The Spia Family Presses On

TWENTY-TWO

A Hell of a Place to Spend the Night

The fall woke me from my head fog, not to mention the hard thud of contact. Thankfully, I was able to land sideways on, of all things, a mattress. After all, if you’re going to get pushed out of a window—Jimmy’s second-story apartment window—isn’t it everyone’s dream to land on something soft or, as in this case, at least relatively soft? The mattress had seen better days thus the reason for it being in a Dumpster. Plus it was a little on the thin side, but at least I didn’t hit pavement. I was thankful to the person who tossed it.

My immediate thought upon landing was that Lisa would be proud of me, that is if I lived long enough to tell her.

Living seemed to be the problem at the moment. As it stood now, I was either extremely drunk or someone had drugged me, either way my consciousness was teetering on the edge of darkness. I knew the feeling quite well, but this time I wanted no part of its drowsy effect.

I kind of remembered the conversation with Lisa’s Emergency Room doctor and survival mode kicked in. I desperately tried to concentrate . . . something about flip-flops and Dumpsters and cut toes and stinky fish made you vomit.

That was it! I needed to vomit.

No easy task considering my hands had somehow been loosely tied behind my back so the old finger down the throat routine was out of the question. Willing myself to vomit had never been part of my repertoire. That was more in the bulimic realm and I was never one for chucking perfectly good food. No, the only thing I could think to do, considering I was surrounded by foul smelling garbage was to inhale something really disgusting.

I thought about my chances of finding a jar of pickled herring, like the good doctor’s mother-in-law had used on the doctor’s nephew, but the chances of finding anything pickled, much less fish, in North Beach was doubtful.

Of course, I had to remove whatever was covering my mouth first.

Minor details when you’re talking about your very survival.

I squirmed off the mattress and wedged myself in between the metal wall of the Dumpster and a particularly putrid smelling ripped bag of rotting food, pasta mostly, with anchovies if I had my stench right. But when I spotted the torn bag of soiled disposable diapers, I knew I’d hit pay dirt. The combination was horrifying, not to mention incredibly rank. Instantly, my stomach began to pitch as I shouldered off what had to be some kind of tape covering my mouth.

Lisa would be pleased with my survival efforts.

My only problem at the moment was I seemed to be functioning on slow speed and my stomach was now on a fast track of disgust. Lucky for me, the corner of the tape hadn’t exactly stuck, and I began to peel it off with the help of something poking out of another bag. It was dark due to a lack of any real street lights in what had to be an alley so I couldn’t make out what I was wiping my face against, nor did I want to, thank you very much.

When the tape was nearly off I took in a big dose of putrefied stink and in a great gush of tummy eruption, my grateful body heaved up the contents of my queasy stomach ripping the rest of the sticky blue tape from my mouth in the process.

After waives of nausea departed and the dry heaves stopped, I was feeling a bit more sober. That’s when my phone chirped in my pocket. I would have given almost anything to be able to answer it, but at the moment I was tied up . . . literally.

It was with those thoughts that I slowly lost all consciousness.

I woke up to the sound of a garbage truck in dreadfully close proximity. At first I couldn’t quite figure out where I was. Then the smells along with the dampness of morning provided a clear picture of a totally gross—stained with God knows what—Dumpster. In all my binge days, and all the strange places I’d awakened, never had I awakened in a more revolting place. It was enough to reaffirm my commitment to sobriety.

My mouth and throat felt thick. I was desperate for water, but no way would I go digging through the firmament to find a drink. I’d die first . . . at least that was my conviction of the moment. If another hour went by without rescue I’d probably have to reconsider.

It was at that moment of dehydration when a thought hit me: I had just spent the entire night inside a Dumpster. I supposed there were worse places to sleep, but at the moment nothing could top this one.

First order of business was to untie my hands before the truck arrived and carried me off to the closest city dump. With my throat dry and sandy, I didn’t think I could scream loud enough to alert the driver he was hauling away a human being.

