County Line (2 page)

Self-delusion was easier in the days before caller ID and 24-hour digital accessibility.

I pull up in front of Uncommon Cup at Twelfth and Ash shortly before seven. Her apartment is a few blocks away, but I’m more likely to find her at one of her shops. Through the window I can see a guy mopping. He’s mid-twenties, with dark flyaway hair and a five-day beard. As I watch, he spins and kicks one leg to the side. Fred Astaire with a mop handle. I don’t recognize him—no surprise. Ruby Jane employs a couple dozen people now. A lone customer sits at a table next to the window, a fellow thick with layers. Thermal shirt under flannel under a half-zipped hoodie under a denim jacket. He holds a ceramic cup under his nose. There’s no sign of Ruby Jane.

As I get out of the car, the guy in all the layers looks up, then checks his watch. He unwinds from his chair and is coming out as I reach the door. Tall and lean, baby-faced, with blue eyes peeking out from inside his hood. “Quitting time, man.”

“I won’t be settling in.”

He slides past me out the door. Inside, I breathe warm air laced with the scents of coffee and bleach. The space is cast in dark wood, and sandblasted brick with mix-n-match tables and chairs from a half-dozen different diners. Barbra Streisand caterwauls from hidden speakers. The guy with the mop pauses mid-pirouette when he sees me.

“Sorry, man. We’re closed.”

“I’m looking for Ruby Jane.”

He props himself up on the upright mop handle. His eyes gaze two different directions, neither at me. “Who?”

“Ruby Jane Whittaker? The owner?”

He sniffs. “Oh. Sure, Whittaker. I didn’t make the connection.” He looks around the shop as if he expects to catch her hiding under a table. “She’s not here.”

“So I see. Is she at one of the other shops?”

“How would I even know that, man?”

I don’t like his tone, or maybe I don’t like feeling so out of touch. “Who’s the manager today?”

He turns his back. “Marcy’s the only manager I know.”

“Do you know where
she
is?”

“She took off at five. Something about seeing a band.”

I take a breath and finger my cell phone. Ruby Jane’s newest location, I haven’t been to this shop more than a couple of times.

“Pal?” I look up. “I’ve got to finish up here, man.”

Streisand gives way to Sinatra and I wonder what possessed this jackhole to tune in the Starbucks channel on the satellite radio. “Do you have Marcy’s number?”

“Her phone number?”

“No, her social security number.”

“I don’t know you. I don’t think she’d appreciate me giving out her number to a stranger.”

“I’m Skin Kadash.”

“Am I supposed to know who that is?”

My cheek twitches. “Who I am is a guy who has enough sway with the woman who signs your checks that you don’t want to keep fucking with me.” My fingertips run across a patch of red skin on my throat the color and texture of raw hamburger.

His eyes come into sudden alignment and he ducks his head. “It’s just, well, I’m new here and I don’t know you.”

Now I’m the jackhole. I lower my chin and turn my hands over, conciliatory. “How about you call Marcy? Tell her Skin needs to talk to her. I’ll be quick.”

He considers that for a moment, eyes fixed on my hands. “Okay. Hang on a second.” He props the mop handle against a table and goes back behind the counter. I wonder if I can convince him to sell me a bagel, closing time or not. I haven’t eaten since morning. He checks a notebook from under the counter, dials a number.

“Hi, Marcy. It’s Alvin … yeah, sorry, listen there’s some guy here—” He looks up at me. “What did you say your name was?”

“Tell her it’s Skin.”

His face blanches a shade or two. “He calls himself, uh, Skin—”

He thrusts the phone my way. “Marcy, hey.”

“Damn, Skin, where the hell you been? Been like a month since my last dose of bloodcurdling ugly.”

“I was off scaring starfish and sandpipers.”

“A month at the beach. Did you meet any nice lady sea monsters?”

“The surf was crawling.” I clear my throat and change the subject. “Hey, you know what’s up with RJ? I’ve been trying to get hold of her, no answer.”

“Shit, man. You didn’t know? She’s gone.”

“Gone? Gone where?”

“I’d have thought if anyone knew, it would be you.”

“I don’t understand.”

“A couple of weeks ago, she asked me to manage the shops while she took care of personal business out of town.”

“Did she say when she’d be back?”

“About two weeks, so she’s due anytime.” There’s a slight pause, half a beat. “She didn’t call you?”

I take a moment to respond. “Cell service was spotty where I was staying.”

“She must not have been able to get through.”

She could have left a voicemail, if nothing else. “You’ve no idea what’s going on?”

“She said there was nothing to worry about, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“What do you think?”

“This is RJ we’re talking about. I’m sure she’s fine.” I can almost hear her shrug through the phone. “Listen, I’m supposed to meet some people, but tell you what. I’ll be working at Hollywood tomorrow. Why don’t you come by? We’ll catch up.”

“Okay. Thanks, Marcy.”

“Good to have you back, Skin.”

Then she’s gone. Alvin takes the phone, places it back on the charger behind the counter. “Find out what you need?”

“Uh, yeah.” Ruby Jane, gone and out of touch, without explanation. Doesn’t make sense. In all the time I’ve known her, she’s taken only one vacation—a trip to Victoria with her one-time beau Peter and me. She fretted about the shop the whole time we were gone.

“You need anything else, man? Call you a cab maybe?”

Alvin’s color is coming back, his expression growing impatient. I don’t know if he senses my dismay or has recovered from the sight of my neck, but sudden heat rises in my chest. “Marcy told me to tell you to crack the register and sell me a bagel.”

