A World the Color of Salt Read Free Page B

late November chill was taking its toll. I wrapped my arms around my waist.
    Joe gave me his freak-of-time speech. I’d heard it a million times applied a million ways. A freak of time kills people. A freak of time makes people fall in love. With the wrong people. A freak of time sometimes puts two and two together to make a case; a freak of time puts the right judge or the right prosecutor on it to get a conviction. This freak of time bore no witness. Sometimes it works for you. Mostly it doesn’t.
    â€œJerry Dwyer deserves these guys on a stake,” I said.
    â€œHave at it, baby.”
    â€œJoe . . .”
    â€œNobody heard me.”
    â€œThat makes it worse.”
    â€œSorry.”
    The sky was a darkening purple because of the haze and the dying sun, and the traffic light at the intersection glowed a raw red. Next door, a tanker at the Texaco station was backing up, making dinging noises. Car engines whined up the on-ramp to the 5 South. Life was going on.
    I half smiled at Joe. My third knuckle touched the back of his hand when I stopped for a second.
    â€œWhat time will you be back?”
    â€œEarly.”
    That meant seven. Joe was not really an early guy. Early is like five, six at the latest, but it’s still dark then, and besides, most of us, unfortunately, are, I hate to say it, government workers. Look at our paychecks. I know people who work in aerospace, and those people get up early.
    â€œI’ll be here.” I started to head out to my car when I had to ask, “How’s Jennifer?”
    â€œFine, fine. She got a promotion.”
    â€œShe’s happy, I guess?”
    He shrugged.
    I followed his gaze to the same ribbon end fluttered down at the stand near the ladies’ restroom. The door was cracked open, something I hadn’t noticed before. We looked at each other. “Somebody used it,” I said.
    â€œDamn,” Joe said.
    Joe was turning the corner, ready to scare the bejesus out of the rookie, I guessed, by the time I got my key in the car door. When I opened it, the interior light shone on something in the grass under the hedge I parked near. I reached down and picked up a roundish, gold metal object about the size of a walnut. It had a small hole in the back and flanges around the rim.
    I didn’t want to go back in when Joe was doing his thing, didn’t want to fuss with Billy K., didn’t want to find a bag-and-tag for something that probably wasn’t even evidence. The metal thingy had been over too far in the grass, a long way from the outer perimeter tape. In a moment of doubt, though, I pushed my car door closed and took one or two steps toward the store and Joe. And then I returned. Why distract him now, when he had some chewing out to do? Once in the car, I pulled out a Kleenex from the box on the console and set my gold gadget in it, twisting the top of the tissue for a handle, and put it in my right pocket.
    On the way out of there I was thinking about the FNG and feeling sorry for him. I thought, If the rookie took a wee in the ladies’ because the men’s was taped, maybe no harm. At least it wasn’t the taped one. Maybe. Tomorrow. We’d see.

CHAPTER
3
    I could get silly with Patricia. She’d be good for me now. I called and asked if we could meet at Chi-Chi’s in Huntington Beach, near her house. How she and I ever became friends is beyond me. We’re so different. Nearly six feet of pretty, all legs, Patricia has deep red hair bottle-streaked with blonde, and a child’s voice. The first time I heard it, I thought she was putting me on, but it’s hers. And the men just love her. She jokes about her lack of frontal topography, but if so, it sure doesn’t interfere with the number of possible dates one woman could have in a lifetime.
    The day I met her I was in the parking lot at Alisos beach after some breathless jogging—whose idea was that anyway, I asked myself, swearing