A Twist Of Noir 196 - Andy Henion

LOOKING FOR MARIA - ANDY HENION

Originally published in December 2007 in the Australian print magazine Skive


The man comes to the house looking for Maria. He’s tall and broad shouldered and eating a package of French fries. I tell him Maria’s not around. He appraises my silk bathrobe and looks beyond me into the living room.

You the new guy? he says. This your place?

Come on in, I tell him. No big deal.

I silence the newscaster who’s blathering about the latest rash of home-invasions and take a seat on the couch. The man walks around the house eating his French fries. I hear him rummaging in the bathroom vanity, opening dresser drawers. When he returns his pockets are bulging with pill bottles. He wads up the French fry package and tosses it to the floor.

This is just a start, he says, patting the pill bottles. What Maria owes won’t fit in my pocket.

The man comes over to the couch and jabs a finger at me. It’s shiny with fry grease and shaking slightly, like the rest of him. His other hand pulls back a shirttail to reveal a black handgun.

You’re on the hook, little man. Maria’s debt is your debt.

Fair enough, I say, and very slowly reach into my bathrobe pocket and pull out a bag. I pat the couch and urge the man to sit down and partake, but he remains standing while I make the preparations. I ignite the finished product and offer it up. He motions for me to smoke first, and I do. Eventually he takes it and sucks liberally and after a few moments seems to relax. He sits down on the opposite end of the couch and looks again at the bathrobe, which is open to the waist, exposing a hairless torso. It’s a rose-patterned garment, but familiar and comfy on my slight frame.

The fuck are you, Helen Hefner?

Hah, I say. Same size as the old lady, believe it or not.

The man frowns. That Maria’s?

Our girl, I say. She loves those roses.

He nods and smokes deeply, keeping it for himself. Five minutes later, when the blunt is nearly gone, he puts his head back on the couch and closes his eyes. The shaking has stopped. His hand eases away from the gun.

I tend to fill silence with chatter, a nervous habit. I say, You hear about this maniac on the news? I tell you, I was a bit freaked when you first showed up. The way he goes from house to house? They say he ties people up, takes a knife to them and then makes himself at home while they bleed out.

The man doesn’t seem to hear me, or worse, care that a killer is terrorizing our citizenry in the privacy of their own homes. He smokes the last of the blunt and then, in a sing-song voice, says, Marr-ee-yaa ... Marr-ee-yaa. Doan do me lack dat.

What did she do, exactly?

The man snorts and sits coma-like for a good while. Finally he opens his eyes with considerable effort, pupils blooming. A sheen of seat covers his forehead and his jaws seem a bit loose. When he speaks, it’s jabberwocky.

Shtook id, jif. Leffy dowd.

Huh, I say, sliding down the couch so we’re thigh-to-thigh. I retrieve the file from my bathrobe pocket and work a cuticle, another nervous habit, as I watch his face shift and contort. At once, his chin bounces off his chest and an orange stew splatters onto his lap.

Damn, I say, wiping my bare arm on his shirt. Too much of a bad thing, fella.

He’s hunched over and unmoving, a line of rust-colored saliva hanging from his lip. I reach out and hold my palm in front of his mouth, letting it hover, feeling his wet shallow breaths, before moving it around to the earlobe. Thumb and forefinger close on the hanging flesh and remain there, caressing. Slowly, gently, caressing.

The man paws feebly for the gun and begins to weep. I move my lips to his ear and in hushed tones describe the concoction of chemicals flowing through his bloodstream and offer a snapshot of his immediate future.

Maa, he manages... Maa-ree-ah...

Who’s Maria? I whisper.

BIO: Andy's short fiction appears in Plots With Guns, Thieves Jargon, Pindeldyboz, Hobart and other publications. He lives in Michigan.

Interlude

Just got done reading three stories from the latest issue of THUGLIT.

Jimmy Callaway tells you about YOUR OWN SATURDAY NIGHT. His narrator is one slick son of a bitch. The angle he thinks up, seemingly off the top of his head? Fucking brilliant.

The story's got 7-11s, cartoons, Burger King and fucking Choose Your Own Adventure books (I loved those things as a kid!) in it so what's not to love? Oh, yeah, and Fosters, Australian for bee-uh!

Meanwhile, Mike MacLean hands over a LITTLE GUN. 12 years old and this kid is a better shot than most men twice his age. In fact, his partner, his mom's ex-boyfriend, Ray, lets the kid do all the work while he disposes of all the evidence afterwards.

No one would expect a kid, right?

But there's a trade-off, of course. Kid's more socially awkward than the class nerd.

Them's the breaks, though, right?

Finally, Matthew Quinn Martin talks about CHICKENS. Not those chickens, let me assure you. No, he's talking about the human variety, those that don't stand up for themselves, letting themselves get pushed around.

I wrote Matthew earlier today and told him that his narrator was "ruthless and worthless". Trust me on this one.

And the ending is so right. This is a beautifully dark tale.

Check all of these puppies out. You won't be disappointed.

A Twist Of Noir 195 - Michael Kechula

THE COUGH-UP GUY - MICHAEL KECHULA

Originally published in the April 24, 2008 issue of Thieves Jargon

I remember when he ran into our apartment without knocking. Had a gun. Held his index finger to his lips. Rosa and me were smart enough to point to a closet. And even smarter to keep our mouths shut.

Cops’ whistles blew. Sirens screamed everywhere. Then cops started knocking on doors down the hall.

Right before they got to ours, I pinched the baby. He screamed bloody murder. Rosa’s eyes called me a bastard. But she was a street-smart woman from Palermo. Even she pinched tiny Salvatore’s rump to make him scream louder, right before the knock came.

Between the baby, Rosa raving in double-time Sicilian, and me yelling back at the top of my lungs about her rotten Sidgie family, the dumb Irish cop saw it was useless to ask me anything. He tried. But who could hear him? He turned on his heels to escape the insanity.

Rosa slipped a salami sandwich to our guest. I gave him a jug of Dago Red and a pee bottle. Figured it might be hours until the cops realized it was hopeless.

“Joseph Gogostanza never forgets a favor,” he said, handing me a twenty. In ’45 that fed a family of three for over a month. “You’re a smart man. What’s your name?”

“Snuffy,” I said. Then I started hacking. Spit blood into a handkerchief.

“Looks bad,” he said. Handing me another three dollars, he added, “Go see Doctor Ferrante.”

Then he left.

The doctor said it was TB. He wanted to send me to a special hospital an hour’s drive from Philly. Yeah, sure. Go there for a couple years to recover. What about Rosa and the baby?

Gogostanza musta heard. Some guys came by and took me to see him.

“Hospital for two years? Well, you go there. Right away. You gotta get better for that beautiful wife and kid of yours. Hey, family comes first. Don’t you worry about nothing. Joey Gogo’s gonna take care of you.”

And he did. Paid for everything. Even gave Rosa a wad of cash to live on, every month.

Even when I was released, it was a year before I felt good enough to walk down the block for cannoli. But Gogo’s money still showed up every month.

*

“Hey, Joey. Cough-Up’s here.”

