Sex, Thugs, and Rock & Roll

by Todd Robinson

  My body rises off the ground and I’m tossed into the dog pit. I land and the dogs chained to either side of the pit start barking.

  I rise up onto all fours and spit blood. “There’ll be no dogs dying here tonight.”

  Everyone from every direction is still laughing, having themselves one hell of a time.

  “Release the dogs,” Tan Blancard says.

  The dog handlers obey. The only things I can see are flashes of teeth and yellow eyes. I won’t hurt the dogs.

  This is a damn hard pledge to keep, though, as the first pit bull rips into my arm and the second bites into my calf. “Good dogs. Nice puppies.”

  I try to keep a picture of Tank and Lassie in my head. I picture them in a meadow sharing a couple of Whoppers. It helps the pain from completely reaching my brain.

  “Stop, damn it! Stop,” I yell.

  I see angels or something damn close to them fluttering around my head and I have to admit that this just might be the end. It’s been a damn good run—maybe too good for a no good bastard like myself.

  Snap! Snap!

  The dogs fall limp next to me. It’s Natasha. She’s shot the dogs with a tranquilizer gun. I know what was bothering me about her now. She’s a cop. Okay, maybe I was wrong about her snatching the dogs, but what I’m not wrong about is that she’s in trouble.

  Tan Blancard comes up from behind her and beans her with a club. She goes down hard. I reach into my trench coat and pull out my roscoe. “This is for you, Tank.”

  All those that came to watch the dog fights are scrambling for the exits. There’s smoke and flames. One of the bullets must have hit something flammable.

  I pull myself out of the pit and see one of the goons mounting a giant stereo speaker. He lets loose with an Uzi, spraying lead all over the joint. It’s ugly. The rich guys dive behind their escorts. A bullet skims my scalp and blood runs down my face. I grab one of the dead dogs from an earlier fight by the collar and use it as a shield as I move toward the shooter.

  The corpse takes shots and I can feel warm dog blood running down my forearm. I reach around the dead dog and fire one shot after another, hitting the guy on top of the speaker, blowing his arm off at the elbow. He’s in too much pain to come after me now, but I shoot him through the head anyway.

  It’s a damn shame all this dying, but I figure that every time one of these bastards gets snuffed the positive balance of the universe is righted. I’ll make sure hell fills up real quick.

  I reload and reload again, shooting up every bad guy in the joint. Soon everyone else is dead or gone except for Tan Blancard. I give him the bum’s rush as he unloads his pistol into the dog corpse and then I chuck it in his face, knocking him down.

  Tan Blancard says something like, “Fuck you.” But at this point it doesn’t matter what he says. He’s going to die.

  I jump on top of him, pinning his arms down with my knees. He’s got more teeth in his mug than a pack of were-wolves and they’re glaring at me all yellowlike. I swing with my brass knuckles and half of them are lying on the ground in bits. I pick several pieces out of my fingers and then, as if my fists have minds of their own, they start pounding his face in. With each strike of my brass knuckles I feel power surge through my body. “You’ll…never…kill…another…dog.” It’s a goddamn beautiful thing. I see Tank, Lassie, and my mom smiling down on me from heaven.

  “Ouch, my head.”

  It’s Natasha or whatever her real name is. My fists are still working, grinding Blancard’s face into pulp. I have to make a conscious effort to make them stop.

  I get up, tossing my brass knuckles to the ground. The smoke is getting bad now.

  “What’s going on?” she asks.

  “We’re getting out of here,” I say.

  I drag Natasha and Cordoba up and out of this hellish place—through the blood and gore and the smoke—and as I reach the top of the steps I can see the cops are already here.

  “Freeze, drop your weapon.”

  I drop my roscoe. Everything looks hazy. Out of the corner of my eye I see something move. “Tank, is that you?”

  A cop with his own roscoe pointed straight at my mug shuffles toward me. “Who the hell is Tank?”

  “He was my best friend.”

  I turn and start walking back into the burning building.

  “Freeze,” the cops yell.

  “There are two dogs still in there. I’m going back.”

