Strange Bedfellows

2

Chinatown

I’d been to the site of the present-day Chinatown from the time I was a kid-impromptu Sunday dinners when my mother didn’t want to cook, shopping for Chinese herbs with Grandmama Cile, field trips in high school. I knew from a paper I’d written in the tenth grade that what people called the area north of the 101 Freeway between Broadway and Hill Streets was in fact the third Chinatown. The first had been established east of the old town plaza. Was it a coincidence, I asked in my paper, that those first Chinese immigrants, brought to California to build wagon routes and railroads for next to nothing, were called coolie slaves and forced to live in a run-down part of town anchored by Calle de los Negros, or what I speculated that less-tolerant Angelenos of the time probably called Nigger Alley? The second “China City,” where parts of The Good Earth were filmed, was more of a tourist attraction than a community and had mysteriously burned to the ground. The third, “New” Chinatown, where I was headed now, was Chinese-owned and had prospered from Day One. As the bus pulled up to one of those tall buildings I had glimpsed from the freeway I wondered if it was a bad Freudian joke or some bizarre form of karma that I would end up at the Depression-era landmark, the intersection of my past and present, trying to figure out whether I had a future.

Maybe I should have had Mrs. Franklin do a reading for me and saved myself the trouble.

The third-floor reception area was empty, the dozen or more chairs lining the walls in quiet judgment. Knew she’d be back, they whispered to each other. I rapped on the receptionist’s window, wondering why anyone would be fool enough to sit in this waiting room exposing themselves, where even the chairs knew your secrets.

A manicured hand slid back the glass to reveal a young woman with dark hair and double-lidded eyes. “Are you Detective Justice?”

“You got more than one black female coming in today?”

I regretted the crack when I saw the receptionist’s eyes flicker and the corners of her mouth tighten. “Just a moment.” She turned to say something to a colleague as she slid the window closed.

“I’m not waiting out here all day!” I warned the frosted glass. When I got no response, I walked the perimeter of the room, studying the art on the walls, pictures drawn by schoolchildren of uniformed men riding in cars, saving kitties, helping kids cross the street. But, after circling the room a few times, I noticed there were no women in the drawings and no one with skin deeper than Crayola’s infamous flesh color. Were females and minorities really that invisible?

I was about to leave when the window slid open again. “He can see you now.”

“He?” I walked through a door on my left and into a colorless hallway that looked worse than my OB/GYN’s office. Better pregnant than this. I was greeted by a tawny-complected male, five-nine, maybe mid-forties, with a softness through his midsection that told me he spent more time on his butt than he did in a gym.

He stuck out his hand and told me his name. “Where’s Dr. Betty?” I demanded.

He hesitated for only a moment before withdrawing his hand. “Let’s go to my office. It’s just down the hall.”

On the left was Dr. Betty’s corner office. Her collection of Georgia O’Keeffe posters was still hanging in the darkened room; her African violets were still massed on the coffee table. The only thing missing was the gold-framed quote that usually sat next to the violets, something O’Keeffe had said that I couldn’t recall at the moment. “Where is she?” I repeated.

His office was three doors down from Dr. Betty’s and smaller by a third. But that was because Dr. Betty ran the place, while this guy, from the looks of him, was a mid-level automaton. Was this soft-gutted fool all I merited this time around?

He gestured to a love seat against the wall while turning around a guest chair that fronted the desk to face me. I chose to stand. “I’d rather see Dr. Betty.”

“That’s not an option.” He turned in his chair and reached past a gold picture frame and wooden clock to grab a folder in the middle of his desk. When he found me still on my feet, he said, “You can stand there all day, Detective, but it’s not going to get you out of here any sooner.” The blandness in his voice concealed a steeliness beneath that made me want to put my fist in his solar plexus.

I parked myself at one end of the love seat, opened the tin of Altoids, and popped a couple. While slipping the tin back in my pocket I checked out the collection of masks that covered the wall behind his desk. There were some wooden ones from Africa and Central America, one of painted batik whose origin I couldn’t place, even a few that looked as if they had been made by children. But for all their political correctness, they told me nothing other than that their owner didn’t mind being scrutinized by these frozen imitations of life. “What’s your name again?”

