“Could be worse. That’s about the extent of it. What
do you expect? That I’m happy things turned out like they did? Maybe I am. I mean, I’m back on the job again, but then I’ve got to deal with you, which ain’t funny.”
His unexpected bluntness punctured me, and I reshaped my feelings. My pulse was rocketing along with the shame in me. I said to him, looking him in the eye, “What did you want, a reward for your deeds?”
“No, but I don’t need your vibes, that’s for sure.”
“Tough shit. You lucked out big time, don’t you know that?”
He turned scarlet. “Don’t play games with me. You’ve got something to get off your chest, hurry up and do it. I can’t fuck around now. I’ve got trouble coming down the pipeline.”
“What do you want me to do about that?”
“You’d help me?”
“Possibly.”
The color in the custodian’s orbs changed like the water in an aquarium when the lights get turned on to keep the fish company at night.
“You know what you can do for me? The pretrial conference with my public defender and the assistant district attorney is coming up before the judge in a week. You can write a letter to the judge, asking him to give me minimum time for assault and battery with a prior.”
“You have a police record? For what?”
He hesitated before divulging, “Burglarizing a church.”
My pet project, Eldon. A man without a rudder. He was succinct enough to strip the enamel from your teeth. How could I stay mad at an asshole like him? The letter went into the mail that afternoon. I’d given it some thought and had written:
Your Honor,
The defendant in question, Eldon Ronald Paskins, age fifty-four, a custodial engineer at the Department of Social Services in the Mission, and a resident of the Altamont Hotel on Sixteenth Street, perpetrated an injury upon my person.
Multifarious in its origins, the affair was regrettable. A victim of circumstances, Mr. Paskins should not be held responsible for conditions which exacerbated the tension between us and which led to his crime.
That he was chronically unemployed, and now has a job, should not be overlooked when you sentence him.
You may notice I never filed charges against him. I am of the opinion jail time would be wasted on him. I hope the court will exercise its intrinsic benevolence and show leniency towards this individual.
Yours,
Mrs. Charlene Hassler
Not surprisingly, my efforts failed to make a difference. My status did not impress the judge. And that’s what I have always said: everything comes to a halt, but nothing ever stops. Eldon was reduced to plea bargaining his way out of a sentence more stringent than the one his lawyer had counted on. I’m sure it was a proverbial kick in the nuts. Before the week was out, he was forced to take a deal from the district attorney’s office for a three-to-five-year jolt in San Quentin Prison.
I promised myself that I’d visit Eldon. The maximum security correctional facility he’d be in was located on the other side of the bay in southern Marin County. It was near the town of Larkspur and you could get there from the city on a Golden Gate Transit ferryboat. I’d bring him a carton of cigarettes, my brand, Marlboros, as a token reminder of what was on the other side of the penitentiary’s crumbling nineteenth-century walls.
thirty-six
S
immons decided to throw a party for himself that Thursday night at Clooney’s. On a lark, he spent money out of his own pocket to print up engraved invitations, sending them Federal Express to every employee at the DSS. Simmons didn’t have a motive for the celebration. His birthday had been in the autumn, so it wasn’t that. He said, “Who needs a reason? I just want to get out of my skull.”
There was a sea of social workers in Clooney’s by sun-down. I don’t know how Simmons did it. He was acquainted with every caseworker from Santa Rosa to Milpitas, with everybody that was within a hundred miles of San Francisco.
I was sitting with Frank at a table in the back. The jukebox had gone off after playing five James Brown singles in a row. In the silence you could see how drunk everybody had gotten in the last couple of hours. Rubio was falling down, pants unbuttoned, at the front door. People were blithely stepping over him while the dog that lived under the video machine slurped at his face.
Simmons had taken off his shirt, winding it around his head, turbanlike. His torso was childishly white and
porcine. He was swinging a long-necked bottle of Bud in one hand and a cigarette was stuck between his lips. He was pleased by the turnout; everybody important from Otis Street had shown up.
Rocky had come with his wife and they were still there, knocking back highballs of Coke and rum. Even the regal Lavoris was present. She was sitting by Petard, nudging one of his gristly ears with the the tip of her nose. He stared at the television over the bar, watching a boxing match from Puerto Rico.