  The cops are yelling at me to stop, but none of them is willing to chase me into a burning building. I know it’s not romantic to die for a couple of dogs, but there’s no way I’m going to let them fry in that hellhole. I can’t have that weight on my conscience.

  I sit in an interrogation room with cops yelling and working me over. I’m sure their punches hurt, but I’m in the golden place in my head where I see Tank and Lassie tussling over a bucket of KFC.

  One of the cops answers the phone. He hangs up and they all leave. I’m given a box of donut holes, a pack of smokes, and a large cup of coffee and left alone. An hour passes very slowly. The door opens.

  “Natasha?”

  She extends her hand. “My name is Detective Uma Pocket.”

  I push the box of donut holes towards her. “Private Investigator Burma Ludlow.”

  “I’ve been working undercover for nearly a year trying to bust Tan Blancard.”

  “Well, look at the bright side—now you won’t have to go through all that messy legal stuff.”

  She looks through the box and picks out a chocolate one. She looks at it but doesn’t eat. “What you did was reckless, irresponsible, and downright dangerous. I should have you locked up for the rest of your natural born life.”

  I stick my hands out so she can cuff me. “What are you waiting for?”

  “Unfortunately what you did was also unfathomably brave. You did all that to save a dog?”

  “I did all that because it was the right thing to do. Don’t go placing me on a damn pedestal. A piece of scum like Tan Blancard deserved what he got. If I have to go down to get rid of one of his kind, then so be it.”

  Her eyes soften and meet mine. I’m pretty sure we could get a game of ring toss going if she unzipped my fly.

  “You’re not going down. I made sure of that,” she says.

  “Well, maybe you could go down…on me.”

  “What?”

  “Uh, nothing.”

  She lays my charred brass knuckles and my roscoe on the table.

  “I suppose I owe you big,” I say.

  “You don’t owe me anything. I wish there were more men like you out there, Burma Ludlow. What passes for a man these days is nothing short of pathetic.”

  She walks up to me and holds my head in her hands. Our lips meet and I’m transported to that golden place in my head.

  They release me at dawn and I pick up Cordoba from the pound. The dog rests with its head on my lap as we drive back to my hotel.

  Outside the hotel Billy Strap is playing craps as I pull up. He jumps to his feet when he sees me.

  “Did you find Cordoba?”

  I point down to my lap.

  “Cordoba!” Billy cries.

  I step out of the Monte Carlo, light up a cigarette, and watch the sun disappear behind a cloud. Billy hugs and kisses Cordoba. It would almost be touching if Billy wasn’t so sleazy.

  “Thanks, Burma, I owe you big time.”

  “Nah, you paid me. We’re square.”

  “Well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I need to borrow back that four grand I gave you. I’ll pay it back next week.”

  I take the wad out of my pocket and hand it to Billy. This case actually cost me money. I’ll never see that stack of lettuce again, but at least I saved those dogs. At least that’s something.

  “All right, now, how about a game of private craps?” Billy asks.

  “I don’t have any mazula,” I say.

  Billy takes the wad out of his pocket. “I’ll lend you some. How mu
ch do you need?”

  The Trouble with Trolls

  Patricia Abbott

  Heading for the driveway on a Sunday morning, Denny noticed that the eight or ten cars outside his neighbor’s house the night before still lined the street. Did grown men routinely host sleepovers or should he risk embarrassment and check things out? He settled on removing Matt and Ralph’s Sunday Times from the yew where the direct hit of the irrigation system had already saturated it. Denny liked to be regarded well as long as the cost was low. The house was preternaturally quiet for nearly noon, the stillness broken only by the sprinkler’s hum.

  He managed to beat Dad to the store by a full fifteen minutes and sat nervously eyeing the display of garden sculptures. More than once lately, he had stumbled over an emancipated troll idling near the rear exit or guarding the bins of screws and nuts. They had taken on the dusty, glazed look of objects that had sat too long in stockrooms. For some reason, Dad found them comical and never failed to chuckle when he came on one unexpectedly. Once or twice, Denny had smuggled one home, burying it in the backyard since he wasn’t sure of its recycling requirements. Thankfully, the decline in the store’s troll population had so far gone unnoticed.

