August 5th. The night was dark and the streets were damp from the neighborhood kids running rampant in games of water war, the result of keeping cool in the heat wave. The streets were abandoned, except for me. Mothers had gathered their children in the house, and some of the more upscale citizens were busy entertaining guests in their homes. Maybe there were a few pictures showing in the theater, but the only place getting a good amount of cash was the speakeasy downtown.
I was leaning against the flickering streetlight as I watched an ambulance roar by me, running over a puddle and splashing my pants with muddy water. Another man that went crazy from the heat, I supposed. Looking down at the spot, I muttered curses that my mother would grab my ear for even in my adult age. I felt it was justified. After all, I was still wearing my good clothes from my meeting with the Chicago Tribune, the most prestigious newspaper in the state of Illinois.
Kicking at air in my anger, I went along my way, heading back down the lonely path to my small apartment. Walking up the front steps to the building I heard a raspy woman's voice calling down to me. "Hey kid, how'd that fancy meetin' of yours go?" It was Amy, an older woman though not by much, that stopped by from time to time to "visit". When we first met, I was in a rush to get a good scoop and ran right into her. She told me that she was visiting her cousin, but I had seen a number of women visiting him as well. The man had a lot of family.
Of course the hens of the neighborhood had a great deal to say about it. Old Mrs. Bennett in her snooping saw me talking to her and promptly shared her thoughts with me. I don't listen to much of what she says but I did hear the words "floozy" and "working girl" in the non-sense she was spouting. By the way that Amy looked I had a feeling that she had relatives all over the place, if you know what I'm getting at. None of the girls I knew painted their faces and dripped with ice like her. To be honest, I could find how many found it appealing, but this woman wasn't like the girls I grew up with. Risqué to the girls I knew was them borrowing their mother's pale pink lipstick for a date. Amy was the poster girl for flappers, defining the word "danger".
"Good, I think. They read some of my articles, and they told me to come back with a big story and if it's good they'll publish it. Better than telling me to scram, you know?" In the faint lamp light coming from the room, I could see her crimson lips curl up into a smile. The thud of a body colliding with a table sounded in the background. She turned her head of wavy red hair back at the scene behind her. "That's good, great actually. One of us needs to get out of this place, but I think you deserve it more." Another thud came from the room and again she turned to look, this time looking bother when she came back to focus. "Go. If you end up visiting a while longer, stop by before you leave. If it isn't a bother, I mean." Amy smiled sweetly. It was like an angel's smile, and I swear I heard a harp as the heavens opened above. Soon after the window shut and went back on my way to my apartment.
My routine was simple when I came home. I slipped off my shoes, hung up my coat and threw a kettle on the stove for a cup of tea. It eases the soul. Flinging my tie across the room and onto the radio, my tea kettle whistled to signal that it was finished. Just as it whistled, I heard a hard knock on my door like someone was beating on it with a hammer. Definitely not Amy. Cautiously I opened the door a crack to see two men with neatly parted hair, one holding a police badge up to my face. I opened it wider, scratching the top of my head nervously. My thoughts were immediately on Amy.
"Officers," I nodded in greeting, backing away from the door to allow them inside. They stood along the wall beside the door, their faces serious but respectful. "We're here about a Mr. Kendrick. We heard that you two were friends, family almost." The way they went about their visit bothered me. There was something wrong, but they weren't telling me. The kettle rocked back and forth. "Brian's the brother I never had. We've known each other since we were kids. We even went to grade school together." I went to tend to my singing kettle, looking up at the still stone-faced officers. "Tea?" They passed.
"Mr. London, around nine o'clock this evening, there was a single gunshot heard on the second floor of the Victory Club, the speakeasy down on Washington street. When we arrived at the scene we saw Mr. Kendrick lying on the ground with a bullet wound in his head. We think it was a quick death, if it's any consolation." I'm not sure when and if I moved before the two police officers took it upon themselves to leave. What do you do with news like that? I couldn't vomit even though I wanted to badly, and I couldn't cry because my eyes dried up as soon as the man said there was a gunshot. All I remember is that not long after the police left, Amy was knocking on my door loud enough to bother the whole building.
