Headstone (14 page)

angel if it flapped its wings in your face.”

But I did know their opposite number—and all too

fucking well.

She fluffed my pillows, saw the envelope, said,

“You got a card?”

I didn’t answer and she asked,

“Are you all right Jack? You seem down in

yourself?”

“I’m good, honest, just a bit weary.”

And wary.

After she’d gone, I did count the money; it was a

lot, an awful lot.

I was due to be discharged in a few days but I

caught an infection, it developed into a fever, and I

was semi-comatose for another two weeks. I

dreamt a lot of Laura and my surrogate son, and

would come to, bathed in sweat, my heart hopping

in my bedraggled chest. Sorrow was like a

constant cloud over me and lashed me in every

way it could. Times, too, I woke to an irritating

itch in my hand, no fingers to do the necessary, and

despair loomed larger than at almost any time in

my banjaxed existence.

I do remember a patient strolling into my room a

few times. I think his name was Anthony but I

wouldn’t swear to it. He liked to sit and read the

papers, aloud, saying,

“Keep you up to date with what you’re missing.”

What, like my fingers, my fucking life, Laura?

I’d drift in and out of fever as he read on.

One particular morning, as the fever was finally

abating, he read.

I’d missed the first few lines but caught

……………………….Medals

to

the

families of captain Dave O’Flaherty,

Sergeant Paddy Mooney, and Corporal

Niall Byrne. The Minister said, despite

adverse conditions, the crew had

responded with the Air Corps search

and

service

motto…………GO

MAIRIDIS BEO (that others may live).

The Minister deeply regretted the

shameful length of time it had taken to

acknowledge their sacrifice.

The Bakers said,

“We don’t wish for a medal for our son.

It won’t compensate for the cover-up

and the mishandling of the affair.”

I really believe that piece moved my recovery

onwards, the cover-up lingered in my mind and if

heroes, as those amazing men were, could be

doubted, it was time for me to get my act together

and get out of there.

The Brothers

…………………………Grimm

Jimmy and Sean Bennet, the worker bees of the

Headstone crew, were born to wealth—not quite

in the same league as Bine, but definitely in the

neighborhood. They’d gone to the same flash

boarding school as he had but he was a few years

ahead and he shone, in sports, grades, popularity.

The golden boy. The brothers, alas, didn’t shine in

one single area, save surliness. To their

amazement, the senior boy, the wunderkind, took

an interest in them.

Approached them one day as yet again they sat

miserably on the football field, unchosen. He said,

“Guys, you wanna go smoke some weed?”

His accent was quasi-American and as likely to

change as his mood. They didn’t know that then.

He led them back behind the locker rooms,

produced some serious spliff s, offered them over,

said,

“Fire ’em up; let’s get wasted.”

They did.

He spouted a lot of shite about superior races,

Darwin, and making your mark. They agreed with

everything. He told them he had a nice supply of

dope available and needed people he could trust.

Sean, stoned but still aware, thought,

“Runners.”

But, what the hell, they’d do anything he asked; he

was the guy. Time came, they got busted—rather,

Bine did and laid it off on them. They took the rap

and he promised he’d one day repay in history.

History they were.

Expelled.

Bine went on to college and some dark sun

continued to light his way.

The brothers, failures at just about everything,

were given a trust fund and basically told to

“Fend for your miserable selves.”

They had the money so they got an apartment and

spent their time eating junk food, doing dope,

watching slash movies. They’d almost forgotten

Bine when he came to their apartment one day.

Ignoring the squalor of the place, empty takeaway

cartons, sink afloat in unwashed dishes, he said,

“See, I told you guys I’d be back and your day

would come.”

He was dressed in black: combats, sweatshirt, Doc

Martens. He embraced them both—it was a long

time since any person had touched them in any

form—and said,

“The day has come, my crew.”

If he noticed the shithole they were living in, he

didn’t comment. No one else did either as no one

else ever came. He produced a bottle of Wild

Turkey and a nice bundle of nose candy. Said,

“Mi amigos, get wasted and then we’ll talk.”

They did, did some serious lines, washed down

with the bourbon in heavy dollops. They were

sitting at the battered remains of what had once

been a valuable antique table: not no more. The

brothers had seen to that. Bine sat back, said,

“Kay, here’s the gig. Firstly, my name is now Bine

and I want to ask you guys a question.”

The brothers looked at each other, then nodded.

He asked,

“Your miserable lives going anywhere?”

Jimmy took the insult easily, he was used to it, but

Sean didn’t much care for it. He answered, said,

“We have some plans.”

Bine threw back his head, laughed loudly, scoffed,

“Right, like watching Tarantino, Rodriguez

movies, eating fast food, and doing weed.”

All true.

Bine added,

“Like to be in your own real-life movie, make a

real name for yerselves, get splashed on the front

pages of every paper in the country?”

Sure.

Who wouldn’t?

He said,

“But the thing is, it takes cojones to make that kind

of impact and I wonder if you guys have what it

takes.”

Sean said,

“Bring it on.”

Bine gave a glorious smile, said,

“Simple test.”

Jimmy, wanting to keep current, said,

“Yeah, what you got?”

Bine had a battered holdall, reached in and pulled

out a gun, said, “See this? It’s your real Colt .45.

My old man paid a fortune for it. Take a look.”