  His father arrived with the usual query, tossing his sweat-stained hat on the counter. “Have you heard from your brother? How’s the new project going?” This was strictly a rhetorical question since, as Patrick’s backer, Dad knew everything about his business. “Listen, Den,” Dad continued, not even waiting for an answer, “I have a small errand for you boys.”

  Denny fixed his eyes on the dark computer screen. A small errand could mean anything from a trip to the bank to deposit funds to strong-arming one of Dad’s recalcitrant clients for payment. Besides the hardware store, a flower shop, a small restaurant in Allen Park, and the financial backing of his son’s aquarium business, Dad was an attorney with a practice in a section of the city populated by Eastern European, Latin American, and Arab émigrés. More than once, Denny and Patrick had been dispatched to collect fees from a Turk or Serbian immigrant who wanted his child support burden lowered. Or, on one rather frightening occasion, to calm a Colombian drug czar, requesting that his ex-wife be deported or disposed of (“Whatever,” Quatro Velasquez told them obligingly, fingering the square-cut sapphire on his pinky). There had been other errands too, of course—tasks Denny would prefer to forget. “All part of the show,” Dad had said to his sons more than once. “Get used to adult life.”

  Michael Patterson had built an empire of sorts in just one generation, coming from a family of auto workers who never thought to do more than side their house in vinyl, drink a beer on Saturday night, and camp in July in the UP. Consequently, complaints from clients regarding his prices drew little sympathy. “You should see the fucking rates I pay in personal insurance,” he told anyone who questioned his prices or practices. “You want me to take risks, you gotta pay for it.” Despite his ever-decreasing height and the flabby girth that eating at his own restaurant had added, Dad remained formidable. He had a strong and jutting chin, a persuasive left hook, and the mental acuity to back both up.

  While Denny considered the possible nature of the small errand, Dad walked over to the wall and raised the setting on the thermostat. “You don’t need to cool the whole fucking place when you’re in here alone, Den. Turn on a fan, for Christ’s sake. Open a door.” His father grabbed a stool from under the counter where the wallpaper sample books rested and sat down. “I’m talking about Tuesday night. She arrives at six forty-five p.m. Air Beirut.”

  “Who arrives?”

  Dad cleared his throat. “Some woman, what else? From the old country.”

  “What old country?” Dad had been born and raised in Detroit.

  “I met her at a wedding. Remember that client of mine—Mr. Shalaby—the one who bumped into his wife a couple years ago?”

  Denny remembered. The bump had been with Shalaby’s Caddy, and following an altercation that broke two of the woman’s teeth, a cheekbone, and blackened both eyes. She was in Henry Ford Hospital for weeks. “I got him community service when he pled and he invited me to his nephew’s wedding,” Dad continued. “We got to talking—this lady and me—and anyway she lands at Metro Tuesday night. She could use a little help.”

  “Language problems?”

  “Sure. Sure. Language problems. That—and other things. Just get her. You and Patrick. You know what I mean, Denny. Remember how you helped me with Olga—what’s her name? This one’s even more…” His father jabbed the air in front of him and Denny, involuntarily, stepped back. “What? What? You think I’d hit you, Den?” His father seemed pleased by this thought and jabbed the air a few more times. “When did I ever hit you?”

  “Does Patrick have to come along?”

  “You’re in this together. He’s like an ox from carting those tanks up and down the stairs. Never can tell when muscle could come in handy.”

  Denny nodded. “So where do we take her?”

  “The Apollo Hotel in Greektown. Make sure those nitwits give her a nice room. Order some flowers maybe—to throw her off. Put it on the store card.” The old man grabbed his Tigers cap from the counter and headed for the door. “Anyway, take care of her just like you did with Olga. You guys did great with Olga.”

  “You didn’t give me her name?”

  “Right. Her name’s Nahla Khalil. She’s on Lufthansa, I think.” Michael Patterson turned back from the door. “Oh, and get her some orchids. Nahla likes orchids. She says they look like a tunnel of love.” Stepping forward a bit, he almost whispered. “When I used that line on your mother once, she said, ‘Stop talking dirty.’ Does it sound dirty to you?”

