Tag: Romance Divas

I was challenged on Romance Divas this week to write a story a\’la 1930\’s noir fiction. The challenge was:

Your story should include the following: a dirty taxi, a missing councilman, a Dick Tracy watch (radio included), and should take place in the 1930\’s.

Here, then, in honor of Flash Fiction Friday, is my story. I think it might work out to be a Chapter One in a possible novel; what do you think? Shall we continue? Read on and decide for yourself. (I should warn you, because of the time period, there is profanity and racism in the writing, so please don\’t continue if you\’re not comfortable with either.)

Taxis these days are abysmal. God damned pig-shit Irish think they run the place, and they can\’t even keep the damn taxis clean. Damn Cermak, anyway, for getting shot when it should have been Roosevelt. World\’s Fair comes here, you\’d think they\’d clean up the damn things.

\”Move it!\” my driver shouted out the window, his cigarette in danger of landing his lap. He shook his fist at some Black kid trundling a huge cart of flat cardboard boxes from sidewalk to sidewalk, wrestling the dumb thing up the eighteen-inch curb.

Progress. That\’s what they call it in the papers. Just an excuse to beat up on the little guy, like always.

\”Go left at the next street,\” I told the driver.

\”Look, buddy, you really don\’t want –\”

\”Just do it!\”

God damned pig-shit Irish, thinking they\’re better than good honest Americans. Come over here with their potato famine and their accents and think they run the place. Stupid Cermak; why\’d you leave us like this?

\”Let me out here.\”

The driver\’s blue eye gazed at me in the mirror, his disagreement plain on his freckled Irish face. His nose didn\’t show the signs yet, but they\’re all drinkers. Irish whiskey, Scotch, it didn\’t matter. They say God invented the stuff so the Irish would never win a war.

And now they\’re in my town. Thanks a lot!

I got out around the corner from forty-seventh, smack in the Black Belt. Lieutenant Dziedziecz thought I was nuts for coming here, but here is where the witness lived.

\”You\’re a nice White boy, and Polish to boot, Lapinsky. How you gonna go to the Black Belt at night and find a tinker\’s damn in the place without getting shot or worse? The Councilman sure as shit ain\’t in the Black Belt, for Christsakes!\”

\”You wanna find the Alderman, or not?\” Dziedziecz came from New York, by way of Poughkeepsie. Couldn\’t get it through that brick he called a brain that Chicago had Aldermen, New York had Councilmen.

He kicked me out of his office with his characteristic profanity, and I gave as good as I got.

There are benefits to being a gumshoe and not a cop, chief among these is I don\’t have to take shit from a Pollock no matter how rich he was. Still came from Warsaw, or at least his pop did, same as me.

My watch chimed and I glared down at it. A Dick Tracy radio watch, the genuine article! My kid bought it for me as a birthday gift last month. God damned comic book hero, and my kid thinks that\’s what I do for a living. I\’d leave the thing at home but the wife says it makes me a better father.

Because of a watch?

The bar I wanted was three doors down. And I mean down – the thing lived in the basement of a three-storey brick number. The three-flat housed two famous Black Jazz musicians and what was reputed to be a famous Black madam, but I didn\’t care about that. I wanted the bar.

The hulking bouncers loitering by the cast iron fence and smoking promised to interfere with that plan…

I pulled out a cigarette and approached. \”Got a light?\”

The one closer to me turned to get a better look at me and then stared. \”Lapinsky?\”

\”Joe Brown? What the Hell you doin\’ all the way down here? I thought you was going to Los Angles!\” I lit my own damned cigarette, since neither of them showed any sign of doing it.

\”Los Angeles,\” Brown drawled, spreading out the syllables like a Spaniard. \”When you gonna learn another language besides Panglish?\”

His buddy made a sound somewhere between a cough and a snort and covered his mouth with one huge black fist. If he could have turned red, he would have. Hell, maybe he did; with the night around us, Hell if I could tell if Black skin reddened.

\”What are you doin\’ here, man?\” Brown asked me. \”This is Reggie.\”

Reggie nodded but said nothing, so I sketched a salute in his direction. \”I\’m lookin\’ for the Alderman. Word is, your Bartender could help me.\”

Reggie straightened, no longer blushing. Brown motioned him back and he hesitated, then leaned against the fence again. Except this time, I had his undivided attention.

\”Police send you?\” Brown wanted to know.

\”I told Dziedziecz where I was going.\” I paused. \”He said I\’d get my ass shot off.\”

Brown laughed, a loud bray of sound that echoed through the street even over the sounds of Jazz coming from the place on the corner. \”You might at that, you crazy Pollock. You might at that.\”

I narrowed my eyes. \”That mean you\’ll let me in?\”

Brown glanced at Reggie, who shrugged. He turned back to me. \”Yeah. You can go on in. Ask for Marve.\”

\”Thanks.\”

\”And Pollock,\” Brown added, \”be careful.\”

Great. First the Lieutenant and now Brown. You\’d think I was shakin\’ down Capone\’s place or something, and not some Black dive bar in the middle of the Black Belt.

Progress, my ass.

I took a final drag on my cigarette and tossed it into the gutter. The steps led down to a black door. Here\’s hoping they led up again.

