George Pelecanos: What It Was

“I was right.” Vaughn could see Arrington through the window of the store, talking on the pay phone mounted by the door.

Arrington came out the store cradling a brown paper bag as if he were holding a baby. He looked around, then crossed the street and walked almost directly toward the Monaco. Vauge M"0em"›hn got out of the car and leaned his forearms on its roof, waiting. Arrington read him as police and started to beeline, but Vaughn badged him and said, “Stop right there, Henry.”

Arrington stopped and stood flat-footed. “Am I in some kind of trouble?”

“Get in the car.”

Arrington slid into the backseat. He had the stink of jail on him and the body odor brought on by a summer day. His eyes said he would avoid conflict at any cost. He looked like someone who could be easily taken.

Arrington glanced at Vaughn, who had said his name, then Strange, who had deliberately declined to introduce himself. Arrington would assume that he, too, was MPD.

“What I do, officers?” said Arrington.

“Did you make a phone call in that liquor store?” said Vaughn.

“Yes, sir, I did.”

“Who’d you call?”

“I’d rather not answer that question, if you don’t mind.”

“You don’t have a choice,” said Vaughn. It was a lie.

“The man in lockup said he’d kill my grandmother if I told you.”

“Bowman?”

“Said his name was Clarence.”

“And you believed him?”

“Wasn’t no upside to dis believe.”

“How old’s your grandmother, Henry?”

“Seventy-eight, somethin like that.”

“She’ll be dead by the time Bowman comes out of prison.” Vaughn looked over the seat at Henry’s wasted form. He didn’t say it, but Arrington would be dead and buried by then, too.

Arrington’s hands twisted at the bag he held.

“Go on,” said Vaughn. “Take your medicine.”

Arrington unscrewed the bottle top, tilted his head back, and drank deeply. The smell of orange juice and alcohol filled the interior of the car. Tango, thought Strange. When Arrington was done with his swig, he looked more alive than he had before.

“Who’d you call?” said Vaughn. “Say it now. I don’t have time to dick-dance around.”

Arrington wiped his mouth. “Dude named Red.”

“You talked to him?”

“Another dude first, then him.”

“Tell us what you said.”

“Wasn’"3"ght="t all that long a conversation. I said what I was told to say: Bowman failed and got locked up. A man-ho named Martina set him up. And Vaughn is getting close. That’s you, right?”

Vaughn nodded. “Now tell me the number you dialed.”

Arrington said it and repeated it, and Vaughn told him he could go. Arrington thanked them, got out of the Dodge, and walked down the block.

Vaughn radioed in the digits and asked the dispatcher to get him an address to match. Vaughn and Strange said little to each other as they waited for the information to come back over the speaker. They were both anxious, and somewhat excited, thinking of what was to come.

Red Jones, Coco Watkins, Alfonzo Jefferson, and Monique Lattimer sat in the living room of the house in Burrville, drinking coffee and huffing cigarettes. The men were in slacks and sleeveless white T’s, and were barefoot. Monique had a robe on over a bra and panties. The robe was open, and what was visible was provocative. Coco was wearing one of Monique’s negligees that she kept at Jefferson’s.

Realizing that they had pushed misadventure to the limit, they plotted their next move.

“We gotta leave today, Red,” said Coco.

“Your girl gonna deliver us some money?”

“And some other shit, too. Soon as Shay brings me my makeup kit and clothes, we can get gone. I can’t go nowhere without my kit.”

“You called her?” said Red.

“Yeah.”

“And you talked to her about the police stakeout outside your spot?”

“Po-lice lookin for me, not my girls. Shay knows what to do.”

“Where y’all fixin to go?” said Jefferson.

“We gonna make our way to West Virginia,” said Jones. “I still got people there. You?”

“I don’t know,” said Jefferson. “Guess I’ll head south. Got a cousin down in North Carolina will put me up.”

“What about me?” said Monique. Jefferson did not answer her or look her way. He was gonna take her with him but did not feel it wise to give any female too much comfort. Monique was all right; she was steady ass, anyway. But she wasn’t all that special. No woman was, to Jefferson.

Jefferson said to Jones, “Give me one of them double-O’s, Red.”

Jones shook a Kool from the hole he had cut out the bottom of the pack. He tossed it onto the cable spool table and it rolled close to Jefferson. Jefferson gave it a light.

“We about out of cigarettes,” said Jones.

“Monique’ll go out and get some.”

“Shit,” she said. “Do you know what I been through since yesterday? First I had to talk to that white motherfucker from Homicide. Then last night I had to slip out the back of my spot and not get noticed by that Tom police they put in the playground. Then I had to walk, and get on a D.C. Transit, and get a cab… and now you want me to go out again?”

“Exactly,” said Jefferson. “Get dressed.”

“You crippled or somethin?”

“I got two legs and they both work,” said Jefferson. “But I’m tellin you to go.”

“Where your car keys at?”

“Uh-uh,” said Jefferson. “My Buick stays out back till I’m ready to leave here. It’s too risky to move it now.”

Monique looked over at the tall woman wearing her negligee. “Coco, can I take your short?”

Coco dragged on her cigarette and glanced at Jones. On his instructions, they had parked the Fury several blocks away, then walked to Jefferson’s house through alleys and backyards. She already knew Red’s answer. By way of one, he shook his head.

“Sorry, Nique,” said Coco.

“You people expect me to walk? Nearest market’s a mile away.”

“I was you,” said Jefferson, “I’d wear some comfortable shoes.”

“Fuck y’all,” said Monique. She got up out of her chair abruptly and left the room.

“Where she off to?” said Jones.

“Gone to change her clothes,” said Jefferson, tapping ash into a large tray. “So she can get us some cigarettes.”

“That woman’s unruly.”

Jefferson nodded. “She like that in bed, too.”

The room fell silent as they smoked pensively. None of them wanted to leave D.C., but they knew it was time to go.

Gina Marie, Martina Lewis, and the white girls, April and Cindy, were in the diner on U, drinking coffee, having cigarettes, and, as was their custom, recounting the street stories they had gathered the night before. They were in the pre-makeup stage of their day, not yet dressed for work.

“They picked us up in a Lincoln Continental,” said April, “and then we went out to their motel room off Kenilworth and had a partaaay.”

“That where you got the ring?” said Gina Marie.

“You mean this one?” said April. She put out her hand, bent it at the wrist, and showed the others her new treasure in a way that she imagined a fancy model might do.

“Just tell the story,” said Cindy, who knew the detaikneat the wrls already and was tired of hearing April go on. Cindy dragged on her cigarette, careful not to put the filter to the right side of her mouth. A cold sore festered there.

“So we was doin some nose candy,” said April, “me and old Lou, and all a the sudden Lou had to take a shit on account of the cut.”

“Thought you said Lou was a professional,” said Gina Marie.

“Not with cocaine,” said April. “But, yeah, he said he was down here on business. Axed me about Red Jones. Claimed he owed Red money. Like I was gonna talk to a stranger about Red. I be like, I heard of him, but I don’t know nothin about him.” April looked directly at Gina Marie. “Girl, I ain’t dumb.”