ClownFellas (18 page)

Spotty and Pinky rushed out of the bookshop and headed down the sidewalk toward Spotty's car.

“We need to find Hats,” Spotty said. “If we don't get proof that he's the rat instead of you, they'll never call off the hit.”

“How do we get proof?” Pinky asked.

“We search his apartment, see if he's got any listening devices stashed away in there. If that fails then we'll beat a confession out of him.”

“You think that will work?”

Spotty chuckled. “No, but it will sure be fun to try.”

The smile fell from Spotty's face as he saw something over Pinky's shoulder. By the time Pinky turned around, it was too late. The yellow clown car raced down the street toward them, the popcorn tommy gun pointed out the window.

“Get down!” Spotty cried.

“Say good-bye, ya dirty rat!” cried the wild-eyed clown when he opened fire.

It was Winky Gagliano, a trigger-happy young turk from another crew who was always itching to whack anyone at any given opportunity. He giggled, firing popcorn bullets across the sidewalk and through the bookshop's windows.

Spotty threw Pinky to the ground as the bullets rained down on them. Pinky covered his face and vital areas, surrounded by popping sounds as the bullets hit the cement. When the car drove on and the gunfire went silent, only the roar of the engine and Winky's giggling could be heard echoing through the street.

Getting to his feet, Pinky felt his body. He wasn't hit. He wasn't even grazed. Pinky knew the danger of being hit by a popcorn bullet. Those things expanded the second they entered your flesh, like popcorn popping inside your body. They could do five times the damage of a normal bullet.

“That was a close one, eh Spotty?” Pinky said, looking over at his mentor.

But his mentor wasn't moving. A pool of blood formed beneath him. Cockroaches scurried across the ground in circles around him.

“Spotty!”

Pinky went to him, turned his body over. Two bullet holes dotted his chest. The old clown wheezed.

“He popped me good,” Spotty said, gasping out a laugh.

Pinky put pressure on the wounds. “Hang on.”

Sir Reginald Van Pumpernickel looked out of the entrance to his store. He saw Spotty on the ground, bleeding all over the sidewalk.

“What happened?” Pumpernickel asked, standing in his doorway as if afraid to go out in the street. “Is he okay?”

“Call an ambulance,” Pinky told him. “He's been hit.”

“I shall immediately,” Pumpernickel said, and ran back inside to call for help.

“Don't worry, you're going to be all right. I'll get you to a hospital.”

Spotty shook his head. “No, you gotta get out of here, kid. You don't have time for this.” He pulled his car keys from his pocket. “Here, take my car.”

Pinky ignored the keys, too focused on stopping the bleeding. “I'm not just going to leave you here.”

“You've got to go after Hats,” Spotty said. He pushed Pinky's hands away from his wounds and folded his fingers around his keys. “Prove your innocence to the boss and the hit will be called off.”

“But I can't let you die,” Pinky said, fighting the tears forming in his eyes.

“I'm probably dead already,” Spotty said. “But you still have time to save yourself. Get out of here. Prove you're not a rat. Marry that girlfriend of yours. You still got your whole life ahead of ya.”

Pinky scanned the street. He didn't want to leave until he heard the sound of ambulance sirens, but he didn't have time to wait. And judging by the look of him, Spotty didn't seem like he was going to make it either way.

“Don't die,” Pinky said. “You've got to be the best man at my wedding.”

Spotty didn't respond. His eyes rolled back and his body went limp. Pinky turned away. He didn't want to believe his mentor was really dead. He got into the little red clown car and sped away.

After he was gone, Spotty's pet cockroaches scurried around his body. One made its way up to his nose and perched off the tip, staring down at the clown and wiggling its antennae.

Spotty opened one eye and saw the roach staring down at him. “Luigi, what are you doing there?” He smiled a blood-caked smile and then lifted the little bug off his nose. “You wouldn't by any chance know how to treat a bullet wound, would you?”

The roach wiggled his antennae.

“No, I didn't think so,” he said.

Pinky had no idea where to find Hats Rizzo. He didn't know where he lived and had nobody to ask for his location. The only place he knew where Hats frequented was Bonkers—one of the Bozo Family's downtown strip clubs. It wasn't safe to show his face in a joint with so much of the clientele being members of the family who were most likely out for his head, but he didn't have a choice. It was his only lead.

The second he walked through the door of the shady back-alley building, Pinky scanned the place for familiar faces. It wasn't a busy time for the club, so there were only a few customers: an old retired clown sucking down cotton candy martinis, a vanilla businessman who'd probably ditched work to ogle naked clown girls without letting his wife know he got out early, and a couple of street clown brats who looked way too young to be in such an establishment. There was nobody Pinky had to hide from, but there was no Hats Rizzo neither.