“Don’t mind him, Snuffy. That’s what they call you around here. You know, from when you useta cough up blood.”

“It’s OK. I like it better than Snuffy,” I said.

“They know what you done for me. When the cops coulda caught me. When they didn’t know it was me who shot that two-bit hood from Baltimore. All they knew was that a shooter was on the run. If they’d of found me that day in your place, I woulda been fried in the electric chair by now. Anyway, to show my appreciation, I got a good paying job for you.”

The job was to go around the city and collect protection money. Easy work. Nobody’d touch a little guy like me. If they did, Joey Gogo would blow up their business, or maybe their house.

The guys we squeezed every week called me Cough-Up, too. But for a different reason. When I walked in, they coughed up cash.

One Friday, when I went into Pasquale DiNicola’s pharmacy, the money wasn’t ready. Neither was the free, double-decker tuna sandwich and chocolate milk he used to have ready for me at the soda fountain counter.

“Hey, Patsy. Whadda ya nuts? Where’s the dough? And my sandwich?”

“Ain’t paying today, or ever again.”

“Cripes, Patsy. You better see a head doctor. You know what Joey Gogo will do?”

“He ain’t gonna do anything.”

“Oh, yeah sure. And the Pope ain’t Italian, either.”

“Joey’s dead,” Patsy said. “Heard it on the radio. Now get the hell out of here. If you come back again, it better be with a prescription.”

I’ll never forget that day in 1949. The radio said Joey Gogo got blasted while getting a haircut. Over on the other side of town. Somebody threw a hand grenade into the barbershop. Nasty mess. Even the State offered $100,000 reward for information. Far as I know, the money’s still sitting there.

Suddenly, I was out of a job. While waiting to hear from the new capo, I made a few bucks fixing tickets for neighborhood jerks. Sold beer, Benzedrine tablets, and hot books to high school kids. Hawked hotdogs and cokes at the ballpark.

When the smoke cleared, the new guys offered a job to Dumbo, a mathematical genius. Dumbo’s brain stored detailed records for two decades worth of illegal transactions. Pick any day, and he could rattle off every damn thing bought, sold, won, lost, paid, stolen. No books, no evidence.

Guys like him never go hungry.

They also hired Madman Mancuso. He was twice the size of Frankenstein and a hundred times meaner.

Guys like him never go hungry, either.

But me? Nothing. They said they already had a collector. A leg breaker. I didn’t have muscles enough to break a kid’s little finger, they said. Nor the guts.

“Tell your boss he has a short memory,” I said.

“He got a long memory, so you better keep your freakin’ mouth shut. Take what you get and light candles in thanksgiving.”

They sent small checks every month.

I don’t know why I started to cough up blood again. Maybe it was from the sleazy gossip the old guys whispered in my ear while we played bocce ball. Maybe it was from tossing a grenade into the barbershop when Joey was there. Maybe it was from slitting Rosa’s throat while she slept the day he was blown to smithereens.

Rosa had slipped hard salami to Joey Gogo with bread. In return, he slipped Rosa his hard salami without bread. Every damn day for the two years I was hospitalized.

BIO: Michael A. Kechula is a retired tech writer. His fiction has won first place in 8 contests and placed in 7 others. He’s also won Editor’s Choice awards 4 times. His stories have been published by 116 magazines and 32 anthologies in Australia, Canada, England, India, Scotland, and US. He’s authored two books of flash and micro-fiction stories: “A Full Deck of Zombies--61 Speculative Fiction Tales” and “The Area 51 Option and 70 More Speculative Fiction Tales.” eBook versions available at www.BooksForABuck.com and www.fictionwise.com. Paperback available at www.amazon.com.

A Twist Of Noir 194 - Brian G. Ross

MY WIFE GLOWS IN THE DARK - BRIAN G. ROSS

Originally published in Futures Mystery Anthology Magazine

My wife is following me.

Again.

Lately, I have been distant: hands-off when she wants me to be hands-on, too busy or too tired when she wants to talk. She has suspicious blood, my wife, but she trips over her reckless curiosity. She does the math, comes up with five, and paints herself a pretty picture. Next thing I know, I’m watching my back because she’s on it.

She never stops to ask why.

So we play the game.

She asks me how my racquet-ball practice was and I say, great thanks. I rub my shoulder convincingly as she tells me about her evening of dishes and dirty nappies. Her story is as transparent as mine, but I’m working a lie so I don’t question hers.

She is a poor detective - more Clouseau than Poirot. She thinks I don’t see her - behind cars, in doorways, around corners - but I do. I see everything. She doesn’t move when my eyes try to find her, but she is there just the same, not realising that I have her chasing her own tail.

I’m happy to indulge her, to pretend I don’t notice my new shadow, because she will only ever see what I want her to. And besides, after tonight, she won’t do it again.

*

“It’s work, honey,” I tell her, already shrugging my jacket on. “I’m sorry. I have to go.”

I’m a doctor, so leaving the house at eleven-thirty on a Thursday night isn’t such a stretch. I have made midnight trips before: I have saved lives at this hour several times. This one though is different. Make up a patient, give him a name, a tumour, two months to live. Shake and stir.

I cross the street and make as if I’m checking for traffic, but there are no cars at this time of night, and it’s really her I’m looking for. She’s still there, hands frightened by her sides, pretending to be interested in the sides of beef Joe has in his butcher’s window.

My wife, the vegetarian. She can’t fool me.

The town is black, but the truth cannot be masked by flicking a switch and killing the light.

I turn up my collar and sink deeper into the gloom.

I pass a guy on the street, his hands shoved deep into his pockets like he is digging for answers. His eyes meet mine as our shadows merge under a street-lamp, and he quickly looks back at his guilty feet, as they take him towards the wrong bed.

I turn the corner and there’s the building I’m looking for. Five storeys. There are a few yellow eyes in the wall of concrete and black glass: dozens of numbers on the silver panel by the door. I press forty-two, and say:

“Sorry to bother you so late, but I’ve locked myself out. Can you let me in please? It’s seventeen. Thanks, man.”

He doesn’t say a word. There is a buzz, the lock springs, and I push inside. The door falls closed on my tail.

The outside chill is replaced by artificial warmth. The heating system tick-ticks within the walls of the building like a telltale heart.

I climb the stairs, passing seventeen, and throw a look over my shoulder.

Nothing.

She has learned fast, but not fast enough.

Out of sight, and soon to be out of her mind, I think, almost loud enough to hear outside my own head.

When I reach the third floor, Number Forty-Two is standing in his doorway. Bare feet, wild hair, black pants. His middle-of-the-night curiosity is a dangerous thing, although at this moment he doesn’t realise it. I don’t mind. It saves me knocking or breaking in.

Less noise, more haste.

I walk up to him and say: “I believe you know my wife.”

It’s not a question but he seems to think it is. I can see him wondering who the hell I am and why the hell I’m here. He looks at me strangely - because comprehension is asleep at midnight - then tries to say something, but I am not interested in any of his excuses.

I pull a gun from my inside pocket and shoot him three times in the chest.