It was black, shiny, and for all the world like the

one Clint used in his westerns. Jimmy said,

“Fucking beauty.”

Bine produced one single bullet, inserted it and

spun the barrel, said,

“Here’s where we see what you got?”

He put the gun to his head, pulled the trigger.

Click….nada.

He inverted the gun, handed it to Sean, barrel first,

asked,

“Wanna play?”

Sean didn’t even think, analyse or swirl the barrel.

He put it to his head, pulled the trigger.

Click………….nada.

Then grabbed the Turkey, drank straight from the

bottle.

Bine said,

“My kind of guy, like Clooney said in
From Dusk

Till Dawn,
you are in my cool book.”

They turned to Jimmy, whose whole life was a

movie; he just wished he had a bandanna so he

could be Chris Walken in
The Deer Hunter.
He

took the Colt, made a dramatic show of spinning

the chamber, and then put it to his head.

For one lucid moment, Sean nearly cried,

“Fuck’s sake,
stop
.”

He didn’t rate much in the world of bile and hatred

he inhabited. But Jimmy, Jesus, Jimmy was all he

had, and…without him? The gun cocked and,

almost in slow motion, the hammer came down.

Click……………..not this day.

Sean realized he was sweating and Jimmy

whooped,

“Fucking A, way cool, dude.”

Bine smiled, he had the two stupid bollixes in the

palm of his brilliant hand.

He said,

“Group hug guys, you passed.”

Sean wasn’t wild about this shite but went with it.

Bine laid out some celebratory lines, said,

“The family that cokes together croaks together.”

Jimmy thought that was hilarious.

Bine straightened up, the coke hitting him fast,

said,

“Here’s the plan.”

Laid it out.

Jimmy would have agreed to anything but Sean

thought it was way out there. Bine said,

“Now we begin. Jimmy, your first job is to go to a

graveyard and get us a headstone.”

Sean was beginning to think he was in a movie by

Sam Raimi, asked, “A headstone?”

Bine moved to his feet in an easy almost elegant

way, said,

“From now on, we have to have certain rules:

One, you don’t question my orders.

Two, I say jump, you ask, how high?”

Sean was thinking, like fuck.

Bine tossed the Colt to Sean, said,

“My gift to you and Headstone. It’s our name and

it’s where we are going . . . to lay every fuckhead

this side of the Shannon.” He then went off on a

rant about the losers, the scum, the parasites, and

how they personally would make a statement to rid

the country of all the flotsam.

What snared Sean was when Bine asked,

“You had some dealings with a so-called PI named

Taylor?”

Jesus, Sean was shocked, how could he know that?

And that fire of rage that burned in Sean for that

man. A few years back, Sean was, he thought,

doing good with a babe in a nightclub. Sean ever

doing anything with a girl was a nonstarter and so,

OK, she was protesting but Sean was flying on dust

when this bouncer, an ex-cop, filling in for that one

night, grabbed him, said,

“You wanna be a rapist.”

Him? Sean . . . rape?

And in the middle of the club, he had beaten Sean

mercilessly, to the jeers and delight of the

clubbers.

And then dragged Sean, literally by his hair, very

long then, to the door, put his shoe in his arse, said,

“I see you again, I won’t go so easy.”

Before Sean could ask anything, Bine said,

“He’s on the list.”

Sean was sold.

Later Sean would realize that Bine knew exactly

what buttons to press for whomever he needed. It

was like a black gift.

Bine ranted on again about Darwin and about the

superior races and a lot of stuff that Sean tuned out

till Bine said,

“There’s another member of our crew.”

The brothers waited for this revelation.

But Bine was thinking how much these two eejits

reminded him of the Menendez brothers. Not that it

mattered.

Much.

He never intended them to survive C-Day anyway

and if by any chance they did, he’d off the stupid

fucks himself. Jimmy he regarded as simply fodder

but he didn’t much care for the looks Sean gave

him. Time to sweeten the pie. He said,

“There’s a girl—sweet, sweet wee fang.”

Sean nearly groaned. The rants were easier to

listen to than the awful American twang.

He let that sink in.

Jimmy simply drooled. Sean waited, so Bine

continued,

“Name of Bethany, but don’t let her gorgeous body

fool you.

This is a lethal fox and you disher, she’d have your

balls for a bracelet.”

He reached in his jacket and Sean thought,

“What, he’s got, like, a photo?”

It was a list.

He said,

“I want that last taken care of ASAP.”

Then threw a shitload of euros on the table.

Jimmy was thinking, takeaway pizza. Sean was

thinking, phewoh, large-denomination notes. Bine

said,

“Where was I? Oh, right, Beth. She’s my fuck

buddy, but you guys do right by me, I’ll give you

some of that sweet meat.” Finally, he put a Stanley

knife on the battered table, said,

“Use this as much as possible. Call it a sentimental

quirk.”

He made to leave, paused, said,

“Keep this in mind.”

He paused for effect, then said,

“More rage, more rage, remember what our guys

said: it’s humans I hate.”

He looked at Sean.

“Look it up, you’re a bright kid.”

As he got to the door, he added,

“Here’s a hint,
we’re going to kick-start a

revolution, I’ve declared war on the human race

and war is what it is
.”

He withheld the other part of that rant:

“You guys will all die and it will be fucking

soon.”

Revenge Tango

—Jerry A. Rodriguez