The Butcher's Granddaughter (2 page)

I told Li I would check up on her sister and give her a call if anything went wild, but I didn’t think it would. She thanked me with a hug, and I tore into the late evening traffic.

One thing stuck in my mind like a glass splinter: Ballesteros carried. Love and guns go together like cars and alcohol, so I dropped by my place on the way to Jay’s apartment and picked up my own little security blanket: an Israeli Arms nine-millimeter with no serial numbers. I could have gotten a Saturday Night Special for the cost of a downtown movie, but you buy a gun like that waiting for somebody to make you use it. All I wanted was a showpiece.

Nonetheless, I popped the clip and made sure it was full before I stepped off my bike in the parking lot of Gorky’s Café. A block away I could see a light on in Ballesteros’ fifth-floor apartment.

His place was in the Santa Fe Building, a ten-story gray dinosaur on the northern edge of L.A.’s South Central district. Sixty years earlier it had housed a bank on its ground floor and every business from shyster attorneys to legitimate chiropractors above. The architecture reflected a period when people wanted their banks to look like places where you would put your money—muscular. In the 1960’s it had been condemned and listed for demolition, but developers put a little money into it, turning the office space into studio apartments. They were huge and L.A.-cheap at less than a dollar per square-foot. Three decades of lenient leases and art students from the local campuses have left their mark. Most of the twelve-foot-high walls sport murals or at least some type of original paint job, usually ethnic, often impressive. Ballesteros’ apartment had one, a portrait of its last tenant. Catching my breath on the fifth flight landing and wondering if the mural was still there, I took the gun from my inside jacket pocket and shoved it into the back of my jeans.

The block-and-a-half walk from Gorky’s had given me time to get nervous. I stood outside the door, convincing myself that everything was going to be cool. Jay was probably already home and asleep, having thrown both Song and Sheff out on their cheating asses.

When I stepped into apartment 5E, I was only one-third right. He was already home.

I listened at the door, cracked open about an inch. There were none of the usual habitation sounds—water running, footsteps, muffled voices. I silently pushed it open far enough to fold around inside, ready to call out a tentative, “Jay?”

His name froze in my throat.

The short walls of the portico hid me from most of the room, but I could see Jay, sitting in a faux-antique wingback armchair. He was leaned forward with his elbows on his thighs, staring at the floor in total silence, barely breathing. His hands were crossed limply between his knees, one of them holding a cigarette, and his head was slung so far down between his shoulders that it looked to be growing directly out of his chest. The only clothing he had on that wasn’t black was a pair of torn and bleached Levi’s with both knees blown out and a faded drawing of a long-stemmed rose on the left thigh. Aside from that, he wore a black turtleneck underneath a leather motorcycle jacket, which had bunched up when he leaned over, giving his back a deformed, grotesque look.

He either hadn’t heard me come in or simply didn’t acknowledge me. To a stranger, he would have looked like any twenty-year-old kid who’d just gotten off the late shift and was having a cigarette before going to bed. They would not know what I knew: he was damned smart and, unfortunately, knew it. That made him arrogant, which he didn’t like, but couldn’t help. He was extremely driven, and I knew from experience that being around him could be mentally and emotionally draining. Now, sitting perfectly still, he was coldly masking a mind that was moving like an open freeway, careening and twisting but only converging on three subjects. The first was his girlfriend, Naomi or Song or whatever, sitting across from him in their bed, naked, her eyes wide and making no effort to hide fear. The second was the guy sitting next to her in roughly the same position, just as frightened and looking it. This would be Sheff. The last, and which was probably giving him the most trouble, was the .45 automatic that he was holding in his right hand.

When Song saw me peek around the corner of the entryway, the fear in her eyes subsided for a second but returned when I put my finger to my lips and didn’t seem to want to do anything.

I didn’t. If Song could have read my mind right then she would have screamed—I could not have cared less about her. I just wanted to go back down the stairs, let what was clearly about to happen, happen, and make whatever I could off the homicide squad for what I had seen. Instead, I stood at the door, just inside the portico, thinking.

