Pigs

by Daniel James

  The guy didn’t look like much. Some yuppie type, maybe, and a low-salary bottom-feeder one at that. Could be he was an intern, judging from his bargain-basement black trousers, short-sleeve white shirt and red tie. Conway thought everything about him looked cheap. Even his thick-framed glasses seemed a little off, a trickster’s artifice. Underneath the appearance there was something else, and Conway caught a whiff of danger about the man, mania even, like a spring-loaded trap. But Conway was unsure if the man was a threat to himself or externally.

  The newcomer walked over to the bar, dishing out a few unreciprocated smiles and nods to some of the patrons. If he had picked up on the simmering mistrust and hostility with his coke-bottle lenses he didn’t care to show it.

  “You lookin’ for somethin’?” Conway grumbled, folding arms which were somewhere between flab and muscle over his generous belly, tautly stretching an old Motörhead t-shirt which was so threadbare a gang of cats might have been rutting and feeding on it.

  Mr. Discount fidgeted with his thick frames in such a fastidious manner that Conway inaudibly sighed at this dumb stiff’s wrong turn.

  However, unperturbed, the visitor pulled up a stool and cleared his throat. “Um, hi there.” His voice was quite reedy, hardly unexpected. “I’m looking for an old friend of mine who I was told frequents this bar.”

  “I doubt it,” replied Conway tersely, leaning his arms across the bar and staring at him from beneath bushy, graying brows. “But you piqued my curiosity.”

  “Yes, well, um, his name is Isaac Reid.”

  Conway’s face was a brick wall. He stared impassively at the gangly, slick-haired trespasser for several seconds.

  Cheap Specs held his stare with a cordial patience that somehow seemed insectile. As if concerned that the chunky, graying walrus had suffered some inconvenient stroke, he rotated his neck left then right, first catching the eyes of a few greasy biker types in a corner booth, and then a few flint-hard stares from a couple of pool players.

  The fat statue returned to life. “He hasn’t been in here in a long time. Surely a friend of his would know that.” Conway glanced at the glossy, slicked-back hair of this alleged friend and wondered if he owned shares in a pomade brand.

  “I’ve been on the road for a while. I travel a lot on business, y’see. But I always make sure to catch up with him when I’m in town.”

  Conway folded his arms back across his barrel chest, shutting down this line of dubious inquiry. “That so, huh? Well, I don’t know what to tell you, slick. I haven’t seen him in—” His eyes rolled up to tally the annual chicken scratches on his mental wall of time. “Shit. Ten years. And I think it’d be best for you to reverse on out of here. This isn’t your scene.”

  Slick looked impatiently reflective, drumming two fingers on the bar. “I don’t want to keep you. I know you’re busy.” His magnified eyes swept across the small clusters of bad intent locked in their secretive conversations in the four corners. “What about Curtis Roach? He still drink in here?”

  Conway didn’t appreciate the inquisitiveness of the outcast. “You don’t look like a pig, but you smell similar. Who the fuck are you? A fed?” His hand reached under the bar with practised ease, leaving no ambiguity as to what he was taking a hold of.

  Specs could feel the hungry eyes of the phantom 12-gauge staring at his stomach. “Honestly, I’m just a friend. Truth is, I heard Isaac’s had a rough go of it. Something about prison, and something on the news about—” He rubbed his brow line in discomfort and lowered his tone for decency, “his family being murdered. Just awful. I don’t like talking about this stuff.” He wilted. “I don’t have the nerve for it. I was just hoping I could find a way to contact him to pass on my regards. I know he and his boys used to be fond of this place.”

  “I think it’s time you walk out, while your legs still work.”

  A small, nervous smile displayed caps of white. “Please, sir, is there call to be so aggressive?”

  Conway was about done with his miserly civility and was a cunt hair from introducing this suspicious little prick to both barrels hinged below the register. “Last chance, dick weed.”

  Slick shrugged in compromise. But his smile of feigned awkwardness slipped into one of cocky amusement. “Christ, man. Can I at least get a beer?”

  Conway wasn’t in the mood to hire out some bozos to refurb his wet bar, so he brought the shotgun out to play. “If this thing could talk, it could tell some stories.”

