by Ed Lynskey
“You’re nothing but trailer trash,” he said, an unsmiling slur.
Rage balled up my knuckles to smash in his leer of superiority. But restraint weighed in, and I slow counted. One … I couldn’t stoop to his level. I was no thug. Two … but the putrid vapors breezing off Lake Charles defiled my nose. I saw the parade of dead men: Mr. X at Lang’s Teahouse, Acne Scars the punk robber at the store, the archer at the growers’ campsite, and Herzog at the wayside. Three … all of the dark shit—betrayal, greed, lust—had run into my life from Lake Charles. So I reached back to slug a right cross at Sizemore’s chin.
“Don’t, Brendan. “ Her face and words tough, Agent Sutwala dodged Mr. Kuzawa’s restraining hand and approached me. “Take a breath … relax … good, there … now, back away, and I’ll take control. Do it, now.”
Her incisive command told me the violence had to stop. As she commanded, I faded away from Sizemore. But my fists didn’t go lax, and neither did Sizemore’s oily smirk.
Agent Sutwala stepped between us, saying to Sizemore, “You have the right to remain silent . . .”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Mr. Kuzawa’s eyes skimmed the ominous, battleship gray clouds bunching over Lang’s Teahouse. “The damn hurricane will hit us if we don’t hustle.”
“I hope it blows up and levels the earth dam and Lake Charles dies.” After I reseated the Magnum loads, I wedged the .44 into my waistband. I wasn’t in the mood to take any shit off anybody.
Mr. Kuzawa, laughing, cracked the bond seal on his fifth, and we alternated tipping the Jack Daniels. It scorched all the way down. Invading the laurel hell, we set Will Thomas Mountain as our compass bearing. Pearly wisps of haze shrouded the grassy bald while Lake Charles reeked of a morgue’s drain. The smell of death was fitting. Seeing the algae scum brought to mind our bass boats still racked on the trailer at Mama Jo’s house. The Umpire Bank would soon repo them. I didn’t care. We’d left Edna’s jet ski in the sheet metal building. Evidence, said Agent Sutwala. Again, I just didn’t care.
The morning packed a joint-numbing chill. I flipped up my jacket collar, and my coughs racked my lungs. Jags of pain drilled my temples. One consolation was the early frost had killed the gnats and deer flies. Coming to the ruins of the pot plants in the first glen, we redoubled our gait. Mr. Kuzawa had brought the sheaf of a rolled up sailcloth, and I lugged along the hatchet I’d sharpened earlier on a buhrstone.
“Something should be left under the rocks.”
My nod was terse. “Jesus Christ couldn’t tunnel out of there.”
“Don’t go dragging Him into this.” Mr. Kuzawa kissed the upended Jack Daniels bottle, then said, “This Lake Charles mess is all of our own shameful doing.”
“I heard that.”
My palm swiped off the fifth’s glass rim, and I nailed a hearty swallow. The booze re-fired my near comatose heart, and we slogged on until passing under the firs into the growers’ old campsite. The abandoned black pot and fishing equipment were still there. The stench from Cobb’s crude sepulcher needled our nose linings. My glance didn’t include the dead archer, but the crossbow’s shot arrow still creased a streaking coppery blur in my brain.
“Earth to Brendan.” Mr. Kuzawa glared at me. “I said we’ll stove that dead shitbird in Cobb’s place.”
“The DEA wants the dead shitbird.”
“A piss-ant drug mule? Think again.”
“But his mama will probably want him.”
“Then let his mama hike up and get him like I am my boy.”
I shrugged.
We crouched low, our fingers clawed at the sepulcher’s flat stones, and within the next five minutes, we disinterred Cobb.
My hand cupped my nose and mouth. The heaves seized me to retch, but I swallowed back the rising bile.
“Just breathe through your mouth,” said Mr. Kuzawa.
“I did and tasting it is worse than smelling it.”
“You’ll live.”
I’ll omit any physical description of Cobbs’ earthly remains. Think maggots. Enough said. He weighed down Mr. Kuzawa’s sailcloth, and I feared it’d rip and spill out Cobb. After we swapped out the two cadavers, we buttoned up the sepulcher by refitting together the same flat stones.
