George Pelecanos: The Way Home

“You’re gonna be all right,” said Larry. “But you need to lie there some.”

“I gotta get back to my van,” said Chris.

“You been hit on the noggin. You should take it slow.”

Chris felt weak and a bit shocked. He peeled off the blanket and tried to get up on his feet. He was too dizzy. He sat back down, waited for the nausea to pass, and tried again. He stood carefully and gripped the rail.

“Who’s that?” said Larry. He was nodding at the bike trail that broadened to a road.

Chris looked in that direction. A man with wild black hair was running down the road toward them. His feet were pounding the asphalt and dirt, and their heavy contact raised dust.

“Crazy sonofabitch,” said Larry.

Chris issued a blood-caked smile.

Thomas Flynn walked Chris to Amanda’s SUV and got him into the passenger bucket. He found a packet of wipes in the glove box and cleaned Chris’s face, and once it was free of dirt and blood he inspected it.

“I should take you to an emergency room,” said Flynn.

“I’m all right. I hit my head when I was falling, is all.”

“All the more reason to get you to a doctor.” Flynn shook his head, looking at the purple bruising that had come to Chris’s face. “Why he’d do this to you?”

“Lawrence? I was tryin to stop him. But it was more than that. In his own way, Lawrence was looking to protect me. He wanted to keep me out of it.”

“Do you know where he was going to meet them?”

“I had some time to think about it, lying under that bridge.” Chris nodded. “I’m pretty sure I know where he went. It’s a spot Lawrence took me to, over at the Arboretum.”

“Then you need to call the police.”

“Go ahead.”

“You need to, Chris.”

Chris looked at his watch. “It’s close to four. He’s already there.”

Flynn scrolled through the contacts on his cell and found the one he was looking for.

“This is the number for Sergeant Bryant. Call her and tell her what’s happening. She’ll get some cars over there.” Chris did not reach for the cell. “Do it, son. You’ve got to do what’s right.”

“I’m tryin, Dad.”

“I know it. You’ve been trying all along. I’m sorry I doubted you.”

“Forget all that,” said Chris. “It’s past.”

They looked at each other across the seats.

Flynn held out his phone. Chris took it and made the call.

He had parked the Cavalier in a small lot near the Capitol columns and untied the bicycle from the roof. It was now late in the afternoon and a drizzle had come that would soon turn to rain. Lawrence swung the daypack over his shoulders and got onto the bike.

He took the Crabtree loop and then Hickory Hill. He rode for miles. The rain cooled him and his pace was steady as he geared up and took the rise. The wind was pleasant on his face and it blew back his braids.

His prize possession as a boy had been his bicycle. When he would go out on long rides, to the Peace Cross, the Aquatic Gardens, and the Arboretum, he was far away from his roach-infested apartment, his smoked-up mother, her various men. He imagined that if he kept pedaling he would come to a place that was safe, find people to hold him instead of slap him, and be with adults who would talk to him with kindness and patience instead of sarcasm and cruelty. He never did find that place. But on his bike, for a short time at least, he could see it in his mind.

He pedaled up the road as the woods grew thick. He was soaked with sweat beneath his jacket as he climbed the last hill. He passed a motorized maintenance cart, its driver giving him a small wave, as he arrived at the Asia Collection and its parking lot. There were no cars. It was the most out-of-the-way area in the park and also it was raining. There would be few visitors or grounds crew here today.

Lawrence got off the bike. He walked it off the road, past the brick house that held rest rooms, and carefully stepped down a lightly forested hill, holding and guiding the bike. Halfway down the hill he laid the bicycle on its side, partially concealed behind an oak, and covered it as best he could with brush and leaves. It was not hidden, but there was no place to keep it totally out of sight without putting it very far away. He would need access to it in the unlikely event that things went right.

Lawrence lifted the pack off his shoulders. From it he retrieved the Smith and Wesson combat magnum. He broke open its cylinder and thumbed six rounds into its chambers.

“Six is enough,” he said, speaking out loud because he was nervous.

He snapped the cylinder shut and slipped the. 357 into the shoulder holster he wore under his jacket. He drew the weapon cleanly and put it back in its holster. Then he took the Crain knife from the pack and slid it into the side pocket of his North Face.

He pinned the daypack under the bike and walked up the hill.

Sonny and Wayne went into the Arboretum visitors’ center. There were some old-folk visitors in the lobby and a couple of large female employees. One was complaining to the other about her man. The two white men with the outdated facial hair looked like they did not belong here or anywhere else but went virtually unnoticed because they did not linger. Wayne grabbed a folded information pamphlet that contained a map, and the two of them went back outside.

Crossing the lot, Wayne remarked on the numerous compact Jeep security vehicles and their drivers, rented cops.

Sonny said, “What are they gonna do? Only real police and criminals have guns in this town. Anyway, my Merc’s got eight cylinders and they got four.”

“What time is it?”

Sonny checked his watch. “Three thirty-five. Our friend said he’d be there at four.”

“This bro -chure says the grounds close at five.”

“We’ll be done by then.”

Sonny ignitioned the Marquis and took off. Wayne served as copilot as Sonny navigated the roads. Wayne was confused by the icons on the map, which he found overly clever and unhelpful, but signs on the shoulder had English words and clear arrows, and Sonny followed their directions up into the hills.

“How many exits you see on that map?” said Sonny.

“Looks like three. A service road makes four.”

“Jesus, they’re makin this easy.”

Wayne lit a Marlboro, rolling the window down as Sonny arrived at the area, high atop a winding rise, marked “Asia Collection.” There was a Cushman utility truck parked on the edge of the road, bales of hay stacked on its flat bed. Sonny put the Mercury into a lined space, head in, facing a small brick structure set down a stone path. He cut the engine.

It was raining harder. Wayne kept his window open, his arm leaning on the door ledge as he smoked, not noticing that he was getting wet.

“That can’t be theirs,” said Wayne, turning his head to indicate the truck.

“That’s a vehicle for workers,” said Sonny.

“So there’s a third party here in these woods.”

“Shame on them if they see us.”

“Where’s our friends?”

“They’ll be here.”

“You reckon there’s two?”

“Well, there was that Afro American I spoke to. And Chris Carpet. Them and the smoke you butchered. They were all in this together. Criminals, like us. But not as hard as us.”

Wayne took the Taurus from his waistband and pushed it under the seat. Its barrel had been cutting into his middle. He pitched his cigarette out the window and found a snow seal in the pocket of his Wranglers and carefully unfolded it. In it was a small amount of white crystal speckled with blue. He put his nose to it and snorted it up. He licked the paper hungrily, crumpled it, and dropped it on the floor.