“Damn them,” Marta threw the newspaper on the floor of the Stumptown Café. “Damn them,” she repeated.
     “Don’t tell me.” Howard balanced a couple of dirty plates in one hand and swiped a damp rag over the counter with the other, “Let me guess. It’s the evil corporations. What have they done now?”
     Marta just stared blankly at the headline of the Metro section on the floor. “Activist Arrested in Bartlett House Death.”
     “It must be pretty bad, whatever it is,” said Howard. He was agitating for an argument; one of Howard’s favorite past times, and baiting Marta was easier than catching fish in a barrel.
     Marta stood up stiffly. “I don’t have time, Howard,” she said sharply, heading for the café door. As the door flew open she heard him muttering about the paper she had left lying on the floor.
     As Marta searched for a pay phone, her mind went back to the night of Emmy’s death. She had run into Colin at Pioneer Square earlier in the day. Tweak and Bug were there.
     “What’s up, guys?” she had asked them
     “Dude,” said Tweak, “the cops have on jackboots today. Think we’re gonna lay low for the afternoon.”
     “Yeah, we’re gonna put on our love beads,” said Bug with exaggerated disdain. “Go hang with the hippies.”
     They were either going to the South Park blocks where kids with long hair played hackey sack and sold dope, or to Waterfront Park where the Rastas were dancing to tribal drums.
     Marta’s time on the street had given her a good understanding of the rivalry among Portland’s youth subcultures. The punks and streetkids, like Tweak and Bug, preferred the Square and other urban vistas, which they shared with an assortment of ravers and skaters and riot grrls. Crank addicts had staked out “Tweaker Park” on the north side of downtown. Anti-racist skinheads, having rescued downtown from Hitler’s Youth, had migrated to the Irish pubs on the eastside, where they would probably spend their lives celebrating. Meanwhile, Hitler’s legions had moved back to their white, middle class suburbs.
     “How about you, Colin? What you doin’ this afternoon?” she had asked.
     “Not much,” he responded, ” Got some business to take care of tonight. I think I’ll go find a place to sleep for a while.”
     Business, to Colin, could mean a variety of things, but from his tone, Marta had taken it to mean that it had something to do with the street kids. Marta remembered walking by the park blocks later that afternoon. No Bug or Tweak. No Colin either. She hadn’t seen them again that day.

     Marta brought her mind back to the present. She hadn’t really considered that they might actually arrest Colin for Emmy’s death. It seemed so ridiculous. She found a pay phone on the bus mall on Fifth and Davis and dropped in 35 Cents. After two rings, Lucy answered with a sleepy voice: “Yeah?”
     “Mom. Did I get you out of bed?”
     “Hi sweetie. It’s okay. I need to get up anyway.”
     “You haven’t been drinking, have you, Mom? I know these last few days have been tough, but….”
     “No, no, no. I was up late working on a story.”
     “Mom, have you read the paper?”
     “No, sweetie….”
     “They’ve arrested Colin.”
     “Colin? Why?”
     “For Emmy’s death, Mom. I think someone’s setting him up. They said it was some kind of kinky sex game that got out of hand….”
     “That’s what the police told Will.” Lucy paused. “You’re sure about Colin, Marta?”
     “Of course I’m sure, Mom. Think about it. Emmy didn’t even like Colin.”
     “Marta, sometimes people do things….”
     “Mom, I’m not a twelve year old, remember? Besides, Emmy was in love with Will. She wasn’t the type.”
     “I know, sweetie. I know.” Lucy sounded as though she were about to cry.
     “Mom. You have been drinking.”
     “I’ve only had a few, sweetie.”
     “Oh, Mom.” Marta was whining. She hated that in herself. “Look, Mom, I’m going to talk to a few people. I’ll come over later. Try to pull yourself together, okay?”
     “Yeah, sweetie, I will.”
     Marta hung up the phone. Lucy got this way when she began thinking too much about Elena. Marta’s younger half-sister had disappeared when Marta was ten. Elena was three that spring and her rapidly growing ability to talk delighted Marta. Marta loved showing her little sister around the few parched acres near Salinas, California that Marta’s mother and her second husband Robert Klein rented. But Robert had left in the winter and was living in town. He would come out on weekends and take the girls to town. They’d all wander around up and down the streets, and Robert would buy them junk food and ask them if their mom ever talked about him. Then Robert started taking just Elena. Marta still had a sore spot over that. She knew she was not his child, but he had always been a father to her, and she didn’t understand why all of a sudden the fact that someone else who was always absent was actually her father. Why did that matter so much?
     “You’ve got Marta.” She remembered hearing Robert say to Lucy. “Elena belongs with me.” But Lucy wanted both of her girls with her. She said she would fight him in court. Robert didn’t wait to find out how that would turn out. One weekend, he picked up Elena, didn’t stop in Salinas, and didn’t stop at the California border, either.