Swinging the hatchet, I hacked down a tote pole from an oak sapling. Mr. Kuzawa broke out a few pieces of coat hangar wire, and we lashed the corpse-laden sailcloth through its grommets to the notched out tote pole. Mr. Kuzawa balanced one end of it over his shoulder, and I hefted up the opposite end.
“Ready back there, Hoss?”
“Hit it.”
Our pacing in lock step, we marched off. The cold rain driven by the rising winds slashed and flouted us. I imagined how bedraggled we had to look tramping off the mountain.
* * *
We tucked Cobb’s remains knotted in the sailcloth beside the tool chest, sloshed up to sit in the cab, and my truck groaned off, hauling us away from Lake Charles. I flipped on the heater and windshield wipers. The rain cascading down mauled our progress. After shattering the empty fifth on a rock pile, the wet Mr. Kuzawa cranked up his window and produced a new fifth. We laughed and chug-a-lugged. Booze always makes life’s dark times funny as shit. The wipers slapped at the sheets of rain on the glass. He pointed the fifth to behind us.
“Set a Zippo to it.”
“I’d say so.”
I wrenched around in my seat for a parting snapshot of the tattered dance pavilion and old marina. Then realizing how Cobb and I would never again bass fish curdled the booze heavy in my gut.
“We were damn near brothers.”
Mr. Kuzawa replied, his murmur brusque. “Too bad you didn’t see how much until now.”
I nodded but I’d had my fill of Lake Charles.
“Do those weird dreams still leave you buggy?”
“Not so much these days.”
“They’ll lighten up. The battle fatigue drains away. Trust me.”
“Thanks,” I said, then, “Did you know my dad at all?”
“Angus? Sure, we knocked back a few when we didn’t raise a little Cain. Why?”
My shrug coincided with the tires’ solid hum gripping to the wet blacktop on the state road. The wind buffeted the cab truck, but I skippered us with a rock steady hand. “I never got the chance to know him.”
“He did Mama Jo wrong by cutting out early like he did. I can see it was rough on you. I also grew up without a real dad.”
“Did you search for him?”
“No, I always knew where to find him. He’d wiggled up inside a bottle. It was shameful for me to go and shepherd him home.” Mr. Kuzawa gave the fifth of whiskey he clutched a doleful eye. “I guess I didn’t learn much by doing it.”
“Why did Angus leave?”
“The denizens in Umpire are schizoid. Either they love you or they hate you. Angus fell in the latter camp. It wasn’t from what he’d said or did. They just tarred him as a black sheep. He always struck me as square enough. He battled a thirst for whiskey, but then only the Baby Jesus wears a shiny halo.”
“I might go look up Angus.”
“Why? To put a bullet in his brain?”
I forced a laugh. “What was it like joining the Army and leaving Umpire for Korea?”
“Different day, same shit. The top brass awarded me a Purple Heart for the enemy shooting me in the latrine. Truth be told, my proudest coup was staying off the V.D. report. Just don’t let Uncle Sam draft you. Tell you why. I can guarantee you a rock skull president sits behind every war.”
“Got it,” I said.
“Say, that DEA babe is sharp.”
“Who?” I flicked my eyes from the drenched roadway, and he grinned at me. A burst of wind slamming the cab truck snapped my eyes back to our front. “But Agent Sutwala is all business.”
“Uh-huh. She digs your moves. I’ve noticed the way she watches you.”
“Do you think so?” I smiled at the not-so-absurd idea and then asked, “What happens after
Cobb’s funeral?”
Bending forward and narrowing his squint out the cab window, Mr. Kuzawa picked up a glint shining there off in the rain. “Oh, I always keep a few irons in the coals. That’s the key to life, Brendan. Having options and leaving them open.”
I nodded as if I took his meaning, but I didn’t.
* * *
Three days later, my grief and regrets blunted by Jack Daniels, I sleepwalked through Cobb’s funeral service. It featured the usual condolences, tears, and pallbearers (I was one of eight). I wished they’d cremated him and scattered his ashes across a sunny, natural lake. Dark, dirty places, starting with graves and mineshafts, terrified me.
For the service, Mr. Kuzawa nailed shut Cobb’s coffin using the hammer I brought. With a little finesse from the DEA, he fudged Cobb’s death certificate to cite a fatal drowning in Lake Charles. Edna and I just played along, but few bought the cover story. She added a sprig of mountain laurel atop Cobb’s coffin lid, a fitting tribute, I thought.
