The Bridge Trilogy Part 97

He'd done a little better with the GPS, which had a rocker keypad built into the right temple. The fifteen-channel receiver seemed to have really good lock-on, but the tutorial seemed to have been translated

23.

badly, and all Rydell could do was zoom in and out of what he quickly realized was a street map of Rio, not LA. Still, he'd thought, taking the gla.s.ses off, he'd get the hang of it. Then the phone in the left temple had beeped, so he'd put the gla.s.ses back on.

"Yeah?"

"Rydell, hey."

"Hey, Durius."

"You want a ride up to NoCal tomorrow in a nice new car?"

"W/ho's going?"

"Name of Creedmore. Knows a guy I know in the program."

Rydell had had an uncle who was a Mason, and this program Durius belonged to reminded him of that.

"Yeah? Well, I mean, is he okay?"

"Prob'ly not," Durius had said, cheerfully, "so he needs a driver. This three-week-old 'lectric needs to get ferried up there though, and he says it's fine to drive. You used to be a driver, didn't you?"

"Yeah."

"Well, it's free. This Creedmore, he'll pay for the charge."

Which was how Rydell came to find himself, now, driving a Hawker-Aichi two-seater, one of those low-slung wedges of performance materials that probably weighed, minus its human cargo, about as much as a pair of small motorcycles. There didn't seem to be any metal involved at all, just streamlined foam-core sandwiches reinforced with carbon fiber. The motor was in the back, and the fuel cells were distributed through the foam sandwiches that simultaneously pa.s.sed for cha.s.sis and bodywork. Rydell didn't want to know what happened if you hit something, driving a rig like this.

It was d.a.m.n near silent though, handled beautifully, and went like a bat once you got it up to speed. Something about it reminded Rydell of a rec.u.mbent bicycle he'd once ridden, except you didn't have to pedal.

"You never did tell me whose car this is," Rydell reminded Creedmore, who'd just downed the last two fingers of his vodka.

"This friend of mine," Creedmore said, powering down the window on his side and tossing out the empty bottle.

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"Hey," Rydell said, "that's a ten-thousand-dollar fine, they catch you: "They can kiss our a.s.ses good-bye, is what they can do," Creedmore said. "Sons of b.i.t.c.hes," he added, then closed his eyes and slept.

Rydell found himself starting to think about Chevette again. Regretting he'd ever let the singer get him on the topic. He knew he didn't want to think about that.

Just drive, he told himself,

On a brown hillside, off to his right, a wind farm's white masts. Late afternoon sunlight.

Just drive.

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6. SJLENC)O.

SILENCIO gets to carry. lie's the smallest, looks almost like a kid. He doesn't use, and if the cops grab him, he can't talk. Or anyway about the stuff.

Silencio has been following Raton and Playboy around for a while now, watching them use, watching them get the money they need in order to keep using. Raton gets mean when he's needing to use, and Silencio's learned to keep back from him then, out of range of feet and fists.

Raton has a long, narrow skull and wears contacts with vertical irises, like a snake. Silencio wonders if Raton is supposed to look like a rat who's eaten a snake, and now maybe the snake is looking out through its eyes. Playboy says Raton is a pinche Chupacabra from Watsonville and they all look this way.

Playboy is the biggest, his bulk wrapped in a long, formal topcoat worn over jeans and old work boots. He has a Pancho Villa mustache, yellow aviator gla.s.ses, a black fedora. He is kinder to Silencio, buys him burritos from the stalls, water, cans of pop, one time a big smooth drink made from fruit.

Silencio wonders if maybe Playboy is his father. He doesn't know who his father might be. His mother is crazy, back in los projectos. He doesn't think Playboy is his father really, because he remembers how he met Playboy in the market on Bryant Street, and that was just an accident, but sometimes he wonders anyway, when Playboy buys him food.

Silencio sits watching Raton and Playboy use, here behind this empty stall with its smell of apples. Raton has a little flashlight in his mouth so he can see what he is doing. It is the black tonight, and Raton is cutting the little plastic tube with the special knife, its handle longer than its short curved blade. The three of them are sitting on plastic crates.

Raton and Playboy use the black two, maybe three times in a day and a night. Three times with the black, then they must use the white

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as well. The white is more expensive, hut too much black and they start to talk fast and maybe see people who are not there. "Speaking with Jesus," Playboy calls that, hut the white he calls "walking with the king." But it is not walking: white brings stillness, silence, sleep. Silencio prefers the white nights.

Silencio knows that they buy the white from a black man, but the black from a white man, and he

a.s.sumes this is the mystery depicted in the picture Raton wears on the chain around his neck: the black and the white teardrops swirling together to make roundness; in the white teardrop a small round of black, in the black a small round of white.

To get the money they talk to people, usually in dark places, so the people are frightened.

Sometimes Raton shows them a different knife, while Playboy holds their arms so they cannot move.

The money is in little tabs of plastic printed with pictures that move. Silencio would like to keep these when the money is gone out of them, but this is not allowed. Playboy throws them away, after wiping them carefully. He drops them down the slots beside the street. He does not want his fingers to leave marks on them. Sometimes Raton hurts the people, so that they will tell the charms that make money come from the moving pictures. The charms are names, letters, numbers.

Silencio knows every charm that Raton and Playboy have learned, but they do not know this; if he told them, they might be angry.

The three of them sleep in a room in the Mission. Playboy pulls the mattress from the bed and puts it on the floor. Playboy sleeps there, Raton on the other part of the bed. Silencio sleeps on the floor.

Now Raton has cut the tube and puts half of the black on Playboy's finger. Playboy has licked his finger so the black will stick. Playboy puts the finger in his mouth and rubs the black against his gums. Silencio wonders what it tastes like, but he does not ever wish to speak with Jesus. Now Raton is rubbing his own gums with black, the flashlight forgotten in his other hand. Raton and Playboy look foolish doing this, but it does not make Silencio laugh. Soon they will want to use again, and the black gives them energy to get the money they will need. Silencio knows there is now no money, because they have not eaten Since yesterday.

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Usually they find people in the dark places between the big shapes at the foot of Bryant Street, but now Raton thinks the police are watching those places. Raton has told Silencio that the police can see in the dark. Silencio has looked at the eyes of the police, pa.s.sing in their cars, and wondered how they can see in the dark.

But tonight Raton has led them out, onto the bridge where people live, and he says they will find money here. Playboy has said he does not like the bridge, because the bridge people are pinche; they do not like outsiders working here. Raton says he feels lucky.

Raton tosses the empty vial into the darkness, and Silencio hears it hit something, a single small click.

Raton's snake-eyes are wide with the black. He runs his hand back through his hair and gestures.

Playboy and Silencio follow him.

SILENCID pa.s.ses the bodega for the second time, watching the man in his long coat, where he sits at his small white table, drinking coffee.