by Brian Keene
“Got to go,” Tonya said, and then hurried away. The guys at the other booth whistled as she approached them. I turned back to Darryl and Jesse.
“Maybe she got her period,” Jesse said. “Can’t dance if she’s bleeding.”
I didn’t respond. Instead, I got up and started to walk away. Darryl tugged my elbow.
“Where you going?”
“To piss. Be right back. Save me a beer.”
Nodding, he turned his attention back to Lakita, who’d managed to win over the crowd. I headed for the bathroom.
The men’s room at the Odessa was filthy, and I hated it. After the first time I’d used it, it was easy to understand why we’d seen guys pissing in the parking lot. The parking lot was much nicer. Cleaner, too. The restroom had three urinals, three commode stalls, and two sinks. All of them were covered with grime and stains. The toilet seats were pitted and loose. They wobbled when you sat on them. One of the urinals had a leaky pipe, and there was usually a pool of water on the floor beneath it. A paper towel dispenser and a condom machine hung on the wall, along with a cracked mirror. The linoleum floor was pea-green and my shoes stuck to it. The toilet stalls and the walls were the same sickly color as the floor.
There was an old guy using the urinal on the left. He leaned against the wall with one hand, drunkenly swaying back and forth. About every fourth drop of piss hit the floor, rather than his intended target. His nose whistled when he breathed. Ignoring him, I picked the urinal on the right, putting one between us for distance, and hurried to do my business. I tried not to step in the puddle beneath the urinal. I wondered again where Sondra was, and why she’d missed her set.
The wall was covered in graffiti. People had etched it into the paint with keys and knives or written on the wall in everything from black marker to shit. Some of it looked very old—ancient hieroglyphics from the late-Nineties. Other missives looked fresh. None of them had ever been painted over, as far as I could tell. They’d been left for posterity, I guess.
The old man flushed and walked out of the restroom without washing his hands. I didn’t blame him. The urinals were probably cleaner than the sinks.
As I pissed, I read the wall. Some of the graffiti looked like Russian. A few of the letters were written backwards. ‘Chobo Meptbbin’. I wondered what it meant. ‘Ctopoha cnhrk aeno 555-0673’. Gibberish. I read the English graffiti instead. ‘This is shit’. ‘I got the Aids’. ‘Legalize it’. ‘Who farted?’ ‘What are you looking at?’ ‘Tony was here’. ‘For good head, call 555-9081’. And the ever popular ‘Here I sit, broken hearted. Tried to shit but only farted’. Then there was an entire exchange between different people: ‘I love them hoes’. ‘Your Mom is a ho’. ‘So is your mom, fucker’. ‘You fucked his mom, too?’ ‘This is his Mom’. There were several that were either cryptic or crude—or sometimes both: ‘Have you seen Teddy and Frankie…call 555-6667…ask for Kaine…Cash Reward’. ‘My pussy ate my thong’. ‘My crabs have crabs.’ ‘Jesus saves, but Ob rulz’. And then there were doodles—a big-nosed Kilroy looking over a wall, the President with a gap-toothed grin and enormous ears, a smiling dog, weird occult symbols like you’d see on a Slayer disc, a smoking bong, and lots of male and female genitalia, all of them larger than life. Some of them made me laugh. Others made me cringe. Some made me do both.
Finished, I shook myself off, zipped up, and turned the sink on with my elbow. I was afraid to touch the knob with my hand. There was a layer of black scum and pink hand soap on top of it. I rinsed my hands off under the water, and then used my elbow to work the lever on the paper towel dispenser. It was empty, so I wiped my hands on my pants.
As I was heading out the door, a bouncer pushed past me and charged into the bathroom. I had to slink against the wall to avoid being run over. He paused, then turned around and looked at me.
“You see girl inside?”
His accent was thick and I had trouble understanding him at first. He leaned closer. I could smell his cologne.
“Girl,” he repeated. “You see her?”
“In there?” I shook my head. “Just me and an old guy. Maybe she’s in the stalls?”
“Da.” He started to turn away.
“Who you looking for?” I asked.
“No one. You go back to table. Enjoy show. Look at pussy. No worry.”
