Coldwater Read online

  COLDWATER

  Tom Pitts

  PRAISE FOR COLDWATER

  “You know those times when your reading slows down and you can’t find the right book to read next? Tom Pitts’s Coldwater was the book I needed to pull me out of those doldrums. I tore through it, gripped by every page. Simply put, Coldwater is a damn good book. A thoughtful and violent tale of bad luck and bad choices. I loved it.” —Johnny Shaw, author of Big Maria and Undocumented

  “A great American writer who knows his way around the gutter. Pitts is bold; his style his own. In Coldwater, he builds characters with heart, through layered storytelling and dialogue as real as a conversation between old friends. Tom Pitts at his very best.” —Matthew McBride, author of Frank Sinatra in a Blender and A Swollen Red Sun

  Copyright © 2020 by Tom Pitts

  All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

  Down & Out Books

  3959 Van Dyke Road, Suite 265

  Lutz, FL 33558

  DownAndOutBooks.com

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Cover design by Elderlemon Design

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author/these authors.

  Visit the Down & Out Books website to sign up for our monthly newsletter and we’ll deliver the latest news on our upcoming titles, sale books, Down & Out authors on the net, and more!

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Coldwater

  About the Author

  Also by the Author

  Preview from Some Awful Cunning by Joe Ricker

  Preview from Paying For It by Tony Black

  Preview from Occam’s Razor by Joe Clifford

  For my friend, Alameda Mark

  I'll miss you, brother

  Chapter One

  Maureen DeWildt gave birth alone. No husband, no relatives. No familial hand to hold.

  She gripped the cold steel bars of the hospital bed as the maw of labor grew. The endless pushing and breathing accompanied only by the encouraging chants of the maternity team at Cedar Sinai. After the ordeal, there was a room full of flowers—which the staff removed for fear of contamination—and a stack of cards from people she didn’t know. The nurses came by and showed her the bouquets one at a time, as they stood safely in the doorway.

  “Look how pretty. These ones are from…”

  Maureen wouldn’t respond, or couldn’t respond. She lay listless in the bed, her eyes focused on the shades drawn over the windows. She didn’t need to see outside, she saw something else in those windows. She saw her future.

  Gary stood by the kitchen window looking at the house across the street, the empty shell where the Perkins used to live. Two weeks ago he watched the last of their moving trucks pull out. They’d used three. He didn’t realize they had so much stuff in that little house. The Perkins’ place was the same size and shape as Gary and Linda’s. All the houses on this block were. Most had been reshaped and painted so they appeared unique, but they were all the same little boxes. When he was young, Gary swore he’d never end up in a row of tract housing. Now he felt lucky to be there.

  Although he didn’t know the Perkins very well, Gary thought they enjoyed a healthy neighborly relationship; they’d always waved whenever they were both in their driveways, and they shared occasional chats on garbage night. Never awkward but never cold, the Perkins were the kind of neighbors he liked. He felt as though he should’ve taken the time to say goodbye, but on moving day, by the time Gary made his way to the front lawn, the Perkins were already gone, leaving a tired and confused-looking mover to wave back at Gary.

  The choked gurgle of the coffee maker finally quit and Gary poured himself a mug. As soon as the hot liquid hit his lips he wanted a cigarette. No, he told himself. Not yet.

  He knew he’d give in, though. He always did. Gary’d been playing this game with himself for almost a year now, promising his wife he was going to quit, then making a half-hearted effort to cut back. Sometimes he’d make it till noon, other times only an hour.

  He patted his thigh to summon the dog, walked out the front door, and took a deep breath. Sometimes that helped with the cravings. He sat down on a wrought-iron chair and watched the morning breeze rustle the leaves of the huge fruitless mulberry standing in the yard next to theirs. The block was embroidered with trees, all kinds—a lone palm, several mimosas, some dying oaks, Italian cypresses—as mismatched as the colors of the houses.

  Barney sat at Gary’s feet, twisting his leg up and licking himself. Gary and Linda adopted the dog after their miscarriage in San Francisco. It seemed foolish to try to supplant their sorrow with a pet, but for a while it helped. Barney was a rescue dog, though, and was already maybe eight years old when they got him. Now he was displaying the attributes of an old dog and didn’t much care for listening, or hygiene, or humans. He was still a good companion though, even if he did make your fingers stink when you scratched his head.

  They’d both discussed adoption. Alternately trying to convince each other it was a noble idea. But neither was ready. Gary feared down in his heart that taking on a child from afar would end in tragedy. If not soon, then later in the teen years when the child would grow to resent them and run wild.

  Linda tried to convince him this wasn’t the case, raising a child of their own would be just that, their own. He was thinking of foster children, she told him. She didn’t intend to take on a troubled child from a broken family. Linda’s thought was to skip the entanglement of American bureaucracy and instead go to China, where little girls waited to be rescued from being discarded. But secretly she harbored the same beliefs. She wanted one of their own, she wanted to see Gary’s light in the baby’s eyes.

