We stepped inside a big empty room. There were three small windows along one wall. The other three walls were exposed brick. Exposed pipes and ducts snaked through the rafters overhead. The wooden floorboards creaked as we walked toward a window.
I turned to Cassandra. “This used to be an after-hours joint for the high rollers. Some place to take the girls and get a drink after two a.m. A club within a club. By the morning, every flat surface in here would be sparkly with cocaine.”
Cassandra raised an eyebrow. “You came here often?”
“Not if I could help it.” I glanced out the window at Yonge Street. Shopping crowds, business folk, cars gliding by. Business as usual. “I don’t see Fisher.”
“Maybe he’s around back.”
“Yeah, maybe.” I grimaced. “Fucking Bruno.”
“He’s the one that fired you, right?”
“Yeah.” I peered back through the window. “It was a little misunderstanding. No big deal.”
I led the way to the back of the big empty room. We went through another door and into a storeroom. More cardboard boxes lined the walls. I went over to a window and forced it open. “Let’s go.”
We clattered onto the fire escape. Cassandra looked down. I shook my head and pointed up.
Rooftops in the city were interesting. On a rooftop, you were in the city, but also removed from it. You could see people, but unless they were looking up, they couldn’t see you. We crouched low as we scuttled across the strip club’s roof.
I peered over the side into the alley behind the club. Three homeless men in tattered jeans and dirty flannel were passing around a bottle. I didn’t see Fisher anywhere. “I think he left.”
I turned and Cassandra was right there. Our faces were inches from each other. The wind rippled through her hair and sent long dark strands thwicking across her face. I reached up and brushed them back. We stood there for a moment on the rooftop, framed by the noonday sun.
Then she blushed and stepped back. “Jack —”
“Forget it.”
“No, I mean —”
“It’s okay. Let’s just —”
“Okay.” Cassandra stared down into the alley. Then she straightened up and smiled at me. “Let’s go home.”
CHAPTER 5
After all that Scotch, I kept my car keys in my pocket and left the Camry at the club. We could’ve taken the streetcar but we splurged and took a cab back to my office. It wasn’t home, exactly, but it was close enough. We sat in the back seat together. She smelled spicy, like cinnamon and cloves.
In the old days, we would’ve tumbled through my office door, smashing our lips together and ripping off each other’s clothes. Just the thought of it was making me hard. I flashed back to the girl-next-door brunette and her regular-sized titties snapping her G-string for the roaring crowd. I unlocked my office door and stepped inside. I needed to hobble over to the bathroom and pour a few cupfuls of ice-cold water down my pants.
Cassandra stepped through my office door and smiled. “You got a new couch.”
“Yep.” I didn’t tell her what had happened to the old one. One night after powering back most of a bottle of Scotch, I’d dragged the couch outside (letting it tumble down the wooden stairs with a rumble and a thud) and I set that shit on fire. I stood swaying in the alley and watched the damn thing burn. I had slept on that couch most nights, and when Cassandra and I were together, she slept on it, too. It was a tight fit, but we made it work.
Our eyes met and we both quickly looked away. Then Cassandra chuckled. “This is silly. We’re adults, right? We’re adults, so let’s talk like adults.”
Take off your top, I wanted to say. But I didn’t.
She came closer to me. “You’ve got a girlfriend.”
“Yep. Well, sort of. We’re not exclusive.”
“Either way, I’m not looking for a relationship right now.”
“Right.”
“Too much shit going on.”
“Yeah. I gotcha.”
“Plus our history …”
Now it was my turn to chuckle. “Who are you trying to convince?”
She blushed. “I won’t lie, Jack. You’re a handsome fella. You were handsome ten years ago and you’re handsome now.” She reached out and gently placed her palm against my chest. “Some might say even more handsome.” She moved her hand away and winked. “Not me, though. You were much more handsome ten years ago.”
We both burst out laughing. And just like that, the spell was broken.
I stepped toward my desk and swept some Styrofoam takeout containers into the garbage. Then I picked up a nearly empty bottle of Scotch. “Drink?”
“No, thanks.” She tilted her head toward my desk. “You got a plant.”
“Yep. Right after I got out of jail.”
Cassandra nodded. “I heard you were Inside. What was it, a year?”