His lips form a line and a crease appears between his eyebrows. “Yeah. Sure. Fine.”

“Sesame seed, with cream cheese. Toasted.”

But when I reach for my wallet, my pocket is empty. Back straight, Alvin slices the bagel and drops it in the toaster.

“Hang on a second, I need my wallet.” As I head for my car, I think about the guy in layers who brushed past me as I came in. I look up and down Twelfth. There’s no sign of him. My wallet is in the gutter beside the rental car.

I sigh and head back inside.

Alvin is waiting for me. “Everything all right?”

“The guy who left as I came in, do you know who it was?”

He ponders. “Like I said, I’m—”

“New. Right. I got it.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Bastard picked my pocket. Took my cash and tossed my wallet in the gutter.”

Alvin thinks for a moment, glancing at my neck as he wraps the bagel. “I hope he left your debit card.”

- 2 -

Bath Time

I awake from a dream in which unseen figures toss bloody bones wrapped in cloth into my backyard during a rainfall. Always count on my subconscious for a little melodrama. I lie disoriented in the dark, no memory of turning off the light. Rain taps at the bedroom window. After a moment, I feel around on the nightstand for my cell phone. The light from the display is a splash of acid in my eyes. No calls, no messages. It’s not even eleven.

I throw my forearm over my eyes, but restlessness flits through my belly with reckless insistence. The air in the room is stale and my pillow smells like dust. After leaving Uncommon Cup with my bagel, I’d stopped at Safeway for half-and-half and grape juice—plus some pocket cash—an errand remarkable only for the woman snacking from an open bag of Purina Beggin’ Strips in the checkout line. From there it was Hertz to drop off the rental car, then a ride from a taciturn cabbie whose only comment was “Yar” when I told him my address. You can’t prep too early for Talk Like A Pirate Day. Once home, I hadn’t bothered to do much more than put away the groceries and check my email—opportunities to earn hundreds working from home or to get unlimited hits to my web site. Lacking either a web presence or a desire to work, I deleted it all. The fridge yielded a sound, if wrinkled, pear and some aged cheddar with a little fur on it. I slumped on the couch with my snack and a short Macallan, where the second half of
NCIS
failed to grab my attention. Before the credits rolled, I roused myself enough to switch off the TV and head to my room, there to fall on my own bed for the first time in a month. I don’t remember stripping to my skivvies.

Outside, the rain continues to fall and the phone continues not to ring. I slide my feet to the edge of the bed and let gravity make my decision. A few minutes later I’m dressed and pulling a ring of keys off a magnetic hook on the refrigerator. I’d like to think Ruby Jane planned to be back before I’d know she was gone—the timetable she gave Marcy allows for the possibility. But how hard would it have been to drop me an email or leave a message on my cell? As I drive my car through the rain-slicked Portland streets, I ponder any number of reasons why she might drop out of sight without a word, none of which make what I’m about to do a good idea.

The original Uncommon Cup was in a building on a triangle block of Sandy south of Burnside. The Depression-era concrete block structure had been home to everything from small-scale manufacturing to warehouse-and-distribution to multiplex low-income housing. Ruby Jane had her own vision. She demoed the interior walls to create a large open apartment for herself in the rear, and remodeled the front for the café. A walnut bar salvaged from a long defunct tavern served as counter. Her first roaster, a refurbished cast iron beast from the prehistory of epicurean coffee, sat in a nook at one side.

As her small coffee empire grew, first with the addition of a location on Hawthorne not far from my house in the lee of Mount Tabor, then with a larger shop near the Hollywood Theatre, she began to feel the pinch of her original space. When the shop on Twelfth and Ash became available, she saw it as an opportunity to decommission the mothership and create some distance between time on and time off. The new shop was close enough to allow her to retain her regulars, yet with a clientele of its own. Now the original space serves as home to a Probat five-kilo coffee roaster and her business office.

By the time I arrive, the rain has stopped. The air feels warm and heavy as I climb out of the car and look around. Only the teal awning over the entrance remains from the original shop. The windows and glass door now feature vertical blinds for privacy and a small sign reading UNCOMMON CUP—BUSINESS OFFICE. No light peeps out from around the closed blinds, meaningless at this time of night. If Ruby Jane is home she’ll be in her apartment in the back.

A car passes on Sandy, muffler popping. I heft the ring of keys in my hand, a spare set RJ gave me months before. They jingle overloud in the misty night air. My footsteps rasp on the sidewalk as I circle the block. A few cars are parked on Tenth Avenue near her side door, none RJ’s beater Toyota.

She lives close enough to St. Francis church, with its daily meal service, that it’s not uncommon to see homeless men and women tucked under awnings or in doorways. Tonight, I see no one. The emptiness is unsettling. I round the block a second time. A row of dark windows runs between the roof line and the top of the door, too high to peep through even if the glass wasn’t frosted. I rap on her apartment door, too gently to be heard by anyone who isn’t alert for a knock. I take a breath and rap again, louder this time. No one comes. After compromising between a reasonable wait and eternity, I key open the door.

The first thing I notice is the silence. Nothing, not even the security system warning beep. I reach for the light switch I know is near the doorway. The bulb overhead flares and pops. My hand jerks back and a tremor runs through me. I give my eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness. In the faint light filtering in from outside, I make out the alarm control panel on the wall. Something doesn’t look quite right. I ease my way into the foyer. The panel hangs off the wall by wires, many severed. I reach into my coat pocket for my phone. Someone has disabled the alarm.