KKBBFF Challenge Fic: Sunshine State

[cassyl]

Title: Sunshine State
Summary: Perry and Harry are hired to tail a truant teen heartthrob.
Word Count: 7,690
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Strong language, not enough gay
Disclaimer: No ownership is implied, no profit made, and no offense intended.
Author’s Notes: This is for the 30 Days of KKBB Fic Challenge, the prompt being “Florida,” which I was supposed to turn in last month, but I did a switcheroo. Hopefully this is worth the wait.



“I just don’t get it, you know? I mean, you should just sleep with who you want to sleep with. Not promiscuously-not that there’s anything wrong with that, I’m not judging, people can sleep around as much as they want as far as I’m concerned.”

“That’s very generous of you, Harry.” Perry shifted in the uncomfortable seat, adjusting the little pillow behind his neck.

“But, seriously, I don’t see why people feel like they have to lie about who they fuck, you know? Unless you’re molesting farm animals or something, that’s just creepy, you probably shouldn’t share that kind information with other people. But in general, it just seems stupid. All this bullshit . . .” I flicked a page of the copy of Us Weekly I bought for research. My fingernail left a dent in the glossy forehead of the picture’s subject. “Like, if you do it, just do it. You know? Just, fuck what everybody else has to say. I mean, am I right?”

Perry looked over at me. He never has much patience for me to begin with, but his temper was extra-short today. Places like this drive Perry crazy, he called it a ‘circus of human stupidity.’ I think it was the woman in front of us who spent ten minutes taking off her shoes that really pushed him over the edge. Anyway, the point is, he looked like he was thinking that if I got any stupider I might just regress right back into being an ape. “You really don’t have any idea, do you?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re full of ideas today, you figure it out.”

“But it doesn’t bother you?” I wasn’t really sure why I was pressing the issue. Maybe it bothered me a little. But it just didn’t seem right. “Some cold-hearted money-grubbing manager hires you to keep her teeny-bopper meal-ticket in the closet, and you’re totally cool with that?”

“I make too much money to have very many scruples.”

I snorted. “Man, you are so full of it.”

“No, Harry,” he snapped. His jaw went all tight, the way it always does when someone says something spectacularly stupid to him. “You’re the one who’s full of shit. The only people who fall for that accepting equal-opportunity bullshit about the freedom to love indiscriminately are straight people. And I’ll tell you one thing, keeping that kid in closet isn’t only in his manager’s best interest, ‘cause he won’t sell too many copies of Tiger Beat once his twelve-year-old fanbase finds out he likes sucking cock.”

The woman sitting across the aisle from us looked over at him, scandalized. He smiled at her, one of those humorless, challenging smiles he’s so good at. She averted her eyes.

“Well, excuse me,” I said. “I’ll just keep my opinions to myself.”

“Good.” He slipped the headphones out of their little plastic bag and settled them over his ears, turning up the volume button on his armrest pointedly, as if I hadn’t gotten the message already.

I went back to flipping through the magazine. I reached it at last, the cover story: “Is He or Isn’t He?” Scintillating journalism, right?

If you’re wondering what this is all about, well, it’s not too complicated. See, we had a case. Or Perry had one, which is practically the same thing. Our client was the manager of an up-and-coming teen heartthrob. She was a Class A collagen-sucking harpy, a real cool number. There’s something about women in business that’s just scary-what’s the phrase? The female is deadlier than the male? Well, it was definitely true about her. She sat down with us in her office to explain the situation. It was all modern architecture, the kind of sleek leather couches that look more like sex toys than furniture. I had trouble focusing on the briefing because I kept sort of sliding off my chair as she talked to us. But from what I could follow, Dabney had referred her to us, assuring her that we were more than capable of handling things quickly-and quietly. It was going to have to be quiet, because her client, the little golden boy, had run off to Miami with his pool boy. Which wasn’t going to sit very well with his bosses over at Disney. She wanted us to go and retrieve him before any of the paparazzi got wind of it. So Perry booked two tickets to Miami International and told me to pack a carry-on. Which is about where you came in.

And now, ladies and gentlemen, please put your seatbacks and tray tables in the upright and locked position, because the story is about to begin.

It was raining when we landed in Miami, a lazy sort of spitting rain, the kind that arrives just to piss off golfers and weekend tourists. I should have known then how the whole thing would turn out, but I was optimistic. I’d never been to Florida before.

The first thing we did was drop our stuff off at the hotel. Our client was paying all our expenses, so we were staying right on the water. I wanted to go down and check out the beach, but Perry nixed that idea right off. By which I mean he smacked me upside the head and said, “We’re not here so you can check out girls’ tan lines, remember?”

