Torpedo Juice

by Tim Dorsey

  “No!” said Coleman.

  “Yes!” said Rebel. “Fernandez loses it. Starts screaming at the kid: ‘Out! Out! Out!!!’ I heard the guy literally jumped down the whole last flight of steps. Took Fernandez a whole ’nother year to build a replacement ship.”

  “The guy get his promotion?” asked Coleman.

  “Yeah, he got his promotion all right,” said Rebel. “Fernandez prides himself on his word. Then right after, they cut him in half with a table saw.”

  “A table saw?”

  Rebel nodded. “Lengthwise.”

  “I’m telling you he doesn’t exist!” said Sop Choppy.

  “Does too,” said Rebel.

  “Then how come nobody’s seen him coming or going?”

  “He drives this big white Mercedes, but the windows are tinted.”

  14

  A BIG WHITE Mercedes with tinted windows drove past the No Name Pub. Air conditioning on 65. The suspension made it feel like the sedan was standing still. It was the S600 class with the massive V-12 engine, liquid-display global navigation system and a manufacturer’s suggested retail price of $122,800.

  There were four men in the Mercedes. Actually five. The last one was in the trunk, pounding with fists.

  Bang, bang, bang.

  The driver tooted from a cocaine bullet and looked in the rearview. “He better not be fucking up the lining.”

  All the men in the car wore bright tropical shirts. The one sitting across the front seat from the driver cracked open a Heineken. “Why didn’t we just shoot him back on the mainland? That way he couldn’t mess up your car.”

  The driver whipped out a giant nickel .45 automatic and stuck it between the man’s eyes. “I told you! Because this is just like the beginning of Goodfellas. I love that scene! Goodfellas is the second-best movie ever made!”

  Not those stupid movies again. All the other men in the car knew what the Number One film was, and it was also how they finally realized that the driver had gone completely insane. The movie was what started the whole nickname business. Fernandez demanded you call him that or else.

  It had been hard to tell for a while about the insanity thing. Between Fernandez’s original personality and the cocaine, he’d always been a nervous experience, even when he was working his way up as a deckhand unloading pot. Now that he was at the top of the organization and had more coke than he needed, it was beyond intolerable. There was never any conversation in the Mercedes that Fernandez didn’t start himself. Many trips were silent the whole way down the Keys, except for the near-constant tooting up that made them all tremble. One toot closer to pulling that big gun again.

  The Mercedes crossed the bridge over Bogie Channel to No Name Key. Fernandez was leaned over snorting when the miniature deer wandered into the road.

  The Mercedes maintained a steady sixty miles per hour. The guys glanced at each other. Fernandez was doing an extra-long series of toots, even for him. The man in the front passenger seat finally cracked and grabbed the dashboard. “Doug! Watch out!”

  Fernandez looked up and slammed the brakes. Another car would have screeched to a halt, but the antilocks quietly eased the sedan to a stop a few feet from the unstartled animal. It trotted into the brush. The .45 automatic was back in the passenger’s face. “What did you call me!”

  The passenger replayed his own voice in a loop inside his head. Shit, he’d called him Doug.

  “I didn’t mean anything by it,” said the passenger. “Just the excitement. We were going to hit that deer.”

  Fernandez pressed the gun barrel against the passenger’s forehead. “What do you call me!”

  “I’m sorry…. Scarface.”

  Fernandez unconsciously touched the three-inch scar on his left cheek. “That’s better.” He put the gun away and hit the gas.

  Scarface. Film Number One. There was a time when the guys had actually liked the movie, but none of them could stand it anymore. They were forced to watch it at least three times a week, the whole time Fernandez repeating lines along with Pacino to work on his accent. They didn’t think it could get any worse until the anniversary special-edition DVD came out, and they also had to watch all the bonus material on disk two.

  The Mercedes turned south on a dirt road and wound its way into the swamp, finally parking under a secluded stilt house. They got out and opened the trunk.

  Fernandez sniffed the air. “Did you pee in there?”

  The hostage shielded his unadjusted eyes from the sunlight. “Oh, please! God! No!…”

  The other three yanked the man out of the car. His legs went limp, and they had to carry him up the outside staircase. Fernandez unlocked the door. They threw him down in the middle of the room.

  He sat up on the hardwood floor. A large-screen TV at one end of the room; a big oak desk with a model ship at the other. Also, watercolors and oils: fly-fishing, sunset, a woman hanging laundry in Bimini. Some of the paintings hung on the wall over a two-hundred-gallon aquarium. The hostage wasn’t looking at any of it because he was busy wiggling backward across the floor while Fernandez kicked the stuffing out of him.