Phfft.

Phfft.

Phfft.

Silencers are wonderful. It’s like plugging a pillow.

Forty-Two falls back and hits the carpet, dead before he does. I’m a doctor. These things I know.

I put the gun back into my jacket and make my way downstairs.

My wife is standing in the foyer with her mouth open, looking at me the way people do when they don’t know what to say.

I smile and brush past her into the night.

You see, a cheat is easy to see, and a betrayal of the heart shines like a beacon.

My wife glows.

But not anymore.

BIO: Brian is thirty-three and lives in Scotland. He has over eighty publications to his name - from humour (Defenestration) to horror (Nossa Morte), mystery (Futures Mystery Anthology Magazine) to mainstream (Southern Ocean Review). He appears in the first three volumes of paperback horror anthology, Read By Dawn, available from Bloody Books, and is currently at work on his first novel. He is married, both to his wife and his words, and runs a blog of his literary wanderings at Purveyor Of Imagination.

A Twist Of Noir 193 - Des Nnochiri

DUSTED FOR PRINTS - DES NNOCHIRI

The office was spotless. Polished bookshelves, neatly stacked. Plush furniture. Even the knick-knacks on the desktop looked to have been placed there by design.

Only the upturned swivel chair behind the desk gave any clue that something was amiss. That and the circular depression in the wall behind. Oh, and the poor slob sprawled feet up on the fallen chair. The guy with the bloody hole in his forehead.

He didn't look too neat, at all.

Vitale and Garber, wearing surgical gloves, poked around the office as the Forensics guy (it was Clapton, this time) fussed around the body - plotting trajectories, doing scrapings. He was taking forever with it.

"Hey, Matty," said Vitale. "What do you say? D' you think he's dead?"

"It's Matthew," replied Clapton. And that was all he said; he'd dealt with Vitale before.

"So," Vitale was addressing his partner, now. "What's it look like to you?"

Garber frowned. "I'm not sure..."

He prodded the desktop for a moment. Nestled - neatly - behind a drinking bird paperweight was the victim's cell phone. A sleek little model that Garber wouldn't mind having himself. He found the key combination for last number redial and hit it.

A whiny, nasal voice on the other end. "Arnold Gleissner, paparazzo. Hello? Hello?"

Garber cut the connection. Mouthing the word, "Paparazzo?", he turned toward Clapton, who was approaching with a scrap of paper in a clear plastic evidence bag.

"Pried this out of the victim's hand," Clapton said.

He handed the bag to the detectives.

"I had to smooth it out a little. Well, a lot, actually--"

Garber, not really listening, held it up to the light. And grinned.

"Paparazzo," he said, handing the bag to Vitale, who studied the paper. It was a fragment from a glossy photograph, showing--

"Hey!" Vitale said, "Isn't that--?"

He was interrupted by Clapton. "You guys can go ahead. I've dusted for prints already."

A harsh laugh from Vitale. "Yeah. That's what this guy was, looks like."

He pointed toward the corpse.

"Dusted. For prints."

Garber nodded. "Yes, indeed."

BIO: Desmond (Des) Nnochiri spent his early years traveling with his parents, and was educated in England, the USA, and the Republic of Ireland (Eire). He writes freelance now, and has taken his first steps into the world of screenwriting. He has contributed stories to A Twist of Noir, The Flash Fiction Offensive, and Powder Burn Flash. He has just started blogging, at Des Nnochiri's Write to Speak.

A Twist Of Noir 192 - Robert Crisman

TWO PHONE CALLS - ROBERT CRISMAN

In some jobs, pink-slipped means dead.

The heist blew up in their faces. They got out of the place and they got what they came for, but they also left three people dead, one an old lady outside the place when the whole thing exploded, and now the town was on fire.

Eddie dropped Dennis off at his house. No warm goodbyes or see you tomorrows. Dennis was cold and remote as a rock on the moon.

Dennis went in the alley in back of his place and ditched the gun in some bushes. He went into the house, and straight to the phone by the livingroom couch. He was thinking about Eddie. Times before, when things had fucked up and Eddie’d looked ready to jump, Dennis had always been able to reel him back in. This time, though, he’d caught Eddie’s eyes. Not good.

He felt a chill, too. He’d lost it back at that house. He’d never lost it before. And now—what? He couldn’t get at it. Whatever it was, this feeling, some kind of displacement or something...

And now, he had to talk to Ramon.

Dennis, 6’5”, 250, all muscle, with cold hazel wolf’s eyes, sweating bullets.

Ramon, mid-30s like Dennis, still trim and pretty—with eyes like black ice seen at night on a trek through the Arctic.

Dennis let out a breath. Nothing to do now but get through.

He flicked on the light, punched out a number, and someone picked up on the other end of the line. “Lupe,” he said, “I need to talk to Ramon. Tell him to call me. Fifteen minutes.”

He headed back out the door, and down to the 7-11 a block-and-a-half from the house, to the pay phone outside. It would be ringing in 10 or so minutes.

He picked up on one ring and said, “Yo.” He kept his voice low.

Ramon: “How’d it go?”

“Not so good.”

“What do you mean, not so good? What happened? You got the stuff, right?”

“Yeah, we got it. Money, everything.”

“Then, what?”

“Shit hit the fan.”

“What do you mean, shit hit the fan?”

“He went nuts, man, him’n his ol’ lady both. He jumped me, an’ then—”

“Wait, wait, he—how did that happen, man? I told you—”

“Ramon, I had the gun in his face, an’ he went ahead an’ come at me anyway. I couldn’t believe—”

“Jesus Christ!”

“I thought, we took care of the dog, it’d do it, but then, the guy—”

“What? What’d he do?”

“Hey, I dunno, man. He went nuts. An’, when I clocked him, his ol’ lady jumped on my back.”

“Just like that?”

“Yeah, man. It happened, just, bam.”

“Shit.” Ramon was hot. “Where was Eddie in all this?”

“Well, he—lemme get to that. He was there, but, I think we got a problem.”

“Problem?”

“Uh-huh, but—wait. Just lemme—anyway, we got it. The stuff’n the money an’ everything. I had to bitch-slap the broad, an’ she went an’ got it, an’ then we got outta there. An’ then, we’re headed to the car, an’ Mizell comes flyin’ out after us, an’ he had the shotgun...”

“Wait, wait—how did—what’d you do back there? I thought he—”

“I thought he was outta commission. I hit him pretty good, believe me. But, I dunno. Anyway, I had to take him out. Wasn’t nothin’ I could do.”

Silence on the other end of the line.

Dennis said, “There was this broad, too, man—”

“Broad? What broad?”

“This ol’ lady, man. She’s walkin’ in front of the place, an’—”

“What? Dennis—Jesus! What happened?”

“She got caught up in it, an’—”

“Oh, Christ, you—”

“Yeah, yeah, man, I know—”

“She’s dead.” Not a question.

