Hard Case Crime: Fake I.D. (8 page)

“You look great,” I said, and it was true. She was wearing tight jeans and a tight purple velvet top.

“Thanks,” she said. “So do you.”

We hung out by the door, talking. She asked me how my audition went and I said, “Okay.” She said she hoped I got the part and I said, “I wouldn’t bet on it.” I got off work early, around one-thirty, and Janene and I left the bar together.

“So do you want to go to a diner or something?” I asked.

“Are you hungry?”

“Not really, but I can always eat.”

“If you want we can just go back to my place—you know, to hang out and talk.”

Janene had had a couple of drinks at the bar and she seemed a little drunk.

“You sure you want to do that?” I said. “I mean I remember what you said last night about taking it too fast.”

“I was just being insecure,” she said, grabbing my hand and squeezing it. “Don’t pay any attention to me.”

We walked toward her apartment, holding hands, stopping every once in a while to make out.

Her apartment was on the sixth floor at the end of a long hallway. It was a big one-bedroom, at least twice the size of my dump. There was even a living room with a white couch, a coffee table, a rug, and some other expensive-looking furniture.

As soon we got inside and Janene turned on the light, I came up behind her, putting my hands around her waist, and started kissing the back of her neck and under her jaw. She stood there for a while, letting me go on, then she moved away.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Nothing,” she said. “It’s just...don’t you want to come inside for a tour first?”

“I figured you could give me the tour in the morning.”

I tried to put my arms around her again but she pushed me back and said, “I’m serious.”

She walked away into the living room.

“What’s the matter?” I said. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No,” she said. “It’s just...I don’t know...Forget it.”

“Hey, if you don’t feel comfortable with me here it’s no problem. I’d be happy to—”

“No, that’s not it,” she said. “Of course I want you to be here. It’s just, I was hoping we could sit down for a while, and talk and...I really have to go to the bathroom.”

“Are you sure nothing’s wrong?”

“No. Please. I’m sorry.”

I waited on the couch while she went into the bathroom. She was taking a long time. I wondered what I could have said or done to piss her off. There was a copy of
House Beautiful
on the coffee table and I started looking through it. Finally, she came out and said, “You want some tea?”

“I don’t drink tea,” I said.

“You want something else to drink? Coke, 7UP, water...?”

“I’m all right,” I said.

She turned on the stove, putting up water for tea, then she came back into the living room and sat next to me on the couch.

“I’m sorry for the way I’ve been acting,” she said. “Really, you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not you, it’s me. It’s just...”

“What? Come on, you can tell me.”

My hand was on her thigh.

“Well, it’s this, what you’re doing now—holding my hand. Touching me. Why weren’t you like this before at the bar?”

“What do you mean?”

“I tried to hold your hand a couple of times, but you kept pulling away. I was just wondering—are you embarrassed about me or something?”

I laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“That’s a good one,” I said. “Embarrassed to be with a beautiful woman like you.”

“Well, that’s how it
seemed
.”

“I was proud to be with you,” I said. “I wanted to be all over you at the bar, but I didn’t know if you wanted me to. I mean I remembered what you’d said last night about how we might be going too fast and—”

“Are you being honest with me?”

“Of course I am. What are you talking about?”

“Never mind,” she said. “I told you I was the one with the problem, not you.”

We started making out. She had her hand on my leg when she said, “So you got a new wallet, huh?”

At first I had no idea what she was talking about. Luckily, I caught on fast.

“No, that’s the old one. I found it in my apartment. It turned out I didn’t lose it after all.”

“Well,
that
must’ve been a relief.”

“Shit,” I said. “I didn’t have a chance to hit the bank before work to take your money out. But I could go out right now if you want me to?”

“No, it’s okay,” she said.

“You sure?” I said, knowing there was no way she’d send me out into the cold. “There’s an ATM a few blocks away, right?”

“Don’t be crazy, it’s freezing out,” she said. “Give it to me the next time we see each other or whenever. It’s no big deal.”

“I’m really sorry,” I said.

