Richmond Noir (9 page)
A few photographs loosen themselves from the Ziploc between my teeth, floating along the water without me. Suddenly I’m surrounded by spinning pictures, swirling over the surface, moving downstream. One of them floats up in front of me. Black-and-white. Cute little brunette smiling for the camera. Reminds me of someone I used to know. Lost her in this river, long ago. Never been able to get her back. And here’s history repeating itself again. Like getting caught in a whirlpool. Sucking me under. Looking at that photograph, bobbing through the water—I’m watching my daughter swim downriver with me, the two of us drifting along together.
That’s Richmond for you. This city’s built upon bones. What isn’t buried simply washes downriver. It’s a matter of hitting the right current. Ease myself to the southern side of the James. Keep to the right and I’ll make it.
Got to make my way back to Belle Isle.
Got to head home.
I
t was around the hour when the sun began to sink into the James River and the lights of downtown Richmond came on and made the city look as big and grand as it wished it could be. The air was warm and thick. It made me think of maple syrup. There was a small breeze that picked up when I pushed my good foot on the accelerator. One arm hung out the window, the other with a hand on the wheel and a smoke between the knuckles. I was driving into Oregon Hill and I wasn’t happy about it.
Denby and Reggie Baker had just moved into the neighborhood. Cheaper rent, they told me. If you happened to be meandering through on a shiny afternoon you might see why. Oregon Hill was a dirty place and it was a nasty place. It was a place where stray cats could raise families. The gaunt houses were packed together and looked like the trees out in front of them: old, tired, and resentful. The porches sagged into themselves like wet cardboard, and Confederate flags hung with no wind to give them false glory. The lawns, if they had anything growing in them at all, grew wild and unkempt. Random objects stuck out from these yards, rusted machinery that had long since ceased to operate, children’s toys. There were families here, white families, that hadn’t yet moved out into the depressing alcoholic counties beyond Richmond, and they had a hell of a chip on their shoulders. The nights were deathly quiet but there was always something moving, shadow-to-shadow, and whatever it was knew when there was someone in the neighborhood who didn’t belong. It was the feeling I had every time I paid a visit. And every time it felt like I was sneaking in.
I made a right onto China Street and parked a half a block down from where the brothers lived. I got out of my beat-up burgundy Dodge slowly, with my wrapped left foot in the air. I pulled out a pair of aluminum crutches, stood up, also very slowly, locked the door, and moved onto the sidewalk.
Many of the red dusty bricks that made the sidewalk were broken or missing and in between them grass sprouted. I tried to step quickly on my crutches without looking like I was in a hurry. Denby and Reggie might have been all right in the neighborhood initially because they were white. But it was their visitors who were going to end up getting them in trouble.
As I was coming up to the brothers’ house, I could make out two people sitting on the porch of the place next door. No light illuminated the porch and I couldn’t see their faces. Two men, from the looks of them. They sat in their chairs, smoking cigarettes, as silent as the neighborhood around them. I could tell by the direction of their heads that they were staring at me. I didn’t stare back. This wasn’t anything new. My skin couldn’t help but get that crawling feeling, a feeling that made me very aware of that same skin’s color. The two men could have been a part of the house if not for the smoke twisting into the air and the rising and falling red dots of cigarettes held by invisible hands. Behind their screen door, past the darkness, I thought I could hear something growl. It was a low growl that sounded like it came from something big. Maybe it was the house. I kept going and got to the place I meant to get to.
Denby and Reggie’s house didn’t put on much of a front. A pair of beat-up sneakers sat next to the door that had no screen and the address was missing one of its golden digits. I was coming up the three steps of the porch when the door flung open, smacking against the rail of the porch. A girl came stomping out.
It was dark so I couldn’t quite make out the hue of her eye shadow but I could tell it was Ebone and she wasn’t happy. It was all the swearing that gave it away. I’d always found it amusing to hear people with British accents swear.
Her hair was short and sleek and a golden bird shook violently under each earlobe. She wore a zebra-print tank top and black hot pants, all of this showing a lot of the dark smooth skin I had found myself admiring the one night we had gone out for drinks with some mutual friends. That night, she’d been dancing on top of a bar with a drink in each hand. Now, her heels ground into the porch wood and she came down the stairs and went right past me without any word I took as directed to myself. She headed on down the block and didn’t trip once.
