Chapter 5-3
2384 Words
“You’re saying I can’t make them take that video down.”
“I’m saying you’ll just make it worse if you try.”
“So, what can I do?”
“Getting to that, doll. Have you met my nephew, Alphonse? He’s in film school. Taking courses about documentaries. He’s going to win Oscars with flicks about skateboarders.”
“And that helps me how?”
“You can be his next class project. He interviews you; puts in footage about how they lied about you. We put that up on the web and suddenly there is what the PR world calls a competing narrative. You’re the victim instead of the villain.”
“I hate like hell to be called either one.”
“Publicity, doll. Everybody plays the victim card these days.”
“How long would it take Alphonse to put this together?”
“Well, he’s a perfectionist but I think maybe he can throw something together in a couple weeks.”
Maxie looked at the memorial. Someone had added a cross and two American flags.
“I don’t think I have that long.”
She found posterboard in the storage room and took markers from her office desk. After half an hour she emerged and showed it to Spike. “Whatcha think?”
“Wow,” said Spike.
“You impressed?”
“I haven’t seen a sign like that since, I dunno, third grade. Gimme ten minutes on your computer and let me go to the print shop and I’ll bring you something that looks professional.”
“Why not? I’m made of money.”
“It’s just a few bucks.” He paused to look at the poster again. “Can we lose the shouting?”
“The what?”
“The all-caps.”
“And here I didn’t know I hired a graphics designer. Knock yourself out.”
As soon as the poster went up in the window customers started commenting on it. Of course, some of them had not seen the video or even noticed the memorial until they spotted Maxie’s sign. That was the Streisand Effect, come home to roost.
But they were mostly supportive.
“Don’t let ’em push you around, Maxie.”
“These idiots want to bring back prohibition.”
“You oughta sue them.”
The next day Trevor Walsh was back, red-faced and furious.
“Get out of my shop,” said Maxie. “Or I’ll call the cops.”
The big teen pointed to the poster in the window. “You calling me a liar?”
“Whoever made that video is a liar and you know it. The man who killed your sister didn’t buy booze here.”
“Maybe not. But you would have sold it to him. You’d do anything for money.”
would“Those are nice sneakers,” said Maxie.
The football player looked down at his feet. “What?”
“Cost a bundle, right? Somebody in your family thinks making money is important.”
Somebody“You bitch.”
Spike, behind her, took a step forward. Without turning, Maxie waved him back. “That does it, kid. Know what I’m going to do now?”
Trevor sneered. “Call the cops?”
“Call your daddy. Just what he needs right now, to hear how his son is screwing up.”
He tried to slam the door on the way out, but it was built to close gently.
“You really gonna call the father?” asked Spike.
“I hope not.”
The next afternoon a bunch of young people stood on the sidewalk and sang songs, accompanied by a ukulele this time. Maxie hadn’t seen one of those in years.
The good part was that they ignored the store and showed no interest in the customers coming and going.
Mr. Kotsky, putting a bottle of schnapps on the counter, said: “If they’re gonna be a band maybe they should call themselves the Carolers. Get it?”
“You’re a riot, Mr. K.”
Just before closing time, Maxie told Spike to fetch a case of red wine from the storeroom.
He carried it to the front and set it down with a sigh. “I’m getting too old for this.”
“Oh, don’t make me weep. I have bras older than you.”
He stretched. “I’d rather not think about that if—”
The crash made Maxie back up to the wall. Not as loud as the car accident, but closer. The front window had turned into a spiderweb.
“Get down!”
Spike had been facing away from the window. He started to turn, then hunched his shoulders and dropped.
The second brick burst through the fractured glass and sent shards flying.
Maxie waited for a breathless second to see if more would be coming. Then she ran to Spike. He was on his hands and knees. There were splinters of glass on his shirt and blood was leaking onto white cotton.
“Don’t move. I’ll call 911.”
“Again,” he croaked.
“Yeah. We get the loyalty discount. Stay still!”
Maxie couldn’t open the store the next morning, but she was in early anyway, making calls. First to Jorge and Sirena, the best cleaners she knew. When a*****e has been sprayed with glass and blood, you didn’t take chances. Couldn’t have a customer reach for a bottle of cabernet and come back with a lawsuit.
Then the glass company. The night before, after the ambulance had left, Maxie had found the plywood sheets had Jerome purchased to cover the windows whenever a bad windstorm was predicted. They weren’t exactly in tornado country, so it hadn’t happened often, but Jerome, bless his heart, had seldom thrown anything away.
Two of the cops had been kind enough to drag the boards up and over the window. That would last until the glass guys installed a replacement.
Now somebody was knocking on the door. It was a cop in uniform, squinty-eyed, black hair in a bun.
Maxie let her in. “Ms. Lorgan? I’m Officer Ravo. Is everything okay here?”
“As well as can be expected. They kept my clerk in the hospital overnight.”
The cop shook her head. “He’s lucky it wasn’t worse. I’d like to show you some photos. Tell me if you saw any of these people around your shop yesterday.”
“Sure.” Maxie gestured to the counter.
Ravo opened a folder. Inside was a page with photos of six young white men.
Maxie picked it up. Her hand began to tremble, so she let the folder drop.
“This is called a photo array. Take a look at all the pictures. Tell me if—”
“I know how it works, Officer. We get robbed every few years, you know. It’s part of the circle of life around here.”
“Oh. Sure.”
“Number four is Trevor Walsh. I’ve never seen the others.”