I was feeling better—as good as anyone could feel who had been drugged, pushed out of a second story window, and spent the night communing with garbage. Now I needed something sharp, the lid from a can would be perfect. Except of course, if this neighborhood recycled I would be shit out of luck. I could only hope there were eco-criminals amongst the folk.

In situations like I was in, there was something to be said for those valiant people who weren’t eco-friendly!

Luckily, my feet weren’t tied and I was able to slip off my Uggs to free up my toes to go searching for the appropriate sharp instrument, hopefully not slicing my own feet in the process. After much searching there were no can lids to be found, but a crafty person has to make do. My trusty toes discovered a lifesaving bag of discarded S&M toys, appropriate for the neighborhood, and I was able to wedge some kind of a black strap dotted with metal spikes under a broken tricycle and poke holes in the tape around my hands enough times to then force a tear.

As I worked, I developed a new fondness for the kinky set.

All the while I poked, that damn garbage truck kept getting closer and closer.

Finally, just when the truck’s brakes squealed to a stop in front of my very Dumpster, the tape loosened and I was able to unbind my hands, push up through the bags of garbage that had been thrown in on top of me overnight and stand up to glorious freedom.

I smiled and waved to the driver while still standing inside the Dumpster.

“What the f*ck?” he said, obviously startled by my presence. “You okay?” he yelled over the roar of the engine, leaning out the window.

“I am now,” I croaked, grinning while I climbed out of my entrapment. When I got closer I said, “You wouldn’t happen to have an extra bottle of water in there, would you?”

He looked me over and made a couple throaty sounds, shook his head, smiled and held up a lovely six pack of water. “How many you want?”

“Just one. Thanks.”

He pulled one off the pack and flung it to me. I caught it, opened it and guzzled the entire bottle, letting the glorious overflow spill down my chin.

“You must’a really tied one on last night, sugar. You sure you’re okay? You don’t look okay, and you certainly don’t look like no bottle collector or free food collector. You look like you’re in the wrong place, sugar.”

I began to tell him what happened, but he didn’t have the patience to listen to my crazy talk.

“All I know is, that’s one hell of a place to spend the night,” he quipped.

“Tell me about it,” I said, tossing the empty bottle into the Dumpster then slipping on my Uggs.

“Look here, you seem like a smart girl, let me give you some advice. That kinda partying don’t get you nothin’ but sorrow. A drink now and then keeps the blood flowing, any more than that and your life ain’t worth shit. You know what I mean?”

“More than you know,” I told him as I leaned against the side of the smelly can.

“You need a lift anywhere or you want me to call somebody?”

“No, thanks. I’m good,” I said, and took a few steps, my legs almost collapsing under me. I figured I was still a little unsteady from whatever I’d consumed.

He gave me a little nod. “Okay, Missy, but you think about what I said, all right?”

“Will do,” I told him and made my way out of the alley to the familiar street in front of me. The piercing high-pitched warning beeps coming from his truck as he backed up did a number on my already aching head and I suddenly felt as if I was going to upchuck again. I told myself to breathe slowly and to put distance between me and the Dumpster, both of which seemed to help.

My keys were gone and so was Dickey’s ring, but miraculously I still had my phone. A few blocks away, I stopped and called Lisa.

“I’ve been calling you all night long,” she scolded as soon as she picked up. “You had me worried sick, and you know I gave up worrying about you years ago, but when Jimmy said you’d been drinking I—”

I didn’t have the strength to get into it. “Can you come and pick me up? I’ll be standing in front of The Steps of Rome.”

It was way too early for the restaurant to be open, but at least she knew exactly where it was. We’d eaten many great meals inside that place.

“On Columbus Street? But Jimmy said you—”

“Just come get me, okay?” And I clicked off. I was feeling a bit sorry for myself and tears weren’t far from the surface.

As I sat on the sidewalk, leaning up against the building, waiting for Lisa, several people tossed dollar bills into my lap. I tried to give back their money, but no one would let me. I actually scared an older woman when I approached her with the dollar. She yelled that she would call the cops if I came any closer. The final blow came when an obvious homeless man with a missing front tooth dropped fifty cents into my lap and told me I needed it more than he did.

