Blue Moonlight (2 page)

My name is Dick Moonlight, and I’m just a head case who barely survives on a cop’s half pension and the occasional private dick job I can scrounge up. A suicide survivor who carries a small piece of .22 caliber hollow-point lodged inside his brain. By all rights, I should be a dead man. But then there’s not a whole lot of right surrounding me these days since my girlfriend left me for another man, since my sweet, bushy-haired little boy, Harrison, went to live with his mother in LA and at the same time ripped the pumping heart out of my chest, since my bar—Moonlight’s Moonlit Manor—burned to the ground, since Jack Daniels came back into my life in a big way.

Welcome to my world.

The plane dips and lifts and dips again, the entire fuselage rattling and shaking. An overhead light clicks on, along with a gentle chime.

PLEASE FASTEN YOUR SEAT BELTS.

You ain’t gotta tell me twice.

But then, I’m already strapped in.

A tinny voice emerges over the PA asking us fliers to return to our seats and fasten our seat belts until the captain decides to turn off the warning light or we crash. Whichever comes first. We’re about to encounter a patch of severe headwind-instigated turbulence that simply cannot be avoided.

Severe. Turbulence.

It rings a bell. No, it more than rings a bell. Just the sound of those two words sends my balls on a vertical rise up through my colon, through my stomach, and on up into my throat, where they settle like two concrete lumps.

I tap into my memory banks. What’s left of them.

I’m flying.

But I don’t like to fly.

I hate flying.

I’m afraid to fly.

No, that’s not right.

I’m afraid of crashing.

We hit the promised patch of turbulence.

The plane rocks like a boat on a choppy sea. A wave of cold fear rushes through my body. But the big guy next to me, he’s smiling.

Correction.

He’s laughing. Laughing like flying through severe turbulence is the most fun you can have with and without your clothes on. What’s even worse is that every time we hit a wave of bad air, he yanks on the cuffs, the sharp end of the bracket digging into my wrist as if going for bone. I’m beginning to think he’s drawing blood.

“Mister,” I say, my voice a full octave higher than the good Lord intended. “Mister. Sir. Mister.”

He turns to me. He’s sporting this big-ass smile that’s centered in a bowling-ball-round face, thick red lips surrounded by a goatee and mustache that’s far thicker than my own. His hair is thick too, but sprinkled with gray and balding in the middle. I peg him for maybe fifty, but going on sixteen. You know the type.

“Well look who’s awake!” he barks. “And just in time too. We’re in for a ride. Turbulence. Makes things interesting, don’t you think? My three marriages were chock-f of turbulence. Never a dull day, sweetie.”

Sweetie…? Did this bruiser just call me sweetie?

He laughs, shaking his belly, which protrudes up tight against a Hawaiian print shirt that must have been specially woven for one of those huge-ass Samoan motherfuckers. He’s opening and closing the fingers on his left hand, the middle digit of which bears a thick gold ring with a big red gemstone embedded inside it. The stone is bigger than my eye, and I’m betting the entire thing must weigh in at five pounds. Even from where I’m sitting, I can see the letters NFL embossed into the gold band.

Football.

Pro football.

I love football.

But this guy’s a dick.

Situation check.

I’m flying.

I’m handcuffed to a bigger-than-big man who enjoys turbulence. Handcuffed to a big man who likes turbulence and who used to play pro ball, and who just referred to me as sweetie. Attached at the wrist to an NFL man and flying through some
of the worst turbulence I’ve ever experienced and I have no idea how I got myself into this little predicament.

Which, of course, begs the question…

“How did I get here?”

“You mean, like…here?” NFL Man says, yanking on the cuffs, sending a wave of electric pain shooting up my right arm. “Oops, my bad. You mean
here
on this plane? You tell me, sweetie…What’s your name again?” Reaching into his shirt pocket and pulling out a slip of yellow Post-it note. “Mr. Richard Moonlight, date of birth seven-two-sixty-something; Social Security number: zero-five-zero, yadda, yadda; height: five feet nine inches, even if you do look like five-seven with your boots on; weight: one hundred seventy-six pounds. Divorced, father of one poor unlucky kid, currently single after a crap load of fucked-up relationships. Or should I say, relationship fuck-ups.” Staring down at me like I’m a booger on the armrest. “Five-seven and a buck seventy-six. Little guy, you are.”

