“Who were the DJs?” I said.

He shook the last pill in his bottle into his palm and frowned. “Kip ‘n’ Rog.”

Then—

“Man, you know what I just remembered? I know where Hawley hid his key.”

“What key?”

“To his pad—I can get us in there.”

“I—no, that doesn’t sound like a good idea.”

“No, no, actually it’s a great idea.” He downed the final pill with the dregs of his strawberry shake. “I’m an old friend; I know where the key is. He let me in there all the time.”

“I can’t do that; I’m a person of interest. I’m not breaking into—”

“Nobody’s breaking anything. There’s stuff in there, all the leads he collected and whatnot. I mean, you want to figure this shit out or not?”

“Not like that, I can’t. My lawyer—I can’t.”

His brow hardened, eyes sliding into a mean squint—the tough guy resurfaced, buzzed and pissed. “Fuck your lawyer—you’re taking me down there, bro. I just opened my fucking heart to you. Quid pro quo—fucking ride’s the least you can do.”

“Mickey, for all we know there’ll be cops all around the place; it could be roped off—”

He stood. “Get up—we’re gonna go find out.”

17

We pulled up to Hawley’s place on Lobdell—lights out, empty driveway.

“See—no cops, goofball.”

We got out and Sandoz moved quickly, up the little walkway to the potted alocasia. He slid it, lifted a brick, dug around, squinted.

“Shit—key’s gone. Fuck it, follow me.”

We walked around the back, over some old rolled-up hose and a tin trash can. Sandoz pressed open the gate.

I whispered, “What are we doing here? We are not going to break and enter—”

“This ain’t nothin’, man. We’re visiting.”

He pulled a ratty-looking handkerchief from his pocket and was wrapping it around his fist. “Once I robbed a Winchell’s with nothing but my hand in the pocket—stick ’em up!”

“Don’t,” I said, “don’t break anything, please, we’re—”

But it was too late; Sandoz rammed his fist through the back door window and was reaching in to jimmy the lock. No alarms, no lights. We cut through the dark laundry room, the small kitchen, into a big empty dining room/living room combo—old Spanish, 1930s style. The place was sparse—hardwood floors, antique furniture, a round table straight out of some old King Arthur flick, and one big framed painting of red flowers in a vase—it looked like something you’d pick up at a garage sale.

“Psst.” Sandoz was hyped, eyes darting. “Follow me.”

He led me down the railroad hall and opened doors—a home office with a drawing board and sketches of models, a green-tiled bathroom, pristine. Then he cracked open the door to Hawley’s dark and lonesome bedroom—the first thing that hit me was the bed, a perfectly made single beside an empty nightstand.

“This guy ever have spouses?” I said. “Girlfriends, boyfriends, anything?”

“Nope. He had one thing—the dream.”

Sandoz flicked on the light and spun me around by the shoulders to face the inside wall—a massive cacophony, thumb-tacked on corkboard.

I stared, breathless, pulse racing: The Daily Telegraph and nothing but—lyrics, flyers, undeveloped photo shoot strips, a demo cassette cover, and Polaroids: a classroom full of intent-looking eighties teens, yearbook pages, Guitar Center receipts, same cutout listings ad from Natural Fudge that was left in the test pressing, all of it overlapping, hastily unarranged, the cornucopia pouring.

And dead center: Emil’s Fairfax High ID card—hopeful Emil, rosy and bright-eyed.

“Told you he was obsessed.”

I reached for the ID to get a closer look.

“Don’t touch!” Sandoz said, grabbing my hand. “Fingerprints, dum-dum.”

I nodded, dazed. Then I pulled the cell phone and started taking photos, but as I did, Sandoz went kinetic behind me. He was getting busy, grabbing a pillow one-handed, shaking it out of the pillowcase.

“What are you doing?”

“Research.” He started bagging things—the dresser full of old watches and pens and batteries, a hanger full of ties—then he dashed down the hall and I watched him stuff an unmatched pair of dinner candelabras into the bag, and he was digging through drawers, grabbing handfuls of silverware.

I tried to get tough in a hard whisper. “Dude, I thought we came here to get info, not pilfer.”

“Hawley don’t care anymore—he ain’t got no quarter with the material world.”

I heard clanging and shuffling as I scurried to photograph every corner of the collage. Sandoz came back down the dark hall wagging a book.

“The Holy Bible,” he said like a gospel preacher. “Been looking for one of these.”

He tossed the book into the pillowcase and shook it like Santa. “Locked and loaded. I’m outta here, bro. Come on—front door’s faster.”

Shaking my head, I followed him out, taking one last look at the gloomy place—a lonely man’s home, lonely no more.

I jammed the ignition as Sandoz flopped into the passenger seat. As I tore down the hill toward Sunset, he burst out laughing, his wide mouth showing off chipped meth teeth. “We did it! Nice work, cowboy.”

“Yeah, great,” I said. “We robbed a dead man—really cool.”

“This is what Devvy would’ve wanted, bro.”

Then he reached into the pillowcase and pulled out a black spiral datebook, slapped it on my lap.

“Happy birthday, amigo. Now cruise by Sixth and Arapahoe.”

“Oh no,” I said. “Not a chance. I am a licensed Lyft driver. I’m not taking you on some kind of a drug run.”