by Dorsey, Tim
“Doesn’t anybody study history anymore?” said Serge. “Florida was colonized by Spain. English is the foreign language here.”
“I’m counting on you! Vote yes on Proposition 213!…Because they smell funny!”
“What kind of trip is this guy on?” asked Lenny.
“Not sure,” replied Serge. “We may have just slipped through some kind of white-trash worm-hole in the time-space continuum.”
Zargoza glanced again at the backseat. “I been meanin’ to ask: What’s with the Miami Vice getup?”
“I’m the Don Johnson experience.”
Zargoza laughed again. “You look more like James Woods.”
“It’s not look. It’s heart.”
“Okay,” said Zargoza, humoring him. “Show us some heart.”
Lenny cleared his throat in the backseat. “Listen, pal! I don’t do this for kicks! It’s a job, and when it’s over, I walk as far away from it as I can!”
Serge and Zargoza snapped their heads toward the backseat. “My God,” said Serge. “It’s him.”
They drove randomly around Tampa Bay, admiring the views.
“Face it, Rico, we’re just small-time players in a high-stakes game, where the rules are made by people we can’t touch!”
Serge directed Zargoza up Fifty-sixth Street until they came to an uneventful honky-tonk.
“What’s so great about this place?” asked Zargoza.
“Keep it in your pants,” said Serge.
They went inside and the place was dead. Idle dart boards and pool tables. One drunk chick swayed slowly by herself on the dance floor to a country song about lost love and lice.
Serge ordered drafts for Lenny and Zargoza and a mineral water with a twist for himself. Serge drained the water in one pull and slammed the glass down. “Kill those,” he said. “We’re on the move,” and he ran out the door.
Back in the car, Serge told Zargoza to go north and hang a Louie on Busch Boulevard.
They pulled into a lounge that was an afterthought to the package store. A dive on a resigned stretch of the boulevard. Only two other people and an unidentified smell. The side door was open to the humid night. Yellowish crime light in parking lot and a fresh wreck up the street that was closing two lanes, the ejected body still in the street. A cop squatted next to it and felt for a pulse.
Serge ordered drinks again, but this time Zargoza declared he would not be rushed.
“No problem,” said Serge. “We’ve arrived.”
“Arrived where?” said Zargoza.
“You’ve just completed the Goodfellas tour of Tampa,” said Serge. “Remember the Martin Scorcese movie? The part where Robert DeNiro and Ray Liotta got arrested in Tampa? In the movie they threatened a guy with a gambling debt by dangling him over the lion fence at the Tampa Zoo, which was actually the Lowry Park Zoo. That was Hollywood. In reality, they kidnapped him from that last bar we were at, pistol-whipped him in the car on the route we just took, dragged him into this place and stuffed him in that storage room”—Serge pointed across the bar. “It was October eighth, 1970.”
Lenny leaned over and whispered to Zargoza: “He has incredible recall.”
“How do you know all this?” asked Zargoza.
“The zoo scene didn’t feel right, so I pored through the microfilm morgue at the library. I found the clips from the original case. There they were, defendants Henry Hill and James Burk.” Serge snapped his fingers for effect. “DeNiro’s and Liotta’s characters in Goodfellas. All the facts were identical except instead of the zoo there were these two bars. The names of the lounges had changed but I was able to track them down through old city cross-indexes.”
Serge jumped off his stool in excitement and made a sweeping gesture with his right arm. “Scorcese put Tampa on the map!” Then his expression shifted. “Come to think of it, really wasn’t a very positive light.”
He rubbed his chin. “You know what would make a better movie? All the people getting killed over the five million dollars that’s floating around in a briefcase.”
Zargoza spit up his drink, and Serge handed him a napkin.
“I gotta hit the can,” said Serge.
He was gone awhile. Zargoza went looking for him.
“What are you doing?” shouted Zargoza, walking out in the parking lot, finding Serge messing around by the Beemer’s trunk.
“You had a little wax buildup.” Serge buffed a spot with his elbow. He smiled; Zargoza squinted back. Lenny came out and the three got in the car.