He reached into a woven basket on his desk and handed me a card. PABLO WYCHOWSKI, PH.D. I looked at him and then reread the card, twisting my mouth to conceal the smile.

“Something wrong, Detective?”

“I’m sure you’ve heard this before, but you’ve got quite a name, sir.”

“Please, call me Dr. Wychowski, or Pablo. And what do you mean, quite a name?”

“Wychowski is Polish or Jewish, right?”

He stared at me, his eyes emotionless pools of brown.

“And with a name like Pablo…” I paused, squinting to interpret the tint of his skin. “I’d guess someone in your family is Latino.”

“Or likes Pablo Picasso’s art.”

“Possible, but I don’t think so, sir.”

The mustache above the Polish Picasso’s lip twitched a bit. “Is it that important?”

I crumpled his card into a pocket. “I’m just trying to level the playing field here.” I gestured to the file in his lap. “You’re the one with the information advantage.”

“This?” His tapered fingers touched, but didn’t open, the file in his lap. “This is just paperwork.”

“On me, correct? Paperwork that could get me bounced out of the department.”

He folded his hands over the file. “I’d much rather hear what’s in here from you than read a bunch of reports.”

I had the distinct sensation of ants crawling along the back of my neck. “I’ve covered a lot of this territory before with Dr. Betty. Don’t you people believe in continuity of care?”

“When it’s in the best interests of the client, yes. But in your case, I don’t think it would hurt to revisit some of this territory, as you call it, with someone new. Besides, Dr. Frasier is out of town.”

One point for our side. I’d gotten him to tell me something he hadn’t intended. But my victory was short-lived when I realized he was just staring, waiting for me to say something. I couldn’t figure out which was worse-him or those damned masks. I preferred Dr. Betty’s sensual O’Keeffes to these lifeless faces, taunting me with their fixed gazes and gaping mouths. Like looking at a corpse. “We could save a lot of time, sir, if I could talk to Dr. Betty.”

“And why is that?”

“She knows my-what do you people call it?-my history.”

“Is that the only reason you want to talk to her?”

I resisted the urge to brush those ants off my neck. “What else could there be?”

He considered me with eyes as vacant as the sockets in his mask collection. “I don’t know. Perhaps you object to my being male, or maybe what you believe to be my ethnic background makes you uncomfortable. Weren’t your former partners Jewish and Latino?”

I shot to my feet. “Don’t you dare try to peg me as some kind of bigot, because you don’t know the half! With the crap I’ve had to put up with from folks in the department, I should be the one questioning your motives, not the other way around.”

His eyes sparked a bit. “I see the thought of being considered prejudiced upsets you. Why is that, Detect-or may I call you Charlotte?”

“I’d prefer Detective Justice.”

He raised a hand in a gesture of truce. “Okay, Detective Justice, sit down and take it easy. My objectives here are the same as yours, or at least I think they are.”

I crossed my arms over my chest and tried to ignore those masks staring at me. “Go ahead. You seem to have all the answers.”

Undeterred, he ticked off on his fingers: “One, to ensure that you’re fit to return to active duty. Two, to ensure that as a consequence of what you’ve been through on your last case and”-he gestured to the file in his lap-“some of these others, you don’t lose your concentration and endanger yourself or your co-workers. And three-”

“That’s a crock of shit!”

“May I finish?”

“No! You talk like I’m crazy or something.”

“Going to a therapist doesn’t make you crazy…”

Aubrey called you paranoid.

“… despite what people say,” he added, as if in response to my inner voice.

“I don’t need people talking about my business all over the department!”

“They won’t, but I’m interested in why you would care.”

Now he was really beginning to sound like Aubrey. “Get real! A cop with a history like mine is bad enough. Add a few visits to Chinatown, and my career could get permanently sidetracked.”

“Don’t worry, Detective, our sessions are completely confidential.”

“Except what you tell my superiors.”

“You should know from before, Detective Justice, that I only discuss with them your readiness to return to work, not the content of our sessions. As for your career concerns, it may comfort you to know that eighty percent of BSS clients come to us voluntarily.”

“So what does that say about me? I’ve been ordered in by my superiors to see you people three times in the past year!”

