“It’s the very same car, my man. I hauled it out of the impound yard myself.”
Emilio clapped him on the shoulder, his eyes pinpoints, his grin manic. “I been spending nights and weekends on this since I don’t know how long.”
Deal knew Emilio was waiting for him to say something, but it didn’t seem possible. Where to begin? Just a car, on the one hand, that’s what he was staring at. An ’83 Seville, its rear seat and trunk chopped away, the whole thing transformed by Cal Saltz, his long-dead friend and car junkie, into a gentleman’s pickup, an El Camino of a higher order. The last time Deal had seen it, a police wrecker was winching it up from a full-fathom-five parking spot at the bottom of Biscayne Bay. It had nearly cost Janice her life, and his as well.
“My cousin did the mechanic work,” Emilio said. “He’s been through it top to bottom. Also, we dropped a ’67 V-8 in there, runs like a sonofabitch without all that emissions crap.”
Deal glanced up at the sign above the bays, still speechless: “EMILIO AND RODRIGUEZ, FINE COACHWORK,” the sign read. Four years before, it had been “EMILIO AND SON, FINE CABINET-WORK”: Emilio’s father and Emilio, who’d built kitchens and bathrooms and dens full of bookshelves for DealCo, for Deal and Deal’s father before him.
Then, after the hurricane, with Emilio Sr. retired, had come “EMILIO AND RODRIGUEZ, BACKHOE SERVICE”: Emilio and his cousin with the big machine, down from Tampa to work four hundred days straight, big money, clearing deadfall and debris from shattered homes. Now, with that work long gone, the pair were in the body shop business. If he lived long enough, Deal thought, maybe he’d see the two cousins in advertising, or maybe banking: “EMILIO AND RODRIGUEZ, FINE SAVINGS & LOANS.”
“What are you going to do with it?” Deal managed finally. He felt the silent chirring of the phone pager in his pocket, but ignored it.
Emilio stared at him, an odd expression on his face. “Do?” He turned and swept his hand at the car again. “I’m giving it to you. This is my gift to you, man, make up for that fuckup on the Terrell job.” Deal nodded. Emilio was referring to the cabinets that had never been delivered, one last job, a favor to Deal, forgotten when the body work beckoned.
Rodriguez had come out of an adjoining bay, paint mask pushed down around his neck, wiping his hands on a cloth. He came to stand beside Emilio, and though he was not smiling, Deal knew Rodriguez was just as eager to see his reaction. Emilio tall and lean, with his boyish good looks and grin that made it hard to be angry with him, no matter what the screwup—and there had been many; and Rodriguez, short and stocky, a bushy handlebar mustachio and a bandit’s tough stare—both of them with the coppery skin and high cheekbones of the Indios. Deal felt a wave of affection sweep over him, and for a moment he thought he might weep. All the effort he’d expended to wall himself in about to be swept away at the sight of two charming bandits and the car they wanted to give him.
“It’s a great job,” Deal managed. “Unbelievable.” He found himself moving forward, his hand tracing the curve of a fender. The acrylic paint was luminescent, flawless beneath his touch. God knew how many coats were on there. He glanced back at the two. “But I can’t take it, Emilio. Really.”
“The parts didn’t cost us nothing,” Rodriguez said. “We put in a little time, that’s all.”
“You got us a lot of jobs, man. You had your share of trouble. We wanted to do something for you.”
Deal took a deep breath. How could he explain it to them? That what they thought was a prize seemed more like a portent of disaster. Hey guys, I got my wife back but now I’ve lost her again and somehow it seems it’s this car’s fault? The beeper was going off in his pocket again, vibrating like an angry insect.
“What I told Emilio was, a man loses his ride, his special ride, it’s like he loses part of himself, especially if it’s somebody tried to take it from him, you know?”
Deal nodded. He’d never heard Rodriguez approach philosophy before.
“This is a special car.” Emilio nodded. “We wanted you to have it back.”
