The Subtle Art of Brutality, page 15
“Have they broken in?” I ask. We round the corner.
“They uhhh...they sold the stuff Dobbin’s got ’em and now they’re uhhh...popular. They needed more dope is all. Dobbins couldn’t turn up anymore, especially for the price he took for the first batch. So they want the girl. Well, Cherry does more than Danny. The folks they sold to are starting to go to other dealers already. Their street cred is drying up. They found another supplier who wants a shitload of cash. And...uhhh...”
Blimpie trails off. Of course their street credit is drying up. Junkies don’t wait for a hit. They move on to whoever has their fix.
Blimpie doesn’t start back up and I grip him by the neck. We round the next corner. One more right hand turn and we’ll be heading back to the bar.
“Finish the story, turd,” I say as I squeeze his neck until his eyes close and his teeth grit. “You were doing so well.”
“Okay!” he says and I let up. Encouragement. “They stole those ATM’s that have turned up missing...you know, the three that were on the evening news? They went to a hotel and stole a truck. They used that to hit three ATM’s and drag them to a storage shed outside of town. Just bam bam bam. Cherry said it would be like the movie Gone in 60 Seconds. You know, by the time they notice the first one missing all three will be hidden. That was like two days ago.”
“Have they gotten inside them yet?”
“They don’t tell me that kind of stuff, man. I just work at the bar. Okay? I didn’t steal your drugs or nothin’. I just—”
“So why do they still want the girl?”
“She’s got the fuckin’ hook-ups, bro! Cherry was pissed he needed to steal an ATM to get the same amount that girl sold ’em for next to nothin’. Cherry said it cut into the bottom line.”
We round the corner and stop two storefronts down from the bar.
“So those two douchebags sell some pot to high school friends, then decide it’s time to become full-time dealers and the girl comes along and gives them the score of a lifetime. That’s not enough so they look for her again, can’t find her, steal ATMs and now are hunting for her because the bottom line isn’t what Cherry thinks it should be. Do I have the story?”
“Yeah. I guess. I’m not really in their deals or nothin’, man. I’m on the outside of it all.”
“Get back in the bar,” I say. “If you tell Danny and Cherry about this I’ll fucking kill you. Got it?”
He shakes his head. Turns white. I let go and he numbly walks into the bar. Obedient.
I pull out Blimpie’s phone. Dial Danny’s number from the address book.
“What?” Danny screams. Blimpie must have forgotten to mention I took his phone.
“Back at the bar, Danny. You forgot something.”
“What?”
“You forgot something at the bar, Danny.”
Dawning realization now: “Who—who is this?”
“Better pick him up before I do.” I hang up.
I finish another cigarette before they make it back. Park the van, leave it running. Doors unlocked. Rush inside. I’m in the back of the van before they get back out.
34
They make Blimpie drive his own car.
I’m lying down in the back of the van, .44 Magnum out, the gun panting. Asking impatiently to shoot someone. All in due time.
We’re on the street, Cherry driving. We’re breaking the speed limit, that’s for sure.
The conversation is not good.
Cherry: “Dude, I know he’s your brother but who cares? I mean, first of all he’s only your half-brother. Even your mom says she doesn’t know who his father is—”
Danny: “Dude. She knows, she’s just embarrassed or something about it because, quite frankly, she dates a lot of guys. But who even cares? Seriously, we’re in over our heads here—”
Cherry: “No, we are not. These are growing pains. I told you shit is going to happen. Just does. This game pays, Danny. But, sometimes it fucks with you, that’s all. You fuck back. This is top-dog shit right here. We’re gonna be top-dog.”
Danny: “Dude, watch where you’re going and slow down. Blimpie can barely keep up. Now, listen. I know growing pains and all but this—”
Cherry: “Whoever these guys are looking for their dope, and whoever this bull is muscling Blimpie, they’ve got nothing. Understand me? What, a fiend cocksucker like Dobbins diming us out? I’m still not sure that wasn’t a sting. The bull is probably a Three Mile High cop and—”
Danny: “I don’t care. We get out of this. We’re already in deep shit if they figure out how we got the cash to buy into the market in the first place. Dude, what if they are cops?”
