“Hey, big guy,” Amy answered. “How’s that Belvedere treating you?”
No reply.
“Domino? You there?”
No reply.
“Did you drunk dial me, mister?” she said with a smile. “Hellooo?”
Still nothing.
She hung up, tempted to phone him back. Except this was not the first time he’d called her and hung up without saying hello. It had happened a few times before, in fact. He’d later confessed that he’d been too drunk to talk, but needed to hear her voice. Needed to hear that she was safe so he could relay the message to Patrick at the time. Amy never once questioned it. Just smiled and took his hand and said, “You can hang up on me anytime,” to which Domino let loose his trademark laugh that shook the house.
Amy smiled at the memory and decided not to call him back.
• • •
Domino flopping, bleeding profusely, feeling as though his body belonged to someone else, found his cordless phone. He tried and failed three times at first, fingers too slick with blood, hands too weak and uncooperative with whatever drug Kelly had given him.
Please, he begged his body.
On the fourth try, he got Amy.
“Hey, big guy. How’s that Belvedere treating you?”
Domino opened his mouth to speak. Only blood escaped. He could not even manage a moan this time.
“Domino? You there?”
He tried to speak again and had even less success than before. His vision was a narrowing tunnel.
“Did you drunk dial me, mister?”
Domino started crying. No sound, just steady streams of tears down his cheeks.
“Hellooo?”
Patrick…I’m sorry…
Amy hung up.
11
Kathy Brown, aka Kat, aka Aunt Kat, was waiting outside on the front steps of her cozy suburban home when her brother, Allan, pulled up. Her smile was bright and true, and when she stood she performed tiny jumps in place with little claps of her hands. Whether it was strictly a show for the girls in the back seat or genuine excitement at their arrival, Allan couldn’t have loved his sister any more because the girls started laughing and giggling at once, easing any misgivings he’d had about dropping them off for the night after their asking to stay home earlier that day.
The second Allan rolled the SUV to a stop out front, Jamie and Janine darted from the car and raced toward an open-armed Aunt Kat. Any other woman might have toppled from the impact of the twins’ charging embrace, but Kathy Brown was no stranger to fitness. Long brown hair eternally in a ponytail (Allan could not, for the life of him, recall the last time he’d seen her with it down) and always donning some sort of attire that would do in a pinch if a workout fix beckoned (tonight’s was black sweats and a black tee that showed off her sinewy arms), Kathy clearly had made exercise her stress-buster of choice. And although Allan was grateful it was something healthy, unlike his preferred method of scotch and saturated fats, such a thing could be overdone. And judging by the increasing vascularity and weight loss he noticed every subsequent time he saw his sister, his concerns were not without merit. Not so much for the fact that she may injure herself, but for the underlining cause of such excessiveness.
Never one to discuss her problems (depression, generalized anxiety disorder, and an ugly divorce from a douchebag of the highest order), Kathy was always the type to smile, pat your arm a little too hard, and insist “I’m fine, I’m fine” whenever you tried to get too deep. She was a world-class shrink when it came to talking about Allan, but when it came to herself, not a chance. It simply wasn’t her way. The gym was her way. And Allan had noticed once again, as he had each successive time prior, that she looked even thinner than before, more veiny than before. Ironically, unhealthy. He would file this away for another time. Although he supposed he might as well file it in the trash for all the success he would likely end up having in getting anywhere with her when the time came.
Aunt Kat held and squeezed her “Kittens,” firing off a million things at once: Tell me about school. How was your sleepover? You’re getting taller every day. Any boyfriends yet? And so on.
Allan, whose chauffeur duties apparently now extended to those of bellhop, reached into the back seat and pulled out both girls’ overnight bags, slinging them over one shoulder with a grunt.
“Yeah, no worries, girls; I’ve got everything,” he called to them.
The twins spun and ran to their father to retrieve their things. Kathy laughed her raspy laugh.
