Gunmetal Blue Read online

  The priest says something about the dead boy and then a picture of the boy with a little biography of the boy is circulated through the crowd.

  ALBERT VOLARES

  He is survived by

  His parents

  Albert and Mona Volares

  He loved Pokémon, Battlefield, Minecraft, pizza and football.

  He wanted to be an FBI agent.

  He was loved by everyone who knew him.

  He will be missed.

  He was a person full of promise.

  The picture is of an astonishingly handsome young man with the cheekbones and hooked nose of an Aztec warrior.

  A line forms behind a pile of dirt and one by one people grab the shovel, a silver spade, and toss a clod of dirt on his casket.

  •

  This is one thing I want to remember from the week my wife died: I want to remember the pile of dirt that we all stood behind. I want to remember that I had stood near that pile of dirt with the spade in my hand. I want to remember that I had shoveled the dirt without cease upon her tomb until she was completely buried. I want to remember the weight of the earth in my hands as I threw it down upon my beloved wife’s grave. I want to remember the feeling of labor, the feeling of using my arms and legs to lift the earth and hurl it upon the box of her coffin. I bought her the most expensive coffin money could buy, and that day, tossing dirt against her coffin, I realized it was utterly the wrong decision to make. I should have buried her in a plain pine box. I should have sent her to earth the humblest way imaginable, and yet the coffin gleamed back at me as I hurled dirt upon it, to remind me how much I paid for it. I remember lifting the dirt and praying in my heart of hearts to be humble. I don’t know who I prayed to, but I believe I was talking to the truest purest aspect of me. Be humble, I exhorted myself as I flung dirt upon her grave. Be humble, thou who hurlest the dirt upon thine wife. Be humbler than the dirt.

  The undertaker and a couple of Adeleine’s uncles tried to slow me down. They tried to politely remove the shovel from my hands, but I wasn’t going to let them. I pushed them away. Step aside. This was between me and my wife. Be humble, ye who buriest thine wife, and do what labor she will ask of you. Do it without complaint. And so it was. I threw the dirt as if I were fulfilling a sacred obligation. I threw all the dirt, not just a spadeful. The sweat fell down my brow and into the dirt and my massive chest heaved and when I was done I set the spade in the earth and removed a handkerchief and as I looked up at the great oak tree under which she was buried I saw a gathering of crows and I knew that what I had done was the most righteous thing I have ever accomplished.

  Then I looked over at my daughter Meg. She had a stunned look on her face. She looked at me as if she couldn’t believe what had just happened. She watched her dad bury her mother with a fury that suggested he had been waiting for this moment for years. She watched her dad dispatch her own mother, and when I walked over to her to explain, she turned away from me.

  What the hell were you doing, Dad?

  I was trying to do right by your mom.

  You looked like you couldn’t get her in the earth fast enough.

  That’s not it at all.

  Well how do you explain it? You were like a madman over there.

  My mother-in-law came up to me. I reached over to give her a comforting hug and she slapped me, then walked away. Adeleine’s father walked up behind her and told me confidentially that my behavior was the most appalling thing he had seen in his life, and he had seen some appalling behavior in his day.

  Meg shunned me the rest of the day.

  At the meal after the funeral, my daughter played hostess. But people had been turned off by my digging. Meg was so angry with me she shunned me when I went over to her to try to explain yet again. Our relationship has never quite recovered.

  It was at this time the food was brought out: ribs, pork chops, fried chicken, piles of the stuff. The place smelled like a barbecue pit. I grabbed a bib and found a table in the corner. Friends and family members came to offer their condolences. I flagged them away and ate more food than I had ever eaten in my life: three slabs of ribs, eight or nine pieces of chicken, countless hot links, slaw, cornbread, and the haunches of a spit-rotated hog. I ate until I passed out. The next day I shit forever and cried.

  •

  I stand at Albert Volares’ grave while family members shovel dirt onto his casket. I was raised Catholic, and have retained some vestigial sense of intimate prayer, though I no longer pray. Instead, I just close my eyes.

