Wrong Flight Home (Wrong Flight Home, #1)

by Noel J. Hadley

  “Hell, we can’t let them treat her like that,” Tim motioned after a moment of silence licking our wounds, rubbing the trickles of crimson flow from our noses. Funny thing was we were all thinking the same thing.

  That’s when we rose to enter the bar, or so our story goes, as Logan told the boys, to beat on bikers or take another beating like men. We all agreed.

  “A life used spending the currency of mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing,” Michael told me, picking a wedge of glass from his flesh.

  “Who said that, Emerson?” I rubbed my jaw then checked to see if all of my teeth were still attached. On further inspection, my balls were still accounted for too. Alex patted me on the back.

  “No, Shaw,” Michael said, wiping the blood from his nostrils.

  We stood on our feet, all eight of us, clinched our knuckles, and reentered Hog’s Breath. The beating to follow wasn’t nearly so bad as you’d think.

  13

  It wasn’t long after we’d returned into Hog’s Breath to beat or take another ridiculous beating at the hands of obvious professionals that the whine of sirens interrupted our evening. Thank God.

  “You’ve got to get me out of here,” Alex explained between another gauntlet of kicks and punches. A bottle shattered over someone’s head. “I’m on parole. If the police arrive, I could end up in prison for a very long time.”

  “Alright, let’s go.” I grabbed Alex by the collar and ushered him out the back door amongst the fluster of chaotic scatter. Michael followed.

  Tim and Logan tried to coax the woman in the Van Halen t-shirt to be rescued in their getaway departure. She said they were very sweet. “I had a wonderful time.” She kissed Logan underneath his swelling eye and then left with Baldy on the back of his bike.

  By the time the first of what I imagine to be many cop cars arrived on the scene, screeching to a halt, dozens of bikers were already rumbling up and down the street like chaotic flies and Tim and Logan had piled their groomsmen into two cars with the prerogative that we’d all regroup in the morning for Tim and Tina’s wedding vows. Nobody was arrested.

  Within half an hour Alex, Michael and I had found a PANCAKE HOUSE situated at the north end of the strip, near the Stratosphere. We slumped into our booths and sighed. Our waitress, her nametag read FANNY, said we looked like non-fossilized dinosaur dung and she’d give us a little more time to look over the menu if we needed it.

  “This is sort of embarrassing,” Alex finally said. His breath reeked of alcohol, and now that I thought about it, he stammered. “But I just got through a series of court-ordered anger management sessions. About half a year ago some guys came to rough me up at the docks in the Port of Long Beach. Let’s just say at the end of it Meat-Duck was the last man standing and the court awarded my heroic survival skills by sending me to anger management in the place of prison, thanks to an excellent family lawyer. If they caught me breaking parole tonight I’d probably go to prison. Thanks for getting me out of there.”

  “Wait, hold on,” Michael said. “Some guys came to rough you up at the docks.”

  Before Alex could explain FANNY returned with her notepad. She wanted to know if we were ready to order. I said we’d have three coffees.

  “You don’t want any pancakes?” She seemed disappointed.

  “Just three coffees will do. Thanks Fanny.”

  She shoved her notepad back into her pocket and flustered away.

  “I work for my father-in-law,” Alex said. “And they don’t. Those guys push papers for another employer, and let’s just say they were sending my father-in-law a message about the kind of papers that needed to be pushed.”

  “What does your father-in-law do for a living?” Michael wanted to know. I was speechless. Even FANNY, who had returned with a coffee pot, was speechless. I eventually thanked her kindly for the coffee and flashed my grin until she left.

  Alex didn’t answer. He looked out the window at several passing headlights and the various discount knick-knack stores that all competed against each other but always seemed to sell the same souvenirs (Vegas shot glasses or Vegas sweaters or Vegas post cards and pink plastic sunglasses that utilized Viva Las Vegas as eyebrows) on the north end of the strip.

