Is Fat Bob Dead Yet?: A Novel

by Stephen Dobyns

  Connor heads south on Interstate 95. The heater is on full blast but has little effect on his face though he keeps his speed at a modest forty-five. Twice he stops to thaw out his nose. His punishment’s only virtue is that he feels he deserves it. He’d lied to Didi and ruined the current prospects of Bounty, Inc. He’d told his brother about Sal, which most likely led to his murder. He’d played the fool with Céline and, worse, might play the fool again if the chance arose. So he suffers from the onslaught of wind and takes pleasure in his suffering.

  It’s nine-thirty when he reaches the auto-glass shop on Broad Street in New London and almost ten-thirty by the time the windshield is replaced. He pays with one of Didi’s credit cards. Possibly it’s bogus. Then he drives back across town to Céline’s house, telling himself that he’s curious, though he remains vague about the specifics. It’s simply free-floating curiosity. He keeps the car heater roaring full blast until he begins to sweat. It’s like a belated blessing.

  When he turns onto Glenwood Place, Connor receives a shock. A large white truck is backed into the driveway, and on its side are the words MURPHY’S RENTALS, along with a New London address and phone number. Two men in gray overalls carry a beige couch from the house to the truck. Two more men edge past them back into the house.

  Connor pulls to the curb and jumps from the car. His first impulse is to tell the men to stop what they’re doing. They’ve no business taking away Céline’s furniture. They have to put it back. He won’t do this, of course; it’s just an impulse. But he runs to one of the men and asks what’s happening.

  “It’s all going back to the warehouse,” says the man, pushing the couch into the back of the truck. He’s tall, muscular, and no-nonsense. “That’s where it goes when folks are done with it.”

  “Where’s the woman who lived here?”

  “She took off this morning with two suitcases. Cab picked her up.”

  Connor hurries to the house and reaches the door as two more men emerge with a beige easy chair, turning it first one way and then another so they won’t knock its wooden legs against the doorframe. Connor waits and then runs inside.

  Half the furniture is already gone. The bedrooms are empty. Connor opens one of the closets, but the clothes are gone as well. He sniffs. He detects a sweet smell that he decides must be Céline’s perfume. His knees wobble with desire. But the sweet smell is a Chanel cologne for men called Égoïste Platinum: Sal Nicoletti’s favorite.

  In the kitchen two women in gray overalls pack the dishes and silverware. The refrigerator is already empty.

  “We’ll be done in another half hour,” says one woman. “You movin’ in?”

  Why not? thinks Connor. He could rent the house and rent the bed in which Céline had slept. He could eat off her dishes and use her silverware. But Connor’s romanticism has its limits.

  “I’m just looking,” he says.

  “It’s a rush job, so we figured someone wanted it right away.” The woman puts her hands on her hips, stretches backward, and grunts.

  Connor spends twenty minutes searching the house. Maybe he’s looking for one of Céline’s intimate articles of clothing or one of her black high-heeled shoes. He imagines finding a letter addressed to him personally, in which she apologizes for the previous evening and includes a phone number where she may be reached. She’ll wait for his call. These thoughts zip past like flies and are gone before he can swat them away. They embarrass him. Cut it out! he tells himself. It’s just as well she’s gone. He’s not infatuated; he was hypnotized. It’s like being drugged. After all, her real name was Shirley. The creature known as Céline was a phantasm. In real life, as Eartha had once told him, Céline was someone who scratched and farted. She had no conversation. She only gave commands.

  Maybe this is exaggeration. Maybe back in Detroit, Céline is a Cub Scout mom. She was offered serious money to move to New London to pretend to be a creep’s wife, and jumped at the chance. Connor knows nothing about her, and he must stop thinking about her. Even Eartha—or Beatriz, whatever her name is—has greater actuality, despite a plastic surgeon’s nips, tucks, and additions. At least she speaks truthfully to Connor, even if she doesn’t speak truthfully to anyone on the phone.