  Before Gary realized what he was doing, the cigarette was in his mouth and his thumb was rolling over the flint wheel of his disposable lighter.

  “Really, Gary? It’s not even eight and you’re already smoking?” Linda stood behind him in the open door, arms folded and irritation creeping across her face. “And if you’re going to smoke, shut the damn door. The smell comes in the house and sticks to the walls.”

  “How much you think it’s going for?” Gary said.

  “What?”

  “The Perkins’. I wonder what they’re asking.”

  “Why don’t you walk over and check? They should have some flyers under the for sale sign.”

  Gary pointed to the empty lawn across the street. “But there’s no sign. You think they already sold it privately?”

  Linda was already turning back into the house. “I don’t know, Gare, but if you don’t hurry up, you’re going to be late for work. Put out that damn thing and get ready.”

  Gary took one more pull off the cigarette, the last drag, the one he didn’t need, the one that always made him feel lightheaded. He stubbed out the smoke with more than the usual self-disgust and stood up to head inside.

  After feeding Barney and letting him out for one last pee in the backyard, Gary
was out the door in less than twenty minutes, on his way to work. He didn’t give the house across the street another thought. His job at an air-conditioning supply house was distraction enough. The gig was dry and tedious but challenging because he had to make it to the end of each day without walking out the door. He’d been tempted more than once. Grateful for the employment, but it wasn’t where he wanted to be at this stage in his life. He was lucky today though, the hours rolled by quicker than most and before he knew it, he and Linda were sprawled out in bed watching TV.

  It was Jason’s idea to send the kid in. Not that anyone was going to argue with him, but he thought his reasoning was sound. The kid could slip though the small basement window. That was the most obvious reason. If there was someone in the house—or an alarm—it was the kid that’d be caught, and he’d get out in a day or two. The kid didn’t know shit. Even though he’d been hanging with them for weeks now, he didn’t know any of their last names. Likewise, even though his name was Russell, they only ever called him the kid. That was good enough for them and good enough for the kid.

  But, the best reason for sending the kid in? So they didn’t have to go.

  Jason parked the old Impala in a nearby lot adjacent to a playground a half-block away. The car was jammed full of their belongings, but looked like such a piece of shit they didn’t worry about it being broken into. A rusted-out green hull with garbage piled up in the rear window, no one would want what was inside. The four of them dug out what they needed—a cell phone, drugs, drug paraphernalia, a couple of candy bars—and started out down the street.

  The short walk to the house meant they’d be exposed, but it didn’t matter. At this hour, everyone on the block was asleep. TVs glowed in several of the windows, but Jason figured they were most likely left on to deter people like himself from getting too close.

  Four of them walked up the sidewalk. Jason, Juliet, Bomber, and the kid. All of them silent, listening for cars, or doors, or dogs. On the lawns lay dormant sprinklers and abandoned kids’ toys, lawn gnomes, and felled pink flamingos. One or two of the places still had Christmas lights lining their siding. Only the minor details belied the uniformity of the block, of all the blocks in this neighborhood. Jason took the lead with the other three phalanxed out behind him. Bomber hung back the farthest, lost in his thoughts. When they’d passed their target and reached the far corner, Jason turned and pointed back at the house. The third house in. It was dark. No porch light, no interiors. As though this one house had been unplugged.

  The houses and yards on Coldwater Court were stacked back to back, partitioned by wood or chain-link fences, so there was no alley for them to access. Jason moved beside the kid, placed his arm on the boy’s shoulder, and pointed to the house beside the one that was dark and quiet. “This should be easy. You go through that yard there. Just hop the fence. They got no dogs, so if you hear a dog barking at you, it’s from over the fence. It ain’t gonna get you, so keep moving.”

  Russell wasn’t saying anything. He nodded a little every time Jason told him something, but he kept his focus on the target, the empty house.

  Jason continued, “When you get to the house, look for a small window down near the ground. There should be at least two on either side. If there’s bars on ’em, come back, but if there ain’t, kick the window in. Be sure to kick all the glass out. Use your toe, make sure it’s gone. Then slip in there. Don’t use your flashlight until you’re all the way inside, okay?”

  The kid broke his gaze and looked up at Jason. “I don’t have a flashlight.”

  “Juliet, give him your cell phone.”

  “No fucking way,” Juliet said. “I ain’t giving him shit. He’ll fucking drop it or get caught or something.”

  Jason tightened his glare at Juliet and, without another word, she pulled the cell from her jacket pocket and handed the kid the phone.

  “Once you’re inside,” Jason said, “get to the front door and open it up.”

  “What if there’s an alarm or something?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Jason said. “You still got to come out the front door, right? You won’t be able to crawl out the basement again. Just be sure to tell us if you see any little green lights. They’re usually near the front door.”