Pinky stepped through the club and went to the bar, trying to keep a low profile. If he wasn't going to find Hats he at least needed a drink. The events of the day were wearing him thin. First, he got the black joker card, then he found the love of his life cheating on him, then he learned that his own friends and colleagues were out for his blood. And after what happened to his mentor, who was like a father to him, he didn't know how he was going to hold himself together. All of it left him in a state of shock.

The portly guy behind the counter recognized Pinky immediately. He didn't know the kid's name but knew he was with the Bozos, which meant that he knew not to keep him waiting.

“What can I get for you?” said the bartender, a fat-jawed clown with a permanent five o'clock shadow.

“Candy apple whiskey,” Pinky said.

As the bartender made his drink, Pinky looked back at the stage. There was a nude clown girl up there, dancing to circus music for the small crowd. She had a frizzy rainbow-striped Afro with matching pubic hair and massive breasts that honked when she squeezed them. That was one reason Pinky never visited many strip clubs in Little Bigtop—he wasn't fond of the new trend of honkable breast implants that a lot of clown girls were getting, especially those who danced in the local strip clubs. The other men in the club giggled with delight whenever a dancer squeezed their faces between her breasts, honking the marshmallow melons against their ears, but Pinky just didn't see the appeal of turning breasts into squeak toys.

“Here you go,” the bartender said as he passed him a drink with a tiny caramel apple sticking out of it.

Pinky pulled out a wad of cash. He paid the bartender, then stuffed two large bills into the tip jar. The portly man took notice.

“I'm looking for Hats Rizzo. Have you seen him around?”

The bartender shrugged. “That lousy tipper? He hasn't been in here for a couple of days. Sorry.”

Pinky tipped a larger bill. “I need to find him. Do you have any idea where he lives?”

The clown shook his chunky head. “You'd know that better than I would.”

The bartender moved away from Pinky for a moment to pour a glass of Chardonnay for the girl arriving at the counter next to him. With her bright-ruby-red hair and pink-bubblegum lips, Pinky recognized her immediately. She was Isabella Funshine, a burlesque dancer who happened to be in a serious relationship with the biggest, toughest mug in the Bozo Family—Bingo Ballbreaker. If she was performing that day there was a good chance that Bingo might show up. Pinky couldn't stick around long.

“How's it going, sweetie?” Isabella said.

She blinked her long lashes at Pinky, but he didn't look at her. He didn't want to make eye contact. When he showed no interest, she turned away and wrapped her pink lips against the rim of her wineglass.

“I just thought of something,” the bartender said when he returned to Pinky.

“Huh?” Pinky asked, too focused on Isabella to remember what they were talking about.

“Hats. I thought of where you might find him.”

“Where's that?” Pinky asked.

“Over at the church on Eighty-Second near the park. He volunteers there on the weekends.”

“Volunteers? Are you sure we're talking about the same Hats Rizzo?”

The bartender asked, “Short guy who always wears a big collection of hats on his head?”

Pinky nodded.

“Yeah, I've seen him over at that church loads of times.”

Pinky couldn't believe it. “I never thought of Hats as a religious man.”

The bartender shrugged. “Yeah, it kind of surprised me as well. Don't tell anyone I said it, but I always thought he seemed like kind of a prick.”

Pinky slammed his drink, put another bill in the tip jar, and said, “Thanks.”

On his way out, Pinky ran into somebody on their way in. His first thought was that it was Bingo Ballbreaker, coming in to see his girl. But this guy wasn't nearly big enough. It was Manny Malone, the filthy cop he'd met with earlier that day.

“Hey, it's Pinky Smiles,” Manny said, with a big grin on his face. “Pleasure meeting you here.”

Pinky couldn't tell if it was just a coincidence or if the cop was following him. Either way, Pinky didn't care. He pushed past him and walked through the door.

Before the door closed behind him, Manny said, “Tick-tick, Pinky. You're running out of time. Tick-tick.”

But Pinky Smiles didn't want to hear it. No matter what happened, he wasn't going to go crawling to the feds even to save his life.

Pinky Smiles figured Hats Rizzo wouldn't be at the church when he arrived. The bartender said he volunteered on weekends, but it was only a Thursday. Still, he knew the church kept a record of every parishioner in the flock. If he could get his hands on that he'd be able to obtain the clown's address no problem.

