Young Americans

by Josh Stallings

  His 501s were loose fitting, tucked into a pair of Red Wing Engineer boots—expensive foot leather meant for years in the field, not a night on stakeout.

  • • •

  The next time Sam went on stage she played “Little Bitch Blue” by Suzi Quatro. The 151 rum she had been blasting in the dressing room helped get her into the music. She whipped around the small stage like a demon, spitting as she screamed along to Suzi. She kicked a beer bottle, which exploded over the bartender’s head. He just laughed. She watched mustachio man watching her. His undisguised desire turned her on. Glitter rock boys were fine, some were fantastic, but many of them thought androgyny meant they should act like pussies.

  Dancing, Sam was an amazing combination of Kali the destroyer and Marilyn Monroe, cooing one moment and lashing out the next. Whipping her belt off, she cracked it like a whip. The leather tip hit the dollars stacked in front of the frat boys. One fast flick and their bills were raining down around her.

  “Thank you, boys.” She leaned down and kissed the first one on the cheek. He flinched. She laughed.

  Sam stepped off the stage onto a chair, tipped it over, riding it to the sawdust. She stalked up to mustachio man, wrapped her belt around his neck, and pulled him close enough for their lips to touch. They didn’t. She pulled back. His eyes said the battle was over, and she was the victor. All that was left to be settled were the terms of his surrender.

  • • •

  Sam’s shift was done a 2:45 a.m. At 2:48 she was in the front seat of the stranger’s 1967 sky blue Firebird, tongue deep in his throat. She didn’t remember her shirt or bra coming off. Her nipple plumped in his mouth. Then she was on him. He fit just perfect.

  MYTH: Bigger is always better.

  FACT: It is all about the fit.

  At least that was Sam’s view, and man did he fit. There was nothing faked in her orgasm. After, she collapsed onto his thick chest hair.

  “That was . . . was . . . unexpected.” She was panting.

  “No it wasn’t.” He barely broke a sweat.

  “Oh, I knew the minute I saw you we’d be bumping uglies.”

  “Very full of yourself, girl.”

  “Woman. Girls don’t do what we just did.”

  “So what was the ‘unexpected’?”

  “That it would feel so fucking good.”

  “Did feel great,” he puffed up his chest, “didn’t it.”

  “Lucky I’m not ovulating. We would have made a man-child. Science says male sperm swim slower, so deep thrusts give you a better than average chance for a boy. We can call him Bill, after the money you gave me.”

  Mustachio slumped against his Firebird.

  Sam moved very close to his ear, filling it with warm air and words. “I’m on the pill. You get extra points for not bolting.”

  “Any chance the rest of the test is written? I’m hell on wheels with multiple choice.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” She was really starting to like this stud-muffin. “My car is the piece of shit Valiant across the lot.”

  “You in a hurry to get down the road?”

  “Nope. I’m hoping you aren’t either. Damn, that sounds pitiful. Trust me, I’m not usually this pliable.”

  “I don’t intend on going anywhere. My name is Callum.”

  “I’m Sam.”

  “What happened to Cassidy?”

  “She dances in the club. Sam inhabits the rest of my life. Boundaries.”

  “Nice to meet you, Sam.”

  The handshake felt a bit formal and silly, so he kissed her outstretched hand. Then he ran his tongue across her knuckles. The second time they took their time, enjoying every movement. He came rocking slowly deep inside her.

  • • •

  Smitty looked comical flying out of the shack. A mostly strapping-tape suitcase came flying after him. He tried to speak but the door slammed shut.

  Callum took in the one-room cabin. “You live in this rathole?”

  “Yeah.”

  “With that punk?”

  “Not anymore.”

  “We are going to have to make some adjustments if this is going to work.”

  “Um, like what?”

  “Tomorrow we’re moving you into my apartment in Arcata. Two bedroom, view of the water.”

  “No. I pull my own weight. You wanna be with me, this is where I live.”

