Taste of Tenderloin Page 7

  He ignored the cautionary thoughts. With long strides, the Ugly Man bounded into the street, deftly dodged a vehicle and scooped up the child and ball. He spun 180 degrees as adroitly as Reggie Bush, holding out his hand and stiff-arming a taxi to a brake-squealing stop, before finally handing off the crying child to his mother, who was still standing frozen in the doorway to the You-Do-It laundromat.

  "Hey, yo, dude, way to go, man!" said Double S, a legless black man who roamed the Tenderloin on a scooterboard. He stretched up and offered the Ugly Man a high five.

  The Ugly Man slapped Double S's hand, then nervously looked back down O'Farrell, remembering the threat of the two drug dealers. Still not in sight. He let a sigh trickle across his lips and glanced again at the grateful mother and her child. She held her boy tightly in her arms, talking to two female friends, gesturing at him and nodding.

  Waving back, he smiled with pride and moved along for a few steps, but for some reason he stopped and shifted his gaze overhead. The nightly mist had thinned, and here and there bluish-crystal stars glistened against the black backdrop of space. It was an unusual sight this time of year; the fog usually shrouded the night sky from view. For a moment, the break in the fog and rare sight took his breath away, providing ice for his bruised soul. Momentarily, the smells, the sights, the sounds, and all the nastiness of the 'loin were gone. A sense of gratitude for just being alive overwhelmed him---something he hadn't felt for a long, long time.

  With a slight shudder, thoughts of the two thugs again flooded his thoughts. The Ugly Man shuffled along quickly down his alley, past his cardboard tent to the very end. There, he squeezed in to hide behind the dumpster and collect himself.

  He expected to hear footsteps any minute. He knew he should be paralyzed, but after searching his feelings and thoughts, he detected little sense of fear in himself. No, he wasn't scared at all. His fear had been replaced with...something else. In fact, he had only positive thoughts and feelings, partly because of the series of events of the past ten minutes or so, concluding with his discovery of the extraordinary star-filled night. But he was also acutely aware of the itchy, dry skin cracking along his arms and legs as he slumped down behind the dumpster. Another weird feeling, too, centered on his back---the just-noticeable sensation of something crawling. Giddy, he knew the remarkable change, whatever it signaled, was nearing completion. And he also knew that the transformation wasn't just physical; no indeed, he was dramatically changing inside, too, growing stronger. A really positive feeling about himself.

  At that moment, The Ugly Man drifted; for a second or two he could almost hear his friend's mystical advice from long ago: Follow the Way.

  Blinking, he sucked in a deep breath and looked about his cramped enclosure, assessing his immediate situation. He realized that if Big Foot and Sleepyboy tracked him back there, he would be trapped in a dead-end alley. But, then again, so would they. The thought almost made him giggle, but he restrained himself, cocked his head, and listened intently, lurking like a shadow in the night.

  Another minute or so dragged by.

  Overhead, the mist had thickened, again blotting out the stars.

  Then came the sound of footsteps in the alleyway, cautiously approaching.

  Closer.

  The Ugly Man completely shed the last of his ugliness.

  Transformed, he gazed back down on the alley as Big Foot and Sleepyboy paused at the cardboard tent and peeked in.

  The big man angrily kicked over the dwelling place, scattering things. "Ugly dude done gone!" he said, his mean features scrunched into a dark scowl. Sleepyboy tapped the big man's shoulder and pointed to the nearby dumpster, his face deadpan.

  Big Foot grinned and shuffled forward. He cautiously looked behind the dumpster and swore under his breath. "Oh, shit! Looky here, Sleeps."

  The thinly built sidekick peered around the wide leader.

  In back of the dumpster, there was only a pile of smelly clothes and a threadbare hooded sweatshirt resting atop the wrinkled shirts and pants.

  With a puzzled expression, Big Foot leaned over and flicked through the pile of clothes, finally exposing what looked like a pile of discarded, cracked, marked skin, like something a huge diamondback rattler might have shed.

  "What the fuck---?"

  He found a stick and used it to lift up some of his discovery to show his cohort.

