by Eric Beetner
“Get those fuckers!” Ambrose said through the bloodstained hands he held over his nose.
Calvin threw open the door to the garage and without looking launched himself forward, missing the three steps down. He pitched forward and hit hard on the passenger door of the Plymouth, grunting out a made-up curse word, “Fuckapuss-cock!”
Tucker stepped up behind him and put a hand under his armpit. “Get him in,” he said to Milo.
Tucker stood Calvin upright and dug a hand into his granddad’s pocket pulling the single key ring out as Milo opened the door and pushed his great-grandfather into the back seat. Tucker moved around the front end of the Superbird, fumbling with the keys and thinking again about the zombie movie and how this would be the exact moment the engine didn’t start.
He slid into the driver’s seat and the engine turned over no problem.
As Ambrose and his three cousins came piling out of the front door, the two healthy men helping along the two injured, the rumble of the Superbird’s V-8 already spilled out from the garage.
The tires squealed on the slick garage floor surface and the rubber smoked before catching grip and blasting the car out of the garage. Tucker hit the street with no idea where to turn. Instinct took over. Fear drove the car, not Tucker, but from the backseat Calvin felt he was witnessing a rebirth.
“That’s it, boy. Drive it like you stole it!” he said.
“We did steal it!” Tucker said, his eyes wild and trying to see every possible obstacle in his way at once.
Milo was shocked into silence at seeing his father behind the wheel of a strange, loud car doing anything over thirty-five miles an hour.
Tucker reached the stop sign at the end of his block, screeched the tires again to make his stop before the white line.
“Fuck the stop signs, kid.”
Tucker knew he was right. He regrouped, inhaled deep and spun a U-turn.
“Where the hell are you going?” Calvin asked.
“This way is better,” Tucker said.
He drove back past his own house as the pickup truck with Ambrose and his cousins banged away from the curb.
Tucker felt thankful for the automatic gearbox on the Superbird. Shifting would be one thing too many to worry about. He powered the car through the suburban streets as fast as he could make it.
The pickup had its soundtrack of clangs and rattles. Ambrose hadn’t been kidding about the rust and dented exterior, the broken tailgate and the hundred thousand plus mileage. He leaned his head back in the passenger seat applying direct pressure to his nose wound while one cousin drove. The two unlucky ones clung for dear life in back. The sawed-off hockey stick bounced twice and flipped out the open tailgate to the street. The owner wasn’t about to let go of his two-fisted grip to try to snatch it. It was life over limb in the back of that truck.
Tucker reached the end of his subdivision and turned onto a long straight road that ran along farmland between there and town. The sun was gone on the far horizon and the deep blues of dusk faded to black quickly as the ghosts of bootleggers past came out overhead to usher the McGraw boys along. Some would look up and see stars, but Calvin knew better.
Tucker took the hard left turn too fast. He knew nothing of the car’s limits, or any car for that matter. The back end began to fishtail out and Tucker, he wasn’t sure why, cranked the wheel and turned into the slide, keeping the car on track and unleashing a wild banshee cry from the tires as they slid along the Iowa asphalt still warm from the faded sunshine.
Calvin nearly teared up. The dormant cells he knew survived inside every McGraw man, even Tucker, were being shocked to life inside the cauldron of fear and high-octane gasoline.
Tucker would never admit to his granddad that he learned that move from Cars. Maybe on Calvin’s deathbed if he wanted to put the old man out of his misery he could cough up that little detail and it would be enough to send him to the great beyond. Until then, it was between him and the two-lane blacktop.
The pickup skidded onto the country lane losing ground quickly to the Plymouth once they hit the straight. Ambrose punched the dashboard, urging the truck to move faster while simultaneously admiring the well-tuned engine in the Bird. He rarely got to hear the sound from outside the car and it sounded like a big ball of fuck you, like it was supposed to. Made him miss the old gal even more.
