by John O'Brien
“Stay down and do what you can for him with this,” he told her, for Langston was still the priority; his condition was what they all feared the most, what they would all be most likely to unite against. Rudd took up a position in a forward booth. “Fenton!” he cried over the relentless pounding. “Get that scotch under cover before you do anything else!”
“Is that what’s called for, Rudd?” said Fenton, currently too pinned down by his proximity to the door to rise even to a crouch.
Rudd, his Walther locked open just that fast, pulled out his Glock and emptied it at the door. There was a brief lull in the outside fire and Fenton, who like all these men had seen enough to recognize an opportunity, stood straight up and gathered the three remaining glass bottles-two scotch and one liqueur-leaving the less breakable juice containers to stand the next round of fire.
Rudd, reloading, caught sight of him going the long way around the bar. “Good,” he said, “don’t risk the jump. Put ‘em in the sink. Gently–”
Again he was cut short by a spate of shooting, but Fenton had safely made his position behind the bar. He set the bottles in the sink and unholstered his own Glock. Miles was glad for the support on his flank and took the opportunity to snap another clip into his Colt Gold Cup. He turned, nodded at Fenton, slid down a few feet and was able to retrieve the two plastic juice containers from the top of the bar. Jill was doing her best with Langston, who now cognizant of the bottle being placed at his lips was calming somewhat. He made a feeble motion to sit up, but Jill pushed his arm back down and hushed him. The busboy was standing in dry-storage, not so much afraid as uninvolved. No one had heard from either of Osmond’s two forty-four-magnum Smith & Wesson model twenty-nines, though the shooting showed no sign of letting up.
“Somebody’s knockin’!” screamed Langston from the floor of his booth, using a southern drawl, which nobody present had ever heard him use before.
The shooting stopped, as if just as surprised as the rest of them at this half-assed speaking in tongues.
“Hah!” yelled Langston, claiming credit of sorts but more likely too delirious to know or care.
It only seemed to precipitate more shooting, and perhaps it really did. More than anything it broke Rudd-temporarily, it had happened before when things went spinning far beyond his control-broke his temper.
“Jill! You either shut him the fuck up or I’ll put a round in him myself!” With that Rudd, in disregard of the continuing gunfire, stood like some driven demigod, a Patton or a Robert Duvall, a pop-culture icon impervious to harm but one whose legend would never leave this room. He walked so straight and sure to the booths that Jill covered the oblivious Langston with her own body, fearing for a moment that he might have meant it, might now be on his way to shoot this man, her charge, through the head.
But Rudd only walked by, a strained “I mean it” issuing like steam from between his clenched teeth. “Osmond!” he bellowed. And again upon arriving at that man’s booth, his still inert body so drunk, so very passed out, “Osmond!” A bullet pierced Rudd’s thigh, clean through the flesh, harmlessly if such an occurrence can be described in such a manner. Nobody noticed, not even Rudd, so intent was he on righting this wrong, on awaking the passed-out-on-a-cheat Osmond and bringing him to this battle. Not that its course would have been altered by Osmond, but the fearsome bark of his twin forty-fours would have been a welcome voice in its sporadic refrain.
Even as he approached the booth and squatted with his left hand contacting his own fresh wound Rudd failed to notice either pain or blood. Not until he placed his hand, now covered in his own blood, on Osmond’s back, shaking him violently in an effort to revive him, did Rudd see the blood. And because what he saw first was blood on Osmond he assumed then that the blood on him came from Osmond and this was his first, both true and false, sign that something was wrong with this large man beyond being dead drunk.
Rudd stared at his hand. He stared at the blood on Osmond’s back. He even stared at his thigh, saw the wound or at least the hole in his pants, and thought for a perverse moment that if he was destined to stain his pants with Osmond’s blood then wasn’t it propitious to have done so in the same spot where they’d been torn anyway.
Then Jill was behind him. Langston had fallen silent and there was a lull in the shooting. In fact the shooting had stopped, Jill was sure of it. “You’re hurt,” she said to Rudd.
“No, it’s Osmond,” Rudd said, placing his hand on the man again and shaking gently. “I think he’s dead.”
With that they heard a muffled crunch as the bottle Osmond had drunk himself to death with and was lying on finally gave way to Rudd’s gentle nudging. The dead man’s huge chest lowered a bit, as if in final exhale.
