Pigs

by Daniel James

  “Very nice.” Strauss’s German accent could draw people in with its polite charm. “Magnificent.” He held up to the light of the sky a select few pieces from the hefty bundles of cut gems and gold, a few drifts of exhaust particulate and loose dirt tarnishing the beautiful view. “Our buyer will be ecstatic with these items.”

  The badly beaten Mazda was already cubed and shelved somewhere amongst the countless columns of automotive death strewn all around in semi-ordered destructive art. Roach continued to watch Strauss ogle the goods, and if he didn’t know better he might have been expecting a double cross. In beige chinos and a maroon turtleneck, with a cashmere scarf over one shoulder, Strauss was dressed for an expensive nightclub, not a drab scrapyard. The dapper German opened the driver’s door of his immaculate E-Type Jaguar and laid the take on the empty passenger seat.

  “Very well, lady and gentlemen. I’ll have these properly appraised and will be in touch with Ludlow later on today with an exact figure. You will each be getting a tidy sum.”

  “Ballpark?” Roach asked.

  “Well, I see you got all the specified pieces here, along with some extras …” Strauss bit down on his lip to estimate. “Approximately $290,000. The jeweller will have a more trained eye for these specifics.”

  Roach extended his large mitt. “Thank you, Mr. Strauss.”

  “Pleasure is all mine.” Strauss challenged the sun’s glare with a hard squint and returned his stylish sunglasses to the bridge of his hooked nose. His hand dived into his trouser pocket like a gannet spearing a fish and pulled out another set of keys. He tossed them over to Fitzy and Grace, who were idling in chit-chat. Fitzy snatched the keys out of the air and flicked his cigarette away into the nearest heap of hardy weeds, bolts and rust.

  “Don’t drive like a madman,” Strauss called over with a wry smile.

  “It’s never me, Mr. Strauss.”

  “Always the cops, yes?”

  “Exactly,” Fitzy joked, hitting the fob and unlocking the waiting blue Subaru with a double beep. “Those guys are dangerous.”

  Strauss left Roach’s two stooges to return to their conversation whilst he focused on the main man. “How’s the bar?”

  Roach calmly stuffed his hands in his pockets, a small, prideful smile doing wonders to hide his tough features. “Pretty good. You should stop by and have a drink sometime.”

  Strauss rested one arm on the Jag convertible’s roof. “I might have to take you up on that generous offer one day. It’s not my nature to bury my nose into a man’s affairs, but you must be doing well by now—financially, I mean. Have you ever thought about opening a franchise? I could be your silent partner.”

  Roach thoughtfully inspected the surprise offer for any pitfalls or dubious small print. The truth was, though, he enjoyed running the bar solo far too much to saddle himself with another business partner, silent or otherwise.

  “Youth is a commodity in your current occupation,” Strauss went on. “You don’t want to be strong-arming people and waving guns around when your joints are popping, your reflexes are slow, and your whole damn body is fighting you.”

  Roach threw a few jovial boxing combinations to deflect the joint business venture in a pleasant manner which wouldn’t hurt the feelings of a long-serving associate of Ludlow’s, particularly one with such a surprising mean streak. “I got a few years left in me. What you trying to say, I’m not beautiful anymore?”

  Strauss eyed him critically and gave him a cynical smile, which, with the help of his dark lenses and combed-back gray hair, made him look like a sinister snake oil salesman, alert for fresh targets amongst the gullible. “Take care of yourself, Mr. Roach.”

  “Always do.” Roach winked and patted the hood of the German’s slick transport. Strauss had told him that its color was turquoise green sand. Roach thought it looked like phlegm but kept it to himself.

  “Wunderbar.” Strauss got behind the wheel and slowly wound out of the spoiled grounds of flaking scrap.

  Roach slid the beanie-terror mask off his head and unknotted his ponytail, letting the waves of deep brown hair cascade down his broad back.

  Fitzy was in the middle of telling some story to Grace—one of his blue tales involving one of his stripper girlfriends, no doubt—and cracking the girl up. Roach always found Grace’s laughter to be infectious. The black south-side kid was hard as nails but there was an innocence to her laughter. Roach left them to run at the mouth for another few minutes whilst he hit a speed dial number. The call was answered after a disconcertingly long time, running close to the automated message service before a deep, raspy voice answered to a background soundtrack of smooth jazz.

