CHAPTER 15
Truman
After the ill-fated basketball game, we all gathered inside an unused warehouse a hundred miles east. Erin and Gunning brought everyone hamburgers, and we sat around a big flashlight as though it were a campfire.
Erin flourished her messy burger and declared, “I found these pill bottles in Les’ hotel room. Looks like Les was going to fill them up with capsules.”
“Why capsules?” asked Alessio. “Most people want to snort it.”
“Well!” she announced. With her other hand she removed something from her pocket, a plastic bottle she rattled.
“Some bottles had actual ‘legitimate’ pills with the TE inscription for fentanyl.
The biggest revelation was . . . “ She paused for dramatic effect, then took another sloppy bite of her burger.
“What?” I cried. “What? Stop making us wait, girl!”
All we could hear through her muffled mouth was “Moofa Foofa.” Alessio became so impatient he crawled over and whisked the container from her hand.
He read the label. “Dr. Pleasant Bridgewater in Needles prescribed this. Someone, map this address. Three four one Cow Hollow Lane.”
We all whipped out phones, but I was quickest. “Pine Valley Skilled Nursing Facility.”
Erin even stopped chomping. Her swallowing was the only sound for a few seconds as we all stared at each other like we’d seen Medusa’s head.
Finally, I uttered, “Skilled nursing. He’s giving patients fentanyl and tranq.”
Alessio leaped to his feet, about to orate as he’d done on my roof. Pointing to the ceiling, he proclaimed, “We gotta get over there! Find this asswipe, so-called ‘doctor’ Bridgewater. Take him out.”
“Crosshair him!” announced Denmark. “This makes my piss boil!”
Gunning said, “I thought we’re not taking anyone out anymore.”
I spoke for Alessio. “Well. Make it so he can’t practice anymore, at the least. Bust him.”
Alessio said, “Maybe get Jack Hoffman to expose him.”
That was a genius idea, and everyone crowed and cooed. “Bro!” “Bro!” “Brilliant!”
Squinting at the bottle, Alessio said, “He prescribed it to a resident named Pickett Yarborough. The first thing should be to go visit this guy.”
Now I was googling. “This Pine Valley is a memory care facility. I doubt these drugs are making anyone’s memory sharper.”
Denmark said, “Well, maybe we can get somewhat of a story from Pickett Yarborough. Pretend to be his kids. I guess Erin’s up for that role.”
I said, “Me and Erin. As usual, we look the squarest. I’ll call you ‘sis.’ We can use one of these IDs we’ve stolen from drug dealers.”
“Oo, that reminds me.” Erin stood too, reaching into her inner jacket pocket. Looked like a wad of cash she withdrew. “I snarked this from Les Moore’s room. Here you go.” Professionally, she counted off bills with her thumb, handing each of us a new wad.
Busy scrolling through Les’ phone, I took the money distractedly. “Look here. He’s texting this Bridgewater dirtbag. “Bridge. Got all the stuff for Yarborough. Have they cleaned out Mrs. White’s room? You need to keep cycling new ones in.”
“Big ol’ scumbag!” cried Denmark, openmouthed. “Are they wiping out old folks?”
Alessio said, “Well, if the drugs don’t do it, maybe they assist.”
“Assisted living,” spat Erin.
“Here’s another one from Bridgewater. ‘Can you turn the stuff into gummies?’ Erin, did you find any gummies?”
None of this had deterred her from finishing her burger. Eyebrows raised, she again reached into her inner pocket, shaking a few more bottles. “Yeff. Here.”
Sure as shit, this bottle of gummies was prescribed to another patient.
Gunning said, “Gummies seem much less harmful to patients.” We knew that, because we gave prescription gummies to patients at the Establishment Club to wean them off the hard stuff. “They think it’s candy.”
Erin rolled her eyes. “Especially if they can’t remember anything.”
I said, “Maybe people die at Pine Valley, and Bridge keeps taking the Medicare money.”
Erin asked, “I wonder where they put all the bodies?” She was always a tough cookie. She sure was delving deep into this story.
Gunning’s phone lit up his face as he thumbed it. “I’m gonna find us a place to rent near Needles. Someone who doesn’t care who we are. Camping out is getting ridiculous.” His hands trembled with cold.
“At least here we have a can,” said Denmark. But the toilet’s water didn’t run, so we couldn’t even wash our hands.
Alessio stood in slo-mo. “Holy fuck.”
“What?” I asked, standing too.
He gazed at everyone. “Jack Hoffman. He’s found us.”
I looked at his phone screen. It resembled a regular text to Alessio’s probably fifth burner phone.
I read aloud. “Alessio, congrats! You hid for a whole week. But I put a dynamic geofence for your phone heading east from Livermore. I saw you at the school in Barstow, where I am now. And now you’re in an industrial area in Ash Hill. ”
Denmark jumped to his feet, fingers outspread. “What? The? Fuck?”
“What’s a geofence?” cried Erin.
We all looked around us, as if the walls had eyes. Then we freaked.
I stupidly picked up the flashlight without thinking. Erin and Denmark ran toward one door. Gunning ran to the bathroom door. Alessio and I ran to the rollup door that we’d left three feet open. The light bobbed, creating a flickering show of open mouths, splayed hands, and boots hitting the floor.
I was halfway scrunched down, ready to spring out the rollup, when Alessio shouted, “Hold. Hold.” Like we were all puppies.
We held. Gunning was the only one who’d already slammed the bathroom door shut behind him. The four of us gaped at Alessio. He snatched the flashlight from me, swooshing it over our bodies.
“Hold. This could be good.”