When I turned back to the door, Denby Baker was standing there.
“Hey, bo.” His voice was raspy, as if it’d been rubbed raw with a Brillo Pad. It matched the beard on his face and the Newport hanging from his bottom lip. He readjusted his Yankees cap, adorned with the brothers’ trademark golden fish hook on the bill, and showed a perfect row of teeth while he held the door open for me to come through.
“Hey, Derb,” I said, and passed him on the way to the kitchen. I leaned against the counter in the middle of the room next to an empty sink and a large microwave. The only thing on top of the counter was a set of jade dice. “Thought you were done with her.”
“I am. That’s why she was all in a huff. I can’t even stand to listen to her talk. The accent lost its charm probably around the third time she scammed me. Ain’t no way I’ma hook her up with nothing. Told her to beat it. It’s nothing. Hey, how’s life on the crutch though, Levy?”
“Hell on the armpits. But at least now I can grow out my beard like you two bozos seeing as how I can’t work. I try to be a glass-half-full kinda guy.”
“Speaking of glasses half full, how about a beverage?”
“Night’s getting better already.”
He stepped past me and opened the fridge. All that was inside of it was a twelve-pack of Milwaukee’s Best, a jar of mayo, a loaf of bread, and a very large plastic bag full of marijuana. He grabbed two cans of beer, opened one, and handed it to me.
I took a healthy sip out of the can and said, “Your neighbors aren’t creepy at all, by the way.”
“Yeah. They’re backwards as hell. But they’re all right. Just sit on the porch and drink. See some dogs in the backyard here and there. Big boys.” He took down practically half of his beer in one extended gulp. “Crazy thing is though,” he continued, “me and Regg see girls come over there every now and again. Half decent too—I mean, no peg leg or hook at the wrist. It’s suspect, real suspect.”
“Kiddin’ me?”
“Nope. Ain’t no gun to their heads neither.”
I gave him an unconvinced, “Huh.”
Reggie came running down the stairs. He looked almost identical to his brother except his hair came down to his shoulders, he was taller, and he was lighter in the paunch. He entered the living room wearing a ridiculous outdoorsman vest and no shirt underneath, long jean shorts, and sneakers with socks pulled up right under his knees. In his hand he had a plastic container with what looked like dirt in it.
“Let’s go fishin’, boys!”
“Where to?” I asked.
“Docks on the James.”
“I’m with it,” I shrugged and looked at Denby.
“Lemme grab the kush.” He took a small plastic bag out of a drawer and went to the fridge, filling it with marijuana from the larger bag. He stuffed that in his pocket, grabbed his beer, and we were out the door. The neighbors were no longer on the porch smoking.
We took their car. I kept my beer can low in my seat as we made a left onto Belvidere. In five blocks only six police cars passed us. We made a right onto Cary and slid down hills that brought us downtown. The streets and buildings looked like a world inside a lightbulb, all yellow and empty. Further down, past all the buildings occupied by suits in the daytime, the road became cobblestone.
Hotels and restaurants provided a different kind of light in Shockoe Slip. A group of brightly dressed young people stood outside of Tobacco Company contemplating where to get their next cocktail.
We made a left onto 14th and then a right on Main. The train tracks were raised into the sky above us, along with I-95. They created a dark ceiling, illuminated dimly by streetlights to give everything the grainy look that always made people from the West End reluctant to visit. When they did, they had to get drunk, and fast. The droves weren’t parading the streets this night, however. It wasn’t yet the weekend. But the traffic was still heavy.
We went past downtown, riding east on Main Street, past Church Hill, away from the city. Everything became very dark and the night lost the sounds that people made. There were more train tracks down this way and the James River became visible as we passed through or under a large building that must have served as a kind of gateway at some point in history. Now, it was only a shell. Richmond had a lot of that kind of history.
A large white yacht was harbored on the docks. During the week it gave tours. Tables with white cloth draped over them could be seen inside the yacht through the windows. We parked the car a little ways down from where the boat was docked and unpacked the fishing rods, tackle box, bait, and booze. In the daytime it was fine to fish next to the yacht. People from all walks of life came out, set up chairs, and spent long hours fishing amiably. We wouldn’t fish there though. Several lights set next to the boat and in the parking lot made the whole area very bright. There weren’t any other cars out there, which wasn’t any surprise, considering the hour. Still, it was too out in the open for what we had in mind.