He walked over to the stalls. Shrugging, I let the door swing shut behind me and made my way through the crowd. There was a lot of commotion. Most of the bouncers had disappeared. I wondered where they’d gone. Whitey was standing outside his office door talking to Otar. They leaned close together. Whitey kept jabbing the bigger man in the chest with his finger, shouting something in Russian. Even though Otar was twice his size, he seemed scared of Whitey. The bouncer headed for the front door. He seemed worried—the first expression I’d ever seen on his stone face. Whitey scanned the crowd. His eyes lingered on me for a moment before moving away. I didn’t like how they made me feel. I hurried to the table and sat down. Lakita was on her second dance, gyrating to the latest by Fergie.
“What’s going on?” I asked Darryl and Jesse.
“Don’t know,” Jesse said, “but it must be something important. The bouncers took off backstage and Whitey looks pissed as shit.”
“About what? Was there a fight or something?”
“Nope.” Jesse shook his head. “Who knows? Maybe one of the girls stole some money or something.”
“Got to keep his pimp hand strong,” Darryl said, his eyes never leaving Lakita.
“You like that?” Jesse asked him.
Darryl grinned. “I hate this fucking song, but damn if she don’t make it better.”
They laughed. I tried to join in, but found I couldn’t. My stomach hurt. I felt tense. First Sondra hadn’t come out. Then that shit with the bouncer in the bathroom. There had to be some connection—but what? Even the other strippers seemed nervous. They kept glancing around the club, looking over their shoulders, distracted. Cowed. There was definitely something serious going on. Something bad.
After that, the fun seemed to go out of the evening. The Odessa’s atmosphere became muted, its energy drained. The customers didn’t clap as loud, didn’t tip as well. The dancers moved slower. Even the DJ seemed off, stepping over songs and fucking up the mix. Darryl and I finished our beers, and left the rest for Jesse to drink.
“You guys taking off?” His voice rang with disappointment.
“Sorry, man,” I apologized, “but I can’t stick around. Darryl needs to go in.”
“Damn straight,” Darryl said. “And so do you, Larry. You keep taking off work to look at pussy and GPS is gonna fire your ass. Besides, your girl ain’t here anyhow.”
Jesse twisted the cap off another beer. “She probably got tired of you stalking her and bailed.”
“Fuck you both. Twice.”
We said goodbye to Jesse, told him to be careful driving home, and then we left. Otar wasn’t at his usual spot. In fact, nobody was watching the door. More proof that something was up; people could just walk in now without paying. Definitely not business as usual. When we got outside, I saw why.
The moon was out and the sodium lights hummed and buzzed. Despite the illumination, it was still dark and shadows lurked between the cars. Whitey, Otar, and the rest of the bouncers were walking around the parking lot. Several of them had flashlights in hand, training the beams on the ground, looking for someone or something. One bouncer glanced at us briefly, but otherwise they paid us no attention. I heard Whitey grumble something in Russian. It sounded like his mood had worsened.
Darryl drew closer and whispered, “Maybe somebody was out here breaking into cars.”
“I hope not.” Immediately, I thought of my iPod. I’d put it in the glove compartment, but if a thief had broken into the Cherokee, they’d probably find it easy enough. “Shit.”
As we got closer to the Jeep, I sighed in relief. The windows weren’t broken and the door wasn’t ajar. The tires weren’t slashed
. No signs that vandals had scratched it with a key or anything like that. None of the other vehicles looked like they’d been broken into either. The Russians continued searching the lot, walking slowly up and down between the rows of cars, shining the flashlights along the ground. They didn’t speak. Only Whitey remained motionless, standing in the middle of the lot and watching their progress. The moonlight sparkled in his white hair. He glared at us as we approached the Cherokee. I nodded at him and tried to smile. Instead of returning the gesture, Whitey turned away.
My stomach was in knots and I didn’t know why. It was a terrible feeling. I looked to the sky. Darryl followed my gaze.
“Full moon,” he muttered. “Bound to be some crazy motherfuckers out tonight.”
“True that,” I said.
I pointed my keychain at the Jeep and pressed the button to unlock the doors. While Darryl hopped inside, I walked around the front, checking the hood and grille for damage. There was none. At that point, I really wasn’t expecting to find any, either. Whatever the hell Whitey and his guys were looking for, it wasn’t vandals. Not the way they were going about their search.