We started to make out again, then she was lying on the couch on her back and I was on top of her. I pulled back and smiled, looking into her eyes. Then, suddenly, something was different about her and I couldn’t figure out what it was.

“What’s the matter?” she asked.

For a few more seconds I stared at her, then it hit me.

“What happened to your eyes?”

“My eyes?” she said, like she had no idea what I was talking about. “What do you mean?”

“They used to be blue.”

“Oh, I didn’t tell you about that?” she said. “I wear color contacts. They were itching me so I took them out.”

“You mean your eyes aren’t blue?”

“What’s the matter? You don’t like my eyes?”

“No, I like your eyes a lot,” I said. “I just thought they were blue, that’s all.”

The tea kettle started to whistle. Janene went to the kitchen and came back with a mug of tea. She took a sip then put the mug down on the coffee table.

“There’s something I need to talk to you about, Tommy.”

“Shoot,” I said.

“Well, remember last night, when I told you I had something important I wanted to tell you.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I decided I want to tell you...tonight...right now.”

“So go ahead and tell me.”

“First you have to promise you won’t be mad at me. I mean it’s not a big deal, but you might be mad that I didn’t tell you.”

“There’s no way I could ever be mad at you.”

“Okay, well...” She was looking down. “See, there’s something about me you don’t know. It’s just...you see—God, I don’t know why this is so hard. I guess I might as well just say it—I’m married. Not really
married
—separated. I’ve been separated for over a year but, technically, I’m still married. I wanted to tell you the night we met, and then the first time we went out, but I didn’t know how to bring it up.”

“Wow,” I said. “That’s pretty heavy.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you right away,” she said. “I would’ve told you but—”

“It’s all right,” I said. “I mean it’s not your fault.”

“You’re probably really mad at me now.”

“Why would I be mad at you? So you’re married. It’s no big deal. So who’s the lucky guy?”

“His name’s Joe. I went to college with him at Stony Brook. We were only married two years and we were never really right for each other.”

“That’s cool,” I said.

Her face brightened.

“You mean it?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I mean it’s not like you’re living with him anymore or anything. And it’s over, right?”

“Of course it’s over. The divorce should come through in the next month or two—we’ve both been seeing other people. You’re really not upset?”

“Why would I be upset?”

“You can’t believe what a relief this is. I was obsessing about it all day. I was afraid you’d freak out, that you’d ...I don’t know...want to make a big deal out of it.”

“I’m just happy to be with you tonight, that’s all,” I said.

We stayed on the couch for a while, making out, and then we went into the bedroom.

She moved closer to me. Her head was wedged between my arm and my chest. We were naked and sweaty.

“It feels so nice to be with you,” she said.

A few minutes later she was fast asleep.

I noticed the jewelry box on the dresser. I got out of bed and dressed quietly. The light on the night table was still on. In the dim yellow light I saw Janene still facing the other way. A necklace and a bracelet were out next to the jewelry box, but she’d probably notice if they were missing. Instead, I reached inside the box and took out a gold necklace, some diamond earrings, and a gold bracelet. I put the jewelry in my pocket. In the mirror above the dresser I saw that Janene was still fast asleep. I tiptoed out of the room and left the apartment.

The next morning I drove to Chinatown. It wasn’t hard finding a pawn shop down there—the hard part was finding a Chinese guy who spoke English. After walking in and out of a couple of places, I finally found an old guy who seemed to understand me at a place on Hester Street, off the Bowery. I cut a deal with him—he’d give me three hundred bucks for the jewelry and I could buy it back for three-fifty. He originally wanted to give me four hundred, but we made it three if he wouldn’t put the stuff out for sale until tomorrow. The place closed at eight o’clock so I’d have plenty of time to buy the jewelry back before I went to work. Then I’d call Janene, figure out some way to explain why I took off last night, and find a chance to slip the jewelry back into her jewelry box.

From the Bowery, I hopped on the Manhattan Bridge to the BQE and about forty-five minutes later I was in the Aqueduct Racetrack parking lot in Ozone Park, Queens, sitting in my car, waiting for the gates to open. Leaving my apartment building this morning, I’d picked up a copy of the
Racing Form
and today nobody came over to bother me. I handicapped the whole card, letting the motor run to keep the inside of the car warm.

