Sex, Thugs, and Rock & Roll

by Todd Robinson

  Three in the morning, snow whirling from a sky stained pink with reflected light. The city sleeps.

  I try not to think about what I’m doing. If I think about it, I might back out, and if I back out, I lose everything. So I just focus on Jess and the road.

  It takes half an hour to find the right block. The house is somber against the sky. A thin layer of snow drapes the porch. I’d like to circle back to take another look, but I can’t be sure that someone isn’t watching. So I keep my speed steady, go two more blocks, then swing into the alley and kill the engine.

  There is no silence like the middle of the night in the midst of a Chicago snowstorm when you are about to do something truly stupid.

  I take a breath.

  I take my Louisville Slugger.

  I get out of the car.

  I rifle through the trunk for the ski mask I wear to shovel the car out. Putting it on does nothing to muffle the sick-sweet odor of trash. I stick to the side and move carefully. The air is sharp. Snow crunches under my boots. My fingers are cold, the skin waxy and thin. After two blocks, I’m right behind the house. And sure enough, Lester was right.

  Kids these days aren’t worth a goddamn, because there’s still no security cage on the back of his stash house.

  Taking delicate steps now, careful not to disturb the broken bottles and chunks of concrete that line the sides of the alley, I move to the building. There’s no screen, just a solid-core door with a metal kick plate. The cold of the wood is startling when I press my ear against it, but I can hear music. Someone is awake. Figures. Twenty-four-seven, people want what Lester sells.

  The door is locked, of course. But you don’t go down for a robbery beef without knowing a thing or two about locks. I bend one paper clip into an awkward tension wrench and the other into a scooped pick. My tools are clumsy, and it’s hard to work with numb fingers, so it takes almost ten minutes. But finally the cylinder of the deadbolt gives, spinning counterclockwise.

  My heart is hammering my chest hard enough I’m afraid my ribs might crack. There’s no way to know what’s on the opposite side of this door. I could be walking right into the barrel of a shotgun. Even if I’m not, there will definitely be two or three guys in the house, definitely armed and probably jacked up. Tweakers aren’t known for trigger discipline.

  Trying to remember the words for a Hail Mary, I turn the knob, pull the door a scant inch, and press my eye to the crack.

  It’s dark, but looks like a back room or a pantry. I can make out metal racks sagging under the weight of shadows. There’s an archway screened by a bedsheet, and beyond it, yellow light. The music is clearer now.

  Gripping the bat so hard my hands shake, I step inside and close the door behind me, and just like that, I’m back where I started. The last time I broke in where I wasn’t supposed to be, it cost me five years, my wife, and my daughter. And now here I am again, and just like last time, I’m doing it for Jess, even if she’ll never understand.

  The kitchen is on the other side of the curtain. It’s been converted to a lab, every surface covered with burners and flasks and tubing and jars. An efficient little operation: cook meth in the back and sell it out the front. No muss, no fuss. Of course, when the cops get wise to it, everybody inside will face federal time. But what does that matter to Lester? There’ll be nothing connecting him, and there’s always another stupid kid ready to step up for a spin of the wheel.

  I can hear voices now. The music swells, and I realize it’s a television. Perfect. If they’re caught up in something, maybe I can sneak right by, find the stash, and get the hell out without anyone the wiser.

  Adrenaline sings in my blood as I step through the kitchen towards the stairs.

  One night in a past life, Lucy rolled on her side and looked at me. Leno was on mute, and the light flickered across her features. “I think Jess is starting to figure out what you do.”

  “She say something?”

  My wife shook her head. “Not exactly. But she roots for the bad guys on TV.”

  “What, I’m a bad guy?”

  Lucy touched my cheek. “No, baby. But you’re not a model citizen either.”

  I snorted and rolled over on my back, stared at the ceiling. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s time I quit.”

  “Maybe it is.”

  I looked over. “A little fucking judgmental, are we?”