“Just under. The guy I supposedly assaulted decided not to testify.”
“Where were you?”
“The Don.” I poured myself a drink and drank it. “It’s not a jail anymore. A hospital bought it. My old cell is probably someone’s office now.”
It was strange to think about — some middle manager typing away in a cubicle where I once lay on my thin prison mattress and tried not to dream. Dreaming just made things worse. If you spend all your time Inside thinking about everything and everyone you’re missing, you’ll drive yourself crazy. Better to tuck your head down, read some books, lift some weights, keep to yourself. When I got out of jail, I was in great shape, at least physically. Lifting all that iron and staying away from booze had sharpened my physique something fierce.
I almost died when I was Inside. A gang of cons came at me with mop handles. They would’ve killed me, but a guy I knew called them off. That was Tommy. He had juice because his father ran rackets on the outside. He saved my life. When I got out, I tried to return the favour. I repaid my debt, but some shit went sideways.
Cassandra stared at me. “You okay?”
“I don’t like thinking about it. You know … jail.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No big deal. You sure you don’t want a drink?”
“It’s a little early for me.”
“You know what they say. It’s five o’clock somewhere.”
Cassandra watched me pour another. “That was something I never liked when we were dating.”
“What? Scotch?”
“Your drinking. You drink a hell of a lot.”
“I do.”
Cassandra bit her nails. “‘Never turn your back on a drug.’ You’ve heard that before, I bet.”
“You don’t trust me.”
She paused, carefully considering her words. “It’s not that I don’t trust you. I know you mean well. But … you know my history with drinking.”
I did. When Cassie was sixteen, she and her parents lived in Port Hope. Her home life was a mess because both her parents drank. I could relate. I never knew my dad, but my mom and all her boyfriends drank, too. One night while Cassie was at a friend’s house, her parents got into a big drunken screaming match. The screaming escalated into a fight. Cassie’s dad pushed her mom too hard, and she went crashing through the second-storey window and plummeted to the sidewalk. She broke her neck and died.
Apparently when the cops came, Cassie’s dad was there on the sidewalk cradling his wife’s broken body, rocking back and forth and sobbing, running his fingers through her long black hair. But it didn’t matter. There were no do-overs. There was no going back from that. Cassie went to live with an aunt and her dad went to jail. Cassandra never talked to him again.
A sudden stillness filled my office. Cassie glanced toward the plant, its dark-green leaves straining toward the light. “I think about my mom all the time. Like, what would’ve happened if she had stayed in Vietnam? Would she have lived? Maybe she would’ve died in the war, who knows? Either way, if she had stayed, she never would’ve met my dad. I never would’ve be
en born, but maybe she would still be alive.” Cassandra looked at me. Her eyes were wet with tears. “In Vietnam, they don’t call it the Vietnam War. They call it the American War. They’re still finding land mines in Laos and Cambodia. Still. Every now and then, a farmer goes into a field and blam.”
I set my drink aside. “That’s fucked up.”
“Yeah.” Cassandra looked around the room. “You still have your apartment?”
I shook my head. “Nope. Gave it up when I went Inside. Didn’t want to pay rent and have it just sitting there.”
“You could’ve sublet it.”
“Didn’t want strangers in my place.”
“Fair enough.” Cassandra’s eyes stopped on my new couch. “So you live here, then?”
“Mostly, yeah. For the past nine years.”
“Nine years of sleeping on a sofa.”
“I sleep over at Melody’s sometimes.”
There had been other women over the years. About a year after Cassandra left me, I met Suzanne. She was a bartender in one of my favourite bars. We hit it off and then we fell in love. My world was too violent for her, though, and she left for greener pastures. I still thought about her sometimes, and when I thought of her, I wished her well.
“Right. Melody.” Cassandra bit her nails. “I hope I didn’t mess that up for you.”
I shrugged. “She didn’t want to leave the club. I wasn’t going to carry her out by force.” I looked over at my glass of Scotch. So tawny, so smoky. “Fisher wants me to go back tonight and meet Anton.”
Cassandra’s eyebrows shot up. “It’s a trap.”
