A Twist Of Noir 500 - Jimmy Callaway

FIVE HUNDRED - JIMMY CALLAWAY

Why bother trying to find the pool money in the house? Ray can just follow the winner to his car and hit him over the head. Yeah. Put the “easy” back into “easy money.”

First thing Ray was gonna do after that was break off fifty bucks, go get himself a nice piece of ass. Ray figures there’s gotta be at least five hundred bucks in this pool. Right? If everybody buys one car at a dollar a pop, hell, that’s at least five hundred. So get this guy laid first thing, then stash the rest.

Ray couldn’t give a good goddamn about stock car racing. When Larry invited him to this Indy 500 party, Ray didn’t hear a single word until: “Free beer.” And then he only agreed to go when Larry told him about this betting pool Larry’s neighbors did every year. Ray would rather flick lit matches at his own nuts than hang around Lakeside with a buncha mongoloids, watching cars drive in circles for hours on end. But throw in some free booze and a chance for some easy money his way, and you could slap a trucker hat on him and call him Joe Bob.

So Ray’s sitting around this dipstick’s living room, some guy named Brandon. Nice enough place. Big ol’ flat-screen. Barbecue wafting in from the backyard, tickling Ray’s nose. Wet bar in the corner.

Ray is surprised how much tail is running around. Maybe it’s the Coors Light talking, or maybe it’s just that he ain’t been laid in a while, but man. Who knew there’d be so many foxy broads at an Indy party? Ray hasn’t seen this many little cut-off shorts this side of a Daisy Duke look-alike contest.

And who’s this now? This blonde number, a big six-foot Amazon, been giving him the eye all afternoon. Well, all right. They do the thing for a bit: look, look away, look back, smile. Eventually, she comes over and sits on the arm of the couch next to him.

“Hey,” she says.

“Hey.”

“Good race.”

“Yeah?”

“You don’t care, do you?”

“Not even a little bit.”

She smiles. “Why you here, then?”

Ray shrugs. “Free beer.”

“That’s it?”

Ray shrugs.

“Well. If you’re bored, I can think of something to do.”

“Yeah?”

So after Ray’s done fucking her in the upstairs bathroom, he takes his seat back on the couch. The race ends, and the winner gets up there, some douche in a jumpsuit, and they give him a trophy, and he drinks some milk, of all things, and Ray just wants them to hurry up and announce the winner.

Thing of it is, Ray finds out, there’s only thirty-three cars, not five hundred. Shit. Ray’s guessing he shoulda done a little more research. The pot’s just about sixty bucks and change. Hardly worth getting off the couch for.

But the Amazon wins. Ray shrugs. So he got his fifty bucks worth anyways.

Fuck it.

Get this guy another Coors Light.

BIO: Jimmy Callaway lives and works in San Diego, CA. All the ladies can report to Attention Children.