“Yeah, I think so, I dunno. She was—look, Ramon. It happened fast, wasn’t nothin’ I could do. It’s just, Danny firin’ on us, man, an’ she’s, she got hit. It’s just, it fell out that way. Damn, man—an’, okay, so then I had to go back an’ take care of Mizell’s ol’ lady. Wasn’t nothin’ I could do. She saw us, an’ I couldn’t just leave her, you know?”

Ramon thought. “Anybody see you?”

“No. Nobody. I’m sure. No cars, nothin’.”

“What about the other houses?”

“Man—there’s only about five other houses on that block. Most of ‘em are way back from the street, an’ kinda hidden away by bushes an’ trees an’ stuff. I didn’t see no lights, except one house at the other end of the block.”

“Yeah, man, but you guys were—”

“Damn, Ramon! Jesus! I dunno, man! Maybe they did. But, damn—”

“Hey, alright, man, okay. It was dark. Man... We’ll just have to hope, huh?” Ramon was not happy.

“Anyway,” he said, “what about Eddie?”

“Well, that’s the deal. The guy’s flippin’ out.”

“What do you mean, flipping out?”

“Just that, man. He thinks—I dunno what the fuck he thinks. He wasn’t ready for it. In the car, after, he... Jesus, I dunno, man. I dunno what he’s gonna do.”

“He started cuttin’ up in the car, or before?”

“He just, he was freakin’ out, man.”

“Yeah. In the car or what, man, tell me. What’d you do?”

“It was in the car, man. He’s, I dunno what he’s gonna do. He’s freakin’ on me, like, I dunno. It was, he couldn’t hang with it, man, an’...”

“Okay, man, what’d you do?”

“I told him, he fucks up, I’m gonna kill him.”

“Okay. What then?”

“He got real quiet.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah, man, but, I dunno... I think—”

“Where’s he at now?”

“Home. He dropped me off here—”

“You know he’s at home?”

“Well...no, I don’t know if he’s home, but—”

“Ah, Jesus. Dennis. We’ve got a problem.”

“Man—”

“He could be anywhere. This isn’t good. You shouldn’t’ve let him out of your sight.”

“What? Man, what was I supposed to do? Stick him in the trunk of the car? Jesus, Ramon—”

“What I’m saying, man, you shouldn’t’ve let him get away from you. When you saw what was coming, you should’ve—”

“Whattya mean? We were already in the car—”

“Man, goddamnit, you remember, I told you about him, man. If he messes up, if he’s gonna mess up, you’re ready for it, man, you—”

“Ramon—”

“And he—”

“He was drivin’ the car, man! We’re out in traffic! Whattya want, off him out at the storage? Jesus—”

“Yeah, man! That would’ve been the place, now that you bring it up! Or, anywhere, man. It’s dark, you pull him over, take him out, and—you see? Dennis. We’ve got a problem here, man! That guy—”

“Ramon—”

“Dennis!”

This wasn’t going anywhere. Ramon couldn’t believe it. This stupid bastard. He decided to leave it for now. There was too much to do, and right now. “Okay, man, to hell with it. We’ll deal with it later. We’ve got to take care of this thing we’ve got, man, you hear what I’m saying?”

No response.

“Man, I can’t hear you.”

“Yeah, Ramon, I know. We got to...”

“I mean, right now.”

“Yeah.”

“You agree with that, man?”

“Yeah, I do. We got to.”

“Good. Now. I’m thinking, we’re supposed to be meeting back there at the storage, right? That is the place to do it. Nobody around. No buildings close by. Take him there, stick him in the room, and leave him.”

“Yeah, man, but they’ll check—”

“So what? I had that space for a year, man, and the guy who actually got it, he’s not even in the country now. There’s no way they can put it on us.”

“Alright...”

“Yeah. Now. We need to take care of this tonight.”

“Ah... You know what? I think that ain’t such a good idea. I think, right now, he’s spooked bigtime. An’ I bet you he’s thinkin’ I might make a move on him. See—”

“Dennis. We can’t wait on this.”

“Man, I don’t—I go over there tonight, he’s gonna know, I’m tellin’ you. He ain’t stupid. He knows it’s tomorrow night. Things could get real messed up—”

“They’re messed up right now, man.”

“Ramon, listen to me! Look... Right now, he’s really freaked out. This was a heavy deal, man. But, I think, tomorrow, I call him, you know, I’m supposed to call him tomorrow, an’ I think there’s a whole lot less chance of him thinkin’ there’s somethin’ funny about it. I just talk to him, man, we’re still a go, cool, calm, an’ I think I can bring him down outta the tree. Tomorrow—see, Eddie freaks, man—”

“No shit, Dennis.”

“Lemme finish. See—he freaks. This was heavy, an’ he wasn’t ready for it—”

“Your old road dog.”

“Yeah, Ramon... Look, you want me to—”

“Go ahead, man. I’m listening.”

“Okay. The thing is, it’s like, he’s in shock now, man, see? But that’s—tomorrow, I think it’ll, it won’t—I mean, this ain’t never gonna be one of his fond memories or nothin’, but the guy—we did stuff before, an’ it’s like he’s, I can talk to him, man. He’ll come around. I mean, tonight he’s freaked. It’s like a bad acid trip an’ he’s in it, you know? But tomorrow he won’t be so messed up. I’ll be able to talk to him. Plus, man, look. There’s still the money. He came for the money. Money’s still there, right? An’, you know, what’s his best option? Don’t nobody know it was us. An’ we got the stuff, man. So, what’s he gonna do, just walk away? All that for nothin’? Plus, where’s he gonna go? Dude’s broke, man.”

“He’ll go to the cops, Dennis.”

“Ramon, uh uh. He ain’t goin’ to no cops. What’s that gonna get him? Cops, man, those’re the last motherfuckers he wants to talk to. After this? No way.”

“Well, hey, man, that’s great. What’re we even worrying about, then? What you’re saying, we’ve got no problem. Why even bring it up? Listen—”

“Look, Ramon! All I’m sayin’, I know the guy. He—look. It ain’t right now I’m worried about. It’s down the road, he gets in a ditch or somethin’. Then, maybe we got a problem. He lets stuff chew on him. I mean, he’ll go along, an’ it’s okay, but then, somethin’ happens, an’ meanwhile, this shit’s been eatin’ away at his ass, an’ it’s, boom. Who knows what’ll happen? Other times, I been there to kinda straighten him out, an’, you know, he comes around. But this one, man, like I said, I dunno. I don’t think he can hang with this. An’ a month, year, somethin’ happens, well, who knows? So, that’s why I agree with you, we gotta do it. But I really think we oughtta just, go ahead an’ do it accordin’ to the original deal. Meet there like we said, an’ do it there.”