  Russell still looked up at Jason, wanting to be reassured.

  “Don’t worry, if an alarm goes off, we’ll just leave. We got plenty of time to walk back to the car.” Jason waved the group of them toward the spot where the kid was expected to enter the property.

  The three of them clustered together while they watched the kid hop the fence into the first yard. His size made it difficult, but after a couple tries, he managed to scrabble over the wood-planked fence. By the time he’d gone over the second fence, he was out of sight. They listened for the sound of the glass. They heard something, but the crack seemed too distant to be coming from the house.

  “Told you,” Jason said. “The kid’s a natural.”

  “He just better have my fucking cell when he comes out.”

  “Don’t worry, he’ll have it. We need that thing to call Pedro.”

  Chapter Two

  Gary stood in the same spot as yesterday morning, the same place he stood every morning: in the kitchen, beside the coffee maker, in front of the window. He sipped his coffee and told himself he wouldn’t be smoking today—at least not until he left for work. He could sneak one in the car and not have to hear Linda shame him.

  Barney sat patiently on the linoleum beside him, hoping his master would drop some toast instead of making him eat the dry kibble he was forced to endure every day. Always a possibility, never a probability. The dog clung to morning rituals like his master.

  Gary listened as Linda busied herself with her morning routine. When he heard the gargle and rinse of her mouthwash from the bathroom, he knew she was ready to walk out.

  The first words out of her mouth: “Thank you for not smoking.”

  “Gee, you should just put up a sign that says that. A big red and white one with the American Cancer Society logo on it. Good morning to you too.”

  “I’m sorry, baby. I’m lagging and I’m almost running late.” She pecked him on the lips, keeping it light so she didn’t taste his unbrushed teeth. “Good morning.”

  Linda had scored a job with the state, the reason they landed in Sacramento after things fell apart in the city. It was a pencil-pushing cubicle job somewhere deep in the Health Department, but it left her with a residual zeal for all things health-minded. Their milk was now organic, as well as their produce, and yoga and fitness DVDs sat in short stacks throughout the house. Gary acquiesced to the higher grocery bills and the occasional workout, but he never intended to quit smoking, not really.

  “I’m serious, Gary. Please don’t start up this morning. Those things stink up the house. You don’t notice it because you smoke. The smell lingers.”

  “I know, I know.”

  “It’s so nice to wake up to the smell of coffee instead.” She moved past him and reached for a mug from the cupboard. She poured a cup and treated it with raw sugar and her beloved organic milk.

  “You know, I got up to pee this morning—”

  Her back was turned and she spoke into the fridge as she returned the milk. “That’s not really news, hon.”

  “Seriously, listen. I got up to pee, and of course Barney wanted out too, so I let him out front, you know, so that Rottweiler in the yard behind us wouldn’t start barking. Anyway, when I let him out, I could’ve sworn I saw a light on at the Perkins’ place.”

  “Jesus, Gary, you should’ve paid this much attention to them while they still lived here. You and old Donald would be fast friends by now.”

  Gary ignored the barb. “When I looked back, the light was gone. It’s still dark over there.”

  “Maybe you imagined it. What was it, five in the morning? I’d be seeing things too.”

  “It was cl
oser to six. The sky was almost light. I know what I saw.”

  She leaned into her husband and kissed him on the cheek. “I have to finish getting ready. You better hurry up too.” She turned to walk back to their bedroom and added, “And no smoking.”

  The grey light of morning crept into the Perkins’ living room and found all four of them sprawled across the short green carpet. Jason and Juliet clung together for warmth, but Bomber and the kid lay by themselves. Bomber was face down with his arms tucked under him for added warmth. The kid was curled into a fetal position and shivering. The cold had kept him awake and he held still, waiting for the others to stir.

  Jason was first. He stretched, yawned, and coughed. The coughing degenerated into a fit and soon he was sitting up, gasping for breath. The noise woke the others, but they remained quiet.

  “Fuck,” Jason said. “Where’s that bag? Juliet? Wake up. Where’s the bag?”

  Without lifting her head, Juliet pointed to a worn-looking pouch a few feet beyond their reach. It was the kind bicyclists wore around their waists. A fanny pack. Jason grabbed the bag and headed straight for the bathroom.

  Juliet, suddenly animated, bolted up and called after Jason, “You better fucking leave me some.”

  The bathroom door slammed and she muttered, “Asshole.”

  The kid rubbed his eyes and sat up too. “Is there anything to eat?”

  “We’ll all get something to eat after me and Jason get ready. Fuck, we’ve only been up for two seconds. Don’t you have any candy from last night?”

  Russell shook his head and looked to Bomber.

  Bomber sat cross-legged, rubbing his eyes, with a half full forty-ounce bottle of malt liquor in front of him. He was already shaking his head at the kid.