In the Night of the Heat (12 page)

“Where'd you meet her?” I said.

Chela sighed. “This isn't about her. She saw I was miserable, that's all.”

“Where?”

“She didn't get me into the business, if that's what you're wondering. Three other girls and I were splitting a room. I'd been in The Life for months. I found out about a big party at a hotel on the Strip, and talked my way in. Made serious money that night, and one of the other girls threw me a bone—an even bigger party up in the Hills. I didn't realize it, but she was a scout, and that was an audition. I spent my entire roll to get better clothes, and spent all day on my makeup and hair. Walked into that party like I owned the place. My contact”—she looked at me shrewdly—“no, I'm not going to tell you her name, liked the way I handled myself, and sent me to meet Mother. At a place called ‘Mrs. Winston's.'”

“Green Grocery? Best salad bar in L.A.?”

She nodded. “That's the place.”

Century City's best “hidden” restaurant. So Mother had chosen a public, healthy, casual spot for her seduction.

“The whole all-u-can-eat salad bar still blows my mind. She told me all these awesome war stories about Kosovo. She was like me—a survivor.”

My stomach was an icy knot. “And you went with her?”

“You didn't see where I was living.”

I was surprised it wasn't under a bench in the park. Chela was a survivor. And she'd recognized a better berth when it was dangled in front of her.

“Anyway…it worked out,” she said.

“It worked out how?” I tried to wash the judgment and rage from my voice.

“It was the best place I ever lived. She treated me nicer than anyone. I had my own room, I had spending money. After I started going out, I had thousands of dollars in the bank. And she didn't treat me like a kid. She gave me credit for having a brain.”

“You don't see anything wrong with what she did?”

“All I'm saying is, I don't
care
what people think. If I wanted to go back there, I could've done that already. But that doesn't mean I don't appreciate her giving me a life.”

I rubbed my forehead, trying to quell the raucous pain between my ears. I wasn't used to headaches with a sound track. If I'd seen someone like Chela at Mother's when I first met her, I would have known to turn right around. I wouldn't have associated with a madam who profited from child prostitution. I still hated to believe it. It made my time with Mother feel even more sordid.

“How many other girls are there? Young ones?”

“What—you think I'm about to rat out Mother?” Chela said. “Forget it. Number one, I don't know. I never asked, and I was the only one who lived with her. Number two, I wouldn't tell you. Or maybe you didn't hear a word I just said.”

“Oh, I heard you.”

“Then get off your high horse,” Chela said. “You had a police captain to keep you safe. A house to sleep in. We're not even on the same planet.”

“Then how did I end up at Mother's, too?”

“Fast cash. Easy work. Just like everybody else.”

I'd never told her the story. Maybe I'd finally found the right time. “When I was thirteen, one of my teachers invited me to swim at her house. Things went on between us that shouldn't have, and it went on for a long time. The vibe was all wrong. I didn't see it that way—hell, what boy past puberty would?—but a kid has a kid's appetites. Suddenly sex was the only thing on my mind, and getting laid was my number one preoccupation. I've hung out with dozens of sex workers, and every one of them started having sex young. People don't just wake up at eighteen and say, ‘Hey, I'm gonna go shoot some porn,' or ‘Hey, I'm gonna go sell my ass.' The more I heard their stories, one day I realized, ‘Hey, when I was a kid, I swam in those waters, too.'”

“There you go, always making it negative. Like sex is evil.”

“No, it's not evil,” I said. “But it's powerful, Chela. It's
powerful.
It's like fire. It can cook your eggs or burn your damned house down. The results are unpredictable. Like the way you can't keep away from this guy, even though I think you really want to.”

She hid her eyes from mine. I'd broadsided her by bringing up Internet Stud. For a while, we'd allowed ourselves to forget about him.

“I haven't had sex with him,” she said.

“Would you tell me if you had?”

A half smile. “No. But I hate lying to you, so it's my lucky day.”

I was too tired for ultimatums. Do-what-I-say-or-else. Her childhood story had just told me she would bolt if I came on too strong.

