America Rising (11 page)

We made awkward introductions and she poured two cups of coffee and set out a plate of Christmas cookies while I unpacked my pocket video camera and set it on a miniature tripod. I wasn’t much of a shooter but the video team at Public Interest would take my raw footage, edit it, mix in complementary footage, tweak the sound and picture, and come up with two, five and twelve-minute reports for our clients and for our own website too. We’d also post the entire unedited interview so we couldn’t be accused of manipulating the facts.

“I’ll be with you in a minute, Josh,” Julie said, “I just have to check on Megan.”

I sipped my coffee and eyed the cookies hungrily. They looked like something you’d see in one of those glossy, four-color food magazines. They were delicious too. I was wiping the crumbs off my shirt when Julie emerged from her daughter’s bedroom.

“She’s finally asleep, thank God,” she said. “This is a lot for a five-year-old to take.” She sat in a cracked leather armchair facing the camera and gave a wry smile. “I guess I’m ready for my second fifteen minutes now. Maybe I’ll even get my own reality show. We’ll call it ‘Making It and Losing It in America.’” Her eyes welled up and she took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I guess this is a lot for a thirty-five-year-old single mom to take too.”

It’s times like this that make me doubt my chosen profession. Julie Teichner wasn’t a publicity hound or a celebrity. She didn’t seek out the media spotlight but it was trained on her anyway. And here I was, shining that blinding light again, taking her pain and turning it into a product for all the world to consume. But how else would the world know? The real stories of real people are the only things that matter. Everything else is just filigree. Or so I choose to believe.

I swallowed my ambivalence and turned on the camera.

“Tell me about life since the video,” I said, just to get her comfortable talking to the camera.

“It was sort of fun at first,” she said, smiling wistfully at the memory. “Seeing myself on TV. People would stop me in stores, in line at the bank, walking down the street, and say they appreciated what I did, that it gave them a little hope. I had five thousand new friends on my Facebook page. Megan kind of enjoyed it too. The kids at school would say, ‘I saw your mom on TV,’ and she’d feel really proud. That lasted a couple of weeks.”

Her smile faded. The memories weren’t so good now.

“Then it all changed. Someone found out my phone number and address and email and posted them on one of those hateful anti-every-thing websites. I was just. . . overwhelmed. Phone calls, emails, even letters. Thousands of them. And the things people said! Terrible things, ugly things. People would yell at me from their cars, throw trash in my yard. It was like we were criminals. I changed my phone number and email address, started picking up my mail at the post office, closed my Facebook page. I had to call the police twice because people were stalking me. I was afraid for me but even more for Megan.”

Tears pooled in her eyes. “I never asked for any of this,” she said haltingly. “I never wanted to be a celebrity or a symbol or a spokesman for anything. All I wanted was a good home, to be a good wife and mother. Now I don’t know if I’m good at anything.”

I moved to turn off the camera but she stopped me.

“I’m sorry, Josh,” she said. “I get a little emotional sometimes.” She dabbed at her eyes with a tissue.

“It’s okay, Julie. Really. You want to stop? Pick it up tomorrow? Or not at all.”

She shook her head. “I’m alright. Ask your questions.”

“Where do you go from here?” I asked gently. “Physically. Emotionally.”

“I’m don’t know,” she said. “This is my home. My parents are here, my friends are here. Megan’s school and friends are here. But I don’t know if we can stay. My sister lives in San Diego and we’ve talked about my moving there and the two of us opening a little bakery.”

I would have bought stock in it right then. “You made those cookies?” I said. “They look like they came from some fancy restaurant. Delicious too.”

Julie smiled shyly. “I’m a pretty good baker, I think. John always used to say that. And I’d always sell out at school fundraisers. To leave all this and move across the country. . . I just don’t know.”

“How is Megan taking things? Have you talked with her about—”

A soft tapping at the front door made me stop. Not loud but insistent. Who knocks on someone’s door in a deserted neighborhood at midnight? I wanted to tell her not to answer. That you never know who or what could be just beyond that thin wooden slab. But this was her neighborhood, her neighbors, the ones who stood with her in the snow, risking their lives to keep her and her daughter from being thrown into the street. She got up and went to the door. Threw the deadbolt. Reached for the chain lock—

CRASH!

