A Short Story by Joe Clifford

When my father was getting ready to die last year, he made me promise to look after Madeline, his new wife. At the time it seemed like a simple promise. They’d met over canasta at the Sunny Gates trailer park down in Sunnyvale, six months before he was diagnosed with brain cancer. Although I hadn’t gotten the chance to know her that well, Madeline seemed pleasant enough, even if she wasn’t exactly Dad’s type.

After Dad finally retired, he could’ve gone anywhere he wanted but he picked Sunny Gates. I guess I could see the appeal. These weren’t low rent shacks but upscale trailers on finely groomed lots in a seniors’ community, with around the clock staff and care. They even had a little market on grounds that delivered groceries.

My father had been a tremendous success, and growing up I hoped to be just like him. The year he made partner in the law firm, my mother died. Still, he raised his only son and kept his affairs in order, continuing to litigate some of the Bay Area’s biggest civil liberty cases. I attended the Top of the Mark ceremony when he received his lifetime achievement award for his work with The Bridges and Hands Foundation, a nonprofit group that provides services to teenage runaways. I swelled with pride.

After he passed, I made arrangements with Madeline to take her to breakfast one Sunday a month. At first, the trips were painless. I’d get up early and on my way through Marin stop for a cappuccino and hummus wrap—because Madeline always wanted to go to Denny’s, a restaurant where I refuse to eat.

It was during one of these visits that I first heard about her son, Winky.

I didn’t know Madeline even had a son. I couldn’t recall Dad’s ever mentioning him. As details about Winky’s life began to emerge, I understood why. I caught a few references about his “having gone away” at one time, something I assumed to mean prison, although I never asked for clarification, and Madeline never offered any.

It is one thing to agree to do favors for somebody; it is quite another doing favors for the person who is the favor. Which is what started to happen. Small things at first. Madeline would ask me to drop off some clothes to Winky. Once it was a VCR, another time an envelope with a twenty dollar bill in it. Before long, Winky needed a ride on Wednesday or Friday because his car had broken down. Winky lived in the city, which has more than adequate public transportation. But Winky needed a ride, nevertheless. I later discovered that he didn’t even own a car.

I was often tempted to refuse these requests, as I felt my generosity being taken advantage of, but I’d made a promise to Dad and wanted to believe I’d inherited his sense of philanthropy.

Winky lived in the Mission, which has its good and bad spots. Winky’s place was somewhere in-between. From the outside, his apartment on 30th and San Jose wasn’t exactly the skids, but it wasn’t high class either.

During these initial encounters, I kept conversation to a minimum and Winky didn’t appear the talkative type. Still, I was never entirely comfortable around him. A wiry fellow who seemed perpetually distracted, he was too tall and too skinny, always dressed in some angry graphic tee and dirty jeans. I had my suspicions he was on drugs, but what a man wants to do in the privacy of his own home is none of my business. Best I could muster about his employment status was that Winky didn’t have any. Once I took him to the Social Security office, so I thought he might be on some kind of disability, but he didn’t seem particularly retarded, and it didn’t make any difference to me.

The last Sunday of October, Madeline and I were at Denny’s on South Mathilda. As usual, I’d offered to take her somewhere better, but she said she liked their biscuits. There was no point asking. Madeline didn’t strike me at the sort who could appreciate good cuisine anyway.

This morning, she ate dreadfully slow, pawing at dry biscuits with clumsy fingers, crumbs spraying everywhere. I drank the swill they tried passing off as coffee.

“I think Winky’s in trouble,” Madeline said, her mouth full of plum lipstick and dough.

I flagged down a waitress. “The check?”

“Steven, would you be a dear and make sure he’s all right?”

I reached for my wallet. “I’d love to help, but I can’t today,” I said, extracting a ten. “I have to drive to Sacramento and pick up some briefs. I’m in court tomorrow.”

The waitress, a middle-aged cuss with fried red hair, slapped the check on the table like she’d been inconvenienced to do her job.

Madeline sighed. “It’s so hard being a mother. You never stop wanting what’s best for your children.”

It was an obvious ploy. My father’s desire to help the lower classes notwithstanding, I couldn’t help but speculate how lonely Dad must’ve been to marry into this family. Her eyes began to well.

“OK,” I said, biting. “What makes you think Winky’s in trouble?”

She placed a crust carefully on her plate. “He called the other day from the bus station. He was talking about the strangest things, how people were after him, and if he never saw me again… I wouldn’t ask, Steven, but I’m worried. He’s my boy. And I’m sure your father—”

All right, I said. I’d drop by on my way through the city.

