from Jason Kapcala's "Hungry Town"

Jason Kapcala | Hungry Town: A Novel | West Virginia University Press | 2022 | 288 Pages

Rieux and Mulqueen

The municipal fire alarm sounded, and the town of Lodi stirred. Along the edge of the abandoned steel plant, steam rose from the manhole covers and filled the street, softening the glow from the street lamps and darkening the roll-up doors on the parts and produce warehouses.

Rieux keyed the radio on her shoulder and let dispatch know they were out of service, said, “You’re up, big boy.”

Mulqueen tugged at the bottom of his jacket. A car’s headlights cut through the fog before disappearing around a corner, briefly spotlighting the misshapen figure that sagged from the inside of the security fence. It was the fourth time this month they’d been dispatched to the mill, a waste of time, as far as Harry Mulqueen was concerned. Kids broke in, tagged the walls, hung Halloween-style scarecrows from the fence, and the cops wound up drag-assing their way through the worst parts of dog shift, conducting perimeter searches, yanking on doors, scanning big dark shapes for littler dark shapes—all of it amounting to nothing. The first raindrops ricocheted off the brim of his service cap. “It’s time for them to hire a security guard, already.”

Rieux leaned against the cruiser. “Nobody likes a grouch,” she said, tapping free a cigarette, lighting it in cupped hands. Above, black iron scaffolding loomed over the slag heap, a forest of rusted scrap known simply as The Yard. She could see why kids found the place so fascinating. Both of her grandfathers had worked the foundry as sandrats, melting steel, and she’d grown up on local lore—ghost stories of mill workers searching for severed hands, tales of people engulfed by boiler explosions. In Lodi, everyone had a story to tell about the mill.

Mulqueen cut through the zip ties, and the dummy slunk to the ground. He folded his knife shut against his sleeve, and Rieux held out her Marlboros. “That’s some first-class, top-notch police work, Officer Mulqueen. You may be up for a commendation.”

Mulqueen aimed his Maglite at her hand. He took her pack of smokes, almost delicately, and pocketed them without a word. Then he popped a piece of nicotine gum, waving the box at Rieux.

Little crow’s-feet formed at the corners of Stefani Rieux’s eyes. She let the smoke drift from the side of her mouth. “Whatever. Don’t judge me, Cigarette Nazi. I’m making progress.”

“Progress,” Mulqueen said. “Progress is impossible without change. You know who said that?”

“Should I?”

He watched her spin the diamond on her finger, a new habit, one that annoyed him. “Who wears a rock like that to a crap call?”

“What? I forgot to take it off.”

Mulqueen pointed his beam back at the fence, its snarled loops of razor wire. On the opposite side, between the powerhouse and the treatment shop, he could just make out the dark shape of Lodi Steel’s blast furnaces. “Yeah, well, he sure took his sweet time asking.”

A cold wind kicked up, driving rain across the pavement in broad, flat sheets, and the cops pulled their collars high and shoved their hands deep in their pockets until it died back down and the water pooled again in the street. Rieux took one last drag off her cigarette before pitching it in the gutter. “Some of us are worth waiting for,” she said.

*

By the time they reached the other side of the mill, it was well after midnight, and the temperature had dropped low enough that their breath fogged the air. Ed Lewis sat parked beneath the floodlights near the east gate, and as they approached, he rolled down the window of his patrol unit and spat in the mud. “Rieux and Mulqueen. I feel safer already.”

Rain dripped from the brim of Mulqueen’s cap. “Tonight just keeps getting better.”

Lewis was a gasbag, a dinosaur. He told too many stories about the old days, spent too much time pissing and moaning about his arthritic hands, his aching knees, the way kids wore their pants today, their hair. Rieux’d served with dozens of good ol’ boys just like him—hell, the entire force had been full of Ed Lewises when she started—and Mulqueen knew it was one of the reasons why she was coming up on retirement yet still riding with him in a prowler, responding to crap calls.

“Why don’t the two of you go find some doors to tug on?”

Rieux pinched a bead of rain from her nose. “Ed’s a funny guy, don’t you think, Harry?”

“Hilarious.”

“I mean, the way he sits there on his hemorrhoids, pretending to be stupid—”

“Okay,” Lewis said, pushing his door open and swinging a leg out. He groaned to his feet. “Anything’s better than listening to you two hammerheads flirt all night.”

Mulqueen slammed the door shut behind him. “Come on, Edmund. Rieux’s about to marry my brother. Her flirting days are over.”

