Brooklyn Noir (40 page)

Rain threatened and the beach was empty. Seagulls dove and screeched, fighting over a ragged piece of food. The gangster looked out to sea.

“The Duna flooded this year. They found Ana’s body buried in a field.”

Ana. My chest tightened.

“She had been beaten to death. Cops were able to tell that, even after all this time.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“I’m sure you are.”

“What’s this got to do with me?”

“The day she went missing, I felt it in my gut that she was dead.” The gangster put his fist to his stomach. “And that you had killed her. You’d beaten her before and threatened her. That’s why she no longer wanted you as a client. She was frightened of you.”

“Isn’t this a little far-fetched?”

“You were hanging around at nights waiting for her to finish work, so I had Peter walk her home. But the night she disappeared Peter got held up and he didn’t meet her. And the next day she doesn’t turn up for work. I think immediately of you and your threats. I came to your apartment and you had also gone, rather suddenly, the landlord said.”

“I got called away on a job. This is stupid, Istvan. I can understand that you’re upset at losing one of your working girls, but I didn’t kill her. I loved her. I love her still. Look at me, my life’s a wreck because of her.”

“You were obsessed with her,” the gangster said. “Not quite love, something else. Maybe you didn’t mean to kill her, but you did it. And your life’s wrecked because you can’t live with yourself.” He pulled the gun casually out of his jeans.

“Please,” I said. “Even if what you say is true, this isn’t going to bring her back.”

“No. But what I’m doing is for the living, not the dead.” He raised the Glock and pointed it at my forehead. “You see, I loved her too. I guess you didn’t know that.”

He gently squeezed the trigger.

I could have run, I suppose. Or tried to fight him. Could have at least made an attempt to do something. But a strange thing happened: When that bullet began its deadly journey, I had a flash of clarity, the first of my whole life. Time slowed, and then slowed some more, and I could see the bullet speeding toward me, right toward my brain. Life is love. That’s it, there’s no other point, I thought, as I watched the bullet smash into my head. Saw myself fall onto the wet, hard sand. Heard myself think,
Perhaps I’ll see her now, and perhaps she’ll forgive me.

A gust of wind carried the sound of the gunshot out into the Atlantic. The seagulls scattered, wings beating. The gangster walked away. He didn’t look back. He didn’t see the body being claimed by the rising tide.

PEARL ABRAHAM
is the author of the novels
The Romance Reader
and
Giving Up America.
Recent essays have appeared in the
Michigan Quarterly
, the
Forward
, an
Dog Culture: Writers on the Character of Canines.
Abraham teaches in the MFA Writing Program at Sarah Lawrence College.
The Seventh Beggar
, her third novel, will be published in September 2004.

NICOLE BLACKMAN
(www.nicoleblackman.com) lives in an undisclosed Brooklyn neighborhood where she prefers eavesdropping on unsuspecting people. She is the creator of the innovative “The Courtesan Tales” performance, and author of the poetry collection
Blood Sugar
(Akashic, 2002). She is currently wanted for questioning in the disappearance of three men in Brooklyn.

KEN BRUEN,
author of
The Guard
and
The Killing of the Tinkers
, is published around the world. He has been an English teacher in Africa, Japan, Southeast Asia, and South America. He lives in Galway, Ireland.

MAGGIE ESTEP
has published four books, including
HEX
, the first in a series of “horse noir” crime novels. She has written for the
Village Voice, New York Press
, and Nerve.com, and gives readings of her work throughout the U.S. and Europe on a regular basis. She lives in Brooklyn and likes to hang out at racetracks cheering on longshots. For more information, visit www.maggieestep.com.

NELSON GEORGE
is a noted author and filmmaker who has resided in Brooklyn all his forty-six years. His most recent nonfiction work is
Post-Soul Nation
(Viking), and he is the executive producer of two recent TV projects:
The “N” Word
and
Everyday People
, a fictional film made for HBO. For more information visit Nelsongeorge.com.

LUCIANO GUERRIERO
is the author of one novel, a noir thriller entitled
The Spin
, and has been a resident of Brooklyn or Manhattan for twenty-three years. While writing plays, screenplays, short stories and poetry during that time, he has also acted in or directed sixty-five plays and acted in twenty Hollywood and independent films.

PETE HAMILL
is for many the living embodiment of New York City. In his writing for the
New York Times
, the
New York Daily News
, the
New York Post
, the
New Yorker
, and
Newsday
, he has brought the city to life for millions of readers. He is the author of many bestselling books, including novels
Forever
and
Snow in August
, as well the memoir
A Drinking Life.
He lives in New York City.