Cherry: “We lay low. I got a real job; you got a real job—”
“Dude, you’re a night attendant at a gas station and I clean—”
“Shut the fuck up. Bottom line, Danny: Blimpie and Dobbins are the weak links here. Simple. You and I would be avoiding this mess completely if it weren’t for them. Think about it. Simple, bro. Simple.”
Danny: “I’m not going to do anything to Blimpie just because he’s dumb and scared—”
“Then fuck yourself. You listen to me, Danny. You fucking listen good. I owe your stupid retard brother one for squealing to the cops about me and Loren—”
“Dude, drop that shit! Seriously! He never—”
“I got convicted of domestic violence for that! You know I can’t legally even go hunting now! I can’t own a damn rifle!”
“You really think the cops needed Blimpie’s story? You really think that? ’Cuz I think Loren, with a broken nose, fractured arm and contusion—I think that little tune-up spelled it out for you! So stop calling my brother a fat retard! I ain’t going down with you on this dope shit!”
“You think you got troubles with this, Danny? Do ya? If we get convicted on distribution that’ll be my third strike! Get me? I ain’t talkin’ about no baseball! Third strike! You’re out! Gone for life!”
Danny mumbles. I’m sure he’s quite tired of being lectured and yelled at. Cherry takes some deep breaths. Rolls down a window. I hear the spark of flint, smell tobacco.
Cherry: “Fuck that. I’ll do whatever it takes. I ain’t goin’ back. No way. This is my time, Danny. Our time. We’ve got a plan and we’ve stuck to it. This shit ain’t more than a hiccup.”
Danny: “Are you saying Blimpie and Dobbins are only ‘hiccups’? What’re you gonna do, Cherry? What are you gonna do?”
“I said I’ll do whatever it takes.” Cherry goes cold. I’ve heard that tone from an interview room a few times. When an animal masquerading as a man finds itself cornered and at the end of the line, sometimes they’ll turn like this. This situation just grew thorns. “Keep that in mind, Danny.”
“You’re talking about murder and that ain’t no hiccups—”
The scenery changes. The ride becomes rough. Sliding. Off road.
Danny: “What the fu—Where are you goin’?”
Cherry: “Short cut. Trust me.”
Danny: “Jesus, Cherry. I can’t believe Blimpie is following us. You are out of—”
Cherry: “Don’t forget that your half-brother knows about the ATMs. And the drugs. And everything.”
No response from Danny.
“What if that bull shows back up at Dobbins’ place and offers him immunity to testify that he set up the deal between us and the bitch?”
Danny: “No one said for sure the bull was a cop. He might just be muscle—”
“Pig or muscle; who cares? Either way, Dobbins and Blimpie will squeal. Both those lousy fucks. If the bull is a Three Mile High cop he’s going to be squeezing Blimpie. He probably already did. Put the fear of God in him about going to prison over this horseshit. Retards don’t last in the pen. Trust me.”
“For the last time, he ain’t retarded! He’s just stupid. Besides, I thought you were looking for the girl.”
Cherry: “Yeah, I was. And that piece of shit Dobbins told me she was shackin’ up with her daddy.”
Well, Mr. Dobbins. Funny that didn’t come up earlier.
Cherry some more: “But it don’t matter now ’cuz that muscle found us!”
Danny: “He said he represented who—”
Cherry: “And it’s bullshit, Danny! He’s a cop and he’s wired, tryin’ to get us to admit sellin’ dope! Somebody squealed!”
“I cannot believe you want me to consider...Blimpie. Blimpie, man. Fuck you.”
“Then you’re a bigger retard than that lardass brother of yours. I’m telling you.”
“I swear, Cherry, you listen to me. Now. You try and hurt Blimpie and I will take the whole thing to the cops myself! Got me? I’ll squeal and then you won’t have to blame my little brother—”
Cherry: “Fuck you then!”
