THUGLIT Issue Nineteen

by Mike Miner

  Not far to Union Station. My car was in the front lot. Once inside, when I started to drive, I realized I was still pretty wrecked. Good thing it was late. I took it nice and slow. The 10 east to the 405 north. Forgot how much I liked to drive when I was high. Everything a blur of lights. I didn't ever want to stop. I had enough product to get to Canada, maybe Alaska, without losing my high.

  Reluctantly I got off in Granada Hills. My hometown. Chatsworth Street to Hayvenhurst, past St. John's Church where I received all my sacraments, baptism, first communion, confirmation; thought of all the sins I confessed to Father Joe, and all the ones I didn't.

  I grew up right around the corner. Walked to elementary school at the buildings next door to the church. A Catholic schoolboy. Learned to ride my bike in the parking lot.

  The junk in my veins made me nostalgic.

  My mom took me trick-or-treating in these neighborhoods. She would dress as Princess Leia or Catwoman or Wonder Woman, always got into the spirit of things. Now she couldn't stand without help.

  "Just a matter of time," the doctor said. "Inoperable," he said. "It's all about managing the pain." Isn't that what life is?

  I was in my old driveway, looking at the house I grew up in. A long house with a Spanish tile roof. Citrus trees in the backyard, oranges, lemons, limes scattered on the ground, the smell of them rotting in the air.

  At least my mother couldn't get out of bed to see the messes I'd left. The dirty dishes in the sink, the piles of clothes thrown on all the furniture. I promised myself, again, that I'd clean them soon. From her room, I can hear music turned low. I peeked in on her. Sleeping to the sound of Bret Michaels singing "Every Rose Has Its Thorn." I closed the door.

  Hard to picture sometimes, my mother as a big-haired rock and roll chick. Even when she showed me the pictures of her at old concerts; Bon Jovi, Poison, Mötley Crüe. She loved her some glam metal. Saw them all, she said, at the Coconut Teaszer or the Roxy down on the Sunset Strip.

  It had always been just the two of us. An occasional boyfriend, nothing serious. I never knew my father. A musician, was all my mother ever said. A guitarist, a singer. When I was younger I'd stare at myself in the mirror, looking for a resemblance to some famous frontman. Vince Neil maybe?

  In the kitchen I prepared everything. Laid out the spoon, the lighter, the heroin, the syringe—like I was making her a meal. A last supper.

  I crept into her room, sat by her bed. So thin, so pale. She'd always been so tan, spent as much time as she could at the beach. Malibu or Ventura. Now she was a wheezing ghost of herself. I listened to her lungs rattle, listened to "Sister Christian" by Night Ranger.

  The syringe was heavy in my hand. I considered changing my mind. Keeping it for myself. Something stopped me, guilt or love.

  She woke coughing.

  Her eyes landed on me, they still held flecks of green, but a duller shade now. She smiled through her pain.

  "Hello, son."

  "Hi, Mom. How are you?" I put a hand on top of hers.

  She sighed. Coughed again. "Sometimes I wish God would just get this over with." She looked at the needle in my hand. "What have you got there?"

  "Something for the pain, mom."

  She already had an IV plug in her arm. I wouldn't have to go hunting for a vein.

  "Well, I could use something."

  "I know."

  Did she know what I was up to? Did she care?

  I squeezed the plunger. Watched her face as a stampede of heroin chased the pain from her body, saw her expression relax into a gentle smile.

  "This," she whispered. "This is what you were after all those years. This is what you had to give up."

  I nodded but she wasn't looking at me. She was as high as those kites we used to fly at Ventura Beach when I was a kid. Maybe it had taken her back to the Whisky a Go Go, the first time she heard Def Leppard sing "Hysteria."

  "Thank you, son," she managed from wherever she was.

  I wished I was stronger. Wished I could trust myself. Resist my base urges. But I wasn't. I couldn't. Never was. Never could. A slave to my appetites since I was a kid. Always insatiable. Always craved what was bad for me.

  While she nodded, I prepared another batch in the kitchen. A big one.

  This wasn't the original plan. I wanted to keep her on a nice, long high. Chat with her about it. Wanted her to understand.

  But I'd be coming down soon, sick and craving a fix.

