Finishing The Job

by Harley Fox

  Where am I going? I don’t know. I could go home. But I don’t want to. I don’t want to be alone there. I want to stay out.

  Point Blank isn’t far from here. I rev the engine and turn out onto the streets. The traffic is lighter now. My bike dips and dodges between cars, passing them quickly, speeding through lights just before they turn red.

  Taking a right, I ride down our street until I reach the bar. And then I pull over to the side of the road, not turning into the lot. The lights are on. Bikes and cars sit outside, people mingling, talking, smoking and drinking bottles of beer, bottles of something stronger hidden in paper bags. Snorting bumps of white powder off their fingernails and the backs of their hands.

  I could go in. But something’s holding me back. The place seems strange to me now. Foreign. It’s like I’ve never been here before, even though I’ve been here a thousand times. Maybe the Bullets are in there. Maybe they’re not. What would they say if they saw me? Would they try to kill me? Would they pretend I wasn’t there? I don’t know which would be worse.

  I breathe a sigh. Check for oncoming traffic. Take a U-turn on the road and ride away.

  Where am I going?

  The Bullets are gone. Trista is gone. I’m alone. I have nobody. Some people wish for this kind of freedom. I can leave now, just like I told Trista I wanted to. Get out of this city. Just leave it all behind.

  But Trista.

  I don’t know why. Why? Why do I feel this connection? Why can’t I make it go away? She holds me back. Like a band, traveling from the middle of me to the middle of her. It can stretch, but it doesn’t seem to break. And I feel it, pulling me to her, trying to drag me off of my path to wherever she is.

  I want her. I want to be with her. I can’t explain it. I can’t say why or why not. I just want her. I want to be with her, now.

  And then a voice, loud and clear in my head: So do something about it.

  I blink, the voice’s word resonating in my skull. The road seems clearer now. The sidewalks and people are more in focus.

  Of course. Of course! All this time I’ve just been whining, complaining about everything that’s been happening around me, and in the meantime I’m just standing here, like a lost child, just letting it all happen. Why don’t I do something about it? Why don’t I fight back? I keep saying I want Trista so much? Then fucking prove it.

  So what can I do?

  My fingers drum on the handlebars. Street lamps pass me, my bike taking me from one circle of light to another. Somebody grunts in an alley as I pass by.

  What can I do? Something to impress Trista. Something to let her know that I’m serious.

  What does she want? She wants Will Silver dead. That’s at the top of the list. But I have no idea where he is right now. And even if I did, surely he has security. I couldn’t just show up at his door and shove a gun in his face. I’d die.

  So what else can I do?

  I could get at Will Silver some other way. His business? No, what would I do? The drugs connection with the cops might have been an option, had he not already killed that police captain on his own.

  Wait a minute … the drugs!

  The facilities, the ones Maddox had us all gut out and set up. I know where they are. I know where they all are. Their ins and out.

  My heart start beating faster. I’m getting excited. Of course! I could do something. Steal their supplies or trash the buildings or something. I figure out where the closest one is and turn my bike, banking a hard right onto a side street to get me there quicker.

  Ten minutes later I’m stopped in the shadows of a run-down business district. Small, single-story buildings populate the area. And there, in front of me, is one of the facilities we outfitted, complete with wire mesh-covered windows and myriad security cameras.

  My heart is hammering. I should have eaten something. I feel weak, but exhilarated, like I drank way too much coffee on an empty stomach. I shut off my bike’s engine and climb off, the gravel crunching under my boots as I walk over to the building.

  Nobody’s around. My ears are perked, but all I can hear is my own footsteps. I stick to the shadows. The cameras don’t have a wide range of view, but their quality is good enough that they would pick up my face. I step up to the edge of a shadow, facing the front door. Take my gun out. Cock it. Bringing it up, I aim at the camera that’s pointed right at that door.

  BANG!

  The device shatters and pieces scatter against the side of the building, raining down upon the ground. I stop, stand stock-still. Waiting to hear if anybody else is here. Ten seconds pass. Fifteen. No sound. I’m safe.

