Chapter 26
“Looks like World War 3 down there,” said Sutton, for the third or fourth or fiftieth time. Norm had lost count.
As residents passed Pleshette’s, Sutton, nominating himself for the role of Weeble Wobble shaped info kiosk, would hold up the dumb enough to slow down, informing them that at this distance from the shooting and car smashing everyone ought to be safe enough, long as a stray bullet didn’t ding Norm’s oxygen tank. That happened, all bets were off.
Sutton’s laugh sounded like a ceiling fan Norm had battled most of his time with Cathleen in Eugene, years before he couldn’t breathe right, before he became more a parent than just an uncle. The bathroom light and fan operated on a single switch. Under the influence of the green, the bud, Cathleen would turn it on, then wander the house, most the time talking on her landline with the generous cord length, or forgetting it was on, taken in by TV or the radio. Wasn’t long before that fan whipped around on ungreased bearings. Norm’s inability to silence the noise just one of many reasons the romance had gone bust.
Sutton might delight to see that ignition occur, Norm sent off into the sky like a rocket. Fired or quit from the County Road Department - it depended on who you asked - Sutton just liked to jaw, and working from facts rather than fiction presented a brand new suite of conversational opportunity. Who knew how many variations on the theme of Norm’s fiery death he could assay before the day was done.
Tiffany hadn’t checked in. There wasn’t a schedule. The way Norm looked at it she could run around when he didn’t need her to watch the store. Not that there was much to watch. Both he and Sutton could wander away, join up the crowds down near the park or further down, massed around the SUV smashed up, blocking Main Street, and not a soul would wander into Pleshette’s.
Dusk falling, he wondered how much longer he should let it go before he called her. Made sure she was all right. The only ambulance ride out of Little Creek had been for Doug Lueck, according to Sutton. He was getting updates on his phone. Norm’s phone was somewhere. He hated the phone. All phones. They bred distraction. As if people weren’t dumb enough already. Auntie’s held some regular contest, Racine Dobbs would let her phone randomly dial a customer, and presto, they won a $5 gift certificate.
“I bet the National Guard will come on in,” said Sutton. “And at least one network. Not those liberal sons of b’s, none of their affiliates, but maybe the Northwest News Channel.” Sutton rubbed his chin like he was considering the sacrifice he could throw Little Creek, make himself available to the talking heads, represent the best interests of the town. Sutton always talked about running for mayor, and here, The Honorable Bud Luotto’s inability to foresee these dangers playing on out right now in front of everyone might be the necessary wedge.
The man walking east on Main Street, away from The Outpost, now past the post office towards Pleshette’s was lanky, dipped at the shoulders like he was embarrassed by the 6’4” or so Mother Nature supplied.
Sutton’s novelty item sized phone meeped at him (maybe he’d won Racine’s contest), and instantly he was talking away, the device so big it looked like he held an irradiated dinner plate up to his head.
Across the street, Fenton had been coming out of the Up’n Up, reminding regulars that any beer drinking had to be done inside, unless they wanted him to lose his license. They kept apologizing, taking a last look down at the crowd, heading back inside, then coming back out, clutching Coke and Pepsi cans Norm bet hid beverages of a yeastier bent.
The tall walker held up just in front of Norm. Even taller than Norm had estimated. Big nose, a woman’s lips, and a kind of Italian nose. A sad face, but the guy looked beat. Could just be the common humidity a little too much for his system.
“Afternoon,” said Norm. He waited it out, the usual. A stranger’s eyes taking in his breathing tube, down to the oxygen tank, the mobile-wheeled cage, and back again.
“Are you Norm? Norm Pleshette?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did your niece call you about me?”
“’About’ you?”
“Sorry. Long day. I’m Connie. Tiffany said she’d call.”
“No. I haven’t heard anything from her since about noon. Connie? I don’t-”
“She said she’d call.”