Nursing a gin and tonic, Vukovich got up from his seat and lugged himself over to the jukebox. He punched in some buttons and the festive strains of a tune by Sam and Dave filled the room. The music brought a smile to Matt’s lips and he twirled around in a circle, tripping over his own untied shoelaces, sloshing liquor down the front of his Dockers.
Frank appraised the empty bottles jumbled on the table in front of us. He was folded hunchbacked into a chair. His hands were wrapped around a perspiring bottle of Bud Light. He’d been tapering off in the last hour, having made the switch from whiskey to beer, a strategy that I approved of.
He flexed his shoulders, not moving his head. His lustrous sapphire-blue eyes were on me. It might’ve been the alcohol I’d been drinking, the nine daiquiris accompanied by fifteen cigarettes, but I saw Frank’s love for me under the thirty-one years of character armor on his face.
He said, “Babykins?”
“What is it?”
“I don’t feel so fucking hot. Will you help me to the bathroom?”
“Give me your hand.”
It was like this every time Frank got drunk. I put an arm around him, then extracted him from the seat. With a beery groan, he got to his feet and together we lurched to the men’s room.
The day Frank and I got married at City Hall, neither of us felt like slogging back to the funky Mission after the nuptials, so we retired across the Civic Center Plaza to the Starlight Room. We talked about our future, drinking Beck’s beer, dark for me, light for Frank. That night, he got sick on Market Street. Three weeks later, the Starlight Room was shut down and the entire building was razed to the ground.
Vukovich came up to us. He analyzed my husband’s pasty face and asked me with a lecherous burr, “Having trouble?”
“Yeah, I am. You mind getting out of my way?”
He was fucking smashed and I was hoping he wasn’t going to choose this occasion to come on to me.
“I’m tipsy,” Frank slurred.
“Hey,” Matt said. “Don’t toss your cookies on me. Here, let me open the bathroom door for you guys.”
What a comrade. Me and Frank slipped into the john, and before I could situate my hubby in one of the toilet stalls, he threw himself at the nearest sink. He got both of his hands on the bowl and presto: Frank puked a geyser of beer and whiskey, splashing the mirror, the floor and himself with an amber liquid that made it seem like he was urinating out of his nose and throat. I placed the palm of my hand against his forehead and held it there while he wretched his guts out into the sink.
I was trying to look my best that night. I’d gotten into a dress that had a pretty floral pattern, a cotton shift with a
nipped and tucked waist. My legs were freshly waxed. The hemline, billowing out just above the kneecaps, showed off my calves and the place where I got shot. I’d washed my hair and pinned it, letting it sweep back against my temples, streaming down my back. My pumps were modest, if not sedate, but new.
Rocky’s jaw had dropped an inch when he saw that I was wearing makeup.
It took an effort to make myself attractive. My legs were firm, my breasts weren’t sagging and the crow’s feet around my eyes were in remission. But I didn’t have any goddamn time for the task, for the massages, the facial peels and the hour-long baths.
Presently, I was looking better than Frank. I handed him a wad of paper towels and he scoured his mug clean with them. He was ghostly; having upchucked on an empty stomach, he had nothing left in him. He threw some water at his face and said to me, “Sorry about that.”
“I don’t care.”
“Charlene, I mean it.”
“You ready? C’mon, I’ll take you home.”
“You’re not mad at me, are you?”
“Honey, why should I be? You fucked yourself up, not me.”
“It’s a walk. You wanna call a taxi?”
Frank dragged himself to the door, too sheepish to face me. When he pulled it open, there was a curious gap in the music from the bar—offbeat because the jukebox had been going strong again. He stuck his head out into the hallway that connected the restrooms and the pay phone with the kitchen and the front. When Frank turned around, he was pure chalk.
“Whoa,” he moaned.
“What?”
“Keep your voice down. Someone’s sticking up the joint.”
“How many are there?”
“It’s only one guy. But he’s got everyone against the bar.”
I tiptoed over to the door, opened it. My view was partially blocked by the narrowness of the hall, but I saw Simmons, Rubio, Vukovich, Lav, and Petard with their hands up in the air. The barmaid was standing by the cash register.
