“Are you one hundred percent sure?” I ask.As if Tan suddenly laughs and says: oh, here it is! The body isbehind the cupboard, I just didn't see it.

“One hundred and ten. Unless it's a wrongaddress.”

“What do I do? Call the Dispatch and cancelthe Homicide Emergency Response?”

“Too bloody late, partner. They are on theway, for sure.”

“OK, fine. Sorry that I wasted yourbirthday. Will try Kim now.” I disconnect the call and turn to thetrike driver, “Can you stop here, bro? It looks like I don't need aride anymore.”

“Problems?” The first man throws me thetobacco box. At least, he has managed to roll himself a smoke.

“‘Problems’ is a bloodyunderstatement. That's what I call the perfect Friday thethirteenth. Fire in the hole?” I click my macho lighter. “Thanksfor the ride, boys.”

The men leave me at theroad and depart on their trike. I dial Kim's phone.‘You have dialed the Harris County Policenumber. Currently the phone is switched off or in the area withservice temporary unavailable. For transfer to an operator, pressone or hold the line. To leave a message, presstwo.’ Surely, Kim and Chen are already atthe place in which the cell phone coverage is ‘temporaryunavailable’. In the Houston slums, ‘temporary’ often means thatnobody cares to fix it for months.

What if there has been nostubbing? An elaborate prank? But what for? Why would one pull aprank on the local Police? The Taiwamerican looked genuine enough:out of breath, scared, upset, shaken. Then, his adrenaline rush wasover, and he looked deflated. To act like this, you got to be amovie star with few personal Oscars on the shelf. Well, we have nomore Hollywood and no more Oscar, only the old movies fromtwenty-something years ago plus few remaining TV soap operas. Butwhat about the gut-driverand the bloodied rag? By the way, what did theyuse in the real movies if they wanted to show blood? Tan insistsit's pig blood, but I think it must be some food dye.

What do I do? Call theDispatch and ask for the Operator One-Niner? I imagine howthe Looney Tunes Granny, only with dark skin, says: ‘No worries, sweetie. Iwill make you a good excuse – right away. Everyone can make alittle mistake, dear.’ Then she will disconnect my call, chuckle,and make some plausible coded diversion for the Station. Her littleAfro grand-niece has screwed up and needs some help!

No, I will not ask tocancel. I must believe my eyes and my head. The gut-driver is real. The blood isreal. The shaking hands are real. And if the old man is stillalive, and somehow managed to get away or call for help, – hey, hestill has his quarter-inch hole! If the quarter-inch hole is not anemergency, what is the emergency? Of course, for a stubbing withouta dead body – the Homicide Unit is excessive. The standing ordersare to call a case investigator from the Station. The investigatingofficer can ride a bike. Horses are not cars. Horses cannot go toevery stupid little case. People can, but horses – cannot. I try tocall Kim once more. ‘You have dialed theHarris County Police number. Currently thephone…’

But really. Why do I panic? So, Ioverreacted. The Homicide Unit had to harness a horse. Let's callit a practice run. The horse cart instead of the emergency responsetruck is a recent brilliant idea of our Station Chief. Diesel fuelis too expensive, he says. No more cars, except for some realemergency. As the result, the Station now has two nice horses, asource of endless jokes and horse shit. Unfortunately, very fewPolice officers know how to harness these fine animals to carts.Even if you served in the mounted police, they don't teach officersmuch about carts and wagons. OK, gentlemen, so shut up andpractice. Myself, I can withstand a joke or two. My personal spaceengineer Scotty will jury-rig some Stale Joke Deflector or WhoGives a Damn Blaster.

They can't kick me out of the Police. I amnot a Deputy, just a Records Clerk. My position is a low pay, lowresponsibility plug-that-hole-role. The Garret Road Slum vast areaand dense population require at least three deputies, but thebudget can only support two and a half officer's salaries. I camehandy, so the Personnel conjured this: a half-time records clerkposition for a Navy veteran girl, halved by the war. The fact thatI am not a whole girl, but just a half, can be convenientlyestablished by direct observation. Or you can check me with ameasuring tape, if you prefer not to trust your eyes. The half-timemultiplied by the half-person multiplied by the girl-factor equatesless than one-fifth of the full deputy's salary. Think all thedelightful budget savings!

Well, I am not necessary a black sheep(despite my skin color, no offense). At the Personnel, I was told:‘This position is perfectly suitable for a disabled vet. You willdo fine, no problems.’ No problems, aye-aye! All my life I havebeen doing exactly this: trying to do fine and have no problemsunder the most adverse circumstances. In my twenty-one years ofage, I have achieved something many people can't do in alifetime.

When I was ten, I decided to read all thebooks in our school library. They had quite a few – one hundred andforty-nine different titles. Half of the books were total crap, butI was lucky to discover the Sherlock Holmes stories – still myfavorite after eleven years. Believe it or not, I read all thebooks! The library lady nearly went bananas. In Detroit, theten-year-olds didn't read books. No, I wasn't a wonder-child. Inthe high school, my marks were all solid ‘C’. But strictly – no‘D’! I struggled with my Math. I hated English Literature. Romeoand Juliet were OK, but for Prince Hamlet – this sadisticShakespeare deserved a slow death through torture; what a shamethey let him die on his own. The English teacher finally gave me my‘C’ for ‘non-standard approach to classics’. I cheated my wayaround the History teacher. She had problems with her mental mathand miscalculated the number of my test attempts. But, I have torepeat this proudly: I graduated from the high school! I was theonly Afro at the grad ceremony, along with fifty (mostly white)boys. In Michigan, few Afro girls even bother to start the highschool nowadays, and even white girls can be counted by fingers ofone hand. And, you may call me a shameless liar, but it's true:through the entire school, I managed not to get pregnant (as allthe other girls in my class did one-by-one, before leaving theschool for good) and not to become a drug junkie (as my olderbrother did, with all the logical outcomes).

After the school, I firmlydecided not to die of starvation along with many thousands oflosers in Mitch. Instead of complaining at charity soup kitchens, Ivolunteered to the Navy – and served in a war zone for over twoyears. With my beloved machine gun, I killed many enemies of ourFreedom-and-Democracy. I have no idea how many, but many – forsure. If you are on a river monitor and dispense nine hundred andfifty Freedom-and-Democracy servings every minute, it's difficultto count all the recipients. Well, the recipients got a bit mad atme. One direct hit by a laser-guided missile, my left leg went intothe river together with the sinking Piranha, and I was sent to my freeCruise. On a floating hospital! One day later, my remaining legbecame a fish food too, and two weeks later the upper part of mefound itself nicely planted in warm asphalt of the welcomingGalveston harbor. I have no hard feelings about the Latino enemiesof our Freedom-and-Democracy. War is just business, nothingpersonal.

And I have twodecorations: the Purple Heartfrom Venezuela and the Lifesaving Award for the hurricanefive months ago. Yes, I can do something better than pulling atrigger. I saved lives, goddammit! Although, the hurricane hiteverybody, so we had to do something anyway. Kim and Tan did waymore than me, and rightfully got themselves Medals of Valor. OK, I admit, twoyears and three months out of the five-year volunteer contract plusthe Purple Heart for being halved don't count for that much. Any clown can getherself shot in the aft and lose both legs. But myLifesaving Award is onehundred percent honest achievement. Nothing in common with myHistory ‘C’.