“Where to?” Zargoza asked.
Serge knew Tampa after midnight. Not the nightclubs. The rest. When he was having one of his spells, he would go until he dropped, so places with quirky hours were essential. The print shops, the study halls at UT and USF, all-night fishing spots, the Dale Mabry coffee shops, the cafeterias in the Tampa General and St. Joseph’s maternity wards, the twenty-four-hour post office at the airport. He listed the options out loud.
“Anything else?” asked Zargoza.
“There’s the three-day nonstop revival,” said Serge.
“We do need grace,” said Zargoza.
“I have sinned,” said Serge.
They pulled off the causeway into a sea of cars parked outside an auditorium bathed in floodlights. Inside, the show was in full swing, the man on the stage talking fast, stiff-arming people in the forehead, knocking them over. His burly assistants/bouncers worked the crowd with collection baskets. Zargoza hung back at the rear of the hall, but Serge grabbed Lenny by the arm and made for the stage, to be healed.
The preacher had already selected a group of twelve, but Serge and Lenny jumped right up and took their place at the end of the line. The preacher saw them, but didn’t want to mess up a good thing. He worked his way down the row, interviewing each person with a microphone over the PA system.
“And what is your name, my brother?”
“Serge.”
“And what is your affliction?”
“I’m crazy.”
The preacher started to ask another question but thought better of it and skipped to Lenny.
“And what is your name, my brother?”
“Lenny.”
“And what is your affliction.”
“I have a problem with weed.”
The preacher raised an arm to the crowd and bellowed into the microphone, “He has a problem with the evil weed, tobacco!”
“No, preach, I mean pot,” said Lenny.
“He has a problem with the demon weed mareeee-juana!”
“Well, I wouldn’t really say demon.”
“He is caught in the fangs of dope! He wants to rid himself forever of its scourge!”
“Actually, I just want to cut down,” Lenny said, patting his stomach. “I’m starting to get a bit of a gut from the munchies.”
The preacher furrowed his brow at Lenny and then backed up on the stage to address the group as a whole.
“Do you believe in the power of the one true living God?”
“Yes!” the group said together.
“Do you reject Satan and all his works?”
“Yes!” the group said again.
“Yes!” said Serge. “Except for Led Zeppelin’s fourth album.”
The preacher glared at Serge.
Serge shrugged his shoulders. “It’s a classic.”
Large hands grabbed Serge and Lenny from behind and they were given the bum’s rush by security.
Zargoza made a break from the back of the auditorium for the parking lot, and he already had the car in the circular drive when the doors burst open and Serge and Lenny hit the pavement.
On the other side of town, at the studios of the Florida Cable News network, Blaine Crease was summoned by the news director for an emergency three-A.M. meeting.
Correspondent Blaine Crease was the undisputed journalistic star of the upstart news network. He was brilliant with delivery, big on flash, short of facts, reckless with accuracy and destined to go places. As the newest network on the
block, FCN needed to grab attention, and Crease was their guy. A former stunt man, he reported every story as if danger were all around. He was the master of the “newsman as fearless participant” feature story. He went on SWAT team raids, got in the tank with killer whales, threatened to fistfight murderers during jailhouse interviews, rappelled from small buildings, and ate with a large fork from the latest lot of recalled food.
Crease often appeared on camera scuffed up, bruised and bleeding, usually because he had rolled himself on the ground just before going on the air. If the story lacked drama, he’d set up a wind machine just off camera. It could be a piece about geranium season, but Crease would be leaning into the wind, fighting for balance to hold the pose that made his hair look dashing in a gale. He wore combat fatigues, flak jackets and helmets whenever it was unnecessary. But most of all, Crease liked to ride loud, fast things. Ambulances, fire engines, boats, planes.
Consequently, Crease was beside himself when the news director of FCN called him into the office in the middle of the night and gave Crease the assignment he’d been waiting for all his life.
“Good, glad to hear it,” said the news director. He left the room and returned shortly with a small metal cage.
“What’s that?” said Crease.
“You’re taking Toto along.”
