I waved my hand. “No way. Nothing but the best for you. We get married by an Elvis impersonator at Vegas.”
“Deal.”
The line moved slowly; I noted how many of the people around us looked sad, or angry, or like us, exasperated. A good blogger is a good eavesdropper, so even as I flirted with Sara I picked up snatches of conversation; the friends of drunk drivers wondering when it was going to stop, the parents of drug users talking in circles around their dread of someday standing over their child's grave and, most tragically, the still bruised faces of domestic abuse victims making excuses for their abusers.
Finally it was our turn, and we found ourselves standing in front of the Justice of the Peace. It was nothing like you see on the TV, no impressive courtroom, no jury box. Just a gray-haired man sitting at a standard metal desk with a sheriff's deputy on either side of him. He looked more tired than distinguished. He asked, “Are you here for Roy Foster Junior?”
Now, as someone who has been in front of a judge or two, I can tell you when the judge doesn’t have to look at his paperwork before speaking, some serious shit must have gone down.
“What is your relationship with Mr. Foster?”
“I’m his cousin.” I explained, “Brian Foster.”
“I see. He has been charged with misdemeanor cocaine possession, trespassing, and sexual harassment of a police officer. Were you aware of that?”
The deputies shared a glance at each other, so did Sara and I. “Uhm, the first part.”
“He will be granted bail at $850 dollars. You can pay the clerk when you leave at this entrance. His next court appearance is in three weeks to officially answer the charges.”
“Three weeks?” Sara said, then corrected herself, “I mean, he doesn’t even live here.”
The Justice of the Peace’s expression became even more frosty. “Ordinarily I would be sympathetic, but considering Roy Foster considers driving through a private community seven times in one night and grinding up against one of our Deputies appropriate behavior, he can sleep on the streets for all I care.
“But wouldn’t that get him arrested all over again?”
“Indeed,” His expression became even frostier, “he will also have two restraining orders against him, one preventing him from coming within 100 yards of Deputy Sheriff Regina P. Bannister and within 100 yards of the Bayard Estates manufactured home community.”
And with that my inner monologue went from its usual snarky wisdom to the simple sentence of: Don’t punch him in the courthouse. Don’t punch him in the courthouse.
“Now please go to the door to your left.”
We went to the left where the same crowd of folks from the entrance were gathered. There was a line for a window to a pleasant elderly woman taking bail money and fines from people who probably couldn’t afford it and sending them off with a sheaf of papers and a “Have a blessed day.”
From there it was off to the very secure-looking side entrance of the building, where one by one the detained people were buzzed out. I couldn’t help but notice a police car across the parking lot with a woman sitting at the wheel. Her appearance was concealed by her standard-issue hat and gear, but there was something about the shape of her face that seemed to make a sliver of kindness peek out from behind her perfectly rehearsed law enforcement glare. I wondered if this was the deputy my cousin had harassed when Sara said, “Who the Hell is that?”
I turned to where she was pointing and saw a man standing on the rightmost side of the parking lot. He had to be at least six and a half feet tall and was leaning against the hood of a 1965 Shelby GT350. Both the man and his muscle car had seen better days, but they each looked formidable.
The car had tinted windows and unnecessary chrome. The man had a military-style buzz cut and a cowboy-themed mustache. He stood perfectly still, watching the courthouse. He looked like trouble; he looked like a criminal; he looked like he would have been right at home at a…
“…trailer park,” I said.
The door buzzed, and Roy came bursting out of it like a fresh bronco at a rodeo, which is appropriate because I wanted nothing more than to call him a horse's ass.
“Hey Cuz!” He threw his arms open wide and hugged us. “Hey Sara-cua! You would not believe the last couple of days I’ve had!”
I looked from one end of the parking lot to the other; the Deputy and the Giant were both looking our way. “How the Hell did you piss off so many people in such a short time?” Sara asked as she struggled to free herself from his grip.
“It’s a small state,” Cousin Roy explained, but he refused to say more until we got him to the nearest Waffle House...
