Robert Crais - The Watchman

She stared for a moment as if she was confused.

“I’m not asking you to-”

Pike gripped her hands harder and cut her off again.

“If you want to go home, let’s go. If you want to die, go home, then die, because I will not allow it.”

Maybe he squeezed too hard. His hands were gristle and bone and calloused, and he was strong. Her chin dimpled and her eyes filled with tears.

“All I was doing was driving my car!”

Pike slapped the steering wheel.

“This wheel, it doesn’t care. The air we’re breathing, doesn’t care. Suck it up-”

“You’re an asshole!”

“Do you want to live or go dancing? I can have you home in twenty minutes.”

“You don’t know what it’s like being me!”

“You don’t know what it’s like being me.”

Headlights and taillights played on her, moving the way light plays in water; yellow and green and blue lights on the shops and signs around them painted her with a confusion of moving color. She didn’t speak, and didn’t seem able to speak.

Pike softened his voice.

“Tell me you want to live.”

“I want to live.”

“Say it again.”

“I want to live! ”

Pike let go of her hands, but she still didn’t move. He straightened behind the wheel.

“We’re not so different.”

The girl burst out laughing.

“Ohmigod! Oh my God- dude! Maybe you’re high!”

Pike put the car in gear, but kept his foot on the brake. Their sameness seemed obvious.

“You want to be seen; me, I want to be invisible. It’s all the same.”

The girl stared at him, then straightened herself the way he had straightened himself.

She said, “An idealist.”

Pike didn’t know what she was saying, so he shook his head.

She said, “Your friend. Elvis. He said you’re an idealist.”

Pike pulled out into traffic.

“He thinks he’s funny.”

She started to say something but fell silent the way people are silent when they think. They drove back to the house in that silence, but once, just the once, she reached out and squeezed his arm, and once, just the once, he patted her hand.

Later, when the rhythm of her breathing suggested the girl had fallen asleep there on the couch, Pike turned off the final lamp, and the room and the house went dark. He would go out later, and wanted no light when he opened the door.

Pike sat quietly, watching her. They had eaten the Indian food, though not much of it; speaking little, her mostly, making fun of the music on Cole’s iPod, and now, still wearing the headphones, she had fallen asleep.

The girl seemed even younger in sleep, and smaller, as if part of her had vanished into the couch. With her asleep, Pike believed he was seeing her Original Person. Pike believed each person created himself or herself; you built yourself from the inside out, with the tensions and will of the inside person holding the outside person together. The outside person was the face you showed the world; it was your mask, your camouflage, your message, and, perhaps, your means. It existed only so long as the inside person held it together, and when the inside person could no longer hold the mask together, the outside person dissolved and you would see the original person. Pike had observed that sleep could sometimes loosen the hold. Booze, dope, and extreme emotions could all loosen the hold; the weaker the grasp, the more easily loosened. Then you saw the person within the person. Pike often pondered these things. The trick was to reach a place where the inside person and the outside person were the same. The closer someone got to this place, the stronger they would become. Pike believed that Cole was such a person, his inside and outside very close to being one and the same. Pike admired him for it. Pike also pondered whether Cole had accomplished this through design and effort, or was one with himself because oneness was his natural state. Either way, Pike considered this a feat of enormous import and studied Cole to learn more. Pike’s inside person had built a fortress. The fortress had served, but Pike hoped for more. A fortress was a lonely place in which to live.

Pike decided Larkin’s original person was a child, which might be good but might be bad. A child could not hold for long. A child would weaken with the strain of holding the outer person together, and something would give. The child would be crushed and torn into something else, which might be good or might not, but either way the original person would change. Some philosophies believed that change was good, but Pike wasn’t so sure. That belief had always struck him as self-serving; change often seemed inevitable, so if it was inevitable, we might as well put a good spin on it.

After a few minutes, Pike moved to the dining table, broke down his pistol exactly as he had that morning, and set about cleaning it for the second time that day. He had no intention of sleeping. He still had to decide whether or not they would abandon the house, and much would depend on the Armenians. Pike was waiting for them.

Pike had no trouble working in the dark. He swabbed the parts with powder solvent, but was careful not to use much because he didn’t want the smell to wake her. He wanted the girl to be asleep when the cousins returned.

Pike was brushing the barrel when he heard them. He went to the front window and saw the five cousins getting out of their BMW.

Pike slipped through the front door and down off the porch. The oldest cousin got out from behind the wheel. They didn’t see him until he reached the sidewalk, and then the youngest, who was on the far side of the car, said something, and they turned as Pike stepped into the street.

It was quiet, this late, there in the peaceful neighborhood. The porches were empty. The old people and the families were sleeping. Cars were parked and streets were empty except for Pike and the five cousins, there in the cone of blue light.

Pike stopped a few feet away, looking at each of them until he settled on the oldest, the one who had tried to front him in the bar.

Pike said, “I figure she didn’t tell you we’re married. I figure you didn’t know, which is why you took her out. I figure now that you know, we won’t have this problem again.”

The oldest cousin raised his palms, showing Pike he regretted the misunderstanding.

“No problems, my friend. She said you just shared the house, that’s all. Roommates. She said you were roommates.”

The younger one nodded along.

“Hey, we were just chillin’ out here, dude. She came out and started talkin’ with us.”

The youngest had become so Americanized he spoke hip-hop with an Armenian accent.

Pike nodded.

“I understand. So we don’t have a problem between us.”

“No, man, we are cool.”

Pike read their expressions and body language, not to see if they were cool, but to see if they had recognized her. If they or someone they knew at the club had recognized her, they would have been talking about it the rest of the evening. Pike decided they neither knew nor suspected. Larkin was just another out-of-her-mind chick to these guys, another girl gone wild. He decided they were safe.

Pike said, “Mona has done this before and it’s caused problems. There’s a man, he’s been stalking her. We moved, but we know he’s trying to find her. If you guys see anyone, will you let me know?”

The oldest said, “Of course, man. No problem.”

Pike put out his hand, and the oldest shook.

The second oldest, who had been staring with a kind of awe, finally spoke.

“What was that you did at the club? What do you call that, what you did?”

The youngest laughed.