This was a long-standing joke between us. The scary part was that his question might one day become reality as Billy knew a wide, wide range of people around the greater Portland area.
He slid off the stool and turned toward the door. At the last moment he said, “Hey, I ran into Marta last night at Millennium Park. She wants you to do some work for her.”
“What kind of work?”
Billy shrugged. “Said she had a job that required tact. You any good at tact?”
“About as good as you are,” I said.
“You hear about that kid fell in the lake? He’s in a coma in the hospital.”
Billy’s good at shifting subjects faster than warp speed. I may be ADD but he takes the cake. “What happened?”
“Buncha kids screwing around in a boat.” He shrugged. “He fell somewhere and was trying to get back in the boat. Think it happened on the island.”
There is one island in Lake Chinook. Circling it is a footpath and guarding this footpath is a black chain-link fence. Enterprising teenagers make a habit of leaping the fence and racing the perimeter, trying to speed all the way around before the island’s Dobermans catch their scent.
“He was running around the island?”
“Probably. Mighta tried to jump in the boat from the island. There are a lot of big rocks around that one side. But kids are tough. Don’t know what his name is. Julie…you know?”
“What?” Julie was deep into the whir of a latte, staring into a fat silver cylinder where foam lifted and fell in white waves.
“What the Coma Kid’s name is?”
She shook her head. “Everyone’s been talking about it this morning. I hope he’s okay.”
Billy nodded, then waved a good-bye as he headed out. I sent a silent wish that the Coma Kid would be all right. Hadn’t we all done something dangerous and stupid in our youth that might have killed us?
I drank some more coffee and my thoughts turned to Marta Cornell. She was the best and baddest divorce lawyer in the city of Portland and probably the entire state. Come to that, she could probably rival anyone in the region. Dwayne was her information specialist of choice, and I’d done a bit of work for her through him. Not pretty stuff. Divorces were messy and ugly and, personally, I’d rather be a process server and evict crack dealers armed with semiautomatic weapons than deal with one of Marta’s jobs. (This is a lie as guns generally worry me, but you get the idea.)
But Marta pays well. Dwayne says he’d put her first for money alone. This makes him sound mercenary and maybe he is a little, but you’d never be able to tell by his minuscule cabana off North Shore which makes my bungalow on West Bay look like a palace. Dwayne wants me to move my business to his cabana, but I fear for my independence and my soul. Not to mention I can’t see myself working cheek-to-jowl inside Dwayne’s living space. This is where the guy resides, after all, and Dwayne just doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy I want to get that close to. I have this sneaking suspicion I will turn into his cleaning woman/coffee maker/receptionist and God knows what else.
I finished the rest of my coffee. Every muscle felt stretched out of whack from my run. I don’t think exercise can seriously be good for you, but I sure as hell have to keep up with it. The last time I process-served, the woman opened her door, reluctantly accepted the eviction notice I thrust into her hands, gave it one look and howled as if I’d hit her. She then grabbed a broom and whacked me once, hard. I left with one shin smarting and my pride bruised even worse. Talk about killing the messenger. I don’t plan on being taken by surprise again.
I wondered what Marta had in store for me. Her jobs tend to be a little more involved than mere process serving. I’d once been asked to drive to Baker—a city plopped way off in eastern Oregon and miles and miles from anything else—and question the locals about the habits of a Portland businessman who’d suddenly grown a hankering for ranch life out in this remote windblown part of the state. His wife wanted to know whom he was ranching with and what she looked like. It turned out the lady in question was surprisingly plump, sweet and homegrown, and I didn’t blame the guy one bit when I met the real wife, Marta’s client, who was thin, grim, long-nailed and tense. It sorta bothered me to be on her side, so to speak. But, once again, it paid well.
With a last gulp of now cold coffee I gathered up my energy and jogged back to my rundown 1930s bungalow on West Bay, the small body of water on Lake Chinook’s westernmost tip. Once upon a time wealthy Portlanders owned summer homes on the man-made lake. Lake Chinook was created by Chinese laborers who dug a canal in the late 1800s and connected the sluggish nearby river to what was by all accounts little more than a large pond, beautifully named Sucker Lake. Now the town thinks it’s beyond upscale, and though Lake Chinook is a nice community, I think it’s good to remember one’s roots.
My cottage is a ramshackle remnant, built a few decades after the lake became a desirable locale for summering. It’s Craftsman style, which means there’s a lot of wood trim, a wraparound porch and the exterior is composed of shingles. The inside must have been utter crap because my landlord, Mr. Ogilvy, updated the place before I moved in. Ogilvy’s known for his pecuniary ways, so the improvements—new kitchen appliances and a low-water pressure toilet which requires two or three good flushes to work properly—are a complete and utter gift. The cottage sits on a flag lot, encroached on each side by huge new homes whose builders fought city ordinances against the setbacks and succeeded. Ogilvy is about sixty-five and hates government, especially city government, so he cheerfully okays every variance sent his way. Along the way he’s chopped off chunks of his own property and sold them for a premium price so now I have a teensy line of sight and strip of land that leads to the water. Still, there’s enough room for a boathouse, also ramshackle, which matches the taupe, shingle siding of the cottage. This matching color scheme exists because last year I talked Ogilvy into painting the place. This is saying a lot for my skills of persuasion as Ogilvy bitched, moaned and sidestepped until we were both beyond exasperation. Eventually, he just bellowed, “Fine!” and signed on the painters. Now the place looks semi-presentable and if I had any serious cash I’d try to buy it. On my own dime I’d cleaned out everything on the inside—some of the items in the storage shed had been left over since the cottage was built, I swear—ripped up the carpet and had the old hardwood floors stripped, sanded and generally redone. I possess a modicum of furniture, all of it castoffs that, for some reason or other, I can’t seem to cast off as well. Except my bed, which is new, springy and a double—nothing bigger fits in the bedroom—and covered with a solid red, quilted cover—a splurge at Pottery Barn.
As I jogged up to my front door, catching my breath and slipping the key in the lock, I mentally congratulated myself on my industrious fitness program. Self-affirmation is all that stands between me and the depression of reality so I keep a steady “Atta, girl!” going in my head at every given opportunity.
Stripping off my In-N-Out Burger T-shirt (which I brought back with me from my last trip to California) I walked into the bathroom and reminded myself I had to buy groceries or die. My desktop computer—years old and a real electronic grinder—sits cold, blank and silent in the little desk/nook I’ve arranged next to my bed. Though mainly used for writing up short reports for Dwayne, invoices for my process serving services, e-mail, and the occasional resume, I worry its life is close to ending and whenever I hit the switch, I fear its little green “on” light might sputter and slowly fade out forever. I’m not only afraid of the cost of replacing it, I’m afraid of new technology, period. I keep a laptop in a case nearby, just in case. It’s far newer,
