Grave on Grand Avenue Page 2

  “Shut up, Rickie,” Nay says, then turns back to me. “Look, Ellie, you have a real job. You’re not a professional Dumpster diver like some people.” She gestures toward the Mohawk.

  Rickie swallows. “Ah-ah, I prefer upcyler. You should have seen what I did to an old lampshade frame. Covered it with my lola’s old nightgown. Sold it for twenty bucks on craigslist.”

  The rest of us cringe in unison at the image of Rickie’s grandmother sans nightie. I shake my head free of that picture, as Nay directs her attention back to her food, generously sprinkling Japanese chili powder on top of her ramen. “Look, what I mean is that you can afford a new car. Like, actually new. “

  “Yeah, get some decent wheels.” Rickie devours a plate of gyoza, which had probably been Benjamin’s order. Rickie describes himself as a free spirit. Unfortunately, we’re the ones who usually end up paying for his freedom. “Last time we all went to that fund-raiser for the Legal Center, everyone was giving the Green Mile dirty looks. I even had to apologize to the valet.”

  But you didn’t feel bad enough to give him a tip, I think.

  The four of us continue chatting about nothing of consequence—our specialty—as we finish our meal. Even though I don’t get much love for the Green Mile, I do feel better. But then, I always feel better after hanging out with my friends, especially Nay.

  As I lay ten dollars on the plastic bill tray to pay for my meal, Benjamin unexpectedly grabs my wrist and holds it tight while Nay and Rickie continue to jabber away on the other side of the table.

  “We need to talk sometime. Just you and me,” he says softly, so the other two can’t hear.

  “Okay,” I say, trying to sound as casual as possible. He’s wearing his faded red plaid shirt, my favorite. And he’s close enough that I can smell the soap on him. “How about right now?”

  “Hey, guys,” he then announces loudly, getting Nay’s attention. “I have to take off. See you around.”

  And like that, his backpack on his shoulder, he’s gone. What just happened? I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do. Follow him? He didn’t give me a chance; he disappeared too quickly.

  In any case, we’ve paid the bill and are all about to leave, so soon I’m also saying my good-byes to Nay and Rickie, who are off to the PPW library to do some studying. The streets of Little Tokyo are relatively empty for a Sunday night. There are a few groups of people our age mixed in with single Japanese men in T-shirts and flip-flops. Before I walk to the Little Tokyo station, I text Benjamin:

  When do you want to talk?

  But he doesn’t call or text back, and I start wondering whether I, again, am reading too much into nothing.

  * * *

  The next day at work, Johnny Mayhew and I are assigned to patrol Grand Avenue, just past the courthouse around Walt Disney Concert Hall. Apparently, a bunch of jurors have been jaywalking across First Street from jury parking to the courthouses, and yesterday a DASH bus sideswiped one of them. Luckily, the bus was pulling into one of its stops, so it wasn’t traveling too fast. The pedestrian got away with her life intact but her leg broken. And now we’re here to try to keep the other pedestrians in line.

  I remember a teaser I saw for the six o’clock news last night—something about a bus running over a pedestrian, as if the woman had been innocently strolling on the sidewalk or within the crosswalk lines when the bus mowed her down. No mention that she’d actually been running through a red light and across four lanes of traffic during rush hour. Plus, we found out this morning that she was actually high on painkillers at the time. That juicy detail is not going to make it on tonight’s news.

  Because of all the hype, Johnny and I are essentially crossing guards on bikes today. Even Grandma Toma could do what I’m doing today, and she’s eighty-eight with hammer toes on both feet.

  “This is so lame,” says Johnny. He has a slight stammering problem, but it doesn’t seem to come out around me. Which I can either take as a compliment: he’s comfortable around me; or as an insult: he doesn’t view me as intimidating. I choose to take it as a compliment, because why not? It’s going to be a mighty long morning regardless.

