by Peter Gent
He lit a long cigar and puffed up a large red coal at the end. Then he lay his lighter on the table and checked the wicks in the gin bottles to make certain they were soaked. The T-shirts were stacked on the table, next to his pistol, the speed loaders, the railroad flares and the small .22 rifle. He still wore the surgical gloves.
Except for the red spot of the glowing cigar, he was completely hidden in the shadows of the awning.
He checked the area once more for people who might accidentally wander into the firefight and had the small firecrackers ready to toss at them to drive them off. There was no one around as the limousine’s lights came on, and it wheeled out of its parking place up to the gate.
Lamar picked up the small rifle and drew a bead on the driver as he approached the automatic gate opener. His window hummed down and he shoved the car into park. When he leaned out to push the plastic card into the small orange box, Lamar squeezed off two shots, hitting him below the left eye, scattering lead fragments through his sinuses and prefrontal lobe.
The small pops were lost in the sounds inside and outside the car. The driver jumped slightly, dropped the card and sat back in his seat. Johnny C., sitting beside him, never noticed; he was looking and listening to the discussion in the back.
Lamar drew a bead on the rubber tube of jellied kerosene and gasoline, blowing holes in it with the small .22 rounds. The gel began running slowly down the slope. He lay down the rifle and picked up his lighter and one gin bottle. He lit the wick and tossed it underhand at the car. The bottle sailed through the air, bounced off the leather top of the limo and failed to break, rolling onto the trunk and catching in the bumper. The wick came loose and went out. Lamar quickly grabbed the second bottle and flicked the lighter without success, getting only sparks.
Nobody in the car saw the first Molotov cocktail, but they heard something bump the roof. When Johnny looked around, he saw the blood running down the driver’s face.
“Son of a bitch! Donny,” he cried, “look at Mort.”
Lamar finally got the second wick lit and tossed the bottle hard at the limousine, overthrowing and hitting the wall on the far side, turning it into a sheet of flame. It wasn’t what he wanted, but the backlight from the flames outlined the occupants of the car clearly.
Johnny tried his door several times in panic before giving up and trying to crawl out the window over the dead driver.
Lamar picked up a T-shirt and touched the exposed fuse to his cigar. It ignited, hissing and sputtering. He tossed it high, hoping the attached firecracker would explode in the air; it didn’t, and the napalm-filled tube bounced harmlessly off the hood. He lit and tossed a second before Johnny could complete his attempt to crawl out the window. It, too, failed to explode. Lamar reached down on the table for his combat .357, squeezing off one shot, hitting Johnny directly in the crown of his head and knocking him back into the passenger seat. Lamar grabbed and lit a third homemade bomb, tossing it just as the rear passenger door opened and Tiny dived out, carrying one of the alligator attache cases filled with A.D.’s money.
The gel-filled rubber tube bounced off the fat man’s back directly into Donald Cobianco’s lap, where it exploded, blowing flaming gelatin all over the inside of the car.
Momentarily the other bombs began exploding and the car was engulfed in flames, and Lamar watched the two brothers in the backseat screaming and flailing around hopelessly.
It always amazed Lamar how long it took to burn to death.
He pitched his remaining napalm and the railroad flares into the inferno, calmly puffing his cigar, watching Tiny scramble away with the bag in one hand, the other digging in his belt for his pistol. Tiny had his pistol out and was heading straight for the van, raising the gun, moving fast for a fat man. Lamar chewed his cigar and thought about the Captain. He got killed the night they were overrun in the highlands. That night, too, there had been gunshots and explosions, fire and screams, terrifying and glorious.
“All the heroes are dead,” he told Lamar the day he joined the outfit. “I need live soldiers and all the heroes are dead.” The Captain said that and then went right on ahead and got himself killed, trying to pull two guys out of a burning MEDEVAC chopper. They were his men.
The whine of lead cut through the air fairly near Lamar Jean’s head. The big fat guy was getting closer, firing his automatic pistol and carrying a satchel.