The last charge on Golden Boy’s card had been at a swank hotel in South Beach, so that was where we went. Perry marched right up to reception, leaned his elbows on the shiny desk and gave the concierge his best smile.

“Hi, I was hoping you could help us.” He was in full flirt mode. That “Hi” was thirty fucking seconds long. I swear to God, if his hair had been long enough, he would have curled it around his finger.

The concierge was totally into it. His eyes flicked up and down Perry in a way that kind of made me sick to my stomach. “What can I do for you, gentlemen?”

“We’re with Vanity Fair. We’re supposed to be doing a piece on one of your guests. He should be under the name Joel Goodsen.” The name sounded familiar, and I could remember the feeling of plastic upholstery sliding under my ass as I watched the Golden Boy’s manager say that name-something about using pseudonyms on press tours.

“I’m sorry, we don’t have anyone under that name staying here at present.”

“Excuse me, did I say Joel?” Perry laughed lightly, “My mistake.” He rolled his eyes like they were both in on a joke. “I meant Hunt. Ethan Hunt.”

“Oh . . .” The concierge frowned. “Are you sure it was Mr. Hunt?”

“Yes, I’m sure. He was supposed to meet us at the bar twenty minutes ago.” I wondered how Perry thought this shit up. Maybe it was part of the job description: must have small arms experience and the ability to prevaricate.

“Well, it’s just . . . Mr. Hunt checked out three days ago.”

The big, phony smile dropped right off Perry’s face. “What?”

“His friend said they were going down to the Keys for a few days.”

“What friend?”

The concierge shook his head. “I didn’t get his name. They checked in together.”

For a minute, I thought Perry was gonna grab the guy’s collar and throttle him. But he just gave him a tense smile, and said, “Thank you for your help.”

He was out of there so fast I had to jog a little to catch up with him. “Shit,” he muttered, handing his ticket stub to the valet.

“At least we know where they went,” I said, trying to be up beat about the whole thing.

There was a rumble of thunder overhead as Perry looked over at me. “Do you even know what they Keys are, idiot?”

“Uh . . .” I hadn’t actually thought about it, but I guess I’d sort of assumed it was another hotel, or something.

“The Keys are an archipelago-which, in case you don’t know what that means, is a lot of fucking islands. So, yes, it’s such a relief to know that he may be one of a thousand islands. At least there’s that.”

Perry was in a shitty mood the rest of the night. I kept hoping maybe he’d lighten up, so we could at least have a little bit of fun, but no dice. He sulked all the way through a really good dinner in Little Havana, and by the time we got back to the hotel, I couldn’t take it any more. I left him there and went out for a walk.

The wind was high, and lightning was flashing back and forth between the clouds, but people were still out in droves, and the neon was brighter than any lightning. I walked up and down Ocean Drive for a while, enjoying the noise of the crowd, and was about to go down to the beach when the rain started again, harder than before. I decided the beach could wait until tomorrow, and ducked into a bar for shelter. A couple of hours and several insanely overpriced drinks later, I stumbled back to the hotel.

I’d sort of hoped Perry would still be up-I wanted to make it up to him somehow, I hate it when he’s pissed at me, which is always, but, anyway, when I got back to our suite, the door to Perry’s room was closed. I went in anyway-I’ve never been one to stand on convention, or courtesy, or any of those c-words, for that matter-and tripped over the door jamb. Perry sat up quickly. I couldn’t see his face. It was pretty dark.

“Oh, you’re up,” I said, straightening up.

“I wasn’t a minute ago, Harry.” There was a warning tone in his voice, but I wasn’t really in a state to really appreciate it. I might have had a few more than several overpriced drinks at that bar.

“I, um . . .” I took a step closer.

“You did not wake me up at two in the morning just to chat.”

“Well, kinda . . . It’s just, I mean I was thinking-”

“Get out. Fuckhead. And set your alarm, we’re leaving at 7 AM.”

You know how sometimes you have a dream that’s completely creepy but also insanely hot? How, like, you’re having sex with Mrs. Ludecker your old math teacher and you’re really into it in the dream, even though when you wake up, you’re grossed out that your subconscious would even consider something so totally fucked up? I was in the middle of one of those-not about Mrs. Ludecker, by the way, that only happened the once, and it was a long time ago-when, at exactly 6:58 AM, Perry threw open the door to my room and said, “Wake up, you fucking waste of skin.” I kind of shrieked, and pulled the covers up to my chest-I’m not proud of it, but what can you do when your gay best friend walks in on you in the middle of your daily wet dream? It was weird. Perry didn’t seem fazed, though. He just snapped his fingers a couple of times and said, “Chop chop, we’re burning daylight.”