  Connor pauses in the empty living room and considers Linda, the young lady who works at the travel agency. Yes, yes, we see where these thoughts are going as she begins to blossom in his mind. If Didi were here, he’d urge Connor to slow down. It’s unlikely that Linda is a secret serial killer, Didi might say, but you know nothing about her. Nearly everyone is on his or her best behavior when we first meet. It’s only later that the rough spots emerge: the bad habits, insecurities, and secret angers. But Connor’s alone at the moment and able to avoid Didi’s cautionary messages. In this he’s fortunate. It’s sufficient that his thoughts about Linda are strong enough to nudge Céline from the forefront of his brain. He won’t forget about her—it’s too soon for that—but she’s moved back a few steps. Is Connor ridiculous? Surely he’s no more ridiculous than most young men with romantic natures and healthy libidos. Indeed, there are days when Connor doesn’t think of sex more than two dozen times, days when he’s efficient and hardworking and his intelligence is able to crawl out from underneath his fantasy life and show its muscle.

  The movers are nearly finished. Two men carefully take down the seascape from the living room wall. In a day or so, it will grace the wall of another rental. Connor hears a breaking noise from outside that he can’t identify. A man shouts, “Hey you, cut it out!”

  Running to the window, Connor sees someone bashing the new windshield of the Mini-Cooper with a golf club. Idling behind the Mini-Cooper is the black Denali.

  By the time Connor gets outside, the man has completed his work. The windshield is in a thousand-plus pieces. “I told him to stop,” says one of the moving men. “Should I call the cops?”

  Connor doesn’t respond. The guy with the golf club gets back into the Denali. Without thinking, Connor runs toward him. Who knows what he hopes to do? Among his confusing thoughts, not one has yet crawled its way to the top.

  The moving man calls to him. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you!”

  A rear window of the Denali opens, and Chucky looks out. His smile is as friendly as a spider bite. He sticks out his hand and makes a peace sign. Then, with the same two fingers, he taps his throat, as if to say, You’re a dead man. Connor comes to a halt.

  —

  Fidget lies stretched out in a tub of tepid water with his bony knees poking above the surface like twin Ararats. He thinks it’s time to give the hot-water tap another twist to increase the temperature a few degrees, but if he leans forward, he’ll disturb the gold necklaces arranged becomingly on his chest. Fidget’s chest is more sunken than thin, and the necklaces nicely fill the declivity. So he’s torn, but if he does nothing, he’ll grow cold. He remains still for another minute to further admire the golden twinkling, as he delights in the smallness of his present dilemma. He has gold, vodka, and food. What more can the world offer?

  This is when Fidget hears the opening of the garage door, followed quickly by the sound of a motorcycle being revved up. The 1690-cc air-cooled twin-cam 103 engine and Tommy Gun 2-1-2 exhaust of the Fat Bob would be noisy even in Times Square, but within the garage they’re thunderous. Terrified birds fly up from the bare branches. The surface of Fidget’s bathwater ripples.

  At other times Fidget might feel anxiety about possible intrusions, but he’s inside a fortress. The doors and downstairs windows are covered with plywood, and no one can enter. Eventually he might worry about how to get out, but not today. The outside world is not his concern.

  If Fidget cared to disturb his comfort and look from the window, he’d see a black Fat Bob hurtle out the driveway and accelerate down the street. But he sees nothing. His attention is focused on sliding forward as slowly as possible so he can turn on the hot-water tap and solve his only significant problem: tepid water. As his knees disappear, his nugge
t rings, gold bracelet, and gold Rolex break the surface and sparkle a sentimental greeting. He admires them fondly as he adjusts the tap and the water heats up. When a nearly unbearable warmth is reached, he closes the tap, leans back, and readjusts the gold chains across his chest. The rings, bracelet, and Rolex disappear as his knees rise like baby Alps, or were they Ararats? Fidget sighs.

  An hour passes. Perhaps Fidget dreams—we have no information about this—but when he wakes, the water is again tepid. Such a nuisance. Slowly, he pushes himself upward to turn on the hot water. But over the sound of the splashing water, he perceives another noise. A car has pulled in to the driveway. Should he investigate? He thinks not. Still, he hears voices: a conversation that becomes audible as two men walk toward the rear of the house.

  First voice: “Back door’s sealed up, too.”

  Second voice: “What about the garage?”