“Man—”

“Ramon, I’m tellin’ you, I go up there now, there’s no tellin’ what’s gonna happen. At least fifty-fifty, he’s expectin’ it anyway. He might not even be there at his place—”

“Man—”

“Ramon! Damn, man! What I’m sayin’ is, I dunno. He’s—ah, man, he’s there. What’s he gonna do, sleep in his fuckin’ car? By the side of the road or somethin’? Plus, where else is he gonna go? He ain’t even got enough gas to get outta town. Anyway, like I said, I go up there, he ain’t gonna let me in. An’ I swear to God, man, I don’t wanna go kickin’ his door in, you know what I’m sayin’? Lotta people up there, man, Capitol Hill, on the street an’ whatever, an’, plus, lotta cops up there, too. An’ also, man, I only been up there a coupla times. I don’t know the layout, who’s gonna see me an’ stuff, you know, somethin’ happens. An’, the dude, too, he got a back way outta there. I dunno, he sees me comin’, rabbits out the back, an’ I’m chasin’ him down the street... I don’t like that, man, swear to God. Too much stuff can go wrong, an’ then—”

“Hey, Dennis, you hinky on this, or what?”

“Huh? Well... Yeah, man, I kinda am. This has been, wow, man, an’—Look, Ramon, I got no problem doin’ this, okay? It’s just—an’ also, man, this, somethin’ happens, it could be the one thing that sends him to the cops. ‘Cause then, man, what’s he lookin’ at? No money, right? An’ somebody out there tryin’ to kill him. It’s best we do it the other way, man, I’m tellin’ you.”

“Man...”

“I’m tellin’ you, Ramon.”

Ramon had to think. He wanted Eddie off the map yesterday. But, what Dennis was saying, he had some points. Plus, push him too hard on this, he might just go up there and fuck the thing up. And what then?

Eddie might just have to keep one more night.

“Okay,” Ramon said.

“Okay? Tomorrow?”

“Yeah. But here’s the deal. You’ve got to take care of it.”

“Huh? You ain’t gonna be there?”

They’d originally planned that the three of them would be there the next night.

“No,” Ramon said, “I can’t make it. I was going to tell you. I got some family stuff here that I’ve got to deal with, and—I’ve got to deal with it. I can’t get away till it’s done.”

“But—”

“Look, man, it’s Lupe and mama, and I really don’t want to get into it. Just, believe me, I’ve got to get this straightened out here. And, what I was going to say to you was, I need you to get the stuff and come here with it.”

“But—”

“Dennis, you’ve got to take care of it, you hear what I’m saying?”

“Well, damn, man—”

“Look. I was saying, you should do this tonight. You say you want to do it tomorrow, for all those reasons, and I see your point. But you’ve got to do it. I can’t get there. You’d’ve had to do it yourself tonight anyway, you know what I’m saying? And I, we need to get that stuff out of there. I can’t wait on that. So, you’ve got to get here with it. Might be best you get yourself out of town, too, for a minute or two anyway.”

Dennis chewed it over.

“You there?” Ramon said.

“Yeah, I was just... Okay, I’ll do it. I’ll tell Eddie, an’ he’ll come over, an’ we’ll go there, an’ I’ll do it there. An’ then I’ll be comin’ over.”

“Good.”

“Yeah...”

“Okay, then, I guess that’s it.”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. Later.”

Dennis hung up, thoughts gnawing away. He wanted something to spike them. A shot or three of whiskey sounded just about right.

*

He called Eddie next morning, nine on the dot.

Eddie’d been tossing and turning all night. He rose, features puffy and blurred. He reached out his hand toward the phone and struggled to sitting position.

His thin frame looked frail and pale. He chewed his thin lips and rubbed his sharp nose, his eyes blinking sleep from deep in a tunnel. His hair, a blond mop, stuck in different directions.

Dennis sounded a little thick on his end of the line. Groggy or not, though, his job was to talk Eddie down out of the branches.

“Hey, man,” he said, “how’re you doin’?”

Eddie sucked up some breath. “I dunno... Not so good.”

“Yeah? So... What’s goin’ on?”

“Just... It’s messed up, man.”

“Yeah. Sounds like it. You gonna be okay, or what?”

“Man... I dunno... I haven’t had much sleep.”

Eddie sounded like he was slated for hanging. Dennis figured that was okay, though. Last night, he wouldn’t’ve answered the phone.

“I know what you mean,” Dennis said. “I didn’t get much sleep myself. It was rough last night. Be better today, you know what I’m sayin’?

“Look,” he said. “I talked to Ramon. An’ he’s, you know, it’s a bad deal, but what can we do? Except, you know, be cool an’ don’t get fucked up behind this. Main thing, an’ I agree with this, is to keep things goin’ the way we had it set up. You know what I’m sayin’? We can still do this, you know, so...he’s gonna be there at the place around nine tonight. An’, I’m thinkin’, why don’t you get here at my place around eight, quarter after, pick me up, an’ we’ll meet him there, get it done. Divvy up, an’, you know... Whattya think? Sound like a plan?”

No response.

“You there?”

“Yeah...”

“So, whattya think?”

No response. Eddie’s visual: Ramon with fangs...

“Hey, Eddie, man, look. Last night, man, it was fucked up. I got a little hot, man. I didn’t know where you were comin’ from. You know, I overreacted. I was wound up, man, you know what I’m sayin’? That was some heavy-duty shit, you know? An’, I know how you’re feelin’, man. I feel kinda the same way. But, this, we gotta let that go. It was messed up. I didn’t know what you were gonna do. But now... It’s today, man, it’s different. My head’s a little clearer, an’... It’s okay, you know?”

A beat, and then Eddie said, “I dunno, man, I just... You hear anything? About, you know, the thing.”

Dennis had heard stuff, alright. Radio, TV, the front page of the morning P-I. Bloody triple murder, ‘possibly drug-related’. Just the kind of stuff to send Eddie toward Mars. Oh well. Dennis had to deal with it.

“It’s in the paper.” He said it calmly, like, nothing here we can’t deal with.

“Where?” Eddie said. “I mean...”

“P-I, man. Front page.”

“Oh, Jesus...”

“Yeah. But, man, I read the story, an’ all it really is, is the cops got three people dead, two in the house, one outside, an’ that’s all they know. Nobody saw nothin’, nobody heard nothin’, an’ they ain’t got squat. They figure it’s drugs. Well, hell yeah. It’s a known fuckin’ dopehouse. ‘Suspected drug traffic’ an’ all that good shit. They got no clue, man. Coulda been 10,000 guys.”

“Yeah, but they don’t always tell you, you know, in the newspapers, man.”

“Well, yeah, I know, but look at it. I believe it, you know. I mean, there wasn’t nobody around there, except that ol’ lady. I was checkin’, man, one house down the block with the lights on. Shades pulled. Nobody saw nothin’, an’—”

“Yeah, but—”

“An’, Eddie. The rest of it—who knew we were comin’, right? Mizell an’ his old lady—an’ she didn’t even know, fucked up as she was—an’ Ramon, you know? That’s all. An’ then, that was the first time I ever even been in that part of town, an’ you too, so it ain’t like we’re a coupla familiar faces or nothin’ like that, am I right? Plus, man, what else? What other possible evidence is there that we were there? Fingerprints? In that place? I don’t fuckin’ think so.”

“Yeah, man, but... I dunno. This is a lot of heat, man.”

“Well, yeah, it is.”

“That old lady, man...” That’s what was chewing at Eddie. And Mona, Mizell’s old lady. And, just the fact that Dennis had lost it. He was supposed to been the man who stayed cool.

