by Rob Pierce
That part was true. “I hurt somebody, now someone dangerous wants me dead.” I moved my hand down her leg a little, then back up, under her skirt. My mouth went for hers and her head tipped back. I grabbed her by a shoulder and pushed her down and held her there. She lay back and I sat up straight and tore at her skirt. It stayed on so I stood her up and everything fell.
***
I woke on my back on the living room floor, Olive’s arm across my chest, gripping my shoulder. I stared at the ceiling, eyes open wide. Dim sunlight glinted through a gap in the black curtains. Whatever time it was I knew I should get up. For now I needed a shower, then gallons of coffee and dozens of eggs. I ran three fingers between Olive’s small breasts and rested them on her smooth belly. She moved a little, but not like she was aroused or even awake.
I stood, staggered to the bathroom like I was still drunk, got into the shower and let the warm water run. It was seven something in the morning, I’d glanced at a clock and knew I was early. I also knew I couldn’t sleep, might as well live with this part of the massive hangover. There wasn’t any scotch left, I remembered draining the last of the bottle from my place on the floor while Olive scratched at my chest.
The shower woke me, didn’t sober me. I made it to the kitchen and got the coffee water boiling, leaned against the counter, my head throbbing. Rico. We were in a business where being a friend didn’t mean much. He’d do what Tenny told him or he’d die. I didn’t think that bothered Rico. I washed down some percodan with the first coffee, poured myself another and started some eggs.
***
Back to the high-end collections. I felt worse than ever, I collected fast. I didn’t need to hit them, and I was too numb to want to. I threatened their cars instead. If I threw one punch I didn’t know if I could stop. That much must have been obvious.
End of the day I gave Rico the money, barely talked, headed back to Olive’s, drank and waited for her to get home. I slumped on the couch, arms open wide.
The door opened fast and I jerked up. Olive walked in and I relaxed as she shut the door behind her. There was no reason anyone should be coming for me, not yet, but it was already in my dreams. She saw me drunk again and I caught it in her eyes before she said a word. I stood and stepped away. If she came at me like that I might hit her.
“You used to wait for me sober.”
“You don’t know what these days are like.”
She went into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of scotch. Mine was already in my hand.
“I know what my nights are like,” she said. “If you can’t handle what you do, you should stop doing it.”
I downed my drink, walked up to her. “You think I can’t handle it?”
Her face was surprised, like I wouldn’t dare question her, like she forgot who I was.
I stepped past her, opened the cupboard and poured myself another glass. She stood to my left. I looked to my right. “You know I chose this life. You know it’s dangerous and there’s shit I can’t talk about. You know this much and that’s all you know. You don’t know shit about when it gets hard.” I turned. Her mouth was shut, her eyes dull. I leaned my neck forward so our faces almost touched. “When I need to fucking drink I need to fucking drink. You see losers all night long, they think their lives are hard. Don’t look at me like you look at them. I ain’t depressed cuz some pussy looked at me wrong and maybe he’s after my job. I got shit I gotta do, that’s all. And sometimes I need this to get there.”
She didn’t step away, just turned so our faces weren’t so close. “I get that you’re a man, Dust. You beat the fuck out of people. I’m okay with that. But you get drunk and you’re lousy in bed. Drink a couple pots of coffee or you’re wastin my time.”
“You’re missing the point.” My face was in hers again. “My life is on the fucking line.”
“Then get the fuck out there and deal with it. Don’t take it out on me.”
I swung, and my glass was in my hand. I hit her across the cheek and she fell. I dropped the glass on the kitchen floor, watched it break and spill.
She looked up, eyes wide, mouth wider. Her hand grabbed her cheek then dropped to the floor. Her hand came up bleeding from the glass on the floor. “You sonuvabitch. Get the fuck—get the fuck—” She waved her bleeding hand and I stepped back. “Don’t ever come back! Cocksucker!”
I got out.
***
I staggered to my car as fast as I could. I hated men who hit women, I had to get away. Fuck she was beautiful, and fuck I hit her in the face with a glass. She gave me shit but goddamnit. I had to get away.
