Plainclothes Naked (21 page)

“Get her out of here!” she shrieked, aiming those awful, lashless eyes at Tina, making her feel like a
thing.
“I don’t want this girl in our house! Get her
out!
”

Then the policeman’s daughters were in the room, giggling and whispering in each others’ ears. The policeman, somehow smaller

without his uniform, wrapped a blue bath towel around Tina’s naked body and lifted her in his arms. His hands were smooth, not like the truckers Mommy sometimes made her cuddle.
Go ahead, Darlin’, Howdy really likes little girls.
The policeman’s hair was mussed and his lean face had a sad expression.

“She’s just scared,” he said.

But Tina did not know who he was talking to. After she got dressed, she spent the rest of the night in the policeman’s car, driving to a place where he said they put children like her until they found some family to take them, or people who wanted to make them part of
their
family. He asked if she wanted him to put the cherry-top on, and she said yes. “We only do it for special passengers,” he told her. So that’s how they rode, with the red light flashing and Tina curled against him, her head on his shoulder, watching the white lines on the highway until she fell asleep. It was light by the time they arrived. And two weeks until Pop Lee, her nine-fingered grandpa, swooped through to take her to live with him, in a whole other nightmare.

When the phone
rang again Tina snatched it on the first ring. She’d turned off the machine. She didn’t want messages. It was better not to answer. But she wasn’t thinking. Lost in all that history.... All that shit she never thought about. Her own life.

“What?” she snapped, looking around at the pile of shoes. “Give it up, bitch.”

“What?”

“Fuck you! You’re already dead!”

The voice was frantic, quavery. A tweaker. When her first husband, the part-time RV salesman, got deep into freebase, he sounded the same way. She could hear fast breathing, then a worried voice in the background. “Just tell her,Tony.”

The phone dropped with a clatter and she could make out the first man’s garbled scream.
“Don’t say my name, you fucking dink! What the fuck’s wrong with you?”
The second voice said something else, and the tweaky guy came back on, panting and talking fast. “Okay, right. Shut up! We know who you are, bitch. You took something that doesn’t belong to you. We’re going to come and get it.”

“I love company,” she said, going kittenish. “Can you come over now?”

The tweaker giggled. “She’s a nympho!You believe this shit!” Then he remembered he was supposed to sound heavy, and started in again. “We’re coming when you don’t know we’re coming. And you better have what we’re coming for.”

“Oh, I
do,
” she said. “I really do!”

There was a barking laugh, and the line went dead. She hung up and, two seconds later, another ring. She stared at a tassel loafer—when the hell had Marv bought
that?
—then picked up without saying any thing.

“Tina? Tina, you there?”

“Manny? Is that you? My God—”

“What’s happening?You sound, I don’t know . . . what happened?” Tina pulled herself off the floor. Took a breath. Steeling herself. “I got a call,” she said, “that’s all. Somebody knows where I live. Some body wants something I have. Somebody’s coming to get it. One of

them’s named Tony.”

“It would be,” said Manny, calculating. Today was Chatlak’s funeral. After that he had to go to Carmella’s house. To tell her family. At Manny’s insistence, they’d been sitting on the news. Waiting to see who came forward, maybe filed a Missing Persons. But no one had. Normally Fayton liked to make the Hanky Calls, to represent the Force.
“We want you to know, we’ll do everything we can to find the scum who did this to your mother-father-husband-daughter-wife-or-son. You know, I’m no stranger to loss myself. . . .”

More than once, Manny’d had to sit beside him at these visits, breathing in the chief ’s insincerity like steam off horseshit. No doubt he’d make a speech at Chatlak’s funeral, move himself to tears over the virtues of this fine, departed officer, a credit to the force, an inspiration to law enforcement everywhere, and a close, close personal friend.

“Fuck it,” said Manny, making a left instead of a right on Liberty Boulevard, three blocks from the station. “I was supposed to go a funeral, but fuck it, the guy’s dead anyway. I’m coming over.”

“I don’t need that.” “I didn’t say you did.”

For some reason,Tina remembered the time a long-distance hauler

slapped her mother for spilling his drink. Tina stabbed him with her homework pencil, and her mother locked her out of the trailer until morning. Tina could still hear her whisper as she slammed the door:
“You little bitch, that was my medicine money. Timmy’s our friend. . . .”
She was maybe seven.

“I can take care of myself,” Tina said finally. “I’ve had a lot of prac tice.”

“So I figured.”

