by Mike McCrary
He carries few Earthly possessions in his thick hands save for his prized cigar, which is barely holding together, a plastic bag that contains a roll of duct tape and a bible. The guard working the release counter thought it was kinda strange when Lester asked for the duct tape. Lester proceeded to point to the holes in his boots. What the hell does the guard care? Lester readjusts the crude silver tape job that holds his footwear together.
His fingers rub along his bible, caressing it. This is not some cheap-ass Motel 6 bible. This thing has some weight, with a hard binding built to stand up to time and gold accents with touches of tough leather designed to protect the words of the Lord.
Thoughts bounce. Thoughts of the life he’s led. Thoughts of the life he’s going to lead. Thoughts of how he’s going to find salvation for the wicked he has done, if that’s even possible. Can you forgive the killing? The stealing? The severing of limbs? The blood Lester has spilled during his lifetime could fill an Olympic-size pool. The money he’s made off of it could fill a needle…and it did. Can all the wrongs be washed away by recently letting the Lord in? By performing a righteous act or two? Can that kinda shit be forgiven?
Good Book says it can. Sing Sing preacher man says it can. Gotta give it a shot, what the hell else is he gonna do? Go back to that life? Back to the shit that put him in a hole for the better part of his life, shoved him farther and farther away from the Lord? Not fuckin’ likely. To Lester this is a new day with a new path. One that will deliver him from evil…even if that means inflicting a touch of evil in the process.
Lester closes his eyes tight while he mutters a few holy words under his breath.
Pops his lids open.
He’s ready now.
A horn blares, jolting Lester from his perfect moment of introspection. His eyes squint, verifying the vehicle kicking up dirt is headed his way.
Yup, that’s his ride.
A slightly used black Escalade—a fine mode of criminal transport a few years ago—dented here and there with four unmistakable bullet holes peppered around the hood. The Escalade makes a sudden stop, a drop of the power window revealing the driver—Bobby Balls from Remo’s story.
But unlike in Remo’s story, he’s very much alive.
Bobby Balls smiles wide while greeting Lester. “You ready, Sweetheart?”
Lester checks the back, spotting two other criminals. The young one, a punk of a bastard begging to show you how hard he is, answers to Country.
On the other side sits an ice shard of a man with a piercing gaze that makes pit bulls piss. A man who’d gladly cause the suffering of fools way before he’d even consider suffering one himself. One who’s spent his years without knowing remorse. Goes by the name of Ferris Mashburn.
Yup, all three of them are very much alive.
Sizing up the occupants of the car, Lester makes his way to a passenger side door. He tosses the cigar, grips the plastic bag in one hand, bible in the other. As he takes in a deep breath of fresh air he looks to the heavens, mutters a few more silent words before plopping down in the Escalade’s passenger side.
Ferris starts in. “We cool?”
Lester gives a nod as he rubs a finger across the bible.
“Fuck yeah we are,” from Country. “That fucker is dead as Dillinger.”
Nothing but a searing gaze from Ferris. “Nobody touches the lawyer until Dutch gets loose.” Eyes Country in the back. “Get me?”
“Fuckin’ why?” fires Country.
“Because that’s how Dutch wants it—”
“Fuckin’ retarded.”
“—which means that’s how we want it. More importantly, that’s how a subhuman half-wit like you wants it. Clear enough?”
Lester slowly removes the duct tape from the bag. No one notices.
Says Country,“I know big man Dutch wants to be the one to end the motherfucker, but he’s locked up and we’re out. Fuckin’ free, and I’m really fuckin’ tired of being in hiding. It sucks. We got Chicken Wing on the lawyer right now, watchin’, just waitin’ for the green light. We go in, blow that legal eagle to shit, get our money and ride off into the sunset as soon as Dutch joins the party. Pretty fuckin’ simple if you ask me—”
Ferris stops him midsentence. The heart-freezing glare, along with Ferris’s fingers tightening around his voice box, puts an end to Country’s debate. They roll on in silence, the energy in the car having been sucked up and held hostage by Ferris.