The door exploded inward. The frame splintered. Julie staggered back and fell. Three bodies—two large, one small; two men, one woman—burst in. They were clad in black, wearing ski masks. Each held a small boxy pistol with a stub of a barrel. I’d seen guns like that on TV; they looked even deadlier in real life. I jumped up and got in the first man’s face. He slashed at me with his pistol, tore a channel through my cheek. Blood splashed on my collar. I staggered and pitched to the floor.

The second man yanked Julie up, threw her on the couch, kicked me in the ribs, motioned towards her with his pistol. I crawled over and sat next to her, blood really flowing now. The small body, the woman, holstered her pistol. She reached beneath her nylon jacket, produced a tiny video camera and swept it across the room, then over Julie and me on the couch, the two men pointing guns at us.

All of a sudden I got it.

This was payback. Payback for that day in the blowing, swirling snow when a handful of men and women faced down an angry Dan Majerle and a squad of blue uniforms, when they stood in the path of wealth and power. This was the response. A warning. A lesson. The video would be posted to show with brutal clarity that anyone who stood up would quickly be knocked back down

I tried to think it through, look for a way out. There wasn’t any. They had numbers, guns, surprise. We had nothing. Julie trembled beside me, the enormity of the outrage beginning to sink in.

“Who are you people? Why are you doing this to us?” she sobbed, blinking away the tears.

“Shut up, lady.”

The man was the largest of the two. His voice was rich with arrogance and contempt. The woman trained her video camera on him as he loomed over Julie. “You think you can steal someone else’s property? Think your neighbors with their little popguns will protect you? You have no idea the people you fucked with. You’ve got five minutes to get your stuff and get the hell out of here.” He turned to the smaller man and barked, “Back bedroom. Get the kid.”

“Don’t you touch her!”

Julie Teichner flew off the couch like a madwoman, hands like claws grasping for the man’s throat. If she was forty pounds heavier with a fraction of his skills she would have torn out his windpipe. He swatted her back like a bug, wiggled his pistol at me. For the first time, the woman spoke. “For crissakes, we don’t have time for this. Let her get the damn kid.”

The big man glared at her, thought the better of it. He switched his gaze to Julie and said, “Go.”

Julie went. The second man followed. The bedroom door opened. Megan’s quiet sobs filtered into the living room. I could hear Julie murmuring to her. The sobs rose to hysterical. More murmuring. A gruff voice interrupting. The sobs rose, then fell. Drawers opened, closed. A suitcase unsnapped, then snapped back up again. More sobbing.

The man standing over me sneered. “What are you, the boyfriend?” he said. His eyes lit on my reporter’s notebook on the table, then the camera and tripod. “So you’re some kind of snoop. You bonking the bitch?”

“Fuck you.”

He laughed. It was a harsh, grating sound. “Ooh, tough guy.” He tossed a box of tissues in my lap. “Clean yourself up, tough guy. You’re bleeding all over the furniture.”

I took a wad and held it to my cheek. The wound stung and began to throb. I’d probably need stitches. Julie came out of the bedroom holding Megan’s hand, the little girl hiding behind her legs, face red, eyes swollen. She was still sobbing, very softly. The man came behind them, carrying a pair of suitcases like a porter. The woman with the camera recorded every move.

The big man who’d hit me opened the shattered front door. “Get in the car,” he said.

Julie paled, her voice trembled. “It. . . it doesn’t run. Mitch—my neighbor—said it was the alternator. I was saving up to get it fixed. . .”

Everyone stopped. Tension crackled like a static charge. Everyone was impatient, edgy. This was almost over, and now complications. The woman’s brown eyes flashed. “Check it,” she said to the big man. He glared again. “Don’t give me that,” she said. “Just do it.”