  “I didn’t do anything! Please! I’m begging!”

  Kick.

  “You idiot! You fool!” Kick. “Billy was wired for sound up in Fort Pierce.” Kick. “The feds heard every word you said!” Kick. “That’s how they got all those lovely indictments!” Kick.

  “I didn’t know! I swear!”

  “You’re supposed to!” Kick. “That’s what I pay you for!”

  “Please!…I’ve always been loyal!…”

  Fernandez shot a look to the other three men. They stepped forward and jerked the man to his feet. “No! Anything! I’ll give you money! I’ll leave the country!…”

  Fernandez walked across the room to the aquarium. “Bring him here.”

  “W-w-what are you going to do?”

  Fernandez didn’t answer, just addressed the others in a low voice. “Give me his right arm.”

  The trio tightened their grip on the struggling man. One grabbed the requested limb below the shoulder and forced it forward. Fernandez seized it by the wrist.

  The man was now more confused than terrified, until he looked in the tank…. His head snapped toward Fernandez. “Piranhas?”

  “You need to be taught a lesson. Not to be so stupid.”

  Fernandez pulled the arm over the tank and lowered it toward the water. Fish gathered near the surface. Now the struggling really started. And the crying.

  “Don’t be such a baby,” said Fernandez. “Take your punishment like a man.”

  “I’ll be more careful next time! I’ve learned my lesson!”

  “You have?”

  The man nodded as hard as he could.

  Fernandez released the arm, and the man clutched it to his chest. “You…uh…you’re not going to stick my arm in there?”

  “Nah, I’ve changed my mind.”

  “Oh, thank you. You won’t regret this. Thank you! Thank you!…”

  “Don’t mention it.”

  Fernandez suddenly grabbed the hair on the back of the man’s head and slammed his face into the tank. The water broiled and turned pink.

  The rest of the crew winced and looked away but didn’t dare release their grips. Fernandez began laughing. He held the head down a good while after the resistance had stopped, then let go. The lifeless body collapsed to the floor, carotid spurting.

  The crew turned green, staring in any direction other than down.

  Fernandez pointed at the floor. “C’mon, look at him. It’s funny.”

  They couldn’t bear it. Not without throwing up in front of Fernandez, and you definitely didn’t want to do that.

  “Okay, be that way. I try to have some fun with you guys….” He walked around the oak desk and dropped down into the butterfly chair. He grabbed a cocaine mirror with one hand, a remote control with the other. “Go get some towels and clean up this mess.”

  The crew headed for the door. They
heard the TV come on behind them at max volume.

  “I bury the cock-a-roaches.”

  15

  T HE GANG IN the No Name Pub gave up trying to convince Sop Choppy of Scarface’s existence, and instead turned their efforts to Serge’s love life.

  “I still say you should try Brenda,” said Bud. “She’s nuts about you.”

  “And hot as they come,” said Rebel. “My God, any guy on this island would love to be in your shoes.”

  Serge shook his head. “I told you. Something’s missing there.”

  “Have you been seeing anyone else?” asked Daytona Dave.

  “Thought I’d found the perfect woman this morning,” said Serge. “But it didn’t work out.”

  “What happened?” asked Bud.

  “He got tear-gassed,” said Coleman.

  “What approach are you using?” asked Sop Choppy.

  “He follows them at a distance with binoculars,” said Coleman.

  “That never works,” said Bud.

  “You come on too strong,” said Sop Choppy. “What you need to do is relax, forget about marriage for the moment and just try to strike up a friendly conversation like a normal person.”

  “They’ll see that coming,” said Serge. He moved his right arm in a wide circular motion. “You have to sneak up from the back side.”

  “I’m going to do you a favor,” said Sop Choppy. “I want you to walk up to a woman right now and start talking. This very minute.”

  “Where?”

  “Right here.”

  “In a bar? Are you crazy?” said Serge. “The force fields are up. I always have the worst reactions.”

  “Worse than pepper spray?”

  “He’s got a point,” said Bud.

  “I don’t see any available women, anyway,” said Serge.

  “What about her?” said Sop Choppy.

  “Which one?”

  “The petite number in back with the sunglasses. She’s sitting all alone. I bet she’d just love for you to come up and talk.”

  “I don’t know….”

