"He's out back with a few of the guys. I'll go get him if you—"
"That's okay, Angie." I smiled a little at her and she smiled back, grateful that I obviously meant her no harm. "I'm an old friend of his and thought I'd just say howdy. Out back you say?"
"Yeah! Yeah, just go around the back by the truck wash, he'll be there doin' his thing."
The truckers in the booth had begun to shift around again, and the day seemed brighter to everyone with the prospect of my leaving the immediate vicinity. Even the redneck on the jukebox was finishing his whiny tale of woe and loss.
"Great. I'll just go and surprise him."
Angie started to ask me if I wanted the blue plate special or whatever the hell she serves to her customers trying to fight off a methamphetamine jag, but she could see I was already out the door. As I closed the door behind me, I heard the guy at the counter begin his jabbering again.
I walked around to the back, past the diesel pumps and the reeking toilets, and could hear a couple of voices coming from around the corner.
The truck wash area behind the building was a concrete block wall about thirty feet long and ten feet high with a couple of spray hoses hung on the side. It was wide enough to pull a rig in and scrub some of the looser highway dirt off. The floor of the wash was also concrete, with a couple of drain holes in it. The heat had dried up any water that might have been left from the last truck. A few rusted oil drums lay at the head of the concrete wash-down.
Three men were standing next to the drums. All three were laughing and passing around a small black crank bottle, each one sniffing greedily at the brain buster. I made the smallest one as Del. He had grill grease all down the front of his ratty t-shirt and blue jeans. His long hair was dirty and his mustache was brown. His face was sunken and gray, teeth yellow, eyes burning with the meth.
The truckers with him were big men. Not quite my size, but big and strong-looking guys. One had on a black leather vest and biker boots. A Marine Corps tattoo hung on his big bicep and he had short black hair and sunglasses. His buddy was more a beer-belly, bar-fight type of guy in baggy jeans, cowboy boots and a bright red t-shirt. He was bald and fat but dangerous-looking. Not much in a foot race, but judging by the scars around his piggish red eyes, he'd seen his share of brawls. In a fight, he'd be more trouble than his friend. As Del took back the bottle, the bald one whipped out his chain wallet and began pulling out money.
I wanted to wait until their little deal was over. No sense in making things harder for myself. Not for three hundred dollars. I'd just go back inside and wait. But, besides not being very smart, I'm not very lucky either.
"You want somethin', buddy?"
Del had seen me and was looking at me, eyes glowing.
"You Del?" I asked, resigned to my fate.
"Yeah, he's Del. Who the fuck are you?" Baldy, barking off some chemical hostility.
"His ex-wife sent me to talk to him." I know, I could have lied but fuck it, I wanted to get this over with and get back home. As I waited for the response, I pulled my black leather gloves out of my back pocket, slipped them on and moved so that a concrete wall was behind me.
"Fuck! You shittin' me?" The black-haired marine obviously had one or more ex-wives himself, and the crank was telling him that I worked for every goddamn one of them as well. Probably worked for every ex-wife in the U.S. and Canada. Blackie was moving towards me quickly, his biker boots sparking off the dry concrete.
Del was grinning now. He was going to have my kicked ass boxed and sent back to his ex in Sonoma via UPS.
I could see that Baldy was content for now to watch his partner whip on me for a while, and then maybe get a couple of kicks in at the end. He was following his friend, but in no big hurry. Del was bringing up the rear, his boyish grin almost making him handsome again.
Blackie tried a cop move, snatching at my hair to get a handful to bring me down. But I ducked, rolled my shoulders and brought a tight left up into his belly. He grunted a strong "FUCK!" as the punch lifted him off the ground. Now you know why in a battle the Marines always go in first. They're stupid.
"Cocksucker!" Baldy was pissed now. His buddy fell hard to his knees, his purple face puzzled as to why he couldn't seem to breathe. Baldy played it smarter and tried to get as close as possible before grabbing me with his big meaty hands. He circled closer to my left, and at about two feet away, he feinted to his left and swung a vicious hook at my unmoving head. I was right about him. He was quick—and I was sure he was strong enough to take a lick and keep coming.
So I caught his punch in the crook of my arm. Using the bald man's considerable momentum, I locked his wrist and held it as he flew by. When he slammed into the wall, I torqued his trapped arm as hard as I could. The arm broke from the wrist up to the elbow with a loud crack. He screamed and collapsed, a huge cloud of dust rising around his bloated, jerking body. I kicked him in the head to keep him quiet. It worked.
