Moonlight Rises

by Vincent Zandri

  The bed sheets have been ripped away, the mattress ripped open in several places with a blade. Same for the box spring, which has been removed and is now leaning up on its side against a far wall. A nightstand has been tipped onto its side next to the smashed clock radio it used to support, and the dresser drawers have all been pulled out, their contents—clothes, underwear, handkerchiefs, jewelry, Depend undergarments, and who the hell knows what else—tossed on the floor into a pile. Even Czech’s shoes—all either loafers or specially-made adult Velcro models—have been examined.

  What the hell kind of box are the Obamas looking for?

  Of course, the desk hasn’t been spared a good ransacking. The drawers have been opened, their contents dumped out. Same with the rolling drawers on a giant metal filing cabinet, their files and their contents spilled everywhere. Some black and white banker’s boxes, like the kind my dad used to store the funeral parlor’s tax records in, have been yanked from the closet and dumped.

  I have to wonder about the banker’s boxes.

  Is a banker’s box the kind of box the Obamas have been talking about?

  “Think they found what they were looking for, Moon?” Georgie poses.

  “The mysterious zippy or flesh box,” I say, a little under my breath. “I’m listening to my built-in shit detector, Georgie, and I’m voting no. No way the flip would have been this thorough otherwise.”

  But something else is wrong with this scene and if I know Georgie as well as I think I do, I know he can sense it, too. Together we look into one another’s eyes, and swim in the weighted silence.

  Until Georgie breaks it by telling me he has a quick story he wants to share.

  “There was this guy,” he begins, “went to his doctor complaining of migraine headaches. Said he got them every day. He couldn’t work, couldn’t function, couldn’t eat or drink. Guy’s life was just a total wreck. So, the doc examines him, determines he’s got a rare disease. His testicles are positioned too close to his spine. They’re pressing up against his nerves, causing the headaches. The only cure, of course, would be total testicular extraction. Guy with the headaches was in such pain, he agreed to emergency surgery.

  “He wakes up from the operation and never before has he felt so good. So good, in fact, he wants to treat himself to a custom-tailored suit upon his hospital release. So, he heads to an expensive Jewish tailor. Jewish tailor gives him one looks and says, 44 long. The guy is amazed at how knowledgeable the old tailor is. Tailor looks him over further, says, 38/14 for the shirt and 34/34 for the trousers. The guy is just positively floored at how much this old dude knows. But then the tailor says, for underwear, 36 or 38. The guy says, No way, sir, I’m a 34. No, no insists the tailor, on you, 34s would be so tight they’d press your balls up against your spine.”

  Georgie laughs. But there’s a lesson to be learned here, no doubt. Just because something appears to be broke doesn’t mean it’s actually broken.

  “Take a look here, Moon,” he says, reaching into the top drawer on the file cabinet. “I’m nearly six feet and I have trouble reaching all the way into back of this thing. How the hell was Czech going to do it from a wheelchair?”

  “Plus, those bankers’ boxes up on the top shelf of the closet. He couldn’t exactly have climbed a stepladder.”

  “The dishes in the kitchen cabinets, the books on the bookshelf, the pills in the medicine cabinet…all unreachable for a guy who’s in essence not even three feet tall.”

  We head back into the kitchen, take one more look around. In the adjoining vestibule is a closet that we haven’t opened yet. I go to it, open the door.

  “Czech is more than just a traitor,” I say.

  “Explain,” Georgie pushes.

  “I think he’s perfectly capable of walking,” I say, staring down at his unoccupied wheelchair.

  Chapter 39

  There are explanations, of course, for how a disabled man can have boxes stored on the top shelf of his closet and files of papers in the top drawer of his filing cabinet. There are logical reasons why he’d have meds, plates, and drinking glasses stored in areas he can’t reach, just as there are valid explanations why he might have boxes stored in an otherwise empty basement. The most obvious explanation is that Czech has someone help him from time to time. Perhaps even regular help on a daily basis. Many handicapped persons, no matter how independent, depend upon the assistance of others just to get through a single routine day.