  Revealing little emotion, Sleepyboy nodded. "The ugly ole fool done shed all his ruined skin, man. That's it right there."

  Amazed, Big Foot discarded the shed skin on the pile of clothes. He shook his head, his face even more puzzled. "Fuck him, Sleeps. Let's find the skinny-ass deadbeat, an' slice his apple." He slipped something from his pocket, flicking it back and forth in the air threateningly.

  The dim light glinted off the blade of the straight razor.

  Sleepyboy nodded his head and began to turn away. "'Kay. Let's do him."

  Overhead, the Ugly Man thought, No, they aren't doing anyone. He fanned his wings.

  The two drug dealers froze in place, noticing the air whirling down and stirring the alley debris into a hurricane about them. Startled, they looked up at the rooftop of the two-story building at the end of the alley. He was poised on the lip of the overhang, his fearsome red gaze glaring down at them, paralyzing both in place.

  Before either hoodlum could even twitch a muscle to run, he sprang off the building with an ear-shattering roar, swooped down, and engulfed both men in a blistering inferno that lit up the cool night.

  Balance

  At 6:55 a.m., when Declan Mulcahy first stepped out onto O'Farrell Street from his apartment building, San Francisco's Tenderloin district appeared sunny and warm but uncharacteristically deserted---a brief lull between changing shifts. Most of the dealers, junkies, and hookers had called it a night; the homeless were still asleep in their cardboard tents, and the neighborhood street cops were all up at Happy Donuts doing police work.

  Declan walked a block up the street from his apartment and met only an old Asian lady coming from the opposite direction. She pulled a little red wagon stacked with two baskets of dirty clothes, obviously headed for the nearby You Do It laundromat. He crossed the street and saw one other person, a black dude waiting for the Korean's grocery store to open. The guy was about Declan's age, late twenties to early thirties, sporting dreadlocks and frayed camouflage utilities---no name tag or unit designation, only the faded Army patch remained intact over his heart. Declan had seen him around in the past month or so, often leaving the Korean's with a small brown sack. Sometimes he wondered if the guy had been in Desert Storm, too. But he never asked, only nodded.

  Declan was wound pretty tight that morning. He'd been up most of the night, his mouth almost too dry to ask anything, his underarms and crotch gritty and damp with clammy sweat. He sniffed, reminded that sweat smelled different, depending on the type. Work sweat had kind of a neutral odor, mildly offensive at worst; sex sweat lingered on you, smelled good, especially when mixed with traces of perfume; booze or dope sweat the morning after had a stale, nauseating smell; but the absolute worst smell of all was nervous fear sweat---sharp, sour, and biting. At that moment the sharp stink was flaring his nostrils, making them itch.

  He rubbed his nose, sucked in a deep breath, closed his eyes, and centered for a moment to settle his nerves. Then, at 7:00 sharp, Declan followed the guy in Army cams into the store.

  Mr. Pak himself had opened the front door and stepped back behind the service counter. He bowed politely to his two early morning customers in his self-deprecating way, an old-world mannerism that neither of his teenaged children practiced. Both had grown up on the mean streets of the 'loin, attending local public schools. Declan nodded back, wandered over to the video machine, and waited impatiently for the black dude to pick out his Old English forty-ouncer from the drink box, pay, and get the fuck out of the grocery. Then it would be only Mr. Pak, alone in the store, and his two kids either in back where goods were stored or in the fami
ly flat upstairs getting ready for high school.

  Declan slipped to the back of the store and took a quick peek through the round window in the swinging door leading to the storage area. The boy was back there, occupied with cutting open cases of various canned items. Declan tilted his head, listened intently, and could just make out the girl moving around upstairs. The entire family was on the premises and accounted for at this early hour, just as planned. Yes, indeed.

  After the dude in the Army cams carefully counted his change twice and finally left the store with his brown bag, Declan stepped up to the counter.

  The middle-aged Korean grocer looked at him curiously. "You no find something?"

  Declan shook his head, closed his eyes, and concentrated. Mr. Pak, you know the reason I am here, right? he thought. Then he blinked, steeled himself, reached under his dark green USF sweatshirt, and slipped the recently purchased Colt Python .357 out of the front of his Levi's.