  “The good news is I’m not calling you from prison, hospital or the airport. The better news is we hit the fucking jackpot with this one. A very happy German will be in contact with you later.” Roach relayed the estimated value of the hit.

  “That’s great, Curtis.” Ludlow sounded preoccupied, and it wasn’t due to the perpetual jazz which followed him like it was his own externalised soundtrack. Over the course of their long relationship, Roach had been relentlessly abused by Ludlow’s education on the city’s proud musical heritage. Ludlow only quit in disgust when it became apparent that the art was an irrevocably foreign language to his student. “Have you been to see him?”

  Roach was about to ask for clarification but quickly caught himself. There was only one “him”. Of course there was only one. He had tried to avoid thinking about Isaac’s pending release date for the past several months, for the sake of his own mood, but found that he couldn’t successfully muffle the noise. “No. I haven’t.” He tried to think of a reason which wouldn’t make him sound like a heartless coward. “I thought about it. But nothing’s changed. Isaac wanted a clean slate.” Their time apart had helped him to disguise the resentment in his voice. “I told him I would never turn my back on him. That my door would always be open, but I had to respect his wishes.” A pause. “I’m not risking dragging him back into this life after all that. He’s a family man.”

  Nothing in reply but jazz. Roach thought Ludlow had put the phone down and walked away. Finally the reply came.

  “I have a bit of bad news. I got a call from Jones at the station. Isaac was attacked last night. He’s unharmed, but Maggie and Will are dead. Isaac said it was Wyndorf.” Ludlow sounded one part melancholy, two parts whisky. Not a good start to the afternoon. “He doesn’t have anyone now. That new leaf he turned over just withered and died on the branch.”

  Roach couldn’t articulate. He kicked up a small hillock of mishmash plastic and loose grit. “Wyndorf? That piece of shit. He actually popped back up?”

  Silence on the line. Except for jazz.

  “Jesus, Luds. I don’t even know what to say.”

  Silence. The clink of ice against glass.

  “Isaac—you know where he is? Where he’s staying?”

  Ludlow sounded battle-worn. “The detective who interviewed him mentioned that he was going to find a hotel. The police aren’t going to give a shit about what happens to him. He’s not a suspect. No motive, and Jones said there was forced entry to the home. Not to mention the neighbors seeing a guy haul ass out of there shortly after the shots were fired.” A swallow of alcohol. “I’ll have a few guys check around. And keep an eye on the obits. If we can’t find him before, you could catch up to him after the funeral.”

  “What would I even say to him?”

  “It doesn’t matter what you say, the two of you were like brothers. A decade doesn’t change that. Just let him know we’re here for him. For support. It’s not an invitation to backslide.”

  “What about you? Why aren’t you reaching out personally?”

  “I don’t think I could look him in the eye. I’m afraid he’ll blame me. Pathetic old fool, I know.”

  Roach combed his moustache with a thumb and forefinger, mortified at the idea of a reunion. It was ridiculous how he felt this way. So much blood, pain and death had separate
d them, like a botched amputation, and now more senseless misery had been inflicted on Isaac and his innocent family.

  The bond they used to have would have transcended such trivial matters like time apart. So why was it so awkward to consider a face-to-face?

  “I’ll keep an eye out for him.”

  Head Full of Bad Ideas

  It was a good job Isaac had squirrelled away a small sum before the iron bars slammed shut on him. It was time to collect.

  King Pawn seemed to loiter in the Park West neighborhood like it was casing the place for a hit. It looked like any other pawnshop, an overstuffed box of unloved and neglected possessions, brimming with all manner of assorted goods which were either junk or treasure, depending on the beholder. The old dump had been given a makeover during Isaac’s incarceration but it still failed to dazzle, like an old hag who had been slapped with rouge by a beautician. But red trim paint and a fresh neon window sign were probably afterthoughts, or so Isaac assumed, because what was most notable was the enhanced security. The windows had new robust iron bars behind the glass, and the doorway, with its scuffed checkerboard floor, was under constant scrutiny from a small concealed camera wired into the ceiling.