  “Consider it batting practice,” said Sop Choppy. “Go on now, get over there.”

  The others: “Do it, Serge.” “Come on, Serge.”

  He took a deep breath. “Okay, here goes nothing….”

  The gang watched as Serge walked over to the table and started talking. After a few seconds, the woman jumped up and ran out of the bar crying.

  Serge came back to his stool.

  “Jesus,” said Bud. “What on earth did you say to her?”

  “Nothing. Just, ‘Why the long face? You look like someone died.’”

  The screen door opened. A large group of people streamed into the pub and stood silently behind the stools. Bud tapped Serge on the shoulder and pointed.

  Serge turned around. “Oh, no. Not you guys again!”

  They didn’t say anything.

  “Who are they?” asked Rebel.

  “These people from the cult meeting. It’s a long story.”

  Some in the group held tape recorders toward Serge.

  “Go on now!” said Serge. “Shoo!”

  They just stood there. A few took snapshots.

  “Why won’t you leave me alone?”

  A man in the front piped up. “Because you speak the truth.”

  “I lie all the time. Ask anybody.”

  The man turned to the rest of the group. “See? Everyone lies. But he’s the only one who tells the truth and admits it.”

  Serge made a whining sound. “Why me? Don’t you guys have some guru or messianic folk singer to follow?”

  “Yes,” said the one in front. “But we found out they had other agendas. Wanted to screw all the women and have the rest of us put our houses in the churches’ names. Or they were selling herbal supplements. But you’re different. You don’t have any agenda at all.”

  “Oh, I’ve got an agenda all right. I want to be left the hell alone!”

  The man turned again to the others. “Doesn’t even want to be followed. That means he’s The One.”

  Serge raised his arms toward the ceiling in exasperation. “Why are you doing this to me?”

  “He’s calling on The Father.”

  “No! Stop it! It’s a figure of speech!” said Serge. “What can I do to get you to go away?”

  “Give us a message.”

  “Message? Okay, I have a message. Here it is: Do as I do. And you know what I do? I follow nobody. You got it? I follow nobody at all. That’s exactly what all of you should do: Follow nobody!”

  The group exchanged glances. “Follow nobody?” Then nods. “Follow nobody!”

  They wandered out the screen door, chanting: “Follow nobody. Follow nobody…”

  “Hey, I got an idea,” said Rebel. “I know the perfect woman for you. Real outdoorsy type. Saw her fishing on the bridge when I came in here. Probably still there.”

  “What are we waiting for?” said Sop Choppy.

  “I don’t think so,” said Serge. “This hasn’t been a very lucky day for me.”

  “Come on, Serge.”

  The gang coaxed the reluctant suitor off his stool and out the door. They started up the road to the bridge. Serge’s mood brightened. “I love the fishing scene!”

  “There you go,” said Rebel. “You already have something in common with her.”

  They passed a man with barbed wire tattooed around his upper arms, working a spinning rod, Marlboro hanging from his mouth. Then a pair of African Americans cutting bait and listening to a cheap radio.

  “There she is,” said Rebel.

  “Where?”

  “At the very end.” He pointed at a tall, freckled redhead in shorts and a black sports bra, gathering up the skirt of a nylon cast net. “Her name’s Daryle.”

  “I’ve never seen a babe cast-net before,” said Coleman.

  The woman expertly folded lengths of mesh, gripping the braided retrieval cord in her teeth.

  Serge’s mouth hung open.

  The woman started spinning on the bridge. She took a couple quick steps toward the railing and twirled the net high in the air, lead weights evenly fanning out before slapping down in the water.

  “What do you think?” asked Rebel.

  “I’m in love.”

  The woman reeled the net back over the rail, depositing a respectable quantity of flopping fish on the bridge.

  “You’re up,” said Bud.

  “I’m too nervous….”

  The guys pushed Serge in the back. “Go talk to her.”

  Serge walked up and stood a few feet away. The woman was gathering the net again and didn’t see him at first. He coughed. She looked up.

  Serge was bouncing on the balls of his feet with a big smile. He tried to speak but nothing came out.

  The woman wound the retrieval line. “Can I help you with something?”

  “…I-I love you!…Shit!…I mean, love cast-nets. That’s an eighteen-footer, isn’t it? Must have cost a hundred.”

  “Hundred fifty.”

  “Yes, sir. You have great style. Not many men can handle an eighteen-footer. That didn’t sound right, did it? I’m completely behind Roe v. Wade. Can I try?”

