The Weight

by Andrew Vachss

  “So what was that before, more acting?”

  She cocked her head to the side, like she was listening.

  “When you acted like I thought you were stupid, remember?”

  She smiled, showing off those perfect teeth.

  “That must have hurt,” I said.

  “What? I do presses like that every—”

  “The implants.”

  “Are you serious? You go to sleep, you wake up with new ones. A couple of weeks on the painkillers, you’re good to go.”

  “I wasn’t talking about—”

  “How could you know that?”

  “Know what? Look, you lost me a while back. I can’t do this stuff.”

  “Stuff?”

  “Talk in … code, like.”

  “Don’t like dress-up, do you, Wilson? Okay, then, tell me how you could possibly know it did hurt. A lot. Most of the time, it’s just like I said … no big deal. But the job Albie paid for, they had to take the old ones out first. Those were over the muscle, not under, the way you’re supposed to have it done. But I was just a kid that first time. And the pig who ran the club said I needed them if I wanted to work the front pole, make some real money.

  “It took me three months to pay off that bill. Five grand. Back then, I could’ve flown first-class for that much cash, but I didn’t know that. I was even grateful to that sleazeball for fronting me the money. He probably split the fee with the cutter. Then he let me work it all off. Five hundred a week. Plus points, which is why I had to do the whole three months.”

  “I didn’t know that. Any of that.”

  “But you said—”

  “I was talking about your teeth. I know people, had that done. Not even their whole mouth, just a few. They said that hurt, so I figured, you got a whole new set, it had to hurt even more.”

  “Maybe I just have good dental hygiene.”

  “That keeps teeth white, maybe. But it can’t make them perfect, like yours are.”

  “So maybe I’m wearing dentures.”

  “Like those things you take out at night? Not a chance.”

  “I suppose you’re sure about that, too?”

  “Yeah, I am. You work too hard at … everything, I guess. You don’t take shortcuts.”

  “There wasn’t one to take—my teeth were mostly rotted out, plus I had impacted wisdom teeth.… They had to come out anyway. So I guess I’m the one who should be saying I’m sorry, huh?”

  “You don’t have to say anything.”

  And she didn’t. Sat there without moving until I finished. Then I asked her, “So can I borrow the Lincoln?”

  “Now?”

  “Yeah.”

  She hopped off the countertop and walked past me. I could hear her rooting around in that big white handbag she’d been carrying when she came in. Taking a lot of time to find the keys. I would have bet serious money she was bending over. I didn’t turn around.

  When her heels started clicking, I shifted position so I could see her coming. She put down a photocopy of the Lincoln’s registration and insurance card. And a letter signed by her saying I was using the car with her permission. The letter was on some fancy stationery, said she was an interior decorator. It was even notarized. And I had a Florida driver’s license, too. With my picture on it.

  “This is better than perfect. Thanks.”

  “Hold on. First off, you understand that we’re still in Leon County, but just barely?”

  “Huh?”

  “Ah, I mean, it’s probably forty-five minutes to get into the parts of Tallahassee you’re looking for.”

  “Okay, so how do I—?”

  “See these buttons on the key fob? The yellow one turns off the sensors at the front. Always hit it before you go between those stone pillars. The red one opens the garage door. It’s pretty long-range—you don’t have to be close for it to work. The door’ll be open; you just drive in. Press the red one again and the door closes behind you.”

  I nodded to tell her I got what she was saying.

  “Good. Now take a look at this,” she said.

  It was just a drawing of the dashboard, black-and-white except for one big green button.

  “You push that button and this screen here”—she tapped where she wanted me to look—“lights up like a big map. There’ll be a thick red arrow, like one of those ‘You Are Here’ signs at the mall. It’s preset. So, no matter where you end up, just tap that button again. All you have to do is follow the arrow, and you’ll get right back here. You don’t even have to look at it; there’s a voice that’ll tell you when to turn.”

  “Damn!”

