by Deja Voss
He flips on the lights and it doesn’t make things much better. There’s trash scattered on the floor, and his hands shake as he feebly tips a bottle of Jack Daniels to his lips.
“What can I do for you, boy? You looking for some new ink?”
Nothing about this scene makes me want to let this man anywhere near me with a needle. His once white t-shirt is stained and wrinkled. I can smell his breath from across the room.
“Vinnie, I’m not trying to judge you, man, but is everything okay?” I ask. “It looks like you got ransacked or something.”
He grunts and picks up a broom and starts sweeping up the empty take out containers from the ground. “Good help’s hard to find around here anymore. Now you here to give me a lecture or you want to start working on that chest piece we talked about a while ago? I don’t got all day.”
There’s screaming in the corridor, and a half-dressed woman comes tearing through the place, grabbing her phone from her purse.
“Lose my fucking number, you creep!” she screams over her shoulder. She’s running so fast she loses her high heel but just keeps on going, right out the front door.
Vinnie laughs and stubs out his cigarette in an overflowing ash tray. “Kids these days.”
“The fuck is that? Is she coming out of your apartment?”
“I sublet it a while ago,” he grumbles. “Now that Pearl’s gone I don’t need all that space. I got everything I need right here.”
“I guess so,” I say with a shrug. Looks like he has a microwave, a bathroom, and a stash of half empty liquor bottles lined up underneath the cash register. A dingy couch that’s been around since I was a kid and probably saw more ass than a truck stop toilet seat and a box TV from the 1980s blasting the local news. “If cash is tight, you know we can help you out.”
I regret the words as soon as they come out of my mouth. Any doubts of his physical capabilities are washed away as he stands up a little straighter and paces over to me.
“My financial situation is none of your fucking business, son. I got plenty of money. I don’t need your preaching. Your old man send you over here to spy on me?”
“Vinnie, I don’t mean any offense, man. You’re like an honorary brother. Now tell me what you think I should put right here.” I lift up my shirt. My chest is about the only untatted part of my body. Vinnie’s done most of my work over the years, and he is the best in the business, at least, was. I don’t know who this man standing in front of me is right now. He’s paranoid. Drunker than normal. Completely off.
His eyes light up at the sight of my fresh skin. Like something inside of him snapped. “Possibilities are endless, son,” he says. “You giving me free rein?”
In the past I would’ve been honored to let him put whatever he wanted on my body. He isn’t just the kind of artist who regurgitates stuff off the flash on the walls. He truly has a knack for making one of a kind work that turns heads. People pay big bucks for a Vinnie Haines creation. He lights another cigarette, his hands still shaking, and I try to think of the most polite way possible to decline his offer. I know it’s only skin, but I kind of take pride in my body. Takes a lot of work to stay in the kind of shape I’m in, and letting somebody with wobbly hands come at me with permanent ink isn’t exactly on my to-do list.
“How about you draw something up and we’ll go from there,” I suggest.
He’s grinning from ear to ear as he grabs the bottle of cleaning spray and douses his chair in it, wiping it down. Like he’s been snapped out of a funk, he starts lining up little cups on his tool chest, so meticulously it’s like any wobbles he had left his body.
He motions for me to hop up on the chair, and I do, albeit reluctantly. If any of my brothers caught sight of this situation, they’d be laughing their asses off at my stupidity.
“How’s Stoney doing? Haven’t seen the old shit in forever,” he asks, pulling out a razor from his drawer.
“Really?” I still don’t know what set off my uncle last night, but I’m shocked he hasn’t seen Vinnie in a while. Those two are thick as thieves.
“Your old auntie has him on a tight leash I think. Ever since Kid got locked up, seems like he’s not allowed to come out and play anymore. I miss the old fool.”
“He was asking about you last night,” I say. It’s not exactly a lie. “I don’t think he’s feeling too hot these days.”
