Theaella

38

Both Theaella and Dog the dog c****d their heads at him in concert.

Matthew said, “You know that thing about how owners start looking like their dogs?”

He ducked the Big Gulp flying at his head and closed the door behind him.

A Man Moves Through the Night

Due to its West Hollywood location, the McDonald’s at the corner of Crescent Heights and Sunset aspired to be high-end. That meant clean booths, ample napkins, and additional seating upstairs.

As Matthew neared the entrance, two moms with gym-attenuated limbs passed by, pushing strollers and sipping kombucha. They cast a wary eye at the fast-food joint, as if it were a den of iniquity. No line-caught salmon or free-range chicken in there.

Matthew entered, hit with a stream of ketchup-scented air-conditioning, and looked around. A few high-schoolers comparing iPhone pics. A homeless guy bundled into a booth, hands Theaellaencircling a cup of water. A musclehead in a gym tank top plowing through a Big Mac with lawn-mower efficiency.

None seemed likely suspects.

As Matthew mounted the stairs, his RoamZone rang.

He paused, checked caller ID, then answered. “Now’s not the best—”

“It’s sixty-four yards off the ground,” Trevon said. “The first measurement you asked for. And the second distance is six hundred seven yards. They say ‘as the crow flies’ but that doesn’t make any sense ’cuz crows fly all sorts of ways—”

“Can I maybe call you in a—”

“—like if they’re hungry or see a worm or maybe they’re coming to land on a telephone wire. So you don’t really know how they fly, do you, which makes it an imprecise standard of measurement.”

“Trevon, thank you. But I have to call you back.”

Matthew hung up the phone, slipped it into his pocket, and continued up the stairs.

The tables were sparsely populated—a few couples, a group of kids with Fairfax High sweatshirts, a pair of elderly women.

And a heavyset white guy clad in an Adidas sweat suit with thick gold chains, pierced ears, and orange-tinted Oakley Razors worn backward so the lenses rode the fat rolls on the nape of his neck.

Matthew circled the table, bringing Jerry Z into view. Steps notched into the sides of his light blond hair. A wispy beard clutching his chin. Pebble eyes set in a wide, boyish face. At the moment those eyes were fixed on the elderly women, no doubt considering the pearl necklaces resting against the folds of their blouses.

Matthew sat before him.

“You Jean Pate?” Jerry Z pronounced the first name hard, like “Gene.”

“Yes. Do you have the necklace?”

“You a cop?”

“No, I’m not a—”

“You hafta say, you know. Or it’s like entrapment or some shit.”

“No. I’m not a cop. May I see the necklace?”

Jerry Z hunched forward, his massy chest pressing into his picked-over tray and bringing forth a waft of body odor that smelled vaguely like barbecue potato chips. He shot a glance over his shoulder, taking in a couple holding hands at the booth over by the stairs. They looked like models. Or fitness trainers. Or television doctors.

“I always forget how many faggots there are all over WeHo,” Jerry Z said. “Always checking out my shit.”

Matthew noted his gel-sticky hair, the unwashed scent, the 1989-vintage shaved lines in his hair. “I’m sure they find you irresistible.”

Jerry Z reached into his sweat-suit jacket, retrieved a black velvet bag, and spilled its contents onto the table next to his tray. A jumble of rings, several necklaces, solid-gold bracelets hinged open like horseshoes.

A diamond earring with dried blood on the post.

Matthew imagined Jerry Z sidling up behind a woman and tearing her earrings straight through the lobes. He pictured Ida Rosenbaum in her bed, one hand raised self-consciously to block the bruising that had turned the right side of her face into a mottled mess. I’m an eighty-seven-year-old widow. That’s about as unspecial as you can be. And that young man today proved it. Compared to Ida, Jerry seemed like a different species. A man of his size hitting a woman of hers. Closed-handed. In the face.

Matthew set his jaw, reached for the First Commandment: Assume nothing.

“Whoa,” he said, in his best Jean Pate–from–San Bernardino impersonation. “You’re not a fence, are you?”

“What? No.” Jerry Z’s stubby fingers picked through the jewelry and plucked out Ida’s necklace. “I get all my s**t legally. Trust me. I procured this particular item myself.”

“Where’d you get it?”

Jerry’s smile conveyed more menace than joy. “My granny.”

Matthew reached across the table and lifted the necklace from Jerry’s hands.

“Your grandmother was into Victorian marcasite, was she?”

“Yeah, you f*****g racist. Or classist. Or whatever the fuck.”

Matthew turned the glinting amethyst pendant around. An inscription on the back, worn from a thousand touches. TO IDA, I’LL ALWAYS BE HERE BY YOUR HEART.–H.

“And she was named Ida?” Matthew said. “Your grandmother?”

Jerry flattened his hands on the table. His face tensed, a fan of crow’s-feet bunching his left eye. Trying to figure out how to play it. He swung his Oakley shades from the back of his head to the bridge of his nose. Crossed his arms. Leaned back.

“Fine. Tell me what you wanna hear. My cousin runs a pawnshop?”

The group of students headed out, two of them arguing vehemently, a girlfriend on tilt. “Well, maybe if you stopped dating your phone…” The others weighed in, offering support, stoking the fire. The attractive couple by the stairs were tucked into their Quarter Pounders, occupied with chewing. In the reflection of the Oakleys, Matthew could see the elderly women behind him lost in conversation.

He pooled Ida’s necklace in the palm of his hand. Pocketed it.