Crooked Roads

by Alec Cizak

  At that point I was laughing. The whole thing was absurd. This little woman, pushing around Big Bad Johnny Law. She yanked my socks off and jumped on top of me. She squeezed my waist between her thighs, surrounded me with her warmth, and snaked down and almost kissed me. I reached for her with my lips but she raised back up and, without my taking much notice, grabbed my wrists and guided them behind the steel bars at the head of the bed.

  Then the cuffs, my cuffs, were on my hands.

  “Hey, baby,” I said, “I’m, you know, quite at a loss here.”

  She put her finger over my mouth. “Be cool.”

  I didn’t say a thing as she used my socks to tie my legs to the posts at the foot of the bed. Then she corkscrewed like an old movie star on those high heels to the bathroom. I thought she might be throwing on something even sexier. Then I heard her talking to someone behind the door. She spoke in a soothing, tender voice, the way one might speak to an anxious child.

  When she came back out, she had a jar of peanut butter and a spatula in her hands.

  “Whoa,” I said. “I’m thinking this is gonna’ get pretty kinky.”

  “You’re thinking right, mister.” She sat on the bed next to me. She opened the jar and scooped out a heap of peanut butter.

  “What’s the plan?”

  She smiled. She smeared the peanut butter all over my chest. It was sticky and warm and, to be honest, didn’t turn me on all that much.

  “Really, Patience,” I said, “what do you got in mind here?”

  Something rattled in the bathroom. “That your friend?”

  “I told you,” she said, “Finesse will be here when the time is right.” She continued spreading peanut butter all over my body.

  “I sure hope you got a clever way to remove this,” I said, using my chin to point at the sea of brown gunk.

  She stuck out her tongue and winked at me. “Didn’t I say this would be a night you would never forget?”

  When she was finally out of peanut butter, she put the jar on the floor. Then she stood and pulled her blond hair off of her head. Underneath, wouldn’t you know it, she was a brunette. My favorite.

  “You remember me now?” she said.

  I closed my eyes and asked a God I didn’t really believe in how I could have been so stupid. “No,” I said, still not looking at her. “When did I arrest you and what was it for?”

  “You didn’t.”

  I opened my eyes.

  “When I was thirteen, you offered me a ride home from school. Virgil Junior High, on Vermont.”

  One of many sealed capsules of guilt opened in the pit of my stomach. “Jesus,” I said, “that was, like, fifteen years ago.”

  She nodded.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I forgot all about it. Whatever it is that happened, I forgot.”

  “I didn’t,” she said. Her eyes got wider. I could almost see what she would have looked like as a child. “Hard to forget losing your virginity to a flashlight.”

  At first, I failed to recognize that I had started to cry. Maybe I knew things were about to get much, much worse. “Sweetheart,” I said, “you can’t hold me responsible for the way I acted back then.”

  She hissed, loud enough to shut me up. Before I could regroup and protest once more, she slid her panties down her legs from under her skirt and stuffed them into my mouth. “It’s time for you to meet Finesse,” she said. She went to the bathroom, this time without the corkscrew in her steps. When she returned, she carried a cage with an animal jumping around it in frantic, maniacal twitches. A rat. A big, fat Los Angeles rat. The size of a goddamn rabbit.

  “Finesse hasn’t eaten in two days,” she said. She set the cage right on my chest. The rat pecked at the peanut butter oozing up between the thin bars.

  It tickled at first. Then I felt its tiny teeth scraping at my skin. I tried to scream. Her panties stifled my voice.

  Patience put her hand on the latch to the front of the cage. “You two will have the place to yourselves for the next three days,” she said. “Good luck.” Then she opened it and rushed out of the room. She hung the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign as she shut the door.

  I struggled for a while, whipping my body from left to right, throwing the rat, sometimes getting enough momentum to send it clear off the bed. It found its way back every time. My energy drained and I went into a daze. Maybe it was shock.