Deal looked back at the Hog, found himself kicking a front tire like a buyer on a used car lot. New Michelins, he noticed, mounted on oversized chrome rims. He pulled the beeper from his pocket, still angling for the right words, then stopped when he saw the number on the readout: it began with 911, then gave a number with a Broward exchange. Only one person up that way who knew his code for an immediate callback.
He glanced at Emilio. “I have to use the phone, okay?”
“Use the one in there,” Rodriguez said, pointing at the Hog. Deal stared, puzzled, then noticed the little antenna poking out of the roof for the first time. Emilio tossed him a set of keys. “Some guy drove a ’Vette into a pillar on I-95. The wrecker guys said he still had this phone in his hand when they scraped him up.”
“He must’ve paid in advance or something,” Rodriguez said. “I used it to talk to my mom in Colombia a couple of times.”
“Go on,” Emilio said. “You have to start the engine, though.”
Deal was about to protest, then felt the beeper go off again, this time in his hand. He sighed, got in the Hog, searched for the ignition key. Surprising how comfortable the leather seat felt, as if he were dropping into it again with hardly a day gone by. He turned the key and the engine came alive with a rumble he felt more than heard, a throb that made the car seem capable of flight. The phone, mounted on a little console pedestal, beeped to life. He shook his head, picked the thing up, and dialed the number.
“Barbara?” he said, when she picked up.
“Deal?” she said. He heard it in her voice, knew it was bad before she told him a thing. Some things you never forget, he thought, even as she explained what it was about. She was on her way out the door, she said, could he meet her somewhere down his way in an hour. Then she broke off, fighting her tears to tell him how sorry she was for presuming. She was being silly. She’d understand if he couldn’t make it. It wasn’t that important. Sure.
After he’d hung up, Deal sat silently in the car for a moment, his hands gripping the wheel, staring out the windshield down a road trip from the sadder past. For the first time in years, his life had seemed in order, disaster far at bay: business on the upswing, his wife on the mend, his daughter happy and thriving…
And then, Janice—stalwart, impregnable Janice, who’d weathered more physical trauma than any dozen people should have to without so much as a whimper—had suddenly caved in. Even this offending car had come back into his life. And now, there was Barbara, Miss Tough-as-Nails herself, sounding like she was ready to go off like a rocket. It had to be a dream. In a moment, he was going to wake up, laugh it off, go back to his real life.
He heard a tapping noise and realized that Emilio was at the passenger’s window, trying to get his attention. Without thinking, his hand found the controls, sent the window gliding swiftly down. Deal smelled fresh paint, lacquer thinner, a trace of male cologne.
Emilio was pointing out into the courtyard. Startled, Deal saw his own pickup speeding off, banging over a speed bump and into the street.
“My cousin, he had to run over to the bus station for some parts,” Emilio said. “I didn’t think you’d mind.”
“Goddammit, Emilio,” Deal said. He was trying to force the door of the Hog open, then realized he’d somehow locked himself in. He was searching now for the control buttons, but, because he was actually looking for them, didn’t have the slightest idea where they were. “I have to go somewhere, Emilio.” Deal heard the whine of his voice in his own ears. “I’ve got to go!”
Emilio nodded, his good-natured grin in place. “Well, why don’t you drive your car, man?”
Deal stared back at him, fuming, ready to explode. But what good would it do? He’d seen Emilio suffer the outrage of the most apoplectic contractors and homeowners: threats, harangues, pleas, they all washed over placid Emilio like heavy surf against the rocks. What chance did he have of thwar
ting the intentions of this man who wanted to do a good deed?
Deal sighed then, and mashed the accelerator down. Emilio was still grinning as Deal took the Hog out of the bay, chrome-clad Michelins squealing all the way to the street.
***
Deal idled at a traffic signal, waiting to swing onto Ocean Drive at 5th Street, noting a Santa mannequin in one of the corner shop windows. Christmas, he thought. He’d forgotten that holiday was coming up. But then, given the state of his life, he could be forgiven, couldn’t he?
He did notice that the Santa in this particular window wore his big white beard and red cap, but very little else that was traditional. His red suit was gone, his boots replaced with sandals that laced up his skinny plaster legs. His chest was bare, his big gut hanging over a thong bikini that barely concealed his anatomical correctness. Christmas on South Beach, Deal thought, as the light changed and he piloted the Hog easily through the turn.