“Go on inside, there’s a surprise waiting for you,” Kathy said to her nieces when they returned with their overnight bags.
“What is it?” Janine asked.
“Go in and see,” Kathy replied.
The girls started to bolt for the front door.
“WAIT!” Allan called. Christ, how many times had he said that to them today? He marveled at the resiliency of children. Every emotion he’d experienced today still clung to him like something sticky he couldn’t quite wash off. The girls had had their share of emotion too—the talk of their mother and cancer in the car; the wanting to attend tonight; watching their father lose it when getting a ticket—but right now their whole world resided in the mystery surprise from Aunt Kat lying in wait behind her front door. Nothing else existed. Allan wanted to bottle this resiliency for use with his girls at a later date. For when that moment he was ruminating over earlier, about discussing the death of their mother, finally hit. The one that would make “The Talk” seem like a cakewalk.
And for himself.
Allan would love to bottle the stuff for himself. Hell, he’d walk around with it in a paper bag, taking pulls from it every ten minutes like some kind of drunk.
The girls, hearing their father’s cry, turned and froze a few feet from their aunt Kat’s front door.
“There is no way you are going inside that house without saying goodbye to your father,” he said to them.
Kathy smiled at the scene.
The girls immediately spun and ran back toward their father, hugging him simultaneously. Allan’s throat tightened. His heart swelled.
“I love my Deejays,” he said.
“We love you too,” they returned somewhat robotically, though Allan took zero offense. Nothing else existed except for the mystery surprise waiting for them behind Aunt Kat’s door, he reminded himself. And he would sacrifice a thousand love you too’s to give them this moment time and time again. A moment free of everything and anything but the here and now.
He then wondered about himself. What would it take for him to be momentarily free of everything and anything? To bask in the here and now? A hell of a lot more than a little surprise from his sister; that was for damn sure.
“Gimme a kiss,” he said, bending and kissing his girls one at a time. He then patted them on their butts and said: “Okay, go.”
They dashed for their aunt Kat’s front door once again, not to be denied by their father’s increasingly habitual wait! this time.
Kathy turned to Allan after watching the girls disappear through her front door and said: “So how’s things, ding-a-ling?”
Allan smiled. “Like I said on the phone, one day at a time. What’s the surprise you got them?”
Kathy waved a hand at her brother. “Just junk. Candy, toys. So, what’s happening tonight?”
Allan shrugged. “The usual. Grief-stricken people sharing grief. Catharsis has a weird sense of humor.”
He expected a chuckle from his sister, but got a concerned face in return. “You look tired,” she said.
“I am tired. I just had half the girls from my daughters’ elementary school stay the night at my house.”
Still no chuckle, but she did smile. “What kind of turnout are you expecting tonight?” she asked.
He shrugged again. “It fluctuates. Some people go once and can’t handle it, never show up again. Others show and get hooked, become regulars.”
He paused there for a moment, thought
about telling his sister the conversation he’d had with the girls earlier that day, but decided against it. The devil in him was all too keen to let the filterless mouths of his daughters bombard his sister with such queries about the content of the evening’s meeting and why they weren’t allowed to attend, see whether she could exercise her way out of that one. But of course he knew she’d be just fine. It was about someone else, after all, not her.
“Aaannnd…?” Kathy crooned, waiting on her brother like the dog-eared paperback he was to her.
“And nothing,” he said, wanting to punch her in the gut like they were kids again for her knowing him so well, although truth be told, she had delivered most of the gut-punching growing up.
“Well, it’s good that you’re a regular,” she said. “It must help.”
“It doesn’t hurt. Commiserating doesn’t have to be a one-way street, you know,” he said, bracing himself after such a passive-aggressive dig, memories of childhood gut-punches being mere moments ago and all.
“There’s that humor again, little brother,” she said, patting his face gently, each pat becoming increasingly harder until she whacked him a good, albeit harmless, one. “Remember to never lose it.”
