The Smack

by RICHARD LANGE

  Dr. Wilkes finished her lecture and left, and Petty held Sam’s hand until she stopped crying. Carrie stood beside him but didn’t touch her daughter, just kept saying, “It’s okay, it’s okay,” while dabbing at her eyes with a blob of soggy Kleenex.

  The nurse gave Sam a pill that made her drowsy. When her eyes closed, Petty gestured for Carrie to step out into the corridor.

  “You’ve got to stay with her,” he said.

  “Why?” Carrie said. “Where are you going?”

  “I have things to do,” Petty said. “I’ll be back this evening.”

  “She’s asleep,” Carrie said. “Wouldn’t it be better if I came back later, too?”

  “What if she wakes up?” Petty said. “You wouldn’t want to be alone, would you?”

  Carrie sighed loudly and went back into the room.

  Back at the motel, Petty punched the number of Tony’s mom’s store into the burner. Tinafey stood beside him, chewing her thumbnail.

  “Ready?” Petty said to her.

  “Quit fuckin’ around and let me do this,” she said.

  He handed her the phone. They’d rehearsed the call, so she knew exactly what to say.

  Tony’s mom’s voice crackled over the speaker. “Party store.”

  Petty nodded at this first bit of good luck: Tony obviously hadn’t taken his advice and gotten his mother out of harm’s way.

  “I got a message for Tony,” Tinafey said.

  “My Tony?” Tony’s mom said.

  “He has somethin’ we want, and we’re gonna get it, whatever we have to do,” Tinafey said. “Pass that along to him. He’ll know what you mean. Tell him we know where he lives and where you live and what happened at his apartment.”

  “Who is this?” Tony’s mom said.

  “Tell him to get what we want together,” Tinafey said. “We’ll call later with where to drop it.”

  “I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

  Tinafey hung up and tossed the phone onto the bed.

  “Now, why couldn’t you do that yourself?” she said.

  “The kid won’t be expecting a woman to call,” Petty said. “I’ve got to do whatever I can to keep him off balance. It’ll make him easier to push around.”

  “Whatever,” Tinafey said. She stuck her hand into her purse and came up with a joint. She lit it, took a hit, and sat at the room’s little table.

  “So where’s my money?” she said around the smoke she exhaled.

  “I have to give it to you in two installments,” Petty said. He took a thousand dollars in hundreds out of his pocket and handed it to her. “There’s a grand there, and I’ll send the rest to Memphis.”

  “Installments?” Tinafey said. “This ain’t fuckin’ Kmart. This ain’t fuckin’ layaway. If that’s how you’re gonna do me, I want twenty thousand instead of ten.”

  She was angry at him for asking her to make the call and was going to punish him by grinding him for more money. Petty could understand that. He was being taxed for disappointing her.

  “No problem,” he said. “Twenty thousand.”

  “And you’ll send it when you get it?” Tinafey said.

  “That’s right.”

  “And if you don’t get it?”

  “However this shakes out, one way or another, you’ll get your money, I promise.”

  “In Memphis?”

  “Wherever you are.”

  Tinafey took another hit off the joint and contemplated Petty through narrowed eyes. “So that’s what you think of me, huh?” she said.

  “What do you mean?” Petty said.

  “As soon as shit goes bad, I’m gonna snatch what I can and run off.”

  “What I think is it’s not your choice,” Petty said. “I’m telling you you have to go. You said yourself, one man already died trying to get this money, and I’m not going to put you in danger.”

  “Shit,” Tinafey said. “I been in danger my whole life.”

  “Maybe so,” Petty said, “but you’re going to Memphis on the next flight out.”

  Sparks flared in Tinafey’s eyes. She drew her head back and glared down her nose at Petty.

  “’Cause you say so?” she said.

  “This time, yeah, ’cause I say so,” Petty said.

  “Is that what you’d do if things were turned around, cut out on me?”

  “We’re not arguing about this.”

  “You’re right, we aren’t,” Tinafey said. “I’m gonna make it real easy for you: I don’t want your money, and I’m not goin’ anywhere.”