A single gunshot cracked from the front of Tony’s. Outside. After the Hollywood ping of a ricochet they all heard the shattering collapse of one of the two bottles of J&B that Fenton had placed in the sink behind the bar.
“Well that sure didn’t sound like Malinowa Raspberry Cordial Austrian Liqueur!” lilted Langston, and then he began snoring.
Day1
Rudd sauntered into Tony’s at about 3:30 P.M. He hoped that nobody would notice he was wearing a backup; then he hoped that somebody might. Maybe that waitress, Jill was her name. After all, most women, despite what they said, viewed a gun like a dick only better. Point was that it wouldn’t do for Rudd, the great believer, proponent, and prophet of enduring Civil Obedience to be perceived as paying any attention to scattered media reports of a small situation—which was probably well in hand by now anyway—brewing at an obscure intersection in some godforsaken minority section of the city. Best just put a torch to the whole block and be done with it, and in fact that’s exactly what Rudd knew would happen before it was allowed to get out of hand.
All the same there had been other little problems in other little cities over the last few years and some of those had become big problems requiring bigger problem solvers and inconveniencing the community-at-large for a day or two. Lessons had been learned, to be sure. Still, it smelled like a two-gun day, and most men he knew routinely carried backups every day. Likely nobody’d even heard anything; it was a minor joke at the club an hour ago between him and Fenton.
That was his last drink, and Rudd could feel it was long past time for his next. He’d invited Fenton, who had never been to Tony’s, ostensibly to meet a few of the guys, none of whom Rudd much cared for, but really to impress him with the caliber of bar he was a regular in. They were coming in separate cars, Fenton wanting to squeeze in nine holes and Rudd wanting to get a discreet start on the evening’s drinking so that when his friend walked in he could say of his fourth scotch something like: What timing! I was just about to order a second.
Tony’s was as usual for this hour on whatever day it was. There was Miles, shitfaced, catching Rudd’s eye. “Hey!” he said, “Heard about the riot?”
A man named Osmond, corpulent and known only modestly to Rudd, took the opportunity to shoot him a nonetheless familiar glance somehow apropos of Miles’s remark. Rudd took a stool on the corner of the L, between the two men. There was no one else seated at the bar.
The bartender, standing near but not chatting with Jill, the waitress and only woman in Tony’s at that moment, strode from the far end of the bar and spun a napkin into place. “How are you, Rudd,” he said, extending his hand, rhetorically.
“Jesse James,” said Rudd, though this man’s name was neither. He liked this trick for certain types, bartender types and mailman types, whose names he knew but felt inexplicably uncomfortable using. Rudd felt that calling these people something absurd would make it seem as if he were beyond the point of mere familiarity with them while keeping his hands clean at the same time. Everything I say sounds stupid, he thought very deeply and privately as he silently half-pointed in the direction of the J&B. His way of asking for the usual.
But the bartender was already on it. “Me too,” said Osmond, who always drank vodka martinis
as far as Rudd could tell. Miles preferred Cutty Sark scotch but usually drank something silly. Today his drink was up and black as coal.
“You and your riots,” said Rudd derisively but with a smile. The bartender, exceedingly quick as ever, had the two drinks ready and dropped them into place, Osmond’s first after picking up his empty with the same hand. Okay, thought Rudd, he was closer.
“It’s all he can talk about,” said Osmond. “All afternoon.” He belched matter-of-factly.
“What was that?” Miles wanted to know. “I bet you think it’s okay to burp as long as you’re drinking vodka martinis.” But then he belched himself Of these three men Miles and Osmond had known each other the longest.
It suddenly occurred to Rudd that Miles belonged in a sixties Jack Lemmon movie; then it sadly occurred to him that they all did. He downed his drink in one gulp. He hated that thought. Riot my ass, was a better way to think. Small magic with a dash of eye contact brought Rudd another drink.