  Denny shrugged. “Hey, I thought you told me Air Beirut?” But his father was gone, the heavy metal door to the back alley slamming on Denny’s last words. The troll by the door seemed to blink in the light.

  It had been a long time since either Denny or his brother harbored any illusions about their parents’ marriage, but participating in the demise of women who became inconvenient to their father was unsettling. How many women must die before the old man let his prescription for Viagra lapse? Of course, Dad didn’t knock most of them off. There had just been that Olga until now. But one day soon, Michael Patterson would go too far with something and it would be time for Denny to take over—ending the pretense that his father was still the big cheese. And he would never allow a mere sexual conquest to compromise his position.

  When Denny got home, a fleet of emergency vehicles were backed clear out onto Mack Avenue. Monica was glued to the window. She wore a white dress with a halter top that looked as skimpy as a handkerchief and was holding a festive glass of white wine in her hand.

  “What’s going on?” he asked, easing in beside her. “It’s Matt and Ralph’s house, right?” He remembered the line of cars he’d ignored earlier.

  “The EMS guys carted three bodies out,” she said breathlessly. “Now, don’t jump on me, Denny, but I wonder if we should invite the Blakes over?”

  “Why would you want to invite them over now?”

  “We have the better view. And we still owe them from their Halloween party. A little wine, a little brie—”

  “Oh, look,” he said, interrupting her intentionally. “They’re bringing someone out through the side door.”

  When it was over, two bodies and half a dozen, semiasphyxiated men had been evacuated, the survivors attached to oxygen. “It must have been some sort of poisonous gas,” Denny surmised.

  Monica, now on the phone with a neighbor, shouted, “Somebody turned on the air without turning off the furnace. Every time the air came on and cooled the house, the heat came on to warm it up. And vice versa.”

  “Our unit wouldn’t do that.”

  “Yeah, but that house has probably never been updated. Remember Matt’s dad?”

  Denny did indeed, an old policeman who lived in the house when the area was still known as Cops’ Corner. He’d been a racist and the r
eigning neighborhood skinflint who turned out his light on Halloween and didn’t belong to any of the neighborhood associations. When he had died three years ago, some assumed his son’s sexual preference contributed to his demise.

  “Anyway,” Monica continued, “the vent outside was shut and the negative pressure caused carbon monoxide fumes to back-draft into the utility closet. The detector was disabled, who knows why, and over the course of the party, they were asphyxiated.”

  “What about Ralph and Matt?”

  “Oh, I forgot to ask!” She stood up, her breasts straining mightily against the fabric of her blouse.

  “Dad’s got a little job for me on Tuesday night. That’s why he called this morning.” He stood right in front of her, so she would have to look at him. “Years ago, he’d have handled it himself but recently he’s begun to depend on me. I’ll be taking over in a matter of months. Oh, sure, Patrick might have to be dealt with in some fashion, but he’s got that fish business. It’ll be my empire and I’m already planning on a few changes. Those trolls in the store for instance—”

  She looked at him with what seemed like great understanding, then said, “There’s some cold chicken in the fridge. I promised Mother I’d be over by two.”

  Patrick climbed into the car on Tuesday evening wearing the damp look Denny associated with him since he’d begun tending tropical fish. Low on IQ but high on muscle, Patrick roamed from dental to doctors’ offices, from library to restaurant, maintaining both the fish and their habitat, toting unexpectedly intricate equipment in a chrome handcart, which cost more than Denny’s Civic. Luckily, Patrick was a large man.

  Surprisingly, the business was taking off, though an emerging decline in the fish population in metropolitan Detroit threatened its success. Arriving at his appointments hungover or high, Patrick routinely sucked priceless fish into his hose. Or forgot to remove valuable specimens before applying lethal chemicals. Or spent too much time flirting with the receptionist. Or got into ridiculous disputes. Or failed to show up at all. Patrick had inadvertently hit upon an unmet need in the community but lacked the disposition to exploit it.