"Nam," Spider finished for him. "It was too Nam, right?"
Frank took another drag, nodding his head.
"Don't sweat it Franky, that war shit is still floating around in yer head, fuckin' with you," he said, taking back the joint. "You just need a little time to ease into this stuff, we'll take it slow," he patted him on the back with a smile.
"Sounds good, man, thanks," Frank replied, lying through his teeth. His real plan was to go get a couple hours of sleep back at his apartment, and then throw all of his belongings onto his bike in a knapsack and drive three-hundred and fifty miles straight back to Storm Illinois, which was way off the beaten track of the Dead Bikers' Chicago territory. Only one of them knew where he was from, and he intended on talking her into coming back with him tonight. They both had to get out of this shit.
Chapter 11 Escaping the Dead
Franky's plan of leaving anytime soon that night slowly burned away, as the gang party was in full swing and he couldn't get to her without Spider somewhere close by. It wasn't until about four thirty in the morning before it seemed like Spider was engrossed in a poker game, forgetting all about his woman. The woman he had stole from Franky.
"Margie," Frank whispered as she finished up a shot of whiskey. "I need to talk to you," he motioned his head to the door. "Outside."
She just looked at him with blank eyes for a moment, then glanced over at Spider. "What else I got to do?" she said with a shrug, walking right past him to the door. He slowly followed after, looking back to make sure Spider hadn't noticed. She pushed the door open way too hard, forcing Frank to run the last four steps to stop the door from slamming shut.
"Shit!" Frank said. "Are you trying to get his attention?"
"He scares you that bad?" She asked, lighting up a cigarette.
Frank was so tired of her shit. A part of him wondered if his real reason for trying to get her to come with him was because he still cared about her, or if it was simply because she was the only one that could tell Spider where they were from. He knew she hadn't told him yet, cause that was one of the rules of the gang: nobody talked about where they were from or where they thought they were going, cause they weren't going anywhere. They were staying with the Dead Bikers, unless they died of course, that was the only way to get walking papers out of the club. Paper being a death certificate.
He rolled the dice, what else could he do? "I'm leaving for good tomorrow, I want you to come with me."
"Why would I want to do that?" genuine confusion crossed her face. "I'm the leader's old lady, I can't climb any higher than this. Why would I want to run off with some loser who is hanging on to his patch by a thread?" She blew smoke in his face. "This is your grand scheme to win me back? To show me you're not just a loser but a coward? You sure know how to make a girl swoon," she started back inside.
He grabbed her arm lightly, but she stopped, turning back.
"Did you hear what they did to Ann?"
She tilted her head. "When you say they, you're including yourself, right? Cause you were there, helping hold her down."
"Yeah, I was involved," he admitted. "That was the last straw for me. I'm done with all this..." his mind searched for the right word to define the situation. "Evil shit," his mind finally decided. "After Ann, how could you not be as well?"
She looked off towards the shit smell river, saying nothing, but not walking off either.
"This is our last chance to go before everything goes to hell," he said. "I can feel it, and so can you."
"Where would you go? Back to Storm?"
"Yeah, they'd never find us down there in the middle of nowhere."
"Unless I stay, and tell Spider right where you ran to."
"Yeah, I'm going either way."
She still looked at the river, seeming to actually consider leaving.
"Spider's plans have been getting a little out of hand," she looked back at him. "He's been talking about hitting a bank out in one of the suburbs."
"That'll be the end of the gang," Frank replied. "That will bring in the Feds."
"When are you leaving?"
"I'm packed and ready to go," he lied. "Figure I'll go home, get a couple hours sleep and then hit the road by eight or nine."
"I'll need more time than that, I'll meet you at your place by ten or ten thirty."
"I was really wanting to get on the road before then."
"Relax," she replied, pointing back to the clubhouse. "Nobody in there is even going to be awake before two in the afternoon. We'll almost be home by then."
"So, you're coming with?"
She tossed away her smoke. "I don't know... maybe." She looked back at him. "If I'm not there by ten thirty, don't wait, just go."
He looked down, nodding his head.
"Don't worry, I won't tell him about Storm if I stay," she said. "If he asks, I'll say we met up right before we came to Chicago. I'll mention you saying something about being from up North, Michigan or Wisconsin or something, hell, I can't remember."
She turned without another word and walked back inside.
Frank went back to his bike and had to kick-start the damn thing six times before she roared to life. With each kick he waited for a bullet in the back of his head, but none came, so he shot off into the night.
The sun was making its way up by the time he laid down on his couch and closed his eyes. He had set his alarm clock for nine thirty, but he doubted he would need the clock to wake him before then. He was right.
Franky awoke from the pressure of a large knife pressing on his throat. Slowly opening his eyes, he saw Spider, sitting on the couch beside him, a smile on his face and his large, army Ka-Bar knife in his hand.
"I had such hopes for you, Franky," Spider said. "Do you know at one time I even thought you might have what it takes to be my second in command?" He scraped the black blade around lightly, like he was giving him a shave. "And here you are, nothing more than a panty waste little pussy, running from the only thing that could actually make you something."
"I'm done with the club," Frank whispered, the pressure of the blade making it impossible to speak any louder.