  We live to die.

  Now you’re just feeling sorry for yourself.

  I suppose I am.

  I suppose you are.

  •

  Daddy, find out who did this.

  I don’t know if I can.

  Please.

  It’s too much for me. I’m suffocating, if you know what I mean.

  It’s me. I’m the one who’s suffocating over here. You must.

  Honey.

  You must.

  Please.

  I won’t forgive you if you don’t. And another thing, I hate you so much for taking Mom away from me I promise I will never talk to you again, ever!

  The truth is, I didn’t have the heart to track down my wife’s murderer. I didn’t want to find out. In truth, I was afraid to find out. I expected that the person who killed Adeleine had been activated by one of my jobs. I couldn’t bring myself to verify this had been the case. If I discovered that the man who had killed Adeleine was activated by one of my jobs, it would be more than I could deal with. Worse, it would destroy Meg.

  ¤

  Before all this, years before, I had lost a job in telecom. I was searching for ways to regain a foothold in the economy when I came up with the idea to open my own shop as a detective.

  I told Adeleine about my idea and waited to see what she said.

  Why do you want to be a private eye? she asked.

  Why not, Adeleine?

  Because there are so many other wonderful things to do with your life.

  She was right, but I wasn’t going to let her be right on this point, especially since it was me who had been washed out of the economy and who was searching for relevance. So I told her: I like this detective life.

  You like the ‘idea’ of this life, but what do you know about it? Is your heart really set on becoming a private eye?

  What does that mean?

  It means, do you really want to be a private eye, or do you want to do it because of books you’ve read on the subject?

  I’ve never really read any books on the subject.

  Then where did you get the idea?

  I don’t know. Though I did like James Garner in The Rockford Files.

  But that was a TV show. It’s not what the job is really like.

  I don’t know what the job is really like, but I imagine it’s like any other job.

  How so?

  It is what you make of it.

  It’s long boring hours doing lots of boring things for little to no pay.

  Honey, I objected. It’s what I want to do. We don’t need to analyze it, do we?

  Well I want you to think it over, make sure you’re happy.

  I am happy, I said. I have you.

  That’s not going to be enough to sustain you.

  It’ll be enough to sustain me.

  •

  Later, when I started obsessively shooting at the range with Cal, she raised the issue again.

  Is the reason why you want to be a private detective because you like guns?

  And to be honest, she had a point. I had to acknowledge that.

  I suppose that could be part of it.

  But don’t you see? Shooting guns at a shooting range with your buddy is a lot different from actually shooting someone. If you get a license to carry that thing, don’t you realize you may have to use it?

  Yeah, of course.

  You’re not bothered by this?

  Why should I be bothered b
y this?

  Because by carrying a gun you may either have to use it or…

  Or what?

  Or someone may use their gun on you!

  It’s a dangerous business.

  Yes. But are you willing to take on the risk of such a business?

  Why not? What more do I have to do with my life?

  You can do anything under the sun.

  Like what?

  Like, you could do something important.

  I wasn’t made for important things.

  Not important important. Just something useful, like teaching…

  I already told you. I don’t read books.

  Think it over. Think over what you’re doing. If after thinking it over, taking into consideration all of the risks, you still want to do it, then I support you one hundred and ten percent. But remember the monstrosity you evoke may come home to haunt you.

  I don’t know why she said that, but she did say it, and I never forgot it.

  •

  After a few days I came to her. She was in the kitchen cooking one of her Beef Stroganoff meals. An open bottle of Merlot was on the counter.

  Well, I have something to tell you.

  She looked at me, her eyes bright with expectation.

  I’m going through with it.

  I wiped my mouth and tamped the sweat on my brow, and Adeleine didn’t say anything, so I went on.

  I found an office downtown on Wabash Avenue and I’ve located a secretary, Wanda Jones. She’s Welsh.