“Well, she didn’t.” Norm providing the smile he kept ready for the occasional drunk or when Sutton got into it with one of Don Jennings’ acolytes – usually the trigger the latter accusing Sutton’s hero Ronald Reagan of being a closet liberal, about the same for Sutton as calling old Ron a cocksucker. Norm had permanently banned a Dale resident, Peevie Owens, after a launched can of peas missed Sutton’s head and permanently dented a wall.
“Who’s this?” Sutton couldn’t resist noticing, butting in. He stuck his lips back near his glowing dinner plate. “Hold on, Peevie. Just. Yes. We all saw the helicopter. Jesus. Take a breath.” Sutton smothered the phone against his ribs. Norm processed the fact Sutton and Peevie were still on speaking terms. This was war come to their neck of the woods. Old alliances held firm apparently.
“Says his name’s Connie,” said Norm. “Said Tiff was supposed to call me, tell me about him.”
“Well, where is your phone, Norm?”
Norm shrugged.
“Everyday,” said Sutton. “Everyday. I swear. And still I’m surprised.” He hung up on Peevie, and started in toward Pleshette’s, stubby fingers working the pad screen. “I’m calling it, Norm. Is the ringer on?”
“No idea.”
“Of course not. It’s only technology preschoolers have mastered, but not a 50 year-old business owner. Jeezum Crow.” Sutton mounted the porch and disappeared through the doorway.
“How do you know Tiff?” asked Norm.
“Oh. You know.” Connie tried to smile. Good-looking boy at some angles, and that smile might melt hearts in most situations, but his flat out lack of fuel left it looking more of a snarl. “Friend of a friend.”
Norm nodded. Wished he and Sutton had some keyword worked out so need be one of them would know to grab the gun under the register.
From deep inside the store Sutton bellowed, “Bingo”.
Even the drunk out in front of the Up heard it. Wiped some faux cola out of his whiskers as he squinted across the street, anticipating something exciting to burst on out of Pleshette’s.
“Oh. I forgot.” Connie snapped his fingers, pointed at Norm. “She said if you seemed a little reluctant to help I was supposed to tell you a Dobbs was involved.”
“Wait. What?”
“Tiffany. She said to tell you that you needed to help me. And a Dobbs was involved. She said that would totally grease the skid.”
Norm’s scalp tingled. He’d hoped to witness the brick-colored store down at town center to explode. Maybe have the Amazon hole up inside Auntie’s and shoot it out with the Sheriff’s deputies. A million dollars in damages. A stray bullet punch through something combustible. No deaths, no-no-no. He wanted the Dobbs alive, destitute, leaving town with their tails between their legs.
“Which one? Which Dobbs?”
“I don’t know.” Connie felt like taking a step back. Norm looked like he might grab Connie, shake the name out of him.
Sutton was lollygagging. Held up, standing there on the porch lip, lost in the world of his dinner plate. Norm could see the found phone tucked between Sutton’s flipper and breast.
“Do you want to borrow my phone, to call her?” asked Connie.
Norm waved away the offer.
“Sutton! You find it?” Nothing. Pecking away at the touchscreen. “Sutton! My niece could be dying right now, but I’m not going to be able to say goodbye to her because you’re busy updating your motherfucking Facebook!”
Sutton not even looking at him, but at least he was moving.
“Swearing. And at your age.”
He stepped off the porch onto the gravel and held the cell out, the whole time eyes fixed on his device. Norm so agitated he nearly dropped the phone taking it from his employee. Sutton kept looking at his screen. Looking at Connie. Back to the screen. Back to Connie.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Connie grinned.
“If it’s nothing why are you giving me that dirty look?”
“Ain’t dirty, mister.”
“No?”
“No. Interested is all.”
Connie looked at the short man until something gave. Sutton turned the pad around, the motion knocking one floppy string of his bolo tie askew.
Random video from what seemed hours ago. Recorded from Don’s Automotive, aimed across the street, at Auntie’s. A jittery image, heads in the way, voices asking who was in the car, who was the woman shooting, the crowd watching Millie sprint down the middle of the paved street out towards the woods. And then a tracking shot, another sprinter, Connie, giving chase. A dozen muffled voices asking each other whom the running man might be. No one knew. Someone tossing it on out there, could be an FBI agent. Someone else, voicing hopes the Fed didn’t get shot. Someone else saying fuck the Feds then being told in no uncertain terms to shut up.