They followed the security fence toward the rail line, past the crumbling arches of the foundry. Other than the sound of rain spattering the service road, the night was quiet. Ahead, the machine shop sat high on a trestle of girders, still the longest building in the state, its brick walls and broken windows spanning nearly a quarter mile, ending at the rails of the Lodi Valley Mainline and, beyond that, the south bank of Monhocken River. As they approached, Rieux elbowed Mulqueen and pointed out a light in one of the windows.

“Probably some bum looking for shelter, which is what we should be doing,” Lewis said, stopping at the bottom of the stairs to catch his breath. “I should have stayed in the car.”

“And I should have been a butcher like my old man,” Mulqueen said. “But we make our choices.” He stepped forward for a better look at the light. Something wasn’t right. There was no flicker, no dancing shadows—just the steady, unbroken glow.

Lewis said, “Don’t you ever get tired of being a Boy Scout, Mulqueen?”

Mulqueen ignored him, held out a palm to Rieux. “Age before beauty.”

“And pearls before swine, sweetheart,” she said, brushing past.

The lock was missing from the machine-shop door, and when Rieux pushed, it gently swung open. They held their flashlights pinned high against their shoulders, the beams skipping across the brick walls and concrete floor. The welfare room could have doubled as a horror movie set, its walls spalled and stained the color of turquoise jewelry. Large arched windows offered a smeared view of the moonlit blast furnaces. Steel cauldrons hung from the ceiling, dozens of chains stretching down to a metal sawhorse in the center of the room and a row of padlocks. Each basket bore four hooks on the bottom.

“I hate this place,” Lewis said.

Rieux touched one of the dangling baskets where workers had once stowed their belongings. “Like having your own locker.”

“Maybe if you’re Edgar Allan Poe,” Mulqueen said, and when Rieux glanced over, he knew what she was thinking, what she’d say if Lewis weren’t also there—Nice to see you’re getting some use out of that book-club membership, big thinker.

An open staircase led to the next floor, and when they reached the top, Rieux swept her light through the room. A thick girder ran the center of the ceiling like a metal spine, and a rib cage of heavy steel crossbeams spiderwebbed the roof, all of it supported by a seemingly endless row of columns. Moonlight filtered onto the dirty work floor in scattered patchwork patterns. It was like entering the sanctuary of an abandoned church, a cathedral of steel.

Mulqueen could hear the murmur of voices in the distance, and when Rieux motioned forward, he followed. Beyond the columns, toward the center of the room, someone had set up a portable lamp tethered to a car battery. Its beam intersected with a beam from the other side, illuminating the factory floor, and it took a second for Mulqueen’s eyes to adjust. A red-haired girl lay on a pea-green Army blanket, her underwear twisted in a knot around her ankles. Mulqueen could see her wispy hair and the way her hip bones and ribs protruded beneath her pale skin, and he felt his face grow hot with shock and embarrassment. A blond boy, wiry and pale, knelt beside her, fooling with the cap on a bottle of bottom-shelf whiskey. Except for a pair of athletic socks, he was as naked and as young as the girl.

“I’m freezing, Rodney.” The girl leaned on a skinny elbow, and the boy gently pushed her back down. She bit his freckled shoulder, put a hand on his bony ass and giggled.

Rodney lay down next to her and shielded his eyes. “Shit for brains, are you good with that thing or what?”

“Almost,” a third voice replied.

The girl reached over and touched him between the legs, and Rodney swatted her hand away. “Easy, Shay,” he said, turning his back to her. “Just be sure you get this big pipe in the picture, okay, Stanley-boy?”

The other boy emerged from the shadows then, his eye pressed to the viewfinder of a large camera. Mulqueen could see he was younger, small, and he seemed embarrassed. He hid behind the lens, twisting the focus knob, playing with the settings.

Mulqueen looked over at Rieux. What the fuck? he mouthed. He had no idea how these kids had gotten their hands on all that equipment, but he felt like a voyeur, spying on something he shouldn’t. If that weren’t bad enough, he could practically hear the jokes circulating around the station house. The last thing any of them needed tonight was to throw the cuffs on a couple of horny, naked juveniles and their frightened pint-sized pornographer.

Rodney snickered. “What’s wrong, Stan? Shy?”

The girl found this funny.

Rieux flashed back a hand signal—play this easy—and Mulqueen understood what she was really saying. They didn’t want to take any chances. Spook these kids and they’d wind up disappearing into the depths of the mill where who knows what might happen.

He reached to unsnap his Taser—easy—but before he could react, Lewis lunged from behind the steel columns. He bumped one of the lamps, and it teetered on its stand, the beam of light swirling in erratic circles, and for a moment, Lewis looked wild, confused. “On the ground, you degenerate fucks!”

