PART 2 BACK HOME WAS IT SERENDIPITY? IT WAS SOMETHING
Grub said, “I don’t nab them off the street.”
His contact sounded desperate, and was calling on the safe line.
“Its an easy shot. Parked across the street south of downtown.”
“You say you already have it?”
“Right.”
“Well, deliver it. I can’t strip it on the street, nor drive it.”
“You tell me when you’re coming, I’ll have the motor running.”
“What is it?”
“A Corolla, recent.””
“Why can’t you drive it.”
“Afraid.”
“Me too.”
End of conversation. Grub thought, That’s one I don’t have to pay delivery for. I’ll bring Vin Wino---VW---from Crack Camp to get it, pay him with a jug.
A lot went down after that, that meant his caller couldn’t drive or start a
motor or do anything else ever again, though Grub didn’t know. First he
scouted for the exact location, and when he found the Corolla looked for VW.
At Crack Camp along the railroad trestle he was interrupted by Manhattan who
ran things thereabouts. and said, “You know you want one of my rock vendors do
you a favor, you ask my permission.”
“Just need VW for an errand.”
“Like the last one?”
“Oh no.” The last one cost him. He had VW bury the body of a car owner who
traced his Vehicle ID Number to Grub Tows and Auto Parts.
“So what’s this mission?”
“Drive a car.”
“You lifting them off the street now?”
“Its already lifted. I can justify it. I get stolen car reports, just taking it to store
safely, will report it to the police.”
“If its all cool and legal like, why don’t you just tow it?”
“My intention- to- report is back up if needed., but you know I might forget to do
that right away, say it was stripped when I got it.”
“So you don’t want them to find you with it first. Two hundred dollars to
rent VW.”
“I can’t make any money paying that for delivery. Parts sell slowly.’
“Look elsewhere.”
“Fifty dollars is going rate.”
“One fifty. Not a penny less.”
“A hundred.”
“My man.”
“One twenty five. One thirty five.”
“One forty. Vinny, get over here.”
To Grub, Manhattan said, “You know about insurance, right?”
“No.”
“He gets busted, you have to find me another vendor or will have to be you.”
“It won’t come to that.”
“Sometimes does. Just had such an experience, and good help is hard to find
these days. But old VW’s at least as reliable as a crackhead.”
“I’ll be careful with him.”
“VW, go with this fella, do what he says. Now you, Grub, up front cash in this
hand of mine. And Vin has the shakes. Get him a small bottle of high alcohol
content wine before he attempts driving.”
“You know he has the shakes?”
“I watch out for my employees’ needs, I do.”
“I’ll see the man gets straight.”
Grub drove VW to the Corolla in the tow truck. There was a family
living in the car. Grub told VW, “Just walk up and say ‘Out of my car.’”
“You have the key?”
“No.”
“How am I going to start it?”
“Shit! You don’t know how to hot wire. I’m not getting in that car. Why I brought
you. Manhattan owes me a refund.”
“He doesn’t usually make refunds.”
“A replacement then, though I do know somebody who knows how. and the shed
he lives in.”
“I’m relieved of duty?”
“No, you’re still going to drive. I just want this old boy to start her. Come on.”
Grub and VW knocked politely on the shed door, creating a noise that sounded
like their fingers were tin cans.
It was opened by that detective that had been in the National Enquirer for using
local psychics to solve and stop a kidnapping. He was with an old Mexican guy,
and was mighty nervous with the gun he was pointing, like he didn’t trust it. He
growled at Grub,
“Who are you? What do you want?”
“Just a friend of Johnny’s, come to say hi.”
“He didn’t have any friends.”
“Well, acquaintance. You say ‘Didn’t’?”
“Your heard right.”
“What happened?”
“Before you start asking questions, answer mine.”
“You asked what I want. Here to visit.”
“It’s the other one I’m interested in.”
“What other?”
“Who are you?”
“Oh. Name is John Grub.”
“Well whatever business you had with Johnny, best forget about it.”
“Yes sir. Come on, VW. We’re not welcome.
Grub drove VW back to the camp. Manhattan listened, tsk tsked VW for not
knowing how to hot wire, but to keep his rep up provided Grub with another patron who assured he could start a car without a key.