We grabbed breakfast to go and were on the Rickenbacker Causeway by 7:45. By the time we got to Key Biscayne, the sky had turned totally black, covered over by heavy rain clouds.

“So what’s the plan, exactly?” I asked, as we pulled into a parking spot across the street from a huge hotel.

“Just start knocking on doors. If he’s here, we’ll have to run into some hotel staffer that recognizes him.”

“Jesus, that could take days.”

“Have you got a better idea?”

Of course, I didn’t.

He’d found a list of hotels in Key Biscayne online, and had sorted it in order of price, with the most expensive at the top. This was our first stop.

The woman at the front desk gave us an apologetic smile even before we got there, which didn’t seem like a good sign. “I’m sorry, gentlemen,” she said, spreading her hands wide. “We’re not currently taking any more reservations, on account of the weather.”

“Weather?” I said, dumbly.

“This is August in Florida, I’m afraid. Hurricane season. In fact, we’re recommending our guests relocate somewhere inland.”

“We’re not actually interested in making a reservation,” Perry cut in, all business as usual. “We’re looking for someone. Maybe you’ve seen him?” He held out a page torn from my copy of Us Weekly.

The clerk looked at the clipping, then back at us, and shook her head. “I’m sorry, I can’t say that I have.”

And so it went, from one high-end hotel to the next. Each time, the story changed. First, Perry was the frantic father, then I was, then we were journalists again, and then detectives with the Miami PD, but no matter what Perry told people, nobody seemed to have seen the kid. It was sort of like he’d disappeared off the face of the earth. We were down to the last hotel on the list when finally the clouds broke and it started raining for real. We ran inside, and just stood there inside the door for a minute, water trickling down our backs. I was beginning to get a picture of how impossible this job really was.

When we got to the desk, Perry didn’t even bother making up a story, just thrust out the picture and said, “Have you seen this kid?”

The clerk stared at the picture. “Well, sure,” he said slowly. “That’s Mr. Babbitt.”

“Come again?” I said. It was just too good to be true.

“Mr. Babbitt? Um . . .” He tapped on the keyboard. “Charles Babbitt. He checked in three days ago with his brother . . . Raymond.”

“What room is he staying in?” Perry asked.

“Oh, um, I’m not really supposed to . . .”

Perry didn’t seem interested in flirting this time, or telling a story, or anything else besides getting this over with. “How about for a hundred bucks?”

“Room 203.”

Perry handed over the money, and we went upstairs. There was a “do not disturb” sign hung on the door of room 203, but Perry knocked anyway.

“So what’s the plan?” I asked. “We’re just gonna knock on the door and say, ‘Hey, there, son, you’d better come back with us.’”

“Of course not, idiot. We’re going to break in and have a look around. Think you can get it open?”

“Well, yeah, but what if he’s in there?” I asked, looking up and down the quiet hallway.

“Not likely,” Perry said, knocking again. “What self-respecting 19-year-old is going to be in holed up his hotel room at seven o’clock at night? Just get us in.”

So I jimmied the lock, and we went in. Something crunched under my shoe. Perry turned the light on, and we could see it was a broken beer bottle. The room was a wreck-sheets ripped off the bed, paintings torn off the walls, a vase of flowers shattered on the carpet. It was serious carnage, like The Who circa 1967 had just been through.

I let out a low whistle. “Guess he’s not here.”

Perry stepped forward, nudging the shriveled-up flowers with the tip of his shoe. “And from the looks of it, he hasn’t been here for a while.”

There was a rank smell of decay rising from the carpet, probably from the spilled beer. “What do we do now?”

Perry wasn’t really listening to me. He was rifling through some papers on the floor.

“What is it?”

He pulled a tissue from a box lying discarded at the foot of the bed and picked up a Blackberry from amongst the papers. “Now we know why he wasn’t answering his manager’s calls.”

Perry pocketed the phone. While he looked through the papers, I checked out the hall closet. “Hey, look at this.”

He got up and came to stand beside me, looking into the open closet. There was a heap of clothes lying at the bottom of it, as if someone had taken a suitcase and just dumped everything out.

I frowned. “Doesn’t it seem sort of weird to you that he would leave his room, but not take any of his stuff with him?”

“I don’t think he went on a day-trip, Harry.”

Well, shit. That didn’t sound good.

When we got back down to the reception desk, Perry asked the concierge how long it’d been since he’d seen the kid.

