Jackboot

by Will Van Allen

  “YOU’RE UNDER ARREST!” he screamed indignantly. The other cops were eager to make it so.

  “Shut up!” Anders said. Cheering erupted anew. He swung his head at the porch. “You too!” His beet-red face turned on her dad. “Get on out of here, McConnell. Go cool off for Christ’s sake!”

  “Get in the truck,” her dad said and she did without a word. Shaking from fear and still a little drunk though sobering up very quickly she was afraid she might barf so she powered down the window for air.

  As they drove away she heard, “Why’d you let that bastard go? Oh shit! My gun! My gun’s missing! He has my gun!”

  “Shut up, Nate,” Anders said. “He set it down in the street. I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.”

  The motherly joy reception at home was short-lived as Boobilicious squeezed her like she was four and then grounded her for the rest of the summer. It was all for show, as likely to happen as the original Nirvana getting back together. With a little wheedling her mom would relent in a couple days and liberty would be restored. Her dad was another matter.

  “Drugs, drinking, older boys? You’re dressed like a damn hooker. What the hell is wrong with you?”

  Her earlier fear was quickly replaced with an all too familiar swelling sea of anger.

  “Me? Me? There’s nothing wrong with me! I’m not a kid anymore, but I guess you’d have to be around to notice! I’m a woman, I make my own decisions!”

  “You’re a spoiled little girl!” He was yelling now. They’d hear it from the neighbors tomorrow. Probably from as far away as Coeur d’Alene.

  How totally fucking embarrassing.

  “Katie, right now, I’m so angry, so disappointed in you—”

  “You’re angry and disappointed in me? Go to hell!” she screamed and stormed into the house.

  She had waited all day, told Mariah to go to the mall without her, hadn’t gone over to the Willard’s to swim in their pool, didn’t go outside unless she had her cell and the cordless and he never called. Her mom had said he would, but was that a surprise? No, it never was. So fuck him! He couldn’t have it both ways! He couldn’t be mad and tell her what to do and not do whenever he wanted!

  She cried herself to sleep, her makeup smearing its way across the pillow. In the morning her mom coddled her with blueberry waffles and bacon, she didn’t rag on her or anything. When she finally got around to asking about her dad her mom looked up with a frown.

  “He didn’t tell you, did he?”

  “What?”

  “He’s gone, honey. Some work in Boise. Won’t be back for a week.”

  CHAPTER 21

  JULY

  Portland, Oregon

  He was running late but his date would wait, and he was a poet and he didn’t even know it.

  He caught his smile in the rearview mirror. There was no one there to appreciate its charming, impeccable quality other than the golden moon rising up ahead, and it was tacit in its admiration as he sped down the highway for one of the seedier pockets of the city.

  How bittersweet freedom was. No more boredrooms or monotonous meatings. Let his sister pretend to enjoy suffocating while grazing among the mundane—she probably did, the fat cow. Oh, he would dazzle the blue-blooded, Xanaxed skanks his sodden mother sent his way, even occasionally dicking their hand-me-down, re-engineered cunts but damned if he would enjoy it. Fucking women was such a tedious business and he despised business. But one did what one had to do. His allowance a pittance, it most certainly beat wasting time on common occupation.

  He glanced at his Bulova. 11:43 p.m.

  Time. That’s all that life was really about. Measured. You could judge a man by the time he kept. Which was why he was always late. A punctual man might respect time but wasn’t respected in turn. Being late was power. Making others wait for you was robbing them of their time, demonstrating they were less than you, they knew it and there was nothing they could do about it. What greater gift could someone give anyone but their time? What greater power was there but to take others’ time away when they didn’t want to surrender it?

  All the imbecilic waiting he had suffered through in life, staring at clocks, waiting, and more waiting, always for something, for someone, the light to turn red, his plane to board, a refill of his cocktail. More often than not it was for something to finish: tiresome lectures, his mother’s soused discursions, Granddad’s tirades, his sisters’ twitting over closeted preppies or yet another ghastly gown for another god-awful cotillion. Waiting, waiting, waiting. He loathed waiting. Yet he was exceptionally good at the Waiting Game. A master, really.

