first, a brief snopsis of  HOLLYWOOD VERITE

     Five years from now, Ron Andrews is a Hollywood film editor and family man in relationship crisis, who hooks up with street prostitute Virginia Castle. West Hollywood has its own police department---known locally as Whoa-Hoa—and its jurisdiction is all of Hollywood and Griffith Park on the Hollywood side. Fake police are cruising in prop police cars, real on-duty cops are having trysts  with hookers in cop cars, and bodies are turning up in Griffith Park

     Ron, turned voyeur on wheels, knows a lot of what’s happening, and makes an unlikely confidant of dodgy police spokesman Donovan, whom he trusts because Donovan is so upfront and  unprincipled about who he is---a genuine sleazeball.

    With Ron’s help, Donovan and Virginia set a trap to catch a killer and solve the mystery.

     This is  simultaneously a scene by scene treatment for a screenplay.

                                    HOLLYWOOD VERITE

                                 novella by Patrick Breheny      

     Five years from now, Ron was home at 8:00 o’clock in the evening. Sally, in seventh grade, was in the kids’ room finishing homework by a table lamp,  even as four year old Billy was already asleep in his bed, and six year old Cathy sat on the edge of her and Sally’s bed, legs dangling, trying to solve the Rubic’s cube. Ron and Diane and the kids were in a rented two bedroom apartment, saving for a down payment on a condo, an objective they’d never accomplish paying rent for more space now.

     He heard from Sally, “Da-d.”

     He left his sugarless cola on the coffee table and went to the open bedroom door. He whispered, “Don’t wake Billy.”

     Billy was awake, but not going for it, turning toward the wall. Ron whispered again, “What?”, though he knew.

     “Math” she complained, not exactly whispering, but not enough to rouse Billy again.

      “Come in the living room.”

       She followed him in, and they got his anticipated reaction to the book in Sally’s hand. Math wasn’t Dianne’s strong suit. It wasn’t his either, but he was learning it with Sally. To be fair, Dianne taught ESL and had just about done Sally’s English composition for her.

       “Prepare them with meaningless skills. What will she ever do with that?”

      “Get a good  grade and go to college?”

       “Oh, touché.”

        Angry  because you can’t do it. He didn’t say it, had said as much before, and it led to a week of walled silence and no conjugal activity, which had anyway gone from not wanting sex with your friend to no wanting it  with not- a- friend .

     He began explaining an equation, and Dianne turned the TV up louder. Of necessity, he spoke louder than the TV. Diane turned the TV up to a level of undecipherable warp. He believed she wanted him to scream at her, pull the chord out, maybe kick the screen in. His Catholic high school education, the military service, his job—yes, creative, as a picture film ediitor, yet with the demand of top professionalism expected for all Hollywood technical skills--- had all taught him self control. He mouthed  to “Sally, “In the kitchen.” Dianne wasn’t at an angle to have seen the lip mime, but when they got up together and moved, she shrieked louder than even the TV. Billy, awoken by the TV, reached the living room in time for the bloody murder roar, Cathy behind him.  Billy, not quite all the way awake,  inquired, “Mom?”

    Ron’s discipline was definitely tried. He went back to the living room, took the remote, and turned the TV off. He took Billy and Cathy each by a hand, and, Sally following, led them all back to their room. From there, he heard the apartment door open, then slam shut. In his pocket, he had the car keys---they got by on one car, the Toyota Corolla, six years old---so Dianne was going up the street to Lisa’s, Lisa her old high school pal, Lisa and Harry’s.    

     He put Billy back to sleep, he and Sally got her math solved, then Sally and Cathy went to bed also. He went into the living room and turned the TV on again. The cola was still on the coffee table, all the ice in the glass melted, but he sipped it warm. It was 10:15, the news channels doing their vile sensationalist reporting, but flicking he found a Seinfeld re-run.

     About 10:30, Diane came in. She said nothing, sat in the soft armchair they’d set at an angle to the sofa he was on. He felt again in his pocket for the car keys, then stood and went for the front door.

      “You’re going out?”

        “For a ride.”

        “So late?”

         “I’m not sleepy.”

      Lisa and Harry’s living room hadn’t been a respite. Whatever she’d intruded on, they weren’t disclosing. Harry’s sidekick Dante was on his way out the door as she arrived, and advised, “Timing’s not so good.” Dante was good looking, and she wished he was staying. Purely carnal. She had nothing in common with him. He wasn’t married, had no kids, no girlfriend she’d ever heard mentioned, she suspected he was gay---and what did that say about Harry? None of hers. None of hers either whatever was going on at chez Harry and Lisa. that equaled her own squall.

     She quickly left, then walked through the streets of  duplex apartment buildings fronted by well tended lawns, where running was often seen, but not walking. She quickened  to a  jogging mime, and wondered, as she puffed, what happened behind all the other indifferently excluding doors, and why nobody ever burst out once in a while, chasing another with an intent to hack. This  Rancho Park neighborhood, with its architecture of stucco one and two  story buildings built post WWII, now genteel, was inhabited largely by people with families, who were connected to the film industry, or supportive to it---people who were script agents, casting directors, film editors, real estate brokers .It was mostly Jewish, though certainly not exclusively---she and Ron weren’t, Dante she thought wasn’t . Yet the area was another world from wild West Hollywood, that it was adjacent to, though you’d find  the same professionals residing there.

    When she went home, she was so piqued she hoped they’d somehow make love. Fuck. Standing out on the utility porch, if they’d wake the kids doing it inside. Maybe she’d prefer the utility porch .But as soon as she sat in the chair closest to him on the sofa, he got up and left.

     Ron was going to the strip. He stopped first at a convenience store and bought a packet of condoms .He always used one, then threw---or gave---the pack away. Destroying evidence. He was careful not to leave the used one in the car, if he didn’t go to a motel. A hotel was better, and often the women had rooms. One night he spent forty five minutes scraping around under the front seat to retrieve a used rubber.. he being the self accused,  but he didn’t feel guilty. What was he supposed to do when it came on? There didn’t have to be the melodrama of tonight. It was cyclical. It would arrive if he was bored, if there was a funny Lucy re-run he hadn’t seen, if he drank a beer instead of a juice. It was  hormones demanding expression without forewarning. Concepts of discipline, sin, fidelity? Shovel sand to keep the ocean off the beach.

     Once he hit the strip, he cruised. There were a lot of them lurking, and there was something primal in the hunt. With a selection, he was seeking best option. He’d always become aware of competition. There were other guys circling. And circling he was. The strip was four blocks long, sweeping hills of clubs and shops. Then where it ended commercially it flattened out to became Beverly Hills, dark, with private houses and no more intersections. .He had to find a driveway to turn around. He chose the easiest driveway too. How many others picked that one? The owners should have somebody outside charging, or shooing them way Did anybody use that driveway for the deed? That would be asking to get caught.    

     He recognized several of the standers from past encounters, knew their names, or the ones they used, most were worth an encore, but he was looking for new tonight. For the promise of something not experienced before, the prospect of finding Nirvana. By someone picked off a public street? They said God worked in mysterious ways. 

     He saw Virginia .Virginia. He thought she had an ironic sense of humor, but she swore it was her real name. Virginia was almost Nirvana. He’d already done several runs along the street, it was getting quite late, and she was probably as close to self realization as he’d get tonight.

     When he stopped beside her, she greeted him with “Al!”

     If she was using her real name out there, it was no reason he should. Night didn’t usually meet the day, but there were fast food restaurants on the strip. Wouldn’t do to walk into McDonald’s some afternoon with his family and have her shout, “Ron!”

     “Want a ride?”

      She opened the passenger door and was in.

     “I’m still staying at he Oasis.”

      The strip had dodgy motels with Vegas and Hollywood names, from Universal Studios Suites to the Ballagio. The Oasis tried for civil society clientele also, and when Ron went in with her, they’d welcome them at check-in as if they knew him too and he was her beau. He could change names, but he couldn’t become invisible. That was the benefit of using the car, but then there were the police. And he liked Virginia’s room. She’d been there long enough that her personality was in it, expressed by a collection of tiny plastic animals on the drab standard issue desk, to a colorful print bedspread replacing the washed out  threadbare maroon one that now hung on the dry side of the plastic shower curtain But that she’d made a home of a room that was a brothel was unavoidably depressing.

    It was almost 1:00 o’clock and he had to be up at 6:00. The sacrificed sleep seemed worth it. Dianne had become neither lover nor confidant, but Virginia was hard to appraise. She came across as sincere, intimated about herself, but was that part of the trick? He’d once been at a late night internet cafe, and from another cubicle, he heard a young woman on Skype talking to a man who seemed to be in Europe, somewhere in the ‘gutterals  he thought, telling him she had most of the money for her rent. He asked how much she needed, and she said “Anything will help.” He made a promise, if he’d ever follow through, and she said, “You don’t know what that means to me, baby. I’ll try to send it back next month.”

    When she disconnected him, she got another and then she was enrolled in school, had paid the tuition, but needed money for books and uniforms, Wherever he was, he didn’t seem to know college students in America didn’t wear uniforms .He didn’t think Virginia was conning, but  what was she doing? She didn’t ask for anything extra, need help with some problem, but she did have him wanting to see her again.

