Dead and Gone

“It sounds very beautiful,” Gem said, her chest puffed out a bit, proud of me for some reason.

It was still dark when they dropped us off in front of the Delta terminal at PDX. The first-class line was empty. Check-in was nothing at all—the clerk glanced at my passport photo so quick I could have been Dennis Rodman for all he knew.

The first-class thing was all about keeping our options as open as possible. We were only taking carry-ons, and they cut you a bit more slack with the size of the bags up in the front of the plane. You get out faster, too, and that can count for something when you have to change planes. But most important was that we wouldn’t have any company right next to us—I could take the window seat and just lie in the shadow until it was time to make our move.

The corridor leading to the gates at PDX was like an indoor mall. Upscale shops, some brand-name, some “crafts,” even a fancy bookstore—Powell’s—a real one, not the usual magazine stand with a couple of paperback racks.

Gem failed to surprise me by suggesting that we had plenty of time to get something to eat. A bakery-and- coffee-shop was open, with little cafe-style tables standing outside. Inside, music was coming over the speakers. Kathy Young’s version of “A Thousand Stars.” The sound system must have been real sophisticated, because someone had the bass track isolated … and cranked up so high you could barely make out the lyrics. I know it’s hip to say the Rivileers’ version is the real thing, and Kathy’s was just a white-bread cover. But I think the girl really brings it, her own way.

I got a hot chocolate and a croissant. Gem got a tray-full of stuff. We sat outside all by ourselves, listening to the music. The Spaniels’ version of “Goodnite Sweetheart, Goodnite.” The Paradons doing “Diamonds and Pearls.” The Coasters on “Young Blood.”

“What do you call that?” Gem asked me, head cocked in the direction of the music. “Rock and roll?”

“No. It’s doo-wop. From the fifties, mostly. Where the voices were the instruments—a capella. The kind of stuff that sounds the same in the subway as it does in the studio. If you ever heard the Cardinals, or the Jacks, or the Passions, or—”

“And today it does not?” she interrupted.

“Today it’s all sixty-four-track, electronic-mixmaster stuff. The engineers are as important as the musicians. Except for the true-blues stuff.”

“What is that?”

We had time, so I told her about Son Seals. And Magic Judy Henske. And Paul Butterfield. Gem was so obviously listening, really listening, that I would have gone on for a much longer time … but she finally tapped her watch and raised her eyebrows.

The metal implants in my skull didn’t set off the detectors like I’d thought they might—I wore one of those Medi-Guard ID bracelets, just in case I had to explain. I’d left the never-fired twin to the piece I’d put Dmitri down with at Gem’s, and made her leave her baby Derringer there, too, so I figured we were golden when our bags went through the conveyor without attracting any attention. But as we turned to enter the corridor to the gate, someone called out, “Sir!”

It was a guy in some kind of uniform. He motioned me over. “Sir, do you mind if we check your luggage?”

“Go ahead,” I told him.

But instead of opening my bag, he put it on a small, flat platform, then ran a wand over the outside. “Supersensitive,” he said. “It can detect the most microscopic traces.”

“Of what?” I asked him. “Cocaine?”

“No, sir,” he said, a thin smile on his face. “This tests for the presence of explosives.”

“That’s nice. So why did you decide to check my bag?”

“Well, sir, this was just a random check, you understand.”

“I understand you didn’t randomly check anybody else.”

“Honey, sssshhh. The officer is just doing his job,” Gem said, tugging at my sleeve as if she thought I was going to lose my temper.

“All finished,” the ATF cop announced. “Thank you for your cooperation, sir.”

As we walked away, I put my arm around Gem’s waist. She moved slightly closer to me. I dropped my hand to her bottom and gave it a hard pinch.

“Oh!” she said. Then: “What was that for?”

“Overacting,” I told her.

“Pooh!” is all I got in response. But she didn’t move away.

When you fly first-class, they let you board first, right along with the people with infants and the ones who need assistance walking. Not for me. You take your seat first, everybody passing through to the back entertains themselves by checking you out.

And they always have plenty of time to do that, because some certified hemorrhoid is guaranteed to stop by the first overhead, where they keep the magazines, and root through them one by one, taking his own sweet time before grabbing a whole fucking handful he can hoard for himself.

By the time we boarded, the overhead racks were crammed full. Gem said something to the flight attendant, and he opened a closet near the kitchen and placed our stuff inside. I climbed in first. Gem brought me a blanket and a pillow, then settled herself in.

The porthole next to me was dimpled with raindrops by the time we were cleared for takeoff, but it didn’t delay things.

Our flight attendant was a man in his forties, maybe, with carefully combed brown hair and a tight smile. He made the mistake of asking Gem if he could get her anything before takeoff. Me, I closed my eyes and tried to keep images of Pansy from opening inside my window.

When Gem finished her dozen sacks of peanuts and four bottles of water, she carefully spread a blanket over