“Do you believe in monsters? No? You should and I’ll tell you why…” Detective Yates takes a drag off his Camel to let the question linger in the air as thick as the smoke he exhales. “Monsters,” he continues, “are very real. If you keep your eyes open on the streets you will see them.”
”Oh, come off it Sir. You don’t honestly expect me to believe that there are vampires and werewolves running around Oakland do you?” The rookie hasn’t learned respect for his partner and that could get him killed someday. The funny thing about it is Detective Yates just laughs and takes another puff off his cancer stick.
”Not Vampires or Werewolves, no, but Trolls, Ogres and even a Dragon.” He’s baiting the rookie with a nice fat worm of truth. The worm sits heavily in front of the younger man as he gawks unsure of how to react. Detective Yates is stone cold serious.
Detective Yates is a pale, soft spoken, old man. Nearly retired and working the beat. If you ask him he’s nothing more than a ghost. A worthless specter that does little more than remind people of those who had long gone. If you caught his squad car driving around you’d think to yourself that it was little more than a figment of your imagination. One clean cop in a city this grimy? Yeah fucking right. The police force is a joke, little more than a collective Gollum, feed them a little paper and they’ll do anything you ask.
”Speaking of monsters kid, this here is one of Oakland’s original monsters. He’s a troll and shit I’ve seen him sleep under plenty of bridges, mostly he just gets into fights with people. Mostly he wins.” Yates points out Tony, a street thug, as he stumbles out of an alleyway with blood on his hands. The kid can’t help but stare, as if in awe, at the stone hard face and the long, deep scar.
”How’d that happen?”
”The scar you mean?”
”Yeah.”
”A long time ago, shit probably twenty five years or so, there was a crime boss known as the Dragon. A real monster. He used to employ other monsters down by the rail road tracks, mostly transients, who would steal from who ever they saw. One night this kid, some punk nobody ever heard of, gets flipped for some cash and he strikes back. He makes a fountain out of several of the guys’s necks and then watches them bleed to death. Just walks away, with out a fucking word, about six months later he walks into a local bar over on Apgar, a place called Krainz Woods, named after it’s owner.”
Detective Yates offers to show it to the rookie if he wants to see it, but the rookie declines. “Once, the door man, an ogre, they call him Mac, he leveled a kid that had walked right in and took a seat at the bar. He hadn’t done anything and Mac is normally a statue. They beat the shit out of each other and Mac used a straight razor to slice the kids face vertically. Mac couldn’t over power Tony in a group, let alone by himself, and ended up losing a lot of blood and getting a knife in his shoulder. Old man Krainz himself told Tony he isn’t allowed in that bar anymore but Mac never presses it. They say he feels bad for Tony after what happened to some slut he was fucking, some succubus named Victoria. See man, monsters exist.”
The light changes, red to green, and the squad car pulls away. The ugly fucker, Tony, wanders down Apgar Blvd in a daze.
Tony was walking off a pint of Hennessy when he heard the yelling. The screams remind him of when he was young and his old man used to beat his mom. Music was his outlet then but now he’s just a bitter old man and the only thing that warms him does it from the inside. He laughed as he heard the couple bicker.
This guy is yelling at some girl but Tony can’t quite figure out why. Her choking sobs are an awful mix of mucus and gasps of sour air. Her crying and begging didn’t exactly cut through Tony, not until he saw her face. Maybe it was the liquor, maybe it was because he missed her with all his heart, but Tony could have sworn it was Victoria.
This Golgothan hit her, right in front of Tony, and at that moment all he could see was Victoria’s face. Her large, almond shaped eyes and her strong cheek bones. He couldn’t believe it when he saw her blood. It reminded Tony of the night he realized Victoria was gone. She walked out with lips so red they glistened in the neon light of the motel’s “no vaca cies” sign. The “n” in vacancies had burned out.
You see, Tony and Victoria used to crash in any motel they could find. Tony never understood why she loved him but he wasn’t about to ruin a good thing by asking questions. Shit. Between that musky sent of hers and the way she would breathe while they fucked, man, you wouldn’t have wanted to rock the boat either.
In the alleyway, though, Tony watches as this shit demon uses his hot and stale breath to turn a beauty like hers to anguish. Looking at them, you would swear they are lovers by the way they stand, the way his hand holds the back of her head. If you watch for another second you’d realize you are wrong. He is yelling at her about money, and about pain.
The dirt bag that stank of human waste had something hidden under his coat and Tony can’t tell exactly what it is so he thinks about his actions. It could be a knife, the black hilt is dull and almost metallic looking. It could be a pistol.
