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Chapter 22
According to Grafton’s pay stub, he worked a split shift as a dishwasher at Villa Marsala on Tuesdays. His break between shifts was between 3 and 4, which coincided closely enough with Timothy and Charles’ schedule to warrant an investigation.
Villa Marsala was on Smith Avenue, directly across from the new Post Office. From half a block away, the aroma of pizza was already pulling them in like a tractor beam.
“It’s 3:15,” Charles said, checking his wristwatch as they peddled along, “we might’ve missed him already.”
As they pulled within sight of Villa Marsala, they could see the Mustang in the far corner of the parking lot. The only other car in the lot at this hour was the beat-up delivery car with the plastic Villa Marsala sign on top.
The Post Office had a convenient bike rack. After locking up their bikes, they crossed the street, then paused on the sidewalk, pretending to look at a faded poster for a lost dog stapled to a splintery telephone pole.
They looked from the restaurant to the car and back again. Nothing was happening.
The smell of the pizza seemed to intensify. Timothy pictured the tomato sauce bubbling up through the cheese like hot lava.
“Maybe we should get a slice,” he whispered.
Charles, as if his stomach were not also grumbling at the moment, held up a single finger. The cloak of invisibility he was conjuring required absolute focus.
At precisely the right moment, Charles made his move, walking casually yet catlike across the parking lot. Timothy followed close behind, thinking maybe they’d do a little surveillance first, then get a slice.
Slowly they approached the Mustang. Putting visor-like hands above their brows to cut the glare, they leaned up against glass and looked in. Maybe there’d be a clue in plain sight. There seemed to be a slight grunting sound coming from somewhere.
Then, something in the backseat moved.
Charles and Timothy both jumped back.
“What the fuck was that?” Timothy said, trying to keep up with Charles as they rapidly retreated to the Post Office across the street. Charles shrugged but didn’t answer, he didn’t know either.
The Post Office was actually perfect because it was such a highly public place. A landscaped berm ran alongside the building, its retaining wall a preferred spot for customers to sit and get organized, either before or after going into the Post Office.
Timothy and Charles perched at the very end of the wall, next to the phone booth and the two outdoor mailboxes. Everyone else was going about their business, not seeming to pay any attention to them.
They each took a textbook from their knapsacks and pretended like they were just doing homework while they were waiting for their moms.
A guy in a suit, who looked like he was on his way home from work, ducked into the phone booth next to them. He didn’t bother shutting the door.
“I’m at Villa Marsala, you know what you want?”
He was probably calling his wife, they could hear him loud and clear.
“Hold on, lemme get a pencil...” he said.
Meanwhile across the street, the Mustang’s door could be observed being kicked open from the inside. A woman emerged awkwardly from the backseat. Shutting the door behind her, she straightened her dress, adjusted her hair and, after looking this way and that, walked off down the street in the opposite direction.
Confused, Timothy looked to Charles, this wasn’t what he was expecting.
Charles took out his pencil and wrote on the back of his spiral notebook in small letters:
“Prostitute”
“Really?” Timothy said in disbelief, looking back at the car.
“So, one half mushrooms and anchovies,” the guy in the phone booth continued, “The other half extra cheese...”
Barely a minute later, the Mustang’s door opened again. Out came Kurt Grafton.
Unlike the woman, who had seemed somehow to be attempting to reclaim her dignity as she put her clothing back in order, Grafton buttoned his black work pants and tucked in his white t-shirt like he couldn’t care less.
No sooner did Grafton begin to make his own way across the parking lot, the door to the pizza delivery car opened and someone came flying out to intercept him. Seemed Timothy and Charles weren’t the only ones watching Grafton.
“Now what’s going on?” Timothy asked.
“I don’t know,” Charles whispered, “Delivery guy looks pissed about something.”
Whatever it was the guy was trying to get out of Grafton, Grafton tried to brush past him once or twice. Then, when the guy wasn’t taking no for an answer, Grafton suddenly snapped.
Pushing him full force, Grafton continued to come at the guy even after he’d flown back five feet and landed on his ass on the hard blacktop. Grafton’s muscular arm flexed as he clenched his fist, Timothy was sure he was going to punch his lights out.
But the guy held up both hands like, okay, okay, take it easy. He got up and into the safety of his delivery car and exited the scene quite quickly.
Timothy and Charles looked around. No one seemed to be seeing any of this but them.
Then, like a madman, Grafton suddenly shifted his gaze across the street and came heading straight for Timothy and Charles. There was no time to move or do anything. Both boys instinctively looked down and pretended to be doing their homework, certain Grafton was about to grab both of them by their collars and yell Why the hell are you following me?
Grafton stopped two feet away from them. He stood staring at the phone booth.
“So, now Ryan doesn’t want olives in the salad?” the guy on the phone was saying to his wife. “Since when doesn’t he like olives?”
