Day One (11 page)

“Wow?”

“World of Warcraft?” He stared, shocked, at my blank face. “Man, you
are
out of it. Even my mom knows what WoW is.”

“If it doesn’t involve a hex map or doubling down on an ace, I don’t play.”

He looked at me like I was speaking Swahili. What can I say? The feeling was mutual.

“Tell you what, Eager. You come help me get the chair out of the trunk of my car, maybe we can talk about a few things.” It was a risky move, but there had been no movement on the Tabor Doe
and I figured if Eager told me something of significance, I’d work out a way to use it later.

“I’m not supposed to talk to you.”

“So I’ve been told. But it’s not like you ever do anything else Charm tells you.”

That earned me a quick smile, but no talk. We walked down to my car. I popped the trunk and together we hoisted the folded wheelchair out onto the sidewalk. Eager relaxed at the sight. He nodded and smiled and tugged at his ear, then pushed off.

But before he got too far, he stopped, looked back at me. His face was screwed up again, and I knew he was chewing on something. Then he spat it out. “I saw his badge, that’s all.”

“Portland Police badge?”

“No, somewhere else. It was a star, but it looked old.” He paused. “Maybe it was fake.”

I nodded. “Was it your dad, Eager?”

He thought some more, tongue working his cheek. “I got no fucking dad.” Then he turned and was off, rolling the chair down the street with his skateboard on the seat. I didn’t know where Jase’s grandmother lived, but I don’t imagine Jase wanted Eager rolling the wheelchair right up to his own front door.

Two days later, he and Jase were back at it, wheelchair, sign, blanket, at the end of the off-ramp from I-205 at Division. I didn’t bother to stop a second time.

Based on the badge and the non-denial
I got no fucking dad
amounted to, I came clean to Susan about my encounters with Eager. Her reaction was better than I expected.

“He’s looking for a father figure.”

I almost made a snotty comment, but she was right. On some level. Why else would he spend so much time showing off and bragging about his kickflips and road rash?

“I suppose I should tell Deiter.”

“He’ll need to know.”

Deiter told me to stay away from the kid, but in a way that made it clear he understood if Eager showed up at my door of his own accord, I couldn’t be blamed. So I went back to listening to Eager’s incomprehensible antics, waiting for an opportunity to delve a little deeper into the badge, the cop. His father. He had nothing for me. Sometimes I’d see him with Jase, and when I did he pointedly ignored me. The rest of the time it was all pop shove-its or some fucking crazy downhill stunt he pulled up on Mount Tabor. Wipeouts and rail grinds. Dude.

A year and a half after the Tabor Doe I stepped out onto my porch early one morning for a smoke only to find Eager standing on the sidewalk in front of the house, gazing at me with an expression reminiscent of the look he’d given me the day he’d declared he had no fucking dad. It was early. No teenage boy I’ve ever known would be willingly awake at such an hour.

“My mom’s moving to Spokane.”

“You going with her?” I meant the comment as a joke, but Eager didn’t laugh.

“Fuck no. I’m staying here.”

“I’m not following you.” I knew the Gillespies had no family in Portland.

“She’s whack. I’d rather sleep under a bridge than live with her. Besides, she’s got a new boyfriend.”

I was supposed to be at work. But I sat down on my top step, motioned for Eager to join me. He dropped his skateboard in the grass and came and swung off the wooden porch railing. “So she dumped her broker?”

“More like he dumped her. Or maybe his wife did.”

Eager’s understanding of his mother’s activities always astonished me. “How do you feel about that?”

“What the fucking shit’re you talking like a brain cracker for?”

I laughed, a bit ruefully. Somewhere inside I thought that maybe I should tell him to watch the language, but I had more important things to worry about than the inexpert profanity of a fifteen-yearold. “You can’t live on your own.”

“Sure I can. I know people.”

“Who do you know?”

He shrugged, kept swinging, his face turned away from me.

“Not your father.”

“Who?”

Susan and I still hadn’t tracked Big Ed down. Last known was years out of date. We tried to get some help from the Klamath County Sheriff, but while they promised to have their Givern Valley sub-station people do some checking around, nothing ever came of it. The State Police weren’t much more help, though I think they tried harder. Big Ed had just dropped off the map. Rumors were that he’d hung around Westbank for years after leaving the sheriff’s department, but no one knew what he did to stay afloat. He hadn’t filed a tax return since he quit, and near as we could tell hadn’t drawn a paycheck either. If Charm hadn’t called the cops on him the day before the Tabor Doe, we’d have no reason to believe he was even alive.

But whenever I hinted about Big Ed to Eager, his stare would go long and he’d clam up. “Who?” he asked again. I was convinced Big Ed was the cop Eager saw on Mount Tabor that day, and Susan admitted the possibility. But we had no other witnesses, no physical evidence, and no trace of the big man himself.

“Hey, Skin. Check out this three-sixty, man!”

“Did your old man take the gun with him, Eager?”

“Who?” Kickflip, crash. What else could Susan and I do but move on to other things?

Couple of Years Back

W
hen the cop grabbed him on Tabor summit, words spilled out like falling water. Four lousy words, look at the damage. Eager refused to speak of the man on the hill again. But in his dreams, his voice couldn’t be silenced. In his dreams, Eager shouted as loud as mountains cracking open. Up from the depths clambered the big man, a shriek gushing with purple blood from his open throat. The shriek would rise like a wave and toss Eager weeping from sleep, his flesh clammy and cold, fearful of his voice in the dark. No one else ever heard. Awake, he remained silent, allowed his silence to drive the big man away. In silence, he found, the hilltop empties, the body dissolves. The awful specter of mud and blood and pouring rain washes away into nothingness.

