by Billy Taylor
“This place is jammed,” I said. “Let’s go across the street to the Sizzler.”
“No way,” Vinny said. “I’ve been looking forward to a Never Ending Pasta Bowl all day.”
I turned to Roy and Jackie, but they were too busy making out to offer an opinion. I pulled out my phone and checked the time.
“This is ridiculous,” I said. “We’ve been waiting almost forty minutes.” I tapped Roy on the shoulder. “Hey, we need to talk.”
Roy untangled his tongue from Jackie’s tonsils and said, “What’s up?”
“You want to get going?”
“But we’ve only been here like a couple of minutes.”
“No. You’ve only been here like a couple of minutes. Vinny and I have been here since Washington crossed the Delaware. C’mon, let’s go to the Sizzler.”
“But they don’t give you all the pasta you can eat.”
“Who cares? I’m ready to eat my sneakers at this point.”
Roy sighed. “All right. Let me go talk to the hostess.” He turned to Jackie. “You want to come?”
“Sure. You boys want anything from the bar?”
“Absolutely,” Vinny replied. “Get me a Heineken.”
“What about you, Skip?”
My hangover was still fresh in my mind and I said, “I’ll have a Sprite.”
“You sure you don’t want something harder? Like a glass of milk?” Jackie asked.
“No, Sprite’s fine.”
“Suit yourself.”
The happy couple headed for the bar, and Vinny stood up and cracked his neck. “Wanna go outside and fire up a joint?”
“No thanks. I didn’t sleep very well last night, and if I smoke anything now I’ll pass out in my Never Ending Pasta Bowl.”
“Okay, tell Roy I’m around the corner.”
Vinny stepped outside, and when I checked my phone I was delighted to see that another minute had passed. The way things were going we’d be eating dinner sometime in the next century.
Roy reappeared a few minutes later looking triumphant. “I slipped the hostess a ten spot and the next available table is ours.”
“Fabulous.”
“Where’s Vinny?”
“Getting high.”
“Excellent,” he said, and turned toward the door.
“What about Jackie?” I asked.
“She’s talking to the bartender. When she gets back tell her that me and the Vinster are outside.”
Four never-ending minutes later Jackie appeared with our drinks.
“Here,” she said, handing me a glass filled with a pale yellow liquid.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“A white wine spritzer. I know you wanted a Sprite and everything, but it’s two-for-one night, and I didn’t want to waste a free drink on just soda.”
I took a sip and said, “It tastes pretty good. Thanks.”
“No problem. Where’s Roy?”
“Out getting stoned with Vinny. If you want to join them I can stay here and listen for our names.”
“No, thanks. Pot makes me sleepy.”
“I know what you mean.”
I took another sip of my drink. Roy had said it was my job to impress Jackie, but I couldn’t think of anything impressive to say. The best I could do was compliment Jackie on her dancing, which I was about to do when she looked down at me and said, “You treat Roy like crap.”
“Excuse me?” I sputtered.
“He told me that you were like his oldest friend in the world, but I don’t buy it. Wanna know what I see?”
“Uh, what?”
“I see a guy who goes off to some fancy school and comes back thinking his shit don’t smell.”
I didn’t know what Roy had told Jackie about me and said, “I’m sorry. My mom’s been sick.”
“Big deal. My father dropped dead of a heart attack, and I still talked to my friends.”
I was at a loss for words. Jackie may have been obnoxious, but maybe she did have a point. “I’m sorry,” I finally said. “But if it’s any consolation, last time I went to the toilet it sure didn’t smell like potpourri.”
Jackie ignored my lame attempt at humor and said, “You think you’re so different from Roy and Vinny, but let me tell you something. You’re just like them. The way you talk. The way you act. It’s i-freaking-dentical.”
She took a sip of her drink, and I noticed a small scar above her left eye. I was about to ask her about it when she leaned in and said, “This waitress I know got this hotshot Wall Street trader to put her up in a nice apartment. Now whenever I run into her she acts like she doesn’t know me. But let me tell you something. The girl’s a joke. She thinks she’s so high and mighty in her five-hundred-dollar heels and Michael Kors dresses, but she’s still a Shooters’ Girl and everyone knows it but her. I can’t wait until the guy dumps her so I can laugh in her face.”
I stared at Jackie and sighed. Talk about the night from hell. Not only was I exhausted and starving, but now I was getting chewed out by someone I’d known less than five minutes. I didn’t think things could get any worse when the door flew open and Vinny burst in.
“Yo, Skip, get out here quick. They’re tugging your ride.”
“What?”
“Your car! Some dudes are jacking it.”
I raced outside and saw two men hooking up my Mustang to a tow truck.
“Hey,” I shouted. “What the hell are you doing?”
A big guy with a shaved head and handlebar mustache looked up from the bumper. “You Stephen O’Rourke?” he asked.
I was so upset it took me a moment to remember that Stephen O’Rourke was the name I was using at that particular moment.
“Yeah,” I said. “What about it?”
The guy held out a greasy hand. “Keys.”
“I’m not giving you my keys.”
“Fine, then any damage we do to the vehicle is added to the lien.”
“What lien? What the hell are you talking about?”
