Stories (2011) Read online

  I stopped and rolled down my window and waited. Outside, the rain had burned off and it was an unseasonably hot day, sticky as honey on the fingers.

  When they drove up beside my window, the three guys in the bed pointed their weapons at me. The driver was none other than one of the two men I recognized from before. Be Bop. His skin was so pale and thin, I could almost see the skull beneath it.

  “Well, now,” he said. “I know you.”

  I agreed he did. I smiled like me and him was best friends. I said, “I got some good news for Big O about Six-Finger Jack.”

  “Six-Finger Jack, huh,” Be Bop said. “Get out of the car.”

  I got out. Be Bop got out and frisked me. I had nothing sharp or anything full of bullets. He asked if there was anything in the car. I told him no. He had one of the men in the back of the pickup search it anyway. The man came back, said, “Ain’t got no gun, just a big jar of pickles.”

  “Pickles,” Be Bop said. “You a man loves pickles?”

  “Not exactly,” I said.

  “Follow us on up,” Be Bop said.

  We drove up to the trio of double-wides. There had been some work done since I was last here, and there was a frame of boards laid out for a foundation, and over to the side there was a big hole that looked as if it was gonna be a swimming pool.

  I got out of the car and leaned on it and looked things over. Be Bop and his men got out of the truck. Be Bop came over.

  “He buildin’ a house on that foundation?” I asked.

  “Naw, he’s gonna put an extension on one of the trailers. I think he’s gonna put in a poolroom and maybe some gamin’ stuff. Swimmin’ pool over there. Come on.”

  I got my jar of pickles out of the backseat, and Be Bop said, “Now wait a minute. Your pickles got to go with you?”

  I sat the jar down and screwed off the lid and stepped back. Be Bop looked inside. When he lifted his head, he said, “Well, now.”

  Next thing I know I’m in the big trailer, the one that’s got nothing but the couch, some chairs, and stands for drinks, a TV set about the size of a downtown theater. It’s on, and there’s sports going. I glance at it and see it’s an old basketball game that was played a year back, but they’re watching it, Big O and a few of his boys, including Lou Boo, the black guy I’ve seen before. This time, there aren’t any women there.

  Be Bop came inside with me, but the rest of the pickup posse didn’t. They were still protecting the perimeter. It seemed silly, but truth was, there was lots of people wanted to kill Big O.

  No one said a thing to me for a full five minutes. They were waiting for a big score in the game, something they had seen before. When the shot came they all cheered. I thought only Big O sounded sincere.

  I didn’t look at the game. I couldn’t take my eyes off Big O. He wasn’t wearing his cowboy hat. His head only had a few hairs left on it, like worms working their way over the face of the moon. His skin was white and lumpy like cold oatmeal. He was wearing a brown pair of stretch overalls. When the fat moved, the material moved with him, which was a good idea, ’cause it looked as if Big O had packed on about a hundred extra pounds since I saw him last.

  He was sitting in a motorized scooter, had his tree-trunk legs stretched out in front of him on a leg lift. His stomach flowed up and fell forward and over his sides, like 400 pounds of bagged mercury. I could hear him wheezing across the room. His right foot was missing. There was a nub there, and his stretch pants had been sewn up at the end. On the stand, near his right elbow, was a tall bottle of malt liquor and a greasy box of fried chicken.

  His men sat on the couch to his left. The couch was unusually long, and there were six men on it, like pigeons in a row. They all had guns in shoulder holsters. The scene made Big O look like a whale on vacation with a harem of male sucker fish to attend him.

  Big O spoke to me, and his voice sounded small coming from that big body. “Been a long time since I seen you last.”

  I nodded.

  “I had a foot then.”

  I nodded again.

  “The diabetes. Had to cut it off. Dr. Jacobs says I need more exercise, but, hey, glandular problems, so what you gonna do? Packs the weight on. But still, I got to go there ever’ Thursday mornin’. Next time, he might tell me the other foot’s gotta go. But you know, that’s not so bad. This chair, it can really get you around. Motorized, you know.”

