The Disco Ball

The Playboy Pink Mustang traversed the highway like a speedboat on glimmering water, the heat making mirages of the road ahead. Around it cars in shades of black, silver and gray raced to nowhere, horns and near-accidents going off like bang snaps in all directions. Inside the sunset-colored vision, Kelly drove with the same ease he did everything else: one hand on the wheel and the other around a Doritos Locos taco.

He was mid-forties, handsome, the kind of imperfect handsome women seemed to prefer somehow. He wasn’t toothpaste commercial handsome, you could say. Rather, there was something regular and goofy in his proportions that made what model characteristics he did have shine all the more.

Sounds untangled as he hit a slow stretch of traffic. Seventies music piped through the radio. Any outside tension or animus seemed to slide off of him and Ginger, what he called his beloved car.

Private Investigator Ash Kelly was gazing attractively into the middle distance when he was lurched forward by someone rear-ending him. The impact sent a spurt of taco onto his bowling jacket, a slick green thing with cherry blossoms on each breast.

“FUCK!!” He wiped it off and made it worse. He held his free hand delicately, now radioactive with grease, while he decided what to do with the food.

Honks in the vicinity brought him back to his present challenge. “Buy me a drink first, would ya??” he said over his shoulder, blotting his top with blue water from the cup in the center console.

The dinged Mustang pulled into the parking lot, a paved oasis on a crowded, crooked street of commercial buildings. When he hopped out he gave a wordless hello to the guard, who returned the energy from his folding chair where he listened to a podcast on a boombox. Kelly’s office was an old thing hiding in plain sight above some kind of hip restaurant. A salad bar, a chocolate bar, he couldn’t keep up. What happened to fast food? Now everything was “fast casual.”

Orange streamed in through the venetian blinds, dust dancing in the daylight. The room was sparse, betraying a man of few attachments: a lone picture frame, albumen-colored filing cabinets, a slim couch he sometimes slept on. On the whiteboard was an unfinished game of hangman. The green desk blotter was piled high with documents and mail.

Kelly went straight to the mini fridge and pulled out a beer. He ambled around the room picking things up, assessing them and tossing them in the trash. Wrapper. Receipt. Collections notice.

He took his usual seat in the spinny chair with his feet on the mahogany desk. His mind turned to his latest case, a young woman wondering if her ex’s Venmo activity meant he was seeing someone new. This was his beat: investigating the intent behind emojis used in Venmo transactions.

Kelly was pretty sure he had this one cracked. It was a fried egg in a pan, which didn’t look good—until research revealed the same emoji had been shared by three other people in a 24-hour span. It was an open-and-shut platonic brunch. But he couldn’t go back to the client just yet. Sometimes if he worked too well, too quickly, they seemed less confident in his findings. Disappointed, almost.

So he gave them exactly what they were paying for: the answers, yes, and a little adrenaline for the road.

By its very nature, his work often put him in the path of college girls and precocious high school seniors. This posed no conflict of interest for Kelly. They were kids to him, so unsure yet acting like they knew everything. He saw how they had to go everywhere in pairs, how one pretended to be on her phone when the other was late. He felt protective of these girls—not much older than his daughter, Adalie.

With this he took a pensive turn to the frame on his desk, gripping it in somber resolve. It held a picture of a sparkling blonde and her mini-me. Kelly turned red with emotion, sadness exiting via tears while anger stayed behind and vibrated his whole body. He spared the photo by facing it down and punching the wall instead.

His family was very much alive and in his life, but a few years ago he lost his entire iCloud and with it, like, so many pictures. Today he was okay, sure. But he was never the same. How could you be after something like that?

So no, he didn’t exactly feel like taking his work home with him. This attitude separated Kelly from his colleagues: if ever in a group of more than two men, there inevitably came a moment when he had to search for Atlantis in a bottle to avoid giving an opinion on women’s bodies or minds or terrible, annoying voices.

He had most of the private eye stuff down: the classic car, the tough exterior, the boyish joviality with which he approached near-death experiences. (One time a boyfriend showed up at the office making threats with a lacrosse stick. Kelly caught the ball with one hand and used the other to knock their heads together.)

But there was something about Kelly, a certain neurosis, an extra helping of melancholy in the batter when they made him. Something approaching a conscience. He was fine lying as much as his job required, but he couldn’t lie about his feelings. That seemed a distinctly goyish gift.

Didn’t it figure: a Jewish-Irish P.I., a guy who drank nonstop but would never forego a seatbelt. He was a walking “walks into a bar” joke, his own unlikely sidekick. Buy One Get One Chosen One.