The junk in the alleyway isn’t anywhere near sturdy enough to use as a weapon and Tony forgot to bring his old forty-four, what a useless fuck this asshole is. There is nowhere to run if he fails. No back up plan. Tony is up shit creek with out a paddle. He is like the US military in Iraq, no exit strategy.
The woman this brute is hassling is named Judy, she’s a hooker and her prices are higher than what this shit head has in his pocket. Lowlifes who can’t get laid know that the broads here are easy pickings. No pimps to worry about, just girls who can’t afford to live so they turn an easy trick just to get some dinner or to cover their rent. I think Reagan called this the trick around economy. Tony spots fear in Judy’s eyes as another fist pounds her rib cage.
Step out of the shadows you worthless prick, he thinks to himself. Save her like you couldn’t save Victoria. Do somethin’, anythin’ to stop this fucktard from crossin’ the line. If you die tonight at least it’s to save a girl who reminds you of when you was happy.
The smells gets stronger as Tony gets closer, still twenty feet away but close enough to know this dame isn’t nothing like Victoria. Her lipstick is smudged and her eyes are red, bloodshot. The side effects from dealing with trash like this. It’s been a long cool night and Tony can tell by her swollen eyes that Judy has had enough.
”Hey, shit stain!” Tony blurts out with out thinking of his safety. He can’t take any chances, but startling his foe just might do the trick.
”Whachawan ya bum? I’m busy wid ma ol’ lady,” said the man in the alleyway. His voice is ashen and unfriendly, the booze made his words run together and Tony realizes that he can do something. He can take him out. “Asshole. Do. You. Mind?” He swayed gently in the wind and eyed Tony wildly.
He can’t focus and he sure as hell can’t fight a grown ass man. Not tonight. Tony walks over to him, slowly, and watches him teeter. He can smell the awful, stale breath from fifteen feet away and it makes Tony want to hurl. This behemoth is putrid, it is no wonder Judy raised her prices tonight.
His dirty, blood stained hands hold a nasty rust covered metal object. Tony is lucky, it is only a knife, dull and rusty, but shit an infection is the least of his worries at this point.
That night’s booze hasn’t harmed Tony nearly as much as it had the shit demon, Tony caught the Golgathan in the face with his right fist. Then Tony reaches his hand around to the back of shit for brains head and brings it down onto his knee. The Golgothan is unconscious and the knife clatters to the ground. Tony picks up the blade and runs it across the neck of his fallen enemy. A mercy kill.
Tony breathes heavily and he stinks of sweat. His mind can’t let go of Victoria. Tony thinks to himself, I should tell her to run from this fucked up town before she ends up dead, like Victoria. All Tony could think about was the body he saw. Her beautiful, almond shaped eyes. Her soft, round lips. The tangled locks of hair and her mocha skin. The blood, dry on her lips. She stared at him that morning, unflinching, cold and dead. Tony knows he needs another pint and he walks back to Krainz Woods.
The thing about Krainz Woods is this, it’s a shit hole bar made for shit hole people and the seediest creatures of the night duck away into the shadows to give men like Tony a place to sit. The bar is full of stale air, smoke and gloom. The despair is so thick and heavy it seems to slow down the music from the jukebox. Billie Holiday’s broken voice stretches over heartbreaking anthems of loneliness and Tony orders another pint of Hennessey.
”You okay hun? I’ve never seen ya pound these back so fast. Don’t get stupid on the sauce, cup cake.” Julie slides the glass to the ugly street thug with a sad glance. “Tony I swear you are the saddest sight I’ve ever seen. Ain’t you got a love somewhere?”
”No. She’s dead.”
”How’d she die?”
”It’s a long story.”
”Tell me, I got time.”
”When Victoria left me, it wasn’t because she was unhappy, she didn’t need money to be happy, lord knows I didn’t have any, but that wasn’t why she left. No, she left me cuz I… She didn’t kick my ass out to the curb, she simply walked out of the dirt bag motel and blew me a kiss. Her dark red lipstick cracked as she smiled and opened the door. She left cuz…” Tony takes a deep breath, a pause in his story.
”Go on, Tony, I’m listenin’ to ya,” Julie’s soft voice encourages Tony.
”Victoria said, ‘I still love you Tony. I don’t want you to think other wise,’ as she walked out the door. Her words at the time seemed hollow and empty. Now I regret not sayin’ anythin’ back. She left me with what should have been hope, instead I turned it into anger. Fierce, awful anger.” He drinks from his pint and sits a little heavier on his bar stool.