Yes. I checked out the place, creepiest trailer park I have ever seen. It’s small like maybe 50 trailers, all of them must be at least fifty years old. They’ve got that streamlined Jetsons vibe to them you know? So there is like a produce store about a half a mile away from it, run by a Mennonite family. Mennonite girls give great handjobs by the way. Must be the butter churn thing. Anyway the eldest daughter of the family works there and she has got stories to tell. She says Bayard Estates is the profanest of the profane. Now Bertha tells me, that was her name by the way. No really. Sweet girl, rough hands though. So, Bertha tells me that whenever their father drives past the entrance to the place he says Psalm 23, you know the funeral one? Yay I am walking through of the valley of the shadow of death. You know? That one.
Anyway she says her Dad says there is something wrong there, that like that everyone that lives there is touched by an unknowable evil. She told me that the owner lives there… he is an ex-football player named Stanley ‘the Muscle’ Russel, you know the guy.
What? How do you not know this stuff. I thought you were an investigator!
Ok Stan was a rising star back in the 70’s recruited right out of college, he was massive dude, perfect for offensive tackle but thing is he wanted to be a quarterback and acted like it too. So he does okay in his first few seasons with the Buccaneers, but it was like the ’76 Buccaneers, you know? Lost every game of the season. But then he gets picked up by the Colts in 82 and makes a few good plays but he gets a bad back injury. I mean it was a bad one, it left him in a damn wheelchair but not because he was paralyzed; it was just he couldn’t straighten up. But as I said this is the 80s, so there are more than enough drugs to help him get back into the game, I mean they say this guy was doing Belushi-level cocaine and painkillers.
With a little side order of steroids, of course.
And he gets by for a while but eventually it all goes tits up and he becomes the most traded player in the NFL and by 1989 he is working as a celebrity spokesperson for ‘Emblazon Unlimited’, he does their commercials for Beef Whips.
Yes, they make beef whips, even MLMs gotta have a side hustle.
By the way Cuz, I am not gotta say it in front of the lady but if you ever want to find out what the ‘secret ingredient’ is let me know.
Oh? Yes it is bull penises. I underestimated you Sara.
So where was I? Oh yeah Stan Russel, he comes here about seven years ago and he buys up Bayard Estates. Now mostly back then it was like fifty trailers, all retirees. Good solid cash flow, passive income, the American Dream. Now Stan comes in and does the standard corporate fascist playbook, raises lot rents, slashes services and waits for his tenants to either die off or be foreclosed on.
Now this next part I got from one of the guys at the local dive bar, Jason and Jay’s is the name, so there is this guy there, he restores old trailers and he told me that as soon as someone got booted out of Bailey Estates, either by the Sheriff, or a Meatwagon he would go in and refurbish the whole thing. New carpets, new HVAC, tinted windows, high-speed internet. He did the furnishing too, and each one was converted so the bedrooms were like these college dorms and the living rooms were converted into offices. Soon as he finished people would move in.
Yeah. Exactly. He was making it into a business. An Emblazon Unlimited cheapass office center slowly pushing out the fixed incomes and failed dream crowd. That’s your story right there Brian, not your Space Worms from Outer Space.
No Sara, I don’t believe in that spooky spiritual stuff. It’s bullcrap. So is UFOs. So is evolution. Only one thing is true, shit happens and half the time we are never gonna understand why.
Why?
Because our minds can’t be trusted and the more that we learn and invent the more confusing stuff gets. It’s like that story about the guys that are tied up in a cave and are trying to figure out they’re looking at an elephant by the way its shadow looks on the wall.
Waitress can I get a refill on this coffee? Thanks darlin. Man I bet you were a real heartbreaker back in the day.
Sheesh. Lady doesn’t know how to take a compliment.
So anyway the new arrivals start settling in and it’s a weird situation and no one in town is really complaining about it, there was some grousing about a residential area being repurposed as a business but Stan’s got this lawyer named Luther Nord, guy apparently never leaves his hometown in Seattle but he brings the town council to their knees via a few well-placed Zoom calls. So now everything is smooth sailing, everyone leaves well enough alone. There are about 15 people working there, with one or two exceptions they barely interact with the town except sometimes going out to the local hardware stores or hunting supply stores. Rumor has it they work twelve-hour shifts doing whatever it is they do there. Dusk to dawn
What are the exceptions? Well there’s Stan of course, he is always out and about but there are these two girls… sorry Sara… ‘young women’ that work there. The lady that manages the Exxon Station calls them ‘the Porcelain Twins’ but they’re not twins they’re just two hotties with milky complexions and dark makeup and eyes that kind of don’t look at anything but still follow you around the room.