It was then that the phone rang, startling Kelly and sending him all the way back in his chair. His fingers and toes tingled like he’d slipped from a tightrope. The wall hit him now, marking what would probably be his second concussion.

“FUCK!!!!”

Who the fuck made phone calls anymore?

“Kelly Consulting,” he managed, using the name he’d listed on Google and Yelp. He was taking the call from the floor and still unsure of the extent of his injuries. May as well’ve had a head bandage like some prick in a cartoon.

“Hi.” The girl’s voice came through tinny and flat like she was calling from a soup can. “Is. This. The detective?”

Kelly straightened up when he realized she was crying. Sobbing actually, hiccuping through tears. He discreetly reached for his pen and something to write on.

“Well I’m not a detective, hon, ’cause they have real badges.” He was doing his usual thing, only in a sweet, hushed tone. “But by the sound of it I think I’m who you’re looking for.”

From what Kelly could make out it was a classic case of crush surveillance gone bad. Things were going well with the guy, no label. They had plans to spend St. Patrick’s Day together. Last week he’d Venmo’d another girl.

“Emma, did you say your name was?” This was such a lay-up he almost felt bad taking her money. But Kelly reminded himself you couldn’t put a price on the comfort his services provided. That and he’d be paying tuition in two years. Why’d that kid insist on being so smart?

“Yes,” she said, starting to cry all over again.

“I’ll tell you what, Emma. I’m gonna send you a link to something called Signal. Follow the instructions and connect with me there. From this moment on we use that to communicate, okay?”

“Oke—hic!—ay.”

He was making a paper airplane when the message tone finally sounded out, a friendly, anticlimactic noise. He picked up his phone with interest but no urgency.

“Okay Emma, how’d we do…” Kelly navigated to their conversation and pulled up the evidence, a screenshot of the scoundrel’s Venmo page.

The gum he’d been snapping fell from his mouth when he saw it. It was right there sandwiched between a car ride (⛽️) and a roommate tithe (⚡️), the sluttiest emoji a man could ever use: the disco ball.

Now he saw why she was crying.

The promiscuity dripping from the icon should’ve made it easy. Someone of weaker constitution would certainly think so. But Kelly wasn’t born yesterday: he’d been doing this long enough to know what made it slutty was its very inscrutability, the way it led you around the dance floor from uncertainty to hope. The disco ball said so much and so little. The schmuck had to go deeper into the menu to find it, but it was less expressive than the bottom shelf of smiles and salutes. If used literally, it could stand for a bar or a gathering or tickets to some future thing. If used figuratively, like a sign-off, it indicated someone of particular sensibilities—a hipster at the intersection of wholesome and sleaze.

There was also the possibility that it stood for drugs. Sometimes this work saw him running parallel to three-letter agencies, which Kelly just resented as the inconvenience it was.

Well roll me in sugar and call me a frozen grape. Whatever it was, this would be his toughest case in years. Kelly picked up the foam brick and began the slow, diligent work of erasing the hangman game.

Name: Maël Alexander Thomas. Age: 21. Occupation: Student. Address: Steve University, Greg Campus.

The room had grown dark around Kelly as he appraised these words on the dry erase board. He was bringing chopsticks to his mouth impatiently, takeout boxes now filling what free space was left on his desk.

What he knew for sure: the target was a Franco-American born to cool, rich parents. He’d grown up fast on dual citizenship, the kinda kid who was enjoying wine with dinner before he could even chart a parabola. He dabbled in the creative arts, his name associated with Soundcloud and Vimeo accounts. His first love, however, was graffiti. A VICE article detailed some sort of defanged vandalism project he was doing around the city.

This was where Kelly had hit a wall. The kid was basically famous on Instagram, but his account was a black hole, the same artwork of a smiley face posted over and over. His story revealed nothing either, just a yield sign and someone’s Band-Aid on the floor.

There was one lead, though. In his Tagged photos Maël was often beside a young man who looked just like him. They were the same kind of guy, big hair and bigger dreams. Long shirts and tight pants. They were in basements, on planes, at picnics with lots and lots of women. Again, it wasn’t much, because the last photo they had together was from 2019. But what sparse evidence existed of their friendship was fairly damning: these two were definitely buds.

Facebook records showed that this friend, Theo, had marked himself Interested in an event called Dragon Roll. It was a night of rollerskating, sushi, and sheer vibes, held monthly at the Paul D’Antona Sr. Memorial Skate Rink. First Thursdays at 7:00—and one was coming up this week.

