Captains Outrageous Read online

  John’s suggestion: a cruise.

  “A cruise?” Leonard said. “You mean, hang out with a bunch of rich old people who want to look at countries from a boat so they don’t have to deal with other cultures? Man, you know I saw somewhere one of those cruise lines is making their own island. You know, like Fantasy Island meets Love Boat. This way you don’t have to deal with those pesky locals. Don’t have to have a nigger rub up against you.”

  “They’re not all like that,” John said. “Most of them stop in different countries for a day or two. Thing is, it would be relaxing. And you could actually go some places you might not go, might not could afford to go to. These cruise lines, you can pay a thousand apiece, plus some expenses, and you get all your food and lodging provided. It comes out about like a good hotel with room service.”

  “Maybe just a month off around here is good enough,” I said. “It’ll save me money.”

  “Yeah,” Leonard said, “this place is swinging. Besides, I’ve spent enough money on you, now it’s time you spent some on me.”

  “Oh, that’s nice. That’s very friendly.”

  “It’s true.”

  “Didn’t I just give you a quarter for a soda the other night?”

  “Yeah, and I’m forever grateful.”

  “Look, I got some stuff here.” John, who was dressed in a sports coat, as usual, took a folder out of his inside pocket. “This isn’t one of the big cruise lines. In fact, the boat is an old Argentine Navy boat that’s been revamped for cruises. It’s not real expensive.”

  “Man, you been thinking about this cruise stuff yourself,” Leonard said.

  “For years, to be honest.”

  “Go with us,” I said.

  “Hey, I’m not fishing,” John said. “I couldn’t go if I wanted. No one’s giving me time off where I am. I spent that time already. I got to be around. But you could maybe go on the cruise and tell me about it. Turns out all right for you two, I might could take one. Me and Leonard might could take one. Something romantic.”

  “Leonard’s about as romantic as a hand job,” I said.

  “I’ll ignore that,” Leonard said. “So, John, we’re the cruise guinea pigs.”

  “Kinda,” John said.

  I eyeballed the brochure. I had never really considered, or even thought about a cruise, but now the idea was starting to appeal. “Maybe it’s too late to get on this one, it leaves, what? Two weeks?”

  “You could call them,” John said. “Their number is on the brochure.”

  I’m not exactly sure why I was convinced to do the cruise, maybe because it was so alien to me. The closest my family had ever come to a cruise was a rowboat down the Sabine River with fishing poles.

  At first I thought spending a few thousand dollars for such was foolish. That was a good chunk out of the hundred-thousand-dollar check, but the more I thought about it, the more I wanted it. I wanted to step outside my life and enter into another. I wanted to leave chickens and disappointment behind. It wasn’t like I was leaving anything of importance, even Brett was out of the picture. It might be nice to masturbate in an exotic location for a change.

  Growing up, my parents had continually put aside things like trips, vacations; only rarely went to movies and ate out at Dairy Queens to save money. Maybe they had to. But they had never had a hundred thousand dollars in their hand at one time. What would they have done?

  I knew what they would have done. They’d have thought first of me, second about survival, and last about a vacation. They’d have banked the money, kept working, and maybe driven over to Tyler to visit relatives. My dad might have gone fishing.

  I wanted to do different. I wanted a radical change.

  But I hesitated, and I knew why. Brett.

  Last week of work before my vacation started, on a blue Monday, early morning when I should have been sleeping off the night shift, I called Brett. If nothing had changed in her schedule, she’d be home from the night shift at the hospital.

  She answered the phone.

  “It’s been a while,” she said.

  “Yeah. I don’t know exactly what to say, but I miss you.”

  “I miss you too, Hap. It’s just … Well, I don’t know. My head’s all confused. It’s not like I’m seeing anyone else. It’s not like I really want to see anyone else. Life is just a mess.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I feel guilty too.”

  “How?”

  “After what you did for me. I thought things would be great, back to normal. They aren’t.”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s not you. I promise. I still feel for you, it’s just that what I feel is so buried in shit. So buried in all manner of stuff. Can you understand that?”