     Dianne would be in bed, and even if he slept on the sofa, she’d know when he came in, but wouldn’t ask where he’d gone, force him to lie. The red roof light of a police car flashed behind him, the siren gave a short wail and their speaker blasted a garbled instruction to pull over to the curb. Except for the clubs, the strip’s businesses were closed, and there were plenty of spaces. Until two years ago before five years from now, West Hollywood municipality was policed by the Sheriff’s Department, which includes the Sunset Strip from Crescent Heights Boulevard westward.. When West Hollywood formed its own police force,  known locally as Whoa-hoa, they made an effort to hire straight men and women to be inclusive, and because those people formed most of the pool of prospective applicants. In a budget deal with L.A., the new department then took over policing for all of Hollywood, and Griffith Park on the side it sloped toward the city..

     The car spotlight was shining into his face, but squinting he could see the shapes approaching, their hands on the pistol grips, a woman on the sidewalk side. The man came beside him on the traffic side and asked for license, registration, proof of insurance,   

     “Registration’s in the glove compartment.”

     “Take it out.”

     “I have tools in there. Maybe you should...”

       “Get them.”

      He had to rattle a hammer, screwdriver and  pliers around to feel the document.  The woman coiled and watched his hands. He kept them visible as he took the certificate out The man had drawn his gun, was pointing it.

      He said, “That’s why I told you about the tools,”  as he carefully and visibly extended the documens.

    .He then started to explain  why the address on his license was different from on the registration, but the woman interrupted  with, “You were driving up and down this street for an hour.”

     His breathing stopped. They’d been watching him, monitoring.

     “I just couldn’t sleep..”

      His eyes were adjusting to the light. Her smile wasn’t to be taken for flirtation.”Then you stopped for about an hour.”

     He had no reply to that, except maybe to claim the right to not self incriminate, but he didn’t want to cite that yet.

     The male asked, “Why do you carry tools?”

      Did they like distracting?

      “Is that unusual?  For emergencies.”

      “What are they?”

       “The tools?  Pliers, screwdriver, hammer. Channel locks.”

     “What kind of emergencies?”

     “Sometimes I come back and the ignition wont turn it over. The battery gets disconnected from vibration. The car’s not new.”                       

     “”What’s the hammer for?”     

     “Bang the connectors back on.”

     “Pliers?”

     “To tighten them up.”

     She said, “I bet the screwdriver is to scrape crud off.”

     “Well, yeah.”

      From the guy: “The channel locks?.”

      “Same as...”

     “The pliers, right. You improvise good.  We’re keeping track of everyone we stop for loitering, Mr. Andrews, their names, activities around here.”

     “Loitering?”

     She said, “Loitering in you car.”

      They could hardly write that on a traffic ticket, so they didn’t intend to. He said,
“Guess I’m guilty of that”, tried smiling.

     The male said, “Don’t be too fast to use that word. The reason we’re taking names is, there’s a killer loose. Its not public yet because he’ll change M.O or go somewhere else... You don’t repeat this to anyone. We’ll know. And that I’m telling you doesn’t mean you’re not a suspect, except going to a motel didn’t fit. He abducts somehow. You skated tonight  picking up  a hooker because we didn’t want to give ourselves away”

     As he handed Ron back his papers, she said, “You’re due for tires, Mr. Andrews.”

     They were new.“I’ll have to get some.”

    . The man continued. “Drive carefully. Bars are closing soon. All the drunks will be out.”

      Ron turned the ignition key. At least the car started.

     The man said, “Good night, Andrews. Safe home.”

     Letting him know they weren’t forgetting his name.

    It became something or a pattern. When Dianne sulked out---up to Lisa’s be believed---he’d get the homework done, the kids to sleep, watch TV, think of Virginia, but wouldn’t leave the kids unattended. When Dianne returned, they changed shifts. Or, if she didn’t leave, he’d stand up earlier and announce he was going for a ride. As he did this night.

     She said, “Maybe the kids would like a ride.”

     “Homework.”

     “Can you stop at Tom and Jerry’s for them?”

     “They might be closed when I get back.”                                                            

     “Stop  now.”

     “Melted ice cream is always good.”

     “Long ride, huh?”

     He was having a beer with Virginia, glasses poured from a quart bottle from her refrigerator, and she said,” If you have a wife, Al, why do you come to me?”

     “You cant have sex any time you feel like it with kids around.”                                

      “So---me.” 

     “Well...Yes.”

      “Do you write at work? Reports, that kind of thing?”

      “On the computer. Mostly as e-mail.”

     “Could you proof something I wrote?”

     He thought if she used ‘proof’, she could probably proof on her own. Hoping it wasn’t a tome, he asked, “What is it?”

     “Ideas  It hasn’t taken shape.. Might make a story. Parts could be a song or a poem. I don’t know.”

     The desk with her menagerie on it had one narrow drawer at the top running across the width of the piece. There was a padlock in a hasp connecting the outside of the drawer to the desk. She took a key from her jeans and released the lock, then carefully opened the drawer by pulling on a solitary knob in the center. He could see that inside she had money in small denominations, various IDs and a  notebook with a  black cover and  coiled wire spine..

     She took the notebook out, flipped through pages, then folded it so the covers were closed back to back inside, the book set at the page she wanted him to start reading from.

    He refrained from thumbing beyond that page to see how much he was obligated for, but she reassured, “Its not long.”                                                                             

     It wasn’t really. It was five handwritten pages Much of it was phrases and images that could be turned into lyrics or poetry Other segments were descriptive paragraphs that might---or might not---be expanded to a story.

     “No ideas where you might go with this?”

     “Only vaguely.”                                                                                                     

     There was no proofing to do. Her spelling and grammar were without error.

     “How far did you go in school?”

    “Some high school/”

     “I can’t tell you to correct anything.”
      “Okay...What do you think of it?”

     “Its .good. Is there more of this on the other pages?”

      He wanted to read more. She’d done what a writer should.. Hooked him. Yes.

      “A lot of it is personal”

      “I wont tell anyone.”

      “Maybe when I know you better.”

       Dianne was at Lisa’s again. They’d watched the DVD of a film Dante had done props on, and about 9:00 he was ready to leave. She didn’t want to become a foil between Harry and Lisa,  turned her wrist to look obviously at her watch, and said, “I have to go too.”

     She left with Dante, and once outside they walked in the same direction. Dante said, “I’m going to Kwik Mart, have a little shopping to do.”                                             

     Her duplex was on the way to the store. As they strolled, he said, “You seem to spend a lot of time at Lisa’s lately.”

      Was he seeking information? Flirting?

     “Have to get out sometimes.”

    “Its always good to see you.”

      If he was flirting, it negated the assumptions she’d made of his preferences. At her building, she stopped and so did he. It wasn’t likely, but she wished Ron was at the window to see her with a man. For a moment, she hoped he’d try to kiss her. He didn’t, but at least said, “Until next time then.”

     She shook his hand just for the contact and said, “Good night.” 

     As to the police, he wouldn’t have to cruise the strip if he only saw Virginia, though setting an appointment brought awareness that the primal hunt was out of the experience then. They spent more time, before the deed and after, talking, and he read more of her self revealing notebook. It didn’t surprise him to learn  that she was the child of a broken home,,had lived with foster parents--- some good, some who abused her--- and ran away from the last ones at age 15, ending her childhood and formal education.

    Tonight, as he read in a chair, she was standing beside him, looking to see what part

 he was on, and--teasing. Letting her hair fall on his shoulder, her elbow pressing against his, then her breasts As if they had never...As if they didn’t even know each other, maybe encountered for the first time in a bar, had never spoken .And,---he didn’t know if she’d accept it, you never did the first attempt---but he stood up and kissed her. She reciprocated, tongues in their mouths like teenagers. When was the last time he kissed Dianne like this? A long time since at all.                                                                         

      A joint and some beer later, she said, “Do you mind if we don’t tonight?”

      Holy shit. Would he go home with a case of blue balls?

     “I'm sorry.  Cramps. I’m spotting.”

      He could ask for hand. She’d do it, but he knew she didn’t want to. Something had shifted between them, and he didn’t want to---disrespect her.

     “One orgasm more of less at this point in my life can’t make much difference.”

     “Al”

     “My name’s not Al. I didn’t want to...”

     “No, I understand about that. I’m Virginia, though. Hardly a name a hooker would choose.” And, smiling, “So what is your name, Al”

     “Ronald.”

     “They call you that? Ronald?”

     “They call me Ron.”

     “Nice to meet you, Ron.”

     If she was running a game, she was good .He said, “Present and accounted for now,” and immediately regretted that corny comment.

   Not only corny, but  untrue. He knew about her from her written effort. 

She didn’t know anything about him, and there was so much he couldn’t touch---his kids, the goals he and Dianne had aspired to--- still pretended that they did, but they didn’t fit together anymore.

    He left Virginia the usual fee. And he didn’t see any way to break out of their commercial arrangement. He’d be asking her to do for free what he paid her for. He liked his boss, but he wouldn’t be there for a moment tomorrow if he wasn’t on salary.

     The only number he had for Virginia was to the phone in the room. He tried numerous times when he thought she’d be there, over several days, first in early evenings, then afternoons, but got no answer. His timing could be off, she had to shop for food or eat out, and some of the ladies offered afternoon delights.