  I put my gun back and walk up to the front door. Kneel down, take a lock pick set out from inside my jacket. It’s a good skill to have, and one that lends itself well to having illegal fun. Plus, not a lot of people know how to do it, so it always impresses.

  It takes me a few minutes but I get the cylinder to turn, unlocking the door. I stand up, push it open.

  Beep! Beep! Beep!

  The alarm system. The panel is on the wall. I step over and punch in the code. The system turns off. Maddox never bothered changing them after we finished our work. Beside the panel are the light switches. I flick them on.

  The inside of the facility blinks and becomes illuminated as the lights come on. It’s white in here. Sterile, and white. There are tables in the center, creating an island for a workspace. Tables along both long walls too, with storage underneath and on shelves at the far end. Large plastic trays, bottles and jugs full of different liquids. On the tables are vials, flasks, plastic tubs, digital scales. Small plastic baggies. Filing cabinets. It looks like half the space is dedicated to production, and half to packaging. There are fire extinguishers stationed every ten feet along the walls.

  They tell me what to do. My heart is pounding again as I look around. I’m almost salivating. I step inside, feeling out of place in this cold, industrious environment. I shouldn’t be here. But that isn’t stopping me. I get up to the shelves on the opposite wall and look at the jugs of liquid. Bleach, chlorine, distilled water. And then I see it: plastic gallon jugs filled with a clear liquid, the familiar flammable sign stamped in bright red on the label.

  Acetone.

  I pick up two jugs, spin their caps off and break the safety seals. Then I go to pouring.

  Disgusting, pungent odors fill my nose and I have to turn my head as I splash the liquid all over the tables, the shelves, along the walls and onto the floors. Moving backwards I coat the place, spraying it side to side, until I reach the wall where I came in. One of the jugs I toss back into the facility, watching it spin head over heel, acetone flying out of it in a fanning arc until it crashes onto the ground. The other jug I take with me, dribbling a trail of the volatile stuff out the front door, taking it ten feet away until I stand up, toss the job back into the facility.

  And then I take a lighter out of my pocket.

  I look at the open door, the light spilling out of it, and out the mesh-covered windows on either side. There’s still no other sound outside. I remember coming here with the Bullets, Maddox telling us what to do. Us tearing down the inside — it used to be an insurance company until we bought the building. Drinking beers, laughing, having fun with our friends. But all that is over now.

  I light the lighter and lower the flame down to the liquid.

  It catches immediately, fire running quickly along the trail towards the open door. I get up and take some steps back. As soon as the fire passes the threshold I watch it spread, fan out quickly, filling the interior with flame and shooting out an enormous heat. A few seconds pass, and then …

  BOOM!!!

  I’m rocked back, the plume of flame that came out the door only just missing me. The lights go out, but they don’t matter anymore. The windows inside the mesh have exploded, and I hear intermittent pop! pop! noises coming from inside.

  BOOM!

  Another explosion. Fire is blackening the insides, spilling out the broken windows, t
he open door, reaching up to the night sky and sending out billows of thick, black smoke.

  It’s time to go.

  The roar of flames drowns out the sound of my boots on the ground. It even drowns out the sound of me starting up my bike. I straddle the vibrating thing, watching the building burn. I feel mesmerized by it. The bike engine rumbles as everything in the building falls apart, burns up to nothing. And as I watch, it feels like a part of me is burning up with those flames. But the funny thing is, I don’t think it’s a part of me that I’m going to miss.

  Merryn

  It’s a bright, sunny day out. Jake and I walk down the street, each holding the hand of little Nathaniel, who’s walking between us. Birds are chirping, other pedestrians smile at us. Nathaniel looks up at me.

  “Mommy,” he says, and I smile down at him. “Do you love daddy?”

  “Yes,” I reply. “I love your daddy very, very much.”

  I look up at Jake and he’s smiling at me. We keep walking.

