Gregory Mason - The helpless captive

Neon lights oranged the sky as the town's avid move-goers queued up in zig-zagged lines anxious for the late afternoon matinee to spill out of Elston's sole movie, which only last year had been converted from a 1940's dance hall.

Auburn-haired Kathy McGuire gave her husband's hefty paw an extra squeeze and leaned her head forward to peek at the promotion poster that advertised this week's movie, the only local entertainment around except for George Mason's bango trio that played twice a week in the basement of the country club. The post depicted a teenage couple seated on a Harley Davidson; the boy's high booted heels dug into the ground to support the massive weight of the machine while a girl with long blonde hair clasped her hands around the boy's stomach, letting her hands drift down to the vee of his pants. The square-jawed youth was turning to hand the girl a poorly-rolled brown cigarette.

"Any idea what this movie is about, honey?" Kathy asked demurely in her hushed voice, knowing her husband didn't like to discuss anything in public.

"Cop show," he sputtered with a jerk of his head.

"Oh, I thought maybe it would be a romance or a musical," Kathy pouted, stepping back at her husband's side and staring straight ahead. The orange of the twinkling neon caught the bored expression on her delicate features. As if I even had to ask, thought the young woman with a twinge of bitterness. Cop shows, violence, death, and justice… that's all he cares about. With a sudden empty ache, the question skipped through her mind: What would her husband have been, if not an undercover policeman? What else could a suspicious, brusque man like Art McGuire contribute to society, except for an occasional "bust" on a drug or prostitution ring?

Drawing her lips into a taut line of disgust, she stared up at her husband, studying the dominance of his strong jaw line, the rippling of his cheek muscles as he worked his lower jaw against his upper. He's hard at work again, realized the finely-boned wife with a smattering of guilt for feeling neglected. Mentally, she caressed the taut muscles in his neck, the tightness in his shoulders. The pressure of work, a job never completed, impossible to complete until the last criminal was behind bars, showed in the furrows of his high, straight forehead.

Did it really matter that she wasn't getting her own way? No, she conceded, it couldn't override Art's devotion to his work. His determination. His sense of justice. For it was those qualities that made Art who he was – a well respected member of the police force, a man who loved children, hated to see them throw their futures away for a few adolescent kicks. What he failed to give his wife in the way of affection, he sacrificed whole-heartedly to the cause of purifying America's youth. That, she could not complain about.

"Wanna see this movie," he grated, giving his wife's hand a jerk in a compromised show of affection. "Got a hunch it's gonna help me bust this drug ring we've been investigating," he whispered, cupping his hand next to his mouth and tilting his head to accommodate the ten-inch difference in their statures. As a policeman, he'd learned the power of secrecy, discretion.

And Kathy had learned to respect that in her tall, broad-shouldered husband. The excitement of the unknown; never knowing if it was a whore, a pimp, or heroine smuggler that he was putting behind bars. The task always involved one common ingredient: change. Different clothing every day to disguise his identity, working miles away from home. Yet it meant a continuous circus of moving from city to town, West coast to the East coast, finally to settle here in the corn belt of Elston for a few weeks – months…? – until this dope case was settled. Then on to another assignment, Texas, California, Georgia?

The past eight years of their marriage had been a merry-go-round, staying on one place long enough to open a bank account, always renting a house, never buying. No thought of the future, only contemplating scars from yesterday. And Kathy, seven years younger than her husband, was growing weary of change.

Time to settle down, she'd finally admitted to herself. Time to plant a tree and watch it grow. Although the subject had never been openly discussed, she had her hopes that Art really wanted to have a family, even though he'd grunted all too often about the decay of America's moral standards, to make her believe he wanted to raise children. Thinking he didn't want any would be too painful a realization to live with.

And so she'd courageously endured it all, the loneliness of watching the late-night movie on television, slipping into a cold empty bed and reading ladies magazines, waiting for the telephone to ring or for Art to come stumbling through the door, dog-tired and irritable from a day of hunt and chase. Someday it would be different, she kept telling herself; someday she might have a baby to coddle and love with the fullness of her being, the way she wanted to love Art.

If only he'd put as much effort into our marriage as he does into putting people behind bars, she thought, watching the black exit door burst open to the sound of stampeding feet.

Kathy stood there leaning against her husband's firm chest, feeling his strong hands weighing on her shoulders while they watched the pubescent crowd brush past. None of them over sixteen, most of them were dressed in sloppy levi jackets with tattered cuffs, cigarettes – still unlit – dangling from their mouths. Faint shadows of fuzz tickling their upper lips, they looked so incongruously innocent yet worldly at the same time with a characteristic clumsiness particular to the young. In their tight levis and tee shirts that showed off developing muscles and sinews, their bodies rippled, fairly quivered with energy. They surged on past like a herd of frightened buffalo, never looking to the right or left of them, their loud, coarse voices guffawing in laughter, cracking on the higher tones.

Sparring with his friend, one particularly rambunctious boy dodged a flying fist by stepping back, sending five-foot-three Kathy McGuire hurling into her husband's chest. The boy turned to apologize, but taking one glance up at the tall man's face whose hands were resting on the woman's shoulders, he thought better of it and instead quickened his pace.

Kathy heard a deep, low rumble emanate in her husband's body, like a dog ready to spring. He hated unruliness, hated insults, and hated anyone touching his wife, intentional or otherwise. She knew it, and although it made her feel secure, it often scared her, too. There was hint of animal in Art, a part she'd chosen to ignore or better still, not inspire.

Art clenched his fists, kneading his fingernails into the palms of his hands. Oh, he couldn't wait to find out who was selling dope to these kids, who was corrupting these poor stupid, unsuspecting souls. Couldn't wait for that damned rock concert scheduled to take place out at the Olson's property was over with this weekend, for then he could get down to business and slap a few suspects behind bars, coax them to cop a plea, and give names, dates, addresses to find the real criminals – the smugglers, the big time dealers.

From experience he knew who they'd be. The kids who smoked the evil weed never made the money, the poor dupes. It was the middle-aged pushers who wanted to make a fast buck, hit town, then split, leaving a town full of kids to get picked up on a possession charge, ruin their record, raise their father's car insurance.

What did marijuana do for them, anyway? Just look at them, he thought with a sneer and ripple of his upper lip, glaring. They didn't even dress decently… they didn't care to look presentable. Why did they show themselves in public in dirty jeans and tee shirts, like the bums who dried out in jail?