  Which is exactly how I explain it to Georgie while getting back inside his Beetle. And Georgie, being a medical man by trade, couldn’t agree more.

  He turns the engine over, throws the manual tranny into first.

  “But how do you explain the wheelchair?” he poses.

  “If he’s lying about who he is,” I answer, “then I guess he doesn’t need it. At least, he doesn’t need it in private. Or maybe he’s got more than one chair. Or it’s possible he was kidnapped without it by the same people who roughed up his house. The Russian Obamas no doubt upon orders from Grandpa Rose.”

  “Which leaves us where?”

  I never get a chance to answer before the bullet pierces the rear and front windshields.

  Chapter 40

  Georgie slams his right foot flat on the gas, the tires spitting dirt and gravel. “Kiss the rubber mats, Moon!”

  I drop down as far into the well as I can, the cold gunmetal on the 9mm pressed against my right cheek. I’m not a big guy. But I’m not Yoda either, and I immediately begin to cramp up in the tight space.

  They—the Russians—must have been watching us scope out Czech’s crib, hoping that we’d uncover what they apparently could not: a box filled with something important.

  Georgie’s speeding down the private drive unaware of what awaits him at the end. That much I know for sure. I poke my head up enough to get a shot off and at the same time make out a big black GMC with tinted windows, a single hand exposed out the passenger-side window, a good old-fashioned silenced Uzi attached to the hand.

  The Uzi spits fire and a couple of rounds take out the back windshield. I drop myself flat onto Georgie’s lap.

  “Faster!” Me shouting.

  “Fuck do you want me to go?!”

  He starts spinning circles on the lawn at the end of the drive.

  Another burst of fire and my driver’s side window explodes.

  “Twenty years of tender loving care!” Georgie shouts. “Not another Beetle like this in the world except for on the Abbey Road album cover!”

  He pushes me off.

  “Fuck are you doing?!”

  Another burst of rounds sink into the flat, metal VW dash.

  “Enough!” Georgie barks. Crazy old bastard stops the Beetle in the middle of the lawn, that big black soccer-mom GMC bearing down on us like one of Rommel’s Tiger Tanks. Georgie pulls back on the emergency brake, opens the door, gets out. What he does next is nothing short of miraculous and suicidal.

  With only the open door to protect him, he stands his ground.

  “Fuck with me, but not my ride!” he shouts, rounds pinging against the door, and churning up grass and dirt.

  He then proceeds to raise his Smith & Wesson slowly, calmly, left hand clutching his right wrist, combat position. Finger pressed against the trigger, he empties the entire clip into the GMC, stopping it dead in its tracks.

  When it’s over, a heavy quiet fills the air.

  Off in the distance can be heard the sound of cruiser sirens. I know the sound well. I was a cop once. A good one. Before my head got scrambled. We have to haul ass out of here. Do it now.

  I crawl out of the Beetle, stand up. Maybe too fast. My head starts spinning. I’ve experienced that same sensation before. The world spinning at my feet, the feel of my body lifting off the ground. The feeling of utter weightlessness. Not exactly my soul leaving my body again—more like I’m about to lose consciousness. My brain, it isn’t right. Under stress, the blood speeding t
hrough the veins and capillaries swells my brain around that piece of .22 caliber bullet.

  Moonlight tilts.

  I raise my automatic to try to give Georgie some backup as he approaches the now quiet GMC on foot.

  It’s the last thing I remember before passing out.

  Chapter 41

  In the dream, you’re dead.

  Big surprise there.

  You’re floating over a mechanical bed inside a private hospital room. The room is white and brightly lit with angelic rays and bursts of brilliant sunlight. Your body is laid out on its back in the bed. You have this smile planted on your face like you’re happy to finally get the hell out.

  Standing by your side is Lola. She’s dressed in a long white gown, her long, lush dark hair draping her face like a black veil. Covering her eyes are those round Jackie O sunglasses. Tears are streaming down her face, and she’s holding tightly to your hand.