     Once, he turned up at his sister’s in south Texas, then fled again when he was discovered. Lucy was certain they were somewhere in the Southwest. Or maybe Mexico.
     It had been twelve long years, and Marta had given up seeing her sister again. But her mother insisted on believing that Elena would knock on her front door someday, still three years old, and give her back those lost years. Marta believed that delusion was fed by alcohol. It was partly Lucy’s drinking bouts that sent Marta out of the house at fifteen.
     Emmy, in a way, had also been like a daughter to Lucy. Marta resented Lucy at first for stealing away her friend, but Emmy would have none of it. She insisted on having a relationship with both Marta and Lucy. Emmy’s tenacity, in the end, had brought them all closer together.

     Marta shrugged her memories away, swung her backpack over her shoulder, and headed west on Davis. Who would want to kill Emmy and set up Colin? Could it be the same ones who had worked over Colin several weeks ago? Colin had shown up at her apartment one night for a meeting with Marta and Emmy, his nose bleeding, a big gash over his eyebrow.
     “Somebody’s trying to shut us down.” Colin was nearly in tears.
     “They were waiting for me at the Max stop. How did they know I was coming here tonight? You guys were the only one’s I told. You, Emmy, Tranh, Kimmi, Bug…you know, the group.”
     “Who, Colin? Who met you?” asked Emmy.
     “They looked like neo-nazis or something. Shaved heads. Combat boots. No tattoos, though. Clean cut.”
     “So, how do you know they were targeting the group.” Marta asked.
     “One of them said to leave the trash in the gutter where it belongs, or something like that. ‘We don’t need it in our nice neighborhoods,’ he said. The other guy blurted out something stupid like, ‘Consider us the litter patrol. We got our eye on you, perv.’ Then the first one said, ‘Tell those two bitches, we got no problem puttin’ whores in their place either.’ They knew where I was going, what time, and who I was going to see.”
     “So, they said whores and, immediately, you assumed they meant us,” Emmy said.
     “There’s a spy,” said Marta. “Somebody in the group has some nasty friends.” In her mind, that somebody was Kimmi. Marta didn’t trust Kimmi, and most of the group felt likewise. Before becoming involved with ROOF, Kimmi had gained a reputation as a tough con artist, and a meth addict. She had given up tweaking, but she was still addicted to something. Marta just hadn’t figured out what. 
     It was time to pay Kimmi a visit.
     Marta realized that she had been unconsciously heading in the direction of the Pearl, anyway. Certainly not out of habit. It wasn’t a place Marta normally went. She tried to remember the name of her mother’s friend who used to live in one of the warehouses, when they really were artist’s lofts. Now they’re full of yuppie puppies, Marta thought. None of our friends can afford to live here anymore. Her eyes skidded over the flat surfaces of new apartments. She passed between rows of art galleries, Italian import shops, and restaurants. Around her, the casual chatter of tourists mingled with business lunch-crowders. She wanted to scream. Instead she dropped her pack on an outdoor table, ignoring the “for customer’s only” sign. She found a pack of cigarettes and her address book. Marta lit a cigarette and thumbed through the book. Kimmi’s address was near the back under R, along with other ROOF member’s phones numbers and addresses.
     Marta picked up her bag and resumed walking. She turned up Kearney, checked the address again. God, this is it? This is Kimmi’s building? Even though Kimmi had let everyone know that she was moving into the Pearl and had gotten one of the low-income apartments that developers had to provide, Marta was still surprised to find it was in a building where most of the apartments had to be nearly twice what Kimmi was paying. Come to that, what Kimmi paid seemed out of her range, given her tendency to work part-time, minimum wage jobs. Jobs that she kept changing as if she planned to work every crappy gig in the city.
     Marta stepped through the street door and instantly, the sounds of traffic and conversation were cut off. She picked up the receiver of the intercom phone, pressed Kimmi’s apartment number, and waited. After a moment, Kimmi answered. If she was surprised to hear Marta’s voice, she didn’t let on.
     Kimmi’s apartment building was clean and contemporary. The builders had paid attention to architectural detail, both inside and out. It made the structure somewhat more interesting than the wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am construction of the sixties and seventies, yet much less attractive to Marta than the older pre-depression style buildings, which were abundant in the city. This was forties/fifties in a postmodern, twenty-first century, cookie cutter sort of way.
     Marta moved quietly down the hardwood-floored hallways to Kimmi’s apartment and rapped sharply on the door.
      “Just a sec.” Marta heard Kimmi approach the door, and turn the lock.
     “S’up Marta?”
     “How you doing, Kim.” Marta was cool.
     “Okay, I guess. S’up?” she repeated.
     “Hear about Colin?”
     “Yeah. They busted him. Too bad.”
     “You think he did it?”
     Kimmi was wringing her hands. Nervous. Stoned, Marta thought. And hiding something.
     “Nah,” Kimmi pronounced, “Colin didn’t do it. He’s not like that. Real surprised that Emmy was into that shit, though.”
