Black Dogs

by Jason Buhrmester

  For Mom. You would have laughed the hardest.

  ONE

  BALTIMORE, MARYLAND,

  JULY 20, 1973

  TWO

  A PAYDAY OF SORTS

  THREE

  LET'S SPEND THE NIGHT TOGETHER

  FOUR

  SPRUNG

  FIVE

  SOUL TRAINING

  SIX

  JIMI THE BEAR

  SEVEN

  CRASH LANDING

  EIGHT

  JUST ANOTHER PAWN

  NINE

  ELECTRIC FUNERAL

  TEN

  BATS

  ELEVEN

  NO FUN

  TWELVE

  THE NEW YORK FUCKING GIANTS

  THIRTEEN

  THE WORST BLOW JOB IN THE WORLD

  FOURTEEN

  PISS TEST

  FIFTEEN

  SNOWBIRDS

  SIXTEEN

  BOOK ‘EM, DANNO

  SEVENTEEN

  LA-Z-BOY

  EIGHTEEN

  NOBODY'S FAULT BUT MINE

  NINETEEN

  ALL ACCESS

  TWENTY

  BIG BOSS MAN

  TWENTY-ONE

  GOING DOWN

  TWENTY-TWO

  THE GREEN, GREEN GRASS OF HOME

  TWENTY-THREE

  LET'S MAKE A DEAL

  TWENTY-FOUR

  GETTING AWAY WITH MURDER

  TWENTY-FIVE

  EVERY DAY COMES AND GOES

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ONE

  JULY 20, 1973

  Paranoid

  Volume 4

  Master of Reality

  And of course Black Sabbath, the album that started it all for the greatest band in the world: Black Sabbath.

  I pulled a copy of each one, stuffed them under my arm and looked around the Record Barn. I'd been coming here since I was a kid. In high school I used to sneak into the kitchen in the middle of the night to make a lunch just so I could pocket my lunch money. By the end of the week I had enough for a few singles.

  Not much had changed at the Barn in the months since I had split town. Faded posters covered the grimy front windows, keeping the store dim even in the middle of the afternoon. The stench of pot still hid behind a thin wall of incense, and boxes of T-shirts and albums littered the narrow aisles like always. The owner, Bob, a frizzy-haired David Crosby look-alike, wandered around squeezing more albums into cluttered bins. He stopped in the aisle and stared at me.

  “Aren't you supposed to be in school?” he growled.

  “I graduated two years ago, Bob,” I told him without looking up from the row of records I flipped through.

  “Oh,” he grunted. “Well, do you need anything?”

  He didn't really sound interested in helping me.

  “Nah. Just waiting for Frenchy … uh … Pete.”

  A few minutes later Frenchy stumbled from the back room. His arms waved wildly around his head and shaggy brown hair swirled around his face. He flung a pile of records on the counter and wiped his face with the front of his Flamin’ Groovies T-shirt.

  “What the hell's wrong with you, Frenchy?”

  “I got caught in a spiderweb in the basement,” he said. He patted down his hair then looked up at me. “And don't call me that.”

  We'd been calling him Frenchy since a night he passed out drunk in the backseat of my car talking gibberish that we decided sounded like French. After I left town he convinced everyone to call him Pete again. It was going to take some getting used to.

  “So did Alex actually get out today?” I asked.

  “Yeah. His mom's having a party for him tonight.”

  Frenchy sighed heavily.

  “You sure he wants to see you?”

  “Probably not,” I answered.

  Bob disappeared into the back room. I followed Frenchy while he walked through the store. Now and then he stopped to file a record into a bin.

  “Man, I shouldn't have told you he was getting out,” Frenchy moaned. He moaned a lot.

  “I just need to talk to him.”

  “He didn't answer any of your letters. Why would he talk to you now?”

  “I know Alex better than he knows himself.”

  “You drove all the way down from New York City just to talk to him?”

  “Something like that.”