“Oh. Well, now that you mention it, I’m not sure. But his brother came down last night.”

“What did his brother say?”

“Nothing, really. . . He was carrying one of those big, rolling duffel bags. It looked heavy, so I called over and asked if he wanted any help, but he said no.”

“Right,” Perry said. “Well, if you see him again . . .” As he spoke, he pulled a complementary brochure off the counter and wrote his phone number on it, then slipped another hundred dollar bill inside the fold of the pamphlet. “Give us a call?”

As we headed back to the car, I knew we were both thinking it. It was the scab you can’t help pulling off, even though you know it’s not going to be pretty. I just couldn’t stop myself from saying it. “I think he had something besides clothes in that duffel bag.”

Perry didn’t even answer. He just scowled into the rain, which was beating down harder than ever. By the time we got to the car, we were both soaked through.

When we got back to the hotel, Perry started going through the numbers on our boy’s Blackberry. I turned on the TV. There was a report on the local news about the Category Three hurricane currently hovering over Cuba. Fucking Sunshine State, my ass.

Somewhere behind me, I could hear Perry talking-“Hello? No-May I-Ma’am, is there-Hello? Fuck. She hung up on me.”

“Who did?”

Perry came over and dropped down onto the couch beside me. “Every other number on the call log is in his address book, except this 305 number.” He showed me the screen of the phone. “Whoever it is, he called them nine times. But when I called back, it was just some old lady shouting at me in Spanish.”

“Give it here,” I say, holding out my hand for the phone. He looked doubtful, but handed it over. The last time I got out of jail, I took a dishwashing job so I wouldn’t lose my parole. I picked up enough Spanish to get by. It’s amazing the things you learn trying to keep out of the slammer.

After a couple of rings, a woman answered, just like Perry said, in Spanish. “Hola, senora, um, le puedo preguntar-” I started, but the second she heard my voice, she started yelling at me, “No! Manuel no esta aqui! No lo moleste mas! El no quiere hablar con usted!” And then she hung up.

“Well, that was weird,” I said, handing back the phone.

“I know,” Perry said. “You can’t even speak English properly.”

“Hey, I speak good English!”

Perry rolled his eyes. “I wouldn’t even call what you do speaking. Now tell me what happened.”

So I translated what the woman had to me, or I tried to. I didn’t get further more than a few words in when he said, “She said Manuel? You’re sure?”

“Yeah . . . What?”

He gave me this look like my brain just dropped out of my head. “Have you been paying attention at all? Think. Our guy skips town with the pool boy, right?”

“Yeah?”

“Whose name is . . . ?”

I tried to remember, but I had no idea. “I give up.” You may recall me saying I was a little bit distracted during the briefing. I might have missed some of the finer details of this case. Possibly. So sue me. I never promised I’d be a reliable narrator.

“Manny?” Perry said. “As in Manuel?”

“Oh. Hey, cool! I found a lead!”

His expression could have melted a hole in steel. I tried to take it in stride, like always. Nothing Perry can throw at me ever really fazes me. It’s obvious that, deep down, he actually likes me. Way deep down.

“But we are gonna follow my lead, right?”

“We are going to follow the lead, yes. Because there is no better option.”

So Perry plugged the number into his super detective database, and came up with an address for Mrs. Beatriz Rodriguez, who was, as it turned out, Manny the pool boy’s grandmother.

Perry didn’t want to waste any time, so we got back in the car and drove out to Manny’s grandmother’s. We parked across the street from the little bungalow. It was raining so hard we had to leave the windshield wipers in order to see anything at all, but even with low visibility it was easy to tell there was nothing going on. There was a black pickup truck parked in the driveway, and a soggy paper lantern was rattling around on the porch, and that was the sum total of the activity at the Rodriguez house.

The stakeout is the worst part of the detective business, as far as I’m concerned. Being shot at, tortured, chased by bad guys-all of that I can handle, more or less. I’m not saying it’s fun, but I can go into that shit and come out the other side. It’s the waiting I can’t deal with. I mean, it’s no coincidence that I steal shit compulsively. I like instant gratification. It’s marginally fucked up, I know, but what can you do? Given the choice between having something now, and having something later, who wouldn’t pick the first option? Anyway, the point is, waiting drives me up a wall. I was one of those kids who always had to know what he was getting for Christmas. I’d sneak into my parents’ closet while they were at work, and end the suspense. Stakeouts are sort of like waiting for Christmas morning, except Santa never leaves you a new magic kit. Imagine reaching into your stocking and finding a grotesque money shot of some overweight banker diddling his secretary. In that respect, every day was Christmas for me and Perry. And, by the way, who says “diddling” any more? I just, like, seriously dated myself. Pretty soon I’ll be wearing knee-high socks with shorts.

