Men of the Mean Streets

by Greg Herren

  “Good for you. I never make promises anymore. They can be dangerous.”

  *

  The television got three channels, but two of them were only showing infomercials. Conor Laughlin sat on top of the still-made bed, drinking straight vodka out of one plastic cup and tapping ashes into another, not really watching the dated sitcom on the screen and wondering what he’d do if the kid showed up.

  Small-town gay kid, desperate to get out of a dying town…willing to throw himself at the first stranger who passed through. He knew the need to connect with another human being, to feel warm flesh and experience passion. It had been a long time for him, too. But there was a fine line between that and taking advantage of a kid barely out of his teens, a good fifteen years younger.

  “But if you were that moral, maybe you wouldn’t have had to leave New York,” he told himself aloud, and the sitcom laugh-track punctuated his sentence.

  A little more than an hour after he’d left the bowling alley, he heard a cautious tap on the door. He almost missed it under the sound from the TV and the rain cascading from the roof through the broken drainpipe just outside the door.

  “Just a minute,” he hollered, dropping his cigarette butt in the plastic cup and crawling off the bed to turn off the television. By instinct, he gave himself a once-over in the streaked mirror before opening the door.

  Tay stood to the side to avoid the splatter from the drainpipe although he was already soaked and shivering from the short walk across the railroad tracks. Even though the door was wide open, he still asked, “Can I come in?”

  Conor nodded. When the door was closed, Tay looked at him warily. “This was probably a mistake.”

  “Have some vodka and sit down,” said Conor, handing him the plastic cup. “Sorry, we’re gonna have to share the last cup. You okay with that?” Tay nodded. “So why do you think this was a mistake?”

  “’Cause someone might’ve seen me coming here.”

  “And they don’t know you’re gay.”

  “Some do. Pretty sure people here at least know I ain’t like them. Hey, can I get a cigarette?” Conor offered him the pack. “Mostly I didn’t want Pat to see me come over here.” He lit the cigarette, then walked to the window, parting the heavy curtains slightly. “Don’t think he did, but…”

  “So your boss…he doesn’t know?”

  “He knows.” Tay took a drag from the cigarette, blowing out the smoke slowly. “Look, can we talk about something else?”

  “Whatever makes you happy, kid.”

  “For one thing, you can stop calling me kid.” There was steel in his voice.

  Conor took a step back. “Sorry. I didn’t mean any offense.”

  Tay tapped his cigarette on the edge of the other plastic cup, and the ash dropped into the yellow-brown water.

  “I know you didn’t. It’s just…I’m just…I…” His voice cracked. “Everything about this damn town is just…I have to get out of here.” Tay closed his eyes so tight the flesh in his cheeks turned red.

  “Are you all right?” Conor asked. The room was silent, the only sound the water gushing outside the door.

  “There are things you don’t want to know about me,” Tay said finally; his eyes still closed, a catch still in his voice. “And things about Pat Thursby no one wants to know.”

  “Did he hurt you?”

  Tay opened his eyes a sliver. “I told you, you don’t want to know. Just…can you take me to San Francisco with you?”

  Conor smiled sadly. “You know I can’t do that, Tay. I don’t even know you. And just jumping into a big city like that from little old Patience, Colorado, well, they’ll eat you alive.”

  The cup of vodka again rose to Tay’s lips and he drained it. When he was done, he looked away and said, “You think I can’t take care of myself? Let me tell you something, Conor. Once you get a reputation as a sissy-boy in a place like this, there’s plenty of guys that want a little action. The wife’s dead or out of town…the migrant workers…maybe they’re just bored or something…so they go find Taylor Harkness, ’cause everyone knows they can get a piece of that action. And one mouth’s as good as another, right?” He took a drag on the cigarette and dropped it in the cup. “And the worst one of all is Pat Thursby. Ever since his wife died last year… It’s just…” He lost his composure and lifted one hand to shield his face.