  Lucy smiled, that slow sweet thing. She turned to take the locket from the bedside table. Dangled it from her right hand and used her left to open it. Inside were two pieces of tan paper, cut to ovals and glued in place. Us. On the left, her thumbprint; on the right, mine. Whorls and spirals marked in black ink, two one-of-a-kind things brought together. Facing each other.

  I waited for her to say something. But after a minute, I realized she had.

  I can hear my pulse. Not just feel it—hear it.

  The house is a small bungalow, with two bedrooms and a filthy bath opening immediately off the top of the stairs. Which means that before I’ve even reached the second floor, I can see straight into the opposite room, where a man lies on a bed with his hands laced behind his head and a shiny automatic beside him.

  I freeze three steps from the top, one foot stopping in midair. I’m a stranger wearing a ski mask and carrying a baseball bat. If he looks over, I’m going to die. A warm fist spins greasy in my belly. I realize I’m holding my breath. I was scared before, but now panic hits, and it’s all I can do not to turn and run. I can be out the back door and heading home in minutes. No one ever needs to know I was here.

  Then I see the money.

  It’s in a paper grocery bag on the floor, which seems strange until I realize that it’s not like addicts pay in crisp C-notes. There are hundreds of dirty bills piled loose in the bag. More than I need.

  The man doesn’t stir. His eyes are closed.

  I stare at the money, and then at the man, and then at the gun, and then at the money again, my eyes flicking in a circle as my mind races, but the truth is, I’ve already made up my mind, I’m just working on my nerve.

  Gently, very gently, I lift one foot and put it down on the next step. Again. Again.

  A board squeaks and I freeze like I’ve been turned to stone. Wait a long moment. Nothing happens.

  I step onto the landing. The bat is a comfort, and I grip it tight enough to leave marks. Force myself to breathe, and take another delicate step, and another. The bag will be awkward, and I’ll have to lift it carefully so as not to make a—

  The man’s eyes open.

  We stare at each other for what’s probably less than a second but seems longer. He looks to be in his twenties. Black hair, soap opera scruff, blue eyes. I’ve seen him before. He’s been in the bar. A vodka tonic man, I recall, absurdly.

  And then he’s lunging for the pistol, his right hand flying, moving so fast I can almost see a blur behind it. He must not have been napping, only lounging, he’s too alert, and before I can move he’s got his fingers on the pistol and is starting to bring it up and I don’t think, just step forward and crack the bat into his head like I’m swinging for the fences.

  The sound is nothing like hitting a baseball.

  Everything stops. I stand and stare at what I’ve done. And for no reason I can understand, I think of that day Jess broke her ankle, the way she said, I’m sorry, Daddy, and how all I wanted was to hold her and keep her safe from every bad thing.

  Then I reach down and pick up the bag and tiptoe back down the stairs and through the kitchen and out the back door, a grocery bag full of cash in one hand and a bloody baseball bat in the other.

  A whirl of soft white erases me.

  The shirt is different. Everything else is the same: the sneer, the cokehead twitchiness, the pistol tucked where I can’t help but see it. Standing across the bar from me, he says, “You have what I want?”

  I take a moment to study him. Not a bad-looking kid if you could convince him to take a shower, get a haircut. He’s young, and too coc
ky. I could yank the bat and sock him in the head, and the way he’s got it tucked under his shirt that gun would do him no good at all.

  Instead, I open the cupboard and hand him the duffel bag. There was almost fourteen thousand in the grocery bag. I was up till dawn counting and bundling.

  He unzips it, glances inside, and I can see triumph flow through him. I remember what it feels like, that raw and animal joy from taking something you could never earn.

  “Smart move, old man.” He straightens. “So here’s how this works. I’m going to walk out of here. You follow me, or I get any hint the cops are following me, and your daughter dies.”

  And I laugh. Was I ever that young?

  He’s not ready for that, and it throws him. “You think I’m fucking kidding?”

  “Come on, kid.” I shake my head. “You got your money. No need to keep pretending you really kidnapped her.”

