The Third Step

by William Lobb

  She said he had an air about him, somewhat dangerous, friendly, but not someone to take lightly. He laughed, said he was just a burned-out truck driver way down on sleep, and he apologized again. He added he had to meet a guy in the morning and he was not looking forward to it.

  She asked what it was about and he said it was work-related. Even though he had lightened the mood somewhat, she still felt something about this guy was just not right. He opened her wine bottle, took a drink from the bottle and handed it to her. He pulled a joint from his shirt and lit it. Frankie took a hit and handed it to her, opened his vodka, took a long drink of that, and breathed out a long sigh.

  Sometimes, watching him drink vodka, one had the feeling that the liquid was a life-giving substance, like oxygen. He said, “It doesn’t matter; tomorrow I’ll be gone. Tomorrow morning, I have to kidnap a guy and kill him. I’ve killed before; that time it was pretty much accepted as an accident, but the reality is that it was stone-cold intentional. My best friend Sammy hit me hard, almost knocked me out. I got to my feet and killed him. This job tomorrow, this is payback for a hit on a friend. I need to be honest with you. I used to lie to myself, but there is something about killing that doesn’t bother me as much as I wish it did.”

  Poor Barbara expected him to say he had a drinking problem, which was pretty obvious, or he hated cats, or he secretly liked to dress up in ladies’ clothes. Frankie’s admission that he was a murderer and didn’t hate the work was a little more than she was prepared for. She nervously asked if he just randomly killed people, and he assured her no, never. There always had to be a good reason.

  This job tomorrow was going to cause a major problem for a lot of people; that’s why he had to do it and get out of the area for a long time. Knowing this person would be leaving and she’d never see him again was the most comforting thing to happen to Barbara that night. She wondered if he would try to get her back to the hotel, but Frankie seemed to be more focused on what was going to happen tomorrow than getting her into bed.

  “Frankie thought, He could kill me too. There is always that chance; it’s going to be a fair fight, but I imagine I’ll kill him.” Suddenly, in his mind, he flashed back on Billy Martin’s nearly dead body, the look in Sammy’s eyes as Frankie knew he had dislodged his brain, and seeing the blood run from his ear and nose.

  He looked at Barbara and said, “Do you think I should just shoot him?” She really was speechless, but she was doing some respectable damage to the wine bottle, and they continued to pass the joint back and forth. Frankie looked out at the waves and the clear sky and the lights from New York City and commented on how beautiful it was.

  Barbara was now both frightened and intrigued at a man who could discuss murdering another human being as casually as he could discuss how good the dinner steak had been. Then, in the next breath, he could change the conversation to the beautiful scenery and the night sky. Her fear somewhat lifted and she began to relax, for no good or apparent reason. She mistakenly took this man as something of an avenger of evil deeds. It was just the wine and the weed, but it helped her to be there.

  They spent the next two hours talking about their lives. Frankie was shockingly honest and candid; it was as if the burden of hiding his past, his crimes, and his sins had been lifted. He wasn’t sure if it was the pretty brunette girl or that part of him didn’t believe he would live to see another night, so keeping his story to himself no longer mattered. The conversation then turned to music and life at the shore.

  They finished about three more joints, the wine, and the vodka, then they stumbled up the ladder to the sea wall and back down the other side, and weaved across the parking lot to Frankie’s room. They both collapsed on the bed. The next thing Frankie knew, Mr. Jones was at the door with coffee and rolls. Frankie showered quickly, left the brunette some cash and ran out to meet Jones. It was a little before 6:00 a.m., and they had to be in Brooklyn before 9:00.

  Chapter Twenty-one:

  The Death Of

  John Quarry

  The drive was quiet and Frankie was uncharacteristically hung over. They stopped before getting on the Garden State for beer and ice. Then he and Jones drank and talked about baseball and the weather and the trucks and where they would look for work after this went down.

  They were discussing it a little like another day at work, simply another bad job they had to do. “Mexico,” Jones blurted out. “Ever been to Mexico? I have a friend who is a coyote, smuggling people across the border; pretty good work, unless you get caught.”

  Frankie said, “Yeah, I could see that. I guess this is going to end our careers in the flower business, huh?”