He jammed a piece of pink paper in my face. “This is a sheriff’s order authorizing me to take possession of this car for delinquency of payments.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means pay your bills, Johnny Appleseed. Now hand over the keys, or I swear we’ll mess up this vehicle so bad your credit rating will be trashed for the rest of your life.”
I turned to Roy for help.
“Give the man your keys, Skip.”
Seeing no alternative, I did as I was told. I held out my keys, and as the guy reached for them, I pushed the panic button on the fob. The car alarm blared, and the second repo man fell backward and landed flat on his butt.
“Sorry about that,” I said with a shrug. “My bad.”
The repo men went back to work and, if nothing else, I now knew who my car belonged to: the finance company. Vinny fired up a sympathy joint, and he and Roy passed it back and forth as we watched them tow my car away. At least the repo guys kept their word and didn’t trash it in front of me.
“Hey, Roy!” Jackie called from the restaurant. “Our table is ready.”
“Excellent,” Roy and Vinny replied simultaneously.
With nothing better to do, I trudged back to the Olive Garden. Not only had I just kissed my ride to Claire’s good-bye, I’d also bid adieu to my only chance of escaping my family. I glanced over at Roy who was so high he was practically levitating and wondered if what Jackie said was true. Was I just like him? Sure, we talked alike, and sometimes we even dressed alike, but so what? That didn’t make us the same person. I had a 3.92 GPA at one of the most prestigious prep schools in the country. I had ambition to be something more than just a successful criminal. Those things had to count for something. Then again, how long would my gold-plated ambition last if returne
d to Long Island permanently?
Use your head, I told myself. There has to be some way to untangle yourself from this mess. Some kind of double cross . . .
And isn’t that exactly what an O’Rourke would think? a voice inside me replied.
It was, and I felt like screaming. No matter what I did, no matter how hard I tried, my inner weasel always reigned supreme. Who was I trying to kid? Didn’t I lie to get into Wheaton in the first place? And Princeton, too? Wasn’t I lying every time I failed to tell Claire who I really was?
Why even bother asking that question? I said to myself. Every cell in your body is tattooed with the DNA of a weasel. Face the facts, you were born a thief and you’ll die a thief. Why not just accept your fate and get on with your life?
I hated to admit it, but sometimes I wished that I had never heard of Wheaton Preparatory Academy. True, I never would have met Claire and got accepted to Princeton, but I wouldn’t have known any better. I’d be the prize crook in a family of crooks. The pick of the litter. And maybe, just maybe, I’d be happy instead of desperate and overwhelmed, which was how I felt at that moment.
But hey, there was a Never Ending Pasta Bowl in my future, so at least I had that going for me. The hostess led us to our table, and as we sat down Jackie turned to me and asked, “Did those guys really just repossess your car?”
“Yeah,” I replied.
“Wow,” she said with just the hint of a smile. “That really sucks for you.”
15
IT TOOK TWO BUSES PLUS A TWENTY-MINUTE WALK TO GET to Shady Oaks the next morning, and by the time I arrived I was as depressed as I had ever been in my life. I know it sounds crazy, but even after Uncle Wonderful kidnapped me, and my cell phone went dead, and I read the e-mail obliterating my scholarship, I still thought I could somehow beat my family at their own game. But as I rode the N81 along Sunrise Highway and watched the parade of unhappy souls trudge on and off, I knew the O’Rourkes had won. No matter how I looked at it, I was back to being a thief.
“That son of a bitch!” my mother yelled when I told her about my car getting towed.
“Who?” I asked.
“Who do you think? My no good, lousy brother.”
“I don’t understand.”
“He was supposed to keep up the payments until I got out of here. I gave him power of attorney and everything.”
“You signed over power of attorney to Uncle Wonderful?” I said with a laugh. “No wonder you’re in Shady Oaks.”
“Save it, and hand me your phone.”
I did as my mother asked, and as she put my temporary cell phone to her ear I leaned in a little closer to make sure she was talking to a real person and not just faking the conversation.
“Wonderful?” she shouted into the phone. “What’s this I hear about Sonny’s car being clipped? I don’t know what you’re trying to pull here, but it’s stopping right now. You hear me? What?” A look of concern crossed her face. “Really? It costs that much a week? Couldn’t you have found someplace cheaper?” She listened for a moment and said, “No, no, I’m sure you did the right thing.”
It was an excellent performance, and I couldn’t tell if she was lying or not. Not that it mattered because I knew I would never see that Mustang again.
“I’m sorry,” she said, handing me the phone. “Wonderful used your car money to pay for this place. You wouldn’t believe how expensive it is.”
“Doesn’t your insurance pay for it?”
“Yes and no. We tried to pull a Medicaid scam—which was why we used my real name in the first place—but it doesn’t cover half as much as we thought. The way things are going, I might even lose the house.”
“I’m sorry, Ma.”
She looked down at the floor and sighed. “I’m the one who should be sorry. The house and car were for you. It all was.”
“I know and I really appreciate it,” I said, taking her hand. “It’s not your fault Uncle Wonderful got to Grandpa Patsy’s storage locker first.”