Everything began to slow down as Lamar concentrated on killing Tiny Walton. The napalm explosions no longer sounded, they were just hot winds blowing. Lamar let the fat man get close, he puffed his cigar and stayed calm. He had been in lots of these firefights. How many times you fired your weapon was meaningless; what counted was how often you hit your target.
He heard the deadly song of lead as he waited on the fat man, who was tiring, his shots increasingly wild, off the mark.
Everything began turning red, as it did in those firefights in the war, and then, as the fat man, gasping air, carrying the satchel and shooting, reached the point Lamar had chosen, Lamar pointed the heavy pistol and fired three quick rounds, placing the slugs within a 3-inch circle centered on the bridge of Tiny’s nose.
After that the blackness roiled over Lamar Jean, as usual.
THE LAST ZEUGLODON
WHEN TAYLOR FINALLY returned to the locker room, it was almost empty. The game had been over more than two hours. The last of the television equipment was being hauled out. The two young boys were picking up old tape and jockstraps and socks before sweeping the carpet.
“Where you been, man?” Speedo Smith was checking himself in the mirror one more time. A thin film of sweat covered his smooth black forehead. “They was all looking for you to show your dick on television. I showed them mine instead.”
“I was hiding in Red’s whorehouse.” Taylor sat in front of his locker and tossed all the gear he carried. “I am not ever wearing that shit again.”
“Yeah. Everybody says that in January, but then when the eagle don’t shit and April fifteenth comes round, they all come back.” Speedo took a towel and blotted his face. “Everybody must have been off fucking. A.D. and Suzy Chandler didn’t show up for the presentation. The commissioner gave the trophy to Red.”
“I’ll bet Red loved that.” Taylor felt calm and relaxed, drained but buoyant. “Did he recite the Gettysburg Address as his thank-you and acceptance speech?”
“No. He just gol’danged and gee-whizzed his way through.” Speedo laughed. “He kept calling Commissioner Burden ‘Commissioner Gordon.’ ”
“Batman’s Commissioner Gordon?” Taylor was too tired to smile.
“You got it,” Speedo cackled. “The commissioner didn’t like it. Ol’ Robbie Burden was white as a sheet and shaking like a leaf. The man will have to get better to die.”
Taylor stared into the bottom of his spacious, perfectly engineered locker filled with free shoes. Each day Jack the Equipment Man stacked his twelve pairs of different brands and colors. The shoe companies paid Jack to do it.
“Speedo, do you remember the mouse that lived in my locker that first year in Colony Stadium? He ate my chin strap, the earpieces and webbing inside my headgear. The mouse had a good life, ate good and got to hang around with pro football stars.”
“It’s too bad he couldn’t be here today,” Speedo mocked, “but he missed the bus.”
“The mouse couldn’t live here.” Taylor was listening to the sound of the showers and smelling the antiseptic. “Too clean, neat, orderly ...”
“Right, man, right,” Speedo said. “We should have voted him a share ... taken his ring size ... a share along with D’Hanis and Hendrix.”
Taylor nodded.
“Well, leader turkey, I gave it to you, the best game forever. No receiver will ever be as good as I was today, and only you know it.” Speedo shook his head.
“No one else would believe it,” Taylor sighed. “Thanks, Speedo ... for everything.”
Speedo pressed a dry towel to his face once more, checked himsel
f in the full length mirror. The sign above the mirror said:
REMEMBER, THE GUY LOOKING AT YOU REPRESENTS THE PURPLE AND WHITE
PHILOSOPHY.
LOOK LIKE A TEXAS PISTOL.
BE PROUD.
“The purple and white philosophy,” Taylor said. “How do you look like a Texas Pistol?”
“You do white,” Speedo said, “I’ll do purple.” He walked out the door. The door sign said:
HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN ANYTHING? ZIP YOUR FLY.
Ox Wood came limping out of the training room, where he had spent over an hour with his knees packed in ice to keep down swelling. He did it after every game and most practices. The ancient body was worn out.
“You the last one in the training room?” Taylor watched him in the mirror by the exit door.