  Jones said it had to end anyway. Nobody could keep up that pace forever. “We just need a new gig.”

  They rode on into Brooklyn and Church Street. Frankie looked at Jones, “I guess we need to do this, Mr. Jones. I don’t like who I’ve become; I don’t like that I have to take on everyone’s wars. I miss a simpler life. I miss having a way back and a way out. I know this guy deserves to die, but I don’t know how many more I can carry, Mr. Jones. I’m still young, but I feel very old. Inside, I feel thousands of years old. I don’t sleep. I lay awake at night and hear the moaning of the ghosts, my grandfather telling me to turn it around, but every day I walk closer and closer to that line: the edge, the line too far, the line I want come back from, a border just too far. I don’t want to kill this guy, but I don’t want Eddie dead either. All these things are out of my hands. I hope he puts up a fight. I hope he makes me earn this death. Part of me hopes he wins, hopes he kills me. That would end the war, wouldn’t it, Mr. Jones?”

  They were waiting on the street until John Quarry’s sister left the building. It was about 8:45 a.m. Frankie turned in the backseat and opened the cooler, grabbing two more beers. “I don’t know how tough this asshole is; if we can’t get him in the car, I guess we’ll do it right there in his apartment. I don’t want to do this. Last night I dreamed I was talking to Sammy’s ghost. This is just one step closer to the line.” He then looked Jones in the eye. “I’ve already crossed the line, haven’t I?” Jones glanced down at his beer.

  Frankie looked up. “There goes the sister with the kid—it’s time. I’m still young, Jones, but I feel a thousand years old. I know how I’m going to die. It won’t be clean and it won’t be pretty, and I hope it’s not today. We’ll go in, buy the weed, maybe burn one with him, then we’ll tell him we have a guy, big time guy, big player, wants to buy quantity. We need to take him to meet him. I had Fat Joe call him yesterday and tell him about it. He’s a stupid, greedy fuck. We get him in the car. I’ll take his keys and his car; we’ll drive out there to the swamps, then kill him and leave him.”

  They walked out of the elevator and knocked on John Quarry’s door. John answered; he was very high, very agitated. He started saying things that made no sense and he was very confrontational. He asked Frankie how much money he had brought. Frankie just looked at Jones and said, “Do you believe this asshole?”

  John came right in tight to Frankie’s face. “Asshole? Asshole? Who are you calling an asshole, motherfucker?”

  Frankie became confused and concerned. This was not part of his well-orchestrated plan. He tried to downplay everything. “Come on now, John, we only want to do business here. We don’t want trouble.”

  John returned, “Don’t tell me shit about what you want,” and he pulled a six-inch, bone-handled switchblade out of his back pocket. Jones reached for his pistol, but Frankie waved him off.

  “John, seriously, we don’t need to do this.”

  But John was getting very bold with the blade. He screamed, “I know who you are!” He lunged at Frankie, and in a move that was almost choreographed, Frankie quickly stepped aside and John went flying toward the wall, and tucked and rolled. Frankie reached down and pulled him to his feet and slammed him hard in the temple with his right fist. John collapsed to the flo
or. Frankie grabbed John’s right arm and twisted it back, bending it almost behind his back as he grabbed the knife from him. Grabbing his shirt collar and neck, he pulled John up. He stared into his eyes, making sure he was still conscious as he pulled him up against the wall.

  Frankie said, “Asshole, I’m going to kill you now. It is purely intentional and do you know why?” John stared into his eyes. He could hear him.

  Frankie plunged the switchblade into him, right below where the rib cage meets, inches above the navel. He pushed the blade in deep as he said to John, “I wish you’d never killed my friend, Eddie, you asshole, but it feels good to kill you. Now I’m going to watch you die.” As Frankie plunged the blade deep into John Quarry’s body he saw blood run, it reminded him of Billy’s and Sammy’s blood. He pushed the blade in deeper like he was fucking him with the knife. He felt the warmth of John’s blood running from his dying body on his hand as he watched life end and escape, like a whisper. The blade felt like it reached John’s heart as Frankie saw the last glimmer of life pass from his eyes. Frankie stood there and stared at him, feeling the weight of John’s lifeless body now, feeling that he was supporting all of his weight on the knife blade and his right arm. He pulled the blade from John and pushed his dead body to the floor.