  “OK, so you keep your things here and we make love in my place, where the roof doesn’t leak.”

  “We’ll see.” They didn’t leave the cabin that night. Instead, they made love twice more. Both were raw and slick when they fell asleep.

  • • •

  By noon, the rain let up. Birds were chirping. T-Rex was on the turntable. Sam was cooking—Sam never cooked. She set a steaming plate of eggs, potato hash and a mug of coffee in front of Callum. “Now that we are done screwing my cooch raw, how’s about some talk?”

  “Talk?”

  “Yeah, like I was born and raised in Redwood City, down in the Bay Area.” It was a lie, but only by fifteen miles. She was raised in Mountain View. Just because her hormones called his name didn’t mean she had to be stupid.

  He gave her a blank stare.

  “Your turn.”

  More blank stare.

  “Boy, you sure were talkative when you wanted to get into these fine, fine, fine panties. Asking me to move in with you and all. If that was just pillow talk and now you want to split? Cools-ville. I had fun. You had fun. Adios.” She picked up the plate he wasn’t done eating and shattered it in the sink. “Oops.”

  “Flagstaff. I was raised in Flagstaff.”

  “That’s a start. You splitting or staying.”

  “I’d like to stick around, if you’ll have me.”

  “We’ll see. Take it casual. One day—”

  “At a time?”

  “You been in the program?” she asked him.

  “No. I did go to AA meetings, but just as a way to get out of my cell. Some words must have sunk in.”

  “My pop was twenty years clean and sober when a semi crushed him.” She poured him another cup. “How long were you down?”

  “Four years. San Quentin.”

  “Am I your first since raising?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was I worth the wait?”

  “Hell yes.”

  “Right answer.” She let out a laugh that swept the tension from the room.

  • • •

  Walking through the redwood forest, jays were cawing and the leftover raindrops dripped from the redwoods’ branches, feeding the lush ferns and lupine. This trail, this view, made it almost worth the stripping for cheap hicks and college boys. They were following a thin game trail deeper into the woods. It wasn’t long before the road noise from the highway was muffled into silence. Nature abhors a vacuum; the silence was filled by beetles clacking, birds calling, unseen critters flapping their wings.

  “I love how small my life feels in the face of this forest.”

  Callum said, “I know just what you mean,” but his eyes told a different story.

  “Always a city boy?”

  “How could you tell?”

  “Fear in your eyes.”

  “That’s not fear—dust, got some dust in them.” He smiled at her. “On the upside, we get attacked by rats, roaches or sewer gators, I have your ass covered.”

  1968, Atherton, California

  Most Jewish girls get a bat mitzvah at twelve. Sam got to go on her first heist.

  Her father and grandfather argued back and forth. Sam feigned disinterest.

  “She isn’t ready,” her father said.

  “She was ready a year ago. Neither of us can fit through that window. And with my arthritis, I don’t know if I can finesse the safe.”

  Her father was as angry as she had seen him. It took her grandfather an hour to convince the younger thief they had no choice. A gem merchant had a bag of uncut diamonds locked in a safe at his friend’s house while he
was in town. “It is now, or say goodbye to my retirement.”

  The guilt worked.

  On the job, Sam was brilliant. Her father boosted her through a small window. The house was quiet. She moved to the back door and let the men in. In the master bedroom there was a wall safe hidden behind a Remington painting of cowboys racing across the plains. They owed the maid a small cut of the action for tipping them to where the safe was and what was in it. That was one of their chief sources of information—a network of gardeners and domestics who were all looking to get ahead. The way Grandpa explained it to Sam, if rich folk didn’t want to get robbed they should treat their people better.

  Sam cracked the safe in three minutes—not a record, but good enough.

  After, dividing up the haul, Sam could tell her pops was proud of her.

  Jake, on the other hand, would never join the crew. The school ran a buttload of tests on him that year, and it turned out he was some kind of genius; the kind who forgot to tie his laces unless she told him to. But also the kind who went to Ivy League schools and got rich without risking spending time in lockdown. He was their golden child.