Ox nodded. “First one in, last one out. Where were you?”
“In Red’s hideout, jacking myself off.”
“I don’t blame you. It was a circus here.” He was still sweating and breathing hard. His face looked tired; dark half-moons lay beneath his eyes.
“You were great, Ox, you know that?” Taylor began recalling bits and pieces of what he had seen Ox do that day. “You always kept them out long enough. Without you and Amos picking up the slack for the young guys, it would have been a long day. That one touchdown of Speedo’s had to take five seconds to get off. That’s a long time. I saw you grab a lot of slack today. You played the whole game.”
“First time this year. But it isn’t as tough to pass-block, since the defense can’t handslap and it’s legal to hold. They still knocked you around today. I don’t understand it. Those young kids are faster, smarter and stronger than me, but they lost their men. You got hit!”
“Not until too late. They kept them off me long enough, that’s all that matters.”
“That’s all they think matters,” Ox said. “But you know it’s not. It’s like they’re doing a job, not protecting the quarterback. There’s a difference—a big difference.”
“They’re young—” Taylor said.
“But they act old,” Ox interrupted. “They don’t understand about duty, loyalty, pride, teammates.... They’re your teammates and they let you get hit. In the Old League you would have some holes in you, but because we win big, these young guys think they played good enough. One good shot in the Old League and you would be just a memory.”
“This isn’t the Old League,” Taylor said. “Thank God.”
“The name of the game is protect the quarterback, and those guys didn’t protect you, they just did their jobs. The rules protected you. And it is still the Old League, it’s just a different game now. I could still beat the shit out of someone if I got permission from the referees, but I never know if I got it until after the play.”
“New rules for new fans, Ox. We are on a constant search for audience ... counted every fifteen minutes.” Taylor felt his aches and pains. “Today, for instance, the referees let them work me over late, like they have all year. Then the commissioner checks the Nielsen overnights. Change the rules and build ratings—or so current theory holds.”
“The rules make new kinds of players too. You got hit a dozen times today and these baby Nazis think they played great. Nice boys. Clean-cut, with a career rap for seminars and TV talk shows.” Ox unwrapped the towel from around his thick waist. “You should have seen training camp in LA in 1968. The highway from Oxnard looked like the Indy 500.” Ox smiled. “The rules? Fuck the rules. We broke all the rules. We fought the law. That year three players crashed and burned trying to make curfew. A glorious death when you consider Oxnard and the world in 1968.
“Fuck the rules, fight the law.” Ox took his boxer shorts from his locker and pulled them on. He was sad. Dressing for the last time. “These young guys, the baby Nazis, got everything: size, speed, technique. The colleges are building right to spec, including making them afraid to break the rules ... putting rings in their noses. There are no longer any football players allowed without nose rings. Basic equipment. Fear of the rules comes in their gene pools. Not the law but the rules, the ones printed in the front of the playbook. These rules. They don’t even know about the law. Union law, contract law, entertainment law. They want to get along, not cause trouble. Be friends. Friends? Why the fuck do this if you can’t break the rules?”
“Some people like to go through life in step.” Taylor shrugged. “Christ, it’s a team game. From goose liver to goose step.”
“A man who has never broken a rule”—Ox was frustrated—“is a dangerous man. The baby Nazis are all hormones and motor functions.”
“Why don’t you show them how to break the rules?”
“Why don’t you?” Ox pointed at Taylor.
“ ’Cause I’m finished.”
“Me too.” Ox wiped his face with his towel. “Besides, they don’t want to know. I ain’t playing with guys who don’t love the game between us and them. They think that being a pro football player makes you important. Well, I play ball to be me, not assbackwards. They follow the rules, so they’re allowed to stay. What happened to all the guys with tattoos? Where are all the real crazies? The sickies?”
“They broke the rules and the law.” Taylor took Ox’s towel, mopped his own forehead. “Break my mind and their rules.” He tossed the towel on the bench.