He rolled forward in his chair, almost close enough to touch my knee. “It says that you’ve been through an incredible amount of stress, Detective Justice. It says you’ve seen way too much death.”

I shrugged and edged away. “Occupational hazard. It’s no big deal.”

“Only if you’re a television or movie cop. In the real world, the violence like what you’ve encountered, year in and year out, can get next to the best of us.”

My stomach flipped. “Shit happens. Far as I’m concerned, only the strong survive.”

“Which is why a lot of cops get their fill of working homicide after a few years and move on to something else.”

“Like what?”

“Burglary. The special theft squads. Even command positions.”

My sour stomach gurgled in protest. Who did this guy think he was-my tenth-grade guidance counselor? “I’m a homicide detective first, last, and always will be.”

“You say that as if there are no other options.”

“There aren’t for me!”

He studied me for a long moment. “Well, if that’s your desire, then let me do my job.”

“Don’t let me stop you.”

His brown eyes locked on mine. “I gave you my first two objectives. You wouldn’t let me give you the third.”

I squirmed deeper into the sofa. Something lower than those ants on my neck was beginning to itch, and listening to this idiot was only making it worse. “Your superiors care enough about you as a person and as a resource to this department,” he was saying, “to want to ensure that you’re not going to end up like some of your colleagues. What’s the term cops have for it?”

Unbidden, a red-hued image of blood and brain matter exploding from the back of someone’s head. My nightmares come to life-was it the memory of a previous case, or a premonition of things to come? Whatever it was, the thought of eating a gun sandwich made me stop, the snappy phrase frozen on my lips.

“If you don’t want to talk…” Misinterpreting my silence, he flipped open the file. I became aware of the clock on his desk, measuring out the hour in maddening ticks. My God, how much more time would I have to spend here?

While I reminded myself to breathe, my captor was reading. “It says here you investigated a case against the orders of your superiors during the riots and ended up discharging your weapon against a fellow officer.”

His comment made me see red all over again. “What would you have done if someone had threatened an innocent child?”

“I’m not judging you, Detective, I’m just reading what’s in the file. And you investigated another homicide last fall where you were involved in a shooting and witnessed a suspect’s suicide.”

“The shooting and the suicide were not related. And, besides, the Board of Rights cleared me on both incidents.”

“And last week, I understand you witnessed your second suicide in four months.”

He says that like you had something to do with it. That sour taste began to rise at the back of my throat, but I resisted the urge to reach for my Altoids tin. “And your point?”

He closed the folder. “In the eyes of many in the department, that kind of history would put you squarely on the path to joining the List of Forty-Four.”

His voice was calm, but I knew he was laying out the bait, seeing if mention of the infamous list of “problem officers”-developed by the Christopher Commission in their post-riot investigations-would make me go off on him again. Instead, I recited to myself a snippet of a psalm my grandmother once gave me-The Lord is my strength and my shield-and took a deep breath. “That’s what it might look like to an outsider, or someone reading a bunch of CYA reports in a file. But, covering their asses or not, I’m betting my superiors briefed you on the background behind those reports. If they did, you know the real reasons behind each of those incidents. Maybe they’re not in your files, or in my personnel jacket-”

They’re damn sure in those diaries I keep.

“-or in the proceedings of the Board of Rights hearings I was subjected to which, I repeat, ruled my actions were within procedure. But, if after what I’ve been through, anybody tries to brand me a rogue cop like the guys on the List, a cop to be bounced because of my ‘potential for future abuse of LAPD regulations,’ then rest assured I’ll be taking somebody down with me!”

He regarded me somberly. “I hear a lot of anger in your voice. Do you hate the department that much?”

No he didn’t! “After dedicating almost fourteen years of my life to the job, is that what you people think?”

Even as I deflected his challenge, that damned voice in my head was saying: Good question! I took in another breath to regroup. “Actually, I love what I do. Every day I have a chance to be one of the good guys. I get to solve murders, bring the scum who commit them to account. I get to give some measure of closure and, excuse the pun, justice to the families whose lives will never be made whole because of losing their loved ones.”

He looked me dead in the eye. “That’s a very noble-sounding rationale. When I hear cops say something like that, there’s usually more to it than meets the eye.”

