Stephan Leeder sat back in the god seat and stared down through the one-way glass at the department store floor and the Madonna-blonde woman flipping through the pastel Hawaiian shirts on the bargain rack. "I wish she'd stick something in that big-ass bag of hers, so we could nail her." he said into the mouth piece of his head set.
"Get real, Steph," Tony's voice hissed in his ear. "I don't know why you get so hard thinking she's a lifter. I've been watching her from down here, and I've seen her buy things."
"Some of them buy stuff to throw us off." He noticed that his yellow-skull reflection in the one-way glass was biting its finger nail and he removed his finger from his mouth. "I know the trend in handbags leans toward the larger sizes this season, but she could hide a sofa and two wing-back chairs in that thing."
"Well, other than your gut feeling and the size of her purse, you've got nothing to go on." Tony paused. "Hector is making faces at me from the info booth. He's doing his rendition of the international stop-shooting-the-shit-or-you're-fired hand signal. Call me if you see something. I'm going to the john."
Steph looked down at the information booth near the entrance to the store and saluted. "Observing radio silence, Capn", he thought. What did Hector expect them to do? It had been a month since they'd had any shoplifting action. Kids swiping Rainblow bubble gum and Super Hi-Bounce balls didn't count. Scaring off the pervert in the men's bathroom who kept sticking mirrors under the stall walls to watch other guys piss had been an interesting diversion, but it didn't quite equal catching someone in the act of swiping merchandise.
Steph zeroed one of the cameras in on the blonde with the bag the size of Texas and watched her for a minute. Her hair looked white on the video screen, her eyes tiny and black, and her lips were just too big for her face. Either she was completely innocent and the quiet of the past month was making him paranoid, or she was one of the sliest shop-lifters he'd ever come across. She came in three, four times a week and usually left without buying anything. Something about her just struck him as off kilter. Might just be the BLONDE! hair. She picked out a shirt. Steph checked its color through the one-way. It was an off-yellow and purple sea print. She carried it to the check-out lines, paid, and left with her purchase.
If he were a member of the fashion police, she'd get the death penalty for that purchase. He laughed. Readjusting the camera to take in the whole store floor, he went back to surveying his domain.
"The scenery could use a little sprucing up," Steph said reaching for his beer and looking over the other customers in the bar.
"Hernie's has never been the place where the elite meet to eat." Tony followed Steph's sweeping glance. "But you're right things are a bit slow this evening."
In one of the booths behind them, two couples were having a marathon smoke. Every time one of them put out a cigarette, another lit one up. They talked so quietly that Steph could barely make out what they were saying. From what he could glean of the conversation the two men were trying to impress their dates by talking about the newest offerings in the theater district. Steph read the theater page in the paper and was quite certain he caught more than a few unattributed quotes from said pages. Lame, guys. They'll see through that before too long.
"Did Hector ride your ass about small talk on the head sets today?" Tony asked.
"He said something." Steph was trying to decide whether the two women at the end of the bar were ‘together’ or just out for a drink. He silently chewed a finger nail and observed. One of them, the one whose hair looked red in the dim light of the bar, wasn't half bad. He watched her smooth her skirt across one thigh, watched her lightly caress what he imagined to be an itch on the side of her neck. He turned to Tony who looked to be distracted by the same two women. "But I don't remember exactly what he said."
Tony looked down into his beer, his eyebrows drawn together. "He gave me a thorough verbal rimming and didn't pause for the lubrication of pleasantries."
"I'm beginning to think I intimidate that little man." Steph was quite certain he did. Had something to do, he thought, with his patented devil-child stare. All he had to do was narrow his eyes, look up through the hair that fell over his forehead, and clench his jaws, and he knew he looked more like Satan than the devil himself.
"Wish I did. He's always nagging me about something."
They both finished their beers at the same instant, and Steph took it as a sign that it was time to move on. "Let's blow this place," Steph said. "The crowd is a bit more pleasing at The Depot about this time of the evening."
"Right behind you, Mi Amigo," Tony said as they headed for the door, winding their way through a bunch of empty tables.
Steph stood in a small forest clearing, but he wasn't alone. Every time he looked in a specific direction he got the feeling that someone had just passed from his field of vision... someone he almost saw... someone who was whispering in the grey sunlessness before the rain. Steph, he told himself one hand clenched, the other splayed at his sides, you need to wake up.
He felt like he had the post-drunk heebies. It seemed he walked through water not air. The blood in his veins felt thick as molasses. He could feel it creep up one side of his neck and down the other with each distinct heartbeat.
This is just a dream, he told himself. You're asleep, and the grey devil neurons in your skull are misfiring and showing you this little freak show, trying to make you believe it's real.
He took a step, certain he had time to calculate pi to the last non-repeating digit before his foot reached the ground. The crack of twigs and dead leaves beneath his foot seemed an electric charge of reality. His subconscious, or whatever, was doing a bang-up job in the realism department.
He turned his head to the right just as a shadow vanished from his peripheral vision. The wind caught its whispers and whisked them out of hearing. What Steph heard sounded like crepe paper streamers brushing against one another in an empty gymnasium, hours after the prom guests had gone. The sound was so thick he could almost feel the streamers caressing his face like heavy spider webs. He turned to catch the watcher again, but he or she or they whispered out of sight.
Steph sat up in bed, breathing in short, hard gusts. Jesus, what a fucking strange dream. He tried to laugh, but it sounded more like a distressed hiccough.
"Boy," he said out loud, "That is the last time you watch horror movies with a buzz on." He and Tony had regrouped at his place to watch "I Spit on Your Grave" and the latest "Evil Dead," when even The Depot hadn't panned out, scenery wise. Steph settled under the covers and laughed. Before long, he slept again.
