Danny Boy twitches and gets up. He gives Lila a drooly smile and goes off on one of the bike trails.
Anthony doesn’t go right home. He circles around and follows Lila. If she knows, she doesn’t let on. She’s put the hood of her gray sweatshirt up over her head. He follows her right to her apartment building, to the side entrance, where the jerk with the mustache is standing at the door. They don’t see Anthony.
“Jeez,” the jerk says, “you got trouble again. He called nine-one-one and the cops just got here.”
“Fuck,” she says, and she goes inside and Anthony doesn’t see her anymore.
~ * ~
Late the next afternoon, after he does the grocery shopping for his grandmother and carries the bags up the stairs to the fourth floor for her, Anthony blades to Lila’s building. He waits for her, smoking a joint out of sight of the doorman.
A lot of people pass him, heading for the park across the street, loggers and hikers especially, and bladers. It’s spring and everyone’s out. Across the way the bushes all have yellow flowers.
A taxi stops and the doorman runs over to open the door. Lila jumps out and walks in Anthony’s direction. The doorman helps a tall, thin lady in a fitted suit and high heels get out. Lila’s mother, though Lila is small and wears baggy clothes so you can’t tell she’s not thin.
“Lila,” the tall lady says, “where are you going?”
“None of your business.” Under her breath Lila adds, “Bitch.”
“What do you want for dinner?” the tall lady asks, like Lila hasn’t talked back fresh to her.
“Leave me alone,” Lila shouts. “Don’t you see I’m talking to my friend?”
“Ask your friend if he wants to stay for dinner,” her mother says.
“He says he would rather die,” Lila says real loud. “Don’t you, Anthony?”
Her mother ducks her head like she’s embarrassed and goes into the building.
Anthony can’t imagine talking like that to his mother.
Lila makes him excited, like he’s on the edge, going to jump. He touches his cock, feels the swell. It feels good. He’s stopped taking his pills. He heard at the clinic they keep you from getting hard. He wants to be with her all the time.
Apricot tits. Little knobs of nipple that connect his tongue to his cock.
“Come on,” Lila says, grabbing his arm. “I gotta get my blades.”
She takes him into her building past the doorman and another man in a uniform.
“No Rollerblades,” the doorman calls to Anthony.
Anthony stops moving.
“Forget it,” Lila says. She shoves Anthony forward and he takes off on the smooth marble floor, barely able to stop himself from crashing into her mother and another woman in a hat waiting for the elevator. He bumps into a bench.
The woman in the hat makes a little noise. She stares at Lila.
“See something you like?” Lila says.
“You kids are out of control,” the woman says.
Lila comes up and barks like a dog right in the woman’s face. The woman backs off and doesn’t get on the elevator when the doors open.
“What is your friend’s name, Lila?”
“Puff Daddy,” Lila says.
“I thought you said Anthony,” her mother says.
“Anthony Puff Daddy.” Lila laughs, pokes Anthony so he laughs, too.
In daylight, the apartment looks like a museum.
“Would you like a Coke?” her mother asks.
“Puff Daddy and I are goin’ bladin’,” Lila says. She takes her blades from her backpack and puts them on.
“Lila, please don’t upset everyone in the building.”
“Why would I do that?” Lila says.
“Come home early,” her mother says. And while her mother continues with, “You know your father doesn’t like you to stay out late,” Lila mouths the same words, making monkey faces.
Anthony can’t get over it. She’s so free. If he could only be like her.
When they get to her bedroom, she pulls off her sweatshirt and grabs a fresh one just like it from a drawer. Her apricots are stiff. She stops. “You lookin’ at me?”
He cringes. “No.”
“What’s the matter? Aren’t they worth lookin’ at?”
He’s sweating. “Sure.”
She pulls the sweatshirt over her head. “Come here.”
He crosses to her, trying to conceal the lump in his pants.
“Closer.” He’s standing right up against her. His cock shivers. She lifts her baggy sweatshirt and pulls it over his head, her tits in his face. He grabs her ass. He’s in a dark place, her sweat salty on his tongue. Her knee nuzzles his cock. “Suck them,” she says.
He comes, goes limp.
“Schmuck! “ She pushes him away.
~ * ~
They blade through the park, drinking beer, and Lila says, “They’re always on my case, come home early, don’t do this, don’t do that.” She stops and yells at no one in particular, “We’re big trouble!” A middle-aged black woman pushing a white child in a stroller gives her a look, and Lila screams, “What you lookin’ at, nigger?”
The woman sits down on a bench. The child begins wailing.
Lila races off, Anthony follows. “My father called the cops on me once,” Lila says. “Didn’t think I was respectful enough.”
“So he called the cops?” Anthony’s shocked. “And the cops came?”
“I punched the stupid asshole out. That’s when they put me in rehab. A lotta good it did.”