And how the Hog had changed. If Emilio had performed a miracle of coachwork, Rodriguez had done an equally amazing job on the car’s infrastructure, Deal had to admit. Not only was the engine responsive to the slightest touch of the accelerator, the old-style suspension had been beefed up as well. Now the old boat cornered like a sports car, and, if he wasn’t careful, snapped his head back as he moved off every light. The Hog had become, in the words of its original owner, “an automobile.”
He was well up the boulevard now, spotting The News Café, then a parking space opening up just in front of him. A lucky break, he thought as he eased into the spot. A sandwich sign across the street advertised valet parking for only $8.
He got out of the Hog, marveling at the solid clunk of the automatic door locks falling into place. From the time he’d taken it over from Cal, he’d never been able to lock the thing, automatically or otherwise. Even the door seemed to shut in a satisfying way, more the sound of a meat locker closing than the crash of metal he remembered. Maybe Rodriguez should go to work for Cadillac, he thought, lay his magic touch on all that big iron.
He fished a couple of quarters out of his pocket, stepped to the curb to plug the meter, had to dodge a pair of bikini-clad girls in Rollerblades whizzing down the sidewalk. He watched them go, thinking that the last time he’d been on South Beach, most of the foot traffic had been using walkers.
He glanced around the stretch of grass that separated the boulevard from the broad band of beach. A long-haired guy tossing a Frisbee to a tireless mutt, a lemonade cart tended by another girl in a microscopic bikini, a person of indeterminate sex bundled in what seemed to be several coats asleep beneath one of the palms.
He’d heard about it, of course, how the Beach had become hot, the crumbling Deco hotels given a coat of paint and a new set of room rates, the dodderers shoved off the porches where once they’d sat in rows, elbow to elbow, and stared out across the boulevard at the Atlantic. Now the porches and the shaded colonnades and the fanciful terraces had become sidewalk cafés and bars and restaurants of note, and glitterati from New York and Los Angeles crowded onto weekend flights just to schmooze along this ten-block strip where a dozen years ago you couldn’t have given away the property.
Another business opportunity he’d failed to foresee, Deal thought, as he stepped lively across the boulevard. There was a red Testarossa bearing down on him from the right, a bargelike Buick convertible from the fifties, meticulously restored, lumbering up from the left. He squeezed between a Bentley and a gleaming ’65 Mustang parked on the opposite curb, thinking, there is a serious car thing going on here, and took a backward glance at the Hog. It seemed to fit right in. Maybe someone would make him an offer, he could go home in a taxi.
He was also worrying that he had made a mistake in suggesting The News. The café was another facet of the “revived” South Beach that he had heard about but never seen. The place was a madhouse, tables spilling out onto the terrace, an adjoining courtyard, the sidewalk, all of the places filled, waiters and waitresses edging frantically through the throngs and the gauntlet of customers who waited under the front awning and clamored for a seat.
Deal glanced around, thinking that he’d collar Barbara when she arrived, take her somewhere where they could hear themselves talk. There was a Newberry’s over on Washington, in the old downtown, had been there since he was a kid. That was the ticket. Orange soda in a paper cone plopped in a silver holder, BBQ beef sandwich that was really a Sloppy Joe, grease-dripping fries in another conical cup.
He could taste it, suddenly, smell the tang of the ketchupy sauce, see the waitresses in their hair nets and starched white uniforms, feel his mother taking time out from the weekly shopping trip to wipe his mouth with a handkerchief she’d wet with her tongue…and thought for a moment that he was going to lose it, maybe just sit down on the curb and break into tears in front of all these pretty people and their automobiles.
“Deal,” he heard then. “Deal!” And looked up to see Barbara, standing on tiptoes at the door of the restaurant, as pretty as an angel, elbowing a guy in mirrored sunglasses aside, and waving him her way.