“How?” bawled Erin.
Alessio shined the light onto the ceiling so we were all showered with a gentle glow, believers at a manger. “He said he wanted to meet us. He’s often said he’s not going to get us in trouble.”
“And we believe him?” whispered Denmark. “Who believes anyone anymore?”
“Hear me out. He’s a journalist. And like Erin said, news sources survive on our types of stories. Not articles about a sports bar closing, which bills passed, or affordability.”
Erin made a lip fart. “Who wants to read about that?”
“So I’m gonna go with the idea that he’s gonna help us. Of course, he’s gonna blow up the internet with his stories, gain even more visibility, go viral. But I really think he has no interest in having us arrested.” He turned to me. “Tru? You good with that?”
I had to believe him. We’d talked about it many times. Hoffman gained nothing if he fucked with us. He seemed to be sincerely on our side. “I’m good. So you don’t need a new burner?”
“Nah! Let me keep this one. Let him follow us to Pine Valley Senior Living. Then he can see for himself what the fuck this Pleasant Bridgewater is up to.”
Denmark pointed at the floor. “But only after we’ve done with that jackoff! I don’t want to get mobbed by a trillion net rats. And we definitely don’t want them overrunning the old folks.”
“Yeah,” I said, “we’ll have to figure that out with Hoffman. Like, he can video us or whatever, but not say where we are.”
Erin said, “Pretend we went back north.”
Alessio liked that. “Yeah! He can say we’re heading to Reno or something. In the meantime, we can make our case, tell that we’re chasing down corrupt doctors dosing seniors with tranq. That part’s fine. You’re right, Denmark. We don’t want a billion stans flooding Needles.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Let’s find a place to stay near Needles and leave your phone there while we go to Pine Valley.”
“That’s bad,” agreed Denmark. “Hey, where’s Gunning? He was gonna find us a place to stay.”
As we all twirled around, I said, “I saw him go in the bathroom. Gunning! You can come out now!”
Gunning emerged skeptically from the waterless bathroom. I shone the light on him as though he were an actor shyly coming onstage to accept an award. “Is it safe?”
Alessio said, “We don’t know. I guess Jack Hoffman could be outside right now. But we’re gonna meet him tomorrow. You three just go get hotels. Alessio and I’ll take the heat if Hoffman busts on in.”
I added, “Though I doubt he will. I mean, he knows we’re armed. We’re the notorious crime couple, so we’ll take the flak. I don’t want to get these guys in trouble.”
Denmark protested that he wanted to have our back, but eventually we shoved them out the door.
Nobody seemed to be lying in wait for us, and I wondered how precise Hoffman’s geofence could be.
Back in the warehouse, we jammed a two-by-four under the doorknob, a feeble defense against Hoffman’s blitzkrieg.
We made our sleeping bags as comfortable as could be, leaning against the wall as a headboard.
We both probably thought the same thing.
Winter was coming on and we’d need to find a place to settle down, to change identities, to meld into the background.
I rested my head on Alessio’s bare shoulder as we lay side by side. “I wonder what kind of place Gunning is looking at for us to stay?”
His voice resonated through me. “I got the impression it was a trailer court.”
“Oh.” I perked up. “That’d be perfect. We could stay there long enough to pretend we’re the kids of Pickett Yarborough, get him on our side. He could be our spy.”
I could practically feel Alessio grin under his horseshoe moustache. “Old people love to be spies. Play games.”
I forked my fingers through his chest hair. “What do you want to do when we finally find a place to call home? Who do you want to become?”
It was obvious he’d thought about it, as we all probably had. “Become Ignaz Semmelweiss.”
I frowned. “Isn’t that a real guy?”
“Wow. You really are educated. Okay. I’ll become Neil Downs, composer. If I just sell compositions I wrote hardly anyone will see me.”
Sitting up, I faced him. “But you love performing. That’s your joy in life.”
He looked at the far wall. “I can’t risk anyone recognizing me, even if we find a safe place. They don’t know I killed the prison guard. But they know I killed Les Moore.”
“Les Moore was a pedo. You could cut and dye your hair. Turn your soul patch into a ducktail.” I knew facial hair was part of Alessio’s image, but it’d be worth it to see him perform.
Again. Of course I’d watched many of his show videos after first meeting him.
His arrogant confidence, his smirking talking head, his flowing arms with the baton, it was overwhelming.
There was something thrilling about him commanding a symphony of horn players, two drummers, a few guitarists other than himself, a crazed, blurry percussionist.
And he sometimes performed shirtless.
His chest heaved with a sigh. “I suppose I could. But facial recognition would bust me in a hot minute.”
I sighed too. “I wonder if they could let you off on the Moore thing. Self-defense and all. Protecting the kids. The kids would back you up.”
“I’m sure they would. But I wouldn’t want to put them through more grief. What will you do when we find a safe place?”
Of course, I’d pondered forever on it. But opening a recovery facility again would be far too obvious. “Maybe I’ll run for mayor.”
This tickled Alessio so much, he lifted my chin and kissed me deeply. It also seemed to give him an idea, and he reached for his phone. I saw he was texting Jack Hoffman. He wrote:
“Someday they’ll go down together
Side by side with their crew.
To few it’ll be grief,
to the law a relief
but it’s death for Alessio and Tru.”
“We could pretend to die?” I suggested as he replaced his phone face down on the floor.
I adored that grin. He shrugged lightly. “Why not?”
Our noses almost touched. “I love you,” I found myself cooing.
Before I could even have a chance to gasp at my own audacity, Alessio said, “I love you too, you cock o’the walk.”
We were cemented for all eternity.