“Chela, you're gonna get me sent to jail. Do you understand that?”

She sighed but didn't answer.

“Do you love this guy?” I said, petrified to hear the answer. If she loved him, there was nothing I could say. Nothing.

“Hell, no. He's married. We're just friends.”

“What about the pictures?”

“We don't do that anymore.” She said it like it was nothing. It was all right now.

“Chela, in your world, you think adults and kids can hang out like that. His attraction flatters you, you like teasing him, you're having fun. He told you what you think is his life story. To you, he's a great guy, misunderstood by everyone but you. But look at what he is to me: To me, he's the turd in my punch bowl. His very existence hurts you, and that makes me want to hurt him back.”

“All we do is talk on the phone. Not even sex stuff. We started over.”

“You think he doesn't want a shot at you? Get real.”

“I told him it's just talking,” she said.

“For now.”

“Now is all there is, Ten. I don't worry about later.”

I didn't know how to reach her, until I heard the muffled sound of my father's voice beyond the door. Suddenly, I had a brainstorm: My father was Chela's hero. He reminded her of her dead grandmother, the symbol of all that was right and good.

“What would my dad have done if he'd known about my teacher and her pool?”

“Captain Hardwick?” Chela laughed. “Put her ass in jail, probably.”

“What would have been the
right
thing?”

Chela's face darkened. “Jail is bullshit. But he would have made you stop going over there, gotten her ass fired from the school. For sure.” I was relieved she had a moral compass still working somewhere. After a pause, Chela said. “Don't tell him about me and Mother.”

“I won't tell if you won't.”

We smiled. But my smile disappeared.

“I will hurt this man,” I said. “I might do worse than hurt him.”

“Yeah, you'd probably kill him,” Chela said. She had met me under a crazy spell, when I was waving a gun.

“Bet on it.”

Chela shrugged. “I can't do that to a friend, so it's over. Promise.” She tried to sound detached, but I heard how much it hurt her to let him go. She didn't have many friends.

“There won't be any warning next time,” I said. “I hope you know I'm not playing.”

That seemed like the right note, so I left.

When I emerged from Chela's room with the CPU and both cell phones, Dad was waiting for me at the foot of the stairs. His wheelchair lay on its side, empty. Dad sat on the bottom step with his hand
on the railing, perspiration gleaming from his brow. He'd been trying to climb up.

For a moment, feeling horror for him, I stood up high without moving. If I'd ever seen that angry, humiliated shadow across his face when I was a kid, I would have soiled my pants.

“Boy, get your ass down here,” Dad said. He didn't have any trouble speaking, and I didn't have any trouble hearing. We were a medical miracle.

Both of us were perspiring by the time I'd helped Dad back into his chair. Dad was too pissed off to be embarrassed by his limbs' jerky motions. He was glad to lean on me so he could get as close as possible to eye level. His open palm was shaking; he wanted to slap me.

“Dintchu hear me calling?” he said.

“I had a problem with Chela.”

Jaw locked like a trap, Dad propellered his arms across his wheels to send his chair speeding across the floor, toward his room. “Comewithme,” he said.

“Long day, Dad. Let me catch my breath.”

He ignored me, rolling like Speed Racer. I had to follow.

Over time, Dad's room had become less a glorified medicine cabinet–slash–rehab room and more a living space. My downstairs guest room had a bathroom and a fair amount of square footage, so we'd brought in the old antique oak rolltop desk he'd put in storage after he got sick, the one where he'd spent most of his late nights studying case files and crime-scene photos when he was a detective, then payroll records and memos after he got promoted. That desk was like his office, and we both liked having it around.

Marcela had also launched a project to preserve his awards and certificates, so in its own way, Dad's room didn't look so different than Judge Jackson's study—except without any sign of his son. I noticed Judge Jackson's name on an appreciation certificate to Dad from
the Beverly Hills–Hollywood NAACP. Small world, and getting smaller.