It had helped that the Deputy looked all of 12. Even with a mustache.
Still, Connie had been amazed he’d hoodwinked the cop. Convinced him he was just a stranger, giving chase after the woman with a gun, some sort of heroic impulse he didn’t know he had in him.
The Deputy hadn’t driven far out into the woods before figuring out Millie wouldn’t likely run parallel to the road. He’d doubled back, set up a roadblock just south of the bridge over Little Creek. Like a dummy, Connie still standing there, Millie vanished, his breath caught, brain befuddled. By the time the Deputy started asking questions the oxygen had resumed flowing normal enough Connie could fib.
Stuck to the story he’d given the Zippy Mart clerk, just passing through, the car breaking down, and for the foreseeable future he was on foot. Circumstances beyond his control dumping him off in Little Creek, further circumstances lighting some fire under him, putting him in pursuit of the crazy woman.
Connie acted the over-interested citizen. Peppering the Deputy with questions, asking if they knew the woman’s name, age, occupation, marital status. The mustache blushed, sorry, but he couldn’t confirm anything right now. Then urging Connie to head back to town. For his own sake. No way to tell if the woman might not pop on out of the trees, guns a blazing. Later, the Deputy’s slip chilled Connie. Running after Millie, he didn’t care if she’d been armed. But if the cop caught up to her, adrenaline overriding thought, he might’ve blown out the back of her head before realizing Ms. Armed and Dangerous had actually dropped her weapon back in town.
Walking down the pavement back toward Little Creek, Connie had tried calling Millie. No answer. He dialed her a dozen times and then what felt like a dozen times more.
The helicopter surprised him. He wondered if they had some ace marksman aboard. Even if they did, it took someone cold around the heart to put a bullet in a woman. His thoughts raced, he wondered if he looked around Little Creek, maybe he could find a pay phone, call the Sheriff, anonymously tip them to the high likelihood the woman was pregnant. Sharpshooters would be called off. A general call to take her in, but not kill her would go out. A dead baby? No law enforcement higher up wanted to deal with that pie in the face.
He’d seen Miss Bikini Top joined by friends. A sea of teenagers on the house back deck, he saw some kid bounce up into the air and then heard a faint ploosh sound. Pool party. Nice. Connie saw Miss Bikini Top pointing at him, telling her girlfriends how she’d seen him sprinting out just a few minutes ago. He waved. They waved back then laughed. Amused. Safe. Touching danger from a safe place.
The suit jacket lay on the roadside. He stepped past it, fuck it, then he stopped, went back, picked it up. Slung it over his shoulder and walked along the park. His phone rang. Tiffany calling. And calling. And calling again.
Sipe.
Back in Pendleton, Connie should’ve told him to fuck himself. The Wub was on the way? Big deal. Connie was moving on. Sipe a big boy, Sipe had done all manner of horrible shit in this life, why not have some horrible shit happen to him for once? Connie could’ve shoved him out of the condo, shut the door in his face.
Connie killed his phone, shoved it in his back pocket. Crowds drifted into Main Street. A few people looked at him, but most the attention was focused down westward, an ambulance had arrived, and Deputy Lueck was loaded on a gurney. A second official looking law enforcement rig - the requisite black SUV - parked behind the wounded Deputy’s squad car.
No way they hadn’t already run the license plates off Millie’s SUV. A little violence in the middle of Buttfuck, Egypt didn’t mean a thing to news gatekeepers, but flutter ‘Millicent Timbers’ in front of them and the floodgates would open.
That temper of hers. No one knew the source, not even Millie. She took prescription pills, mood stabilizers. She’d completed anger management courses. She visualized soothing images to remove the thorn when the thorn sunk into her paw. She didn’t booze it up anymore. That was good. That helped, but she was angry even before the first drops of booze had ever graced her lips. So many Barbie dolls and Raggedy Ann’s ripped limb from limb. Introduction into Little Millie’s toy box like being queued up for the meat grinder. Could be, all those years ago, Bela Yalbo was an astute judge of character. He didn’t want to sign up for a sure case of heartburn and heartbreak.