  Adeleine looked a little crestfallen, as if she were hoping I was going to tell her something else. Like: Honey, I’ve made a decision…Yes?...I’ve decided to be a high school teacher…You have? Oh, wonderful! I knew you would do the right thing! Instead I’d told her what she’d least wanted to hear. And I was committed, so I had to keep going.

  I found an office in a building on South Wabash Avenue. And a secretary. She’s Welsh. I’m having a shingle made and I start work on Monday. I’m going to be a detective.

  Yes.

  Yes. I’m calling my business Triple A Detective AAAgency.

  She looked crestfallen, as if she had suddenly realized she’d married the wrong man.

  It’s not what it’s cracked up to be. Believe me. But if it’s what you want to do…fine.

  Thanks, honey.

  I went to embrace her, and instead of reaching her arms around me, she held them by her side.

  •

  Now I sit in my office all day waiting for the phone to ring.

  I sit so long in my office waiting for the phone to ring I wonder who it is I am.

  When the phone does ring I pick it up and answer it.

  Good afternoon, I say, as friendly as can be. This is Triple A.

  Triple who? the voice says, trailing off.

  Triple A Detective AAAgency.

  Oh. I must have the wrong number.

  Oh.

  I sit in my office all day and the calls I get are all wrong numbers if I get any calls.

  I wait in my office waiting for a call. When none arrive, I knock off for the day.

  Wanda…

  Yes, Art.

  I’m knocking off for the day.

  Yes.

  Would you be so kind to close up before you leave?

  Of course, Art. No problem.

  •

  I call Cal and we drive out to the gun range.

  Cal shoots a well-oiled and carefully tended full-auto vintage Uzi 9mm carbine with the extending metal stock that he was blessed enough to inherit from his uncle Benny Calabrese who himself had mob connections going all the way back to the island of Sicily and who also died of old age, though why he needed an Uzi, not to mention what he might have used it for, Cal can’t say. Lucky, though, for Cal, when his uncle kicked off he got the gun. He had to go through all the FFL rigamarole to start taking it to the range, but he got it for free, so he’s lucky. He shoots it like he knows it too: knows how lucky he is.

  I prefer something a bit more delicate. I like the original Ruger Standard model .22 caliber with suppressor. I picked mine up at a pawnshop for under a hundred bucks. It’s pitted with a bit of rust, but I like the gun. I call his a blurt gun. He calls mine a pussy gun. Compared to his, I suppose it is, but it’s a fun gun to go plinking with. Most people shoot better with a smaller gun.

  That’s a pussy gun, he says poppy-cocking around me.

  So what? I like it.

  Fine by me, Art, if you want to stick with it, but it would be so much better if you actually hit the target.

  I do my best. But it ain’t easy with you leering over my shoulder.

  I’m not leering. I’m just watching what an idiot does with a pussy gun.

  We go shooting back and forth, slapping each other on the back between turns. He shreds the target. I take aim and miss. Reload, miss. It’s all part of our routine. He wears plugs, I wear muffs to cut down damage to our ears and shout above the noise. We both wear safety glasses. And I am shooting a .22, so I don’t get the same recoil. Only the smell is full. That gunpowder smell.

  Cal steps into the lane. Sets his ammo down. He keeps cursing about this girl.

  Shoot her right there in the cunt, he shouts, taking aim, and off goes the gun. BLURT. BLURT. RAT TAT TAT TAT TAT. Cartridge brass bouncing all over the place.

  Got her right there! he says, very smugly.

  That’s not very nice, I say. Under the conditions…

  Under what conditions, Art? She wasn’t a very nice girl.

  But Cal you’re forgetting something…

  What, that it’s only a paper target?

  No. You just can’t pretend the target is a woman. It’s not fair.

  Why’s not?

  Because under the conditions…she can’t shoot back.

  And if she did shoot back, she’d probably miss.

  Maybe, maybe not, Cal. Or maybe she’d shoot your nuts off just for being a jackass.

  Hmm. Maybe so.

  He steps back. We reset the target and I step into the lane. I take aim with my Ruger and go Pop. Pop. Pop.