I figured I had reached an all time low because I took all the money and bought a large bottle of water along with a box of powdered-sugar donuts from a nearby convenience store, sat back down on the sidewalk and ate every crumb. When I finished, I was covered in white powder and proceeded to collect even more money.

Never underestimate the generosity of the American public.

Twenty minutes later I was opening the passenger door on Lisa’s brand new red BMW, an exact duplicate of the last one. The girl certainly knew how to work the system to get a replacement car that quickly.

“We have to go straight to the orchard before he gets away,” I ordered Lisa as soon as I slid into the passenger seat.

“Who?”

“The killer.”

“Jimmy?”

I shook my head. “Federico.”

She looked genuinely stunned and pushed back in her seat. “Get out! No way,” she squeaked.

“Totally way, that’s why we have to hurry, before he disappears like my dad.”

I reached for the seatbelt and strapped it around me. Lisa made a face. “Good God girlfriend, do you even know how bad you smell? You need a shower, like right now. Shouldn’t I take you to my condo first so you can delouse? You look like hell.” She crinkled her forehead as she pressed a button. All the windows rolled down at once.

“No. There’s no time.” A sense of urgency swept through me, especially since I named him out loud. It was as if he heard me and was now busy packing his hidden guns for a long trip.

“If you weren’t my best friend I wouldn’t even let you come near my expensive new car, let alone sit in it. We’re going to my place, or I’m putting you in a cab.”

“I can’t imagine how much that would cost.”

“Ask me if I care.”

She held her nose.

“You can’t be serious.”

She raised an eyebrow and I knew she was dead serious. No way was she budging. “Okay, let’s go to your condo.” She had both hands on the steering wheel. “What happened to the sling?”

“Thumb’s better, especially since I had it re-wrapped.” She held up a thickly gauzed thumb. “And I can even type with this thing, and drive. Be grateful I didn’t have my mom drive me over or there would be no end to her hysteria once she saw you.”

“That bad, huh?”

“I wouldn’t look in a mirror if I were you. It could do irreparable psychic damage.”

She turned over the engine, pulled away from the curb and fifteen minutes later I was standing in Lisa’s ultra modern—with Asian accents—living room staring up at a scowling Nick Zeleski.

“Holy shit,” Nick said, as he backed away, his index finger under his nose, trying not to look at me.

“Yeah, I stink. Get over it.” I wasn’t in the mood to be pleasant, especially since Lisa set me up with Nick. I turned to her. “This isn’t fair. You should’ve told me he was here.”

“You wouldn’t have come.”

“Like I had a choice.”

“There are always options.”

She was right. I probably could have phoned Babe or Hetty, well, maybe not Hetty. Neither one of those women had been behind the wheel of a car in over five years. Lisa was basically my only option, except for maybe Leo.

I caught a glimpse of myself in one of her many wall mirrors and decided that calling Leo was totally out of the equation. One look and he would need therapy to even consider having sex with me ever again. I looked worse than most homeless people, I looked diseased. And what was that brown stuff stuck to the side of my head?

“Step away from the mirror,” Lisa said.

I had no choice but to follow orders because if I didn’t I would certainly toss my donuts all over her professionally decorated condo.

“Tell me the truth,” Lisa said. “No bullshit. What the hell happened to you last night? Did you tie one on like Jimmy said, ‘cause if you did, I can understand it. Not that I’m condoning it, but I can understand it.”

I didn’t have the energy to explain. “Do you think I could take that shower first? The smell is making me sick.”

“Me too,” Nick said.

Lisa escorted me to the bathroom, walking far enough in front of me so the stench didn’t reach her.

“Tell me something,” I said as we walked. “Did Federico come to your book signing?”

“He sure did, but he told me not to tell anyone. That it was our little secret. I didn’t think anything of it because a lot of my male fans tell me the same thing. They don’t want their macho image ruined, I guess.”

“Thanks, that was the last piece of the puzzle. I had to be sure. I think he cut the rung on my ladder.”

“What ladder?”

