Another police car pulls up, and Chucho is pulled roughly from the driver’s seat.
“He killed my friend!” Chucho screams. “He shot him in cold blood!”
“Shut up,” says a voice.
Chucho is spread against the far side of the car, searched.
“We are not armed, officer!”
“Just shut up. I’m arresting you on suspicion of drunk driving and eluding an officer.” He is led out of camera range as the officer tells him his rights.
There is the crackling sound of radios. An ambulance pulls up. The camera seems to sag with fatigue, again showing Danny prone on the ground.
The ambulance crew hustles out a stretcher, sets it on the ground next to Danny.
“What happened?”
“He has a gunshot wound. He tried to attack me.”
Someone clamps a collar around Danny’s neck, and two men turn him onto his back.
“Jesus!”
He is placed on the stretcher and taken away. There is a lot of shouting, doors slamming, and the sound of the ambulance siren starting up and fading away.
More radio noise, and a figure slams the door on the car. The video ends.
The man who played the video has been standing in the corner, watching it silently, observing Danny. “The officer’s name is Troy Amboy,” the man announces, “and we are going to sue him into the Stone Age.”
“Who are you?” asks Danny.
“I’m your attorney, Jason Ritchie.”
Danny glances at Aimee.
“He called,” she explains. “He says we don’t pay him. He only gets paid if we win the case.”
“Why did he shoot me?” asks Danny.
“That’s the million-dollar question,” replies Ritchie. “He claims you lunged at him, that he thought you were armed, but it’s pretty clear he was entirely unprovoked. Look here.” He points a remote at the TV and rewinds the tape back to where Danny is about to exit the car. “Right there,” Ritchie says, waving the remote and stopping the video where Danny has gotten up from the ground to a kneeling position. “He says you reached into your shirt, but you didn’t even touch your chest.”
Danny tries to look down at his body. In addition to the tubes, a complex web of bandages cover his chest, and he feels the pull of adhesive tape across the back of his left shoulder. “When can I get this damn neck brace off?” he asks.
There was the incident outside of Kirkuk. Two soldiers had died earlier that day, and everyone was jumpy. A rumor was spreading that a new shipment of weapons had just arrived from Afghanistan, including IEDs.
Danny had spent the previous day escorting a group of Iraqi detainees from one prison to another, always a dangerous business. One man in particular haunted Danny. As he was led out of the foul-smelling holding area along with fifteen others, the man had fixed an eye on him and said in broken English, “I know you. You promised to get me out of here! Where we are going, they will kill me.”
Danny did not recognize the man, had never been to that prison before. Did the man have him mixed up with someone else? Was it a ruse?
Danny didn’t answer, had merely gestured with his rifle for the man to move along onto the truck that would take them to another foul-smelling prison. Danny knew there was torture. He knew there was death. On their way to reinforce the battalion that had lost two soldiers, they had stumbled across a trash heap with five more Iraqi bodies, hands fastened with plastic ties behind them, no IDs.
Danny did not want to be recognized by anyone in Iraq. He just wanted to do his job and get home.
The following day, he was back on the AFB checkpoint. Forbes, Yamada, Meyer, and he had been checking IDs and searching cars for five hours. Their shifts had ended an hour before, but their relief had not shown up. They couldn’t leave their posts. All they knew was that there had been an “unexpected delay.”
Later, it turned out that Vice President Cheney had made an unannounced visit to the Green Zone to meet with top officials. All members of Danny’s squadron who had not been on duty at the time were called in to provide extra security.
“Dang!” said Sergeant Klein when they got back. “They’ve got hot water twenty-four hours a day in there. And a swimming pool! It’s like paradise, while we’re roasting out here like hot dogs on a stick!”
The incident started when a new black Humvee pulled into line for the checkpoint. The driver got out and walked up to Danny.
“We go around,” he said, indicating that they wanted to skip the line.
“All Iraqi citizens must go through the line and show ID,” replied Danny. Every day, a couple of people tried this stunt.