  Bob returned from the back room with a set of BMW keys in his hand and a briefcase with a Grateful Dead sticker on the side. Something about an old hippie with a BMW and a briefcase made me smile.

  “Be sure to lock up, Pete.”

  “Okay, Bob. See you tomorrow,” Frenchy said as the front door rattled closed.

  Music played in the store. Something loud and noisy. I liked it.

  “Who's this?” I asked.

  “The Stooges. They're from Detroit.”

  “I dig it.”

  “Really? You actually like something other than Black Sabbath?”

  “Just need something to fill the time until their next album.”

  “Whatever.” Frenchy laughed.

  “How's your band going?” I asked.

  “Which one?”

  When he wasn't working at the Record Barn, Frenchy combined his musical talents and marginal high school acting experience into a couple of cover bands that played bars and private events. Want the Rolling Stones to rock your wedding reception? Frenchy can do a hell of a Mick Jagger. Need Neil Diamond at your office holiday party? Frenchy's version of “Sweet Caroline” could get the accounting department on their feet. He could imitate anyone.

  Frenchy finished restocking the bins then locked the front door. The cash register chimed as he stabbed at buttons until the drawer shot open. Frenchy grabbed the tray of cash and headed toward the back office. I followed him until he stopped, blocking the doorway.

  “Where do you think you're going?”

  “I don't know.” I shrugged. “Just following you.”

  “No way. Wait out here.”

  “What's the big deal? You're just counting out the cash register. I can hang out for that.”

  “Not a chance, dude. That's my rule. You, Alex and Keith aren't coming near the cash or the safe or the back room. I don't even want you guys near the fucking mop closet. Just wait out there.”

  I sat on the counter, started to read an issue of Rolling Stone, got bored and read Creem instead. A flier on bright yellow paper hung on the side of the counter.

  THE MISTY MOUNTAIN HOPPERS

  LED ZEPPELIN FAN CLUB

  MEETINGS EVERY FRIDAY-CALL FOR INFO

  I tore it down, folded it up then slipped it into my pocket. A switch flipped from the back room and the lights shut off. Frenchy reappeared and stood in the middle of the store going over everything in his head to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything. He double-checked the back door then the tiny safe in the office. Then he checked the back door again.

  “We need to pick Keith up from work,” Frenchy said, turning off the rest of the lights in the store.

  “Is he still working at Mancini's?”

  “Yeah. Installing car stereos.”

  “And then uninstalling them in the middle of the night?”

  “Of course.”

  Frenchy fished for his keys then stopped at the front door and turned around.

  “Don't you already own those?” he asked, pointing to the stack of Sabbath albums under my arm.

  “Wore them out. I need new copies.”

  “You gonna pay for 'em?”

  “What do you think?”

  Frenchy sighed and opened the door. We walked together across the empty parking lot as the sun set behind the Record Barn, and Baltimore looked every bit as small as it did when I'd left.

  TWO

 
USED THE FANCY-ASS SPELLING OF THE SOUND SHOPPE TO ATTRACT FEDERAL HILL SUCKERS WHO THOUGHT THE STORE MUST BE EUROPEAN. IT WASN'T BUT THE PLOY WORKED ANYWAY. THE GLASS SHOWROOM, LOADED WITH HIGH-END HOME AND CAR STEREO GEAR, ATTRACTED RICH BOYS WHO STOOD AROUND THEIR CAMAROS ARGUING ABOUT EIGHT-TRACK PLAYERS, WHILE INSIDE A DENTIST BLEW A GRAND ON AN ONKYO RECEIVER AND A SONY SUPERSCOPE CASSETTE DECK FOR BLASTING HIS TONY ORLANDO AND DAWN ALBUMS.

  Mancini's office sat just to the left of the $700 Celestion Ditton 44 speakers, through a door marked DO NOT ENTER and down a dingy hallway cluttered with boxes, stereo equipment, empty food cartons, porno mags and other garbage. While the salesmen on the showroom floor kissed up to the rich assholes who shopped there, Mancini lurked in his office plotting ways to fuck those customers over. If you were ripped off or screwed over in our town it was the work of Mancini.