  We have heard these voices before. Manny and Vikström are paying a visit to Fat Bob’s small house on Montauk Avenue to make sure it’s shut tight.

  Manny: “What I don’t fucking see is why the black Denali is after Fat Bob.”

  Vikström: “He owes people money. The Denali’s probably an enforcer trying to collect on past-due debts.”

  Manny: “So the Denali works for the casino?”

  “No way,” says Vikström. “The casino doesn’t need enforcers. But someone at the casino might make a private bet with someone else at better odds. The betting doesn’t have to be on a table game, though. It can be on how long it takes a fat guy to walk to the men’s room. The casino only supplies suckers willing to make the bets and hustlers willing to take them up on it.”

  As the detectives talk, Fidget idly listens from above. He wishes they’d leave so he can return to his aquatic dozing, but he’ll be patient. After all, he knows their voices. How could he not after so many years of receiving their negative attention?

  “The problem for the hustler,” Vikström continues, “is how to collect on the debt. So he might use an enforcer. In this case it’s maybe the guy in the Denali.”

  “But you don’t know this.” Manny chuckles to suggest that Vikström rarely knows what he’s talking about and is just spouting hot air.

  “I don’t know squat. I’m only saying the guys in the Denali are probably trying to collect money.”

  Manny’s about to say, Squat don’t count. Instead he’s distracted. “For fuck’s sake, the Fat Bob’s gone! That’s five gone in a week!”

  The violent segue is caused by Manny looking into the garage and realizing that the last of the Harley Fat Bobs—the black one—has vanished.

  Vikström peers over his partner’s shoulder. “I thought the garage was supposed to be secured.”

  “They only secured the house, the lazy fucks. I bet Lisowski took it.”

  “Maybe,” says Vikström, “and maybe not.”

  —

  Around one o’clock Connor sits at the bar of the Exchange on Bank Street waiting for his lunch: a hamburger with Swiss cheese and mushrooms and a side of french fries. He drinks a Corona. Given his druthers, he’d drink a dozen.

  A new windshield for the Mini-Cooper is being delivered from Hartford. The manager at the New London auto-glass shop has said the car will be ready around four. He’s dying to ask Connor why his windshield was smashed twice in a twelve-hour period, but he bites his tongue. After all, Connor might be returning often. The walk to the Exchange took Connor half an hour and confirmed what he already suspected: his Bruno Magli slip-ons are too loose and chafe his Achilles tendons.

  Didi, when Connor calls to tell him what happened, says, “Why the fuck did you go to her house? It’s not just you that Chucky’s mad at. Your brother says he thinks we’re out to steal some goddamn jewelry. At least pick up the mail!”

  Connor decides to wait till after lunch. He dislikes being yelled at. Pure petulance on his part. But he’s increasingly reluctant to be part of Bounty, Inc., and this feeling has grown to the point that all he wants is to see how many Coronas he can drink before passing out. But he’ll refrain. We may have noted that Connor suffers from a complex mix of responsibility and irresponsibility, leading to alternating impulses that cancel one another out. Warring good and bad angels, people say. Whatever.

  Before reaching the Exchange, Connor stopped at the travel agency a block away to see Linda, but a note taped to the glass said she’d gone to lunch. The one fact he knows for sure is that she isn’t having lunch in the Exchange.

  At this moment a man takes the stool to Connor’s right and jostles him with his elbow as he removes his leather jacket. “My fault, my fault!” says the man.

  Connor didn’t see the man enter, but he realizes it’s Fat Bob even before he notices the motorcycle tattooed on his left forearm. However, he’s not in the best of moods and says nothing.

  “You seen a little red guy around here?” asks Fat Bob.

  Connor thinks it’s a racist remark. “Are you referring to a Native American?”

  “No, no, a little red guy. Red hair, red face, rides a red scooter. Wants to shoot me.”

  Connor wonders if his assumption of racism is in fact an indication of his own racism. “He’s the man who was chasing you yesterday morning past the train station? I haven’t seen him today. Have you seen Fidget?”

  “The homeless guy? Not recently. The cops probably arrested him again. Why’re you interested?”

  “Just curious. Why’s the little red guy want to shoot you?”