“It catches up with ya,” he says. “Now, I’m not trying to be gay or anything, but I’m gonna need ya to show me what we’re working with here. Off with the shirt, boy.”
I reluctantly peel off my t-shirt and stretch back in the chair as he takes the razor blade to my chest. I don’t know how I’m gonna get out of this, but I just started getting him talking and I’m hoping he won’t stop now that the ball is rolling.
“You remember that old Stillman apartment you used to live in? Bet that place saw some wild parties,” I say.
His face turns to stone and he pulls the razor from my chest.
“Why would you even bring that up, boy?” he asks. “That was way before your time.”
“I dunno,” I stammer. He slaps the razor down on the tool chest and lights up another cigarette.
“Did he send you here?”
“Nobody sent me here!” I insist. “Now are you gonna tattoo me or what?”
He huffs down the cig like it’s the only thing giving him breath. His skin grows pale and he storms off into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him. I don’t know why the simple mention of an apartment building would set him off, but apparently him and Stoney have been keeping secrets. I debate getting up, but a picture hanging on the wall catches my eye. It’s of Pearl, the pretty brunette with the wild mane of curly hair who wouldn’t give me the time of day in high school.
In the picture she’s holding a tattoo machine to her father’s forearm, and he’s smiling away like the proudest guy on the planet. Her eyes are serious but her lips are upturned into this knowing smile. I wonder what she’d have to say about her dad’s current situation. She was long gone, though, probably without a care in the world.
Rumor had it she was going to art school in Pittsburgh, and Vinnie was sending all his money down there to keep her afloat. Probably why he had to rent the place upstairs out to begin with. She was always a weird one. Always acting like she was too good to be involved with her dad and the people he associated with. She was too good for us.
Too smart. Too pretty. Too talented. Still can’t help but wonder how she could walk out on her old man, but I realize not everybody is wired like us. Not everybody wants to be stuck in this shit town just for the sake of keeping our family legacies alive.
Still don’t think she’d like to see her dad like this, but Vinnie’s a pain in the ass. I’m sure working for him is no walk in the park. He’s always burning through receptionists and artists who don’t see exactly eye to eye with him.
“You alright, champ?” I ask when he comes out of the bathroom, looking like he at least washed his face and combed his wild mop of long graying hair. Smells like he brushed his teeth, too.
“I’ll be fine. Had a great idea while I was in there.” He brandishes a sharpie from his jeans pocket and starts drawing triangles on my chest. They’re not small, either. I look down at his now steady hand and hope for the best. “This is gonna be a real sticker.”
“Great,” I say, my heart racing. “You care if I make a phone call real quick? I didn’t know you were gonna be able to get me in so fast. I gotta move some things around.”
“You trying to stall or something, son?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say, unable to lie to him. I try to laugh it off, but I’m sure he can see right through me. “Kind of a big commitment, Vinnie.”
I jump up from the chair and he goes back to his Jack Daniels. I pull my phone out of my pocket and call up my dad, thinking maybe Uncle Stoney’s out of the hospital by now. Before the phone can even ring, the sound of breaking glass rings through the air.
&nb
sp; Gunshots.
I dive to the floor, laying on my stomach as I pull my pistol from the waistband of my jeans.
“Vinnie, get down!” I scream, but the old man is just standing there, watching out the window as bullet after bullet flies through the air. I realize his chair is propping him up as blood pools at the floor around his feet.
“What the hell?” I shout, crawling across the floor on my stomach. The windows are completely busted out. The floor is covered in glass. The man from upstairs comes running down the steps and turns around and heads right back up when he realizes what’s happening.
The gunshots subside and I race over to Vinnie. He looks like a piece of Swiss cheese, his body riddled with bullet holes. His guts are pouring out the back of him, and all I can do is pray the first shot he took was the one right between his eyes.
I lay him on the floor as delicately as possible and rush to the broken out window, hoping to catch a glimpse of whoever did this. Couldn’t have been one guy by the amount of sheer bullets shot in a matter of ten seconds. The street is quiet, not a car to be seen from any direction. My bike, still parked out front, is completely unscathed. Whoever it was wasn’t coming after me.