  “I think so. We did discuss those Kentucky Fried Chicken biscuits pretty good. I thought we had a moment there.”

  She laughed. “Oh, Hap. That’s what I miss most about you.”

  “My humor?”

  “The stupid shit you come up with.”

  “Oh, thanks.”

  A beat.

  “Don’t forget me,” she said.

  “I won’t.”

  “Let’s don’t say it’s over.”

  “Sure.”

  “Bye, Hap.”

  “Bye, Brett.”

  A couple minutes later, I called the cruise line. They had space. Me and Leonard would soon be on our way to Mexico, Jamaica, and the Caymans.

  Yeehah.

  Brett. Brett. Brett.

  6

  IT WAS A PRETTY INTERESTING WEEK. I paid off the little bit I owed on my worthless truck, had my stitches taken out, went by the hospital late morning to see if I could look in on Sarah Bond, and they let me. She had just been out of intensive care a couple of days, still in serious condition, able to see visitors, but not long.

  I slid in there and saw her sleeping. Her head was swollen, her face was dark blue, and her lips were puffed and cut and there were stitches all over and wire contraptions and tubes and such. Her hair was oily and pulled up and clipped. A portion had been shaved and in that spot was a red swelling in the shape of a boot heel. Her eye was patched over with a large gauze pad.

  It hurt me to see her.

  “Thanks for coming by.”

  I turned. It was Elmer Bond. He was entering the room, had a Styrofoam cup of coffee in his hand. He was wearing a charcoal gray suit this day, a colorful tie, a kind of off-color white shirt. He looked like what he was worth. Several million bucks.

  “Elmer,” I said. We shook hands.

  “She’s actually much better. They keep her pretty doped. The pain. Then she’s got to deal with the recovery, therapy, you name it. It could go on for a damn long time. Bless her heart. Her mother can’t even look at her. She goes into hysterics.”

  “I just wanted to drop by and see her, you know.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’ll be checking from time to time.”

  “I kind of wish she was awake,” Elmer said. “I think she’d like to see you. I’ll tell her you came by.”

  “Sure. Like I said, I’ll check back. Maybe when she’s out of the hospital. Now that I think about it, it’s best she doesn’t see me, anything to remind her of the other night might not be so good.”

  “She’d want to see you.”

  “Give her my best, will you?”

  “Sure. You enjoying your time off?”

  “Just starting. I’m going to pay off some bills and go on a cruise.”

  “Something you’ve always wanted to do?”

  “No, not really, but I got talked into it by a friend of a friend. I’m going to take Leonard with me.”

  “Have the best time possible. And Hap …”

  “Yeah.”

  “You ever need anything. Anything. Come to me. I’ll do the best I can.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Enjoy every penny.”

  “Sure.”

  I took a last look at Sarah and went out of there, on down
the elevator, out to my car, her shattered image in my head, tears in my eyes. In that moment I wished I had just gone on and shot and killed the cocksucker.

  * * *

  I drove over to Charlie Blank’s place. He was off that day and had invited me to lunch. Marvin Hanson was going to be there. Former lieutenant on the LaBorde police force. He had been in a terrible car accident, then a coma, and had finally come out of it. After months of rehabilitation, he was much better, but in a wheelchair. The only time I’d seen him since the accident was at his house, and he was comatose then. I regularly asked about him, kept up with him through his best friend, Charlie.

  After their separation, Charlie had let his wife have the house. He was living in a trailer on a couple of acres he was buying. It was a pretty nice area, actually. Out by the lake with some trees. When I drove over there it was a warm day and Charlie was sitting in a lawn chair by an outdoor grill and a picnic table. Hanson, looking very thin and pale for a black man, was sitting in the wheelchair. He was wearing a baseball cap that said ASTROS on it. When he saw me, he gave me a kind of sly grin.

  “You and Leonard burned anything down lately?”

  His voice was a little weak, and he talked out of the side of his mouth, as if his face and lips were too tired or lacked the muscles to form words.