But what I’m saying is, I fucking hate the waiting game. I’ve found that the only way to deal with it is by talking. Now, this makes Perry want to flip his shit, but if he hates the sound of my voice so much, maybe he should do us both a favor and not take me on stakeouts. But for some reason, he never does that, so it was his own damn fault that I was, at that very moment, in the middle of a monologue about my parents’ relationship circa 1979.

“I mean, there it is again. Like, why would you choose to do something if you clearly know it’s going to make you miserable? That’s just masochism.” I could almost hear Perry’s teeth grinding against one another, but he didn’t actually say anything, so I just kept going. “It’s like that whole in-the-closet thing we were talking about the other day, you know? Like, who looks at their life and goes, ‘Well, I could tell the truth and be really happy, but I think I’d rather spend the rest of my life lying about shit to people and die alone and unloved.’ I mean, what the hell. It’s masochistic. Life is fucked up enough, you know, and I just don’t get why people feel the need to make it worse for themselves. You know?”

Perry turned to me, and for a moment the silence just stretched out between us, the only sound the pounding of the rain on the roof and the swish of the windshield wipers. Then he said, “Do you ever actually listen to yourself when you talk?”

“Why?”

“Because I think even you would be surprised at how inane you are.”

“Excuse me,” I said, rising happily to the bait. “I am not inane.” Anything was better than sitting in silence, even arguing. Hell, especially arguing.

Perry pretended to consider this for a moment, then said, “No, ‘lacking in sense and significance.’ I think that pretty much sums it up.”

“Jesus, just because you’re a jaded, hardened cynic doesn’t mean we all are.”

“I’m not a cynic.”

“Uh, what? The other day you were Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’s number one fan. Next you’ll be telling me those crazy gays shouldn’t be allowed to vote, either.”

Perry closed his eyes for a minute, drawing a deep breath. “We both know I didn’t say that.”

“Yeah, but you might as well have. You can’t tell me that doesn’t sound a little bit cynical.”

“That’s not cynical. It’s realistic.” He shook his head briskly. “I’m not saying I don’t make my annual donation to the Human Rights Campaign. All I’m saying is that you’re more of an idiot than I thought you were if you think that who you choose to fuck doesn’t have consequences. Just because it shouldn’t matter doesn’t mean that people don’t think it does.”

“Oh, come on, it’s the 21st cen-”

“You know what, Harry, I think that’s your problem in general. You don’t like it when things have consequences. You’d like to think you can get away with anything. Well, guess what? You can’t. And everybody knows that but you.”

For a minute, I didn’t really know what to say. It felt like an inordinately low blow, like I’d asked him for a light and he’d threatened to kill my mother. “I know that,” I said, kind of lamely.

“Do you?” Perry’s eyebrows shot up towards his hairline. “Because your continued behavior seems to demonstrate that you don’t.”

“What do you mean, my-Hey, is that him?”

Perry turned around, just as a set of knuckles rapped sharply on Perry’s window.

“Maybe a little advance warning next time?” Perry hissed, and rolled down the window. The water started pouring in. It was hard to see the guy standing there, because it was dark out and he was soaking wet, but he seemed pissed.

“What the fuck are you doing?” he said.

“Who, us?” I asked.

“No, pendejo, the brass band parked behind you. Of course you. What are you doing hanging around my house?” With every swipe, our wipers splashed more water onto him.

“We’re lost,” Perry said easily. “Can you tell us how to get to Coral Gables?”

“Fuck you,” he spat. “If I see you sneaking around here again, I’ll call the police.”

“Oh, I don’t think you’d want us to get the police involved.” I realized after I said it that it was the wrong thing to say, because all of a sudden the air in the car got about ten degrees colder. If Manny didn’t kill me, Perry was going to for sure.

“You just better fucking watch yourselves.” He slammed his open hand against the doorframe and stalked off, back into the house.

“Give me your sweatshirt,” Perry said, once he’d rolled up the window.

“What?”

“Don’t ask questions.”

I shrugged out of my sweatshirt and handed it over. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I definitely wasn’t expecting Perry to dry his face off with it before using it to wipe the water from the inside of the door. Then he threw it back at me, right in my face, so that the zipper hit me hard on the nose.

“If you ever attempt to give us away to a mark again,” he said, putting the car into gear and pulling away from the curb, “I’ll shove my gun so far down your throat you’ll think you had it for breakfast. You read me, chief?”

