told me they stopped botherin’ you.”

“They started up again,” Angel said. Then, in a much lower voice, “And they took my iPod.”

“They took your— Jesus, boy. When were you gonna tell me?”

“I wasn’t,” Angel said. “I was gonna get it back.”

“With that?” his dad yelled, pointing at the box cutter on my desk. “You were gonna get your iPod back with a box cutter? Goddamn, Angel. If your mother’s lookin’ down right now, she’s shaking her head at the both of us. I taught you better. Why you think I tell you those stories about work?”

“To scare me. Make sure I don’t become one of those kids.”

“And here you are,” Mr. Rosario said. “About to get suspended—
or worse
—for bringing a box cutter to school. Damn.”

He was right about the “or worse” part. If the school wanted, we could push it and have Angel transferred to another school in the district. This was the Year of Zero Tolerance for weapons of any sort, and that was the system’s imaginative way of dealing with this type of problem: move the kid to another building. That’ll teach him.

“Your dad’s right, Angel,” I said. “I’m supposed to suspend you. Bringing a weapon to school—for any reason—is a serious offense.”

“I know,” Angel said to the floor.

It took Mr. Rosario a few seconds to pick up on what I had said. When he did, he leaned forward. “What do you mean, ‘supposed to’?”

“Well,” I said. “The only three people who know for sure that Angel brought a box cutter to school are sitting in this room. I know Angel, and I don’t believe any of our students were in any danger from him.”

“So what are you saying?”

I stood up and went around to the other side of my desk. I took the box cutter and stuck it in my bottom drawer. “I’m saying you and Angel have enough to worry about without having to deal with a suspension.” I shut the drawer with my foot and held my hands out like a magician who had just made something disappear.

“You’re not supposed to do that,” Angel’s dad—the school safety officer—said.

“Do what?”

Father and son looked at me, then at each other, and then back at me. After a few more seconds of awkward of silence, I said, “Angel. You have math this period, right?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Then why don’t you head off to class?”

Angel stood up and slipped his backpack over his shoulder. “So,” he said, “that’s it? I can just … go?”

“I think you and your dad are going to discuss this at home tonight, but, yeah. For right now, get to class.”

He turned to leave, and his dad grabbed his elbow. “You got something you wanna say to Mr. Donne, Angel?”

“Yeah,” Angel said, offering his hand and looking me straight in the eyes like I’m sure his dad taught him to. “Thanks, Mr. D.”

“Get to math, Angel.”

After Angel left, Mr. Rosario glanced over at my desk and gave me a concerned look. “You’re takin’ a chance with that, Mr. Donne.”

“Why?” I said. “You planning on telling my boss?”

He shook his head. “I appreciate it. I don’t know what I’d do with him if he got suspended. Daycare for the week? And a transfer? He likes this school.”

“He’ll be fine here, Mr. Rosario. I’m concerned about those knuckleheads at the bus stop.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I gotta figure something out about that.”

“Call the cops,” I suggested. “Or tell your supervisor. Maybe he can contact the school nearest the bus stop, and they can put someone over there in the afternoons. I’m sure your son’s not the only one being hassled.”

“Right. I’ll talk to my sergeant when I get back to school.” He removed his jacket from the back of the chair. “Don’t got enough things to worry about.”

“Have a good one, Mr. Rosario.”

“Yeah. You, too,” he said. “And thanks again.”

After he left, I reached into my shirt pocket and pulled out Allison Rogers’s business card. She was the reporter I had promised Dougie’s mother I’d call. I had tried earlier and left a message. I took out my cell phone and tried again.

She picked up after two rings. “Allison Rogers.”

“Allison,” I said. “Raymond Donne. I called earlier.”

“I was just getting ready to call you back. How long have you been reading minds, Mr. Donne?”

“It’s Raymond or Ray,” I said. “What are you talking about?”