  Mancini's main operation was Westside Limo, a local car service that drove people to the airport. When Mancini's driver picked you up he checked out your house then he kicked in with the small talk. Where are you going? I hear it's nice this time of year. Getting away for a few days with the wife, eh? You sat in the backseat wondering if the driver was a nice guy or just some jerk working you for a bigger tip.

  The truth was he didn't give a shit about a tip. By the time the driver pulled up at the terminal you'd told him where you were going, how long you'd be gone, who was staying at your place. Everything but where you hid the jewelry. The driver gave the details to Mancini. While you were eating peanuts on the plane, me and Alex were climbing in your bedroom window to steal back that Onkyo receiver and Sony cassette deck you just bought. Plus, anything else we could find.

  Keith started working for Mancini back in high school. He'd been stealing car stereos since the day he figured out you could break a window with the porcelain tip of a spark plug and not make a sound. He really took to it and terrorized every neighborhood, car dealership, church parking lot, anything. Nothing stopped him. He could strip a tape deck from a Dodge Charger right in the high school parking lot during lunch break and still have time to eat and sneak back out for a smoke.

  When Mancini's guys installed a new stereo in a car, they slipped Keith the invoice. Keith dropped by the address in the middle of the night, ripped out the system and brought it to Mancini, who put everything back in boxes and sold it again, often to the same idiot who bought it the first time. Keith got a cut. Eventually Mancini hired Keith to work at the Sound Shoppe installing car stereos. That way, your new system was installed and stolen by the same technician. Keith did both jobs well.

  Now we were waiting at the Sound Shoppe for Mancini to pay Keith. He always kept us waiting. Keith had met us in the garage, still wearing his greasy coveralls. He hugged me and, after some small talk, led us back to Mancini's office. He yawned and stretched out in a brown metal chair with his arms folded across his chest. He was no criminal mastermind. That's for sure. He went along with whatever put money in his pocket so he didn't have to get a real job. And it didn't take much to keep Keith in business—just enough for beer, cigarettes and comic books.

  He certainly didn't spend the cash on clothes. Keith's wardrobe came in three settings: ripped jeans and Stones T-shirt, ripped jeans and Black Sabbath T-shirt or ripped jeans and no shirt. His greasy hair hung in his face. I leaned forward to ask Keith a question.

  “Hey. Is that toolbox out there the one we stole from East-side Auto?”

  Keith grinned, showing off the brown edge of a chipped front tooth, the result of a shot he took from a baseball bat in a brawl outside a party one night.

  “Yeah,” he said. “That's the one.”

  The tool chest was one of my dumbest ideas ever. It was last summer and Keith needed help getting into Eastside Auto Repair to rip a stereo from a Trans Am that was supposed to be parked inside. When it wasn't there, Alex and Keith wanted to forget everything, but I figured after all of the trouble of getting inside, we had to take something. I decided that we should take the tool cabinet. A giant Snap-on chest that size loaded with gear was worth thousands. It also weighed close to a ton. Mechanics used tow trucks to move them from one garage to another.

  We wound up pushing my bright idea twelve blocks in the summer heat. The July weather hit ninety that day, and even though the night air was cool, hot tar from the street pulled against the wheels. We had started on the sidewalk, rolling past the run-down row houses and corner bars, but the rattling toolbox clattered over every crack. We didn't need the attention so I moved us into the dark street. Pushing up the middle of the road doubled our odds of being busted so me and Alex scanned for an escape route every time we saw headlights. We knew the rules, off the street, through the backyards. It went without saying that if we had to run, Keith was on his own.

  He wouldn't have made it far. While me and Alex pushed, Keith staggered alongside the cabinet, guiding it up the street. Sweat raced down his bare chest; his neck and arms were beet red with sunburn, and a faded black T-shirt, dotted with cigarette burns, swung from the back pocket of his jeans. His hair dangled close to a cigarette with a long black ash and his eyes were stoned and puffy. At one point, he coughed up a belch, made a face from the taste of stale beer, and swallowed.