“We’ve been in hiding, that’s correct. What’s also correct, the point you’re missing, is that we’ve been waiting for the right time, and that time has presented itself. Now.”
Country gives a guttural sound, works as a yes.
Ferris eyes Lester. “You’re a quiet prick.”
Lester caresses the bible.
Country continues to gasp and squirm.
“Heard Lester found Jesus or some shit,” adds Bobby Balls.
“I did,” Lester replies.
Lester watches the countryside, but not for the view. He’s looking for something in particular. Setting his bible down next to him, he rests the plastic bag on top, starts to peel a small bit of the duct tape off the roll. Makes a starting pull as discreetly as can be. No one notices…except Ferris, who’s starting to eye the back of Lester’s head.
Country is a second or two from passing out. Ferris releases him from his near-death grip. Country slips into a ball in the corner of the backseat. Where he belongs.
Bobby Balls continues, “Tell me, why do you people always find God in the joint? Is it to cling to something, or is it more about hope? Hoping that some magic man in the sky will help you while you’re taking five black cocks in the shower?”
Country cackles with laughter, starting to feel his blood flowing again.
“Something like that, I suppose,” answers Lester, still scanning the outside world.
Without looking down he has taken the plastic bag in one hand and attached the free bit of duct tape from the roll. Has a finger gripped around the roll as if ready to pull, plastic bag at the ready in the other.
“I mean, seriously. When they say find Jesus…the fuck does that even mean?”
Ferris keeps watching Lester.
Lester keeps watching the road.
Country keeps laughing.
“What is Jesus going to help you do? I mean, now that you found his ass.” Bobby Balls, amused with his own questions.
Lester’s eyes stop. He’s found what he wants through the front window.
“Come on, man, I’m just fucking with you. But really, what are you and Jesus going to do?”
Lester cracks the slightest of grins as he gives his answer. “Murder multiple motherfuckers, save one asshole.”
Everyone except Lester is slapped with of healthy dose of what the fuck?
A perfect, silent slice in time.
The plastic bag flies over Bobby Balls’s head. In a single move Lester rolls the duct tape around Bobby’s neck two, three times, sealing the bag. The words “Right Hand of God” flex on his hand as Lester works the tape. Leaves the roll attached, bouncing as Bobby Balls fights for air, plastic sucking in and out with a panic-stricken rhythm. It’s sick, lacks compassion, but it does give a nice beat you can tap a toe to.
“The fuck?” Country screams, making a dive from the backseat toward the front, 9mm pulled. As he does, Lester grabs the wheel, cutting hard toward a line of trees just off the road.
The Escalade slams head-on into a tree, a jarring collision of bark and steel. Country launches from the backseat—a low IQ javelin—face-first into the windshield. Nose-first, actually, with a crunch of bone and snap of spine, leaving a pulp-faced corpse.
Air bags deploy a fraction of a second after Country’s lifeless body bounces from the glass. Ferris’s seatbelt snaps him back, as does Lester’s. The whole string of events takes only a few seconds. One dead. One working on dying. Two left to kill each other.
The Escalade ricochets off the tree, skidding to a stop.
Fluids spit from the hood. Windshield’s a spider web, with clumps of Country’s face and hair stuck in it. Bobby Balls gives a couple of dying jerks and spasms.
He’s hanging in there, God bless him for trying.
Ferris pulls his .357, squeezing off two blasts at Lester. An air bag takes the blast as Lester pops the seat belt free, spinning out the door.
The eerie quiet that comes after a car crash fills the air. All that violent, sudden energy expended in a sliver of time, leaving you with a pile of life-altering devastation. Granted, most car crashes are not the byproduct of a recently released Jesus-freak suffocating the driver with a plastic bag, but it’s the same result as a soccer mom blowing through a stop sign while on her cell babbling about shoes—shit you don’t want.