Blackie was on his feet again, but he'd seen enough. He ran towards his rig like a lizard crossing the freeway. Unfortunately for my mark, he ran over the deadbeat on his way to his rig, and I only had to bend over and grab Del by his greasy hair to jerk him to his feet. The tires of Blackie's truck were already spitting gravel when I spoke to him.
"Pay your wife," I told him.
"Hey man, I ain't gonna—"
I smacked him, hard, while holding onto his hair. A great bloody clump of his scalp came off in my hand as Del flew some distance away. He crashed into one of the oil drums and fell to the concrete.
He lay on his belly and weakly tried to get up—his front teeth were broken in his mouth and he slowly spat chunks of them out along with a string of bloody drool.
He quit trying to get up and started to cry. I walked over to him.
"You pay your wife, okay?" I was almost finished.
He nodded his head, sobbing and spitting. I turned and started to leave.
"Iths…thshee othay?" I heard Del mumble.
Looking back I said, "I guess. I ain't no judge of how people are doin', Del. But she needs some goddamn money."
"I…thstill…lub hur!" His bloody sobs annoyed me.
"Del, I ain't no marriage counselor." I was about to tell him that in addition to paying me, she had also offered to blow me, but I'm not paid to inflict that kind of pain. I turned and—
"Mister! Watch—"
Someone yelled right as Baldy drove a blade into me, just above the hip. Stupid! He hadn't been out, just quiet.
The blade stuck in me as I spun away. Not giving me time to set myself, he bull-rushed me, catching me flush with a headbutt just under my chin.
I saw red and gold lights but kept on my feet. I stuck out a straight right as I fell back and caught him in the eye. With a pop, the leather glove cut a big gash just above his left lid. He grunted and stopped. That gave me a second to set myself and get to work.
Baldy squealed and rushed again, his broken arm held tight at his side. I caught him with a right-left-left combination that stung my hands but stopped him. I kicked down hard at his leg, and as the heel of my boot found purchase on the joint, I felt his knee give, all the tendons tearing. He screamed and fell on the other knee.
Stepping in tight, I knocked that bald fucking skull of his loose with as hard a right hand as I could bring without shattering every bone in it.
His eyes went back in his huge, shiny head and he fell over. I started kicking him hard in the nuts as he lay there. After the fifth kick, he didn't move or make any more noise so I stopped kicking.
My head was spinning as I grabbed the slippery handle of his switchblade. Gritting my teeth, I pulled it out. The blood on the tip was black.
I looked over to where I had heard the warning, and the kid from the end of the counter was standing there. His brown eyes wide, he stared at me. As I moved towards him, I knew two things.
One: I was losing a lot of blood inside. If Baldy had gotten my kidney, I'd bleed to death in a few minutes. Two:
if I passed out here and didn't die, the cops would pull my record and I'd be back in prison for another, longer, stretch. I'd prefer to bleed to death.
Either way, it was going to happen soon. I couldn't see the kid any longer. I looked down and the concrete began to turn black and runny like hot tar. The tar was making it hard to walk and my legs were being sucked down into the sticky glue that swirled beneath me. A hole in the ground began to open, and the black tar was turning purple like the warm gooey blood seeping out of me. A hot wind blew me over and I fell.
Just so you'll know, I've done some pretty bad things. I've busted bones and heads because I'm too stupid and lazy to get a decent job. I've beaten men so badly they lost eyes or worse. Once in Chino, I raped an eighteen-year-old boy because the man I was working for wanted him broken in rough. I've killed men.
I'm one of the bad guys.
I'm not some misguided retard, I know right from wrong. I do wrong anyway.
I'm telling you all this because I don't want you feeling sorry for anything that happened next. I had it coming.
AUTHOR BIOS
Christopher Fulbright is a former journalist turned technical writer with fiction published by DarkFuse, Delirium Books, PS Publishing, and some other folks. He still writes articles and conducts interviews from time-to-time. His non-fiction has appeared in Cemetery Dance and Texas Highways magazine. His latest novella The Midnight Order is now available, and a horror novel written in collaboration with Angeline Hawkes, Night Wraith, is slated to appear in the next few months. More info is available at his website: christopherfulbright.com.
Nick Kolakowski lives and writes in New York City. His work has appeared in Shotgun Honey, McSweeney's, Crime Syndicate, the North American Review, and other venues. He does not endorse grenade launchers as an acceptable way of settling property disputes, although the idea has a certain warped appeal.