The huge wing on the back of the car pushed down on the rear tires and they gripped the road hard like it was a stripper’s ass. The pickup faded away in the rearview.
They approached a four-way junction with a single flashing yellow light, the need for traffic control out here unnecessary until that very moment. Tucker slowed, the Bird downshifted and he cut the wheel right to make for town.
When Ambrose saw brake lights he clapped his hands which sent droplets of blood from his soaked hands over the inside of the cab.
“We’ll get ’em up here.”
In a straight line the pickup still had some guts and they used the braking of the Superbird to gain some ground, but they pushed it a little far. When the pickup finally did brake to make the turn she was coming in hot and the G-force of the right-hand turn sent both cousins in back sailing across the oncoming lane and onto the soft shoulder and the drainage ditch it dipped down into.
The blur of two bodies flying through the air caught in the periphery of the driving cousin and he slowed the truck with a “Fuck me!”
The two unfortunate siblings landed hard and rolled through fortunately unkempt roadside grass, cushioning their fall and limiting them to a pair of broken legs and more broken ribs than you could count on your fingers.
Tucker revved the Bird back up to eighty before checking the rearview and seeing no headlights following them. He slowed to normal speed and threw a look to Milo whose combination of relief and confusion meant a long explanation he didn’t have energy for. He turned to check on Calvin in the cramped backseat and saw a man beaming with pride the way no one did when Tucker graduated from community college. You’d have thought the family had come to witness his first day of life in prison that day.
What Calvin had just witnessed, though, was his coming out party.
“Welcome to the family, Tuck.”
10
“What the hell was that, Dad?”
“I was trying to save our lives, that’s what.” Tucker made sure to lock the door behind him this time. He aimed for the couch and sat hard, dropping his head in his hands.
“Those boys showed up with sticks in their hands, our lives were gonna be fine,” Calvin said. “But, I’ll tell you what that was—about damn time. That’s what it was. I’m damn proud of you, son. There’s a McGraw in there yet.”
“It had nothing to do with my name. I was trying to get away from a bunch of madmen who you pissed off. Who’s to say they’re not headed back here right now?”
“Nah. They learned their lesson. Won’t be back for a while. Tell me, did you feel it in your balls?”
“Goddammit.” Tucker slumped back into the cushions.
“Tell me if you felt it. I know you did. That feeling never gets old. I still feel it when I go balls out like you just did. Hot damn, I felt like I was eighteen again shootin’ the river run racing to get away from smokies with a hot load of contraband in the trunk. Who wants a beer?” Calvin stepped toward the kitchen.
“We’re out. You threw them at the men trying to kill us.”
Calvin stopped, remembered the last two cans and checked the floor. Both beers had burst when they impacted with Ambrose and his cousins. Each had slowly leaked into the carpet. The wet spot under where Ambrose stood was also colored with some blood.
“Well, crap. We’d better head out to the store then.”
Tucker took his hands down from his face. “We’re not headed anywhere. Let’s get some sleep. I really would like to find my dad and this day has been pissed away by your stupid plans so we’re gonna get an early start tomorrow.”
The room fell silent until Milo,
hands stuffed deep into his jeans and shoulders shrugged up high around his ears, spoke quietly. “Granddad’s missing?”
Tucker sighed and palmed his face again. “I told you it wasn’t really a good time for you to drop in, Milo. Speaking of, we never called your mom. Let’s go do that, otherwise she’ll have the cops over here any second.”
Tucker stood and Milo followed him into the bedroom to use the phone.
Calvin, still amped from the drive, didn’t sit. He stooped and picked up one of the fallen beer cans, shook it, decided there was enough in there to make the effort. He righted himself, spun the can so the tab faced him and cracked the top open with a dull unpressurized aluminum sound. Calvin wiped a smear of blood off the top and tipped the can up to get one decent swig.
Three hours later Tucker picked up the empty pizza box to throw in the trash. He’d tried to entice the other two with one of his frozen pizzas but they insisted on ordering a large with meatball and extra cheese that also came with a two liter Pepsi. Calvin pointed out several times that Pepsi wasn’t beer. Tucker told him to deal with it.