Manny swerved to miss a pair of dogs mating at the intersection. A collie coming in low to nail a willing schnauzer. A small crowd had gathered outside the Bentelbo to cheer. The Bent opened at six, for the wake-up boilermaker crowd. In the old days, the mill-hunks from J & L Steel used to roll in after the graveyard shift, or before heading out for the six-to-two. Now that J & L was history, they rolled in and didn’t bother to roll out again. Manny waved at a pair of early-bird juicers and spoke slowly into his cell. “Tina, pay attention. Don’t answer the door. Don’t leave the house. And stay away from the win dows. I know these guys, and they’re freaks.”

“Unlike most guys,” she said. “Get out much?”

Tony Zank was crawling on all fours, nose close to the carpet, squinting for crumbs. His throat still stung from the chunk of wall plaster he’d just fired up, sucking the tainted smoke in deeply, even though he knew, right away, it wasn’t actually crack he was smoking. Still, there might have been some crack on it. Maybe a mole cule. He didn’t want to not inhale in case he missed any thing.
‌

“Oh man,” said McCardle, combing through the shag fibers beside him. “I think you just smoked a paint chip or somethin’.”

“I know what I smoked,” croaked Zank. “If you wouldn’t have dropped the baggie we wouldn’t be down here.”

“I told you, Tony, it was empty.”

Zank ignored him, having just found a reasonably cracklike white chunk under the couch. He held it to the light, grunted, and shoved it in the tiny pipe. “Bic me,” he commanded his partner. “My thumb’s too sore to flick.”

“Mine, too,” cried McCardle. Holding up his own shredded thumb tips, he suddenly remembered. “You seen Puppy?”

Tony slapped him. “Forget Puppy. Just fucking do it!” He leaned in close, clenching the now jagged glass stub between his teeth. By now the oven mitt was missing in action.

“I’m still worried about Puppy,” Mac said, but Tony ignored him. Wincing, he flicked the lighter a few times, catching a weak flame, and held it unsteadily while Zank aimed the end of the stem into it.

“Uccch, shit!”
he gagged, dropping the pipe as a waxy feather of black smoke trailed toward the ceiling. The carpet began to smolder, where the hot glass lay tangled in fiber.

“Smells like cheese,” said McCardle, covering his tiny nose with his hand. “Must be parmesan, from when we had the Chef Boyardee.”

“I don’t care what it’s from,” Zank shouted. “We’re out of stuff, and we need some.
Now!
”

“But Tony, man, I thought we was gonna go after the girl? To get that picture.”

“We’ll stop on the way there,” said Zank, still combing the carpet lint. “I know a corner. Get the kit.”

“You’re taking your kit?”

“What are you, my mother? Yeah, as a matter of fact, I
am
takin’ it.

Soon as I can remember where the fuck it is.”

“It’s where you left it, man, in the fridge. You said you put it there so you wouldn’t forget it.”

“Well I didn’t, so get it, ass-fucker. I’m busy here.”

McCardle pouted and got to his feet. “That’s really uncool, man.

Ain’t no need for that kind of talk.”

“Read a grammar book or shut up,” Zank carped. “I thought your dad was a dentist.”

“He jus’
say
he was a dentist. What he
was
was a con man. Went roun’ to all the different hoods with a chisel and string, pullin’ out peo ples’ molars ’n shit. Lotta folks in them days couldn’t afford nobody else. Still can’t. So Daddy did ’em a service.”

“That why your mama killed him?”

“Not exactly. Some of the ladies, his fingers wasn’t all Daddy was puttin’ in their mouf.”

“
Mouf?
See that’s what I mean. When you’re straight you sound like Colin fucking Powell. Then you stick your lips on that glass dick and—
Yo!
—Mike Tyson’s in the house. What is
wrong
with you?”

McCardle shuddered and backed toward the kitchen. “Look who’s talkin’! Every time
you
smoke this shit, you go Aryan Nation on me. You get scary.”

“I
am
scary, you fucking homo. Now get the kit. We’re wasting time.”

McCardle got five feet before he had to stop and look behind him.
There it was again!
The grinning midget. As soon as he turned his head, no matter how fast, it flitted out of sight. Around a corner, under a couch.... The thing was watching him now. He could hear it talking, too. He was sure. Not just talking, either. It was
laughing
at him. Mak ing fun. That’s what it was! A vicious pygmy in the shadows, calling him an asshole.