  Slick held his hands up and slowly climbed off his stool in surrender. “Neat-o. Hey, I got a story for ya.” Quick as a magician, Slick pulled a concealed ballistic knife from his trouser pocket and fired the projectile blade into Conway’s ample stomach.

  After several seconds of confusion, Conway shrieked and fell against the beer coolers behind him, knocking over bottles whilst blood poured through his fingers. Slick didn’t move, not even as a number of the shocked patrons began to reach for guns or knives of their own. The bar door swung open, ushering in a swollen body-builder type in a black duster coat, urban camo trousers and army boots. The newcomer had sideburns and a stylish Elvis hairdo completely at odds with the rest of his militant fetishism. Pulling an AR-15 out from his coat, the muscle-bound thug put down each and every barfly with remarkable precision and speed, the type that only first-rate soldiers or overzealous gun range aficionados can muster. When the thunder of each fatal strike stopped shaking the dark wooden walls, he checked on Slick, who remained in his spot by the bar, watching Conway yelp in pain and struggle to remove the sharp-pointed steel embedded in his fat padding.

  Slick tilted his head a little, listening to Conway blubber and beg. “I guess it was more of a short story. But some of those have pretty gnarly endings.”

  The rockabilly-coiffed gun enthusiast quickly confirmed his multiple kills and plodded over to his stone-faced partner.

  “You were right, Garland,” Slick said. “That knife does not disappoint.”

  “Nope.”

  “Did you really put the blade through a fence post once?”

  “Yep.” Garland raised his rifle to one hillside of a shoulder, not caring about small talk under the pressing circumstances.

  Slick removed a tiny, camouflaged earbud, then loosened his tie and collar button to pull away the small adhesive throat mic, bundling and dropping the comm-link system into his pocket. Mimicking Conway’s blustery lean-over-the-bar routine, Slick sounded genuinely needy. “You really don’t know where I can find Isaac? It would be just swell if you could help me out on this.”

  Conway tried to get words out between mewling. “L-last I huh-heard, he was goin’ legit. Roach …” he was practically talking through clenched teeth now, “he’s still active. But he hasn’t drank here in years. He’s got his own place. A sports bar, puh-Pitchers, on North Wells Street, Uh-Old Town. “S’all I know, I swear. C’mon man, help me. I can be useful. I deal in information.”

  Slick clucked a few times and looked around the bar at nothing in particular. “You do? Because you haven’t been overly helpful. And what good will you be when your fat ass is laid up in a hospital bed?”

  “Let’s move out,” Garland prompted. “Cops’ll be on their way.”

  Slick didn’t look at his heavily armed advisor. “Get in the truck. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  Garland paused. “You don’t give the orders here—this is babysitting duty. If Thurman—”

  Slick lashed out like an orchestral conductor with a spasm, a silencing finger in the air. He neatly folded his drama back into his carry-on case. “Give me a minute. He could still be a tattletale.”

  Garland strode over to the doorway and waited like an indignant minder. “I’ll be wanting that blade back.”

  Slick sighed and hopped over the bar, squatting next to Conway. He gave the base of the embedded blade a little wriggle, prompting a horrendous cry from the tavern owner. “You gave me an address so I’m feeling a bit generous. Don’t make me regret being a goo
d guy here.” Conway looked positively ill in his pain and blood loss, sweat beading his bald, bowling-ball head. “Conway, right?” Slick ignored the pressing matter of responding police sirens and the man’s need for medical attention, holding his hand out for a formal, if not redundant introduction.

  Conway, delirious from his misfortune and doing whatever it took to kill time until Chicago’s finest burst in here, took the psycho’s hand in his own.

  “I’m Wyndorf,” Slick said with a single firm shake, using his free hand and the dirty bar rag to slip the ballistic blade free of its suctioned target. Wyndorf reset the blade within in its handle as Conway’s labored lungs struggled to holler further obscenities. With a dripping crimson finger he adjusted his glasses’ frame, smudging a few specks of red on the right lens as he watched the shock and blood loss turn Conway chalk white, the way a diligent student hangs on the words of a good teacher.

  Wyndorf stared into the wet, glassy eyes of Conway, charming him, luring him to stay with him for a few moments longer. He whispered, “You look good for one more scream.” He reached into his trouser pocket, digging out a cylindrical object. It was cherry red, with AN-M14 TH3 stencilled across it in black.