  We’re on the side of the concert hall. Thanks to my father, Mr. “Rah-Rah” Los Angeles, my brother, mother and I were all in the building the day it opened. There was a free concert to show off the hall’s acoustics, which are definitely state of the art. The stage is made of cedar from Alaska, and the whole thing is built so that it sounds awesome from every seat in the house.

  Johnny, who’s more into extreme sports than the arts, has never stepped inside the concert hall. “Looks like a crushed beer can,” he says about Frank Gehry’s masterpiece.

  I don’t bother to tell him that the “beer can” cost close to one hundred fifty million dollars.

  Both of us need to use the restroom, so after the jurors are all safely inside the courthouse, we ride down Grand Avenue toward the artists’ entrance. There’s a fancy restaurant connected to the hall, and we’ve used its bathroom in the past. Johnny goes first while I watch his bike on the corner.

  Businessmen and -women go in and out of the restaurant, their eyes fixated on their smartphones. People of my parents’ generation complain about millennials being addicted to social media and high tech, but I’m not the one posting food porn on Facebook after every three-figure meal. In fact, the academy advised us not to have much of a presence on the Internet. Not only could it affect our professional career advancement, but it could be plain dangerous, especially if a pissed-off perp started following our activities.

  That’s not to say that law enforcement isn’t all over social media. LAPD has an official Facebook and Twitter account, and we have investigators checking social media all the time. While community relations people are sending out Tweets and photos of smiling police officers volunteering at toy drives, detectives are combing through public Facebook photos and posts from criminal suspects and persons of interest, monitoring who’s hanging out with whom and where. It amazes me how stupid people can be—flipping gang signs with known underworld figures on Instagram while claiming to be as innocent as newborn babies. Those images aren’t going away, not even when the subjects attempt to delete them.

  Unlike a lot of my peers, not having a presence on social media isn’t that big a deal to me. I was never much into Facebook, anyway. The PPW Athletic Department used to post photos from our volleyball games on its page; then a bunch of pervs—old ones, too, who hadn’t been in college for at least twenty years—would try to friend me. It made me kind of paranoid, knowing I was being watched by strangers. I didn’t like that feeling.

  So once I got into the Police Academy, I got rid of my existing social media accounts. I did open a new Twitter account, for Shippo Wan Wan, which literally means, “Tail Bow Wow” in Japanese. I only follow a few people, namely Nay, because sometimes she’ll read a Tweet before a text message.

  Being friends with Nay, the Queen of Social Media, also means I’m hardly missing out—she keeps me filled in on anything juicy. Rickie’s totally not into social media, either—he says he’s not going to let the government or Big Business spy on where’s he’s shopping or eating—even though his main activity usually involves a Dumpster, not an exchange of currency. Benjamin does have a Facebook page. He uses a night scene from São Paulo (he’s ethnically Korean, but his family’s originally from Brazil) as his avatar, but he only has posts from other people wishing him a happy birthday. Instagram is more his thing. He’s into taking photographs—never selfies, unless he’s there with other people. Instead, there’s shots of stuff like a cactus in the Mojave desert, the stairs in Silverlake, a man selling paletas from his cart near MacArthur Park, where Rickie lives. Benjamin even has photos of us still in his account. I don’t know why, but recently I’ve started to look up those old Instagram photos. It makes me remember when life seemed way less complicated, maybe even more peaceful. It’s b
ecome a bad habit, though, and I have to remember to turn my phone off before I get sucked in too deep.

  My phone’s not on right now as I stand on the sidewalk on Grand Avenue. Above me on the wall of the artists’ entrance at the concert hall is a huge banner advertising their current performance, Eastern Overtures, and an oversized image of the star cellist, Xu.

  I have no idea whether “Xu” is the guy’s first or last name, but it really doesn’t matter. You know that when a musician is known only by a single name, he or she is bigger than life. Aside from being really bad at both the piano and the guitar, I know hardly anything about classical music. I do know that Beethoven had killer hair, while Bach had either really bad hair or a really bad wig.

  But even I have heard of Xu. I may not actually be sure how he sounds, but I know exactly what he looks like.