“Hey, I’m expecting a phone call,” Grafton said to the phone booth guy.
The guy covered the receiver.
“I’m gonna be a few minutes,” he said to Grafton, then back into the receiver, “Just some guy wants to use the phone...where were we? No olives, and I take it he still doesn’t like onions, anything else?”
Grafton glanced quickly at his watch, growing apoplectic.
Taking a quarter from his pocket, he began using it as a blunt instrument, clack clack clacking on the glass of the phone booth repeatedly, like he was going to shatter it.
“What’s your problem?” the guy said.
“I said, I’m expecting a call,” Grafton said, leaning into the booth right up to the guy’s face. “Get off the phone, dick breath.”
“Janet, I gotta go,” the guy said, hanging up when he realized he was dealing with an unhinged individual.
He almost had to flatten himself to get past Grafton, who was already halfway into the booth before the guy could fully extract himself.
“You need therapy,” the guy called back from safely halfway across the street.
Grafton flipped him off then started yanking furiously on the door to try to get it shut, but the phone rang, so he just gave up and left if open.
“Hello...yeah, I’ll accept, just a minute...”
Digging into his pants pocket Grafton pulled out an angry mitt full of change which he started pumping furiously into the phone. Finally, the call came through.
“Yeah, hey, it’s me...yeah, Mom’s fine...how you holding up in there?”
Charles pointed to a random diagram in his earth science textbook, bolstering the fiction that he and Timothy doing homework together and not listening in on the phone conversation.
“This job is driving me nuts, I’m gonna fucking lose it, they’re fucking riding my ass for twelve straight hours” Grafton was saying. “Yeah I know you’re the one on the inside, but I still can’t deal with this shit.”
Charles took up his pencil again and wrote in tiny letters:
“He’s talking to his brother.”
Timothy stole a glance at the phone booth then quickly back to the textbook before Grafton could see him.
“Look,” Grafton said, then started to lower his voice, “I can pull another IPM job, just gimme the info and I’ll call the guy myself.”
It was almost impossible to keep pretending they were doing homework when they were actually hearing Grafton talk about doing a hit job for IPM with their own ears. Charles reached down and deftly untied his sneaker so he could slowly tie it again while craning his head toward the phone booth.
“Fuck, I gotta add more change,” Grafton said to his brother, then to the operator, “Hold on, hold on, hold on...”
Frantically pulling change from his pocket, he kept feeding the payphone until he’d hit the required amount to keep the line open.
“Fuck me, where were we,” he said, exhaling, then, “Yeah, of course I kept your stuff, it’s in storage...yeah, I can get the other paperwork when I get the IPM thing, I just can’t go till Thursday...of course I’m taking your appeal seriously, I’ve just got another fucking double tomorrow, then a lunch shift Thursday, but I’ll go in the afternoon...”
Charles took the pencil and wrote: Thursday afternoon storage.
“Okay, yeah, sorry...yeah, I gotta go too, I gotta be back in there by four,” Grafton said, wrapping up the conversation. “Okay, okay, we’ll get up there soon...”
Grafton hung up the phone with less force than he’d pounded on the glass earlier, like in the process of talking with his brother the hurricane had begun to wear itself out. He hit the coin return button just in case, but Ma Bell wasn’t giving anything back, even if he’d paid for two minutes longer.
Resigned to having to go back in for his second shift, Grafton actually looked both ways this time before he crossed the street, then disappeared into the service entrance around the back of Villa Marsala.
“You heard that part about the IPM job, right?” Timothy asked.
“I almost cannot believe he said that,” Charles said, “but he did.”
“Man, I wish we recorded that,” Timothy said.
The two boys continued to sit on the Post Office wall, trying to process what had just happened. Then Timothy pointed to the last note Charles had written.
“Didn’t we find a receipt for a storage place on Greenkill?” he asked.
“That’s just what I was thinking,” Charles said. “But I’m also thinking we may want to think twice about continuing to follow this guy.”
“But now we know his next move.”
“Thunderbird, have you not been paying attention? This man is dangerous.”
“Don’t you want to solve this case?”
“I want to see this case solved, yes. But some things are perhaps best left to actual police officers. With guns.”
Timothy continued to look across the street at the Mustang while Charles proceeded to put his textbook back into his knapsack. Whether or not the case would resume Thursday had yet to be confirmed, but for today, the chase was over. He packed his own knapsack, then they went to retrieve their bicycles.
They were two blocks away, the smell of the pizzeria long behind them, when Timothy remembered that they’d never gotten around to getting a slice.
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I love the relationship with his mom’s girlfriend. So sweet. And I loved the tea party report. He’s the odd duck putting into his report what he cares about, not totally doing what is expected of him.
I have a feeling our dynamic duo is not going to call the cops just yet.