  “No, haven’t had any matches,” I said, shaking his hand, which was surprisingly strong. “How’re you feeling?”

  “Like I drove my car into a goddamned tree, that’s how.”

  I sat down in a spare lawn chair. I could smell meat cooking on the grill.

  “What are we having?” I asked.

  “Steaks,” Charlie said.

  “Man, that’s uptown.”

  “Not where I bought this meat. I said we were having steaks, I didn’t say they were any good. I got a feeling this meat might have come off horses found dead at the pony rides.”

  “You’re looking pretty good,” I said to Hanson.

  “Liar,” Hanson said. “But had you seen me before, you’d know I really am.”

  “I did see you before, but you were, to put it politely, sleeping.”

  Hanson nodded. “It’s been hell. Good thing about it, me and my wife have reconciled and the feeling’s come back in my dick lately.”

  “Then your worries are over,” I said.

  “Not quite. I want to have sex, it’s an ordeal to get situated, and though I got the feeling back and the ol’ weenie has got some steel in it, I haven’t got any thrusting power. By the time me and Rachel get set, I’m worn out.”

  “He’s getting some tingling in his legs,” Charlie said, getting up to fork and turn the steaks. “That’s a good sign.”

  “That’s great,” I said.

  “I’m working with a physical therapist, and I’m studying martial arts. Shen Chuan and Combat Hapkido. There’s a guy here teaches both systems to the disabled. I’m a little too weak right now to learn much, but it’s helping me out. It’s building strength in my wrist and arms. My physical therapist recommended it.”

  “That’s good,” I said.

  “I won’t be going back to work at the cop shop, though.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m not. Not the least little bit. I wasn’t all that loved anyway.”

  “I hear that.”

  “And, Hap, I suggest you watch the kind of trouble you get in from now on,” Charlie said, “ ’cause I’m quitting myself. Turned in my notice. A month from now, I’m on my own.”

  “No shit?”

  “No shit.”

  “Me and Charlie are forming a business,” Hanson said. “Private Investigations. Charlie’s the legs, I’m the brains.”

  “Ho ho,” Charlie said.

  “Damn,” I said. “Real private eyes. Charlie, does this mean you’re gonna get sapped a lot and fall into dark tunnels and get laid all the time by strange blondes with long sleek gams?”

  “I can do without the sap part,” Charlie said, “but the rest of it sounds all right.”

  “You guys are serious?” I said.

  “Hanson and Blank, Private Investigations,” Hanson said. “Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?”

  “Blank and Hanson, Private Investigations,” Charlie said, “has a nicer ring to it. Don’t you think, Hap?”

  “You’re not getting me in on this.”

  “We’ll flip for the name,” Hanson said.

  “Not if you’re flipping the quarter,” Charlie said.

  “I think that’s great, guys. Really.”

  We ate the steaks, a salad, and some bread Charlie had warmed in the trailer oven. They drank beer and I drank ice tea.

  Charlie had been joking. It was good meat and well prepared, medium rare with a touch of salt and pepper. We ate, talked, and laughed a lot. When the meal was over Charlie went inside the trailer and made some coffee. Me and Hanson bullshitted a little. Charlie made a couple of trips out. First he brought coffee for Hanson and me. Then coffee for himself and a Tupperware container filled with Hostess Twinkies and cupcakes. “I damn near pulled my thumb out of joint trying to open this damn Tupperware lid.”

  “Childproof,” Hanson said.

  “Probably,” Charlie said. “You know, I shouldn’t eat this shit, but I got like a serious problem about it. I like it.”

  We ate Twinkies and cupcakes and even though Charlie had told Hanson about my adventure at the chicken plant, I told it again, then I told them about the cruise.

  Charlie said, “Well, finally, you and Leonard are off to do something where the worst trouble you can get into is cutting a fart in the dining room.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Ain’t it grand?”

