“I got better ways to waste my life.”
His thin lips tug on his Marlboro, release smoke. “One of those nutjobs left a dead rabbit on the hearse last night.”
I shake my head. “You’re the one calling for lost souls and sacrifices. What do you expect?”
“Yeah, but I just had the damn thing waxed for Friday.”
Friday. The reason I came. Snake’s eyes meet mine, like he somehow knows why I’m here. I shrug my shoulders, turn away and face the bar, which really hasn’t changed much at all, except there are no naked ladies and almost no customers. “I like the extensive remodeling.”
“I’ve got plans,” he says, nodding at the tube of blueprints. One bony hand lifts an accordion folder from the seat next to him. “Plus I’ve got an appeal that’s gonna make those Baptists pray overtime. Meanwhile, I’m looking into the legality of hosting a little female mud wrestling. The way I see it, if a bra comes off in the middle of a sporting event—oops!—that’s just fucking providence, you know?”
“Absolutely,” I say. “Providence.”
One of the bar crew wanders to the jukebox, which is now crooning Sinatra’s “My Way.” The one-armed pool player misses a bank shot and shouts, “Sumbitch!”
Back in the day, even on weeknights we were standing room only, bikers and business suits forced to mingle in the only all-nude club between Myrtle Beach and the Golden Triangle. Snake knew me from the SWC and hired me on as muscle to enforce one rule: Don’t touch the ladies.
The bar girl drops off the pitcher and fills both our mugs. I lift mine and say, “Well, to the good old days.”
Snake’s face sours. “Good old days my shriveled ass. I’m tomorrow’s number one fan. The future’s so bright I gotta wear shades. Don’t look back ’cause something might be catching up to you. Face it, Buddy, nostalgia is for suckers. What was so great about the good old days? The protests? The fines? The raid?”
We both take a long drink in silence. The thing that’s upsetting Snake the most, the thing he’ll never mention, is how Moniqua skipped bail for Vegas, left him with a bond note and her python. I think again of the napkin I found in my pocket and decide to steer the conversation in a safer direction. “Ever hear from Tony?”
He exhales, calming some. “Not after he headed for the good life in Montana.”
“Fat sonuvabitch tended a mean bar.”
Snake nods. “I’ll always drink to Tony.”
“Remember the night those frat boys came back with the .38?”
“Jesus,” Snake says. “Alpha Beta Dipshits.”
I can tell Snake has questions about my sudden return, but he’s playing cool like always. He never asked why I didn’t stop by New Hanover after what happened on River Road, or why I didn’t attend the grand reopening of the bar. But with no dancers to protect, there wasn’t much use in hiring me back. As for wrestling events, we did our jobs professionally, but pretty much skipped the socializing. After all, we had that napkin between us.
Any lingering awkwardness we feel now gets drowned by the beer, and we set to work draining the pitcher while trading war stories about Heaven’s Gate. How he spent Hurricane Fran out here with some of the dancers who lived in trailer homes. The night some drunk claimed to be Alec Baldwin and we quizzed him on his movies. Story by story, drink by drink, I’m renewing my affection for alcohol. That pleasant buzz in the top of your head, the fog that rolls in over your problems. A few beers later, Snake’s finishing a story about his failed attempt to convince ReelWorld to finance a low-budget porno on the premises, and I’m having a hard time recalling all the important things I came here to discuss. But I don’t care. I’m laughing and the beer’s going down smooth.
Only the empty pitcher snaps us from the past. Snake hoists it up and yells, “Sunshine! How about earning those big bucks I pay you?”
Sunshine nods from the bar, and Snake says, “So, Buddy. Quinn gave me a ring. He said you might be calling.”
“Oh did he?” I ask. “Did he tell you what I was supposed to say?”
“That you’ve got concerns about Friday.”
“No way Hardy goes for this deal. For openers, he’s got a serious aversion to Lucifer.”
Snake leans back in the booth, pulling his triangular face into darkness. After a pause he sends smoke into the light. “Hardy’s a good kid. He’ll get over his fear and do whatever we tell him. And at last hisss sssoul will be mine.”
I can’t tell if I’m imagining the hissing or not.
“You need to trust Q, Buddy. The man’s a certified genius.”
“I’d like to know who did the certifying.”