  Conway knew a grenade when he saw one. He shook his head at Wyndorf with great futility. Wyndorf nodded, all mellow and serene. He stood up and popped the pin and dropped it in Conway’s lap, the barman’s mortal wound and rotund torso proving too great an obstacle for his enfeebled dying hands to reach across and clasp. Wyndorf vaulted back over the bar and toward Garland and the exit.

  It wasn’t a fragmentation grenade. With the hiss of a thousand snakes, the small red cylinder erupted into a huge ball of blinding sparks, hot enough to burn through steel plate. Conway’s scream was inhuman for those first few seconds.

  “Christ!” Garland watched the incendiary grenade galvanise into an inferno from behind the bar, engulfing hard wood and stained liquor, the screams of Conway rising to subsonic frequencies before becoming smoke. He shoulder-checked Wyndorf on his race toward the conflagration, raising his rifle. The searing heat had already stolen any lingering breath in Conway’s lungs, cooking him internally, but Garland believed that a euthanising shot was the very least he could do. His bullet shut off any final dregs of consciousness within the flame-engulfed head.

  “What did you do that for?” Wyndorf whined at Garland like the man had spoilt his sport. Standing half in and half out of the thug haven, he watched the wan afternoon light assist the dim bulbs and the spreading tongues of fire in revealing details of the bloodied corpses strewn about the bar and pool table. Sirens swirled in the electric air, growing closer by the second.

  “Shut the fuck up.” Garland shoved his partner up the stairs to the decaying street, and hopped into the red Ford pickup truck parked at the curb beside several Harleys. Starting the engine, Garland gave Wyndorf a scolding look. “Clean shirt in the back. Lose those stupid glasses, too. And pass me my blade. Handle first.”

  Wyndorf grumpily eased into his seat, proffering the blade to his walking one-man army, but he made no effort to change into something less conspicuous.

  Garland was a survivalist through and through, and driving around the area of a recent shooting with a partner covered in blood just wasn’t the done thing. “Uncross your fucking wires, dickhead. We could get pulled over, and you’re sitting there in bloody civvies.”

  “Then we can add a couple of dead badges to the daily total. Bonus points.” Wyndorf’s smile matched the barren emptiness in his brown eyes. “Now how about less talky, more drivey.”

  Garland aggressively tore away from the parking space and reined in his anger at Wyndorf’s bullshit bravado. Having an animated screaming match in the car could also draw the eye. A few police cruisers could be seen in their rear-view mirror, pulling up outside the smoky basement. Luckily they were a good ways down the street by now and able to blend in with traffic.

  “Who the fuck let you into the armory? Huh?” Garland’s cowlick curled toward two focused eyes, covering all points of the street. Wyndorf looked bored by the topic. “Answer the fucking question. Who let you in? It’s not your personal fucking toy store. Sneaking out an incendiary grenade! Jesus H Christ! In case you’re too fucking dumb to remember your arrangement with the major, you supply us with crank, and we cover your ass. But that doesn’t make you one of us. You don’t help yourself to our supplies.”

  Despite the blood stains, Wyndorf looked peaceful: he could have been on his way to a spa, or more likely, a hooker’s. “After all this time I’m almost hurt, Garland. You might have a problem with how I conduct myself, but I know that a bunch of your boys and the major, have accepted me as one of their own. And why not? I keep you assholes flush with cash, don’t I? I’m just another crackpot commando.”

  Garland’s powerful grip caused the wheel to squeak. He slowly exhaled and made certain not to let his bad temper cloud his judgement. This part of the mission required finesse.

  “Any plans, big boy? I was thinking we go get a bite to eat, then mosey on down to puh-Pitchers. See if Roach has any—what do you guys call it, actionable intel?—on Isaac. Squeak his wheel, then grease him. You know, fun and games.”

  Wyndorf’s mental state was a seesaw in a hurricane, and kept Garland on his toes. “We’ll let things quieten down a little. Then you can pay that Roach guy a visit.”

  “Let’s go now, I’m in gear.”

  “That’s the problem. We’ll go later. You’re not dragging me down into some public fucking meltdown. Remember the law, those guys who want you? I’m the guy keeping you under the radar.”