  Had somebody got wise to King Pawn’s activities?

  Isaac pushed through the door, also new and more formidable than its predecessor, and heard the familiar two-tone beep, a call for Roger Coughlin, or whoever he had manning the treasury, to greet the street people with a benign but weary welcome. Isaac was sure he remembered a lot of these abandoned wares from a decade ago: old guitars in need of new pickups or strings, random drum toms and cymbals leaning crookedly around an old bass drum, a few dusty keyboards and TVs, some golf and fishing gear, knives and scratched furniture (not related). The man behind the heavy plastic partition at the back of the store was slumped over a glass case full of watches and jewellery, a newspaper splayed out before him. At the door’s chime, he glanced over his reading glasses and did a double take.

  “Isaac?” Roger Coughlin didn’t look pleased to see him, but he did his best. “I didn’t know you were out.”

  Isaac hadn’t slept. He had continued to wander Chicago meaninglessly with a head full of bad ideas until this particular one snagged, sluggishly forming in his fervid mind. “Got out yesterday.”

  “Hey, congratulations. I still got that old disco ball and DJ light system for sale if you’re looking to party? Throw in the dry ice machine too.”

  Isaac wasn’t in the mood to humor him. “I’m a bit cash poor right now. It’s why I’m here.”

  Stress seemed to push down on Coughlin’s spindly shoulders. He brushed a hand through his stiff copper hair. Isaac remembered him as being rather placid at the worst of times, so didn’t immediately pick up on the bad news circling him like so much cheap second-hand crap.

  Roger pulled his glasses off and left them to dangle from their gold chain. “Isaac, you won’t want to hear this … I had a bit of a problem. About two years ago now.” Isaac waited him out, and noticed that as Roger took a step toward the rear of the shop he was leaning on a cane. That’s new. The man was only in his forties. “Somebody got wise to us and hit the place. They went through the holdings like a damn hurricane. Nothin’ specific, just a whole lotta everything. My clients couldn’t find the crew stupid enough to even think about doing this.”

  King Pawn’s book of clients included numerous mobsters and other questionable businessmen, so Isaac could only guess how much blood ran under the streets in their failed quest to retrieve their loot.

  “We think it was a bunch of dirty cops.”

  Isaac didn’t need nor want to ask, but he did anyway. “My nut for the winter?”

  “From what I pooled back together …” Roger’s jaw clenched, a terminal prognosis. “A deuce or so.”

  Isaac was speechless for a full five count. “Two gee from ten?”

  “I don’t know what else to tell you. I had to break this same shit news to the Italians, the Koreans, the Russians; let me tell you, if one of them filthy rat bastard cops hadn’t already put a bullet in me, I think I could have expected one or two from either of the outfits.”

  It was another blow, but right now a thousand dollars would be more than enough for what he needed. Isaac slowly scrubbed both hands up over his face to his hairline then let his arms go limp. “Get it. I’ll need a burner and a strap too. Nothing flashy.”

  Roger slipped his glasses on. “Consider them free of charge. Compensation.”

  “Thanks.”

  There was a palpable bad aura around Isaac which Roger didn’t seem to dig. He punched in the security code and limped into the back storeroom, returning a minute later with Isaac’s plundered capital, a disposable phone and a clean 9mm semi-automatic. Isaac looked at the clip of fifty-dollar bills in Roger’s hand. To think he had originally planned to jettison this money to honor his clean slate. Give it to charity, or just try to forget it ever existed, leaving it to rot in Roger’s vault until another dirty cop stick-up or a legal police raid scooped it up. He stuffed the clip in his jeans with his phone and stuck the gun in his waistband.

  “See you in another ten years?” Roger asked.

  Isaac silently left King Pawn and marched off down the street, feeling like a piece of trash buffeted by a cold wind.

  Grounds for Divorce

  Roach hated using Skype. It felt like such an awkward way to talk to somebody. Impersonal, despite the visual presence. But his kids had been down in Ann Arbor with their mother and her sister for a while, going on forever. He hated using it even more when his conversation broke down into heated arguments with Diane, once she’d bundled little Peter and Vicky away into the next room so the grown-ups could talk.