“Fuck me? No, fuck you! I’m out!”
“You’re damn right you’re out, Danny. You and your fat retard brother both.” Cold.
Go time.
Gunshot. Just like that. Loud as cannon fire in this enclosed space. Danny slumps. Still breathing. Not flailing or moaning. Just taking his time to blink out.
I hear something pouring. Quick and consistent at first, then a drizzle. Then individual splashes. The carpet beneath him is red.
35
A blur.
The van yanks to a stuttering halt and banks off to the left. We hit something. Another car. Gunfire. Blimpie screaming; even through the two vehicles and all the glass and metal and the smell of gunfire and the shots resonating, I can hear Roscoe’s whipping boy in his death throes.
Cherry screaming to no one left alive: “I ain’t goin’ back to the fuckin’ pen on a third strike! I’ll play the game on my own! Fuck you guys!”
A screeching halt. Engine killed. I look around the bases of the seats. See his leg sticking through. I shoot it. There goes his entire knee.
Screams. He empties his weapon. Half in the ceiling; shock, surprise, agony. The other half back my direction; way too high. He doesn’t know what he’s shooting at. He’s just shooting.
I count fifteen empty clicks from the weapon. I hear the glove box fumble Then nothing. I stand up. Claim my prize.
36
Danny’s facial expression is that telltale mix of blank, relaxed and peaceful that only the dead wear.
Blimpie is slumped over his steering wheel, forehead resting on it. His brains painted along the inside driver’s window. A mess. Cherry has lost so much blood his skin as white as the innocence of a newborn.
We’re at least a half-mile off the road. This part of Three Mile High is desolate, near the foothills of the mountains. Bizarrely flat. No wandering cars or police will be moseying by unless they see the snow tracks running off the road back a ways. I figure I have a little time, which is more than Cherry does.
In my back pocket I keep a pair of good latex gloves. Slap them on.
I take a bottle of water rolling around the inside of the van and flip the cap off. Splash Cherry. Must be freezing.
“Uhhh—” is all he can manage.
“What is this girl’s name?”
Delirious. Pain-racked and mostly dead: “I just—I...”
I shake him. Think about splashing more water. “Her name. What did Dobbins say her name was?”
“Start with...a ‘B.’ No...‘D.’ As is...I can’t think now. My leg...”
“Dobbins said she was living with her father?”
“Yeah...”
“Did he say when?”
“Now...I guess...he—”
I wait. Nothing. Splash some more water. His eyes jut open. Shock of it. Frigid shock.
“What did Dobbins do?”
“He had an...address...”
“Hers?”
“Don’t- don’t know. It—she lived...Dobbins gave—”
“Gave it to you?”
His head nods yes. So Dobbins actually knows Ben Boothe’s address and sold Delilah out to Cherry. Cherry, the winner convicted of DV and whatever other felonies who is perfectly willing and able to kill his own friends.
“Where is the address now?”
Fading: “Dresser...right on top...”
He looks off in the distance. Smiles. I’m sure he sees the long line of his ancestors coming to greet him into their family in the afterlife. I’m sure right now they are beautiful and forgiving and just want him to be with them where it is safe and warm and far from knowing pain.
He can’t help me anymore. But thanks to this asshole I’m going to have to walk back to the road. I cover his mouth and nose with my glove. He doesn’t struggle. Off, go on your way, Cherry.
I wonder if his ancestors could see that.
37
Takes three hours total.
Cherry was digging in his glove box for a spare magazine. I found it. Siphon gas from the car tanks, soak the insides of the cars. The inferno sends smoke into a good wind which carries it towards the mountains and not the city. Gives me time to beat feet before EMS arrives.
The sun is high and still the world is frozen when I get to Dobbins’ house. He’s alone. In through the back door; he hasn’t done much about it from when I entered this morning.
There is he is, the accoutrement of a dirt bag surrounding him: pipe laying on the carpet, crumpled wrapper from a Twinkie, a skin mag dedicated to publishing amateur photos taken in poorly-lit basements with girls who might or might not be legally sound mind enough for consent.
