Tales from the Shack: Nobody

I made my last call at midnight on Saturday.

"This number is not in service. If you have dialed it in error..."

I made my way back to my hotel, my room. At 4 in the morning on Monday my phone rang again. I was instructed what to do with the notebook. I dropped it into a hat of a grizzled old black panhandler outside the Capital South metro station. He just glanced up with leaden eyes and went back to talking to himself.

It was another three weeks before my phone rang again. Two days of following this time. Then another four weeks later. It slowly fell into a rhythm over the course of months.

Sometimes it was a day or two, sometimes it was a week. Occasionally, a room key card would be included in the notebook and a midnight message might instruct me to get something out of the target's room, usually a laptop, or a briefcase - once it was a shirt. Then I took it outside to meet a van -- a plumber, a carpet cleaner, a furniture delivery van - in a specific place. I waited outside the van and was given the "whatever" to put back. None of us ever said a word.

The van drivers changed as regularly as the vans. Once, I recognized the driver as the grizzled old black panhandler, neatly groomed and wearing an electrician's uniform. His nametag said "Jackson." When he handed me the laptop, he saw the recognition in my eyes and gave me a wordless wink of recognition.

I could tell Amber and Tommy were still worried about me, but I'd told her the truth. I had nowhere else to go.

Time went by faster than I expected; it seemed like I was always a lot busier than Amber.

It was five years before I saw Donna again.

***

Instead of a four in the morning phone call, it was a tap on the door. Tommy was leaning on the doorframe; head down, idly biting his lower lip.

"She wants to see you."

There was no need to explain who "she" was, even if we'd never said her name. He followed me in and waited.

I walked back to my closet and threw a set of clothes on the bed. Tommy stood by while I stripped the giant t-shirt I slept in off, and pulled them on.

Tommy didn't even seem to notice, but then he only had eyes for one girl.

We walked out to the car in silence and darkness.

I didn't bother asking Tommy if he knew what Donna wanted. He wouldn't know. And if he did, he wouldn't be stupid enough to say as we drove through dark streets.

Another ruined building with painted over windows and the smell of urine on the steps.

Tommy stayed in the car while I walked in through the gaping front door and headed toward the only light there was, a single door open in the hallway. Donna was sitting at a twin to the last desk I'd seen her at. Or maybe it was the same desk and they'd brought it for her. What light there was came from a single, cordless camping lamp on her table.

"Sit." She waved toward an old wooden dining room chair in front of her. One of her bodyguards loomed in the darkness behind her.

I sat. Good puppy.

She pulled a sheet out of her folder. "He was right. You have talent. Your reports are detailed, you improvise well and you don't panic." She looked back down at the sheet. "And you're a ghost. When we've tested you on our own people, they don't even know you're there. Even when we tell them to keep an eye out. You may be the best we've ever had."

For a fraction of a second I wondered if she'd told the white-haired man. For some reason, I really wanted her to. Realizing that shocked me into silence. I hadn't thought about him in a long time.

She looked up at me with an arched eyebrow. "And you don't talk too much."

I just waited, which seemed to be what she wanted.

"We're going to teach you some things. Make you more useful to us."

"What kinds of things?"

"Security systems, locks, alarms, hotel key card systems. Room search techniques. Some techniques for copying computer and phone data." She paused. "Do you speak any Spanish?"

"Maybe a few words. Mostly insults."

I saw a hint of a smile flicker on the corner of her mouth. She scratched a note. "Housekeeping crews usually have a lot of Spanish speakers. So you'll learn Spanish."

"You'll be off for about six months. You'll be in New York City. I don't want you training around here."

My opinion or thoughts on the matter didn't appear to be necessary -- or desired. But it was better to warn her now. "I never did well in school."

She didn't even look up. "I know. Dropped out in ninth grade. Shitty home life, shitty school systems. Your assessment tests from grade school and child services are pretty clear that while you were behind developmentally, it wasn't because you weren't smart enough. But you really are just about as anti-social as it's possible to be without being a sociopath."

I stared, trying not to show my surprise. Whatever, whoever "They" were, I was pretty sure it wasn't a criminal enterprise. Maybe a really big corporation, but the grinding, queasy feeling in my stomach was pretty certain that was wishful thinking.