  Conor could think of nothing to say except, “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s my life here. That’s why I gotta get out of here.” He looked up at him, his eyes glistening. “You probably want me to go now, don’t you?”

  “No. I want you to stay.”

  “After all that?”

  “Especially after all that.”

  “And San Francisco?”

  “I’d like to help you, Tay. Really, I would. But I can’t. As it is, I’ve got maybe three hundred dollars left in my pocket, and San Francisco isn’t a sure thing, so that three hundred’s gonna probably have to stretch for a long time. I don’t think it’s enough for one, let alone two people.”

  “If money’s the problem…”

  “Gonna tell me you’ve got money stashed away? ’Cause the answer’s still no.”

  “I ain’t got a pot to piss in. Room and board with Thursby, as long as I work at the alley and…you know. But I know where enough money is stashed away that maybe you’d change your mind.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Thursby’s got a couple thousand bucks he keeps in a cashbox in the office. Rainy day money. We could grab that and we could hit the road. Be in San Francisco in two days, especially with two of us driving.”

  Conor thought about it. And thought better of it. “You don’t know where I’ve been, Tay. There’s a reason I left New York, and I’m not going to keep repeating my mistakes. You want that money, I can’t stop you. But I don’t want to know about it.”

  “Okay, let the old bastard keep his money.” Tay poured some more vodka into the cup without asking and sat on the edge of the bed. He wouldn’t look at Conor. “Sometimes when I hear the train come through town, I dream of getting out of here. Like going to San Francisco…or New York City…or even Denver. Every night I wait to hear the whistle. It’s the sound of freedom to me.” He turned to Conor. “I wonder if you can hear it from this room. Probably.”

  “Why don’t you stay for a while and find out?” Conor said, and he began unbuttoning Tay’s shirt, slowly exposing his pale, thin torso. Their mouths met, and—as Conor had expected—Tay’s lips were hungry for those of another man.

  The rest of him was hungry, too.

  *

  The first thing Conor heard in the morning was water pouring out of the drainpipe. He turned to the nightstand and looked at the clock. 7:30. Early morning by his standards.

  He lay back in the tangle of sheets while dim memories of the night bubbled to the surface. Tay had been there; now he wasn’t. Must have slipped out during the night, anxious to get home before Pat Thursby discovered he was gone. All for the best. The kid was probably all right, but Conor was trying to rescue himself from drowning and it wouldn’t do any good to drag someone else down with him.

  He showered in the bathroom that smelled of smoke and mildew, dressed and prepared to drive as far west as he could manage. Maybe if he could get a second wind he’d even be able to make it to San Francisco in the middle of the next night. First, though, he had to find coffee. He hoped the good citizens of Patience had somehow managed to keep a coffee shop in business, but doubted it.

  He was about to leave when he finally saw the note on the dresser.

  “I stayed until I heard the train. Freedom.”

  It made him smile.

  He grabbed his suitcase and left the room, sprinting between gushers from the roof to the space near the office where he’d left his car the night before. He’d kept his head down against the rain so he didn’t realize anything was wrong until he was reaching for his keys and saw the front left tire was flat.


  “Son of a bitch,” he muttered under his breath, hoping he had a spare.

  He stepped back from the car and realized the rear tire was flat, too. And there was no way he had two spare tires. He made a circuit around the car to check the passenger side, and discovered the other two tires were also flat.

  Four flat tires.

  This was no accident.

  “Are you Klein?” he asked angrily as he walked into the office, grateful that Tay had told him the name of the motel. It somehow made for a more personal connection, and he was taking things very personally at the moment.

  “One of ’em.”

  “Listen, Klein, my car’s in your lot with four flat tires. How are you gonna fix that?”

  The clerk shook his head. “Sorry, Mr…” He looked at the registration book. “Laughlin?” Conor nodded. “Sorry, Mr. Laughlin, but you signed a waiver when you registered sayin’ the motel isn’t responsible for damages to the vehicle or things left in the car. Would you like me to get a copy?”

  “Not necessary.”

