Phoenix Noir

by Patrick Millikin

  “Over a flower,” my friend repeated, shaking his head. “Get off here, okay?”

  We took the exit ramp toward Eloy, but within a few minutes of leaving the highway, he directed me down a dirt road. The lightning had been following us, snaking across the sky in big white bolts. Now the storm started to catch up, and the thunder came louder and more often. It didn’t matter much; we’d run out of conversation.

  The truck lurched and splashed along, the trailer bouncing from side to side. I could see Eloy off in the distance, tiny flickers of light that disappeared every few seconds in the blinding flash of the lightning.

  Where the fuck were we going? I wondered. Actually, I wondered how far I was going, because I didn’t think my friend was planning to head back to Mexico with me in tow. I was still sweating, and the truck was full of the tin-can reek of fear.

  “Why—” My mouth was dry, and I had to work my tongue to make words. “Why did you go back? Why not leave him—” I jerked my head backward, “leave him there?”

  The coyote looked surprised.

  “I couldn’t leave him there to rot. He’s married to my—” he cut off sharp, frowning. “He’s family,” he said, and repeated, “I couldn’t leave him there.”

  Two miles farther and we came to a gate, where another dirt road led off toward the mountains. Far south, I could see the outline of Picacho Peak, stark in the lightning flashes.

  “Turn it around here,” he said, moving the gun in a small circle. “Aim it back the way we came, then get out.”

  This would be it, then. The truck lurched into the ruts of the road we’d just traveled, pointed back toward Phoenix. I was looking for something to say, anything, but not one word came to me. There wasn’t anything but the smell of ozone and fear, and the small vivid details that I knew I’d remember forever because they were the last things I’d see: the cracked gray dash, a plaid dish towel somebody’d left on the seat, the coyote’s wrist watch, a Swatch with a green metal band.

  “You got a phone? Leave it on the seat.”

  I fumbled it out, dropped it on the seat, and following the motion of his gun, opened the door into the rain. Run, I thought, putting a foot on the side board. Drop, roll, stand up, and run. I couldn’t make it, I knew that. But I’d try.

  “Hey,” he said behind me, softly. I glanced over my shoulder, and he tossed something at me. I caught it by reflex. The orchid, in its burlap wrapping.

  “Name it for your girlfriend, okay?” he said, and gave me a very small smile. His feet came up and hit me in the ribs. I fell out and landed on my knees in the mud. An arm wearing a Swatch reached out, grabbed the handle, and pulled the door shut. The roar of the engine shocked me out of numbness and I stumbled to my feet just in time to avoid being run over.

  The truck bumped slowly away.

  I stood there with lightning striking all around me, and watched him drive off. One more of all those wonderful people out there in the darkness.

  GROWING BACK

  BY ROBERT ANGLEN

  Apache Junction

  Eddie Keane came screaming out of the motherfucker of all bad dreams. He could still feel the blood coating his belly, arms, and face. A dry and crusty scab, it filled his mouth with copper, sealed his eyelids, glued him to the bed sheets. Eddie lay trembling on the narrow bunk. He couldn’t get over how real the shit seemed, like this meth-and-dust concoction he’d once needled off a biker’s spike. Toxic crystal kept him bouncing five days straight and some freakish creatures had gotten into his skull before he crashed.

  Eddie figured this was worse. His brain was stuck on sleep, caught in the bloody cocoon of his subconscious. He waited for the dream to die. Except it didn’t. Slowly, he became aware of the stillness around him, the strange and utter silence. Not possible. Noise was built into this place; it lived in the walls. The rattle of pain, fear, and tormented prayer hummed 24-7 through the tiers of steel cages, a living current fed by 450 inmates locked into a brutally dull routine.

  Now nothing. Dreamland. Then a crazy thought. Maybe this wasn’t a dream. Eddie panicked, struggling to get up, wake up, seized by the conviction that if he rolled over and opened his eyes he would no longer be in his jail cell. He’d be home again, lying in bed next to the body of his wife. Same as the night he beat her to death with a bottle of Old Granddad.

  Eddie remembered the white-hot hatred pumping through his veins. Her lying there, head propped on one hand, as if what she’d said wasn’t the whackiest thing to ever come out of her mouth.

  “You pregnant, Cheryl?” Eddie’s high instantly lost. “That it?”