Darryl leaned over and opened my door. I raised my leg to step inside. Something grabbed my ankle. It startled me, but I didn’t scream. Not loud, anyway. Instead, I made a strangled little noise in the back of my throat. The Russians were too far away to notice.
I glanced down. A hand gripped my ankle. The fingers wrapped around me tightly. It was a pretty hand. Slender and fair-skinned. The fingernails were long and red. The hand was attached to an arm and presumably, the arm belonged to someone hiding on the ground beneath my ride.
I recognized the fingernails and the hand. Had studied them every night, along with the rest of their owner.
It was Sondra. I was sure of it. For some reason, Sondra Belov was hiding beneath my Cherokee. And suddenly, I was pretty sure I knew who the Russians were looking for. I just didn’t know why.
I took a breath and held it.
“The fuck you doing,” Darryl hollered. “We’re gonna be late for work.”
The bouncers glanced in our direction. The hand on my ankle squeezed harder.
“I stepped in some gum,” I said loud enough so that the others would hear me. “Hold on a second. I want to scrape it off first. Don’t want to get it on my upholstery.”
“Well, hurry up.”
I knelt on the pavement and peeked under the Jeep. My breath hitched in my chest. Sondra stared back at me. Her eyes were wide and frightened. Her face was covered with black smudges. After a second, I realized it was her mascara. She’d been crying. Her lip was swollen and bleeding. There was blood under her nose, as well. She started to speak, but I put a finger to my lips and shushed her. Then I stood back up again, and slowly opened the door. The sound of my knees popping made me jump.
“Darryl,” I whispered. “Be cool.”
“Be cool?” His voice was very loud. “The hell do I care, Larry? It’s your ride. If you don’t want gum in it, then it don’t matter to me.”
“Be fucking cool.” I stared at him as hard as I could, trying to convey the weight and gravity of the situation. He must have seen that something was wrong, because he nodded at me.
“Right. Cool. Like a cucumber.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the bouncers. They were all reconvening now, heading back to Whitey. They seemed to have given up their search. None of them were looking at us.
“Okay, Sondra,” I whispered. “Quick as you can, sneak up into the Jeep. Stay out of sight and keep your head and shoulders down. Crawl between the seats and into the back. Don’t let them see you. Understand?”
“Sondra?” Darryl mouthed the word silently.
I glared at him and gave a slight shake of my head.
Sondra slipped the top half of her body out from under the Cherokee and slid into the vehicle, wedging herself between the driver’s seat and the gas pedal. Then she crawled in the rest of the way. She was barely dressed—skimpy blue silk shorts and a matching silk robe, more like a pair of pajamas than clothing. It was very obvious she wasn’t wearing a bra or panties. On her feet was a pair of baby blue high heels. Darryl stared at her, bewildered. Sondra wriggled over his lap and he turned to me. I shrugged. Sondra slid between the seats, and then hid in the backseat, hunkered down on the floor, keeping her head low. My heart beat faster. I glanced around again. The Russians hadn’t seen her.
Darryl was flustered. “The fuck is going on, Larry?”
“Quiet,” I said. “Not now, man. Let’s just get the hell out of here.”
I slid into the driver’s seat and shut the door behind me. Then I put the key in the ignition and turned it. The engine thrummed to life. I dropped the Cherokee into reverse and slowly backed out of the parking space, trying to drive normally, trying not to attract attention. We headed for the exit. Sondra hyperventilated. I checked the rearview mirror, making sure she was okay. Her robe had come unfastened and her breasts were sticking out. I tried to ignore them. Even though I stared at them dozens of times on stage, it seemed wrong somehow to gape at them now. I stared straight ahead.
“Hey, you!”
“Oh shit.” Darryl looked back over his shoulder. “You done pissed off the Russians, Larry.”
I glanced in the rearview mirror again. Otar was running after us, waving his hands and shouting something. His face was red and flustered.
“What do we do?” I yelled.
“Get the fuck out of here!” Darryl slapped the dashboard with his palm.
In the backseat, Sondra whimpered.