Miss Tina hadn't raised Pinky in the faith, but he was very familiar with the beliefs of the church. A lot of members of the Bozo Family attended worship. Even Taffy Bozo considered herself a devout follower of the religion, though she usually slept through Sunday services.

A clown church wasn't like other churches. While their beliefs might have been very similar, they did things a little differently. For instance, there usually wasn't a lot of pie throwing in normal churches, nor was it common to have whoopee cushions lining the seats.

When Pinky entered the building, there was a small crowd gathered in the front rows. It was the time of the day that the preacher was taking confessions.

“And for the next sinner to step up to the confessional stage we have Mr. Al Butterscotch, who works down at Dinko's Diner.”

Pinky recognized the preacher at the podium. It was Reverend Jellybottom—an old purple-haired clown who wore a yellow polka-dot cassock and, as his name suggested, had a big jelly-filled rump that was twice the size of his body.

“Brother Butterscotch, come on up here and receive forgiveness,” said Reverend Jellybottom.

The crowd laughed and applauded as a fat young clown took the stage. They threw rotten tomatoes and heads of lettuce at him, booing and cheering him at the same time.

“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned,” said Al Butterscotch. “It's been fifteen days since my last confession.”

The crowd threw even more tomatoes at him as well as handfuls of confetti that stuck to the front of his blue suspenders.

“Tell us your sins, Brother Butterscotch,” said Reverend Jellybottom.

“I've committed the sin of gluttony at least thirteen times,” said Al Butterscotch.

The clowns in the front row laughed and pointed at him, slapping their knees through baggy checkered pants.

“I stole two hams from my work and blamed it on the waitress,” Al continued. “She was fired for it. I also ate twelve candy bars while waiting in line at the grocery, before even paying for them. And yesterday I ate pizza from the garbage.”

The clowns' laughter became an uproar as they listened to the confessor. They clapped their hands and dropped to the floor, giggling wildly.

“I can't help it,” Al said, his red cheeks covered in tears. “I have an eating disorder.”

One major difference between a clown church and a normal church was that in a clown church parishioners had to confess their sins in front of a public audience where they were humiliated for all the bad things they had done. Clowns from all over would attend the confessions and laugh at the sinners as they revealed all their deep, dirty secrets—all of which was encouraged as a part of the forgiving process in the clown faith.

When the crying clown finished confessing and the uproar of laughter settled, Reverend Jellybottom stepped forward. “Do you seek absolution from these sins, Brother Butterscotch?”

The clown nodded.

“Then accept of the sacramental pie.” Reverend Jellybottom took a cream pie from a pedestal and threw it into the clown's face.

The pie tin fell to the floor, revealing Al Butterscotch's face coated in a thick layer of whipping cream. The preacher then squeezed the plastic flower on his cassock, spurting holy water all over the parishioner and washing away the pie cream. “And be blessed, Brother.”

While Reverend Jellybottom was busy with the confessional, Pinky Smiles crept around the side walls to get to the office. A new sinner announced his moral offenses to the audience. As the clowns screamed with amusement, Pinky picked the lock and slipped inside.

The computer was password-protected, but Pinky was lucky the church also kept a paper record of everything. He went through the address book and found Rizzo's information. Pinky was surprised to learn that he lived in the Ringmaster Luxury Apartments, just a few floors below Taffy Bozo. No wonder she was able to cheat on Pinky without him finding out about it.

As he copied down the address, Pinky realized large sums of money had been donated to the church in Hats's name over the years. The obnoxious clownfella wasn't the selfish bastard he made himself out to be. Pinky didn't understand.

“Who in the world are you, Rizzo?”

He wondered if Hats only pretended to be an asshole. Perhaps he was really an undercover fed trying to get information on the Bozo Family. If that were true Pinky had to get this information to the others. After so many years as a made clown, Hats probably had enough on the Bozos to take down the whole administration.

On the way out of the church, Reverend Jellybottom spotted Pinky trying to slip away.

“Brother Smiles?” Jellybottom said. “That's you, isn't it?”

Pinky paused. He was surprised Jellybottom even knew who he was. The whole congregation was watching him.

“I was expecting you to pay the church a visit today,” said the preacher. “Word has gotten to me that you don't have long on this earth. Come forward. After living a life such as yours, you must have much to confess.”

Pinky didn't have time to participate in the confessional. If this were the final hour, he might have submitted. But he wasn't out of hope yet.

“Maybe later,” Pinky said.

Reverend Jellybottom's face transformed into a giant toothy smile stretching from ear to ear.

“We'll be waiting for you,” he said.

Then he called up a new sinner for humiliating.