Brighton (9 page)

“I can handle that prick.”

Bobby considered Finn—jowls and belly balanced on a spindly set of grandpa legs. He could handle the weekend bettors from Newton and Brookline. Scare the crap out of most college kids. That was about it. Bobby still paid him like he was a tough guy just because he did. It gave Finn something to talk about on those nights when the Sox sucked and he was sitting outside Fenway with his buddies trying to move a half-dozen grandstand for something close to face.

“I know you can handle him, Finn, but if he gives you any problems, I want to know. Okay?”

“Sure.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Fuck you, nothing. What is it?”

Finn hitched his shoulders. Bobby knew he scared people. He was the guy who’d put a bullet in Curtis Jordan. And that bought a lifetime of respect among the locals. Not to mention a healthy dose of piss-pounding fear. All of which Bobby put to good use. “You still drink in the Corrib?” he said.

“Place sucks.”

“What’s the matter?”

“They started putting butter and chives on the baked potato they give you with the steak tips. I like to do that shit myself.”

“You still drink there, Finn?”

“A little bit. Why?”

“Just watch yourself and let me know if they give you any problems.”

“Fine.”

“You wanna grab a beer?”

“Supposed to work the game tonight.”

“All right.” Bobby jumped to his feet.

Finn licked his lips like a nervous spaniel. “Fuck it, I’m already late. You wanna smoke a joint first?”

“When was the last time you seen me smoke a joint?”

“Wanna wait for me?”

Bobby looked his friend up and down. “How you doing with the blow?”

“You know I’m off that shit.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Finn’s eyes were turning to water, his lower lip starting to crumble.

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing. Why you fucking with me today?”

Bobby glanced around, then leaned close. “Cuz if you’re on the blow again, I got no choice but to hurt you. Before you hurt me. You understand what I’m saying?”

“Of course.”

“Come on then.”

They walked to the front of the store. Max was drinking his coffee and reading the paper.

“Where’d you get them?” Bobby said, nodding at a chorus line of roasted hens sitting under a yellow light behind the counter.

“People gettin’ sick of the subs and all that crap. Fucking things are delicious.”

“Delicious, huh?”

“Sold out yesterday. You want one?”

Bobby looked at Finn. “Hungry?”

“Thirsty.”

Bobby pulled out a roll of bills. “Wrap one up.”

Ten minutes later, they were sitting in a Market Street dive called Joey’s. The bartender put down two Buds and went back to his perch on the cooler, eyes fixed on a muted TV slotted over the men’s room.
Family Feud
was on. Bobby tipped his beer so it clinked against Finn’s. Then they sat in the quiet, the only sound Finn cracking bones and tearing hen flesh.

“How’s your mom?” Bobby said.

Finn’s mom lived by herself in a subsidized housing complex off Faneuil Street. Finn visited the old woman every day, and every day she left a twenty-dollar bill for her only son under a cookie jar in the kitchen. Bobby knew about the double sawbuck but never hassled Finn about it. Bobby also made sure the old woman’s rent was paid up and kicked in a little extra so the building manager didn’t fuck with her like they did with some of the old-timers in those places. Finn didn’t know about that, either.

“Doc told her she’s got maybe a year or two,” Finn said.

“They said that five years ago.”

“Yeah, well . . .”

“Don’t worry about it, Finn.”

“I don’t.”

Bobby could already hear the cracks in his voice and knew he’d be a fucking basket case when his mom finally went.

“Thanks for asking, B.”

“No big deal.”

“Yeah, it is. No one else really gives a fuck, you know?”

The bartender swung by to see if they needed another. Finn was ready. The bartender set him up and drifted away again.

“I’m gonna be putting something on the C’s this weekend. They got the Knicks at home.” Finn began to run through the different permutations of how he might lose his money. Bobby listened to the drone and stared at himself in a clouded mirror that ran behind the bar. He noticed the sag under his chin. A little puffiness around the eyes.

“So what do you think? Bobby?”

“Yeah?”

“What do you think? About Florida?”

Bobby pulled his eyes off the mirror. He had no idea how they’d gotten from Finn’s basketball bets to the Sunshine State, but there they were. “You wanna go next winter?”

“I know. I say it every year.”

“Yeah, you do. Right here, at this bar, sitting on that stool.”

“This time I got the money. It’s all tucked away and not a penny’s going to the gambling. None of that shit.”

“That’s good, Finn.”

“I know I’m too old to play on the circuit.”

“You can still go down and watch.”

“I’m thinking I can coach.”

“Coach?”

“Sure. You ever seen those New York guineas sitting in the stands at the U.S. Open? All I need is to go down there and find a prospect. I was thinking about a girl. Fifteen, sixteen years old. I’ll teach her the game. How to really hit. Not gonna bang her or nothing like that. Just coach.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“You think so?”

“Why not?”

