San Diego Noir

I’d taken every possible precaution to avoid spending my final days in a literal cell instead of the figurative one of my impending death. I obscured my identity two different ways at the candy store and the shipping service, made cash payments with twenties from East County ATMs, wore gloves at every stage of the maneuver except the actual sale counters, where I touched nothing. I used my own cheap ballpoint to fill out shipping forms, flushed or burned the remains of the chocolate-doctoring session, kept only Molly’s cloisonné box and the four rings it contained.

The rings.

I watched Gwendolyn continue to bat the pink ball and remembered the heavy silver ring I’d been wearing when I fixed Laverne’s final snack. It was back in the cloisonné box, but I’d slipped Molly’s opal onto my finger for good luck when I headed out to ship the candy. The ring was a little loose, but that didn’t really matter. It didn’t fit the character I was playing at the shipping service, so I’d tucked it into my purse.

I moved in slow motion now toward the little drawstring bag, its contents still jumbled from when I’d stuffed everything back in as I waited in line to send my package, dismayed that I’d called attention to myself. I dumped the contents on the table.

No ring.

I took my time about it, checked and rechecked, ran the film back and forth in my brain. I went out and searched the car. Checked my purse again. There hadn’t been pockets in the sweat suit I was wearing at the time, and in any case I’d left it in a Salvation Army drop box on my way home twenty minutes later, after changing in a McDonald’s restroom.

So I’d dropped it on the floor at the shipping service, where cops were probably already trying to find out who’d sent the candy. Where somebody would surely find it. And trace it to Molly, who bought it on eBay and told me the seller had assured her only three existed in the world just like it.

I opened the cloisonné box and put the chunky silver poison ring on my finger. I sent a brief reply to the doctor’s e-mail, saying that I had decided not to participate in the clinical trial. Then I opened the poison ring and removed the capsule it still held.

Instant karma.

THE ANGEL’S SHARE

BY MORGAN HUNT

Hillcrest

Betty Lou Thomas from Muncie, Indiana, complained as though the pot at the end of the rainbow had a flush valve. Thick-bodied, flat-chested, 5'2”, with brown eyes, coarse features, and hair the color of stone-ground mustard, she was the sort of woman you didn’t notice. And she carried a twenty-carat diamond chip on her shoulder about that.

She resented being short. (“In Indiana we lived for basketball. What chance did I have on the women’s team at five-two?”) Being female. (“Why don’t men have periods and cramps?”) Being a lesbian. (“Still waiting for my Emancipation Proclamation.”)

She was currently issuing a whine-a-thon into the phone about the lack of cleaning power in modern laundry detergents. Jesus.

I lay on rumpled sheets in my bungalow near Front and Spruce streets. San Diego’s “June gloom,” otherwise known as the marine layer, had finally burned off and sun now warmed my bedroom. Next to me in all of her considerable glory lay Caterina, a thirty-nine-year-old self-styled mixed-media artist and boutique owner whom I’d known for exactly twelve days.

On Caterina’s index finger, a crimson nail sharp enough to serve as Occam’s Razor traced its way from my ankle, along my calf, to the tender flesh of my inner thigh. There she dug in and drew blood. I would have screamed, but she covered my mouth with her other hand.

This latest maneuver made the phone conversation more difficult than before, precisely Caterina’s intention.

Betty was droning on, something about a neighbor in her condo building who kept taking her assigned parking space in the garage.

I twisted my mouth free of Caterina’s hand. “Why don’t you report him to the building manager?” I asked, knowing she’d reject any practical suggestions that might lead to a resolution.

“Oh, he’s just an asshole,” Betty sighed. “What are you having for dinner tonight? I never know what to cook. Last night I tried meat loaf with salsa …”

“Betty, I’m in the middle of something right now; I really have to go.”

“I need to change the settings on my satellite dish tomorrow and I could use some help …”

“What time?”

“I’d like to get it done first thing. Could you come over around seven-thirty a.m.?”

“Betty, I have to work tomorrow. If it can wait a few days, I’ll—”

“No, I’ve got my whole day planned. Your work schedule’s flexible; go to work later. I need to get this done early.”

The talon enameled with Heavenly Heartache now circled a very sensitive part of me. Never answer the phone when you’re lying naked in bed.

“I’ve got a major work project pending and a staff meeting tomorrow. Find someone else to help this time. I’ve got to go.”

“But we haven’t talked in over a week. And I—”