It’s getting dark by the time they stop at the bandstand. The usual group is there. A couple of the guys are slap boxing, but like they’re loaded and they’re not moving too fast and not hitting hard.
“Got any grass, Lila?” one of the old hippies yells.
‘“Yeah,” she says. “Got any beer?”
“Not much.”
Anthony’s beeper goes off. He ignores it.
“Pass it around.” Lila gives Anthony the plastic bag from her backpack. He sees her backpack is full of money, tens and twenties.
“Hey, girl.” Danny Boy sits down next to Lila and throws his arm across her shoulder, offers her what’s left of his Colt .45 malt.
She tilts her head, but there’s hardly anything. She shoves the empty can at Danny Boy and takes out two twenties. “Anthony, get some beer.”
“I don’t have I.D.”
“What a nerd,” she says real loud to Danny Boy.
Anthony feels hot, dizzy, like he’s going to pass out.
Everyone is looking at him.
“Here.” She pushes the twenties at him. “Just do it. You know where. Give him the whole thing. Tell him it’s for me.”
Danny Boy laughs and raises his empty can at Anthony. “We’ll be right here when you get back.” Anthony wants to push it in his face.
His beeper goes off when he is leaving the park, and again at the deli.
The clerk at the deli gives him the eye. “Made you her slave I see.”
Anthony smacks the twenties down on the counter. The clerk hands over two six-packs. “Well, watch out for her. She’s a nut job.”
Lila’s not there when he gets back, and it’s real dark already. He thinks he’s going crazy. He goes from one to another, “Where is she? Where’d she go?”
“Get outta here, asshole,” one of the hippies says, giving him a push. “She’s been taking turns humping everybody.”
His beeper goes off, and they all start laughing.
“Try the lake,” one of the bikers tells him. “Saw her go that way with Danny Boy. But leave the beer.”
Anthony maneuvers his way down the stairs to the grassy slope leading to the lake. There are dim lights around the lake, but he can’t see anything. It’s like she disappeared. And with that old drunk. He’s not watching where he’s going and hits a stump and goes flying, lands on his back, wind knocked out.
“Where’s the beer?” Lila stands over him swi
nging her jeans. She’s wearing her baggy shirt, and that’s all. She sways and the moonlight makes her eyes glow.
“Left it back there.”
She drops her jeans on his face, puts a bare foot on his chest, and moves it around slowly. Then she straddles him. He touches her tentatively, her ass hard and soft at the same time. Just as he is, though he hasn’t taken his medication at all in the past week.
“Well, that’s the last we’ll ever see of it.”
She squeezes her thighs against him like she’s riding and he’s the horse. Her cunt wets through his shirt.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
She gets off him. “Let’s get some movies. We’ll drink my father’s shit.” She pulls her pants from his face, sits on him like he’s a bench, takes her blades out of her backpack, holds them out to him. “Do it.”
She has soft feet, like a baby, and short toes. He takes her toes in his mouth and sucks.
“I knew you were a perv,” she says, taking her feet from him. She puts on her blades herself, and starts off not too steady, calling back, “Well, you coming or not?”
At Blockbuster she picks out a couple of kung fu flicks and they go into her building by the side entrance, where the jerk is on the door. “Use the stairs,” he says.
Anthony takes off his blades, while Lila can’t make her fingers work right and tears at hers in a fury, can’t undo them, and gets angrier and angrier. “You got a knife? Cut them off me.” She claws at him. “You hear? Cut them off.”
He takes his knife, pops open the blade. She pulls it from his hands and hacks at the leather.
“You’re ruining them,” he says.
“Who cares?” Tearing the wrecked blades off, she drops them into the trash can near the back stairs and hands him his knife.
They climb twelve flights and at the back door she tells him to take off his high-tops. “Otherwise,” she says, “they’ll come out and tell me I can’t do this and I can’t do that, like I’m a prisoner.” She uses her key to get in. It’s a kitchen. The cleanest kitchen Anthony’s ever seen. Like no one eats in it.
She’s jumpy, throws the videos on her bed, starts going through her drawers, searching the floor of her closet. “You got any acid?”
Anthony shakes his head. He watches her acting crazy. She leaves the room and he waits. She’s making him jumpy, too. She comes back with a bottle of dark booze and takes a long swallow, then offers it to him. He takes a swallow, chokes, coughs, hands it back to her. Tastes terrible. He’s never had more than a beer.
“I gotta have acid,” she says. “Let’s get out of here.”
They’re back in the park near the bandstand, and there’s a big full moon giving off light and a crowd of the night people, many who work regular day jobs and have money for weed and booze and other stuff. He recognizes them now and they know him, because of Lila. He feels powerful because she’s singled him out to be with. They accept him now.
Someone passes them a sweet-smelling joint and they drink Zima and do acid, and he lies back on the steps and looks up at the moon, watching it expand and shrink and turn into a leering, snot-dripping face.