“He is late for meeting,” said the driver, pointing back at the vehicle. Danny could not see in through the tinted windows.
“Sorry,” Danny answered, “those are my orders. No exceptions.”
The driver returned to the vehicle, and Danny went back to asking for IDs, demanding that car trunks be opened, peering into sweat-smelling interiors at frightened men.
About ten minutes later, the Humvee roared up to him and the rear window rolled down silently. Danny found himself staring at a man in sunglasses pointing a rifle at him. Danny cocked his own rifle, and swallowed hard.
“I mean you no harm,” said Danny. He heard the hoarseness in his voice. He and the man stared at each other.
“I’ll take it from here, soldier,” announced a voice behind him. Major Samuelson and a translator approached the Hum-vee. The translator said something, and the man in sunglasses pulled the muzzle of the gun back into the car without taking his eyes off Danny.
Danny stood down, sweat pouring from his body. Samuelson and the translator got into the Humvee with the armed passenger and drove off.
Just then, Danny’s relief showed up. “What the hell was that all about?”
“Oh, man,” said Danny. “Not my problem. Not anymore.”
* * *
“Okay, we’re going to try sitting up today.”
Danny opens his eyes to see Pilar, the day nurse, rearranging the tubes attached to his body. Almost everybody who works at Harborview seems to be Filipino. When they speak to each other, their soft, clipped language has a lot of Spanish in it, but even so, Danny can’t understand it.
He thinks of an old punch line: “What do you mean ‘we,’ Kemo Sabe?”
“Very funny,” says Pilar. “Okay, ready?”
“Yeah.”
She puts one hand behind his back and pushes gently, while Danny uses his arms to press up. There is some pain and pulling. He catches his breath and grimaces.
“You okay?”
“Not too bad,” he says. “Nothing I can’t handle.”
“Good. The sooner you start moving around, the sooner you can go home. Want to try standing?”
“Sure.”
Pilar fits some slippers on his dangling feet. His legs look like somebody else’s coming out from under the gown.
“You going to give me something to cover my butt?”
“As soon as you stand up, I can put a robe on you,” she says.
Danny stands. Muscles pull. Bones creak as she holds him by the waist.
“How’s that?” she asks.
“Good.”
“Can you stand by yourself? Here, hold onto the railing.” Pilar works a robe onto Danny’s shoulders.
“Well, well! Look who’s standing.” It’s Danny’s father Sam in the doorway.
“Hey,” says Danny, pleased in spite of himself.
“He’s doing great!” says the nurse. “How about if I get a wheelchair and you can visit in the lounge?”
“What do you think, Danny boy?”
“Good deal.” Danny is so pleased that he doesn’t even object to the eternal nickname.
“Here. Stand right here,” Pilar positions Danny’s father next to him, “while I get a wheelchair.”
“Have you seen Aimee today?” asks Sam.
“I think so.” Time has been elastic for Danny in the hospital. “I think she and Sirena took the kids swimming. Is today Sunday?”
“Yes.”
Pilar returns with the wheelchair and Danny’s mother. “Look who I found.”
“Aye,
mi’jo,
” says Letty. She moves to hug Danny, already tearing up.
“Let him sit down first,” cautions Pilar.
Even after two minutes, Danny is grateful for the rest. The nurse attaches his bags to a rolling stand and wheels him down the hall.
“Don’t cry, Mom.”
“I can’t help it.” She dabs at her eyes. “I’m just so happy to see you can stand,
gracias a Dios.
It means you’re getting better.”
Danny’s father goes straight for the television. “Let’s see if the game is on.”
“Is that all you can think about?” says his mother. “You come to visit your son, and you want to watch the game?”
“Of course not! It’s up to Danny. It’s the Final Four.”
“The game is fine, Dad.”
Danny’s father watches Florida vs. UCLA while his mother recounts what Aimee and the kids did that day. They are staying with his parents on South Plum in what had been meant as a short visit upon his return from Iraq. It isn’t a big house, and Danny figures they must all be getting on each other’s nerves by now.
