‘It needs to be mown short first, and I don’t have a mower. Yet.’
‘You can borrow ours, can’t he, Dad?’ Derek says.
Jamal ruffles the kid’s hair. ‘Any time.’
‘No, that’s too much,’ Billy says. ‘I’ll buy one. Always supposing I get traction on the book I’m trying to write and stick around.’
They go over to the porch and sit on the steps. Billy opens the beer and drinks. It hits the spot and he says so.
‘What’s your book about?’ Derek asks. He’s sitting between them.
‘Top secret.’ Smiling as he says it.
‘Yeah, but is it make-believe or true?’
‘A little of both.’
‘That’s enough,’ Jamal says. ‘It’s not polite to pry.’
A woman is approaching from one of the houses at the far end of the street. Mid-fifties, graying hair, bright lipstick. She’s holding a highball glass and walking not quite straight.
‘That’s Mrs Kellogg,’ Jamal says, keeping his voice low. ‘Widow lady. Lost her husband last year. Had a stroke.’ He gazes thoughtfully at Billy’s excuse for a lawn. ‘While mowing the grass, actually.’
‘Is this a party, and can I crash it?’ Mrs Kellogg asks. Even though she’s still on the walk and there’s no breeze, Billy can smell the gin on her breath.
‘As long as you don’t mind sitting on the steps.’ Billy gets up and offers his hand. ‘Dave Lockridge.’
And now here comes the guy who was keeping an eye on Billy’s interaction with Shanice and Danny. He’s swapped his wifebeater and Bermudas for a pair of jeans and a Masters of the Universe T-shirt. With him is a tall, scrawny blonde in a housedress and sneakers. From next door – bearing what looks like a plate of brownies – comes Jamal’s wife and daughter. Billy invites them all inside, where they can sit in actual chairs.
Welcome to the neighborhood, he thinks.
8
The Masters of the Universe guy and his skinny blonde wife are the Raglands. The Fazios also show up – although without their son – and the Petersons from the far end of the block, with a bottle of red wine. The living room fills up. It’s a nice little impromptu party. Billy enjoys himself, partly because he doesn’t have to work at projecting the dumb self, partly because he likes these people, even Jane Kellogg, who is pretty tight and has to keep visiting the bathroom. Which she calls the biffy. And by the time they all drift away – early, because tomorrow is a working day – Billy knows he will fit in here. He will be of interest because he’s writing a book and that makes him something of an exotic, but that will pass. By midsummer, always supposing Joel Allen doesn’t show up early for his date with a bullet, he’ll be just another guy on the street. Another neighbor.
Billy learns that Jamal is the foreman at Excellent Tire, and Corrie is – small world – a steno at the courthouse. He learns that Diane Fazio keeps an eye on Shanice during summer vacation while Jamal and Corrie are at work. Shanice’s brother Derek goes to day camp and will go to basketball camp in August. He learns that the Dugans, who moved out of the yellow house very suddenly last October （skedaddled is how Paul Ragland puts it）， were ‘snooty,’ and Dave Lockridge is, consequently, a good change. After the shot, they’ll tell reporters that he seemed like such a nice man. That’s okay with Billy. He thinks of himself as a nice man, one with a dirty job. At least, he thinks, I never shot a fifteen-year-old on his way to school. Supposing Joel Allen, aka ‘Joe,’ actually did that.
Before bed, he unboxes his AllTech laptop, powers it up, and googles Ken Hoff. He’s quite the mover and shaker in Red Bluff. He’s an Elk. He’s in Rotary. He was president of the local Jaycees chapter. Chairman of the local Republican Party during the 2016 election cycle, and there’s a picture of pre-beard scruff Ken wearing a red MAGA hat. He was on the city planning board but stepped down in 2018 after accusations of conflict of interest. He owns half a dozen downtown buildings, including the Gerard Tower, which Billy supposes makes him a kind of Donald Trump Mini-Me. He owns three TV stations, one here in Red Bluff and two in Alabama. All three are affiliated with World Wide Entertainment, which probably explains Hoff’s reference to WWE. He’s divorced not once but twice. That means hellimony. Plans to build a golf course were scrapped late last year. Plans for another downtown building are on hold. So is Hoff’s application for a casino license. All in all, it’s a picture of a man whose small-time business empire is teetering. One push and off the cliff it will go.