  “Mommy,” Nathaniel says, and I smile down at him. “Can we go play in the park?”

  My stomach lurches. The park. A child’s playground set atop a concrete foundation, separated from the sidewalk by a chain link fence. The park is by my practice … in a bad part of town.

  “Are you sure you want to go there, sweety?” I ask our son.

  “Yes, mommy,” he says. “Let’s go to the park.”

  I don’t say anything. I look around, wondering if I can steer us in a different direction, but I don’t know where in the city we are. We keep walking. Jake doesn’t say anything.

  “Let’s get some ice cream,” I suggest, but Nathaniel replies.

  “No. The park.”

  He’s gripping my hand hard. We keep walking. Soon enough I see it, there in the distance. Nathaniel picks up the pace, almost dragging Jake and me. Jake doesn’t say anything.

  We get there and I look through the fence. Inside are my clients—all of my clients—sitting on the playground, smoking crack and injecting heroin into their veins. Nathaniel lets go of my hand, giggling as he runs through the fence’s opening and into the playground.

  “No!” I scream, but I can’t go in after him. Instead I stand, helpless, gripping the chain link fence and watching him start to climb up to the slide. Some of the clients are watching him. One of them gets his attention, offering him a needle full of heroin.

  “Don’t worry,” Jake says next to me. “I’ll get him.”

  But it isn’t Jake’s voice. I look over and see Will Silver standing next to me. He’s smiling widely, a gun in his hand, the same gun he had in the Bullets’ warehouse. He lifts it up and points it through the fence, aiming it at my son.

  “NO!” I scream, but it’s too late. Flame licks from the barrel of the gun as a shot cracks through the air and I jerk awake.

  I’m sitting in bed. Not my bed. Not my room. I feel my brain struggling to catch up. Trista. I’m in Trista’s room.

  My heart is going a mile a minute. My skin is damp with sweat and the baby in my belly is squirming, dancing uncomfortably on top of my bladder.

  I throw the sheet off and climb out of bed, managing to get to my feet on the second try. It’s still dark. I don’t check the time. I open the bedroom door and pad out into the hallway, going into the bathroom and turning on the light.

  When I’m finished on the toilet I wash and dry my hands, then turn off the light and step out into the hallway. My head turns and I look at the doorway to the other bedroom. It’s closed. That’s where Trista is sleeping, in there with her mother. The memory of that woman on the bed still haunts me. I guess I was just shocked to see someone who looked like that. Trista told me that she went into a catatonic state when Sal died, but it looks to me more like shock than anything else. I mean, the woman still responded when Trista fed her baby food. She just didn’t make any movement otherwise.

  It was the death of her son that caused it. My heart breaks, thinking about Sal. He shouldn’t have died. That shootout shouldn’t have happened. It wouldn’t have happened, if it weren’t for me. Craig would never have rallied up the Bullets and Slingers. He would never have tried to torch Jake’s garage.

  But there was nothing I could do. I just showed up in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  That is true. That Slinger, Skeeze—the dead one—he was really the one who started things. What happened would have happened even if I wasn’t there.

  So then whose fault was it?

  Maybe it was nobody’s fault. Maybe it was just fate. Maybe all of this was supposed to happen no matter what, and we’re all powerless to stop it.

  A wave of loneliness washes over me. That’s a depressing thought, to think that it was fate that Jake and I would split up.

  No, don’t talk like that. You two haven’t split up. You’re just going through a rough patch.

  Sure, Merryn. Remember what you tell your clients: You have to own up to your own mistakes. The only way to get past something is to admit that it’s real and acknowledge that.

  What I did was a mistake. That much is certain. But does that mean that I deserve to have my life tossed away, just like that? Hasn’t Jake ever heard of best intentions?

  This is getting nowhere. I turn back to Trista’s room and quietly make my way in, closing the door behind me.