What I did to beauty.
I drove. I drove like shit but I drove slow, drove near the freeway where I knew the shitty motels were. I pulled into the first one I saw.
I got a room and walked out. There was a liquor store on the corner, overpriced and a lousy selection but it was there. I bought a fifth of Johnny Walker Black and opened it on the sidewalk, drank as I walked back to the motel.
The room had a TV and cable but not enough channels, only movies I didn’t want to see and ESPN showing stuff I wouldn’t call sports. I drank and looked at the screen.
When I hit her it was like I wanted myself dead. That wasn’t me, the guy who did that. But I was the guy who walked out on Theresa. The guy who scared Davis to death. The guy who pulled the fucked up bank job. Fuck it, maybe this was who I was now. It’s like what a woman says before she walks away from you. People change.
***
I got up from the motel bed and put on yesterday’s clothes, chugged my complimentary crappy coffee and drove down to meet Rico. My collections schedule was for the week, but we’d gone back to meeting every morning. Because we were friends or because he was watching me, I didn’t know.
“You don’t look so good,” Rico said from the usual table.
I waved and walked past him, came back when I had my coffee. I sat down. “This job ain’t about looks.” I sipped, the coffee was hot, I set it down. “Probably better I don’t look good.”
“I wasn’t talkin about the job.” Rico looked at me like he was worried, but he’s a friend who’s loyal to his boss.
I needed him to still be a friend. “I broke up with Olive.”
“Shit.”
“I’m okay.”
Rico blinked and looked at me and the whole thing was weird. “Where you stayin?”
“Rooms.”
He nodded, didn’t offer anything.
I sighed, relieved. If Tenny was worried about me Rico might be extra nice. Rico was just Rico.
I looked at him. “I go out of town this weekend. Nothin to do with work. Gotta straighten out some personal shit. If you gotta follow me, I can tell ya exactly where I’ll be.”
Rico nodded. “Gimme names and addresses. When they match, we’re both in the clear.”
***
I checked out of my room Saturday morning and drove to Val’s place. It was oddly hot on the road south. Fucking Bay Area weather. I had what felt like a permanent hangover; the sun was not my friend. Clouds would have been nice, clouds to the point of darkness. Instead it was windows down on a dry freeway, until I gave up on the air becoming fresh. I rolled up the windows and turned on the AC.
I saw the eternal Volvo in her driveway and parked on the street. I got out of my car and walked to her door. I was pretty sure she’d let me in, but my nerves were worse than any bank robbery. I didn’t know exactly what I was here for, only that I needed something.
She didn’t answer the doorbell the last time I was here, but the button was still there so I pushed it. I didn’t hear anything and she didn’t answer so I knocked three times, loud.
“Yeah!” she hollered from somewhere inside. A half minute later the door opened, slow.
“I knew it was you.” She held the door awhile, looked me up and down. “You look like shit.” She turned her back on me, took a step away, looked back over her shoulder. “You coming in or what?’
I push
ed the door the rest of the way open and walked in behind her.
She pointed at the couch, “Have a seat,” walked into the kitchen. She came back into the living room with two dark glasses and sat next to me. “I know it ain’t your usual but I assume you’ll drink bourbon.”
I nodded and took the glass from her. “Thanks.”
Sobriety was a point of pride with Valerie. When her boys died, she wouldn’t allow herself to sink any further. She’d had that one slug of scotch last time I was here, and she didn’t even enjoy it. Now she’d risen above that, and sinking was again a possibility. “I’m surprised you’re drinking, Val.”
“Guess I’m luckier than you, Dust. You can’t do anything that surprises anyone.”
I took that in with a drink, looked at her. “Fuckin pissed, ain’tcha?”
“You, Dust.” She shut her eyes and it was like she should be shaking. She opened them. “I used to think… you were a man I wanted.” She took a drink. I knew where this was going but I couldn’t interrupt. “You’re not that man anymore.”