Reggie took us away from the yacht toward where the trees came in and the river narrowed. We could hear the current rushing past in the dark. There was just enough light from the moon to make out a path. It wasn’t a long walk before we got through the trees and had to work down a thin path that took me awhile to navigate on crutches. The path led to a smaller dock with no one else in sight.
We set everything down on the dock and I started on a new beer. The brothers began to rig the rods. They used a Carolina rig, which had a weight on the line that would sink to the bottom of the river. There would be enough line after the weight that the bait we put on the hook would float up several inches. The moon was bright over the moving river, causing the rocks that protruded from it to glow. It seemed like the arrangement of the rocks changed every summer
We could see to the other side of the riverbank almost clearly, but where we were, with the trees hanging over us, shielding us from the moonlight, we were practically invisible. I guessed I could hurl a potato across the river and reach the other side. Maybe.
Reggie pulled out the plastic container of dirt and began to pick through it. When his hand came out he had a squirming night crawler.
“I got a feeling about it tonight, bo,” Reggie said to me.
“Yeah. A big catfish maybe?” I said between sips, watching Denby pack a bowl with what I could already smell was strong weed.
“That’d be great. Reel one of those big boys in. Yep.” Reggie stood up, his rod set and the worm dangling from the hook. He swung back gently, one finger holding the line, and then cast. It went out very far and made a good-sounding splash. Denby and I both commented that it was a nice cast.
“So what happened with your foot, Lev? Derb told me you jumped off a balcony or something?” Reggie asked, looking over his shoulder in my direction.
“Derb, damn, man. No. I didn’t jump off any balcony.”
He grinned, though I couldn’t see it. I could just tell by how the words came out of his mouth. “Who were you running from?”
“I didn’t jump off any damn balcony!”
“Whoa! Easy there, buddy. Just inquiring, just inquiring. What is it, Sensitive Tuesday?”
“It’s Wednesday, you idiot,” Denby said.
“What is it, Sensitive Wednesday?”
We laughed and the freshly packed bowl began to circulate. After I’d taken my first turn, each proceeding cast I made into the river became worse. I didn’t care very much. We were laughing and I forgot about my foot and the other things that troubled me and became comfortable on the dock in the dark. Several times I lost my bait, either in a terrible cast or getting snagged by the brush on the bottom of the riverbed. I slowly became more concerned with drinking, if only to balance myself out. I felt the rig finally pull loose from a failed cast and was reeling it in when we heard a single scream. It came from the other side of the river. It came from a girl.
The rod almost fell from my hands. Across the river we could see a girl skidding in the leaves and dirt down to the bank. She got back on her feet and started running along the bank. She wasn’t wearing much of anything. Her dark hair was long and looked wild in the moonlight.
Seconds behind her something came crashing down from the trees and almost rolled itself into the river. It was a dog and it was the size of a small bear. It got back on its four feet quickly and started chasing the girl. It didn’t take long for it to catch up to her. The girl’s screams were cut short but the few that she got out were the most terrible sounds I’d ever heard. Sounds that would stay with me for many years and echo inside my deepest darkest dreams. It was at that moment that I dropped my rod.
First it fell on the dock with a thud that shook all of us back to life. The metal of the reel clattered. The rod tipped over the edge and since I hadn’t reeled it in completely, the current took the weight and pulled the rod in as quickly as a vacuum sucking up a dust bunny. The splash shouldn’t have been so loud.
I looked back across the river and saw two men standing on the bank. We couldn’t make out their faces but we could tell they were facing our direction. Lights were suddenly beaming toward us where we stood on the dock. They had flashlights. Then the dog jumped into the river with a splash that told us exactly how big it was.
“Go! Go! Go!” Denby was half yelling, half whispering. The brothers were grabbing everything they could. The tackle box wasn’t latched and half of the lures and hooks and weights came spilling out when Denby tried to scoop it up. He left the spilled items there and put the box under his arm, with his rod in the other hand, and started running up the path into the woods. I was in front of Reggie and tried following Denby when I realized that was impossible, my heel was still broken. My leg twisted on the path and I went down. An incredible pain lanced up my leg. I grabbed at it and tried my best to be a tough guy.
