More Than an Echo (Echo Branson Series) (28 page)

“Excellent. Just remember who your audience is. This isn’t a community who particularly loves their streets littered with human debris.”

Human debris?

“The missing people
are
a community, and as hard as it may be for
regular folks
to believe, they are their own social unit who deserve the same respect and legal help as any other. They know what’s going on out there. They have friends. They pull together. Just because it isn’t
you
r community or one that
our
pristine community doesn’t care about doesn’t mean we can’t
make
them care.”

The line was silent on the other end.

Wes cleared his throat. “You say this is happening in Oakland as well? Prove it then. Get a jump on what’s behind this before the Trib does. This is your story to tell, Branson. Be the first to tell it.” If anything motivated Wes Bentley it was scooping the
Oakland Tribune
.

“I’ve done my legwork. We’re talking about at least a dozen, maybe more on both sides of the bridge. No one has seen or heard a thing, yet there is no blood, no sign of a struggle and no bodies. These people are there one night and gone the next morning. If you were just robbing the homeless, or hell, even killing them for sport, you wouldn’t waste time with body disposal.”

“Go on.”

“That may mean they’ve taken them somewhere. It may mean they are still alive. I don’t know yet, but I will find out.”

“All right. While this story of yours unfolds, I want you to write a series of articles putting a face to the homeless. You want our readers to
care
Miss Branson? Then
make
them care. Give them something or someone to care about. You say they are a community? Then I want a story about this community on my desk before the morning. Oh...and no mention of Oakland. Stick with
our
homeless. Do interviews, get some photos of them that will grab people’s hearts. Think of this as a three-or four-part series before your story breaks. You need to grab their interest, put a face on the issue, warm the cockles of their goddamn hearts, and by that time you had better have something that blows the story wide open.”

The news industry has no soft side, no tenderness. You’re only as good as your last good story. No one cares about what you did do or are going to do. It’s all about the here and now. Unless you won one of the few prizes reserved for journalists, you’re jumping from one story to the next. This is an unforgiving profession where precision is vital, where research must be impeccable, and the truth is everything.

“Fine. I can do that. You going to keep sitting on Carter’s story as well?”

“I’ve given him time to rethink it, yes.”

“Trust me, Wes. The story is not solid. Let it go.”

“Ms. Branson, you are just a rookie. And while I appreciate you catching the error in the Glasco story, that does not give you
 carte blanc
 to dip into every story he is working on. Carter seems to think there is probably a lot of dirt under the rug, and I have to agree.”

“Carter needs to go back to school. San Franciscans love the mayor. He has done so much for this city. He deserves more than being muck-raked. He—”

“Is a politician, not a saint. “You focus on your story and let me worry about Carter Ellsworth.”

“But Mayor Lee is—”

“Don’t be so naive. Just because the people
like
him doesn’t mean he is a good politician. I don’t care if Mayor Lee is well-liked. It’s our
job
to churn up the crystal-clear water to see what really lies beneath it. You have to get your hands dirty in the process.”

“Getting your hands dirty is very different than smearing someone’s good name for the sake of journalistic revenue, especially if your information is not correct or factual. Whatever Carter thinks is happening, isn’t.”

“Perhaps you were absent that day in Journalism one-oh-one when they told you that the bottom line is about selling papers. Selling papers is about making money. Money is what we give you for a good story. If a story on your good Mayor Lee sells papers, then that is the story we’ll run with. Put your philosophic side in your briefcase and try to remember the bottom line: money. I’ll quash that story for two more days. In the meantime, get some human interest on my desk.”

My profession could be really ugly. My only hope was to counter some of that ugliness with a more caring angle…or the truth, whichever came first.

Grabbing my notes and calling in for a photographer, I headed out to find just that.

“Why don’t you just use stock photos of homeless people? I’ve got bigger fish to shoot.” Jeff Simmons was one of the best photographers at the paper. He and I had taken a journalism course together at Cal.

“I don’t want stocks, Jeff. I need one really powerful image that will make San Franciscans care...
really
care, but first, I need your drawing expertise.”

“Drawing? What the hell for?”

“I need something that’s in someone’s head. Just go with me on this.”

We walked to the park and I had him wait a little behind me to make sure Shirley wasn’t having one of her moments. She wasn’t. 

I looked over at Jeff, who was walking toward Cotton. “I’m a dog person, ma’am,” Jeff explained, holding one hand out for Cotton to sniff. “They love me.” It appeared he was right because Cotton sniffed his hand before wagging his long tail. “Cool dog. I’ve never seen one so white.” Jeff wandered over and extended his hand to Shirley. “String Bean,” he said, taking her hand.

Shirley laughed. “I’m Shirley. That’s Cotton, Midnight and Emerald. You came here to take pictures right?”

He nodded. “And to draw.”

“Draw?” She cut her eyes over to me.

I nodded. “What I need for you to describe is the image you got of the bike and the surrounding areas. He’ll draw a picture so I have something better to go on.”

Shirley nodded. “You just sit here next to old Shirley, String Bean, and listen carefully.”

He did, and as Shirley described what she saw, String Bean began sketching, lightly at first, and then filling with more details as Shirley continued on with her scry vision. When they were done, we had a very detailed picture of  a red bike next to a green awning and a blue fire hydrant. On the bike, there was something stuck to the bottom of the frame. In the windows of the store were bottles of alcohol for sale. His bike was locked in one of those old-style gray bike parking areas where you could secure your bike.

“So, what’s this drawing all about?” Jeff asked me. With Shirley’s permission he was taking pictures of Shirley and the animals.

“It’s just a place I’m trying to find.”

