Chapter One

He liked her long, thin braids. Everything about her was long and slender. When she moved, it was with the elongated, graceful strides of a dancer. Her words too, a dance. He wondered how so many people could miss that about her. A slight mist formed over her dark, brown eyes which gazed out somewhere over the lake, skipping over the gentle waves like a stone. She saw things that he could not, beyond the horizon to other illusions. Something in him. He tried to think of the right thing to say, but he did not know how. She was spiritual, and he was a skeptic. He wanted to lift her spirits, but he knew that he would only make things worse. "I’ve got to run," he said as he leaned down to kiss her cheek. He felt her cringe slightly. She continued to stare out the window from their two bedroom apartment that overlooked Lake Michigan. They lived in a hi-rise, north of the city, in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood, an area that had so far resisted the gentrification that was taking place elsewhere. It was perfect for them. They never ran into anyone they knew. "I’ll be home late," she replied, sullenly, sipping tea. "Do you know what I think, Rial? I think you should tell them to kiss your ass." He immediately regretted saying anything. Rial stood up and jabbed a sharp finger into his chest. She took it all out on him. As usual, she told him that he didn’t understand anything. That he couldn’t understand what it was like to be black. He couldn’t understand what she went through everyday. There was no respite, no relief. No matter what, she was black and they never let her forget it. "You just don’t get it, Lenny. You can get away with it. But I can’t." He was a Jew. He thought he got it. He had faced his own kind of discrimination. Sometimes it felt like a contest between them. He wasn’t going to get into it with her again. She would invariably point out that as a Jew, he could hide. But, she could not. What a thing to envy, he thought. He waited until she was through. Then he hugged her. This time she didn’t cringe. She didn’t pull away. Her eyes filled with tears, but she didn’t cry. She held most of it in. She always managed to hold most of it in. But it seemed that she always let just enough out to make him feel as if it were somehow his fault. "I just don’t think it’s right of them to make you cut it," he said, sensing that it was now safe to talk. "I’m not cutting it." "You know what I mean. The braids. Taking out the braids." "They’re not making me," she insisted. "They simply suggested that a more professional appearance might help me get the promotion." He nodded along. There was no point in discussing it further. After containing the anger, she would inevitably force herself to take their side, leaving him frustrated as he continued to argue that she was a victim of discrimination. Of course she was, but she’d deny it. She was dancing again. It was a game, a test she was constantly putting him through. She wanted to make sure he knew. He was growing tired of the game. He suggested that they go out to dinner, but she declined. She would be getting her hair done all day and well into the evening. Her hair, like everything else about her, was a mystery to him. There were subjects that they just didn’t discuss. As he turned to walk out the door, he heard her mumble that she wanted to have a baby. He missed a step, but he kept walking as if he didn’t hear. It was collection day. Most of the miscreants he represented were just too lazy to come all the way downtown to pay their bills. They had the money. Drug money. He was winning the war on drugs. He didn’t care where they got it. He simply had to extract it from them before they could spend it. Rial worried about the bad neighborhoods he went into, but he assured her that they never killed the lawyer. At least not while their cases were still pending. Lose and you might not want to show your face in the hood for a while. He pulled his black BMW in front of a run-down, two-flat and checked the address by looking at the houses on either side. There were no numbers on the house to which he was going. He climbed the sagging, wood stairs and rang the bell. It did not work. He rapped on the door and a rottweiler began to bark and hurl itself against the window. Don’t show fear, he told himself. It was the same with the clients. They could smell it. Hector wasn’t there, but his mother was. The police were looking for him about a murder and he was in the wind, trying to raise enough cash to pay his lawyer. When she saw him the tears began immediately to flow. Her English seemed to grow worse each time they met. It didn’t matter. He knew enough Spanish to discuss money. "Necessito dinero," he said. "Better I surrender him before the police find him. They’ll just fuck him up." "Tengo que pagar alguilar. Tengo qu comprar alimento para ninos." "You have a brand new car in back, Mrs. Sanchez." "Que coche?" "The Chevy Blazer. Habla Ingles. You spoke it fine the last time Hector caught a case. If I don’t get paid, I don’t help. Retirese. Pare." "I can give you $200 now." "One thousand now." Mrs. Sanchez turned away and spit on the porch. She laughed in his face. "I hire someone to paint my house, he paints my house. Then I pay him." "I’m not a fucking house painter, Mrs. Sanchez." "It works the same with a doctor. You better than a doctor?" "I’m not even better than a house painter. But I’ve got to get the money up front, Mrs. Sanchez. Because you won’t pay me if I lose. And you know what? You won’t pay me if I win." "Then give me some kind of guarantee that you’ll beat Hector’s case." "Keep your money, Mrs. Sanchez." "Why do you say that?" "Because this is the worst way to spend it. There are no guarantees. And even if you get what you bargained for, all you bring home is that little drug-dealing gang-banger." "He’s my son." "And he’s killing you." Suddenly she didn’t seem so tough. The edge wore off and for a moment she looked tired and old. She was only 36 years old. Her eyes dropped to the ground and her whole body seemed to sag under a great weight. "Here’s your money, Mr. Shane. How much more do I owe you?" "Nine thousand." A woman can love a man, but only a son can truly break her heart. The worst part of his job was dealing with the mothers. They could not see beyond the child they rocked in their arms, the blind burning love. Mrs. Sanchez reached into her blouse and pulled out one thousand dollars. She began to count it for him. "Don’t," he said. Leonard Shane. Attorney at Law. Lenny. Len. He couldn’t stand to see them count the money. It brought home to him what he was becoming or maybe what he already was. A pettifogger. A shyster. A whore. In fact, he tried his best to have some dignity, but he couldn’t