  But not this night.

  This night Sam was special.

  She was an earner.

  • • •

  “What are you thinking about, babe?” Callum said. They were walking through a wildflower-strewn meadow. A red-tailed hawk’s shadow slid past them. Sixty feet above it circled in the wind.

  “Nothing. Choices. What did you go down for?”

  “You pull no punches.”

  “I have to know.” The red-tail folded its wings in and plummeted to the earth. Opening its wings at the last moment, it swooped up, a fat field mouse in its talons.

  “Drugs. An eight-ball and a bad lawyer.”

  “You on parole?”

  “No. I did the whole jolt, why?”

  “I don’t care what’s coming as long as I know in advance. I have only two rules. One, never lie to me. Never. Two, no other women. Can you live with that?”

  “Sam, you know we just met, right?”

  “We did, and I offered you the getaway clean card. You stayed, so as long as it lasts those are the rules.”

  “Cool. What time is lights out, Cap?”

  “Screw you.” She was smiling. She was happy. Callum draped his arm over her shoulder, letting his hand slip down onto her breast. His thumb slowly stroked her nipple. She didn’t mind one bit.

  • • •

  “What do you know about him?” Breeze was sitting in the booth he conducted business from, drinking a mug of coffee. By day, Rapunzel’s was a bar and Breeze’s office. By night, it was a strip joint and Breeze’s office.

  “He’s just raised and could use a break,” Sam said.

  “Good in the sack?”

  “None of your damn business.”

  “OK, you and me go way back, so I’ll look into him. His tale holds agua I’ll find him some farmer johns.” Sam kissed Breeze, making him uncomfortable. “If, Sam, a big, huge stinking pile of if he checks out.”

  “He will.”

  “Now I need a favor from you, little miss slick fingers.”

  “You lock your keys in your car again?”

  “No, bigger.”

  One lonely, drunken night Sam made the mistake of bragging to Breeze about her criminal past. Later, sober, she’d told him it was bullshit. He hadn’t believed her. In the back room sitting on the desk was a Denver 923, one of the sweetest safes made in the last fifty years.

  “You know I gave this up,” Sam said, playing it casual.

  “I know that’s what you said.”

  “What’s in the box?”

  “Mine, that’s all you need to know.”

  “Ten percent, and you hire Callum.”

  He nodded. “Done.”

  Fact was, the safe was calling her name. Two years. Maybe she’d lost it. She was pure old school. It was all touch and feel. The Denver 923 had four tumblers in a standard pattern of four clockwise, three counter, two clockwise, one counter to zero and bingo. Slowly she moved the dial, getting the feel for the mechanism. She kissed her fingers for luck. She closed her eyes and saw an open field. She and Callum were walking, a flock of multicolored finches flitted playfully around them. Her fingers felt the lock’s cogs and wheels moving as she slowly stroked the dial. It barely moved, but to her it was like climbing a mountain. Every click rocked her. Time disappeared. It was just her in the field, her with the lock. She always felt she went away so that the images would distract the logical part of her brain. Finessing a lock was intuition. It was an art.

  When the safe snapped open, Sam was surprised to find herself standing in the back room.

  Breeze looked at his Rolex. “Two minutes, ten seconds. That has to be a record.”

  “I don’t think it’s an Olympic event.”

  “It should be.” He was grinning as he pulled out a small pile of bills. $750 was the total. Sam got a massive $75 bucks. “Callum gets the gig, right?”

  “I said it. So be it.”

  • • •

  Callum was hired to work the graveyard shift guarding one of the grows deep in the forest. After the first night in his leak-free apartment, Sam moved in. She kept her cabin, to make a point, but only returned there to pick up her mail. For two wonderful weeks, they made love and ate and laughed. When her Valiant threw a rod he started driving her to and from the club. She bought him a lunch pail, and in a nod to a domesticity she never really would capture, she started making him meals, mostly PB&J sandwiches, and sending him off to work with them. In their own strange way, Sam and Callum played house. Even stranger, she didn’t entirely hate it.