  Back in her room. I took comfort in the fact that she felt no pain. And never would again. David Coverdale crooned to her, I'm just another heart in need of rescue, waiting on love's sweet charity…

  I shot all of it into her veins. Enough to kill a gorilla.

  I wept. For my mother or for the dope I'd just wasted, I still don't know.

  The Last Detail

  by Thomas Pluck

  The first time she pulled her Corvette into Privrat's Auto Service, Jay knew that they would tangle, either like eager teenagers steaming up the windows in the back of a Chevy, or like two sportfish getting hauled over the transom of the boss' Viking 55 yacht.

  Her ride was a mako shark-blue late-model Z06 convertible, built like a speedboat for two, making every black ribbon highway as boundless as the open ocean. Every Friday afternoon she brought the Corvette in for a detail, and pulled into the lot with restraint—neither timid nor reckless—parked it in front, and jackknifed her legs out to slip on a pair of sandals.

  Jay looked up from the engine bay of a Lamborghini Diablo. Her sunglasses slashed a glance past him like he wasn't even there. Her name was Lynn, and she didn't fit the mold of a trophy wife for Andrej Privrat, a widowed junkman turned exotic auto magnate. When she had first rolled in, Jay thought she was a sales rep, maybe an insurance investigator. Bundled with her sleek form and assured, efficient manner was a subdued perception that revealed itself when her straight mouth curled at the edges, smiling at her own private joke on the world.

  Something about how she untied her ponytail and shook her honey-blonde hair free set Jay's hackles to rise.

  "Might as well think 'bout sticking it in a meat grinder," Huberto the foreman said. "It would be smarter."

  Jay knew it was true. He had spent a good portion of his life among people whose potential for explosive acts of violence burbled beneath the surface like magma in a dormant volcano, and he had acquired a predictive sense, like that of animals who feel invisible signals when the earth was about to quake or erupt.

  "Just might be worth it," Jay said.

  Huberto laughed, and went back to work. The Lambo was the boss' kid's car, and they knew better than to dawdle.

  They chased an exhaust leak from the manifold to the mufflers until the beast sang. Jay looked at the clock and told Huberto he'd finish up. He needed to talk to the boss, anyway.

  Jay had lowered the car off the lift and was wiping the fingerprints off the paint with a chamois when the boss' son Udo loomed over his shoulder.

  "You done yet? Some of us got lives to live." Udo had half a head on him, maybe thirty pounds, and acted like what mattered was the size of the dog in the fight.

  "Listen for yourself." Jay reached in and turned the key.

  Udo knitted his professionally-tweezed brows and cocked an ear to hear the devil snarl. He nodded slow.

  "Take her for a spin," Jay told him.

  "What, you think I don't trust your work?" Udo sneered. He climbed into the low racer. "We got you trained well, jailbird."

  Jay narrowed his eyes.

  "Speaking of, my father wants to talk to you. Boys been talking, say you're looking to fly your way down to N'awlins."

  Jay smirked at the tourist pronunciation. "He in the office?"

  Udo revved the engine and shouted over it. "Find out for yourself."

  The lobby catered to their high-end clientele with butter-soft leather couches, an espresso bar, and big screen televisions tuned to financial news. The couches were empty. Jay stepped behind the front desk and knocke
d on the unmarked door to the boss' office. Lynn usually joined the boss while her Corvette was being detailed, and it was a given that they were not to be disturbed.

  The door unlocked with a click, and Jay stepped into its masculine confines. An oak desk, black filing cabinets. A bottle of Becherovka on the desk, its piney cloy thick in the air. A rocks glass brimming with ice beside it, held by a thick, hairy hand.

  Mr. Privrat stared at a laptop screen, a bluetooth bug in his ear. "Yes."

  "You wanted to see me."

  "I did." His ice-blue eyes did not waver from the screen. His face a clean-shaved brick, stubbled gold-red along the jawline. His Slovak accent had been filed down to a mere cluck of enunciation at the end of each sentence. "Sit."

  "I'm good." Jay looked toward the sofa, Lynn's usual perch. It was empty.

  Privrat closed the laptop, then took another rocks glass from the bar behind him, scooped ice from the bucket, and poured. He slid the glass across the tabletop. "It is good for the digestion."