What do writers do when we’re bored or seeking inspiration? We do what any self-respecting sports fan would understand: we challenge each other to duels!

Originally posted on the Romance Divas forum, one of the top writing-related forums on the internet, this challenge came about because I failed to step backward fast enough when the Captain asked for volunteers.

That’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it!

Well, okay, this is my story, but hope you enjoy!

Original Challenge, issued by Jess Granger, Thursday, January 07, 2010:

“Your hero/heroine just got a job working in supernatural law enforcement. Lately they\’ve been having some trouble with Leprechauns running a money laundering scheme for a bunch of investment bankers/vampires. Your hero/heroine is just about to meet with a new partner for the undercover operations when she/he suspects someone is following…

Please include a feral cat with a notch in his ear, a wedding invitation, and the phrase ‘sweet butter on a biscuit.’”

“Thank you for calling Chicago 311 Emergency Response. Please state the nature of your emergency.” Calysta, the nametag read, sounded heartily bored.

I resisted rolling my eyes. First week on the job and it didn’t do to make waves, particularly about employee attitudes.

“A what, ma’am?” Calysta blurted, interrupting my train of thought.

I met her eyes and she moved the gum in her mouth over to one cheek, like I wouldn’t be able to tell she had it in her mouth.

“Jessup! In here!” my lieutenant shouted from her office.

“Yessir!” I answered automatically.

Crap. ‘Sir.’ I called her sir! Nothing for it. Just getcher ass in there, Jessup, but sweet butter on a biscuit was the Lieutenant sensitive about her rank and place in a male-dominated department. Even if I was female, I’d cut no points for calling her ‘sir.’

I felt the presence the minute I stepped in the room and froze in the doorway.

“Della Jessup, this is your new partner. Wiggins, say hello to Della.”

“Hello…” The voice whispered and hissed through the room like a nineteen fifties bad monster movie ghost voice, eerie in all the right places. I felt a shiver travel up my back, around my neck, and down my front, tightening both nipples on its way by.

Gods I hate that!

“I want you to take Wiggins to the meetup, Jessup.”

“Lieutenant, there’s nothing here!”

“Oh?” a voice asked. And it wasn’t the Lieutenant.

Frickin’ ghosts. Never should have allowed them on the force. Damned ADA regulations stipulated no discrimination on account of any disability, including the bodily challenged.

“All right, Wiggins. Come with me. We have to meet –” I broke off, mid-sentence, because I saw it again. The same black-haired waif I’d been seeing everywhere since yesterday, following me in Trader Joes, following me to LA Fitness, following me to my carport, following me!

“Jessup?” Wiggins murmured.

“Do you see it?” I realized the second it left my mouth, how is a ghost supposed to ‘see’ without any eyes, but I let it stand.

“What?”

“The kid, there…” I pointed, but of course, poof, no black hair. No waif. No stinkin’ kid! “Come on,” I snarled instead, leading the way back out to my cruiser, first stopping to pick up my sidearm from the security lockup.

“Sign here, Della,” Sergeant Whiska ordered.

“Sergeant, when did you get an earring?” I scratched my nose. Earrings were non-regulation on duty, just like gum, but…

The feline grin that appeared after my question startled me and I had to resist the urge to step back. His teeth looked sharp! “Like it?”

“Um…”

“Beautiful,” Wiggins susurrated.

Whiska flicked all of his fur in a wave down his back. The glossy reddish brown flashed in the light and I had to physically put my hands in my pockets to avoid petting him. After the evolutionary jump that let cats speak, they now had equal status with humans. One did not pet a fully accredited Sergeant of the Chicago Police Department.

Not if one wanted to keep their hand, anyway.

Whiska handed through another piece of paper and I took it automatically. Then I looked at it; the loopy calligraphy beautiful. And pink. Pink? “What’s this?”

His grin widened. “Jezebel agreed to marry me! That’s your wedding invitation!”

“When’s the shower?” I asked curiously, eyes on the invitation.

He hissed. “I don’t like water.”

“No, silly. The wedding shower?”

“Oh. I don’t know yet.”

“Maybe we’ll throw one for you,” Wiggins put in.

On that note… “I have to run, Sergeant. Thank you for this. I’ll see you later!”

My car had chilled to ice in the hour it sat in the lot, thankfully free of the snowstorm. First Blizzard of the New Decade, the news called it. I rolled my eyes.

“Where are we going?” Wiggins asked once we sat down.

Uh, once I sat down. Wiggins… wafted, I guess. “National City Bank, then the Bank of Ireland. Seems the regulators want some police presence. We’re close to an indictment.”

“On what?”

“Money laundering.”

“Mmm.” Wiggins sounded thoughtful, though I still couldn’t see anything in the car with me. “Perhaps you should not tell them of my presence.”

“How come?” I asked.

“I could be of some use, perhaps.”

“Sounds good.” I shivered as I pulled onto the main street, clogged with new snow. Here’s hoping Wiggins didn’t give the bankers the… well. What was I supposed to say now? Willies?

Yeah, I did that, and Lieutenant would find me a trained ape by that name for a partner.

Nevermind. Forget I thought it.

We turned onto Columbus Drive, both lost in thought.