George Pelecanos (26 page)

I
figured the reservoir was safe. The blacks wouldn't burn anything near Howard
University. We found an empty spot in front of the house where Pop grew up, and
parked. Jeanette pointed at the mirrored moon reflected on the reservoir.

"Romantic,"
she said. Compared to Edgewood Terrace, where she lived, and Michigan Park,
where I lived, she was right. We hadn't known much else.

Jeanette
piled Pop's paint tarps flat on top of each other, covering the floor of the
van, and tucked a clean sheet around the outside corners, like a real bed. She
laid two pillows and an old quilt on top, then shed her clothes and stripped
off mine. Pop's van had no windows in the back. We crawled under the quilt. She
pulled at me, impatient, wild, and when she was
ready,
she pushed me flat on my back and guided me inside her. She made me swear to do
anything for her love. Swear. And swear. And swear.

When
we dressed, we sat in the front seat and rolled the windows down. An orange
glow lit the sky above Howard. Smells, like fire jobs before new paint, drifted
through the van. Smoke leeched from between Howard's big brick buildings and
rolled across 5th Street, smothering McMillen's still surface like cemetery
fog. I cracked two beers, lit a smoke and another off it, and clicked on the
radio. I searched for that new Smokey Robinson song, but the shit going down
all over the city screamed out on every station. I was wrong about Howard. 7th
Street burned as hot as 14th.

Jeanette's
eyes glazed over.

"I
got to get out of here" she said. "I'll die here." She waved her hand across
the windshield. "We'll all die here." We stayed on Hobart until 4 a.m. The
fires never went out, and I never mentioned Michael's call.

The
next morning, Pop and I loaded the van for work, and he told me that Michael
had called after I left. He wanted to know why Michael "that piece of shit
jailbird" was calling after me. Pop made it real clear, when Richie enlisted,
that he didn't want to see any of Richie's gang again.

"What,
that scumbag wants to sing you Happy Birthday?" Pop said.

My
only brush with crime, shoplifting from the five-and-dime on Monroe Street, had
been dealt with swift and sure. One of the clerks, who had a crush on Richie,
ratted
me out. I was in third grade at Saint Gertrude's.

Richie
beat my ass and said he'd do worse if he caught me again. From then on, my
criminal activity stayed limited to stealing
Pop's
change. High school ended and I signed on with Pop's paint crew. A couple of
years passed and Pop dumped his crew. From then on, it was just me and him and
the sick smell of paint.

I
didn't tell Pop that I'd called Michael first. Pop would never understand. I
called Michael because I promised I'd do anything for her love. I hoped he'd
never call back.

But
King got killed, the cops got busy, and Michael got hungry.

"Perfect,"
Jeanette said when I finally did tell her, "Olivet's stashing more money than
ever. He's fencing for the looters.
They been
bringing
stuff since they torched downtown. The safe under his desk is fat with cash."

"Where
are the cops?" I said.

"You
think the squares from out in the burbs would come by at night shopping for
their wives and girlfriends if cops were a problem? And Olivet keeps counting
that money, alone, late, after midnight, when everybody's stopped coming
around. Big money, Jackie, for everything we want, and all the cops across the
river."

I
called Michael back and told him what Jeanette said, and about the alley that
Pop and I used to get into Olivet's back lot. Olivet's lot filled the triangle
between the train tracks and Kenilworth Avenue, where they almost collided, and
stretched alongside the back fences of Deanwood's gaso-line alley garages.

"Smart
girl," he said. "I know her?"

I
didn't answer.

Deanwood's
a quiet place, street after street filled with squat brick and cinderblock
duplexes, and none too nice apartments. Pop called Michigan Park a move up from
Hobart Place. Nobody moved up to
Deanwood, that
was
clear. The only single houses were country shacks thrown up by the colored farm
boys who came looking for city jobs, money jobs. Everything looked beat.