Afterward a pair of gravediggers revved up a backhoe and planted Cobb in his final resting place just two plots over from my Uncle Ozzie’s tombstone (1892-1964). But it was Cobb’s stark reminder of our mortality that ushered me pinch-lipped and pale-faced out the cemetery gate. Then my life started on its upward trend.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Yellow Snake’s roly-poly prosecutor went ahead and filed the motions of dismissal to rescind my homicide charge of Ashleigh Sizemore. I suspected the DEA spearheaded by Agent Sutwala leaned on the locals, maybe threatening to expose their political corruption. She was my hero. Over a short time, Ashleigh’s homicide dropped off the cops’ radar and then into the cold case bin.
Ralph Sizemore never confessed to her murder, but I stuck to my pet theory. He’d sneaked into Room 7, injected her while asleep in bed with me, and taped the baggie of tainted angel dust under the bed table to frame me. His team of legal superstars couldn’t help him skate.
He and his drug-trafficking henchmen went to prison with no chance at parole until my middle age. Their federal penitentiary stood in godawful Nevada, very different from Sizemore’s tony digs in Yellow Snake. How the mighty had fallen. Word came back he tried to bargain for a sentence reduction by snitching on me as the two drug mules’ killer. But Joe Law just said good riddance.
Besides going cold turkey on reefer and nicotine, I also aced my booze cure. Yep, I cleaned up my whole act. It was a bitch, too. I thanked God I had an edge. The jugs of mountain branch water Edna kept stocked in my fridge accelerated the process.
“You don’t have to do this, but thanks.”
“Glad to help you out.” Her coy glance engaged me. “That DEA lady is a hottie.”
“She’s a real pro, yeah.”
“Have you called her yet?”
“I keep her business card handy.” I couldn’t blame my sudden hand sweat on the detox. Maybe I was falling in love again.
“Ring her. Today.” Then Edna blinked at me. “The cops never found Cobb’s killer. Is he buried at Lake Charles?”
“Why do you ask?”
“I’d feel better by knowing it.”
My glance caught her shudder, and the horror mangling her face. Harrowing images of what befell her at the growers’ campsite rocked me. I smelled the gamey bedrolls. I visualized her pinioned to them, writhing as the stoned growers raped her. Had the bastard Herzog stood by and leered at it? The old rage carved new vicious slices to my gut.
“What went down up there?” I asked her.
“N-n-nothing happened . . .”
The seconds crawled into hours. She didn’t break off our stare down. I did. “He won’t touch you again.”
She nodded. “I’m relieved to hear it.”
“Did you know Ashleigh Sizemore?”
“So-so. She was the friend of a friend.”
“But did you party with her?”
Edna reacted with a yucky face. “No, never. Why the third degree?”
“I heard some talk,” I said, brushing aside the topic.
“Didn’t you have bad dreams about Ashleigh?”
“Not so much now but let’s not talk about it.”
“Sure, if you forget I was in that campsite.”
“Deal.” But I knew not a day would pass without my stewing about it.
* * *
Agent Sutwala returned my call and allayed my jitters. The white, crystalline PCP, she reassured me, tasted caustic as battery acid. PCP also warped your sense of time and left you feeling weightless. You grew delusional, and some users did a Brodie off a bridge.
“If you’d ingested any PCP, we probably wouldn’t be having this conversation.”
“Even if, I’ll play it safe and stay off any bridges. I appreciate the information, Agent Sutwala.”
The silence over our connection lengthened. My excuse to call her on the PCP use was supposed to segue into less intense topics. At last, she spoke.
“Can we drop the formality, especially since I’m a short timer. Just call me Veera.”
“Sure, Veera.” I didn’t ask why she was bailing from the DEA. Mr. Kuzawa had had his reasons, and hers had to lie much in the same vein. The field office reports touted Gil and Earl’s glowing exploits while Agent Veera Sutwala rated a slight acknowledgement buried somewhere on page three, if any mention at all. But something more basic arose.
“With the wrong plumbing, I’ll never fit in there.” Her voice was so downbeat, and hearing it broke my heart.
“Sorry to hear that.”
