Chapter Two #2
We locked up the office as we’d done with all the offices we’d checked. Permits would have to be drawn up for the use of the sniper perch, but that’s what SAC Bradley did best.
JOSHUA
Billy was in trouble, and I had no idea how to get him out of it.
I’d spent the whole night sitting in his tiny apartment in Westwood, trying to talk him out of taking one hit after another, while watching over Dog, his adorable Boston Terrier puppy.
I was sure the little guy deserved a better name, and I tried to think of one, hoping it would distract me.
At one point, Dog had curled up on my lap and buried his nose in the crook of my elbow where he fell back to sleep.
The smell from the weed Billy smoked couldn’t be good for him, but every time I’d tried locking the little puppy in the bedroom, his whimpers had turned into howls.
Around four-thirty in the morning, when Billy realized he was out of weed, blow, and alcohol, he told me it was time to score.
Since I wasn’t into the drug scene, I told him he was just shit out of luck, moved Dog onto the couch, and tried to tuck Billy under a blanket.
He had to be cold. I was sure the apartment’s thermostat was set at meat locker.
He’d thrown the blanket at me and snatched up his keys, heading for the door before I could even protest.
After a hushed argument in his apartment’s hallway, I’d snatched the keys from him—since there was no way I’d let him drive drunk and stoned—and followed him out of the building.
The drive to Chinatown had ended us up here at five-fifteen in the morning, arguing once again, inside the lobby of an old brick apartment building.
“Billy, this place feels all kinds of wrong. Can we please just go home?” I begged. “You don’t look good, and we left so quickly we didn’t even have time to give Dog a walk.”
He rounded on me so fast I was forced to step back. “I know the guy who lives here, Joshua,” he slurred. “I met him at Marty’s, so you know he’s fine.”
“Are you high?” I asked, kicking myself for the unintended pun. “How do you figure meeting a dealer at Marty’s makes him fine? He could be dangerous.”
Marty’s was one of the premier gay bars in West Hollywood, owned by a very nice older man who’d opened it over forty years ago when AIDS was ravaging the LGBTQ community.
I’d bet my life on the fact that drug dealers weren’t welcome in the upscale bar, but that didn’t make it impossible to find them in most bars, if you tried hard enough.
“Leave me alone, Joshua! I don’t need a babysitter!
” He turned away, lurching for a door to the stairwell.
I felt uneasy about the whole situation.
He fumbled for a moment, finally getting the door open.
As he struggled with the door, I ran to catch up, holding it when it seemed too heavy for him in his inebriated state.
We started climbing stairs, not stopping until we were ten floors up.
I stayed behind him on the way up, ready to catch him, hoping he wouldn’t stumble since I wasn’t a big guy myself.
I breathed out a sigh of relief as we finally reached the door on ten and spilled out into a hallway.
Billy fumbled in his pocket, pulling out a ratty business card, and glancing at it way too long as he tried to read the address. He glanced over at me with a lopsided smile. “Ten thirty-two.”
I was worried. I’d only known Billy for three months, having met him when he came to pick up a friend who’d turned out to be one of my students.
The ESL classes I taught three nights a week paid almost nothing, but the little extra I made helped put groceries on the table while I finished my graduate degree.
I taught all manner of immigrants, not only from places south of the border like Honduras, Argentina, El Salvador, and Mexico.
But one of my students was from Laos, several were from Korea and Vietnam, another was from Germany, and I even had a young, married couple from Italy.
It was one of the reasons I loved teaching the classes.
Not only was I helping them learn English, but I was exposed to cultures from all over the world.
They taught me as much, if not more, than I taught them.
It was a wonderful way to give back and I knew it would benefit me tenfold in a future job hunt. Plus, it just felt good to help people.
Although I hardly knew anything about Billy—like most of the people I took care of—shortly after meeting him, I’d decided he had some problems only I could fix.
Maybe I was the one who needed fixing. My younger brother and sisters loved me to death.
My mother had taught us to always give back and pay it forward.
Now that she was gone, I tried to be the example my siblings needed.