“So who gets the couch now?” Calvin asked, eyeing Milo.
“You can have it still. Milo can help me blow up the inflatable. I think I still have your sleeping bag in the closet.”
“Aw, man.”
“Hey, your choice mister. You keep telling yourself that. Your choices have consequences. For you and for me.”
There was no way Milo could adjust his position on the air mattress without making bizarre rubbery noises like two balloon animals humping on a pile of dodge balls, and the lack of support required constant adjustment.
“Granddad Calvin?” Milo asked, hushed.
“Yeah?” Calvin couldn’t get to sleep in silence. Not after getting used to the way Marie snored for all those years.
“Did you and Dad really steal that car?”
Calvin grinned to himself, kept his eyes shut in the darkened room. “What did he tell you?”
“Nothing. He said he’d explain later.”
“Well,” Calvin turned his body to face the floor where Milo struggled to get comfortable between the TV and the coffee table. “Stealing is in the eye of the beholder. He didn’t have what we wanted, so we took what we needed. To me, that’s not stealing.”
“What did you mean about driving with contraband in the trunk?”
“I shouldn’t have said that. Figure of speech. Don’t worry about it.”
“What about Granddad Webb?”
“Oh, he got himself in a bit of trouble. No big deal. We’re doing what McGraw men do, though. We got each other’s backs. Right?” Calvin opened his eyes and found Milo’s profile in the darkened room.
“Yeah.”
“That’s right we do. Don’t you forget it.”
11
The phone rang at seven a.m.
Calvin clicked the flip phone shut, turned to Tucker who had been listening from the doorway. “We’re going to Illinois.”
Milo turned over on his air mattress, loud rubber glove noises filled the room. “What’s in Illinois?”
“Not you. You got school,” Tucker said.
“Aw, Dad, come on—”
“He’s right,” Calvin said. The mischievous granddad had gone. The one that stared down at Milo was dead serious. Milo obeyed.
An hour later they were showered, shaved and Milo had been deposited at school. Calvin accepted the suitcase from the man in the dark suit jacket. He turned and handed it to Tucker to put in the car.
Tucker was shocked by the weight of it. He tried to do some mental calculations to figure how much cash could weigh that much.
Calvin took a piece of paper with their destination on it and he and Stanley’s man parted ways without a word. The Superbird hit I-80 east toward Moline and Rock Island.
Calvin could feel each time Tucker turned his head around to ogle the case in the backseat. It was growing annoying.
“How much do you figure is in there?” Somehow Tucker assumed Calvin would know.
“Don’t know, don’t care.”
“Really?”
“You never look at the cargo. Never open it, never touch it if you don’t have to, you don’t shake it like a present under a Christmas tree. You never think about it. That’s a rule, hard and fast.”
Easier said than done. Tucker tried counting lines on the highway but numbers made him think about the case. He tried singing songs in his head but all that came to mind was the Pink Floyd song, “Money.”
It didn’t matter how much money was really in the suitcase. From the look of the apartment the two men occupied it was more money than they’d ever seen before.
Calvin carried the case up two flights of stairs. He let Tucker knock. Calvin didn’t hide the pistol tucked in his belt.
“Who’s there?” The voice inside was paranoid.
“We’re from Iowa and we bring good tidings,” Calvin said holding up the case for the peephole to see.
“You with the Stanleys?” asked the voice.
“I’m sure they’d appreciate it if you kept that name out of it.”
A chain and deadbolt unshackled from inside and the door opened wide. An acrid, chemical smell drooled out of the apartment. The man at the door, thin, chapped lips and nervously pulling on a goatee, stared at the case the way a stray dog looks at a steak.
“That it?”
“We didn’t come to Illinois for our health. Can we do this inside?” Calvin said.
