The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death

ONLY A SMALL EARTHQUAKE

– Howd you get out here?

– Taxi.

I took my eyes from the road.

– You took a taxi from Malibu to Carson?

She kept her eyes closed.

– Yeah. They say when youve had a loss in the family, a sudden and unexpected loss, they say driving is a bad idea.

– Whys that?

– Because youre distracted, I guess. I mean, I dont know by what. Unless they mean the memory of finding your dad with his head blown all over the room.

She opened her eyes, shook her head, pinched her cheek.

– I think Im going to have to learn not to be so flippant about that. Im not handling it as well as I thought I could.

– So the taxi was probably a good call.

– Probably. Of course, the driver no doubt assumed I was coming down here for a late-night hookup with some rough trade Id been chatting with online. But Ill live with the dim opinion of my cabby this once.

– We should all be so well adjusted.

She waved a hand.

– Well, well adjusted, lets not get carried away.

I smiled.

– Yeah, especially as your brother seems to have the market cornered on that particular quality.

– Hes really just my half brother.

– Yeah, same mom, I got that.

She stopped inspecting the glories advertised on the massive illuminated signs looming over the 405 North mega car lots of Torrance, and looked at me.

– Howd you get that?

I hit my blinker and changed lanes to get out from behind a Pinto stuffed with the amassed possessions of its owner; boxes and bags heaped from the floorboards to the headliner and smashed against the windows, leaving just enough space for the driver, one of the rolling homeless of L.A. I glanced at him, talking endlessly to himself, as we passed.

I looked back at the road ahead.

– He kept saying your dad. I just assumed that meant you had different dads is all.

She looked back at the signs.

– Oooh, Detective Web at work. Did you suss out any more family secrets?

– Just that the black sheep of the family back there is also a fucking moron.

– Hardly a secret, that one.

– Yeah, he does rather wear it on his sleeve.

She began going through the pockets of her jacket, searching.

– Hes actually kind of OK. Or he was, anyway. When we were kids. Just spoiled mostly. And starved for attention.

– Interesting combination.

She came up with a hair bungee from her pockets and began to pull her hair into a ponytail.

– Well, my mom is an interesting woman with strange abilities. Especially when it comes to screwing with her kids’ heads.

I adjusted the shoulder strap of my seatbelt where it snugged too tight across my neck.

– Yeah, moms are tricky that way.

She got her hair where she wanted it, a couple wild curls poking loose, and settled back into her seat.

– Our mom is a little more than tricky. Her special talent with Jaime was to give him anything and everything he asked for. This being the easiest way she knew to keep him occupied, and keep her from having to actually deal with him as, I dont know, a human being. Jaimes response was to ask for more and more extravagant toys, trips, parties, whatever he thought would force her to deal with him, I guess.

– Howd that work out for him?

– Well, I didnt witness much of it, not wanting to be around her myself, but the way I put it together, the more he asked for, the more she worked to make the money to see he got it, the more he got, the more he asked for, and the more she worked… and so on.

– Kind of a perpetual motion machine of familial alienation, then?

She slid her eyes at me.

– That was clever.

I rubbed my eyes.

– Yeah, clever, thats me, always doing clever stuff. Thats why Im in this van at the moment with a load of someone elses bloody sheets and all.

She went in her pockets again and came out with a pair of big black plastic film star sunglasses.

– I said it was clever, not smart.

– True.

She took off her regular narrow black-framed glasses and slid the sunglasses on.

– Anyway, Mom just worked and worked to get Jaime what he wanted, which meant she was never around to look at him, which is what she wanted. Until he turned eighteen.

– Then what?

– She kicked him out. Of course. If behavioral scientists had designed a scenario meant to create an adult utterly unequipped to provide for themselves and emotionally cope with the world, they could not have done a better job than my mom did with Jaime. And, to make it more interesting, when she set him loose, she did it in Hollywood.

The lights of a jumbo jet cruised over the freeway on approach to LAX. Inglewood sprawled low and wild to the east, endless stucco blocks of small houses with barred windows and dead lawns.

– Its a tough little town, aint it.