They were coming after Vinnie.
I pull out my phone and call the police, calmly trying to explain what happened, calmly trying to explain that no amount of CPR in the world is going to revive this old man who lost his life way too soon.
I sink to the floor next to his dead body, wondering what the fuck Stoney could’ve possibly done to set off this chain of events.
Chapter Eight
Pearl:
Whipping whirlwinds.
That’s about the only way I can describe my drive home.
I say a silent prayer asking for forgiveness for anything I’d ever done to wrong my father, every time I swore I hated him, every time I did the things I did to put distance between the two of us.
I didn’t mean it, I plead to whoever might listen, whatever deity I’d probably written off a million times over already.
I never meant it when I said I hated him. I didn’t hate him.
I hate the things he does. Hate the way he talks to me. Hate the way he always makes me feel so small. Hate the bad choices he made for himself that always blew back on me.
Hate him for the tears running down my face. The way my phone is cradled in between my thighs as my gas pedal nearly touches the floor. Hate him for leaving me in this state of not knowing, this state of thinking the worst-case scenario, hate him for making me love him so much that I don’t care what I’ll have to do to get out of any speeding ticket. Don’t care that I lost my job and I’m probably going to lose my apartment in my attempt to get home to him. I don’t care that it’s pouring down rain faster than my wipers can keep up with and my tires needed changed a long time ago.
Hate him for scaring me like this.
And I want to tell him in person.
Riley’s number shows up across my phone screen. I know better than to kill myself trying to talk on the phone and drive at the same time and I let it keep ringing. There’s this lump in my throat, this burning, this painful notion that I shouldn’t answer because of what she’s going to tell me. I know it’s crazy, but I feel like if I don’t answer my phone, everything will be okay.
If I just keep driving I’ll make it to my dad in time. He’ll explain to me there was some sort of misunderstanding. Different tattoo shop. Different guy named Vinnie. Right this moment, not knowing feels better than whatever Riley has to tell me.
My knuckles are white from gripping the steering wheel so tight, my fingernails cutting into the flesh of my palms. Flashbacks of me being so tiny as a kid I could hide out underneath the bench in his station and watch everything he did, copying along with a crayon in my notebook, hoping one day I’d get to decorate people like he did. The sound of the machine lulling me as I took my afternoon nap on the couch while he tattooed sinners and sailors and who knows who else. I was so tiny but he never made me feel that way until I was grown and working in the industry with him.
Riley leaves a voicemail. For one stupid second I think it’s her calling to tell me it’s just a joke. She just wanted me home. False alarm. I pull over to the side of the road and hold my phone in my hand, the optimist in me telling me to listen to that voicemail.
The second I do, a guttural scream escapes my lips, one I never knew I was capable of.
“Pearl, I’m sorry, you need to come straight to my house when you get here. It’s not good. Just come here first please and we’ll get everything sorted out. I love you. Please drive safe.”
I don’t know how long I’ve been screaming for. Don’t remember getting back on the highway, pushing my foot to the floor even harder than before. I don’t remember rolling down the window as the rain blows through my car, soaking my clothes, soaking my skin until I’m covered in goosebumps and shivering. I don’t remember pulling into town and taking a left turn. Right is for Riley’s house. Left is for the shop. Left is for the flashing lights, the sirens, the police barricade surrounding the whole block.
Left is where my worst nightmares are about to come true.
I slam my car into park and get out, pushing my way through the crowd. Everyone is standing there in raincoats with umbrellas; there’s news crews and every kind of emergency vehicle I could’ve possibly imagined.
I’m so cold and wet, and when I get to the front of the crowd the wreckage becomes apparent. The shop’s front windows are gone, shattered glass on the sidewalk out front like a bomb went off.
“I need in,” I shout to the first police officer I see. “I need in there. That’s my dad’s shop. My dad is in there! I need to see him.”
