J. Jance - Lying in vait

He was a gangly, scrawny kid who shuffled along in unlaced high-tops. He wore a Depeche Mode sweatshirt, the sleeves of which ended several inches below his longest finger. Although early November means legitimately winter weather in Seattle, his legs were bare. His ragged jams seemed to be several sizes too large for his narrow hips.

I know the look. The oversized clothing means only one thing to me, and I was sure it sent the same insulting message to his mother. Jared Danielson was a gang wannabe.

The drooping crotch of his pants hung down almost to his knobby knees. Had I been walking behind him, I think I would have been tempted to give them a yank. It wouldn't have taken much effort to have dropped them around his ankles.

For some unknown reason, kids who insisted on wearing their baseball caps backward six months ago have now, for no apparent reason, collectively turned them bill forward. Jared Danielson was no exception. At least the maroon-and-gray Washington State University baseball cap perched on his head was turned in the right direction. The dark brown hair sticking out beneath it fell well below his shoulders, and a small gold hoop earring pierced the lobe of one ear. He sported a spectacularly black-and-blue bruise under his right eye.

I'm old enough and old-fashioned enough so that the combination of earring and shiner jarred. When I was growing up, a boy who wore earrings wasn't likely to be hauled into the principal's office for fist-fighting. I take that back. They got in fist fights, all right, but they usually weren't the ones who started them. This punk looked as if he had mouthed off to the wrong person.

Just one look at his typical twelve-year-old-tough-guy pout as Jared Danielson slouched into the backseat of the Mustang was enough to make me regret having offered to take the little ingrate along to lunch. But then, settling back into my own seat, I managed to find something positive in the prospect. Lunch with Jared Danielson was all I was in for. He was Sue Danielson's son. She was stuck with the kid for life.

"Where to?" Sue asked me, once she resumed the driver's seat.

Attempting to play the role of polite host, I turned to Jared. "What would you like for lunch?" I asked.

Jared glowered back at me and shrugged. "I dunno," he said.

"Fair enough. It's my call then. Let's try that little diner up on Forty-fifth," I said. "The one just across from the Guild Forty-five Theater."

Ever since the Doghouse Restaurant closed in downtown Seattle, I've felt like a displaced person. Over the past few months, I've auditioned a few other hangouts, but so far none of them quite measures up.

I hate to admit it, but I miss the thick gray haze of secondhand smoke. I miss the butt-sprung orange plastic booths with their distinctive, triangular tears and duct-tape patching. I miss the basic "Bob's Burger" with the onions fried into the meat. But most of all, I miss the crusty old-time waitresses who always knew how I liked my coffee and who saved me a daily collection of crossword puzzles from various abandoned newspapers.

The diner on Forty-fifth was trying hard-too hard-to achieve a "real" 1950s look and atmosphere. Their recipe for authenticity was missing several essential ingredients. What was needed was more grime, more cigarette smoke, a few nonconforming extension cords strung along the moldings, and some hash-slinging waitresses at least one of whom would have a racing form handily tucked in her apron pocket.

Jared skulked into the far corner of a booth. Sue slid in beside him. We had no more than picked up our menus when Sue's pager went off. She headed for the pay phone in the back. "Order me a burger with fries and a cup of coffee," she said on her way. "I'll be right back."

I turned to Jared, who was scowling at the menu. "What'll you have?" I asked, trying once again to break the ice.

"I dunno," he said. "A cheeseburger, I guess."

Such unbridled enthusiasm, to say nothing of gratitude. I wanted to slug him.

He avoided my gaze by staring out the window. "So what are you?" he mumbled sarcastically. "My mom's new boyfriend? Are you two going out or something?"

Boyfriend? Going out? If I had ever been tempted to cut the kid any slack, that just about corked it.

"The lady happens to be my partner," I explained as civilly as I could manage. "We're working a homicide case together. Period."

He looked at me then, his eyes angry and accusing. "Well," he said, "you're taking us to lunch. It seems like a date to me."

The waitress showed up at the booth and saved me from knocking the presumptuous little shit upside the head. I ordered burgers for Sue and me, then stewed while Jared unconcernedly ordered a cheesburger and chocolate shake. I waited until the waitress left the table before I answered.

"Look, Buster. Your mother had to squander her lunch hour checking on a smart-mouthed kid who just happened to get his butt kicked out of school for the next three days. So for the record, I'm taking my partner to lunch. At the moment, however, I seem to be baby-sitting you, and it sounds to me as if you need it."

Jared Danielson was used to dishing out free-floating hostility to any and all comers. He wasn't used to taking it, especially not from a complete stranger. My returned volley of dispassionate animosity caught him off guard.

"I hate school," he said, as though that somehow justified his rude behavior. "I hate this town. I hate my mother."

"So give her a break. Go live with your dad," I said amiably. "Good riddance. You'll be doing your mom a favor. What's stopping you?"

For a moment, his chin jutted defiantly, then his face fell. "I can't," he croaked.

"Why not?"

Jared Danielson shrugged. The tough-guy mask disintegrated. His lower lip trembled, while his eyes filled with self-pitying tears. The surly, belligerent teenager faded into something younger and much more vulnerable.

"We don't know where he is," Jared answered, while his changing voice cracked out of control. "He's supposed to pay child support, but he doesn't. He left town, and Mom can't find him. She thinks he went to Alaska."

Sue Danielson came back to the table. "You two look serious," she said, her questioning glance shifting apprehensively between Jared and me. "What's going on? What are you talking about?"

For the first time, Jared Danielson's eyes met mine in a silent plea for help. "Football," he finally mumbled.

We were? I needed a second to take the hint. I took a clue from the WSU baseball cap still parked on his head and tried to follow his lead.

"How about those Cougs," I said, feigning an enthusiasm for collegiate football that I don't feel. "We were wondering who would win the Apple Cup this year-WSU or the U-Dub. Who do you think, Jared?"

As quickly as the boy had emerged from his hard little shell, he retreated back inside. "Who cares?" he muttered before lapsing once more into a stubborn, resentful silence, but not before I caught a glimpse of what was ailing Jared Danielson.

I never knew my own father. He died as a result of a motorcycle accident eight months before I was born. Days before he and my mother planned to elope, my father was headed back to the naval base at Bremerton after a date with her when the motorcycle he was riding skidded out of control and threw him directly into the path of an oncoming truck. He died two days later without ever regaining consciousness.

Faced with Jared Danielson's pain, I could see now how losing a parent you never knew was different from being willfully abandoned by a father you had grown to know and love. Having a parent die on you is a long way from having your father run away. One loss leaves a clean break that eventually heals. The other leaves in its wake a lifetime of hurt, of unanswered questions and emotionally charged blame.