Passing Through #5
Hitting the sirens, she peeled out of the lot. She sped down the street and noticed all the calls coming in through her laptop. She turned that off as well. The station, she needed to get to the big man in the station.
She slowed at the nearest intersection despite her flashing lights. She briefly closed her eyes and decided on something. One more stop. One more stop and then she would visit her strange prisoner at the station. Blooping the siren in a burst, she U-turned and sped off.
***
Sandy sat in the shadows. After driving around town looking for the little snots to no avail, she decided they would eventually show at the Fast Stop.
They always did. Shoplifting beers, then harassing customers.
Moments earlier, a customer argued inside the store with the clerk, and things got heated.
The customer was Maude Plotkin, a pastor’s wife.
The clerk that night was Greasy Nick. People called him that because his face resembled a pizza.
Maude gave plenty good, dropping F-bombs about something or another.
Maude knocked over every rack she could find that would move.
The pastor and his wife were notorious stick in the butt types, so it pleased Sandy to see the woman loosen up a little.
By the time Maude finished, she left the establishment empty-handed, but looked like she had partaken of a religious experience.
Maude fanned herself and blew her sweaty bangs out of her face before getting in her minivan and peeling out.
Greasy Nick locked the front doors to the shop and placed a sign up that read, Clozed for Kleaning. A whizz that kid. While leaving the rest home, the sheriff had called Sandy. Lindsey mentioned something about a big man in their holding cell and that they needed all hands on him.
Sandy made a sexual joke that her boss laughed at which surprised Sandy. Lindsey also mentioned something about sundown but that was where the information train ended. Lindsey had a call come in from her nagging husband and hung up.
The sheriff never called back but Sandy was not going to go to the station either way. She had a stop to make and planned to wait all night if necessary. But she did not wait long. The snot-nosed skateboarders rolled up. She heard them from a mile away, the annoying clop of wheels on asphalt.
The trio of kids approached the front of the store and cursed a storm about the locked door.
They pounded while Greasy Nick flipped them the bird.
That was all it took to set them off. One of the three began kicking the door.
The glass withstood such an attack. Still, she did not want them to get lucky and crack it, so Sandy stepped out from the shadows.
“Hello, boys.”
The smallest in the group tapped the kicker on the shoulder. “Hey, Justin, po-po.”
Justin looked over at Sandy and smirked. “Yeah? What’s she gonna do?” He kicked at the glass again.
Sandy pulled her gun and aimed it at the two who were not fighting the door.
They raised their hands, and she drew a finger over her lips in a shush motion.
She waved the gun, prompting them to step to the side.
They did. Sandy moved forward and as soon as Justin kicked again, she swept his anchored leg out from under him, resulting in his falling to the ground while one leg remained stuck on the metal rail of the door.
Justin screamed in pain over the forced split that ripped his pants down the center. He could not dislodge the leg trapped on the door push bar. “Tug! Dan! Help me, man!” Justin pleaded.
“She’s got a gun,” Tug said.
“Nah, I’m not a cop tonight. I’m a concerned citizen who is tired of the disrespect that certain ignorant teens show their elders.”
Sandy ejected the clip from her weapon and tossed it. She ejected the chambered bullet and placed the gun in her holster and snapped the holster closed.
“Wrong move!” Tug, a lanky, tall goober, yelled.
He rushed Sandy and kicked her hard between the legs. He smiled, waiting for her to fall, except she matched his grin with a wider one. Tug eyed her crotch.
“Honey, I have felt nothing down there since the nineties. Remember how I said I wasn’t a cop tonight?”
She removed the badge from her outfit and placed the needle end through the fingers of her fist and stabbed forward. Tug screamed and grabbed at his head. The badge stood out on his forehead with the pin stuck deep in his skin. Red poured down into one eye.
Dan helped Justin free his leg. Justin went fetal, grabbing his groin. Dan looked around and saw his two buddies nursing wounds. He stood alone. Sandy bent down and picked up one of their skateboards. She spun a wheel.
“You know what wheels represent?” Sandy asked.
“What?” Dan said.