She shrugged.

– Its designed to fuck the weak is all.

– And howd you avoid the mommy treatment?

She leaned forward and adjusted the heater.

– Dad divorced her when I was three. Seeing as she didnt want to have the responsibilities of actually raising kids, it wasnt much of a challenge for him to get custody. And by then Id already started loathing her pretty well. I mean, Dad didnt have to run her down at all to make me not want to see her. Not that he would have done that. Still, holidays, occasional weekends, hed pack me up and drive me over to the valley. It sucked, but it got better when I was five and she had Jaime. He was cute. And fun.

– Till he grew up and turned into a prick.

– Like I said, he had help.

– We all get help, that doesnt mean we all end up cutting guys up in motel rooms after a drug deal turns sour.

She fingered her sunglasses lower on her nose and gave me a look over the tops of the lenses.

– My, how very hard-boiled of you.

– Im just saying.

She pushed the sunglasses back into place.

– I know what youre saying. And youre mostly right. Hes definitely defective. But hes my brother. So I. You know.

– Sure.

– Anyway, it wasnt a drug deal.

– No? Stocks then? Commodities futures?

– I dont know. I mean, he does deal some stuff. Weed and ecstasy mostly. Works craft services and deals to the P.A.s and the extras. That knife, he was on set for a John Woo movie, one of the prop guys traded the knife for a few hits of X. He loves that knife. Anyway, whatever hes up to, its not drugs. Jaime always gets into something crazy. Usually its something having to do with movies. I dont think so this time. But movies is what it usually is. Hes going to get the rights to some Hungarian sci-fi movie. Hes going to manage the movie career of a Balinese pop star whos the Madonna of Indonesia. Hes going to negotiate U.S. distribution for a Canadian production company that specializes in remaking Paraguayan classics. That kind of thing. Movies. He got it from my mom.

I slid into the interchange lane for the 10 West, thinking about L.L. and the movie game, and what it does to people.

She pointed at the sign for the 10.

– Where are you going?

– Take the 10 out to the PCH and up to Malibu.

She sat up and reached toward the wheel.

– No, no, dont, just. Just go.

She grabbed the wheel and shoved it to the left, sending us veering in front of a barreling SUV.

I slapped her hand.

– Hey! Hey!

The SUV cut around us, horn sounding.

She took her hand from the wheel as the exit to the 10 slipped away behind us.

– Sorry.

She put her face in her hands.

– Sorry.

She took it out and looked at me.

– I dont want to go west right now. I dont want to go home. I want. Oh fuck.

Tears were leaking out from under the lenses of the sunglasses.

– Shit, Web. Shit. My dad.

I nodded.

– Yeah, no problem. Shit. I get it.

I stayed with the 405, looking ahead to where it would climb through the Santa Monicas and meet the 101 on the other side.

– I got a place to go.

She pushed her fingers up under her sunglasses and wiped her eyes.

– Thanks.

I drove, thinking about families. Not my favorite pastime, but one I seem incapable of avoiding. I glanced at her from time to time, black hair pulled back, light olive skin flushed, muscles of her long neck taut as she bent to lean her head against the window, the sky lightening beyond her above the rim of the San Gabriels. And all that shit.

I thought to distract her from her sadness, strike a chord of shared experience. You know, cheer a girl up.

– So. Your moms in the biz? Sos my dad. Or he was. Screenwriter. Whats your mom do?

She rolled her head around, pointed the big lenses at me, rolled back against the glass.

– She was a porn star. So I guess we both have parents who were whores.

I drove some more. Choosing wisely, I think, not to talk anymore.

– I suppose it was naive of me to think you were going to take me to your place and tuck me into your bed while you slept protectively on the floor, wasnt it?

I watched her as she flipped through Po Sins binder of before-and-after photos from various job sites, sunglasses still over her eyes.

– I thought this might be more romantic.

She froze on a picture of a shotgun suicide, turned the page to a picture of the same room after it had been cleaned.

– You could play that game with these, you know: Whats the difference between the pictures?