Dennis just had to deal with it now. “Yeah, man, I know, but—look. It was fucked up. The whole thing was fucked up. You know, it was like we were sayin’ before. Sometimes, you know, stuff blows up. Mizell went nuts, an’ then take it from there. Who knows, man? He just... I dunno. An’ me, too, man, I didn’t expect it. Him and the broad. An’ then, he comes outta there with that shotgun, an’—I thought we were gonna die. You know?”

“Yeah, man, but—”

“Yeah, man, I know. The ol’ lady. I didn’t even see her. That fucked me up, man. An’ then, the broad—I was freaked, man. I thought we were gonna die. I didn’t know what to do. Jesus. There was Mizell, that ol’ lady, an’ Mona inside there, an’ everything was goin’ so damn fast. I just, I dunno what to tell you, man. It happened. Next thing I knew, it was done. I just, I dunno.”

Somewhere down deep, Eddie knew what a pile of garbage this really was. The old lady in front of the house was an accident, sure. But, Mona was cold-blooded mop-up. That said, though, he was part of it, right? And where did that leave him?

He couldn’t even talk. Just the thought of his complicity in this... Lead filled his chest, the hot kind that makes you want to go jump off a bridge.

Dennis rapped on. “But, okay, now—what do we do? There’s a lotta heat, like you said. Gotta figure there’s gonna be. But, you know, lookin’ at it? It’s, like, okay, you remember that thing a coupla months back, where that girl got shot at that high school? Some drive-by, right? Same deal. The whole town was on fire for those guys. Every time you turned on the news, man, it was just, they wanted to get the motherfucker that did it. Buncha Asian dudes. An’ the whole thing went on for about a week. An’ then, all of a sudden, boom, you don’t hear nothin’. It was like it never even happened. Read the paper, nothin’. Back to the same-ol’ same-ol’. Afghanistan, Iraq, Bill Gates bought Europe, that three-feet strap-on Hillary’s got on, Bill says it works, so elect her or somethin’. You see what I’m sayin’?

“It’s like—an’, oh yeah, every so often there’d be some little somethin’, you know, like, they ain’t caught ’em yet, but they’re tryin’ an’ so forth, you know? An’ that’s it. An’ by this time, it’s hard to remember just what the fuck happened.

“An’ then, when they caught the guy, finally, it was sheer fuckin’ luck. Guy’s down in Portland, deep in the weeds. But he’s braggin’ to all his little gangbanger buddies an’ shit, an’ somebody went an’ ratted him out. An’ that’s how they got him.

“See? An’ that’s what we gotta realize, man. All that dude had to do was keep his mouth shut. The cops’d still be runnin’ around with their thumb up their ass. An’, this here, with us? Same fuckin’ deal. Except, with those guys, there was 10,000 people who saw it! Nobody saw us!

“An’, I know, this, it’s messed up. An’ I wish it was different. I wish it hadn’t fell out the way it fell out. But now, what we gotta do is, stay cool. Just, ride it out an’ take care of business. Nobody knows nothin’. Long as we’re cool, we’re okay. You see what I’m sayin’?

“Now, man, it’s, we go get the money an’ split it, an go on our way. Just like we worked it all out. An’, it’ll be cool. We didn’t come this fuckin’ far to fuck it all up.”

Wow. All that blather. “Just be cool, it’ll all go away.” That old lady. Mona. Would they go away?

Eddie’s mind spun round and round. What were his options? The old lady, Mona, and Mizell were all dead. What could he do? Go to the cops? No way would that bring them back.

It would cook his ass.

What then? Take off? And go where? Without money?

Money. A shot at outrunning his demons...

He said, “I’ll see you at eight.”

Telling the man holding the pink slip he’d be there.

BIO: Robert Crisman writes crime and noir fiction. He spent 15 years on streets in downtown Seattle and has some idea of what really goes on in these realms. He’s had stories posted on A Twist of Noir, and some scheduled on Yellow Mama and Darkest Before Dawn. A movie he scripted, Chasing the Dopeman, is currently in post-prod down in L.A. and, with luck, it’ll be ready to go sometime this fall.

Interlude

And it's all over now.

No, not A Twist Of Noir. Not by a longshot.

No, I'm speaking of the hourglass running out of sand for submission time in Eric Beetner's FIST contest.

Everyone that got in, is in and their stories are on their way to the panel of judges.

Everyone that didn't, sorry about that but you had a month. What's wrong with you?

Okay, enough with the phony dramatics.

Good luck to everyone that entered and we should know who took the five-book package in two weeks.

Meanwhile, take a ROAD TRIP with Libby Cudmore and Powder Burn Flash. And don't forget to pack your clown/gardening shoes. Hey, you'll thank me when the mud comes off without a whole lot of fuss.

Interlude

Wow! What an introduction!

I'm speaking about my guest spot on Michael J. Solender's blog, Not From Here, Are You?

About a week and a half ago, Michael wrote me and said he'd like me to guest if I was up to it.

Yeah, I'm up to it, I said.

But, the truth is, I wanted to get this just right. I didn't want to just slough something off on Michael. He was asking me to show up, not phone it in.

So I took a couple swings at it. There's a story in my own inbox that I will be trying to flesh out at a later date. There's a second, more fleshed but not quite there yet story that also will be seeing the light of day someday hopefully soon.

The story that eventually made it was actually written in a white hot blur, which is sometimes the only way to do it. It was actually written over the course of the last twenty-four hours and I put the finishing touch on it this afternoon.

Shhhh! Don't tell Michael.

Sent it off and I thought, "Yeah, it's a pretty good story still... Fingers crossed."

And you just start getting paranoid with this stuff, you know? I don't have to tell any of you guys and ladies, we're all doing the same thing every single time we shoot stories off to editors, right?

I thought maybe I had left some stuff out or whatever. I had to look it over a couple dozen times, even after I'd sent it, to make sure I was just imagining things.

A little while ago, Michael wrote to tell me that my story is now on his site and that he enjoyed and he needed to know a little something that I won't discuss here for the sake of not ruining the story for you before you read it.

The introduction, as I said at the beginning of all this, was nothing short of amazing.

Michael, I owe you big for that one, man. You are truly a class act and I can't thank you enough.

So, without further ado, I send you on your way to read HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HONEY at Not From Here, Are You?

Enjoy.

Interlude

Last day to get your stories in to Eric Beetner to qualify for his contest.

Unless Eric says different, that is.

But with the number of entries that seem to have been flying in, I tend to doubt he's going to extend the deadline. Plus, we've got that drop-dead date of October 15 for the winner to be announced and the winner to be presented here at ATON.

Somehow I don't think Eric's going to be changing anything.

Get 'em in before midnight and you won't turn into a pumpkin.

Meanwhile, head over to The Flash Fiction Offensive and check out MONDAY by Rachel Blackbirdsong. I can guarantee you won't want to visit prison and you'll wish the week went waaay fast after this.

While you're there, take a JOYRIDE with Grant Wamack. Just be sure Grandpa's out cold for the night.