“I will, but whose rules? These guys aren’t ashamed when you get hit. I don’t understand a football player who wants to be normal and then hires some agent to hold his wallet. These guys hug too much. How about a little heckling and motherfucking, for Chrissakes?” Ox stopped dressing. “You know who holds my wallet?”
“Your wife.”
“And what does she have in her other hand?”
“Your balls.”
Ox nodded. “And, my friend, that is how you last twenty years.”
The zeuglodon, the prehistoric whale, the last of his kind, the scarred and tattooed giant, dressed awkwardly, his knees causing him great pain and imbalance. Ox Wood was the personification of the brutal pride that kept Taylor Rusk safe. Even when the referees gave a man permission to tear the Pistol quarterback’s head off, he had to get past Ox Wood, who made them pay the price and seldom gave them the privilege.
Taylor headed to the showers, singing: “Take it back, oh no! You can’t say that. All my friends are either dead or in jail ...
“You know,” Ox interrupted, “you never once put a cigarette out on my tongue.”
“I don’t smoke, Ox.”
“That’s what I mean.”
Taylor nodded, continuing: “Sweet revenge will prevail ... without fail.”
When Taylor returned from his shower, Ox Wood was gone. The trainers were draining the whirlpools and closing down the training room. The locker room was dark and empty. Taylor dressed slowly, taking a long last look, enjoying the satiated feeling that came at the end. He checked himself in the mirror, looking at the dressing room behind, then left.
In the hallway he noticed the new paint was peeling. Water stains streaked the ceiling, and it was cracked and sagging in spots. There was a sour smell; damp, moldy. It was already coming apart.
His boots slipped on the concrete, the promised carpeting was still not installed and wires dangled through holes in the ceiling and walls, marking unfinished electrical work.
When he reached the underground parking lot, he heard sirens in the distance and wondered if the gridlocked traffic would ever be cleared.
Taylor recognized the deep roar of the engine before the white Ford drove up out of the darkness.
Wendy jumped out, smiling, and ran over to Taylor. “You did it!” He lifted her up and she kissed him hard. She stopped for a moment, leaning away to look at him. “You actually did it! Unbelievable!”
“I was out there alone with lots of other guys.” Taylor pulled her toward him; she kissed him hard again, throwing her arms around his neck and squeezing, hugging him tightly.
“God! I do love you! I never knew how much I loved
you until now.”
“Front-runner.” Taylor’s ears rang from the pressure she put on his neck. She had never shown him this desperate sort of affection. “I apparently showed a side of me recently that has caught your attention.”
She kissed him again.
Randall walked up with his Pistols pennant. “Come on, Mom, knock it off, quit the kissing. Taylor’s had a rough game. Right? Haven’t you, Taylor?”
“Yeah.” Taylor bent and scooped up the boy. “But not so tough that I can’t kiss you.” He began nuzzling the boy’s neck and kissing his soft face.
“No ... no ... no ... no ...” the boy squealed with glee.
Taylor carried him to the car, following Wendy into the backseat.
Taylor had created a miracle. He was carrying him in his arms.
HOME TO DEADMAN
“I’M DONE,” TAYLOR SAID. They were still driving. Randall had fallen asleep at the edge of town. Wendy told what she knew about the carnage at the Pistol Dome.
“This Super Bowl was the first time I played for real stakes.” Taylor cradled the sleeping boy in his aching arms; he loved the feel of holding him. “The real game. Your basic human struggle ... greed ... hatred ... revenge ... stupidity ... pride ... vanity ... your life-and-death issues. I could only do that once. I got through this thing without getting killed and I am finished. That was my last and best game. It was amazing, but I’m not going to invest another fifteen years for more. We’ll move to Doc’s until we buy our own place. Just take up sunbathing where we left off.”
“I’m delighted.” Wendy sounded skeptical. “If you think you really can quit.”
Taylor laughed. “Quitting is easy; everybody quits. I contracted for the Super Bowl, a hopeless bargain, but I delivered. That’s why I’m worth one million. Now it’s adios.”
“You are serious,” Wendy watched approaching headlights; she wondered what he would do if he weren’t quarterback.