”I thought you was gonna tell me how she died?”
”I am, but you see, me and Victoria, we had an understandin’ back in the day. She would love me no matter what as long as I tried to keep myself away from the dope. I couldn’t hold down no job, shit, I didn’t even have a place to live outside of a night or two at some fuck joint that charges by the hour. Victoria, she lived out in the suburbs, she made the mistake of walkin’ in here one night.
”Victoria walked in smellin’ like cinnamon and those eyes exploded with a clear white shine, strong contrast from the dark skin surroundin’ them. Her hair straightened with relaxant and her shoulders slanted with a tilt that emphasized her breasts. Not a guy in the joint didn’t notice her, and every other two-bit dame in the place had the look of jealousy flash across their faces.”
”Must’a been before I started. How long ago was this?” Julie asks, as she leans over the bar showing more cleavage than she realizes. Cat calls come from the other patrons and she focuses on Tony’s cold, tired eyes.
”She left me four years ago last August, it was a hot night the night she left me. The middle of another god damn long, dry, and hot as fuck summer and the only thin’ I could do was stay in that room, meltin’. The liquor wasn’t cuttin’ me any slack either. I could handle mine but that night it was straight rum, one fifty one. Nasty as hell and drier than the asphalt outside in the August sun, but I couldn’t just let her memory wear me down, so I drank it.
”Bitterness and anguish go together like rum and coke, but the mini-bar in the room wasn’t stocked with cola. I laid in my misery, my doubt and my despair danced together around me. I was crippled, never has a wound shocked my body so much and I’ve been shot, stabbed, beaten, none of that hurt as much as watchin’ Victoria close that damn door for the last time.”
”Tony, you seem so sad. You need a love for the night? My girl Thess has a place and her rents comin’ up. She could make ya happy for the night.”
”Sad? Yeah I’m sad. If I’d been sober I might have killed myself that night. My arms were dead weight and my old forty four sat between my legs. I still didn’t have a clue why she loved me in the first place. Shit, she was better off without me and I knew it. She did too.”
”Nobody is too good for nobody else Tony, you should a talked that bitch inta stayin’ with ya.”
”Maybe, but who the fuck can say for sure? I ain’t been good, hell I been down right nasty a couple of times.”
”You never done nothin’ that bad have ya?”
”I killed someone, hell, killed lotsa people, but this one time, I killed… The sweat in my eyes stang, I couldn’t feel nothin’ but the burnin’ in my eyes. The world was a blur and the only thin’ I could think about was the figure walkin’ towards me. It laughed at my impotent posture. ‘Pathetic,’ it said and laughed again. The sound of its laughter made my heartache. I gritted my teeth and focused all my energy into punchin’ enough adrenaline into my shoulder. I told myself, ‘Lift the pistol. Lift it. Shoot.’”
”You get ‘im?”
”A loud clap of thunder sent shivers up my arm. The Smith and Wesson burned in my tight fist but my body was freezin’ cold. My breathin’ was halted. I couldn’t hear the body laughin’, or breathin’, or hittin’ the ground. I couldn’t see anythin’. Between the sweat, the tears and the residue in the air, there might as well have been a brick wall between us.”
”But you got out, alright, right?” Julie is locked into the story now, she can’t take her eyes off Tony.
”My body was ice cold and a warm liquid was meltin’ my flesh. The contrast was unbearable but I couldn’t move my arms, I couldn’t wipe the blood away. I was spent, the pop gun fell into my lap, heavier than you could ever imagine. My arm was dead. Never has my body laid so still. I breathed again, slowly, then I looked into her eyes one last time.”
”Her eyes? Who was it?” Tony sits and stares at his drink. “Tony. I swear ta God if you’d just clean up a bit you could do good for yourself. Get a real job. Stop spending all ya time here with me and find you a nice girl.”
”I don’t need a fuckin’ lecture Julie, I need a stiff drink. Keep ‘em comin’.”
Looking at Tony, you wouldn’t think he is much, you might think he is hired a goon at most, but the people who know the shadows in Oakland know Tony is not to be fucked with. A real cut throat – literally.
Shit, back in the day when Tony was walking along the rusted rail road tracks that run parallel to Oakland’s inner harbor, several zombies tried to dip him for what ever they could get. They got what he had alright, a straight razor. At only sixteen the monster was in the making. You would not have believed your eyes to see it. A kid, a punk, a nobody, standing above three cold bodies, staring with the eyes of hate. The blood was everywhere, dripping off the sleek metal of his open razor. Stars danced in the murky puddles that hadn’t quite been soaked in by the dirt just yet. Somewhere that night a train’s whistle broke the air in two.
