Kodachrome Rider

“Break time’s over,” Mrs. Haggerty yelled out the backdoor of City Central Goodwill. She stared hard at Marty and Nadine, as if wondering who had dripped cheese all over the brand-new toaster oven in the staff room. “Nadine, you’re Check-out. Marty, go to Intake.”

The teens whined and were slow to move inside until Marty recalled his probation officer’s advice: “Community hours go by quicker if you cooperate.” So he stubbed out his cigarette, as did Nadine, on a long, filthy snowbank near the backdoor and they went inside to their assigned areas.

Marty preferred Intake to Check-out any day. His Porn Star T-shirt was hidden by the regulation polyester City Central Goodwill vest, but his peacock strut was unmistakable. He watched the curvaceous Nadine, in a matching vest, open her till at Check-out. No way he’d want to be dealing with the losers and misfits who shopped at City Central Goodwill.

 “Morning.” Stringbean nodded to Marty at the Intake area. Stringbean stood about five-foot-three and had a face like a worn-out boot. “Let’s see what Santa brung,” he said as he slammed two enormous plastic bags—full of charitable donations, picked up all over the city—onto the low counter between him and Marty.

Marty ripped open his bag and was enveloped by the scent of freshly washed laundry. He began dumping the neatly stacked clothes into the bin marked Clothing No Wash.

“Hey, slow down,” Stringbean said. “Check pockets… look for that gold watch for my retirement, will ya?” He laughed dryly. He tossed a crumpled blouse from his bag into another bin, Clothing Wash.

Marty clawed back the clothes he had dumped and began rifling the pockets, which gave him a homey feeling, like looking for lunch money in Mom’s party clothes. And a hopeful feeling because, who knew, he might find something even better, like a pizza coupon or cigarettes. But nope, there was nothing to be found. He glanced at Stringbean, whose next bag held a jumble of gray things that smelled like old potatoes.

Marty smirked. “No gold watch, yet, eh?”

“Whatcha looking at?” Stringbean said. “At least mines is reg’lar folk. You got the dead man’s pile.”

Marty’s hand snapped up from his bag as fast as if he’d touched a live ember.

Stringbean continued, “Didn’t you notice the clothes are all the same size? Kind of new, barely worn?”

Marty stared at the knitted argyle vest before him—it was the type of thing Grandpa wore when Marty used to visit. Back when he was sort-of little. Back before the fire.

 “Heh-heh—watch out—the ghost is up there watching you!” Stringbean said, and Marty’s eye followed the bony tobacco-stained finger pointing up into the highest corner of the City Central building. In the Intake area where they worked, there was no suspended ceiling; you could see the pipes and ducts and wires, straight up to the roof. When things got slow, Marty liked to lean back and look at the guts of the building and try to figure out how it was all put together.

He thumped his chest. “I’m not spooked, no sirree,” Marty said and resumed sorting.

Stringbean hooted “Payday!” as he pulled his fist from a pair of purple-striped pants. Nickels and dimes and a bank card. He pocketed the coins and tossed the bank card into the nearby yellow bucket. He grinned, showing all six of his discolored teeth. “Bet you won’t find a red cent, kiddo. The Merry Widow has gone over everything, looking for any trace… of her dearly beloved Edward P. Asshole III.” Stringbean mimicked a woman crying. It was so freaky they both laughed.

Marty reached the final item in his bag, a tan-colored coat of a type he’d only seen on TV. Worn only by spies. He unfurled the trench coat and caught a whiff of cherry pipe tobacco…and a little spritz of what, maybe gunpowder? Yeah, gunpowder, that’s right. He saw pockets. Pockets in the lining. Pockets in pockets in the lining.

“Don’t forget the opera tickets pocket,” Stringbean said. “Great place to stash two grand and a passport.”

Marty had never seen a passport but he knew that spies used them to flee the country. He felt a crackle of resistance near the breast pocket so he dug further. If he had a passport and two grand, he could flee this country of long, filthy snowbanks. He could go to Jamaica, where the beaches were hot and the ganja was good. He glanced at Nadine, far away at Checkout. She looked like she’d be a lot of fun on the beach.

“Whatcha got there?” Stringbean said and Marty opened the flap of a Kodachrome envelope. A photo slid out: a young man astride a motorcycle. A gleaming dark purple beast. Marty recognized the make immediately: a Honda 550 cc, just like his cousin’s friend liked to tool around on. The guy looked about Marty’s age.

“A photo?” Stringbean said. “Put it in the bucket.”

Marty’s hand hovered over the waste bin.

“Bucket,” Stringbean insisted. He touched the number printed on the envelope. “Mrs. Haggerty likes to play detective. You know—with the bank cards and photos.”

 “Whatever.” Marty returned the photo to the envelope and flipped it into the bucket.