***
“I got here early,” she said, staring at him from across the wooden table. They were tucked away inside, in a rustic diner-styled booth, another world from the madcap scene outside. Although all the inside booths were full and the kitchen doors whipped steadily open and closed, the hubbub and the chatter seemed to be soaked up by the dark beams and paneling. Across from where they sat was a tiny library of books and newspapers—“feel free to browse,” the waitress had told them—which Deal assumed gave the place its name.
He took the intensity in her gaze until he was the one to turn away. When he’d met Barbara, she’d been coming off a years-long affair with her boss, one of Miami’s movers and shakers, a lawyer with more money than Croesus and an unshakable arrangement with his equally prominent wife. The guy had eventually gone down in flames, and Barbara had professed gratitude at the turn of fate that set her free. She’d moved to Boca Raton, found a job she liked, dated, lived like a normal person, as she put it. Still, Deal thought, still…
He turned back, uncomfortable with his own presumptions. Barbara had saved his life, Janice’s, too. She wanted him to walk on water, he’d walk. Never mind the way she looked at him. “So how’s your mother?” he said as the waitress brought them coffee. “How’s she doing?”
She glanced down at the table, shook her head slowly. “It’s not good, Deal.” She took a deep breath. “That’s why I got here so soon. I stopped at the hospital, but they wouldn’t let me in to see her.” She paused, trying to gather herself. “The doctors were doing some kind of tests…trying to find out whether her brain was still functioning…”
She swallowed, her voice starting to clutch. “…and I thought, my God, what if they walk out and tell me my mother is a vegetable and do I want to pull the plug…”
She stopped, tears spilling from her eyes now. She wiped them away with a napkin, fought to get her breathing under control. “I just couldn’t handle that, Deal. Not by myself. I just couldn’t. Do you know what I mean?”
He nodded, squeezed her hand, tried to think of something to say. The waitress was back suddenly—too soon, he was thinking, she’d just brought their coffee and why didn’t she buzz off…
“Chicken soup,” the waitress said, putting a steaming bowl down in front of Barbara, along with a thick wad of napkins.
“I didn’t order soup…,” Barbara began, but the waitress put a hand on her shoulder, shushing her.
“On the house,” she said, giving her a little smile. And then she was gone, whisking back into the kitchen.
Barbara picked up a fistful of napkins, blotted her cheeks. “That was nice,” she said, trying for a smile. She paused, glanced about the room. “I must look like a wreck.”
Deal shook his head. “You look great.”
“Such bullshit,” she said, patting his hand. She checked her reflection in the window, swiped at a sm
ear of mascara. She turned, crumpled the soggy napkins away, tossed her hair. Giving it her best to conjure up the old, carefree Barbara, he thought.
“I knew I’d be happy to see you, Deal,” she said. She gave him her brightest, perkiest look. “I’ll get through this.” If it hadn’t been for the red circles around her eyes, the fieriness at the tip of her nose, he might have bought it.
“Now how about you?” she continued. “How’s things in big-time contracting?”
“You’d have to ask a big-time contractor,” he said.
“Okay, I walked into that,” she said. She regarded him for a moment. “Tell me, does Janice ever get tired of gay repartee, push you to open up?”
He felt a twinge, felt himself nodding. “All the time.”
“And do you?”
Like a book, he was about to say, but somehow he couldn’t get the glib phrase out. His mind had emptied suddenly. There was a flash of bright light, like the moment before a projector cranks in the film, and then he was seeing Janice again, that day hardly a week ago, running from him down the steps of the Shark Valley observation tower, flailing at him, crying, stumbling, pounding the rough concrete with her fists and her face before he could get to her, her wails rending the wilderness with the essence of human misery.
“Hey…are you all right?”
Deal blinked. Barbara had reached across to take his hand.
“You just blanked out there. Did I say something?”
Deal looked about the room. He had the impression that he had screamed himself, but if he had, no one seemed to have noticed. People eating, drinking, chatting. One fellow pulling a thick book down from a shelf of the library.
“Janice is in the hospital,” he said.
“What?” She shook her head. “Another operation?” Her face filled with distress. “And I dragged you out to hold my hand…?”
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