  He goes tense. His eyes dart right to left and back again. “How—”

  “Only a person that believes I have money would bother to run an angle on a guy like me. And the only person who’d believe I have money is Jess.” I shrug. “She always believed in the bad guys on television. Why she ended up with you, I guess. You two are together, right?”

  The kid nods, looking like he’s trying to do math problems in his head.

  “Was this your idea or hers?”

  He finally finds his voice. “She was always going on about how her dad was this big criminal, been to prison and everything. So I figured, you know…” He shakes his head. “Wait a second. If you knew from the beginning, why—”

  “Do you have a daughter?”

  “Naw, man.” He says it almost boastfully, like the idea is ridiculous.

  I sip my beer and shake my head. “Then you wouldn’t understand.”

  He stares for another few seconds, finally blinks, shrugs. “Whatever.” He backs towards the door, keeping an eye on me, like I might lunge for the bag.

  “Hey.”

  The kid pauses, nervous.

  “Give this back to her, will you?” I hold out my hand. The locket dangles.

  His features war with themselves, the sneer faltering. He’s young, doesn’t know how to handle his emotions yet. It’s easy to see that he doesn’t understand why I’m letting him walk out with that money. It just doesn’t compute to him.

  Not yet, at least.

  For a long moment he just stares at the locket swinging back and forth. Finally, he steps forward, and I let the chain unspool from my fingers.

  After he leaves, I think of following, letting him lead me to Jess. The daughter I haven’t seen in seven years, who calls every couple of months to say she hates me. My baby. Instead, I pull a pint of Bud and drink it slow. I top off a regular’s beer. I wash some glasses in preparation for the evening rush. Then I lean on the bar and light a cigarette and watch the snow fall.

  I think about the guy I hit with the bat, and whether or not I killed him. I wonder how long it will be until Lester White runs down the list of people that knew about the back door of his stash house, until he puts that together with me asking for a loan. I wonder if it’s true what they say about his pit bulls, and I think it probably is.

  I wonder if, maybe, just maybe, my phone will ring one more time before I find out.

  Cramp

  Anthony Neil Smith

  I got the E. coli really bad the morning of the heist from hot dogs earlier in the week, but I didn’t see the other three sweating and cramping and squeezing back their bowels like me, suffering in the backseat of Winona’s Saturn coupe. It was me, Winona driving, Lewis back with me trying to keep his distance, and Abe riding shotgun. Abe and Winona had a thing. I’d wanted her first. He’d acted first. I don’t know, maybe I still had a chance. We really had good talks. I hated listening to them fuck at night.

  Only two more hours south, the Indiana/Michigan state line. Our first destination, State Line Steve’s Adult RelaXXXation Den.

  My roommate Abe thought up the heist on the way home from his aunt’s funeral in Ohio. He noticed the state line porn shops and imagined they’d be loaded with cash since pervs wouldn’t want the shit on their credit cards. Not a bad idea. I’d never robbed anything before, but my options sucked after I was kicked out of school on a “sexual assault” charge. One of Winona’s friends—she said the charges were nothing personal, but the bitch got a sweet settlement from the school. All I’d done was try to show her that a back massage from me would melt her tension like butter. Instead she kneed me and called security.

  Winona was still my friend, though. She trusted me, probably because touching her would result in Abe touching me badly. I didn’t want that, remembered two purple fingers and a makeshift cast. One still won’t bend right.

  Lewis was melting into the door, telling them to turn on the air.

  “No,” I said. “Freezing.”

  “It’s fucking May.”

  “But he’s sick,” Winona said. “Chills. Come on. Poor guy.”

  Lewis said, “If he’s got food poisoning, aren’t we gonna get it too?”

  “Could’ve been a bad frank. Just one that didn’t get cooked enough. Or maybe it’ll take longer for one of you to get sick. You’re more muscular.”

  “What if it’s the flu? Or worse?”

  Abe turned his head. “Would you shut up? It’s a fucking stomachache, that’s all.”

  “Actually, it’s bacteria,” Winona said. “Most things that make us sick are bacteria.”

  Lewis glanced at me like I had plague. “You sure? How do you know that?”