  Tick-tock-tick-tock.

  One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi…

  Sometimes he’d improvise.

  One eager beaver, two eager beaver…

  A Portland police car raced by in the left lane in a hurry to arrest some unfortunate soul. His breath caught for a moment. He shook his head. That bitch. He still found the sight of police unnerving. You suicidal bitch. Got what you deserved, didn’t you?

  She had been an 847. A high number considering his need, stood up for the second time in as many nights, she had been a ripe, vulnerable contingency to punish for Franco’s infuriating impudence. Arousing enough with her boyish hair and rounded bottom, her urgency to be shamed was irresistible. That damnable gash of womanhood always so unclean, so unsatisfying, he had plunged in and wrecked her other hole without even a courtesy wiggle of a pinky. Her insecurity, her ingratiating need as a weaker creature to be fulfilled by his stronger self, her shy self-consciousness at the bar so easily exploitable—these were her most endearing qualities. He hadn’t meant to knock her out. Where was the fun in that? Humiliation was just another word for foreplay. The filthy whore awaking to her nightmare, crying and puking and bleeding…Now that was memorable.

  847. Fourteen minutes and seven seconds, not counting the hours spent lubricating her up with drinks, sitting on her lumpy, plebeian sofa, smelling her nasty cats, pretending he cared, what a mind-numbing bitch. What a waste of his fucking time. And then the accusations? The jail? His loss of his time?

  We reap what we sow, sweetheart.

  Taking the next exit, he glanced in the rearview, ran fingers through his hair, unbuttoned the top two buttons of his cream silk shirt. Smoothing his dark blue chinos, he pinched his penis with thumb and forefinger through the combed cotton. Whether it was the memory of Miss 847 or the Viagra kicking in he was in for a wonderful night. The bright face of the moon was still coldly indifferent, but what did it know?

  He parked, dug into his front pocket, nudged the condoms out of the way and retrieved his snuff bullet. He took two quick snorts in each nostril, the coke far inferior to the blow in the Riviera or Ibiza. Portland was hell. But one made do. Like the Audi he was driving. It’s dented, humdrum-gray abomination served as ride and occasional boudoir, his “slummer for the summer.” Couldn’t very well be out and about in anything proper and Italian. Not in this shitty neighborhood.

  The area had seen better days but he had been in far worse, slums of the most wicked kind, where money bought anything imaginable. What was a rundown, boarded up, refuse-choked hood in America to him? Ah, the coke was working its magic. Vampires, demons and devils beware! A mightier monster prowled this night!

  He was walking around the corner from the broken red neon of Checkers bar when Kevin stepped out of the shadows.

  “You’re late, Alan,” he pouted.

  “Sorry love, couldn’t be helped. Make it up to you?”

  His eyes roamed up and down his date. Kevin wasn’t the usual ghetto-twink he picked up down here. Tall, he actually made his navy Dockers and dark jacket look less cheap than they were. His hands were deep in his pockets. He looked cold. Well, Alan would warm him up in no time. “Shall we get a drink?”

  Kevin cocked his sunny-blond head and offered him that rugged smile. “A drink isn’t going to make it up to me.”

  “Well, aren’t we the eager beaver?” />
  Kevin maintained that his wife was in the dark about her husband being queer but Alan had his doubts. More likely the whore tolerated his stepping out because he made decent bank as a lawyer in Forest Grove, the breeder probably getting her own strange on the sly. Or there was no breeder at all. Whatever.

  “Shall we get a room? I could really make it up to if you’d like to get a room. My treat, of course.”

  “I was thinking something more…immediate. Then a few drinks. Maybe a room later? How about down there?” Kevin nodded down the dark street, smiling shyly.

  “Lead the way, my pretty.”

  The coke and Viagra really humming now. At the mouth of an alley he grumbled, “We don’t need to trek halfway across the state.”

  “Sorry. Nervous. Just down here,” Kevin implored, his face beautifully suburban in the gray moonlight. He wanted to do unsavory things to it, to Kevin’s tight ass in those 501 Blues, and that wasn’t just the drugs talking. He was in a wrecking mood.

