CRIME
Dorothy Parker was arrested once for attending a rally in support of Italian anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti. After that, she was followed closely by the FBI, who once showed up at her door unannounced. When asked if she had ever attempted to overthrow the U.S. government, she scoffed. “Listen,” she said, “I can’t even get my dog to sit down.”
In this issue, our writers share their brushes with felonies, misdemeanors, and some terrible decision-making
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Stolen Bites
Word Count 174
It’s seven-thirty in the morning and I’m already tired. My stomach hurts. Too much coffee. The dogs are napping after their wild foray outside. I’m depressed about being tired all the time until I notice the lighter is right there on the table and I don’t have to get up to light my cigarette on the stove. I can use the coffee cup as an ashtray which is one of my disgusting habits. What is wrong with me?
The Body in the Basement
Word Count 997
I live in Old Louisville, a historic Kentucky neighborhood comprising 48 blocks of 19th century mansions. Our homes are haunted by urban legends who famously (and infamously) lived and died in the homes we now occupy. Quirky people choose to live here. We celebrate our peculiarities. So, I suppose we should expect a body in the basement now and then.
On June 17, 2010, police discovered a corpse buried in the cellar of a mansion only two blocks from where I live. A man stabbed to death had been laid to rest under the dirt floor, his body folded into a plastic Rubbermaid-style tub. The neighborhood response was not what you might expect.
Howdy
Word Count 431
I was standing by my father’s hospital bed when my brother phoned from prison.
My father brightened at the call, listening carefully and sometimes stumbling over his responses. While he struggled to find words, he’d raise his free hand and shake it by his face, wincing when he failed to jumpstart a stalled phrase. His upbeat expression evaporated, replaced by the determined focus of an impatient crapshooter. Exasperated, he handed the phone to me. My brother was still holding forth, confidently opining about our father’s latest diagnoses and the shoddy reputation of this particular hospital. He boasted that he’d convened his own advisory team, topnotch medical experts all currently on the inside. My brother, an inveterate name-dropper and convicted felon, was serving federal time for bank fraud.
The Day the FBI Came Knocking
Word Count 823
On a hot summer night in 1950, we were eating dinner in the kitchen and listening to a Dodger game on the radio. Dessert would be the mocha layer cake on the counter for my ninth birthday.
When the house phone rang, my mother jumped up. I could hear Fran, my friend’s aunt, who lived downstairs. “There’s a man at my door who says he’s from the FBI. I’m alone with Edwina, and I’m afraid to let him in.” My mother said we’d be there right away.
On the way down in the elevator, I asked my father, “What is the FBI?” He said, “It’s the government’s police in Washington. DC. They catch people who do bad things and put them in jail.”
Swindler’s List
Word Count 979
I sat stunned on the couch in my Brooklyn living room. My former boss, a congressional candidate I worked for right out of college as a press secretary, was featured on the television show FBI: Most Wanted with a substantial ransom on his head.
I barely recognized the man whose campaign poster had featured a photo of the square-jawed, wavy-haired Ted Kennedy look alike with his three daughters at his side, next to the headline: “At Last -- a Man to Believe In!” Now he wore his hair slicked back, like a lounge singer. His broad face was saggy with the weight of the twenty years since I had seen him.
Mezcal Fever
Word Count 591
A field of agave plants grew on the property, two donkeys grazed nearby, and a Dalmatian named Mr. James roamed the house. There were six dogs altogether. Some lingered in the courtyard; others sniffed outside by the garden or compost. At night, while they slumbered, we drank mezcal, distilled from the heart of the agave, whose smokey and buttery tones lulled me. I was staying with my friend, also a writer, at his home outside the city of Oaxaca to work for two weeks. He lived on an ex-hacienda that was over 200 years old, surrounded by valleys and mountains.
At dawn, I heard voices roll across the valley. Over breakfast, I asked my friend if he had heard anything, and he laughed. He told me he had hired a curandera, a medicine woman, to clean the earth of any evil spirits after they had bought the place.
Spanning the Globe
Word Count 1124
I was passing an antique shop on my way to my office last week and saw an old globe in the window that made me think of my patient. I can recall many of our conversations, the gentle character of his voice, the resignation in his eyes, but not his name. I’ve wracked my brain. I saw him almost twenty years ago for nearly a year in twice weekly sessions. He was a former prisoner who had served stints for everything from petty larceny to armed robbery. I was a young intern working in a city hospital.
Mandated by the court to enter therapy, his chart had a red notation at the top I didn’t recognize: “Violence/aggression risk.” His diagnosis was “Schizoaffective disorder,” and the chart noted he had a long-term substance abuse problem. Reading on, I saw he had gotten out of prison two weeks earlier.
La Noche Oscura
Word Count 711
Walk down a dark empty street on your way to your Oaxaqueño apartment, oblivious to your surroundings. You’ve done this walk, albeit earlier in the day, many times. Your brain is busy with: Shit, will I ever memorize Spanish conjugations… Is there any oatmeal left? ... Why hasn’t S called me? ... I need a shower, but … no fucking hot water again…
Notice a dark shadow racing toward you from behind. Feel the shadow’s hands on each side of your waist at the exact second you register DANGER so that the registering and your spinning collide with the speeding shadow, and as you attempt to kick it away, one of the shadow’s hands grabs your leg, and you fall hard on your ass.
Broken Glass
Word Count 1310
Late in the summer, we meet up with my son in San Francisco for breakfast at one of our favorite spots on 9th street across from Golden Gate Park.
From there, we walk down Nancy Pelosi Drive with plans to explore a botanical garden.