“Thanks. I’m no quitter, but I’m no masochist either.” She sounded wound up with some concerns to air, and I was a patient listener. “Three years ago you’d be amazed at what it took. The perp had drawn down first. Clean shoot, case closed, my boss told me. Routine investigation. I was so gullible. The investigation went on for months before they finally exonerated me. It’s extra tough on the job when your own people doubt you.”
“I can empathize,” I said, eyeing Cobb’s lethal .44 on the countertop.
“This Sizemore case was the last straw. I didn’t even rate an ‘attagirl.’ Shit. Maybe I’ll move back to Boston. I don’t know. Whoa, listen to me rambling on like this to a stranger.”
Me, a stranger? Hearing that smarted a little. I detected a hint of loneliness underlying her litany of professional setbacks.
She reclaimed some of her spunk. “How are you bearing up?”
“I’m staying on the beam.”
“Sorry about your friend Cobb. That’s a toughie.”
The lump in my throat was like swallowing over a golf ball. “Thanks.”
“This phone call must be costing you a mint. You’d better go.”
“Stay in touch, Brendan. I’d like to hear from you. Bye.”
Her sincerity lingered in my mind as a tantalizing perfume left in a candlelit café. I liked Veera. A whole lot, I’d soon come to discover.
* * *
Following Mr. Kuzawa’s advice, I boycotted my local draft board. The last legitimate war, he told me with a subversive smile, was in Korea, but his doubts on that deepened. Uncle Sam had lied then, too, he decided. It wasn’t long before he sold his place to a land developer, gave away his war medals, and skipped town. I called over one day, and the phone company had disconnected his line. Pete Rojos passed on the rumor Mr. Kuzawa had hitched on with Cullen and the Smoky Mountain Rangers.
Perplexed, I sorted it out as the best I could. Maybe our disenfranchised war heroes like Mr. Kuzawa only felt dignity while hanging out with the ranger elements. Maybe he felt the heat from the police investigation of the store robbery we’d pre-empted in Yellow Snake. Maybe he wanted to make sure Cullen kept his mouth shut about moving the late Herzog’s Mercedes from Lake Charles and parking it at the wayside for the faked suicide. All I knew was there’d be fewer brush fires blazing up in the mountains, and I’d never lay eyes on Mr. Kuzawa again. I also went ahead and registered with my draft board. Pick your fights, I concluded.
/> * * *
The autumn rains deluged us and doused the ridge fires. Our mountain air sweetened, and you could breathe in deep again. After my pressman shifts, I fell into bed and slept a lot sounder. I caught up on my back rent and paid off the Yellow Snake hospital bill. By Halloween, our shop buzzed over the impending RIFs and shipping our jobs offshore for coolie wages. Options. That was the key to life, Mr. Kuzawa had told me, and I set out identifying mine.
Lake Charles’ days were numbered. The all-wise TVA declared the earth dam unsafe (it was), dynamited a hole in it, and drained the lake dry. But even when emptied, Lake Charles hadn’t finished with me. A geezer using a metal detector to find the coins left by the young couples at the dances uncovered the skeletal remains to an adult male. Mr. X’s .223 rifle (his bullet had grazed my side during their night raid on Cobb and me) made the metal detector chirp. The bones rested a few paces away from the T-dock. The carp had let me down.
The discovery of Mr. X’s bones raised a stink. The DEA put up a smokescreen but for how long? I went into a funk, and Mama Jo noticed it. I’d driven over for lunch followed by another bat extraction from her attic.
“You fished at Lake Charles. Any ideas on the dead man?” She sent me a frank gaze.
“It beats me. Maybe he’s our own D.B. Cooper.”
“Not funny.” Hands went on her hips. Her hard eye contact didn’t fall away from me. “You want to try again?” The pause grew awkward.
“All right, I won’t lie. Some dark stuff hit us at Lake Charles.”
“Leave it at that then.” She acted as if she already knew the worst. “Please go pen up my goats. Axel from across the street let them out. Then we’ll evict the bats. Hopefully this time will be permanent.”
* * *
That same afternoon I dropped by our public library behind Mr. Rojos’ shop. Huddled over a back table, I riffled through the newspaper archives and culled out some intriguing tidbits. The articles I read described fellow citizens who’d felt their lives were in danger and had killed their aggressor. In each instance, the DAs didn’t file criminal charges. Justified self-defense, they ruled it. Clean shoot, case closed, as Veera had told me.
