Hendricks Gay - The First Rule of Ten

I was just sitting down to a cold beer and hot corn soup, at the end of a long week, when my phone rang. I glanced at the number.

Great. Her. My stomach contracted, arming me for whatever barbs my ex-girlfriend Charlotte had in store this time. I tried to breathe a little flex into my gut. Good luck with that.

Hello? I said. Charlotte? I braced myself for the onslaught.

Then she surprised me.

Ten? Im getting married. I thought youd want to know.

Charlotte, married. To someone else. A hot streak of jealousy sliced through me, which made no sense at all, considering I was the one who broke things off.

Tenzing? Arent you going to congratulate me? You owe me that, at least.

And there it was; the familiar you owe me card. It loosened up an avalanche of bad memoriesthe many ways I constantly infuriated her, the times she, in turn, disappointed me. Our last fight bloomed inside my brain like a bad seed. Prompted by her insistence that I had bought the wrong kind of lentil (I hadnt), the small spat quickly escalated, culminating in my yelling at Charlotte, in one of my finer expressions of loving-kindness, that Id never liked the way she smelled. Since the day I met her.

She responded by swatting me with a dish towel, a sharp snap to the side of the head.

Honestly? I admired her for it. It woke me up to the hard truth that we were never going to be right in each others eyes. And that it didnt have a thing to do with either of us. Not her. Not me. We were just a couple of warm bodies stepping into old, familiar roles, long established in the past, and sure to run us well into the future if we didnt do something to change the wiring. Two con artists conning each other, with the occasional great sex thrown in just to keep us good and confused.

That fight was the last time we saw each other.

I could sense Charlottes edginess growing on the other end of the line as she geared up for one last dramatic blowout. The familiar tension bounced back and forth between us, looking for an ally.

My eyes drifted across the room to the big plate glass window framing the far wall. It was dark outside, but beyond that darkness lay the ocean, wide and expansive, mutable yet constant. I felt its spaciousness waiting out there. Just waiting for me to acknowledge it. I took a deep breath.

Congratulations, Charlotte. I said. I wish you both well.

I hung up gently. Then I just stood there, phone in hand, trying to digest this new chunk of information. I waited. After a moment, my insides shifted. The heaviness insidethat cold iron ball that had hardened around all the times wed disappointed each other, pissed each other offactually started to soften, to melt a little. Well, what do you know?

Hey, Tank, I called out to my favorite feline, curled up on his cushion. He opened one eye. Guess what? She-who-hates-cats is getting married.

Tanks tail flicked once. He was pleased. So was I. Relief and something bordering on glee flooded through me. Now and forever, there would always be a buffer, somebody else she could blame for everything being wrong with her life, before she got around to blaming me.

I strutted around my house for the rest of the evening, feeling pretty good about my existence on this fine planet.

The next day I got shot.

Heres how it went down. My partner Bill Bohannon and I were finishing up a quick lunch, steaming bowls of Pho at a Vietnamese place we like in Echo Park, before heading back to Robbery/Homicide. As I opened my fortune cookiedont ask me why, but Angelenos demand fortune cookies from any Asian establishment, Chinese or notthe radio crackled to life: Code three, four-one-five. Possible DV in progress. Headquarters was calling for any available patrol cars to investigate a Domestic Violence incident. The address was only a couple of blocks from the restaurant. I glanced down at my tiny strip of future: Destino est pidiendo, it said. A Vietnamese fortune, written in Spanish. Only in Los Angeles. I turned it over.

Destiny is calling, I read to Bill. As if on cue, the radio crackled out a repeat of its call to action. Lets go, I said.

Within minutes we skidded into the driveway of a dismal-looking little bungalow near Rampart, first on the scene. Ramshackle front steps led to a splintered porch boasting a couple of metal folding chairs so battered they were safe to leave outside, even in this neighborhood.

A siren wailed in the distance. I had a fleeting notion that we should wait for backup, but Bill was reaching for his door. Thats all it took. I rolled out of mine and hit the ground without missing a stride.

I was sprinting toward the porch, Bill somewhere behind me, when he yelped out in pain. I glanced back. My partner was hopping up and down on one foot, swearing a blue streak. Bad time to twist an ankle.

Heres where things started heading south. And from there they careened even further, about as far south as things can go.

Loud shouts erupted from the house. I was caught between Bills gimpy ankle and the fracas inside. My gut begged me to pause, but the adrenaline screamed, Go! The split second of indecision ended with the unmistakable report of gunshot, followed by a wailing female scream. I drew my revolver and ran to the screen door.

Hot shot! Hot shot! I heard Bill yell into the radio behind me. Code ninety-nine.

I pressed my face against the thin mesh and peered inside. A man slouched on a sofa to my left, cradling a .45-caliber semiautomatic. He was around my age, maybe 30, lanky, Caucasian, with a scraggly beard and long, greasy hair. Pretty calm, considering. I followed his gaze across the room, where a second man was sprawled on his back on the floor, a ragged hole in his chest.

Not good.

A woman in her 20s, also lanky, also Caucasian, huddled in the corner, hand to her mouth. Her screams had subsided into a series of strangled, high-pitched yelps. I looked closer. One of her eyes was swollen shut, a purple and black protrusion under her brow.

Apparently I wasnt the only one with relationship issues.

Bill called out, Whats happening?

Stay put for a minute, I called back. Weve got a situation here.

Ten, dont you dare even think about going ins

I stepped inside, vaguely aware that the swelling volume of siren wails indicated at least two squad cars en route, and getting close. Not much time to try to resolve this peaceably before it turned into a goat rodeo.

Whats your name? I asked the guy, keeping my voice calm and friendly. He was lazily twirling the heavy automatic in his hand, like he was used to handling it. I saw it was a Springfield, an M1911. He wasnt pointing it at me, though, so I kept my Glock at my side. Leon, he answered dreamily.

He canted his head in my direction. I checked out his pupils. Fully dilated. He was seriously stoned on something.

Whats yours? he asked.

Ten, I said.

Say, what? Leon said.

I inched over to the body. The guy wasnt moving, and his skin was the leached gray-green that signals zero life force. But I had to be sure. I squatted beside him and lightly pressed his neck, where there should have been the steady rhythm of pumping blood.

Nothing. He wasnt even circling the drain. Whoever he was, he appeared to be gone.

I sent off a quick, silent blessing: Om mani padme hum. May you enjoy peace and joy in the afterlife and in all your future lives. Reciting the mantra would hopefully plant the seed of liberation in him, sinner or saint.

I straightened up. My name is Ten, I told Leon. Like the number.

Ten, Leon said. Never heard that one before.

Short for Tenzing.

Never heard of that, either.

There are lots of Tenzings where I come from, I said.

Oh, yeah? Wheres that?

Tibet, by way of India, I said.

No shit, he said. Then, I been to Iraq.