Otar got closer. I heard part of what he was saying. It sounded like ‘lights’. I slammed on the brakes.
“Go, stupid!”
“Relax. He’s not after us, Darryl.”
“Then why the hell is he chasing us? What’s he shouting?”
“The headlights,” I said. “I forgot to turn them on.”
As I grasped for the knob, Otar reached the side of the Cherokee. He was puffing hard. I could see it from where I sat. His cheeks looked like a blowfish. Before I could pull away, he glanced into the back. His eyebrows narrowed. He shouted something in Russian and grabbed the door handle.
“Fuck!”
I stomped the accelerator and we shot forward. Otar held on to the door handle for a moment, and then tumbled face first to the pavement. As we raced into the street, I saw him jumping to his feet, pointing at us and screaming. The rest of the Russians were running towards him. There was a flash of light, followed a second later by a loud explosion.
“Motherfuckers are shooting at us,” Darryl screamed. “Drive, bitch, drive!”
Sondra spoke up for the first time. “They will kill you if they catch you. Kill us all. Please go. Fast. Now.”
“Listen to the lady,” Darryl urged. “Get us the hell out of here!”
I did. The Cherokee’s tires squealed and the vehicle shuddered, as if the engine was going to leap right out of it. The RPM and speedometer needles wobbled back and forth. We sped down the road and took the on ramp for Interstate 81. There wasn’t much traffic; just a lot of tractor trailers. I darted in and out of them, watching for signs of pursuit, but if Whitey’s men had followed us, we’d lost them.
“Why the fuck did you let that guy catch up to the car,” Darryl shouted. “Did you think he wouldn’t see the bloodied up bitch in the back seat?”
“I know, I know. I wasn’t thinking!”
“Damn straight, you weren’t. Jesus fucking Christ, Larry!”
Sondra sat up and I saw that she was crying again. I grabbed some tissues from the console and offered them to her.
“Here you go.”
“Thanks. You are nice to help.”
Darryl shook his head. “Son of a bitch…”
Sondra wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She looked around for some place to put the tissues.
“I can take them,” I said softly. “Hand them here.”
“Is…how you say? Sno
t…is snot in them.”
“That’s okay. Really, I don’t mind.”
She handed them back to me. I dropped them on the floor at my feet.
“How you know my name?” she asked.
“Huh?”
“My name. You say it to your friend when you help me. You say, ‘Sondra’. How is it you know my name?”
“Oh…” I laughed, nervous. Already, the gunshot and escape seemed distant and unimportant. This—having the girl of my dreams in my backseat—was far more unlikely.
“My name’s Larry Gibson. I watch you dance.”
“Yes.” She nodded, studying us both carefully. “Yes, I see you both at club. You talk to the other girls but you watch me long time.”
“Well,” I said. “I guess I do watch you a lot. I enjoy your show.”
“Me, too,” Darryl said. “And my name is Darryl Moore. And now that we’ve made introductions and we’re all friends and shit, how about you fucking tell us what the fuck is going on and why the fuck you were hiding beneath Larry’s fucking Jeep and why the hell those motherfuckers were fucking shooting at us?”
Sondra pursed her lips. “You curse very much.”
“You’re goddamn right I do,” Darryl said. “Now talk.”
Before she could respond, my hands went numb and I started shaking. I managed to roll the window down, but then I turned on the heat. I felt cold all of the sudden, but I was sweating like a pig. The road blurred. Darryl said something to me, but I couldn’t understand him. His voice sounded like it was far away. He grabbed the steering wheel and I tried to focus on him.
“Pull the fuck over,” he said. “You’re going into shock.”
I was and I did. I felt weak and tired and out of breath. Darryl and I switched places. I wasn’t worried about him wrecking the Cherokee. Not anymore. Such concerns seemed silly and trivial now. It’s not every day that someone tries to kill you. They’d shot at us. They’d actually fucking shot at us. It wasn’t like a movie or a TV show. This was real fucking life.
While Darryl readjusted the seat and familiarized himself with the Jeep, I lay back in the passenger’s seat and tried to get my breathing under control. Sondra leaned forward, staring at me. It felt good, seeing the concern reflected in her eyes. She reached out and touched my forehead.