“Yeah,” I muttered, staring down at the damp sweatshirt in my hands.

“No, don’t say anything. Ever again.”

Needless to say, the ride back to the hotel was more than a little quiet.

After a truly depressing room service meal, during which Perry didn’t say a single word to me, I figured it was time to bite the bullet. Metaphorically, not literally-I’m not really sure what that would mean literally, because, really, who would actually bite a bullet? Anyway, as usual, I decided to swallow my pride and try to make peace.

“What are we gonna do now?” I asked.

“You mean now that you’ve tipped off our only lead to the fact that we’re following him?”

“Hey, be fair. He might not have caught on.”

“Not everybody’s as thick as you, Harry.”

As usual, Perry was making is hard to make peace. He couldn’t just let it go. He had to continue to make me feel like shit for being an idiot. As if I didn’t feel like enough of a heel by my own power. “I’m sorry, OK? Jesus, cut me a break. It’s not like I meant to do it.”

Perry snorted. “No, of course not. You never mean to do it. But you did do it. And, oh, look, now I’m pissed off at you. What a surprise.”

I sighed-or more like I huffed. There was just no winning with Perry, ever. If you did the wrong thing, he’d yell at you. If you tried to do the right thing, he’d yell at you. It was like having a second girlfriend. Or, well, really a first-me and Harmony were in the middle of one of those off-again phases at the time, due to an unfortunate incident where I let it slip that I might or might not have slept with her friend Flicka while we were on a different time-out. Sometimes I felt like the only relationship I couldn’t screw up was my friendship with Perry, and only then because he didn’t actually like me that much. Anyway, the point was, sometimes I couldn’t handle how high-strung Perry was. But before I could say anything really insulting-or anything at all, actually-Perry just rolled his eyes and said, “Go to bed, Harry. I’ll see you in the morning.”

I lay awake for a long time that night, but no matter how long I stared at the ceiling, I still couldn’t figure out why Perry’s criticism of me had gotten so far under my skin. Obviously I knew it wasn’t true. Like all people with compulsive habits, I was secure in the knowledge that you could never trust a person who said they knew what your “problem” was. Perry didn’t have any idea what he was talking about. I was the King of Consequences. You piss your girlfriend off, and a dog eats half your finger-consequences. So, admittedly, there are a few steps between those two points, but one definitely led to the other, no escaping that.

And if there was some niggling part of my brain that told me that maybe Perry had a point, well, I was pretty good at ignoring my instincts, especially where Perry was concerned. Besides, I reasoned, Perry didn’t really mean all that stuff. He was just saying it to put me down, which, I reminded myself, wasn’t going to work.

Still, I didn’t sleep that well, and when Perry woke me up at six, I was not a happy camper. Neither was Perry, really, but we didn’t exactly have a heart-to-heart about it.

The watchword for the day was damage control, and with that in mind we drove out to the airport and got the clerk at the rental place to let us swap out our model for a different one. It wasn’t hard to convince him-after all, it wasn’t like he was doing much business with a fucking hurricane practically overhead. Then we bought a couple of hats-mine a Yankees cap, his some kind of straw fedora that made him look like the missing gay member of the Buena Vista Social Club. But that notwithstanding, it was a pretty good disguise. It was too dark under the storm clouds to wear our sunglasses, but as long as our guy Manny didn’t get too close, I figured he probably wouldn’t recognize us.

The next order of business was to pick up our trail where we’d left off yesterday, so we headed back to the Rodriguez household. The same black pickup truck was parked out front, and Perry decided it was safe to assume that the extra-wide F-150 didn’t belong to Granny. So while I sat in the car and gnawed at a hangnail, he snuck across the street and slipped a tracking device inside the rear wheel well. When he got back, dripping onto a hotel towel he’d spread over the seat, he acted like it was no big deal, like there hadn’t been the distinct possibility that the potential murderer of a teen heartthrob might have come out and bashed his skull into a fine pulp.

The advantage of this course of action was that we could keep a healthy distance between our limbs and Manny. So we found a café in Little Havana and settled down with two cups of strong coffee and a little plate of guava-filled pastries. We didn’t talk much, just watched the portable GPS tracker on the table between us.

The little triangle marking Manny’s car had been still for an hour and a half when I finally had to ask: “What if he didn’t do anything?”

“I thought we agreed you weren’t going to talk any more.”

“No, I’m serious, though. Why are we assuming he killed his boyfriend? I mean, that’s a little extreme, don’t you think? Maybe they just had a fight.”