Ferris stumbles out, his .357 tracking as he makes his way around the back. Legs wobbly as he tries to get his post car wreck bearings, he clears the back bumper and is met by the solid binding of Lester’s bible, which makes a low, muted thwack connecting with Ferris’s face. Leaves his vision spotted with white blobs of light. It only lasts a moment, but that’s just enough for Lester to get to his feet and land a crack-punch. Drops Ferris to the dirt. They go at it like wild dogs fighting over the last scrap of meat. Not elegant. Not choreographed. Criminals beating one another’s ass, life and death on the line.
A 4Runner filled with high school kids pulls up. The bearded, hipster driver pokes his head out the window.
“You guys ok?”
Lester pops up, having wrestled away the .357. Ferris bolts, putting a foot on the 4Runner’s hood as he springs over. Opening fire, Lester’s shots pop holes across the kid’s hood, barely missing Ferris as he escapes into the woods.
Kids in the 4Runner give bloodcurdling, scared-shitless wails as they haul ass outta of there.Lester lowers the gun, less than satisfied at Ferris giving him the slip. Bobby Balls falls from the car, still hanging in there. God bless him. He’s managed to pull the bag off and is crawling away. Lester casually puts two bullets in him.
His mind drifts back to the second bullet point of his plan.
Oh yes, something about saving one asshole.
4
“Asshole?” Mr. Crow barks “Have you listened to one damn thing I’ve said?”
Crow, a dapper, well put-together criminal of means, sits across from Remo Cobb, his high-priced defense attorney.. Not a hair out of place, suit immaculate. Watch costs more than your car.
Remo gives the tiniest flash of eye contact. “All ears on this side of the table.”
Not really; he’s preoccupied. He’s attempting to bounce a pill into a half full scotch glass that has been carefully positioned between him and Crow. A fun little game of pharmaceutical quarters. Crow grows more and more annoyed with each bouncing Ritalin.
“If the bitch would have just done things right we wouldn’t be in this spot.”
“Meaning you would have stopped just shy of crushing her windpipe?”
“It got out of hand. She got out of line. I was having . . . a what? A day let’s say. She just … stopped breathing.”
The two men are surrounded by wall-to-wall, leather-bound legal books, polished oak and brass. A private meeting area at the most prestigious New York legal firm that ill-gotten gains can buy. Same office Remo was in with that prosecutor, Leslie. People are still getting fucked, but a much different meeting is in progress.
“I did it. Can’t lie. But she pushed me. She pulled a blade for Christ’s sake.”
“Shit.” Remo’s response has nothing to do with Crow’s story. He missed the damn glass again.
Crow grows more annoyed as a pill flies by his face. “My sight went white. Next I know she’s not breathing.”
Remo misses. “Cocksucker.”
“Am I bothering you?” asks Crow.
Remo glances up. Now he’s growing annoyed at his client for interrupting his efforts.
“No?” asks Crow.
Remo is not nearly as well put together as his client. Suit’s a mess. Eyes like red pinholes. He was a good-looking man at one time, now he looks like he’s been on a multiyear bender.
Crow, previously completely focused on his dead hooker dilemma, suddenly realizes this asshole attorney, the one he’s paying a mint for, is not even vaguely paying attention to his plight. And in Crow’s mind, there’s a massive plight, goddamnit.
“You think you can pay attention, you son of a bitch prick cocksucker?”
Remo bounces a pill, landing one with a plop in his glass of Johnnie Walker. Shoots his arms up in the air as if draining a buzzer beater at the Sweet 16, then raises a single finger, stopping the now red-faced Crow before he can lay into him with a blitz of heartfelt profanity. He throws back the booze, along with the swimming pill.
It’s hard to decipher if Remo has more distain for his job, life or Crow. Silence permeates the room. They sit eyeing each other like fighters circling, determining how to dismantle each other. Crow hates that he needs Remo almost as much as Remo hates that he needs Crow. Crow stops himself from blowing up, slips into a smile, deciding to break his lawyer down with a different method. The truth.
“Remo fucking Cobb.”
“Present.”
“Straight outta Cut and Shoot, Texas.”
“Great town. You’d do well there.”