  “No, honey. I’m just saying, wouldn’t it be nice? Us making something good.”

  Good? Two hours ago she’d been fucking an aluminum pole at a Van Buren syphilis shack, working her cooze overtime to snatch up dollar bills from businessmen too shit-faced to tell talent from tweak.

  Now she was talking about wanting a kid.

  “That’s speed talk, Cheryl. Nonsense,” he said. “You’re too stupid to breed.”

  Her expression crumpled into a humiliated wad. She sat up, smearing a tear track. “Goddamn. Why you gotta be so mean?” She struck him loosely. Spat. Hit him again. “Admit it. You’re just afraid. Of what will come out. Well, you oughta be. Cause ain’t nothing good’s ever coming out of you.”

  Eddie finally understood what the jigs were always going on about. She’d gone Oprah on him. Well, he knew how to change the channel on that action.

  Cheryl’s eyes went double-ought, her mouth still working but no sound coming out, the red imprint of his hand fading across her cheek. Thing about cunts, no matter how many times you smack them, they always look surprised the next time.

  Eddie lay back and groped around for the whiskey bottle on the floor. Cheryl would suffer him out for a few minutes, then she’d do that stupid laugh thing, make like she’d been pulling his chain. He would apologize. They would fuck. Love all around.

  He never saw her coming. She hit him hard enough to send the bottle skidding across his gums. He lashed out and caught a wad of her hair. Pulled her face into his fist. Blood splattered. Bones crunched. Broken teeth rattled against the wall. Eddie straddled her, not thinking, just swinging. He let the Fury work through his muscles with each satisfying thunk until his rage was spent. That’s when he looked down and saw that he was still holding the bottle. Unlike Cheryl’s face, it was intact. Goddamn. Old Granddad sure knew his stuff. Eddie tipped back the bottle and took a long hard pull before passing out.

  So maybe he hadn’t meant to do her all the way. Wasn’t like he could take it back. And damned if he was going to start crooning like a fish on his first night in stir, begging for a second chance. Accident or not, Eddie knew if he were given another chance, he’d beat the shit out of her a second time.

  Judge knew it too. That raven-eyed executioner sat high up on his throne, hair so slick and shiny he might have been wearing a cowl over his long black robe. Even his smile was more warlock than magistrate, a greedy thing that seemed to anticipate the inevitable sentence.

  Eddie held the judge’s baleful gaze, unflinching, grinning at his inquisitor through the old scar that split his lips. Eddie craned his neck so the swastika brand showed over the collar of his white shirt and kept his fists bunched on the defense table, blue-inked knuckles facing forward: FURY.

  The judge gave Eddie a look of pure indulgence.

  “Tell me, Mr. Keane. What made you this way?”

  “What way is that, Your Honor?”

  “Maybe it’s better you don’t know. You’re twenty-eight years old. What if I give you twenty years to come up with the answer?”

  “Wow,” Eddie aped. “That’s like a whole ’nother life.”

  Something sharp and dangerous flickered behind the judge’s opaque eyes. For a fleeting second Eddie actually felt the stab of it, an invisible hook piercing deep.

  “Exactly,” the judge said. “Another life.”

  Prison sounds pushed out of
the darkness, a jumble of clangs, shouts, and overlapping voices that dissolved the mocking tone of the judge’s voice. Life? Fuck you, Hoodoo Man. Prison don’t scare me.

  “What you saying, bitch?” The terse shout exploded in Eddie’s ears. Without warning a pair of hands slammed him backwards. “I cut you, puta. Then we see who’s scared.”

  Eddie crashed into a wall of bodies. More hands caught him, kept him from falling. He jerked around to see a blur of hard, half-remembered faces yelling encouragement. A flat steel object was shoved into his palm. “Take the greaser out, Eddie! Shank his ass!” He was propelled toward his opponent, a squat Latin killer stripped to the waist, La Eme brands and prison tats stretched over exaggerated muscles. And Eddie realized he was standing in the middle of a memory.

  The men surrounding him weren’t the ones doing time with him now; this place wasn’t the Special Management Unit where he spent twenty-three hours a day in lockdown. None of this was now. It was four years ago, Florence, Central Unit. Small-time drug dispute between gangs on the outside, Eddie tapped by the AB to settle it inside.