  “Baby…”

  “Let me ask you somethin’,” Tinafey said. “We haven’t known each other for too long, but do you think of me as a friend?”

  “What are you talking about?” Petty said. “I fucking love you.”

  Tinafey’s only reaction to this declaration was a slight curl at the corners of her mouth. She was too busy making her point to slow down.

  “I don’t run out on my friends when there’s trouble,” she said. “You might not get that ’cause you ain’t never been with a ride-or-die bitch like me before.”

  Petty paused to catch up to himself and come up with a new tack.

  “How about this?” he said. “Go to Memphis for a week. After I see how things play out, you can come back.”

  Tinafey licked her fingertips and pinched out the joint. “How about this?” she said. “I’m stayin’, and I’ll decide if and when I leave.”

  Petty could see he wasn’t going to sway her. He was off his game after the bad news about Sam. His mind kept flashing back to it, and he kept losing his place in the present. The one thing he was certain of was that he had to work fast. The sooner he got to Tony, the better his odds of beating Avi to the money if he was still after it. And that meant he didn’t have time to argue with Tinafey. She could stay for the time being, and when things slowed down, he’d persuade her to go.

  He walked over and knelt in front of her. It was cold closer to the floor. The rinky-dink heater only warmed the top half of the room. He wrapped his arms around her calves. She sat back in the chair and looked down at him.

  “I’m all talked out,” he said. “If you want to stay, you can.”

  “I’m not tryin’ to cause you trouble. I’m tryin’ to be helpful,” Tinafey said.

  “I know,” Petty said. He kissed her knees. She laid a hand on his head.

  “You really love me?” she said.

  “I really do,” he said.

  “That’s sweet,” she said. “I knew you were sweet.”

  “You’re sweet, too,” he said. “But hey, I have to go now.”

  “Oh, yeah? Well, fuck you, then.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I ain’t even gonna ask where.”

  “I won’t be long—an hour or so.”

  Petty stood and went to his bag for a clean shirt.

  “There’s money in the safe,” he said. “Write down the combination.”

  “That shit again?” Tinafey said.

  “Write it down.”

  He gave her the combination and walked into the bathroom and washed his face. He thought of Sam again but pushed it aside, blanked his expression, and checked his reflection in the mirror. It was a gift he’d always been thankful for, being able to hide what was going on inside his head. Even looking right into his eyes, nobody would have known how torn up he was.

  21

  TRAFFIC ON THE 101 TO EAST L.A. SLOWED, THEN STOPPED. IF Petty had known his way around on the surface streets, he’d have exited the freeway, but he was worried about getting lost, so he stuck to his original route. The cause of the slowdown turned out to be a refrigerator lying on its back like a big white turtle in the middle lane. It had fallen off a truck that kept going. The sludgy river of cars parted to flow around the refrigerator and came back together on the other side. The people in the minivan in front of Petty stuck their phones out their windows to take photos.

  Petty was behind
the wheel of a Mazda SUV he’d rented downtown. He’d called a cab to take him there, left his Mercedes at the motel. He was being cautious in case Avi had new eyes on Tony’s apartment, doing everything he could think of to avoid picking up a new tail.

  He parked a few blocks from Tony’s building. The neighborhood kids were at war in the street, soaking one another with giant squirt guns. The wet asphalt gleamed like spilled mercury, and the kids’ shouts bounced like Ping-Pong balls between the dumpy apartment complexes. It had been a cool day, and it was getting cooler as the sun went down, but the kids charged about in T-shirts and shorts like it was the middle of summer. Petty passed a couple of combatants who’d dropped out of the battle and now shivered under beach towels, their lips blue, their teeth chattering.

  As he walked toward Tony’s building he scanned the vehicles parked along the curb for lookouts. He hoped anyone keeping watch would be distracted by the water fight and the other residents on the street, exchanging Sunday-evening gossip and walking boisterous dogs. The gate to Tony’s building was propped open, as it had been both other times Petty had visited. This time Petty dragged the cinder block inside and pulled the gate shut behind him.