“Hey, when Q came up with the idea of having Lucy ‘talk’ to me, I figured he was whacked. Since then my fan mail has tripled. That dead bunny was nothing. The kids either love to love me or love to hate me. Last week I got a death threat—a real live cut-up-newspaper-headline death threat!”
“I don’t think we should define this as positive feedback.”
Sunshine shows up with a fresh pitcher.
Snake says, “Thanks, Sugar Pie.” He tops off my beer. That buzzing in my head starts to whine like a weed whacker and I’m beginning to think the alcohol was maybe not an award-winning idea, but it tastes too good to stop now.
“Q’s not like you and me. We’re talking about a guy who golfs with senators. He’s got Oliver Stone’s e-mail address. I don’t think you realize how big this thing could get.”
“Paul,” I say. “It’s already big.” I think of Alix on the roof last night. I try to remember exactly why I came here. I lift my beer, which I swore Snake just filled. Now there’s barely a swallow left.
Snake snaps a match to life and lights a new cigarette. “Things are happening, Buddy. Big changes are coming. If Q’s long-term plans go through we could be sitting in a meeting with Ted Turner eighteen months from now.”
“Ted Turner?” I say. “You’re delirious.”
Snake jabs that cigarette at me. “Enough. You want to keep playing Mister Martyr, that’s fine. But don’t muck it up for the rest of us. Q’s got big plans for the future—you know, that thing after tomorrow? And if you were smart you’d be cashing in. With a few grand in my pocket, I could be all nude again in no time. Hire some Raleigh lawyers, get those bogus charges against Moniqua dropped, build a new stage for her, hire a primo dj, add on a kitchen, pick up a karaoke machine, run shuttles to downtown, have dollar drafts, tencent wings, free popcorn. We’ll have college night, bachelor night, ladies night, couples night, sports night, senior citizens night, veterans night, disco night, Hawaiian night. Dwarf-tossing. They’ll come from miles and she’ll know I had the right idea. I’m talking about fucking vindication here. A chance to prove that all that happened didn’t happen for nothing.”
Snake sucks hard on his cigarette, blows smoke over the empty pitcher, then stares down into the ashtray.
The night Moniqua skipped town, he asked me to meet him here and we drank alone with Lucifer prowling the sticky floor. Snake seemed supernaturally calm. He said everything made sense, which made no sense to me. All night, he kept telling me everything was going to be fine. Here’s one thing I’ve learned: When someone in crisis says everything is fine, it’s time to break the glass and sound the alarm.
The next morning I found the napkin in the pocket of my jean jacket with shaky handwriting: Take care of Lucy. This confused me until I got the phone call: Snake swerved to miss a deer on River Road and took out a phone pole. That was the official story. I burned the note. It’s a night we’ve pretended never happened.
That’s how thin the line is. That’s how much you can risk.
I stare at Snake. All his posturing gone. The scars seem brighter on his forehead as he struggles for something else to say. With one thin finger, he traces a tight circle over and over again in his goatee. The wall behind him shimmers like it’s an illusion. My eyes feel loose. Looking down into the last inch of beer, I wonder if Brook is finishing an ice cream co
ne right now. I picture the three of them sitting on the fender in the Dairy Queen parking lot, Trevor pointing out the Big Dipper to Brook, explaining things to her about how the world works. I stand suddenly, lightness rushes to the top of my head. I stumble, catch myself on the edge of the table, and straighten.
I drop a ten next to my empty mug.
“For Christ’s sake, Buddy, c’mon. Don’t leave like this.”
I walk away. The dance runway I once protected lies before me, and I move toward the faded gold shine of the poles. I’m looking at them when I bump hard into something. “Sumbitch!” I hear and turn to the pool player.
On the table, the cue ball rolls into the far right pocket.
“M’sorry,” I offer.
“Sorry don’t give me my six ball back.”
Snake steps up. “Next game’s on the house.”