He touched the glass as the alcohol from the first began to tickle him and it felt well to be in this place. Very familiar, even Miles and Osmond a comfort, the cool of the emptiness, between the rushes, the staff would call it. But then the only staff present was Jill and the bartender. Rudd assumed there had to be kitchen staff somewhere in the back, prep cooks and such, but other than the occasional white-aproned brown-faced illegal alien timidly slipping out for a coke for the cook looking like some beaten-down shifty Toby thinking Kunta Kinte, Kunta Kinte, these people remained transparent to the clientele. Just as well. This day was tense and getting tenser, though Rudd could barely admit this to himself, and the clean room sparsely dotted with only white faces was something of a comfort. Very familiar, very predictable, the best single reason to keep coming back.
“Say, Rudd,” began Osmond, “you don’t think this is going anywhere, do you, this bullshit across town?” He sounded frightened, this big man, unless Rudd was projecting his own secret concerns; oddly, it endeared him to Rudd.
“’Course not,” he replied.
“I know, I know.” He laughed but it came out as a snort just short of embarrassing due to his bulk. “I’m just hoping you can calm down this excitable asshole. It’s all he can talk about. All afternoon.” He indicated Miles with the base of his martini glass as he lifted it to bury his face.
“Fuck if I’m worried,” said Miles. He patted the space under his left arm, under his jacket. “I’m covered, as usual.”
“Still carrying around that antique?” Rudd couldn’t resist any more than Miles could resist showing off his Colt at every opportunity.
“Yeah, well I’m still saving up for one of those nice new plastic guns like the one you got strapped around your ankle right now.” He gave Rudd a look like, I got ya’, and the other man tensed, wanting badly but not daring to look at his ankle right now and see for himself exactly what was visible. Miles continued, “Besides what are you talking antiques with that German piece of shit you carry every day.”
So he let it go and maybe I’m not all that busted, thought Rudd. Try: “Truth be told my Walther has been jamming lately. That’s why I’ve taken to the Glock most every day too.” He gave his firmest most authoritative nod-one jerk-thinking: You’re nothing to me, you’re nothing to me.
“Right,” said Miles, doing a better job than usual of masking his true thoughts, if he had any. “Say Ossie, show him your cannons.” To Rudd: “You’re not gonna believe this. He carries these fuckers wherever he goes, long as I’ve known him.”
A big grin swept over Osmond’s face as, looking down the bar to confirm they weren’t being watched, he unbuttoned his jacket and turned to Rudd.
“Jesus,” said Rudd, duly impressed. “Forty-four mags? Smiths?”
Osmond, already nodding quickly and still grinning, squealed, “Twin model twenty-nines!” He raised his eyebrows as if to underscore the exhibition he was granting before buttoning his jacket quickly. Then he quickly stiffened, turned to his drink, and affected a posture of nothing-funny-goin’-on-here.
Rudd marveled at the man, wanted to look around for the teacher. Well, he supposed, if I was that fat I could play double Dirty Harry too. “Well I suppose Tony’s is safe,” he quipped and immediately regretted it when he saw the jolt of fear pass through Osmond. This guy really was worried.
Miles, either oblivious, uncaring, or more skillful than Rudd, pitched in with, “Oh, Tony’s is safe all right. Anybody that could afford to be in here has too much to lose to ever let anybody else walk in. Besides, didn’t this place used to be a police station or something? I mean, it’s built like a fortress. You ever drive by here at four in the morning and see those security shutters? It’s like a fucking bank vault! Tony must be one paranoid fuck.” He polished off his disgusting drink and hollered at the bartender, who was ready for anything from Miles, “Let’s try a Pernod rocks with a splash—just a splash—of Evian.”
Jesus, thought Rudd. “Savings and loan,” he said. “Some screwball tried to build it bulletproof but got indicted before he could open. Guy named Farrell, I think, built funds out of a mini-mall branch and meant for this to be a more seemly location. Feds never moved in and Tony got it for a song, remodeled. Double shutters, by the way, inner and outer.” This last he said directly to Osmond, like: See, you want information, you come to me.
It was true; Tony’s was a patently defensible place, though no one had ever given it much thought until today. Maybe a joke now and again, a drunken remark or a jab at the drink prices being higher than even Hollydale. Not that Miles or Osmond would know that. It was one thing to be able to afford to be a regular at Tony’s, quite another to be a member of Hollydale. Rudd glanced out the window by way of following his over-the-shoulder gesture toward the security shutters and happened to see Fenton’s cream-colored Lexus making a U-turn in pursuit of a parking place. No valets at this hour. No cops with the time to bust you for a U-turn at this moment. C’mon, lighten up.