  The rat chewed a hole into my belly while I stared at the walls. What I thought about at that moment was the times I’d stuck my gun in my mouth and practiced pulling the trigger. I always rationalized my ego’s inability to let go as some sort of noble nonsense about “choosing to live.” The right decision, as those chumps on daytime talk shows would no doubt have stated it.

  KATY TOO

  Heather’s dad’s friends showed up wearing ski masks. They both looked like rednecks, like Heather’s dad. Wiry. Dangerous. Dirty jeans, plaid shirts, unbuttoned, and filthy t-shirts underneath. One of them handed her a dark, mustard-colored, stinky strip of cloth. “Wrap this around your eyes,” he said. Katy sniffed it. It smelled like mildew and crotch.

  “Do you have a clean one?”

  “Nope.”

  Katy reached for her purse. The man who had given her the blindfold said, “Leave it. Got a cell phone on you?” She told him it was in the purse. “Good,” he said.

  She was scared, initially. The men led her outside to a car and helped her in. As the engine started, she forgot about her fear, worrying instead about the damage the blindfold might do to her hair. It was Saturday, which meant she’d washed it and used cream rinse to give it that extra bounce that made strangers look at her funny when she walked through the mall. She liked that, the way they looked at her. She was monogamous, however, and she had expected Billy Walker to be the same.

  When she found out from her friend Lindsey, who heard it from Kylie, that Billy let his ex-girlfriend Cheryl give him a handjob in a booth near the back of Tubby’s Pizza, on Thirty-eighth Street, she tore the head off of her Curious George stuffed monkey. She confronted Billy and he denied it at first. When he offered to break up with her, she told him that was unacceptable. Billy’s dad was the CEO of Walker Investments. Katy had found her Prince Charming and she wasn’t going to share him or his wallet with any other woman. She went to all her girlfriends at Ivy Tech for advice on how to make sure he never strayed again. Only Heather had an idea she thought would be effective. Her dad was some kind of thug from the south side of town. Katy didn’t want to know too much. Criminals and stuff like that should only be on television.

  Heather told her that her dad could teach Billy a lesson. “What kind of lesson?” Katy asked. Heather explained that she had been beaten and raped once by a bartender named Danny Box. Her father tracked him down and took him to a warehouse where some crazy guys smashed bricks into his dick until he couldn’t walk. Katy said that sounded really ‘icky’ and she wanted to have children with Billy. Breaking his penis wasn’t an option. Heather assured her, “There are other ways to send him a message.”

  The girls met with her father. He was tall and skinny and stank like a bar, all whiskey and cigarettes. He dressed like a lumberjack and wore boots with steel toes. Not at all what Katy had expected, based on the few gangster movies she had seen when there was nothing else on television. His name was Walter, but he asked her to call him Pops. He said she was awful pretty and any boy dumb enough to cheat on her was probably queer. Katy said that wouldn’t do. If Billy was gay, he was going to have to learn how to be normal. Pops laughed at that. “We can do some damage that’ll scare him real nice.” He told her five hundred dollars was the minimum. Katy asked why it was so expensive. Pops explained that he had to pay the men who would be doing the actual work. He started to tell her what was going to happen to Billy for that kind of money. She made him stop. “I want it to be a surprise.” Then she asked, “Can I watch?”

  * * *

  Katy focused on the stench of the leather seats in the car, in
stead of the blindfold. She assumed she was in the back, by herself. The two men who picked her up were in the front. They were probably leering at her thighs. She had worn the highest, tightest black skirt she had, the one she was wearing the first night she allowed Billy to play with her breasts. When he tried running his hand between her legs, she slapped him. “I’m not that kind of girl,” she said. She was that kind of girl, but she didn’t want a rich boy thinking she was a whore. She made him wait two months before she even touched his pecker. He got so excited he messed up her white, denim skirt she bought at the GAP her senior year in high school. She was proud that it still fit her three years later. And the dummy just about ruined it with his baby-juice. She shifted her thoughts to the car she was in. Gangsters on television always drove big, luxury models. These were Southside Indianapolis shit-kickers, though. She decided it was either an ancient Lincoln or a Cadillac. Probably bought with dirty money. They showed stuff like that on Court TV. Then she heard the men talking about her.