  Even if I didn’t, it would be hard to miss the seven-foot-tall image of his face on the banner right above me.

  Nay would call him hot. Heck, I would call him hot, although he’s not exactly my type. He’s got one of those anime character faces, a little emo or femme, some would say. A definite pretty boy. Nice big, sloped brown eyes and a refined chin. A nose that any surgically altered actress would die for.

  Johnny comes out and catches me staring at the banner a few moments too long. I quickly avert my eyes and put on my sunglasses. The last thing I need is the squad room hearing that I was ogling a photo of a male cellist. I’m already considered the biggest nerd in the LAPD Bicycle Coordination Unit. Not only am I a college graduate, which not all my fellow officers are (many just went straight into the Police Academy from high school); I actually got my degree in three years. Add to that my connection to the assistant police chief (aka my aunt Cheryl), and I’m definitely prima donna material.

  Johnny, thankfully, doesn’t seem to have a problem with me, but Mac Lambert, a slightly more senior officer in our unit, has already pegged me as a police princess. We’ve had words and most of them haven’t been good. Like with Benjamin, I’m currently in truce status with Mac, but relations can break down at any minute.

  Mac’s on the radio now, asking us where we are and telling us to get back to post.

  “We better go,” Johnny says.

  “I will,” I say. “Eventually. It’s my turn to pee.” Mac’s not my commanding officer; Tim Cherniss is. I’ll get back to the intersection when I’m good and ready.

  Johnny’s face colors slightly, and before he can stammer out anything else, I hand off my bike to him and walk past a series of concrete stairs in between a building for the artists’ entrance and the concert hall.

  The stairs lead to a small garden that’s wrapped around the oddly shaped building. The gardeners must be adding more plants because I see flats of seedlings and pots of flowers on the stairs. One gardener in maybe his thirties is using a gas-powered blower to brush away dead twigs and dirt from the walkway, and an older guy has his hand around a potted bush with pretty lavender flowers.

  My dad is always on some kind of environmental kick. His latest campaign is drought-resistant plants. He vows that he’s going to transform the front lawn into Joshua Tree. Noah, of course, is hoping to move out before that happens.

  “What do you call that?” I ask the older man about the lavender blooms, wondering whether it’s something Dad might be interested in. The blower that the other gardener is using a few feet away is pretty loud, so the man holding the plant doesn’t immediately respond.

  I repeat the question louder, and switch to Spanish.

  “What you say?” the man asks me—in English—when the younger one gives all of us a break from the blower.

  “The lavender plant. What is it?”

  The gardener smiles widely. I can tell that he’s really into plants. “Gracias.”

  Uh, what? Why is he thanking me? Maybe his English isn’t that great.

  The gardener must have read the puzzled look on my face. “That is the name. Gracias. Gracias sage. Don’t need much water. Grows real strong.”

  Oh. “I like that,” I say. “Well, gracias for Gracias.” I smile back at him, then continue to the restaurant. The maître d’ and I are acquainted with each other, and he knows why I’m there. I take off my helmet and head for the ladies’ room. Inside, it’s cool, the perfect temperature. I wonder for a moment what it would be like to have a regular day job. To wear cute outfits and carry a purse or leather bag to work. To be in an air-conditioned room twenty-four/seven. I consider it for a few seconds and then think, Naaah. I’d go stir-crazy. As I wash my hands, I look at myself in the mirror. My face is a little flushed from being outside all morning. Hair back in a messy French braid. Yup, I’m not meant for the corporate world, and it’s not losing anything by not having me in it.

  When I go through the restaurant, the maître d’ is no longer at the door.

  I soon find out why.

  It’s mass chaos outside.

  A crowd has gathered near where I left Johnny, who is now off of his bike and kneeling next to something on the ground.

  But that something is actually someone: the same gardener who told me about the bush with the lavender flowers. Though he’s not talking now. In fact, he’s not moving. His body is lying at the foot of the stairs, near the Gracias sage, now uprooted from its broken planter, brown soil spilled down the flight of stairs.