  “Oh, I see,” I sighed, breathless, mostly from the pain. “It’s that kind of work.” I was disappointed. I didn’t think Alex had it in him, not the Alex that I knew.

  “Giorgio Mancini, he was born in northern Italy. Let’s just say he’s an importer of goods.” Alex finally said. “Then again, so were the other guys.” He forced a grin. But then again, it may have been authentic.

  “So it was a territory dispute.” Michael sipped on coffee. “Over imported goods?”

  “When I met Gracie, I had no idea what kind of work her father did for a living. I was touring with my rock band, Dumb Angel. It was 2003. She was just one girl in the crowd. What are the chances, right? By the time I fell in love with her, I surmised what he did for a profession and accepted it, and the way he brought me into his family, especially since I didn’t have one of my own, I embraced it.”

  “What about your father,” I said. “Is he doing alright?”

  “My father died rather unexpectedly. This is crazy, but…. he was murdered… right in front of me.”

  “Dear lord.” Michael frowned.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said.

  “That was several years ago. September 10th, 2001. I have the date memorized for obvious reasons. Imagine watching your father murdered right in front of you… in your own childhood home, and waking up the following morning to an attack on the World Trade Center. The fact that the entire world had changed didn’t matter nearly so much as the way the rug had been pulled out from under me.”

  “That’s why I never saw you again.”

  “I’m going to track him down. And when I do…”

  I waited for him to finish his sentence. He never did.

  “You just disappeared and dropped out of college. I never understood why.”

  “Well, now you know.” He forced another smile. “Dumb Angel had something to do with it. I put a lot of focus on that. We recorded an album and toured until the band disbanded a couple of years later. All I know is,” he leaned forward, “Giorgio Mancini is into some bad stuff. As grateful as I was that he took me in, I don’t want anything more to do with it. I’ve probably already said too much.” He slumped back into our booth. “I want out.”

  There was a disparity in his voice when he said he wanted out, such that I’d never heard in him before.

  “Did Mancini retaliate?” Michael wanted to know.

  “At the docks? No need.” Alex pulled another genuine grin. “Not if you stop to consider I was clearly the last man standing.”

  14

  Michael and I were sprawled out on two queen-sized beds watching Ellie Alexander describe her new book Babies Are Atheists to Larry King on CCN, holding packets of ice to our heads. After the interview we switched stations back to The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.

  “So that was bizarre,” I finally said.

  “Joshua, I get this feeling that every single outing with you somehow ends with the bizarre.”

  I opened my mouth to refute his claim, but nothing came to mind. I opened my mouth a second time. Still nothing.

  “So you haven’t seen Alex since college?”

  “Not since August or early September of 2001. It’s been almost seven years. What are the chances?”

  “Do you believe him?”

  “You mean, is he full of it? He was my college roommate for two straight years, and every single day I knew him he was full of it. But that doesn’t mean what he’s saying isn’t true.”

  “His father is murdered. He joins the mob. And he was drunk as a skunk, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “He never said he joined the mob.”

  “Fine, whatever. It’s that kind of work, paper pushing or something. Whatev
er it is that this father-in-law of his, Giorgio Mancini, does for a living, that’s a lot to unload on us at PANCAKE HOUSE. I think he’s full of it.”

  “That’s irrelevant. His sudden arrival into my life wasn’t without purpose. He unloaded what he did because he was desperate and he knew that I was someone he could trust. I intend on helping him.”

  “Joshua, that’s not a good idea. My gut feeling says don’t get involved with this guy.”

  “In college we were quite the item.”

  “I remember.”

  “His friendship meant a lot to me.”

  “I remember.”

  “With my participation in the North Tower, and the fact that I took that entire semester off college, I guess it took me a while to realize he’d gone AWOL. I was sad to learn that he had moved on in our friendship.”

  “You’re talking about the Alex from several years ago. This isn’t the same guy.”

  “They’re both one and the same.”

  “No, they’re not.”