"Tony?" Steph said into the head set mouth piece. "Blondie's back."
"Yeah, well, call me when she tries to snarf something. I don't need Hector on my case today."
"Would I call you for any other reason? She just stuffed a yellow cardigan into the black hole of Calcutta she calls a hand bag."
There was a whispery laugh in Tony's voice when he answered. "Would you like me to come up and take over the god seat while you personally escort her to the police station, or shall I handle things down here?"
Steph settled back in the chair and trained one of the cameras on the woman who was pretending to look over another rack of sweaters. "I prefer to watch. In fact, I think this is one picture that suffers from lack of audio accompaniment."
He smiled and synchronized the camera and the directional microphone. The jumpy grey picture on the monitor was suddenly alive with sound. The hiss of background noise from the speaker behind him filled the tiny room. He could hear the hangers she pushed aside squeak against the metal rack like rusted hinges. He could hear her breathe. It sounded a little ragged, and he wondered if she smoked heavily.
She sighed and looked toward the exit. She's probably thinking all clear, Steph thought. Her footsteps sounded like a hesitant metronome ticking off four-four time. As she exited women's wear, she began to breathe a little more rapidly. He imagined he could see her chest expand with each breath. She walked past the registers. Steph discovered he was holding his breath, and he exhaled quietly. He could see his image super-imposed on the image on the screen. She was very near the exit. Tony stepped out of the alcove at what they liked to call 'the point of no return.'
"Excuse me." Tony's voice was a little reedy coming in over the directional mike. "Store security. May I check your bag?"
"I don't know why you would want to."
Her voice was much flatter than Steph had expected.
"Would you like to come to the office with me so we can discuss this in private with the manager?"
Steph thought he could see a slight bulge behind the fly of Tony's pants. He laughed and leaned closer to the monitor.
"No, I would like to leave. Would you please get out of my way?"
Not even a hint of distress in her voice, but she still breathed a little heavily.
"I'm afraid I can't do that, ma'am."
A red light flashed on Steph's console. Tony had pressed the call-for-assistance button on his walkie-talkie.
Steph picked up the phone and called Hector. They were always more cooperative when talking to the manager. "Boss, Tony needs help out front with a lifter. She's not being cooperative."
"D'jou expect her to?" Hector said. "Call the police if you got her dead to rights. I'll go help Tony."
Steph called the police, filled them in, and gave them the address.
On the monitor, customers walked by looking-but-not-looking for the source of the disturbance. Steph could see the whites of their eyes as they passed. How polite of them not to turn their heads and look at the embarrassment in progress.
The woman had not yielded her bag.
Hector walked up. "Ma'am, I'm Hector Lallie, manager of this store. We have reason to believe you have tried to leave the store without paying for some merchandise. We are not stopping you at random. Our surveillance operator in the booth pointed you out to store security. Would you please accompany me to my office?"
She looked directly into the camera. Steph flinched.
Blondie tried to walk by Hector and Tony.
What a relentless bitch, Steph thought.
Both of them barred her way.
"We can just wait here for the police," Hector said. "they've already been called."
The police arrived without sirens or lights, and Hector, Tony, the two officers, and Blondie walked slowly toward the door to Hector's office.
Steph returned the camera to wide angle to take in the whole store. All in a day's work. He could see the reflection of his smile in the one-way glass.
"It would have been more satisfying if she'd freaked," Steph said to Tony over their table at the Depot. "She was one of the coolest I've ever seen."
"You should have been on the floor with her. I swear I could feel cold air just pouring out of her."
Steph smiled, tapping his finger lightly on the table in time with the beat of the music. "You know, I think I'd like to make a copy of the videotape of your little encounter with Blondie. I've been watching her so long, she's like family."
They both laughed.
Steph felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up. Auburn hair, warm blue eyes, perfect complexion, deep red lips smiling, collar bones for days. She said, "Hi. My name's Linda Stedams. You work security at Lowery's, don't you?"
Steph nodded.
"I work in women's wear, and I've been watching you for a few days. I was wondering if you'd like to dance."
He'd lost track of the music. He couldn't tell if he knew the song playing or not. He stared directly into her eyes and was certain she was whispering something. He thought if he looked at her mouth it wouldn't be moving. Her gaze was a little too warm, and the feeling that those eyes had been on him before when he didn't know it was unnerving.
Tony was kicking his foot under the table.
He looked over at his friend who urged him on with his eyes. "Uh. No thank you," Steph said. "Maybe some--maybe some other time. I just came in for a quick beer. Today really did me in."
"Okay," she said, "I'll see you at work tomorrow." She smiled and waved as she walked across the bar to a group of women who stood like spectators at an accident, watching.
"Man, why did you do that?" Tony said through clenched teeth. "She was really good looking. She said she noticed you at work. What's wrong with you?"
Steph stared after her, absently chewing at a hangnail. He watched her mini skirt tighten over her hips as she sat down with her friends, watched her light a cigarette and flick it against the side of an ashtray when the ash had begun to grow.
"Steph? I see lights. Is anyone in residence?"
Steph looked over at Tony as if coming out of a dream. "I don't know why the hell I did that. She must have just startled me. But I can fix things up right quick." He called for the waiter, and asked him to send the red-headed woman at the bar a drink with the message, 'I don't know where my head was. Tired or not, I'd love to dance if you still want to.'
"Way to be!" Tony said.
Steph smiled across the table at his friend. "You just watch your man, Stephan Leeder. He sees. He conquers. He comes."
"Way to be!" Tony repeated.
Steph watched the bartender serve the drink and sat back in his seat to await Miss Stedams's reply.