The robber stepped into sight, a white guy in a crushed brown leather bombardier’s jacket, Rockport shoes and a baseball hat, holding a Colt Python. A man who wanted to upgrade his role in the psychodrama of the urban jungle. He reached over and removed Petard’s wallet from his pants, then stepped back.
“I want your billfolds and your money. Anyone who makes a mistake, or decides to become a hero, gets popped.”
Simmons objected to the ultimatum, suggesting, “Why don’t you have a beer and unwind with us, man. If you don’t have any cash, I’ll buy the drinks.”
The guy wedged the stubby barrel of the pistol against Simmons’s snout, inserting the muzzle into his nostrils.
“Shut up,” he said.
Unwilling to concede that his party was fast becoming the launching pad of a crime, Simmons whipped out his wallet and replied, “Let’s be friends. We got the time,” he gesticulated with his hands, as to include everyone in Clooney’s. “And we got the money. Sit down and have a drink with us.”
I saw Lavoris whisper to Petard. The robber caught her doing that and bayed, “What are you up to, lady?”
Lav arced her head towards him, just so that the gunman
could see the drop-dead-asshole sparkle in her eyes. “None of your business,” she said, soft as a feather.
“I don’t have any more goddamn money,” Rubio mooed. He fell against the bar after failing to remain on his feet. Vukovich, fearful of getting shot if he put his hands down, let Bart slide to the floor.
Petard said to the gunman, nodding toward Simmons and Rubio, “I wouldn’t press my luck if I were you. These are dangerous men.” Gerald took his drink, finished it, and sat the glass down on the counter.
“I told you to keep your hands up!”
The thought was ridiculous to both Petard and Lavoris. They began to laugh, getting a rise out of it. The bar wasn’t as full as I’d thought. Many of Simmons’s out-of-town guests had left. The floor was strewn with bottles, cans, cigarette butts, and cocktail napkins. The dog wandered over to the bar and had a sniff of the would-be robber’s groin.
“Listen,” Simmons hinted. “We can negotiate. I know we can.”
“You can have my credit cards,” Vukovich said.
The robber, knowing he wasn’t showing the acumen of a mastermind criminal, had a fit. He pushed Simmons off his stool and wheeled around. I saw what was coming, and I took back every creepy thought I’d ever had about the other social workers. The gunman raised the revolver, knitting his forehead. He cocked the double-action hammer, aiming it at Petard.
Rocky chose this moment to come flying out of nowhere. He came through the chairs and the tables like a football player, gaining momentum and jumping on the gunman’s back. He sent the smaller man sprawling against Vukovich. The three of them fell to the floor on top of Rubio. The gun went sailing and the mutt ran after it.
Lavoris retrieved the weapon and decocked the hammer, which, miraculously, hadn’t gone off. Petard went to call the police while the Pinkerton hit the robber in the nose and eyes with open-handed sissy slaps, not willing to give him the dignity of a closed fist.
I opened the bathroom door and Frank staggered out with me holding onto his arm. After dialing 911, Petard saw us and came over. “What’s with him?” he asked.
“Frank drinks on an empty stomach,” I explained.
Gerald stared into my husband’s glassy eyes and said, “You need to eat more protein. Your skin is blemished.”
Simmons was begging Rocky, “Quit hitting the guy.” To the rest of us, he said, “Hey you people, what’s the fuss? We’ve got plenty of drinking to do. Who needs a refill, huh?”
Lavoris laid the revolver on the bar and sat herself down on a stool. “Give me another gin and tonic,” she said to the barmaid.
I related the offer to Frank. “Simmons is buying rounds for us. You want to hang out or what?”
His stamina was returning. “Let’s get another couple of beers. We deserve it.”
“Don’t you want to eat? They serve meatloaf here, babe.”
“Nah, it’d make me ill. A beer will do the trick.”
We got our drinks and waited for the cops to show up. Simmons was expansive, regaling us with stories about the other times he’d had a gun drawn on him. He was an old pro at it, the way he talked. Rocky pocketed the Colt and wrapped an entire roll of duct tape around the robber’s mouth, ankles, and wrists. Vukovich sat Rubio down at the bar and ordered him a hot toddy. When the police arrived, Rocky handed our prisoner over to them. The rest of us went home, leaving Simmons to pay the bartender a little extra for the mess we’d caused.