“Everyone thinks your food sucks, but that’s beside the point. I’m here to collect your debt, plus vig.”
Slowly, Vinnie stepped back.
The last thing Chase remembered was the blast of the shotgun when he left his finger too close to the trigger as he pistol-whipped Vinnie.
The hit of cocaine before he arrived at the pizzeria, fuck you very much, Mr. Baz, numbed the fear of a passerby, or a cop for that matter, charging into the rescue.
When the beating stopped, Chase all but regretted what he had done to a poor businessman down on his luck.
Chase didn’t want to do this. He told Vinnie so. He had to. He had no choice. Sometimes nice guys had to do bad things to get ahead, to survive.
He tried explaining that to Heather two weeks ago when she met up with him at The Java Joint.
He never told her what he had been doing, nor the names of his affiliates. He saw the anguish in her eyes that she fought to subdue and didn’t have to say another word.
Their encounter appeared sound until that point. They both laughed when each gave into their old habits and made a failed attempt at an embrace.
His smile beamed from ear to ear as he tried to convince her that everything was turning around in his life.
Every now and again, he would consciously put his bruised hands in his pockets when she would study them a moment longer than he was comfortable with. He knew he couldn’t hide his Bazzi assisted crook in his nose and blamed it on a bad tumble over his coffee table and taking a dive into the wall unit. He couldn’t tell if the smirk she gave was accusatory or accepting.
“I know. I’m an idiot,” he attempted to regain control of the locomotive. He failed.
Heather was never one for dishonesty, and that’s when he felt the blessed meeting careen off the rails. Her unmitigated silence screamed so loudly in his ears, he nearly covered them.
“Heather?” Chase said, breaking the silence.
“Hm?”
He fixated on her angelic eyes and watched the emotion glisten before she looked away.
He reached out to take her hand, not caring about the scars and discoloration.
She yanked away and grabbed her purse.
“Did you find a full-time job yet,” Heather said.
He slipped his hands onto his lap, nonplussed. She stared and waited.
“I work,” he said. She glowered at him.
“What? I do! What the fuck?”
She pulled two crumpled ten-dollar bills from her purse and tossed it to the table.
“Unless you tell me—” she started and hushed herself.
“Take your money. I got this,” he said. Heather put her hands on her hips.
He leaned over and pulled out his wallet. Thumbing through, he did the best he could to hide its abundance. Heather recoiled.
“How many hundreds do you have in there,” she snapped as he placed one on the table.
“I told you, I work.”
She fell back into her seat and splayed her hands. “Christ’s sake, Chase! What do you do for this?”
He looked down at his hands and tucked them away. “It’s not my fault,” he muttered. “I don’t have a—”
“Fuck you, Chase! I’m tired of that same old excuse!” She swung her purse over her shoulder, snatched her money and stormed away.
“I’m done, Chase. I’m done! I can’t do this anymore!”
He watched her as she stepped away, halted, stomped her foot and slammed her fists into her sides. She did nothing to mask her keening.
“Heather, wait,” he called out and dashed behind her. Grabbing her wrist, he stopped her as she tried to plod away.
“I’m so stupid! What made me think you were going to change?” “Heather, please. I can explain!”
She whirled around, looked him dead in the eyes as she swiped at her nose. Deafening silence drowned out the whir of steam from the espresso machine. She wiped her tears away, nodded and smiled. Chase drifted back. Heather leaned into him and kissed him on the side of his nose.
“Goodbye, Chase.”
III
The door of the pizzeria swung back and forth in the slipstream of the carbon dioxide-factory of a freight truck that roared down Fifth Avenue. A twisted push plate and swivel lock tapped repeatedly into the granite counter behind it with each sway as the lower frame brushed over the marble floor like nails on a chalkboard. The Met Foodmarket light challenged the night to cast its aged glow across the street and into the pizzeria. As the taillights of the semi-truck diminished into the distance beyond Sixty-Fourth Street, the Basilica on the next corner was a gruesome reminder that God hears all that’s said and sees all that’s done. Eyes scanned in the opposite direction as he waited for the racing blue and red lights that sped down the empty street. Discernment snapped sideways when he heard Vinnie flop to his side on the olive oil-slick, anti-fatigue floor mat in front of the ovens. The crunch of glass underfoot with each deliberate step was redolent of a distantly familiar gravel driveway, a hundred miles north of Brooklyn.