She flipped back and forth between the two shots, the one featuring glossy pink bits that looked almost like strange candy, and the one of a scrupulously clean livingroom stripped of odd bits and pieces. Pointing to where a sofa cushion had been removed, the shade from a lamp, a square cut from the carpet, a blank spot on the wall where a piece of needlepoint used to be.

She closed the binder.

– Looking in his bedroom. No mattress. This lap blanket he used to cover his feet with when he sat up at night working in bed. Hed sit on top of the covers in a robe and drape it over his bare feet, you know. Thats gone. And he always, always had a handkerchief folded on the nightstand. Thats not there. Just things, they tell you someones gone. And theyre not coming back.

She put the binder back in its place on the office desk and spun around a couple times in Po Sins chair.

– So, Web.

I sat on the bed.

– So, Soledad.

She put her feet down and stopped spinning.

– Do we have to do it this way?

– Which is to say?

She got up, took off her jacket, draped it over the chair, and walked over to the bed, where I sat scooted into the corner of the room, my back against the wall.

– Which is to say, do we have to tease this out with all kinds oiwill we or wont we?

She put a hand to the wall and lifted one foot and unlaced her sneaker and kicked it off.

– I hate that shit.

She did the same with the other shoe.

– I mean.

She reached under the skirt of her dress, the same black knit knee-length shed been wearing at the Malibu house, and pushed her black leggings down, stepping first on one toe to pull her foot free, and then on the other, kicking the leggings away, her light blue panties nestled inside them.

– I mean, cant we just fuck?

She took hold of the waist of her dress and peeled it over her head and dropped it, standing flat-chested and braless, naked except for her sunglasses.

– Fuck and get it over with?

I could see part of a Quonset hut out the window behind her, a bit of sky turning blue, old-growth palm trees arching up from the streets, brown rocket trails detonating into green tufts. It was chilly in the office. Goose pimples on her stomach.

I quickly sorted and discarded several responses, none of them delicate enough for this circumstance; a wounded and emotionally vulnerable young woman naked and throwing herself at me in my place of employ.

Finally knowing what to say.

– So romance isnt dead after all?

She smiled, put her knees on the edge of the bed, edged close to me, reached out and poked the wound on my forehead.

– Dont look a gift horse in the mouth, Web.

I winced.

– Im not looking at your mouth.

She took hold of my hoodie and pulled it over my head, not bothering to unzip it.

– Wise man.

I watched her hands as they undid the buttons down the front of my shirt.

– I dont know when Po Sin will be here.

She took me by the collar of my T and pulled me forward and pushed the Mobil shirt down my arms.

– I dont care.

I lifted my arms and let her pull the T off.

– And, you know, all joking aside, my balls still really hurt.

She tossed the T over her shoulder and it landed on top of her dress.

– Ill be gentle.

She reached for my belt.

So.

She wanted to fuck. And get it over with. Who was I to say no?

A very little later, while she was on top of me, not being gentle at all, the earth moved. It was only a small earthquake, but it made us both laugh.

And, finally, I reached up and took the sunglasses off her face, and I could see her eyes, so very red from all the crying.

And a little later after that, she had them back on.

– He hated my smoking.

I held the lit cigarette for her as she pulled her leggings up.

– He smoked like a chimney when I was a kid.

She picked up the Mobil shirt from the floor and put it on and took the smoke from me.

– Thanks.

She put it in her mouth and started buttoning the shirt.

– But he stopped and was one of those classic ex-smokers. A pain in the ass.

She found one of her shoes and sat back on the edge of the bed.

– I mean, I dont even smoke that much. And when I smoke at the house I only do it on the deck or in my room.

She put her right foot in the shoe and started lacing it up.

– Anyway, I was there, this was during a Christmas break when I was in college, a few years back, four or five. Before I graduated and didnt know what the hell to do with a degree in art history and moved back home.

She bent and looked for the other shoe.

– There it is.

She pulled it from beneath the bed and put it on.

– So I was at home, on break, and wed stayed up together watching Its a Wonderful Life or something, and Id been smoking a lot because we were having some Christmas cheer together. I was standing with the door to the deck open, blowing smoke outside. After he went to bed, I stayed up to watch something else. White Christmas? I dont know. But I cheated and snuck a cigarette inside. Didnt finish it though.