“I just got out of an editorial meeting with my bosses,” she explained. “They made it quite clear that if I don’t get something new on this Douglas Lee piece, I’m on to writing about the living conditions of the animal acts at the circus over by Lincoln Center. Then, I get your message.” She paused. “I remembered you worked over in The Burg, but, Christ. Douglas was one of yours, huh?”

“Yeah. Graduated a few years ago. With Frankie Rivas,” I added, hoping she’d pick up on my angle.

“Right,” she said. “I have to say, Mr.—
Raymond
—you just might be saving my ass here. The idea of a teacher’s take on the case, and what with your history.… Let’s just say it beats the hell out of smelling horse shit and carnies for the next few days.”

“Glad I could help.”

“How’s four o’clock look for you?”

“
Today,
four o’clock?”

“Raymond,” she said as if talking to an eight-year-old, “this story’s dead—sorry, bad choice of words—by tomorrow if I don’t get something tight to my editor by eight tonight. So, yes.
Today,
four o’clock. At the crime scene.”

“Does it have to be there?”

“I’ll need some art. A photo of the hero schoolteacher at the site of a student’s brutal murder? No offense, but that shit’s gonna fly.” Before I could say anything, she said, “I know. I sound heartless and cold. Talk to my ex. But your take on the victim,
plus
a picture of you looking all sad and pensive, places Douglas’s murder squarely on page four. Let’s see the cops ignore that, Raymond.”

Now who’s the mind reader?
“Four o’clock is great, Allison.”

“I’ll see you there. Be on time. I don’t wanna lose that light.”

*

Less than five minutes later, I was in the main office going through old yearbooks, trying to get a last name to go with “Junior.” The process reminded me a little too much of when I used to go through mug-shot books as a cop. After ten minutes, I found the photo and name I was looking for. Junior Alvarez graduated three years ago. Under his picture, where it said “Future Aspirations,” it read “Businessman.” That’s what it always said when the kid didn’t fill out the questionnaire the yearbook advisor sent out.

I went over to the file cabinet where we kept the old contact cards filed by year. School policy used to require us to hang on to them for three years. I hoped that was still the case. It was, and Junior Alvarez did indeed live close to the school. Two blocks away. At least that’s where he lived three years ago. I copied down the address, along with the number listed for his home and his mother’s cell. Then I put the card back.

On the way back to my office, I took out my cell phone. This wasn’t exactly school business, and I didn’t want anyone in the main office overhearing my conversation. I dialed the home number, and after five rings I was outside my room, listening to a computerized voice tell me I had dialed the right number and to leave a message at the beep.

“Hello,” I said. “This is Raymond Donne from the middle school. I’m looking for Junior Alvarez. If this is the right number, please have him give me a call back at—”

“Mr. Donne?”

“Yes. Is this Junior?” It shouldn’t be. Junior should be in school.

“Yeah,” he said. “What’s up? Emily okay?”

“Emily?” I asked as I unlocked my office and stepped inside.

“My cousin,” he said. “She goes to the school now, and her moms put my moms down as an emergency number. What’s up? She okay?”

“No. I mean, yeah. She’s fine.” As far as I knew she was fine. “I’m calling about something else.”

“Emily’s okay, though?”

“Yeah, Junior. Everything’s fine. I called to talk to you.”

He waited a few seconds. “Me? What do you wanna talk to me about?”

“Your cousin,” I said, then realized I probably sounded like a crazy person. “Your
other
cousin. Tio.”

Silence again. Then, “I don’t talk much about Tio, Mr. D.”

“I understand, Junior,” I said. “And I know you and I didn’t have a lot to do with each other when you were here, but…” I decided to go with the truth. “One of my kids was killed the other day under the bridge. Dougie Lee?”

“Yeah,” Junior said. “I heard about that. What’s that got to do with Tio?”

“That’s what I want to find out. The cops found some beads and a few bags of pot on Dougie, and they’re making some noise it might be gang-related.”