Chase returned to the cash register and finished counting out the bills, skimmed a thin wad from the top and stuffed them into his pocket.
“If you get less than nine-G’s from him, you burn the dump,” Bazzi instructed. Chase shook his head as he reconsidered Vinnie.
“What the fuck, man? You had eleven-thousand.”
Vinnie raised his hand and grasped Chase’s pant leg. He yanked away and kicked over the Rubbermaid trash bin. “I’m sorry, Vinnie. You didn’t give me a fucking choice. Do you have any idea what they would’ve done to me if I didn’t come here?”
Figures. Stupid and selfish. Have you ever considered what I want?
Closed fists slammed the sides of Chase’s head. “Stop! Stop! Leave me alone! It wasn’t my fault!” he yelled.
Chase leaped over the counter and sent the cash register crashing to the floor. The jingle of coins rang out over his dashing footfalls over the sparkling glass and marble. He glanced through the broken door once more before he dashed away into the night.
IV
The acquainted gloom of the apartment embraced Chase like a weighted robe of deceitful welcoming. He hated being here. Nothing more than fragmented memories, broken effects and crushed dreams made his blood run cold. Where else would he be? The means to be anywhere but home, the opportunities for a new life throbbed his head and churned the solids in his bowel into liquid.
The nightmares and the heartache that choked him to sleep every night paled in comparison to the dread of moving forward.
What if it was worse? What if he failed? What if…
This was normal. This was convenient. Status quo. When he could reach out and touch the pain that was more real than the air he breathed, asphyxia of change was…
Suffocating.
There is another way.
The English accent that he heard almost a year ago, harked an odd familiarity in his mind as if it had been his tormentor since childhood.
The striking burst of the late-night insomniac infomercial strongly recommended to call now for a free consultation, split the darkness of night. A gleam from the Colt Peacemaker on the end table stole Chase’s attention.
“There’s always hope.”
Bullshit.
Muscles strained as he turned his gaze the half-full, no, half-empty, fuck you very much, bottle of whiskey. Fingers swept across the fluted cylinder as the final words he heard from the ex-celebrity endorsement, whispered him.
“It’s time.”
Confusion ignored the rest of the spokesperson’s statement to call as he thanked the victim,
No, not the victim. He was a stupid fuck up. He should have known better than getting involved with—
Yes. Victim.
That victim of fate, his latest employment opportunity, that fortunately did not empty the revolver into Chase’s chest, cowered at his feet. Another swing of the aluminum baseball bat sent the gun flying, shattered wrist bones and de
stroyed any chance of a career as a concert pianist. The home run to the head silenced the victim’s public speaking future as well.
For the better part of the last few months, work expanded as wages reduced. And the late hours made damn sure he would miss every menial toilet cleaning and McDonald’s interview he never attempted to make.
Time traveling binges slowly pushed his stubborn, nagging dreams of ever being with Heather again so far behind, he couldn’t even recall the lavender fragrance that sent his spirit aloft, though the emotion that clung to her oceanic green eyes, bore through his heart like frozen daggers of suffering remained.
Without intention or hope, fingers folded around the grip panel as his index finger slipped through the trigger guard. Disconnected, as if watching a lousy movie on the television of his mind, he drew the weapon under his chin.
Hands trembled, and drool rambled from the corners of his quivering lips as he pressed his eyes shut.
“It’s time,” he heard again and again as if the record in his mind skipped. His blubbering drowned the overdriven voice of the has-been spokesperson.
