Another Life (24 page)

* * *

“H
ow many of those do you have?” I asked Mama, after all the others had left.
“Buildings?” she asked, innocently sipping her soup.
“Cut it, Mama. I
read
that deed. It had Clarence’s name on it.”
“So?”
“So it had a
date,
too. On paper, he’s been collecting rents, paying taxes, making repairs, the whole deal…for years. That’s a CPA’s work. Clarence never knew any of this, which means there has to be a bank account in his name around somewhere, too.”
“So?” she said, again.
“You have property for all of us, don’t you?”
“Only for children.”
“Children? That’s not you, Mama. You don’t mean children, do you? You mean
grandchildren,
right? How long has Flower owned a building?”
“Day born,” she said, calmly, as if no other possibility could exist.
“Yeah. And Terry?”
“Day born,” she repeated, patient with a slow learner like me. But I wasn’t that slow: “born” for Terry meant the day he came to Michelle and the Mole.
“You never said a word. None of them know, do they?”
She gave me an “are you actually
that
stupid?” look that women have been giving men since Adam bit the apple.
“And their parents, they don’t know, either?”
I got the same look.
“Because your
own
children—like me and Max—they can’t own anything that has to be registered,” I said, feeling it hit me then. Hit me deep. What could a man like me ever own? I don’t even have a name. Neither does the Mole. Or Michelle.
It must have shown on my face. “You feel bad?” she asked.
“No, Mama.”
“You think maybe I don’t—?”
“You insult me,” I told her, just short of angry. Only her eyes stopped me from saying anything more. In all the years I’d known her, I’d never seen them go liquid before that moment.

* * *

A
n attack-trained dog isn’t a “guard dog.” Just about any dog will protect its own territory. If a puppy grows up associating you with its only source of food, if you’re the one who plays with her, walks her, sleeps next to her, cuddles her…that’ll usually do it. Depending on her personality, the dog might snap at anyone who gets too close to you, even a friend. But she’s almost a sure bet to really rip anyone she thinks is hurting you.
Some bark at anyone who comes near your house, but that’s a watchdog, not a protector. A burglar alarm might let you know someone’s coming; it won’t do anything to stop them.
A true attack dog is one who can do no-provocation work. You sit down across from some guy, patting your dog as you talk things over. The dog lies next to you, looks half asleep. No threat displays, no growling, no showing teeth. My Pansy looked so dumb and friendly that strangers would walk right up to her. And I’d let them. But if I said the right word, or made the right gesture, she’d turn a guy into scraps of flesh even if she’d just licked his hand.
When you think of an attack dog—a real one—think of a chain-saw covered in fur, with a remote-control on-off switch only one person can push.
A lot of trainers use agitators, usually drunks willing to dress up in protective gear and taunt a dog until it goes for them. You make sure the dog always “wins,” build his confidence. Sounds good, but it’s really sending all the wrong messages. You don’t want your dog thinking that the smell of booze is a signal to hit. Or that biting a sleeve is how to bring a man down.
That kind of stuff is good enough for K-9s, but we’re not cops. Where we live, we don’t use dogs to run down escapees. And we don’t deal with gunmen by telling them to fucking “Freeze!” either.
We trained Rosie using some of Max’s advanced students; they had the speed and agility we needed. There’s no scholarships at Max’s dojo. You pay your own way,
every
way.
We had to poison-proof her, too. That turned out to be one hell of a job; she was used to tearing into food without asking questions.
We couldn’t train her out of her natural tendency to nail any stranger she decided was encroaching, so we taught her the signal for “friend,” instead.
“I love this, boss. It’s like learning all this new stuff and watching her have fun at the same time.”
“She loves it, too, Gate. That’s the trick to training any dog: make it fun. That’s why we always keep the sessions short. Rosie pays attention because she
wants
to, not because we make her. That’s why you always end a session with her getting it right, see?”
“Yeah! And she likes to just hang out, too, bro. I swear to God, that little girl sees something on TV she don’t like, she lets me know.”
“The only thing I’m worried about—”
“I got that covered, boss. Look what Terry hooked up for me.”
The chain he had in place behind the counter was now attached to a padded circle of steel that was screwed into a concrete block about the size of a small sofa. Gateman called, and Rosie trotted over. She waited patiently as he hooked her up.
“She can’t get past the desk now,” Gateman told me. “Unless I press this little gadget.” He held up a box the size of a cigarette pack, with a button that took up most of its surface. “Watch.”
The steel-circle collar popped off, and Rosie was free.
“Got another of those buttons under the counter, one on the TV remote, another by the light switch….”
“So anytime—?”
“Oh,
hell
yes, bro. Look, we can’t do this ‘friend’ thing with every rummy who staggers in here, right? The way it works now is, the door opens, Rosie
lunges,
but that chain holds her. We don’t want her killing some wino, but it don’t hurt that word gets around she might be behind the counter with me, either. And if I ever need her to really do some work, well…”
“It’s perfect.”
“It fucking
is,
boss. Terry even has it set so that the smoke alarm pops that collar off, too…just in case. Rosie, she’s the most amazing thing I ever seen. Looks like such a pretty little pup you want to pick her up and give her a kiss. But she could be munching on your guts before you even knew what hit you.”
“And some women got the nerve to think
they’re
real bitches,” I said.
We tapped fists, and Rosie followed me upstairs to our home.

* * *

I
didn’t use the red circle for this one. The answer wasn’t buried that deep. I had it
somewhere,
if I could only…
“You have to let it just float over you,” I told Rosie. “Like balloons drifting by. When you see the one you need, you reach up and grab it. But you can’t be jumping around, understand? The balloons only float over you when the air is
very
still: you try chasing them, you
cause
the wind…and they sail away, out of your grasp.”
I patted the couch. When Rosie jumped up and curled next to me, I went into the semi-trance I needed.