     Marta lost her cool. “Emmy wasn’t into that shit, goddammit. And you know it Kimmi. What are you hiding?”
     “Ain’t hidin’ nothin’.”
     Marta tried to compose herself. “Look, Kim. I know about your cop friend. I know somebody tipped off those boneheads who beat up Colin. The same thugs who cornered Tweak and Bug in Old Town a couple of weeks ago. I think that somebody was you.” You lying bitch, Marta thought.
     “I don’t know nothin’ about boneheads.”
     “Colin will go away for this, Kim. They’re going to put him in jail for a long time for something he didn’t do.”
     “Do I look like someone who gives a shit?” The tears forming in Kimmi’s eyes belied any truth in that cliché.
     “The truth, Kimmi? Yeah, you look like someone who gives a shit. You look like a schoolgirl who’s in love with somebody she can’t have. And he’s in jail, goddammit.”
     Kimmi was bawling now. Marta put her arm around her, and Kimmi buried her face in Marta’s shoulder. A faint scent of licorice touched Marta’s nose. When Kimmi resurfaced, Marta handed her a tissue.
     “We can get him out, Kimmi,” said Marta, “but I need your help.”
     “I can’t help you.” Kimmi dabbed at the tears on her cheek.
     “They got something on you?”
     “Who?”
     “Goddammit, Kimmi, you know who I’m talking about. The cops. The cops have something on you.”
     “Okay, Marta. I’ll try to be honest with you, okay? I got this problem.” Kimmi’s hands were shaking. “It gets real bad, sometimes.”
     “You tweaking again, Kimmi?”
     “Not speed. Anyway, I got a friend. Helps me out when I need it. You know what I’m saying?”
     Marta scanned Kimmi’s well-furnished apartment. “So, you trade information….”
     “Yeah. Something like that. It’s not like I don’t believe in what you guys are doing. I think its great.”
     “Oh Kimmi,” Marta sighed. Kimmi started to cry again, and Marta felt a kind of empathy for the poor, pitiable creature in front of her.
     “I’m so scared. I don’t want Colin to go to prison. But I don’t want to be back there on the street dancing in clubs and turning tricks, Marta.”
     “You don’t have to do that, Kimmi. There are alternatives.” Marta, the social worker. “Get yourself clean.”
     Kimmi laughed.
     Marta decided to change the subject. “Who else do you know, Kimmi, who’s into this S&M stuff?”
     “Well, there’s Connie Crage.”
     Marta’s jaw dropped. “You mean the developer?”
     “Yeah, him.”
     “So how do you know…I don’t even want to go there right now. You’re sure about this?”
     “Yeah, I’m sure.”
     Kimmi walked over to a kitchen cabinet and removed a green bottle, decorated with a delicate Victorian floral design, fairies, and flowers.
     “So, what’s your drug of choice these days, Kimmi?”
     “Can’t remember. I’m absinthe minded.” She held the bottle out to Marta. “Want some?”
     A strong, licorice-like smell permeated Marta’s nostrils.
     “I can’t stand ouzo. Get that stuff away from me.”
     “Suit yourself,” said Kimmi, tipping the bottle for a long, hard swallow.
     Marta was at the door, when suddenly Kimmi said, “I think they know about that girl, Maddy, but I didn’t tell them.”
     “What do you mean? Who knows?”
     “The cops. They asked me if Colin knew her.”
     “What did you say, exactly?” Marta folded her arms and stared hard at Kimmi.
     “I said I didn’t know anything about it,” Kimmi set her jaw.
     “If you’ve put her in any danger…”
     “I wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t tell them anything,” Kimmi said, her tone adamant.
     Marta kept staring at Kimmi, trying to figure out if she was being straight. Kimmi’s face was open; her eyes remained focused on Marta’s. It was Marta who broke the connection. “Stay away from the cops, Kimmi,” She said and turned away.
     When Marta left Kimmi, she headed straight for Pioneer Square, hoping to find Bug or Tweak. She found them both there, sitting on the wall along Morrison Street, holding hands, Bug, cute and feminine beneath her shaved head, and Tweak, the leather punk with lip ring and practiced snarl adorning her otherwise pretty face. They seemed to be involved in an intense discussion and Marta hesitated for a moment, until she remembered why she was there.
     “Hey, guys,” she greeted them energetically. Then more quietly: “I gotta talk to you.”
     “About Colin,” said Bug.
     “Yeah.”
     “Not here.” Bug.
     “Got nothin’ to say.” Tweak.
     Bug tugged at Tweak’s jacket and said something beneath her breath. Then she turned to Marta. “Give us a sec.”
     Marta retreated across the sidewalk as the Max pulled up behind her. The sound of people arriving and departing obscured the sound of the two young lovers arguing. Finally, Tweak arose in anger, brushed past Marta rudely, and boarded the train.
     Bug motioned Marta over. “Come on,” she said abruptly, “Let’s take a walk.”