  “Probably those punk kids from Sterling,” said the clerk, shaking his head. “I don’t know which are worse: the ones with parents in the prison, or the ones whose parents work at the prison. Anyway, I can call Luke at the garage and have him take a look.”

  “Do that,” Conor said, figuring he wasn’t obligated to add “please.”

  Tay must have been right about the town dying. How else to explain that Luke pulled up no more than four minutes later, in a white tow truck so dusty even the constant rain had only smeared it rather than cleaning it.

  “Four tires. And all you got is that donut in the trunk,” Luke said, a chaw of tobacco bulging behind his lower lip, repeating what Conor already knew. They were standing with Klein under the motel’s canopy in front of the door to Room 10, next to the office. Conor’s was the only car in the lot.

  “Okay,” grumbled Conor.

  Luke said, “This should run you about five hundred.”

  Conor wrinkled his brow. “Five hundred? That sounds steep.”

  “Tires plus labor.”

  “What about retreads?”

  Luke scowled, worked his chaw, and began calculating again in his head. “More like three, three-fifty, I guess.”

  “I don’t have that kind of money on me.”

  Luke eyed him. “Can you get it?”

  “Guess I’m gonna have to,” said Conor, but he couldn’t think how.

  “Might take me till tomorrow to get the right retreads.”

  Conor sighed. “Just get it done as soon as you can.”

  “Okay, then,” he said, wiping his hands on his shirt. “I’ll get your tires, check your oil…”

  “Just the tires. Just the absolute least amount of money it’ll take me to get out of this town.”

  Luke smiled, but it wasn’t a happy smile. “Impatient, Mr. Laughlin?”

  “That’s a Patience, Colorado, joke, right? I get it.”

  “Okay, then. I’ll take care of your car.” He grinned. “When you get the money together, you get it back.”

  “Fair enough.”

  The truck backed up and Luke hoisted the car onto the flatbed. Conor had an unsettling feeling the punk kids from Sterling had sentenced him to a stretch in Patience that would make their incarcerated daddies feel like day-trippers.

  When the tow truck pulled out of the parking lot, the motel clerk—one of the Kleins—asked, “So you’re running low on cash?”

  “A little bit. Got any ideas?”

  “No, but…” He looked off into the rainy, misty sky.

  “I read you, Klein,” said Conor, peeling a handful of bills off his diminishing stash. “This should keep my room for a few days.”

  The man looked at the cash. “Two days.”

  “If I’m still in Patience two days from now, just shoot me.”

  Klein nodded and walked away. Conor was afraid for a moment that he’d sealed his execution. No one in this town had much of a sense of humor, and he was starting to join them. Had it really been just a few days ago when he was in New York and everything seemed so much better? Not necessarily good…but better.

  He heard a whispered “Conor” that was almost drowned out by the rain. He turned to see Tay, his head just peeking out from the far edge of the building.

  “What happened?” Tay asked, when Conor reached him.

  “Apparently my car was attacked by some punk kids. You see anything last night?”

  “No way! The car looked fine when I left.”

  “Know who those punk kids might have been? Maybe I can make them pay for this.”

  Tay shook his head. “Sorry, but I’m the outcast, remember? The punks don’t want anything to do with the sissy-boy, and…well, I don’t want anything to do with the punks. If I can help it.” He paused. “You don’t think…well, what if one of them saw me come to your room?”

  Conor took it a step further. “What if Thursby saw you come to my room? You think he might have done this?”

  Tay kicked the soggy gravel. “Shoot. But…no, Pat was out cold when I left, and he was out cold when I came back.”

  “Okay then.”

  “So how much is this going to cost you?”

  Conor shook his head. “More than I’ve got.”

  Tay shook his head. “Sorry.” He paused. “Sorry about sneaking off last night, too. It’s just, well…you knew I couldn’t spend the night, right?”

  “I know. We’re fine.”

  “Good.” He offered Conor a slight grin, which sort of complemented his bad haircut matted down by the rain. “Listen, I got to get back to work, but let me know how things work out.”