  Jay thought the Czech liquor tasted like a cat took a leak on a Christmas tree, but he sipped it anyway.

  "When you were in need, I provided, did I not?"

  "My debt to you's more than paid," Jay said, and smacked his lips at the bitter drink. He had learned to fix cars while in service to the state, taking class after class, thinking he'd never see daylight again. When a court ruling overturned his sentence of juvenile life without parole into time served, he had found himself on the wrong side of forty with a Master Mechanic's certification and no driver's license. Despite the best of intentions, his reentry into the atmosphere of society had been less smooth than meteoric, and he'd left his adopted Yankee hometown with the clothes on his back, a stack of warrants, and a battered and very conspicuous Dodge Challenger. A biker who'd tried to sell him crystal at a Sheetz station told him about a service station that needed mechanics, didn't ask too many questions, and was less than a tank of gas away. Privrat's.

  "You are a Southern man. I should not have to speak of loyalty," Andrej said, and drained half his glass. "You came to me with your foolish story. Lied to my face, in this very room. And I had to punish you, with our current arrangement."

  Jay chewed his lip and listened. Andrej Privrat hadn't turned a junkyard and wrecker service into a fleet of luxury dealerships to service the D.C. elite without having methods to retain top talent. When he'd learned of Jay's warrants, he made it clear that if Jay worked cheap, he would be protected and well kept. The price for quitting went unspoken.

  "So I must ask you again," Privrat said. "Over drinks, an oath. Are you disloyal to me?"

  Jay tried to read those cool blue eyes. Might as well have tried to read a wolf's. He saluted with his glass, and finished it. "This crap you drink might be Czech Pepto Bismol, but it won't put out the fire down here," gesturing at his belly, "that I get from you taking advantage of my legal situation."

  Andrej smiled, baring the tips of large grey teeth. He set his glass down and folded his hands. "So it is true."

  Jay set his glass on the table, hard. "Winter's coming. Never liked the cold, inside or out. So home's been calling. Wouldn't you go home, if you could?"

  Andrej broadened his smile, laughed to himself, and tapped his temple with a manicured sausage finger. "My parents' village, just the memory remains."

  Jay had heard the story. While he'd been in prison, there'd been a war—more of a mutual slaughter—among peoples with thousand-year blood feuds that had only been leashed by Soviet control. When the big dog left the cage, the little ones had fallen upon each other and had their fill of killing.

  "My condolences," Jay said. "But mine's still around. I was planning on sticking around another week, but now that you know, I might as well scoot. If that's disloyal, so be it. If you hadn't sunk the hooks in me, we might've parted on better terms." Jay wiped his hand on a greasy handkerchief from his back pocket, then offered to shake.

  Andrej stood, then gripped Jay's hand. "Servus."

  "Tell Lynn goodbye for me," Jay said. He gripped back. "And so you know? If I was to be disloyal to you, I'd do it face-to-face. I ain't the sneaky kind, Mr. Privrat."

  His emphasis on the second syllable said all that he wanted to say.

  Jay finished his shift like he said he would, then washed up and changed out of his worksuit into jeans and a clean shirt from his locker. Udo had gone; Huberto was finishing up an Audi sedan. Jay wasn't much on goodbyes. He walked round back where the employees parked and frowned at the empty parking space where his freshly painted Challenger should've been sitting beneath a car cover. He walked back toward the bays and snagged a torque wrench off the workbench, slapping the shaft against his boot as he headed back toward Privrat's office. Thinking, did he want to do this?

  Yes, he did.

  "You working OT on a Friday?" Huberto called from beneath the Audi S8.

  "Someone moved my ride," Jay said. "Udo playing games?"

  "Boss sent it to the detailers, as a present, like. Said you were leaving. For real?"

  Jay slapped hands with him, said a weak farewell, and went back toward the office. Lynn's Corvette was still parked in front, rims speckled with road dust. Andrej sat in the office, grinning at his laptop. Jay held the torque wrench behind his leg.

  Andrej spoke before Jay could say a word. "Your Challenger should be ready. I had them put chip guard on the paint."

  "Very generous of you," Jay said, kneading the handle of the wrench.