  * * *

  Leaping over our sprawled bicycles, I get close to Johnny, who’s kneeling down beside the gardener. “What the hell happened?”

  “I’m not exactly sure. Called it in already. The ambulance is on its way.” Johnny puts an ear to the man’s face. “He’s still breathing.”

  “Barely.” I take his pulse. Weak. “Mister—” I’m at a loss for what to call the gardener. “Sir, sir, can you hear me?”

  “Maybe you should try Spanish.”

  “No, he can speak English. We were talking just a few minutes ago.”

  The gardener’s eyes flutter open for a second. He mouths something, though I can’t quite make it out.

  “Ba-ra-baaaa,” he says.

  I hold his hand. It’s rough and callused. Working man’s hands.

  Some loud talking in another language breaks through the din of the crowd, mainly from a middle-aged Asian man in a white button-down shirt and blue sports jacket. I can recognize enough to know that it’s probably Mandarin Chinese. The man is clearly upset; sweat drips from his eyebrows even though it’s only about seventy degrees, cool for LA. I notice that he’s clutching a huge, shiny purple instrument case, most likely for a cello, from the shape of it. There’s some sort of silver design on one side of the case, but I can’t make out what it is.

  Directly behind and above the man, I spot a familiar pretty face. Specifically, Pretty Face with the aquiline nose and soft brown eyes. Xu. He’s much taller in person than I expected, closer to six feet than my five foot six.

  “Is Eduardo going to be okay?” A thin, middle-aged woman with a spray of freckles on her face approaches us and I get up, knowing that Johnny is keeping an eye on the injured gardener’s vitals. “I’m part of the crew. I was up in the garden when it happened.”

  I could probably take notes faster on my phone, but I opt for the old-school method, pen and paper. I remove my notebook from my pocket and ask for her full name. Wendy Tomlinson. “Tell me what you saw.”

  “That man.” Wendy gestures toward the older Asian man holding the cello. “He pushed Eduardo down the stairs.”

  Before I can even write her accusation in my notebook, another Asian man, this one in a bright neon polo shirt, breaks into our conversation. “I’m the translator for Mr. Xu,” the neon man says. “He would like to make a statement.” He pronounces the name something like “Chew.” I mentally file that away. This whole time I’d thought it was pronounced “Zu.”

  I first think he’s talking about Pretty Face Xu.
But based on his body language, I quickly adjust and realize he’s talking about the middle-aged man. A relative?

  “This is Xu’s father,” the translator confirms.

  Father? I look back at the older man. He bears no resemblance to the star cellist, who must have been blessed with his mother’s looks.

  “I can take your statement in a few minutes. Let me just finish up—”

  “How could you?” It’s the younger gardener, the one with the blower. He has large dark eyes, the whites now rimmed in pink. He points a finger toward Mr. Xu. “Why did you try to kill my uncle?”

  At the word kill, Mr. Xu’s face visibly darkens. I suspect he actually knows more English than he lets on. He nudges the translator, who communicates: “That man was trying to steal this cello. Xu’s cello.” The father is still clutching at the purple case. I can see now that the silver spot I’d noticed earlier is a creepy image of a multiheaded bird.

  This is not a good situation. I’m starting to feel that Johnny and I could be in a little over our heads. This isn’t just a routine accident situation, an older gentleman taking a tumble down the stairs. We are suddenly talking about an alleged robbery attempt on one side, and an alleged intent to cause harm on the other. I don’t know how much that cello is worth, but it’s probably a small fortune. Johnny and I need reinforcements. After getting Wendy Tomlinson’s contact information, I call Jay Steinlight, the watch commander on duty, and let him know what’s going on. “We may need a Chinese-speaking officer, too,” I add. “Mandarin, not Cantonese.”

  As soon as I end my conversation with Steinlight, I see that Johnny has his hands full. The younger gardener and Mr. Xu are starting to circle each other like angry cats. “Get ’em outta here, Ellie,” mutters Johnny, who hasn’t left the injured gardener’s side.