I had a couple of hours to come up with something, and I quickly figured out that it was time to call Rudy. He wasn’t in, but I left a message for him on his service and told them where I wanted him to meet me. Rudy would do anything for me and often did.
I met Rudy for an early lunch at AJ’s and ordered two double orders of AJ’s hot chicken wings. Rudy loved them and attacked them more than he ate them. Whenever we had wings, he wound up with orange stains all over the front of his shirt and covering the lower half of his face. He looked like some sort of Stanley Kubrick circus clown when he ate wings.
“What’s goin’ on, Duff?” Rudy asked. “What kind of trouble you in now?”
“C’mon, Rudy, what makes you think I’m in some sort of trouble?”
Rudy just looked at me.
“All right-I need a favor.”
AJ slid the two orders of wings in front of us. Rudy asked for extra bleu cheese, like he always did.
“You know, kid, I got my own troubles. What kind of favor are you looking for?”
“I need to get time off from work.”
“C’mon, kid,” Rudy rubbed his forehead. “That shit hasn’t died down from last time.”
“I’m not taking a fight, it’s something else.”
“What is it then?”
“It’s not important, it’s work bullshit. I think they’re going to fire me today.”
Rudy was cleaning the wings right down to the bone like a kind of sabertooth, prehistoric, short fat guy. There were already speckles of wing juice dotting his shirt. The scary clown face was starting to form.
The wings were good. AJ changed the oil in his Frialator about every solstice, which, as disgusting as it sounds, added to the taste.
“All right, but I can only give you a temporary thing. You’re not going to be able to go out on a full disability. This will give you about a week.”
“I’ll take it.”
“All right, let’s see… depression, nah too easy to question… fibromyalgia flare up… nah… better not… I got it.”
He started to scribble on one of his prescription pads. He wrote as illegibly as any doctor and when he handed the note to me I had no idea what it said.
“What is this?”
“Irritable bowel syndrome-stomach cramps, the shits-often brought on by nervousness. You can’t go into work because of the cramps and the shits and, of course, the stress in your life.”
Rudy was stripping the last evidence of DNA from the saucy drummette he held between his fat thumb and forefinger.
“Will it work?”
“Of course it will work. IBS is very hot these days.”
“Rudy, you’re the best.”
I finished up lunch and headed to Kinkos. I didn’t want to chance showing up and giving the Michelin Woman her chance to can me, so I decided to fax the note in. I hated the idea of Hymie thinking I was some sort of perv, but I could straighten that out later. They can’t fire you when you’re on disability, so I was in the clear-for a week or so.
23
Back at the Moody Blue, I was having problems settling down. There were just too many things happening at once. I was going to get fired from my job for any one of a number of reasons, people were going to think I was some sort of smarmy pervert who spends hours looking at porn sites, Mikey and Eli were still recovering, Shony was still gone, and Walanda’s murderers may or may not have something to do with one of those porn websites.
Coincidence is a funny thing. The fact that Melissa from the jail was on a porn site and in jail with Walanda at the same time didn’t mean her and her friends had anything to do with killing her. At the same time, it was hard not to jump all over the conclusion that they did.
I was pacing back and forth inside the Blue, which wasn’t exactly a mansion so I had to turn around quite a bit. I’d walk the length of the trailer, starting in the yellow formica world of the kitchen/dining area, past the built-in sofa and TV, through the narrow hallway by the bathroom, take a right into the living room, through the bedroom door, and finally turn around at the foot of my bed and start over. Al was asleep in the bedroom away from my pacing, which was just fine with me because he would probably find it objectionable and let me know it. I was working myself into a lather when there came a knock on my door.
I opened the door cautiously. I didn’t feel like taking any chances.
“Hey Duff.” It was Trina and she looked uncomfortable.
“What’s up, what brings you out here?” I said. “C’mon in. The place is a mess.”
“Look, after work, I was thinking.” She sat on the couch and ran a hand through her hair. She had on a pair of faded jeans and black shiny boots with a significant heel.
“Do you want me to warn you of stuff like today? I mean, I don’t want to be the one who brings you bad news and I don’t want to feel like I’m, I don’t know…” she said.
“No, I appreciate it. You probably saved me, at least for a little while.” Trina’s foot tapped nervously. “How’d my doctor’s note go over?” I said.
“Claudia was pissed, but said something about that it wouldn’t be enough to save you this time.”
“Figures. Did she tell Hymie?”
“She called him-so I think so. She also had an emergency meeting of the Quality Assurance Committee.”
“How does my looking at Internet porn become a quality assurance issue?”
“She said it put the agency at risk for public relations.”
“Geez, talk about bullshit.”
“They met and she had me print out the history on your computer to show the committee.”
“Great…”
“Duff?”
“Yeah?”
“Why were you looking at porn for four straight hours in the office?”
“It had to do with Walanda and who killed her-but don’t tell anyone that. I don’t want them to know,” I said.
“You’d rather have them think you’re an Internet pervert?”
“For now, yeah.”
“Duff, you’re not a pervert, are you?”
“No, I’m not, Trina.”
“Good.” She sighed.
“Is that what brought you out here? You were worried that I was some sort of wack-job pervert?”
Trina’s chin started to tremble and a single tear ran down her face. She didn’t make a sound.
“That stuff was awful. Why would anyone like that?” It wasn’t a question for me, it was just a question she couldn’t answer.
Trina put her face in her hands and started to sob. I moved to the couch and sat next to her and held her. It was a bit awkward because I had the side with no cushion. She buried her face in my chest and let go. I let her cry.
It took awhile, but it subsided. She pulled back from me and kissed me on the cheek. I kissed her back lightly on the lips and when I did her lips parted ever so slightly. I felt her hand on my back as she pressed herself into me like she wanted to go through me. I held her head in my hands and kissed her hard.
Trina held on to me with one hand while she untucked her shirt with the other. She was in a hurry and there wasn’t much grace to the movement. She moved my hands under her shirt, first to her waist. Her skin was warm and smooth and she was lean with a hint of muscle like a woman should be.
Trina pawed at my shirt from the back to try to pull it off my head, and when it got tangled around my head we slid off the couch and down to the floor. She pulled off her shirt and undid her bra with an economy of motion. She rolled over so that she was on top of me and we were both naked from the waist up. This time there wasn’t the playfulness there was in the office, this time it was intense.
Trina ground into me as she sat up on me, and she seemed to be almost in another world. She was with me, very much with me, but at the same time she was focused on herself. She slid off me and undid my jeans and pulled them and my underwear off with a strong tug. Trina stood and reached to pull the zipper down on each of her boots before she kicked them off. There was no strip play to this, this was a woman with purpose. She undid the snap on her faded jeans and did that same little wiggle to get out of her slightly too-tight pants that she did that night in the office. Trina climbed on top of me and let out a half sigh, half whimper. She pulled her hair back with both hands and tilted her head to one side as her face contorted with intensity. She had found her rhythm and was riding it.