  Her eyes rear viewed him, rolled. “Duh, I was taking classes, remember? To be a med lab tech?”

  “You get far enough to know a cure?” I said. Every word strained, couldn’t risk releasing.

  She shrugged. “That would’ve been the next semester. It was just too hard for me.”

  I didn’t buy it. I knew how smart she was. Her problem was, she’d rather drown herself in lemon drops and Jell-O shooters than study Immunology. Her new major at Grand Rapids Community College was Social Work, her fourth in two years.

  “I need a restroom,” I said.

  Abe turned farther, couldn’t get his face around that far. “Really?”

  “Urgently.”

  Lately, things had been “make do.” I was C student from a farm family, got booted from school and had to mop floors at Taco Bell to pay rent. Abe wasn’t sympathetic. He still expected me to pitch in a hundred more than him because, “Hey, I’m not here as much as you.” So I made do. I made do with a half-assed relationship with Winona when she was waiting for Abe to either show up or wake up. I liked our mornings, coffee and Pop-Tarts watching music videos—her, bare-legged, wearing one of Abe’s giant Gap rugby shirts. The guy was a hulk, I’ll give him that. Some mornings she’d stagger towards the table and say, “Sometimes I wish he’d ease up. I don’t need bruises every night.”

  Oh, sweet Winnie, I’d be gentler. I’d listen to you. Just let me give you a back massage.

  No, I didn’t say that. I said, “Yeah, that’s pretty tough.”

  I made do with a crap job, couldn’t dare tell my folks about the assault charges. It didn’t get as far as a trial. I didn’t want to fight it. Figured it was easier to let everything cool out and then start over later, my record clean of anything official as long as I kept away from trying to make something of myself—although that dream of being a vet had pushed me out onto the road and just kept on without me. I supposed I could work in pet stores eventually. Wanted to give Abe’s way a try first.

  Made do with a nasty gas station bathroom too. I three-plied toilet paper as a seat protector because of the brown stripes that wouldn’t wipe away. The light kept flicking off. It smelled like week-old stew. And then I released.

  Whispered, “Yeeeeeeeeeeessss.”

  Moaned.

  Took in another breath, like week-old stew and bad pork.

  Read black marker graffiti:

&n
bsp; Had me a long dick here, 4/25/04.

  Jesus Saves

  He sure does—saves the best weed for himself.

  Galatians 1:20

  Lewis pounded on the door. “You can’t set up house in there!”

  I reached for toilet paper, pulled. The last five squares fell off. I tried for the backup roll. There wasn’t one.

  “Son of a bitch.”

  No paper towels for your hands. Just an air dryer.

  Lewis shouted, “We can’t risk being seen, asshole. Come on.” Then to Abe, “I’m trying. He won’t fucking answer!”

  “Five minutes, all right? Can you wait five more fucking minutes?”

  I tried my best. I made do with five squares to deal with my slimy ass, the bacteria turning everything to a syrupy pond scum. I worked it off, sometimes getting a little on my fingers and palm. Shit, shit, shit. The aches were coming back and I had to start clenching. My friends were bound to take off without me if I stayed any longer. The best I did with five squares was about eighty percent clean. Fuck it. I had a long day ahead.

  A bigger surprise when I tried to wipe the shit smears off my hands. The water didn’t work. Tried cold. Tried hot. Tried spinning them as far as I could. Nothing.

  Fine, then. Okay. Just make do. Maybe the air dryer would evaporate them, kill the little microbes, anything. So I hit the button and held open palms beneath. No air, no heat, no nothing.

  I wanted to cry.

  Twenty miles later, the nausea moved in.

  I’d asked Winona the night before why she wanted to come along. I was surprised to learn Abe had told her. She said, “Don’t know.”

  “You could get hurt. You could go to jail.”

  “It’s not like we’re killing someone. People rob all the time.”

  “But they go to jail for it.”

  “A little.” An index finger and thumb almost touching.

  I’d figured her out then. She didn’t like Abe because she saw the gentleman underneath the scars. She just liked the scars. Same with anything else in life.