  “You want to throw?”

  Serge smiled.

  “Do you know what you’re doing?”

  “Of course.”

  The woman shrugged. “Okay, just don’t get it all fuckin’ tangled.”

  Oooooo, sassy, too! She could be the soul mate, thought Serge. Don’t blow this. I’ll impress her with my cast-net mating dance.

  They all stood back as Serge bunched the net in a flurry of motion. Once it was ready, he counted off large steps to the opposite side of the bridge. He leaned with his back against the far railing, closed his eyes and took a rapid series of deep breaths.

  “Serge,” said Sop Choppy.

  “Not now.”

  “But, Serge—”

  “I’m concentrating. I have to prepare the mental pla
ce.”

  “But I’m trying to tell you…”

  Serge opened his eyes and took off running. He reached the middle of the bridge and began pirouetting with tremendous centrifugal force like a discus thrower. Painful grunting noises, spinning faster and faster. Finally, he reached the railing, sprang up and released with a mighty “Hiiiiiiiiiiyyyyy-yahhhhhhhhhh!”

  The net deployed perfectly, sailing higher and farther than anyone had ever seen before. They ran to the side of the bridge.

  “I was trying to tell you,” said Sop Choppy. “The wrist cord—”

  They watched the net splash into the water and sink to the bottom of Bogie Channel with the retrieval line.

  Captain Florida’s log, star date 384.274

  Old Wooden Bridge Fishing Camp, Cottage #5. Today we launch a new Captain Florida feature: Serge’s Word Corner. Here are a few bon mots on the state of the language. Milieu, Zeitgeist, Ennui: these belong to a group called “the asshole words.” People who use them are compensating for something deeper. Bolt: a simple word, except in fabric stores when it becomes a bolt of cloth. Can’t get enough of that. Picaresque: always a compliment, as in, “Who’s my picaresque bastard?” Babbittry, tautology, sophistry: All mean the same thing, and it isn’t important. Skip over them when you read…. Any-hoo, it’s midnight. Women everywhere pissed at me. What did I do? All I ask is an average relationship and in return I get burning eyes and now own a cast-net at the bottom of the sea. The gang tried to cheer me up back at the No Name before I had to rush Coleman to the emergency room after a bar bet that somehow resulted in a small seashell getting pushed all the way up his nose until it went through the hole in his skull and fell down into the nasal cavity. I didn’t even know what was going on until Rebel and Sop Choppy were shaking him upside down behind the pool table. They asked Coleman if it was helping, but he just said, “I can feel it rattling around behind my eyes.” The doctors got it out with these incredible probes and sent him home with a bottle of painkillers. I can’t tell you how old these overdoses are getting. Back to the hospital, where they pump his stomach, yielding the medicine, some corn chips, a half pint of Yoo-hoo, five-alarm chili, small chicken bones and a shirt button. Then they told me to take Gomer home. I said his name’s Coleman, and they confided a little hospital slang: Get Out of My Emergency Room. So they injected him with a sedative, rolled him to the curb and told me, “Good luck.” Good luck indeed. Coleman is an unwieldy shape without convenient handholds, and getting him in the trailer when he’s dead weight is an engineering feat. I found an old block-and-tackle behind the dive shop and rigged it to the roof of his porch. Then I got a Styrofoam cooler, cut a U-shape in one side for his neck to go through and set his head in it. I poked some airholes in the lid and taped it on, so his face wouldn’t get smashed in case he rolled. I tied the pulley to one of his ankles, and everything’s going as planned. The ratio is down to fifty pounds. Suddenly, these dogs that roam our neighborhood pick up Coleman’s scent and start nipping his arms. I yell for them to get away, but I don’t want to drop the rope. That’s when Coleman wakes up and finds his head entombed and freaks out. He grabs the white block on his head with both hands and starts running all over the yard screaming, which made the whole cooler hum. You know that Styrofoam hum? That part was actually funny. Then he’s trying to get that dog whistle of his into his mouth, but he can’t because of the cooler and all. Anyway, the rope is still tied to his ankle, which is how the porch roof got ripped down, and he finally runs full speed into the side of the trailer, knocking himself cold. He’s sleeping like a baby now, but I’m completely awake, sitting here listening to my biological clock tick. I think I need to start working out. That’s it, exercise. Perfect timing, too. The big annual footrace over the Seven-Mile Bridge is this weekend. That’ll be my first workout. Tomorrow’s word: roman à clef.