Authors: Jessica Miller
I take the scene into my lens and catch focus. Of course I falter with the exposure settings at first and it takes me six practice shots to get it right. The result is a crisp image of the downtown Culver City skyline—plain and simple, but at least the subject is in focus. If only my family could understand how much happiness that living here and pursuing photography gives me, maybe they would be able to stop looking at me like the financial disaster of the family.
***
On the way down from the roof I smell fresh paint—the scent certainly wasn’t there on the way up to the roof. I hear the low hiss of,
Tsssssst. Tssst. Tsst. Click. Clack.
I look over and see a figure hanging from a scaffold, tethered, spraying painting the brick wall inside the garage wildly. From the stairwell it seems like he has earphones tucked in under the dark purple bandana covering his face. A garb covering the top part of his head is stone grey and leaves just a big enough slit for his eyes. The get up looks kind of pirate-themed, but who am I to judge style? I’m wearing baggy jeans, a torn up faded black Carhartt, and green Chucks from 2007.
Stories about local artists always sell in photography class, so I get the camera ready to get photos of the artist before he can see me. The last thing I want is for his eyes to fall upon me, let alone see me taking a photo of him. I pray the sound of the lens going off will be muted while his can continues,
Clack. Clack. Tsssssst. Tssst. Tssst—
but at the sound of the first shutter he ceases fire on the can of paint in his hand. I feel his eyes on me and from under his bandana I can hear his muffled words.
“Hey, what are you doing?” he shouts, untying his tether and leaping down from the scaffold. “What the hell did you just do?”
I dart back up to the roof, my legs scrambling. A churning knot in my stomach tells me I was stupid taking that one photograph, and I shove the camera back into the book bag, trying to hide it with old term papers. Leaping up the stairs, I look for another way down or a place to hide. The guy was an artist—he wouldn’t hurt me, would he?
From the top of the stairwell I crane my neck around to see him on the platform where I just stood. His wide eyes catch mine again and the part of my brain that tells my lungs to breathe goes haywire. He walks toward me up the stairs, skipping an additional step with each forward motion. With him rushing toward me, it’s like my life is stuck on fast-forward and the pause button won’t work.
My logic tells me to observe the person whose head is covered by a gray garb and a purple bandana, and in this instant I know my body is trying to decide to fight or fly. One half of me is prepared to hurtle over a car in order to escape him, and the other is planted to the ground, embracing the lunge. In waiting for the collision, I’m not sure if I’m the deer in headlights or the dock taking in the ship.
“Stop!” a heavy voice bellows. “On the ground!”
The shouting comes from the lower level of the garage. In a blink the man is inches in front of me. My body freezes. Each of my joints locks in their places. As the adrenaline courses through me, I am caught in his line of sight and he freezes, too. “You’d better delete that photo,” his voice rumbles, “if you know what’s good for you.”
The shouting follows him up the stairs. I can see behind him that it is the police—two officers, a man and a woman. They’re after him, and he’s trapped between us. The man’s eyes bolt from my bag to my eyes and he runs toward the fire escape on the edge of the roof.
At first the officers barely give me a glance as they chase him to the scaffold. By the urgent gaze they share, I know that the artist is getting away. The female officer dashes past me and down the stairwell, sprinting the length of the alleyway after the artist. The other officer watches her from the edge of the roof and then approaches me.
“Were you with that man?” he asks, hands out as if I might be some kind of danger.
“No, sir,” I say. I notice that my fingers are subconsciously grasping my book bag, that I don’t want the officer to ask me about the photograph.
“He was vandalizing this garage,” he says. “We’ve seen a lot of him lately. Involved with a few other local thieves. On top of the little gallery they’ve been making out of the Culver area, we suspect this guy is also linked to a number of small crimes around here.”
My fingers shake and teeth chatter. My hands feel cold around the straps of my bag. “I can walk you to your car if you’d like, miss,” the officer continues.