"Then you're dead," Spider made it sound like he was talking about the weather, just a little rain is all.
Frank nodded his head slightly, causing a nick of blood to rise from his neck.
Spider's smile changed to a snarl as he removed the blade from Frank's neck and thumped his forehead with the butt of his knife.
"Shit!" Frank replied, bringing his hand to his forehead.
Spider stalked the room like a rabid tiger, pointing his knife at Frank. "You got your wish, you fuck, you're done with my club. I'm going to tell them I killed you and dumped your bike in the river. That old piece of shit Indian ain't worth scraping anyway."
"Why would you do me any favors?" Frank asked.
Spider threw his hands over his heart. "Maybe it's all the guilt I feel about stealing your old lady last year. After doing you so much harm, how could I possibly do anything more to you and still live with myself?"
"Bullshit," Frank replied, sitting up.
Spider chuckled, pointing again at him with the Ka-Bar. "Damn straight, that's bullshit." He stepped forward, bending down and getting right in front on Frank's face.
"The real shit is that the club is done with you, but I'm not." For just a moment Spider's eyes seemed to glow a dull orange, must have been a reflection from the sun. "You've put a serious kink in my long term plans, but don't worry, I'll smooth it all out on myself." He stood back up, slowly walking backwards, still pointing at him with his knife.
"And not only have you not seen the last of me, the price you are going to have to pay for your mutiny is going to be soooo much worse than your own death," he put his knife back in its sheath. "Enjoy the good life while it lasts, Franky, cause it never lasts long." He walked out, leaving the door wide open.
Franky didn't move until he heard Spider's bike start up and drive off, then he grabbed his shit, jumpe
d on his bike and never looked back. It didn't occur to him until that moment that he had discarded the tainted switchblade, simply to have it replaced with the bike he now rode on. Cursed heirlooms really were hard to get rid of.
Things did start to pan out for Frank after that. He made it back to Storm. Got a job working at a local garage as a mechanic, fell in love with the owner's daughter and eventually married her. A few years after that, Frank took over the shop as his parents-in-law retired and moved off to Florida. A year or so after that, Frank's wife, Beth, had a baby girl. Things really had improved for Frank in a relatively short span of time, but just like Spider had told him, enjoy it while it lasts, cause it never lasts long.
Back in the present, Frank was opening one of the cabinets in his garage. He squinted, trying to see the contents in the darkness. There was a cardboard box that could possibly hold some new bulbs. He pulled it out into the slightly better light to see what he had and his heart stopped cold. He looked at the old shoe box that was decorated with crayon rainbows and stick pictures of a father and daughter holding hands. It was the box his daughter had decorated for one of his birthday presents. His daughter Lisa. His dead daughter Lisa.
The strength in his legs disappeared, so he leaned up against the old bike, hating that he needed to use it as a crutch but having no choice. For he knew if he went to the cold concrete floor, he might not have the strength to get back up. He might just lay there until he died.
Lloyd let out a quiet whine, concerned for his partner and dearest friend.
"I'll be alright boy, just give me a second," tears streamed down his face as he grieved for his daughter and wife, leaning against the evil machine of his youth. He was so tired of this damn life. He was more than ready to throw in the towel.
"Not quite done yet though, am I boy?"
Lloyd sat down, not really knowing how to reply. Humans could be so obscure when it came to communication.
"Not yet," Frank answered himself, forcing the strength back into his legs and walking away from the old Indian motorcycle. The old shoe box was still in his hand. He would be placing it next to the picture of his wife on the nightstand.
Chapter 12 Painful Mornings
The alarm went off with an annoying buzz. Jake reached out and turned it off, sighing heavily as he opened his bleary eyes and looked at the clock.
Dragging himself up off the bed, he made his way towards his mother's room.
"Ma," he whispered, opening up the door. "We gotta get ready to go for your treatment."
Opening her eyes, he saw just how much of a hold death had on her on that unholy morning. The skin on her face was taut and thin, with a pattern that looked like spider-webbed glass. Her eyes were bloodshot, dripping with suffering and hopelessness.
His hardcore hangover suddenly didn't seem like such a big deal as he watched her slowly climb out of bed. "Do you need help?" he creaked with a dry voice.
She fended him off with a slow wave of her hand, as the other held her forehead. "Give me a moment."
"Sure," he replied, leaning against the doorway, wondering what the fucking point of life was.
Drew's hangover mirrored Jake's as he threw bacon on the grill and took a sip of his coffee, trying to calm his stomach.
"No drinks at my grill," said Drew's boss Joe as he walked by.
"There are today," Drew replied.
Joe stood just a little over five feet tall, which meant he suffered from short man's syndrome by default, and as a result he took very little shit from taller males in his employment. "What did you just say?" he snarled like a pit bull.
Drew sat his cup down on the shelf above the grill and looked his boss straight in the eye. "I'll be drinking from this cup of java as well as the ice water beside it for the entirety of my shift today. If you don't like it, then fire my ass."