Both thumbs slapping away on a joystick to a video game system. He looks up. He’s shirtless, has on sweat pants. The crotch darkens with urine.
“Hey, buddy,” I say. The controller falls from his hands. Limp now. “I thought you hadn’t seen Delilah Boothe for a while now.”
“Yeah—well, no—I just—see, this is the thing—”
“But you knew she was crashing with her dad, huh?”
“Now that was like last week, man. Who knows where she is—”
“How did you find this out?”
“I took her there,” he says. Small. Very small. His eyes turn red. Wet. “Look, mister, I—”
“Anything else you left out?”
“No. I swear. I—”
“Why’d she go to her dad’s?”
“I dunno but she’s there. She’s there. Please understand that whatever Danny and Cherry said—”
I say goodbye with six rounds from Cherry’s gun.
38
Cab picks me up four blocks over.
Drops me off a few blocks from Cherry’s house. I tear a twenty in half, drop one piece in the front seat and say, “Meet me here in half an hour.” He nods, pockets the piece where his boss won’t be checking.
I smoke, walk. Find it, go right up the front steps. I knock on the front door. No answer. I know where two out of the possible three occupants are.
A guy I know—and maybe he’s somebody I shouldn’t be seen with—sells me bump keys by the shitload. They’re a lock-picking device used to circumvent pin tumbler locks, which are generally inside cylinder locks. They work and they don’t damage the system. No one will know.
I slide a bump key into the front door lock; give it three solid taps with the butt of my .44 Magnum, turn. Open. Inside.
Cherry’s room: sparse furniture, messy in the way a hotel room is when the occupant is in town for a lot of business and not very organized. I go to the dresser.
Folded paper. Address written on it. The name “Delilah” scribbled across the top like a marquee banner spray-painted by a junkie. In my pocket.
I leave. Pick the cab back up four blocks away. I drop the other half along with another twenty and say, “For being timely.”
The cabbie nods, asks, “Where to?”
“Rail station.” Time to go back home.
On the ride home I find my eyelids heavy. The seat is too firm. My left suspender is too loose, and no matter how many times I tuck the tail of my shirt in it pulls out. My socks and pant cuffs are soaked through. My knees have wet spots on them. My ears buzz from the gunshots. Headache that’s moved down into my teeth.
My cell rings. Derne. I almost let it go to voice mail.
“Hello, Mr. Derne.”
“Hello, Mr. Buckner,” he says, almost numb.
“What can I do for you?”
“Find her fast, Mr. Buckner—”
“I assure you I’m working as quickly as possible with—”
“Life is like this, Mr. Buckner,” he says this, not like before. I despise being interrupted but I’ve spoken with enough folks who have something to say to know to let this play out.
“Losing my wife like this...with her cancer we both knew she’d be...well, called home I guess. The fire...I hope it was painless.”
I can hear the void in him. Inside him. As barren as the soul of a mother who has lost her child. That same void filled me with its vast emptiness the day I laid my own wife to rest. She and I weren’t married an iota of the length of time Derne and his wife were. I’m glad I lost her so soon so I don’t have to sound the way Derne does now. No one would take me seriously.
“In the hospital, the doctors did a lot of tests,” he says. “Blood tests revealed a problem with my liver. I forget the fancy doctor terms they used. All I paid attention to was terminal.”
I see now.
“Find Delilah fast, Mr. Buckner. Seems my clock is winding down.”
39
The next day, bright and early: Elam Derne calls.
Tells me if I want I may attend his wife’s funeral. I can’t. Pierce White has been found.
In pieces.
40
Pierce White’s current wife is nowhere to be found.
Janet Richley, the former Mrs. White, had the kids this week. Lucky for Pierce Jr., age seven, and Felicity, age five. They should have been with their father and the new Mrs. White but Ms. Richley had a family reunion out of town and worked out a deal where she could bring her children along.
