THE NURSERY
by Russ Anderson, Jr.
Copyright © 2012 Russ Anderson, Jr.
Published by AnderFam Press
All rights reserved.
Cover design by James, GoOnWrite.com
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this story are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
When I woke up, my forehead felt tight as a drum, the pulse beating in my temples stretching it nearly to the breaking point, and it felt like somebody sprinkled rock salt in my eyes before I'd gone off to dreamland. I'd had hangovers before, and this one probably wasn't the worst, but it would have made it into the books. Probably would have got its own chapter.
There was a tumbler on the desktop by my hand. A sniff told me it had recently contained whiskey, and a somersaulting weasel in my belly told me that if I took another whiff I was going to puke. Which might be interesting from an academic point of view, since I couldn't remember when or what I'd last ate. I also didn't remember what this last bender had been about. With any luck, I could hold onto that forgetfulness for a little while longer so I wouldn't have to deal with it. I shoved the glass away and it skittered across the desk, nearly knocking a 4x6 glossy off onto the floor.
That brought something back. The photo showed me a young black girl, skin like caramel and a smile that could light up a country night, sweetest of sweet sixteen. I rubbed at my eyes. This little girl's mom had been in my office – what, yesterday? - asking me if I thought I could find her girl. Mom wore a clean, but old, gingham dress, checkered in blue and white. I could all but smell the country on her. A worried mom chasing her runaway daughter to the big city and hiring me to find her because (a) I was about the only black detective in town and (b) as a consequence of (a), I was also one of the cheapest.
I turned the photograph over and looked at the name scrawled on the back in my handwriting. Candy Warner. That was convenient, her having a name like 'Candy' already. It'd save her the trouble of coming up with one that fit her new profession.
Fact was, I didn't know for certain where Candy had got to, but I knew her story well enough to take an educated guess. And her momma was no fool. Little girl comes to big city with nothing but dreams of her name in lights, what the hell else is she going to end up doing?
But I had taken Momma Warner's money, and cheapest retainer in town or not, I owed the woman some closure for it. I rubbed at my salty eyes again.
I had a couple of medicinals growing in a window box for an awakening precisely as rough as this one. I plucked a few caps and took them into the bathroom with me, where I chewed them up and swallowed them with a little help from the water coughing and spluttering out of the tap. They tasted like used sweatsocks that had been abandoned in a damp locker, but I knew from experience they'd do the job I needed them to do. I splashed some water on my face, then went ahead and doffed my shirt and pants so I could splash some in my pits and nether regions too. I pulled a gallon jug of vinegar out from under the sink and carefully rubbed it into my face and hair and the places where sweat and darkness gathered on my skin. It would do until I had the time and inclination for a real shower.
Now that I was as clean as I was getting today, I pulled my shirt and pants back on and found a jacket that wasn't as rumpled as the one I'd been wearing. Time to go find a girl that almost certainly didn't want to be found so we could go and break her momma's heart.
Really, it was no wonder I loved this job so much.
The frosted glass on the office's front door said ARNOLD CHEEK. Since that was my name, I felt obligated to lock up on my way out.
*****
My office was a tiny dive near Times Square, meaning I shared my home with capheads, hookers, and shaky little punks who thought they were gunslingers. I hated it, but it was mine in a way no nice apartment in Gramercy was ever going to be, no matter if I struck it rich someday. Which wasn't to say that I wouldn't have been willing to give it a try if some fine young heiress wanted to make me her kept man... but since I'd looked at my face in a mirror not five minutes earlier, and knew how unpleasant it was, I couldn't see that happening anytime soon.
I stopped at Al's, a food cart on the corner of 7th and 42nd, and ordered my usual – a portabella drizzled with balsamic vinegar and a side of fries. I liked Al because he was a straight foodie, not one of these hucksters who sold 'shrooms as enhancements. There were confidence men all up and down the Avenues who would try to convince gullible patrons that their fungus would make them smarter or clear up their acne or keep their dick hard longer. I hated cops on general principle, but I hated them even more for not sitting on those guys with any kind of regularity. Some 'shrooms were medicine, some 'shrooms were food, and some 'shrooms were pretty good for making you crazy. Everything else these assholes tried to sell you was snake oil.
Al just sold food. Good food, too, the kind that made you think of Coney Island in the summer, back when we all had more years ahead of us than behind us. Since I was standing there chewing on my bella anyway, I pulled the 4x6 of Candy out of my coat and asked him if he'd ever seen her.
He gave me a funny kind of look, like he couldn't believe I would ask such a thing, then shook his head with a sigh. “Nah, I ain't never seen her.”
“You sure, Al? You maybe want to take another look?”
“I told you I ain't seen her,” Al said, slamming his tongs down on top of the cart. “I'd remember her if I had, pretty girl like that. Why you riding me, Cheek?”