Preston Lang is a writer from New York City. His first crime novel, The Carrier was published in March 2014 by 280 Steps, and his second, The Blind Rooster came out in October 2014 from Crime Wave Press. His short fiction has appeared in All Due Respect, Spinetingler, and Brick Prison, and he writes a monthly column for WebMD.com. He also teaches a little math and works for a moving company.
David Rachels' noir stories have previously appeared in Pulp Modern, Shotgun Honey, Near to the Knuckle, Flash Fiction Offensive, and Dark Corners. Also, he is the editor of the Gil Brewer short story collection Redheads Die Quickly and Other Stories.
Travis Richardson has been nominated for Anthony and Macavity short story awards. His novella Lost in Clover was listed in Spinetingler Magazine's Best Crime Fiction of 2012. He has published stories in several publications including Thuglit, Shotgun Honey, Flash Fiction Offensive, and All Due Respect. He edits the Sisters-In-Crime Los Angeles newsletter Ransom Notes, reviews Anton Chekhov short stories at www.chekhovshorts.com and sometimes shoots a short movie. His latest novella is Keeping the Record and his latest story is "Quack and Dwight" featured in Jewish Noir. tsrichardson.com
Rena Robinett currently has six short stories published in various magazines, e-zines, and anthologies with international and national publications; and self-published one science-fiction novelette, Breed.
Dale Sandlin is a writer, playwright and actor in Los Angeles. His short story "The Return" was published in QPB Presents: The World's Best Shortest Stories (of all time). Dale has had several plays produced around the country. His original musical, The Snow Queen was recently produced to critical acclaim at the Fremont Center Theatre in Pasadena.
William R. Soldan lives in the Rust Belt city of Youngstown, Ohio, with his wife and son. He graduated with his BA in English from Youngstown State University. He is currently a student in the Northeast Ohio MFA program and a teacher of English Composition at YSU. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in a number of publications such as Quail Bell, Sanitarium, The Fictioneer, Floyd County Moonshine, New World Writing, The Vignette Review, Elm Leaves Journal and others. You can follow him on Twitter @RustWriter1or find him on Facebook (as Bill Soldan). He's even joined Instagram, because, hey, why not?
TODD ROBINSON (Editor) is the creator and Chief Editor of Thuglit. His writing has appeared in Blood & Tacos, Plots With Guns, Needle Magazine, Shotgun Honey, Strange, Weird, and Wonderful, Out of the Gutter, Pulp Pusher, Grift, Demolition Magazine, CrimeFactory, All Due Respect, and several anthologies. He has been nominated three times for the Derringer Award, thrice shortlisted for Best American Mystery Stories, selected for Writers Digest's Year's Best Writing 2003, lost the Anthony Award both in 2013 AND 2014, and won the inaugural Bullet Award in June 2011. The first collection of his short stories, Dirty Words and his debut novel The Hard Bounce are now available and his upcoming novel, Rough Trade will be released by Polis Books in 2016
ALLISON GLASGOW (Editor) drove a Cadillac through the gates of Hell and returned with a fistful of dollars.
JULIE MCCARRON (Editor) is a celebrity ghostwriter with three New York Times bestsellers to her credit. Her books have appeared on every major entertainment and television talk show; they have been featured in Publishers Weekly and excerpted in numerous magazines including People. Prior to collaborating on celebrity bios, Julie was a book editor for many years. Julie started her career writing press releases and worked in the motion picture publicity department of Paramount Pictures and for Chasen & Company in Los Angeles. She also worked at General Publishing Group in Santa Monica and for the Dijkstra Literary Agency in Del Mar before turning to editing/writing full-time. She lives in Southern California.
"CITY OF ROSE has my favorite kind of hero, a tough guy romantic with a smart mouth and a dark past. Terrifically written, and populated with rich characters, this book had me by the throat from page one."
—Chelsea Cain, New York Times bestselling author of ONE KICK and HEARTSICK
"ROUGH TRADE isn’t always pretty, and it isn’t always nice. But it is a brave, unflinching portrait of working-class prejudices wrapped up in a doozy of a crime story and delivered by one of the most assured, distinctive voices in the genre today. "
–Chris Holm, author of THE KILLING KIND
ONLY 300-SOMETHING-SOMETHING SHOPPING DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS!!!
Featuring NEW stories from Rob Hart, Hilary Davidson, Angel Colon, Terrence McCauley, Johnny Shaw, Jen Conley, Justin Porter, Thomas Pluck, Ed Kurtz, Jordan Harper and Todd Robinson
THUGLIT Issue Twenty-One Page 10