I didn’t like the feeling of this. Things could go south in a heartbeat. I caught the woman’s eye. “Forget her car,” I said. “We’ll take mine.”

The tension eased a bit.

“Fine,” she said. “Keys.”

I handed them to the big man. He popped the trunk. The small man tossed the bags in and went to a big gray Hummer parked behind me in the driveway. He got in, got the engine running. The big man pushed me to the car, handed me the keys, shoved me in the driver’s seat. I twisted the key in the ignition, clicked on the heater. Waited.

The woman pulled her pistol, stepped into Julie until their bodies were almost touching, put her face in close. Julie didn’t flinch, just stared back with a preternatural calm. Megan’s wailing grew louder. The woman’s voice was low and deadly, “You leave here. You don’t come back. You don’t go to the police. You keep your mouth shut. We can always find you. Find the kid. Mom and Dad. Anyone we want. Clear?”

Julie just stared.

“Yes,” she said, finally.

The woman stepped aside and led Julie and Megan to the car. The big man held open the door, watched them get in. He rapped on the window to get my attention. “We’ll follow you,” he said. “Just to make sure you get where you’re going.”

The Hummer backed up, waited for us in the street. I backed up too, heading for anywhere away from them. The Hummer’s lights blazed in my rear-view mirror.

“Where to?” I asked Julie. “You have friends, family? Any place I can take you?”

“No!”

The force of her response made me jump.

“I don’t want them involved, Josh. Not in any of this. Just take us to a hotel. There’s a cheap one a few miles from here.”

“I’ll take you to mine,” I said. “It’s close and they’re not exactly overrun with business. I’ll get you and Megan a room and in the morning you can decide what to do. We could all use a few hours rest.”

Ten minutes later we were at the hotel, the Hummer on our bumper the entire time. It wasn’t much of a hotel, rather a slowly decaying motor court that looked better in the postage stamp-sized photograph on its website than up close. It was now after one in the morning. The clerk at the desk was so surprised to see anyone he couldn’t stash his copy of
Hustler
quite fast enough. He stared at my cut face; I gave him hard eyes back. He looked away, embarrassed. Maybe frightened too. He checked me in, handed me the keys to two rooms. I didn’t bother thanking him. Let him go back to his magazine.

I went out to the car, got our suitcases, led Julie and Megan into the seedy lobby, down the chilly hallway to their room. I waited outside until Megan had checked under the bed, in every drawer, every corner, making sure no more bad guys were lurking. Thirty minutes later she was satisfied. I was exhausted. I said goodnight and staggered off to my room. It was as crummy as the lobby but there were no bad guys under the bed. I barely got my clothes off before I fell on the lumpy mattress and slept.

It was fitful sleep at best. I dreamt of blood and violence and death. My cheek hurt. Dried blood was still caked on my face. I got up with the sun, cleaned up as best I could, got in the car and found a twenty-four hour convenience store. I bought bandages and antiseptic, a large bottle of orange juice and one of those breakfast sandwiches that tastes like congealed grease wrapped in library paste.

In my room again I cleaned and bandaged my wound, chugged the juice and gobbled the sandwich; for all its nutritional qualities I could have eaten the bag. Then I went back to bed and slept soundly for two hours. That helped a lot. I took a long, hot shower, carefully shaved and rebandaged my cheek, changed into fresh clothes.

It was almost nine o’clock, when real stores would be open. I went to the bank, to a giant Walmart and a local coffee shop that sold home-made pastries for ridiculously low prices. I filled up a half-dozen bags. I lugged my loot up to Julie’s room and knocked on the door. “Julie, it’s Josh,” I called. “I brought you something to eat, some other stuff too. I’ll leave it outside if this isn’t a good time.”

“Just a minute.”

I waited a minute, another couple minutes more, then Julie opened the door. She looked better than last night, though not by much. She was wrapped in a heavy bathrobe, her face pale and drawn, her eyes red. Megan had stopped sobbing but still cowered behind her mother. She’d probably kept Julie up most of the night. I set my bags on the room’s single table and began pulling stuff out.