Jesus Mary and Saint Joe. It seemed that Kelly had found his disco ball.

Maël hadn’t used Facebook in five years, so it didn’t mean a whole lot that he wasn’t on the guest list. As for the real star of the show—the girl Emma was so worried about—she was another dead end. Too good for social media, there was nothing connecting her back to him but that one payment. Even her name on Venmo was just a husk of consonants: Lnn Smth.

Kelly had reached the end of what he could do from his foxhole. To get further he’d have to enter the henhouse. In other words: infiltrate the event (by buying a ticket) and try to observe how these two got along. Friends? Family? FWB? The only way to know was to see them live and in person.

Looked like he was going to a party.

Glowing from within, the skate rink was a beacon on this dark block at the industrial edge of the city. Each time someone pried open the heavy door, sounds of life spilled out into the parking lot. Kelly pushed forward until he was one with the loud scene.

Lyrics snapped into clarity as he sauntered in and took stock of his surroundings. He was in his typical look of black jeans and a souvenir jacket, now black and gold for the occasion. Across the back it said “1977”.

With the music pumping and the general prom atmosphere, Kelly almost got butterflies. A warmth in his belly. A strange optimism. It was like when he was first dating Christina, when the flow state of having someone to think about made all earthly pleasures even greater. Colors were brighter, choruses were catchier. Bridges were never too long.

So he understood why dating made these kids so bananas. At that age it seemed like the whole world spun on if it worked out. It made him wanna be a better man, do crunches in his room and all that.

He’d just grabbed an onigiri off a server’s plate when he spotted something across the floor. It was a gaggle of intimidating young people: the girls loving on each other roughly, the boys shy and vaping. Among them was the Target, unmistakable in his babyish color-blocked outfit. They were making their way onto the rink.

Kelly set the appetizer back down and broke into a brisk walk, his hands aerodynamic. He was headed to the rental area for a pair of skates. Time was not on his side.

The DJ put on “Don’t Leave Me This Way” by Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes just as Kelly was entering the rink. For the next 11 minutes it would sync up with the action in like a really cool way.

Once he was going he found a safe following distance and stayed there. Grooving as one, the crowd sped to their destiny, the feeling automatic like highway driving. The disco ball got assistance from green, blue, and red LED lights to put on a fantastic show.

It was hard to get a good sense of the group dynamics moving at two revolutions a minute. Still he tried, spying through breaks in the civilians, perking up like an alert Doberman at any crumb of information. But then a breakthrough: on the next lap he recognized the girl Maël had sent the payment to. A friend in the mass called out play-angrily, “Lennon!” The girl just looked back with an easy smile, never breaking pace, her hair curly and flowing like her Venmo picture.

Someone clipped him to his left, a woman going super fast in a head-to-toe Seventies outfit. But he recovered, trying to use what he remembered from birthday parties to bounce and roll with smooth confidence.

It really had been a while, though, and Kelly was starting to feel it. Satisfied that he was in a good reconnaissance posture for the rest of the night, he peeled off to the edge for a break. He was stretching his calves on the carpeted area when a voice came from behind.

“Hey Mr. Detective.”

Kelly was still mid-turn saying “How many times do we have to say it. We’re not detectives, we’re private investa—” when he was socked square in the nose. It was Maël.

The kid’s face was emotionless but his breathing was heavy and uneven like he’d been waiting to do something that gritty his whole life.

Behind Maël his passel of hip youths appeared. They were all giving Kelly the same impenetrable stare, the disinterest radiating off of them like body heat in the snow. Kelly cupped his nose in disbelief. He was now likely on TBI #3, which he’d read somewhere was a line in the sand.

Was this coordinated? He was trying to make sense of it all in his head, parsing the last minute and fifty-two seconds for clues he could’ve missed. Then they all moved a step toward him like a phalanx. Tabling the subject, he nabbed a pink helmet off a teenager’s head and assumed a boxing position.

Baby! My heart is full of love and desire for you…

From there it was an all out fight, moms shuttling their kids out of the path of destruction. But what looked from the outside like bedlam was actually an intricate ballet.

At one point Maël had him pinned and was punching him repeatedly when something occurred to Kelly. If the kids were willing to go this far, they must’ve done something about the girlfriend, too. Not girlfriend—girl he was talking to. Again, Kelly could never keep up with this shit. Between painful breaths he found the words: “Where’s. Emma?”