  If everything was going according to his timeline, Tony’s mom had by now told Tony about the call from Tinafey. A couple of things could have happened after that. One possibility was that the kid had panicked and gone into hiding, maybe even taking his mom with him. In which case Petty was screwed, because he had no way of tracking him down. What he was counting on, however, and what seemed more likely from what he knew about Tony, was that instead of fleeing he was cowering in his apartment, paralyzed by fear and indecision.

  Petty approached the door slowly. The living-room blinds were closed. A toddler circled the courtyard on a toy motorcycle, watched over by an old woman sweeping the walkway in front of her unit. Petty knocked on Tony’s door and got no response. He checked the blinds for movement. Nothing. He knocked again, louder.

  “Tony,” he said. “It’s me.”

  He backed up so Tony could see him through the peephole. A few seconds later he heard a muffled voice from inside. He pressed his ear to the door.

  “Tony?” he said.

  “What do you want?” Tony said again, louder this time.

  “I got a phone call,” Petty said.

  “From who?” Tony said.

  “You know.”

  “I don’t know nothing.”

  “Look, man, we’re fucked,” Petty said. “We need to talk.”

  After a long pause, the dead bolt clicked, and the door opened wide enough that Petty could see one of Tony’s eyes and the muzzle of the sawed-off shotgun he was holding.

  “You alone?” Tony said.

  “Of course I’m alone,” Petty said.

  Tony moved aside, and Petty slipped past him into the apartment. The kid locked the door and wheeled on Petty with the shotgun.

  “Lift your shirt and turn around,” he said.

  Petty pulled his shirt up to his chest and spun in a slow circle. He had a flash of the cowboy lying dead on the floor. The sooner he got the gun out of the kid’s hands, the better.

  “Sit on the couch,” Tony said.

  Petty nodded at the sawed-off. “Where’d you get that?” he said.

  “I got homeys,” Tony said.

  “Well, you don’t need it with me,” Petty said.

  Tony kept the gun pointed at him but let the barrel dip a bit.

  “What did they say when they called?” Petty asked.

  “It was a woman,” Tony replied. “She said they know what happened with that asshole, and they know about the money.”

  “They don’t know about the money, that you actually have it, unless you told them yourself,” Petty said. “They’re bluffing.”

  “It’s that Avi, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “What did they say to you?”

  “They said if I didn’t convince you to give them the money, they’d tell the cops about the dead guy. Which’d be bad for me but worse for you.”

  “Fuck!” Tony said.

  “Seriously, could you get rid of that thing?” Petty said, gesturing at the sawed-off.

  “Relax,” Tony said. “It’s not even loaded.” He carried the gun to the breakfast bar and moved aside a few empty beer cans to set it down.

  “I came to see what you’re gonna do,” Petty said.

  Tony covered his face with his hands. “I don’t know,” he said.

  “Well, figure it out, because my next move depends on yours.”

  “I been sitting here all day trying to figure it out.”

  “Let’s go over your options.”

  “What options?”

  “One: you give Avi the money,” Petty said. “The end.”

  “And Mando and his crew take me out,” Tony said.

  “Two: you don’t give Avi the money. You disappear like I told you to and take your mom with you.”

  “For how long?” Tony said.

  “I don’t know,” Petty said. “Maybe a long time. Avi’s a persistent motherfucker.”

  “My mom won’t go for that,” Tony said. He opened the refrigerator and got himself a Tecate. “She has a boyfriend and shit, my brother and sisters, their kids.”

  “Then there’s option three,” Petty said. “You fight back. You do what you have to to scare Avi off.”

  “How?” Tony said. “I don’t know nothing about him.”

  “Yeah, but I do,” Petty said. “He’s a bad guy, but not as bad as he thinks he is, and what we’re gonna do, me and you, is give him so much grief that he says, ‘Fuck the money; it’s not worth it.’”

  Tony eyed Petty suspiciously.