      One night when the urge hit, as usual unannounced and urgent, he decided to go out and drive along the strip. A pass or two, see if she was around.

     On the third run, once again he got pulled over, and quickly realized by the same dynamic duo using the spotlight. They adapted the same positioning, the man beside him and saying, “Back again? Get out of the car and stand beside the door.”

     Ron did as requested---ordered---and faced the officer, who had moved several paces back for space. If the cop was close to the traffic lane, all the motorists were giving a wide swath around that flashing roof light. Having encountered the pair before, Ron was less stressed and more observant, the light wasn’t in his eyes, and he took note of the name plate on the chest of the man across from him. It was black lettered against a beige background in a neat laminated rectangle, and read SENIOR DETECTIVE RAYMOND PATTON. A detective would  not be in a patrol car, certainly a supervisory one wouldn’t, but one was.  It  confused any theory of strategy. The cops’ were using a cover as---cops?

     This time the woman came around the back of the car to stand beside her partner, and said, “You don’t get the message, Andrews?”

      He focused on her name tag. She was SHIRLEY ORTEZ, SQUAD DETECTIVE.   They certainly weren’t on the street to catch clients or traffic violator. He had begun to  think he might have to report Virginia’s absence, but for obvious reasons  was reluctant to go to the police station and do so. So why not now? He was here, they were here.

     “Another disappeared.”

     Detective Patton asked, with condescension,

     “Who disappeared, Mr. Andrews?”

     “One I know.”

     From Detective Ortez: “One you’re a regular client of?”

     Incriminating himself by confirming? Certainly diminishing.

    “She became a... friend.”

       Patton said, “Maybe you can tell us her name then.”

      “Virginia.”

     “Virginia what?”

      “Virginia Castle.” That was the name on her diaries.

       Ortez asked him, “That’s the reason you’re out here tonight?”                                   

     “Yes.”

   : And from Patton,, “Well, we’ll follow up  then. You go on home now. Stay out of trouble.”

     But he didn’t go home.. He called her room again, and this time a woman with a hoarse congested voice said “Hello’” and coughed.

     “Is Virginia there?”

    “Only me, and I don’t know any Virginia.”

     “How long have you been staying there?”                                                                  

    “That’s none of yours. You looking for a date, honey?”

     He hung up and drove to the Oasis.

    The front office desk clerk, maybe owner, was a middle aged woman who looked north Asian and had an accent.

    “She stop paying rent. Weekly rent was up three days ago, she not around. You see her, tell her come get her belongings. and  pay days we couldn’t rent out.”

     “How much does she owe you?”

    “”Hundred and eighty dollars.”

    “If I paid her rent…”

    “You can pay her rent, but you can’t take her stuff. Has to be her.”

     Where would he put it anyway?

    She said, “Not legal to give to you.”

     “Okay.”

     “So you want to pay?”                                                                                           

    “Not tonight.”

     Finally one afternoon he did go to the West Hollywood police station. His misgivings were immediately realized by being greeted at the desk by a female sergeant with close cropped hair and a clipped formal manner who inquired with apparent irritation at his being there,

      “How can I help you?”

     “I want to report a missing person.”

      “A relative?”                                                                                                        

      “No/”                                                                                                                      

      “How long has this person been missing?”

      “Almost a week.”

       “Live with you?”

      “No.”

      “Are we talking about a child or an adult?”

      Maybe he could just turn around and walk out.

      “An adult. She’s a friend.”

      “What do you mean by missing?  People have free wills, move around.”

       “She could, but she had a room that was paid up for a week.”

      “Even so.”

      “She’s not rich. She was staying at the Oasis.”

      “Are you saying...you want to report-- a  hooker missing?”

      “Yes.”

       “Mmm...Okay. And  do you know her name?’

      “Virginia Castle”

     “Virginia Castle. And she’s your...friend?.”

.     “Look, I know about the serial killer, okay.”

      “What?”

      “Your undercover car pair told me.”

     She must have pressed an alarm, but however she signaled, two male officers appeared with drawn weapons, and the woman  stood up with hers raised.

      She ordered, “Hands up.”

     He complied, and the two males holstered their guns and slammed him face forward against the counter. They cuffed him, and he was roughly dragged to  the receptionist’s side,  then through a door that led to a squad room of eight desks, all occupied by plain clothes at computers. He was pulled through that room to a door that said  INTERROGATE, and was soon in a small concrete cubicle like a bunker, with a circular, institutional type steel desk and an attached bench. There was a thin black pipe in the center of the bench, extending up to the ceiling. His cuffs were released just long enough to put them around his hands in front and lock him to the pipe. He was pushed down so his knees were on the bench, and he had to scramble his legs to get them between it and the desk..

     One cop said to the other, “Sweat.” Then, though he didn’t have the sight lines to confirm it, he knew they left. To figure out why they were holding him? Or---he’d seen cop shows---make him so miserable he’d talk to anybody .Except, he was there to talk to them .Just maybe not too candidly.. That wasn’t guilt,  just---self esteem. Well, guilt, but not for anything criminal. Or nothing that should be criminal,. And certainly no more than a misdemeanor.

     He had a long bout of self examination that gave way to fatigue, itches he couldn’t scratch, hunger, thirst, back pain, anger at the sons of bitches, until one came in, his tag with the letters blurred, he was Lamb or Lane or Lamp, who cared, and he said, with I-don’t-take-any-shit in his tone,

     “Tell me about this serial killer.”

     “You guys told me.”

     “Which guys?”

     So he told him of his encounters with their undercover detectives.                            

     “You saw the detectives in the other room? That’s our whole squad. Two broads and six guys. None of them are named Patton or Ortez, but I’ll give you a line up, let you look at them.”

     He freed him from the pipe, switched the cuffs so were behind again, then marched him back to the room or desks. Eight accounted for, none whom had stopped him on the striip.

     “Night shift?.”

     “This is everybody. If they work at night, its overtime.”        

     Back in the vile little room, he was presented with a pad and pen.

    “Write it all down.”

     “I told you. I know you recorded it. Others were listening. You can collaborate each other’s account.”

      “Write a confession.”

     “I didn’t do anything.”

     “You came in here informing of  murders we don’t know anything about. Who is Virginia Castle?”

      “I think you know.”

     “I don’t.. Ron, you’ll feel better letting it out. Don’t keep it to yourself. You came in. You want us to know.”

     “What I want is a lawyer.”

     He shouted, “Lawyered up.”

     They had the audio transmission switch to both ways. He heard coarse laughter, then someone said, “Donovan's here.”

     With a sigh and a tone of accepting the inevitable, the interrogator  said, “Send him in.”                                                                                                                              

      Donovan came in, wearing crumpled slacks and a sports jacket with the tie pulled down, looking as if he was doing a parody of Sinatra.. He said, “I’m an insurance adjuster who free lances around here when a criminal requests a member of the bar.”

    “I want an attorney.”

      “Sure you do, but we have a budget. Say you were injured and only a veterinarian was available? How can I help you?”

     “I’m invoking my right to remain silent, right now, from here on.”

      “A federal constitutionalist!”

     The cop indicated the pad again. “Just tell us what you did., Ron. Frankie, if we’re going to be here, you want coffee? Ron, you take cream and sugar.”

       “I’m leaving.”

        “But---you’re handcuffed.”

        “There’s no crime.”

        “You said there was.”

         “Talk is cheap. Prove there’s a crime.”

          Donovan said “A habeus corpus man too”

        “You can’t hold me for a crime if you can’t show it exists.”

       “Go-od. Why did you need me? You are either stone hallucinating crazy, or maybe full of shit up to your eyeballs to get attention, or you’re a killer trying to play the cops. You want a body, they’ll find one to connect you to.”

     “I asked for an attorney. You’re not even a public defender’”

     “Yeah, I was joking about insurance adjuster. My specialty is DUIs.”

     The officer loosened the cuffs and said, “Get the fuck out of here.”            

      Frankie Donovan said, “For now.  Cherish your freedom.”

      It was 4:00 PM as he was leaving the police station, and there had been a shift change of officers. At the front desk, Detective Ortez was now sitting, but her name tag identified her as Officer Gorsky.

     “Detective Ortez.”

      “What?”

     “You’re---what is it? Shirley? Shirley Ortez.”

      “You causing another problem, Mister?”

       The interrogator from inside was back. “I told you what to get out of here. Maybe you want to stay.”

     “No, no. Just absorbing.”                                                                   

      Ortez/Gorsky asked, “Have you been using drugs?”

    “No.”

     “We can do a blood test..”                                                                               

     “Not necessary. Wouldn’t show anything.”

     “There’s help. Treatment centers. Sometimes we  refer as a pre-empt, keeps you from becoming our problem.”

     “That’s thoughtful of you. Not today’.

      Donovan popped in and asked, “Is he self incriminating again.”

     She said, “No, now he’s in denial.”

     Dante walked back with her again, again said he he’d hit the Kwik Mart for    22

milk, bread, eggs, not enough on his list to go to the supermarket. He’d told her tonight about his film industry niche, which was having a catalog of props and costumes for rent to productions, and what he didn’t have he’d find.

     Diane said, “If you don’t bring a car and  you pick up a few items at the convenience store, you must live close.”                                                                                                          

     “Around the corner, then two blocks..”