Allan laughed and rubbed his cheek. “Make sure they do their homework. You sure you don’t mind taking them tomorrow?”
“Would you shut up?”
He smiled and started for his car. “Take care of my girls.”
“My Kittens are always safe with me,” she said. Then: “I hope tonight goes well. I hope you get some new faces.”
“We’ll see.”
12
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Kensington Avenue
Only Jennifer paced the room of the apartment. Tim and Michael were far too sick, lying back to back in fetal balls on the room’s solitary mattress, sweating, shivering, moaning. No less sick, Jennifer’s violent tendencies did not allow her to just lie and moan, waiting for their fix to arrive. She was more apt to stomp around the decrepit apartment, kicking and smashing what few items they had. Or what few items the true residents had. No one knew who the house truly belonged to. They’d managed to squat here for over a week now, undisturbed. The small girl with the long dark hair had found it for them. Told them to hole up there and wait for her arrival each day as opposed to going on the street for it.
Except now she was late. She was late, and Jennifer, periodically pulling long swaths of black hair from the self-inflicted thinning patch on the side of her head, was not pleased.
“Fuck this. Fuck this, man. She said three. Didn’t she say three? She said three, right?”
“What time is it?” Tim said in a weak voice from the mattress.
“I don’t know. Do you know? I don’t fucking know. It’s gotta be close to three though, right?” She kicked the mattress. Both men moaned in protest. “Right?”
Michael rolled his head over the side of the mattress and vomited. Rolled back and assumed the same fetal position as though he’d done nothing. Neither Jennifer nor Tim seemed to care.
“If she wants us to do this thing for her tonight, no fucking way am I doing it sick,” Jennifer said. “No fucking way. She can’t expect us to do it sick. She can’t. She wants us to be right for this? She wants us to be right? We can’t be sick. She can’t expect us to be sick. No way. No fucking way.” She pulled more hair from the side of her head and then absently flicked her fingers back and forth, the long strands falling to the floor.
An agonizing moment passed. Shivering, sweating, vomiting.
Jennifer picked up one of their only two chairs and threw it across the room. “She’s got five minutes,” she said. “Five minutes or I’m going on the street for it.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Michael said. He had vomit on his cheek. “Any shit you get out there will pale to what she’s been bringing us.”
Jennifer approached the mattress. “I’m saying for now. Just for now. Until she arrives. We get something just for now to hold us over. Just for now.”
Neither guy responded. Jennifer kicked the mattress again. Both men moaned in protest again.
“Look at you two, laying there like a couple of pussies. Big tough guys when you’re all fixed up, aren’t you? Look at you now.” She kicked the mattress. “Look at you now.” Kick. “Look at you now.” Kick.
“Fucking stop!” Tim yelled.
There was a knock at the door. Tim and Michael sat up.
Jennifer rushed for the door and opened it.
Kelly Blaine walked in. She was not alone.
“Who’s this?” Jennifer demanded, gesturing to the disheveled man standing beside Kelly. The man looked as if he hadn’t slept in days, eaten in weeks, bathed in months.
Kelly said nothing, just stepped deeper into the apartment with the disheveled man at her heels like a puppy.
“Boys,” Kelly said, gesturing to Tim and Michael on the mattress. “You’re looking well.”
“Fuck you, man,” Tim said. “We’ve been waiting forever.”
Kelly’s eyebrows bounced. “Fuck me? Maybe I should come back when you’re feeling more polite.”
“No!” Michael rolled off the mattress and found his feet. He stood hunched over, clutching his stomach, his dark hair soaked with sweat, complexion a ghostly white. He spun toward Tim. “Tim, shut the fuck up!” Spun back to Kelly. “He didn’t mean it. Seriously, we just need a little something, is all. He didn’t mean it, right, Tim?”