“I’m five-eight-and-a-half. And your scale must be off…I’m one-seventy.” I wanna bust his ass for talking like Yoda, but I’m afraid he’ll yank on that cuff chain again. And besides, the plane is bouncing and I’m too scared out of my skin for idle chatter.

Another jolt of turbulence. I feel my heart stop for the briefest of seconds. It starts up again.

“We get the info from the computer,” he says and laughs. “We don’t actually weigh you. And besides, you wouldn’t have let us if we’d wanted to, anyway. Not in the condition you were in.”

“What. Condition.”

NFL Man just looks at me, into my eyes. “You don’t remember, do you? You truly don’t remember?”

“My head,” I attempt to explain. “I have this problem with my brain. There’s a—”

“Little piece of .22 caliber bullet inside it, pressed up against your cerebral cortex. Yes, yes, yes, I know all about it. You wouldn’t shut up about it on the drive all the way to the airport.”

“What drive?”

“From your crib to the airport. Plane didn’t very well pick us up in front of your loft, Moonlight.” Another belly laugh.

“OK, I give up. Who are you?”

Reaching back into his chest pocket, this time pulling out a wallet. When he does it, his unbuttoned shirt opens up enough to reveal a hand cannon stuffed inside a black elastic-banded shoulder holster.

Guns on a plane. Cop on a plane. Or hijacker on a plane.

I’m putting my money on the cop. If I had any money. Even I’m not lucky enough to be hijacked by a hijacker.

He opens the wallet, revealing a laminated picture ID. There he is, all smiles and wavy black hair that isn’t yet sprinkled with gray. Big guy’s got to get a new pic. I try to catch the name printed in between the photo and the letters
F, B,
and
I
, but only catch the last name.

Zumbo.

Now if that doesn’t sound like a pro ball player, I don’t know what does. Turns out I recognize the name.

Zumbo.

Bob “Zump” Zumbo, fullback for the New York Giants from 1987 through 1994 when a knee injury sidelined him for good.

I might be flying, on the verge of crashing, but things are definitely looking up. “Giants,” I say.

Now the smile is so wide I fear it might split his entire face in half. “You a fan, Moonlight?”

I nod. “Never miss a game,” I tell him. “You were pretty great. The return of Larry Csonka. The
Zonk
.”

“Bad knees,” he says, cocking his head down toward his lap. “I had to retire with half pension.”

“That why you’re a fed agent now?”

“The FBI is my hobby. Keeps me out of the bars.”

“Mr., or is it Agent, Zumbo? Listen, I gotta pee something fierce. My back teeth are floating.”

He purses his lips. “Ah jeez, really?” he says, annoyed. Like I’m his five-year-old kid. “OK, but you gotta make it quick. Lots of turbulence. Case your injured brain hasn’t picked up on it.”

Reaching into his pocket, he pulls out a key, uncuffs my wrist.

I feel immediate relief. The skin isn’t broken, but it’s scratched. I run the fingers of my left hand over it.

Zumbo pushes himself out of the seat, stands up, and shifts himself into the aisle. His body fills out the entire back end of the plane. “OK, Moonlight, up and at ’em. And don’t try anything funny. We’re on a commercial flight and I have a gun, and by the looks of things, you don’t need any more trouble added to what’s sure to be an impressive rap sheet.

Behind him, a female flight attendant approaches. “Do you think it’s wise taking his cuffs off, Agent Zumbo?” she poses. She’s a small but attractive redhead with long, smooth hair parted neatly over her right eye.

The plane buffets and rocks again, enough that Zumbo has to grab the seatback to stay on his feet. Meanwhile, the flight attendant seems entirely unaffected by the sudden motion. She’s got her sea legs.

“Terrorists gotta pee too,” he says and laughs, a little under his breath. “Constitution grants the right for a suspected criminal to water his teensy-weensy hog.”