“No, thank you,” I say, in a trance. “I have a bus to catch.” I start back for the stairwell, trying to nonchalantly walk around the man, but he stops me. With him standing over me, looking down, I feel intimidation setting in, as if he were interrogating me.
“Be careful out there,” he says, eyeing my bag. “It’s getting dark.”
***
Once I reach the ground level of the garage, I turn and barge right for my bus stop. There are few lights in the alley but I can see the shine of Culver Square at the end of the dark corridor. Why is it that dumpsters always give off a sketchy vibe at night? I pick it up to a jog but can’t help but look over my shoulder. Behind me, there is nothing but the ghostly silhouette of the parking garage, and the faces of the two Stooges, which I can no longer make out in the shadow.
There are people clamoring around, the Sunday nightlife just blossoming. As I step out of the alley I’m stopped when my hand is grabbed, jerking me back. Instantly I go breathless. At this point my body has had too much shock for one day.
“Vylette, chill,” the voice says. My eyes go from my hand and up the arm of the artist. His hand is warm, his fingers pressing firm against the innermost triangle of my palm.
“Who are you?” I shriek, trying to free my hand. He releases it without struggle.
“Come on, girl,” he says, his voice full of bass. “Don’t you know? I’ve seen you naked.” My face goes numb and the sensation follows suit down to my feet. Why does my body refuse to run? Is this what it’s like when an animal in the wild becomes prey? My knees buckle and as I stumble over, the artist catches me in his arms.
I honestly don’t know what to think; every part of me feels useless. “Vylette,” the artist says, and pulls down the dark purple bandana to reveal his face. The first thing I see is the scar running down from his ear, and then I realize that the artist is the guy from my class—Roman. “I got them in a loop,” he says, and I sense his urgency. “You can follow me and we can lay low, or you can go.”
I’m struck, his chestnut eyes surveying me up and down, left to right. My lips and eyebrows tremble in search of a reaction, but when he looks back, he sees the lady cop from earlier. “Vylette,” Roman repeats. “I need to know right now. Are you down?”
He takes my hand again, heading back to the belly of the alleyway. This is the moment of truth. Am I down? I exhale and in the next moment I’m trailing behind him, our hands coupling, our arms like a chain. Now it feels like my life is stuck on rewind, with no choice but to go back down the alley. Roman takes a sharp right down an even darker alley—more like a three-foot space between two buildings. This tunnel feels like I’m going down the rabbit hole, and as we exit the crevice there is a door blended in with the rust colored brick. Without letting go of my hand, Roman pulls me forward. I look back through the narrow passage and all I see is blackness, like a void. He opens the door and we enter into an ember chamber of a room with another door. In here, there is a golden plaque on the door that I can barely make out before the second door closes. It reads,
Eighty8 Lounge
.
***
A saxophone blares in the smoky room, beams of blue and red light coalescing a steady glow as the music dissipates. Once we’re a few feet into the club, Roman’s grip grows tighter around my hand, locking his fingers with mine. The crowd of faces blur past me, their distant eyes focused at the band on stage. Not expecting this array of lights and sounds, I lose myself for a second feeling dizzy. Roman looks back to me. His eyes bring reassurance so I follow on.
Around the stage and the bar there is a hall with bathrooms, but past the bathrooms is a beaded curtain. Without a second thought Roman proceeds through the beads and they rattle as he passes. I take a breath and look to my left, where the music bellows and the crowd swings. How did I end up here? I’ve heard of secret bars in Los Angeles, but nothing like this.
Roman pokes his head back through the curtains. “You coming?” he asks with a coy smile, then disappears again beyond the beads. I take one last look to my left and then step forward, the beads cool against my face. Roman is already halfway up the flight of stairs leading to yet another door.
He stops at the door, which gives me time to catch up behind him. The stairs beneath me creak with every step and the saxophone is still audible but faded in the background. I hear the door unlock, followed by the sound of a second lock. In total Roman unlocks five of them. What kind of place is this to need five locks?