Jay was obviously not aware of how much time had gone by. When a two-inch ash from his cigarette broke off onto the toes of his black Converse high-tops, it was the only movement the room had seen in some time. But to him it probably seemed just seconds since he had casually crossed the room, sat down, and pulled out the gun.

In contrast, Song was in a raw panic. Her eyes darted between the gun and the side of Jay’s face like they were watching a tennis match. She was looking for a twitch, a blink, anything to give some sign that she was still looking at a human being. I could tell it wasn’t going to happen. Jay looked like a parody of Rodin’s “Thinker,” in whose hands some joker had placed a cigarette and a gun.

I played it over in my head, picturing her on the downside of an orgasm, Jay walking in and flicking on the light, she being slow to turn around and realize who was standing in the corner with a face that had all the animation of an egg. I imagined the pleasure draining from her features and being replaced by the pure fear that was evident now in every crease of her face.

Her hands were white-knuckled around the lip of the sheet that she had failed to completely cover herself with. Her small, tan breasts rested innocently between her arms. I’d never had the pleasure of seeing Li naked, but it was obvious that she and Song were sisters.

I thought about that and popped a match lit with my fingernail. It sounded like a jet engine starting up.

Jay was the first to move, but Song was the first to open her mouth. As Jay raised his head, she asked in a voice so locked with fear it creaked, “Who are you?”

I ignored her at first because, although I didn’t feel like I was in any real danger, I also wasn’t totally sure what Jay would do—and a .45 makes an exit wound a nine-year-old could crawl through. I was standing there holding the lit match without lighting my cigarette, breathing slowly, when Jay went ahead and answered for me.

“Bird. What the fuck are you doing here?”

Getting the important things out of the way first, I said, “You gonna use that cannon on me?”

He shook is head and re-adjusted it between his shoulders. He said “No,” to the floor. I didn’t ask if he was going to use it on anybody else.

Song chose that moment to assume, wrongly, that my arrival somehow broke the tension or even affected the situation. She suddenly shuffled across the bed to get her shirt. Without looking up, Jay raised the gun, leveled it at Song and cocked the hammer, which cracked like a high-tension wire in the cold silence of the room. She froze, looking at me like I had forgotten to do something important. I deliberately lit my cigarette and inhaled and exhaled reflectively, all without looking at her.

“This is a little weird, Bird,” Jay said to the floor, “you showing up right now. You can sit down if you want. You been standing there a while.” He waved the cigarette at the foot of the bed.

Not wanting to have to move around any bullets if Song continued to exercise her I.Q., I said, “I’ll stand, thanks. I’m here because I was asked to be. I’m not going to tell you by who because...well...just because.”

There was some silence. It’s amazing how long you can linger over simple decisions. For me it was:
stay
or go? For Ballesteros:
kill
her or not? For Song: Sit there and wait, or move and die?

Jay finally asked, “You scared, Bird?”

“No.” I wasn’t lying.

“I am, man.”

That surprised everybody. “What are you scared of?” I asked, studying the end of my cigarette.

“I’m scared I’m gonna do something really stupid, you know? I mean, I got a problem, and...” His words trailed off to a whisper and he twitched the gun at the bed.

He was talking about Song like she wasn’t even in the room, which scared her back into the tennis game between his face and the gun. He hadn’t even mentioned Sheff, but hadn’t shot him either, so I figured he was safe.

“I’ve been sitting here trying to decide whether to kill her or not,” he continued. “But, like, not as if she was a person—like she was a problem. I mean, you know me, man. I got a problem, I get it out of the way.” He grew quiet for a moment, then gazed emptily between his shoes and said, “You think killing her is the best thing?”

Song’s facial expression was split between the relief she felt because he was at least talking now, and the realization that she was essentially sitting on her deathbed. The academic tone of the conversation Jay and I were having could not be helping any, either.

Jay was still looking at the floor. From his voice I could tell his mind was calm, and he was in control. He was figuring all of this out as best he knew how. He was being careful, and therefore, slow. He didn’t seem to be aware of the anxiety this was causing. I took a relatively minor chance and said, “Sheff, get dressed.”

