58

The waning moon bled its light every night, becoming smaller and darker with the passage of the month. Flip stared at it, his two eyes on the single bright misshapen orb above. For once, he felt a sense of kinship with it. Endless cycles, waxing, waning, orbiting around and around, lifeless, dusty, dry.

Pointless.

From this alley he could watch its motion another hour maybe. If he lasted that long. His idea was to hide here until the sirens died down and then make his way to Diane’s. Brenda’s, that is. He didn’t even know what she wanted him to call her anymore. He would go to her. She would know what to do. After all, she was the one he orbited.

But since dropping to this spot against the bricks, he himself had waned. This alley had become too comfortable to leave. The asphalt carpet, the bricks mortared together to cradle his back, the mirrors of the puddles reflecting the moonlight—he’d even grown fond of the fetid smell of garbage seeping from the trash bins. And anyway, there was no standing now. He was dizzy enough just sitting here staring back at the moon’s prying, half-blinked eye.

His heart charged in his chest. Pump faster and faster. Get what blood’s left through these veins.

Diane would know what to do. Brenda would know. His cell phone had been in his good hand for a long time. He’d meant to call her before he’d become engaged in this staring contest with the unwinking, pitted eggshell overhead.

Another hour, maybe two, and the moon would pass behind that wall, and he would be alone. The water and oil puddled in the street wouldn’t glow any longer when the moon turned away.

He had her number stored in his phone. She could be here in ten minutes, her hands on him, helping him into a car. Maybe she would nurse him herself. Or maybe she would think it best to take him to a hospital. She would know what to tell the doctors to keep the police out of it. If that was possible.

He set the cell phone on the pavement and reached for his left arm. Adjusting it was like moving a piece of a cadaver. Someone else’s arm sewed onto his shoulder. He tried bending the arm with his right hand, as if he could pump sensation back into it by levering it back and forth. Finally, he gave up again. It was dead.

Like he would soon be. If he didn’t make the call.

But she might be with him again. Her mark. The one this job was all about. She might have lit candles again tonight. They’d be burned down to stubs by this hour. She’d hadn’t told Flip much about her plan, really. She never did. She just gave instructions and expected him to carry them out. That was his job. Stand by for more orders. Don’t call me; I’ll call you. Then we’ll be together.

Deep down, he always knew she was stringing him along. Since the first night he was back. When he’d read the letters she’d written to him while he was in Lancaster, something had told him that she had a reason to keep him on a hook. He didn’t want to believe it. He wanted to believe that a girl like her might want him. He thought maybe there was a chance that what he’d done for her over the years might have earned him something from her, even as she grew up and he had to grow meaner and meaner to survive. She liked part of his meanness, that was sure, but now, with the last drops of his life oozing through the sponge of his clothing and onto the blacktop, he saw it all clearly. Finally.

She had no desire for him. He was just another tool in her kit. Another piece to the puzzle of the life she was assembling for herself. What would the rest of the puzzle pieces look like? She’d shown up in the evenings dressed like any of the career women striding the sidewalks of Beverly Hills or Century City in their heels and skirts, entering office buildings or shops. She spent her days in that world and her nights plotting and planning how to set the next piece of the puzzle into the frame.

No, a wounded convict had no place in that puzzle. If he called her, she might not even answer. And if she did, she would have an excuse for not coming.

He could call his dad. Inglewood was only fifteen minutes away. The old man might drive over in his Buick. Flip pictured him covering up the seat with a towel to keep the blood off the upholstery. He imagined the words he would say. The disappointment. Again.

No.

And then there was Jason. Closest of all. That snug house in Cheviot Hills. The perfect little lawyer wife. The sweet little job handling other people’s money all day long.

Flip’s mind flashed on the familiar image of Jason as a boy, counting the cash from the paper route they shared.

He smiled. Kids playing with cash. Daffy Duck sitting at a folding table.

The walls framing the moon at the end of the alley were spinning now, a dizzy rotation around that glowing eye. The back-and-forth motion was hypnotic.

He closed his eyes. Very tired now. Very sleepy. He caught again the image of Jason at the summer card table, the fan blowing air at Flip, Jason not letting the fan blow on him for fear of ruffling the piles of bills he’d collected. Jason counting and recounting, as if the number could grow larger by repetition. Keeping a list of those he’d collected from and those who still owed him. And Flip poking fun. Calling him the cartoon character who was crazy for dough. Jason preferring to sweat rather than have anything interfere with the organized stacks before him. Beads of sweat standing out on Jason’s forehead like dewdrops.

Twelve-year-old Jason lifted a five from a stack. He pursed his lips like a lady and dabbed at his forehead with the bill to make his little brother Philip laugh.

And Philip laughed.