Stifling silence filled the room as the weapon discharged.
The gun swung loosely in his hand as his unresponsive eyes stared blankly at the television screen.
He shot up from his seat and hurled the Peacemaker.
“Fucking loser,” he shouted. If only he had a real fucking gun. Something that would excise a sizeable chunk of brain and bone through the wall.
That fucking Baz knew it when he sent Chase on that parking garage job where the night shift guard had nothing but a plastic water gun, painted up and filled with Plaster of Paris.
“Nice piece,” he said upon Chase’s return. “It’ll fool almost everybody. If such an occasion should ever occur,” Bazzi said.
It fooled Chase that night. He shat his pants when the guy whipped it out.
Shoulders jerked as pain glistened his cheek and dripped from his chin as he floundered back down onto the sofa.
V
“Hey, Jackie… it’s me,” his voice cracked. Silence consumed the device’s reception. Chase pulled the phone away from his cheek and examined the screen. When he noted the timer continued its march forward, he returned it to his ear.
“Jackie. You there?”
Jackie cleared his throat. Chase thought he heard the slap of a cigarette pack to palm.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m here. What’s up,” Jackie said. There was a distance in his voice that pierced Chase’s heart.
“Nothing. I just—I haven’t heard from you in a while. I wanted to see how you were doing.”
Jackie sighed before Chase imagined was disgust.
“Hey, are we Okay? What’s going on,” Chase said.
An airy sigh preceded Jackie’s words.
“I guess. Why wouldn’t we be? What do you need, Chase?”
There were times when Chase grubbed a cigarette or six, borrow few bucks for beer, or fix-it money after his bike took a shit on the Gowanus. And maybe a place to crash for the weekend when he hid from people Chase would not speak of. But Chase didn’t need anything. Except for a familiar voice and a little compassion.
Did Jackie notice Chase’s emaciation? His jittery hands the days after a hit of coke when he needed a little extra pick-me-up for a job or quell the hatred in his soul?
No. Jackie didn’t pay that much attention and never judged. Right?
“I don’t need anything, Jackie. Maybe just—”
Another sigh breathed loud and full of—
Disgust?
“Hey, I just wanted to talk. Can’t we just talk? Maybe ask your opinion about something?”
The line went silent again.
“Jackie?”
“Yeah, I’m here. But listen. I should go. I’m in the middle of something. I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said.
The line went dead.
Chase stared at the black screen of the phone and gawked. Tomorrow never came. Neither did the next day. Or the next.
Whatever was going on, it couldn’t have been his fault. He didn’t trash Jackie to Rick one night after binging on booze and coke one night at Dickinson’s. He didn’t ramble on about how pathetic Jackie was in his solitude and his inability to open up. Nor did Chase get loud when he wished Jackie would just give some much-needed advice on what to do with his life.
Jackie somehow had it together. Surely there was some wisdom he could have imparted on Chase as he fell further into hell. How Chase should just get the fuck out of his own head, push the misery aside and be a fucking man for a change. Right?
Chase scrolled through the numbers on his phone and stopped.
Maybe, he thought.
He dialed and put the phone to his ear. He lit a cigarette as he waited for the line to answer.
“Hey, T,” he exhaled. “You doing anything tonight?
“No, no. I haven’t been drinking. Not yet. Care to join me?
“No, everything’s just fucking peachy. Trust me.
“Okay. Liquor store, drug store. Got it.
“See you in a half hour?
“Cool. Alright, Heath— Stacy. Alright.
“No, I didn’t. I coughed on my cigarette.
“Yeah, I know what it sounded like. Will you stop? I’ll see you in a little bit. Okay. Bye.”
As he tossed the phone across the dinette, it skipped over his wallet and flopped open. He picked it up and waited for the moths to fly out. It had been a while since he worked. As much as he never wanted to hear from the infamous Mr. Baz again, his absence was financially noticeable.