  Mind reeling, he watched the Mexican bob and weave in front of him, stick razor flashing. He remembered the spic’s name. El Gato. But unlike the first time they squared off, Eddie’s reflex was disbelief. “No way this is happening.”

  “Oh, it’s happening, ese. Tell me you don’t feel this.” The Mexican lunged and Eddie screamed, the blade slicing across his face. Liquid fire filled his mouth. The meat of his shredded lips bounced against his teeth and puffs of air seeped through a hole in his cheek.

  “Now, I cut that teardrop off your face, pendejo.”

  This isn’t real! It’s the past! Eddie’s brain screamed. But the pain was real. Same for Eddie’s reaction, the surge of strength, the narrowing of vision, and the dark detachment as the Fury took over.

  He let the spic have his second of victory, then struck from a crouch, twisting his own blade into the Mexican’s middle. El Gato looked down, mystified, battle forgotten as astonished fingers tried to rejoin the severed green lines of tattoos over a bulging white ribbon of muscle. Eddie charged. Stick, stick, stick! He followed the Mexican to the cement. Shouts erupted. A siren went off. Someone yelled, “Guards!” Eddie shook off the warning and rose over the spic’s body. He coughed up a ball of blood and tissue, spat the clotted mess onto the dead guy’s upturned face. “Gato, shit!” he screamed. “Pussy!”

  Eddie’s mind unzipped.

  The kill scream was still tearing out of his throat when his senses went black and a ripping sound filled his head. Shit just opened up, Eddie thought. Reality evaporated. Gone went the fight scene, the mad crush of inmates, the warble of alarms. One instant Eddie was breathing blood over the spic’s body, the next he was back in a cell, staring into a mirror.

  And crazy stared back at him.

  Eddie leaned into the strip of sheet metal above the cell’s sink, not trusting the reflection. He recognized the face but it belonged to someone else, some other Eddie.

  The knife wound was gone.

  No bloody track. No itch of stitches. No trace of the jagged white scar. He could still feel the icy kiss of El Gato’s razor. Remembered the patchwork repair job by prison docs and the forever-after taste of antiseptic.

  But the reflection face was unmarred, as if the fight never happened.

  “Keane! Visitor!” Eddie jumped away from the mirror. The CO stood three paces from the bars, khaki-bland, indifferent. “Stand your gate. You know the drill. Move before you’re told, you forfeit your privilege.”

  “Who?”

  “Says he’s your father.”

  Eddie barked a laugh. “Right. My father’s—”

  He’d been about to say dead—before memory stopped him: The old man stooped over a plastic visitor’s chair, humiliated and embarrassed, talking about death. Cancer. Eating him from the asshole out. Sitting there, too selfish to beg sympathy, too full of pride to realize that’s what he was doing. Looking into that bulldog face, Eddie had experienced an overwhelming urge to embrace his father, to let go all of the history and hate between them. Because for the first time his father was here, reaching out to his only son.

  Then the flash of judgment in those rummy eyes, the same smug look on the old man’s face that had chased Eddie out of childhood. And bitter realization. His father hadn’t come to make peace. He was making a point. Like a miser arranging bundles of cash in the bottom of his coffin. Preparation. Telling Eddie death didn’t change anything. I own you.

  Eddie felt the hurt, fresh. Which made zero sense. The old man was five years dead and gone. Cancer had done a bang-up job. Turned his body into a busted stack pipe that kept leaking until the guy in the unit below complained about raw sewage dripping from his ceiling.

  So, anyone care to explain how the old man could be waiting to talk with him?

  Slowly, Eddie swiveled back to the mirror. The face—stripped of its hardest time and wounds—was his. Only years younger. And Eddie knew he hadn’t been remembering events. He’d been reliving them.

  Growing backwards.

  “C’mon, Keane,” the guard pressed. “Enough preening. Let’s go.”

  Eddie wanted to scream in protest. He could already hear the old man’s voice, the leathery gloat roughing its way past Redman chaw.

  “See you got yourself branded. Didn’t take long.”

  “Thought you of all people would understand.”

  “I understand fine, boyo. Skinheads made you their punch.”

  “I’m nobody’s—”

  “You’re everybody’s punch, Eddie. Always been, always be.”

