Headlock

by Adam Berlin

  Gary hesitated. I had been with him long enough to know that he wasn’t really weighing the options. He had already made his decision and he hesitated because it was one of those moments for him, the romance of gambling, the stuff that kept two kids up past their bedtime so they could hear one more story, pleading with their parents Just one more. People surrounded the table, three deep, watching and waiting. Gary had his audience and he was the leading man. I watched the second hand stutter and start. One card. The dealer’s finger rested softly upon its straight back, ready to pull it from the shoe. Gary relaxed into the moment and I stood still and watched him. He lifted his small hand, so cool, like he had all the time in the world and pointed his index finger until it touched the felt. Like he’d rehearsed it a hundred times in front of the mirror. The dealer took the card from the shoe, turned it over, and placed it on Gary’s sixteen. It was a two-eyed jack. A red jack. Of hearts. The prince. The son of the king. The one to carry on the tradition but as a card he never would, always the prince, sandwiched in like that, just a card, a red card, worth ten, too much.

  Gary stood. The crowd opened and a few people who knew blackjack applauded. He’d taken a chance that a lesser player would not have taken, he’d played tough, he’d hit on sixteen with big money riding, the kind of money they told stories about.

  Gary walked to the elevator. Blue was behind him.

  “You should go now,” I said to Tia.

  “I’m not going,” she said.

  We walked into the elevator. I kept myself from looking at Blue. I needed to focus. I needed to think.

  I shifted my weight. I thought about some kind of deal. I could find some money somewhere. I could trade my garage uniform in for a valet’s outfit, park cars until I made the money back, tips better in the desert, they had to be better, Gary could do something else but I knew he couldn’t and he knew he couldn’t and the elevator stopped at the twenty-fourth floor and we got out, Gary walking, forward, side to side, forward, my blood rushing. Gary stopped in front of the room.

  “We’re not doing this,” I said.

  “Yes we are,” Blue said.

  “No.”

  “Don’t be stupid, kid.”

  “No.”

  “You’ll make it worse for him than it already is.”

  “No.”

  “Wait,” Gary said. His voice was tired and scared. “Stay outside. I don’t want you here now. I’ve made up my mind. It has nothing to do with you. You hear that, Blue. It has nothing to do with him.”

  “Whatever. That was the kid’s word, right?”

  “Give me your word,” Gary said.

  “Give me your money.”

  “He was just along for the ride,” Gary said. “Leave him out of it.”

  “Go inside,” Blue said.

  “Leave him out.”

  “I’ll tell you what, Gary Rose. I’ll leave him out if you admit you’re a fat fucking loser. Say it. Say you’re a fat fucking loser who eats like a pig.”

  “I’m a loser.”

  “Say it,” Blue said.

  “No,” I said.

  I shifted my weight.

  “Stop,” Gary said.

  Loud. Gary never spoke loud like that. He was looking at me, eye to eye. It was for Gary. I had to control it.

  “Say it,” Blue said.

  “I’m a fat fucking loser who eats like a pig.”

  “Make me believe you, Gary Rose.”

  “I am a fat fucking loser who eats like a pig.”

  “There you go. Yes you are. Now get inside.”

  Gary took the card key from his shirt pocket and slid it into the door. His frame filled the door and then Blue went through the door and closed it. The coach said that when it was done right it was beautiful. It hadn’t been beautiful. Not on the mat in my last match. Not in New York. Not in the diner. It was ugly. It would be ugly in the room.

  Tia slid down against the wall. I just stood there. I heard a dull sound but no cry of pain. Grandpa had taught us the Hand Game but I no longer knew if keeping it in was the best way. I wanted to cry out, a cry past the panic, a cry past the blood rush, a cry for him and my family. I wanted to cry past the black outline of a wrestling mat. I was ready to leave the circle, take a U-turn, take a straight line like the road across America, home.