Somehow, that's all I know, I managed to open the door for her although the chances of me showing any joy for the fact that she was there were slim to none. "I saw the police come in when I was in my apartment. I was leaving when I saw them at your door. Please tell me you're not in any trouble. You're a good kid and you know that." My hands were shoved into my pockets uncomfortably as I watched my feet on the ground. My silence was getting to her. I felt her fingers comb through my hair like a mother soothing a sad child. That was us alright.
"Brian's dead." My mouth felt like sandpaper. I looked up to see her reaction, and it was the same as mine. Amy managed to move before I did though and flung herself on my, squeezing the life out of me as she kissed my forehead. I let her. I closed my eyes, fell to the aroma of roses in her perfume and let myself sink in the fact that my best friend, my brother was gone. Dead. Murdered. Gone was the nice word that they said. They made it sound like it was an accident.
"He was shot at the Green Jazz, the club downtown. They said he was on the second floor with a bullet to the brain." For some reason, as hard as it was to accept, it flowed from my lips like it was an everyday event. It kind of was. Murder at a speakeasy was hardly any big news. It hardly made news at all. Amy pulled away from her embrace and I could see the wrinkle on her forehead, the one that women hate. "Second floor of the Green Jazz?" I nodded in confirmation. "Honey, that doesn't sound like Brian, at least not from what I saw." In Amy's visiting she had seen him come and go, and talked to him a number of times when she was stopping by to see me.
"You've heard about that place, haven't you? It's a mob spot. Only criminals, boozehounds, gamblers and whores go there. In fact, most guys that go there are criminals looking to get drunk, gamble and make some time with a whore. That's not your friend." Amy's voice had dropped at the last word of her sentence. Her face was directed toward the ground and she shook her head. Her lips moved but I couldn't hear anything other than a line of rambling letters. "Amy, what are you saying?" She looked up almost as though it was going to be passed off as nothing, but she sighed sharply and gloomily answered.
"I said that I knew something bad was going to happen eventually. Those guys are always up to no good but it's been quiet lately. Real quiet. I know people, Paul, and the ones that have been talking say that it's scary. If this has anything to do with the way that people have been acting, your friend won't even be a memory in this place. No one's gonna talk." If life was like the funny pages a light bulb would've hovered over the top of my head. Amy could see it. I wasn't in the mood to argue, and I knew that was coming next.
"I know how you feel about him, but if you walk in there they're gonna fill you with lead. You don't know anyone there and you don't look like the type that would want to know anyone there. You don't have any business there." Amy was nearly shouting at me as I grabbed my jacket off the coat rack and sloppily pulled my shoes on. "But I know you, Amy, and I know that you're a good person. Deep down, you know that too." With my shoes and jacket on, I looked at Amy who stood with her hands on her hips, appearing distressed. Even she knew that she wasn't going to stop me.
"Look," she said as she approached me, placing her hand on the door to block me from leaving. "I'm going there in ten minutes. I'm working until one in the morning. Certain things don't happen until eleven. The johns know not to show up then. You wait until after eleven to show up and say that Amy sent you there for some company. When you go there, we're barely even acquaintances, okay? Don't even go to me. If you want to know what happened to your friend, go to Trish, but don't ask for her. She's the head girl there. Pretty girl, long blonde hair like you've never seen. Tell her what's going on and she'll help you. I know she will."
The silence was deafening. Amy sighed once again and leaned forward to kiss me on the cheek. She was gone shortly after. I would follow her plan. It was smart, I knew that much, and I had to do the smart thing for Brian's sake. To pass the time I was going to do the only thing that I could. Write. Everyone was going to know what happened to Brian Kendrick. Everyone. And I was going to be the one to tell them.