“Oh man, I am
never
doing this again! Tony, you hear me! I’m done!

I never wanna
see
another chunk of cocaine... .”

He thought he was yelling, then realized his voice was barely over a peep. His heart pounded so hard it hurt. He felt like he’d swallowed a ringing alarm clock. The crack dwarf was back, tee-heeing in every corner.

Suddenly dizzy, McCardle clung to the door of the refrigerator as if clinging to the side of a ship, trying not to get carried off by waves. His own weight swung the appliance open. Inside, among the Iron Cities and Slim Jims—Tony liked them chilled, to bring out the bite—was a canvas plumber’s bag. He made a grab for it, peeking over his shoulder for the angry munchkin, and accidentally tipped the contents onto the sticky floor.

Mac dropped to his knees, cursing. “Shit SHIT
SHIT!
” Why was it, whenever he did crack, he always ended up on hands and knees, picking at things?
Carpet-mining
. Fighting back panic, he tried to shove everything back in the bag: the two tubes of superglue, the grapefruit spoon, the thick roll of silver gaffer’s tape, the eyebrow tweezers, the

three pairs of pliers, the nipple clamps, the two Colt-Python .357s, the Ex-Lax, the fur-lined handcuffs, the little jug of Arm & Hammer bleach, the baling wire, the dozen packets of black pepper and hot sauce from Taco Bell, the skinny jar of plastic cocktail toothpicks, the power stapler and the rolled-up copy of
Guns & Ammo
with the “New Slim Glock .45” on the cover. He swept his fingers beneath the fridge, in case he’d missed anything, and wiped his hand on his pants as he closed the bag and dragged himself back up. Then he ran screaming into the living room.

“Tony, I just remembered something! They can find where you live, man! I saw it on
Cops
. They can check the rent computers. Every body who rents anything, anywhere, they got ’em in a big computer!” But Tony wasn’t there. He was... somewhere. Mac could hear him coughing. When he called him again—“Tony? C’mon, man, this is a bad time for hide-and-seek!”—his partner replied in a harsh whisper.

“Keep your voice down! I’m behind the TV.”

McCardle tiptoed carefully across the room. After being awake for a week, the ground started to feel . . . soft. Like the whole world was getting as mushy as his brain. He found Tony flat on his belly, wedged in the narrow space between the television and the wall.

“Get down, you simp! They got the infrared.”

“Fuck the infrared, we gotta split,” cried McCardle. “Right now! I’m tellin’ you, they check the rent computer, we’re cooked. All’s they gotta do is type in your name, then shoot over here with one of them battering rams. I seen it on
Cops,
man. They can knock down steel!”

Zank lurched forward and grabbed McCardle by the belt. Mac kneeled to keep from falling. Tony switched his grip to his shirt collar and tugged him the rest of the way down. “You think I’m stupid? Is that it? You violate my manhood and then you come in my house, and you call me stupid?”

“No,Tony, no. I wasn’t—”

“Oh no? Then why you think I’d sign a lease under my own name? Huh? I’m
not
stupid. I’m De Niro. Okay? I’m fucking De Niro.”

“Robert De Niro?”

Their faces were now inches apart. Both whispered, not sure who was listening—maybe the CIA, maybe NASA—but sure someone was. McCardle had caught Tony’s paranoia and sploshed it on top of his own.

“
Robert
De Niro?” Zank repeated disgustedly. “
Robert
fucking De Niro?” He looked incredulous. “Only a complete moron would say they were Robert De Niro. Robert
De Niro
’s Robert De Niro. Every body knows that. Mother
fuck!
I’m
Ed,
man. I’m not some dickhead like you. I went with Ed.”

“You’re
Ed
De Niro? On the lease, that’s who you are?”

“Smart, right? The landlord sees Robert De Niro he’s gonna know I’m bullshitting. But Ed De Niro, hey, he don’t know. It could be we’re related. I mean, we look alike, right?

“Uh, well, yeah. Sorta. I mean, you’re both white.”

McCardle stopped talking and tried to swallow. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d drunk anything besides Iron City. Or the last time he’d urinated. His whole body felt seized up.
Brittle.
As though somebody’d shellacked him when he wasn’t looking. Then a wedge of light through the blinds caught Tony’s face and Mac had to gasp. Dried blood blotched Zank’s nose and forehead, and his left ear looked like it had a bite taken out of it. His eyes glowed an unwhole some yellow-red, like a Rottweiler with distemper Mac had once seen at a bus stop.