I've introduced another new female at Thrillers, Killers 'N' Chillers. This time, it's LILY.

A Twist Of Noir 191 - Barry Jay Kaplan

TWO BOYS ON THE ROAD - BARRY JAY KAPLAN

The incident occurred in November, rainy day, early evening, darkish but not yet completely dark, on a two-lane highway just outside Stellar City, near the Macomber Lake campsites. There were woods, and a lake that steamed at dawn, ringed by stands of tall fir trees, a few cabins near the water, rentals for the most part, though one or two were occupied by the owners on a weekend basis. Of the four people involved in the incident, the two boys were badly shaken, though aside from a few bruises, not hurt. The two men were dead.

According to the one of the boys not shaken as badly as the other--who could barely speak at all but sat still, staring, his lips moving, faintly blue--the two of them were coming home early from a camping trip cut short because of the rain. Their mothers had insisted they pack rain gear and they had, reluctantly and with much eye-rolling, but were glad in the end, because once their tent had sagged and finally collapsed under the weight of the pounding rain, they needed that rain gear and grudgingly praised their mothers, though silently, as boys will do.

They stuffed the tent into their knapsack, shook out their folded rubber ponchos and pulled them over their heads, and started out, first along the shore of the lake until the drop off to the water was too steep, then through the woods and out onto the path that lead to Route 19, not far from Hooly’s store and a telephone to call their parents. A pick-up had been arranged in advance, of course, but the rain had of necessity made for a change in plans. This was years ago, you understand, and no one had yet imagined such a thing as a cell phone.

The boys made their way through the woods where they could hear but not feel the rain, and onto the dirt road, where the rain pounded on their rubber ponchos as they walked Indian-file through the mud that had been hard-packed and dry only the day before, watching their feet slide, careful not to fall and feeling, the boy who told the store admitted, that this was the best thing that could have happened. It was an adventure, he said later. The boys were twelve years old.

It was getting dark though, and one of the boys, though he’d never let on to his more garrulous friend, did not like the way the situation was going. It was one thing to be out in the rain, that was OK; it was another thing to be out in the dark in the mud with only the darkening woods as shelter. This boy had a lot of imagination and it usually took him to places that frightened him. What might come out of those dark woods? A bear nine feet tall, maybe. A strange man with a weird stare and an axe, maybe. Or something else, something unknown, something silent. As long as they got to Route 19, though, as long as they were within a couple of miles of Hooly’s and a telephone, they’d be OK. Except it was getting awfully dark and he wondered if they’d even be able to see Route 19 once the light was really gone. The sky was dark grey verging on green. The storm was getting worse.

Finally, they were off the muddy road and onto Route 19 though things were no better there. There weren’t cars where there were usually a lot of cars. Hooly’s was a few miles away but maybe it wouldn’t even be open and suddenly they weren’t even sure of the direction. They stood still for a long few minutes. Underneath the pounding of the rain there was a strange sense of the universe being quiet, waiting for something to happen.

Then there was the sound.

“What is that?” the more frightened of the two boys asked, turning in every direction, though the sound didn’t seem to come from anywhere in particular. It was just there.

“You’re scared!” his friend said, though he had been startled by the sound too, which now that they had stopped to listen seemed to be getting louder.

The two boys moved closer together and backed slightly away from the road until they were up against a tree. They waited, breathing in short shallow breaths, as the sound got louder and was definitely coming from somewhere particular by now and now there was a faint light too, two sources of the light, hazy and blurred and—It was headlights! It was a car! The boys laughed and pushed themselves away from the tree out into the road. When the car crested the hill, the headlights found them. The boys retreated a few feet back again and stood still at the very edge of the road. As the car came closer it slowed down and finally stopped about ten feet from them.

“Come on,” one of them said and started for the car but the other one balked.

“Let’s keep walking,” he said to his friend.

“Aw, come on. They’ll give us a ride to Hooly’s.”

“How do you know what direction?”

“I don’t.”

“We can find it on foot,” he said, but, by this time, his friend was walking towards the car and, as he approached, the back door of the car opened.

His friend turned to him.

“See?” he said, then turned away: “Hi!” he said. “Thanks!” And got in the car.

The boy who was reluctant moved to the car, though he said later that this was the moment that time began to slow down, as if he was stepping into another world, though that didn’t really explain his feeling very clearly. His friend leaned out of the car and gestured to him to hurry. He ran the last few steps, more to be with his friend than to get into the car. At this point, the sound of the rain pattering on his rubber poncho was comforting to him. He hesitated before he stepped inside. Was the man in the driver’s seat wearing an eye patch? Was the other one holding a hatchet? Was this a nightmare? Was he going to wake up in a second? A chill ran down his back and legs. He wanted to sink back into the mud where he would be safe but his friend said, “Come on, come on,” beckoning with his hand from the backseat, and so he put one foot on the running board and hauled himself inside. He thought, as he sank his weight onto the seat: something very bad is going to happen.

The boys leaned back. It was very quiet, just the sound of the rain on the roof of the car, the swish of the windshield wipers, and the hum of the motor idling. The driver kicked the car into gear and the car started down the road.

The men were drunk, the boys knew that familiar smell from their parents’ parties. The more reluctant of the two boys, the one who felt the possibility that this was his own personal nightmare, wished very hard that he had not gotten into this car, especially as the road got steeper and curvier. He didn’t think this was the way to Hooly’s. There was a distant rumble of thunder, a flash of lightning. The car went into a skid. The boys were thrown against each other. The car came out of the skid. The boys laughed in relief and pushed each other away.

Have you boys been camping,” one of the men said, and as he flicked his cigarette lighter, threw his arm on the back of the front seat and turned to look at them. He was smiling, the boy telling the story remembered, but when the other boy yelled—he couldn’t help himself and blamed himself forever after—“Don’t hurt me!”, the man’s mouth flapped open and his cigarette slid from his lips.

“Oh, no,” he whispered. He brought the flame of the cigarette lighter closer to the boys’ faces. The boys backed away.

“No. No.”

“What’s up?” the driver asked as the man in the passenger seat said no no over and over, no no no no. The driver turned in his seat and, when he saw the boys in the flame from the cigarette lighter, he started to say it too. No, no, no.

Both men were saying it now and the driver’s hands flew off the wheel as he clutched his friend and the car went into another skid and this time didn’t recover because there was no one holding the wheel and careened off the road, down the embankment, bounced against rocks, scraping, crunching metal, then smack into the trunk of a fir.

A few hours later, when another driver who had left his lakeside cabin because of the rain found them, the two boys were sitting on a log next to the car, stunned and bruised, and the two men were still inside the car. Both of them were dead.

*

The last patient of the day, the man with anxiety disorder who would not go out in the dark, left Martin’s office, the front door of the house closing with a sharp click that signaled it was time for Martin to pour out a half jigger of rum from the bottle in the bookcase hidden inside a hollowed out volume of Dickens’ Hard Times. It was odd, wasn’t it, he thought, that it was rum he drank and not gin or rye or something softer, wine maybe or beer. Rum? When had he chosen rum? Martin didn’t think very hard about this, not towards any resolution, but let his mind wander as he often did after a day’s work, feet propped on his desk, one hand idly loosening his tie, the other swirling the rum in the glass, but as soon as his mind took a certain turn he stood up, swallowed the rum as if it were medicine, which it was, of a sort, cleared his throat because his heart was pounding, and went upstairs find his wife.