His words drew me back some fifteen years, to an image I’d tried hard to forget, to blood pooling among the jacaranda blossoms in my driveway, to me cradling my husband Keith and baby Erica and screaming for help that came too late. I took in a breath to steady myself, and tasted chalk at the back of my throat. “That’s your interpretation, sir, not mine.”

The shrink allowed himself a small smile. “I’ve just been observing you today, Detective. And from where I sit, despite your superficial politeness, I can see you’re sitting on a lot of anger. I suspect you probably do a good job of hiding it from the untrained eye, but it’s there nonetheless. Which brings me to my treatment plan.”

He paused. What the hell was he waiting for, a drum roll? “I think if we spend some time exploring where that anger comes from, what it might be hiding, we can make your job a little easier. I can also help you develop some tools that you can use to cope so the anger doesn’t eat you, or your stomach lining, up alive.”

“My stomach lining is fine!”

He glanced in the direction of my pocket. “Hiding antacids in candy tins is an old trick, Detective.”

I could feel the Altoids tin resting in my pocket, could remember the number of times I’d resorted to eating the Rolaids I’d secreted inside it in the past few months. The past few hours. I gave the shrink’s words some thought, weighing the pros and cons of the situation and calculating how much bargaining power I had. “I guess that’s a fair trade,” I replied. “But I’m a pretty quick study. Why can’t you give me these tools now, so I can get out of here and back to work?”

“What’s your hurry, Detective Justice? You’re on medical leave until I sign off on your clearance to go back to full duty. Why don’t we take some time, make sure we really see what’s going on with you?”

His words sparked a memory, directing my gaze to the gold picture frame on his desk. I realized that it wasn’t a photo at all, that I’d seen it before, but not in this office. “May I?”

“Be my guest.”

It was that Georgia O’Keeffe quote that had been on Dr. Betty’s coffee table the first time I was ordered in for therapy. Nobody sees a flower, really, it read. It’s so small. We haven’t time, and to see takes time.

To see takes time. It was something Dr. Betty would say in our sessions. Although I didn’t know where my former therapist was at that moment, I did know one thing-she and what’s-his-name were in cahoots, probably talking behind my back about “objectives” and “treatment plans” and God knows what else. So, like it or not, it was this funny-named pudgeball, not earth mother Dr. Betty, who held the keys to the kingdom I longed to reenter. And if I wanted to get back to the work I saw as my calling, I was going to have to do what the ex-wife of a victim once said: go along to get along.

I had one more card of my own to play, but I’d have to do it carefully. “How much time is this going to take?”

“Why do you ask?”

Don’t be too eager. Just lay it out and let him do the rest. “There’s been a development on a cold case that I think is going to need my involvement.”

He shifted in his chair. “Why is that?”

As the excitement rippled through my stomach I realized how much I wanted to win another round of this match, beat what’s-his-name at his own mind games. So I told him about the Smiley Face shootings and Nilo Engalla, about how important it was for me to interview him. “Finding Engalla is the first break we’ve gotten in seven months. And I’m the only one left in the department who worked the case originally. They need me on this one.”

“What about the case files?”

“There’s a lot of information that’s not in the files. It’s up here.” I tapped my forehead. “You know, like continuity of care in your field, there’s stuff I know about this case that could make a difference.”

Watching him stroke his beard, I wasn’t sure if he was still listening. But after a while he murmured: “It would be a way for us to examine your reactions in a controlled environment.”

Toss him a bone, now! “And it would be nice to have someone outside of the job to talk to while I’m working a case.”

I realized it was the wrong thing to say when he said: “You don’t talk to your family about your work?”

“Not that much.” I was reminded of my mother’s opposition to my being a cop, her alarm at the “murder and mayhem” I’d insisted on bringing into her spotless View Park home for the past thirteen years. Or my “quit now” brother Perris, who had left the LAPD after being shot on duty the same day my husband and daughter were killed. With a chip on his shoulder the size of a sequoia tree, Perris had become a successful attorney specializing in criminal law and cases against the department. And he was not above getting ammunition for his plaintiffs by any means necessary, whether it meant picking my brain about harassment in the department or, in his latest stunt, stealing some of my late husband’s files on gangs and black militant groups when he and my family were at my house, supposedly helping me pack up some odds and ends for storage.

