The Assault on Tony's

by John O'Brien

  The Assault on Tony’s

  ALSO BY JOHN O’BRIEN

  Leaving Las Vegas

  Stripper Lessons

  The Assault on Tony’s

  by John O’Brien

  Copyright © 1996 by the Estate of John O’Brien

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

  Published simultaneously in Canada

  Printed in the United States of America

  FIRST PAPERBACK EDITION

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  O’Brien, John.

  The assault on Tony’s / by John O’Brien.

  p. cm.

  eBook ISBN-13: 978-0-8021-9731-3

  I. Title.

  PS3565.B669A9 1996

  813’.54—dc20 96-1917

  DESIGN BY LAURA HAMMOND HOUGH

  Grove Press

  841 Broadway

  New York, NY 10003

  The Assault on Tony’s

  Dayl6

  How bad is it?” Langston wanted to know, and the truth was Rudd couldn’t tell him.

  “Not so bad,” he lied.

  “Then where’s Miles? Not so bad my ass! If it’s not so bad then where the hell is Miles? He’s down already, isn’t he? I should go down before Miles. You know that. So where is he?”

  “Only shot,” Rudd told him. “Miles got hit last night during the bombing. That’s where he is.”

  Langston eased slightly at this news. “Damn if this thing doesn’t have me feeling six ways of fucked. I’ll try to keep it together. Really, I will. Sorry, Rudd,” he mumbled.

  It rattled Rudd to hear Langston cave in—the man had been through a lot without showing the strain that boiled under the rest of them—but he was right. He would have gone down before Miles. He would have been the one to go down first, before any of them. That’s why Rudd couldn’t tell him how bad it was. And it was bad. It was very bad.

  Langston pulled a somber beat, said of his fallen comrade, “Shot. Who knows, maybe it’ll make it easier on him.”

  “I don’t think so. He was only hit in the shoulder. I think he even managed to stop the bleeding.”

  “The bleeding,” he echoed, and it seemed he would leave it at that.

  But a chuckle rose from behind the perspiration glistening across his forehead, rose beyond the already moderate quaking of his chest. Langston stood up carefully, as if not to frighten off his skittish smile, and his chair fell away like maybe it was thinking now would be a good time to get the hell out of there. “Tell me you didn’t sterilize it,” he said, his trembling hand seeking out that awesome and feckless bar.

  Rudd picked up the laughter, and that made it real laughter. Rudd knew this was part of it, this sort of hopeless mirth. So did Langston. Of course Langston knew. It made him laugh more, under Rudd’s painful gaze, now off, away, down.

  For another look in what he ironically still referred to in his own head as dry-storage, he would best take along a witness. Who would be good he wasn’t yet sure. Not Jill, somebody else, one of the guys, and the dry in dry-storage was ironic now for obvious reasons, and originally ironic for insignificant reasons. Only that it was the first place he ever kissed a grown woman, so not Jill.

  Not Tony’s dry-storage, not considering he was thirty-eight the first time he ever stepped into Tony’s much less Tony’s dry-storage. No, Rudd’s first kiss was in one of those godforsaken midwestern cities that last he heard was experiencing only pockets of unrest (would be the phrase) and keeping things more or less under control, one of those places that could provide one with a glimmer of hope provided one looked closely yet not close enough. Rudd was sixteen and bussing tables in a tony restaurant where even the dishwashers were Caucasian and the busboys were damn near transparent. So that was that place and it worked so sue him and fuck you if you don’t like it. Worked then and there, anyway.

