George Pelecanos: Right as Rain

'It's not a uniform,' she said, her voice softening, losing its edge. 'It's just an old cotton shirt.'

They studied each other for a while, not speaking, as the recorded mariachi music danced through the dining room and bar.

'What I was trying to tell you,' she said, 'before you interrupted me… is that I don't even know your name.'

'It's Terry Quinn,' he said.

'Tuh-ree Quinn,' she said, trying it out.

'Irish Catholic,' he said, 'if you're keeping score.'

And Juana said, 'It sings.'

'Where's your car?' asked Juana.

'You better drive tonight,' said Quinn.

'I'm in the lot. We should cut through here.'

They went through the break in the buildings between Rosita's and the pawnshop. They neared Fred Folsom's sculpted bronze bust of Norman Lane, 'the Mayor of Silver Spring,' mounted in the center of the breezeway. Quinn patted the top of Lane's capped head without thought as they walked by.

'You always do that?' said Juana.

'Yeah,' said Quinn, 'for luck. Some of the guys in the garages back here, they sort of adopted him, looked out for him when he was still alive. See?' He pointed to a sign mounted over a bay door in the alley, a caricature drawing of Lane with the saying 'Don't Worry About It' written on a button pinned to his chest, as they entered an alley. 'They call this Mayor's Lane now.'

'You knew him?'

'I knew who he was. I bought him a drink once over at Captain White's. Another place that isn't around anymore. He was just a drunk. But I guess what they're trying to say with all this back here, with everything he was, he was still a man.'

'God, it's cold.' Juana held the lapels of her coat together and close to her chest and looked over at Quinn. 'I've seen you before, you know? And not at the bookstore, either. Before that, but I know we never met.'

'I was in the news last year. On the television and in the papers, too.'

'Maybe that's it.'

'It probably is.'

'There's my car.'

'That old Beetle?'

'What, it's not good enough for you?'

'No, I like it.'

'What do you drive?'

'I'm between cars right now.'

'Is that like being between jobs?'

'Just like it.'

'You asked me out and you don't have a car?'

'So it's your nickel for the gas.' Quinn zipped his jacket. 'I'll get the oysters and the beers.'

They were at the bar of Crisfield's, the old Crisfield's on the dip at Georgia, not the designer Crisfield's on Colesville, and they were eating oysters and sides of coleslaw and washing it all down with Heineken beer. Quinn had juiced the cocktail sauce with horseradish and he noticed that Juana had added Tabasco to the mix.

'Mmm,' said Juana, swallowing a mouthful, reaching into the cracker bowl for a chaser.

'A dozen raw and a plate of slaw,' said Quinn. 'Nothin' better. These are good, right?'

'They're good.'

All the stools at the horseshoe-shaped bar were occupied, and the dining room to the right was filled. The atmosphere was no atmosphere: white tile walls with photographs of local celebrities framed and mounted above the tiles, wood tables topped with paper place mats, grocery store-bought salad dressing displayed on a bracketed shelf… and still the place was packed nearly every night, despite the fact that management was giving nothing away. Crisfield's was a D.C. landmark, where generations of Washingtonians had met and shared food and conversation for years.

'Make any money tonight?' said Quinn.

'By the time I tipped out the bartender… not real money, no. I walked with forty-five.'

'You keep having forty-five-dollar nights, you're not going to be able to make it through school.'

'My student loans are putting me through school. I wait tables just to live. Raphael tell you I was going to law school?'

'He told me everything he knew about you. Don't worry, it wasn't much. Pass me that Tabasco, will you?'

He touched her hand as she handed him the bottle. Her hand was warm, and he liked the way her fingers were tapered, feminine and strong.

'Thanks.'

A couple of black guys seated on the opposite end of the horseshoe, early thirties, if Quinn had to guess, were staring freely at him and Juana. Plenty of heads had turned when they'd entered the restaurant, some he figured just to get a look at Juana. Most of the people had only looked over briefly, but these two couldn't give it up. Well, fuck it, he thought. If this was going to keep working in any kind of way – and he was getting the feeling already that he wanted it to – then he'd just have to shake off those kinds of stares. Still, he didn't like it, how these two were so bold.

'That's not fair,' said Juana.

' What isn't?'

'You been asking about me and you know some things, and I don't know a damn thing about you.'

You been. He liked the way she said that.

'That accent of yours,' he said.

'What accent?'

'Your voice falls and rises, like music. What is that, Brooklyn?'

'The Bronx.' She shook an oyster off her fork and let it sit in the cocktail sauce. 'What's yours? The Carolinas, something like that?'

' Maryland. D.C.'

'You sound plenty Southern to me. With that drawl and everything.'

'This is the South. It's south of the Mason-Dixon Line, anyway.'

He turned to face her. Her hair was black, curly, and very long, and it broke on thin shoulders and rose again at the upcurve of her smallish breasts. She had a nice ass on her, too; he had checked it out back at the restaurant when she'd bent over to serve her drinks. It was round and high, the way he liked it, and the sight of it had taken his breath short, which had not happened to him in a long while. Her eyes were near black, many shades deeper than her brown skin, and her lips were full and painted in a dark color with an even darker outline. There was a mole on her cheek, above and to the right of her upper lip.

He was staring at her now and she was staring at him, and then her lips turned up on one side, a kind of half smile that she attempted to hold down. It was the same thing she had done back at Rosita's with her mouth, and Quinn chuckled under his breath.

'What?'

'Ah, nothin'. It's just, that thing you got going on, your almost smile. I just like it, is all.'

Juana retrieved her oyster from the cocktail sauce, chewed and swallowed it, and had a swig of cold beer.

'How do you know Raphael?' she said.

'He came in the shop one day, looking for Stanley Clarke's School Days on vinyl. Raphael likes that jazz-funk sound, the semi-orchestral stuff from the seventies. Dexter Wansel, George Duke, like that. Lonnie Liston Smith. I knew zilch about it, and he was happy to give me an education. I call him when we buy those old records from time to time.'

'You always worked in a bookstore?'

'No, not always. What you want to know is, am I educated, and if so, why haven't I done anything with it. I went to the University of Maryland and got my criminology degree. Then I was a cop in D.C. for eight years or so. After I left the force, I thought I was ready for something quiet. I like books, a certain kind, anyway

'Westerns.'

'Yeah, and there's nothing quieter than a used book and record store. So here I am.'

She studied his face. 'I know where I've seen you now.'

'Right. I'm the cop that killed the other cop last year.'

'It's the hair that's changed.'

'Uh-huh. I grew it out.'

Quinn waited, but the usual follow-up questions didn't come. He watched Juana use her elbow to push the platter of oyster shells away from her. While he watched her, he drank off an inch of his beer.

'How about me?' asked Juana. 'Anything else you want to know?'

'Not really. What I know so far I like.'