“Like hell I am! It’s demeaning! I’m the star of this network!”
“Now you listen to me!” said the director. “You may be the highest-rated human on the network, but this dog butters our bread…. Catch!” The director threw a box of liver snaps hard into Blaine’s chest.
20
Zargoza roared up in his BMW just as the bouncers tossed Serge and Lenny out of the all-night revival. They hopped in, and Zargoza sped out of the driveway.
“You’re right about Zeppelin’s fourth album,” Zargoza told Serge. “It rules.”
Serge launched into air guitar of the album’s first cut, “Black Dog.” Zargoza joined in playing drums on the steering wheel. Lenny growled with a Kmart Robert Plant, but it was serviceable.
“Hey, hey, mama said the way you move—gonna make you sweat, gonna make you groove!”
Serge made guitar sounds with his mouth and Zargoza pounded on the wheel.
“…been so long since I found out, what people mean by dinin’ out!”
Serge resumed the scorching guitar part again, but Zargoza had a funny look on his face.
“Whoa! Whoa! Stop it! Hold the fuckin’ train!”
The others fell quiet.
“What was that?” Zargoza asked Lenny.
“What?”
“That lyric. Did you say ‘what people mean by dinin’ out’?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s not how it goes.”
“Yes it is.”
“No it isn’t you boob. It’s down and out.”
“No it isn’t,” said Lenny.
“What kind of shithead are you?” said Zargoza. “Jimmy Page is choppin’ the most savage guitar licks ever laid down, and you think Plant is singing about not getting out to White Castle enough?”
“I didn’t give it much thought,” said Lenny. “I figured they were very busy in the recording studio and they ate a lot of takeout.”
“It’s down and out!” said Zargoza. “He’s talkin’ about the struggle of the common man!”
“Now I’m hungry,” said Lenny.
“Me too,” said Zargoza. “Let’s find a place.”
Lenny fired up a tubular joint—“so I can taste my dinner.” They turned onto U.S. 19, fast-food row, and pulled in the drive-through lane at the new fried-chicken-skin joint.
Lenny was quite high now. “This is the best place!” he said. “They get rid of all the damn meat so you just get the skin. That’s all we’ve ever wanted. That’s all we’ve ever asked for.”
He took another hit.
“Why do they say the drinks are king-size, like that’s the biggest possible comparison. Look at Prince Charles—no superlatives spring to mind there,” said Lenny. “You wanna get my money? Start talking about a dictator or a conqueror. Like Attilasized, or Stalin-sized!…”
“What the fuck’s he talking about?” Zargoza asked Serge.
“Free-associating,” said Serge. “I’ve seen this sort of thing before. Verbal incontinence. Just vomiting words.”
“When does it stop?” asked Zargoza.
“It doesn’t,” said Serge. “Not without intervention.”
Zargoza glanced back at Lenny and then at Serge. “We’re up next at the ordering microphone. You need to suppress that shit with prejudice.”
Serge turned around and gave Lenny the mondo eye, which made Lenny extremely paranoid, and he became quiet.
“That should do it,” said Serge. “He’ll go on an introspective journey now. But be prepared. We may hear weeping.”
Zargoza rolled up to the menu board. The small metal speaker came on. “May I take your order?”
“Yes,” said Zargoza. “I’d like your mega-combo meal…number twelve. Do I get the Galactic Massacre playing pieces with that?”
“Yes, you do.”
“Okay, and I’ll take the extra-crunchy fried chicken skin on a stick…”
Lenny leaned over the side of the car toward the speaker.
“Hitler-size my french fries!”
“What?” said the speaker.
“Saddam-size my apple pies!”
“Can you repeat that?” said the speaker.
“Shut that motherfucker up!” Zargoza yelled at Serge.
“Excuse me?” said the speaker.
“I wasn’t talking to you!”
Serge climbed in the backseat and grabbed Lenny in a full nelson.
“Where were we?” Zargoza asked the clerk.
“Number twelve, chicken skin on a stick.”
“Can I substitute cole slaw for the mashed potatoes?”