  “In the trunk, there’s a lot of athletic equipment. Used equipment, years old. I’m pretty sure there’s a couple of baseball bats. One wood, one aluminum, if I remember right.”

  “Okay.”

  She handed me a black knife, the kind that you can open with your thumb. The top edge was all ridges, like a saw. “In case you get a hangnail or something.”

  “Thank you.”

  She put her hands behind her back. It didn’t look like she was showing off her chest that time; it looked like she wanted to make sure she didn’t touch me.

  The new shoes were as comfortable as if I’d been wearing them for years. Black lace-ups with a one-piece sole and heel. The chinos had a tongue-and-groove thing in front. The light-blue T-shirt felt like silk. The jacket was a darker blue, made of some kind of fiber that would breathe. It only came to my waist, so I tucked in the T-shirt.

  I don’t know much about cars, but I could tell the Lincoln had a real soft ride. I guess that’s why everyone uses them for the baby limos you see all over New York. They’re like cabs, only they don’t have meters and you’re not supposed to pick up passengers from the street, only off calls.

  Three hours later, I still hadn’t even seen a place that looked right. I didn’t want to try the strip clubs yet—I figured I could run names past Rena and she’d be able to tell me something about them. Not what went on inside or anything, just their price range. I couldn’t see this Jessop going into a place where you’d look wrong without a suit and tie.

  I tried four poolrooms, but they were more like singles bars than the kind of spot I could see this Jessop in. The tables were all different colors, waitresses walking around between them, everything lit up, music playing.

  The last one, I figured maybe I’d stay around awhile, see if anyone came over to talk to me. I can shoot a little. Not great or anything, but I wouldn’t embarrass myself. If it cost me a few bucks to get some kind of lead, it’d be worth it.

  I smelled them before they came up to me from behind, one on each side. A blonde in a yellow top, cut off just below her boobs. A Chinese girl—something like Chinese, anyway—with long black hair. She had on one of those outfits divers wear, only hers was red, and it zipped down the front. They must have used the same perfume.

  The blonde kind of bumped me with her hip. I looked down at her.

  “I made a bet with my girlfriend. Jasmine, that’s her. I’m Angel.”

  I looked from one to the other.

  “Your turn,” the Chinese girl said.

  “Wilson,” I said.

  “This is the bet,” the blonde said. “Jazzy is always saying she weighs exactly a hundred pounds. Does she look like she weighs a hundred pounds to you?”

  “I’m no good at that. Guessing, I mean.”

  “See?” the blonde said. “Didn’t I tell you?” She jabbed her finger into my left biceps, like she was checking to make sure it was real. “You do free weights, don’t you?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “How much do you curl?”

  “I don’t pay much attention. I’m not trying to set any records.”

  “But you’ve got some idea. You must have. Like, benching a hundred pounds, that’d be a joke for you.”

  “I guess so.”

  “That’s why I asked about curls, see? I mean, you could bench my girl here, even if she was
a total heifer. But curls, like off a preacher bar, a hundred would be a serious lift.”

  “You know a lot about that?”

  “I know a guy, built like you, walks in here and leaves his jacket on, he’s not trying to impress anyone. That’s not even a tank top under your jacket. So I say to Jazzy, ‘That guy, he’s the one to settle our bet.’ ”

  “You want me to curl … her?”

  “If you can. That’s the bet. If you can curl her, she wins. If not, I do.”

  “I never curled a person. That wouldn’t—”

  “You’re worried about where to grab her?”

  “I … No, what I meant, a person, that’s live weight. Not the same.”

  “But I’m wearing clothes,” the Chinese girl said, like that would fix things.

  The two of them were standing side by side, facing me. The blonde was way taller than the other one. I looked down to see if it was their heels.

  “Can’t you guess?” the blonde said.

  “Not just by—”

  She pointed at her chest. On that cutoff thing she was wearing, one boob had a little “R” over it; the other had a “G.”