Tim was on his feet now, his sickly posture and appearance identical to that of Michael’s minus the dark hair. Tim’s hair was blond and thinning, the abundance of sweat accentuating the diffuse loss throughout his scalp. He began nodding vehemently, forcing a smile that appeared like a grimace.
“Yeah, totally,” Tim said. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
Kelly pulled a cigarette from her long black overcoat and lit it with a black Zippo. She kept the tiny lid of the lighter open for a moment and exhaled a long, thin stream of smoke into the Zippo’s trademark windproof flame, watching it flicker and shrink before it stood tall again. She finally glanced back at the two men before her. “You guys really don’t look so hot,” she said. “I’m beginning to have doubts about tonight.”
“We’ll be fine,” Michael said. “Hook us up and we’ll be fine.”
“Guaranteed,” Tim added.
Jennifer stepped in front of Tim and Michael and faced Kelly. “You’ve seen us when we’re fixed up. We’re good as gold, and you know it. You just gotta keep us fixed up is all. Just keep us fixed up.”
Kelly took a deep drag of her cigarette and looked away in thought. “I don’t know—I’m not sure how long this thing is going to run tonight. Could last well into the morning.”
“That’s fine,” Jennifer said. “It can last a week. We don’t give a shit. As long as we have enough to keep us good, we’ll go until you say when.”
Kelly gave a theatrical and pensive purse of the lips. “Yeah, I’m just—I don’t know…”
“What?” Michael said, running a shaking hand through his hair.
“I question that extra mile,” Kelly said.
“Huh?” Jennifer said.
“I question if you’re truly willing to go that extra mile for me like you promised you would.” She turned and looked at the unkempt man she’d arrived with. “I know Winston would. Isn’t that right, Winston?”
Winston nodded quickly, scratching his scalp hard enough to look as though he meant to draw blood.
“What?!” Jennifer said. “You can’t back out! You gave us your word! You promised we’d be fixed for months after it was over. You gave us your word!”
Kelly exhaled smoke and again donned the pensive purse of the lips. “Yeah, but…I guess I just feel like I need more convincing.”
“Anything,” Tim said. “We will do absolutely anything you ask us to.”
“Anything,” Jennifer echoed.
Kelly laughed. “And a junkie’s word is always so reliable.
Especially when they need a fix.”
Michael spit on the floor. “We could rush you and take it,” he said. “You’ve got it on you now, right? What’s stopping us from rushing you and taking it?”
Kelly laughed again. “You could do that. But what about tomorrow? You wanna go on the street for stuff that’s one-tenth as good as what I’ve been giving you?”
“No, we don’t,” Tim said. “Michael, shut the FUCK up. He’s not speaking for me, Kelly.”
“Or me,” Jennifer said.
Michael spit again, spun, and went toward the window, a dirty cracked pane that looked down on a dirty cracked street.
“Anything,” Jennifer reiterated.
“Please,” Tim said.
Kelly looked over toward Michael, who was still staring out the window, down into the lawless and unreliable streets below. “Michael?” she said.
Michael faced the group. “I’m sorry. My head’s fucked. I don’t feel right. Anything you want. Anything.”
Kelly nodded. “I brought Winston up here with the promise of a fix,” she said. “And he may get it too. He may get what I’d intended to give all three of you. Enough to last him days.” Kelly dropped her cigarette to the floor and stubbed it out with her toe. “That is, unless you beat him to death first.”
All four addicts exchanged twitchy looks.
“Beat him with what?” Jennifer asked.
“Beat him to death,” Kelly corrected.
“Beat him to death with what?”
Kelly surveyed the room. “I see a chair, a table, ash trays, needles…” She gave a little shrug. “Surprise me.”
All four stood frozen.
Kelly smiled, went into her overcoat and brandished a generous bag of heroin. “Convince me how serious you are,” she said to Jennifer, Tim, and Michael. Then to Winston: “You too, Winston, old boy.” Then to all of them: “Winner gets to chase one hell of a dragon.”
Bad Games- The Complete Series Page 79