  Be Bop, who was still by me, said, “He’s got somethin’ for you, Big O.”

  “Chucky,” Big O said, “cut off the game.”

  Chucky was one of the men on the couch, a white guy. He got up and found a remote control and cut off the game. He took it with him back to the couch, sat down.

  “Come on up,” Big O said.

  I carried my jar of pickles up there, got a whiff of him that made my memory of Jack’s stink seem mild. Big O smelled like dried urine, sweat, and death. I had to fight my gag reflex.

  I sat the jar down and twisted off the lid and reached inside the blood-stained pickle juice and brought out Jack’s dripping hand. Big O said, “Give me that.”

  I gave it to him. He turned it around and around in front of him. Pickle juice dripped off of the hand and into his lap. He started to laugh. His fat vibrated, and then he coughed. “That there is somethin’.”

  He held the hand up above his head. Well, he lifted it to about shoulder height. Probably the most he had moved in a while. He said, “Boys, do you see this? Do you see the humanity in this?”

  I thought: Humanity?

  “This hand tried to take my money and stuck its finger up my old lady’s ass … Maybe all six. Look at it now.”

  His boys all laughed. It was like the best goddamn joke ever told, way they yucked it up.

  “Well, now,” Big O said, “that motherfucker won’t be touchin’ nothin’, won’t be handlin’ nobody’s money, not even his own, and we got this dude to thank.”

  Way Big O looked at me then made me a little choked up. I thought there might even be a tear in his eye. “Oh,” he said, “I loved that woman. God, I did. But I had to cut her loose. She hadn’t fucked around, me and her might have gotten married, and all this,” he waved Jack’s hand around, “would have been hers to share. But no. She couldn’t keep her pants on. It’s a sad situation. And though I can’t bring her back, this here hand, it gives me some kind of happiness. I want you to know that.”

  “I’m glad I could have been of assistance,” I said.

  “That’s good. That’s good. Put this back in the pickle jar, will you?”

  I took the hand and dropped it in the jar.

  Big O looked at me, and I looked at him. After a long moment, he said, “Well, thanks.”

  I said, “You’re welcome.”

  We kept looking at one another. I cleared my throat. Big O shifted a little in his chair. Not much, but a little.

  “Seems to me,” I said, “there was a bounty on Jack. Some money.”

  “Oh,” Big O said. “That’s right, there was.”

  “He was quite a problem.”

  “Was he now … Yeah, well, I can see the knot on your head. You ought to buy that thing its own cap. Somethin’ nice.”

  Everyone on the couch laughed. I laughed too. I said, “Yeah, it’s big. And if I had some money, like say, $100,000, I’d maybe put out ten or twenty for a nice designer cap.”

  I was smiling, waiting for my laugh, but nothing came. I glaced at Be Bop. He was looking off like maybe he heard his mother calling somewhere in the distance.

  Big O said, “Now that Jack’s dead, I got to tell you, I’ve sort of lost the fever.”

  “Lost the fever?” I said.

  “He was alive, I was all worked up. Now that he’s dead, I got to consider, is he really worth $100,000?”

  “Wait a minute, that was the deal. That’s the deal you spread all over.”

  “I’ve heard those rumors,” Big O said.

  “Rumors?”

  “Oh, you can’t believe eve
rything you hear. You just can’t.”

  I stood there stunned.

  Big O said, “But I want you to know, I’m grateful. You want a Coke, a beer before you go?”

  “No. I want the goddamn money you promised.”

  That had come out of my mouth like vomit. It surprised even me.

  Everyone in the room was silent.

  Big O breathed heavy, said, “Here’s the deal, friend. You take your jar of pickles, and Jack’s six fingers, and you carry them away. ’Cause if you don’t, if you want to keep askin’ me for money I don’t want to pay, your head is gonna be in that jar, but not before I have it shoved up your ass. You savvy?’

  It took me a moment, but I said, “Yeah. I savvy.”

  Lying in bed with Loodie, not being able to do the deed, I said, “I’m gonna get that fat son of a bitch. He promised me money. I fought Jack with a piece of firewood and a hatchet. I fell off a roof. I slept in my car in the cold. I was nearly killed.”