     “I’d love to see the costumes, and the photos of your props.”

     “Do you have time now?”

     She thought, What’s the rush? Relieving Ron, so he can  leave?

     “I can make a little time.”

     “I’ll shop later. The store’s open all night.”

      Dante lived in one of the stucco houses , a one story, and one of the bedrooms was like a showroom that held single costumes. In the other cramped bedroom were duplicates of a lot of the samplings in the display room .In there she viewed, from the doorway, soldiers’ uniforms of numerous ranks from various periods, splendid attire and tiaras of royalty, clown’s togs, doormen and generals regalia (similar), police issue, garb for cooks, trappers, sailors, cowboys, construction workers, wedding principals, convicts, businessmen---an overwhelming assortment. The large props,  from fuselages to tanks to cars to boats, were in files on his computer.     

   Ron was home with the kids, and Dianne wasn’t. He had Sally and Cathy on homework assignments and Billy watching cartoons. He’d leave when she got back, wherever she was,  but  observant and oldest Sally, comprehending the distraction of keeping them occupied, asked “Where’s Mom?”                                                                              23

     “At Lisa’s.”

     “Doing what?”

      “Conferring. Women talk.”

      And with knowledge past her age, “Sure, Dad?”

      “Of course I am.”

      He wasn’t, but what else could he say? Except for the kids welfare, he didn’t care.

     Diane was in the bathroom when the doorbell  rang. She heard the door open, and there was a loud conversation there, Dante and a woman. She didn’t think she should show, nor was she in any physical situation to quickly do so. The woman said,

       “You told me you were a producer.”                                                              

       “I am.”                                                                                                                                     

      “Bullshit. What were we doing? I’m a cop. I can lose my job. We lit those scenes with the spotlight.”       

      “You told me you’re an actress.”

       “I needed the money. Were we filmed? We could have been.”

      “I’ll let you ‘sweat’ that.”

     “You know about that?”

      Dante asked “Know about what?”

     “Sweating him. The department thinks he’s a serial killer.”

      He laughed, with a quality unfitting what she knew of his personality until now

      The woman asked, “What happened to that missing girl from the Oasis?”

      “How do I know?”                                                                                                  24

      “Its just so much like what  we were pretending.”

      “So what?  A flaky whore’s missing.””

       Dianne didn’t want to keep hearing, flushed the toilet. She heard anyway.

     “You have to go, Sylvia. I’m busy.”

     “If there’s any film, I want to know”    
      “You worry too much.”

      “I have friends on the force, you know.”              

       “I’m closing the door now.”

       When Dianne heard it close and lock, she came out.

       Dante said,”That’s a stand-in. She wants an upgrade, trying to get her SAG card.”

       Dianne asked, “Who is she really?”

      “An actress.”

      “A cop actress?”

     “Let me show you something.”

      He inserted a DVD in the player. On the big screen a  video started, Dante in a police uniform, a prominent name plate identifying him as Senior Detective Raymond Patton. Beside him, in the driver’s seat, was a pretty dark haired woman whose name tag read Squad Detective Shirley Ortez. It was only seconds long, they smiled and waved, then it ended

     “What’s this?”

      “A promo to pitch a TV program with.”

     “Reality TV?”

      “Right.”

      “But---you know I heard---she said she wasn’t portraying herself.”                        25

       “Almost reality. Cinema verite. We make it look real

      “Is she...like a girlfriend?”

      Dante laughed as though the postulation was absurd, that unsettling laugh she’d hear from the bathroom..                                

      She said, “I thought you were gay at first.”

     “What makes you now think I’m not?”

    “Her. And you seemed to show an interest in me.”

      “Have I shown any inclination to act on it?”

     “Well...Not yet.”

     “Don’t take it personally But as to the other, I don’t believe in homosexuality.”

    “You don’t believe.? What do you mean? It doesn’t exist, or you’re intolerant of it?”

     “You see how precise these props and costumes are? There in no room for tolerance. They have to be exact. I’m also an engineer. A rivet that is off  by a fraction of a centimeter in a machine will shut it down.”

     “People aren’t machines”

      “I’m a spiritual Darwninist.”

     “I can’t say I’ve head of that.”

      “Its my own religion. Danteism.” He didn’t smile, wasn’t being funny.”Our species survives through sex, so anything without the potential for procreation is  pointless and irrelevant.”

     “What about pleasure?

.    “The reason it feels good is so you do it.”

       She was thinking, only in L.A., but said, “So…You don’t have sex?”

     “I don’t have to/”                                                                                                    26

     “You’re asexual?”

      “I get my kicks other ways.”

      He shut the player, took the disc out, and put it in a Fed Ex envelope.

     “Mailing this one tomorrow.”

     “To a producer?”

      “Something like that.”

     “How do you get those kicks?”

     “Maybe a little like that guy who showed his submarine to the journalist.”

     “I think I’ll go home now.”

      He repeated the laugh, this time maniacally. Was he preforming?  She thought of Richard Widmark in ‘KISS OF DEATH’ pushing the old lady in a wheelchair down a flight of stairs.

    But he said,  “I won’t stop you.”

    She tested that offer quickly, went to the door.

   “I just like scaring people.”

    The door opened for her. What came form her mouth, idiotically but instinctively, was           “Thanks.”

    “For what?”                                                                                               

      “Letting me go.”

      The laugh came again, and she was quickly out on the street and moving.

        Ron couldn’t stop looking for Virginia. The next time he got stopped, the          

 cop from the passenger’s side of the police vehicle came to his car. From the car, the driver, female, told the male partner,                                                                     27

    “Get him out of the car and frisk him. He’s the one.”

     The partner did that, then the woman came too, her badge reading Gorsky.

     He said, “Well, Detective Ortez.”

      Gorsky drew her gun and pointed it at his chest.

      Her partner said, urgently, “Stop. Holster that.”

       To Ron’s relief she did, but said “We have to bring him in.”

       The partner said, “Don’t move so much as a hair,” and they went a few feet away to consult. He couldn’t decipher the conversation,  but gleamed the partner had a dissenting opinion. He did hear, “Captain won’t book him if it won’t stick. Write him a ticket for something.”

     She stewed in that frustration a few minutes, then came back to him.

     “I’m writing you a citation for loitering, Andrews.”  

     “We had that conversation. I can’t loiter driving.”

    “Are you in your car now? You’ve been standing here in the street a while with your finger in your ass.”

         After receiving the ticket, he defiantly drove to the Oasis, and back to Virginia’s old room. The one  with the hacking crack cough was there, and said, “I’m Rosie, baby. She came and took anything that was overlooked by the office.”

      “The animals?”                                                                                   

      “Took them.”

      The the padlock on the desk was missing, and Virginia’s notebook was in the trash basket. By the assortment of empty energy drink bottles and quick noodle cartons, the book was there only because neither tenant nor motel  bothered  taking out the trash. Of course, any money or other valuables from the drawer weren’t there.                           28

       He said, “She hasn’t been here.”

      “You calling me a liar?”

     “What’s she look like?”

      “Like any working lady. Pretty, the way you all like us.”

      He reached into the trash and retrieved the notebook. .”She wouldn’t leave this.”

      “A dumpster diver?. Take the rest in there too.. That’s some crazy shit in that book.”

       She was wearing a plastic dino on a leather chord around her neck.

      “Took her animals?”

      “She gave me one.’

       “She was never here.”

       “You want me to call the desk on you ?”

       He went to the office, the glass paneled room that was physically inaccessible    without breaking the glass. The same woman inside recognized him, and said, “ She hasn’t been back. You seen her?”

     “No.”

    “You do, tell her her clothes are in storage now.”    

     Donovan was representing her. Officer Gorsky was facing a disciplinary review, a captain conducting the hearing .He showed her the video they received, on their big screen.                                                                                                                    29

        “We also received physical evidence, the uniform costume and fake badge.”

        “.We moonlight, off duty as security on locations. Some cops work as actors. Your  evidence is props”

      “You were impersonating an officer.”

     “I am an officer.”

      “Not named Ortez, not on assigned duty ,and  in an unauthorized car.”

       “For a fictional scene.”

       “We have witnesses, who saw you stop Ronald. Andrews.”

       “Who are these witnesses? Street women?”     

       Donovan said, “In a fair courtroom, their testimony wouldn’t be credible.” 

      Gorsky said, “It was only intended to look real. I was told Andrews was part of it.”             

     “Taking that possibility into account but we’re continuing to investigate. You’re on desk duty until we finish.”.

     “When might that be?”

      “Hard to say. It takes its course.”

     “I was acting.”

     “We have to know if you were presenting as real to the public before we assign you outside again”
 

      Gorsky was sitting at the police desk when Dante came in, and she inquired,

    “What the fuck are you doing here?”

     “I have to report a stolen car.”                                                                                30

      “There are forms on that counter.”

      “I have one filled out. Got it from the website.”

       She read the details.

      “The prop car? Bullshit.. They got a warrant to seize it for evidence in my hearing.”

      “Somebody got there sooner. Maybe you won’t have to worry about it now..”

      “Well give it here, and you go.”

      “You going to look for it?”

       “I’ll handle this appropriately.”

       “Just so there’s a record I reported it.”

