Nine Inches (2 page)

“Shit,” I muttered. “I can’t believe this.”

“Excuse me?” Lt. Finnegan shined his humongous
fl
ashlight in my face. “What did you say?”

I raised my hand to block the glare. “Nothing. I was just talking to myself.”

He clicked o
ff
the light and leaned in. His broad face
fi
lled my window frame, just a few inches from my own. He wasn’t smiling, but I had the feeling he was enjoying himself.

“Do we have some kind of problem, Donald?”

“No, sir.
Th
ere’s no problem.”

“Good. ’Cause I don’t see any reason why we can’t be friends.” He straightened up, tugged on his gun belt, and turned in the direction of his car. But then he swiveled right back.

“Tell me something.” His voice was casual now, almost friendly. “What’s that mean?
Sustainable Pizza
?”

“It’s just a name.
Th
ey use lots of organic ingredients and recyclable boxes. Some of the produce comes from local farms.”

“People like that, huh?”

“Some of ’em.”

“Is it better than regular pizza?”

“It’s okay. Kind of expensive. But the customers keep coming back.”

“Huh.” He nodded, as if that was good enough for him. “I’ll have to give it a try.”

I HAD
two bosses at Sustainable — Entrepreneurial Eddie and Stoner Eddie. Entrepreneurial Eddie was an impressive guy, a twenty-four-year-old Middlebury grad who’d returned to his hometown to start an eco-friendly pizza restaurant that he hoped someday to grow into a regional, and possibly even national, chain. He was organized, ambitious, and charismatic, a crunchy-granola preppy with shaggy blond hair and the strapping physique of the rugby player he’d been in college. He happened to be Jake’s cousin, which was the reason I’d gotten the delivery job, despite my complete lack of work experience, and the fact that I’d only had my license for a couple of months.

I’m taking a chance on you, Donald. Don’t let me down.

Entrepreneurial Eddie was always in charge when I started my shi
ft
, but he got replaced by Stoner Eddie at the end of the night, a
ft
er the restaurant section had closed, and Malina and Jadwiga, the two Polish waitresses, had gone home. At that point, it was just me and Eddie and Ignacio, the Salvadoran pizza maker, who stuck around to
fi
ll any late-night delivery orders and help out with the cleanup.

Entrepreneurial Eddie could be tense and short-tempered, but Stoner Eddie absorbed the news of my moving violation with a philosophical shrug.

“
Th
at’s the way it goes, bro.
Th
e cops in this town are ballbusters.
Th
ere’s no crime, so they have to make shit up to keep themselves from dying of boredom.”

“But a hundred bucks?” I whined. “I work for tips.”

“
Th
at’s how the government rolls, my friend.”
Th
e two Eddies were di
ff
erent in many ways, but they were both big Ron Paul supporters. “It’s all just taxes in disguise. Right, Ignacio?”

Ignacio looked up from the
fl
oor he was mopping and said something in Spanish. Eddie nodded and said something back. His accent was atrocious, but his meaning must have been clear enough, because Ignacio grinned and added another rapid-
fi
re burst of commentary, to which Eddie replied,
“Verdad,
bro,
verdad.”
I wished I’d taken Spanish in high school instead of four years of Latin, which was utterly useless in the real world. It was my guidance counselor’s fault: he’d insisted that colleges liked students with “a classical background,” and who was I to doubt him? At that point in my life, I would’ve cut my arm o
ff
if
U.S. News & World Report
had mentioned that selective colleges were looking for amputees.

A
ft
er we settled up, Eddie walked me to the front door. We were almost there when he put his hand on my shoulder.

“Yo, Donald,” he said. “You’re friends with Adam Willis, right?”

“Kind of.”

“Could you do me a favor?” He reached into his pocket, pulled out a serious wad of bills, and counted o
ff
fi
ve twenties. For a second, I thought he was reimbursing me for the ticket. “See if you can hook me up with some of that superior weed of his.”

I didn’t take the money. “Can’t you ask him yourself?”

“He never answers my texts.”

“He’s probably just busy. I’m sure he’ll get back to you.”