  “Divorce! Can we be civil here? We have an arrangement, right?” Roach’s jaw hung open between rapid bursts of shock. “What, the separation isn’t enough anymore?” On screen Diane waited him out, fully expecting this response. “They’re my kids too, Diane. Please, let me come down there to see them. It will save you the trip. You wouldn’t even have to do anything.” Roach hated the sound of him begging, but this was the type of highly sensitive issue where being a big-swinging-dick tough guy did very little to help.

  Diane shook her head, the determined movement like a sharp spasm. To Roach it looked like this was a decision which had kept her up more than a few nights. Her eyes were firmly pushing back tears. “Yes, they’re your kids, and that’s what worries me, Curt. I thought you might be willing to talk like adults but I’m wasting my breath. I finally see that, and I’m not happy about it. You think I want to do this?” Frustration carved weary lines into her brow, and she ran a soft hand through her short blonde bob.

  “Then don’t, please.”

  “You’re incapable of change. All these years I’ve held on, hoping that this might be the day you grow up. Focus on your bar, or anything, I don’t really care as long as it’s legal.”

  “Funny how that never used to bother you, huh? I remember you had no problem spending my money at one point. You were just peachy at looking the other way back then.”

  “Right! Back then! I was stupid. This mess is as much my fault as it is yours, Curt. But we put these walls up between us a long time ago. And I can’t tell you how much time I’ve spent begging, wishing that you’ll learn what it takes to break through them.”

  Roach sat there at his glass table on the balcony of his plush Gold Coast apartment at the Bernardin. He shot a thoughtful look at the magnificent view of the affluent district’s high-rise apartments and splendid architecture. He looked back at her. She had peach lip gloss on her full lips. Who’s that for? Herself? Him? Some other guy?

  “Everybody’s luck runs out sooner or later. I thought you might have learned that from Isaac. I can’t have our children around a criminal. How long until you get arrested, or hurt, or killed? It’s not fair on them, and I can’t let that happen to them. And you shouldn’t want it to, either.”

  “It won’t.”
That was weak, and he knew it.

  “I’ll be arranging to talk to an attorney, Curt. You should too. I’m sorry.” She ended her call, her pained face disappearing.

  Roach was left staring at his frown in the laptop’s screen. He went back inside and paced the apartment, very much wanting to smash something. There wasn’t much to smash. Feng shui took a day off when he moved into his one-bedroom luxury apartment. It was purely minimal. Lots of bright airy spaces, glass and marble, some generic and meaningless hanging art, but little in the way of home comforts apart from a nice TV and a much-used pool table. He homed in on his futuristic slab of a refrigerator and scanned the shelf of non-alcoholic beers. An apple-flavored Holsten. The German brewery had eight different flavors, all of which Roach stocked: strawberry, cranberry, black grape, lemon, pomegranate, mojito, classic and the aforementioned apple. It seemed like an apple kind of mood. He popped the cap and walked around restlessly, feeling like a guest in his own home. The conversation with Diane waltzed around his mind. He sought solace at the balcony, looking for a distraction somewhere in that beautifully designed rat maze of skyscrapers, but he couldn’t stand still. He went back inside again and idled by the photographs over the mantel. A few had him looking like the biggest kid in the trio, with Vicky and Pete cracking up about something or other, Diane wrapped around them, putting on a positive front for the camera. The more modern pictures contained only the twins, both parents having amicably removed themselves from the time capsule.

  He missed them.

  And he missed Isaac. He had learned to deal with his friend’s absence over the years, respecting his wishes and wanting only the best for him. He couldn’t imagine the pain he must be in right now. Diane was right, Roach knew that. But he wasn’t capable of breaking away from Ludlow and his other life as easily as Isaac had done. Could his luck run a little bit longer? With Wyndorf stirring again, he couldn’t stick his head in the sand right now. And Isaac would need help with this.

  Roach took his bottle back out onto the balcony and pulled his laptop closer. He took a long, unsatisfying slug of neutered beer and hit up the Chicago Tribune, moving to the Beacon-News site and searching the obituaries.