The boy named Stanley jumped, tipping the tripod. It bounced once, clattering on the concrete. Shay shrieked and pulled the blanket to cover herself. Rodney sprang into a half-stand, pushing the girl onto her side, covering his nakedness with one hand, and in the confusion, Lewis launched himself forward, locking his arm around the boy’s neck.

“Don’t you fucking move a muscle.”

The boy reached up, tried to pry the cop’s arms apart, and Lewis jerked him back hard, kicking. “You deaf?”

“I can’t breathe,” Rodney sputtered.

“You’re killing him,” Shay cried.

Mulqueen scuttled forward, his fingers laced below the trigger guard of his Taser. “Easy, Ed. Easy.” And then Rieux was on them both, pulling at Lewis’s forearm, trying to break the choke hold.

“He’s down. Ed, he’s down, for fuck’s sake. Not like this.”

Lewis pushed her away, but Rieux wrapped herself around his elbow, pulling with all her weight. “Okay, okay,” Lewis said, easing up. “Fuck. Don’t tear my fucking arm off.”

Rodney rolled onto his side, coughing.

“Alright,” Mulqueen said, pointing to his badge. “Party’s over. Everybody take it easy now. Nobody move.”

Stanley fell to his knees, clawing for the camera, clutching it to his chest.

“I said, don’t move, Ansel Adams.”

“Who?” the other boy, Rodney, said.

Mulqueen looked over and Rieux shrugged.

“Shut up, smart-ass,” Lewis said, staggering painfully to his feet. He bent over at his waist, his breath quick and ragged. “You better check, make sure these derelicts ain’t packing.”

Rieux swept a hand through the pile of clothes. She glared back at Lewis. “Christ, Ed, relax. Just kids fucking around.”

“Yeah,” Lewis said, rubbing his shoulder. “Fuck, good job, everyone. Go ahead and call it in, will you?”

Mulqueen took a step forward and motioned that the boy and girl should get dressed, and as they started toward their clothing, he tucked his Taser back into its holster and tugged at the bottom of his jacket, shaking his head at Rieux as though to say so much for your first-class, top-notch police work.

Behind him, the older boy rocked as though drawn in opposite directions by a force only he could feel, and Rieux saw the feral glint in his eyes.

“Don’t, kid,” she said, holding out her hand. But she knew what came next—before Lewis, before Mulqueen, maybe even before the kid himself.

Mulqueen turned in time to see the boy bolt for the exit at the far end of the building. Steel columns whizzed by on both sides as he gave chase, and he could hear the frightened breathing of the kid up ahead, his own breath sucking stale air and coming back in desperate puffs. The boy was fresh and lithe—a gazelle—putting space between them on the stretch toward the exit, a pinpoint in the distance.

Mulqueen ran until he thought his lungs might burst, ran hard until he tripped and stumbled forward onto his knees. Looking back, he saw an old fire extinguisher, its red tank and rubber hose mounted on an overturned wooden cart, heavy wagon wheels spinning slowly in the dim light.

The boy slid to a stop at the end of the room, darted behind a set of girders. He tugged at the exit door, ran to the other side and tried there, too. Finally, he froze in the middle of the work floor, panting, his profile stark against the fingernail of moonlight that peeked through the frosted bay windows at the end of the shop. Beyond those windows there was only night—night and the river.

“Okay, end of the line,” Mulqueen said, pressing a hand to the stitch in his side. “Just take it easy, kid.”

He was pulling his handcuffs from his duty belt when he heard the squelchy crack of rotten wood and the tinkle of shattered glass. He saw the boy disappear, sucked down toward the dark rushing river, and he froze, stunned.

Holy God, he thought, though he’d long suspected that God cared little about the town of Lodi.

As he approached the window, he steadied himself against the splintered frame and fought to tamp down the roiling in his stomach. Below, in The Yard, shards of glass twinkled like diamonds. Mulqueen laced his fingers behind his head and said, “Shit.”

The boy was dead. Or would be soon. He could tell that just by looking—by the spastic jerking and the ten-foot length of rebar that stuck up through the kid’s abdomen. Behind him, Rieux’s voice sounded warped, as though he were listening from underwater. She said something about backup and an ambulance, and he knew she was calling for help. He heard her say his name—twice—but his tongue felt like a rusty railroad spike in his mouth. Outside, the rain had stopped and the night was clear and the air felt fresh and sharp. A few stars dotted the black canvas above the plant, and the wet slag loomed like a purple bruise along the banks of the river.

Used with permission of West Virginia University Press
© 2022

Jason Kapcala is the author of the short story collection North to Lakeville. His writing has been nominated for numerous prizes, including the Pushcart Prize. He grew up in northeastern Pennsylvania, near the ruins of the Bethlehem Steel Works, and now lives in northern West Virginia.