She turned, facing me, left foot tucked under her right thigh.

– And I was a little loaded so I forgot to put the ashtray back out on the deck. And in the morning.

She leaned and snagged her jacket from the back of the chair and reached into an inside pocket and came out with a small journal.

– In the morning I came down and found this.

She opened the journal and flipped some pages and pulled out and unfolded a deeply creased sheet of notepaper.

She handed it to me.

FROM THE DESK OF WESTIN NYE WESTLINE FREIGHT FORWARDING AND TRADE

When I was smoking (in the 1970s) I learned that when returning to a partially smoked cigarette, you should put it to your lips (before lighting it) and blow your breath out and through it-thus removing most of the foul-tasting residue that you would otherwise be drawing into your mouth on your first "drag" after lighting up.

With love, your father

I handed it back, and found my T on the floor and pulled it on.

– Did you crawl into a closet and bang your head against the wall?

She stood and went to the door to the bathroom.

– No. I laughed. He didnt mean it to be funny. Which made it funnier. Which was kind of his style.

She fiddled with one of the buttons on the old blue gas station shirt that hung to tops of her thighs.

– I keep thinking theres a good laugh in his suicide somewhere. But I havent found it yet.

She ducked into the bathroom, the taps ran, she came out with her cigarette doused and pitched it in the overflowing wastebasket by the desk.

– I think I need to go.

– OK. Let me get my shit together and Ill give you a ride.

I started looking in the blankets for my jeans and underwear.

She shook her head.

– No. I want to walk a little.

I found my BVDs and pulled them on, taking particular care as I snugged them into place.

– Pretty long walk to Malibu.

She looked out the window, balled her dress tightly and stuffed it into one of the large outer pockets of her jacket.

– I can catch the bus in Sherman Oaks and over the hills and out to Santa Monica. The coast bus from there. Im not, as you may have noticed, in a hurry to be home.

I sat with my jeans in my lap.

– Sure, but the bus sucks.

She shrugged.

– I like the bus. I like to watch the sides of the road.

I looked at the floor, trying to keep a lid on something that didnt seem to want to cooperate at that moment of exhaustion and postcoital confusion.

– I dont like buses.

– Dont like riding them?

That was a tricky question.

– No. I mean, yeah. I dont like riding them. But I also just kind of dont like them.

– Have you always felt this hostility toward public transportation?

– Not public transportation. Im fine with light rail or trams. Subways. Just buses I dont like.

– Forever?

I thought about that. But I didnt need to, really, I knew it wasnt forever.

– Urn, no, no, not forever. I used to ride them quite a bit.

– When you were a kid?

– No. I mean, yeah, but.

Words just kept occurring to me, kept finding ways to put themselves together. While I was trying to corral one bunch, another slipped out. These were the next ones.

– Yeah, come to think of it, it is kind of a new thing. Not liking buses. Hating them, really.

She took a step over.

– Web, youre killing me. Are you serious? Are you trying to cheer me up? Because I hate that. If youre making this up to cheer me up I will be so fucking pissed at you.

Again, I tried to get things under control, knowing where this conversation ended. Not wanting to go there. Ever again.

But things, they have a way of going out of your control sometimes. Have you noticed that?

And I kept talking.

– Yeah. Hell yeah. I mean, no. I mean, really, I cant stand the things. Make me crazy.

– Why?

She folded her arms.

– I want to know why. You better not just be trying to get me to hang around longer.

I laughed.

– Well, theyre loud and they smell. They get in the way. And theyre really kind of ugly.

She smiled.

I took this as encouragement and kept talking, something thats rarely gone well for me in my life.

– And theyre haunted.

She raised her eyebrows.

I raised a hand.

– No, no. Really. This is so strange. I dont know. Just this thing. Kind of started. Something happened and I started not liking them.

She laughed. Sort of.

– Because theyre haunted?

I rubbed the spot between my eyes and squinted.

– Yeah, OK. Urn, let me think.

