No offence Intended - Barbara Seranella (2 page)

Ruby said that one day maybe Munch might adopt. That
was another of those nebulous in-the-future things that Ruby was
always promising. Like getting married one day Munch told her that
yeah, that might happen, but first she needed a date.

"So what do you want from me?" she asked.

"I want you to meet my kid," he said.

"What about Karen?"

"Karen's dead. She OD'd." His eyes clouded.
If she didn't know better, she'd think he really felt bad. This
realization annoyed her. More jealousy? she wondered.

"I've been staying in Venice," he said.
"You're going to laugh when I tell you where." He held up
an oval rubber key fob with the number 6 stamped on it. A single door
key dangled from the stainless steel ring.

"What? Back at the Flats? Many happy memories
there."

"There's a few, you can't say there isn't. The
truth is I haven't been home in a few days."

"Too hot?" she asked.

He grinned that infuriating
I-know-I've-been-bad-but-I'd-probably-do-it-again grin at her. She
had to fight herself to not respond with a smile of her own. How did
he get his eyes to twinkle like that?

"So who's watching this kid of yours now?"
she asked.

"A neighbor."

"Does this kid have a name?" She felt
herself being sucked into his bullshit. Forget the kids name, she
told herself, forget misplaced loyalties to old running partners. She
wasn't a part of that world anymore. The war was over. She had
surrendered.

"Asia."

"Asia?" she echoed, shaking her head. What
kind of name was that? She turned to step away from him. She had work
to do. She didn't need this shit. He followed her as she walked back
to the Cadillac she'd been working on, the one with the leaking water
pump. She was conscious of her walk and how it didn't wiggle.
Steel-toed boots didn't lend themselves to sexy walking.
"Actually"
he said. "There is one other thing."

"I'm sure there is." She squeezed her arms
around the radiator shroud of the Cadillac to get to the four bolts
that held the fan on. She knew she would pay for this action later.
Soap and water wouldn't completely wash out the bits of fiberglass
that would embed in her arms. She'd be itching for days.

Sleaze leaned over a fender, ingratiating himself
under the hood.

"I just need you to take the baby over to my
sister's and pick up a few things at the apartment. Mostly just the
baby's stuff—clothes, her car seat, a couple toys."

She paused, feeling that tug between two worlds, and
thought about Venice Beach—the place that used to be home.
Nostalgia filled her as she remembered all the old haunts: the
boardwalk, the circle, Hooker Hill, Sunshine Cab. There was a time
when she knew who she was and what she was about. Think harder, she
told herself, think about the misery attached to that old life—the
running, the constant fear, the hopelessness.

"I don't go to Venice," she said.

"I'm not asking you to stay there," he
said. "Just a quick pit stop. You'll be in and out in two
minutes."

"What about your sister? Have Lisa go to
Venice."

"I'm kind of overextended with her," he
said.

"You mean she's fed up with your bullshit."

"No," he said. "The thing is, there's
these guys—"

"Don't tell me any more. I don't want to know."

She put her cigarette between her teeth to free her
hands as she worked the ratchet. Smoke filled her eyes and she
squinted, feeling her face scowl. She stopped working and threw away
the butt.

"But you'll come?" he asked, dangling the
key She looked at him for a long minute, framing a reply

''You're my only hope," he said.

"Don't do me like that. I'm not anyone's only
hope. I didn't get sober to keep digging losers out of holes.
Whatever you've gotten yourself into, that's your problem. I can't
get into any of that."

"You've changed."

"That's what I've been trying to tell you."

"You didn't use to be so cold."

She wanted to say that wasn't it. She was anything
but cold. All her using career she had wound her feelings into a hard
knot and stored them in a place deep inside her. A place so dark and
barren that nothing and no one could get to them. She had hoped that
eventually all that was vulnerable would shrivel and die, free her
from the pain of life. But it hadn't gone like that. Now that she was
going to live, she had to tread carefully He would never understand
that her reprieve was a daily thing, so instead she said nothing. Let
him think what he would. The fender lifted slightly when he stood.

Through the reflection of the Caddy's windshield, she
watched him climb into the cab of the truck and then shake his head
like he was disappointed. He said something to his passenger and the
other guy nodded and said something back.

It pissed her off. Who the hell did he think he was,
passing judgment on her? He was the one who fucked up, right?

Her knuckles slammed into the cold steel of the
engine block as the socket slipped off the bolt she was loosening.
Now look what he'd made her do. She felt tears well up in her eyes.

Feelings sucked.

When she looked down she saw he had left the key on
the fender.
 
 

2

MUNCH SPENT the next two hours sweating over the
Cadillac. Three bolts had broken off inside the block. One shop
teacher at an extension class she had taken at West Valley College
called it electrolysis when two metals such as aluminum and steel
bonded inseparably Although she had liked the sound of the word, how
it rolled on her tongue, part of her always felt that it was too
benign a term to assign to a condition that always gave her so much
grief.

"Rust never rests," she said aloud as she
pried the leaking water pump loose from the motor with a large
screwdriver. Earlier in the day she had explained to the owner of the
Cadillac that the bearing supporting his impeller shaft had failed.
Any other mechanic might have just said that the water pump was
broken and let it go at that, but she loved explaining to people what
was wrong with their cars, especially when it gave her the
opportunity to sound out the words always ringing in her head.

The broken bolts in the Cadillac added an additional
forty-f1ve minutes to the job, Forty-five minutes that she didn't
have to spare. Why did this sort of shit always seem to happen on
Fridays? she wondered.