  At first Mr. Pak nodded and smiled, as if answering Declan's silent question; then the smile froze on his face and his eyes widened when he spotted the gun. Both hands flew up in a defensive gesture as he said in a shaky voice, "You no stealy-boy. Why you do this?"

  Declan didn't answer as time, movement, and his thinking seemed to alter dramatically into super-slow motion. On a kind of pre-programmed autopilot, he gently squeezed the handgun's trigger.

  The gunshot made a sharp, high-pitched whine, characteristic of a .357, shattering the stillness in the store. The sound made Declan's eardrums vibrate painfully. He hadn't anticipated this trait of the gun and had neglected to use cotton earplugs. He ground his teeth against the pain.

  The grocer tumbled backward into the wall behind the checkout counter, a crimson flower slowly appearing over his right eye as he finally slid inelegantly to the floor.

  "Papa...Papa!" a voice screamed to Declan's far left. The teenage daughter stood frozen on the bottom step of the staircase leading to the family flat. She held her hands up to either side of her round face as if holding her head on her shoulders. A shocked, disbelieving expression glazed her dark eyes.

  Swinging his gun hand slowly around in her direction, Declan squeezed the .357's trigger again; the round hit the young woman in the chest.

  Unlike her father, she fell forward, face down, after her right leg buckled and slipped off the last step. Declan watched as a thick pool of blood spread out from her upper body.

  For a brief moment, he closed his eyes, feeling time and place slipping away from his mental grasp, like so many other times in the past few years. He felt himself pulled back to the Storm, the night his Force Recon unit was surprised, almost wiped out under a thundering barrage of friendly rocket fire.

  "No," Declan whispered hoarsely, blinking and resisting the pull of the past. He did not need to relive the pyrotechnic horror show again.

  Turning his back on the fallen father and daughter, Declan glimpsed a frightened face in the round window of the door at the rear of the store. Still moving in slow motion, he took five giant steps down the nearest aisle and pushed the storage room door open with his free hand, pointing inside with the Colt.

  The boy tried to escape, bounding slowly up and down, heading for a rear exit into the alley behind the store. Declan's third shot hit him in the lower back, sprawling the teenager forward onto all fours, a red stain spreading across the back of his white T-shirt. Legs useless, the boy struggled for a moment or two toward the alley exit, pulling himself along the floor with his arms in an awkward swimming motion. Making little progress, he looked back over his shoulder, his face a grimace of pain, and said something. It appeared like lip-synching, because by then Declan was completely deafened by the three high-pitched blasts. He moved alongside the boy, leaned down, and gently pressed the weapon to the back of the young boy's head. He fired a fourth time, ending the teenager's agony.

  The operation was over, mission completed. Probably less than two minutes. Declan slipped the weapon back into the front of his Levi's.

  Weak-kneed and shaking slightly, he managed to make it to a sink in the corner of the storeroom. He expected to throw up, like after the slaughter of his unit during the Storm, but he was only slightly nauseated. He used his finger and gagged forcefully twice, managing only to make his eyes water heavily. He should feel some remorse for the Pak family, who had always been polite and helpful. Kind, even. No, he chastised himself, you can't think like that. They had all three been volunteers, helping counteract the Law of Catastrophic Isostasy.

  Sometime shortly after the last shot, Declan's thinking and perception had sped back up to real time. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, took a deep breath, and washed his face with cool water. As he straightened up from the sink, the ringing in his ears began to subside.

  Declan pushed the swinging door back into the store, about the same time a neighborhood bag lady shuffled in the front door and looked around, frowning angrily. "Say, boy, where's that ole Gung Ho or one of 'em young'ns? I needs a coffee, bad."

  Declan shrugged, turning his face down and away as he pushed by the impatient old woman on the way to the street, mumbling, "Dunno."

  He crossed O'Farrell, looked anxiously back over his shoulder once, and realized no one was following. He hurried down the block back to his building, the street still relatively empty of pedestrians and traffic. Everything had gone real smooth, according to plan. Yes, indeed.