  I didn’t want to argue.

  “Joshua,” Michael finally said. “You know I’d be Samwise Gamgee to your Frodo Baggins any day of the week. I’d go all the way to Mount Doom with you if you asked me to.”

  “I feel an analogy coming on.”

  “This Alex….”

  “In college I called him Meat-Duck.”

  “What was your name again?”

  “Prosexionist.”

  Michael stared at me. “That’s a stretch.”

  “Remind me not to have you write my biography, then.”

  “Anyways, as I was saying. If you’re Frodo and I’m Samwise, then Alex, he’s Gollum.”

  “Our bizarre reunion wasn’t a coincidence. There’s purpose to it, and just you wait and see, he’ll be showing up again sooner rather than later. I’m going to help him find his foothold.”

  “Mm-hmm. You’ll help him dig up what’s precious to him.”

  “Yes, I will. And I get where you’re going with this.”

  “You’re describing Gollum and Frodo’s relationship in The Lord of the Rings to the letter.”

  “Michael, I don’t even have his contact information. If I’m right, then the universe will bring us together.”

  “Frodo didn’t have Gollum’s contact information either, and look what the universe of Middle-Earth did. It lopped his hobbit finger off.”

  “There’s that.”

  15

  News of the bar fight went over about as well as you’d imagine at Tim and Tina’s wedding. Tina was pissed. At around 10:45 in the morning she even considered calling the whole thing off. Her day was ruined, and she let everyone know that fact, especially as it pertained to the outrageously expensive photographer that her parents hired, all because her fiancée and his stupid best man couldn’t control their urges to let their faces get smashed in. But then Tina’s matron of honor, Lindsay, (who also happened to be her exquisitely good looking elder sister,) had something else entirely to say. She suggested it was an act of heroism, trying to save that woman from the biker gang, and it was a clear-cut sign that Tim would protect her with his very life if needed, and that he even had a posse to back him up. This turned the tide of the conversation and everyone’s opinion about Tim and his groomsmen (and the photographer), and soon Tina was crying celebrated tears of joy as I photographed their first wedding day encounter, even though his face was somewhat swollen and purple and smashed in.

  It also helped, I think, that Tim and Logan and all of their groomsmen held actual swords during the ceremony. Tim kept a replica of William Wallace’s battle sword from Braveheart at his side, Logan’s was from Highlander, Corey’s from Gladiator, and I think The Lord of the Rings was thrown in there somewhere. Of course, just to confuse the matter of what movie universe they were actually trapped in, as soon as Tim kissed Tina on the lips, The Raiders March, John Williams’s iconic score to Raiders of the Lost Ark, strummed over loudspeakers. Logan produced a leather jacket and Indiana Jones hat. Tim casually put them on seconds before escorting his wife back down the aisle.

  Logan even made a point during his best-man’s speech to explain how the groom historically stood on the bride’s right so that his hand could be free to lift his sword in battle, just in case evil should arise its ugly head during the ceremony. He even had a name for Tim’s posse of freedom seekers. They would henceforth be known as The Lone Wolves. Michael and I were honorary members, and that mysterious Alex fellow, who came to the rescue like a masked vigilante in their most desperate hour; he too was an honorary member.

  Nerds, what are you going to do about it?

  “Maybe we should have gotten tattoos,” Michael said.

  16

  The air conditioning was still broken on our return trip home. “Global warming must be real,” Michael finally said as we approached the California border at Primm, Nevada. “Except we’re republicans, so this must be hell.”

  “Ah, but hell is the last great adventure,” I reminded him. My shirt stuck to the seat.

  “Which just so happens to be every single weekend that we’re together.”

  I opened my mouth to refute his claim, but couldn’t come up with a single example, and so closed it.

  “Mm-hmm.” Michael crossed his arms. “That’s what I thought.”