  Did I tell you I had a date last night, Art?

  You’re hung over, I tell him, stepping aside.

  He steps into the lane and picks up the Uzi: Blurt. Blurt. Blurt.

  The bitch, he says, shooting at the target again as if it were a woman.

  How’d it go?

  Lousy. RAT TAT TAT TAT. I met her at the track. Should know better than to meet a woman at the track. RAT TAT TAT TAT. We left after the fifth race. She wanted me to go shopping with her. So I took her to the mall. We must have walked around that mall for three hours holding hands. At one point in an elevator we started kissing. I bought her a pair of shoes and some perfume. And then…

  He goes into target shredding mode. Blasting away. When he’s through, he sets it down and steps back and I step into the lane. Pop. Pop. Pop.

  So tell me about her, Cal, I say, trying to figure out what’s wrong with the sighting of my gun because I don’t seem able to hit the target like I want. The sights on this one don’t adjust. Rust. So it must be me or the gun. I can’t decide.

  I met her at the track, Cal says. Should know better than meet a woman at the track. We left after the fifth race. She wanted me to go shopping with her. So I took her to the mall. We must have walked around that mall three hours holding hands. At one point in an elevator we started kissing. I bought her a pair of shoes and some perfume. And then…

  You told me all that already.

  So I did.

  So you did.

  I step back and he steps into the lane. He puts up a new target and goes to town: Blurt. Blurt. Blurt.

  And then I thought we were headed to my car in the parking lot, Cal says, but she flagged a cab! Wait, where are you going, I said. Blurt. Blurt. Blurt. Home, she said. I’ll take you home, I said. No need, she said, I’ll take a cab. But wait, I said. And no sooner did I say that then she was off. Gone with the wind. I must have spent two fifty on
her.

  He pauses from his shooting and looks at me until I get the full implication of what he’s saying.

  Two hundred and fifty dollars?

  Yes. Two-fifty. He goes back to shooting. RAT TAT TAT TAT TAT.

  Did you even get her name? I yell above the noise of his gun.

  Maria or something…a pretty little Mexican. It gave me a lift holding her like that in the elevator. For a moment I thought things in my life were about to change. When I told her I was still living with my mom, I think I noticed disappointment.

  Did you tell her your mom is flexible?

  He pauses from his shooting to consider my question, and then he goes back to shooting. Blurt. Blurt. Blurt. When he’s done, he steps back, and I step into the lane. Pop. Pop. Pop.

  She said she doesn’t believe in guys who live with their moms.

  What does that mean?

  What do you mean, what does that mean? It means she flagged the first cab she could find and disappeared.

  But not until after you spent two-fifty on her.

  Yes. Not until then.

  I continue shooting trying not to be distracted by Cal, but I'm plenty distracted, so my shooting is all over the place. Pop. Pop. Pop.

  You suck, Art.

  I do my best with your palavaring. I find it distracting. Pop. Pop. Pop.

  When I met her I felt lucky all of a sudden, Art. You have no idea. As if my luck were changing in an instant. You gotta understand. I’ve never been lucky.

  Yes. I know.

  So to meet this girl and be off with her . . . it made me feel lucky.

  I understand.

  He loads up his Uzi while I shoot and when he’s done he asks: Do you want me to load a clip up for you?

  Sure, go ahead.

  Pop. Pop. Pop.

  Like I was saying. I was on top of the world. I wouldn’t have spent all that money on her if I knew how it was going to end. Believe me, I’m not a fool. I like to think I’m a better judge of human character than that. She didn’t seem the type to screw me for two-fifty.

  You say you screwed her?

  I step back to make way for him. He motors the target back down to us, changes it, motors it back out. Then he pulls a 9mm Luger from out of nowhere.

  See, if you only aim, Art, like I aim, and watch your breathing, and keep your hand steady, you might actually hit the target. But I’m watching you and your hands are jerking all over the place and there ain’t even any power in that pussy gun to make your hand shake.