       “You can hope.”

         Ron was addicted to the cruise, but not looking for any woman except Virginia,, 

  and he got stopped by another police cruiser, this time with one regular cop alone. The officer used procedure, told him to park at the curb, then approached.

      Ron tried not to sound ironic when he said, “Evening, Officer.”

      “Good evening. You seem to be aimlessly driving around, but of course you must have a purpose.. We have an operation you’re impinging on, a sting on tricks.. If you don’t stay off this street we’ll find a reason to take you in.”

     He said “Okay”.

     But waited until the police car left, then began his own surveillance again.

    A few streets on, halfway along the strip, at a red light, he saw...he gasped.,...Virginia? But he wasn’t sure.. She looked different. Heavier. Healthier. Shorter hair, tinted red. Was he mistaken, had too much hope? He parked several car lengths away, turned off his lights    .                                                                                                                        31

    Another patrol car, with one officer inside, pulled over to the woman on the street, who started to use her phone, pretending annoyance at the intrusion. Can’t anyone stop for a second at the curb?

      He couldn’t heat the conversation, but without the officer exiting the car, the woman opened the car door and got in. He wondered if she was one of the decoys for the sting.       

      He followed at a distance. They went east on Sunset, over to Western Avenue, then up to Griffith Park. He couldn’t get too close without revealing himself. The patrol car lights went off, it pulled off into a dirt trail and stopped.

     And stayed. The sitting shapes inside seemed to recline, could not longer be seen, and after a while the car shook jerkily---frantically?  It looked to Ron like an on duty cop was having sex with an undercover decoy in a police car,  having a tryst with a prostitute in one, or both at once.                    

      He still had a job and a family. The following day, when he came home from work, Dianne left, and he took the kids to KFC. There was a TV playing low in the restaurant break room , which he could see and hear. The gist of the local news story was that a transvestite’s body was found in Griffith Park up from Western Avenue, in the lover’s lane spot where he’d last seen the police car..

     He waited until he got back home, had the kids occupied, then he called Donovan .He asked himself, Why did he trust Donovan? The answer he came up with was, Donovan was who he was, a genuine sleazeball who didn’t pretend to be anything else He wasn’t a phony. He had integrity                                                                                                32

.     He told Donovan what he witnessed the previous night.

      Dante was in the station getting questioned by Captain Ouver. who was the same captain leading the investigation of Gorky, and he  asked,

      “When was the last time you saw your prop car?”

      “I kept it in a parking space in the front of my property. Its quite a shock to go out, and something you expect to be there isn’t.”

     “Go out? So it was stolen when you were home?”

    “In the night. And  no. I didn’t hear anything.”

     “A police car would be a prime pick for joyriders alright.”

     “That’s exactly what I thought.”

      “Then why did you leave it so easy to take?”

     “Well, I mean that’s what I thought after.”                                             

      “You’re sure you didn’t move it somewhere else and forget?”

     “Absolutely.

      “Well---Somebody saw you driving it yesterday.”

      “Nobody saw me driving it.”

      “You didn’t think anybody saw you?”

      “Nobody saw me because I haven’t driven it since we  made the promo.”

       “Wasn’t Gorsky driving in the promo?”

       “I had to bring the car home. And that’s the last time I drove it.”

       “But you were seen driving it the day before you say it was stolen.”

       “By who? If somebody said they saw me driving it, they stole it.”                      33

        “Didn’t you drive that car into Griffith Park Wednesday?”

       “Whoa! Absolutely not. That’s what this is about?””

      “Would you be willing to give a DNA sample?”

     “Why should I?”

      “Well, it could clear you.”

      “You suspect me of that? I have to consult an attorney.”

      “Lawyered UP!”

       Donovan was quickly in attendance.

       “Not him. I’ll get a real lawyer. Can I leave? Am I under arrest?”

       “Will you stay in town? We can hold you forty eight hours.”

       “I’ll be here.”

        “We’ll be watching that you are.”               

       Ron was at lunch, spending the hour prowling on the flat eastern side of Sunset,   hoping he might see Virginia, and hoping he had been wrong in thinking she could be in the car he saw go into Griffith Park. She wasn’t a transvestite, that didn’t fit.

    As he cruised, he saw Dante’s prop car, moving slowly, and in sunny daylight Gorsky was driving the reportedly stolen car.

    He opened his phone to contact numbers and dialed Donovan.

     Gorsky was back in the hearing room with  Captain Ouver.  Donovan was present, and she said, “Ron Andrews is a liar.”

       Ouvers asked, “Why would he lie?”

      “I have to explain his motive?’                                                                    34

     “Look, you’re not on trial. We’re three people having a conversation.”

     “Bullshit. Donovan, you’re representing me?”

     “I’m trying to help you. They think you killed that queen up in the park.”

      He said, “He saw you driving the fake car the day before the body was found in the same spot you went to. You picked up a TV and took him to the park.”

     “NO”

      Donovan said, “Lies will kill you, Gorsky. Tell the truth here.”

     “I stole the car to get even with Dante. I couldn’t resist playing cop in it.”

      Ouver asked “Wasn’t enough to be one?”

      “There’s no excitement in desk assignment. I was antsy.”

       Donovan spoke, his tone soothing. “So what happened?”                                 

       “I picked up a woman. A woman. not a transvestite. So the TV found up there isn’t her, but I went to the park.”

           Ouver interjected, “Why did you do that?”

         “Well, I mean---What do you think, why?”

        “Why the park? Couldn’t you go to a room?  A supermarket lot?  Take him home?”

         “Her! It was riskier in the park, okay.”

         “I’ll  bet. And even more exciting to strangle him.”

          “I didn’t do that.”

           Donovan said, “This transvestite...”

          “Woman!”

           “Okay,” Donovan said, “But we only have your word for that. This. woman...if you’re telling us the truth, she’s your alibi. Do you know her name?”

       “Jeannie. That’s all I know.”                                                                            35

       “Any idea where we might find her?”

      “Sunset Boulevard would be a good start.”

       Ouver told her, “We have to keep you, Gorsky.”                            

       Donovan said, “You know its forty eight hours. They don’t have the coroner’s report yet. I’ll try to find your Jenny.”         

       “Jeannie. So, if you don’t have a cause of death, what crime are you investigating me for?”

         Ouver said, “Lying to us. And the motive for so doing.”

       “I was with a woman, and she didn’t die of anything. I dropped her off on Western Avenue. Didn’t Andrews see that?”

        “Afraid not. He said he left, didn’t want you to discover him.”

      Another afternoon, on another long  lunch break Ron pulled into the Denny’s  coffee shop to take a toilet break, then slid into a booth and ordered coffee. After it came and the waitress left, another pleasant feminine outline presented itself over him, and he heard,   “Ron---Al.”

     It was Virginia, coming from the lady’s. She said,  “I’ve been in rehab, baby. Can I sit down?’ He nodded and she did.

       “I had a come-to-sobriety moment. I’m going to the Oasis in a moment.”

       “Staying there?”

      “Probably will. Haven’t called to reserve. I’ve been busy .I called from rehab, asked the manager to keep my clothes. Rosie was in my room, said she’d watch my locked drawer, save the animals for me.”                                                                                 

      “Ohh…? Maybe Rosie’s left by now.”                                                                  36

     “She’s there. Other girls told me she is. Can I get a ride?

      He didn’t want to tell her what he knew of her belongings, and didn’t want to bring her to the Oasis. He told her he’d definitely be hooking up with her,  made his ‘no time’ excuse, and left.                                                                                                          

      Back in the car---Well, he found her, so what was he cruising for? Inertia, not the part of that law about a body at rest, but of a body in motion, propelled him on. But the pointlessness soon became obvious, the activity on the street...pedestrian And he felt craven. Hadn’t he abandoned her to face the Oasis alone?

     At the motel office, one of the heavy shields of glass paneling was cracked into big spider web patterns, the owner cowering inside, and when she saw him she loudly exclaimed, “The po-lice are coming.” Said ‘po-lice, her speech inflections morphing into her clientele’s

     He ran to Rosie’s room, where from outside it sounded like---well, somebody getting killed inside--- one woman pleading, “I didn’t”, the other screaming, “You bitch.”                                   

      The door was closed but he discovered unlocked, and he went in. Both were on the floor, Rosie on her back shrieking, Virginia over her,  punching and plummeting. He shouted “Stop,”  grabbed Virginia from behind, then pulled her to her feet in a lock that restrained her arms .When she realized who he was, she said, “I wasn’t murdering    anybody. Let go. I just want to kick her ass.”

     “You already have. The cops are coming. Let’s get out of here.”                     37

      They were back in the Denny’s booth when he returned her notebook he’d loyally kept in his car trunk, and told her he loved her.

     She said, “You and me? Oh honey, you don’t have a clue.”

       “Remember that kiss?”

      “That was so sweet. Oh, it was a long time since anybody just wanted me for that.”

     “Well?”

      “We don’t play the same sport, Ron .I like women. I’m sorry. But .I have to tell you this, my father confessor. Since I’ve been back, I had a date with a female cop in uniform” She was proud of that, bragging. “In the cop car.”

      “I know.”

      “Huh?”