  THE SECOND PHOTOGRAPHER

  1

  “I guess that’s the last of my stuff,” Elise shoved her spandex workout pants into a cardboard box filled with dozens of other various odds and ends items combed from the apartment. She tried the best she could to hold back a tear as she took one final glance over the living room.

  “Elise, I don’t want you to go.”

  “It’s better this way. I won’t live with Tom. It’s not right, you know. It’s unfair to you and since we’re married it’s clearly not moral. It will be good to have my own space for a while. I actually found a cute little apartment less than a mile away. You really should come by.”

  “What I don’t understand is why you left me. You said I was gone too much. You were lonely, and yet you’re living alone. There’s not a lot of meeting in the middle, here. Help me understand.”

  “Yes, I know,” she laid a hand on my cheek. A tear rolled down the edge of her nose. “I don’t understand it myself. I’m confused, Joshua. I guess it’s why I need to live alone right now. I can’t be with someone until I’m content being with myself.”

  “Is that the latest marriage advice from pop psychology 101?”

  “There’s so much to this that you don’t understand. I don’t even understand it all myself.”

  “I’m sure part of that is getting some on the side with Tom.”

  “Joshua, if making love is what you want, we’ll march into the bedroom right now and make love. I am your wife, after all.”

  “I won’t share you. Why don’t you do yourself a favor and learn to be alone with yourself without pulling his pants down and licking his pop.”

  “That’s not nice.”

  “Elise, we’ve known each other now for how many years, thirteen? We were just little children. We were each other’s first kiss. Hell, we were each other’s first mating partners, for crying out loud. Don’t throw all of that away. How long have you known Tom, like a month or something?”

  She bit her lips.

  “I guess I don’t want to know.” I thought about it. “You met him in counseling, didn’t you?”

  She looked away. “You said you didn’t want to know.”

  “Oh hell. You’re counseling him, aren’t you? That lunch at NOSTIMOS was a business expense. This goes against every single ethical rule in the book.”

  “Joshua, I know. I’ve said it before. I’m the world’s worst therapist. Please don’t rub it in my face.”

  “Yes, I’m finally beginning to think you are.”

  “Let’s not leave like this.”

  “Elise, you’re Catholic. We’re Catholic. Catholic’s don’t divorce. What ever happened to till
death do us part? We’re supposed to be together.”

  “Joshua, I do want to grow old with you. Why can’t you see that?”

  “It’s pretty hard when you’re off giving another guy the horizontal screw.”

  “That’s not nice.” She said.

  “No,” I handed her the box. “You’re right. It’s not.”

  2

  I desperately needed relief from my own circumstances. Coincidently, that’s when Meat-Duck showed up again, and in a timely manner, just as I’d expected him to. I was sitting in CHAMBERLAIN Studios staring out the balcony window and occasionally up at the ceiling from my swivel chair, trying not to think about Elise. I had just spoken with a bride-to-be on the phone and managed to wedge yet another east coast wedding into an already busy summer traveling schedule, this one in Kennebunkport, Maine. I sipped coffee from my Charlie Brown t-shirt mug, and since I had nothing better to do, I stood by the screen door waiting for the absentminded basset hound to come walking down the suburban street, tongue hanging dumbly from its mouth while the cute college-aged girl tugged it on a leash. The cute college-aged girl never came.

  Directly across the private courtyard was Sophia and Zoë’s second story apartment. It was 10AM and I typically liked the view this time of day. That’s when Zoë and Sophia dressed up in colorful spandex and taught their class of several overweight women to shake their hips to the rhythm of the beat, all in their living room. Never mind the students. I liked learning from the master. I spent considerable time concentrating on the way Zoë’s ponytail flailed wildly around her headband. Halfway through a Michael Jackson song she waved at me through the window. I choked on my coffee and spilled some of it on my shirt before waving back at her. All this time I had no idea that she could see me. I hurried back to the front door just in time to see the tail end of the cute college girl as she and the absentminded basset turned the corner, and then a BMW convertible swooped into the last available parking on my side of the curb.