As we walked to the right apartment, I wanted to kick myself for thinking I was the only one who could help Billy.
People always told me I jumped into situations before thinking things out, and I had a sinking suspicion that this mess was going to turn out to be one of those, I told you so, situations.
Billy stopped in front of ten-thirty-two and knocked, glancing over at me with glazed eyes. “It’s gonna be fine, Joshua, you’ll see.” He slid an arm around my waist and gazed up at me. “You’ll see.”
I was so sure it wasn’t fine the moment the door flew open. We sprang apart and jumped back. I swallowed hard because I knew…just knew…we were completely fucked.
The angry Hispanic man who greeted us with a sneer, couldn’t have looked scarier. The fancy shirt he wore unbuttoned to the waist revealed an impressive array of tattoos, but it was the tats on his neck and face that made me want to run.
“Who are you?” he barked in Spanish.
“Is Juan here?”
“Juan who?” The man switched to accented English.
Billy laughed nervously. “I don’t know…just, Juan. Tell ‘im Billy’s here. I met ‘im at Marty’s,” he slurred.
The man smirked as he looked Billy up and down before uttering a slang term for a gay man, one I’d heard before. I frowned, taking hold of Billy’s arm and tugging at it. He didn’t move, just dug in his heels.
The man repeated the slur then glanced at me, giving me the same up and down perusal.
He grinned widely, showing off a set of white teeth including the gold one in front.
Before I could say anything, he stepped forward and hooked a meaty arm around Billy’s neck.
He dragged him into the apartment, laughing as he announced in Spanish that entertainment had arrived.
Fuck. I wanted to turn and run to get help, but I’d never leave a friend, especially one in the condition Billy was. Silently cursing my inebriated friend, I knew I had no choice but to follow him in. The sight that greeted us wasn’t encouraging.
Since I’d never been inside a drug dealer’s apartment before, I hadn’t known what to expect.
But seeing six guys lounging around on couches and chairs in the room and another two in the kitchen, didn’t make me feel any better.
No one was sleeping, even at this hour. I found that very strange.
The whole situation was surreal. I stayed close to Billy as the guy who’d opened the door, disappeared down a hallway, leaving the two of us to be ogled by the men in the room.
Two of them stood up and sauntered over, smiling as they approached.
They stopped in front of us, looking us up and down the same way their buddy had.
The close proximity made my skin crawl. I was trying not to notice more tattoos that matched the ones on the other man’s neck.
I realized we’d most likely stepped into an apartment full of gang members…
the full-fledged, card-carrying type. These were the kind of gangs my students warned me about since many of them didn’t live in the best of neighborhoods.
“You’re here for Juan?” one of them asked. I didn’t like the way he was staring at Billy. He grinned. “I’m Juan.”
Billy looked around before returning a bleary gaze to him. “No, I—I was looking for a different Juan.”
The man frowned. “You don’t like me? But you said you were looking for Juan. Here I am.” He looked over his shoulder at the others before grinning at Billy again. Several of the men laughed.
I swallowed hard, taking hold of Billy’s elbow.
“We need to go. I don’t think your friend Juan is here.” I turned to the other man. “We’re just going to go now.”
For the first time, I noticed that Billy’s eyes were filled with concern. “Yeah, let’s go, Joshua.” He almost sounded sober.
We turned to go when I felt a hand clamp down on my shoulder. I stopped in my tracks to pivot. “We’re going now,” I said, offering him my best smile. My mother always taught me a kind smile was the best way to disarm even the most fearsome creature.
His face changed. Gone was the frown as he smiled.
“Your name is Joshua, right? Come on. Sit down and talk to me. My friend went to get Juan.” He took hold of my wrist and held tight.
“Sit with me, Bonito.” He pulled me toward the couch.
His grinning friend pulled Billy down onto the couch and slid over so there was room for me and the other guy.
I ended up sitting way too close to him.
“Joshua is a pretty name,” he said, angling his body to face me.
I glanced around noticing the drugs, bongs, and half-empty bottles all laid out on a huge, glass table in the center of the room.