I tucked the picture back into my coat, never taking my eyes off of Al, until finally another set of customers came up and he turned his attention to them. He was all smiles and Brooklyn charm with them, a handsome white couple dressed like they were going to a show. Young, smart enough to avoid the 'shroom hucksters, and completely unafraid of the tall black man taking up space in front of Al's cart. I liked them already and, making a mental note to come back to Al if my other idea didn't pan out, left them to their lunch.
A cleaning truck buzzed by, spraying vinegar and diluted bleach into the gutters and swishing it all around with the big brushes on the back. I could still see rogue mushrooms hiding in the drains, withered but alive and ready to encroach as soon as the city missed a cleaning. There were dark places at the openings to alleys and in the elbows where concrete stoops met brick buildings, where the mushrooms had worked their way through the sidewalk. These were no good for eating, of course, growing out of the cement and bedrock like that. If anybody tried, they'd most probably break every tooth in their head.
I'd finished my bella and put most of the fries to rest by the time I reached 11th Avenue. I threw the wrappers into the gutter and stood licking my fingers for a minute, getting my bearings. Then I crossed 42nd Street and slid up beside a couple of gals who were working the curb next to a rundown warehouse building. I knew one of them – she went by Lucy, God knew what her parents had named her. The other girl, the one I didn't know, was Latina and looked too damn young to be there. That wouldn't last long, of course – the mileage would overtake the years soon enough.
“Mondo says we ain't supposed to be talking with you, Cheek,” Lucy said by way of greeting.
That caught me off-guard. “Mondo's got a beef with me?” I asked. “Why's that, baby?”
“You can stuff your 'baby',” Lucy said. “And take it up with him. Whatever it is, I ain't having it taken out of my ass, you dig?” The Latina was pretending not to pay attention to us, but she had quietly repositioned herself on the other side of Lucy, away from me.
I started to reach into my coat. “I'm looking for a girl – a particular girl. Just take a look at this picture for me.”
Lucy put out a hand, pinning mine inside the coat. “Didn'
t you hear me? I can't talk to you or Mondo's going to black and blue me up and down. Get out of here before he comes by.”
I sighed and pulled my hand out of the coat. “Fine, I'll just go ask Mondo then.”
“Ask me what, motherfucker?”
I turned... and a hand the size of a bear's paw fastened around my throat. The giant of a man attached to it shoved me back against the wall of the warehouse, rebounding me off the corner of the building and sending me sprawling into the alley. I went for my piece, but my coat was all twisted around me, and before I could get it free of the shoulder holster I heard the hammer-click of a forty-five from the mouth of the alley. I got my hands up and kept them there, still kneeling on the ground.
“What's this about, Mondo?” I asked. I heard him trudging toward me and considered making a fight out of it, but no. Mondo was slow as a broke-leg tortoise, but he didn't need to be fast with that hand cannon of his.
That bear's paw fell on me again, yanking me to my feet this time and hurling me into the alley wall. I spun around, determined not to let him shoot me in the back, but kept my hands up. Mondo was already there, one hand wrung up in my shirt and the other pressing the warm barrel of the forty-five to my skull.
Mondo was six and a half feet tall, and most of that height was in his meanness. He had one gold tooth sparkling in the middle of his snarling face and a blue, sweat-stained bandanna wrapped around his bald head. I'd seen car hoods that weren't as broad or smooth as that head of his. He had striking eyes, golden in color, but one of the irises had been misshapen by an infection when he was a kid.
I'd helped Mondo beat a murder rap once, even though I kind of suspected he was guilty at the time. None of that mattered today, apparently. I decided I'd better talk fast.
“Mondo, I'm looking for a girl,” I said in as calm a voice as I could manage under the circumstances. “That's all I'm doing.”
“I know what you looking for, motherfucker,” Mondo said, digging the forty-five into my forehead. “I don't want any of your bullshit around here.”
I tried to lean away from the barrel, but the wall was in my way and Mondo just dug in harder. “What are you talking about, man? You don't even know-”
“You leave my girls alone,” he growled. “This the last time I'm telling you, Cheek. You can warn your boy Filly, too. I see either of you 'round here again, I'm gonna plug your asses and throw the bodies in the goddamn river.”
He let go of my shirt and poked me hard with the gun, splitting the skin on my forehead open and slamming the back of my head against the wall. I fell to my knees with a grunt.
I watched him trudge out of the alley, tucking his gun back into the front of his pants. Lucy was standing there and he waved a threatening arm at her before sliding back into the front seat of a black Charger, which sat rumbling at the curb. As he pulled away, Lucy and her Latina friend beat a hasty retreat.
“Hope you shoot your dick off,” I muttered. There was blood in my eyes, and I put a hand up to probe at the wound, but touching it felt like driving an icepick into it, so I let it be for the moment. I'd have to stop somewhere and get cleaned up. Guy walked around with an open wound in this town, he was likely to have something growing in it before too long.
I got to my feet, staggered, and steadied myself. When the alley stopped bellydancing in front of me, I took a step away from the wall. Since I didn't fall down, I took another and another, until finally I reached the street.