  I stood there. I waited. I heard a crash inside the room. It did not fit what I had pictured. I put my room card into the door and charged in. Gary on top of Blue. Right leg hanging off to side. Awkward angle. Broken knee. Blue underneath. Legs kicking out. Snakeskin boots. Sliding against carpet. Blue tried to move but Gary stayed on top of him. Gary’s hand was in Blue’s mouth. His small hand all the way in, his arm shoved down past his fat wrist. He was saying Eat me, eat me, eat me, shoving his hand deeper and deeper into Blue’s throat. I saw Blue’s hand against Gary’s side and I saw the knife in his hand and I went for his arm. I turned his arm and heard a high-pitched sound. There was no room in his throat to get the scream out all the way. I turned his arm some more until I heard it break and the high-pitched sound became higher. I took the handle of the knife and pulled it out of Gary. Gary didn’t scream. Blood leaked from Gary’s side and Gary shoved his hand deeper and deeper into Blue’s throat. Blue’s legs kicked out and one of his legs kicked at Gary and I moved to Blue’s leg and listened to Blue’s high-pitched sound while I broke the leg kicking Gary. I looked at Blue’s mouth. His mouth was stretched open and his lips were tight lines of pink. I could see his bottom teeth biting down on Gary’s arm, scraping, puncturing, blood. Gary said Eat me, fed Blue his hand and arm, all those fat jokes backed up in Blue’s throat. Gary was bleeding. Blue was still biting. His eyes were white, the irises and pupils in the back of his head. Gary stayed on him. Four hundred pounds. The high-pitched sound had reached a higher pitch. Blue’s good leg kicked again and Gary shoved his arm deeper into Blue’s throat. I moved over Gary’s back and put a hold on Blue’s head. I looked into his white eyes and he was still biting my cousin’s arm and it was in me and I took his head and turned it. Blue’s body stopped moving, pressed down by Gary, his leg broken, his arm broken, no way for him to resist and I turned his head some more until I heard his neck break. It was a different sound from other bones I’d broken. It was loud and defined and final. The high-pitched sound stopped. The leg that had been kicking shivered and stopped. My hands were still on his head and I took my hands away. Gary said Eat me, eat me, eat me but his voice was more of a whisper. He was out of breath. His back was heaving.

  I pulled Gary’s arm out of Blue’s mouth. It was bloody and chewed. Tia was next to me, her face pale. She helped me lift Gary and we moved him to the bed and sat him down. His leg stayed off at an angle. The pipe Blue had used to break Gary’s knee was on the floor. It was short enough to fit in a sport jacket and hard enough to break bone. The knife was on the floor, blood on metal. Gary held his side with his good hand. His shirt was covered in blood.

  Tia unbuttoned his shirt and opened it, wiped at the cut with a towel. It wasn’t the kind of cut a napkin could stop. Gary clenched his jaw in pain.

  “You need to get to the hospital,” Tia said.

  “Dess. He was going to break your knees. On the way out.”

  Tia told me to get another towel from the bathroom. I got a towel and gave it to her. She wiped at the cut and for a moment his stomach was clean, white with stretch marks, then the cut in his side started to leak and she pressed the towel against it. She told me to get another towel. There was one face towel left. She used it to wrap Gary’s hand.

  “He was going to break your knees. He said it like it was already done.”

  “I wasn’t supposed to let this happen.”

  “You didn’t.”

  “I was supposed to protect you.”

  “I told you to stay outside.”

  “He was supposed to break something and that’s all. I could have taken him down before all of this. I could have just taken him down and we could have left.�
��

  “I was tired,” Gary said. “I’m tired.”

  Gary smiled for me and I had to smile back. I couldn’t help myself.

  “We need to get you to a hospital,” Tia said.

  “He broke my knee,” Gary said.

  I picked up the phone.

  “Hang up,” he said.

  “You’re hurt.”

  “I don’t want you two here. I don’t want anyone to know you were here.”

  “Do you want to make the call?”

  “I want you to drive me,” Gary said.

  “Where’s the hospital?”

  “I’ll tell you how to get there.”

  “I’m calling an ambulance.”

  “No you’re not,” Gary said. Like he wasn’t bleeding. Like his knee wasn’t broken. Like he was stopping someone from ordering room service when a whole buffet waited downstairs.