Finn wiped chicken grease off his fingers with a bar napkin and sucked down half his beer in a long, greedy swallow. “Fuck, yeah. Why not?” The thought seemed to warm him. “You’ll come down and visit?”

“Try to keep me away.”

“I was thinking I’d get one of those condos in a marina. We could keep a boat. Go out and tuna fish in the gulf.”

“You ever been fishing, Finn?”

“Caught a catfish once up at Chandler’s Pond.”

“Good enough, brother.”

They laughed and drank to Finn’s make-believe future.

“Did I tell you who I saw?” Finn said.

“Who’s that?”

“Kevin Pearce.”

Bobby stopped the bottle of beer halfway to his lips and returned it to the bar. “Where did you see him?”

“Over at Tar Park this afternoon. He was asking about you.”

“What did you say?”

“Nothing. He told me he won the Pulitzer Prize or something.”

Bobby whistled. “No kidding.”

“That a big deal?”

“Jesus Christ.”

“I read the sports page. And that’s mostly to see what time the games start.”

Bobby’s gaze traveled out the window and down Market Street.

“B?”

“Yeah.”

“You haven’t seen him in twenty, thirty years.”

“He’s like a brother, Finn.”

“Like you and me?”

“That’s right. Just like you and me.”

Finn grunted and polished off his beer. “I should get going.”

“Have a good night.” Bobby touched his nose with a finger. “And remember what I told you about that shit.”

Finn tossed what was left of the chicken in the trash. Bobby watched him go, then walked behind the bar.

“You see some black broad got killed in Brighton,” the bartender said without taking his eyes off the set. Bobby looked up at the news banner. A reporter stood on a street corner talking.

“Why should I care?”

The bartender shrugged. “I know. It’s a fucking smoke, right?” He smiled. Not so much at what he’d said, but just because he could say it. “You want company down there?” The bartender poked his eyes toward a door next to the reach-in cooler.

“She’s coming in with the books.”

“Anyone else?”

“No. And give a yell down fifteen minutes after she gets here. Tell me I got a call or something.” Bobby grabbed another beer out of the cooler and walked down a sagging set of wooden steps to a cold basement. He flicked on an overhead light and took a seat behind a large metal desk. To the left of the desk was a couch, a refrigerator, and a couple of old filing cabinets. Beside the cabinets were three TVs, a dry-erase board drilled into the wall, a Nerf basketball hoop, and a small, free-standing safe. Bobby turned on a computer and began to go through the baseball lines. A phone on the desk rang three times. Bobby ignored it. He felt his cell phone buzz in his pocket and ignored that. It was going
to be a heavy night. Fourteen baseball games, four on the West Coast. Plus basketball and hockey. Bobby needed to focus, but all he could think about was Kevin. There was a creak on the stairs. Bobby looked up. She stepped into a circle of light, a blue binder under her arm.

“Hey,” Bobby said.

“I heard he’s back.” Her eyes were bright and liquid and measuring.

“That’s what Finn says.”

“I’m not surprised. You want to go over the numbers first?”

Bobby kicked out a chair. Bridget Pearce took a seat.

SITTING IN
the privileged shadow of the Boston Public Garden, the Bull and Finch Pub used to be a classic watering hole, so classic that they made it into a TV show called
Cheers
and, of course, ruined it. Walk around the corner, however, and you’ll find the closest thing to what the old place used to be. Perched along Charles Street, on the hallowed cobbles of Beacon Hill, the Sevens isn’t much to look at: long bar, a rough collection of tables, dartboard, and jukebox. The beer, however, is cold, the roast beef sandwiches are cut fresh behind the counter, and a few heads at the bar still talk about the day Luis Aparicio cost the Red Sox a division title when he tripped over third base. Still hate him for it, too.

Kevin found an empty stool and ordered a pint of Heineken. The beer had just hit the back of his throat when the pub’s front door swung open. Lisa Mignot was there, hand on a hip, powdery motes of sunlight fighting to fill the space around her. Kevin smiled. She slipped off the threshold and drifted in, brushing his cheek with her lips and running her nails across the back of his neck.

“Hey, Kev.”

Lisa was a prosecutor for the Suffolk County district attorney’s office She’d grown up in Roxbury, graduated with honors from Harvard Law School, and decided to spend a couple of years putting bad guys in jail before moving on to attorney general, the governor’s office, senator, president of the United States. That kind of thing. Most people wondered why she’d ever decided to talk to Kevin, never mind date him. It’s not that supremely intelligent, decidedly hot women of Caribbean and French ancestry don’t cotton to pale, white, scrawny Irish-Catholics from Boston. Kevin was certain it happened all the time. He’d just never heard of it.

“What are you drinking?” he said.