Miles, inspecting his Pernod as if it were an Erlenmeyer flask, taunted, “You been researching this, Rudd? That why you’re here on such a volatile afternoon?”
But Rudd barely heard him, or didn’t want to. Enough was enough, and now that Fenton was about to walk through the door Rudd wanted to suspend the conversation, such as it was, rather than waste a possible witty retort (something might come up) without his friend here to witness it. Not now, not when he was so close. Might be something good, really good, something worth repeating at the club tomorrow. Fenton would cajole him to repeat it and Rudd could demur until whomever they were with joined the course and he finally, coyly, condescended. “I’m here every day,” he said, and once again he regretted speaking too soon, for this sounded too defensive.
He swiveled his stool fully toward the door, preemptively, placing his elbows on the bar behind him.
Fenton walked in. “Found it!” he announced, rather blithely Rudd thought, and it occurred to Rudd that Fenton probably believed everything he told him.
“I had no doubt,” he said, brightening immediately, infected with his own optimism like catching back your own cold. These clods at the bar really had him going. “Grab a stool. We’re comparing penis size.” Something Fenton would say, so naturally Rudd had picked up the habit of saying such things to Fenton, or even just around him.
Fenton was well aware of the dynamic of their relationship, and he was sensitive to it. Though there were seats available on either side of Rudd, he elected to sit on the far side of the large man to Rudd’s left. This would more effectively distribute the conversational group. For no reason he thought of silverware, napkins, his sister’s wedding, and buying a second tuxedo. “Hi, I’m Fenton,” he said, extending his hand to the large man.
“Give me a damn second for chrissake,” Rudd jumped in. “Fenton, Osmond,” finger, tocking, this man, that man. “Miles,” he added via thumb over shoulder. “What are ya’ drinking, Fenton?”
The bartender, already there, looked at Rudd with a
jackass smile. Rudd always tipped well, and the bartender wanted to say something familiar and facetious like, You want to come back here and pour it too? but fuck it, he thought.
Rudd drained his drink. Remembering, he said, “I was just about to order–” He had to let it go; he couldn’t very well yell a lie across the room. He had expected Fenton to sit next to him; then he could have muttered quick and low, a second.
“We got anything but Colt 45 malt liquor,” Miles put in.
“You gotta loot a liquor store if you want that.”
“Perrier’s fine to start,” Fenton said more to Miles than the bartender, spotting right away that the latter was enough of a pro to respond to light neglect, to take it as a code for a nice tip in exchange for straight service, and that the former, likewise, would respond to a lick of attention, sycophancy even. “A topical reference, I take it,” he added, surprising Rudd, then, going to bat for same: “You don’t look like a slave to the media, Miles.”
At this Osmond opened his jacket to Fenton, perhaps taking advantage of the bartender’s turned back. “Twin forty-four mags,” he said, snapping it shut.
“Not only the biggest penis, but two of them,” said Rudd.
“Colt forty-five, as a matter a fact,” said Miles over raised forefinger in response to Fenton’s inquisitively raised eyebrows. “Gold Cup. And yourself?”
“Glock twenty-two,” said Fenton without hesitation. “Forty-caliber.”
Miles exhaled in a vaguely derisive fashion, too fast and too hard, prompting Rudd to say to Fenton, “Miles is less than awed by our plastic guns, as he calls them.”
“Let’s hope he doesn’t end up getting shot by one,” said Fenton with a smile.
“But then you’d be aiming at the wrong color,” said Miles. “I like your friend, Rudd. Too bad he doesn’t drink.”
Rudd watched Fenton let this slip, as he knew he would. Fenton was a bit of a bleeding heart, Rudd knew, but also smart enough to not let it interfere with anybody’s drinking. That shit was better left in the miserable little dive bars that dotted downtown, places like Dewey’s Lucky Shot, where Rudd once happened to witness a fight many years ago. About what he didn’t know, could’ve been racial, plenty of poor blacks and Latinos glaring at each other over their draft beers in that place. Those guys always seemed to have knife scars. Rudd patted his Walther. “He drinks,” he said. “He’s just not a drunk like us.” This, the men’s favorite form of self-deprecation, brought them all back to good humor.