“They got up and had cereal, then went out. So I’ve just been cleaning all day.”
The sound of the game on the television suddenly rises, the announcers rabid with excitement.
“Turn that thing down!” snaps Danny’s mother.
“I just want to hear the scores. I’ll turn it back down in a sec,” her husband replies.
When Danny spots Aimee and the kids coming down the hall, he breaks into a big grin. Sirena is with them.
“Daddy!” chirp the kids, running up and trying to climb in his lap.
“Careful, careful,” says his mother.
Aimee holds them back, an arm around each waist. “You can’t climb up on Daddy yet. Remember, he was hurt. Just give him a kiss.”
Just then Danny’s father turns up the volume on the TV again. “Here you are,” he says.
The TV shows a clip from the grainy video taken the night Danny was shot. Danny sees the car window slowly roll down, the stone face of the policeman. The officer has his gun out. He yells at Danny, who stumbles out of the car, struggling to comply with the policeman’s orders as he barks out commands and expletives, his voice rising higher and higher. Then he hears himself say it: “I mean you no harm.”
The officer orders him down, then up, and Danny shuts his eyes, anticipating the sound of the gun.
“Not in front of the children,” Letty hisses.
“Sorry.” His father switches the channel to a commercial. Danny’s parents continue to argue in low voices in Spanish, until his father switches off the TV and stomps out.
“Was that you, Daddy?” asks Jacob.
Danny turns his wheelchair at the sound of his son’s voice. He continues to stare at the blank television, as though the ghostly blue-white images are still on the screen.
“No,” he says, “that was somebody else who looks a lot like me, talks a lot like me, but gets shot by the police. That’s not me.”
“But you were shot. Who shot you?”
Aimee says nothing.
“Somebody,” says Danny. “Somebody who thought I was a threat.”
Eight months later, Danny is back in Iraq. For better or worse, the cop in Seattle had missed all his vital organs and he healed up as only a young guy can. Danny had gladly rejoined his company.
“Soldier,” says his lieutenant, “you need to report to the CO’s office.”
Oh shit, thinks Danny. Now what?
The commanding officer has a desk, a couple of chairs, and an air conditioner. Danny removes his helmet and feels the sweat evaporate off his head and neck.
“Have a seat,” the CO says. “We just got a call from Seattle.”
Danny sits.
“There was a shooting incident there last night.”
Danny swallows.
“Same place, same block where you were shot. The police think the officer in question was deliberately targeted.”
“What do you mean?”
“It was the cop who attacked you.”
A pain shoots up Danny’s side from his leg to his shoulder. Amboy had been cleared of all wrongdoing and put back on the street. Danny tries to keep his face impassive. “Nothing to do with me.”
“We know that. And that’s what we told them.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“I just wanted you to know.”
“Thank you. May I go now, sir?”
“Yes. Dismissed.”
Danny stands to leave.
“Oh, by the way…”
Danny turns.
“Just like cops, MPs take care of their own.”
The CO holds his eye for a moment, then waves him out.
T
he bar fight was over. Matt staggered to his feet. The loudmouth was down and he wasn’t getting back up without assistance. None of the barflies volunteered to help him, though they closed in to examine Matt’s handiwork. Matt ran the back of his hand across his mouth, leaving it streaked with blood.
Police sirens wailed in the distance. Matt’s heart rate quickened just as it had finally started to slow down. He couldn’t afford to be busted again. The spectators swarmed for the exit. This wasn’t one of those trendy downtown bars where management called 911 at the sound of a raised voice. Everyone was a little cop-shy at The Dive. The Dive lived up to its name—literally and figuratively. It was a basement place, part of Seattle’s subterranean past. An underground bar for underground people.
Matt went to follow the crush out the door, but someone held him back. He shook off the hand gripping his shoulder and whirled around with a readied fist to face his new challenger. The middle-aged guy held up his hands in surrender. He had six inches and fifty pounds of muscle on Matt.
“Easy, pal,” the guy said. “I’m not trying to stop you. Backdoor, before the cops get here. You kinda stick out in your current condition.”