“Come on, bro. Help me out here. I got a big date this weekend.” His voice got so
ft
and con
fi
dential. “I’m telling you, that stu
ff
’s some kind of aphrodisiac. I smoked half a joint with Malina last week, and that was all it took.”

“Malina?”

“I know, bro.” He grinned at the miracle. “I’ve been working on her for weeks, and she wouldn’t give me the time of day. Couple hits of that magic bud, and the panties just slid right o
ff
.”

It was hard to imagine Malina’s panties sliding o
ff
for Eddie, or any guy around here. She was pale and chillingly beautiful, with sad eyes and a husky, disdainful voice. She always seemed vaguely o
ff
ended in the restaurant, as if waitressing was beneath her dignity, and life a bitter disappointment.

“Wow.”

“I know.” Eddie tucked the money into my jacket pocket and patted me on the shoulder. “I’m counting on you, bro.”

THE NEXT
a
ft
ernoon, I joined Adam Willis and his chocolate Lab for their daily hike through the woods behind the abandoned state mental hospital. It was creepy back there — lots of rusty appliances and old tires lying around, not to mention a tiny cemetery with maybe twenty unmarked headstones and a sign explaining that the graves belonged to former mental patients who’d died in the hospital:
THOUGH
YOUR
NAMES
ARE
UNKNOWN
,
WE
HOLD
YOU
CLOSE
IN
OUR
HEARTS
.
I waited until we’d been walking awhile before I told Adam that my boss wanted to buy some of his weed.

“No way,” he said. “I don’t sell to strangers.”

“I could introduce you. Eddie’s a pretty good guy.”

Adam stopped and scanned the woods, shielding his eyes from the golden light streaming down through the red and gold treetops. It was mid-October, and the leaves had just begun to drop.

“Yo, Hapster?” he called out. “Where are you, dude?”

Th
e question was barely out of his mouth when Happy burst out of the woods and onto the trail, his ears
fl
apping as he galloped toward us, the usual look of crazed anticipation on his face.

“Dassagoodboy.” Adam crouched down, scratching Happy’s ears and slipping him one of the little bone-shaped treats he carried in his pocket. “Dassaverygoodboy.”

He gave the dog a booming thump on the ribs, and we started walking again.

“I don’t get it,” Adam said. “Why are you even involved with this? If your boss wants some weed, why doesn’t he just ask me himself?”

“He did. He said he texted you a bunch of times and you never got back to him.”

“Damn right. I’m not gonna text some guy I don’t know. What if he’s a cop?”

“Eddie’s not a cop. He’s Jake Hauser’s cousin.”

“Jake Hauser,” Adam sco
ff
ed. “Dude never said shit to me.”

Adam and I had been high school classmates, but our social circles didn’t really overlap. We’d been close as kids — pretty much best friends — until his mom died of cancer when we were in seventh grade. He turned angry and distant a
ft
er that, started listening to this dark metal, Slipknot and stu
ff
like that, and hanging out with a druggy crowd. His dad wasn’t around a lot of the time — I heard he had a girlfriend in another town — and Adam did pretty much whatever he wanted, which was mainly just playing video games and getting high and skipping school. Whenever his name came up, my mother called him
poor Adam
and referred to him as
a lost soul.
I’m pretty sure he didn’t graduate.

I ran into him outside of CVS one day in September, a
ft
er everybody else had le
ft
for college, and we got to reminiscing about the old days and the fun we used to have. He had his dog with him, and I had nothing else to do, so I tagged along on their a
ft
ernoon walk. He texted me the next day, asking if I wanted to do it again.

Any time,
he said.
Happy enjoyed the company.

If you’d told me six months ago that I’d be spending my fall living at home and hanging out with Adam Willis, it would’ve sounded like a nightmare to me. But it was weird how normal it was starting to feel, like
this
was my life now, and Adam was way more a part of it than Jake or Josh or even Heather, who’d broken up with me a couple of weeks a
ft
er she got to Pomona, sparing me the nightly Skype updates about her awesome roommates and amazing professors.

