inappropriate. That I had plans. That my wife might mind.
“Sure, I’ll be there at six.” The address he gave me was one of the worst blocks in town.
It was a beautiful Christmas. Sweet presents for each other, a great dinner. Keith invited Karen, one of my students. I guess it’s childish, but it made me feel good for him to see how much she looked up to me. Ben’s girlfriend Megan made mince pies. Both of them helped me with dinner and it was fun. Our friend Larry came. Big fire, nice old-fashioned day.
Nathan and Keith were so glad Jesse was leaving that they were really nice to him, even gave him presents. Jesse had made gifts for everyone. It was warm and festive, except then in the kitchen Jesse whispered, “Hey, Maggie, whatcha gonna do when I’m gone?” and I thought my heart would break. He gave me a ring with a star and a moon. By coincidence we each gave the other a silver flask. We thought it was great. Nathan said, “Ma, that’s so disgusting,” but I didn’t hear him then.
Jesse’s plane was leaving at six. Joe wanted to come along. I drove us to the airport in the rain. “The Joker” and “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” on the radio. Joe was sipping from a can of beer and Jesse and I from a pint of Beam. I never gave it a thought, that I was contributing to their delinquency. They were drinking when I met them. They bought liquor, never got carded. The truth was I was so much in denial about my own drinking I wasn’t likely to worry about theirs.
When we got inside the airport, Jesse stopped and said, “Christ. You two will never find the car.” We laughed, not realizing it would be true.
We weren’t exactly drunk, but we were high and excited. I was trying not to show how desperate I was about him leaving.
I realize now how much attention we must have attracted. All of us very tall. Joe, a dark Laguna Indian with long black braids, in motorcycle leather, a knife on his belt. Big boots, zippers and chains. Jesse in black, with his duffel bag and guitar. Jesse. He was otherworldly. I couldn’t even glance up at him, his jaw, his teeth, his golden eyes, flowing long hair. I would weep if I looked at him. I was dressed up for Christmas in a black velvet pant suit, Navajo jewelry. Whatever it was, the combination of us, plus all the buzzers that Joe’s metal set off going through security…they saw us as a security risk, took us into separate rooms and searched us. They went through my underwear, my purse, ran their fingers through my hair, between my toes. Everywhere. When I got out of there I couldn’t see Jesse, so I ran to the departure gate. Jesse’s flight had left. He was yelling at the agent that his guitar was on the plane, his music was on the plane. I had to go to the bathroom. When I came out no one was at the ticket counter. The plane had gone. I asked somebody if the tall young man in black had made the plane. The man nodded toward a door with no sign on it. I went in.
The room was full of security guards and city police. It was sharp with the smell of sweat. Two guards were restraining Joe, who was handcuffed. Two policemen held Jesse and another was beating him on the head with a foot-long flashlight. A sheet of blood covered Jesse’s face and soaked his shirt. He was screaming with pain. I walked completely unnoticed across the room. All of them were watching the policeman beating Jesse, as if they were looking at a fight on TV. I grabbed the flashlight and hit the cop on the head with it. He fell with a thud. “Oh Jesus, he’s dead,” another one said.
Jesse and I were handcuffed and then taken through the airport and down to a small police station in the basement. We sat next to each other, our hands fastened behind us to the chairs. Jesse’s eyes were stuck shut with blood. He couldn’t see and the wound on his scalp continued to bleed. I begged them to clean it or bandage it. To wash his eyes. They’ll clean you up at Redwood City Jail, the guard said.
“Fuck, Randy, the dude’s a juvenile! Somebody’s got to take him over the bridge!”
“A juvenile? This bitch is in big trouble. I ain’t taking him. My shift’s almost over.”
He came over to me. “You know the peace officer you hit? They have him in Intensive Care. He might die.”
“Please. Could you wash his eyes?”
“Fuck his eyes.”
“Lean down a little, Jesse.”
I licked the blood off of his eyes. It took a long time; the blood was thick and caked, stuck in his lashes. I had to keep spitting. With the rust around them his eyes glowed a honey amber.
“Hey, Maggie, let me see your smile.”
We kissed. The guard pulled my head away and slapped me. “Filthy bitch!” he said. Just then there was a lot of yelling and Joe got thrown in with us. They had arrested him for using obscene language in front of women and children. He had been angry when they wouldn’t tell him anything about us.
“This one is old enough for Redwood City.”
Since his arms were cuffed behind him, he couldn’t hug us, so he kissed us both. Far as I remember he had never kissed either of us on the lips before. He said later it was because our mouths were so bloody it made him feel sad. The police called me a pervert again, seducing young boys.
I was disgusted by then. I didn’t get it yet, didn’t understand the way everyone would see me. I had no idea that my charges were adding up. One of the policemen read them to me from the counter across the room. “Drunk in public, interfering with arrest, assaulting a police officer, assault with a deadly weapon, attempted murder, resisting arrest. Lewd and lascivious behavior, sexual acts upon a minor (licking his eyes), contributing to the delinquency of minors, possession of marijuana.”
“Hey, no way!” Joe said.
“Don’t say anything,” Jesse whispered. “This will work for us. Must have been planted. We had all just been searched, right?”
“Shit yeah,” Joe said. “Plus we would have smoked it if we had it.”
They took Jesse away. They put Joe and me in the back of a squad car. We drove miles and miles to the Redwood City jail. All I could think of was that Jesse was gone. I figured they would send him to Albuquerque and then he’d go to London.
Two nasty butch cops gave me a vaginal and rectal exam, a cold shower. They washed my hair with lye soap, getting it in my eyes. They left me without a towel or a comb. All they gave me to wear was a short short gown and some tennis shoes. I had a black eye and a swollen lip, from when they hit me after they took the flashlight away. The cop who took me downstairs had kept twisting the cuffs so there were open bloody cuts on both wrists, like stupid suicides.
They didn’t let me have my cigarettes. The two whores and one wino with me let me have their last wet drags at least. Nobody slept or spoke. I shook all night from cold, from needing a drink.
In the morning we went in a bus to the courthouse. I talked through a window, by phone, to a fat red lawyer who read the report to me. The report was distorted and false all the way through.
“Advised of three suspicious characters in airport lobby. Woman with two Hell’s Angels, one Indian. All armed and potentially dangerous.” I kept telling him that things said in the report were total lies. The lawyer ignored me, just kept asking me if I was fucking the kid.
“Yes!” I finally said. “But that’s just about the only thing I’m not charged with.”
“You would have been if I had written it. Statutory rape.”
I was so tired I got the giggles