By the time I made it back to the Bay, the fog had rolled in. Exiting on Cesar Chavez, I found the entire district infested, lampposts, traffic signs, produce markets, all swallowed up in dense pockets of wet gray.

Far as I knew, Winky didn’t have a phone, but he always seemed to be expecting me. Usually he came downstairs right away and took whatever trinket I was passing off, so I never saw the inside of his second floor apartment. This time when I rang, he hollered for me to come up. I would’ve rather we stuck with our usual routine.

Heading through the unlocked gate, I felt the murkiness trail me inside.

All of Winky’s lights were off, and there weren’t any shades on the big bay windows, a soft gray filling the room.

Even though it was close to noon, Winky looked like he’d just woken up. He didn’t have a shirt on, only the same pair of dirty jeans he always wore, not even buttoned up. I noticed the tattoos on his shoulders and flanks, all in black with shaky outlines. Naked girls and barbed wired phrases like, “In Loving Memory” and “Never Forget,” whatever the hell that meant. He looked scruffier than usual.

He told me to have a seat and asked if I wanted some coffee. I like to be polite regardless of the company, so I accepted. The coffee, that is. The only place to “sit” was a couch I had no intention of going near—foam bursting at the seams, strange blotchy stains—who knew the parasites breeding in there. Water burbled through old clanking pipes. The place stank of gas leaks and animal fur. I didn’t see any pets.

Winky went into the kitchen, and I listened to cupboard doors open and shut, a kettle fill under the faucet.

I looked around. Crap everywhere. Greasy paper bags and pop cans sawed in half, spent matchbooks. A tiny TV with foiled rabbit ears sat atop a milk crate, the type of TV they don’t make anymore. The corner to a big blue blanket, which I assumed functioned as a window shade, was tacked to the side and draped to the floor. The walls were riddled with yawning holes, exposing plaster and the wood planks behind it. What sort of person chooses to live like this?

“Winky,” I said, “I just saw your mother—”

“Oh, yeah,” he said, poking his head out. “Today’s Sunday, ain’t it? How she doin’?”

“She’s fine.”

“Went to breakfast?”

“Yes, I took her to breakfast. It was a lovely meal. Listen, she asked me to stop by. She’s worried about you. Said she thought you might be in some, well, you know, trouble.”

I heard the toilet flush and a door slam, and a girl emerged from the blackness of the hallway. She couldn’t have been more than fifteen. She walked toward me in a crooked line, teeny denim skirt twisted up, wife-beater, black bra straps off the shoulder. Waif-thin with bleached out hair, she frantically scratched her arm inside the elbow. When she passed, she didn’t look up. I caught the ripe odor of sex and overly fruity perfume. She plopped on the couch and fidgeted her legs.

He didn’t bother to introduce us, and I grew indignant. It’s one thing for a man like Winky to choose that lifestyle; it is quite another for a girl that age.

Winky stretched his arms inside the kitchen door frame, slow-like, bony body elasticized. He began swinging, gently, like a perverted monkey. I studied his face. There was something in his eyes I hadn’t noticed before, something desperate, dangerous. They were sunken and yellow and mean.

“So Moms sent baby brother to check up on me,” Winky said.

Police sirens whirred by, flashing blues and reds.

“I mean, your dad married my mom, right?” he said.

“And what’s your point?”

“No point, Sporto. Just that would make us brothers is all.” He looked past me. I didn’t like the way he did it either, wolfish.

I didn’t know for sure if he and the girl were lovers, but the way she lay there, like a limp rag doll, him licking his chops, it was nauseating.

“Hey, Valerie,” he said. “You know I got a baby brother?”

She flopped on her side. I winced a smile at her. She didn’t return the favor.

The kettle whistle blew, and he dropped from the frame.

Just leave, I thought. Contact the authorities and be done with it, screw this idiot. But she was so young, helpless; it didn’t seem right leaving her there.

“Sorry, bro. Don’t got no milk or sugar,” he said, striding into the room, almost thrusting the hot coffee in my hands.

I didn’t know from where this hostility stemmed, if it was for Valerie’s benefit or what, but such aggression was seriously misplaced. I hadn’t done anything but favors for the guy since we met.

“Why don’t you sit down, Sporto?” Winky shrugged his shoulders, as if offended, then affected a dreadful southern accent. “Val, I don’t think baby brother likes our home.”

I could see where this was headed. I held up my hands. “Listen, Winky, your mom asked me to stop by and make sure you’re OK. You say you are, good enough for me. I didn’t mean any disrespect.”

“Sure, Sporto,” he said, his voice trailing to a whisper. Then his whole demeanor changed, an effort to feign humility. “Actually, there is something you could do for me—me and Val, I mean.”

“What?” I said.