  “Get me down to the car.”

  “You’re bleeding.”

  “It’s not that deep. I’ve got plenty of layers to get through.”

  Gary smiled, then coughed.

  “He had a knife in his boot. He thought I’d sit my fat ass down when he told me about you. Not you.”

  Gary coughed. He was sweating.

  “I didn’t make a sound. You didn’t hear me make a sound, did you?”

  “No,” I said.

  “We killed him.”

  Tia was kneeling at his feet and pressing the towel against Gary’s side. I started to make the call. He still had quick reflexes. With his good hand he knocked the phone off the night table.

  “Either you drive me there or I’ll drive myself.”

  “You can’t drive yourself.”

  “I can if I have to.”

  There was no talking to Gary.

  “Will you drive me?” he said.

  “I’ll drive you.”

  “Button me up.”

  Tia pressed the towel against the cut, pulled his shirt together and buttoned it. Gary pressed his hand against his shirt to hold the towel in place. He told me to take the shoeshine cloth from the bathroom. I asked him why and he said to get it. I went and got it and put it in my pocket. I picked Blue’s glasses off the floor and put them in my pocket. I looked at Gary’s wide back. From behind he looked as if he were just sitting on the bed taking a break.

  “I was alone in the room if anyone asks,” Gary said to Tia. “Understand?”

  “I understand,” she said.

  “Understand?” Gary said to me.

  “Yes.”

  “Great. Get your stuff together.”

  I picked up my clothes and put them in my bag like packing for a fucking vacation.

  “Let’s go,” he said.

  I took Gary under one arm, Tia took him under the other and we lifted him. His leg touched the ground. Gary breathed through the pain, nodded his head. There was blood on the bed, the knife, the pipe, the hotel reading material that had been knocked to the floor, a room service menu, a Welcome to Las Vegas shopping guide, a pamphlet on casino gaming. Blue was dead on the floor. His eyes were still white. I didn’t force the irises down to see what color they really were. What was once his mouth looked like an overripe tomato, too long in the sun, burst on the vine. Ripped lips. Torn tongue. Hemorrhaged gums. Loose teeth, bits of Gary stuck between them. His head was off to the side. His neck was broken. It was ugly. We got Gary out the door.

  The casino was still so crowded, the sounds so loud, the lights so flashy, that a fat man with a knife wound and a broken knee being helped across the floor wasn’t that striking a sight. People looked at Gary’s face, at his girth, but they didn’t seem to notice that anything was wrong. It was late. Maybe he’d had one too many at the tables.

  It was hot outside. I helped Gary lean against a wall. I went to valet parking and got the Jaguar. I put my bag in the trunk. I got in the driver’s seat, pushed down the hand brake and put the car in drive.

  Tia was talking to Gary and he was smiling for her. Blood was leaking through his shirt. There was nothing I could do. I put the car in park, pulled the hand brake, got out of the car, walked around the front and opened the passenger side door and we walked Gary forward and eased him into the seat. He breathed through the pain. He kept his good hand against the cut in his side. I lifted his one leg in and then the other, the leg with the broken knee. I closed the door.

  Tia sat on one side of the driver’s seat and I squeezed in next to her.

  “Let Tia get her car,” Gary said.

  “We don’t have time.”

  “She’s parked close by.”

  “How do you know?”

  “She told me. She’ll get her car. Then we can follow her to the hospital.”

  It was hard to steer but I pulled onto the strip and then off at Tia’s lot. Tia ran to her car, threw the plastic bag with her uniform onto the backseat, revved the engine once, pulled in front of me and I started to follow her. She weaved through the traffic until she hit a clear patch of road.

  “Pass her,” Gary said.

  “I’m not passing her.”

  “Pass her.”

  He coughed.

  “Pass her. I want to take a drive. I just want to drive.”

  “We’re going to the hospital.”

  “We will. Just drive.”

  “We’ll drive after they sew you up.”

  “It’s still my car. You’re still my younger cousin. I said drive.”

  Gary’s eyes were tired.

