Shaker: A Novel

by Scott Frank

  It took Danny less than a week to find her.

  While it wasn’t much of a shock to learn that she had long ago divorced Dr. Toomey, Roy was somewhat surprised that his mother had remained in Kansas City, living for the past three years in a two-bedroom apartment in Quality Hill. She had hated Kansas City, all of the Midwest, for that matter. Roy had always assumed that the minute she could, she would have fled.

  Danny wanted to drive over right away, but Roy argued that showing up unannounced would likely upset her, make her defensive, and ultimately hurt his cause. The best thing to do, he thought, was to call first, give her time to think about a meeting. She might hang up on him, might not give him any chance to say what he needed to say, but at least she would know that he had found her, and could find her again. If she still resisted, he would go see her and make his plea in person. The bottom line remained, if Roy wanted to see his brother, there was no choice but to go through his mother.

  Nearly twenty years had passed since Roy had last seen The Captain: eight years in Boonville and another twelve on the farm with Harvey. And though his brother would be twenty-one now, Roy was no longer sure of his own age. It didn’t matter; Roy had died and was also born again in Boonville. Raytown, whenever that was, had been another lifetime. That wasn’t him. It seemed impossible now to see himself then, running away from Jim McDonald, or cowering in the halls of middle school. The image of the boy afraid of everything around him had long since faded away.

  Roy wondered if his little brother even knew of Roy’s existence. He doubted it. He doubted his mother would ever tell him, or anyone, about his older brother. She, too, was born again when Roy went off to Boonville.

  To Roy’s surprise, she sounded genuinely excited to hear from him. Though Roy got the feeling he had woken her up in the middle of a nap, there was eagerness in the gasp and hitch of her voice, and as soon as he explained who he was, she said, “Sweetie, of course I know who you are! I’m so happy you called!”

  She pushed for him to come see her as soon as he could. Please, sweetie. Right away. Tomorrow maybe?

  Roy asked about his younger brother, could he see him, too? She said yes, of course, Roy had to see him and she would do what she could to make that happen. Just please come as soon as you can!

  Danny suggested that Roy keep this visit to himself. He needn’t have bothered. Roy knew full well that Albert would never understand and would, in fact, actively try to prevent this meeting from happening. He had always maintained a They’re all dead to you position and would argue that any effort to make contact with his family would be a disloyal step backward and only lead to disappointment.

  Harvey and Rita would certainly feel the same way, but then Harvey considered himself Roy’s father now and would see any contact with his mother as some sort of threat to his own standing. He was right to worry about losing Roy. For once Roy saw his brother, he would explain to him what had happened and why he had disappeared, that it was for him, and then the two of them would start over. Roy would get a regular job somewhere far from this place and look after his brother for the rest of his life. He would keep the promise he had made twenty years ago. And nowhere in that plan was there room for Harvey or Albert or anyone else.

  His mother’s apartment was on the second floor of a recently redone brick five-floor on the corner of Broadway Boulevard and West 10th Street, across from the Quaff Bar & Grill, where Roy sat with Danny nursing a single beer and waiting for his hands to stop shaking. He was still tight in the chest an hour later when he stood alone in the hall outside her apartment, as a small Asian man in blue scrubs answered the door.

  “You must be Roy,” he said, extending his hand. “I’m Paul.”

  Roy followed Paul into the cheerful living room. The curtains were open, and the place was all bright colors and sunshine. The opposite of the house Roy had grown up in. A line of silver-framed photographs of his mother and little brother over the years ran along a green marble mantel and on the trestle table that sat behind the peach-colored sofa. There were no pictures of Roy or his father.

  Paul led him down a short hall and said over his shoulder, “She’s very excited to see you. It’s all she’s been talking about.”

  Roy peered into the first bedroom. A brown leather jacket was draped over the back of a chair. On a desk were more photos. Roy knew that his brother stayed here. He might not be here now, but he definitely stayed in this very room. Roy relaxed and felt overcome with good feeling, until Paul led him into the other room.

  She couldn’t have weighed more than ninety pounds. She sat upright in her bed with her hair, clearly a wig, fanned across the pillow behind her. Roy noticed that she had made the effort to apply some makeup—pale blue eye shadow and pink lipstick—but her face still looked hollow, like it was somehow slowly being sucked back into her skull.

  She reached out with shriveled hands attached to a pair of fleshy sticks and said, “Come here, sweetie.”

  Roy bent down to hug her and felt sharp bones cutting into his chest and caught the smell of a strong perfume mixed with Listerine, all of it making him dizzy.

  “Sit down,” she said. “Let me look at you.”

  Roy took the chair beside the bed and she gave him a long once-over.

  “I never thought you would ever be so tall. Or so handsome.”

  Roy found it hard to recognize his mother inside this emaciated old child lying in a bed that reeked of looming death. She could see him working it out and smiled.

  “It’s everywhere,” she said. “All over my body.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It came on so sudden. I can only imagine what I must look like to you.”

  “You look fine.”