“No biggie. Just a ride. Not far. Half an hour tops, round trip.” He plucked his cigarettes from his jeans and lighted one from the burner.

“Hey,” Valerie said, finally speaking up. “Pass me one of those.” Her voice was high and small.

He flicked the lit cigarette over my head and it landed on her belly. She flinched a delayed reaction, then picked the burning cigarette and sleepily swatted away the ash.

“I mean, if you think you can hang,” Winky said. “I know Moms would appreciate it.” He winked. “I could pay you, if you like.” And he patted down his hip pockets, like he had money, and like I’d take it if he did.

***

“Nice ride, Sporto.”

“You’ve been in my car before, Winky.”

“True, but Val hasn’t, and I ain’t never told you how much I like Bentleys.”

“It belonged to my father.”

They were piled in the back. He was reclining, one leg up; she was wedged in-between. He had his arm around her neck, holding her there, letting his fingers dip and molest, trying to act nonchalant when they slipped between her legs. Once she and I caught eyes in the rearview, but I couldn’t read a thing; she seemed so disaffected.

Winky said he had to go down to Daly City “to see a friend.” I wasn’t naïve. I spent a lot of time in the city and wasn’t as sheltered as I may’ve looked. I’d read Baudelaire and Bukowski, seen Mean Streets and Taxi Driver. More than once. I knew plenty about the darker side of life.

“I’m not doing anything illegal,” I said, “so you can forget that right now.”

“Illegal? You hear that?” he said, pretending to ask Valerie for her opinion. “You’ve read too many books there, Sporto. Do I look like the kind of guy that’d do something illegal?” He spat out a low laugh.

Anything happened, he looked the part, not me. More importantly, I wanted the chance to talk to this girl, find out where her parents were, why she stayed with this creep. I felt as though the fates had delivered me there. I could only hope that whomever he had to see, he’d be seeing alone.

I cut through Precita, and the fog had thickened. I entered the freeway from Bernal Heights and on past the 101/280 split, the air a cold mist. I had to keep the wipers on. Winding down the 280 valley, there was no traffic and no one talked in the car, the only sounds slow, steady breathing and wet tires on asphalt.

In Daly City, we pulled into a sprawling apartment complex, a dozen or so high-rises spaced out. Winky directed me to pull into the parking garage, down a level and toward a dark corner with no cars.

I cut the engine. He whispered something in Valerie’s ear as he got out, but she didn’t respond. He said to me he’d be right back. Then he was gone through a basement door and I sat alone with her.

Where to begin?

The world’s a screwed up place, I know. But most of the people in bad spots are clowns like Winky, adults who make bad choice after bad choice until they are so far down they have to look up to tie their shoes. They get what they deserve. She was a child, though. Despite the way she dressed or whatever she’d allowed herself to become, she was still just a kid.

My father wouldn’t turn his back.

“How long have you known Winky?” I asked.

“I dunno,” she mumbled, chewing the side of her thumb, staring out the window.

How do you ask the questions I wanted to ask? Why don’t you live at home with your folks? Why aren’t you cheerleading and having sleepovers and popping popcorn and giggling about boys instead of defiling your body with a slimball old enough to be your father?

In the mirror, her lax, suggestive positioning left nothing to the imagination, and I grew flush.

“How long have you lived in the city, Valerie?”

“You got any gum?”

“Yeah, sure, I think so.” Happy to be doing something for her, I opened the middle consol, sifting through my receipts and day planner until I found a pack.

When I sat back up, she was poised behind my seat. Animated as hell, bouncy, like an overly stimulated kitten, she snatched the chewing gum from my hand and giggled.

“You like me?” she asked.

“Sure. I mean, I just met you, but yeah, I like you.”

“I like you, too,” she said and gave me a peck on the cheek. She slithered between the leather seats up front. Facing me, resting on her haunches, she nibbled on her lip. Then she eased forward, her hand creeping over my lap. I grabbed her wrist and she squealed.

I pulled her close. I wanted to tell her that she misunderstood, that I wanted to help her. I wanted to tell her that she was good. But it all happened so fast, and honorable intentions got twisted into something perverted and wrong. She moved her mouth to my ear and her breath was hot. She told me to let her go, and I let her go. She eased her head down and I closed my eyes.

***

She sat curled in my lap while I stroked her hair. Of all the thoughts whirling around inside my brain, all the things I could’ve said, all I got out was, “What about Winky?” I didn’t mean it like that, but that’s what came out. What about Winky.

“Winky?” she said with a curious laugh. “He don’t care. He said to let you do whatever you want.”

I pushed her off me. I felt sick and dirty. I stared at her and she stared right back. And I finally understood that look in her eyes, the one I couldn’t quite place at the apartment and in the rearview, and it was death and everything cold and hopeless.