I take one step and it’s like I’m no longer breathing oxygen but some new life source—an air of lavender and lilac. Once I’m fully through the doorway, he clicks all the locks closed and in addition slides a dresser in front of the door. He unties the bandana and the garb and folds them neatly placing them on the dresser’s surface.
My heart pounds like a drum in sync with the upbeat jamboree downstairs. Roman turns his left shoulder slowly over to me, and the tissue of his scar glimmers in the moonlight from the window adjacent to him. When he is turned all the way, he has that same wide grin he wears so well.
“Roman, I don’t understand,” I manage to spit out. “The cops were…why are you trying to get caught over some…” No matter how hard I try, I can’t catch my words. He puts a hand on each of my biceps and rubs them firmly.
“Everything’s cool now, Vylette,” he says. “Relax. They won’t find us here. Take a breather. Can I get you a drink?”
“Do you live here?” I ask. “Do you like, own this place, or what?” I’m at a loss as to any reasonable deduction for the current situation. With Roman’s hands rubbing my arms up and down I can barely think straight, anyway. He just laughs again, releasing his grip.
Walking around me, I can tell he’s at home here. It’s just a simple room, damp with the musty smell of herb and a few simple pieces of furniture, but the walls are decked out with one endless painting of trees, vines, and overgrowth in vibrant greens and browns. For a second I get the feeling of being at a rain forest exhibit, and something about it makes me feel hidden from the world.
There is a bed in the corner, a bathroom, and a kitchenette. “I call it ‘The Brush’,” he says, going into the kitchenette. “I just come here to chill, get in my zone, and figure shit out.”
“The cops could come in here any minute,” I say, ignoring his self-indulgent introduction. “I don’t care how many locks you put on that door. Why are we here? Why are you running?”
I’m in his face now and he’s peering at me down his nose, keeping his chin held high. “They don’t like my work,” he says, cracking a smile, “and they don’t like the people I run with.”
“So, what?” I smile back, raising my chin in retort. “You going to make me ask who you run with? And what your work is?” Suddenly, I jump at something shocking my thigh.
Buzz buzz
.
Buzz buzz.
I don’t need to look at my phone to know that it’s Malik texting to check in on me. He expected me home hours ago.
“Hey, you got to do what you got to do,” he says, breaking our stare and reaching for glasses in the cupboard. “If you got a man, you better tell him that everything is cool and the leash is tight.”
“
Leash
?” I chirp, realizing my voice cracks, but I’ll make it work in favor of the attitude. “I don’t know who you think you are or what you’re getting at, but you don’t know me. And so far, as much as your game of tag-a-long has been quite the sideshow, you haven’t shown me much respect, either.”
While he moves smoothly, pouring two glasses of bourbon, I’m stiff, and all I can do is observe what’s around me: a tan counter littered with pencils, film rolls, stacks of SD cards, old drawings, books, and a small, silver knife. When he returns to me, he’s holding out a small glass with a fair pour of honey-colored liquid and two ice cubes. “Drink slow,” he says. “This place is cool. And when I say cool, I mean those parking garage rent-a-cops won’t come looking for us here.”
“Us?” I reiterate. “I never said I was with you.”
“Well, you never said you weren’t.” Holding both glasses, his stare is patient. I take a glass and put it to my lips. The air within the glass hits my nostrils like a matchstick, and through the glass I see Roman downing his glass as well.
***
The bourbon tingles in my throat and the ice clinks in the glass when Roman takes it from my hand. “Another?” he asks, seemingly copacetic from the drink.
“I guess you’re just not going to answer my questions,” I say, “So why am I here at all? Why shouldn’t I just go home right now?”
“Where is home, Vylette?” He pours himself another, but I’m firm in shaking my head to pass on this round. It’s not like me to drink with strangers. “I can tell you’re not from here. You’re so rigid. Look at you, standing there like a mannequin.” He leans against the counter, smiling with the glass to his lips. The walls practically vibrate from the music downstairs.