Heaven, INC: Chapter 8: JIMMY AND EVIE

Ain’t no sunshine when she’s gone,
only darkness every day.
—Ain’t No Sunshine,
BILL WITHERS

622 NAUTILUS AVENUE
LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA
8:01 AM PDT

IT WASN’T UNTIL JIMMY finished the guest room that Pearl Necklace abandoned him to work with Owen downstairs, but even a floor above, Jimmy could hear her shrewish voice warning Owen against bleeding on her Italian marble floor and that if he did bleed on the marble or anywhere else, for that matter, he’d be sued by the best attorney in the state to the effect “you’ll never clean carpets in this town again.”

It wasn’t long until the woman’s absence and the hum of the cleaning unit relaxed Jimmy’s mind enough to get his thoughts circling, like they so often did, back to Evie.


JIMMY’S REACTION TO EVIE’S MURDER might seem ironic, given he was homicide and all the bodies he’d encountered, but there’s really no preparing a man to see his love dumped on a hillside with nothing but the flies to keep her company, dumped as Evie had been, with the mattresses, old tires and the dried-up houseplants the world no longer wanted.
Jimmy, he went nuts for awhile.

Now, the record label guys, so enamored with Panorama Love and their rock-pop duo, they said how sorry they were, what a tragedy it was and how remarkable had been Evie’s voice, the clear power with which she sang— but then added, “Listen, Jimmy, you’re the songwriter. We find someone to fill Evie’s role, someone special, bang, you could go straight to the top . . . And I know just the girl to replace her . . . Just the girl, Jimmy. Young, hot, ambitious. I’m telling you, we fill Evie’s spot, I can take Panorama Love straight to the top. With, of course, the proper marketing.”

The guy saying this, sniffling with a scotch in hand, Jimmy at least waited until he set his drink down before slamming a fist into the guy’s face. And after that, you could say things soured a bit. In fact, could say things got downright awful. But what would you do, finding your love with a broken neck and left out on a garbage-strewn hillside like trash no more valuable than a broken lamp? It’s a terrible pain beats in your chest, a living thing, suffocating and all-powerful that most everyone just sucks up because there’s nothing else they can do but wait passively by the phone.

But Jimmy was police, Jimmy was Homicide, and Jimmy was the emotional type and in the position and of certain a disposition that rendered him unwilling and unable to simply forget about Evie and take up with her replacement— how does one replace a soul?— to play those dreamed-of shows at the Troubadour and the Whiskey, dreamed of on a hundred nights and a thousand dreary days.

No, Evie was the only thing that went unforgotten.

And it never mattered to Jimmy he was banned from the investigation on grounds of personal prejudice because he worked his own investigation, worked it morning, noon and night like a junkie works a needle, working it long after losing his job, his band and his mind, lost somewhere well past the exit points of exhaustion, hope and sanity down in the ragged crevasses of despair where the only thing that still animates a man is the need to revenge . . .

All of it, beginning, middle and end, hung in Jimmy’s mind like an angry red E-note. And Jimmy never gave up. Oh, it may have taken 16 months of his life and wrecked nearly every last relationship, but Jimmy finally found his man because no other outcome was acceptable. So after tracking down Evie’s killer and arresting the stone cold killer, as was his strong desire, what was the outcome, but watching the motherfucker walk free, exonerated of all charges by strands of genetic code drawn from his cold veins that supposedly didn’t match and that set him free despite the overwhelming circumstantial evidence. And none of it, not one goddamn word, was ever released to the public by a gag order out of the D.A.s office, and the D.A. a known political slime-bag on the block for anybody with enough money to bid his services—

“Hello? HELLO? Can’t you see that dark patch there? I mean, wake up and pay attention please. My god, where’s your head?”

Pearl-Necklace pointed to a patch of bright white carpet along the edge of the king-sized bed, carpet so bright it was nearly blinding. “None of you people pay attention to detail or craftsmanship anymore.” Her hands went to her hips. “I want it white, you understand? White white white.”

Jimmy glanced around at the antiseptically white master bedroom, the white carpet, white furniture and the polished chrome, all devoid of any touch of human warmth and so like the woman, rich, white and soulless.

“Ma’am, I’ve gone over that area twice and it’s bad for the carpet, blasting more hot water into the glue backing, but on top of that, it’s a shadow, ma’am—”

“I’ll be the judge of that. This is my carpet, my house and you’re working for me. Now clean that edge!”

With a shrug, Jimmy started along the bed’s edge. The ChemSteem-patented unit featured steam nozzles and vacuum intakes mounted on a rotating head that swept in circles—

“White!”

— and as Jimmy ran the rotating head under the edge of the bed-spread, the woman watched over his shoulder.

“Yes. Yes, just like that, all the way around, I want my carpet to glow, do you understand, glow. If you need to get down on your hands and knees and scrub it then that’s what I expect—”

Chh-Clunk!

The unit shuddered as the rotating head brushed something beneath the bed. Whatever it was suddenly flung from under the bed and with dread, Jimmy powered down the unit.

Amazingly and for the first time since arriving, the woman was quiet. Instead, she stood with her shoulders hunched and hands over her mouth in a Monkey Speak No Evil kind of way as she stared at the object loitering on her bright white carpet.

It was a rubber dildo, arm-length and black, and it featured life-like veins and tissue paper stuck to its life-like testicles.

The woman looked to Jimmy—

He didn’t even bother trying to suppress his smile.

— and back to the dildo. Hesitating, one hand again fingering the pearls as she looked back at
Jimmy—

Jimmy grinned broadly.

— before she crossed the room and grabbed the dildo by the head. Slinging it over her shoulder, she silently exited the room.


THE WOMAN made no eye contact signing the job manifest and tipped them all of five bucks total for nearly two hours work.

Curiously, the next job on the list was the Ocean Beach 3-area they’d pass Mij Poopikov’s DreamCircus getting to, and as Jimmy started the van, he looked over at Owen. “Gonna make a pit stop on the way,” adding, “Before we get there, though, there’s something I gotta tell you.”
Owen smiled as the van got rolling. “Cool. How about starting with the part about the gun sticking out from under your seat.”