She sweated as she worked. Her uniform clung to her
back. Beads of perspiration fell from the tip of her nose, flattening
when they hit the cross-brace of the frame. The thermometer mounted
on the Caddy's sideview mirror read ninety-two degrees.

This was her first autumn in the Valley It was a year
of firsts—one right after the other. Ruby said to think of it as an
adventure.

And were all adventures this lonely? Munch wondered.
She didn't mean to seem ungrateful. But what did you do with the many
hours of the day?

When every moment of your life was spent pursuing
drugs and the ways and means to get more and then suddenly that all
ended? You don't use anymore. Great. You're going to live. Now what?
What do you do with yourself when you're not busy with work or on
your way to another meeting? What about Sunday at 3:00 P.M.? Whom do
you talk to when you have a foot in two worlds and you can't relate
to anyone?

These things take time, Ruby always said. You didn't
get screwed up in one day; you won't get better all at once, either.
Sometimes Ruby would point out that Munch was still young, which
Munch supposed was meant to be comforting in some way

Another bolt felt like it wasn't going to give. She
sprayed it with penetrating oil and worked it back and forth, a
quarter turn at a time. A bead of sweat worked its way down her
cleavage. Venice Beach would no doubt be at least thirty degrees
cooler. Would it have been that big a deal to pick up his kid?

She straightened and stretched. The backs of her
knees ached from being locked so long in one position. Jack walked
over to her and put a meaty hand on her shoulder.

"How's it going?" he asked.

"Not great." She showed him the broken
bolts.

"What did that scuzball in the truck want?"

"A favor."

She knew Jack felt she was being taken advantage of
by her old "lower companions" and didn't approve. In the AA
questionnaire, the one with the twenty questions that determined if
you too were an alcoholic, it asked if you consorted with lower
companions. Ruby said that included everyone Munch used to know.

"You didn't give him any money did you?"
Jack asked.

"No, he didn't want money"

"Watch out for that guy"

She felt tears swelling behind her eyes and bent back
down over the engine. "I can handle it," she said.

"You always say that. Next time one of those
creeps comes around, you let me deal with them."

She shook her head, unwilling to attempt to talk
through her closed throat. She'd asked Ruby once when she'd stop
being so emotional. Maybe never, Ruby said. Welcome to the human
race.

Munch cleared her throat. "I've got to go see my
probation officer today at four."

"When are you going to be through with all that?
It's already been almost a year. Can't they see how good you're
doing?"

"I was lucky to get probation."

"Yeah, but three years? Jesus." Jack patted
the fender of the Cadillac. "Don't worry about getting this one
done. I'll call the guy and tell him we've run into some trouble.
Maybe I can get you a few extra bucks for the broken bolts."

"Good luck, this guy's got the first nickel he
ever made."

Jack chuckled. "You pegged him right."

"Uh, Jack?" Munch pushed back the hair from
her forehead where it had worked loose from her braid. "Thanks.
Thanks for everything."

"Sure, kid." He turned to go and then
spotted the key on the fender. "This yours?" he asked,
holding forth Sleaze's house key "What? I say something funny?"

"No, I just remembered something about that guy
who was here. He thinks he knows me so well."

She took the key and slipped it in her shirt pocket.
She gathered up her tools and checked he clock. It was a little after
three. Her new probation officer—the intractable Mrs. Olivia
Scott—was in Santa Monica. The drive over the hill took thirty to
forty-five minutes depending on the amount of traffic. Santa Monica
bordered Venice, she thought as she put her tools away and locked her
box. Inglewood, where Lisa lived, was only another few miles farther
south. What was her big worry?

She scrubbed her hands, put on a clean T-shirt,
kicked off her heavy work shoes, and slipped on a pair of Keds. The
mechanics all kept lockers in the small room where the uniforms were
stored. In a concession to gender, Jack had installed a latch on the
door soon after he hired her. Munch always felt funny about locking
the door. Perhaps it was all the time she had spent secreted in
rooms, usually bathrooms, when the doors had to be locked.

A small mirror hung over the sink. She loosened her
braid and ran her hands through to her scalp, ruffling her light
brown hair. Usually fine and straight, now it was kinked from the day
spent entwined. She liked the effect. Someday maybe she'd get
someone to show her how to curl her hair on purpose.

She thought about Deb and her boy, up there in the
country She missed them both. Sleaze, as usual, had hit a nerve. She
and Deb had been best friends since they were sixteen, when Deb had
first moved out from Missouri. Now she was in Oregon.

What were the fall months like there? Did the leaves
on the trees all change color? And what sort of a town was
Canyonville? Did it have a little general store where the locals
gathered? Did the postmistress know everyone by their first name? Was
there a small gas station there with a repair shop in back?

All this had been part of the big dream. Deb would
get some part-time job in one of the stores so she could be home when
Boogie got out of school. They would rent a small house together.
They'd grow their own vegetables and have two cats in the yard, just
like in the song.

The issue of Boogie's mixed blood wouldn't exist. In
the country nobody would ever say nigger.

At the end of the month, he would be turning seven.
Had over six years really passed since she held out her arms to
receive him after his first staggering steps? Hard to believe. When
he was a newborn, Deb told Munch that she had turned his head every
twenty minutes so that it wouldn't get flat on either side. Was
anyone thinking of doing that for Asia?

She emerged from the back room and paused before
Jack's open office door.

"I'm going over to Denny's," she said. "You
want anything?"

He checked his watch before answering. She cringed in
response to his unspoken disapproval at her early departure, but
maybe she was reading him wrong. Maybe he didn't mean anything by the
gesture, and she was just overreacting to everything.