Red's CD Project Part 8

Note: This was one of the harder parts to get down. The second section here I was trying to be careful and precise with what was being said. Then I was just blocked on the last section. Hopefully it turned out OK. 


Disc 2
Track 4
Nearly Beloved
The Wallflowers
Rebel, Sweetheart

You play your fiddle, baby, I’ll play dumb

They both wore dark suits and straight, solid-colored ties. Hal thought to be completely cliché the pair of agents should have been wearing oversized sunglasses even when indoors. The taller one, Mick, wore his short hair gelled firm to his head with each dark strand precisely combed into place. He was too tan for Illinois in spring. Hal figured he shelled out hundreds of dollars a year for tanning beds or that fake stuff people spray on their skin to turn it orange.

The other guy was older, up to 15 years, than his partner. He was a black fellow whose stomach ballooned out in front and who went by the name Robinson. He was balding and clearly tired of his job. He sat across from Hal while Mick stood.

“We grilled him for two hours and got nothing useful,” Robinson said while lifting a styrofoam cup of coffee to his lips. Chief was at a luncheon for local officials leaving Hal as the highest-ranking member of the staff for the two FBI guys to pump for information. “Have your or anybody else around here heard him mention this Raheel character? It could be very important.”

“Sorry, guys I really haven’t spent a minute with him since he was transferred in. What’s the big deal about this Raheel guy? Isn’t Abdul the one you want behind bars?”

Mick paced on the other side of the desk.

“Raheel dropped off our radar three days ago,” Mick said with a clear fidget. “We don’t like that. We don’t like that at all.”

Hal leaned back suppressing the small ball of nerves settling in his gut.

“Look, when a guy like this goes under you don’t see him till he’s flying a plane into a building or driving a van full of fertilizer into a daycare center,” Robinson said calmly and coolly. He was much more used to the pressures of the job than the younger Mick.

“Didn’t you say there was a sign of a struggle at his apartment? Maybe someone took him,” Hal walked the line knowing where that lead could end up.

“Unlikely,” Robinson said and drank again. “We think it was staged to throw us off his trail.”

“I’d love to help where I can boys, but I don’t really think anyone here knows anything,” Hal said.

“You’re the ranking detective on staff?” Robinson asked.

“Yeah.”

“Well, why don’t you get to know our boy a little better. See if you can’t get him talking about this Raheel, a little. Maybe we can get a better idea of their connection, maybe get a glimpse of what might be going down.”

Robinson stood up. Hal jumped to his feet, almost in attention.

“I’ll give it a try.”

“You could save a lot of lives,” Mick jumped back into the conversation.

Robinson eyed his partner for a moment before handing Hal a card.

“Just call that number if you find out anything.”

“Alright, then.”

Hal shook Robinson’s hand and then watched them walk away.

“I sure will let you know. I tell you exactly what you want to hear.” Hal whispered slipping the card into the inside pocket of his sport’s jacket.


Disc 2
Track 5
Your Heart is an Empty Room
Death Cab for Cutie
Plans

And start new when your heart is an empty room

Neither of them spoke for several minutes. Hal had brought a folding chair in and set it up outside of Abdul’s cell. Sitting cross-legged on the cold steel, Hal stared between the bars at Abdul, who sat upon his cot. Abdul’s eyes were fixated on Hal. He held a brooding, heavy glare piercing out at everything. It reminded Hal of a pack of starving dogs that the force had found caged out in country a few years back. Their owner had been an elderly man who lived alone in a small shack. When the man died in his bed, no one knew. It was weeks before his body was discovered. His six dogs were frantic when they saw the policemen arrive. If any of the officers had let them out right away, the dogs would have torn every inch of flesh from the man’s body before moving on. That was the same look that Abdul’s eyes carried. He was close to where Hal wanted him, but not quite there yet. Anger blended with reason and calculation is what Hal wanted, not just hot rage.

“How did you say you got that cut on your face,” Abdul finally said.

“Shaving? Why does it matter?”

“It’s looks too deep to be an accidental cut. It has a funny shape to it.” Hal forgot that Abdul had studied medicine in an earlier life. “It’s looks like someone carved it on there. Like it was some sort of mark or reminder or a bad omen.”