  “She’s a piece of ass,” one said.

  “Hell, she’s a chunk of ass,” the other said.

  A smacking sound, like one was giving the other a high-five. Disgusting. Men had a single-track mind. All of them. They didn’t care about relevant things like shopping or television. “Where are we going?” she asked. She wanted them to talk about something other than whether or not she was a natural blonde.

  “You don’t need to know.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  The same man spoke. It sounded as if he had turned his head to face her. “Can I ask you a personal question?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I’m a natural blonde. Duh. Do you see any dark roots?” She tossed her hair around to prove it.

  “Only one way to know for sure.”

  The other man said, “She looks like one of these modern girls, you know? Shaves the puss so nobody knows what her real shade is.”

  Both of them laughed.

  “That’s not why I…” She shut up. They had managed to make a discussion of her hair-color sexual. Amazing. They’re like sharks. She analyzed her frustration, something she sort of learned watching Dr. Phil and Jerry Springer. She wasn’t really angry at the thugs. She was angry at Billy. This made her feel better about what was going to happen.

  * * *

  The car slowed down and veered to the right. Katy heard gravel crunching and shifting beneath the tires. They parked. The front doors opened and closed, then hers opened and she was helped out. The air reeked of decay. Smelled like a trash can with rotting meat in it. Maybe they were near a factory. Or possibly the animal burning plant near Greenwood. They led her by her elbows, one man on each side of her, across what she assumed was a parking lot. When they stopped, the man to her right let go. She could hear him struggle with a metal door, pushing it along a track that squealed as it rolled. She was nudged forward.

  The door closed behind her. She smelled booze and cigarette smoke. Pops whispered in her ear, “Take the blindfold off and keep your mouth shut.”

  She did. As her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she saw that she was in a large, aluminum warehouse. Her drivers stood behind her.

  Underneath a single, hanging bulb was a wooden table-chair. Seated in the chair was Billy. His hair was uncombed, a stupid habit he picked up watching celebrities on TMZ. He was in his Bears jersey, the one with holes all over it that Katy had begged him to throw out, and jeans she bought him to replace the pair he had been wearing since, she figured, puberty. His arms and legs were taped to the chair’s arms and legs. He was gagged and squirming and trying to protest. He had on a blue blindfold. Katy wondered if it stank as bad as hers. Something developed in her stomach. She thought it might be a reaction to the teaspoon of humus she’d eaten for breakfast. Part of her wanted to laugh. Seeing Billy so helpless, she wanted to chastise him, ask him where his father was now, who was going to save him? More than that, she wanted to tell him exactly what he had done to end up there.

  Standing on each side of the chair were two men who looked pretty much like the ones who had driven her there. With the exception of Pops, they all wore ski masks. Pops nodded to one of the men standing near Billy. The man walked off into the darkness. The creaking of wheels on a metal cart echoed across the warehouse, a handheld sledgehammer and a regular claw-toothed hammer on top of it. Pops motioned for her to follow him over to the cart. He pointed to each implement, the way a model on The Price Is Right might point to a fabulous new car or maybe an awesome set of jewelry. She understood what he was asking her. The unpleasant feeling in her stomach spread. She imagined a kitten, or maybe even a cute little puppy, in her belly, stretching its limbs. She took a deep breath. Pops pointed again, this time with jerky, impatient movements.

  The sledgehammer looked too vicious. Pops pulled her back. The man on the other side of Billy walked around and picked up the claw-toothed hammer. He moved the cart out of the way. The pain in Katy’s stomach felt like a hand, pulling down at her throat. She wanted to throw up, but her belly was empty. The man with the hammer turned it around and slammed the claw-end of it down on the center of Billy’s left forearm.

  The hammer landed with a thud and the claw cut into his skin. He tried to leap out of the chair but only succeeded in reinforcing the tape around his wrists and legs. His head shook back and forth. The screams forced through his gag came out in panicked wheezes.

