O Is for Outlaw

of the sort you'd buy at a flea market or pick off the sidewalk, like an alley fairy, on collection day. There was a shredder against one wall, but the bin had been emptied. In Mickey's view of the world, no scrap of paper, no receipt, and no piece of correspondence should go into the trash without being scissored into tiny pieces. He probably dumped the bin at frequent intervals, using more than one trash can, so that a thief breaking in wouldn't have the means to reassemble vital documents. No doubt about it, the man was nuts.
    I moved into the dining area, past four mismatched chairs and a plain wooden table that was littered with mail. I paused, picking through the stack that was piled at one end. I was careful not to sort the envelopes, though my natural inclination was to separate the bills from the junk. I spotted a number of bank statements, but there were no personal letters, no catalogs, and no credit card bills. I had little interest in his utility bills. What did I care how much electricity he used? I longed for a phone bill, but there were none to be found. The cops had lifted those. I picked up the handful of bank statements and slipped them down the front of my jeans into my underpants, where they formed a crackling paper girdle. I'd look at them later when I was home again. None of the other bills seemed useful so I left them where they were. Best to keep the federal mail-tampering convictions to a minimum.
    Off the dining area, I entered a galley-style kitchen so small I could reach the far wall in two steps. Stove, apartment-sized refrigerator, sink, microwave oven. The only kitchen window was small and looked out onto the alley. On the counter, he kept a round glass fishbowl into which he tossed his extra packets of matches at the end of the night, a road map of his journey from bar to bar. The upper cabinets revealed a modest collection of Melamine plates and coffee mugs, plus the basic staples: dry cereal, powdered milk, sugar, a few condiments, paper napkins, and two sealed bottles of Early Times bourbon. The cupboards below were packed back to front with canned goods: soups, beans, Spam, tuna packed in oil, tamales, SpaghettiO's, applesauce, evaporated milk. In the storage space under the kitchen sink, I found an empty bourbon bottle in the trash. Tucked in among the pipes, I counted ten five-gallon containers of bottled water. This was Mickey's survival stock in case a war broke out or L.A. was invaded by extraterrestrials. The refrigerator was filled with things that smelled bad. Mickey had tossed in half-eaten items without the proper wrapping, which resulted in dark chunks of hardening Cheddar cheese, a greening potato covered with wartlike sprouts, and half an air-dried tomato drawing in on itself.
    I retraced my steps. To the left of the living room was the door to the bedroom, with a closet and undersized bath beyond. The chest of drawers was filled with the usual jockey shorts and T-shirts, socks, handkerchiefs. The bed-table drawer contained some interesting items: a woman's diaphragm and a small spray bottle of cologne with a partial price label on the bottom. The cologne had apparently been purchased from a Robinson's Department Store, since I could still make out a portion of the identifying tag. I removed the top and took a whiff. Heavy on the Lily of the valley that I remembered from the early days of our romance. Mickey's mother must have worn something similar. I remembered how he'd lay his lips in the hollow of my throat when I was wearing it myself. I put the cologne bottle down. There was a tissue paper packet about the size of a stick of gum. I unfolded the paper and picked up a thin gold chain threaded through the clasp of a small gold heart locket with an ever-so-tiny rose enameled in the center. Not to sound cynical, but Mickey'd given me one just like this about a week into our affair. Some men do that, find a gimmick or shtick that works once, the gift of a single red rose – and recycle the same gesture with every woman who comes along.
    In a cleaning bag, he'd hung two dark blue uniforms with patches on the sleeves. I slid a hand up under the bag and checked one of the light blue patches. Pacific Coast Security was stitched in gold around the rim. Also hanging in the closet were a couple of sport coats, six dress shirts, four pairs of blue jeans, two pairs of chinos, a pair of dark pants, and a black leather jacket I knew very well indeed. This was the jacket Mickey