* * *

T
hey always get the idea from somewhere
floated by, but I never reached for it. I knew the taproot; knew I was looking for people who do things they’ve done before. Rapists rape; that’s what rapists do. But the rapist who only targets blondes in red dresses and high heels is playing out some script. The general impulse is always there, but it takes a specific image to fire his synapses before he acts.
Porn can do that for some of them—narrow the general impulse into some specific imagery. Once that happens, it’s
that
image they look for when they’re hunting.
I never dealt with a sex-torture freak who didn’t have a porn collection of some kind. Some even created their own.

* * *

T
he scrawny kid sported shoe-polish-black spiked hair with a green streak on one side, a leather vest, and subtle eyeliner. He was behind the counter inside the filthy-window storefront, thumbing through a manga porno-comic. He didn’t know me, but when I walked into the computer-repair shop empty-handed, he knew I was a cash customer. And
I
knew there wouldn’t be a security camera anywhere in the place.
He looked across at me, waiting.
“An armadillo walks into a disco,” I said. “He sees the big mirrored ball, but it’s too high for him to reach, so he walks out. Get it?”
“No. What’s it supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” I told the Goth-geared slug.
“Huh?”
“Zen.”
“Oh. Yeah, I get it.”
“Nothing means something, because nothing means nothing. You with me?”
“Everything has a meaning,” he said, nodding sagely.
“Yeah. But not the same meaning to everyone. Some people might even think there’s enough work to keep a computer repair shop afloat, even though it’s cheaper to buy a new one than get an old one fixed.”
A fear-glint showed in his eyes. Too soon. I brought him back to where he’d feel like an insider, not a target:
“Some people, I tell them I got a friend’s who’s going to go all
Shaolin Cowboy
on their ass, they wouldn’t even know what I was talking about.”
“What friend—?” he started to say, as Max materialized next to me.
“This is Max the Silent,” I told him. “You see how he got his name? Now, I just let you in on a secret of mine, how about you let me in on one of yours?”
He was a lot smarter than he looked. Or played. “Kill the lights,” he said. “That means we’re not open.” Then he led us into a back room, down the stairs, and into what looked like storage space.
As we watched, he showed us everything they had for sale, all the time repeating that he was only a clerk, a functionary who filled orders someone else gave him. “I don’t even
look
at that stuff, man.”
It took almost half an hour for me to accept that he didn’t have any of the Sheikh’s training program on a for-sale CD.
I didn’t bother to tell him to keep our little discussion to himself.

* * *

I
couldn’t check out every porno shop in the city—that would take an army
and
a year. Besides, it’s not like the dull-eyed piles of jaundiced flesh who sat next to the cash registers actually knew the contents of every DVD on the shelves—that’s what the packaging is for.
The Internet would have them all, anyway. And if it was out there, Clarence would find it.
“You want me to search for
this
?”
“Yeah,” I told him. “Remember what Terry taught you? The narrower the parameters, the easier the search. What could be narrower than these?”
“I will do it, mahn. But…”
He didn’t have to say it aloud.

* * *

I
didn’t expect Clarence to come up with anything. Not because the “scene” I told him to search for would be too repulsive—I don’t think that’s actually possible, anymore—but because there’d be too small a market for it.
People think porn started with under-the-counter magazines, but it’s been around ever since our species developed opposable thumbs. There’s cave paintings of rape. And there was rape before there were paintings.
Jerkoff artists aren’t the only market for pornography—politicians buy it too. The Meese Commission started a whole “porno turns men into rapists” industry. And now the hucksters who have the public believing kiddie porn started with the Internet are raking in federal grants to “find” it.
Always the same—you never know if they’re stupid, crooked, or both.

* * *

W
hen you want the purest information, you need the most neutral possible source. Finding one, that’s the trick.
Especially today, when there’s no such thing as actual “news,” only press releases and “commentators” who go total Rashomon on every story until it all turns into white noise. If you get tired of blah-blah, you can always dial up some blog-blog. Fabricating stories is the new frontier of “freedom of the press.” Anyone can play, and nobody pays…except the targets.
But if you actually
want
neutral, you go to the total obsessives. They’re so hyper-honed that there’s no room for any agenda besides their own. But you have to hit that agenda on your first pass; their kind don’t accept social calls—they wouldn’t even get the concept.
“Reform School Girl,”
I said into the phone. “By Felice Swados.”
“Cover?” The other man’s voice was just this side of uninterested.
“It’s a photo, not a drawing. A weird size, too.”
“Look for the year,” he instructed.
“Nineteen forty-eight, it says.”
“What else? It would be on the—”
“Diversity Romance Novel #1.”
“Grade?” he said, now trying to sound calm.
“Your job, not mine.”
“Agreed. But I need some indication of—”
“Looks like it was never read.”
“Really?” The whole cellular network shuddered at the intensity of the obsessive’s prayer-question. He’d gone from mildly bored to so deeply hooked that he even bypassed the bargaining ritual.
“I’m not asking you to take my word for it,” I told him.
“Bagged and boarded?”
“Might have been. Not now.”
“You haven’t—?”
“How else could I give you the info I just did? But I never touched it with my hands. Cotton gloves only.”
“Listen,” he said, in the same tone a bomb-diffusion expert uses when he has to guide a rookie over the phone. “I want you to open it.
Gently.
Just enough to read page numbers. Can you do that?”
“Sure.”
“Is there a page three and four?”
“I…Yeah, there is.”
“I have to see it.”
He wasn’t kidding about that—the cell phone in my hand was hot, like I’d been on the battery for hours.
“Name a—”
“Can you bring it over now?”