Grub brought Dunn, his tweaker-on-loan, to the Corolla, gave the family a quick eviction order, and waited until he heard Dunn turn the motor on and saw smoke coming out of the tailpipe. He drove off in the tow truck, in a direction that did not directly lead to his shop, which the Corolla was destined for.
After the door knock interruption, Dayton had to call for uniforms, forensics guys, the coroner, and Poppa had to stay as a witness.
While he was explaining what happened to the chief, his phone beeped. The computer GPS was now working in the Corolla stolen from him, because the engine was on and the car was moving, not far away.
To his chief, Dayton said, “Sir, I have another case.”
Dayton being pop media star Dayton, he was free to make his own assignments and left to retrieve his car. In plain clothes, following the signal from the Corolla and driving an undercover car, when he saw his car ahead on the country road, he had no siren to make it stop, and, better, followed to see where it went.
When it went to the yard of Grub’s Tow and Used Auto Parts, he stopped at a surveillance distance to see if in that yard he’d see John Grub, whom he’d just met. Was that serendipity? Well, It was something, wasn’t it?
Then the tow truck pulled up with no car hitched to it, and Grub drove it into the yard. Dayton waited for the anticipated arrival of his car that was showing on GPS signal as approaching.
The family that had been living in the Corolla certainly thought it was serendipity They did their own surveillance from brush, saw the medical types take a body shrouded in muslin out of the shed, saw the yellow CRIME SCENE tape strung in front of the open doorway, and waited for dark to crawl under the tape and occupy.
They weren’t a patriarchal family. That figure, Harry, was missing since St. Louis, when the car wouldn’t take third gear anymore. They had driven from Portchester, New York, Harry and Betty with the two kids---Barry 10 and Tina 8---and Betty’s younger sister Molly.
Without Harry, trying for the promised land of L.A., they made it to OKC from St. Louis in second gear, where, as they were pouring gas into the stalled carburetor, flames started shooting from the engine and they all ran like hell from the old Dodge’s fiery explosion as it burned beyond possibility of residing in.
So, without even that, they came upon an unlocked Corolla that would do until somebody chased them away, which just happened.
Dayton made the collar on John Grub and Dunn Talbert. He intended to bring Grub up on charges, but Dunn had value as a witness. He told the tale of how he was recruited by Manhattan. Manhattan was paid, didn’t lose anything that they got busted, but he’d be suspicious if Dunn was let go.
Dayton hung on to Dunn in the jail for a day while he figured out how to traverse the minefield of using Dunn and not getting him killed as an informer. The shed. He could place him in there and supply him with enough rock to stay, while he decided how to use him---and let Manhattan think he and Grub just got themselves busted, which was actually what happened. Dayton could chippy from the police drug locker. The court never wanted to see the physical evidence, accepted the written certification. Eventually the stored evidence got burned, or…
In the evening, he drove Dunn to the shed. Something strange already going on in there. The door was closed on the tape, and he heard kids and women’ voices, but no adult male’s. He listened a while, then politely called in, “Everybody properly dressed?”
The door opened a couple of inches, and there was candle light in there. He saw the face of a young woman, who said authoritatively, ”Cant’ you read. This is a crime scene.”
An inner female voice said, “Molly, that can’t be Harry..”
“How could he find us?” To Dayton she said, “If you don’t go we’ll call the police.”
“ Only want to add one member.”
“He could be a danger to us.”
“I’ll leave him handcuffed.”
“Who are you?”
He badged and said “Detective Dayton, OKC Police.”
“And you’re not throwing us out?”
“I believe in families staying together.”
“The initiator of this one didn’t believe that.”
“Sorry to hear, but not surprised. If we leave this addition here, there’s a small budget to feed him. I’ll see you get that. He’ll be smoking some crack, so he won’t have much appetite.”
“He could be a blessing?’
“An unlikely one, but maybe.”
Sharon and Edgar came home too. Missed Ma’s home cooking, Pa’s earthy life coaching. They missed Carmen too, and there she was involved again with her former nemesis and abuser Rake, who was drug free and smiling---an expression they’d never before witnessed. He said his rehab program ceased to exist during the ‘a’, but he remembered what they thought him, the most important mandate being, “Don’t use.”
They were all at a table in the café. The twins being both alike, Edgar spoke for both, sounding like he was joking with Rake listening, but he wasn’t, and they couldn’t anyway fool Carmen.
“We’re Jealous.”
Rake got up and went to his dishwashing station in the kitchen.