“Where’d you go, Lulu?” Danny Boy sits down next to Lila and throws his arm around her, like he owns her or something. “How about a little sugar?” He makes smacking sounds with his lips. He’s so drunk he can’t keep his head up, and he stinks of vomit.
Anthony feels Lila stiffen up next to him. She gives Danny Boy one of her bad looks. “That’s it,” she says. “We’re goin’ to the lake.” Anthony follows her, but can hardly feel his feet anymore, and she’s swinging and swaying like she feels the same as him.
Danny Boy gets up like she’s invited him to go along.
Nobody’s at the lake yet, but they will be because the cops will start coming around with the searchlights and drive everyone away from the bandstand. The surface of the lake is like one big dark mirror. Anthony stands at the edge and looks into it and it goes red and yellow and purple and ends up making him lose his balance.
“Watch out there, son.” Danny Boy grabs Anthony’s shirt. He’s so drunk, he leans into Anthony, slobbering, and Anthony pushes him away. There’s a ripping sound.
“You tore it,” Anthony says, looking at his shirt. Everything explodes in his head. His mom’ll kill him. He punches at Danny Boy, but the man is already on his knees.
“Slice him,” Lila yells. “Where’s your knife?”
Anthony takes his knife out, pops the blade. Danny Boy looks up at him, blinking in the moonlight. He tries to get to his feet, but falls down again.
“What’re you waitin’ for?” Lila screams.
Anthony has his arm low. He underhands the knife. The blade catches Danny Boy as the man comes up. Catches him in the gut. Danny Boy grabs hoid of the knife and struggles with Anthony, like he wants to keep it in his gut and Anthony’s trying to get it out. There’s blood flying, like it’s raining, and Danny Boy howls like a jungle animal. Magic music, is what it is, and when Anthony gets the knife out, he plunges it back in, and out, and in, keeping time to the music. It’s so good ... so good. So good. . . .
“Yes,” Lila sings. “Yes. Yes. Yes.”
Anthony shudders, his body jerks like he’s a spastic. The come collects in his pants.
Danny Boy goes over backward and doesn’t move. Anthony holds up the knife to the moon. The blade runs soft and red.
“Don’t stop, Anthony,” Lila says. “If we throw him in the lake, he’ll just float up and they’ll find him. We have to cut him up, take his insides out, then he’ll sink. I read it somewhere.”
Anthony’s confused. What’s she saying? His beeper goes off.
“Here.” She grabs the knife from him. “I’ll do it.” She’s going through Danny Boy’s pockets, pulling out wallet and papers. She empties the wallet, throws it and the papers into a trash basket, and follows it with a lit match. The trash basket bursts into flames.
Danny Boy’s insides are hanging out of him, all slimy. “Come on, move it,” she says. They throw everything in the lake, but the stuff is slippery and maybe they miss some. Then they each take an arm and drag Danny Boy farther into the lake.
“Everyone out of the park,” comes over a loudspeaker.
“Let’s get out of here,” Lila says, taking off.
The footpaths are pitch black and everything gets very quiet, except for Danny Boy’s howling, which rings in Anthony’s ears. He catches up to Lila and they leave the park together, heading for the side door of her building, where the asshole doorman lets them in.
“Jesus H. Christ!” He’s staring at them in the dim light. “You been in a fight?”
“We were attacked by a crazy bum,” Lila says. “We’ll wash up in the laundry room.”
“I don’t want nothing to do with this,” the doorman says. He turns and leaves them.
Anthony and Lila go to the laundry room and begin to wash the blood and slime off them. “Give me the knife,” she says. “I’ll take care of it.”
He gives her the knife. They put their wet clothes in one of the dryers, drop the coins in, and while everything dries, they wait around wrapped in someone’s clean towels Lila pulled from another dryer. And all the time Lila doesn’t stand still, but paces the room up and down. He gets tired following her and sits on the floor and starts to go to sleep.
“Wake up.” She’s hitting his head like she’s crazy. They get dressed and go up to her apartment the back way, and she tells him, “Take a shower.”
The hot water feels good. He’ll just get dressed and go home. He can hardly hold his head up.
Lila pulls back the shower curtain and steps in, takes the soap and lathers her hands. She grabs his cock with her soapy hands. “You come too soon, dickhead, and I’ll kill you, I swear.”
“I won’t,” he moans.
She jumps him like a monkey, her left hand around his neck, her right hand guiding him inside her. He holds her slippery ass while she puts both arms around his
neck and starts banging. He’s going to pass out, for sure.
She digs her nails into his back. “Don’t just stand there, asshole.”
His feet go out from under him and he goes over backward, pulling her down on top of him.
Lila’s screams get drowned out by the water that’s coming down on them. “Think we made an idiot baby?” She laughs, turns the water on freezing cold, and jumps out of the shower.
The Best American Mystery Stories 3 Page 39