At the top of the hill, we sat down on a fallen log in the shade of the water tower. Adam took out his little one-hit pipe and packed it with weed. He o
ff
ered it to me, and I shook my head, the way I always did, though I wasn’t sure what was stopping me. In high school, I’d stayed away from weed because I thought it might interfere with my studies and sap my motivation, but what did that matter now?

“
Th
e thing I don’t get,” he said, in that squeaky, holding-it-in voice, “is how your boss even knows my number.”

“Don’t look at me. I didn’t give it to him.”

“And how’d he know I was selling?” Adam released a cloud of smoke so big I couldn’t believe it had all been stored inside his lungs. “It’s not like I’m advertising.”

I shrugged, not wanting to tell him that it was common knowledge that he sold some kind of killer weed, the source of which no one could pinpoint. We lived in a small town, and you couldn’t keep something like that a secret for long.

“You know what?” I said. “Don’t even worry about it. I’ll just give Eddie his money back. It’s no big deal.”

Happy was sitting at our feet, panting cheerfully, thick body heaving, tongue lolling sideways from his mouth. Adam leaned forward and kissed him on top of his big square head. When Adam looked up, I could see that the weed had kicked in. His eyes were cloudy, his face dreamy and trouble-free.

“Chill out,” he told me. “I’ll take care of you. I don’t want to jam you up with your boss.”

I DIDN’T
realize I had a problem until my next run-in with Lt. Finnegan.
Th
is time I wasn’t speeding and hadn’t violated any tra
ffi
c laws. I was just minding my business, heading back to Sustainable around nine-thirty on a Wednesday night, when an unmarked Crown Victoria popped up in my rearview mirror, that familiar white-haired douchebag at the wheel.
Th
ere were no
fl
ashing lights, but he tailgated me for a couple of blocks before
fi
nally hitting the siren, a quick
bloop-bloop
to get my attention.

We were right by Edmunds Elementary School, the quiet stretch of Warren Road that runs alongside the playing
fi
elds. I pulled over, his car still glued to my bumper, and cut the engine. It felt like a bad dream, the same cop stopping me for the third time in less than two weeks.

I was
fi
shing around in the glove box for the registration when he startled me by tapping on the passenger window — he usually approached from the other side — and yanking the door open. Before I could react, he had ducked inside my car and shut the door behind him.

Th
e Prius was pretty roomy, but Lt. Finnegan seemed to
fi
ll all the available space. He reached down, groping for the adjuster bar, then grunted with relief as the seat slid back.

“
Th
at’s better.” He rotated his bulk in my direction. He was wearing civilian clothes, khakis and a sport coat, but he still looked like a cop. “How are you, Donald?”

“Did I do something wrong?”

“I don’t think so,” he said. “Not that I know of.”

“
Th
en why’d you pull me over?”

“I didn’t pull you over.”

“Yes, you did. You hit the siren.”

“Oh, that.” He chuckled at the misunderstanding. “I just wanted to say hi. Haven’t seen you for a couple of days.”

“Oh. Okay.” I nodded as if this made perfect sense. “I just assumed — ”

“I get it.” He laid his hand on my knee. “I’m sorry if I scared you.”

I waited for him to remove his hand, but he kept it where it was. I could feel the warmth of his palm through the fabric of my jeans.

“Umm,” I said. “You know what? I really have to get back to work.”

“You’re dedicated,” he observed. “I like that.”

“I just got hired. I’m trying to make a good impression.”

He tilted his head, giving me a thorough once-over. I was uncomfortably aware of his a
ft
ershave, a sharp lime scent that mingled badly with the stale pizza funk inside the car.

“You seem a little tense, Donald.” He li
ft
ed his hand o
ff
my knee and placed it on my shoulder. “I bet you could use a backrub.”

I shook my head, but he didn’t seem to notice. His le
ft
hand was already cupping the back of my neck, squeezing and releasing, exerting a gentle, disturbing pressure.

Oh, God,
I thought.
Th
is isn’t happening.

“Just relax, Donald. I’m really good at this.”