Bust (17 page)

He began, like a mantra, the sports lingo he’d been learning, measuring out the phases like a new language. You grew up in Ireland and hurling was the sport of necessity, this American deal was a whole new territory. But he loved the sound of it, like praying but without the guilt or the bartering you had to do with god. He started, “Them Knicks need to take it to the next level, what to plug in and take out, they need a point guard, Isaiah Thomas better get his head outa his arse, the old days, Patrick Ewing, John Starks, they had a core, then the Bulls, ah they had it, the fookin Lakers, what was going on there, and the Sox, way to go boyos.” Like that. No idea what he was saying but getting off on the melody.

No one paid him any heed, just one more crazy fuck, with a menthol cig and a bug up his ass.

New York, you gotta love it.

Walking down Fifth Avenue, all Angela could think about was the way Bobby Rosa had looked at her. On his way out of the office, he’d winked at her and smiled and said, “Goodbye, sweetheart.” He wasn’t really her type. She didn’t mind the wheelchair, but guys with beards had always kind of disgusted her because they reminded her of her uncle Costas from Astoria who used to try to feel her
up when she was thirteen. But Bobby didn’t seem like a bad guy. She felt bad that they were gonna have to kill him.

Angela didn’t know how everything had gotten so screwed up. It was bad enough that that innocent girl had to die, but then Dillon had to go and kill a cop. Getting Max’s money was turning out to be a lot harder than she’d thought it would be. Besides, after hearing on the news about how brutal Dillon had been with the two women and then seeing him stick that knife into the cop’s chest like he was getting off on it, she wasn’t sure she wanted to marry him anymore anyway. You marry a whackjob like that, were you expecting white roses? Yeah, right. She didn’t know where all that rage came from. One minute, he was talking about all that Buddhist peace shit or quoting the poetry of that Yeats guy, and the next thing he’d smack her across the face.

She’d go, “The fook did I do?”

Nothing, was the answer, but he’d laugh, go, “Just in case you were thinking of fooking me over, and there’s more where that came from — call that a taster.”

Then he’d take out a knife and start cleaning his nails with it, staring at her with that deadeye look.

But she couldn’t break up with him now. She had to wait until this mess was over with and then decide what to do.

It started to rain as Angela continued along Fifth Avenue. She didn’t feel like taking a bus or paying for a cab so she just kept walking, hardly realizing that she was getting soaked.

When she got home Dillon was sitting in his underwear on the bed watching music videos saying, “You brung me fookin dinner, I hope.”

“I figured we’d just order in or something,” Angela said.

“You said you were gonna pick it up, yah bleedin bitch.”

“So I forgot. What’s your problem?”

“I’ve been trapped here all day and guess what, I’m
starving — that’s what my problem is, so get in the kitchen, get me some stew — you’re Irish, stew is yer birthright. Put lots of cabbage and bacon in there, and don’t forget the spuds, you got that, bitch?”

“I’m not your bitch,” Angela said.

Now, his voice getting all gentle again, he asked, “What’s that, mo croi?”

“Shut up.”

He laughed. “That’s funny,” he said. “I really like that, mo croi.”

Angela sat at the kitchen table and started taking off her wet shoes.

“Food, now!” he roared.

“You could’ve ordered in something yourself,” she said.

“And have a delivery boy come up here and ID me? It’s all on the news and shite. They’re talking about how that cop
you
brought up here is missing and they got a cartoon of me in the paper, tis the spit of me too. That Chinese hoor informed on me arse, the one I dumped that jewelry on in Chinatown. What if the cop I did told other cops he was following you last night? I’ve been sitting here all day, waiting for the cops to show up — Jaysus, it’s worse than the Falls Road, waiting for the Brit patrols.”

“I told you you shouldn’t sell that jewelry.”

“Well, I did and get this right in yer dumb head, you don’t
tell
me dick. You have two jobs, and both begin with f. One is food.”

“Fuck you.”

“Yeah, and that’s the other one.”

“If we wind up in jail now it’s because you sold that jewelry.”

He got up suddenly, a bad sign, and said, “I don’t do jail, get that?”

There was something in his voice. “That’s it,” Angela said. “I’ve had it.”