  7

  JOHN HAD TO DRIVE us over to New Orleans to catch the ship. We got there a day early and took a hotel near Bourbon Street and walked along and watched people wander about. I had once been there during Mardi Gras, and the place was nuts. People everywhere, women exposing their breasts, yelling, floats, the whole nine yards. But this night was not a total waste. We did get to see some guys wearing makeup, hear some great jazz music over at Preservation Hall, and we ate some good crawfish at a place called Mike Anderson’s Seafood.

  On the way back to the hotel a drunk naked man took a leak against a wall and staggered into a bar and didn’t come out.

  “Do you think he just went in and ordered a drink?” Leonard asked.

  “I wouldn’t doubt it,” I said, “and I wouldn’t doubt they gave it to him. He’s probably in there sitting at a table sipping whiskey with one hand and playing with his ding-dong with the other.”

  “For an old Baptist boy,” John said, “this is just a little too close to Sodom and Gomorrah for me.”

  “Yeah, Hap,” Leonard said, “we better get John back to the hotel before he wakes up naked in an alley with a black leather whip handle up his ass.”

  We went to the hotel and took our rooms. Me in mine, John and Leonard together. Where we were staying was in the French Quarter, and because of that, we were paying more for location than convenience. The joint was clean and not nearly as primitive as my place, but then again, I was paying one third of my monthly rent for one night in this cracker box and down below I could hear drunks who seemed more than happy to collect like crows and sing show tunes beneath my window.

  I even went to the trouble to open my window and yell at them once. One of the drunks, wearing a gold lamé shirt and pants so tight his dick looked like a cucumber in Saran Wrap, looked up at me and said, “Oh, honey, lighten up.”

  He was right. I was tense. I also hated hearing those morons sing under my window. He and his crowd moved on, and across the street I saw a tired black prostitute trudging along in a red dress that started just below her navel. Her wig was slightly askew and her shoes looked designed to hurt her. She walked in a manner that didn’t invite business, but appeared more an invitation to a fist-fight. She clicked on down the street and out of sight.

  I watched TV for a while
and thought about Brett. The last thing I remember was seeing the first fifteen minutes of the remake of Cat People and wishing it was the original, and then it was morning.

  We met in the lobby, went over and had bignets and coffee at the Café du Monde, and took a short cruise on a riverboat that took us past the place where the tour guide told us Hard Times with Charles Bronson had been filmed.

  We arrived back at the dock early afternoon, had lunch at a hamburger joint, went back to the hotel, got our luggage and John drove us to the dock. When we saw our ship, the Sea Pleasure, sitting in the water against the dock, it was a little disappointing.

  “I was expecting something bigger,” Leonard said.

  “It’s big enough,” John said.

  “Well, it isn’t like on TV,” I said. “You know, like those commercials where everyone is dancing on board and fish are jumping and there’s a rainbow and stuff.”

  “It’s a smaller cruise line,” John said.

  “You mean cheaper,” Leonard said.

  “Does that mean we don’t get the dancing fish and the rainbow?” I asked.

  “We get a fish floating belly-up under a rain cloud is my guess,” Leonard said.

  “You guys are always such pessimists,” John said.

  “That’s because pessimistic things happen to us,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Leonard said. “Like our cruise boat is smaller than everyone else’s.”

  We were standing outside John’s car with the trunk open. A couple of guys in white steward suits and hats had come over to take our bags. Leonard and I didn’t want them to. Considering we only had one apiece, we figured we could handle it. They stomped off without our bags or the tips we might have given them.

  “They look disgruntled,” I said.

  “Long as they keep it to themselves,” Leonard said.

  Leonard reminded John how to care for his pet armadillo, Bob. Bob had been with Leonard for a year now, and the damn thing was like a dog. It stayed in the house during the day, holed up under the bed or on the tiles in the bathroom right by the toilet. By night Bob roamed the woods and rooted holes in Leonard’s yard. It came when Leonard called and would curl up in his lap. I always liked to remind Leonard armadillos were the only animal that could carry leprosy, other than man, but this had no impact on him. Leonard liked that big armored rat.