She kept on without pausing. "This makes you more useful and it will have some benefits for you, if there's something you want."

Want. A rush of memories, a flash of sitting in that dimly lit basement across from a man....

"I want to meet him. Talk to him." The words were out before I even knew I was going to speak.

She looked up sharply. Silent. She knew I was talking about the white-haired man. And she was not happy about it.

I knew I'd crossed a line. But I didn't know why it was so important to her.

After a long moment. "Why?"

My heart started again. "I don't know. He... he saw me. Nobody else..." I just stopped. I didn't even know what I meant by that.

She blinked. Twice. "We'll see. Maybe." She seemed a little off balance. "If you see him, it will probably be the last thing you ever do."

There wasn't much point in arguing that.

"Don't get cocky because of this. Just remember what's important."

"I know. I'm nobody."

She nodded grimly and handed me a bus ticket to New York City and a hotel key card folder.

"Listen for the phone."

***

For the next six months, six days a week, I met with "Maria" and "Brandon." I'm sure those weren't their real names. I know Rose wasn't mine.

Maria taught me Mexican style street Spanish three days each week. Within two weeks I was only allowed to speak to her in Spanish and within two months we spent nearly every "class" in places where only Spanish was spoken. Restaurant kitchens, hotel laundry companies, a slaughterhouse. We even went to seemingly endless numbers of street fairs.

Brandon was clean cut and athletic. Every day we met, he brought a backpack with something in it -- a lock system, a security camera, a mockup of a sensor or whatever. We spent the day taking it apart and putting it together. He would show me how to beat it or fool it -- sometimes it took tools, sometimes electronics. Then he would leave me an address and a time we would meet and use what I learned.

The scariest thing about Brandon was that I was sure he was military. The way he carried himself, the way he talked.

Which meant Donna definitely knew that I knew.

Tommy and Amber might be able to fool themselves, but I couldn't. I was sure I was right, and if I was, none of us would ever leave. They couldn't risk letting us go.

On the other hand, at least I got laid for the first time in five years. In all the jobs I'd been on, I'd more or less worked alone, but now I was breaking and entering into hotels, businesses, and private houses with Brandon three days a week.

The rush of getting away with it, of not getting caught. It's very primal, very exciting. The first time, we'd just slipped away from a house -- a very, very expensive house with a very, very expensive security system, and were crossing a very large golf course. An overpowering urge, a wave of desire struck me and I just pulled him into the trees and started tearing at his clothes. Twenty minutes later we were racing in the shadows along the edge of the greens and fairways, flashing grins at each other like a couple of teenagers.

After that first time, it pretty much became a ritual. We never said anything about it; both of us understood that it was more a release of tension for each of us rather than anything between us.

Then it was over. Maria didn't show up, Brandon didn't show up and I just got an envelope with a bus ticket back to DC in it.

The first night I was back, Amber knocked on the door and walked in with a bag of chicken vindaloo as if I'd never been gone.

***

In some ways, nothing changed; Amber, Tommy, 4 AM phone calls.

In other ways, everything changed. I wasn't just following anymore, sometimes I was given addresses, times, things to look for. Places to break in. I wasn't always working alone anymore either.

Sometimes a distraction operation was used -- a girl, never one I knew, would hook up with the target, and keep him "occupied" while I searched his room, his car, or use a device to clone his phone. The sheer number of different girls meant Donna's organization was far larger than I'd thought. Brandon had talked about this kind of thing. The girls were called "swallows."

At first it was a little odd, quietly copying a laptop while listening to a couple in the next room.

Talking dirty, moaning and screaming.

I suppose it was inevitable.

One of the "swallows" was keeping the target very loudly and vigorously occupied in the bedroom while I did my part. From the squealing and gasping, the guy must have been rougher than the usual ones and I was feeling a twinge of sympathy for the girl.

I heard the target imperiously order the girl to get him a drink from the hotel room bar just as I was almost done cloning the sim card from the target's phone. She strolled out of the bedroom, stark naked. She was a wreck -- mascara, eye shadow and lipstick streaking down her face.

Amber.

She looked right at me but didn't say or do anything; she didn't even acknowledge me. Just quietly mixed a drink and carried it back to the bedroom.

That night she knocked on my door. She was obviously freshly scrubbed, wearing a bathrobe and carrying a bag I recognized as the type that usually contained a couple slices of Tivoli's chocolate cake.

