Gone, Gone, Gone

Gone, Gone, Gone

“You might think this is funny,” the girl screamed to Roland. Her head came as high as his collar-bone. She stood next to her boyfriend who was about even with Roland’s ear. “But it’s not funny! You’re not funny!”

“No?” said Roland. His face was as bland as his tone of voice.

“No!” the girl shrieked. She had on a tight black skirt and wore spiked high heels and seemed to want to stand on her toes to reach her face higher into Roland’s face. She tottered a bit forward and Roland steadied her by momentarily holding her upper arms. She jerked her arms away and all she could do finally was glare up into his dead-pan eyes. She looked more than ready to do something drunk and stupid and the people sitting at the bar looked over at her with smiles beginning to form.

I watched from my post at the door. The bartenders were busy and neither of them seemed to notice the scene unfolding. There was a long line of people standing behind me at the door waiting at the satin chain to get in. Roland was dressed in black; shirt, pants, coat, and remained firm with his hands hanging loose at his sides.

The boyfriend said, “Bonnie, we can talk about this calmly…”

I could tell by his knitted eye-brows the kid was doing his best to calm things. He used his hands like a basketball coach; pressing them downward.

“It was right here!” Bonnie said. “I asked that guy to watch it and we came back and my purse is gone!”

“What guy?” Roland asked. He turned when Bonnie looked toward the bar. There was a great mass of people sitting at the bar and standing next to it, some leaning over the bar trying to order, and others reaching between people for drinks and she said, “Well, I don’t see him now, but we just went to dance!”

“We danced two songs,” the boyfriend said from behind Bonnie. He rubbed her bare arms and nearly laid his chin upon her tan right shoulder.

Roland drew his walkie-talkie from beneath his black leather coat. I’d been waiting for this. “We got a ten-six-niner,” he said into the hand-held.

“Copy that,” I said into my radio.

“What did the individual look like that you asked to watch your purse?” Roland asked. He held his radio at the ready near his mouth.

“He looked like, you know, a guy…I don’t know, a guy. He was white.”

“Be advised, we are looking for a white male that looks like a guy. He’ll be caring a woman’s purse--” Back to the girl, Roland leaned from his waist closer-- “Please describe your purse, ma’am,” he listened for a moment. “The purse is a little black Marc Jacobs…” he listened again “…With a gold clasp and it has like everything in the world in it…”

The girl tried to say something more but Roland put up his index finger. “Team Two?”

“Team Two. We’re on the roof,” I said. I used a different voice.

“I want eyes on all four corners” came his calm voice. “Where is my damn helo?”

I waited a beat and then garbled my voice, “Vaaavrrrr vivvvver on route kkkkk,” I clicked the mic several times. “Vazzz vizzz kkkkkkkk east kkk on the kkkkk, one-oh-one.”

”Roger that, Sky-Ranger. Keep me advised of your approach.” He turned to the girl again. “We’re on this, ma’am,” he looked at her with stern eyes, then, back on the radio, “I want road-blocks set up at Laguna and Nance, St. Vincent and Collins, and Lawrence and Lake!”

“Copy that, Roland.”

“Nothing gets out! You hear me? Nothing! I want a house to house. Every farmhouse, henhouse, doghouse, and outhouse! You reading me?”

“Loud and clear, Command!”

“Oh, you think you are so funny!” said Bonnie.

“We are doing everything possible, ma’am,” Roland said. He looked at the girl and then at her boyfriend and back to the girl. “You have to prepare yourself, though. Your purse may be gone!”

“Gone?” the girl asked. Her voice weakened with the word.

“Gone,” Roland repeated. The man was a master at this! “Gone, gone, gone!” he turned away from the two wide-eyed little yupsters and walked with great, hurried purpose, his walkie-talkie near his mouth.

“And where the hell is my helo!”

-782 Words-