Cape Cod Noir - By David L Ulin Page 0,39

beat up her ex-boyfriend? Was that story even true? And if it was, it occurred to me he might know some of these cops. Would they let him into the cells to work me over with a truncheon? But I hadn’t really done anything to Margaret other than embarrass her, so maybe I was safe.

Somehow, a facsimile of sleep arrived, and when I awakened it felt as if a flock of tiny raptors were battling in my skull, their spiny wings throbbing against my delicate membranes. Pain like I had never known radiated down the left side of my head and to my neck. It sang in unbridled cacophony to my quivering tendons and hollow bones. As soon as I realized where I was, the feeling intensified. I was too dehydrated to urinate so I sat frozen in a vortex of self-pity until I heard the metal door open. Was this someone coming to exact revenge, to beat me in all the places that would never show when I stood in court? No, just a cop unlocking the cell door. He said he was taking me to be arraigned.

In the courtroom, I looked for Bob, but he was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he’d had no real intention of showing up, his little revenge. The judge was a bald man with black horn-rims who asked me how I pled. “Not guilty,” I responded. My plan: take the money I had made that summer, hire a lawyer, and have this stain removed. Out, damned spot, right? My father would never have to know and my future legal career would go as planned.

I was given a court date and released on my own recognizance. I didn’t need Bob to post bail after all. When I left the building, sunlight eviscerated my eyes. The tiny raptors continued to beat against the inside of my skull. Bile sluiced through my gut as I wobbled down the courthouse steps. I heard someone calling my name. It was Bob. He was backlit by the sun so it was hard to see the expression on his face, but I could tell the person standing next to him was his sister. Was she going to shoot me or do something equally trite? Bob said she wanted to have a word and I had better do her the courtesy of listening, but I was in no condition for a sidewalk colloquy with a one-night stand and I said as much. I didn’t see Bob’s fist, but the blood pouring out of my face an instant later suggested he had broken my nose. The pain, of course, penetrated the penumbra of my hangover and I felt like a grenade had discharged in my sinuses. The blood-soaked white polo shirt looked like a crime scene as I staggered away, the pathetic maledictions of Bob’s sister raining down on me. Why are people so unbelievably annoying?

The Peugeot had been taken to the police garage so I walked the short way there from the courthouse. The guy in charge of the motor pool, prematurely gray with hawkish features and a scar on his left cheek, stared at me and didn’t say anything. I looked down at my bloody shirt and shrugged. “A bad night in Hyannisport,” I said. He nodded warily and told me there was a problem with the transmission. If I wanted, he would fix it, but it wouldn’t be ready until the afternoon. The oil stink of the garage was making me nauseous and I had to get out of there. I thanked the man and told him I’d be back later. Then I thanked him again. I remembered enough of the previous night to recall that after my arrest my behavior had left something to be desired, and today I was going to make up for it. I’m not a bad guy. I thanked him a third time before I left.

The walk home from Hyannisport to West Dennis was about ten miles. My hangover seemed to have gained in intensity and I thought a cocktail of fresh air and sunshine might make it dissipate. The list of places more beautiful than Cape Cod in August is a short one. As the salt breeze filled my nostrils, I noticed that a few dabs of ochre and yellow had begun to peek through the leaves. I headed east along the blacktop, still trying to will my hangover into submission and humming the opening of “Immigrant Song” by Led Zeppelin. Their drummer,