Matt glanced at himself in the mirror behind the bar. Ripped clothes. The red blooms of burgeoning bruises.
The sirens intensified. Matt didn’t argue and followed the man out the fire exit. It opened up into an unlit stairwell. The guy burst through the door, casting streetlight onto Matt’s escape. He clambered up the stairs and into the service alley.
“C’mon, this way,” the man urged.
The alley ran from Cherry to Columbia. He jogged down the alley away from The Dive’s entrance on Cherry, sidestepping busted trash bags and puddles containing more than just water. Matt followed the man uphill on Columbia a couple of blocks, then into another alley lit by a thumbnail moon.
“We’ll hang here until things are cool.”
Matt didn’t reply. His guardian angel didn’t sit well in his stomach. He didn’t trust him. He didn’t trust anyone.
Late for the party, two cop cars roared down 2nd toward The Dive, spraying red and blue light. Matt’s stomach clenched. They’d start combing the surrounding streets for someone matching his description soon. He needed to get moving.
“Get into a lot of fights, don’t you?”
The sudden question jolted Matt from his thoughts.
“What makes you say that?”
“The way you handled yourself in there. You didn’t learn those moves in a boxing ring or a dojo. You’ve had a street education. Besides, I recognize a bottle scar when I see one.”
Instinctively, Matt touched the thin mark beneath his left eye with his thumb. Although it was faint after so many years, he remembered the fight like it was yesterday. He’d been eighteen and it had been over a girl. Frank Tremaine hadn’t liked the idea of losing his Susie. Matt thought it would be easily settled, but he hadn’t expected Frank to go for him with a bottle of Bud. He nearly lost his eye that night. There’d been a lot of Frank Tremaines over the years and a lot of fights over lesser reasons than Susie. Tonight was no exception.
“Have you done time?” the man asked.
“Once.”
“Carry on like you’re doing and it’s easily going to be twice.”
“Who the hell are you?”
“Harry Sharpe.” He thrust out a hand.
Matt looked at the hand warily. This attempt at an introduction could be a stunt to take him down. He ignored the handshake and said, “Matt Crozier.”
Harry let his hand drop without showing any signs of being insulted. “Good to meet you, Matt.”
“What do you want? Why are you helping me?” Matt backed up a step. He’d rather take a chance with the cops than this guy if something went down. At least he knew what to expect with the cops.
“I represent a group that helps young and wayward men like yourself. We try to turn their skills toward more positive outlets and keep them out of trouble.”
Matt was already shaking his head. He knew where this was going. A dark alley, a sensitive older man, and a misguided youth; a cry for attention and a sympathetic ear, leading to a tender moment. It was pathetic really.
“Sorry, dude, you’ve dialed the wrong number. I don’t answer those sorts of calls.”
“I’m not trying to pick you up,” Harry snapped. “I’m trying to keep you out of trouble.”
Matt backed up toward the street. “Okay, whatever you say, reverend.”
Harry lunged and snared Matt’s arm. Matt took a swing. Harry blocked it and slammed him up against a dumpster.
“I’m not a priest. I’m trying to teach you something. If you want to end up dead or serving a life sentence, then carry on doing what you’re doing, because believe me, you will overstep the boundary of a bar brawl to manslaughter one of these days. But if you want to change that, learn something, make yourself a better man, call me.”
Harry released Matt and jammed a business card in his palm. Matt watched him leave and turn the corner. Once he felt Harry wasn’t coming back and the police weren’t waiting for him, he stepped out into the street. He examined Harry’s card under the streetlight. It had no information other than
TASKMASTERS
, followed by a local telephone number.
Matt spent the following day mulling over what Harry Sharpe had said. He didn’t need some do-gooder telling him where his life was heading. He knew already. He couldn’t keep from getting into fights. He wasn’t a kid anymore. He was fast approaching thirty with nothing to show for it except calluses and scar tissue. He’d eventually cross the line and it would end his life one way or another. Harry had handed him a much-needed reality check. This was certainly the time to wise up.