String Bean nodded, placing the camera to his thin face. He looked like a cartoon cutout of a person, he was that thin. “Who do you think sees everything that goes on in this city? Who has eyes everywhere?”

I watched in fascination as the animals appeared to be posing for him. “Photographers?”

“Ding! Ding! Ding! Give the girl a gold star! I’ll scan this baby with one simple caption: Fifty bucks to the first shooter who can tell me where it is within the next  twelve hours.”

“Are you serious?”

“Trust me on this, Echo. If anyone knows where this is, we’ll know before the twelve hours are up. There are a few things in that drawing my guys will find in a nano.”

“Such as?”

“The blue hydrant. Not many of those in the city. Don’t know what they stand for, but that one is so obviously not the right color. There was one other thing.” He pointed to a pole near the bike. There  was no sign I could see. “I’m betting this is either a BART stop or a MUNI. Either way, I’ll have this place to you in no time.”

I felt a sense of hope I hadn’t felt since I started my story. “If that’s true, I so owe you.”

Jeff nodded and sighed. “Wait until you see these shots, Echo. They’ll get somebody’s attention.”

And he was right.

I was meeting Finn for dinner shortly after I finished the first installment of my series “Invisible No More.” I liked the article and thought the story a good one. It would make people who had a heart care; all others were already too far off the grid to bring back.

“Hey there,” Finn said, rising when I approached the booth. And I thought chivalry was dead. “Great story.”

I grinned. Damn she looked good. I had never seen her in street clothes and she was even hotter than when wearing her tight little uniform. She had on a black turtleneck, light blue jeans and Doc Marten boots. A hint of a spicy cologne barely caressed my nostrils.

“Thank you. Thanks to you and Jardine, I was able to crank out one hell of a first story.”

She grinned and there were those two dimples. “Glad to hear it.” She perused the menu and then we ordered. “It’s nice to have the night off, but even nicer to have someone to share it with.” Leaning  forward, she smiled softly. “So, let’s not talk about our jobs. What is it you do when you’re not being Lois Lane?”

I smiled at the reference. First I was Clark Kent and now Lois Lane. Interesting.

We spent the entire dinner talking about our hobbies, our passions, our dreams.

She loved being a cop and couldn’t imagine doing anything else. When not on the beat, she played in a softball league, took two-step lessons and made mosaics and stained glass. I was enthralled just listening to her. She was animated, eloquent and very, very funny.

When she asked about my childhood, I got a little jumpy, as I usually do. How much do you tell someone about a past like mine? My foster child days were sad and pathetic, so I never spoke about those times. I couldn’t very well tell her that I’d spent time in a mental hospital.
That
was a conversation stopper to be sure. And of course, what could I say about my time on the Bayou?

I had absolutely no memory from before I was five years old, so there was no need to go there, either.

Fortunately for me, Finn wasn’t interested so much in my past as she was in my present, and for that I was grateful. She loved that I lived alone with a three-legged stoner cat. She owned a boxer named Lucy, and even carried pictures of her in her wallet.

After dinner, we strolled down to Fisherman’s Wharf to walk off our expensive dinner and to just keep talking. We talked a lot, but could also share those comfortable moments of silence as well. I could see how easy it was to fall in love with her, but I was curious about something first.

“If I may be so bold. How is it you are so smokin’ hot and still single?”

Turning to me, she lightly stroked my cheek. I melted then and there. “You’re very sweet, but I’m not a great partner. I’m a cop twenty-four-seven. It’s not a vocation or a hobby, or a job. It’s a lifestyle. It’s who
and
what I am. A lot of women fall for the uniform expecting me to shuck it off at the end of a day and act like a regular Joe. That doesn’t happen. I see things out here I wish I never had to revisit. But I do. There are times I can talk about my job, but I usually prefer not to. Most women feel closed off from me after a while.” She shrugged. “Long story short, the badge gets in the way of everything except the sex.”

I stepped closer to her, our breaths mingling together in the late San Francisco fog. “Sounds to me like you haven’t been with the right women.”

Lacing her fingers together behind my neck, she pulled me to her. “Oh is that right? What does the right woman look like?”

“Someone who is as invested in her own job as you are. Someone not expecting you to entertain her. Someone who,” I stood on tiptoe to kiss her soft lips. “Loves you for all of the different people you are. Unconditionally.”

She leaned down and kissed me deeply, pulling me to her, almost too tightly. “Oh, Lois, how I wish that woman existed. I’d snap her up in a heartbeat. But trust me. They all start out that way—believing they can handle the highs and lows and ups and downs, but once the honeymoon wears off…” She shrugged. “It’s been the same time in and time out. I decided it was best to save everyone the trouble. And just stay single.”

I nodded and pulled out of her grasp. “Good to know.”

She stuffed her hands in her pockets. “Doesn’t mean it has to stay this way.”

I smiled and kissed her again. “That’s more like it.”

We pressed together, kissing, running our hands in each other’s hair, touching each other’s faces, until she finally came up for air.

“Okay, I know we weren’t going to talk about our jobs, but—”

Finn laughed. “Can’t stand it any more, can you?” She glanced at her watch. “I was wondering how long you’d hold out. You did better than I imagined. Okay, Lois, go ahead.”

I threaded my arm through hers as we walked. “I still have my list of missing homeless people from both Oakland and the Tenderloin, but I don’t know what to do with it to make it work for me. I know I should be looking for similarities...”

She laughed. “And who told you that? Jardine?”

“No. Carter.”

“Ellsworth? You two on good terms now?”

“Something like that. Call it an uneasy truce.”

“Well...I hate to say that cretin is right, but he is. Tell me more about your list.”

“It’s just street names and in each case, what little I know about each of them.”