After his shift, he hung out with Nadine for as long as she would tolerate him, then crept back to his sisters’ place. That night he lay on their lumpy sofa, still wide awake after sexting Nadine and getting interrupted twice by sisters traipsing in and out. He was trying to think of things that meant nothing to him, like that photo of a young man he’d found in the old man’s coat. What did it mean? Why couldn’t he shake it? In the semi-darkness of his sisters’ crowded front room, the face of the Kodachrome Rider, staring proud and defiant, burned like an after-image.

*         *         *

Impressions glided into Marty like dust motes floating into a corner. The motorcycle rider, he figured, was the target of the spy who owned the trench coat. Someone said, “Here’s our man, Jack; go get that Kodachrome Rider before he stabs the Queen.” Marty knew the Rider was a stabber—someone used to blades and shivs and hand-to-hand combat—because he’d seen a zig-zag scar running through the Rider’s eyebrow. Funny how much Marty could recollect of the photo as he lay there in the middle of the night on the sofa full of knee-bones while he tried to think about nothing.

Yes, there was a scar. The spy, trench coat flapping, would have jumped into his Corvette, and roared off in hot pursuit of the motorcycle. Likely along a narrow, twisting road high in the Swiss Alps. Or was it the Andes? Nope, Swiss Andes didn’t sound right. Marty tossed and turned. Nadine should come with him to Jamaica; he could nick a tube of sunblock for her, no problem. But could they go to Jamaica if they were still on probation? He couldn’t remember her charge… fraud, he’d guess. Marty flipped his pillow to the cool side and imagined bobby-pin curves all along the Swiss whatevers.

*         *         *

The next day Mrs. Haggerty spoke to Marty—and he wasn’t even in trouble. “Martin, thank you for your work in the Intake department. Thomas says you’re a quick learner.” She had the steely demeanor of an optimist, despite years of working in the non-profit sector.

Marty stepped backward in surprise, knocking over the “Belts $2” rack. A quick learner? No one ever called Marty that. And “Thomas” –was that Stringbean’s really name? Marty hooted as he hoisted the belts rack upright.

“Come here,” Mrs. Haggerty said, motioning him into the staff room furnished with mismatched chairs and table and a brand-new toaster oven (cleaned up since yesterday) with warning posters taped around it (“Clean up your own mess!!!”).

 “I don’t never use this thing,” Marty declared, nodding at the toaster oven. When in doubt, build a wall of denial. Besides, how was he to know the smoke alarms at City Central actually worked?

“Do you like the new fridge?” Mrs. Haggerty asked. It, too, was encircled by a cloud of warning posters (“Absolutely no cans of pop in freezer!!!”)

“Um, yeah,” Marty said, wondering who the psycho sign-maker was. Wondering, as well, what had happened to the two cans of Mountain Dew he’d told Nadine to bring.

Mrs. Haggerty polished the Frigidaire nameplate. His grandparents had a Frigidaire, too. Before the fire, anyway. “It’s good karma to return things to their rightful owners,” Mrs. Haggerty said. “People sometimes don’t realize what they are giving away. One donor left his wallet in a box of used Lego! We returned it promptly. He was so grateful, he said, ‘Come on down to my appliance store and pick out something you folks need.’ How’s that for good karma?”

Marty kept his poker face. “What we really need,” he said, “is a new truck.”

 “We-ell, yes,” she said, taken aback. “Were you talking to Thomas?”

Marty instinctively covered for Stringbean. “That truck sounds like a bag o’ hammers when you shift down,” he said.

 “I see. Well. Anyhow. Securing the funding for a truck—that could take years.”

The PA system quacked, “Manager to Front,” and she brushed her hands together. “Well, thanks again for finding the photo—they can trace the order number and return a significant memento.”

“No sweat,” Marty said, bowing gallantly so she could walk briskly ahead of him. He sauntered out, sliding the envelope and photo, complete with address on a Stick-It note, into his pocket.

*         *         *

“Yeah, it was a picture of some dude on his dirt bike,” Marty said to Nadine as they trudged to the bus stop. He shook his unbarbered hair and ensured his jacket was unzipped against the raw March breeze. “Mrs. H needs my help contacting the folks the picture belongs to.” His chest expanded as he spoke the words.

Nadine looked up the address on her smartphone. “So close by,” Marty said. “You should come.”

Nadine wrinkled her nose. “It’s a useless picture, Marty. Just some geezer’s kid or brother.” She leaned so close their noses almost touched. “What’s the big deal?”

Marty, who was not wearing his Porn Star T-shirt today, leaned back from her. He rubbed his hand over his mouth. “It’s Stringbean’s fault. He conjured a spook from my stack o’ clothes. I felt it whooshing right up to the top o’ the warehouse. That spirit won’t rest easy until…” He fell silent. Nadine watched him with wry amusement. In that moment he hated her more than anyone he’d ever known, even more than that dickhead judge who had lectured him about defacing other people’s property.