Then she shrugged, peeled the stick of peppermint chewing gum from its wrapper and popped it in her mouth, gazing wistfully into the darkness. She began snapping little bubbles, lolling her head from side to side. In between snaps, she hummed a soft lullaby in that high, teeny voice, like she didn’t have a care in the world.

I fired the ignition, having no idea where I’d go with her in the car but needing to get out of there. I’d dump her on the side of the road. My heart was in my throat and I could still taste her sweet strawberry lip gloss all over me. I had to fight the urge to vomit. I turned to check the side-view mirror and there stood Winky.

He rapped on the glass and made a winding gesture to roll down the window.

“Turn off the car,” he said.

“I’m not turning off anything.” I made to shift into reverse.

“How old you think she is, Sporto?”

I looked over at Val, chomping away. She closed her eyes tightly and gave me a big phony grin, chin jutting forward.

Before I could even think, he whispered in my ear, “She’s a lot younger than that. You’re a lawyer. You really want the police swabbing that pretty mouth?” He clucked his tongue. “Might wanna buckle up there, Sporto.” He patted me on the back. “Sit tight, baby,” he said to Val.

I shut off the engine.

Winky nudged me through a basement door and down a long stairwell. I felt like I’d been drugged, as though the world were a recording playing back on a faster speed.

The well reeked of chemicals and urine. Big slabs of concrete surrounded us, as though encased in a tomb. At the bottom, we passed a boiler and I could feel the heat. A darkened hallway narrowed to a heavy slate door.

Winky tapped and it fell open.

Two big men, their arms prison-sculpted, stood off to the side where a kitchen should be, but there was no stove or refrigerator. Radiator steam hissed. The men didn’t look up, continuing to measure out small black lumps on a scale. Above a sink, a garish painting of Jesus hung, ornate gold frame slightly askew.

Winky put his arm around me, said to relax, that big brother wouldn’t let anything bad happen. He led me into the next room where a squat older Mexican stood, hands in pockets, eyes squinty red. It was insufferably hot. The Mexican looked really old, wisps of long gray hair clinging to his neck and shoulders. He didn’t wear a shirt. I stared at the navel of his fat, hairy belly.

The room overflowed with merchandise and electronic goods, TVs, stereos, VCRs, power tools, stacked one on top of the other, the apartment dimly lit by artificial yellow light.

“This him?” the Mexican said to Winky.

The Mexican didn’t offer to shake my hand. He scoured at me like I was infected. He gestured to a chair in front of him and said to sit down, and I did, as Winky hovered behind. Out the corner of my eye, I spied what at first I thought a Buddha statue. But then I saw it was a birdbath on its side, cradled in the lap of an elephant god. The Hindus call him Ganesh.

Winky crouched behind me, sinewy arms riddled with needle marks, dangling down my chest.

He gestured toward the Mexican. “See, brother, Indio’s my partner. We been talking.”

The room grew darker as the big boys moved in, vibrations traveling across the concrete floor and up my feet and into my wrists, which locked onto the arm rest.

“Why are you doing this to me?” I pleaded.

Winky clasped his hand firmly on the back of my neck. “We don’t think what you and your father did was right.”

“My father? My father spent his life trying to help people like—” I tried turning around but he squeezed harder.

“Gets all up in her, pounding that shit like it’s free, and doesn’t leave her a dime? Pretty rude, don’t you think? We’re supposed to be family. Breakfast once a month?” He tsked-tsked. “Moms and me figure you owe us something more than pity.” He bent lower. “And what you did upstairs to Val, taking advantage of a little girl like that.”

“Winky, I—I mean, she—”

Winky leaned in closer, got right up next to my ear. His breath stank like stewed pork. “I wouldn’t say nothin’ bad about Val there, Sporto. That’s Indio’s niece. You know what we do to sick fucks like you in prison?”

Then the squat Mexican’s mouth slung open wide, wider than any human mouth should be allowed to extend. He was missing all his bottom teeth. The big boys circled in and the heat choked the air. And as the room closed up around me, I knew all the money in the world couldn’t buy my way out of this.

______________________________________________

Joe Clifford’s work has appeared in Bathhouse, Big Bridge, Bryant Literary Review, the Connecticut Review, Dos Passos Review, Fringe, Hobart, Opium, and Thuglit, among others.  He was the 2004 recipient of the Connecticut Review’s Leslie Leeds Poetry Prize, as well as that year’s representative on the Connecticut Poetry Circuit.  Most recently he served as editor-in-chief of Gulf Stream magazine and as co-producer Lip Service, a spoken word event in Miami.

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