Walking into the track, I felt lucky.

I took the escalator up to the third floor. I once hit an exacta on the third floor for two Gs so I knew I had a much better chance of winning up there than on the first or second floors.

I won four hundred-plus dollars on the first race. I hit the second race
and
the daily double. Suddenly, I was up over a G. I lost the third race, hit the fourth and fifth, lost the sixth, and hit the seventh. I didn’t like anything in the later races so I left the track with a little over three grand in my wallet.

It was a great ride back to the city—blasting The Stones and The Who, banging out the beat on the dashboard.

Now I only needed seven grand to join the syndicate.
Seven grand.
I could make that in one or two more bets. I just had to be patient—wait for my spot. The key was I couldn’t just start betting wildly—I had to use my head. Over the next week I’d find a couple of solid bets—sure things. If I doubled my money two times that would give me more than enough to join.

It was a little after four o’clock when I crossed the Manhattan Bridge and arrived in Chinatown. The neighborhood was still packed with shoppers, but I found a parking spot right away, across the street from the pawn shop, proving that things were definitely going my way.

The old man was busy helping another customer so I hung out, looking at some Swiss Army knives in a display case. When the customer left I told the old man I was ready to buy back my jewelry.

I knew something was wrong when he acted like he couldn’t speak English.

“Look,” I said as slowly as I could. “I want my jewelry. Jew-el-ry. Can you un-der-stand what I’m say-ing?”

“Sorry, no jury,” he said. “Jury sold. Sorry, you leave.”

“Sold?” I said. “I think you must be making a mistake. I was the guy in here this morning—”

“No mistake,” he said. “Jury sold. You leave.”

“I don’t understand,” I said. “Don’t you remember me?”

The old man yelled something in Chinese.

“What’s wrong with you?” I said. “Why’re you yelling? I just want to know where my jewelry is.”

“What’s going on here?”

I looked over my shoulder and saw a young Chinese guy pointing a gun at my face. I didn’t know much about guns, but this one was big and silver and it looked like it could put a very big hole in my head.

“There seems to be a little misunderstanding here,” I said. “See, I dropped off some jewelry here this morning—”

“We sold your jewelry to some lady,” the young guy said.

“Why’d you do that?” I said. “Your boss promised me he wasn’t gonna sell it.”

“Well, he did. So why don’t you just get the hell out of our store before I call the cops or shoot you. You decide which.”

I stood there for a few seconds thinking, then I walked out. I kicked the side of my car as hard as I could, adding a new dent. I thought about hanging out until the kid went home, then going back into the store to talk to the old man again, but what good would that do? It wouldn’t get me Janene’s jewelry back.

I still had over an hour before I had to be at work so I went downtown to the OTB Teletheater on Water Street.

The Aqueduct card was over so they were showing races from Hollywood Park. It had to be an omen—the place I was going to wind up someday as a horse owner was on the TV screen. I bought a program. There was a horse going off at three to one, and it looked unbeatable. This was it, the spot I’d been waiting for. I bet the whole three grand, figuring when it won I’d get back twelve.

The race went off and I thought I must’ve bet on the wrong horse. The horse I bet on always went to the lead, but this pig was dead last. Then the announcer said that the jockey had pulled my horse up on the backstretch.

I couldn’t believe it—I was broke again. The money didn’t even have a chance to get warm in my wallet.

When I got to work I was still numb. I had no idea what I’d say when Janene came asking about her jewelry.

I poured a Sam Adams and sat at the bar. Jerry, one of the old cronies who came to O’Reilley’s every afternoon, was sitting next to me. He reeked of alcohol so I knew he was lit.

“Hey, Tommy,” he slurred, just noticing me next to him, even though I’d been sitting there a couple of minutes already. “How’s it goin’?”

The last thing I was in the mood for was to get into a conversation with some old drunk. I just nodded, staring straight ahead.