She marched past Dillon and went into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her. He banged on the door, demanding that she come out, going, “Where the hell’s me dinner?” Angela covered her ears with her hands and sat down on the toilet seat, squeezing her eyes shut.

He was pounding on the door, now saying, “I’m too hungry for this shite. I’m going to ring for some takeout but you have to go to the door to pay for it. I’m not kiddin’ yah.”

Angela turned on the shower to drown him out, but it didn’t work till she got in. As long as she kept her head under the water, his ranting was just part of the white noise.

When she came out, wrapped in a towel, Dillon was still in his underwear, now watching a basketball game.

Noticing the layers of Band-Aids over the bottom of Dillon’s right foot, Angela said, “Did you put peroxide on that like I told you to?”

“You addressing me?” Dillon asked.

“Yeah, I’m talking to you,” Angela said. “Why wouldn’t I talk to you?”

Dillon went back to watching TV. He muttered along with the play-by-play, “Move yer ass mothfookers,” trying to sound like a New Yorker.

“So?” Angela said, putting on a bra. “Did you or didn’t you put peroxide on that?”

“Couldn’t be bothered,” he said.

Angela leaned forward, taking a closer look at the foot.

“You probably need a shot for that, you know, or you’ll catch tetanus.”

“I’ll catch anorexia if I don’t get me grub,” he said.

Angela finished getting dressed — putting on jeans and a black T-shirt with “My Boyfriend’s Out of Town” in red across the front. She sat down on the bed next to Dillon and rested a hand on his lap. For a while there was silence except for the sports commentator babbling, then
Dillon said, “I was watching
South Park
before and Kenny is dead again, you see that one?”

“I think so,” Angela said.

The food arrived and Angela and Dillon sat on the bed together eating the shrimp lo mein and barbecued spare ribs directly from the cartons. Finally, Angela decided it was a good time to break the bad news.

“Something happened today,” she said, “but before I tell you you have to promise not to get mad at me.”

“What?”

“You have to promise.”

“What is it?”

“You’re gonna get angry,” Angela said. “I can tell it already.”

“Just tell me what the fook it is, you’re spoiling me dinner.” Christ, she thought, she never saw a man eat so much and still stay skinny as a wet rodent.

Dillon’s nostrils flared. He looked the same way he did before he stabbed that cop.

“All right,” Angela said. “Remember how I told you I was with my boss last night at that hotel?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Well something happened that we didn’t know about. Something that could be bad.”

“Stop whining and tell me what it is.”

“Well, there was this guy,” Angela said, “and he took some pictures of us.”

“You mean like a Guard?”

“No, not a cop — definitely not a cop. He was in a wheelchair and — anyway, he came to the office today and he showed the pictures to Max.”

“What were the pictures of?” Dillon asked.

“Just of us, you know... in bed together.”

“So? What’s he going to do with them, beside play with his own self?”

“If the police see them it’ll show that me and Max were together, that we could’ve planned the murder.”

“But the police haven’t got the pictures, the gimp in the wheelchair does.”

“That’s where the bad part comes in. He wants money for them. A lot of money.”

“You mean he’s trying to blackmail you?”

“He’s trying to blackmail Max.”

“And you’re sure this fooker isn’t a Guard?”

“I don’t know what he is,” Angela said, remembering again how Bobby Rosa had looked at her. “But Max thinks it’s a big problem. He wanted me to get you to get rid of him.”

Dillon sat calmly for a few seconds and Angela thought, Hey, that wasn’t too bad. Then he suddenly threw his carton of food against the wall on the other side of the room. Angela covered her ears as Dillon stood up and kicked the top of the TV set with his right foot, then roared as the pain hit his already inflamed sole. He said, “You’re going to get the hiding of yer life, you hoor’s ghost!”

Dillon began hitting her in the face, slapping her with his open hands. Angela didn’t know how she got out of the apartment. She ran down the stairs, nearly tripping several times. She walked toward Second Avenue, not realizing for several minutes that she was barefoot.

She went into the Rodeo Bar, on Second Avenue and Twenty-eighth Street. She sat at the dingy half-empty bar and then realized she had no money. She told the bartender she was “waiting for a friend” and stared at the hockey game on TV.