"Hey, Spooks. Want some dessert?"

I just stood back and let her walk in. She looked a little frailer, a little more vulnerable without her makeup.

She pulled two small ribbon-tied white cardboard boxes out of the bag and handed me one before sitting on the bed.

"Love Tivoli's."

We sat on the bed, eating the rich cake wordlessly.

As she finished, she sighed contentedly and settled over to look at me seriously.

"It's all pretend. You know that, don't you?"

I shrugged.

She looked back in the direction of her room. "It is, Spooky. Think about it. I sell fantasies. To make it work, I have to pretend there's some kind of human connection. Something emotional. Pretend to enjoy it, pretend to be or feel whatever it is they want. That's what most of them want."

She pulled her feet up to sit cross-legged, huddled under her robe. "Then there's guys like 'Morton Gallagher, Esquire,' born with more money than God. Wants to be the big tough guy, so he picks up a girl a little smaller, maybe a little scared looking. Somebody who makes him feel like a big man."

I waited for her to go on.

"So I look a little nervous, wear makeup that isn't waterproof, so it runs. Squeal and moan like he's too much man for me." She smiled crookedly. "Think how funny that it." She gestured down between her thighs. "We're made to push a 20 inch long, ten pound baby out through that. Do you really think Morty's 'six inches of steel' can really hurt if I use a little KY?"

I smiled at that. "Maybe not."

"Gallagher is all about the big man thing, makes me fix him a ginger ale highball before we start, halfway through and then at the end. "

"A highball?"

"I think it's a thing he got from his dad. One of those passed-down-from-father-to-son things that guys have. He always starts off tripping on something anyway. He's usually pretty out of it by the time I leave. I always roll him on his side so he doesn't choke if he throws up. I don't think she'd like that."

"Probably not. "

She looked at me with a kind of helpless look. "This is what I do. Tommy understands. He drives and he treats bullet holes, knife cuts and overdoses for them. Sometimes he has to get rid of the ones that didn't make it. That's what he does, and he knows what I do. He knows I can't be what he deserves. We don't have choices anymore, not 'til this is... over. All I get... all we get, is Sunday. She lets us have that. Probably because Sundays are lousy days to do this stuff. I mean, who wants to see a hooker on a Sunday?"

"That makes sense." I thought about my own request. "Did she agree to it, or did it just kind happen?"

"Tommy asked her for it. She didn't really answer, but neither of us has gotten a Sunday morning call since. During the rest of the week he and I just work together."

It was none of my business, really, but I asked. "So how does Tommy feel about you 'earning extra money,' anyway?"

She actually smiled a little. "He gets it. Like I said, what choice do we have? I have to show up on the street regular anyway, or everybody would think I'm a cop. That'd be a real bad idea, even with them knowing I'm protected. You could fake it for a while, maybe, but not day after day, year after year. Tommy understands. And I use condoms every time."

"Maintaining your cover."

"Yeah, that." She flicked the lid on her cake box up and down a few times, and looked sharply at me, then down at the box lid.

I looked down at my own. The inside of the lid was covered with writing.

She looked immensely sad for a second, then got up stuffing her box in the bag, and walking to the door.

"I'm just tired today, Spooks. Thanks for listening. Sometimes I just need someone to talk to."

And she was out.

I stared looked at box lid while I pretended to study a map of Arlington.

***

Spooks,

If anything happens to me, take care of Tommy. He doesn't deserve any of this. He's not so good with money, so I need you to help him.

Please.

Amber

The rest of the note just explained that where she'd been hiding the cash from her 'cover' nights.

She couldn't tell Tommy where the money was. Addicts are addicts even if you love them. I realized I was the only choice she had.

I had to ask myself: in what kind of shit-world do I become the one to trust?

***

Amber never said anything about it after that. But Tommy did. Sort of. On the way back from a job, he pulled into a diner parking lot with no warning, saying he'd missed lunch and was getting the shakes from not eating. We sat in a booth and stared at each other for a few minutes.

"Amber says she talked to you, about us."

"Yes..."

"We're not stupid Spooky, we know how this probably ends. One of us dies, both of us die, or they decide we aren't useful anymore."

There just wasn't much to say to that.