He hadn’t heard of the Taskmasters and neither had anybody else he asked at the oil changers where he worked. The consensus was they were something like the Toastmasters or the Rotary Club. He took some shit from the guys about not being Rotarian material. More concerned about who exactly the Taskmasters were, the jibes bounced off him. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but a public speaking group wasn’t it. Harry didn’t seem the type to sit around over a pleasant meal, challenging others to speak on a subject suggested by one of the other Taskmasters. How this would make him a better person he couldn’t imagine, but he’d heard they were connected with the business community and helped members find jobs. He could do with a boost in that direction. He’d go—just this once.
He dialed the number. Harry picked up on the first ring.
“Yes.”
“It’s Matt, from the bar last night.”
“I remember you. I wasn’t sure you’d call, but I’m glad you did. You want to join, then?”
“I thought I’d check it out.”
“Good. We’ll pick you up at 9. What’s your address?”
Matt waited outside his apartment block so that Harry couldn’t see the hole he called a home. Not that standing outside helped. It wouldn’t be hard for him to work it out from the address. The five-story converted residential hotel on the wrong side of I-5 looked almost as bad from the outside as it did on the inside.
A horn tooted and a blue-black SUV pulled up in front of him. Harry was driving, but he wasn’t alone; three other men sat in the vehicle with him. Matt wandered over and the guy in the back flung open a passenger door. Matt got in.
“Guys, this is Matt,” Harry said. “Okay, quick introductions. Riding shotgun with me is Brett Chalmers. Sitting next to you is Frank Tripplehorn. And taking up too much room in back there is John Stein.”
The Taskmasters smiled and nodded. Matt tried to do the same, but they were nothing like he’d imagined. Matt had taken the trouble to dress up, nothing too fancy, but then again he didn’t have anything too fancy. Surprisingly, however, he was the overdressed one. Everyone else was in jeans, polo shirts, and windbreakers. They all had Harry’s muscular build, except John Stein, who was another X-size up. His head scraped the underside of the SUV’s roof.
Introductions over, Harry turned the car around and took Madison over the freeway and into downtown. The Taskmasters bantered with one another, talking about nothing much. Matt interrupted them.
“Where are we going?” He hadn’t intended the level of fear in his voice. It didn’t go unnoticed by the others.
“We have a clubhouse where we meet,” Tripplehorn said.
“Is there anything else you’d like to know?” Chalmers asked. The jagged edge the man placed on his question didn’t invite further questioning. Matt shook his head and the Taskmasters returned to their conversation.
The clubhouse was an exaggeration of mammoth proportions. Before Matt had called Harry’s number, rich Corinthian leather and dark mahogany had sprung to mind. All that went out the window when Harry drew up in front of a largely ignored stretch of Yesler Way. By day, this area was home to the court and city workers. By night, it was nothing. Matt was checking out the restaurants dotted along the streets when Harry pointed across the road at a decayed building. Graffiti-strewn boards covered old busted-out windows.
“Home sweet home,” Stein said, sliding out of the SUV.
Harry popped open on a giant padlock on a security shutter protecting the entrance from bums and thieves and slid it back. He unlocked and opened the dark wood doors with amber-colored, leaded glass insets.
Stepping inside, Matt remembered this place. It was going to be some fancy five-star restaurant headed by some TV chef and financed by a dotcom millionaire. When the dot-com bubble burst, it took the millionaire and his restaurant dreams with it. The place had been festering ever since. It was a shame. The turn-of-the-century brick structure gave the place class, but only when it was in tiptop condition. In its current shape, the heavy brick construction turned the place into a dungeon. The place was rainproof, but the brick held the damp and didn’t let go. Someone had gotten into the building at some point. Graffiti covered the walls and either the contractor or opportunists had made off with anything that had salvage value. Someone at sometime had urinated in the building. A startled rat scuttled across the floor to hide in a darkened corner.
Harry closed the doors and locked them. The dead bolt sounded like a gunshot and echoed off the walls.