I looked in her eyes and I was fucked. I’d come to her for mercy, but that was nothing I could ever take from her. I had to be her savior. Women saw who I was, and they wanted to offer their help, but they never expected me to actually need it.
“I got you through a lot of shit, Val.”
“But now—I’m in this other shit, and the old shit,” she tapped her temple with an index finger, “it’s still here.”
I felt my shoulders sag, my body lean forward. As soon as I felt it I straightened up, sat back, tried to look relaxed. “What’s the other shit?”
“It’s us, Dust.” Her tone was sharp. “You know it’s us. You always had other women, and I was never ready for you anyway, and then I was, and you…” She blinked, she drank, she tipped her neck back as she swallowed.
No one’s strong all the time, I would’ve said, but she’d throw that back at me. She saw me as flawed now, and when you start seeing a man’s flaws it’s like they never stop.
“You boost yourself with booze,” she went on, “and act tough til everyone’s convinced. Well, maybe I can do that myself now. You don’t need me, I don’t need you. We’re that kind of team.”
“We been friends a long time, Val. It’s always been a certain way. It wasn’t meant to change.”
“It changed.”
I grabbed both her shoulders. She brushed my hands away. I looked in her eyes and I didn’t know who I saw in there. “Maybe you’re not lost anymore.”
“I think like you now. We’re all fucked and I finally see it. I’m nothing special. Neither are you. You’re part of my past, Dust. I can’t live in that. Cheers.” She took a drink. I got the feeling she wasn’t pissed off, she was just in a state. She’d been in that other state so long. I hoped it didn’t take her as many years to get out of this one.
I’d taken care of Valerie a long time. It was weird having her tell me to leave her behind. This whole thing was backward. I stood and finished my drink, set it on the coffee table, walked out the door. Val couldn’t go back to where she’d been. I had to go back, I had no other choice.
***
It was still early Saturday, I had nowhere to go and no reason to be in a hurry, but I drove fast. It was the only way to do anything, do what needed to be done and not think about it too much. Try to find a rush then try to find the next; don’t slow down, don’t come down. Stop hurting everyone I cared about, stop letting them hurt me.
I drove fast with my window down, hoped the wind would whip some sense into me.
***
I made it to a motel, drank and slept. The drinking was okay, the sleeping was ugly. Nothing but nightmares. Reality crawled all over me. Rico was everywhere I turned, always with an envelope never with a smile. Tenny, vast and black, stood behind everything I saw. Everyone else crawled away.
I woke to the buzz from my phone, rolled to turn it off and sunk into the cheap springy mattress. I got up and chugged my lousy motel coffee, got in my car and drove to the usual café.
Rico was there. I wasn’t glad to see him. He sat like everything was normal. I guess for him it was. I bought my coffee and sat with him.
“Long night, Dust?”
“I gotta get a place. Motel beds suck.”
“People say they want independence. They really wanna be in charge.”
I took a sip. The coffee was too hot. “Fuck people.”
Rico set down his cup and shrugged. “You know women don’t stay.”
“Shit, why would they?”
“There’s guys who get married.” Rico picked up his cup again. “Me, I’d rather get laid.”
I fucked up with Theresa, but Rico didn’t want to hear about me fucking up again. And he sure didn’t want to hear that I hit Olive with a glass. I had to get under control. I was falling apart. “I get a good bed, I’ll be alright. Women left me before.”
Rico pulled an envelope from his coat, handed it to me.
“What’s this? I’m not done with the last list.”
“There’s nothin in the envelope. Just a name and number on the outside. Call that guy, tell him you need a place, tell him you work for me.”
“And you knew I needed this today?”
“Shit, I been carryin that around for a week.”
“You knew they wouldn’t take me back.”
Rico leaned forward, whispered. “You been bouncin around like a fuckin pinball. Only a crazy woman puts up with that.” He leaned back again. “You’re a good worker. Don’t want you stayin with no crazy woman.”