  Jones finally spoke, “Well, it wasn’t supposed to go down that way—”

  Frankie said, “Let’s grab his weed, guns, and money and get the fuck out of here.” Jones looked at him, questioning. Frankie said, “Jones, you want to leave it?” Frankie took John’s wallet, went into the bedroom, found about a pound of weed and a small stack of cash. Jones said he had found a couple of guns. They threw the weed and guns in a bag and bolted for the door. Jones started the car. He took off before Frankie had made it fully into the passenger seat.

  “What’s Going On” by Marvin Gaye played on the radio. Frankie quietly said, “I don’t know, Brother Marvin; I really don’t know.”

  They didn’t say much until they hit the Garden State. Frankie rolled a couple of joints and they passed them back and forth. At about 10:30 a.m., Frankie finally asked if Jones wanted to go to a bar. Jones didn’t want to. Instead, he offered, “Let’s just grab some beer. I want to get back down to Jersey and figure out our next move.”

  Frankie was just barely holding on to sanity. He was hearing voices. He kept seeing Sammy’s face and John’s face. He finally said, “Is this weed bothering you. You feel okay?”

  Jones said he felt fine and pulled into the parking lot of the 7-11. Frankie sat in the car while Jones went in to buy beer. He was shaking inside; not visible to anyone on the outside, but clear to him. He couldn’t stop it. Frankie sat in complete silence for a long time, trying to silence the noise of all the voices—the old woman, Alex, Pam, Billy, Sammy, Landry, and now John and Eddie.

  He started talking to Eddie. It was like his dead friend was sitting there next to Frankie. Eddie told him that he never wanted Frankie to avenge his death. “What was the cost you paid for that? You couldn’t forget this, let it pass? These events become who you are, Frankie. I never wanted this for you, and I’m still dead and you’ll live with this man’s ghost forever. Was that your plan, Frankie, to carry my weight and now his too? You’ve done something you can never undo; now you need to live with this. I’m sorry, Frankie, you did nothing for me; all you did was ruin yourself.”

  Chapter Twenty-two:

  Going To The Carnival

  Jones returned with the beer and handed him one. Frankie said he needed two. Jones looked at his friend and asked, “are you okay?”

  Frankie could only say he didn’t know. Then he said they should call in an anonymous tip to the cops, so they could find the body before the sister and kid got home. Jones looked at him and replied, “Are you serious?”

  Frankie said he was talking about a two-second call from a pay phone somewhere in North Jersey. “Not a lot of risk in that, Mr. Jones. Maybe we can get a little even with karma. I don’t want the sister or the kid to see what I did to him.”

  He got out of the car, pulled a quarter from his pocket and dialed the police. He ran back to the car and they took off. They had to lose these rental cars, pick up the trucks, and get out of town. Frankie said, “I’m heading south; I’ll get lost somewhere in the South.” He wondered if the girls would still be at the motel. He kind of wanted to fuck the brunette and they needed someone to drive one of the rental cars. Frankie would pick them all up with the tractor, pick up Jones’s truck and then they would come up with a plan. Jones had a trailer; Frankie didn’t. They still were fat with cash, but after the Fourth of July holiday, they needed to get back to work, somewhere.

  All that business was settled, quickly and easily. Frankie picked up the blonde and the brunette at the motel, and they all decided to head down to Asbury for the holiday, fireworks and a pretty good party were promised. They could sleep in the tractors in the sleepers; to the girls it was a big adventure. When they were alone, Jones confided to his blonde friend that he was becoming a little worried about Frankie. They drove down Kingsley Street in Asbury and pulled the tractors up to the sidewalk on one of the side streets. In the vacant lot that was bordered by Kingsley and Ocean Avenue, a small carnival was being set up. They walked past it on the way to the boardwalk and lunch.

