Street Dreams (45 page)

Rina nodded. “I’ll ask her. But I have one favor—no more talk about the murders. It should be only pleasant recollections.”

“Yes, yes, of course,” Marta said. “So many bad memories.” A sigh. “It is bad to be senile,
ja?
But not so bad to forget some things.”

“Selective repression,” Rina said.

“Exactly,” Marta said. “Our lives now are very short. It is not a time to dwell on the past.” She squeezed Rina’s hand. “We
can come to Los Angeles.”

“We can?” Anika said.

“Yes, we can,” Marta insisted. “I can drive.”

That thought was truly terrifying. Decker said, “How about if I arrange to have you driven down? Arrive in style.”

“No, I wouldn’t accept!”

“As a present to Rina’s mother,” Decker insisted. “It would be my pleasure.”

“He doesn’t want you to drive,” Anika told her sister.

“I want you two to be comfortable,” Decker said. “Let us talk to Magda—Rina’s mother—and I’ll e-mail you some dates.”

Again Marta brought her hand to her chest. Again, her eyes watered. “That would be wonderful. Thank you so much.” She kissed
Rina’s left cheek, then the right one. The tears came streaming down. “I am so sorry!”

“Please, Marta—”

“All the pain and suffering that we did to your people!”

“Marta, it’s a new world.” Rina squeezed her hand and sighed. “Hopefully.”

“Yes, hopefully.” She smiled. “That’s all we have … hope.”

As soon as they hit the freeway, Rina said, “I wonder how Mama will react when we tell her we’ve found Marta Lubke.”

“
We?
”

“I was hoping you’d help me out. Give me a logical reason for why we’d be looking up Marta.”

“That’s easy. Tell your mother that talking about her past made you curious.”

Rina nodded. “I think that will work just fine, you devious devil you.”

“I take exception,” Decker said. “You’re just as devious as I am. I’m just better at it than you.”

“More practice.”

“That’s true enough.” Decker stroked her cheek. “Are you really all right with the outcome? Having your grandmother’s murder
remain an open file?”

“Honestly, yes. Like I said, it wasn’t about the murder, it was about my mother’s childhood.” She felt her eyes mist. “I have
only known my mother as a burdened woman. I think I needed to know that once she was a little girl.” She put her hand on Peter’s
knee. “Are
you
okay with not knowing the specifics?”

“Doesn’t bother me at all.” He let his thoughts go for a moment. “Besides, we both know a little more now than we did going
into it.”

“You think it was a political thing?”

“Maybe. But it also could have been a serial killer who used politics to mask his murders. We really don’t need the gruesome
details.”

“I agree.” Rina felt her eyes closing. “Do you mind if I take a nap?”

“No, of course not. Do you mind if I listen to a CD?”

“No. As a matter of fact, the background noise will help me sleep.”

Decker turned on the L.A. Quartet—four guitarists, four virtuosos. A beautiful woman by his side, superb weather, great music
… soon he was flying at eighty plus, ready to take on the big, bad world.

Eyes still closed, Rina said, “Serial killers have this sameness to them.”

“Man, you are right about that. Cut from the same mold.”

“Why is that?”

“I don’t know,” Decker answered. “But I’m sure if the German police ever found this psycho and interviewed his neighbors,
they’d say what an ordinary guy he was—although he tended to keep to himself.”

T
he days passed to weeks,
the weeks melded into the months of summer, an intoxicating time of night-blooming jasmine, warm nights, and fiery lovemaking.
Afterward, as we lay in a pile of sweat-soaked sheets, swatting mosquitoes that had squeezed through the screens of the open
bedroom windows, my legs draped over Koby’s lean and sinewy body, I was thankful for the moment and hopeful for the future.
Yaakov and I went from a dating couple to an item. I met his friends; he met mine. Between the two of us, there was always
someplace to party, but most of the time we elected to spend our rare free evenings together sharing a bottle of wine in between
our physical calisthenics.