“Freedom. Wheels allow you to travel. They give you freedom to move, but also freedom from harassing innocent people. The freedom not to terrorize people who simply desire a large soda and some gas. Freedom from bullying other teens. Freedom from being total and utter assholes!”
“We’re just having fun,” Dan said.
“And how old are you guys?”
“Eighteen.”
“Good, good to know, so I don’t pull any punches if you were minors, not that I would care much,” Sandy said.
Tug finally yanked the badge from his head and ran toward the woman, fist raised, roaring in his approach.
Sandy swung big with the skateboard. It cracked along the underside of Tug’s jaw with an epic pop.
The teen immediately crumpled to the ground, where he fell into a twitching fit.
Dan stood there wide eyed, horrified. He started toward his downed friend, but Sandy waved him off with the skateboard.
The kid eyed his own skateboard near his feet and grabbed it. He raised it threateningly. Sandy nodded and the teen charged. He swung, and she held hers up. The impact caused both to drop the weapons and shake out their hands.
Dan saw his chance and punched Sandy in the gut. She wheezed and grabbed her stomach but smiled through the pain and stood. The kid looked surprised.
“See? You don’t understand we were all young once.
All had our time in the sun, but time does its thing.
We’re like cookie batter, being baked into shapes.
Some thick, some thin, some big, some small,” Sandy said and gestured to Dan’s friends, highlighting the difference, and emphasizing the word small.
Dan punched her in the face. Her lip split and gushed blood.
She smiled again. “That dough? It’s not formed yet when you’re young.
And it’s a delicate process. Squeeze it too hard, abuse it, and it becomes the worst cookie in the bunch.
Turns into something inedible, something untouchable, something no one wants.
Burnt maybe. Is that what you really want?
You know it’s a matter of time before you bake into the person you will be.
So, if you don’t want to be the worst in the bunch, you can start by respecting your damn elders! ”
Dan struck again, punching her in the face. She immediately punched back, smacking him in the face. He looked surprised and raised a fist again. She nodded.
“One for one? Show me yours and I’ll show you mine. Let’s go.”
She stood tall. Dan went for the gut again. She took the hit even though a rib cracked with a loud snap. Dan then stood in place, and Sandy punched him in the gut. He fell to his knees gasping, but quickly rose. He punched her in the chest. She yelped loudly.
“Ah! Boob shot. Bastard.”
She wiped the smile from his face by striking his chest hard enough to knock him back while he massaged out the pain. He went for her lip again. She reciprocated, drawing blood.
Then, with a loud cry, Justin charged her on shaky legs, skateboard held high, aiming for Sandy’s skull. Acting as one, Dan and Sandy both punched Justin’s face. He crumpled, unconscious. Then Dan and Sandy faced off again without missing a beat, ready to keep going.
***
Nolan locked Dolores in the cell across from Crevice.
Nolan glanced over and noticed something odd.
The man sat on the cot, leaning forward, the brim of the hat covering most of the man’s face.
But something seemed different. The clothes appeared to fit the man better than when they first brought him in.
A trick of the light, surely. The phones in the squad room were ringing off the hook when he arrived with his prisoner.
The entire way to the station she vacillated between propositioning him and threatening to bash his skull in.
The man in the cell was Nolan’s type, mysterious, large.
But also, creepy. There was that. Now, the man appeared off.
Nolan could not place it despite being a student of the male form.
He did not wish to look too long lest he become creepy himself.
Without looking up, the prisoner somehow knew he was being watched.
“Should have let me go. A little busy, are you?” Crevice asked.
“You know something about that?’ Nolan asked, wondering what the man knew.
“I know the phones haven’t stopped ringing.”
Nolan shook his head. Of course, the man knew how busy they were; they locked in him with all the phones.
Nothing mysterious there. The guy simply heard call after call.
The prisoner lifted his head and Nolan spotted his eyes.
Were they blue? He did not remember them being blue on the way in.
The man’s face seemed more relaxed than earlier.
The phones kept ringing. Nolan wondered what all the calls were about.
Nell directed them when she was on the job, but she had friends in town for a baby shower, so was off.
Absent an admin, the phones transcribed the calls and sent them to their laptops in their cruisers.
Nolan left the prisoners and headed toward a desk when his own cell rang.
“Nell? Wait, what?”