The thin man in the Nine Inch Nails T-shirt stepped aside. Calvin entered, Tucker followed.
Sheets hung in all the windows blocking out the sun. The furniture, a couch and two armchairs, looked like it had been found on the street and brought inside. A second man, equally thin and wearing a hooded sweatshirt, took a long last drag on a glass pipe while holding a lighter to the bulb at the end. White smoke swirled around him and he tried to suck it all out of the air and fit more in his lungs like an overstuffed sock drawer.
The smell: explained.
“Pass it over here boys,” said the one who answered the door. Neither man had bothered to look Calvin or Tucker in the eyes yet, their focus singular on the case.
“We wanted to ask you boys a few questions about the man who picked up the truck. Is that alright with you, uh…?”
The one standing finally looked at Calvin, took his expectant face to mean he wasn’t getting the case until he introduced himself.
“Randy.”
“Randy,” Calvin repeated. “And?” He turned to the man on the couch.
“Brent.” Brent licked his lips, speeding fast on the last inhale of the pipe double-dosed with the anticipation of the contents of that suitcase.
Calvin handed the case to Randy who snatched at like a hyena after a carcass. He threw the payoff down on the couch next to Brent and fumbled with the clasps.
“So the man who picked up the truck, was he alone?”
Calvin was ignored as the case opened.
Tucker craned his neck around Randy to see. Neat rows of tightly wrapped bills. He still had no idea how much was inside, but he felt a little bit queasy at the thought that he’d been carrying that much.
“Boys?” Calvin said. Nothing. Awestruck. The three wise men weren’t so enraptured at a sight as these two tweakers were.
“BOYS?”
Randy turned to Calvin. “Sorry, bro. What?”
He wiped his drippy nose on his hand. Calvin swore he saw tears of joy in the boys’ eyes.
“The man who took your cargo, was he alone?”
“No, no man. There were two dudes.”
“Did one of them look like us?” Calvin pointed a finger between him and Tucker. Randy was confused.
“No, man. You look like you. They looked like…them.”
“I mean, could he have been related?”
Randy looked down at Brent. Brent squinted his eyes. “Could be I guess.”
“And they left no problem?”
&
nbsp; “Yeah. They checked the load and took off.”
“Checked the load? They opened the back of the truck you mean?”
“Yeah. They took a look-see and then hit the road. You guys want to blaze? We got some weed around here too if you want. Got an atomizer.” Randy began to search the room from his standing place.
“No, we’re okay.” Calvin sensed he was losing them. “What can you tell me about the other guy?”
“What other guy?” Brent said.
“The guy who drove the truck.” Calvin was growing annoyed. “The one who didn’t look like us. Did anyone use his name?”
“No, man,” Randy said. He reached out and Brent handed him the glass pipe followed by the lighter. Randy held the pipe up to the light to check the bulb and see how loaded it was.
“Hey, guys. We’re still talking here.”
Tucker flinched when the lighter sparked. He worried about paranoid things like getting a contact high, the things he’d read about meth labs exploding, the cops busting in. And not so paranoid things like the gun in Calvin’s belt.
“Hey,” Calvin put a hand on Randy’s arm, stopping the pipe from reaching his lips. The lighter burned the air between them.
“What the fuck? What do you want from us, old man? You did your job, now go.”
“What I want from you is a little respect for my son.” Calvin reached out and pushed Randy’s other hand up at the elbow. The lighter flame pressed into his cheek and he screamed. The pipe fell to the floor.
Brent stood up. “Woah!”
Calvin took Randy’s shirt in both hands, pulled him in close until the rotten teeth smell filled Calvin’s nostrils. “I’m asking you some simple questions here. You’d do well to cooperate.”
Tucker watched Brent as he bent to the floor and came up with a bong about three feet long in green glass with a Grateful Dead skull as the bowl. Brent raised the water pipe over his head to use as a club but Calvin stepped forward and kicked at Brent’s leg. He caught the back of Brent’s knee and heard a pop.