  The sheets feel damp and clammy as I climb back into bed. I lay down on my side, one of Trista’s pillows under my swollen belly. I’m facing the wall opposite the window. There are streetlamps on outside, casting an eerie glow about the room. I close my eyes, but sleep feels like it’s far away. Like I can’t quite reach it. I’m in a black void, trying to move towards sleep, but it’s sliding away from me at the same pace that I try to reach it. My baby stirs inside of my belly, maybe trying to get comfortable too, unable to sleep. I relax my muscles, letting them sink into the mattress below me.

  The window in Trista’s bedroom is open. Every now and again I hear the sounds of a car or people out walking. Sometimes voices, sometimes not. My mind floats, wandering. My body’s uncomfortable, but with this huge belly there are only so many positions I can actually sleep in.

  And then I hear it: the rumble of an engine. But it’s not a car this time. I recognize this sound.

  It gets louder and louder, sounding like it’s stopping right outside the window. And there the sound stays constant, not moving on. I open my eyes, and instead of a dark bedroom I see that the air surrounding me is filled with a white mist. That rumble of a motor is still there. I lift my head from the pillow, feeling the sheet slide off of me. Turn my head, and the bedroom window is illuminated by the streetlamp outside.

  Jake?

  I get up from the bed, walk in bare feet around it and approach the open window. Grabbing onto the ledge I stick my head out and look down.

  There he is. Jake. He’s sitting on his motorcycle, which is vibrating underneath him, the exhaust sending thick plumes out into the white mist that’s surrounding him, surrounding both of us. He’s looking up at me.

  “Jake?”

  My voice sounds dampened in all this mist, and I wonder if he heard what I said. If the sound waves even managed to travel to his ears. But he nods his head. He did hear me. My heart is beating harder. Is he really here? What’s he doing here, so late at night?

  “Jake, what are you doing here?”

  “Merryn,” he says. He sounds far away through all this mist, even though he’s not fifteen feet from me. “I’m sorry.”

  A tear rolls down my cheek. “You’re sorry?”

  He nods. “For everything. For how I acted. For not trusting in you.”

  “Jake …” My voice is cracking now, and another tear rolls down my cheek. “You hurt me so badly.”

  “I know,” he says. “I know, and I’m sorry. But it wasn’t my fault.”

  What? “What do you mean? It wasn’t your fault?”

  “You know how I am,” he says. “And you trusted Will Silver. After everything he did. Why did y
ou go into that, unarmed, unprotected?”

  “I … I …”

  I’ve thought about this so many times since the surprise Will gave me at the warehouse. Why did I go in unprotected? Is it because I actually trusted that he would do the right thing? Or is it just because I wanted to think he would do the right thing?

  “I just wanted things to be better,” I finally say. “I thought Will could help us. I didn’t know that would happen.”

  Jake shakes his head. He doesn’t say anything. A wind comes rushing down the street, heading towards us. The sound of it drowns out the rumble of his engine.

  “Jake?” But the rush of the wind is too strong. “Jake!”

  I have to close my eyes against it, feeling it almost knock me to the side, into the wall. When I open my eyes Jake is gone. His motorcycle is gone. I can’t hear the engine anymore. The mist is still around me.

  I pull my head back in. I’m not crying anymore. I walk barefoot back to the bed and climb in. The sheet doesn’t feel damp and clammy now. Laying down on my side I close my eyes and feel my body relax.

  When I open them again the mist is gone. It’s no longer dark; sunlight fills the room with an ambient glow. I sit up in bed and look behind me at the window. It’s open, but now there are just the normal sounds of people and cars. It must’ve been a dream.

  I throw the sheet off and get out of bed.

  Jake

  My eyes blink open against the light streaming into our room.

  “I had the strangest dream last night,” I say in a groggy voice, reaching over for Merryn, beside me. But my hand goes through air instead, landing on the cold other half of the bed. My heart skips a beat and I look up, see she isn’t there … and then I remember.

  I drop my face back down into the pillow. Now there’s a hollow part of my chest. A hole, where Merryn used to be. I close my eyes and the memory of last night’s dream comes swimming back to the surface.