Sheff
looked at me like I had told him to cut off his left foot. I moved my chin enough to indicate the door behind me. He moved so slowly at first that I thought he was going to pass out. Jay didn’t even lift his head. Once Sheff got the message that he wasn’t going to get shot, he dressed so fast he wound up with his shirt on backwards and inside-out. He paused outside the door and said, “I owe you...big.”

“That’s right,” I said under my breath. “You do.”

His shoes whispered down the stairs and when the click of the big entrance door closing echoed up the stairwell, I decided to play it out.

“You know,” I said casually, “you
could
kill her.”

Song shot her eyes at me and let out a high squeak. Jay raised his head and waited for me to go on, like I had made the decision for him and he was waiting for me to tell him what to do next.

“Think about it. Nobody knows who she is. Just another eighteen-year-old in the big city. She’s a Jane Doe. Got no home but this one, and her name’s not on the lease, right? She may split the rent, but there’s no record of that. You ace her, toss the body a couple blocks away in a liquor store dumpster, and she might as well have died in another country. No I.D., nothing. Beauty and the unknown beast.”

Song started sniveling, very quietly and very high.

“After all,” I continued, “you’re trying to say something with that gun, now, aren’t you? Something to Naomi here?”

He looked puzzled. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“You think Naomi has anything to say to you?”

He hadn’t thought of that one. He didn’t move or speak.

I turned to her. “Do you, Naomi?”

She didn’t know whether to talk or not. Her mouth moved for a minute, but when nothing came out she shut it.

“Look honey,” I said, “Jay’s not the fuckup here. He’s not gonna go first.”

At that Song started crying, but I couldn’t decide if it was fear or grief or both. I waited a second and then said, “Talk, Naomi.”

She shook her head as her body racked with sobs.

“Talk!” I yelled. I crossed the twenty feet to the bed in three strides and grabbed her shoulder, squeezing hard. Jay watched intently but otherwise didn’t move. “You’re going to start with ‘I’m sorry,’” I said firmly. “And then you’re going to tell him more. You know what I mean,” I said, pulling her over to me and whispering, “Song.”

Her eyes got wide, and then the apology flooded out of her. It was insincere, but it was exactly what Jay needed to hear.

“I’m sorry,” she coughed, “but this is the first night, Jay. The only night, I swear to God. Maybe I’m not ready.” She thought about that one. “I’m
for sure
not ready for this. You’re too much for me. Too intense. You’re wonderful, Jay. But I wanted something else.”

“What?” I said.

“To get out.”

“Why?”

She looked up at me with those eyes like Li’s. They didn’t have the same effect. “Tell him,” I said flatly. She still looked blankly at me. “Tell him why!” I yelled, and wrapped a hand around her neck and stood her up at the end of the bed like a rag doll. The sheet fell away and for a split second there was complete silence, Song’s sudden, brutal nakedness filling the room and freezing us both with her sheer vulnerability.

Then she screamed and Jay stood up, his .45 swinging in a hard arc. Almost in tandem I pulled my own piece and pushed the muzzle into Song’s soft neck just as Jay settled his aim, rock steady, at my chest.

“Stop it, Bird. I swear to God I’ll kill you.” This was delivered in a tone of voice he might have used to order a sandwich.

“First,” I said, keeping my voice from shaking, “you need to hear this. Second, you’ll take us both down.” I could feel my jacket collar sticking to my neck. But if he would protect her from me, he wasn’t going to kill her anymore. I slowly pulled the gun away from her neck, staring him down. “Tell him, Song. Tell him why you want out.”

At the use of her real name, Jay didn’t say anything. He just stood there, waiting. Later on, that would bother me.

But Song blew it all—told Jay about her parents, who he thought were dead, about the lie of her whole life. “You were part of it, Jay. Part of the lie. I thought that I loved you but I was wrong. When I slept with Sheff, I guess that pretty much showed me how I felt. I needed out.”

“Then get out,” he said. It wasn’t hateful. There simply wasn’t anything left to say. The problem was solved. He wanted it to leave.

I had put my gun away as she spilled her guts. I waited by the door until she got dressed and went past me with her head down and scuttled down the stairs. If she hadn’t been Li’s sister, I would have had to fight the urge to kill her myself.