"I just wanted to ask you to take care of Amber if anything happens to me. She's a good kid. She got fucked over by that asshole boyfriend of hers. He put her on the street, made her carry drugs. " He gave a tilted gap-toothed smile. "Somebody has to watch out for her, she has a taste for loser boyfriends."

"You think you're just another bad choice?"

His smile faded a bit. "Seriously, is there any way I would ever be a good choice? The only day I'm clean is Sunday. I can do that, but I'm full-blown tweaker for fuck's sake. I'm one really bad day from an overdose. I saw enough overdoses when I worked the ER, I know where I'm headed." He shook his head in a jittery, nervous shake. "And I have a lot of bad days, Spooky."

"She thinks you're a good choice."

"Then you're probably smarter than me or her, just take care of her, will ya?"

"I'll probably get sick of chicken vindaloo, but if anything happens I'll keep an eye on her."

He smiled tightly with too-shiny red eyes. "Thanks. Don't tell her I asked, okay?"

The way he said it, he didn't know she'd already asked me to take care of him.

The world was maybe a tiny bit less shitty when we walked out of that diner.

When I had to do a house three days later, I was supposed to make it look like a break in. Steal a laptop along with whatever I thought would look like a spur of the moment burglary.

It was a spectacular house -- all marble and exotic wood. Rich people spending money to show how rich they are.

I found the laptop, then took jewelry from an armoire and some small electronics. But on my way out, I saw a wine refrigerator in the kitchen and pulled a couple bottles of champagne out of it.

I turned the laptop over to the ever-waiting van and dumped the electronics and jewelry in a storm drain.

The next morning was Sunday, and I did something I was sure would never do. I knocked on Amber's door at ten.

She answered, wearing a pair of jeans and a big flannel shirt. No makeup, hair just pulled back. This was Tommy's girl, the real girl I'd gotten only the smallest glimpses of.

She was wearing a ring I'd never seen before. A little band with a small diamond. An engagement ring.

Of course. She would only wear that on Sundays.

She just stood there studying me, not saying a word. Face utterly impassive. I'd broken the one rule she'd asked me to keep.

"I missed the party, but I just had to give you guys an engagement gift."

I held out the bottle to her.

She took it without looking at it, smiling a real smile.

Then she stepped suddenly forward, hugged me fiercely and whispered, "Thank you."

She let me go and stood back. I could see her uncertainty about what to do so I shrugged. "I have to get going, but give Tommy a hug for me." And walked away before she felt like she had to invite me in.

But I was smiling as I heard the door close behind me. Not everybody gets to celebrate their engagement, even years late with 1959 Dom Pérignon Rosé. I guess that's understandable since it runs forty thousand dollars a bottle on a good day. I wondered if they would ever look at the label, but I didn't really care. It's the thought that counts.

I heard giggles and laughter late into the night that night.

The laptop turned up four days later at a pawn shop with classified weapons plans on it. The guy who owned the home was arrested. It was in all the newspapers.

Donna wasn't even pretending to hide it from me anymore.

***

You roll dice every day. Step off the curb into the crosswalk without looking, change lanes without thinking. Most of the time nothing happens, but sometimes, once in a while you roll snake eyes.

Seven years, six months.

It was supposed to be an easy one, another Swallow Game. Maybe I'd grown jaded about it over the last couple years, but I wasn't nervous at all. Give the distraction time to work -- maybe ten minutes, and copy the cell phone memory and sim card, like usual.

It was on the third floor of the hotel, a corner suite. I glanced in the front of the hotel at the nearly empty lobby as I walked past, then around the back to the loading dock. I'd already rigged that lock earlier in the day, disconnecting the alarm and making sure my stolen punch code worked.

The door was already partly open -- just half an inch, but enough that the latch hadn't caught. I felt the hair on the back of my spine stand up. My route was blown. But something kept pushing me forward through the door, glancing at the green lights of the alarm panel, just to be sure. Across the loading dock and up the maintenance stairs.

Tommy was lying on the third flight of stairs -- awkwardly sprawled, feet up toward the third floor landing, head down. Eyes wide open, unblinking. A hole just above his right eye, ringed in black burn marks. Not much blood at all. He didn't look scared, or angry or anything, really. Blank. Just an upside down doll on the stairs.