“What about a significant other?”

I noted his use of the politically correct term and wondered whether he was trying to be polite or infer something about my sexuality or his own. “I moved in with my boyfriend a few months ago, but he’s not a cop,” I replied, knowing that Aubrey was a listening ear but that his sympathy came too often with a dose of unsolicited advice.

He made a note. “Sounds like something we can talk about in a future session.”

“Whatever you think,” I said, trying to keep my voice agreeable.

He didn’t say anything for a while; then, more to himself than me: “Perhaps something could be arranged with your superiors. Maybe get you an inside assignment.”

I almost told him I’d rather be back in the field, but I knew that was a lie. Much as I hated riding the paper or fielding phone calls, if it was all I could do to get back on the Smiley Face investigation, I’d do it gladly. Anything to crack one of those unsolveds that keep you up at night with the feeling that some murderer is out there laughing while you twist in the wind of your failure.

“Detective, are you sure you’re up for this?” Wychowski said, regarding me intently.

“Call me Charlotte.” I took note of the slight crinkle of satisfaction around his eyes. Two points for our side. “And I am up for it, sir. I’ve had almost a week off after that last case, and I did nothing but sleep.”

“Which could be a sign of something other than tiredness.”

I knew where he was headed, but I was willing to let him have his little victory. “Like what?”

“Depression, for one thing.”

“Isn’t that where you come in? I come and talk to you once a week, work out this anger or depression or whatever it is you think you see.”

He shot me a look that said he’d caught the disparaging edge in my voice. “And you can show me how to use some of those tools you mentioned,” I hurried on, afraid I might have tipped my hand. “I could try them out, you know, in real-time situations, see if they can keep me from ripping the heads off of some of these idiots I have to deal with.” I rattled the antacids in my pocket. “Maybe I can even get rid of these.”

He didn’t respond. Instead, he sat leafing through my file for what seemed like hours. He eventually pulled an LAPD form from a drawer and started writing.

“So?” I could feel the weight of those antacids in my pocket.

“I’m going to go along with this on a short-term basis.”

“With what? Desk duty only or can I go back into the field?”

“Into the field, but only for this one case. And only under the close supervision of a senior detective.”

“But I was supervising on my last case! I don’t see why I can’t-”

“Take it or leave it, Detective. I’m not going to let you put yourself, or anyone else, in danger until I’m satisfied you’re ready to resume a full schedule.” While I grumbled acquiescence, he went on: “You will report to this office and me twice a week. See Yuki on your way out-she’ll help you arrange for days that fit your work schedule.”

I started to protest that the appointments would interrupt what I expected would be intense work weeks, but decided to bite my tongue. Go along to get along.

Bullshit the bullshitters.

“Are we clear, Detective?”

“As a mountain stream, Dr. P.”

His mustache twitched upward, letting me know there might be a human being in there somewhere. “Soon as we’re done, I’m going to phone your CO and tell him of my recommendation, and that the paperwork is on the way.” He put down his pen and looked at me the way my father would when he’d let me stay out past my normal curfew. “But don’t mess this up for yourself, Charlotte. Or this department. We don’t always allow an officer back in the field during therapy, especially not one who’s been through as much as you. So you’ve really got to do the work this time. No breezing through here for three or four sessions, half-stepping and telling me what you think I want to hear, and then getting back out there and going into meltdown. You got it?”

So Pablo Wychowski had been talking to Dr. Betty. And had read my file more closely than he’d let on.

“Despite what you cops say,” he added, “BSS does not stand for Bullshit Shrinks.”

And he wasn’t as clueless as he looked. “Got it,” I said.

“We’re going to look at every aspect of your life on the job and your family life in a way I suspect you never have before. Think of it as a chance to take stock.”

“Take stock.”

He rose and extended his hand. “You’ll work as hard in here as you do on your cases, so get ready.”

If shooting the shit with this shrink helped me get back to the work I loved sooner, I was willing to give this therapy idea another shot. I took his hand this time and squeezed it. “I’m ready, Dr. P.”