  When the door opens, a second person enters the room. It’s Some Young Guy. He’s faceless again, his face not really a face, but an oval-shaped blur or a mask. He stands on the opposite side of you, looking down upon your prone, motionless body. He then reaches his right hand over you as if offering it to Lola. She drops your hand and takes his. That’s when Some Young Guy reaches into his pants pocket with his free hand, pulls out a big white diamond engagement ring. He slips the ring onto Lola’s finger.

  “Will you marry me?”

  “I will,” she answers, her face lit up like a glowing moonbeam. “I will. I will. I will.”

  Together, they consummate their new vow with a long, slow kiss, directly over your shattered corpse.

  When I come to, there’s a man lying on the grass beside me. Guy’s kicking up a storm, and trying to scream, but Georgie’s stuffed a rag in his mouth. The rag he uses to check the Beetle’s oil level with.

  Subdued Guy is dressed in black and his ankles and wrists are bound behind his back with the same plastic portable Hefty Bag cuffs that I used to apply to drunk and disorderly perps back when I was still a cop. The guy is about average height but big. Stocky. Maybe five-nine or ten. Two hundred-twenty pounds if I have to guess. Big enough that I can’t imagine how all one-hundred-sixty pounds of skin-and-bones Georgie managed to subdue him. But when I see the old pathologist kneel down and zap the man with the stun gun, I’m no longer kept in the dark.

  Georgie spots me. “Moon! You blacked out.”

  Oh yeah, I blacked out.

  Cop sirens off in the distance. Getting louder by the half second.

  A big guy lying beside me.

  Stun guns and real guns.

  Oh, yeah, a shootout. I was in a shootout. Just a minute ago. Behind a house. Peter Czech’s house. Shootout, behind the house. A black GMC with tinted windows. Russians. Russians who want something. A box.

  Sirens.

  The cops getting closer. Lying there on the grass, I estimate their ETA to be no more than a few minutes. It tells me I’ve been passed out for only a few seconds at most.

  “Can you get up, Moon?”

  I lift myself up, feeling that familiar resettling sensation that my brain always experiences after an episode. Kind of like the weights drawing back on a doll’s eyes when you stand her upright, while your brain reboots all of its memory programs. Let me try and remember, did I save my settings before logging off? Or did my brain save my settings for me?

  “What are we gonna do with him?” I pose in a groggy voice.

  “He’s our leverage and our navigator,” Georgie answers. “Help me stuff the son of a bitch into the back of the Beetle.”

  “We can’t just take the GMC?”

  Georgie shoots me a look.

  “There’s a dead driver in there and blood and brain matter, and the freaking police are on their way. Any more questions?”

  I know better than to argue with my big brother, even if this is my show.

  Me being the physically bigger man, I grab hold of the goon’s shoulders, while Georgie grabs hold of his legs. Dropping him onto the back seat, we push and shove his stocky body into the cramped space with all the grace and finesse of a pair of slaughterhouse butchers. It’s like packing two pounds of shit into a one-pound barrel and both Georgie and I scrape the backs of our hands and bruise the tops of our skulls getting it done.

  Before we bolt the scene, Georgie grabs the thug’s Uzi, aims it directly at the windshield of the GMC, and fingers off the remainder of the clip. The entire glass plate explodes, along with what’s left of the driver’s head. He then wipes the weapon of prints and brings it back with him to the Beetle. Lifting up the still catatonic goon’s hand, Georgie presses the guy’s fingers and palm against the weapon, making sure to leave some noticeable print impressions. Then the old pathologist tosses the still smoking weapon to the ground.

  Hopping back behind the wheel, Georgie revs the engine.

  I barely make it into the passenger seat before the tires resume spitting grass and gravel.

  Chapter 42

  Georgie doesn’t opt for the easy, take-the-long-way-home, kind of smooth mobile escape. Instead he motors the Beetle through a small patch of woods located on the opposite side of the private drive. The car rocks and rolls and scrapes and pounds its way through the thick brush until we come to the other side, which turns out to be some poor suburbanite’s backyard.

  Georgie never pauses to contemplate going around the yard. Instead he throws the tranny into fourth gear and motors right on past the swing set and the clothesline.

  Who the hell still uses a fucking clothesline?