When our schedules didn’t coincide, I spent my off-hours hunting—for Joseph Fedek, for Leonard Chatlin, for poor David Tyler,
who had dropped out of sight. The good news was Raymond Paxton was true to his word, helping Louise Sanders and me with cash
as well as with personal items. I had several good pictures of David. I went through dozens of homeless camps and shelters,
and lots of abandoned buildings, flashing David’s photo and receiving blank looks for my efforts. I called local municipalities
and got addresses. I checked them out. I found nothing.

Sometimes Koby would come with me. One hot day toward the end of August, I specifically
asked
him to come with me. The address I had was southeast in a black area outside of L.A. I thought that maybe David would go
there because he was black and might feel safer, less conspicuous among his own.

It was a twenty-minute freeway drive into a district of heat and smog and dirt and concrete. The apartment buildings were
run-down, the streets pocked and littered, and the buildings desecrated with graffiti warfare. The area held many more liquor
stores than schools and libraries, and not much hope where hope should be. It had a few storefront churches and a lot more
thrift shops.

The directions I had were good. Once we were off the freeway, I gave Koby a series of rights and lefts and he found the shelter
sandwiched between a fast-food joint and a Laundromat. But there was no parking directly in front of the building, forcing
us to pull into a space a half block away. I knew I was out of my element, but Koby appeared comfortable. Maybe more protective
than usual, looping his arm squarely around my shoulder. This wasn’t our usual Hollywood beat and was probably as foreign
to him as it was to me. I was dressed for the heat in knee-length cutoffs and a green tank top, my hair pulled back in a ponytail.
Koby wore a red muscle shirt and jeans, his skin now the color of chocolate, made much darker by all of our forays into the
California sunshine.

As we headed toward the shelter, a couple of homeys passed by. Big men, both as tall as Koby; the one with a shaved head was
at least twice as wide as my boyfriend. But it was his dreadlocked partner with the tattooed arms who spoke up.

“Yo’, niggah! Whatchu axin’ for yo’ ho’ bitch?”

Koby’s eyes narrowed and I saw him clench his fists. Immediately, I pulled out my badge and flashed it in front of their faces.

“Move along, gentlemen,” I told them.

“Dreadlocks” stared and started to speak, but I didn’t give him a chance. “I said, move along!” Then making solid eye contact,
I added a please.

They paused long enough to give me ’tude and defiance, but then they probably figured I wasn’t worth the effort. They ambled
on, Dreadlocks spitting a couple of inches from my foot. Koby looked over his shoulder, his eyes fuming. When he started to
turn around, I took his hand and pulled him forward.

“Here we are.” I opened the boarded door, and still holding Koby’s hand, I dragged him inside. We stood in a small anteroom
with peeling stucco walls that held a rack filled with flyers and pamphlets of services. Through an archway, I saw a communal
dining room. There was a lone desk, the woman behind it around fifty and completely round with clipped kinky hair of gray-and-black
knots. She wore a white tank top and was sweating profusely. It was hot inside and the lethargic ceiling fan didn’t help much.
She eyed us suspiciously. Again, I took out my badge.

She read it, then scowled. “LAPD? Someone should give you driving lessons. You’re in the
wrong
district, sister.”

I ignored the hostility. “I’m trying to locate a runaway.” I took out his picture. “He’s twenty-four with Down’s syndrome
characteristics. Black, obviously. Originally, he’s from my district in Hollywood. His retarded girlfriend was gang-raped.
He was beaten up and tossed in a trash can like garbage. No one has seen him since and that was around nine months ago.”

She listened to me, then turned her eyes to Koby. “I don’t see your ID.”

“He’s not a cop,” I told her. “He’s my boyfriend.”

Instantly, her eyes narrowed as she studied my face. There was disapproval of me, of course, but also an ever so slight softening
in her expression. I had seen it in other blacks before—that by dating Koby, I
might
be more trustworthy than an average white cop.

“What do you want?”