The police officer picks up his walkie-talkie and starts talking into it into it. I can’t hear what he’s saying because the crowd is so loud. I can’t get a read on his expression because his face is dripping wet with rain. Everyone’s brows are furled, eyes squinted; all I know is this rain is doing a good job of masking my tears. While he’s busy occupying himself, I just push my way in and take off in a sprint towards the end of the block.
“Pearl, you shouldn’t be here,” a familiar voice says. “I told Riley to have you meet her at the house. There is absolutely no reason for you to be here.”
It’s Henry, and he’s standing in front of me like a brick wall, his broad shoulders blocking me from seeing what’s behind him.
“Henry, I’m not messing around. Tell me what’s going on right now. I’m a big girl. I can handle it. Don’t fucking sugarcoat it!”
All I know is that my dad is in trouble, and the shop I grew up in is in shambles. I haven’t prepared myself for the stretcher being wheeled from the building with a body bag on top of it.
“Who is that?” Everything moves in slow motion as I try and get closer to the officers wheeling the stretcher to the coroner’s black SUV.
“Pearl, calm down. Come on, let’s go sit in my car,” he says, grabbing me by the arm.
“Tell me who it is! Is that my father?” I know the answer, but I need to hear it out loud.
“We’re going to take him to the coroner’s office, Pearl. We’re going to get this straightened out. I’m gonna call Riley right now to come pick you up, okay?”
“No. I’m not going anywhere until I talk to someone who knows what’s going on.” I try my best to keep myself together, hoping he can’t see me falling apart inside, hoping if I put on a stoic face I won’t be shoved off like some fragile little girl. Knowing my dad is inside that black bag is making it really hard. The crime scene is garish and chaotic, nothing like what I’ve seen on TV shows about murder. There are so many people coming in and out of the building, picking up shards of glass off the street and putting them into bags. Between the noise and the rain, I feel like I’m trapped inside a body bag, too. I want to crawl out of my skin.
There’s an ambulance parked off to the side, the back door open. A man I haven’t seen in many years sits there w
hile a paramedic wraps a bandage around his arm. There’s a police officer talking to him.
I jerk myself out of Henry’s grip and storm over.
“Pearl,” Donovan Day says. He’s staring at me like he’s just seen a ghost. He still has those gleaming eyes I once found so enchanting, but his boyish charm is long gone, replaced with something more manly, more rugged, more dangerous than some football jock who knew how to lay down a pickup line. “I was hoping somebody called you.”
It doesn’t matter how attractive he is; I spent the last twenty years not wanting anything to do with him, and deep in my heart I still feel that way. Knowing him and his motorcycle club probably had something to do with this incident makes me want to jump in the ambulance and punch him in the face.
“What happened?” I demand. “What the fuck did you do?”
“We need to talk,” he says, eyeing the paramedic next to him like he has something to tell me but doesn’t want anyone else to hear.
“We all good here?” I sneer at the sight of Stoney, my father’s ‘best friend’ in the entire world. He’s walking around the place in his leather cut like he’s leading the investigation. “My boy’s gonna be fine. You need anything else you got my number.”
To my horror, the police officers shake his hand and scatter like they’re under his direct order. Donovan thanks the paramedic, and as he stands up and comes over to me I am completely overwhelmed. I don’t remember him being so tall. So broad.
“Holy shit, Pearl,” Stoney says, wrapping his arms around me in a hug I definitely didn’t ask for. “I didn’t realize that was you, girl. Sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. We’re gonna take care of this, babe.” I don’t know why, but his hug is what pushes me over the edge. Maybe it’s because the only person in the world who cared about my father as much as I did was Stoney. Maybe it’s because “I’m so sorry” is basically the nail in the coffin. My father is dead. I am an orphan.
I can hear the catch in his breath as he hugs me tighter, and of all the emotions I’ve seen out of this man in my entire life, open crying is not one of them. It only wrecks me even more.