She became aware of a guy sitting on the stool next to her. He was young, around twenty-three, in a business suit and she saw a couple of other guys — his friends — giggling to each other. The guy said, “Hey, is this Woodstock or something?”

Angela was confused for a second then realized he was making fun of her for being barefoot.

“Just leave me the feck alone, yeh arsehole!”

The guy, looking terrified, went back to his friends.

Angela left the bar and headed toward home. She approached her apartment building, hoping Dillon had calmed down a little. Food and weed usually took his edge off, but she knew it was only a matter of time before he really lost it. Then she thought about Bobby Rosa again. The guy was really into her — that much was obvious. And, yeah, he was in a wheelchair, but there was something about him that made her think he could take care of himself. But could he take care of Dillon?

Angela didn’t have the key to her apartment. She kept ringing the buzzer, but Dillon wouldn’t answer it. Finally, after nearly an hour, someone leaving the building let her in and she went upstairs. The door to her apartment was open.

Dillon was sitting on the bed, watching videos and reading his damn Zen book. He said, “I wouldn’t go in that bathroom if I were you. That fookin Chinese food, it was off.”

Angela went to the fridge and poured herself a glass of soda.

Dillon said, “While I was in there on the bowl, shittin’ out me organs, I was thinking this guy in the wheelchair is our problem too. I don’t trust that bollix, Max. If he cracks, he’s taking us down with him. You know that, right?”

Angela didn’t answer.

Dillon said, “So my question is how much should I charge?”

“Charge?”

Dillon glared at her like she was stupid.

“For blasting a guy in a wheelchair.”

Muggers are plain creepy.

D
UANE
S
WIERCZYNSKI

Max said to Kamal, “Have you ever had herpes?”

They were in Max’s kitchen where Kamal was busy cooking Max’s macrobiotic meals for the rest of the week. Three pots were going on the stove and Kamal was chopping up beets and potatoes.

“Herpes?” Kamal said pausing with the cutting knife in his right hand. “Why do you ask that?”

“No reason,” Max said. “I mean it’s not like I think you’re gonna infect the food or anything like that. It was just something that was on my mind.”

“No,” Kamal said, still looking confused. “I do not have any venereal diseases.”

“Ah-ha,” Max said. “So you haven’t been tested for herpes.”

“No, I do not believe so. Unless it was part of my regular physical examination.”

“Very interesting,” Max said. “Very very interesting.”

Now Max was almost one hundred percent sure that the little Indian guy had been banging Deirdre, probably had been banging her for some time. The last time Max had had sex with her must have been three or four months ago and he must have caught the virus then.

“You can just admit it,” Max said.

“Admit what?” Kamal asked.

“That you and Deirdre were, you know... a couple. Don’t worry, I won’t fire you or anything like that.”

“I have no idea what you are talking about,” Kamal said.

“Come on,” Max said, “you think I’m blind? I saw how much time you and Deirdre spent together. It’s obvious you two were very close.”

“I admired your wife a great deal,” Kamal said, “but I could never imagine having relations with her.”

“Not even one time,” Max said, “just for the hell of it?”

“I’m offended that you would even ask me such a thing. I am a Sikh from Punjab — we are very spiritual people. We don’t sleep with other men’s wives, not even if we wanted to, and I did not want to sleep with your wife. No offense but, western women, they have a peculiar odor — it’s from eating meat perhaps. I like the smell of curry and spices, if you can understand.”

Max stared at him deadpan, thinking, Is this guy for real?

Then Max demanded, “You swear to God?”

“Why should I—”

“If you didn’t do anything you shouldn’t have a problem swearing to God about it.”

Kamal slid the potatoes and beets into the steamer then said, “I do not believe in God the same way you do.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Max said. “Then do you swear to the Buddha about it?”

“The Buddha does not ask anything to swear to it. The Buddha is not a singular being or concept. The Buddha is all things.”

Max picked up a plate and held it up. He said, “Fine, so let’s say this plate is the Buddha. Do you swear to this plate that you never banged my wife?”

Kamal looked at Max like he was crazy, then said, “I did not do anything with your wife. I’m giving you my word which should be enough, now please, do not say any more disrespectful things about the Buddha. It is very, very hurtful to me.”