Back-stepping, the attractive redhead shakes her head in disgust and retreats into the aft galley. I know what she’s thinking:
Men!

Zumbo picks me up by the arm, leads me the two or three feet around to the emergency exit area behind our seats, where the lavatory is located. He opens the door and shoves me inside.

“One minute, sweetie,” he insists. “Or I come in after you, guns a-blazin’.”

“Yeah, I got it.”

He goes to shut the door.

“Wait one second,” I say. “What did you just refer to me as?”

The look on his round face has gone from glee to confusion. “Oh. Sweetie?” he barks. “I call lotsa people sweetie. Come on, Moonlight. Pee already.”

“No, not that. I mean just a second ago when you were talking with the attendant. You called me something.”

Back with the smile. “Oh, yeah. I called you a terrorist. Well, allow me to rephrase. You are
suspected
of performing a quote, ‘domestic terroristic act,’ unquote, to be accurate. You haven’t been arrested for anything quite yet. You’re merely being detained under suspicious circumstances. Think of it as being waitlisted for a spot in a federal pen.”

“So where are we going and why have I been handcuffed and why does it take an airplane to get me there?”

“We’re on our way to the Manhattan field office, for an interview.”

“I don’t understand. I’m not a terrorist. In fact, I used to be a cop.”

“Hey, man,” he says and exhales, “a Mrs. Doris E. Walsh of the Internal Revenue Service of these here United States of America disagrees entirely. And she can prove it.” Pulling out a folded sheet of stock from the back pocket on his husky-size Levi’s 501s. Unfolding it, he glances at it, then back at me. “Where’d you learn to construct pipe bombs, Moonlight?”

He shoves me farther into the bathroom, closes the door behind me. “One minute,” he repeats from outside the door.

The plane shakes again. Dips. We’re going down. I just know it. I’m gonna crash, burn, and die a tragic, violent death. Be identified later by my dental records.

But then that would be the best news I’ve heard all day.

I turn, stare at the closed door.

The lock.

There’s a small, door-mounted diagram telling me that if I should wish to engage the lock and the interior bathroom lights, I must slide the device to the left. At the same time, this will alert other passengers whose teeth are floating that this lavatory is presently “occupied.” Zumbo didn’t tell me not to engage the lock. It’s one of those silent givens of the business, I’m sure. Which is why I reach up and slide the lock in place.

Moonlight the shifty.

The red light embedded into the small plastic laminate counter shines on.

OCCUPIED

A fist pounds on the door.

“Unlock that door, Moonlight!” Zumbo barks. “Or I’ll put my fist through it and do it for you.”

I’m still staring at the now-locked door. Still feeling the plane going bouncy-bounce under my feet.

Time to think. Quick. Me, the head case.

“Cut me some slack, agent!” I shout into the door. “I can’t pee unless I know the door is locked. Stage fright. You know what that’s like, right?”

I picture him standing naked inside a ceramic-covered locker room bathroom along with fifty other like-sized men, all of them naked, slapping each other’s pale bare asses with white towels twisted into whips. In my head I hear him calling them “sweetie.” I’m here to pee. I try to erase the thought from my memory.

But first I run the water, place my hands under the flow. I splash the cold water on my face, stare into the mirror.

Bloodshot eyes, sunk deep into black pools. Crow’s-feet dug into the skin along the outer regions of my sockets. Narrow fissures so deep I’m sure I could slip dimes into them and they’d stay. My goatee and mustache have turned into a full three-day, salt-and-pepper beard, and my usually shaved head is sprouting new growth that not only doesn’t hide the bullet-sized scar that resides beside my right earlobe, but somehow accentuates it.

Look at me…I tried to blow my brains out once.

It dawns on me that my head is pounding and my mouth tastes like an ashtray. I’m hungover. Crap, I hate hangovers. I’m thirty-plus-thousand feet up in the air, trapped inside a plane that’s rocking all over the cosmos, and I’m hungover and apparently under arrest…excuse me…under
suspicion
of being a quote, “domestic terrorist,” unquote, and I’m hungover.