Target on Our Backs

by J. M. Darhower

"You confronted him."

  He sounds almost alarmed by that word.

  "He's still alive," I elaborate, not wanting him to think I'm in any way back in or wanting to play his game. "But after our little confrontation, I had another encounter... this time with the guy you call Scar."

  I stare at him when I say that, hoping to riddle out his reaction, but his expression stays blank. No surprise. No fear. No intrigue. Nothing.

  "What kind of encounter are we talking here?"

  "Just more or less an introduction."

  Or rather, a reintroduction, but I leave that part off.

  I'm not ready to give away all of my cards.

  "First impression?"

  First impression? Same one I got so many years ago. "Curious."

  "Curious," he echoes, reaching into a humidor on a table beside him, pulling out a cigar. It's long, deep tan in color, with a brown label. Cubans, I'm guessing. He wordlessly offers me one but I wave him off, declining. He lights his, taking a deep puff before continuing. "He's not going to be a problem, is he?"

  Maybe.

  "For me? Not at all."

  "And for the rest of us?"

  Knowing Lorenzo like I think I do? The rest of them are screwed. It all depends, though… depends on what I do about him. Depends on how hard he makes life for me.

  "Hard to say," I reply. "He's determined; I'll give him that."

  "Seems that way," he says, puffing away on his cigar. It has a strong smell to it. It makes my nose twitch. "He's been wreaking a lot of havoc, the kind of havoc that draws attention to us all."

  That he has.

  Genova stares off in the distance, like he's pondering that. He flicks his ashes right onto the floor, letting them drop to the tan carpet. I pity his housekeeper.

  "Tell me, Vitale," he says after a moment. "You planning to do something about him?"

  "I'm thinking about it," I reply. "Is that going to be a problem?"

  "For me? Not at all."

  It doesn't escape my notice that he's using my exact words. Genova's a smart man. You can't just take him at what he says… you have to consider how he says it.

  Standing up, I brush the wrinkles from my suit coat. I came to test the waters. That was all I really wanted. I hold my hand out toward him. "Been a pleasure."

  He takes my hand, shaking it. "Pleasure's been all mine. If you decide to handle your little problem, I'd be happy to offer—"

  I cut him off before he can finish what he's saying. I don't want anything from him. "Don't worry about it."

  He looks surprised. "You're certain?"

  "Handling it will benefit everyone. We'll simply call it a parting gift."

  The surprise on his face only deepens at those words. "Oh? Going somewhere after all?"

  I half-shrug. "I'm getting too old for it all."

  "Nonsense, Vitale… you're still young. Get to be my age and then we'll talk."

  I don't respond to that. There's no point. Nodding my goodbye, I turn to walk out, finding the young guy lingering in the hallway right outside. He trails me, a few steps behind, following me to the front door of the house.

  He locks it up the moment I step outside. I can hear the clanging as he secures the door, keeping anyone from being able to come in. Genova always was more paranoid than the others. More locks. More security.

  It's probably why he lives alone, why he has never been married.

  He doesn't trust anyone enough to lie beside him when he's sleeping.

  Stepping off the porch, I head to my car, but my footsteps stall as I approach. The muscles in my body grow tense, on alert. A few feet away, I pause, hands in the pockets of my black pants, clutching my keys.

  Someone is perched on the hood of my car.

  Not just any someone, either.

  Lorenzo.

  Unbelievable.

  He sits there, relaxed, right foot propped up on the corner of the front bumper, his arms resting on his knee. He's peeling an orange, pulling it apart and tossing his scraps right into the street.

  My eyes scan the neighborhood, looking for any black sedans that might account for the cars I encountered last night, but the street is quiet, nothing out of the ordinary. He seems to be alone.

  Huh.

  "Littering's illegal, you know."

  He glances my way when I say that, raising his eyebrows. "Assaulting men in alleys is illegal, too… or so I've heard."

  "It is, but the trick is to be careful. The cops in this city are always looking for a reason to take us down. One dropped receipt on the sidewalk can earn someone like us ten days in lockup."