Carmen said, “Give him a chance.”
Sharon said, “Seems like he’s had one.”
“He’s different now. If its any solace we don’t…you know.”
From Edgar came, “None of us ever did.”
“So what’s the problem.”
Sharon said, “We’re insecure. We admit it.”
“You’ll get to like him”
“It’s the feeling of loss.”
“You think I’m not still connected to you guys? All we’ve been through?”
“We’re afraid there’s not enough to go around.”
“I’d never expect this of you two.”
“That we’re human? Haven’t you ever been jealous?”
“I’m young yet. I guess I could learn.”
Carmen got up to use the temporary outhouse, municipal water not yet supplied. When she was gone, they spoke in an aspirate because Rake was in the kitchen.
Sharon said, “We’re overreacting. She’s asexual.”
“He doesn’t say he is.”
“He’s respecting that.”
“Georgie arrived in this world, didn’t he?”
“We have to live with it, like it or not. The Spirit is speaking to us.”
Was Dayton getting extra perceptive too? Or was it just, knowing about Carmen and Rake, and seeing the twins demeanor, detective that he was, he was deducing on arrival at the café? Because he said to them, “Welcome home. I hate to interrupt your domestic strife, but a distraction might be therapeutic. I need your help.”
Dayton had led the chase by him, Edgar and Carmen, to save Sharon, had the faith in Edgar’s psychic connection to her, and in Portland rid the world of Strode. Hopefully. This time.
She said, “You know we’re always of service if you need.”
“I’ve sort of adopted a homeless family. They’re in that shed where the last bad…no, the most recent badman…shot himself. Could you look in on them when I can’t, see they have what they need?”
“You want to introduce us to them?”
“That would be magnificent.”
At the shed, Dayton and the twins remaining outside, he said, “These are two good fiends of mine who are going to be on your side.” He was addressing Betty, the mother, the eldest there. “If anybody else thinks to squat here, you tell them you rent from the owner, me, Detective Dayton Dayton of the OKC Police Dept, and trespassers will be breaking and entering with intent to commit robbery and assault, and shall so be prosecuted.”
“Can I write all that down?”
“Just improvise, it will be more effective. End it with, So, get your you know what out of here.”
“You can say ass. I’ve been around. Believe me, the kids have heard worse from their father.”
“I wasn’t going to say ass, but you can.”
“I’d find a more colorful phrase too.”
“It’s the message that will count. And remember you have back up.”
To reinforce that promise, he presented an old cell phone.
“Remember these? The kind you could just make a phone call on? You still can. My number and theirs’ are in here”
“I do thank you.”
“May you not have to live like this for long.”
Dunn, who’d been an almost invisible outline Dayton saw in the flickering candle light inside, asserted his presence with, “I don’t know about that.”
Dayton took that as affirmation that at least to him living conditions were satisfactory.
Harry had continued his journey to the L.A. promised land alone, hitchhiked into Oklahoma City, spent a night at a mission, and the next day saw his wife’s kid sister Molly had a job passing out advertising flyers in the downtown. She didn’t spot him, and he stalked from a distance until she was through giving out fliers and went to the shed.
The sagging and soggy from rain crime scene tape was disconcerting, but they had to be in there, so he knocked. Betty opened it, and upon seeing him forgot any planned expression of what part of anatomy should go away, just said, “Get out of here.”
“Break my heart.” To Barry 10 and Tina 8 gawking incredulously, he petitioned, “Hey, kids”
Kids were unresponsive. He said to Betty, “Got them brainwashed against me. Breaking my balls too.”
“Can’t break what you don’t have.”
“Hurt a guy, why don’t you. Let me in to rest.”
“Go or I’ll call the cops.”
Harry had a good laugh then, until he heard another male voice from inside say, “She aint shittin’ about that,” and he saw a guy in manacles.
Betty again said, “Go!” and slammed the door as hard as she could without dislocating it off the fragile hinges.
Harry wasn’t giving up hope. He found a TV box and set that up as habitat a few yards from the shed. And Betty called Dayton about her box squatter ex.
Dayton came when she said Harry was present, and was civil when he asked Harry to come out for a chat. He looked with concern at the forbidding sky and said, “Carboard box won’t do. We’re going to have some weather, and you’re in tornado country now.”
“Maybe I can find some tin too, reinforce it.”