  I just shook my head.

  “Real,” the blonde said.

  “Good,” the Chinese girl said, like they’d done this a hundred times.

  “I wasn’t—”

  “Well, now you are,” the blonde said. “Come on, big boy. One lift.”

  “How much did you bet?”

  “Oh, we don’t bet money. When you play pinwheel, the one who gets to go first has the best time.”

  “What’s pinwheel?”

  “If you stop asking questions and just try and curl this cute little slut, you’ll see for yourself.”

  I held out my arms. The Chinese girl jumped up against my chest. I cupped the back of her neck in my right hand and wrapped my left around her calves. She made herself straight as a steel bar.

  Then I kind of rolled her until she was at the end of my arms. I brought her down to the top of my thighs, sucked in a breath through my nose, and let it out as I pulled her all the way back to my chest. She nipped at my neck, so quick I didn’t even feel it until I was putting her back down.

  “Less than a hundred,” I said.

  They didn’t want me to stay the night in the motel. “Why ruin it?” the Chinese girl said.

  “She means, it’s not going to happen again,” the blonde told me. “Ever.”

  They didn’t have to spell it out—I could see they couldn’t wait to get at each other.

  Crazy bitches. They thought they had everything covered:

  Told me to follow them to a motel they’d never go back to. Didn’t give me their real names or phone number. Even if I grabbed the license-plate number, it’d turn out to be a rental, under a fake name. Probably never pulled their act in the same place twice, either.

  Like I said: crazy bitches. It was just a matter of time before they dialed a wrong number. They had to know that. Maybe that was part of the kick.

  There’s all different ways to be that kind of crazy. I knew this girl, she wanted me to choke her until she was almost out. “Edge-play,” she called it. “That’s where all the best things are, out on the edge.”

  Probably the same way the guy who killed her a couple of years later felt. It made all the papers, how he carved her up while he was doing her. That “sex game gone wrong” defense, it’s no good when you play it with razors.

  By the time I walked out of that room, it was real late. So much for my bright idea. I’d figured, after it was over, the girls would want to … I don’t know, exactly, but … talk, or something. Me being a stranger, they might want to tell me about all kinds of places where I might look for this Jessop.

  I was wrong about everything. And now it was way late. This Jessop, he wouldn’t be a street guy. Even with it being so warm out, he’d be inside, someplace. Maybe a bar.

  Rena was right. Small town or not, it was way too big for me to find anyone in it.

  That map worked just like she said it would.

  When the garage door closed behind me, I left the key in the ignition, so I wouldn’t have to walk through the house looking for the right spot to put it.

  The clock was showing 4:57 with a blinking sun when I closed my eyes.

  When I opened them, the clock said 1:01 with a moon. While I was under the shower, I was thinking, this part was kind of like solitary, too. That’s the only place where you can take a shower by yourself. You put your back against the cell door, hands through the slot. That way, they can box-cuff you before they have to open the door. Two guards walk you down, give you maybe five minutes, and back you go.

  That’s in Ad-Seg, not PC. The cons in Ad-Seg, they’re supposed to be dangerous, I guess. PC, protective custody, the only way you get in there is if you ask for it, or if they decide you wouldn’t be safe in Population.

  Only, that isn’t how it really worked. I was never in PC, but I know for a fact that the shot-caller of any gang, he can ask for volunteers to go there.

  At least the Spanish ones can. I was still out in Population when this skinny young boy tells the guards he’s afraid of getting raped. That’s an automatic PC. But that skinny kid, he was in for murder. Not some drive-by, either; he’d used a blade.

  Some of the weak ones, they run to a gang for protection when they get Inside. But this kid, he was already a Latin King on the street. That’s where he picked up his charge. Word was, somebody owed money for dope, and the kid collected in blood. He was never going home.

  Another reason to ask for a lockup is if you’re a rat. A known rat. That skinny kid, he was in PC maybe two weeks before he shanked a guy who’d ratted on a whole bunch of Latin Kings.