*         *         *

The next day, Marty strolled around a quiet tree-lined neighborhood, sizing up the houses. They looked like real brick, none of that fake quarter-inch brick siding. A classy place, with tiny white end-of-season snowbanks. Millionaires lived here, no guff.

He hung around for a ridiculously long time, wishing he had Nadine’s phone for company, maybe even Nadine herself, because he had forgiven her.

Any minute, Marty reckoned, a millionaire would come driving up to the address. A millionaire who would take one look at the photo Marty had brought. A millionaire who would say, “OH WOW thank you for returning the picture of me in my wild sexy days. It was the only picture I had before I cracked up that motorcycle accident. Here’s a thousand bucks, kid; what I wouldn’t do to be eighteen and reckless again.”

Marty paced and smoked. As he waited, he dreamed another scenario.

He could see it all, plain as a TV show. The man would grab the photo and cry, “OH MY GOD thank you for returning the picture of my brother Johnny. It was the only picture we had before he was killed. In a motorcycle accident. Here’s the keys to my Mercedes, kid; what I wouldn’t do to lay eyes on Johnny again.”

A Mercedes! Marty pictured Mrs. Haggerty’s jaw going slack with amazement when he drove up in a gleaming replacement for the Goodwill truck. She would kiss him and sign off on his probation order faster than dropped eggs break.

Marty paced and smoked, from time to time straightening his arm and peering into the treetops. Stringbean should not have made that crack about the dead man. Marty wished Grandpa had not died. He was a nice old guy, most of the time anyway, unless it was tax season, and Mom was so blistering sad when the family house burned down.

Grandpa used to carry around pictures of Marty and all his sisters. How very strange, that someone would carry around his, Marty’s, photo. Just a boring school photo, not even with a motorcycle. Whatever happened to those wallet photos? Marty knew the other photos—on the mantel and the fridge—had burned in the fire. Marty recalled Grandpa’s tattered wallet—black, warm, sometimes with a couple bucks in it for the ice cream truck. He chewed his lip until it bled.

Suddenly a minivan sped around the crescent and careened into the driveway. A big-bodied middle-aged man got out and slammed the door.

Marty ran from across the street. “Excuse me, sir, I think I have something of yours,” he said, panting a little. “Something from the old clothes you gave Goodwill.”

The man turned away and opened the back door of the minivan.

Marty repeated himself and added grandiosely, “Something of great value.” He saw two children’s car seats in the back seat but no kids. Why was this guy ignoring him?

“Something connected to your father. Or grandfather,” Marty persevered.

The man sighed, a great heave awash with irritation. “Look, I can’t stop you idiotic dumpster divers. But just take the clothes and go. Don’t bug me.” He turned to face Marty head-on.

The eyebrow—the scar.

Marty backed up to take in the whole picture and swallowed hard. It was the young man—or formerly young man—the Kodachrome Rider—thicker in the body, softer in the jawline. “But your father—your father—” Marty’s words tripped all over each other as they fled his mouth.

 “Yeah, my old man died. Last month. Goodbye and good riddance,” the man said, still with that sulky defiance. “Except, of course, now I gotta deal with this shitty pile of bricks. Whoop-de-do. It’ll cost an arm and a leg to knock it down.”

It looked like a fine old house to Marty. Twice as fancy as Grandpa’s. Marty declared, “This was found in your father’s coat. Something of great value. Kept near to his heart.”

The man narrowed his eyes. “Is this a shakedown?”

“What did your dad love most,” Marty persisted, “until his dying day?”

The man stood very still, mouth half-open. Frowning, he thought hard. “Money. What, you find his Titanium-plus credit card?”

With a flourish, opened the envelope and showed him the photo.

“Huh,” the man said.

“Yes,” Marty said. “It’s you he carried next to his heart.”

“You came all the way to show me this?”

“That is you, isn’t it?” Marty licked his bloody lip. Maybe he should just settle for a crisp twenty and a promise not to breathe a word to Mrs. Haggerty. “He carried this photo of you all those years.”

The man’s scowl turned to a peculiar mix of anger and revulsion. He turned an icy glare to the teen. “This man ignored me until the year before I left home. Said he had better things to do with his time. He ran over my dog. Said he would teach it a lesson. He never let my mother leave the house, said she was a Jezebel. And now you think this is special, that he forgot my photo in some random pocket?”

With his teeth bared in rage, the man snatched the photo from Marty’s hand, tore it in quarters, and let the pieces fall.

“It means nothing to me,” he sneered. “Absolutely nothing at all.”

The End