  Inside his studio apartment, Declan glanced around cautiously. The tiny room, sparsely furnished, appeared undisturbed. He stepped over to the chipped desk his social worker had given him and re-aligned the three pencils parallel with the edge of his writing pad. Yes, everything was neat and simple, just like his room had been at the VA hospital in Martinez. Except there he'd had to go into the dayroom to see TV. Here in his apartment, Declan sat down on his one folding chair and stared at the portable black and white set with its rabbit ears. But he didn't turn on the TV, just stared intently at the blank grey screen and waited patiently, a skill he'd developed over the years during his stays at Martinez.

  After a few minutes, a figure materialized on the screen: a woman, looking just like the blindfolded statue down at the Hall of Justice. Only the scales held by the TV Lady Justice were balanced evenly.

  Declan sighed deeply with relief.

  At that moment, a feminine voice in his head announced: You did very well, Declan Mulcahy. Very well indeed, considering it was your first assignment. I am quite impressed by your effective and timely performance. But, to validate to yourself that we have indeed counteracted the Law of Catastrophic Isostasy, please peruse the San Francisco Chronicle tomorrow morning, noting the complete absence of any reported disasters.

  Declan nodded and smiled as Lady Justice faded from the blank screen. Yes, he promised himself, I will definitely check the newspaper tomorrow.

  Early the next morning, Declan walked up O'Farrell, glancing nervously across the street as he passed the Korean's grocery. SFPD yellow crime scene tape roped it off, and quite a few cops were still on the scene, talking to pedestrians up and down both sides of the street. A TV van from Channel 7 was set up nearby, too. It looked like that Melendez lady talking into the camera. None of the policemen seemed the least bit interested in stopping Declan or asking him questions. Apparently they hadn't interviewed the bag lady, or maybe she hadn't been able to ID him. Either way, he breathed more easily and walked quickly past the cops.

  Declan continued two blocks up to the corner of Jones and crossed over to Homeboy's liquor store to buy a Chronicle.

  Back out on the street, Declan anxiously thumbed through the newspaper. No Oklahoma City bombings, no hurricanes, no earthquakes, no tornados, no floods, not even a thunderstorm reported in the Midwest. His held breath trickled out across his dry lips. The voice in his head, the Lady Justice, had been right. The intervention had definitely worked; they had managed to keep the scales balanced.

  Jacked up by the results of the successful covert operation, Dec
lan turned to head back home, grinning at the dude in the Army cams who was apparently coming in to get his morning taste of Old English up at Homeboy's now that the Korean was out of business.

  The guy nodded and spoke as he passed Declan. "Whassup?"

  Declan didn't answer, surprised by the first verbal greeting in a month or so of exchanging nods. He strolled on back down O'Farrell, the Chronicle tucked under his arm.

  Back in his tiny apartment, Declan went through the newspaper, page by page, more carefully, making sure he hadn't missed something. He'd been right the first time; no disasters, man-made or natural, reported anywhere across the country. He smiled to himself, feeling pretty good.

  Actually, really good.

  The best he'd felt since leaving the hospital four weeks before. Yes, indeed.

  After returning home to San Francisco from the Gulf and Desert Storm, Declan had spent eight years going in and out of the North Bay VA hospital a dozen times. The surgeons had done a pretty good job on his bad leg---he had only a slight limp---but the doctors had ended up with less luck with his damaged psyche, or so they claimed. Over that time, the psychiatrists and clinical psychologists at the hospital had built up an impressive ten-inch file of extensive test results, observational anecdotes, and diagnoses. Most of the technical jargon was incomprehensible to Declan, with the exception of post-traumatic stress disorder and the two words often tacked on at the end of a diagnostic rambling: delusion and hallucination. He suspected that most of the psychiatric babble was inaccurate, especially the treatment prescriptions, because each time he returned to San Francisco from Martinez---even when he attended outpatient therapy two to three times a week at the VA center and took his meds faithfully every day---he still couldn't hold a regular job, attend City College for even a short summer session, or maintain a relationship with a regular woman. In fact, nothing seemed to work out right no matter how hard Declan tried. After all these years, he'd finally decided that the nightmare night during the Storm had done nothing to his head; instead, it had permanently damaged his soul. Who could cure that?