  He makes for the front yard, speeding across the manicured lawn and then jumping the curb back onto the quiet suburban street.

  My head is still reeling.

  I’m not feeling dizzy anymore. I know the danger of passing out again is all but gone. But I also recognize something else happening inside me. It isn’t a physical sensation, so much as a transformation. A temporary loss of bearing. Like a captain piloting a rudderless boat in thick fog.

  What’s just happened?

  A gunfight…Roger that…Check.

  Outside Peter Czech’s house…Check.

  Dead people inside a black GMC…Dead Russians…Check.

  Russians want a box…Check.

  Cops chasing us…Check and double check.

  I look down at my lap, at the 9mm gripped there. I have no idea how it got there. I only know that it’s mine, and that it’s a good thing that I’m still holding it.

  We head north on Route 9 toward the city, Georgie taking it easy, to not attract unwanted attention.

  No more sirens.

  No sign of the police behind us, beside us, or ahead of us.

  Check and triple check.

  “Georgie,” I say, after a time, “who exactly is the dude in the back seat again?”

  “Oh shit,” he says. “Short term memory kicking out on you.”

  Short term memory. Let’s review today’s headlines, shall we?

  Russians want a box…Roger that and check.

  Gunfight in back of a house…Check.

  Whose house?

  Shit, whose house?

  Wheelchair, Blackberry in hand, thin mustache, one pint Jack and Coke…

  Peter Czech. Czech’s house…Check.

  Gun in my hand. Oh yeah. Gunfight. Check.

  OK, Moonlight, get your shit together.

  I’m not sure how to put this delicately, but beneath my gun, my lap has grown stiff and full. I’m sporting a road boner…and damn if it isn’t in some painful need of relief.

  Concussions…Check.

  Multiple concussions…Check.

  Concussions on top of a bullet frag lodged in brain…Check.

  Declared dead just days ago…Check.

  Brought back to life. Double and triple check.

  “Take a breath,” Georgie insists. “It’s the concussion. Your memory will come back to you. Trust me.”<
br />
  My memory. It always comes back to me. So do these boners.

  Behind us, the guy jammed down into the back seat squirms like a gut-shot rabbit. He starts kicking the seat and screaming into his oil-rag gag.

  The Jimmy Dean in my pants is getting huge. Too big for the Beetle.

  But that doesn’t stop the need for immediate relief.

  “Listen,” I say, “you gotta stop off at the gas station or something. I mean it.”

  I nod down at my lap, lift the cold hard steel of the 9mm just enough to reveal the hot hard flesh that’s pushing up my pants. Meanwhile, the guy in back is pounding on the Beetle wall and kicking the crap out of our seatbacks. Reaching into his leather jacket, Georgie pulls out the stun gun. While keeping his eyes on the road, he thrusts the business end of the stun gun against the big man’s ribs. The electrical jolt puts him back out.

  Now it’s me who’s squirming, feeling like I’m about to explode.

  “What you’re experiencing,” Georgie the retired pathologist explains. “In your head. In your pants. It’s temporary.” He can’t resist a giggle.

  Cops are likely on our ass, and I, a forty-eight-year-old man, am sporting a raging road boner, like a kid on the school bus.

  “Pull over, Georgie. I’m fucking telling you, dude.”

  He yanks into a Mobile gas station, pulls around back near the dumpster to hide the Beetle. “Go do what you gotta do,” he says. “Just make it quicker than quick.”

  “Maybe they’ll let me borrow a Playboy off the rack,” I say, opening the door.

  “Penthouse is better. Go!”

  I get out of the car, head for the inside of the station and the privacy of the bathroom.

  How do you spell relief?

  Just ask Richard “Dick” Moonlight, Captain Head-Case.

  Chapter 43

  When I emerge from the gas station bathroom, Georgie has the radio on. I get in, sit down, pull the seatbelt around me, buckle it. The news report on the radio speaks of a shootout inside a suburban neighborhood. A man was discovered dead inside a GMC, the result of severe gunshot wounds. That’s when it all starts coming back to me in a less fuzzy, less punch-drunk way. The bits and fragments of short-term memory start making some sense.