A Thousand Steps

37

The next day, Matt finishes his route and sits astride the Heavy-Duti up in Bluebird Canyon, breathing hard and looking down on his world.

Furlong pulls up in Moby Cop. He lowers the window and regards Matt with his blunt, bear-like curiosity.

“How’s your mom? I called last night but the nurses were vague.”

Matt describes her injuries and the possibility of irreversible brain damage. This morning she was dazed and distant, but able to remember much of the day before. She seemed embarrassed.

Dr. Hoppe asked a lot of questions and made notes. Julie said she was very sore, especially the ribs, but when offered pain pills she refused. This surprised Matt, her finding the strength to say no.

“Where’d you sleep last night?” Furlong asks. “I saw the for-rent sign on Third.”

“A friend from school,” he lies. “Thanks for not taking me to juvie.”

“Where’d Julie go?”

“She moved to Dodge.”

“Oh, Christ.”

“She was starting over, really trying to beat the dragon balls. Now this.”

“Starting over in Dodge City.” Furlong takes a long look at Matt from behind his now clean Ray-Bans. “Why didn’t you go with her?”

“I need freedom and I don’t like Dodge.”

A beat while Furlong considers. “Did you see her fall?”

Matt nods, sees her falling again. Tearing at the air like she’s trying to climb it.

“Was it an accident?”

“I believe so.”

Matt still isn’t sure. There was that moment of deliberate commitment, like she was stepping into a pool and trying not to splash. Like this was something she had decided to do, until fear took over and made her fight for her life.

Furlong turns off the engine and surveils the street before speaking.

“I need a few things from you, Matt. And, now that your mother is a resident of Dodge City, one of them might be easier for you to get.”

“Five dollars per item.”

“First, I want a jar of Laguna Sunshine Farms canned stewed tomatoes. They have a groovy psychedelic label on them, all organic, and they’re grown in the commune farm out there. I’ll pay for them, of course.”

“You can buy a jar yourself, at the roadside stand.”

“I tried. They wouldn’t sell to a cop.”

Matt remembers the dog turd trick that Grail pulled on the sergeant. Stifles a smile.

Furlong continues: “I also want my own copy of that fancy book you delivered to Marlon Sungaard — The Tibetan Book of the Dead. And, also from Mystic Arts World, a box of the Languedoc Toffees from France.”

“The Tibetan books are special-made gifts for Brotherhood church members and important customers,” says Matt. “Same with the candy. They keep those things separate because they’re not for sale.”

Safe in the Bat Cave, he thinks.

“Which is why I need you,” says Furlong.

“That would be shoplifting.”

“I’ll look the other way.”

“The Brotherhood won’t.”

“They’re criminals, Matt.”

“Those leather-bound Tibetan books are expensive,” Matt says. “Just buy a cheap paperback.”

“I want the same edition you delivered to Sungaard.”

“Why is this stuff important — the tomatoes and the candy and the book?”

“A little bird sang in my ear.”

“I don’t want to steal for you,” Matt says. “We didn’t agree to that.”

“I need those things and I need them soon.”

Matt says nothing. He knows he shouldn’t do it and he’s not sure he even can get away with it. Johnny Grail gives him work, shows him the Bat Cave, helps his mom find a place in Dodge, and a job. And Matt rips him off for the cops? Matt is still pissed at Johnny for the drug-infused Summer of Eternal Love invitations, which have potentially made him a sixteen-year-old felon. And possibly contributed to his mother’s broken body and perhaps damaged brain.

Matt has also heard grim stories about Orange County’s Juvenile Hall. It turns you into a worse criminal than when you went in. Crowded. No family. No friends. No fishing, no paper route, no Laurel. Just big hoods ready to kick the shit out of you like Staich did. Hamsa Luke at Mystic Arts World told Matt that juvie was worse than jail, and he’d been in both. The food was vile.

“Two people died out there at Sycamore Flats yesterday,” says Furlong. “Overdoses. I saw one of them give up the ghost, flopping around in the dirt like a fish. But then, to balance the deaths, two women gave birth, too. A boy and a girl, born in their own drug-riddled Garden of Eden with an acid-rock soundtrack and Tim Leary droning away on stage. From what I hear they’re healthy, too — the newborns.”

“I missed all that.”

“It happened after dark. Got crazy. Ten heat strokes for the day, two rattlesnake bites. Three officer assaults. We arrested a hundred and twenty-eight people. This morning I lugged nine of them off to the juvenile court in Santa Ana, which will process them into Juvenile Hall. Which is exactly where you’ll be if you don’t get me my things. Be smart. Be careful. The Brotherhood of Eternal Nonsense is not your friend, Matt. They’re criminals, smuggling drugs into Laguna from all over the world and selling them to kids. Look what they did to your mom. Julie wouldn’t have fallen, or jumped off that ledge, if she wasn’t too messed up to think straight. You know that. So, do the right thing, partner.”

“I’m not your partner.”

“I’ll expect your call tomorrow or sooner. I’m pulling for you and Julie. I wish she’d have stayed at the Jolly Roger.”

“Me too.”

“I busted Grail at Sycamore Flats before he could scamper away. He said there wasn’t any LSD on the invites. Said the crowd hysteria was set off by rumors, fanned by the police. He said nothing that happened was because of acid. The violence was all from us. He made bail this morning. Cash. He’s back in Dodge already.”

“Well, you can prove if there was acid on the invites or not.”

“We already have.”

A hard look at Matt, as if to remind him of his standing as a possible felon.

“I don’t like you trying to make me steal from people I know. You stand here trying to make me commit a crime while Jazz is out there, held by men doing who knows what to her.”

“I need the tomatoes, toffees, and the fancy Tibetan Book of the Dead.”

“What if I get caught?”

“Explain that you like candy and valuable books. I heard you’re going door-to-door, asking about Jasmine.”

Matt nods. “You should be, too.”

“She’ll turn up.”

“Turn up like Bonnie?”

Furlong’s casual tone angers Matt. He’s not doing jack shit to find his sister. To Furlong, it’s all Johnny Grail and Bonnie Stratmeyer. He doesn’t even believe that Matt saw Jazz in the fog on Third Street. Or got a terrified call from her.

Another long look from the sergeant. What did cops do before Ray-Bans to keep you from seeing their eyes?

“Can you give me any more information on Bonnie?” asks Matt, expecting none, now that FBI is involved.

“The FBI still can’t identify the drugs that were in her.”

“How did they get in her?”

Furlong considers. “Through a fine gauge hypodermic needle between her toes. The Bureau has been pretty open with us. Their general consensus is that Bonnie had been recently drugged and restrained. The ankle bruises came from some kind of soft shackle. The ligature marks on her neck, too.”

“Restrained, like tied up?”

“They’re not sure what with.”

Matt tries to process this new information. Add it to the fresh water in her lungs and the serious blow to the top of her head. Add it to Bonnie being with Cavore at Sapphire Cove, and with DeWalt at the LA Moves Happenings, and the Vortex of Purity.

These jagged facts seem like pieces from different puzzles.

And they’re pieces of Jasmine’s puzzle too.

“What happened to Bonnie and what’s happening to my sister are related.”

“That’s a big stretch.”

“There’s a connection.”

“We’re doing our best on both cases.”

“Do more. They’re not cases, they’re people.”

“You help me, I help you,” says Furlong. “Think about my offer. Oh, I saw your dad early yesterday, walking into the Jolly Roger.”