  He must have been quick—there’s no blind corners in PC. And a real artist, too. Most of the time, a guy gets shanked, they can save him. I’ve seen guys stuck like a pincushion—two, three cons doing the work at the same time—and they still live through it. They know how to handle stab wounds in prison. But this Spanish kid, he hit the rat a perfect kidney shot, spun him around, and planted the spike in his neck before the guards could get to them.

  I know the story because, by the time they transferred the kid to Ad-Seg, I was already there.

  For me, landing in there was just pure luck. I don’t know why those two black guys jumped me. I saw them coming in plenty of time to call for a CO, but I didn’t do that. You can’t do that.

  I got cut a few times. Not stabbed, sliced. It’s a big, big difference.

  I wasn’t dumb enough to think I was going to win that hearing they have to give you before they toss you into Ad-Seg. Everybody in the whole joint knew it was self-defense: What kind of maniac’s gonna jump two guys, specially when they’re carrying? But one of them had a fractured skull, and the other got a splintered rib that tore a lung, so they had to lock me up.

  I still don’t know why they went after me—it wasn’t that I made some first-timer’s mistake, like I had with the weights. They were real young, so maybe it was some kind of initiation. But a lot of the white guys thought it was me, representing.

  And the guards—in Ad-Seg, I mean—they gave me a lot of play. Treated me good. Nothing out-loud special … maybe a few extra minutes in the shower, not tearing up my cell when they searched, calling me by my name. Doesn’t sound like much, but in there, that’s a lot.

  Truth is, I kind of liked it. I didn’t have any friends out in Population, and I wasn’t going to make new ones.

  “Do your own time,” is what they always say, but that’s no good anymore. Probably never was. I just caught a break, is all—if it’d been white guys who jumped me, I’d’ve been screwed.

  Different color could mean a random shot. But a same-color hit, that couldn’t be random. So it’d look like I was locked down for some kind of wrong reason—snitching, not paying a debt. Or, even worse, being what the Aryans call a “race traitor.”

  I just wanted the five years to go away. I di
dn’t need to play dominoes or work some two-bit racket. I had a little radio, with earphones and all. And those books and magazines Solly had sent in.

  I didn’t even miss working out. You don’t need equipment to do that, and I never skipped a day.

  The only really lousy thing was the food. Even with my heavy commissary draw, I didn’t have a whole lot of choices. I just stayed with what I knew, drank lots of water, and let every day fall into the night.

  I woke up one morning when they key-slapped the slot and told me to roll it up, all the way. I guess they were a little surprised that I didn’t get more excited about it.

  That’s prison for you. I’m too dangerous to be put in a population of nothing but criminals, but they kick me straight out into a much bigger population. What, I’m not dangerous to the public?

  A couple of the guards wished me luck. The way they say it, it’s always the same: “I don’t want to see you back here, Sugar.”

  Like I’d be trying to break into the place.

  I went down to the kitchen, but nobody was there. Not in the gym, either. The place was too big for me to go poking around on my own. And even if it wasn’t, if I tried to find Albie’s little book, I’d probably set off a hundred alarms.

  So I went back to the kitchen and made myself something to eat. Killed another hour, doing that.

  You don’t want to work out right after you have food. Besides, something was gnawing at me, and I couldn’t nail it down. Something about looking around …

  That’s when I went back to the place she’d put me in. But I didn’t stay there. I went into the garage. If she was around, I could always say I hoped I’d done the right thing, leaving the keys in the Lincoln last night.

  The Lincoln was still there. But not the little car. A Thunderbird, Rena had told me it was. A ’57, like that was real special. All-original, like that was even more special. There was only one place in town that she trusted to work on her car. Maybe that’s where she was.

  Only, I couldn’t see Rena sitting around while people worked on her car. For all I knew, she’d be back any second. Too many “maybe”s for me.