If the Taskmasters owned this place, they had a lot of work to do. But Matt knew these guys probably didn’t own it. Something was very wrong and Matt started planning how he was going to get out of this. He knew when he was out of his league. Harry and Co. weren’t the kind of guys he could punch his way past. He wondered if the Taskmasters were connected to someone he’d hurt, but couldn’t think of anyone with that kind of muscle on tap. Harry dropped a heavy hand on Matt’s shoulder and guided him toward a circle of raggedy looking La-Z-Boys.
“Don’t be put off by the surroundings. Take a load off and have a beer.”
Tripplehorn carried over the cooler he’d retrieved from the SUV’s trunk and deposited it at the center of the circle. He flipped it open and tossed Matt an MGD. “You’re in good company.”
Matt did as he was told and sat down.
Harry took a beer from Tripplehorn and flopped into a chair next to Matt. “I declare this meeting of the Taskmasters is now in session.” He raised his bottle and so did the other Taskmasters. Matt shifted in his seat. “Only two items of new business tonight,” Harry continued. “The first being our new member, Matt.”
“Good to have you, Matt,” Stein said, and raised his bottle to him.
“I think Matt can be an asset,” Harry said. “I believe he has a good heart, but he’s a little misdirected. I hope becoming a Taskmaster will straighten him out and put him on the right track.”
Harry’s character assessment embarrassed Matt. It made him feel like a kid at parent-teacher night forced to listen to a report being given about him. He hid his embarrassment behind his beer, drinking it too fast.
“I don’t know if Harry has explained what we do here at the Taskmasters,” Tripplehorn said.
“Not really,” Matt replied.
“Well, once a month we challenge each other.”
“One person from the group is given a specific task chosen by the others,” Chalmers chimed in.
“Which must be completed by the next month,” Stein added.
“Which brings us nicely to our second piece of new business,” Harry said. “This month’s challenge.”
Tripplehorn fished out a pack of playing cards from his pocket, but Harry stopped him.
“No low-card winner this time.” He looked at Matt.
“Taskmaster rules state that the new Taskmaster member is automatically assigned the challenge.”
Stein and Chalmers grinned at each other. An invisible noose tightened around Matt’s throat and he shrank into the damp-smelling La-Z-Boy.
“Harry, you’re right. I forgot the rules.” Tripplehorn did nothing to hide his smirk. “Matt, you’re this month’s automatic low-card winner.”
“Don’t let these goofballs scare you, Matt,” Harry said. “There’s nothing to worry about. As fellow Taskmasters, we’ll make sure that everything goes smoothly.”
“What do I do?” Matt’s fear began bubbling to the surface.
“Didn’t I tell you Matt is a born Taskmaster?” Harry said.
“You guys give speeches, right?” Matt asked. “Like Toastmasters do, right?”
He knew his assumption was wrong. This was no conventional organization. They were something else and their burst of raucous laughter confirmed the fact.
“I think you need another beer,” Chalmers said, and tossed another bottle at Matt.
“No,” Harry said. “We do things a little differently. Stein, why don’t you tell Matt here what you did for the Taskmasters last month.”
“Surely.” Stein wiggled in his seat, making himself comfy. “I killed a no-good pimp. Put a bullet,” Stein put a finger to his own forehead and made a popping sound, “right between his eyes.”
Stein handed around half a dozen Polaroids of a stick-thin Latino man lying dead in a gutter with a small hole in his face. He went on to describe how he’d stalked the pimp, some guy named Hernandez, and finally lured him to his death with the promise of a big score. The Taskmasters laughed and joked with each other as Stein walked them through the story. Matt didn’t laugh. He was too busy trying to hold it together. His worst fears struck him with freight-train intensity. He’d guessed the Taskmasters weren’t on the up and up when they’d picked him up in the SUV. Philanthropic tendencies were the last thing he felt from them now. He remembered Harry’s words in the alley. When he’d said that he could help Matt turn his life around, Matt had thought he would help him straighten up his act, not teach him how to hone his violent tendencies.