  The man with the hammer smashed the claw-side into the same spot until the thud was followed by a clicking sound that made Billy react so ferociously he brought the chair off the ground and turned it. Katy screamed and immediately grabbed her mouth. It was the most disgusting thing she had ever seen, with the possible exception of Saw IV, which her last boyfriend forced her to watch because he was a weirdo and that seemed interesting when she’d first met him.

  Billy said her name through his spit-soaked gag—”Katy?” It was clear enough that everyone understood it and stared at her.

  Pops sighed. He took the hammer from the man who had been using it. He brought it back to Katy and said, “You break the other arm.”

  She refused to take it. She was crying and couldn’t speak without choking back her breathes. “I… don’t…”

  Pops grabbed her by her arm and shoved her toward the chair. He ripped the gag out of Billy’s mouth and removed his blindfold. He wedged the hammer into Katy’s hand. “Break his other arm. Now.”

  She shook her head. She could feel Billy trying to make eye contact with her. She didn’t want to see anybody, didn’t want to be anywhere right then. “I can’t,” she said again.

  “Katy,” Billy said. “Please, Katy…”

  Pops clenched his fist around Katy’s hand holding the hammer and arched her over Billy’s right arm. She tried to resist, tried to pull her body away. He drew her hand back and forced it to slam into Billy’s arm, over and over, until the claw tore into the muscle and flesh and chipped the bone. He let go of her and she collapsed, sobbing.

  Billy stopped moving. Katy thought he had gone into shock. She learned all about that on ER. And Billy said, “Don’t worry, baby. My dad will get these guys.”

  Pops shook his head. He turned to the men Katy assumed had driven Billy there. “Eighty-six,” he said.

  They removed the tape holding Billy to the chair. One of the guys picked him up and draped him over his shoulder. The other man pulled Katy to her feet. They led them out of the warehouse, to the parking lot.

  Her eyes adjusted once more. She was tossed into the back of a white, stretch van, along with Billy. He seemed to be in complete shock, carrying on about how he preferred blueberry Kool-Aid to strawberry Kool-Aid. Katy held her nose. The van smelled worse than the blindfold. There were dark red streaks along the walls. She felt sick again. As the van carried them away, she looked out the back windows. She had been wrong about the car that brought her there. It was an Oldsmobile.

  MY KIND OF TOWN

  Jenna rested on Tom’s chest. Both worked to catch their
breath. Tom closed his eyes and allowed the different scents coming from his young lover to massage his senses. He grinned and realized, for the moment, just how happy he was.

  “What are you smiling about?” Jenna bit his neck, then smacked his chest hard enough to snap his eyes open.

  He brought her head up and kissed her. “Don’t do that. I can get that at home.”

  She sighed, rolled off him. “Speaking of the devil,” she said, “how soon?”

  He looked out the only window in her bedroom. Past the smog from Gary and East Chicago, the setting sun bled orange over the Chicago skyline. “Even if I can get her to agree to the split,” he said, “we’ll still have to wait.”

  “Why?”

  He assumed her inability to see the plan in a logical manner was a casualty of her youth. He didn’t begrudge her. She’d had a tough life. Her mother was murdered by a serial killer from Illinois and her father died in an explosion at the tire factory he worked for in East Chicago. His generic life insurance left her just enough to maintain a small house on the edge of town. She was only twenty-two and she’d already lost her world.

  “Let’s say I file in the morning,” he said. “How soon do you think it’d be proper to pack up and ship out?”

  “Tomorrow night?”

  “Believe me,” he said, “ain’t a thing I’d like more than to scoop you up and carry you off to fancy old Chicago. We got to be smart.”

  “Who cares what other people think?” she said.

  “Maggie’s sure to get a hell of a good lawyer to take a run at the stash,” he said.

  “The stash?”

  “Stop playing dumb.”

  She frowned, brought her arms over her chest and pouted.

  “I’m serious.”

  “I hate this town.”

  “Haggard ain’t the problem,” he said. “Life’s mostly misery. Might even be true in Chicago.”

  * * *

  Maggie was waiting for Tom when he got home. She was seated at the dinner table, one leg hoisted over the other, bobbing up and down.