  "You spend many days in lockup?"

  "No," I say. "I'm careful."

  He laughs, turning back to his orange, and peels another piece, again tossing the scraps into the street. He's not worried, not a bit. Fearless. "Ah, life's too short to always be cautious, Ignazio. Sometimes you've got to put yourself out there and take risks."

  "True, but you have to be smart about what kind of risks you take."

  He pops a wedge of the orange in his mouth, chewing slowly as he regards me. I don't know why he's here or what he wants, and I'm pretty sure I'm not going to get a straight answer out of him about it if I ask. He's playing some sort of game, a game I have no desire to play, but he's going to force me to, anyway.

  "You've got balls," I tell him. "It takes them, to be sitting out here, in front of this house, in broad daylight."

  "Oh, you mean old man Genova's place?" Lorenzo motions toward the brick mansion. "He's not going to do anything to me."

  "How can you be so sure?"

  "Because he swore it himself," he says. "Had a meeting with the five families late last night. Or well, the four that are left." He shoots a look my way that tells me he knows exactly what happened to number five. "It was… enlightening, I guess you could call it. Temperamental bunch. Burn down one silly little building and they get their panties all twisted, but I managed to straighten them out… for now."

  The hair on the back of my neck bristles at the casual way he says that.

  A meeting with the families?

  I'm not sure what to make of it.

  I'm not sure if I believe it.

  Genova certainly didn't mention it when suggesting I kill the guy.

  "Come on, Lorenzo… we both know that's not all you've done."

  "What makes you say that?"

  "The streets talk."

  He ponders that for a moment, continuing to eat his orange, dripping juice all over the hood of my car. I want to snatch a hold of him and rip him off of it, slam his face against the mess and make him lick it up, but I'd also like to go home today. And even though I can't see any recognizable cars around us, I'm not entirely convinced he's out here alone.

  Is he really that brazen?

  "How'd you get here?" I ask curiously.

  "Friend dropped me off."

  "Friend," I muse. "You got a lot of those? Friends?"

  "I've got ten of them," he says. "Eleven, if we're counting you."

  "We're not."

  "Ten, then."

  "And you're sure one of them isn't Fat Joe?"

  His response is immediate. "The rapper?"

  "The man in the alley."

  His eyes seek me out when I say that. He's still sitting casually, like he's not bothered at all, but there's something in his eyes now, a deep kind of suspicion, like he knows I'm on the tip of an accusation. "You got something you're trying to get at here, Ignazio? Never thought you'd be one to beat around the bush. Just spit it out."

  "You had someone shoot up my father's deli."

  He shakes his head. "Wasn't me."

  I take a step toward him, reacting on instinct, but I manage to stop myself before doing something. His denial grates at me, though, burrowing under my skin. It's cowardice. Ridiculous. If you're going to attack a man so personally, the least you can do is take credit for the act.

  "So I guess none of it was you, huh? Ray's men being picked of
f, one-by-one?"

  "Nope."

  "Not even the men who died at Cobalt? The ones who burned alive that night? Still not your fault?"

  "Now, okay, that was me," he says, pushing away from the car to stand up, popping another wedge of orange in his mouth. "I warned them first, though. Not my fault they didn't take me seriously. Guess they will now."

  "Yeah, the ones who survived."

  His brow furrows as he steps around my car, toward the passenger door. "Don't tell me you had some sort of emotional attachment to that place."

  "I spent a lot of time there," I say. "I wouldn't say I was attached, but it hit a little too close to home for my liking."

  "Oh, well, then in that case..." He holds up his hands, smirking. "Innocent."

  He's a lying son of a bitch.

  I know he's being sarcastic, but by no means do I find it funny.

  "In my defense," he continues, lowering his hands, "well, you know, there's really no defending it. You know as well as I do that sometimes things just have to be done. You've been there."

  I have.

  He knows it.

  I know it.

  I've done more than my fair share of bad because I felt it was just what had to be done. I never bothered trying to defend my actions.