“Yeah, probably. But we’ve got to talk to Anton sooner or later.” I reached over, grabbed the glass and took a big sip. Almost instantly the warmth tingled through my body. “Don’t worry, I won’t go alone.”
Cassandra smiled her crooked little half smile. “And while you’re doing that … let me guess — I’ll be back at the safe house watching The River Wild.”
“It won’t be so bad. It’s got Meryl Streep, remember? Make some popcorn and get cozy on the couch.”
“Snuggle in with Vin.”
“I don’t think his boyfriend would like that.”
“Vin has a boyfriend?”
“Yep. His name’s Carl. He sells guns.”
Cassandra made a face. “You must hate that.”
“I don’t like guns, but what the hell.” I grinned. “Anything for love.”
CHAPTER 6
I don’t like guns, but I do like knives. Guns are too impersonal, too imprecise. Too many innocent bystanders get killed or hurt. Knives, on the other hand, are as personal as it gets. Using a knife forces you to get in close.
I had my big Bowie knife in a sheath strapped to my chest and a smaller knife strapped around my ankle. I strapped on a third: a lightweight but deadly diving knife. Would Fisher and Anton bring friends? They would have guns for sure. There’s an old saying, “never bring a knife to a gunfight,” but where’s the fun in that?
I dropped Cassandra off at the safe house, then headed back to the Starlight. It was around three o’clock, seven hours before my meeting with Anton and Fisher. I wanted to make sure Melody was safe and then I wanted to get her the hell out of there. She wouldn’t go to the safe house, but maybe I could convince her to hang out at Eddie’s casino for the night.
Bruno the manager saw me come in. A guilty look washed over his face and then he composed himself. He reached up and smoothed out his dyed-black moustache and sauntered over to me, a stupid smile plastered across his face. The dude was trying so hard to be nonchalant. I was surprised he didn’t break out whistling.
“Jack! Welcome back. Can I get you a drink?”
I thought back to Cassandra’s conversation. The hidden land mines still lurking beneath the surface. “No thanks. Melody around?”
Bruno looked relieved. “Sure, she’s around. She’s on again in about ten minutes. You sure I can’t get you —”
“Hey, Bruno,” I said, cutting him off.
“Yeah?”
“Next time you rat me out, I’m going to rip out your tongue.”
Bruno went white. I left him standing there and walked away.
The lunchtime crowd had thinned a bit. Back to the cubicles, boys. Someone had taken away the steam trays of chicken fingers and mac and cheese. Bobby the DJ was still in his booth, grinning his cocaine grin. He did a lot of coke back when I worked here, and by the looks of it he had only gotten worse. I could practically hear his teeth grinding from here.
I wandered over to the bar. The bartender, Veronica, came over and gave me a wink. “What can I getcha, Jack?”
“Club soda.”
She blinked. “With, like, vodka?”
“Not today.”
She nodded slowly. “One club soda, coming up.”
The bubbles fizzed into a glass. Veronica put the glass down in front of me and waited. I took a sip and slid a five dollar bill across the bar. “Keep the change.”
“Thanks, Jack.”
I took another sip. The bubbles fizzed on my tongue. It made me think of Pop Rocks. When I was a kid, we thought that if you put Pop Rocks and Coca-Cola in your mouth at the same time, your head would explode.
“There was a guy in here earlier — older guy, shaved head, silver goatee. I was talking to him for a bit.”
Veronica nodded. “Sure.”
“You ever see him in here before?”
She smiled. She had a beautiful smile. “Sorry. After awhile, they all start to blend together.”
“You ever see him maybe talking to Bruno?”
Veronica grimaced.
“What?”
“Bruno.” She shook her head slowly. “I like this job. I like the girls. The tips are good. But Bruno … that guy’s a creep.”
I waited, but Veronica didn’t say anything else. “I’ll talk to him.”
“Nah.” She flashed me her awesome smile again. “Don’t bother. I can handle him.”
“I’m sure you can.” I took a big drink of club soda. The bubbles burned down my throat.
DJ Bobby’s voice boomed from the speakers. “LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, PLEASE PUT YOUR HANDS TOGETHER FOR … MELODY!”