Joe was surprised by Drew's behavior, and honestly didn't know how to react. He genuinely liked Drew, he was a hard worker and even though he was quite a few inches taller than Joe, he was still classified as short, which in Joe's mind gave them a certain kinship. The black eye and bruises on Drew's face also told Joe something bad happened last night to the poor kid. Not knowing what else to do, Joe simply turned and walked away.
"Bout time something went the way it should," Drew whispered to himself, grabbing the ice water and pouring it down his dry throat.
Johnny sat up and looked around, at a complete loss as to where he was. The bottle of Dead Ace tipped over on the floor started to revive his memory.
"There was somebody else here last night," he mumbled, grabbing the bottle, looking at the dead bugs and broken leaves inside it. "What the fuck?" he asked looking at the debris floating around in the bottle, things that had easily been there for years.
"I didn't drink out of a bottle full of shit last night," Johnny said, throwing the Dead Ace up against the wall. The dark liquid and glass sprayed across the pictures of ponies and princess that hung on the wall as it shattered.
The memory of his laughter last night over the missing girl suddenly reverberated in his head, forcing him to scramble out of the room as his stomach started to revolt.
Making it out to the porch, he puked over the broken banister, nearly falling over after his vomit as the rail broke he held on to.
"Bullshit," he mumbled, turning his fall into a jump at the last moment as he launched off the porch and onto the dark soil in front of the porch, shuffling for a moment before getting his footing and then moving off towards his house, which was a good four miles away.
"Motherfuckers," he said to himself, which essentially cursed everyone involved with last night other than himself.
Sarah dreamed of the fight from last night, but Jake didn't stand on the sidelines this time. He circled around them like a hungry shark, goading them on to prove who the real man was. Every time one of the combatants would score a good hit, Jake would howl with laughter, regardless of who scored the hit. Jake didn't seem to be on either of the fighters' side, he was just happy they were fighting. He was feeding off their violence. He looked her way, giving her a wink.
Her stomach suddenly lurched, ripping her from the dream. Nearly falling out of bed, she stumbled to her bathroom, barely making it to the toilet before losing the contents of her stomach.
"I didn't even drink that much last night," she thought to herself, resting her head on the cool lid of the seat. After a few minutes she gathered enough strength to stand up and turn on the faucet, splashing cold water on her face.
She looked at her reflection. "Probably just from all the bad shit that went down last night," she told herself as a drop of water fell from the tip of her nose. "And that dream sure didn't help calm my nerves," she grabbed the nearby towel, drying her face. "That's all it is, I'm fine," she walked out of the bathroom.
Hangovers for the long term alcoholic are quite different than those for young pups that haven't even seen twenty years of life, much less twenty years of alcohol addiction. Jacky was within an elite group of booze hounds, for he had been a slave to the bottle for over forty years, and his love for it was as strong today as it was back when it first got its claws deep in his heart in that nasty, dirt fuck war with the Cong.
His throat was as dry as a ten year old bone baking in the Sahara sun, while his head throbbed as raging rapids flowed in-between the thin space between the top of his brain and the roof of his skull. The sensations that bombarded him would be enough to put even the most experienced college binge drinker in a fetal position on the dirty floor of a public restroom. For him, it was just another shitty morning, same as all the others.
He lit up a smoke, taking a seat on the rusty step leading up to his trailer. The demon was suddenly beside him, kicking over a bucket so he could sit down beside Jacky.
Jacky squinted at the fiend, puffing smoke out of his nose. "Where'd you disappear to last night?" The demon's sudden appearance didn't faze him in the least. The beast only made him nervous when he was sober. Drunk or hung
over, he couldn't give a shit about what it was or what it did to him or anybody else.
"Had some business to attend to," the demon replied, lighting up its own cigarette.
"I thought you had shut Frank down already."
"It wasn't Frank. It was one of those fine young men you just recently made friends with."
"What use could those dumb-shits possibly be?"
The demon flicked his cigarette, sending ashes drifting to the ground. "You know, the thing they say about youth being fleeting is quite correct."
Jacky shrugged, shaking his head slightly, completely lost at the fiend's point.
The fiend ignored him, watching the ashes float to the ground like tiny broken angels. "It never ceases to amaze me, those that hold such a high commodity are the easiest to manipulate, know what I mean?" He smiled at his old friend Jack.
Jack slowly nodded back, knowing exactly what he meant now. After all, the demon had done the very same thing to him decades before.
"At least I was in a war," Jacky defended himself. "Hell, I was in the tunnels during the war."
"Definitely," the fiend agreed. "You were in a much scarier situation than these young weaklings. They are pampered and ignorant compared to the shit you were going through. You had no choice but to partner up with me, it was the only way for you to survive."
Jacky looked at his old comrade. "God sure as hell wasn't lookin' for any partners down in the dark."
The fiend gave him a genuine smile, patting him on the back. "The old man never gets his hands dirty anymore, he leaves that for ones like us. Ones with the stomach for the shit work."
Jacky shrugged. "His loss."
"Yes it is, my man," the hell-beast said with a chuckle, massaging Jacky's neck. "Most definitely!"
Linda walked into the waiting room, making eye contact with Jake, who sat next to his mom. "Got you ready to go, Margaret."
The Damned Summer (The Ruin Trilogy) Page 13