  “Just a misunderstanding. Anyway, he’s a nut job. Calls himself Jack Sprat.”

  A waitress brings Connor his hamburger with Swiss cheese and mushrooms and his french fries. Fat Bob nods at it. “Get me one of those suckers, will you?” he says to the waitress. “And a Corona.”

  “I thought the cops were after you,” says Connor.

  “Them and all the world,” says Fat Bob with a touch of melancholy. “How’s the lying going? Making improvements?”

  “I don’t seem to get better.”

  “Yeah, Angelina said that. She said you’d stopped by twice collecting money for ex–prom queens and smokin’ beagles. Seems like a hard way to make a buck.”

  Connor’s surprised. “How d’you know it was me?”

  Fat Bob reaches over and takes several of Connor’s fries. “She described you: tall, black-haired guy with a tan. Said you were an awful liar.”

  “She called the cops on me.”

  “Yeah, she does that to everyone. Don’t take it personal. Just stay away from her and you’ll be fine. Right now she’s been selling my bikes. I’d been storing them out at my place on Montauk Avenue. It’s driving me crazy. She wants money for a face-lift, says she wants to look like a prom queen again. Someone on the fuckin’ horn’s been telling her she owes it to herself.”

  “Why’d she call you? I thought she hated you.”

  There’s a pause as the bartender appears. He’s a round, middle-aged man with a shaved head and a stained white apron. He puts a little cardboard coaster advertising Guinness in front of Fat Bob and a bottle of Corona on top.

  “She gets a charge from turning the blade. Like, she calls when she sells one of my Fat Bobs cheap. I mean, she’ll sell a bike worth fifteen grand for five thousand.”

  “Scary.”

  Fat Bob sprinkles salt on Connor’s fries and takes a few more. “She’s got this guy who runs Hog Hurrah helping her: Lisowski. Says I owe him money. You mind if I put ketchup on these suckers?” Fat Bob squirts dollops of ketchup on Connor’s fries.

  “Go right ahead,” says Connor. “So why are the cops looking for you?”

  Fat Bob sighs. “You know Marco?” He takes a few more french fries.

  Connor shakes his head. “I only saw him … after.”

  “I’m bummed he got killed, I really am. But it wasn’t my fault. I offered him my bike, and he took it. I mean, it was like a test-drive. He said he wanted to buy it.”

  We can’t say how much Fat Bob believes
this. He owed Marco money as he owes everyone money, and he might have offered Marco a cheap price on the Harley and urged him to take a spin. Ride it to work today, he might have said. You’ll love it. After all, on that Monday morning the weather was beautiful, and at that time Fat Bob still had five other Fat Bobs in his garage on Montauk.

  “Did you have an appointment to meet Sal?” asks Connor, taking a guess.

  “Hey, look at it this way: If I’d ridden that bike into town, I’d’ve been smashed to pieces just like Marco. I’d put money on it.”

  “Someone hates you that much?”

  Fat Bob rubs his chin, a thoughtful gesture with a touch of irony. We should say that Fat Bob is one of those fellows who could shave two or three times a day, so thick is his beard, and now, at lunchtime, his heavy cheeks and chin are darkened by incipient stubble. Indeed, when he rubs his chin, there’s a sound like a cat scratching in its litter box, but very faint.

  “The ex-wife might stick a knife in me if she wasn’t afraid to get in trouble, like jail. But she calls to say people keep asking if I’m dead yet. They want my stuff, and they’re ripping off my bikes. I’m fuckin’ broke. And I lost my job at the casino. They said I had a conflict of interest. Like I wanted their money.”

  The waitress brings Fat Bob’s hamburger with Swiss cheese and mushrooms and his french fries. He and Connor engage in some companionable chewing until Connor asks, “So you’d seen Sal upstairs when you were visiting Marco?”

  “We’d talked.” Fat Bob lifts the bottle of Corona to his lips and drinks. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “You know his real name was Danny Barbarella?”

  Fat Bob lowers his voice. “Dante, he liked to be called Dante. I met him once in Detroit, and then I read about the court stuff. What a fuckup. He sure wasn’t any good at hiding himself. He should’ve gone to Guam.”