Ravo nodded. “And was he in the store yesterday?”
“No.”
“Maybe you saw him outside?”
“No. But he was here a few days ago.”
“Did he threaten you?”
“He and his friends said some stupid things. I probably did too.” She shrugged. “I don’t think they meant anything by it. Why do you bring him up?”
“He was stopped by police last night on Highway 7, driving well over the speed limit. We found brick dust on the floor of his car.”
“Brick dust. Amazing what scientists can figure out these days, isn’t it?”
Officer Ravo looked at the camera on the side wall, the one pointed at a sheet of plywood where a window used to be. “We’re going to need the footage from that security camera.”
Maxie took a breath. “Yeah, that’s a funny thing. It hasn’t been working lately. I haven’t had time to get it fixed.”
Ravo scowled. “Are you sure?”
“Absotively.”
“I don’t think your insurance company is going to be happy to hear that.”
Maxie nodded. “You have a bucket list, Officer?”
She frowned. “Excuse me?”
“A bucket list. Things you want to do before you die.”
“I know what it is. No, I don’t have one. Why do you ask?”
“Yeah, you’re too young. Well, I have one, and cheering up insurance companies ain’t on it.”
Once the cop left Maxie went to her office and sat down at her computer. She had some video erasing to do.
Jorge and Sirena, bless their hearts, came right after lunch. They shook their heads, offered sympathy, and got right to work on the bloodstains and busted window glass. It turned out no bottles had broken, which was a nice surprise.
They were almost finished when someone knocked on the locked door. Maxie let Dennis Walsh in. The girl’s father was breathing hard, like he’d climbed a long way to get there.
“Step into my office.”
He followed her. She sat behind her desk and gestured toward a chair. He didn’t sit.
“I’ll take all that crap down. Is that the deal?”
“There’s no deal,” said Maxie.
Walsh’s hands were clasping and releasing, like he was doing strange calisthenics. “You told the police there was no film of—of what happened. If the memorial stays up, are you going to magically discover film of my boy and show it to them?”
Maxie leaned back, folding her arms. “You know you’re insulting me, right? In my little crowd people get cranky when they’re accused of blackmail.”
“Sorry. I—” Walsh wiped a hand across his face. “This is the worst month of my entire life. I don’t know what you want.”
“I want it to stop, that’s all. Things are getting crazy.” She shook her head. “I’m not blaming you. Hell, it’s at least as much my fault as anyone’s. But we have to end this now.”
Maxie pointed toward the front of the store. “If Spike had been facing the other way when your son threw those bricks he could have been blinded. Maybe killed.”
“I know.”
“Tell you what. When I total the repair bills, I’ll send you a copy. Contribute what you see fit.”
He nodded. “All right. And your assistant…”
“Worker’s Comp should take care of Spike. If there’s deductible or whatever I’ll send you that bill too. Okay?”
Another nod. “And, like I said, I’ll take the memorial down. You’ll never have to see it again.”
Maxie straightened up. “Look, your daughter, Carol… She was on her way home from Silver Lake, right? Been to a concert there.”
He frowned. “That’s right.”
“So how about this? You and me write to the Parks Department, and ask they let us put up a plaque there. Maybe we need a petition or something.”
“A plaque?”
“Something pretty. Something permanent.” Maxie waved toward the street. “Something people can tie all the flowers and balloons they want to.”
permanent“I don’t know…”
“Come on, Mr. Walsh. Her friends should remember her where she was happy, not here.” She raised her eyebrows. “I’ll even chip in on the cost. What do you say?”
Walsh rolled his shoulders. “I drive past this street on my way to work every day. You don’t know what that’s like. You can’t know.”
Maxie felt a pulse throbbing in her throat. “Don’t say that, pal. Don’t you dare say that.”
She stood up. “Follow me.”
They walked forward into the sales space and stopped near the beer cooler. “You see that corner? Six years ago, this April my husband died right there. Some junkie with a g*n came to rob the place and Jerome, poor sweet Jerome, was in such a hurry to get to the cash register and give him our money that the guy panicked and shot him in the face.”
“Jesus.”
Maxie cleared her throat. “So don’t tell me I don’t know what it’s like, okay?”
Walsh stared at the floor in front of the cooler as if he expected to still see blood stains. Then he looked up at her.
“How do you do it? How do you live with that?”
Good question.
Good question.“Well. First, you try to make yourself numb.” She waved at the shelves of liquor. “Not with this stuff. That would kill you. But you make yourself do all the stupid little tasks you can do without thinking. Or feeling. And day by day, scar tissue starts to form.”
“Scar tissue,” said Walsh.
Maxie made a face. “Not the right way to put it. Makes it sound like it builds up steady, and there’s nothing steady about it. A birthday, an anniversary, and suddenly the pain is fresh as your first cup of coffee, and you have to start over.”
She was blinking hard now. “Could be a song. Or the way sunlight pours through the goddamn window. Then you have to ask yourself: what would…what would Carol want me to be doing? And you do it for her.”
Walsh looked at her for a long moment. He cleared his throat. “Thanks for not going after my boy.”
“He’s hurting enough.”
“Do you want to write the letter to the Parks Department?”
“You do it,” said Maxie. “You’re better with words than me. Besides, I need to visit a sick employee.”
Robert Lopresti’s stories have appeared in most mystery magazines and reprinted in The Best American Mysteries. He blogs for SleuthSayers and Little Big Crimes.
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