“You probably can, but I can do better by you.”
“How so.”
“Let’s take a ride.”
“Not to jail?”
“No.”
In the car, Dayton said, “The man you want to see where I’m taking you is called Manhattan. Just hang around a while, let him know you want a job.”
“Oh, I don’t know I do. I didn’t say that.”
Dayton was of two opinions about homelessness. There were some it was imposed on, like the shed family, and those who were willing, like Harry.
“There’s no labor. He’ll give you a job selling for him, but your real job will be reporting to me what Manhattan tells you to do. I’ll see you eat and have a place to slep at night.” Not quite at the Hyatt. He was planning to talk to the Reverend, get Harry nightly priority at the mission.
”You want me to be a snitch.”
“Up to you. You can stay in your box if you want, just not next to the shed.”
“Let me check out this camp.”
What to do with Dunn? Didn’t need him now. He’d waited too long to charge him, but he’d still be in danger if released too soon. He’d leave him handcuffed in the shed for the moment, but he was no longer necessary and the witness protection allotment was running out.
He visited the shed to impress on Dunn that he’d have to prepare himself for that eventuality, only to see that his handcuffed detainee was holding hands with Molly.
He remarked, “That can’t be easy to do in cuffs.”
Betty said, “He’s quite talkative when he smokes that stuff. You know, personable. And they’ve actually found a way, late at night when they think everybody’s asleep, to…you know.”
“Don’t tell me!”
But she had. “I don’t care so much about that. Is she smoking with him?”
“I haven’t witnessed such. I don’t think so, but I don’t know.”
”I have to do something about this.”
“I think too late to break them up.”
“What have I started?”
“She has nothing more than him, but they have each other.”
“She didn’t have his curse.”
“If that’s what she’s doing, she’d have found it without him or you. She’s an adult, if a young one. Not on you.”
Soon Dunn could plausibly go back to the camp as a loser/user jail kickout. Dayton was already weaning him with a reduced drug supply, so It was not likely he’d be inclined to share, if he ever was. But maybe Molly was getting high from side stream smoke. What about all of them, in this tight space? That would be on him.
Dunn had to go, before Dayton created a family of crackheads. He provided a washing machine box close to the shed and told Dunn, “You’ll get product provided you stay in there. You can go in the house to the toilet…” (It was close enough to downtown that they had water) “…eat if you have any appetite, but otherwise stay in here tripping. I’ll take the cuffs off.”
He gave it two days and went back to bring Dunn more medicine, be sure he was staying inside. He was, but unfortunately Molly was in the box too.
“I’m not supplying crack if you’re with her.” But he didn’t smell the smoke.
“I don’t want it. The cutback got me off it without a bad withdrawal. Just give food in the house. We’ll eat over there too.”
“If you’re not accepting rock, and not going out for it, you can stay in the shed too But time is limited. The subsidy is ending. Y’all have to find some source of income.”
Molly said “Fliers.”
“That is something.”
The next time he saw Dunn and Molly they were on different streets downtown, as was Betty with the kids, all passing out fliers. Betty told him they were still in the shed, would accept the food aid as long as it lasted.
Out at the café, as the twins got to know new Rake, Sharon fell under his spell too. Carmen was okay with that, being mutually attracted to Sharon and Edgar, and she and Edgar became an item. Dayton thought it was a kind of spiritual-for-the-moment menage a quatre, expressed as platonic for now, but had to remind himself to remain a loyal family man. Was it serendipity? It was something, wasn’t it?
Manhattan wasn’t quite as bad as he made people believe, but there was a sentence to serve. Mostly it was over arranging the hiding a body, He had nothing to do with the initial act, but he knew the jingle, “Don’t do the crime, If you can’t do the time.” And he cooperated in court against John Grub.
Grub was the one who met the big time, convicted as the actual killer, and got life without the possibility of. Pathetic VW had a stretch ahead of him too for his part in disposing of a corpse.
And Harry knew, after legal proceedings originating from his information, that continuing his odyssey to L.A. alone had to be a good survival strategy.
The rest of them kept on. Life continued, such as it was. Things would change again. Serendipity? Sometimes its opposite? There were more synchronicities, dramas, to come. They knew there were. Of course there were.
Meanwhile, back in Portland, Gus and Spokes were still at the Paradym Club and….will have to visit them, see what they’re up to now.