“Daddy died in a backroom card game. Mommy . . . nobody knows. You’re a walking, talking hillbilly lullaby.”
With a gulp of scotch Remo replies, “That’s the rumor.”
“Made a name working small cases around Texas. Then you caught the eye of a big swinging dick firm in New York City. Got some motorcycle gang off or some shit, right? Must have been hard shedding that dumbass Texas accent while chewing up d-bag, Ivy League Jews.” Crow takes a calculated dramatic pause for fun. “Also managed to lose a family along the way.”
The family statement sticks at something in Remo, deep. He shakes it off, pushes it down. Swishes a mouthful of Johnnie Blue while eyeballing Crow, absorbing the relenting, unnecessarily hurtful truth Crow is telling.
“This path of most resistance made you into the man you are today, and that man is a USDA certified, Grade-A, grain-fed asshole.”
Remo’s had enough. “The body gone?”
“The body?”
“The girl. Her body. The shell that carried her soul. Remember? You killed her with your bare hands? Sorry, the one who stopped breathing. I mean, let’s table your unfortunate murder habit and forget the people who might care about these women.”
“This isn’t my first rodeo,” sneers Crow.
Remo pours another drink.
Crow, slightly offended, “You gonna offer me a drink?”
“You shouldn’t drink.”
“Should you?”
“Absolutely.”
“Can you take care of this or no?”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah?”
Pulls at Remo’s gut to say, “I can ease your troubled mind and heal your heavy heart.”
“Fuck you, Remo.” Remo slams the empty glass down. “Much appreciated.”
Every word out of Crow’s mouth was accurate. Why the hell does the truth have to come from a retched human being like that guy? That fucking guy? Remo doesn’t go to a therapist. He should, heaven knows he should, but he doesn’t. Doesn’t see the point, doesn’t believe in it, and, damn it, he’s not going to. However, his inner thoughts and feelings—some may call them demons—seem to come to the surface while talking to these dregs of society.
Should I just lie on the couch while taking these client meetings?
Remo knows the truth of his life. He’s lived the history. Which is precisely why he drinks and pops those pills.
Fucking duh.
Not a supernatural mystery of the universe.
He’s no Bigfoot.
Unfortunately, substance abuse doesn’t make past memories or present truths or lifelong demons disappear. It might later on in life, but even if Remo makes it to
old age and can’t remember the past, who gives a shit? It’s today that’s rough for him. The here and now is a fucking mess. Besides, if his current behavior can shave those later shitty years off his life, so be it.
Remo knows his life. Doesn’t necessarily hate it. Doesn’t exactly love it either. It is what it is. That’s what people say when they can’t, or don’t want to, explain a fact of life, right?
All this fuels the synaptic fireworks that are Remo’s mental state as he stumbles through the city, in and out of crowds, hours blurring until he finds himself at Gramercy Park. He watches kids playing at a crazy pace, an army of youth without a care in the world. Dogs being chased and giving chase in return. Moms and nannies keep a watchful eye. A safe distance away, a distance where he can’t be seen, Remo sits, still dressed in his pricey, mussed up suit which hangs on him like a hanger made of old bones.
He pulls a small pair of binoculars from his coat pocket. He keeps them there, just in case. He begins spying on the children. Actually, he’s spying on one child and mother in particular. The three-year-old boy is Sean, his beautiful mother, Anna.
Remo’s not a perv. He is a lot of unsavory things, but pervert isn’t on the list. Well, not the kind who goes to the park to look at little boys. Jesus, how fucked up is the world when you have to explain that in order to clear the air?
It is what it is.
Remo knows Anna and Sean. Cares about Anna and Sean.
Anna picks Sean up, spinning him around. Happiness doesn’t begin to cover it.
Remo watches on for a moment. It’s hard to make out his purpose. He sets down the binoculars. Shades of sadness and rising ripples of regret hit him. He wishes he were with them.
No time for that shit—that thinking, feeling shit you hear so much about. Remo sparks a one hitter looking for some clarity, letting the smoke roll into his lungs and back out. Flushing out his system.