Perry dismissed the idea with one short shake of his head. “You don’t threaten people like that unless you’ve got something to hide. And, anyway, if that’s true, then where’s our Golden Boy? There hasn’t been any more activity on his credit card, and we haven’t heard word one from our friend at the hotel. People don’t just disappear, and, more importantly, celebrities don’t just stop spending money.”

He had a point there, I had to admit. “So, what, he’s just going to hide out at his grandma’s until this all blows over?”

Perry shrugged.

“Hey, speaking of Grandma . . .” An old Cuban guy at the table next to us gave me a curious look, and I lowered my voice. “When I called the house the other day, she didn’t wait for me to introduce myself or anything, just launched right into that whole rant. I think she thought I was somebody else-maybe our Golden Boy.”

Perry inclined his head, like this wasn’t a half-bad thought. “He did call her house nine times before he mysteriously abandoned his phone.”

“You think maybe Golden Boy got a little too clingy . . .”

“. . . so Manny got rid of him? Who knows. It’s not out of the question.”

Somehow, though, it wasn’t very a satisfying solution. It was a far cry from the ending I’d been imagining in my head, where we found the two of them sipping daiquiris on the beach, maybe in matching little swim trunks, and Perry scolded them and sent them home. It seemed sort of indicative that all the relationships I’d ever been witness to had ended in carnage-either literal or metaphorical. It would have been nice if, just for once, something could have had a genuinely happy ending. Perry said to me once that, if anyone ever thought they’d found their happy ending, they just hadn’t gotten to the end yet. What pissed me off was that, the longer I thought about it, the more it seemed like Perry was right.

Maybe I was a little lost in my thoughts, because the sound of Perry’s chair scraping against the floor make all the hair on my arms stand up. “What?”

“He’s moving.”

And sure enough, the little triangle was floating across the screen of Perry’s GPS gadget. So we had no choice but to leave some money on the table to cover our bill and head back out into the rain, which showed no signs whatsoever of letting up. The streets were practically deserted, and dark as night in the storm. The noise of the rain slamming down on the roof of the car drowned out the radio, no matter how loud I turned it up, until I was forced to admit defeat and turn it off.

We followed Manny at a discreet distance as he got onto the highway, leaving the city behind. All we could see of his car was a vague white shape ahead of us, where the wheels of his car were sending up a cloud of spray and steam. I felt sort of sick to my stomach, although that might have been because the wind was so strong that Perry was actually having trouble steering.

After an especially strong gust of wind pushed the car into the next lane, I just started talking. I don’t really know why imminent danger makes me so talkative. I guess anything’s better than thinking about the possibility of being crushed to death in a tangle of steel and rubber.

“Why are you so cynical, though, do you think?”

I could see his jaw clench. “Do you really think this is the moment to have this conversation, Harry?”

“Fine.” I did the only other thing I could think of to calm my nerves, and lit a cigarette.

“Put that out!”

“Either I can talk or I can smoke. It’s one or the other, so you’re gonna have to pick.”

Perry’s knuckles whitened on the wheel. “At least the sound of your voice won’t give me cancer.”

That was as much permission as I needed, and I was off again. “Is it all an act? I mean, I know you have to be all macho and shit, it’s part of your image, I get that. But I don’t really believe you can possibly be as hard-boiled as you make yourself out to be. There’s no way you genuinely think life is as shitty as you’re always telling me it is.

“I think that’s why you like me so much, actually. You’ve got to have somebody around who doesn’t buy into your jaded worldview. When you think about it, we pretty much have that whole optimist-pessimist shtick collared. We could take that on the road-do a whole franchise deal. Hey, wouldn’t it be cool if somebody wanted to make a reality TV show about us being detectives? Like Ace of Cakes but with private investigating. I bet we’d test really well with audiences. We could get Dabney to shop it-”

“I really need you to shut up now,” Perry said, his voice tense.

“Hey, we had a deal.”

“I’m sorry if I don’t want to listen to your bullshit, Harry, but I’m a little busy trying not to get us killed.”

Another gust of wind rocked the car, and I felt the wheels on Perry’s side leave the road briefly, which was scarier than any threat Perry could ever make.

I was never quite so grateful to get off a highway as I was when the white cloud that was Manny’s truck turned onto an exit ramp and, a minute later, we followed him. The town was a little more sheltered, but the road was littered with fallen branches and other shit torn down by the wind. We bumped over a downed stop sign, and garbage cans rolled slowly around in the street.

“Where is he going?” I muttered.

“How the fuck should I know?” Perry snapped.