  He finally forced us to stop at a Laundromat on Jackson Street so he could break in and buy a soda from a vending machine. When he realized that he didn't have any change, we pried open the machine. Once we were inside, I decided we might as well clean out the rest of the machines. Keith wandered around in the glow of the neon sign outside and used a pry bar to knock the change boxes off every dryer and washing machine. We dumped the coins in a cardboard box, set it on top of the tool chest and rolled all the way up Fort Avenue to Keith's house. We sold the tools to Mancini and made more money than we would have with the stereo from the Trans Am.

  Keith thought for a minute. He dug a line of dirt and grease from underneath a fingernail. Finally he spoke up.

  “When was the last time you talked to Alex, anyway?” he asked.

  “The night he got arrested, I guess.”

  Keith nodded.

  “You talked to Danny?”

  I glared at Keith. He knew I hated Alex's uncle Danny.

  “Can we swing by my place before Alex's party?” he asked. “I need to shower.”

  “Since when do you shower?” Frenchy asked.

  Keith ignored him.

  “That's all the way across town,” I said.

  “I'll give you five bucks for gas.”

  Keith was always broke.

  “You don't have five bucks.”

  “I just gotta get it from Mancini. I'll have it in a minute. You know that. Come on.”

  “We'll see.”

  Just then Mancini barged in. He threw open the door and stopped. He held a box under one arm and stood leaning in the doorway with his back to us as he yelled at the Mexicans working behind him in the garage.

  “And put those Delco speakers in the Olds not the fucking Pioneers! I don't care if he paid for them. He ain't fucking getting 'em.”

  Mancini looked like a three-hundred-pound caveman. His nose and mouth sloped down from his face and, his thick black eyebrows jutted low over his eyes. He left his purple dress shirt unbuttoned to the middle of his chest and thick black chest hair sprung through the opening. The shirttail hung out the back of his stained black dress pants. The entire outfit probably hadn't been washed in a month. He wheezed as he trudged across the office then slammed down into the chair behind his desk.

  “Fellas! How have you been?”

  He always shouted. Keith and Frenchy muttered something. I stared at the floor.

  “What's been going on?”

  This was Mancini's rap. He liked to hear the latest gossip and keep tabs on where everyone in town hung out and who had a beef with who. If he knew where you hung out it was that much easier to find you if you fucked him over. And if he knew who your enemies were, it was that much easier to find someone to do the job.

  “So
how's New York, Patrick?”

  “It's good.”

  “Yeah?” He smirked.

  He looked over at Keith like they were both in on the same joke.

  “You still working that catering gig with my brother Carmine?”

  “Yeah,” I said, nodding. “Carmine's a good guy.”

  Mancini rolled his eyes.

  “No, he's not. He's a fucking scumbag but I'm glad you two are getting along.”

  Mancini opened a thick black binder. The papers inside were loose and stained at the edges with coffee. He smoked and flipped through the papers. He found a pink invoice and squinted at it.

  “All right, Keith. That asshole Pannazzo kid installed a new Panasonic deck in the Cutlass his parents bought him last month for graduation. You know where he lives?”

  “Yeah. On Juniper.”

  “Great. Let's get that back. And whatever happened with that Huffman kid I asked you about? He has an eight-track player and a pair of Pioneer speakers in that Trans Am.”

  “He's been parking in his garage every night. I can't get to it.”

  Mancini looked up. His eyes were dark and heavy, and when I realized how bloodshot they were, mine began to water. He jabbed at Keith with his cigarette as he sputtered.

  “So what! So you break into the fucking garage.”

  No way was Keith breaking into Huffman's garage. Huffman's old man was a maniac and he kept a pit bull named Peaches locked in the garage. Keith put up a good front, though. He glanced down at the tile and nodded his head then took a drag on his cigarette. He wanted to make it look like he'd thought it over and come to a decision.