Tonight is different. Tony is getting old, almost forty and still alone, living in a hovel, a hole in the wall, a dirt cheap, one room apartment that didn’t even have hot water. It might, if Tony ever paid his gas bill, shit, if he could afford the bills he just might stay on top of ‘em, but being out of legit work changes a man’s mind, makes his priorities different. If it weren’t for McAllister’s Pawn Shop over on Apgar, this gruff and unshaven man wouldn’t even have money to buy himself the wetness that burns his throat.
”Tony, you drive here tonight?” Julie asks as she slides another pint towards the shamble of a man some might call her friend. “You can crash in the back if ya want, just don’t tell Krainz. He’d have a fuckin’ fit, ya know?”
”I’m walkin’ so you ain’t gotta worry about nothin’ happenin’ to nobody but me.”
”Aiight darlin’ but that’s ya last one. I ain’t tryin’ to kill my best customer.”
Julie is one of the few sweet souls still living in the inner city. Though don’t think it’s a miracle she hasn’t been killed or worse in this bar. Truth is the only reason she ain’t been touched is the Sawed Off under her counter. That, combined with the hoodlum in black standing beside the doorway, a living wall they call Mac. Mac only moves his large body if there is a problem, and even then the first thing he does is swing that redwood trunk they call his neck around to look the problem dead in his eye. Usually that’s enough. The crowds get rowdy, don’t think this is a dead joint, but there is only so much Krainz will allow and his hired goon knows just when that breaking point is about to snap.
Oakland’s finest rarely patrols around Krainz Woods, even though on any given night they know they can pick up some of the more ruthless hoodlums this town has ever seen, but that would put ol’ Krainz out of business so he throws a couple G’s at the police force every month to keep ‘em quiet.
The police force in Oakland is a joke, with fewer than five hundred officers for the whole city, very little policing gets done. Corruption is found at every level of course, not just from Krainz, but from every crook that needs a break. All the cops are guilty of taking a little cash now and then, or some free pussy from the local prostitutes. Some of the higher ups are even known to Hoover vacuum a line of coke every now and then. The only man on the force who is clean is the hard nosed detective Yates.
Detective Yates isn’t blind to what goes on around him. He ain’t stupid, not by a long shot. He just wants to retire and be done with the whole business.
Yates can already see inside Krainz Woods, his imagination is vivid and sharp and it doesn’t hurt a lick that he knows the place, and the people there, inside and out. Julie is probably telling ugly ass Tony that he’s got his last bottle of Hennessy, and Mac is staring down a young punk at the pool table. Some idiot frat boys come in and pick up a game. Poor kids don’t know what they got themselves into tonight. Putting Pearl Jam’s “Do the Evolution” on the jukebox, killing Tony’s soul by killing off Billie Holiday’s scathing voice, then one of the kids, name of James, he’s hustling the tables and is making a killing. Enticing guys to play and fork over the cash as he puts his college math to good use.
The six ball goes in, all the solids are down except the 8 ball and James has the stick. His beady eyes focus on the corner pocket. His opponent is the young flashy street thug called Kool. Normally, Kool is made of Ice. He’s the fucking abominable snowman. Tonight? Kool is boiling over in anger and is ready to start a fight, a beer bottle smashing bar brawl like Krainz Woods has never seen. Yeah, that’s what he’s fixing to do.
Tony gets up from his bar stool and stumbles past the pool table and bumps into James as he takes his shot. Scratches. Scratches on the fucking eight ball and it’s all that retarded fucks fault! Can you believe it? Three hundred bones because of this ass hair! Kool smiles as he picks the cash up off the corner of the table and calls it a night. He knows when his luck has come up. James on the other hand throws a fist at Tony, landing it dead on the scar that runs down his face.
”What… the fuck… is the matter… with you?” Tony staggers and reaches out and snags James’s skull and slams it into the pool table. The green velvet is stained and old Mac knows the line has just been crossed. He scrapes his knuckles on the tables as he walks by, barely wanting to lift them until he strikes.
Tony is getting kicked out of his favorite bar tonight and some kid might end up in the hospital. Why? All because of some bad memories. Leaving before Mac can even lay a hand on him, Tony walks the streets of Oakland, drunk, depressed and out of his mind. It ain’t the first time and it damn sure won’t be the last.
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