  “You’re wasting time,” he said. “Go on.”

  I pulled into the left lane and pressed my foot on the gas. I turned to see Tia looking at us and then we were past her.

  “Jaguar is the best city car,” Gary said.

  “I’ll take that Jaguar,” I said.

  Gary held the towel against his side with his left hand, the hand that wasn’t half eaten. His jaw was clenched. His hair was wet from sweat. He was breathing hard and looking at the road.

  “Reach into my pocket.”

  “Which pocket?”

  “The deep one.”

  Gary shivered. I reached into his pocket. I felt the crispness of new money and I pulled out a small stack of bills. There was no blood on them. Not really.

  “That’s for you.”

  “I don’t want your money.”

  “It’s two grand. It’s enough to hold you over. I thought we’d win. I really did. I thought we’d win, pay him off, have some money of our own to play with. It wouldn’t have mattered on the last bet anyway. I thought we’d get on a streak of our own.”

  “Sure.”

  “You never thought we’d do it.”

  “I didn’t know.”

  Gary shivered.

  “It would have been a great time if we’d won,” Gary said.

  “I liked just driving.”

  “Then drive.”

  “I am.”

  “Drive faster.”

  “I think we should go to the hospital now.”

  “Fold them up.”

  I folded the bills in half as best as I could.

  “Hey, champ. Don’t spend it all in one place.”

  I wasn’t the champ but the way he said it almost made me believe it was true. He was good. I put the money in my pocket.

  “Faster,” Gary said.

  “I’m going fast.”

  “Go on,” Gary said.

  I pressed my foot down. We were well past the strip. There were no hospitals in sight. It was desert and night sky and the road straight ahead.

  “Wipe the wheel down with that shoeshine cloth. Then get out of Vegas. Your friend promised me she’d drive you to California. Buy yourself a plane ticket and go home. Say hi to your folks and your brother for me.”

  Gary shivered.

  “Faster,” he said.

  I pressed my foot down.

  “That’s right,” Gary said.

  “Faster,” I said.

  “Faster. Press it all the way.”

  �
��Faster.”

  “Keep going.”

  “You can’t drive forever.”

  “I never worried about forever. Faster.”

  “Faster.”

  The speed took it all away. We were just driving. It was one of those moments and I relaxed into the speed. The rush was outside of me now. The car was rushing, was doing the work, was moving forward and with my hands on the wheel I relaxed into it.

  “Faster,” I said.

  “Great,” Gary said.

  I held the wheel and we moved. It was us and the road and the speed and we were flying out of Las Vegas back to the darkness of desert sky and Gary shivered and started coughing. I looked at him and I knew he was trying to keep his eyes open. I slowed the car and he didn’t say anything. I slowed the car some more. He shivered.

  “I’m not even hungry.”

  “I’m taking you to a hospital.”

  “You’ll wipe down the wheel and she’ll drive you to California.”

  He was breathing fast. He shivered and his eyes went scared and then the shiver passed and his eyes were calm again. I thought about telling him to imagine sundaes the way he’d told my brother and me when we’d pissed in our pants and had to finish those cold grilled cheese sandwiches but I didn’t.

  “Pull over,” he said.

  “I’m turning around.”

  “Pull over. I don’t want them finding me in the passenger seat. Do what I say. Pull over.”

  “You can’t drive.”

  “Pull over.”

  I slowed the car and pulled onto the breakdown lane. I put the car in park and turned off the ignition. The headlights lit some of the desert.

  “Help me out.”

  I pulled the hand brake and went around to the other side of the car. I opened the door and helped Gary move his body, bad leg first, good leg second. He breathed short breaths through the pain. The towel around his chewed up hand had started to come undone. His fingers had turned purple. Some blood rubbed off on my uniform and made the blue dark. Gary held the towel in place against the cut in his stomach. Blood soaked through the cloth. I struggled to lift him out of the car and I walked him forward. I was exhausted. I half leaned half sat him down on the hood of the Jaguar. The car sank under his weight. Gary held himself up with his good hand. His jaw was clenched. His eyes were sleepy.