Olivet's
alley lay half hidden behind brush grown wild around the tracks. It dead-ended
into Olivet's back lot. He didn't bother with a gate or fence. He wasn't
worried about keeping anybody out. I told Michael that the whole time Pop and I
worked painting Olivet's office, we never saw a soul use that alley, coming or
going.

"Tonight's
the night," Michael said on Saturday when I got him on the phone, "the city's
still hot. Get the key from your girl and meet me at Chick Hall's." Honky-tonk
whites gathered at Chick Hall's Surf Club, a shitty storefront bar just over
the line in P.G. County. Jeanette loved Chick Hall's.

I
told her the plan and she handed me the key to Olivet's back door. She kissed
me on the mouth and said she knew the safe was full. Then her eyes narrowed and
she asked, "When do I meet Michael?"

"Hasn't
come up," I said. I didn't like how quick she was to ask that.

"How
about tonight, how about I ride with you to the meet? I'll drive Pop's van home
and pick you up after it's over."

"Michael
might not go for it," I said, hedging.

She
closed her fingers around my arm and pulled me tight to her. On tiptoes, she
kissed me again and let my hands

"C'mon,
Jackie, we'll have some fun later," she said, and pushed me off, playing. Her
fingertips grazed across my zipper. She was driving Pop's van to Chick Hall's
that night around 11:00. She always got her way.

On
our way there, we passed a group of kids hanging out at the intersection of
Bladensburg and South Dakota, in front of Highball Liquors, too late for kids
so young to be out. They were yelling at each car passing by. I felt better.
With cops around, no kids do that.

When
we turned through the light, the kid nearest my window screamed, "Honky!" He
flipped me the finger and pumped his fist in the air. Jeanette pushed the gas a
little harder.

Chick
Hall's was near Peace Cross, in a strip of crummy stores on Bladensburg Road.
Ten miles past Chick's was all country.

We
pulled into the lot, behind the bar, and I glanced over at Jeanette. The glare
from an alley streetlamp sprayed across her face. She slid the tip of her
tongue between closed lips and moved her head side to side, searching the
stretch of empty lots.

She
picked a spot next to the dumpster, in the darkest corner, and cut the engine.
A dark sedan, hidden in the night shadows, blinked its lights once, and the
doors sprung open. Michael and two strangers spilled out.

Jeanette
watched Michael lead his crew across the lot toward us. They looked like
killers, dressed in black from head to toe. Jeanette licked her lips.

"He's
handsome," she said. She wouldn't take her eyes off Michael, and leaned forward
in her seat.

"Michael
said alone," I reminded her. She looked at me like she'd forgotten who I was.

"Does
it matter?" she said. I wished my brother Richie was one of them. Jeanette
jumped from Pop's van, slammed the door, and propped herself against the front
fender. I moved
quick
, to be by her side. Michael
walked right up to us without saying a word. The two with him split apart and
flanked us. Michael glanced at me,
then
nodded his
head to the guy near my shoulder.

"That's
Ray," he said, and the guy's face pinched togeth like a smile hurt him. Michael
called the other guy his boy, and said his name was Dee. A thick rope of scar
cut through Dee's right eye.

"You the smart girl?"
Michael said to
Jeanette. He moved closer like he might sniff at her, like some dog.

"Maybe,"
she said, "smart enough." Michael's eyes traveled from her ankles to her eyes.

"Surprised
I hadn't noticed you before," he said.

"That's
okay, I'll be around."

"Cut
the shit, Romeo," Ray said to Michael, "we got work to do."

A
noise, like a laugh, came from Dee. Jeanette looked at Ray like I'd seen her
look at bugs.

"You
got the key?" Michael said to me, but still stared at Jeanette. She reached
into her pocket to retrieve it. Her jack t opened and she drew in a deep breath
and pushed her breasts out. Michael didn't miss a thing. She held the key
between her thumb and index finger and extended her hand toward Michael. He
held his hand still, palm up. When the key came close, he touched the side of
her hand with his fingers, and she dropped the key.