I could feel her grip on my hand tighten ever so slightly and she asked, “What are you talking about?”
“Grandpa Patsy’s money. I just assumed Uncle Wonderful took it. I mean, otherwise paying for this place wouldn’t be a problem, right?”
“Riiiiiiiight.”
The best thing about lying to a liar is watching their face as they try to measure the angles. Maybe my mother wasn’t 100 percent certain that I’d taken the money, but she was 100 percent certain that Uncle Wonderful would have taken it given the opportunity. She put an unlit cigarette in the corner of her mouth and said, “Then I guess it’s a good thing I ran into Sal DeNunsio. He could be the answer to all of our problems.”
Nice comeback, I wanted to reply. Instead I said, “Yeah, talk about winning the Irish Sweepstakes.”
We put on our coats and went outside to hit the gazebo. The sun, the breeze, and the barking dog were still there, but they now felt as inviting as the view from a jail cell. I tried to keep a smile on my face and was doing a pretty good job of it when Roy appeared.
“Hello, Royston,” my mother said. “What brings you to Shady Oaks so early?”
Roy handed her a bag of M&M’s and said, “Somebody’s gotta give this car-less loser a ride home.”
“You always were a good boy.”
“Thanks, Aunt Sheila.”
We dropped off my mother at the O’Neil Pavilion, and I followed Roy to the employees’ parking lot.
“What’s up?” I asked as we climbed into his Lexus. “Something tells me you didn’t come here to give me a ride home.”
“Of course not. We have to plan the job.”
“Oh goody. I’ve been wondering how we’re going to pull off this magic trick without Mr. DeNunsio finding out Fat Nicky is still alive.”
“That’s the beauty of it,” Roy replied. “DeNunsio wants this done on the down low. Part of the deal is that we’re supposed to make the body disappear after we cap him.”
I held up my hand like a traffic cop. “Wait a minute. You just said we? Mr. DeNunsio doesn’t know I’m involved in this, right?”
“That would be correct.”
“Good, because like I told your dad, I don’t want anyone outside the family knowing I’m part of this thing. One word gets out, and I’m gone. You understand?”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“Good.”
I didn’t believe Roy for a second, but at least I’d drawn a line in the sand. If someone in my family crossed it, I now had the perfect excuse to quit the job and flush my life down the toilet forever.
“Just out of curiosity,” I asked. “With no body and no pictures in the paper, how do we prove we killed Fat Nicky? Or is Mr. DeNunsio just going to take our word for it?”
“Of course not. He wants a scalp.”
“He wants us to scalp the guy? How do we do that without killing him?”
“No, doofus. A scalp is something that absolutely, positively belongs to the victim. In this case, DeNunsio wants a picture.”
“What kind of picture?”
“An autographed picture of Frank Sinatra.”
“The singer?”
“Old Blue Eyes himself. Sinatra was like a god to these guys. They practically worshipped at his feet.”
“That doesn’t sound very hard,” I said. “There must be a million pictures of Frank Sinatra on the Internet. Let’s just print one out and autograph it ourselves.”
“Not so fast. The picture DeNunsio wants is a Polaroid of Fat Nicky and Frank Sinatra taken backstage at Caesars Palace. It’s Fat Nicky’s most prized possession, and there’s only one like it in the world.”
“That makes things a bit more challenging.”
“Only a little. But don’t worry, I’ve got it all figured out. Fat Nicky has a hard time breathing from
all the lead in his chest, and twice a month he gets these big oxygen tanks delivered. I slipped the guy who drops them off fifty bucks, and he told me the picture of Frank Sinatra is hanging above the TV in the living room. It’s the perfect setup. All we need is a van, some uniforms, and a couple of oxygen tanks. That way we can pretend to work for the oxygen company and steal the picture when Fat Nicky isn’t looking.”
I thought about it a second and said, “That’s the dumbest plan I’ve ever heard.”
“Why?” Roy replied, looking hurt. “What’s the matter with it?”
I held up a finger. “One, uniform or no uniform, Fat Nicky isn’t letting a total stranger into his house. The first thing he’s going to do is call the oxygen company and—boom—we’re busted. Two, let’s say we do get lucky and steal that picture. All roads still lead back to the oxygen company, and do you really think your guy will keep quiet if Fat Nicky puts a gun to his head? And three, there’s no way I’m letting Fat Nicky see my face. Sorry, cuz, your plan stinks.”
“Fine. You got a better one?”
I thought about it for a minute and said, “Why don’t we just break into Fat Nicky’s house and steal the picture while he’s asleep.”
“You can do that?”
“Not me. You.”
“No way.”
“Why not? You’ve broken into a thousand houses. Why should Fat Nicky’s be any different?”
“Because the guy’s a mobster.”
“I thought you said he was retired. And besides, he’s hooked up to an oxygen tank. How dangerous could he be?”
Roy chewed on a thumbnail. “You know,” he said after a minute. “You might be on to something here.”
16
THE ONLY GOOD THING ABOUT TAKING ROY’S JOB WAS THAT my old cell phone started working again. I’m not saying Uncle Wonderful had anything to do with it, I’m just saying that the person responsible for it was probably named Uncle Wonderful.