Lost Light

of the Valley and turned it brilliant shades of orange and pink and purple. It was like some sort of reward for putting up with having to breathe the poisoned air every day. This evening it was mostly a smooth orange color with wisps of white mixed in. It was what my ex-wife used to call a Creamsicle sky when she watched sunsets off the back deck of the house. She had a descriptive label for each one and that always made me smile.
    The memory of her on the deck seemed like such a long time ago and such a different part of my life. I thought about what Roy Lindell had said about seeing her in Las Vegas. He knew I had been asking about her even though I told him I hadn’t. If not a day then at least not a week went by that I didn’t think about going out there, finding her and asking for another chance. A chance of making a go of it on her terms. I had no job holding me to L.A. anymore. I could go where I wanted. This time I could go to her and we could live there together in the city of sin. She could still be free to find what she needed on the blue felt poker tables of the city’s casinos. And at the end of each day she could come home to me. I could do whatever came up. There would always be something in Vegas for a person with my skills.
    One time I had packed a box, put it in the back of the Benz and had gotten as far as Riverside before the familiar fears started rising in my chest and I pulled off the freeway. I ate a hamburger at an In-N-Out and then headed back home. I didn’t bother unpacking the box when I got there. I put it on the floor in the bedroom and took out the clothes I had packed as I needed them over the next two weeks. The empty box was still there on the floor, ready for the next time I wanted to pack it and make that drive.
    The fear. It was always there. Fear of rejection, fear of unrequited hope and love, fear of feelings still below the surface in me. It was all mixed in the blender and poured smooth as a milkshake into my cup until it was filled to the very edge. So full that if I were to move even a step it would spill over the sides. Therefore I couldn’t move. I stood paralyzed. I stayed home and lived out of a box.
    I’m a believer in the single-bullet theory. You can fall in love and make love many times but there is only one bullet with your name etched on the side. And if you are lucky enough to be shot with that bullet then the wound never heals.
    Roy Lindell might have had Martha Gessler’s name on a bullet. I don’t know. What I do know is that Eleanor Wish had been my bullet. She had pierced me through and through. There were other women before and other women since but the wound she left was always there. It would not heal right. I was still bleeding and I knew I would always bleed for her. That was just the way it had to be. There is no end of things in the heart.

16
    On the way into Woodland Hills I made a quick stop at a Vendome Liquors and then headed to the house on Melba Avenue. I didn’t call ahead. With Lawton Cross I knew the chances were always good he’d be at home.
    Danielle Cross answered the door after three knocks, and her already strained face took on a deeper scowl when she saw it was me.
    “He’s sleeping,” she said, holding her body tightly in the door’s opening. “He’s still recovering from yesterday.”
    “Then wake him up, Danny, because I need to talk to him.”
    “Look, you can’t just barge in here. You’re not a cop anymore. You have no right.”
    “Do you have the right to decide who he does and doesn’t see?”
    That seemed to stall her anger a little bit. She looked down at the toolbox in one hand and the box I had under my arm.
    “What is all of that?”
    “I got him a gift. Look, Danny, I need to talk to him. People are going to be coming to see him. I have to talk to him about it so he’ll be ready.”
    She relented. Without further word she stepped back and opened the door wide. She signaled me in with an outstretched arm and I stepped over the threshold. I found my way to the bedroom.
    Lawton Cross was asleep in his chair, his mouth open and a spill of medicinal-looking drool curved down his cheek. I didn’t want to look at him. He was too much of a reminder of what could happen. I put the toolbox and the clock box down on the bed. I went back to the door and closed it, making sure it banged in the jamb loud enough to hopefully startle Cross awake. I didn’t want to have to touch him to wake him up.
    When I