KENJI JASPER
was born and raised in the nation’s capital and currently lives in Brooklyn. He is a regular contributor to National Public Radio’s
Morning Edition
and has written articles for
Savoy, Essence, VIBE
, the
Village Voice
, the
Charlotte Observer
, and Africana.com. He is the author of three novels,
Dark, Dakota Grand
and the forthcoming
Seeking Salamanca Mitchell.

NORMAN KELLE
is the author of the “noir soul” Nina Halligan mystery series, which includes
Black Heat, The Big Mango
, and
A Phat Death
. He is also the author of
Head Negro in Charge Syndrome
, forthcoming from Nation Books, and he edited and contributed to
R&B (Rhythm and Business): The Political Economy of Black Music
(Akashic, 2002). He currently resides in Brooklyn.

ROBERT KNIGHTLY
is a trial lawyer in the Criminal Defense Division of the Legal Aid Society. In another life, he was a lieutenant in the New York City Police Department. This is his first published fiction, which is a piece of a first novel,
Bodies in Winter
He was born and raised in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, the locale of the story.

LOU MANFREDO
was born and raised in Brooklyn. He is a former New York City public school teacher and legal investigator. The father of one daughter, Nicole, he currently lives in New Jersey with his wife, Joanne, and their long-haired dachshund. Mr. Manfredo recently completed his first novel.

ADAM MANSBACH,
a resident of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, currently on sabbatical in Berkeley, California, is the author of two novels,
Shackling Water
and the forthcoming
Angry Black White Boy
, and the poetry collection
genius b-boy cynics getting weeded in the garden of delights.
The former editor of the hip hop journal
Elementary
, he serves as an Artistic Consultant to Columbia University’s Center for Jazz Studies and is a teacher for Youth Speaks.

TIM MCLOUGHLIN
was born and raised in Brooklyn, where he still resides. His debut novel,
Heart of the Old Countr
(Akashic, 2001), was a selection of the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program and has been optioned for a film. It was also published last year in Great Britain and in Italy, where it won the 2003 Premio Penne award. He is completing his second novel.

ELLEN MILLER
is the author of the critically acclaimed bestseller
Like Being Killed.
Her fiction and essays have appeared in many literary magazines and anthologies, most recently
Lost Tribe: Jewish Fiction from the Edge.
She has taught creative writing at New York University, the New School, and the women’s unit of a federal prison. She lives in New York City and is at work on her second novel

THOMAS MORRISSEY
is an Army brat who grew up in exotic locations like Okinawa, Heidelberg, and Staten Island. He began writing when, as a child, he found great pleasure playing with his mother’s Sears portable typewriter. His first novel,
Faustus Resurrectus
, is on the way.

ARTHUR NERSESIAN
is the author of six novels, including
Suicide Casanova, Chinese Takeout, Unlubricated
, and the cult classic bestseller
The Fuck-Up
. The former managing editor of the
Portable Lower East Side
, he currently lives in New York City.

CHRIS NILES
was born in New Zealand. In the last fifteen years she has lived in Australia, England, and Hungary. She now lives in Brooklyn and does not intend to move for a very long time. She is also the author of
Hell’s Kitchen
(Akashic, 2001), as well as a series of crime mysteries featuring radio reporter Sam Ridley:
Spike It, Run Time
, and
Crossing Live.

SIDNEY OFFIT
is a novelist, author of books for young readers, teacher, member of the board of the PEN American Center, president of the Authors Guild Foundation, and curator of the George Polk Journalism Awards that originate from Long Island University’s Brooklyn center. During the mid-fifties he covered the Brooklyn Dodgers, New York Giants, and that other team from New York for
Baseball Magazine.
His most recent book is
Memoir of the Bookie’s Son

NEAL POLLACK
is the author of three books: the cult clas-sic
The Neal Pollack Anthology of American Literature, Beneath the Axis of Evil
, and the rock ’n’ roll novel
Never Mind the Pollacks
A regular contributor to
Vanity Fair, GQ
, and many other magazines, Pollack lives in Austin, Texas.

C.J. SULLIVAN
lived in Brooklyn on the Ridgewood/Bushwick border for seven years and loved the neighborhood. He has worked as a Court Clerk in Brooklyn Supreme since 1994. He has also been a freelance writer for the last ten years. Sullivan has a regular column in the
New York Press
called “The Bronx Stroll.” He now lives in Ridgewood, New Jersey with his wife Lisa and his twin daughters, Olivia and Luisa.