The crowd cheered as Melody took to the stage. She was dressed like an angel, white and radiant and glowing in the spotlight. She had a tinfoil halo and wings and everything. She was also wearing skimpy white lingerie. The lingerie wasn’t exactly biblical. But then again, neither were the halo and the wings. In the Bible, angels are more like a bad acid trip. Some of them have six wings and can burn you alive (the Seraphim), others have four heads, including an eagle head and a lion head (the Cherubim), and some are wheels within wheels, each wheel covered with eyes (the Thrones). A wheel covered in eyes isn’t something you’d ever want to see rolling toward you in a strip club. Or anywhere else, for that matter.
Melody was decked out like the classic pop culture angels we all know and love. She wasn’t playing it cutesy, though. The look on her face as she sashayed across the stage was pure power. A challenge. Can you handle this?
I stood dumbfounded, watching her glow. You ever see Marilyn Monroe in Some Like It Hot? She glowed like that. I couldn’t turn away. The bass boomed from the speakers. I stared transfixed as she shed her stockings. Frat boys hooted and cheered as she sailed her white bra out into the crowd. Then she wriggled out of her lacy white G-string. The crowd roared. Her pussy was mostly shaved, but right above her folds she had a tiny bit of blond fuzz shaped like a heart. She turned her back to the audience, giving us all a view of her smooth round ass. She looked over her shoulder, met my eyes, wiggled her wings and winked.
The frat guys were pushing and shoving each other, waving twenties in the air, everyone trying to buy a private dance. I eased my way past them. One frat boy, his face red from drinking, bumped against me hard with his shoulder. He sneered. I put my shoulder down and bumped him back. He went tumbling into his buddies. He came up snarling.
> Snarling Boy swung at me. I ducked easily. The boy was drunk. I decided to walk away. The kinder, gentler Jack Palace. The boy swung again. Fuck it. I punched him and he rocked back and fell to the floor. His friends were too stunned to catch him.
Tomasso and another bouncer, Quentin, were on us like flies on shit. Snarling Boy was still on the floor. One of his buddies with thick-framed black glasses and a fascist haircut (shaved on the sides, floppy on top) was trying to lawyer-talk the bouncers, proclaiming at the top of his lungs that I was guilty of assault and they were going to sue me, the bouncers, the club, and everyone else under the sun. I looked up and caught Melody’s eye. She looked pissed. Her green eyes flashed. She turned and stomped off the stage.
Tomasso helped Snarling Boy to his feet. He wasn’t so snarly now. Sheepish Boy was more like it. Fascist Lawyer was still braying on about due process. I thought, I hit the wrong guy.
“Forget it, Carleton,” Sheepish Boy muttered. “Just forget it.”
The Fascist Lawyer shut his trap. The frat boys lumbered off. Tomasso stared at me and slowly shook his head. “Jack, man. Why you always gotta piss in the punch bowl?”
“Sorry about that.”
I said goodbye to Tomasso and went backstage to meet Melody. Bobby the DJ was there with his mirrored sunglasses and his cocaine grin. He was leaning toward her, chatting her up. I walked right up to them and stared at Bobby. Melody turned and ignored us both. She pressed a cotton pad against her eyelid to loosen the glue of her fake eyelashes.
I kept staring at Bobby. He chuckled nervously. “It’s not what you think, man. It’s just, you know, when the girls sit down next to a dude and try to get them to buy a dance? The girls always pull out a scarf, right, and drape it over their seat before they sit down. It’s hygienic, right? Otherwise you get girls in G-strings sitting down all over the place and the health inspector gets antsy. Anyway, what I was thinking was … what happens to all those scarves at the end of the day? Straight into the laundry, right? Well, what if, instead, we sell those scarves online?” DJ Bobby licked his lips. “Big market for stripper butt sweat. You’d be surprised. It’s like how in Japan you used to be able to buy used schoolgirl panties from vending machines. Also, ’shrooms used to be legal there, too.” Bobby chuckled again. “Gotta figure that’s why there’s cartoon monkeys and big-headed mascots and stuff like that all over the place. Cartoons everywhere, man. They’ve even got cartoon monkeys on bank cards. I’m telling you. Magic mushrooms, man. These days, though, ’shrooms are illegal and they yanked the panties out of the vending machines. Too bad, man. I was thinking of moving.”
Carve the Heart Page 4