  I'm not surprised he isn't bothering, either.

  "And yeah, okay, maybe I picked off a guy or two," he says, holding his hand up like a gun and shooting. Pew-pew. "But I have no reason to target you, Ignazio."

  He doesn't need a reason, I think, and I start to point that out, when a loud, obnoxious ruckus shatters the air around us. My pocket vibrates, and I reach into it, grabbing my phone. The song... it's coming from it. Shit.

  The fucking boy band.

  I silence it, pressing the button on the side, just to stop the annoying blaring. Karissa's face is plastered on the screen, and as much as I hate doing it, I ignore her call.

  Now's not the time for it.

  Slipping the phone back away, I glance at Lorenzo. His eyes are wide, the orange halfway to his mouth, like he's forgotten about everything else for the moment.

  "Was that...?" He gapes at me. "What was that? Do I even want to know?"

  "No," I admit, "you don't."

  He shakes his head before tossing what's left of his orange right into the gutter beside my car. He wipes his hands on his black pants like they just don't matter. He's dressed casual, his light blue button down halfway open, exposing part of his chest.

  At least it's not jeans and a t-shirt today.

  "Great seeing you, as always," he says, just as a black car whips around the corner of the block, heading our direction. Bingo. "We should get together again soon. I'd love to meet this wife of yours. I've heard so much about her."

  "From who?"

  "The streets talk, remember?" He steps off the curb behind my car just as the black sedan pulls up beside us, blocking me in. "Besides, you seem to forget I once knew her parents. You aren't the only one."

  With that, he's gone, yanking open the passenger door and ducking inside before it drives away. I stare at it as it accelerates, my eyes scanning the Florida license plate.

  No, I haven't forgotten he knew her parents.

  I was just hoping like hell it wouldn't come up.

  High-waist jean shorts.

  Pastel pink leg warmers.

  Matching distressed sweatshirt, hanging off my right shoulder.

  I feel utterly ridiculous and completely out of place, even though, okay, I just bought this outfit today. It was all there, in the store, waiting on the rack. Apparently the eighties are making a comeback.

  Who knew?

  I certainly didn't.

  Clothes surround me in my bedroom, some with the tags still on, others dragged here from Melody's closet… or her floor… or bed… or whenever they'd last been. Enough crazy outfits to dress a dozen people.

  I'd managed to nab the most modest get-up of the bunch.

  The faint bruise around my neck has mostly faded. I can barely see it anymore. Nobody around me has mentioned it, not even Melody, who I know for a fact would've rang the alarm had she noticed.

  I'm looking myself over in the full-length mirror beside the dresser—another one of my purchases today. The only mirror Naz ever had in this place was the small one in the bathroom, and well, let's just say Melody noticed last time she tried getting ready here. "Ugh, no wonder you're always so… you," she'd said, motioning at me. "How do you pick out pants in the morning without, you know, checking out your ass?"

  Wasn't sure how to answer that question.

  Wasn't sure there was even an answer for it.

  But still, I bought a mirror this afternoon, because she had a point somewhere in there, I think.

  And okay, I have to admit… my ass does look kind of nice in these shorts.

  Looks bigger than it used to be.

  "You got anything lace?" Melody asks, walking right over to my drawers to scour through my things. She starts with the top drawer, shooting me a smirk as she yanks out a pair of my underwear. "Anything other than this thong?"

  She shoots it at me, like it's a damn slingshot, before turning back to the rest of my drawers and opening them to find nothing she wants.

  "Don't wear much lace," I admit. "It itches."

  "So?"

  "So I like to be comfortable."

  She looks at me again, closing the last drawer. "Sometimes we have to suffer for fashion, Kissimmee."

  I grimace. "You, maybe. I'll pass."

  Rolling her eyes, she gives up her search for lace and dives into the pile of clothes strewn around my bed, finding a pair of leggings with a stich of lace on the bottom of them. "Ha!"

  Apparently leggings are back, too.

  And harem pants.