  Everything was copasetic. Until it wasn’t.

  • • •

  At midnight the only light in Breeze’s office was on his desk. He leaned back and looked at Sam and Callum. She was dressed in a gauzy gown and G-string. Callum wore hunting camouflage and a shoulder holster filled with a Colt Python.

  “Glad to see you both. Drinks?” Breeze asked.

  “What the fuck, fellas,” Sam said. “I got a wealthy bigmouth on the hook out there. Can we cut the foreplay before Angie snags him?”

  Breeze let out a laugh. “Love the mouth on this girl. The intercourse of the matter is, your man here wants to step out big. He wants me to front him a sweet pile of our best bud. Says he has a pal in Texarkana will pay double. I want to know if it’s bullshit.”

  “Callum told me about his friend, but shit, Breeze, I’m just a dancer with a bone for the guy, what do I know.”

  “Come on baby, it’s more than—” Callum started.

  “Shut up, I’m talking to the lady,” Breeze said. “Gut up time, girl. You give him the nod and you two could be sitting high on that hog. He burns me . . . you owe me, large.”

  Sam gave Callum one long look. She always wanted a rich outlaw for an old man. She nodded at Breeze. “I’d trust him. I’d also send one or two of your boys along.”

  “He said he was leaving you and his Firebird as collateral.”

  “Ain’t that romantic. Send the boys.”

  “My buyers see strangers, they could freak,” Callum said.

  “Then they freak. I got to get back to work.”

  • • •

  The bigmouth was an English professor from Humboldt State University who had just sold a book and was tossing his advance around. He offered Sam three hundred to come home with him. She declined, but didn’t slap his face. What would be the point? Angie disappeared with him, so that was that. On stage Sam could hardly keep it together long enough to finish her shift.

  • • •

  That night after she and Callum made love, they lay in the moonlight panting, catching their breath. She lay on his chest, content. “Sam, if something goes wrong . . .”

  “Like what?”

  “Like I don’t know, but if it does.”

  “How will I know?”

  “I’ll call everyday at
two a.m. I don’t call, something has gone wrong.”

  “And what do I do?”

  “Split.”

  Sam wrapped herself in a quilt. He took her to the carport, to the Firebird. He showed her where the nitrous switch was under the dash. He showed her a hidden kill switch under the driver’s seat. No one could hot-wire the car if that switch was on. In the trunk, he showed her a hidden false floor. He kept a twelve-gauge pump and a gym bag in there. With the trunk floor locked in place the hold became invisible. Cops had even searched it once and came up empty-handed.

  “Why are you telling me all this? You getting froggy?”

  “No, but you never know on a run like this. Anything goes hinky, you get in the Firebird and take off. This bitch will outrun the CHP if needs be.”

  “If.”

  “Yeah. It won’t happen, but if . . . How do I find you once I straighten it out?”

  “Find me, or your car?”

  “I don’t give two shakes of a rat’s tit about the car. I love you.” He had never said those words. They struck Sam hard. She rewarded him with a deep kiss.

  “Where do I find you?” Callum said, stroking her face gently.

  “No one up here knows about my family. It has to stay that way, OK?”

  “Cross my heart.” Callum traced a cross over his heart.

  “Mountain View.” She wrote out her mother’s number in a matchbook and pressed it into his hand. “Breeze and them, no one can find this.”

  Callum looked at the number, saying it under his breath several times, then lit the book on fire. It flared as all the match heads went up. He dropped it into a large glass ashtray. After the number had turned to ash he smiled at Sam. “Feel better?”

  “Better. If your deal blows up, that is where I’ll be.”

  “You’ll wait for me?”

  “At least for a couple of days.”

  Back in Callum’s bed, they made love again, hungry to stave off the fear.

  When Sam woke, Callum was gone on his run.