  They all sat down at a small cafe on the boardwalk, with cooling breezes coming in off the Atlantic, and the heat rising from the worn slats of the wooden walkway. There was nothing like the smell of salt and sand and suntan lotion in the air, the warmth of the sun. Looking down the boardwalk they could see the casino, and north to the convention hall they saw the giant sign that read, “Welcome to Asbury Park, NJ.” Everywhere there were people and dogs. It seemed the perfect place to relax and forget the events of the past week. It was relaxing for anyone else on that beautiful day, but Frankie seemed to be obsessed suddenly by the carnival. Every chance he got, he’d look in the direction of the lot where it was set up. He didn’t know why he was drawn to it.

  The four passed the day quickly on the sand and the boardwalk. Later in the afternoon, as the sun was setting, Frankie left them on the beach and walked over to the carnival tents as things were being set up for the night’s shows. There was something about the atmosphere that appealed to Frankie: the bearded lady, little Tiny Tim, fire eaters, sword swallowers.

  As he stumbled around the outside, Frankie ran into a girl who worked there; she ran some chamber of horrors. Her chamber was a trailer, painted with some really dark and ugly graphics in black and blood red on the side. There was a wooden ladder with a little porch under a sign that read “ENTER IF YOU DARE.” Down at the end, another sign read “EXIT.” What happened, what could happen, in the forty feet or so between those signs both scared and fascinated Frankie.

  Something about this girl made him think she wasn’t just another performer pretending to be a freak. She was a very dark, frightening girl, a genuine freak; she invited him in. This girl was immersed in the character, or so he hoped. She evoked a sense of fear. Even the words she used had a sense and purpose about them. She started to describe what she would do to him. She spoke in carefully measured tones, never smiling, never losing eye contact. Splinters under his fingernails and toenails, skinning him alive, blood; maybe she’d cut off his balls and end his misery of trying to be a man, neuter him. She had a rack she could put him on and rip him in two.

  He asked if she was kidding. The girl looked at him with the coldest eyes he’d ever seen and she said, “There is nothing funny here. Do you find anything funny about this, about me?” Frankie assured her he did not. She suggested he come back after everything closed; she would break him, teach him, and bring him to her world.

  She sat down next to him and took his hands and she looked into his eyes. Suddenly, her facial expression changed. She backed off, got up quickly, and said he had to go. “You have to leave. You have to leave now. I sense a very real evil in you,
an evil darker, perhaps, than my own. I sense something deadly in you. Do not come to me with your poison. There’s a thin line, a fine veil between show and reality. Most of these people are all part of the show. I’m not. I live here to hide in plain sight. I’m a lot like you. You’re not part of the show either. I can sense who you are; you are broken and damaged. The danger in you is that you’ve lost the line. We’re a lot alike. I started out part of the show, but I lost the show. I became the show, and this is who I am now. I’ve hurt men and women, both. I’m on the run, too. So are you. I know it. Tell me who you are running from. Tell me all you’ve done. Tell me your story.”

  Frankie looked down at the ground as she kept talking. “This all used to be fake, but I got pulled in, just like you did. The blood used to be fake. Now, at times, it’s real. I’ve been living here in hiding since the spring. They say the taste of blood becomes a need. That’s how I lost the line. The men, the woman, meet me here and we’ll arrange to meet somewhere, thinking they will have a fetish fulfilled, a fun kinky time. I don’t stop; I can’t stop. I plan for nights when the carnival will be pulling out of town the next day. I don’t stop. I don’t want to stop. I’m like you. How many have you killed?

  “Come with me; come to my next date with the poor slob who thinks he’s out for a night of kinky fun. I leave them dead in the hotel rooms; I take their money and their lives and I hide in plain sight. My bloody blouse, my pale skin, it excites them, turns them on, until they realize I’m not the game, I’m the reality. I am the darkest fear these good folks have. I see the terror in their eyes as they meet me, meet my reality. Their pure terror as they realize, too, that they have crossed a line from which there is no return. Then I watch—not happy, not sad, just sated—as life slowly drains from their bodies, as their light goes dark. You have looked into these eyes, I can tell. I can see it on your face right now. You know the moment of tortured death; it’s within you now, and it is a terror and a comfort to you. Evil senses evil. Evil finds evil. People like us find each other out of a common need. Stay with me. We will explore this darkness together.”