  Prince of that place, and fast, and everybody liked Rudd, especially this waitress. Gail, it was. Now Rudd’s good enough that he handles the whole place by himself and still has time to wolf down the occasional untouched order of scallops while washing it down with a stashed bottle of house wine rejected by some local goon who thought such a move might impress his date but didn’t know that you’ve lost your shot at impressing anybody the moment the phrase house wine crosses your lips. Well Rudd doesn’t mind one bit ‘cause that wine tastes just fine back there behind the biggest stainless-steel sink this rich boy ever wants to get next to. Now Gail’s digging him and likely nipping at whatever gets her through her own particular night, so she grabs his hand and takes him into dry-storage, which is the storeroom in the back of the place for canned goods, rice, flour … hence the name. Close the door and this woman who has probably eight years on him which may not sound like much but is half again his age gives him a tonsil licking that would make an oral surgeon blush. Yet Rudd is less than impressed, like that wine guy’s date, so much so that when poor old wrong-side-of-the-tracks Gail grabs what she expects to be his hard-on she finds only a great big piece of humble pie. That was Gail. And Rudd knew for a fact, his dad used to fuck waitresses, maids.

  That story he remembered the first time he walked into Tony’s dry-storage, which was some time after first walking into Tony’s (which, it turns out, was something of a seminal event in its own right). Sitting at the top of the steps, deciding whom to take back down for a second awful look, Rudd remembered the irony, the utter lack of anything dry in Tony’s dry-storage, which of course was filled strictly with liquor. Tony’s, a damn fine restaurant, was still primarily a bar, and what was originally bona fide dry-storage soon, Rudd later learned, turned out to be a more appropriate space for the rather formidable back stock of liquor. By then though the room was dry-storage, at least to the staff. And now, what with the shutters bolted down and him inside more or less permanently, wasn’t Rudd once again on staff at a restaurant? The battle outside raging, one might say, the storage down here much further from dry than it was yesterday, or less so, one might say if one had the courage, what was Rudd if not a de facto employee of Tony’s? Or even the boss. Or manager, Rudd thought, that’s what I am, Dad, a restaurant manager. And he’d fucked a waitress too. Now didn’t that beat all?

  Rudd felt the anticipatory withdrawals nipping from inside his abdomen. Also at the back of his neck. And his arms, the backs of his upper arms. This was the sort of thing that kept a less experienced man mired deep in a couch-ridden binge, he knew. He’d been that man-most of them had, certainly Langston-back before Tony’s and his second marriage, back before he got better. In those days he would mistake this stuff for Big Trouble and hit the vodka bottle prematurely. Now he knew better; he had some time, the condition of dry-storage notwithstanding. Langston was closer though, by at least a day, maybe two.

  He felt the ridges in the piece of aluminum that covered the edge of this top step. It was worn less on the sides, the ridges still discernible by eye or by buttock, sobering buttock. Even a screw, unless it was a piece of pocket lint, made its presence known, and this was really going too far, feeling far more than a man in his condition ought to be feeling, a portentous sign. The black steps down to dry-storage each had a worn, bone-colored center from where countless Nikes and Red Wing work shoes had made their marks, or, more accurately, erased another’s. Only the top and bottom steps bore aluminum armor, like: you’re there, this is as high as it gets, low as it gets, so don’t fuck with me ‘cause I’ve seen it all. But Rudd once noticed the bottom piece of aluminum kicked out of place, exposing a
bone-colored center like on all the rest of the steps, as if the bottom step had once seen service in the mediocracy, a more central location, the infantry above.

  He rested his chin in his right hand, elbow to knee, and reached with his left hand for the handrail at his shoulder, not so much to give himself rise as to advance by just one frame, pause and examine the moment he was in. That rail wobbled when he clutched it, the brass-colored bracket that held it to the wall being fastened with a screw whose anchor was losing its grip. As he grasped round the diameter of the rail his fingers touched something wet and sticky on the bottom. Likely it had, whatever it was, been there for a while, discovered only now due to the odd angle of Rudd’s seated grasp. He wondered what it was, but he didn’t pull away though he realized that would be the correct response. It was a mere detail. Gross. Press harder: it oozed from beneath the pads of his fingers.

