Tales of the City 08 - Mary Ann in Autumn

obviously taken before she started using. The other people in the pictures seem friendly enough. Coworkers, maybe. Or friends, even. But who the fuck are they?”
    Otto opened the lunch box and riffled through the photos.
    “Damn, she was fine.”
    “Tell me about it.”
    He held up one of the photos. “What about this fabric store?”
    “I called them already. Nobody’s heard of her. It was at least fifteen years ago.”
    “You said she worked at a Foot Locker, too. West Portal, right?”
    “Same thing. Those places have a huge turnover.”
    “And you Googled Lemke.”
    “Of course. They’re all over the place, believe it or not. There are even some other Alexandra Lemkes. The Web tells you too much sometimes.”
    Otto took the lunch box and dumped the contents on the table. Amid the photos was a pathetic tangle of costume jewelry and condom wrappers, glinting with sooty shards of aluminum foil that Alexandra must have used for smoking crack. Otto seemed fascinated by the inside of the lunch box itself, where Obi-Wan Kenobi was gazing up from the bottom with melancholy wisdom. He began to pick at the corner of the image.
    “What are you doing?”
    “It’s cardboard. I think it comes out.” He fiddled with it until the bottom pulled away completely, revealing the raw tin innards of the lunchbox. “ Et voilà! Princess Leia’s secret hiding place.”
    There was a letter there, still in its envelope, though it had already been opened. It was stuck to the tin, so Otto pried it away and handed it to Shawna. “Would you like to do the honors?”
    There was a major revelation even before she removed the letter. The envelope was addressed to Alexandra Lemke at 437 Tandy Street, San Francisco, California.
    “She had an address! She lived somewhere!”
    “What’s the postmark say? What year?”
    She squinted at the faded numbers. “1995. So she was … what? … in her late twenties?”
    Otto was enjoying her excitement. “Open it.”
    Her hands were actually shaking as she read aloud to him.
Dear Lexy,
Only 2 or 3 more days in Coos Bay and then I’m coming home to you. My aunt is very sick and they say she doesn’t have much longer. Please don’t do any more of the bad stuff. You know what I mean. I know its hard when I’m not their, but I will help you get better. I know you had it bad when you were little, but I truely believe that our love will make it better. Your my angel and you always will be. You are safe now. I will always be grateful to God that you married me—and that I went to buy those shoes. Ha ha.
See you soon!
Love always,
C
    Shawna set the letter down and gaped at Otto. “Jesus. She was married.”
    “Yep.”
    “And it sounds like she was already using.” She pondered that for a moment. “Why do you think she kept this so long? Because he never came home again?”
    “Why would you say that?”
    Good question , Shawna . Why are you projecting your own half-assed desertion issues onto a dead homeless woman?
    “What … then?” she asked. “You think she was too fucked-up to stick around? That she left him ?”
    “Maybe. Or they could’ve had a few more years together before she hit the skids. Who knows? It’s a nice letter. She probably saved it for sentimental reasons.”
    “She must’ve met him at the Shoe Locker.”
    “Yeah.” Otto tilted his chair back and rocked on it, his long, denimed legs extended, as if he were trying out a new prop for his act.
    “Ever heard of Tandy Street?” she asked.
    “It’s behind the Mint, I think. Up there on the hill.”
    “Wanna go for a ride?”
    Otto winced. “Aw … jeez.”
    “What?”
    “I thought we were gonna take her to Stow Lake.”
    “We can do that later,” she told him. “If that’s what we wanna do.”
    “This woman is dead, Shawna. It’s over. Do you really wanna make a pilgrimage to some place she lived thirteen years ago?”
    “What if her husband still lives there? That’s possible, isn’t it?”
    “Pretty remote, I’d say.”
    “Yeah, but if he is still there , wouldn’t he like to know what happened to her?”
    “Right. That she ended up turning tricks in Cocksuck Alley.”
    “ I would like to know,” she said. “If it were you, for instance. If you ended up, say, disappearing into the sordid underbelly of Pier 39.”
    He smiled at her like a sleepy forest cat. He was used to her jokes about that venue. “We have to leave the ashes in the car. We can’t just show up with his wife in a