Page 2 of Love, Lines, and Alibis
Of course, there was one person I did recognize, even if both of us seemed to be doing everything in our power to avoid one another. I’d even taken the stairs up to my apartment on many occasions to prevent being stuck with him in the elevator. And I’m not exactly your always-take-the-stairs-and-count-your-steps health-nut Californian.
David was there on the street as well. Now, please don’t read his name the American way (DAY-vid) but the Spanish way (dah-VEED) as he’s a proud third-generation Angeleno of Mexican and Argentinian descent.
David, naturally, was being his most obnoxious, helpful self. He assured everyone there was nothing to fear and that the fire department was already on its way. I’m sure he’d checked to confirm that was true. He might have even had more than one source who corroborated that fact. He was thorough if anything else. He kept asking by name about neighbors from whom I hadn’t heard in my life, making sure they were all accounted for. The guy was leading a head count, for fuck’s sake! He even went as far as taking his own light-down jacket and giving it to a woman in her seventies who was wearing a T-shirt and shorts. Sure thing, she hugged him. I can’t blame her. He’s all six feet of manly huggable splendor.
I guess you can draw your own conclusions now. I’m a socially awkward screenwriter who’d just woken up that day and whose idea of a nightmare is having to call a restaurant to make a reservation. David is a city reporter who’d probably been up since five that morning, gone for a run, volunteered in some place or other, and already filed an error-free story and sent it to his adoring editor.
Go ahead, take his side. All our former common friends did it anyway. I’m told he’s more fun and engaging to be around.
David gets on my nerves because I’m a heartless spoiled bitch. That and, you may have guessed it, there’s an entangled backstory. I’m gonna make this short because I hate when a tale gets stopped for the exposition dump portion, and I interrupted the narration when a possible fire was developing.
David and I were friends in college, and then we were best friends, and then we made out and kept doing it and then, at some point, we sort of started officially dating. We even moved in together and shared a cramped one-bedroom Art Deco bungalow in Central LA with a historically original (if malfunctioning) kitchen. We broke up about two years ago, left the bungalow, and by some mischievous turn of fate ended up renting separate units in the Eastern Columbia during the same week. They were having a sale.
Now you know.
Back to the spillage of humans on Broadway Street.
The firetruck arrived then and, to my dismay, most of the neighbors started clapping and cheering. We still had to wait for almost forty more minutes though. If it wasn’t because my agent had agreed to meet a fifteen-minute walk away from there—she was willing to drive from Beverly Hills to Downtown with the excuse of trying a vegan ramen spot in Grand Central Market—I’d be calling her and asking for a postponement. But even if the firefighters took the rest of the morning, I could simply drop by as I was, though I didn’t recall having checked myself in a mirror that day. If I told Beatrice (my agent) that I’d been in a fire, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind me looking a bit disheveled. And she would not be able to accuse me of not taking my career seriously.
She’d complained about that on a couple of occasions during the last few months, but I’m focusing again on unimportant things.
Returning to the fire. We were informed by one of the firefighters that there was no trace of actual flames anywhere in the building. They believed the alarm had been triggered by accident. I wasn’t surprised. The least interesting or exciting possibility tends to be the one that happens. As a screenwriter, I was well aware that real life tends to be far duller than fiction. Also, with the ability humans have to do things they aren’t supposed to do, I wondered why fire alarms weren’t triggered accidentally more often.
But of course, with my bad luck that morning—cold, unshowered, and improperly attired—everything wasn’t over yet. Rumor had it (and rumor at the Eastern Columbia always arrived via the apartment 10B tenant—our resident gossip) that there had been a death in the building.
A violent one.
3
“They found a body!” the apartment 10B tenant kept proclaiming as a small group of residents gathered around him. “That’s why they’re not letting us back in.”
“What do you mean they found a body, George?” asked David in a taking-charge tone. I rolled my eyes, irritated at him. He’d been talking to another elderly neighbor but had obviously kept his ears open and was now coming to inquire about this unexpected development.
Let me tell you, the only reason I know the face of the tenant at apartment 10B, other than the fact that he’s a fucking blabbermouth and impossible to ignore, is that he’s my next-door neighbor. I live in 10A. David is in 2D, yet he knew the dude is called George. He may have even known his last name and where he’d moved from before coming to the building.
“I was making my way downstairs to get my car since the firefighter captain had told us there was no fire in the building,” started George in his perfectly modulated tone. He loved an audience. I recalled him telling me that he was a voice actor who mainly did audiobooks. “I took the stairs because there’s still a lot of activity around the elevators, but I couldn’t make it past the basement door. I heard something about a body they found at the underground parking area.”
“Again, what do you mean a body?” insisted David. I knew his journalistic instincts were piqued. He’d grill George until he got a satisfying and clear answer out of him. A quotable answer.
“I don’t know. The firefighters saw me then and forced me to get out. Apparently, we aren’t allowed back inside yet.” George sighed. “But I think I saw a dropped shoe. And blood,” he added dramatically.
One of the neighbors gasped. Another one said he felt faint. David promptly grabbed the potentially fainting person by the elbow and guided him to sit on one of the chairs from the sidewalk coffee shop at the corner of the Eastern Columbia. David then promised to return with water for everyone. I rolled my eyes for the umpteenth time.
Only once David was out of my sight and not distracting me did I realize a man was staring at me from the other side of the street. I can’t explain why, but he made my hair stand on end.
Cars from the LA Police Department started arriving then. Some were patrol units with uniformed officers inside but others were unmarked black SUVs with agents garbed in the most odious business wear. It almost looked as if we were in a low-budget episode ofBoschor some other Michael Connelly TV adaptation. I even checked for cameras. But they were not there—not yet. And when I checked again, the creepy dude standing on the other side of the sidewalk was nowhere to be seen.
“Brought water,” said David, distributing the plastic bottles among the neighbors. He made sure the person who had actuallynotfainted got one first.
“Toma,” he told me in Spanish, handing me a bottle. That was a new precedent: David talking to me in plain daylight for the first time since the breakup.
“Thanks,” I replied, stunned, but he’d already moved on to other people in need of hydration and comfort.
The police cordoned off the entrance to the building with yellow tape, and it occurred to me that George may have been telling the truth after all and not just trying to be the center of attention.
“What happened?” I asked one of the uniformed officers. When I didn’t get a reply, I added, “Someone said there was a body...”
“You a neighbor?” The officer, a woman in her thirties, pen and notebook in hand, asked me.