  Roy’s eyes stung and he fought the urge to break down in front of her. After all he’d been through, all she’d put him through, he was still somehow so moved to see her. In that room, at that moment, he was once more ten years old. It wasn’t so much that he forgave her for anything, he didn’t, as it was a recognition that, absurdly enough, he still needed her. And so he sat, momentarily unable to speak, confused and determined at the same time.

  She looked down her starveling hands and said, “I know that you’re not here to see me.”

  Roy sat up and cleared his throat. “Where is he?”

  “He travels so much these days.”

  “He lives here?”

  “He stays here sometimes, to be with me. But he has his own place. A condo he bought with his own money. Can you imagine that? Someone his age being able to do that?”

  “I’d like to see him.”

  “And you will.”

  “When?”

  She closed her eyes. “I’m in so much pain, sweetie. You have no idea. A drink of water, I can feel it all the way down, like a thousand icy pins in my throat.”

  “Can’t they give you anything for it?”

  “They do. But it’s no way to live. Waiting to die. That’s as unbearable as the pain. More so.”

  “It’s just you and Paul here?”

  She nodded.

  “What happened to Dr. Toomey?”

  “That only lasted a few years.”

  She seemed genuinely upset about it.

  “I had a beau,” she said, “but he disappeared the minute I got sick.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I don’t blame him.”

  She smoothed out the sheet in front of her and said, “The doctors can’t really do anything for me.” And then she looked at Roy. “But you can.”

  “Me? What can I do?”

  “If you help me, I’ll help you.”

  “Help you how?”

  “The same way you helped your father.”

  He just looked at her.

  “Do you understand?”

  “I didn’t do anything to my father.”

  She said, “Of course you did,” and then leaned closer to him. “You put a pillow over his face and saved him from that awful bed.”

&
nbsp; Roy opened his mouth, but found that he couldn’t speak.

  “Please,” she said, and then leaned forward, grimacing from the pain as she reached back and grabbed one of the pillows from behind her and held it out for Roy. “I’m in so much pain.”

  Roy looked down the hall.

  “Paul’s leaving to do the shopping.”

  Roy just looked at the pillow and said, “Why don’t you ask my brother to help you?”

  “He’s not like you. He couldn’t do it.” She held out the pillow for him. “Please, Roy.”

  “If you’re gone,” he said, “you can’t do anything for me.”

  “Paul will make the arrangements for you to see your brother.”

  “Paul?”

  “He knows all about it.”

  “You talked about it?”

  “Of course. He just wants me at peace.”

  Roy considered her a moment, and then asked, “How much are you giving him?”

  “There’s not much left to give.”

  “You don’t want to say good-bye to the Captain?”

  She smiled. “The Captain. I haven’t heard that one in so long.” She then looked at Roy and said, “I can’t let him see me like this.”

  Roy looked once more into the other room where Paul was now quickly putting on his coat. Roy then stood up and took the pillow from his mother. He held it a foot or two above her face and said, “I forgive you, Mom.”

  She smiled that smile Roy remembered, the one that made Jim McDonald and the other kid whose name he’d long forgotten trip over themselves. She said, “I love you, too, Roy,” and lay back and closed her eyes.

  He looked down at her another moment, then started out of the room.

  He could hear her behind him. “Roy?” And then: “Where are you going?”

  He didn’t look back.

  She began screaming. You’ll never see him again! He’s too good for you! You leave him be! You hear me! He has a good life now, don’t you fucking dare ruin it!

  Roy handed the pillow to a confused Paul, said, “She’s all yours,” and walked out of there.

  She died a month later in the arms of her loving son Joseph, or so Paul had informed Roy when he called, though how he had gotten Roy’s number was a mystery. He wanted Roy to know that his younger brother would be at the funeral in case Roy wanted to pay his respects. But by then, Roy was on the run a good thousand miles away, and worried about his own funeral.

  Danny was sitting in the car, his leg bouncing against the dash, getting stoned, when Roy came out of his mother’s building and got in the car.

  “How’d it go?”

  Roy looked up at her window and said, “Great.”

  “She gonna set you up with your little bro?”

  “You know what, Danny? Just drive us home.”

  “You okay?”

  “I’m fine. Start the car.”

  Roy made him stop at a liquor store and bought a fifth of Jim Beam, most of which he drank before they were even out of the city limits.

  It was dark when they turned down the dirt road to the Cooper farm. Roy sat in the car when Danny got out, stared at Bob in the window, helping Rita set out a couple boxes of pizza, which Albert was now opening. There was Harvey in his chair smoking a pipe.

  One big happy family.

  He watched as Danny walked inside and Albert asked him something, then came to the window and looked out. He waved a hand and mouthed Get the fuck in here. If he hadn’t been so drunk, Roy would have slid over, started the car, and backed all the way up that dirt road.

  Instead he stumbled out of the car and threw up. He took another minute to get himself together and then went inside for what would be the last time they would all be together.