afford to. Rousseau said, "It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living." Leonard Shane knew this because he had once fancied himself a scholar. But that was college. He had different dreams then. He couldn’t remember the last book he read. He had bills to pay. But it was more than that. He was addicted to the money. Cash. He felt free when he held big wads of it in his hands. No one could hurt him if he had enough of it. He could always buy a meal. Keep a roof over his head. A man could run away with cash and not leave a trail. There were no strings attached. He did not want to owe anyone. Lenny would not even accept a favor from an old friend if he felt it would leave him beholden. However, he would spend bundles of it on his friends, buy their meals, their drinks, to prove to them that he was not the Jew they made jokes about. The niggardly Jew. So the money never lasted long. As a result, he lived in terror of poverty. He awoke at night in a cold sweat. But it was more than the money. The secret life he was living left him craven and fearful of everyone. No one knew about Rial and him. Not even their families. They were living in a cage and the money didn’t help. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "You’ve got to believe in something." That’s what Luke Periwinkle’s father always told him. That’s why his father had dragged Luke to church every Sunday. And that was why he imposed such strict discipline upon his son, making certain he stayed on the straight and narrow. And when Luke learned of his father’s indiscretions, that he had cheated on his mother, cheated his business partners and stolen from his clients, he rebelled. The faith he had never questioned began to flicker and dim. By the time his father was through, the Periwinkle name was disgraced. A messy divorce, a federal conviction and a stretch in prison was the younger Periwinkle’s legacy. "What if you don’t believe in anything?" asked Luke. "What are the consequences?" Hook would always answer him. You could say anything to Hook. "It’s complicated. On one hand, you’re free to do whatever you want to do. There are no regrets. There’s no pain." "No pain? Then what separates us from the animals?" Hook reached under his shirt and pulled out a thick gold chain which he wore around his neck. He had a Rolex on his wrist. He had a 14 karat diamond earring in one ear and silver rings on his fingers. "Motherfucker. Animals don’t wear gold chains," replied Hook, laughing coarsely and displaying a mouthful of gold teeth. "They don’t wear 14 karat diamonds. They don’t fuck in hot tubs." Luke laughed. He looked around to see if anyone was watching. Somehow, the mere act of laughing at one of Hook’s jokes felt like a criminal act. He dismissed the feeling as a remnant of his innocent youth. "Most people are in pain all of the time, Luke. They want you to be in pain too." Hook handed Luke a package and Luke unbuckled his belt. He reached for some masking tape from the glove compartment and lowered his trousers. Luke had long, slender legs that he could not straighten in the confines of the front passenger seat of Hook’s Alfa Romeo. The hair was thick and black on his knees and calves, but he had shaved his thighs bald. Hook handed him a clear plastic Baggy filled with white powder. Luke placed the bag flat against his inner thigh and began to wrap masking tape around his leg. Hook handed him another plastic Baggy filled with a green leafy substance and Luke taped it to his other thigh. "I take care of my rappies," boasted Hook. Hook was a dealer. He never used drugs himself. He never actually sold anything himself. But he made sure that whoever worked for him had a lawyer and anything else he needed if he got arrested. If he still turned trick, Hook could make sure he never told on anyone ever again. Hook handed Luke a bundle of fifty dollar bills. Luke counted out forty of them. Two thousand dollars in all. "When’s the preliminary hearing on your boy’s case?" asked Luke, lifting his buttocks off the seat slightly and pulling his pants up. "Tomorrow." "This doesn’t cover the preliminary, Hook. It’s another $2,500.00 for that." "C’mon Luke. I thought we were friends." "I could lose my license for bringing contraband into the jail, Hook," said Luke, reaching over and touching his arm, failing to mention the fact that it also meant jail and disgrace. That would have had no meaning for Hook. "Doesn’t mean you’re not my friend." Hook was Creole. His skin was lighter than Luke’s but of course, it was understood that Hook was black. There was a part of Luke that wanted to be black and another part that was glad to be white. Luke wanted to move effortlessly between worlds like a spirit, to be above it all. He did not want to be in pain. "Just get the shit to my boy." "Don’t I always?" The deputy sheriffs at Division IX of the Cook County Jail knew Luke, so well that they barely even patted him down anymore before allowing him into the jail for an attorney-client consultation. They greeted him with broad smiles and he engaged them in conversation easily. They commiserated. They both spent their entire day dealing with the scum of the earth. The guards dealt with their physical needs: clothing and feeding them; herding them into the showers and trying to keep them off the weaker inmates; breaking up their fights; beating them when they broke the rules. But at least they didn’t have to listen to them. They wouldn’t be able to do their jobs if they had to pretend they were human beings. That was Luke’s job. His job was 90 percent make believe. Luke had to pretend to believe them. He had to pretend that the system was fair. He had to pretend that he actually gave two shits. Luke showed his attorney ID to a hefty, African American Deputy Sheriff who had one eye on Luke and her other on the clock. It was nearly time for a shift change and she wanted to go home. Luke always visited clients as close to the change in shift as possible when the guards were even less attentive than usual. He made some small talk about the upcoming November election. The Sheriff was running for re-election. Did he have the support he needed to win re-election or would his opponent, an African American candidate with Jesse Jackson’s support and a campaign pledge to treat inmates more humanely, unseat him. "They think this is a goddam hotel," complained the deputy as she filled out a pass that would allow Luke to walk through the jail. "I always tell them, if they don’t like it here, go stay at the Four Seasons." Luke laughed and resisted an urge to scratch his thigh. It was so easy to smuggle in contraband that he was getting careless. He didn’t even see the canine patrol officer coming down the corridor. He didn’t even notice the German Shepard.