  The brass-colored handrail bracket on the bottom didn’t wobble. This was the stairway from the back of Tony’s dining room to dry-storage. The paint was cracked and chipped in places. It was splattered with at least three different colors of liquids: grease, tomato sauce, and something yellow. There were more than seven steps; he knew because he and Fenton had made a bet on it some days before. The handrail was walnut stained but almost black in places. There used to be a bare bulb in a ceiling-mounted socket at the bottom of the steps, but now it was a fluorescent ring that was intended as a more economical screw-in replacement for the bulb. The fluorescent ring always took a bit too long to reach its maximum brightness, so the switch was set in the on position by a piece of masking tape, which was pretty much beat to shit because everyone kept trying to turn it off without looking. Writing on the masking tape said DO NOT TURN OFF; then in a darker black that must have been added later it demanded PLEASE!!! The light was always off now because all the lights were off because the power had gone out six days earlier. Nobody was holding their breath. There were flashlights. There were candles. In the daytime there was sunlight streaming through the cracks in the security shutters as well as through the few bullet holes in the roof.

  Miles being shot the day before had something to do with these holes but Rudd hadn’t told Langston that part of it, nor had he been asked. It felt like cheating-Langston was blinded early on-but Langston knew he was blind. Rudd wondered if that meant Langston would be spared the visual if not the aural hallucinations of delirium tremens. The two men had discussed it and decided not, after all these were pictures of the mind. Still Rudd wasn’t sure. A chance to see again? They were indistinguishable from real sight. Surely Langston, whatever he was now seeing in his mind, wasn’t seeing anything like that. Rudd had said to him, “Maybe it’ll be a good thing,” and then they both had laughed.

  So lost in his thoughts was Rudd that the sudden spray of automatic weapon fire against the west side of the building practically startled him off his step. He froze, listened, hoping that someone would handle it. A beat was followed by a second thirty-round clip, and Rudd could almost hear the release and click that filled that beat for the man who held the gun. Rudd didn’t know squat about fully automatic weapons or even where one would go to obtain one. He fingered his own Walther PPK/S tucked under his belt and was reassured by his command over it. He’d had this gun for over ten years, one of the German-made models purchased before Interarms acquired the license and began manufacturing them in the United States. That’s a fine gun, the Interarms Walther, but Rudd liked owning a German one, something about it, the history yet unaltered. A mouse gun, the other men derided it as, yet Rudd had taken out his share and more thirteen days ago when it counted most.

  The shooting was over and still no return fire.

  “What the hell’s going on!” he yelled, now worried.

  In response came the bark of Fenton’s Glock twenty-two, forty-caliber for chrissake, all fifteen rounds. Rudd instinctively tapped his own Glock nineteen nine-mm holstered on his ankle. Though a larger and more powerful gun than the Walther, the Glock was carried and considered by Rudd as a backup piece.

  “It’s about time. We can’t have them thinking we’re out of ammo, they’ll be in here in a second,” he added.

  “Sorry Rudd. I don’t know where Jill is, and Osmond’s passed out,” explained Fenton from the other room. “I took care of it as soon as I could.”

  “Yeah. Next time, don’t wait for anyone else, just shoot.” He waited for a response but none came. Fair enough, Rudd was being a prick and he knew it. Just the beginning, it would get worse for all of them; they would all turn into pricks. Except for Jill maybe, and Osmond since he seemed to be sleeping through his withdrawals. “Say Fenton, come help me take another look at dry-storage after you reload,” offered Rudd as a kind of overture.

  “Right away, boss.”

  Smart ass. Burned through his and his sister’s inheritance, Rudd had heard of Fenton; but then it was highly probable that Fenton had heard similar things of Rudd. And what the hell did Osmond find enough of to get passed out on? All seemed quiet outside the west wall. Fenton had made the right choice in returning fire with his Glock, perhaps less so in selecting a forty-caliber model. Worst case: Rudd would give his nine-mm to Fenton when the forty-caliber rounds were all gone. Fenton would appreciate that, and he was already familiar with the Glock so it only made sense. Besides, you had to respect a man who carried a plastic gun.

  Fenton came fast around the corner and had to pull up short when he saw Rudd still sitting on the top step. He dithered for a moment as if finding it difficult to abandon his plan of bounding down the steps the way he normally would, but he shrugged off the excess energy and sat down next to Rudd, who frankly looked as if he could use a little cheering up.