The kid is in my face. I’ve got eighty pounds on him, easy, but I’m still about to clock him when my eyes fix on his empty sleeve, folded neatly and safety-pinned to his shoulder. Was he born without the arm? Did he lose it somehow? While I’m staring, he raises the only hand he’s got. I look up just in time to see the fat end of the pool stick descending. I drop hard, ass then head, and find myself staring at the unlit disco ball hanging from the ceiling. My hand finds a little blood on my forehead, though I’d hardly call it “pooling.” This is the kind of inferior prophecy you get for 99 cents a minute. The one-armed pool player steps into view over me, fisting his stick like a warrior. “Mutashoo,” he says. I swear. “Mutashoo! Mutashoo!”
I brush away the helping hands and climb to one knee, stagger toward the door. Snake’s holding my shoulder, and he’s saying something about a taxi. “Lawsuit,” I hear. “Full liability.” But I shove him out of my way. He’s still shouting as I push through the double doors, but his words make no sense.
The air outside clears my head a little, though I still don’t understand what’s happening around me. The gravel parking lot rises and falls like a waterbed. The beer is full inside me, and I look around for a place to relieve myself. Out back I come across Snake’s hearse, a big black monster from the ‘70s he drives to all the matches so he can haul away the dead bodies of his wrestlers’ opponents. Leaning on the shiny black surface, I work my way to the sideways back door. The license plate reads, SSSNAKE 1. My hands fumble with my zipper as I envision a hot stream spraying Snake’s plate. But a few seconds later my toes are growing warm and I realize my marksmanship skills have grown rusty.
I should sober up and go back inside, pound teeth from the punk with one arm. But I’m old now, too tired for anything but my brown couch and the sure comfort of late-night TV.
Driving is not easy. Every set of headlights I figure for a cop. This was a stupid, bad idea. The worst of all plans. I lock up the brakes at a green light by accident and almost get rear-ended by a pizza delivery boy. The bleeding on my forehead stops. WAOK’s broadcasting an hour of New Age music. All clicks and whistles. I shut it off to concentrate on the road, but my mind is so fixed on staying between the lines it forgets where we’re supposed to be going. Old instincts take over. I make a right instead of a left, go straight at the light where I’m supposed to turn, and suddenly I find myself back in the old neighborhood, cruising down Asgard Lane.
I pull to the curb five blocks away from the house, shut off the engine. I roll from my Ford and stumble into the gully, a ten-foot-wide ditch the city owns that runs through the middle of the development. Everybody’s backyard has got a fence up to block the sight of the thing since the city doesn’t do much in the way of maintenance. So I’m sloshing through six inches of still water, stirring mosquitoes up into the humid June air. I keep quiet and hope if anybody hears me they’ll figure me for a possum. Twice I stop because I hear voices whispering in the pine branches over my head, but it’s only the chatter of insects.
I come up to the eight-foot fence I installed myself and climb the little incline to it, stick my face up against a knothole like a boy without a ticket for the big baseball game. Best-case scenario is Alix is in the kitchen, or alone upstairs by a window. But all the lights are out. I figure it for about 22:00, way too early for everybody to be in bed already, but late for them to still be out on that ice cream run. I try to jimmy the lock but splinter it away from the wood, then slip through, into the backyard I used to mow once a week from May to September. Trevor’s letting the crabgrass take over. Bald spots from mole crickets.
Up close there are still no signs of life in the house, so I step up onto the deck. Trevor’s bought himself a new grill, the GasMaster 5200. A nice model: side burner, dual beer holders. For spite I crank the gas nozzle closed, wondering how long it will take Mr. Director to figure that one out. I cup my eyes and lean into the sliding glass door. Inside I detect no movement. No sound. Recon complete—negative occupancy. I try the door and it gives, so I slide into the air-conditioned cool. I think about wiping my feet but then figure what the hell and track a little mud onto the carpet we paid an extra hundred bucks to have StainGuarded.
In the darkness I do the blindman shuffle toward the kitchen, knocking over a chair that’s not supposed to be there. I flip the light. Magneted to the fridge are pictures of Brook in costumes from her different dance routines. Here she’s a baseball player, here a soldier in fatigues. In one my daughter is dressed as Elvis. In another she is dressed in bright scarves, a harem girl or something, and Trevor is standing beside her, grinning.
Next to these pictures is a photocopy that reads: “Jhondu’s Five Steps to Being a Better Dancer and Finding Inner Peace.” Number four reads, “Eliminate the source of all negative rhooshies.”