  Wyndorf filled the cab with a quiet tension Garland had long grown accustomed to. He remained immobile, staring off vacantly at the streets and passing traffic. “You know, I’m really disappointed in myself about the other night. Slippery little bastard was right there. Why didn’t I just gut him first, then do his bitch? Ya live, ya learn, I guess.”

  Garland didn’t engage. He was sorely tempted to slam on the brakes and put the freaky little turd through the windshield.

  But the major wouldn’t be pleased with that.

  Wyndorf didn’t like Garland ignoring him. He wanted the big dog to know his place. “If you don’t have the stones for this, the major and a few others will.” He lazily craned his neck at his disciplined chauffeur. “You can stay at base camp and play army man, and I’ll round up the guys who have a pair. And I’ll find Isaac without your ’roid-swollen ass. Shit, I’ll even pay Ludlow a visit if I have to. That old coot’ll know somethin’. He’s bound to. Plus I probably owe the old prick an apology.”

  Garland turned at the intersection, obeying every road sign and signalling like a good and proper driver. He glanced at Wyndorf, wanting him to hurry up and snap out of his little starry-eyed deathgasm and change his fucking clothing already. “Sounds like a stupid risk. Storming the fort to hit an A-lister over a ten-year grudge.”

  Wyndorf was on him in a blur, practically climbing into his lap and stamping his ill-fitting black shoe onto Garland’s brake foot. The Ford screeched to a fishtail halt in the middle of the road, creating an unwelcome riot of angry honks and a backup of skidding motorists. Garland felt the point of a concealed knife probing his jugular. Calmly, he looked around as if doing so would make Wyndorf get his act together and allow them to quickly move on before they made a scene.

  Wyndorf didn’t even take notice. He growled through gritted teeth, his breath hot and unpleasant, smelling like the BBQ beef military rations he had scoffed down before leaving the compound this morning. “Do not pretend to understand the shit that faggot’s sensitive nature has caused me. Isaac’s a career criminal. They all are. But he got a bit jumpy when the job got rough and tried to kill me? ME!” Those intense eyes and snapping teeth inched so close to Garland’s earlobe they almost chewed them off. Instead, all the big soldier got was a tickle of hot breath. “Then he feeds me to the law. Forces me to a life of looking over my shoulder? FBI’s Ten Mos
t Wanted. $100,000 bounty on my head. My cuz C.B. keeps me at arm’s length, knocks me down to some shit-heel small-time distributer. This is much more than some pissy li’l grudge.”

  Garland was nobody’s pushover, and his professionalism wouldn’t allow him to sit here as the horn honks grew more aggressive and the pedestrian mobs gathered to gawp. His voice was cool, composed, disciplined. “We’re business partners, you know we’ll back you up—it’s why you pay us. But do you want to stay on the run or get a fitted onesie and a cellmate? Because we’re getting popular by sitting here.”

  After a few seconds the pressure eased off Garland’s toecap, and his throat, and Wyndorf flopped back into his seat. Garland got them out of there quickly but without too much of a fuss.

  “You’re right … you’re right. It’s been a productive afternoon. We’ll let things settle down a bit. We can check out Roach’s pad tomorrow. What’s one more day after ten years?” Wyndorf started to unbutton his shirt, swapping it for a fresh one. “I almost forgot, my bad, we’ll need to go see Rico later anyway. C.B.’s got a new shipment coming through.”

  Garland bobbed his head curtly. It was a miracle that this brainless maggot hadn’t got them all killed or busted ten times over already. Not wanting to talk for a while, he turned the radio on and busied himself with their commute west toward the Van Buren Street Bridge over the river.

  Wyndorf grew into a solemn silence, stroking his clean-shaven chin. “Man, I miss my beard.”

  Up In Smoke

  Isaac pulled his white t-shirt over his shower-damp hair, and let it slide down his body, covering the healed pinkish-white stab wound just left of his abdominals, stitched together by thread and the slow salve of time. After leaving Graceland he had returned to his fourth-floor room at the Hotel Versey, and managed to grab a few restless hours of sleep before a nightmare about dying families awoke him. He tied his bootlaces and grabbed the 9mm from the dresser, slipping it back in his waistband, and crossed to the window to watch the meek sun begin to fade on Chicago. Taking stock of his life for a moment, coming up short on optimism.