There were ashtrays overflowing with cigarette butts and the apartment smelled like every party I’d ever been to in college.
One guy was smoking something hinky on the other couch.
I turned to the man beside me and smiled, deciding I needed a strategy.
“What’s your name?”
He grinned. “Chico.”
I was momentarily distracted by a single gold tooth among the otherwise perfectly white ones. “Oh…you have a gold tooth too.”
He frowned, reaching up and touching it, as if to make sure he’d heard me correctly. I rolled my eyes. “Yes, that one.”
“Yeah…what?”
“Nothing.” I kept talking. “So…you’re named after a character in one of my favorite old time TV shows,” I said.
“What?”
“Chico.”
“What?”
“You said your name was Chico. Did you ever watch Chico and the Man with Freddie Prinze?” He opened his mouth to answer before I waved my hand. “Never mind. It’s not important. He was Puerto Rican anyway.” I pointed at him. “You’re not Puerto Rican…are you?”
He frowned and then shook his head, looking at me as if I was crazy.
“I didn’t think so. Anyway, there was this old show…well, never mind.”
He stared at me as I kept going. I reached up and brushed a lock of the man’s messy, black hair out of his eye, rubbing a few strands between my fingers. “You know, my friend, Delilah could do wonders with your hair. It needs conditioning, and a few highlights wouldn’t hurt.”
“What?”
“Delilah, right?” I chuckled. “Sampson and Delilah? She cut off all his hair to take away his strength, but with your hair, I think all it needs is a few highlights. It’d be stunning on you. It really would. Every girl who saw you would instantly fall in love.”
“You—I—? Highlights?”
“Yeah, and—” I twisted on the couch to look down at his clothes before shaking my head. I plucked at the oversized white tee he wore. “And what’s with the T-shirt? I mean it’s like three sizes too big for you. Is that a 3X or something?” I chuckled again.
“No—I—”
“Yeah.” I reached for both sides and pulled it wide. “Look! It’s way too big.” His mouth opened and closed soundlessly, but I ignored him, hopping off the couch and gesturing at him. “Stand up.”
He stayed right where he was.
“Well…hurry up! Let me look at those pants.”
He frowned, looking down, but did as I asked.
I reached out and lifted his T-shirt, totally ignoring the gun tucked into the front as I quietly shuddered. I tsked, taking hold of the gun. “This won’t do at all.”
He grabbed my wrist, frowning at me. “No!”
I instantly let go and waved at him. “Fine. Fine. You do it. Put that thing on the table. I want to check the fit of these—” I pointed at his drooping khakis, visibly scrunching up my nose.
“Horrible excuse for pants.” When he just stared at me, I waved again.
“Come on, Chico. Get a move on. I can’t show you what I’m talking about when you’re holding… that.”
I held my breath. Miraculously, he did as I asked, pulling the gun from his waistband and setting it down on the table. I marveled, kind of surprised all these guys didn’t shoot their dicks off. One sneeze and I’d have had a higher voice.
He stood in front of me and pulled up his tee so I could resume looking at his pants.
I tsked again, shaking my head as I cocked it to the side and chuckled.
I reached for both sides of his waistband and hiked the pants up where they should be and then held the waistband out, leaving a one-inch gap on each side.
“See? These don’t fit either. You definitely need a total makeover, Chico.” I let go of his pants and stepped back. “I can help you if you let me.”
He frowned for a minute and then smiled, reaching for me. He pulled me back to the couch, sitting us both down. “You know, I think you’re one of those guys from that Queer show,” he said, honestly.
“Queer Eye?” I grinned then let out a high-pitched laugh, clasping both hands over my heart.
“Do you watch it? Don’t you just love Jonathan?
He does hair you know. That’s what I’m talking about.
Highlights. That’s all you need, Chico…well—” I leaned in looking closely at his face.
“Okay, maybe you need someone to attack those brows with a hedge trimmer.”
He stared at me for a few seconds before doubling over in laughter.
Charmed and disarmed and he hadn’t even realized it. My sister, Barbie, would have been proud.