I call that ‘stripper vision’ and I know it well. I was a DJ off and on at the Cookie Jar in Albany. You know the gentleman’s club that keeps getting raided? Yeah so ‘stripper vision’ is when the girls are scanning the crowd for guys that are going to spend way way waaaaay too much money on lap dances.
Thing is the Porcelain Twins aren’t selling lap dances they’re selling the chance to work for Stan’s business as outside sales personnel. Someone’s gotta try and sell cheap toilet paper and off-brand cologne to the masses right?
What time is it anyway? Oh we’ve got hours to go before sunset.
Sunset? Well, that’s where the real show starts. You and Sara are gonna help me violate a restraining order…
…now we’re back at Fosdick Motel. I got Cousin Roy a room of his own on the opposite end of the building and we are going to all try and settle in for a nap before we go to see ‘the real show,’ whatever the Hell that is.
I’ve got to admit that aside from the whole making a spectacle of himself thing, my cousin did a fantastic bit of investigation. I’ve got some answers but more questions too. I still think stealing the book is my best idea, but if the Bayard Estates is full of telemarketing shut-ins, that makes my chances of getting caught pretty high.
Sara is mumbling in her sleep. Despite everything she’s been through, she can drift off pretty easily and look beautiful doing it. As I go over my notes from last October and the strange case of Sue Charney, I find myself pausing to watch her sleep. Not in a creepy way, but in a ‘Holy Shit, I’m In Love’ way.
I find myself thinking about how I would do anything for her.
And worrying that I can’t.
When I started this, I assumed I would be dealing with some low-stakes dabbler in the unknown, like Tegan Blue or poor old Osric Langhorne. Someone who knew just enough to be impressive, or was in possession of a few strange books or an eldritch Ouija board. Now? What would a failed football player and a slightly supernatural MLM have in common with the Eternal Codex of Tovit?
Realizing I was just making myself crazy, I put my laptop aside and started to slink down into the bed ready for some sleep and spooning or maybe something more. Then my phone rang. It was a vibrating in a particular way, a special signal for a special person. It was a ringtone I hear very rarely.
I grabbed my phone and leapt out of bed, disturbing Sara. She made an annoyed sound and fell right back to sleep.
Once I was in the bathroom with the door locked and the shower running, I sat on the toilet and answered. “Who is this?” I asked.
But I knew the answer.
I didn’t get a greeting; I got a song, “Ain't no grave can hold that body down.
There ain't no grave can hold that body down…”
“Started going to church?” I tried to sound snarky, but I was already starting to shake all over.
The singing stopped. Now it was just a voice, heartbreakingly familiar but even more heartbreakingly different, “You’re far from home aren’t you?”
“I could say the same thing about you?”
“The world is my home now.”
When I spoke next I almost didn’t recognize my own voice, “Shouldn’t you be spending quality time with your loved ones?”
There was that familiar chuckle and then, “I always have time for you. Always did.”
For a moment I couldn’t breathe, but I took a moment to collect myself, “What do you want?”
“I saw the moon last night and dreamed of you. It was a witch’s moon but then again aren’t they all these days?”
I was being baited, “I dream about you sometimes too.”
“Do you still wake up crying?” I could hear their expression change.
“Don’t flatter yourself. I have a lot of reasons to wake up crying.” I said.
A sigh, a thoughtful pause, “You might have more reasons to soon enough.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
No answer, just more singing, “When they feel that moonlight shine they’ll rise right out of time. Ain't no grave can hold that body down…”
On the rare occasions it happened I would draw these conversations out, letting them drag in the hopes to catch one snatch of the humanity that had once colored that voice. But not this day. Not when Sara was knocking on the bathroom door. I told her to wait just a minute, that I was just getting out of the shower, then I rinsed myself under the cold stream for a few seconds, just enough to get my body wet.
Especially my face.
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