  Eddie shook his head against his father’s words. Told himself that if he refused to leave his cell, his father would stay a memory, stay dead. The face in the mirror told him different. Against his own volition, Eddie let the guard take him—to what?

  His past.

  The dark cord of memory dragged Eddie toward its umbilicus. Time warped as his life played out in reverse. Days and weeks compressed into emotions, tight fistfuls of grief and rage that pummeled Eddie with savage intensity. Single events stretched out in slow-second madness, suspending him in acts of cruelty and degradation. He fought to reassert his indifference, tap into the Fury’s narcotic rage. But Old Granddad had left the building. And Eddie fell victim to his own torment.

  Zip.

  There was the kid’s face, fear flushed with betrayal and begging Eddie not to let it happen. Eddie backed out of the showers as the crew of Level 5 meat packers moved in. He had sold the kid’s drug debt to the faggots for pennies on the dollar. Call it a refinancing plan. Watching the attack, the men throwing themselves at the quivering and mewling flesh, Eddie got a hard-on. He imagined his dick as a knife. Not fucking. Cutting.

  Zip.

  DT demons whispered in Eddie’s ears. He was in the hole. A sensory-deprivation chamber where the Arizona Department of Corrections turned out snitches and bitches. Eddie fought the voices. He talked over them, yelled, sang, recited goddamn Motörhead lyrics until he ran out of words and gushed gibberish. They had dropped him cold turkey into an SMU II isolation cell. All Eddie needed to do was renounce the brotherhood. Roll over. Three days later the detox demons came, ripping his insides, twisting his spine, loosening his bowels. He blew chunks, gagged air, shouted at the walls. Then he beat on them, hitting the concrete as if working a heavy bag. Each blow accompanied by the mash of gristle and Eddie’s roar. “You!” CRUNCH.“Don’t!” CRUNCH.“Own me!”

  Zip.

  Flesh burned, sizzled, and popped. His skin came off in searing layers, filling the cell with a burnt-onion stench. It took two of them to hold Eddie down as the heated metal blade worked a dollar-sized patch on his neck. “Cross’s got six sides,” the knife-man said. “We’re three down.” From the corner of his eye, Eddie saw the knife pass through a guttering flame. He sucked in a lungful of the crispy air. He was kindred now. Full-fledged AB. Silently he repeated the pledge that he’d just said
aloud. My life is this and this is for life.

  The car baked in the dirty sunrise, a primer oven. Eddie sat behind the wheel, windows down, stewing in sweat. He could taste the grit trapped in the heat haze rising above the rows of battered single-wides. The vial of crystal death lay on the passenger seat, all sparkle and sunshine. Eddie cranked up the radio on some rage metal and tried to stave off the shakes. He didn’t want to be here. Scrunching his eyes shut, he fiercely tried to make believe this backwards bullshit was part of a monstrous bad trip. But Jackyl’s hammer-jammer guitar clash—“Mental Masturbation!”— removed any doubt about where he was or who would soon come stumbling out of the mud-colored trailer.

  Here was the Wagon Wheel Mobile Home Park, another artifact of Apache Junction’s dismal Western heritage. The city had tried everything to cash in on cowboys short of issuing Stetsons and spurs to the hookers on its greasy main drag. Probably would have if the hookers had been willing to stick around.

  You could still find actual Indians on the Apache Trail, usually pulling all-nighters in stop-and-robs or passed out in bars named Rooster Cogburn’s. The redman Eddie sought operated an auto salvage yard to front a methamphetamine distributorship. He was too glazed on his own product to care that Eddie greeted him as “Tonto” or ask why Eddie dropped twenty extra for a corroded car battery.

  Eddie spent the next hour scraping the terminals onto a sheet of butcher paper and cutting the acid into the crystal, creating the ultimate shot of high test. He spent the rest of the night sick over what he planned.

  Still wasn’t sure he could go through with it.

  But he knew that he would. Because, let’s face it, this was the past. He saw the trailer’s door swing open. At the same time, a hand drew back a piece of foil blocking the front window and a familiar wedge of blond hair appeared. Her eyes found his. She nodded. A second later, Wade Gramble stuck his face through the side window of Eddie’s car, his greeting stretching all the way back to grade school: “Edddieeeeee Spaghetti!”