  “That sucks,” Loodie said.

  “Sucks? You got snookered too. You was gonna get fifty thousand, now you’re gonna get dick.”

  “Actually, tonight I’m not even gettin’ that.”

  “Sorry, baby. I’m just so mad … Ever’ Thursday mornin’, Big O, he goes to an appointment at Dr. Jacobs’. I can get him there.”

  “He has his men, you know.”

  “Yeah. But when he goes in the office, maybe he don’t. And maybe I check it out this Thursday, find out when he goes in, and next Thursday I maybe go inside and wait on him.”

  “How would you do that?”

  “I’m thinkin’ on it, baby.”

  “I don’t think it’s such a good idea.”

  “You lost fifty grand, and so did I, so blowin’ a hole in his head is as close as we’ll get to satisfaction.”

  So Thursday morning I’m going in the garage, to go and check things out, and when I get in the car, before I can open up the garage and back out, a head raises up in the backseat, and a gun barrel, like a wet kiss, pushes against the side of my neck.

  I can see him in the mirror. It’s Lou Boo. He says: “You got to go where I tell you, else I shoot a hole in you.”

  I said, “Loodie.”

  “Yeah, she come to us right away.”

  “Come on, man. I was just mad. I wasn’t gonna do nothin’.”

  “So here it is Thursday mornin’, and now you’re tellin’ me you wasn’t goin’ nowhere.”

  “I was gonna go out and get some breakfast. Really.”

  “Don’t believe you.”

  “Shit,” I said.

  “Yeah, shit,” Lou Boo said.

  “How’d you get in here without me knowin’?”

  “I’m like a fuckin’ ninja … And the door slides up, you pull it from the bottom.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, really.”

  “Come on, Lou Boo, give a brother a break. You know how it is.”

  Lou Boo laughed a little. “Ah, man. Don’t play the brother card. I’m what you might call one of them social progressives. I don’t see color, even if it’s the same as mine. Let’s go, my man.”

  It was high morning and cool when we arrived. I drove my car right up to where the pool was dug out, way Lou Boo told me. There was a cement-mixer truck parked nearby for the pool. We stopped, and Lou Boo told me to leave it in neutral. I did. I got out and walked with him to where Big O was sitting in his motorized scooter with Loodie on his lap. His boys were all around him.

  Be Bop pointed his finger at me and dropped his thumb. “My man,” he said.

  When I was standing in front of Big O, he said, “Now, I want you to understand, you wouldn’t be here had you not decided to kill me. I can’t have that, now can I?”

  I didn’t say anything.

  I looked at Loodie, she shrugged.

  “I figured you owed me money,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Big O said. “I know. You see, Loodie, she comes and tells me she’s gonna make a deal with you to kill Jack and make you think you made a deal with her. That way, the deal I made was with her, not you. You followin’ me on this, swivel dick? Then, you come up with this idea to kill me at the doctor’s office. Loodie, she came right to me.”

  “So,” I said, “you’re gettin’ Loodie out of the deal, and she’s gettin’ a hundred thousand.”

  “That sounds about right, yeah,” Big O said.

  I thought about that. Her straddling that fat bastard on his scooter. I shook my head, glared at her, said, “Damn, girl.”

  She didn’t look right at me.

  Big O said, “Loodie, you go on in the house there and amuse yourself. Get a beer or somethin’. Watch a little TV. Do your nails. Whatever.” Loodie started walking toward the trailers. When she was inside, Big O said, “Hell, boy. I know how she is, and I know what she is. It’s gonna be white gravy on sweet chocolate bread for me. And when I get tired of it, she gonna find a hole out here next to you. I got me all kind of room here. I ain’t usin’ the lake-boat stalls no more. That’s risky. Here is good. Though I’m gonna have to dig another spot for a pool, but that’s how it is. Ain’t no big thing, really.”

  “She used me,” I said. “She’s the one led me to this.”

  “No doubt, boy. But you got to understand. She come to me and made the deal before you did anything. I got to honor that.”