The note on the dresser said she was out, simply that, but when dinner time came and she had not come home or called, he phoned her sister and was informed that yes his wife was there and that no she did wish to speak to him and that for his information she was not simply out but out for good, that she would send for her things, that he, her husband, was to vacate the premises while she did so which would be the next morning and that her lawyer would be in touch with his.

Martin stretched out in the middle of the wide bed, spread his arms to the sides and thought that if he was going to be perfectly straight with himself, he would have to agree that she had been well within her rights to leave him. He had not been much of a husband and supposed now that it had been a lot to ask that she not notice: driven, but by shame and fear rather than any hope of success, and in the end, or close to it as this was, not achieving all that much: a home practice ministering to people who did not understand themselves and did not even understand that they didn’t. He was getting nowhere with them and never had. His chaotic interior life required an exterior of quiet and regularity and modesty. He had no interests that set him apart from other men, no hobbies or compulsions, no friends or social life, no appetites or desires to have anything other than what he had. Of course his wife had had enough. Of course she left him. The question now was: am I better or worse off? Sleep overcame him before he could decide and as he slept the nightmare began. He reached out for his wife to pull him back, to tell him not to go but his wife was gone and the nightmare played itself out until he woke up screaming.

*

Eddie turned up the volume on both speakers in the garage and listened to the balance of sound. Inside the house the kids were yelling at their mother and she was yelling back. He went to the garage door, raised his arms very high, caught the chain, and lowered the door from the inside. He lit a joint and leaned back against a pile of tires to smoke it down. When he was done he ate the ash. Now there’d be some peace.

The garage contained everything he wanted: his jeep, his old jeep, his good old jeep. Running his fingers along the fenders he thought this old car this old jeep, jeez tears came to his eyes she was loyal and sweet as a golden retriever. He’d take her out later, had to or wanted to, he wasn’t sure which but something told him he’d be behind the wheel today. His hands slapped his thighs. He looked around the garage: tools, tires, dartboard, freezer, the same bike he had as a kid still working, stacks of magazines, shelves of motor oil and anti freeze, a workbench, a vise, a set of free weights. Yes yes and yes. He had it all. There was no other path he’d wanted to take, nothing he regretted, nothing he thought he’d missed out on, no trails he’d wanted to blaze, no women, no mountains, nothing he wanted to see he hadn’t seen, no drug, no sensation, nothing new, nothing that he hadn’t thought about as a boy, gone after and gotten.

When did it happen, Eddie wondered, that he lost control of things? Hadn’t he been a go-getter once? Wasn’t he the guy who was going to be something? Or was it that he liked to think of himself that way when in reality he’d always been a loser, loud and bragging but with little to show for all the noise. His chest was still muscular and hard. He touched the tip of a dart through the opening in his shirt until the point touched his flesh and drew just a tiny drop of blood. Don’t be a fool, he thought. That’s all he’d need was for them to find him like this, stoned and bleeding. He flicked his tongue over the point of the dart and sent it sailing across the span of the garage to the dartboard on the far wall: whut! Saw it land in the deep cleavage of Miss November. Bingo! Never lost the touch.

He sat down and closed his eyes, listening to the muted sounds coming from the house. He saw some funny things with his eyes closed like that and opened them with a click. He reached for the rifle and set it on his knees. It’d be so simple, he thought. He stared at the dartboard, at the shadow between the girl’s breasts, at the dart which seemed to be quivering still, until his head drooped onto his chest and his eyes focused again on the rifle on his knees.

*

So I told ‘em shut up shut up shut up! Jeez the names they call her... And she takes it, don’t ask me why.

“I won’t.”

“Whyn’t you roll down your window?”

“It’s raining.”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot. You’re of the melting variety.”

“A hothouse bloom.”

“OK, OK.”

They drove in silence for a while. The driver kept one hand on the wheel, the other reached in the glove compartment and pulled out a fifth of rye.

“Not my drink,” his friend said.

“Yeah, I know your drink. Mister Rum. Look in the back,” he said. “Never mind I got it,” and he pulled out a brand new bottle of rum, the seal still on it. “To friendship.”

“To friendship.”

Neither man spoke for a long while after that, though their eyes met over the rims of their respective bottles as they got progressively drunker and quieter. Then, finished, they stared out the window without thinking of where they were going but glad to be getting further away from what they were leaving behind, though neither of them knew the other well enough, or trusted the other with enough confidence, to tell what that thing was. They were old friends, at least that’s what they called each other. They went way back, that was all they knew, friends since they were boys and the bond was there and that was it, they didn’t question it any more than they questioned each other about their lives, any more than they asked themselves what it was they liked about each other or even if they liked the other one at all any more or ever had.

“Does the heater work in this heap?”

“Watch who you’re calling a heap,” the driver said and flicked on the heat. “Hothouse.”

The two lane highway which was usually well trafficked during this time of the day was emptying out with the storm warnings that had been on the radio all day. It was raining steadily now and the sky was turning the green that said it was going to rain and rain hard and long. It looked like their little trip was going to be ruined.

“We better turn around.”

The driver didn’t answer for a moment, just to show he was considering it when actually he agreed right off.

“Yeah,” he finally said, but there wasn’t a likely place to make a U and so they continued on, lulled by the sense of forward motion, unwilling to turn around and admit to going back. The future was ahead. They already knew what they’d left. A few minutes later the sky really opened up and the mountains they were driving towards were lit stark and vivid in flashes of lightning.

“Wouldn’t want to be out walking tonight.”

“Huh.”

He wanted to say better turn around but he’d said it already and he knew anyway that it was futile, knew they’d keep driving until they no longer could.

“Look,” he said, a few minutes later, up ahead. The headlights illuminated two people walking.

“They must be soaked to the skin,” the driver said.

“Don’t stop,” his friend said.

The driver stared into the rain. “Gotta.”

“Why?”

The driver shrugged.

“Don’t.”

“Gotta,” the driver insisted without knowing why and slowed down so he could pull off the road.

The rain sounded very loud on the stopped car. The two men sat still and watched through the streaming windshield as first one, then other of the two figures ran towards the car and hauled themselves into the back seat. The driver put the car into gear and started back on the road.

“Have you boys been camping?” the other one said, as he took a cigarette from his inside pocket and put it in his mouth, then flicked his lighter into flame. He turned in his seat to look at the two boys in rubber ponchos, who sat shivering in the back seat.

“Don’t hurt me,” one of the boys said.

BIO: Other stories of Barry's have appeared in Descant, Bryant Literary Review, Upstreet, Storyglossia, 971 menu, Storyglossia, Apple Valley Review (Pushcart Prize nominee) and others. “His Wife” is included in Best of the Net Anthology 2008.