Gone ...

...
poof
...

... forever ...

Except, deep down, Eager knew it wasn’t that simple.

So a month later, two months later, as the heat died down and Charm quit watching his every move, as she got back into her own groove, sneaking off with her boss and pretending it would make
their lives better, Eager took to trolling the neighborhood. He knew he had to keep a low profile, cut back on his work. He couldn’t afford to get caught with his hand in someone’s purse, or pulling a stereo out of a car. A little panhandling, that was it. The prosecutor guy, fuckwit—Jesus, Charm could crack him up sometimes—talked about using his work against him. To make him talk. Like that was gonna happen.

He didn’t suppose he could afford to get caught skipping school any more than he could afford getting caught busting the glass on some overloaded Hummer. Bullshit. What the hell did he care about the Boston Tea Party, storm formation, means and medians? But school was only six hours, plus maybe a half hour of Charm bitching about how he was gonna be held back if he didn’t start doing his homework. Rest of the time, he hit the pavement. Searching, but for what?

Hard to say. Different things. When his dreams were loudest, he looked for the man from the hill, always over his shoulder and half on edge. Awake, he knew the guy had to be miles away. Maybe in a hole. But maybe around the next corner. Eager knew it wasn’t too bright to show himself out in the world. Asking for change, skating, searching. What would Charm say? Fucking brain-dead, that’s what. He could get snatched off the street and Charm would never know what happened. Whatever.

Lu kept her head down. Looked after the baby, made nice with that slob she met at Common Grounds. Working her own deal. Couldn’t blame her for that. But she didn’t like Eager being so public, so soon. One month, two months. Too soon.

Still.

Day after day, Eager rolled along, 50th to 60th, Hawthorne to Division. Familiar ground, little different street to street. Closer to Division, the houses were smaller, maybe. Duplexes like the one he lived in were the exception, but that wasn’t the sort of thing Eager
noticed. He was looking for something specific, just didn’t know what. So he skated, up and down, back and forth, dodging traffic on Lincoln, grinding retaining walls until old ladies shouted him off.

Luellen was more cautious. Sometimes he went weeks without seeing her. Look in the coffee house window, no sign of her—roll.

Halloween, that was the day. Kadash. Eager remembered a lot from his afternoon sitting at the woman cop’s desk drinking shitty cocoa and exercising his right to remain silent. Skin. Shaggy grey hair and that neck, Jesus. The ugly fuck was hauling a yellow recycling bin full of empty cans and newspapers down to the curb. Their eyes met, cop’s surprised, Eager’s not. Eager knew he’d find him, even if he hadn’t known he was looking.

He waved, put on the face he wore for adults. “Hey, Detective Kadash! This your place?”

The detective didn’t answer right away. “What are you doing here, Eager?” He set the bin down and stood up, one hand on his back. Face was screwed up in a knot like his tongue was made of lemons.

“Just skating. You know how it is. A man can’t never get enough board time.”

“I guess I can see your point.”

“Fucking hell, yeah.” Eager ollied up onto the parking strip. “I only live a few blocks away.” He waved in some direction, no matter if his house was that way or not. Skin didn’t look anyway.

“I know.”

“Your street has too many cars on it.”

“Tell me about it.”

Eager laughed. He liked the old guy’s voice, gravelly from cigarettes, tempered by amusement. “Wanna see some shreds?”

“Maybe some other time.”

Eager waved again and continued on. Didn’t look back. He could tell Skin was watching him. At the next corner, he turned toward
the park. Now he knew where the cop lived, time for some serious skating. He grinned, not recognizing the relief he felt as relief. Just glad he could find the cop when he needed to.

That night, in his dreams, the man on the hill stayed quiet. Eager woke up with sunlight in his eyes.

A few days later he skated past again. Kadash’s house was different from the rest on the block, older, smaller. A bit more run down. Eager possessed no awareness of architectural nuance, couldn’t tell the difference between an Old Portland and a Craftsman. But he had an eye for nice, and Kadash’s house wasn’t nice. It was average: one story, sagging porch. The grass had been cut, but aside from that, the yard looked like a whole lot of nothing. A few box hedges under the windows beside the porch, crabgrass and moss in the lawn.

About what you’d expect for a crunchy old cop.

The houses to either side and across the street were another story. They showed off fresh coats of paint, new windows and hanging plants. Security company signs. Eager didn’t bother with house prowls, but if he had, these were the kinds of joints he’d consider. Nice, but not too nice, with a
Protected By
sign tucked under the azaleas next to the front steps. Eager didn’t worry about security systems. He knew the score. People set them off all the time, false alarms. But he knew a nice neighborhood full of those signs meant a lot of taxpayers with shit to protect. Police kept an eye out for such types, people with more than a jar full of change and a stack of CDs and DVDs to sell at Everyday Music. Include a cop, no matter how good or bad his house looked, and the street was everything he hoped to find. Even if he hadn’t known he was looking.

Eager made a mental note, satisfied. Skated. Later, he ran into Skin again. Jawed a little, talked about his deck, his wheels, his trucks. Eager, rarely a talker, found himself describing the transitions at Burnside and O’Bryant Square. Skin sat on the top step of his porch and listened, maybe even a little interested. Eager liked him.
And the way he figured it, it was good to have a friend who was a cop. Especially once the house across the street went up for sale. Perfect house, safe house, even if Skin didn’t understand Eager’s interest. Luellen would love it, once she convinced that slob she had on the hook that he needed to buy it for her.