A man with skin the color of wet cement surfaced from somewhere beneath the taps. He was wearing black hi-tops, black shorts, and a shapeless Celtics T-shirt. There was an unlit cigarette stuck between his lips, a pen and scratch paper at the ready. Lisa lit him up with a smile and the bartender danced a little in his Cons.

“Maybe just a glass of OJ? With a straw?”

Kevin figured the barkeep might squeeze the oranges himself. After he planted a tree in the back of the place. Three minutes later, Lisa had her OJ. First time Kevin ever saw it delivered in a frosted mug, but there you go.

“How was your day?” he said.

“Pretty good.” Lisa took a sip and settled herself on her stool. They’d been together almost a year. Some days, it seemed like they hardly needed to speak—the connection so strong words just got in the way. Other days, Kevin barely managed to scratch the surface. Maybe it was just women. For him, they’d always been
akin to Russian nesting dolls, one secret wrapped inside another, both container and contained. Inscrutable. Irresistible. Life.

Lisa pulled a soft, black briefcase onto the bar and began to unpack it. “Actually, I’ve got this work thing I wanted to talk to you about.”

“What about the rules?”

“I thought we could suspend them this one time . . .” She looked up from her unpacking and froze. “What’s going on, Kevin?”

“Nothing.”

“Something’s going on.”

He shook his head and buried his nose in his beer. Lisa stuffed the paperwork back in her case and zipped it shut. Then she sat back, hands folded, chin lifted, golden light streaming through the window and lighting up a sculpted set of cheekbones.

“How do you know?” he said.

“I love you, moron. I’m supposed to know. Now, what’s going on?”

“Remember Rosie Tallent?”

An anxious moment flickered in her eyes and was gone. “Of course I do. Charges should have never been filed. And yours were the best stories the
Globe
ran all year.”

“Yeah, well, something happened today.”

“There’s nothing coming out of our office.”

“It’s not about the case itself. Although I’d still love to find the real killer.”

“So would I.” Lisa coaxed a cigarette out of a pack of Marlboro Lights and lit up. Kevin breathed shallowly through his nose and stared at the Sevens’s red painted walls.

“Kevin?”

She was still there, the familiar curves of her face conspiring to strip him of whatever it was that protected him against whatever it was he feared. He took a cleansing breath and edged out into the open, dropping his shield and baring his breast to the slings and arrows of his outrageous good fortune. Somewhere Shakespeare was having a good chuckle.

“It hasn’t been announced yet, but I won the Pulitzer Prize today.”

A couple of construction guys sat at the far end of the bar, eyes glued to the Sox pregame playing on a TV above the jukebox. In a booth along the wall, an artist type with a soft felt hat was drinking a dark beer and cleaning some brushes with a spotted rag. Across from the artist sat a college girl wearing chinos and a pink Izod who was dying to touch something special before she settled down in Wellesley and had her three kids. The artist didn’t look particularly special, but he’d get better through the years as she retold the story to her friends over lunch. And then there was Lisa, eyebrows arched, perfectly manicured nails gripping the life out of her cigarette. Kevin didn’t know whether the relationship would last, but she was the one he’d shared the news with. Regardless of what happened in the future, nothing and no one could ever take that away. And that had to mean something.

“Are you serious?” she said.

“Pretty serious, yeah.”

“For Tallent?”

“Best investigative piece.”

“Holy shit.” She crushed out her cigarette and took his face in her strong, well-shaped hands, laughing as she kissed him and
hugged him, pulling him close and laying her cheek next to his. Kevin felt the thick knot he hadn’t realized was there loosen in his chest.

“You’re impressed?”

“What do you think? Tell me about it.” Her fingers brushed his cuff before cupping the inside of his wrist, and he suddenly worried she might start crying.

“There’s not much to tell. Someone on the committee leaked it to my editor. I asked if he was sure and he said a hundred percent.”

“Goddamn, Kevin. I’m so proud of you.” And then she did cry. A single, lovely tear, wiped away with a single, lovely finger. And it meant everything.

“Thanks, Lis.”

“I love you.”

“Me, too. You want to celebrate?”

“Better believe it. Let’s get some dinner, champagne.”

“How about we just grab a couple of beers here instead?”

“That what you want?”

“I think so.”

Lisa kissed him again. “You want to get drunk in the Sevens? Let’s do it.”

She motioned for the bartender. Kevin stopped her. “What did you want to talk about?”

Her eyes slid to her briefcase, packed with paperwork and still sitting on the bar. “It’ll keep. Pulitzer Prize, Kev. Jesus.” She threw down some cash. “Order us a round. And don’t try to pay for it.”

He watched her head off to the ladies’ room, all legs and
heels and silk and smarts. A Picasso in motion. The two construction guys gave her a discreet look as she floated past, then back at Kevin. He tipped his nearly empty pint. They smiled and returned the favor. Kevin figured tonight would be as good as it got. So he’d enjoy it, before it all went to hell in the morning.