In the back of my head, some still-sober voice is telling me I’m nuts. If I get caught in here there’ll be real trouble. Court-ordered quarterly chats with Dr. Collins and pink pills won’t be enough to keep them from taking away my Saturdays with Brook. But it’s clear I’m in the middle of something and the current is pulling me along now. Habit has me crack open the fridge, and I scan some old salad and a Saran-wrapped pyramid of barbecued chicken. The twelve-pack of Heineken draws my interest, and I decide Trevor won’t notice one missing beer.
With the opened Heineken in my hand I start toward the stairs. Suddenly I want to see my old bedroom and the pillow where Trevor puts his head. I want to go through Alix’s drawers and find fading pictures of me, of us together. But then I see blue light glowing from the living room. The television’s on—a clear impossibility since the Trinitron is downtown in the Salvation Station. Stranger still, it sounds like football but there can’t be football on in June. I poke my head around the corner and sure enough there’s Frank Gifford on the big screen talking to Al Davis about the Raiders moving back to Oakland, which is screwed up because they moved back years ago.
The couch is empty, but I see somebody’s legs extended out on my La-Z-Boy. I can’t tell if it’s Alix or Trevor but I’m pissed now. That old chair was about the only thing I asked for in the divorce and she swore—under oath!—that she gave it to Second Chances. I step in front of the Trinitron to confront the chair stealer and everything—the whole wide world—makes no sense at all. ’Cause it’s me in the chair. Buddy Cooper.
“Hey,” he says, “where’d you get the Heineken?” He holds a can of Bud Light.
After ten seconds of silence, I say, “The fridge.”
He asks, “You want to trade?”
“No.”
He points at my face. “You’re a mess. Between the chin and that goose egg on your forehead, you’re not about to win any beauty prizes.” When I don’t say anything, he goes on. “Take a load off,” he says. “You’re kind of late.”
I settle down onto the couch and stare at my younger face. It’s smooth. And my crew cut is thicker. Young Buddy is watching the game. He lifts his beer and I catch the glint of gold on his finger. That ring is in a shoe box in the back of my closet downtown.
“What the hell’s going on here?” I ask.
; “Nothing good,” he says. “Jackson’s running all over Seattle.”
And then of course the wave of déjà vu crashes. This is the Monday night Alix comes home and we cross the line. The night she kicks me out. But somehow I’ve been given another chance.
“Buddy,” I say quickly. “Do you recognize me?”
“Sure,” he says. “You’re Buddy Cooper.”
“Great. That’s great. You’ve got to listen to me. Bad things are going to happen tonight.”
“I’ll say,” he says. “I’ve got twenty bucks on the Seahawks and they’re gonna lose thirty-seven to fourteen.”
“You don’t understand. This is the night our life falls apart.”
Buddy giggles at the screen and I look. It’s the “Where’s the Beef?” commercial. “That one kills me,” he says.
“But we have a chance to save it,” I say, trying not to get angry. “A chance to save our life.”
He looks at me. His face is warm. “Buddy,” he says. “You shouldn’t have stopped reading good books after you left college. You’re looking at this from a strictly Hollywood viewpoint and that’s just a flawed perspective. This ain’t It’s a Wonderful Life. Hell, it’s not even Back to the—”
“Shut up,” I say. “You don’t understand. We have to stop this from happening again. You don’t know how terrible—”
“You whine a lot,” he says. “And you’re not a very good listener. You should try watching Oprah instead of those soap operas. Oprah knows how to listen.”
I stop. Calm. I say, “We—have—to—stop—this.”
“No we don’t,” he says. “We can’t. This already happened. You think I don’t know what’s coming? Five minutes from now Alix comes in mad from Harris Teeter. The Raiders are driving. You offer to help but she knows it’s token. She tells you to enjoy the game. A bag of groceries rips. Bo Jackson plows over Brian Bosworth on the two yard line and sends his career spiraling toward bad movies. The jar of Ragú shatters and splashes spaghetti sauce. Alix curses. You can’t find the paper towels. Brook locks herself in the bathroom. Before long we get the Spock plate in the ass. We’re out of the emergency room by midnight and in the Motel 6 by one a.m. That’s tonight’s script, Buddy. We can’t change it. You can’t change it.”
Buddy Cooper Finds a Way Page 5