  “I will.”

  “And if you change your mind about taking me with you…”

  “I won’t.”

  “Okay, then, but remember what I said about the cashbox.”

  Conor frowned. “Listen, Tay. Please don’t ever mention that again. I’ll figure this out. Okay?”

  Tay puffed out his lower lip, but more in play than protest. Even with the rain and gray skies, a new day seemed to have brightened his attitude.

  Although who knew what the night would bring.

  His room paid up for another few days, Conor asked Klein for directions to the nearest coffee shop. Klein told him there was one a ten-minute walk away. He found it and took his time trying to wrap his head around Patience, Colorado. He went back to his room and sat on the bed through the late morning and afternoon, trying to figure out where he’d get the money to get his car back.

  Because, he thought, the problem with pretty much burning all of your bridges is that it proved a man could be an island.

  Especially when Patience, Colorado, was flooding around you.

  *

  Before he left New York, he’d borrowed some pocket money from Artie Green. Maybe Artie could make him another loan. He managed to get a signal on his cell phone and punched in the 212 area code and seven other digits. His call went to voice mail, so he left a brief message and prayed he’d call back.

  A few hours later it finally stopped raining. Or at least took a break. Artie still hadn’t returned his call. He’d had quite enough of talk shows and game shows and TV judge shows while he’d sat in bed and tried to think how he could score a few hundred dollars—and quickly—if Artie couldn’t or wouldn’t come through.

  The only thing he was sure of was that he wasn’t going to get it from Pat Thursby’s cashbox. Not that he had other options, but he wasn’t going to compound the mistakes that had turned his life into…this.

  But if Thursby’s cashbox was off-limits to him, his bowling alley wasn’t. He downed the stale sandwich he’d picked up that morning at the coffee shop and, around seven, decided he was thirsty and frustrated and unhappy, and a trip to the closest bar in probably three towns was in order.

  Thursby was sitting on a bench outside the front door and frowned when Conor approached, sidestepping the puddles and mud outside the bowling
alley.

  “Evening,” said Conor.

  “Leave the boy alone.”

  Conor, almost past him, stopped and turned slowly. “Excuse me?”

  “I told you to leave the boy alone.” Even from several yards away Conor could smell beer and cigarettes on Thursby’s breath. For a moment his temper flared—maybe even enough to match Thursby’s—but he swallowed it down. He wanted to tell Thursby that if anyone should leave Tay alone, it should be Thursby. But he’d be leaving Patience soon enough…as soon as he could find a couple hundred bucks to pay for the retreads. Tay would be left behind. No sense in giving Thursby more reason to make the kid’s life even more hellish than it was. He left Thursby sitting on the bench.

  Inside, a few people bowled. The old couple was there again, wearing matching blue sweaters. He watched a solidly built teenage girl sling her ball almost immediately into a gutter, and walked to the bar. Tonight Tay was waiting there, as if expecting him.

  “Oh, hey,” he said, as Conor took a seat. “Vodka and…something?”

  “Sure. Surprise me.”

  “Don’t say that. You never know what you’re gonna get with me. I’ll make the usual.”

  “It’s like I’m a regular.”

  “In this place? You are.”

  He started to make the drink, pausing only to grab a Coke for the Solid Girl, finished and set it down in front of him.

  “Any luck finding money to pay for your car?”

  “Not yet. But I’ve got a call out to a friend who might be able to help me out.”

  “Hope it works out.”

  “Thanks.”

  Tay absentmindedly wiped a glass, one hand repeatedly twirling the bar towel without inspecting his work. As he rubbed, he said, “I ever tell you how Flo died?”

  “Flo?”

  “Florence Thursby. Pat’s wife. She died last year, right there behind lane three.”

  “You don’t say. What happened?”

  Tay first looked to the door to make sure his boss wasn’t coming, and then out over the lanes, making sure the bowlers were preoccupied.

  “Got crushed by the pin-setter one night.”