     Donovan was speaking at a press conference:

   “The cause of death for the body in the park was a drug overdose. There have been no murders related to those police impersonations that we know of, but we won’t give up on the possibility there are some. As of now, we have a lot of people with personal problems   who were interacting with each other. Office Gorsky is charged with Grand Theft Auto, and the prop car is held as evidence..”                                                                        

      He drove and swallowed his disappointment. His grief .Sure, he had no idea how he ever would have had a relationship with Virginia, but that was irrelevant, it wouldn’t have stopped him from trying. And as he cruised---he couldn’t believe he was seeing the fake car again .Dianne was supposed to be at work, so was he, his two older girls were at school, Billy in daycare. So how then was he looking at--- Dianne driving the prop car?     

 And where did she get a uniform?                                                                             38

     He followed to see what she was doing, and became aware she was following a car.  She turned the flashing roof light on, hit a blast of siren for a moment, and very  professionally pulled over a large Hawaiian looking man who had, as far as Ron could tell, done nothing untoward.

      He parked to observe. She got out of the car, hitched up her web belt, which he knew held a holster with a toy gun, and said to the motorist, “The reason I stopped you is that you’re driving to slow---slowly”

     He replied, “I didn’t know there’s a too slow-slowly.”

    Was that what his English teacher wife was doing out here---educating the public, improving their grammar?            

      “There is. Its the anti blocking the road policy.”

      “There’s one of those?”                                                                 

       “I said so, didn’t I? There is, and high time. Were you on the phone? Texting? Those are big fines.”

     “I left my phone in the shop. Just ran to the post office.”

     “Ran? More like crawled. I’ll give you a warning this time, but look alive when you’re driving out here.”

     “Officer?”

     “Yeah?”

      “You’re Detective Raymond Patton?”

      “You got a problem with that?”

      “No. no.”                                                                                                             39

      In traffic again, his car behind, Ron pulled in front of her ‘squad car’ and braked .hard. She blasted her horn in outrage,.but traffic in the outside lane was too dense for her to go around him .He exited his car, went to hers, opened the passenger door, then got in and sat.                                                                                                              

     She looked at him and said, “Oh, shit.”

     “Di, how did you get this car?”

     “I bought it at auction.”

      “It’s evidence. The couldn’t sell it.”

     “Well, there are lots of things they can’t do and do anyway.”

     “You didn’t buy it.”

      “Okay, no, you got me. I stole it from their lot.”                                                                                                             

      “Where did you get the uniform?”

       “Oh...let’s say I have a connection in Wardrobe.”

        “No you don’t.”

      “Actually, I have. But I stole the uniform too.”

       “Dianne, the kids are at school, we’re both playing hooky from work. Let’s go    home.”

      “I never thought you’d ask me that again.”

       “I’m just  seeing a side of you I somehow forgot.”

      “What the…?”

       “Want to go?”                                                                                   

      “Um...Yeah?...Yeah, why not? Let’s go. My car or yours?”

      “Park this one. It can only cause you problems.”                                             40

       Later, the house to themselves, lying close like a couple of young lovers, she told him about Dante.

     “Don’t get jealous. Nothing happened. I broke in his house and stole the uniform. They’ll think he stole the car .from impound.”

        It wouldn’t be Ron to exonerate him.

     Ron still cruised,  as an addict, doing the what he had been doing, not expecting different results---but okay hoping for .He was driving east on Hollywood Boulevard, looking up at the famous sign that told you where you were,  in case you arrived  in an alcoholic blackout and hadn’t seen a newspaper yet.

      At the Sunset / Vermont Ave intersection he stopped in the left turn lane at the red light, and a kid with pamphlets came up to the car.                                                  

     “Want a map to the stars homes, Mister?. See who makes the illusions?”   

     “I live here .Light’s changed. Get out of the street.”

      Halfway up the street from Hollywood Boulevard, on Vermont Avenue, was a hitchhiking woman. As he waited to make the left, a car made a right turn first and stopped for the ‘hitchhiker’. Ron completed his turn as the other car moved again, passenger within.

     At Franklin, it turned into the House of Pies restaurant. Maybe she was hungry? He saw as they exited the car that she was not a woman he recognized, but... she was with...Donovan. This was none of his business, but he was intrigued.

       They went inside. It was a left turn into the lot off Vermont, so Ron stayed facing north, parked on Vermont and waited. It was a  long forty minutes. When Donovan and the woman came out, that car went west on Franklin. By the time Ron could turn to   follow, it was a block ahead. He did see it turn on Western Avenue and go in the  direction of the  lover’s lane. When he got to Western he drove up to the pull out, and there it was, parked in that spot.                                                                                41

    He parked on Western Avenue below the park, his car facing south, and waited almost an hour for Donovan’s car to come down. The sun was reflecting then on the windows and he couldn’t see inside, but he followed,  only to lose the car in traffic as Donovan got more than a block ahead .And what was he to do or make of this? He went home.

     They were trying to balance what what there once was between them with present family reality, yet somehow keep alive the passion they just experienced .It was hard, kids came first---yes, they did---and he was telling himself it was time to grow up. What did it matter what Donovan did? Ron had to stop his own compulsive cruising that was mutating into voyeurism Clean his own side of the street.

    If Dianne would never have Virginia’s shape again, he’d accept that. He wasn’t what he used to be. He AND Dianne were helping Sally with Math---Dianne just got her

through English---and the two smaller ones were watching cartoons when the local station interrupted the program, a program for kids, to announce the finding of another body, apparently female, in Griffith Park.

    He said, “I have to go out, Dianne.”

    “Ron!” Like she didn’t expect his betrayal to be so abrupt.

     “I know what happened in the park.”

      “What ? Tell me.”                                                                                                   42

     He couldn’t without telling her he’d been out cruising again. Maybe he could explain he wasn’t out there. looking for a woman now. But this news flash had its own urgency.

     “I’m going to the police.”

      “Now.” Like wouldn’t they be closed this late?

      “Yes. Come with me.”

     “The kids...”

      “All of us.”

     “We can’t.”

     “Then trust me this once. I have to report it. Donovan killed her.”

     “Ron?” Now the tone indicated she was thinking his head had gone funny.

     “I’m not crazy. I have to go to the police.”

      “You’re sure...that’s where you going?”

     “Yes.”

     “Then go. We can’t all go with you.”

     At the desk, there was a female officer who wasn’t Gorsky. and she inquired why he was there.

   “ I want to talk to Captaon Ouver.”

    “Do you have an appointment?”

     “I have information.”

     “Have a sear, Mr. Andrews.”

     He crossed the room to a row of stern chairs, as she typed into the computer. His buttocks no sooner touched metal than she asked, looking at her computer,

      “What’s this regarding?”                                                                                      43

    “The body just found in the park.”

     “And what information do you have?”

     He got up again, returned to the desk.

     “I want to give that to Ouver. Privately.”

     “He’s busy so tell me. I’m qualified.”

     “I know who did it.”

      ‘You do? There’s not a did it we know of yet. There are lots of ODs up there”

        ‘This wasn’t.”

       “And YOU know? Oka,y I’m game .A little bored. Who dunnit?”

     “I want Ouver.”

      “You can’t always get what you want. Tell me. Me or nothing.”

      “Donovan did it.”

     “Donovan? I see. Well then. You can  sit down again.”

       He went back to the row of chairs, thinking he got through to her, Ouver would be out to talk or bring him inside. But momentarily two burly policemen came into the room, took an arm each, and escorted him toward the door.

     The woman behind the desk said, “As a rule, we keep people.. There’s commitment when some got too strange.”

    The one holding his left arm let go and said, “And don’t come back.” Ron sensed his frustration that he had given him  no justification for a kick in the ass goodbye.

     He drove back on Fairfax Avenue toward his neighborhood, then turned on Beverly Boulevard to go to CBS. The closest parking was two blocks away, and when he got to their offices,  he could see from visible security he’d probably get into the Pentagon more easily at night..                                                                                                                44

   There was NBC, but would that be any different? Back int the car, he played the radio as he drove. METRO MAN was on “On The Air!”, with his show A VOICE IN THE NIGHT, doing talk radio between  DJ songs, and tonight’s theme was “Where to take your love in L.A.”

    Ron called the number immediately. He got through. Metro Man said, “Hello caller. Where do you take her? Or him?”

     “I can tell you where they get taken to.”

     “That might work. Lay it on me.”

      “Griffith Park above Western Avenue.”

      “We’ve all heard of that wee rendezvous.”

     “Well I know who’s responsible for the last body found up there.”

     “Ohh? ...Shouldn’t you be speaking to the police?”

     “They don’t want to know”

     “So...Before you tell me more, you know you’re on the air? There are probably hundreds of people right now getting set to record you. Including us..”

     “I accept that.”

     “Fire way then, my man.”

      “Donovan. The spokesman and jack-of-all-trades at Whoa-Hoa.. He did it.”

       “DID it? Can you prove this?”

     “I can provide witness testimony making him quite circumstantial to it.”

     “Do you want to give your name?”

      “Ronald Andrews.”

     “Rings a bell somehow. Can you tell us what happened?... Oh shit! Our power’s going. Hey. You call me back, Mr. Andr...”                                                       45

     Donovan held another press conference:                                                      

   “Andrews has shown previous mental problem .He wants attention. This was another overdose. There is no murder. If there ever is one, we’ll find the killer, and it won’t be me.”