"Be
careful," she said. I wanted her talking to me, but she wasn't.

"Don't
worry," Michael said.

I
sneaked my arm around Jeanette's waist and pulled her closer to me. Michael
didn't blink. She couldn't keep from staring.

"Let's
go," he said.

I
tried to kiss Jeanette, but she tilted her face away, like she did with fresh
makeup, and blew a kiss. I followed the three of them across the lot to the
dark sedan.

Michael
tossed me the keys. He jumped in the front seat and motioned me behind the wheel.
Ray perched in back. Dee stared at me from the rearview mirror.
The scar jagged through his eye and left his eyeball milk-white,
like a boiled egg.
He shifted in the seat and the twin barrels of a
sawed-off shotgun poked out between the buttons of his overcoat. He took his
time covering them up.

"See
what you want, boy," he said.

Michael
motioned me to start the car. "Do the speed limit and don't run any lights."

"I
thought you weren't worried about cops," I said.

"I'm
not. Just drive and shut the fuck up. I'll do the thinking."

Pop
called it right about Michael, he was no friend, but it was too late. Richie
wasn't around this time to bail me out. I took Bladensburg to Kenilworth
heading toward the city, and passed commercial buildings and scrap joints left
stranded on empty streets. I thought about Jeanette's sweet lips against mine
and mashed down on the gas.

"Easy,"
Ray said. Hot breath laced with stale booze pushed against the back of my ear.
I let off the gas and he settled into the backseat. I scoped every intersection
for law, but no cops were in sight.

At
the D.C. line, I turned off Kenilworth onto Eastern Avenue and headed into
Deanwood. Before we came to the tracks, I turned right onto Olive Street and
slowed down to a crawl. Olive dead-ended into Polk, and Olivet's alley opened
across the intersection. All the houses and apartments sat dark, like everyone
had turned in, like real people, like
Pop
.

I
glanced again in the rearview mirror and saw Dee's milk eye blink once, slow
motion, then his good eye zeroed into mine. The shotgun lay across his thighs.

"Eyes
on the road," Ray said, nudging me in the shoulder.

We
stopped at Polk, facing the alley. To the left, a walk-way disappeared under
the tracks into a concrete tunnel, black from soot off the overhead trains. The
last garage in gasoline alley was half a block to my right. The streetlights
were out

"Let's
go," Michael said.

I
cut the lights and coasted across Polk onto the gravel alley. The night
swallowed us up. I kept my foot off the gas, careful not to tap the brakes,
afraid of the red glare. Loose stones grumbled beneath the sedan's weight. The
weeds from the tracks side of the alley swept against my side of the sedan,
grabbing, like living things trying to hold me back.

I
steered a little closer to the fences that separated us from the garages.
Nothing stirred.

"There's
his light," I said, and pointed ahead to the familiar white-washed building
that appeared from the darkness like a ghost.

"Stop
here," Ray said.

I
touched the brakes and winced, waiting for the red glare.

"Ray
disconnected the lights," Michael said, and chuckled to himself. Ray said
something about me under his breath.

"Make
a U-turn," Michael directed. I looked up at the little patch of yellow light
shining through the door that led to Jeanette's and my future.

"Face
out the alley and keep the engine running," Michael said, "we won't be long."

I
adjusted the rearview so I could watch the landing at the top of the metal
stairs and the door with the light. Olivet's Cadillac snugged close against the
side of the building, hiding beneath the stairs.

Michael
swiveled in his seat and faced the others. Dee slipped a shell in each barrel
and snapped the shotgun closed. The hair at my neck stood up. They lingered
outside the car for a second, talking too soft for me to hear, then I watched
them creep across the lot to the bottom of the stairs.

I
could've started the car and taken off. If I waited until they climbed the
stairs and went inside, I could've hauled ass. They couldn't stop me.