  “Why would you help me now when you wouldn’t a couple days ago?” he said.

  “Peace of mind,” Petty said. “I don’t want Avi holding anything over my head.”

  “Me, neither,” Tony said. “I don’t want him holding anything over me, either.”

  “And the half share you offered me earlier.”

  “Huh?”

  “If this works out, I want the money you said you’d give me the other day. From your cut.”

  Tony rubbed the scar on his cheek with his mangled hand and stared at Petty like he was a puzzle he was trying to solve.

  “What’s your plan?” he finally said.

  Bam! Something hit the door, hard. Tony pivoted on his fake leg and reached for the shotgun. Petty jumped off the couch and raced to the peephole. Nobody was there. Bam! Petty shifted his gaze downward. The little boy outside backed up his motorcycle and ran it into the door again. Bam!

  Petty opened the door. The kid was startled almost to tears by the scowl on his face. He abandoned his toy and ran to the old woman. She slapped him on the head and called out to Petty, “Lo siento, señor!”

  Petty closed the door and turned to Tony. He had no idea if anyone was watching the apartment, but in order for his scheme to work, he had to make Tony believe there was.

  “We need to get out of here,” he said. “Do you have any other guns? Some with bullets in them, maybe?”

  Tony made a face, didn’t appreciate the joke. “We can get shells anywhere,” he said.

  “Okay, later,” Petty said. “Right now, pack a bag. Underwear, toothbrush. You’re going away for a while.”

  “Where to?” Tony said.

  “Just do what I say,” Petty said. “While you’re standing here who-ing and what-ing and why-ing, more of Avi’s stooges might be sneaking up on us. Grab your shit, and let’s go.”

  Things were moving too fast for Tony. He scratched his scar and sipped some beer.

  “Why would I go with you?” he said.

  “If you don’t, you might as well give Avi the money right now,” Petty said. “Or call the cops and turn yourself in. That’s another option. Although I don’t know how safe you’d be in prison.”

  Tony flicked the pull tab on his beer a couple times, then said, “I’ll
kill you if you try and fuck me over.”

  “That’s how it usually goes,” Petty said.

  “I’m not kidding.”

  “And I’m not gonna fuck you over.”

  Tony looked like he was going to keep arguing but then thought better of it. He headed for the bedroom.

  “We can’t go out the gate,” Petty said. “Is there a back way?”

  Tony led Petty to a door that opened onto a dead-end alley. Weeds had forced their way up through the asphalt like bony fingers, and gang graffiti slithered over cinder-block walls. The two of them hurried down the passage past crippled shopping carts and gory mattresses, past a discarded washing machine and a bum wearing a scrap of shag carpet as a coat.

  They emerged near Petty’s rental car and scrambled inside. Tony scrunched in his seat and pulled the hood of his jacket over his head like he was worried somebody might see him. Good. He was on the hook. Petty kept an eye on the rearview mirror as he drove to the freeway, made sure nobody was tailing them.

  “Avi’s gonna regret messing with us,” Petty said. “We’re gonna come down on him hard.”

  “How?” Tony said.

  “First things first,” Petty said. “Where’s the money?”

  Tony considered the question, then said, “A couple places. Hidden real good.”

  “Where?” Petty said.

  Tony didn’t respond, just sank deeper in his seat and pulled his hood tighter around his face.

  “I’m trying to help you,” Petty said. “But for me to do that, you’re gonna have to trust me.”

  “Trust you?” Tony said. “I don’t even know you.”

  “I don’t know you, either,” Petty said. “But that’s the boat we’re in. We’ve both got our dicks hanging out.”

  Tony clammed up again, sat there scratching his scar. It was time to get his attention, jack up his paranoia.

  “Look out the back window,” Petty said.

  “Why?” Tony said.

  “I think somebody’s following us.”

  They had just crossed the L.A. River, headed west on the 101. The downtown skyline was silhouetted against the sunset. Petty twisted the steering wheel and swerved across two lanes of traffic to take the next exit.

  “What the fuck?” Tony said, grabbing the dash.