I’d never told her about what happened out in the grove.

“Remind me to tell you later. Right now I really need a hot shower.”

When we arrived at the red bathroom door Lisa turned and said, “This has to be hard for you, sweetie. Federico is closer to you than your own dad ever was.” She walked in closer and patted down my mucked up hair, on the cleaner side of my head, and the instant she touched me my eyes welled with tears.

“Yeah,” I said. “At first I was devastated, but I find it interesting how spending a night in a Dumpster with my hands tied while soaking in my own vomit can change years of adoration into complete loathing. Let’s get the son of a bitch.”

An hour later, after copious amounts of hot tears, and gulping down three more bottles of water, I emerged from the shower with a new sense of resolve and decided to spill everything to Nick.

Wrapped in an ultra-soft white terry robe, I sat on Lisa’s cherry red sofa, legs tucked under me, drinking honey-sweetened hot tea, going over everything that had happened leading up to last night. Needless to say Nick was grateful for my honesty. He took notes while Lisa recorded the entire miserable story on a tiny digital recorder.

“So what happened when you got to Jimmy’s bar?” Nick asked.

“Not much, but once I took a whiff of Federico’s tobacco, I knew I’d been going after the wrong goomba. I’d walked right into a lion’s den and I wanted to run, but it was too late, so I played the game. Only thing was, Federico knew I was on to him so the bastard must have spiked my Coke.”

“Can you prove that? I mean you have a reputation and—”

“Believe me, I know all about that reputation. No, I can’t prove it, but I know I didn’t drink any hard liquor, and I didn’t take any drugs, at least not willingly. Whatever’s floating around my veins wasn’t something I agreed to.”

“I went looking for you at the bar right after my signing, around eight-thirty, and Jimmy told me you had left with Federico. He said you were pretty well lit.” Lisa said. “I believed him. Sorry. Could he have been in on the whole thing?”

I shrugged. “Maybe, but I think this was a one-man operation.”

“Was Jade anywhere around?”

I thought about it for a long time. “No. Not that I can remember.”

“You’d think he’d have found someplace other than his own turf,” Lisa said. “Seems dangerous to play it so close to the chest.”

“Not if he was aiming to pin your murder on Jimmy,” Nick said.

“Never thought of that one,” Lisa said.

“Wow, he had it all figured out, didn’t he?” I told them as I rested my now empty cup on the glass coffee table.

“We still don’t have motive,” Lisa said.

“I think Federico was Carla’s jealous lover,” I told her.

“But wasn’t Federico in Texas the night of Carla’s murder?” Lisa asked.

“He said he was, and he probably had good documentation and a witness to back him up,” I said. “But we’re talking mob. Those guys could prove or disprove anything they want. I have a strong feeling he was right there in San Francisco watching Carla.”

Nick stood and walked over to the black granite fireplace, which had a lovely gas fire snapping around fake logs. “Right now, it’s still looking as if your mom killed Dickey. All the evidence leads to her. She had motive. It was her gun, and we found the body in her trunk. It’ll be hard to beat all that. And let’s face it, a lawyer would rip your story apart in court, not to mention dig up your past.”

“I know,” I said. “That’s why I need to show up at their weekly poker game this afternoon to force Federico out in the open. At this point, he thinks I’m dead or at least trapped at the city dump, but thanks to Lisa who continually quotes from her own books and her many fans, namely the Emergency Room doctor, I’m alive. Although, whatever Federico slipped into my drink is still making me a little woozy.”

I leaned back on the sofa.

“What you’re proposing is extremely dangerous,” Nick said. “We’d have to come up with something that would keep you safe, but also get him to talk. He tried to kill you once, next time he’ll use deadly force. He won’t take the chance of messing up again.”

“Deadly force?” I asked.

“Yeah, a gun or a knife or anything that will cause certain death,” Lisa said.

How the woman knew all these things was beyond me.

A sudden waive of nausea swept over me. Funny how that happened when someone told you that the man you thought loved you like a daughter would just as soon slice your throat than see you live another day.

I shivered. “Just tell me what I have to do.”