Page 3 of Into the Fire

Oh, well. As his old man said, A whole lotta folks do better with worse.

The breeze blew sage and chaparral, the dusty scent of the Santa Monica Mountains when you got away from the asphalt and car exhaust. Max started up the trail, nearing a homeless guy five layers deep in rags. The man seemed to grow out from the base of the fence, an organism composed of tattered cardboard, scraps of bedding, and dirt-caked flesh. Swollen legs protruded from a shabby blanket, the skin the same color as the fabric, the dirt. His feet were bare, the soles cracked like shattered plastic. A pit-bull mix was curled up beside him, his snout scarred like the hull of an old ship—probably a dogfight rescue.

The man rattled some coins in a chewed Fatburger cup. “Help a guy out?”

Max said, “We all got it rough, pal.”

The man nodded sagely. “Ain’t that the truth.”

Max jogged up the trail, weaving through the post-workday rush. Designer mini-dogs trotted on bejeweled leashes. Rihanna blared from Beats headphones. A few young guys moved together like a pride of lions, their hair cut in Mad Men parts, negotiating deals too loudly on their phones. A silver-haired husband and wife held hands and looked as content as anyone Max had ever seen outside a TV commercial.

He reached Inspiration Point and took in the downtown skyline miles to the southeast. The scrubby trail brush in the foreground framed the urban sprawl beyond, a snapshot of Los Angeles in all its rangy glory.

Violet had always loved this view. And now this was the closest to her he could get.

A mom nudged up beside him with an off-road stroller rugged enough to have been designed by the United States Army. Behind dark mesh a baby cooed, and Max turned quickly away.

He ran back down even harder.

As he passed through the gate, he heard the homeless guy rattle his few coins and call out to the pride of young men.

The loudest of the bunch muted his phone against his chest. “Quit bugging everyone, dude. You’re a joke.”

The homeless guy said, “Then help me not be a joke.”

The young man laughed, white teeth flashing, and pointed at him. “Nice try, bud. Nice try.”

Max walked up the street to where he’d left his truck, a TrailBlazer with rust patches eating through the wheel wells. He had to climb in across the passenger seat because a tap-and-run months back had dented in the driver’s door.

He sat for a moment, hands on the steering wheel. He thought of the homeless guy back by the fence, those painful deep cracks running through the soles of his blackened feet. Help me not be a joke.

He turned the truck on but couldn’t bring himself to tug the gearshift into drive.

A whole lotta folks do better with worse.

Defeated, he cut the engine and climbed out over the console. He headed back toward the trailhead.

Three minutes later he returned.

Barefoot.

From the truck bed, he pulled out a dirty pair of socks and his work boots, worn from his by-the-day construction gig. When he crawled back behind the wheel, his phone chimed in the glove box.

He popped open the antique clamshell he’d been using ever since he fell behind on the payments for his iPhone.

A text from his father waited: YOUR COUSIN GRANT WAS KILLED LAST NIGHT. FIGURED YOU SHOULD KNOW.

Max lowered his face, took a few deep breaths, his hand clammy around the phone. Then he shoved the truck into gear, the transmission complaining, and headed into whatever the day held.

As Max drove up to his apartment on the last street in Culver City still unclaimed by gentrification, he reminded himself: He didn’t know anything about anything.

This seemed true in general. But specifically it meant that he didn’t—shouldn’t—have to worry about the nonsense that Grant had saddled him with two months ago.

He recalled the scene with the clarity reserved for painful memories. Golden Boy Grant, the pride and joy of the Merriweathers, paying his first visit to Max’s shitty second-floor apartment, standing on the worn carpet in a thousand-dollar suit so he wouldn’t have to sit on the stained couch. Grant, whose exploits and accomplishments Max heard about at every infrequent brush with a family member. Grant, the forensic accountant, certified in internal auditing, business evaluation, fraud examination, financial forensics, and God knew what else, the licensure initials appended to his signature even on the family fucking Christmas card. Grant, caped investigator of misfeasance, who scoured the books at the behest of insurance companies, police departments, attorneys, banks, courts, government regulatory bodies, and the occasional private citizen. Grant of the rugged good looks, the strong chin, of the spit-shined wingtips and high-precision haircut. “Exactitude is my business,” he’d told Max on more than one occasion. And indeed, sprawled on his inferior couch, Max noted that he could probably cut himself on the crease of his cousin’s slacks.

Grant had handed him a canary-yellow envelope and said, “If anything ever happens to me, call the number inside.”

Max said, “You serious with this Hitchcock routine?”