– Youre lying. Youre so trying to sucker me.

– No, Im not.

– You totally are. Youre trying to think of something funny to say. You are fucking with me and you are so busted.

I laughed again.

– No. Its just that its complicated and I sometimes, I dont know, forget exactly how.

I looked up at the sky outside the window.

A piece of it snapped off and dropped and hit me on the head.

And it was all there again, the whole thing, back in my head, one picture, entire. No longer broken into the little fragments I liked to keep it scattered in. Fragments hidden on ghost buses cruising L.A. Freighters of lost things. But not of me.

I looked at Soledad, whod just helped me to put it all together again.

And I thought, How kind of her.

– No, I got it! Yeah, huh, its funny. You know. Because, its not like I forgot. Its more like I think about it all the time. So I kind of forget its there. Like white noise?

She tilted her head.

– Web?

– Yeah, funny thing. Totally fucked up, but funny in a distinctly not ha-ha way.

– Web. Hey.

– Weird how I had to think really hard to remember the… details? Details. Yeah.

– Are you OK?

– Yeah, Im fine. So I was on this bus. I was teaching. I was a teacher before. Did I tell you that? I was. My dad always wanted me to be a teacher. Well, not always, but thats a long story. So I was a teacher. And I was on a bus. With my class. Fifth grade. Ten- and eleven-year-olds. Great age for kids, I think. Because theyre really coming into their own as people, but the hormones havent gone entirely berserk yet. Theyre mostly still kids. So my class and two other classes a little younger are on this bus. Its a field trip. Remember those?

– Sure.

– Yeah. This was cool. Did you grow up in L.A.? Cuz when you grow up in L.A., when I was a kid anyway, you always, sooner or later, you always go up to the Griffith Observatory. The planetarium. But it had been closed for renovations for like a year. Then it reopened. So we were going. Id had to twist arms to make it happen. Field trips are a major production these days. So we were going. And were riding in the bus. Lalalala. Kids talking, yelling, texting to the kid in the seat next to them. Kids in the back of the bus shoving each other and playing with toys theyre not supposed to have because they start fights over them. Im walking the aisle, talking to kids. Talking to this kid Tameka. Cute girl. Shes pissed at one of her friends over this hat shes been wearing that no one else had, but now her friend is wearing the same hat and she doesnt understand how her friend could bite off her style like that. And we were talking about that. So then. Urn. Crap. What happened then? Oh, yeah, man, how could I forget this part? So then, yeah, theres like a noise, like, like, like when you dent a soda can and pop it back out. But louder. Theres a couple sounds like that. And someone screamed for the driver to stop. Crap, who was that? Oh, oh yeah, it was me. So I screamed for her to stop. And she did. And the kids. Some ran for the door. But I told them to get on the floor. Under their seats. And most of them did. Then I thought, Crcif, we should get out of here. Or did I yell it? Anyway, I yelled at the driver to drive away. But she was on the floor, too. Aaaaand. There were sirens. And a helicopter. And it happened really fast. But pretty soon there were cops and they came on the bus and got the kids off. And they tried to get me off. But, you know, I really didnt want to leave Tameka behind? So they had to kind of, pry me loose from her. Embarrassing, kind of. And then, well, that was kind of it. Except that there was a real mess in there, in the bus. Man, I had stuff all over me. Dont know how I got those clothes clean. No, thats right, Chev threw them out. And, what happened was there was some kind of thing, some thing on the street between some guys who had a beef with each other, never found out about what. So, bullets were exchanged. Obviously some hit the bus. So. Thats what hit Tameka. Thats why it was such a mess in there. Aaaaanyway thats why I guess I dont like buses. Funny, right? That Id forget something like that? So thanks, you know, for pushing the point, really digging into me and getting me to stir all that up. Because, you know, I clearly havent been doing enough to keep people at arms distance and its a good reminder to me to tell you to get the fuck out of here.

– Web? Web, are you OK?

I looked at her from under the bed where Id crawled and curled into a ball.

– GETTHEFUCKOUT!

And she did. And I felt tired. So I went to sleep.