What was I supposed to do, argue? Say I was the crazy one? Rico already said that, only he didn’t stop long enough to emphasize it. “This guy got a building?”
“A couple. Unfurnished rooms. Bring your own bed, sleep like you want.”
I nodded. “Thanks.”
“Stop being crazy, keep collecting money. That message is from Tenny. Listen to him. Right now, he’s all you got. And really, he’s all you need.”
Not what I wanted to hear. I took a sip of coffee, looked around the empty street, looked at Rico and smiled. “Damn right.” Tenny wasn’t what I needed, I didn’t know what that was. But all I had? Yeah. I knew Rico a long time and I thought we were friends, but if I needed something from him this time I might come up empty-handed. If I came up at all.
I finished my coffee, got up, shook Rico’s hand. Maybe after work I’d call this guy, and see about an apartment. Or maybe I’d find another shithole motel room and drink myself stupid. How smart did I have to be to beat people up? To hit a woman with a glass so she’d hate me? To make other women hate me without raising a hand?
I got into my car. I had nowhere to go. Life ran itself now, I just went where I was told. I started the car and drove.
***
Ripping off Tenny was my only way out. There were ten names on the list: total debt, three hundred thousand dollars. He’d kill me if I tried this, but if I didn’t, he owned me. I was better off dead. And with even half of three hundred large, I could really plan some bank jobs.
The shits who owed this kind of money owned real nice houses, they weren’t going to let me inside. But they were just guys with high-paying jobs, they’d leave home for work and I’d meet them on the way. They wouldn’t have the money on them, but I’d take their cars as collateral. Or their girlfriends, their children. Tenny had me by the balls, and these poor bastards were where I’d burst.
I’d have to break a lot of laws to pull this off. Might as well break them all at once.
Frank Walls owed twenty-two large, had a wife and two small boys. I waited outside his house in the morning, watched his high-end Lexus pull away, waited another fifteen minutes. For a bank executive, his house was sure easy to approach. I pulled into his driveway in a stolen Pacific Gas & Electric van with swapped out plates.
I rang the doorbell, stepped back so Mrs. Walls could see me in my blue PG&E uniform through the peephole.
A
woman’s voice answered. “Who is it?”
“PG&E, ma’am. There’s a leak in the area and we need to check all external gas lines. I don’t need to come in, just want you to know I’m out here.”
“Is it safe? My babies are inside.”
“We haven’t found the leak yet. If you’re worried, you can leave for a while and come back.”
I took a couple steps off the porch, waited two minutes. She ran out the front door with two infants in her arms. She stepped off the porch and I came around the corner of the house, put my pistol against the side of her head.
“There’s no leak and I don’t want to hurt you. Keep quiet and let’s go back inside.”
She backed away. “But—”
“Your husband owes money and I’m here to collect it.”
“My husband isn’t home.”
“Let’s go make a phone call.”
I guided her into the house, shut the door behind me, saw a phone on a table and waved my gun at it. “Call him.”
She walked over, raised the phone shakily, hit a number on speed dial and spoke briefly. I took the phone from her hand. “Mr. Walls,” I said. “I have your wife and children. You have my twenty-two thousand dollars. If you want to see them alive, I need my money now.”
Walls said he’d get the money. I told him when and where to meet me.
I had a stack of license plates in the back of the van. I could pull this PG&E scam all day. And it wouldn’t make the news because if any of these guys said a word he was dead.
***
Rico would recognize my car if I tailed him in it, so I came to the meet in a stolen late model Accord, small, black, and nondescript. I parked a couple blocks away, met him in the usual café.
“More slow guys,” I told Rico over beers. “They don’t know me, they don’t pay right away.”
“Some do.”
I set down my glass. “Some,” I nodded, and passed him a fat envelope. There was forty thousand dollars inside. “I gotta convince every fucking one of em.”
“So you got more money tomorrow?”
“Probably some. In two days, I get you everything.”
Rico’s tall glass looked tiny as his big hand spun it in a circle. “Tomorrow’d be nice.”