He shook his head, dropped the wallet down on the table and walked towards the coat closet. Rummaging through, he palmed the wide, flat lid of his plastic jug, half filled with copper and silver. Counting out twenty-five dollar, he shoveled it into his jeans pockets. They jingled like Goddamned Santa Claus bells as he left his apartment.
VI
The long walk up Third Avenue was as bitter as the mid-winter blast of wind in his face. The numbness in his nose gave no sensation to the clear snot that dribbled in the chill of January. Winded by the diminishing flu in his system and years of smoking, he hacked every now and again and spat out large, yellowed balls of phlegm to the sidewalk. The escaping steam from his breath clung to his face and cooled his skin and stiffened his muscles. The steady hum of cars, buses and the occasional honking of horns right before a traffic light would turn green barely whispered in his consciousness. Nothing but automatic propellant towards a familiar destination drove him forward. After less than two months of employment at Arnipoor’s II Liquor Store, Sanjeev had to let Chase go.
The occasional ten to fifteen-minute tardiness didn’t do much than annoy the typically calm Mr. Arnipoor, but when empty shot bottles of Jim Beam and Stolichnaya fell from Chase’s jacket, he had enough.
Chase tried to calm the situation, insisting he would never steal, especially from his employer. But when he argued that it would have been worth it due to the comically low wages, Sanjeev pointed to the door.
The minimum wage was a joke in Chase’s eyes, especially since he would make more in one night from Baz than the liquor store paid in ninety.
But he didn’t want to work for mobsters anymore. Nor monsters. He wasn’t one of them. He never would be. Chase might have been Italian, but as far as being connected, his cord was a foot short of the outlet.
He greeted his second-floor neighbor when he entered the lobby of the six-floor walk-up. She feigned her smile through gritted teeth and furrowed brows as the lines on her face creased deep. Chase shook his head and stomped his way upstairs.
The heartache, the misery and the contempt he displayed had finally boomeranged. What comes around, goes around, right?
When he was old enough to understand that his foster parents held back their emotion, he accepted it.
When he was made fun of in his hand-me-downs, or the burn scars on his legs at gym class, he ignored it.
When Stephanie
would whisper that Chase would never amount to anything because no one loved him, that Linda only took him in for the well-paying welfare-for-kids program, he held out hope.
Accused of being the tough guy in high school because of his silent presence and black attire, he would turn the other cheek after the first one was punched.
Little by little, the darkness engulfed him as he would openly curse God for his misfortune and pray for something better. A lifetime of prayers unanswered, Chase turned his back on God.
“Fuck Him.”
His existence was nothing more than his Creator’s muse. A cruel fucking joke where the only punchline suffering. Like Job.
But Job started out well-loved, respected and wealthy; all the things Chase never had. Hate coursed through his veins so much that he tried to excise it with sharp objects.
When he moved out at eighteen-years-old, his friends understood why he joined the Marine Corps. If he were to remain angry, at least he had someplace to channel it. Chase believed it was a fresh start where his hatred might have evaporated and distilled into focused purpose.
He never anticipated that the tinnitus from too many mugs to the head would render one ear nearly deaf and grant him a medical discharge.
It wasn’t long after his twentieth birthday that he realized doing the right thing never moved him forward. Every now and again, if he didn’t have the means to buy what he needed, it would fall into his pockets. If someone looked at him the wrong way, he would lash out. And when he needed a shot bottle or three to calm his nerves, he deserved it. Just as he deserved to get fired.
Before Chase’s boot clomped atop the sixth-floor landing, his gut fluttered, and his mouth went dry. The air was thick with static and reeked of bleach and aftershave. Silently stepping down the hall, he noticed his front door ajar.
Fists balled up as tight as his stomach.
Coming closer, he looked at the twisted steel frame where the deadbolt should have held. Pausing at the doorway, he held his breath and listened.
“Come on in, buddy. I’m not here to hurt you,” a voice called from the other side.
His fists closed tight, and fingernails dug into palms.
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