Lenny broke free from Serge and leaned out the car again. “Ho Chi Minh my chicken skin!”
“I’m getting the manager,” said the speaker.
Zargoza floored it through the drive-through, snapping off a sideview mirror.
“Goddammit!” he yelled as the car bottomed out onto U.S. 19. “I was hungry, too!”
They headed back across the Howard Frankland Bridge and took West Shore down to Gandy.
A red Audi with tinted windows pulled alongside at a stoplight.
Zargoza looked over. “Twats!”
“What is it?” said Serge.
“Those damn Diaz Boys!”
The light turned green and both cars patched out and drag-raced all the way to Bayshore. At the red light, the Audi’s tinted windows went down and shotguns appeared.
“What’s this about?” Zargoza shouted at Tommy Diaz.
“Safety inspection,” said Tommy. “You wouldn’t mind if we checked your trunk, would you? We’ve been hearing rumors. Beemers sometimes have expensive loose objects back there that could create a hazard.”
“Sure,” said Serge. “But you’ll have to race us for the opportunity.”
“We don’t need to race. We have the guns.”
“You also have the tiniest balls this side of the squirrel family,” said Serge. “I was thinking of cutting ’em off and feeding ’em to my poodle as a new between-meals treat, since they’re not too filling.”
“Don’t ya just love this guy!” Zargoza called out the window.
Tommy Diaz was in a barely contained rage. “Okay, we’ll race! First one down to those psychedelic fish at the bridge to Davis Islands!”
“Hold on,” said Serge. He turned to Zargoza. “You got that opium pipe?”
“Sure,” said Zargoza. He handed the pipe to Serge and cranked up “Free Ride” on the stereo as he gunned the engine. Tommy Diaz gunned his engine, too.
Serge leaned out the window. “Peace pipe,” said Serge. “Anyone for some good opium?”
“Back here,” said Rafael Diaz, reaching out the passenger window be
hind the driver. He hung way out the door to take the pipe from Serge. Just as their hands met, Rafael noticed one end of a set of fur-lined handcuffs around Serge’s hand. Serge quickly clasped the other end around Rafael’s left wrist. He turned back to Zargoza. “Hit it!”
“Roger!” Zargoza floored the gas. Screaming came from the other car and Tommy gave it the gas, too.
The cars stayed tight as they wound along the waterfront route, Serge smiling, Rafael ashen and whimpering. Zargoza intentionally drifted the BMW to the left, and Tommy Diaz mirrored his moves. Zargoza popped the left wheels up on the grassy median. Then he had the whole car in the median, doing fifty, and kept drifting. Tommy Diaz was forced to drift with Zargoza unless he wanted to lose Rafael. Serge laughed like a lunatic, but the other car had gone silent.
Zargoza drifted left until he had forced the Diaz car onto the median as well. This was the same median where city leaders had decided to move a series of abstract modern sculptures, and the next one coming up was a jumble of sharp pieces of round metal, a giant serrated Slinky. Now the other car came alive again, pointing ahead and screaming, begging with Serge. Rafael was more than halfway out the window, and the others held him in the car by his legs.
Just a few seconds to go. Serge casually got out the key.
“Whoops,” he said, and jerked forward like he’d dropped it. He smiled and showed he still had the key. “Just kidding.” A second left. Serge turned the key and he and Rafael shot apart. The two cars parted high-speed around the sculpture, Zargoza ending up on the wrong side of the median in the oncoming lanes. He swerved around a taxi and jumped the next median, crossing back in front of the Diaz Boys as both cars raced around a hard left curve, then a right, neck and neck. Tommy Diaz gunned it and took the inside as they went into the last turn. Zargoza opened it up and passed him as they went by the psychedelic fish.
They both hit the brakes, skidding into the parking lot at the boat launch, and everyone jumped out and drew guns. Zargoza aimed a shotgun across the hood of the BMW and tossed a pistol to Serge.
“You fucking sons of bitches!” yelled Tommy. “Cocksuckers of whores!”
“Easy now,” said Serge. “You’re mixing your metaphors.”
“We should kill all of you!” said Tommy.