“Just a sharp blade and an unsteady hand, I am afraid.”

“Hummph.” Abdul went silent again.

“You know those FBI guys want me to pump you for information on that Raheel guy.”

“They got everything I know. I’ve nothing to hide.”

“Really?”

“I barely know the guy. I’ve spoken with him maybe a half dozen times over the last five years and it’s been a year or so since the last time. He’s just somebody with the same colored skin and same set of beliefs, so we must be best friends, right?”

“Do you think he’s up to something?”

“Possibly. I doubt it.”

“Why?”

“Raheel loves attention. If he were up to something, he’d broadcast it loud enough for everyone to hear. Disappearing would be too hard on him?”

Hal smirked and let the topic drop. While scratching behind his ear, he leaned forward and indicated that Abdul should come closer.
“You know those FBI guys just like to get in the way.”

Abdul crinkled his eyebrows in confusion.

“Aren’t all you guys the same?” Abdul asked. “All you law guys?”

Hal made his face as serious as he could.

“No fucking way, my man. Those FBI guys, they are just tools for the politicians. Every perp they catch, every drug bust, is only done to further some suits career in Washington. They aren’t catching criminals. They are making them. It’s all a show. They aren’t the police force.”

Abdul moved to right in front of the bars of the cell and fell to his knees. It was the posture of a man close to prayer. A Christian man at least, a man like Abdul would be putting his nose to the ground for his praying.

“Have you ever thought about who is really in control of this country?”

“How do you mean?”

“Think about the police force that spans this nation. Thousands of men and women all trained the same and armed. They are on the streets of every village, town, city and metropolis. Every person runs to them for help, for answers, for order.”

“So?”

“So what if we were finally able to give it to them? What if every department in every corner of the map worked together to eliminate the vermin of our society? We’ve already rounded up hundreds of thousands of them and caged them. Those would be easy to destroy. The rest – the dissenters and the troublemakers – well those people could just start disappearing.” Hal said this final sentence with his finger pointed outward.

“Disappearing?”

“Oh, I was just coining a phrase.”

“Your people wouldn’t allow this. Your laws forbid it.”

“We are the law, Abdul. We are the people. In every community, we’re there with family and friends that love us and support us and trust us. If we say this is right, they’ll agree.”

“What of your FBI?”

“We’ll they do pose a problem, but like I said they are nothing more than puppets of the politicians. No politician is going to oppose the police, it would be political suicide.”

“So the police are the one’s to stop?”

Hal grinned.

“You can’t stop it. It’s too late for that. All you can do is fight in every way you can think of?”

“Why are you telling me this?”

Abdul looked confused. Hal shook his head and stood up.

“Haven’t you figured it out yet? Where do you think you’re going to go when we finally let you out of this cage?”

Hal spun and walked away, he thought he could almost hear a hissing sound coming from the man he left back in the cell.


Disc 2
Track 6
Maybe It’s Just Me
Butch Walker
Letters

It’s not a contest of who’ll try harder. Or who’ll cross the finish line.

Hal left work that day early and drove out to this parent’s farm. He stopped at the house and popped the trunk. He pulled out the chest that still caused him some repulsion to touch. That was the human side of him screaming at the grim facts contained inside. He carried it upstairs to the attic back to where it had resided for decades earlier.

After that, he went out to a shed and retrieved a shovel. He walked back behind the barn and found a plot of earth that was obviously freshly covered. He had been careful to find every piece of hair or fragment of bone and threw to the bottom of the cruelly dug grave before refilling it.

He stood at the edge of the muddy turf and faced south and then stepped off a hundred feet. There he sunk the shovel’s head into the field and started to dig. It was cool out creating an odd sensation as his muscles started to burn. He went about four feet deep before widening it out.

He stepped out of the hole and then walked north fifty feet back in the direction of the first grave. There he turned west and walked out another hundred feet and began to dig.

The sun was low in the sky when he finished. He walked up to the barn that inclined up to its big sliding doors. He watched the sun sink on the horizon and noting how the two empty holes seemed to cast a shadow reaching toward the barn.

“They’re hungry to be filled,” Hal whispered. “We’re going to satisfy one of you by morning.”

“Did you hear that!” he screamed. “I’ll take care of one of you by the morning.”