That was when Maël paused for a good while and when he spoke again it was just a loud, long, menacing laugh.

“Why don’t you ask her yourself?” At that he turned to his compatriots and said sing-song: “Oh, Em-ma...”

Lennon stepped forward in her flares and crochet top. Like an ecstatic preacher she began convulsing, fake heaving and sobbing, then quickly snapped out of it. It had been her on the phone. Good God.

“So this is what, revenge?” Kelly was looking back and forth between the mad king and his court. “A shakedown? A dark web thing?”

Maël ran his tongue around his mouth toughly, something he’d probably seen in a movie. “Does the name Zoe Miller mean anything to you?”

“Listen guy, I meet a lotta people—”

“Of course it doesn’t. Why would it? Because that’s all this is, right? Names and pictures, names and pictures…Well what about the LIVES behind them that you DESTROY!” The artist’s hair shook as he shouted rabidly, spit flying with each impassioned syllable.

“What are you talking about?” He wasn’t angry when he said it, just confused. It was clear the kid was lost and reeling and Kelly wanted answers for both of their sakes.

“I’m talking about how in 2019 you investigated Zoe Miller’s talking stage and found him guilty of talking to another girl, which freed her up to talk to other guys, which led to her dating my best friend Theo.”

“Congratulations to the beautiful couple?”

“WHICH LED TO HIM FOLLOWING HER ACROSS THE COUNTRY FOR COLLEGE.” The supervillain was so activated he had to get up and pace, kicking an innocent soda cup in his way.

Kelly sighed a father’s sigh. “Kid, look. I know I’m an old sack of shit, and none of this shit existed when I met my wife. But that talking stage was gonna end with or without me. Change was gonna happen with or without me. Whether it was Zoe or someone else, your buddy was gonna meet a nice girl and do what she wants and be happy. Don’t you want that? Him to be happy?”

“You know what I want?” Maël got really close to his face again, his rage barely contained by calculated calm. “Accountability. Something people know FUCK ALL about these days.”

“And how exactly will you hold me accountable?”

“It’s simple,” he said with a big creepy smile. “Just cease all operations immediately, dissolve your business and leave town, or I’ll finish breaking your brain.” With that he and his entourage headed for the door.

Kelly laughed to himself as he pieced something together. His easy demeanor seemed to disturb Maël, who stopped and turned back around like “What?”

“It doesn’t make sense.” Kelly rose to his feet and clapped his hands clean. “You’re telling me you did this to, whatever, avenge your friend’s singleness. I get that, I do. But then he agrees to use his Facebook to lead me to you? Typically when you’re rescuing someone from their own self-deception, they don’t exactly sign up to be the honeypot.”

“Don’t you GET it, fucknuts?” Maël lowered his voice conspiratorially. “Nobody uses Facebook anymore. I hacked him and he didn’t fucking notice! The security emails go to his school email.” Now he was laughing scarily again. “His school email! Is that not the best fuckin’ thing you ever heard?”

At this point a female security guard appeared and very procedurally asked them all to leave.

The XL bag of pizza rolls hit the Formica with some slapstick. The little old lady behind the counter seemed startled by this, or by something at least. Kelly, his face bruised and bloodied, gave her a sleepy smile.

“How ya doin’?”

She responded wordlessly, neither kind nor unkind. She was ringing him up when he stopped her with one hand—there was more. Something had caught his eye in the glass case by the cash register: a slim turquoise can of AriZona iced tea.

It was the green tea flavor, the one with the cherry blossom tree. Kelly always liked that design. There was something honest about it. He wondered what it would be like if the sky were really that color, if trees like that grew everywhere or could be made small enough to fit on his desk. It kind of felt like he and the can were swooning for each other. “Dream Weaver” was playing diegetically but also in his mind.

The song kept going for him as he cruised home in his trusty ride, out of the shrill hum of the fluorescent store and into the orange glow of the street lamps. He was driving with the Totino’s on his head like an ice pack.

Suddenly, Apple CarPlay started ringing through his dashboard. (Aftermarket system.) He cleared his throat and hit the green phone symbol.

“You’ve reached Asher Kelly.”

“Hi babe! Do you need me to grab you anything from the store?”

“Yeah…” he said with a wisened, nostalgic air. Oh what a ride it had been. “You could say that.”

“I don’t know what that means. Did you want something from Trader Joe’s?”

He touched the can to his lips and took a deep, restorative sip. From the street, from a drone angle, his car must’ve looked really cool.