The only photos of individuals were snapshots of my parents together, my mother alone, and one of all three of us, when I was six weeks old. Apparently, that was when Dad had stopped taking pictures. The delicate-boned woman who gave birth to me looked like she had a dancer's frame, with a bulb nose and skin that matched mine perfectly. She was sitting at the bench of the old black piano that had sat in our home until Dad got sick and we finally sold it. I wish I'd kept the piano, but I never really learned to play it. Here's what I can tell about my mother from her photos: She liked to laugh, she knew she was pretty, and she thought my father walked on air. Her photo with her baby is the only one where she isn't smiling, just tired. No more laughter. In nine months, she would be dead.

I try not to take it personally.

I almost overlooked a new photograph on Dad's desk in a small ceramic frame: Marcela standing in the kitchen chopping celery, her face glowing.

“Don't…you…ever…dis-re-spect…Marcela…again,” my father said. I couldn't pretend I didn't know what he was talking about. Dad was overreacting, but I'd been rude to Marcela when she told me about Melanie's call. I knew better.

“She's…'fraid…you…lost…your…mind.”

“I'll call her and apologize.” I would have reminded him that my life was in a free fall, but pity wasn't his strong suit. “Tonight. Before it gets late.”

“What about…Chela?” Dad said. He folded his hands, ready to hear.

My allegiances felt torn, but not for long. I needed allies. “There's a guy on the internet she was in touch with a few months ago, and he showed up again. I squashed it.”

Dad grunted. I had never told him outright that Chela had been a prostitute, but he knew she was a runaway, and he knew their world. Dad had dedicated the last ten years of his career to Hollywood's teenagers.

“She…staying?” Dad said.

“We'll see by morning. I'm not gonna chain her down.”

Silence. I always felt itchy in Dad's room, but there was nowhere to divert my gaze, except to photographs of the dead woman who haunted both of us. I thought about Chela's anger toward her mother and let myself feel how much I was pissed at mine, too. You can't get sick and die when you have a kid. You find a way to fight.

“Her gramma was dead…five days…'fore any help came,” Dad said.

“She just told me.” I couldn't be jealous Chela told Dad first; I was just glad she'd had someone else to talk to. Sometimes I worked fourteen-hour days on the set. Used to, anyway.

“Helluva life…”

“Yeah.” I sighed, still itching to go. “But she listens to me. I've got some insights.”

“Howso?” Dad shifted in his chair, leaning on his elbow, settling in to talk.

I am not about to have this conversation,
I told myself.

“There was a teacher who used to invite me over after school. First it was swimming, then it was more. For a while I was hanging out there almost every day.”

I watched Dad's face, but it didn't change. Either his stroke had wiped nuance from his expression, or my words had had no impact at all. I didn't know what I'd expected him to say, but his silence was pissing me off.

“How…old?” Dad said finally.

“Thirteen.”

Dad's head snapped back. He sucked in his breath. He didn't ask me which teacher. He didn't say he wished he had known, or what he would have done if he had. He held the information in his head for a while. “Too…young,” he said.

I shrugged. I still felt ready to bolt his room, but not as much.

“I went to Judge Jackson's house today,” I said.

“Whafforr?”

I told him about almost everything except the murder book. I trust my father well enough, but a promise means something to me. Although I didn't mention Judge Jackson's suspicion of an LAPD cover-up, Dad nodded as if he knew the whole story. Nothing could surprise him. Same old, same old. I could almost hear his thoughts.

“You…taking…the case?” he said.

I'd brought the money home, but if Dad helped me change my mind, I could always return it. “Thinking about it.”

“Don't…break the law.”

I nodded, but I didn't make a verbal promise. And Dad didn't call me on it. “Anyway, there's probably no chance in hell of figuring this one out,” I said.

“Not just one,” Dad said. “Two.”

“Two what?”

“Not just T.D. The…wife. Good chance…they're…related.”

I hadn't thought about it that way, but he was right. I would have a much better chance of solving T.D. Jackson's murder if I could learn the truth about the death of his ex-wife. I needed to drive back to Judge Jackson's first thing in the morning and give him his money back. I must have been out of my mind to take it, I thought. Who in the hell could sort through this mess?