We drove all the way through town, following the blinking triangle on the GPS screen more than anything else. The car was cold and humid at the same time, and my whole body was covered in goose bumps.

Right as I was beginning to wonder if maybe Manny was just leading us out somewhere so that he could kill us without attracting attention, he turned into the parking lot of a motel. We pulled into the bowling alley across the street and watched, the wipers knocking water from the windshield at top speed. I could just barely make out his truck, black against the pink stucco of the motel, and then a light came on in one of the windows.

“Shit-what’s he doing? What are we gonna do?”

“We’re not going to do anything. Once he’s gone, we’ll see what we can see.”

“You don’t think . . .” I almost didn’t want to say it, knew saying it would spoil the thought somehow, but it was already halfway out of my mouth, there was no turning back now. “You don’t think Golden Boy’s in there, do you? Maybe he’s just hiding out, or something.”

Perry sighed. “Don’t get your hopes up, Harry.”

I didn’t say anything. It sort of felt like, if I didn’t reply I wouldn’t have to admit that Perry was right.

We waited for maybe half an hour, and then the light in the window went out, and Manny’s truck pulled back onto the road. Perry waited a couple of minutes to make sure that he wasn’t coming back, and then we crossed the road and pulled into the same parking space the black Ford had occupied a minute ago.

There was a narrow overhang shielding the door from the rain, and we squeezed under it while I tried to pick the lock. My hands were stiff from the cold, and it seemed to take hours to get the door open. It probably didn’t help that I kept imagining Manny sneaking up behind me, ready to give me a good clobbering. But, finally, the lock gave and I pushed open the door. We clambered inside and shut the door against the wind that was trying to follow us in.

The room was totally empty. With the exception of a trail of wet footprints, it looked like nobody had ever even set foot in it. The bed was neatly made, and even the pictures on the walls were so straight it looked like someone had arranged them with a T-square.

I think both of us knew better than to take that as a good sign. But we both just looked around, kind of squinting in the bright fluorescent light.

“There, see?” I said. Even as I said it, I could hear how strained my voice sounded, how untrue the words were. “There’s nothing here. Just goes to show you, not everything has to be totally fucked up.”

Perry looked at me then, very still. His wet hair was plastered to his head, and it made him look weirdly-I don’t know, vulnerable, kind of bare. He didn’t look mad any more, just tired, maybe a little sad. I sort of felt the same way. “Are you going to show me some evidence to the contrary, then? Go ahead.”

I opened my mouth to say something, but I couldn’t think of anything to say. We were standing really close to each other, dripping onto the carpet, while the rain whaled on the pavement outside. It felt, for just a second, like he and I were the only two people in the entire state. And suddenly I just wished like hell it could stay that way.

But it didn’t. Of course.

I took a deep breath, preparing myself to say-I don’t even know what-and I tasted it on my tongue, the raw stench of decay. “Do you . . . ?” It was coming from the general area of the bed.

I didn’t even have to lift the mattress all the way up from the bed frame. There he was, the Golden Boy, squashed awkwardly under the springs, bloated and discolored but still recognizable as the face that launched a thousand copies of Tiger Beat. I had to turn away to keep from throwing up.

And that was it. We’d solved the case. Or the case we’d come to solve had ceased to be an issue. It wasn’t very Johnny Gossamer. No intrigue, no death-defying feats, no car chases, no torture. Just us, alone in that room. There was a question, and then an answer. It was an answer I think both of us would have preferred not to hear.

I won’t bore you with the details about how the police arrived, or how they tracked down Manuel Rodriguez in a basement somewhere in Homestead, Florida. I will tell you the police eventually decided it was manslaughter, not murder. Manuel said he and his boyfriend got in an argument at the hotel in Key Biscayne, and he admitted to shoving him. The kid hit his head and died of a hemorrhage, or something like that. The coroner’s report corroborated his story. Manuel said he freaked, thinking the police would never take the word of a poor immigrant in a case like this. Ironically, it was his attempt to cover his tracks that really got him the worst in court. I hate that word-ironically. What does that even mean? It seems like just another polite way of talking about a really raw deal.

The news was all over the papers-for weeks, each tabloid carried some new, shocking “revelation” about the circumstances of the Golden Boy’s death. Hookers and club kids came out of the woodwork to say they’d partied with him once in the Chateau Marmont. We got a lot of offers for exclusive interviews. Someone wanted to give us half a million for the story, but neither of us really felt like sharing.

Anyway-that’s what happened. For what it’s worth.

And, you know, here’s the funny thing-It was a beautiful day when we stepped off the plane in LA, not a cloud in sight.