  Albert was hyped up and running on some chemical. He was talking a mile a minute and going on about how they had been summoned to a place in Waterloo, an hour drive from there. From what Roy could make out in his fucked-up state, apparently some asshole had been running an unsanctioned poker game in the city and was currently in some hideaway counting his money, or something like that. The current Number One in Kansas City—Roy couldn’t remember his name—wanted the man turned off and any recovered cash brought to him. Same old bullshit.

  What was new was how Albert asked Danny to come along. There was a strong likelihood that the guy in Waterloo had muscle around him, so they would need all hands for this one. Had he been sober, Roy might have been just a bit wary of the invite, given that Albert and Harvey had never trusted Danny with any wet work before this. But Roy, still reeling from the five minutes with his mother and the fifth of bourbon after that, had no such clarity. He was simply too drunk and too angry to know that Waterloo would turn out to be an apt name for the town where all of their good fortune would finally end.

  Three hours later, they were parked some fifty yards away from the dark house. Albert had gotten out of the car and went ahead on foot to have a look around. This was farm country and the nearest neighbor was several miles away. A fact not lost on an increasingly nervous Danny.

  “There’s no one out here.”

  Roy could see that Danny was anxious. His hands were shaking, but, for the first time Roy could remember, the rest of him was stock-still. He turned and caught Roy staring at him.

  “How long are you gonna stay pissed off at me?”

  Bob looked at them in the rearview mirror. This wasn’t the time to have this conversation.

  “I’m not pissed.”

  “I was just trying to do something good, you know?”

  “I know.”

  Bob said, “What are you two lovers fighting about?”

  But before Danny could tell him to fuck off, the front door whipped open and Albert leaned in.

  “We own the place.”

  Albert got back in the car while Danny pulled a .45 from his coat and checked it. Albert leaned over the seat and put a hand on the gun.

  “No need for that,” he said. “Turns out our guy’s solo.”

  He smiled and opened up a couple of beers, turned and handed a can each to Danny and Roy. Opened two more for Bob and himself. Danny drank his in nearly one go. Roy didn’t feel so good after all that bourbon, took a single sip, and set the can on the floor. Albert opened another and passed it back to a grateful Danny.

  “Merci.”

  Danny, relaxed now, looked at the house and asked, “What are we waiting for?”

  “He’s getting ready for bed. Might as well let him settle in. What’s Harvey say, Roy?”

  “No sense making it harder than it has to be.”

  “So very true.”

  Roy then got out of the car and threw up again. Albert rolled down his window. “You all right there?”

  “I am now.”

  Albert looked at the house and said, “Fuck it, let’s go.”

  The other three got out, Danny swaying from inhaling the beer or from nerves. As they started up the gravel drive, he asked, “What’s the plan?”

  Albert said, “The plan is we go in, we kill the guy, and then we leave.”

  “He’s gotta be expecting us, or someone like us.”

  Albert put his arm around Danny and said, “I guarantee you, he’s going to be very surprised.”

  It was getting colder by the minute and the night air smelled of snow, yet Roy was sweating. If he hadn’t sobered up on the drive over, walking up to this black-shingled house definitely woke him up. Everything about the place was wrong. Roy could see through a grimy window that there was a dim light on inside, but no movement of any kind. He hung back as Albert opened the door and walked right on in as if he lived there. He stepped aside for Danny and Bob to follow and then turned back to Roy and smiled.

  “You coming?”

  The entire place seemed to sag in one direction. The floor was warped with boards missing here and there, and wallpaper peeled from bowed walls. The only furniture in the front room was a couch minus a cushion and a couple of lawn chairs with frayed we
bbing. A lamp with no shade sat on the floor throwing off light that seemed to end before it reached the walls, giving the room a weak, yellowish cast.

  A woodshop was set up in the corner of the room. There was a wall of tools along with a table saw and a workbench. Beer cans and candy wrappers were strewn among scrap pieces of lumber and sawdust. The entire house smelled of mold and was, if possible, colder inside than out. The bones of the place chilled well past the point of ever warming up.

  Danny took it all in and said with a nervous laugh, “Cozy.”

  Roy took a look down a short hall and peered into an empty bedroom. He took in the missing window and the torn-up floor and said, “There’s nobody here.”

  When he turned back, Albert had Danny’s .45 pointed at Danny’s head.

  “Al?” Roy said. “What are you doing?”

  Bob stepped up beside Roy and put his gun to Roy. “I’ll need whatever you brought.”

  Roy looked at Bob.

  Albert said, “It’s all right, Roy. We’ll give it back when we’re done. I just can’t have you interfering. I know this asshole made you think he was a friend.”

  “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  Danny looked at Albert, laughed without any heart. “Yeah, Albert, what the fuck are you talking about?”

  Roy noticed now that Danny could barely keep his eyes open and asked, “You hit the beer with something?”

  “Rita’s Valium.”

  Bob reached behind Roy, into his waistband, and pulled the old Walther Harvey had handed him as they were leaving.

  Albert considered Danny for a moment and said, “I’ve been trying to figure out why they picked you for this job.”

  “Why who picked me? For what job?” Danny looked like he might fall asleep standing up.