  "If you are in such a hurry, take Lynn's Corvette to the detail shop."

  Jay drove with the top down, even though the clouds threatened rain. The detailer's was a warehouse behind a car wash, which was closed on account of the forecast. Jay pulled in back, honked at the rear gate. When the door rose, he rolled in.

  Empty rows of little work bays with buckets, microfiber towels, rows of sprays and polish. No Challenger. Jay pulled the parking brake and reached for the door handle. He saw a black shape in the mirror and his head spun and blanked white.

  He woke to the taste of metal. He threw a jab at the nearest shape, felt his wrist yanked back and something warm and soft slammed into his side.

  A woman grunted. "Idiots!"

  Jay blinked his head clear, and looked at his left wrist. It was handcuffed. The other cuff was attached to a smooth hand with short blue nails.

  Lynn rubbed her right wrist. She wore a blouse and skirt, and wedge sandals. Her hair was messed and her cheeks rouged from a slap or two.

  Jay tried to apologize but his mouth was full. His jaw was stretched, lips taut.

  Three large men stood in front of them in the concrete room. Two blue-eyed Slovaks with trim beards, holstered pistols, and hard edges, plus one tan fellow who looked like he'd been sucking on an air pump. Fat head and a tight, round belly. Neck nicked with fresh speckles from his morning shave.

  "That's a grenade in your mouth," the chubby guy said with a giggle. Jay recognized him as the stereo installer. "Don't swallow it. Not yet."

  Jay reached up for it and one of the big men slapped his hand away. The other held up a stun gun, and the electrodes sizzled.

  Jay held up a hand in surrender. He rubbed behind his ear, where they'd shocked him the first time. It throbbed like two bee stings. His hand still quivered from the jolt.

  Giggles directed him to a laptop staged on a steel folding chair. Andrej Privrat smiled from the screen.

  "Hello, Jay."

  Jay grunted around the grenade.

  "You misunderstood my question about loyalty," Andrej said, chuckling. "I was not concerned with our arrangement of your employment, but rather the matter of betraying me with my mistress."

  Jay moved to protest, and the stun gun was raised.

  "I already told him he was crazy," Lynn said. "He won't believe anything you say anyway."

  "Shut up," another voice said. Udo stepped into the room, his designer clothes swapped for a shop apron. "I already told my father what I saw."

  "
He's lying!" Lynn snarled. "Andrej, your brat corners me in the shop every chance he gets. Begging, threatening!"

  Udo spat on the floor. "Like I'd beg a whore."

  She lunged, and was jerked back by the cuff.

  Jay reached for the grenade to say his piece.

  Giggles held up his hand, showing the grenade ring on his middle finger. "I wouldn't do that."

  The giggling got on Jay's last nerve. He thought about spitting the grenade at him, and to hell with what happened. But Lynn hadn't done anything wrong, not with Jay, at least. He knew plenty of men in the ground for putting their dicks where they didn't belong and dealing with the consequences. These pricks had him stuck between dying and killing over something he hadn't done. Reminded him of the prison chaplain who'd preached that thinking sin was sin enough.

  "Now you will betray me one last time, for my pleasure," Andrej said. "Then you get your own grenade."

  "I'm doing no such thing," Lynn said. "Might as well stick my grenade in now." She opened her mouth.

  Andrej laughed. "Yours goes somewhere more appropriate, whore."

  Udo produced a portable grinder from behind his apron and kicked it to life. It had a wire brush wheel attached, for quickly stripping rust and paint. He lowered it to the concrete floor and sparks showered toward Jay's boots.

  Lynn yelped as the embers singed her feet.

  "Andrej," Lynn's eyes darted from the laptop to the grinder. "Why would we do it? You've got to believe me!"

  "I am no fool," Andrej said. "You were my mistress only because the other choice disgusted you more." He poured himself another Becherovka.

  "Make them strip," Udo said, punctuating with two whirrs of the grinding wheel. "Let's see how they like rutting once half their skin's scraped off."

  The thug made the stun gun sizzle again.

  Lynn reached for her shirt buttons. Jay tugged her hand away as he reached for his belt.

  "How are we supposed to strip when our hands are cuffed together?"