  “I could just go on,” I said. “I could forget all about it. I was just mad. I wouldn’t never bother you. Hell, I can move. I can go out of state.”

  “I know that,” he said. “But I got this rule, and it’s simple. You threaten to kill me, I got to have you taken care of. Ain’t that my rule, boys?”

  There was a lot of agreement.

  Lou Boo was last. He said, “Yep, that’s the way you do it, boss.”

  Big O said, “Lou Boo, put him in the car, will you?”

  Lou Boo put the gun to back of my head, said, “Get on your knees.”

  “Fuck you,” I answered, but he hit me hard behind the head. Next thing I know I’m on my knees, and he’s got my hands behind my back and has fastened a plastic tie over my wrists.

  “Get in the car,” Lou Boo said.

  I fought him all the way, but Be Bop came out and kicked me in the nuts a couple of times, hard enough I threw up, and then they dragged me to the car and shoved me inside behind the wheel and rolled down the windows and closed the door.

  Then they went behind the car and pushed. The car wobbled, then fell, straight down, hit so hard the air bag blew out and knocked the shit out of me. I couldn’t move with it the way it was, my hands bound behind my back, the car on its nose, its back wheels against the side of the hole. It looked like I was trying to drive to hell. I was stunned and bleeding. The bag had knocked a tooth out. I heard the sound of a motor above me, a little motor. The scooter.

  I could hear Big O up there. “If you hear me, want you to know I’m having one of the boys bring the cement truck around. We’re gonna fill this hole with cement, and put, I don’t know, a tennis court or somethin’ on top of it. But the thing I want you to know is this is what happens when someone fucks with Big O.”

  “You stink,” I said. “And you’re fat. And you’re ugly.”

  He couldn’t hear me. I was mostly talking into the air bag.

  I heard the scooter go away, followed by the sound of a truck and a beeping as it backed up. Next I heard the churning of the cement in the big mixer that was on the back of it. Then the cement slid down and pounded on the roof and started to slide over the windshield. I closed my eyes and held my breath, and then I felt the cold, wet cement touch my elbow as it came through the open window. I thought about some way out, but there was nothing there, and I knew that within moments there wouldn’t be anything left for me to think about at all.

  BILLIE SUE

  About a week before the house next door sold to the young couple, Billie Sue and I broke up. It was painful and my choice. Some stupid argument we’d had, but
I tried to tell myself I had made the right decision.

  And in the light of day it seemed I had. But come night when the darkness set in and the king size bed was like a great raft on which I floated, I missed Billie Sue. I missed her being next to me, holding her. The comfort she had afforded me had been greater than I imagined, and now that she was gone, I felt empty, as if I had been drained from head to toe and that my body was a husk and nothing more.

  But the kids next door changed that. For a time.

  I was off for the summer. I teach math during the high school term, and since Billie Sue and I had broken up, I had begun to wish that I had signed on to teach summer school. It would have been some kind of diversion. Something to fill my days with besides thinking of Billie Sue.

  About the second day the kids moved in, the boy was out mowing their yard, and I watched him from the window for a while, then made up some lemonade and took it out on the patio and went over and stood by where he was mowing.

  He stopped and killed the engine and smiled at me. He was a nice looking kid, if a little bony. He had very blond hair and was shirtless and was just starting to get hair on his chest. It looked like down, and the thought of that made me feel ill at ease, because, bizarrely enough, the down-like hair made me think of Billie Sue, how soft she was, and that in turn made me think of the empty house and the empty bed and the nights that went on and on.

  "Hey," the boy said. "You’re our neighbor?"

  "That’s right. Kevin Pierce."

  "Jim Howel. Glad to meet you." We shook hands. I judged him to be about twenty. Half my age.

  "Come on and meet my wife," he said. "You married?"

  "No," I said, but I felt strange saying it. It wasn’t that Billie Sue and I were married, but it had seemed like it. The way I felt about her, a marriage license wasn’t necessary. But now she was gone, and the fact that we had never officially been hitched meant nothing.