  They ended up in an inner courtyard of an old bakery, bricked in by high walls. The air was rank with sluggish water. “This should do.”

  “Perfect. Ten points for Kevvy!” He moved in close, taking his shy date by surprise. The reek of damp and rot and garbage wrinkled his numb nose but he was beyond caring. “Unzip me,” he commanded.

  Kevin swallowed, slowly drew Alan’s zipper down. “Like I said, I’ve never—”

  “Yes, yes. Shut up. Just get on your knees and put my cock in your mouth.”

  Kevin slowly dropped to his knees.

  He was rock hard. Just met the married dolt that afternoon and here he was about to blow him without a jollybag. He muffled a giggle as his chinos bunched down to his ankles and he was free as a bird in the breeze. He glanced at his watch in the pale moonlight, closed his eyes in sweet anticipation.

  One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi…

  Ppfffft!

  He doubled over in agony as lancing pain struck his groin.

  Warmth ran down his thighs. He drew in air to let out a shrill scream but a latex-gloved hand smothered it to silence as his feet were swept out from under him, thank God, he needed to lie down, the pain was excruciating. He landed hard, the hand still tight against his mouth. Dazed from the impact, the wind knocked out of him, he snorted air through his nose as Kevin’s face filled his vision.

  Seven Mississippi, eight Mississippi…

  “Stay with me. You with me, Alan? Nod if you’re with me.” He was in pain but with him. He nodded. “Remember Angela Flynn? Remember raping her? Nod if you remember, you fuck.” He nodded again. He remembered. It was then he realized this was not Kevin. Kevin had been nervous, bashful. This Kevin, this Not-Kevin was way too cool by far, his eyes no longer so alluring, they were hard and cold flint from somewhere deep in the earth. Not-Kevin wasn’t affable. He was very angry. Not-Kevin meant business.

  “That’s why you’re dead, Alan,” Not-Kevin said.

  His eyes widened in cold fear. Fifteen Mississippi, sixteen Mississippi…His hands began to explore the warm, thick gooey sensation below his waste.

  Not-Kevin glanced down at his groin. “Yeah. That’s right. I shot your dick clean off, Alan. It’s lying over there. Won’t be wrecking any more assholes now, will you?”

  Shock, he was in shock. His hands came away with a pasty rouge and tears started to well up in his eyes. Snot bubbled out his nose, he couldn’t get enough air, he needed to scream, reached to pull Not-Kevin’s hand from his mouth but Not-Kevin was strong.

  Twenty-seven Mississippi…

  Ppfffft!

  Pressure filled his heart. Alan Odom stopped waiting.

  Hillsboro, Oregon

  Struggling family man/sales rep Tom Woodridge was up earlier than usual. He poured his cup of their acerbic lobby coffee and it looked like he needed it, like he hadn’t gotten a wink of sleep. Job search must not have panned out. Too bad. She liked Tom.

  The small family-run motel east of central Portland was run down but clean. The coffee bitter but cheap. The rooms outdated but comfortable. But Tom never complained.

  “Checking out today, Tom?”

  “Yep. Back to Butte. Thanks for everything, Connie.”

  Connie checked him out, which was quick since he’d paid cash up front for his week’s stay. Normally they required a credit card but it was a recession, after all, and Tom Woodridge wasn’t the only credit-ruined, broke soul out in search of work. Too bad he was already happily hitched; her oldest, on divorce number two, could really get her act together with a decent man by her side. Decent and handsome with those earnest hazel eyes. Tom was the kind of man you could trust to get things done.

  “Take care, Tom. Good luck. Anytime you’re back in the neighborhood—”

  “This is where I’ll stay. Thanks again, Connie.”

  Tom Woodridge threw his leather bag in the back seat of his Chevy Malibu, slid behind the wheel and headed east.

  Tom Woodridge’s Montana license read he was forty-two, six-one, two hundred pounds with blue eyes and blond hair. He was an organ donor. It rested comfortably in the wallet of the man driving into the glare of a glorious morning. Said license had been filched from a sleazy establishment known as The Whore, where he’d stopped in ostensibly to shoot the shit one morning. When the ugly barkeep slipped in to restock the walk-in Tom went behind the bar and ransacked the cigar box that held misplaced and confiscated IDs.