     Now Ron was meeting rejection. From hookers! He didn’t even want to pick them up, but they were waving him away. He figured they were thinking he was trouble---maybe a psycho, the police watching him. But he kept on cruising. He was becoming-- had to acknowledge it---Jimmy Stewart  from Rear Window, only driving a car.

     She could just leave the car in Dante’s driveway, Dianne thought. She’d gone back to the strip and got it, had been hiding it under a tarp behind her school, where the Auto Mechanics Dept stored old clunkers for lessons .She’d kind of hoped they’d uncover it, ask no questions, use it as a teaching instrument, but no---not even disturbed. She removed the shroud and drove off along 3^rd Street in the conspicuous car, from the school several blocks east of Fairfax Ave to Dante’s house on 5^th Street near La Cienega Blvd.

     Once there, she thought he might hear her parking in the driveway, maybe even in front of the house, so she parked in the street half a block away. She started to leave, but---What was it? An impulse? A premonition? A beckoning? Something told her to go back and look inside.

      She returned and went up on the low porch where there was a big French window on the living room. Beside that, on the side away from the driveway, was another window of dark glass panels, interrupted by sections of wood. The glass panels were small and smoky, and she chose one of those to peep through                                             46

.     Dante was inside, in an armchair, watching a woman reclined on the sofa---with a needle in her arm, and holding a syringe full of blood that was mixing with a white substance, then the entire contents disappeared  from the vial and into her.

     The woman lay still then in an apparent relaxed slumber, the tube falling from her hand and tugging at the needle in her arm. She didn’t make any movement, and

Dianne couldn’t detect if she was breathing.

    Dante attended her. He put his hand by her nose to determine if there was breath. He took her wrist in his hand, seemed to be checking for a pulse. He had a stethoscope, stuck the end with the sensors under her blouse, and  put the signaling buds in his ears. And he was masturbating..

    Then he left the room and came back with a sleeping bag. He was wearing thick cloth gloves .He pulled her off the sofa, letting her fall hard to the floor with a thump Dianne heard outside, then rolled her inside the sleeping bag and zipped it. He put a canvas tent tarp down and wrapped the woman and sleeping bag in that .He went to the front door, and as it opened Dianne darted along the side of the house and hid.

   There was no sound after the door opened, and she gathered he went back for the bundle. Then she heard him come out. By the grunting and tussling, she knew he was placing the package in the SUV in his driveway. Then the jeep sputtered, coughed to get rhythmic, and she knew it hadn’t been driven for a while, needed to warm up.

    She was on the side of the house in the direction up the street where the prop car was parked, and she had the keys. She had hot wired when she first stole it, then had keys made by a cooperative locksmith who, for a hundred dollars, wouldn’t ask questions.  47

     The jeep was far enough up the driveway that the building could keep her from being seen as she fled. She got back to the squad car, started it and waited. In a moment Ron’s SUV came out. It started toward La Cienega, the way she was facing, and she hoped he’d be too preoccupied with his foul endeavor to realize he was being followed by one of his inventory rentals.

     She tracked as he turned right on La Cienega and went up to Fountain, then east on Fountain all the way to Western, where he turned north. L.A traffic was so gridlocked all the way she almost couldn’t lose him, just stayed back and kept him in view. She hoped the police would stop her, she could tell them, but  she knew you can never find a cop when you need one.  She had thought to call them, but Whoa-hoa  Dept  had enough of the Andrews family. When she found out where Dante was taking the woman, she’d make sure they listened to her.

     He drove into Griffith Park and she had to keep a distance to not be seen, but she observed him park briefly at the loves’ lane, then turn around and come down the road. She was in the pull out, and as he went by he gassed the jeep and sped out of the park.

    She didn’t know if he’d seen her, or the car, but she was too afraid to just call the police. She drove directly to their HQ.

      They made her comfortable. Fresh coffee. Donuts. (Did they bake their own?) They didn’t ridicule. They sent a crew and the coroner to the park to retrieve the body---a female, they said, but not an original---important because that was meeting a modus. Dianne had useful witness testimony to provide, but it was circumstantial. He could say she was vengeful, lying, and the body could have been there already. They’d be surveilling him now, and if he acted  they’d stop him. But they wanted more. They wanted to set him up.     

     Ouver suggested she could do it.                                                                      48

     “Oh, no. No. My kids need me.”

     “You wouldn’t be alone. We’d be there with back up.”

      Donovan reminded him, “She isn’t his fetish target.”

      “Lucky me.”

     “I’d say so.”

      Ouver offered,  “She could pretend.”

     Dianne said, “NO!”

      So, no was no. They could use one of their officers for the sting, but the best bait would be---a known Hollywood prostitute 

     The cops started asking each other. Who could be best? And, What would be better than--- Ron Andrews recruiting Virginia Castle?

      As Dianne was thinking, Who is this Virginia Castle?

       Donovan promised Ron not to tell Dianne all about Virginia if Ron would just talk to Virginia about protecting her colleagues out on the asphalt. Ron had her number at the new motel, the High-At, and met her in their lobby coffee shop.

     Virginia wanted a deal. She was clean and her price was, All records of petty possession and prostitution arrests disappeared from their files so she could apply to the Whoa-Hoa Police Training Academy.

    Maybe they thought they could just flunk her out later, but they agreed, and she could stop looking for a waitress’ job because they would take care of her expenses while she was undercover for them.                                                                                     49

    Virginia started carrying a sign that said, I HAD AN OPERATION AND I’M  REAL Everybody she knew thought she’d flipped out. Even tricks were wary, after they stopped and read her sign, which she held a flashlight to, and that was fine with her because she’d quit the game. She just had to wait until Dante stopped  for her.

     He must have seen her sign at night because it seemed he knew. When he did pull up beside her it was afternoon on a side street, as she was walking to lunch dressed like anybody and signless. He was in a Mercedes SUV and the window went down smoothly when he was next to the curb.. She’d seen lots of pictures of him, and it was Dante. She played the old role and asked,

          “Interested?”

           He said “That’s why I stopped.”

           “How much?”

           “Not into that.”

          “Oh?...So---what? Think your fancy car gets it free for you?”

           Said as a joke, smiling, as if to not to piss him off. She knew she couldn’t, but acted like she didn’t want to alienate his attention.

           “Why don’t you get in and we’ll discuss.”

            It was a given she would..

           “What’s there to discuss?”

          “You shoot skank?”

          “Oh, well, I mean, what’s that to you?”

          “I’m doing research. If you want to get high, I’ll pay for the heroin.”       50

          “Yeah? Research, huh?”

          “I’ll even pay for your time. A hundred dollars plus the free fix. That sound good?”

          “Mister, you’re not a psycho or anything, are you?”

           He laughed heartily as though that postulation were absurd, Virginia thinking, Damn, I’m good.

          Dante said, “No, I’m a Darwinian psychologist. A scientist. This is academic.”.

         “No shit?”        

         “Not a bit.”

          “You have the scag?”

          “I prefer calling it  project material.”

           “O-Kay! You have it already or you want me to score it?”

           “Perhaps you’d be more comfortable getting it where you usually do.”      
           “And where’s your shooting gallery? I mean, the lab.

          “Not to far away. Near the Tar Pits.”

           Where all the animal fossils were recovered from. A prehistoric woman too. Why didn’t he just dump them in there? DON’T say it.

           “I get a hundred plus the dope?”

           “Correct.”

           “Can you front me fifty dollars so I trust you?

            “Free heroin.”

             The money would become evidence, she couldn’t keep it, but bartering was convincing. She always wore the wire and an ankle bracelet, wanted to play the scene well, and hoped the Whoa-Hoa  audience was listening. This was expected to happen at night.                                                                                                                        51

          “Yeah, but I don’t need a fix. This would only be for old time’s sake. Like nostalgia.”

          “Well, never mind..”

           She knew he wanted her in that car.

           “Yeah, okay.”

           Suddenly he had a hundred dollar bill in his hand to show her.

           “I can’t cut this in half.”

          “I don’t mind taking it whole.”

          “I’ll let you hold it then. You keep your end of the deal, you keep the bill.”

           “Give it here.”

           “First get in.”

           The door opened.

           “I can get out again?”

            “You won’t have to.”

             She sat in the passenger’s seat, he handed her the bill, and the door closed with a sound like suction. She didn’t expect it would open if she tried, and thought, My fuckin’ back up better be tuned in.

            He asked, “So, where to?”                              

           “Hey, look, I’m not a police officer.”

            “Didn’t imagine you were.”

            “Are you?”

             He laughed again. The laugh was bizarre, and he said,

            “Let’s go meet your connection.”                                                                     52

             “You didn’t answer my question.”

             “I’m not with the police.”

              “Sixth Street, couple blocks  west of Alvarado. Mc Arthur Park area.”

                That was a good time consuming ride, and when they got there she had him pull into a depressing mini-mall with a liquor store, laundromat, dry cleaners.

                   ‘The laundromat. And he won’t have change.”

                   “How much do you need?”

                   “Forty dollar hit will do me.”

                    He parked in a space in front of the laundromat. and handed her three twenties.

                    “Get sixty to be safe.”

                    “Mister, I haven’t been doing this. I won’t shoot sixty.”