  Hammer pants.

  Melody bought a pair of them today.

  I don't know what's wrong with her, honestly.

  She shimmies out of said pants right where she stands beside the bed, tossing them onto the pile, already regretting that purchase, I think. She's situating the leggings, about to pull them on, when a voice calls out through the room.

  A voice that isn't ours.

  "Do you—?"

  Naz steps into the doorway, cutting off mid-question. His reaction is automatic, his expression shifting to one of surprise as he turns his head, away from us, and closes his eyes, raising his hands as if to ward of whatever the hell he'd just seen.

  Melody is in her underwear.

  I don't know why, but I find it pretty damn funny.

  I laugh, seeing his distress over walking in on that, especially when Melody groans. "Geez, Ignazio, never took you for a voyeur."

  "I can assure you," he says, "that was the last thing I wanted to look at."

  Melody scoffs, leggings finally on, and playfully nudges him with her elbow as she jets out of the bedroom, heading for the bathroom down the hall. Naz cautiously turns back my way when she's gone, his eyebrows raised as he approaches. His eyes scan the room around me, taking in the utter mess, before settling on the mirror. He regards my reflection as he pauses beside me, eventually turning right to where I stand. "Another venture into the eighties, I gather."

  "How'd you guess?"

  "You look like someone I used to masturbate to when I was in my teens."

  My face heats at that, blush taking over my cheeks.

  Naz's eyes scan me, from my head to my toes, before settling on the piece of black lace by my feet. He reaches down and picks it up. It isn't until it's in his hand that he realizes exactly what it is. His face pales just a bit as he whispers, "Please tell me this is yours."

  "Of course it is."

  He breathes a sigh of relief, smirking, as he takes a step back, wordlessly shoving the thong in his pocket. I laugh and am about to say something about it when Melody waltzes back in, brush in hand, steadily teasing her blonde hair. Naz looks her over quickly, not at all the same way he looked at me.

  He almost looks conf
used.

  "You know, we didn't really dress like that in the eighties," he tells her… same thing he once told me. "I don't know where you girls got that idea from."

  Melody looks down at her outfit, her black lacy leggings and what looks like a neon pink sports bra with matching tutu. She's even got on a pair of jelly sandals… something else we found today at the store.

  She said she wouldn't be caught dead in a pair any other time.

  They shouldn't make them for anyone over the age of nine.

  "Really?" she says. "What did you wear?"

  "Acid-wash jeans," I chime in. "The also really liked shoulder pads for some reason."

  Melody pretends to gag. "Even I'm not crazy enough to go down that path."

  Naz shakes his head, like he disagrees, and turns back to me without commenting. Melody disappears again after grabbing her bag full of make-up, as usual the last to ever be ready.

  "Do I, what?" I ask, running my hands over my hair. It's poufy from being crimped. Another thing we stumbled upon at the store—a hair crimper. I didn't even hesitate before grabbing that one.

  "Excuse me?"

  "When you walked in," I say. "You were asking something."

  "I was wondering if you had any plans tonight," he says, glancing around. "Sort of already answered my question."

  "Oh, yeah… Melody wanted to go to Timbers, and I mean, I didn't think it was a good idea… I still don't know, but I figured, well… no harm, right?"

  I'm babbling, because I'm not sure how to explain it or what I'm supposed to say, if I'm supposed to ask how he feels about me going out. I'm barely twenty, and this is prime ‘going out' age, but we're married now.

  I've never exactly seen an example of how normal married life is supposed to be.

  "Right," he says. "You don't need my permission. If you want to go dancing, by all means, go dancing. I'm not going to tell you no."

  "Are you going to follow me, though?"

  A slow smile spreads across his face.

  Of course he is.

  I'm not surprised, and it's not like I planned to do anything he wouldn't approve of, but still, I roll my eyes. Now that is old Naz. As much as I might hate it, I've got to admit—it's good to see him being himself again.

  "I would," he says, "but I have a few other things I need to do tonight."

  "Like?"