|
“I ain’t the un to be askin’.” The guard’s eyes
were calm, but an anger touched his voice. “Lord an’ Ma Penn, they
disapproves o’ whoring.” He waited a moment, but Mike was scowling into his
drink. The man turned away to take up his position at the door.
Mike swallowed the boilermaker and belched. A woman turned
scornful eyes on him, and he muttered an apology.
Creel slid forward. His forehead hit the table with a sharp
thud, and he snored on. Mike tipped him back. He looked OK, so Mike let him drop
again and slid back in the seat, his head tipping to one side, his mouth opened
in a light snore.
Benny saw Mike pass out. He crept out and began to empty
ashtrays and then clear the tables. He stopped by Mike. The man was still
sleeping, so he took the glasses, putting them in a bucket and lugging that back
to the bar for Mitch to wash.
“You need me tomorrow?” Benny asked.
Mitch glanced over the place. “No, but Mond’y I will.
Come in late cause there won’t be many.”
He handed over the sack of food and handful of credits to
Benny.
Benny counted it under Mitch’s frosty eye. He handed back a
credit.
“Gimme change. You overpaid.”
Eyes widening slightly, Mitch shook his head. “Man said the
steaks were done to a T. He gave you a
nice tip. You don’t like that?” Mitch snapped. “Call it charity, and I’ll
kick your sorry ass, redskin.”
“Kick my ass?”
Benny snarled a laugh, and Mitch started for the end of the bar and a non-verbal
discussion with Benny.
Dolores jumped out of the kitchen. “First man to swing gets
this over his head.” The tortilla press clattered in her hands.
Benny scowled and Mitch said, “Woman, this is man business.
Put that away.”
“This is my business, keeping my man a man,” she said,
her eyes cold. “We have an agreement; you keep your temper, and I let you live
without needing crutches. I love you, but I married a man of his word. Hain’a?”
she asked, then when Mitch didn’t answer, shouted, “Hain’a?”
“You did,” he muttered.
Benny grinned, and Dolores swung the press at him. He yelped,
ducking under it and scurried for the door.
“Benny, man,” Mitch shouted. Benny turned, and the sack
caught him square in the chest. He grabbed it and by the time he crossed the
room, the guard had the door open
“Mon, he’s a fool he fights with dem women folks,”
Jason shouted. “Save a life, stay quiet around dem crazies.”
Benny gave him the finger and the man roared a laugh.
When Jason started to close the door, Mike belched and
muttered an apology. Another customer bumped into Mike, and they staggered
together for a moment before Mike shoved him away. Smiling and weaving, the man
slid out the door in a drunken shamble.
“Here,” Jason said. “Be not leavin’ without yer
pardner, are ya?”
Mike coughed, shaking his head. He handed Jason a hundred in
credits.
“Call a cab, OK? I gotta find me a woman.”
“Find more dan dat, ya will, ya don’t take a care.”
Jason shook his head over the evils of this world. “An’ stay away from dat
LeAnn girl. She pure poison,” he said, closing the door on Mike’s back.
Benny was a dark shadow under a watery moon. Mike shook
himself and popped another pill in his mouth. Any effects from the whiskey
dropped away, and he started walking.
His heels were loud on the cobbles, but so were Benny’s.
He slowed, listening to the kid. Benny had stilled. Mike
stopped. Enough of the alcohol remained for a pleasant buzz to enter Mike’s
head. It was a low, rumbling sound, and he touched his stomach. The effect was
there, as well. And he felt it lower down and that was OK, but getting painful.
A low laugh came through the dark. Mike slid a monocle out of
his coat pocket and fitted the lens in his left eye. Scanning the street, he saw
heat leaking from around shutters and small, scurrying things that might have
been rats, but no Benny.
He frowned. The buzzing grew louder, deeper. Turning, Mike
saw several dog-shaped blazes of heat coming at him. Behind the dogs were two
humans.
Raiders.
Cursing the whiskey, he reached in his pocket and fumbled, but
the gun was gone.
Touching the lens’s rim twice, the flames eased back to
more natural shapes of a pair of men. Neither wore night vision equipment.
He tried to find the gun again and found his wallet was gone.
The plastic cord still hung from a belt loop, but it had been clipped. His
grinned. The pickpocket in the bar.
“Motherless creep.”
One of the dogs stilled. The jaws were broad, the eyes a
burning yellow. The man closest stilled. The second breathed a little heavier.
He and his dog moved around Mike. A signal of some sort?
They moved a little closer, inching in until he saw them
clearly.
A low growl came from behind him. Certain it was another dog
and about to attack, Mike twisted around in a crouch.
Benny stood there. He waited until the handlers saw him, then
made a hand sign, his palm down, then sweeping away.
The handlers were scowling, the dogs whining. Benny hissed,
whispering something. His eyes began to burn a bright gold in the lens, and the
dogs cried out, shoving against the handlers, trying to protect them and at the
same time push them away.
Muttering to each other, the raiders were trying to calm the
dogs. They backed a few steps, then fled.
Benny turned away. Mike saw why he lost the kid. Benny had
his shoes off and was walking barefoot on the icy cobblestones.
“Hey, kid,” Mike said. Benny paused. He turned, his
shoulders hunched, his movements slow but unthreatening.
“Thanks.”
“Stupid, man,” Benny said, with no rancor in his voice.
He could have been instructing a small child. It was the matter-of-fact voice
and not the words that angered Mike.
“Hey, I could have handled them, Grey.”
Benny muttered a laugh. “They were armed. You aren’t.
They had a catch net and tazers in case you tried to fight.”
“How do you know that?”
A small shrug loosened the tension in the kid’s shoulders.
"A man that’s armed walks and acts different from one
that ain’t. You were all bull shit and bravado when you left the bar. When you
figured out you lost the iron, you moved slower, with more caution.”
Mike winced. Was it that bad? He snapped, “I mean about
them.”
Grinning, Benny said, “Mitch told me there were meat
hunters hanging out. So did a couple o’ others in the place.” He waved a
hand at the south. “Safe Siders, maybe, looking for a little fun and free
pork. Maybe they would o’ held you in a clubhouse and tortured you first. You
know?”
Low and biting, Mike asked, “How did you know they were
armed?”
This time the laughter was mocking.
“Man, what’s with you? Don’t you know what I am? A
freak. Remember? Cindy needs pet freaks to breed more freaks so she can get that
Nobel Prize and the fame she wants. This is what freaks do, yo.”
In a slow, hesitant voice, Mike whispered,
“This is what Terry Jo is carrying?”
©2004 StoriesByEmail.com
|