The first time they’d had sex, all of ten minutes after bumping into one another at a Santa Rosa nightclub - Connie and fellow Culinary Institute students cutting loose - Connie had been scared, afraid she’d snap his neck, bite his dick off, at the very least break his ribs the way she rode him, grabbing hold and essentially turning his whole body into a massive dildo. It turned her on that he didn’t come first, in fact, she finished off four times, riding twice, once on her back, and then outside, braced against the car trunk, Connie finally tripping his magic wire hot on her heels. Wiping his mess off her crotch onto his shirt, she told him she’d been looking for him. For the man just the right size that could last like that. The Divine Hammer. Giggling, kissing him for the first time, telling him it wasn’t everyday a girl discovered some myths were true.
Siren blaring, the ambulance had sped out of town, driving west, towards the Forest Service then beyond. The Jeep driving EMT still down at ground zero, talking to the Sheriff, on-lookers. A rumble noise sounded from Don’s Automotive and a tow truck drove out, the driver beep-beeping until the crowds parted, allowed him to drive all of a half-block. Connie wondered where the impound lot was around here. Probably out of town. Maybe far away as Pendleton.
Connie noticed some in the crowd pointing at him. Looking. Showing their phones to one another. He faked an anthropological interest in the signs next to the propane tanks. Messages on patriotism. Black helicopters. Prescient on that one, if nothing else.
Connie knew, if not Sipe, then someone else eventually would’ve transformed into a new Bela Yalbo. Years from now, they might’ve been married, 2.5 kids, Connie running his own restaurant, nothing but the good life, then something would hit Millicent the wrong way. A PTA meeting, a soccer game, a grocery aisle, a neighborhood block party, some simple, ordinary little event would transform into ground zero. Then it’d be, sorry kids, mom’s got to go away, serve out 10-25.
Hours ago, before taking off for Timbers Athletic, Millie had asked if he wanted pancakes for breakfast. And Connie mistakenly scrunched up his face and answered in this grossed out voice, the way he’d regularly tease Susan years ago, feigning disgust when his aunt-not-an-aunt knew good and well pancakes were Connie’s absolute favorite.
Millie’s face had crumpled. It was like a big
fat greasy turd had dropped into the telling of the fairy tale. Connie caught his mistake, hugged her, told her what it meant, his reaction, just autopilot, he didn’t know where it had come from, and the thousand or so kisses he’d smothered her in seemed to heal any sign of wound.
Maybe it was better to have things go to Hell early on in the affair, before they had spent time and energy on shoring things up. Before marriage. Before kids. Before a mortgage. Before forever started to really and truly feel like forever.
Connie ended up standing next to the Patriot’s Kiosk, staring into space, a virtual twin to the sun-weathered mannequin in Revolutionary-era wear.
The next time Tiffany called, he’d answered. Let her know what was going on and she updated things on her end of the persistently interesting day. She told him Norm would help out, especially after he knew Quinn Dobbs was up to his neck in it. Then Tiff had handed Sipe the phone. Before arriving at Pleshette’s, Sipe asked Connie to stop inside The Outpost, check the restaurant out.
“We’re going to have a meeting there,” said Sipe. “If you think it checks out.”
“Meeting?”
“With some locals. Me, the girl - Hope. Her former employers. About as neutral ground as they get around here.”
“You want me to help? With the meeting itself?”
A long pause before Sipe said, “Maybe.”
“Sure.”
“When you’re in there, want you to look around, see if there’s someplace good to hide, uh, you know, a gun. Something similar sized.”
“Thought you said ‘neutral ground’.”
“Way it goes, you hope for neutral. Long as nothing happens, it’s neutral. Everyone walks in, everyone walks out, no one has to utilize all the little ways you cover yourself, it’s neutral.”
“Right. Sipe. Uh, what does ’similar sized’ mean?”
“You know. Palm sized. Handy.”
The Lipless Gods Page 28