All The Way Down

Chapter 35

I listened to Bean's labored breathing and swearing. Bell-bottoms was up off the floor, and he and black pants didn't look as sure of themselves now. Then the door to the cell burst open and two guards came in with nightsticks.

One of the guards pointed at me with a nightstick and said "You! Out!"

I left the cell, and the two guards led me back past the cells toward the booking desk. I guessed that they were going to put me in a different cell, but they took me back through the doorway into the booking area, where Esto stood against the desk in his pressed cotton shirt.

"Ready to go?" he asked. "I post bail."

"Hell yes," I said. "Thanks. How did you know I was in here? They wouldn't let me make a phone call when they brought me in."

"I was on my way to the liquor store," Esto said. "I saw that cop hurting you. I want to help. I knew you would be here."

"I'll pay you back, I promise," I said.

"I know you're good for it," he said.

The officer behind the booking desk pushed a manila envelope with my name on it through the slot in the grille. I picked it up and we started for the stairs with me shuffling along in my jogging shoes. I could put my belt and shoelaces back on later. I just wanted to get out of there.

"I don't understand why you're arrested for drunk driving," Esto said. "You don't seem drunk."

"It was Bullard, the son of a bitch. He said I was drunk so he’d have an excuse to beat me with his nightstick and make me spend the night with some psychos in the drunk tank."

"Bullard?" Esto said. "I think maybe I catered a party at his house one time."

"I hope the bastard got food poisoning," I said. Esto looked hurt.

It was dark as we went out through the front door of the police building. I felt pretty good about the fact that I was outside walking around. The knuckles on my left hand were swelling fast and my head hurt like hell, but I didn't mind. At least I wasn’t in jail.

We climbed into Esto's gigantic silver Caddy, and we were off. I slid my belt through the loops in my jeans and started lacing up my shoes again.

"I really need to get the back to my restaurant," Esto said. "Do you mind?"

"Not at all," I said. Esto moved the Caddy smoothly through the other traffic. It was almost perfectly silent in the car and the ride was waterbed smooth.

"Esto," I said. "I really appreciate you helping me, but I've got to admit I'm curious about why. You barely know me. Why go to all the trouble?" He looked serious, and thought for a few seconds before responding.

"My wife and I, we cannot have children," he said. "If I did have a daughter, I would like her to be like Michelle. She is very beautiful, but she has modesty. She is very intelligent, but she doesn't think too hard about things. I want good things for her."

"Okay."

"If you seen the other gringos Michelle has taken up with, you'd understand," Esto said. "They treat her bad. When she was a waitress, one of them brought his new girlfriend in to humiliate her. Now, you seem like maybe you treat her right. So, I watch out for you. Maybe you return the favor by treating her right? Okay?"

"Esto," I said. "I think I'm in love with her. You don't have to bribe me to be nice to her."

"Ahh," he said. "Music to my ears." He turned the car into the narrow alley that ran behind the strip mall that held his restaurant. He parked the Caddy near an unmarked gray door and we got out. He popped the trunk and we each picked a case of liquor out of the trunk of the car.

The back door opened onto the kitchen where two cooks were working up dinners for customers. The smell of onions and frying meat and chicken was heavy and sweet. We put the cases down on the floor. Esto grabbed a knife off a cutting board and deftly slashed open the cases. He pulled a couple bottles from each box and started for the door to the dining area. He put his back up against the door to push it open and said to me, ''You want anything from the bar?"

"How about a cup and some ice?" I said.

He smiled and was gone. I watched one of the chefs for a couple of minutes while he chopped fresh vegetables and cooked up strips of steak at the same time, all the while keeping up a busy patter in Spanish with the other cook. His hands were a blur on the countertop.

Esto reappeared with a couple of tumblers full of ice. He pulled a bottle from each of the liquor boxes we had carried in.

"Let's go to my office and talk," he said.