                    “Better to have enough. You can save a little. What do you call it---a wake up?”

                      “I’m awake.”

                      Her connection was Lester, a petty dealer who was himself an addict, supporting his own habit by selling. Once inside, with Lester and the machines and a woman nodding on a bench,  she gave Lester the sixty. Lester immediately went out to the car, where Dante had the window down, and threw the heroin bag  in on Dante’s chest.

                    Dante protested, “What the fuck it this, a set up?            

                  Not what she wanted him to suspect. Lester laughed. He had appraised Dante as her  trick, was having some fun and wanted to rattle him in his Mercedes, but she    53   could have done without it  She got back in the car.

      They were in Dante’s house. The plan was that she’d go right up to the point where she had the needle in her arm, when his intent was obvious and confirmed, and the squad would burst in. Were they on her twenty four seven?

      She had a hustler’s bag of tricks, with one that usually worked, and her only strategy now seemed postponement because if the troops weren’t  here, when they realized she wasn’t around they’d track her and would be.

      “So you say you do research? Does that mean you write reports?”

      “Of course.”

      “Well, I write too...I wonder if you’d read a little of my notebook?”

       “Why?”

       “Just to evaluate.”

       “I’ll look if you get yourself ready. Tie off your arm.”

         Donovan figured, afternoon, Virginia was just being a homebody, not posturing in daylight, and with time to fill for himself, why he took another chippie up to the now unfairly infamous lane. The department didn’t have the budget to keep round the clock on Virginia anyway, had pretty much determined the time frame of Dante’s moves as night, and Donovan could go missing for a short spell.

           Dante showed little interest in her literary effort. To stall more,  she tried engaging him with conversation.                                                                                                    54

          “Why do you like us?”

          “Us?”

         “You know---post operatives?”

          “What makes you think I like you?” 

          “You chose me.”

           “I like precision.”

           “That doesn’t make any sense.”

           “Thank you. Your surgery doesn’t make any sense. A man in drag doesn’t make any sense..”

            She hoped the troupe were listening in real time, but  if the weren’t it was all recorded. “There were a couple of them found in the park. ODs. Would you know anything about those?”

       She should have said ‘us’, not ‘them’.

     “Lets say hypothetically I could. But if they buy the heroin, like you did, nobody killed them. Those who want to live, live. And those who don’t, die.”

      “What about those who shoot too much by accident?”

     “Can’t determine that. It was their choice. Me, I’d try to resuscitate. If I couldn’t, I couldn’t.”

     “You could bring them to an emergency room. Call 911.”

      “Might be hard to explain. I’d try to save them. I wouldn’t kill them, or let them die. But I’d want them too..”

      “And the reason?”

      “Imprecision. Altering their specifications. You’re very slow tying off you arm.”

      “In a moment. Told you its been a while. Have to prepare my mind. What do you believe, that you’re allowed such control over life?”                                             55

       “Hey, we’re talking hypothetically. But, believe? Like, in God?”

        “Right.”

        ‘I believe in myself. I can’t find a more credible candidate.”

        “You’re God?”

        “To myself I am .I’m a Danteist.”

         “Whoa.”

         “Yeah, whoa..  I’m just noticing---your small teeth, you small shoe size. No Adam’s apple.”

         Oh, shit!

       “Had an applectomy.”

      “There’s no such thing.”

       “Sure there is. Surgery into the throat through your mouth, the way they used to take tonsils out. Then some hormones.”

         “You’re a real woman.”

         “Exactly the position I take.”

         “No, I mean always were. Why are you tricking me?”

         “Mister, you picked me up. I was a small boy. Abused and that stunted growth I Iiked women, some liked me, but the bullies chased them off. I had the operation to attract women, not men. And attract money.”

         “I think bullshit, but whatever you are, I’m going to see you shoot that scag.”

         “Well, that was the deal.”

       “So do it. Now!”

        He came up with a hand gun. Where in hell was Whoa-Hoa?

      “Oh, come on , if you shoot me I can’t shoot the shit into my arm, right?”    56

      “I can.”

       “That wouldn’t be the same to you?”

     “This is an exception. You want to live, do what you came here for. Fast.”

     “How do I know you won’t kill me when I’m helpless?”

     “You don’t. But its your only chance.”

      “Put like that...”

      She tied the belt tight around her bicep, put the needle in a vein and drew blood into the syringe that had the white powder inside, the substances blended, and she slammed the mixture back into her arm.

     Her body slackened and she sat back on the sofa, the back of her skull on the top of the headrest cushion as her limbs and torso went limp. Even with her eyes closed, she was aware of what Dante was doing. His vision of God, he himself, was engaged in a sacred rite of jerking off. She felt some reassurance that by Dianne Andrews’ account, he   wasn’t into more than stroking himself. and hoped that pattern held.. But a moment before he seemed  ready to ‘get there’ he put the pistol down on a table, pushed her lengthwise on the sofa,  lay beside her, then whispered to himself, “So, a real woman today.”

     Virginia opened her eyes and said with thick tongued, barely decipherable speech, “You didn’t want Dianne.”

     “Who? You’re awake? Who’s Dianne? Oh...How do you know…?  No, Dianne’s a mommy. Not the specification for that. I want exactness. A whore.”

     He began tugging at her jeans snap. As many times as Virginia had done this, she’d acknowledged in recovery she never wanted to. And not with him for love nor money.

    He was getting her zipper undone. She put her fingers together to form a firm shaft, then rammed it hard into his testicles. He yelped with surprise, pain and outrage, as she grabbed hold and squeezed with all her strength He put his strong hands around her throat and began strangling her. They struggled beside each other, the contest being, could he stand the pain until she lost consciousness or would he let go first? The struggle lasted seconds, but seemed  to her to be happening in slow motion.                                   57

     The glass on the big French window to the porch let out with a loud crack and shards of glass flew into the living room. Sections of glass still stuck in the frame were batted away, and she saw Donovan step through the gap that had been the window. He was dressed like a tourist---three quarter length khaki trousers and a T-shirt---but had his badge pinned on his waist band at the hip, and a gun in his hand.

     Dante jumped up, but if he had any inclination to flee or go for the gun, he took too long comprehending what happened. Donovan ordered him to put his hands up, and he did.

     Dianne got easily off the sofa. Donovan appraised her clear eyes and alert demeanor, and said,

      “That couldn’t have been too strong.”

      “Protein powder. I switched.. No way was I shooting heroin.”

      “How do you feel from that?”

     “Like I might get hair on my chest. Why are only you here?”

      “The rest are coming. Lester called me.. I was…busy… thought you had a day off..”

     “Right, your mea culpa….Lester?”                                                                    58

     “He’s been undercover for us .In return for not doing any time on his minor dealing busts. Of course over there he’s on LAPD  turf. They cut the deal, lent him out to us.”

     He seemed to remember Dante, who had his hands up, his  penis dangling, and was gawking at them like they were a soap opera.

    “I told you to put your hands on your head.”

    “You only said put them up.”

     “Virginia, didn’t I say on his head?”

     “Sure did.”

      Donovan said, “So do it now.”

      From Virginia, “Shoot him if he doesn’t. I‘ll say he attacked you.” And to Dante she said “But first get dressed. That’s disgusting.”

     Dante complied with both demands.  

     The tapes of her imprisonment were widely heard on TV, Donovan was hailed as a hero, and Virginia let it slide that he almost got there too late .She didn’t go to the police academy after all. She could have, but didn’t need to because her vocal quality first got her voice over offers, and then her improvisational skill got the attention of a sit com producer casting a ‘pretend reality’ show wherein the suspension of disbelief was that the characters wouldn’t know their lives were being filmed .and viewed by the world every week. Virginia wasn’t a star yet, but—she had a part.

     As a free lance film editor often on his own hours, Ron still liked long lunch breaks and driving around observing everything. He saw that the old prop car had been transformed into a colorfully garish ad board for Universal Studios Tours, and was being driven by none other than Donovan, who bought it at auction when it was released as evidence, then let Universal pay him to advertise.                                                59

    He saw Donovan pick one up, another standing lady, and did go along behind for a while, but there was no longer any reason to be following, and in that car Donovan certainly didn’t care who knew. But Ron was in the park, so he went to the Griffith Park Observatory.

     At the Observatory parapet, high and windy above Hollywood, there were coin operated telescopes, and he paid for another clandestine view of the home turf. He could move the telescope around, and in his first view was a poster on a building at Hollywood and Vine recruiting extras to play audience members in the Hollywood Bowl at a make believe concert by a non-existent rock band.

     He shifted the scope to another street, where a lass was interacting with---by demeanor and attire---a tourist from that little town somewhere that all the US tourists came from, and bought their clothes at the J C Penny’s.

    The street woman was shooing him away. Maybe, no car?. Maybe she thought he was a cop, overdoing it with the camo. Maybe he was a cop. Maybe he was a tourist playing a cop. Who knew?

     Ron spoke to him, though of course he’d never know. “Welcome to Hollywood, my friend. She’s only a whore, but you can’t have her.”

     The telescope went blurry, he heard the coin drop. Time was up and he turned away, looking out at the gray plate of sky over the dreams and fantasies

      And, talking to himself still, said, “Unless maybe you happen to be one.”