  “Miles is fine,” remarked Fenton to break the silence.

  “I’d call that a pretty rosy picture,” said Rudd.

  “I mean the wound, it’s nothing. Jill was able to–”

  “Spare me the fucking romantic adventures of Nurse Jill and her patients. I’ve seen quite enough already.” Rudd had grown somewhat possessive of Jill, and it ate at him that he could be so easily conquered by this … waitress.

  “That’s neither fair nor kind, Rudd. She’s doing what she has to do, just like the rest of us.”

  Fenton raised his eyes, looking straight at the other man as a way to underscore his defense of the woman. Rudd, though rankled by this declaration of loyalties (suddenly thinking: Jill plus Fenton? Jill plus Fenton?), knew that his friend was right. He decided to leave it alone, and that was something.

  “Thanks for covering. You okay on ammo?”

  “Box and a half, I’m fine.”

  “You should say: ‘seventy-five rounds,’” but this was given with a smile. Rudd’s nature.

  Fenton sighed. “Let’s call it a box and a half,” he said, feeling that it was, after all, getting rather late in the game for this shit.

  “Right,” said Rudd, rejoined, “right.”

  “So,” said Fenton, “I’m guessing we’ve got some bad news waiting for us down there.” He indicated the steps below them, the dry-storage cellar that lay beyond.

  “I’d call that a pretty good guess,” said Rudd, and he thought, This is nice, how we can be friends here and make small talk, how no matter how bad it gets Fenton and I can still smile at each other. “I think it’s starting to hit me,” he added. “I’m getting pricky.”

  Fenton put his arm around Rudd’s shoulder, said, “It’s okay, I know, I understand.” And he thought, I’m scared, ‘cause if Rudd goes down then it’ll be me, last, left alone.

  The streets outside remained quiet as the two men descended the steps. Of course something must have been happening somewhere in the city, but outside of Tony’s, at least for now, it was quiet. Perhaps the distant rumble of a self-serve gas station in flames, its mini-mart long since looted, responding firemen, if any, coming under sporadic fire, kid stuff, perhaps these sounds would reach the ears of someone standing outside of Tony’s at that moment
. But at that moment no one was.

  Dry-storage was a place in which each of the men had spent some time alone, some more than others. The busboy and maybe Jill would have spent time alone there too, but one hardly thought about that as it would have constituted more of a professional obligation than the more spiritual endeavors of the others. Rudd was the last man to be down here alone or so he thought, and what he saw was enough for him to make sure no one ever came down here alone again. But then why would they.

  There was a little light down here, but there was also quite a lot to see. Rudd took two flashlights from the first shelf to his left, where they’d always been kept, even before they were needed. He turned to hand one to Fenton only to find him waiting at the foot of the stairs a few steps back.

  “What?” Rudd demanded.

  “I’m afraid to look. I can smell it from out here; I can’t believe we don’t smell it upstairs.”

  “Jesus, Fenton, you are a lightweight. You may recall that our senses may not be operating at peak efficiency. When’s the last time you smelled a vodka martini without holding it under your nose? Where you been for the last two weeks?”

  “Sixteen days, and pretty close to you is where I’ve been.”

  Rudd clicked on his flashlight and turned it on Fenton’s face. Fenton glared back, his eyes, Rudd noticed for the first time, as bloodshot as everybody else’s.

  He turned around the flashlight into his own bloodshot eyes, like a kid playing monster under the sheets. “I know. I’ll never forget that. The rest of us, well, we were pretty much stuck with this. But you could’ve gone another route. We all appreciate how you stood by us.”

  “Standing. I’m standing by you. And it’s mostly you, Rudd. Those other guys aren’t anything to me. I’d never even met Miles and Osmond until that first day.”

  Rudd retraced the few steps to where Fenton stood, handed him the lit flashlight while turning on the one in his other hand. “Give me some moral support here,” he said, leading with an arm around Fenton’s shoulders, and the two men cast their beams into the once dry storage.