Suddenly, I hear a pop, a crunch, and patter. Ahead of me, maybe 30 feet, I see a young man in a dark hoodie with a blue bandana wrapped across his face, his arms up to his elbows inside the back window of a black van. Shards of glass glisten on the sidewalk.
Oh, he’s locked himself out of his car, I think for a fleeting second. Wait, no. I try to recalibrate what I’m seeing. Broken glass.. What’s he doing? As he extracts his arms, empty-handed, and runs to the driver-side of the van—I scream.
Disappearing Girls
Word Count 873
I was in high school when the girls began disappearing. First, there was Maggie Ward. She went away without any warning. Then there was Traci Peterson. We watched her get fat in her gym suit, and then she too was gone. Perhaps we could have anticipated something like this after the public shaming of Sherrie Salter. Sherrie had done something in cars with boys when we were still in middle school, and our teacher made Sherrie stand up in front of us – just the girls, not the boys – and confess her sins. Her mother sat in the first row, stoically watching as her daughter, one of those tough girls from the other side of the tracks, cracked and fell to pieces before our eyes. After that, I always knew what I’d do.
A Monstrous Boy
Word Count 961
James laced a telephone cord around his mother’s neck and pulled until he asphyxiated her.
I knew James since first grade. In fourth grade, he sat behind me in Ms. L’s class. He kicked my chair throughout the school year. My head bounced back and forth like a rag doll.
One day, before lunch, James was desperate to get my attention. “Tamara! Tamara!” I ignored him as always, and then he pleaded more. “Please! Turn just this once.” I couldn’t concentrate and thought if I swerved, he’d stop kicking, so I could finish my spelling lesson.
I twisted my neck, begging him with my eyes to, please, stop. I was a shy little girl and rarely spoke, especially to boys. A pencil flopped in my right hand, close to my mouth.
Auld Lang Syne at the Parisian Five and Dime
Word Count 1080
Paris. New Year’s Eve. 1980. I have had to cancel my plans for dinner with friends to meet my father during his three-hour layover at Charles de Gaulle airport. Swollen with the kind of self-pity I excelled at, I wandered the aisles of Prisunic, a Parisian version of Woolworth’s that supplied the kind of hodgepodge one might call “sundries,” toy cars and plastic baby dolls sat disturbingly close to mousetraps and feminine hygiene products. While my neighborhood was hardly a tourist hot spot, a souvenir case stood near the store’s entrance, packed with made-in-Taiwan Eiffel Towers, and dusty Arc de Triomphe snow globes.
Con Academy
Word Count 1176
I have learned not to wear an underwire bra on teaching days. Shoes, coats, and class materials are searched by hand and stamped with invisible ink., A metal door slides open, and we pass through to a small vestibule. My co-teacher, Linda, and I hold our stamped hands under a purple light while pressing our IDs up to the window, where another guard sits.
A new building, more screening. We get passes to display on our shirts, and sign in: time in, time out, purpose –teaching memoir writing to the prisoners.
New Careers for Drug Dealers
Word Count 1015
“Um… I had a rich boyfriend,” I shrugged, explaining my threadbare resume and lack of current employment.
The career counselor across from me—a young, serious blonde close to my age—looked to be a recent graduate in a white polyester blouse, a navy skirt, pantyhose, and low heels. I would not be caught dead in polyester. I never wore heels because I didn’t like to be taller than Nick, and the last time I’d worn pantyhose was when I smuggled hash from Morocco.
I clasped and unclasped my hands nervously as the counselor studiously reviewed my resume. I left off drug and diamond smuggling, listing just salesclerk, waitress, and the stint in a mental hospital.
“I was an employee, not a patient at the hospital,” I joked.
Watching The Detective
Word Count 612
When I was in my 20’s, I met Tom T., a New York City homicide detective in his early 40’s. We both lived on the same side of the street in Greenwich Village. Even before we were introduced, I had my eye on him as he was extremely attractive in a pirate-y sort of way. He had black hair and a black beard, and dark brown eyes and wore Native American silver rings on every finger. He had a satin bomber jacket with the words “Film Trucks” embroidered across his back. After we’d been seeing each other for a few weeks, he shared he’d worked a long time undercover in the narcotics division, which is where he developed a taste for high-grade blow.
Rock Bottom
Word Count 566
I am out of money and out of booze. I put on my favorite black dress and take myself out to the Mexican restaurant around the corner. It’s comforting just walking in the door. It smells like frying onions and cilantro and has the reassuring sound of ice in blenders. The waiters are setting the tables with white tablecloths. I sit down at one and order chicken mole and margaritas for two, inventing a dinner companion. Inventing a husband who I tell the waiter will be joining me soon. I sip my first drink, congratulating myself.
The Stolen Bathing Suit
Word Count 494
I needed a bathing suit, and I didn’t have one. That much, I know.
I was a freshman at Radcliffe, living in the quad in a tiny room that I’d requested when my roommate, Carol, stopped speaking to me after she returned from Thanksgiving break.
Though she never explained, I knew that her close proximity to my experimentation with sex and drugs was threatening her educational goals and probably her image of herself.
Crime in Japan
Word Count 703
When I lived in Japan, my fellow expats often swapped tales testifying to the honesty of the Japanese. We’d excitedly relate to each other how a wallet we left on a park bench got returned to us—all cash and cards inside, of course—or how someone who’d scraped the side of our car had left an apologetic note taped to the door including personal details so we could get in touch to ask for reimbursement.
And yet, there is crime in Japan. Twice during my long residence in the country, I was visited by police to make a witness statement about a crime committed in a neighbor’s house.