  It had taken six days of finding, trailing, trapping and finally killing the rapist bastard Alan Odom.

  Odom had been hanging his hat at the family manor, a sprawling sixty acres in Goose Hollow, secured by man, dog, and too many cameras and security systems to count. During the day Odom ate at bistros and cafes with the haut monde who could stand him, then crawled and slimed his way through clubs, bars and pubs, some refined, many downright seedy at night. He gave nothing of value in return for his existence. More pathetic than decadent, Odom was a parasite.

  At a gas station along the Columbia Gorge Tom tossed into a dumpster the bagged up clothes he had worn the night he had met Odom outside of Checkers.

  It wasn’t their first meeting. That had been in the day, at the same dusky bar, its shades drawn to encourage young ghouls to venture in and strut and hustle for a few bucks for their fix or a more permanent sugar daddy. The industrial neighborhood in decline for decades, the chance of running into someone you knew from the golf club or church was remote, which lured in a coterie of well-dressed men pretending not to know each other while they admired the parade of potential paramours with impressive disinterest. Gay? Me? Please! I just stumbled in here. I have a wife at home, four beautiful children, thank you very much! I’m a monster on the racquetball court! I have an eight handicap! How could I possibly be a blazing butt pirate? The alley and hourly motel down the highway contrary to such hetero proclamations.

  It was his carelessness and/or inexperience which made their introduction.

  “Are you following me?” Odom stood at his table, lazily stirring a cocktail with affected boredom.

  His blank look was not affected. For a split second he had been lost in thought, staring at his flat beer, and that was all the time needed for his quarry to reverse roles and sneak up on him.

  “I saw you at The Silverado last night.” Odom threw on his disarming smile and extended a hand. “I’m Alan. I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure?”

  “I don’t think we have, no.”

  “Love the hair. Care for a drink…?”

  “Kevin. Sure.”

  Odom wrinkled his nose at the one before him. “Beer’s so proletariat. You feeling Caribbean or Mediterranean?”

  Kevin was struggling with his sexual identity and revealed as much after one daiquiri. By three they were flirting with the idea of carrying their conversation to more private quarters though Kevin was nervous, and excused himself by confessing his boss was going to have his balls in a jar for such a late lunch and he did love his wife. It
wasn’t so much his imagination as it was Odom’s prejudice and assumption that crafted the narrative. Odom knew things and wanted to show he knew them. He had dimmed, then brightened when Kevin suggested they meet up later that night if he could slip the leash. Odom had tossed a hundred on the table and as he left drew two fingers along Kevin’s cheek.

  Kevin (Tom) had returned to the hotel and showered, scrubbing his skin and golden hair, gelling and spraying for added measure. Not because he felt dirty being touched by the man he aimed to kill but to reduce as much culpable DNA as possible. His prints weren’t on file, but he had taken the precaution of wearing gloves anyway. There was always powder residue. Better safe than sorry seemed the apt motto of the trade.

  A tryst turned robbery gone angry. He had cleaned out Odom’s wallet, flung the sealskin billfold onto the body before gathering up the two spent casings. It had been bloody. He had expected his adrenaline to spike, it hadn’t, though his emotions had. He had been wrong; there was a satisfaction in killing the sonofabitch after all.

  Tom caught sight of his hair in the mirror. The reddish gold was still disorienting. Desert Sunrise, Clairol called it. His eyes were the same. Those eyes caught the glint of a wedding band on his finger. He tugged it off and into a pocket. He drove east.

  In Boise he returned the Malibu to Alfredo’s Good Deal Rentals, whose advantage over their chain competitors was they loved cash and didn’t ask a lot of questions. Alfredo called him a taxi for the airport where Tom Woodridge took a shuttle to a Park ’N Fly, jumped into John McConnell’s Titan, handed over a hundred to the kid in the booth and headed back up US-95.

  It was hot. He drove with the windows down.