J. Rain - Hail Mary

Who smiled at 5:43 in the morning?

I marveled at this, and then let it go.

The morning continued to brighten. Birds twittered with a little more energy. Somewhere an early worm was getting devoured. Somewhere in that house across the street, a killer was either sleeping or watching his kids. And somewhere not too far from here, my mother’s bones were rotting away.

I rubbed my forehead, my eyes, my face, the stubble along my jaw. It was all I could do to not burst in there, guns blazing.

Time and place, I thought.

Besides, I still don’t know if he was the killer. His only crime to date was circumstance.

Cars started appearing on the street. No one paid a roofing truck any mind. No one knew I was staring out the heavily-tinted window.

The woman came back. His wife, I assumed. Looked pretty good for having three kids. Not perfect. But good.

As my mechanic friend Charles liked to say: Good enough.

I should have felt bad for her. I should have felt bad for her kids. I should have felt bad for them because one way or another-unless I was dead wrong about Gary Tomlinson-they were going to be without a husband and a father.

I should have felt bad.

But I didn’t.

I spent the day following Gary.

He was a medium-sized man with a great tan. I wasn’t sure if he even worked. Maybe I had caught him on his day off. I followed him to his kids’ school, where he dropped off the twin girls and their brother. I followed him to Gold’s Gym in Newport. Then to Whole Foods in Huntington Beach. I followed him to the cleaners and then back home.

At four in the afternoon, after Gary had picked up his kids, I peeled off and went home and went to bed, and willed myself to not dream of finding my mother’s body in a pool of her own blood, to not dream of her lifeless eyes and her cold flesh. To not dream of the deep wound in her neck.

But no such luck.

“ So you’re really going?” Cindy asked.

We were hiking on a wooded trail in Oak Canyon Nature Center in Anaheim Hills. Wooded trails in Orange County were not easy to come by, so we had to drive forty-five minutes to find this one.

“ Yes,” I said. We both carried water bottles. The water bottles were Cindy’s idea. She also shoved two Luna bars in her fanny pack, should we get lost on the well-marked trail and end up in someone’s shaded backyard gazebo without a snack.

“ To Ensenada to hunt shark hunters?”

“ Hunting the hunters, yes.”

“ How long do you expect to be gone?”

“ However long it takes to find them.”

We broke through a tangle of trees and stepped out into the bright morning sunlight. By broke through, I meant we strolled forward on a dirt path wide enough to play a game of touch football on.

Vibrant and prickly cacti crowded the trail, a reminder that the deserts of California were never very far away.

“ What are these cactus called again?” I asked.

“ Beavertail,” said Cindy. She was sweating. Her shades had slipped down to the tip of her nose. She sort of looked like a petite Susan Sarandon.

“ I’m sorry, what?”

“ Beaver-oh, shut up, Jim!” She slapped at me absently, apparently too exhausted from our nine-minute hike to put much effort into a full shoulder slap.

Soon, we fell into step next to each other. I noted that my shadow was a good deal taller and wider than hers. As it should be. My shoulders were easily twice as wide as hers. So was my head. Jesus, I had a big head.

She said after a few minutes, “The world is full of shark hunters, Jim.”

I nodded. My shadow nodded, too. My head looked like a big block of cement nodding. Holy hell.

She went on. “But I know you, Jim. I know those hunters made it personal.”

Nod. Shadow nod.

“ It would have been better if they turned and split,” she said. “Rather than rubbing your face in it.”

I didn’t nod. Instead, I thought of the poor creature being hacked alive, and thought of the cages. I thought of hooks in muzzles and paws and necks. I thought of the terror, the blood, the pain, the inhumanity.

She looked at me and pushed up her glasses. They promptly slipped back down to the tip of her nose. She had a cute little upturned nose. Probably what kept the glasses from sliding all the way off.

We turned up a path that led through a tangle of beavertail cacti. Soon, we were following a high trail that gave us a spectacular view of the park. Lining the rim of the park were many dozen million-dollar homes with stately back yards. At least half the backyards had a gazebo in them. Cindy led the way along this narrow, upper path. I let her since she was wearing my second-favorite shorts.

“ So what are you going to do if you find them?” she asked, glancing back.

“ I don’t know.”

“ Please don’t end up in a Mexican prison, Jim.”

“ I’ll do my best not to.”

“ Will Sanchez be going with you?”

“ Yes,” I said. “And I think it’s funny that you call him Sanchez, too.”

“ That’s what you call him.”

“ That’s what most people call him.”

“ So? Then why is it funny when I call him Sanchez?”

I grinned. “It just is.”

She might have rolled her eyes but from my position, all I could see were her snug-fitting shorts as we continued our climb up. “Anyway,” she said, stressing the word. “I feel better knowing he’ll be with you.”

“ Most people would.”

When we had reached the shade of a rocky overhang, Cindy hugged me particularly tight, burying her face in my shoulder, and wouldn’t let go. I hugged her back and held her as long as she needed to be held. Her hair, I noted, smelled perfect. If perfect had a smell, it was her hair.

From over her head, I could see the many back yards. “So what’s the deal with all the gazebos?”

She laughed a little into my shoulder. “Oh, Jim.”

“ Well?”

“ Gazebos are pretty, Jim.”

“ That’s it?”

She hugged me tighter. “It’s enough.”

“ So do we know these dudes’ names?” asked Sanchez.

I shook my head. We were in line at the Mexican border. I hadn’t been to Mexico in twelve years, back when I was in college. Back when getting drunk in foreign places sounded exotic. Now I prefer getting drunk alone, in my apartment. Just me and my alcohol and sometimes copious amounts of Oreos.

“ So we’re going in there blind?”

“ I have the name of their boat.”

“ The La Bonita,” said Sanchez.

“ Yes.”

“ Any clue how many boats are fucking called La Bonita?”

“ No clue.”

“ Well, let me fill you in, kemosabe. Shitloads.”

“ Shitloads, huh? You know this for a fact?”

“ Supposition. Cops are good at supposition. Something you wouldn’t know.”

“ Since I ain’t a cop?”

“ Right.”

“ We’re both detectives, Sanchez.”

“ But only one of us has a real badge.”

“ I have a private investigator’s license.”

Sanchez snorted and looked away. We were driving my crime-fighting van with its tinted windows and control station inside. By control station, I meant a desk with some electrical jacks, the world’s smallest bathroom, and a couple of comfortable chairs.

I showed the guard at the checkpoint my visa. He checked it out and let me pass. Soon, we were traveling through Tijuana. Tijuana has a lot of good people living in absolute poverty. We moved through it steadily, following a single-lane highway past billboard after billboard selling something called Corona Light. Interspersed with the Corona Light billboards were smaller billboards for Pacifico and Tecate. Beer was alive and well in Mexico.