“For the last three months, I’ve been trying to find this kid on my off-hours. I’m going through the lists and this place
popped up. I’m just asking if you’ve seen him. And if you haven’t, do you know of other places where I should look?”

She took in the picture. “You already looked in L.A.?”

“Everywhere. I was thinking that because he’s black, maybe he perceives himself safer here.”

“That’d be a switch.” Her laugh was bitter. “Comin’ here for safety.”

“I’m grasping at straws. What smells so good?”

“The kitchen.” She hooked a thumb over her shoulder, indicating the location was through the doorway behind her. “Cookin’
up supper.” She glanced at Koby, then returned her eyes to me. “What’s your business in a nine-month-old crime?”

“It’s a long story.”

She crossed her arms and waited.

I took a deep breath. “His girlfriend gave birth to a baby girl. She threw the kid away in a Dumpster. I retrieved the baby.
I think the kid deserves to know both her parents. Especially since this poor boy was frightened away. He’s not indigent.
There’s a trust fund for him. If I could prove he’s the father of this baby, the kid might get some money, too. Lord knows,
she deserves it.”

“And you’re not gettin’ any finder’s fee?”

Cynical eyes.

“I’m not getting a dime,” I told her.

She laughed contemptuously. “Just your average nice white do-gooder cop.”

I held my ground. “They exist.”

She glanced at the picture. Then took it and studied it in earnest. “Lemme show it to Urlene.”

I said, “And you are …”

She hesitated. “Cerise.”

“Cynthia Decker.”

I held out my hand. She gave me a limp-fish shake, then regarded Koby. “You don’ talk?”

“Just here for the ride,” he answered.

“You said it, bro’. ’Cause all yo’ be gettin’ is a
ride.
” She stood up—her lower torso encased in black stretch shorts—and tramped through the archway into the kitchen.

I threw my hands over my face.

“Don’t worry about it,” Koby whispered flatly.

But his eyes were roiling like storm clouds. He was slipping.

We lived in a liberated and somewhat libertine age and the vast majority of the time our skin tones were as relevant as vestigial
tails. So when it happened, it was always like a dash of cold water, this thinly veiled hostility. Koby got the worst of it
from white men; I got it from black women.

Your men aren’t enough? You’ve got to steal our men, too?

About a month ago, Koby had taken me to a party hosted by one of his friends. It was 80 percent black, 15 percent Hispanic
and Asian, and a few stranded whites. By subconscious design, we Caucasians wound up talking together. We swapped stories
and formed a consensus. It was easier to deal with hostile women any day of the week. Women sniped with words, men shot with
guns.

Of course, Koby’s attraction to me had little to do with my being white and very much to do with my being Jewish. Even more
important, I had never been married. Although Koby wasn’t Orthodox like Rina, he was well rooted in tradition. He was born
into the Jewish priest class—
Kohanim
—and I found out from Rina that
Kohanim
cannot marry divorced women without giving up their priesthood. Which didn’t translate into much; it was a symbolic thing
that most American Jews couldn’t care less about. But I knew Koby and I knew he cared—the reason he had asked me soon after
we met if there had ever been an ex-husband in the picture. It was obvious he was looking for something more than a casual
lay.

Cerise came back a few minutes later. “Yeah. It’d be like I thought. He’s been here, but not for at least four months.”

I was utterly flabbergasted. “He was
here?
”

“Didn’t I just say that?”

“Oh my God, he’s alive!” I grabbed Koby’s arm and broke into a smile. “I can’t believe it!”

“I don’t know if he’s alive. I haven’t seen him in months.”

“You made my summer!” I was grinning. I took her hand and pumped it. “Now it’s just a matter of finding the right spot. Did
you talk to him at all?”

“Girl, we get over a hundred souls walkin’ through that door every day of the week.” She pulled her hand away and shook it
up and down. “I jus’ remember him ’cause he got that Down’s face. I’ll tell you one thing. He looked a lot older than that
picture.”