Joe's Black T-Shirt (16 page)

Kenneth held it open for James, then set a triangular block under the door to keep it from shutting. Fool me once, he thought as he wedged the doorstop tight between the door and the carpeted floor.

James went directly behind the counter and plugged the saw in a nearby outlet. The isosceles-shaped nose became a blur, whirring back and forth, as he gave the trigger a test pull. It felt good in his hands. He was more than ready to use it, hungry to destroy, the rush of adrenaline causing his hands to shake with excitement.

Kenneth took the can of spray paint from James’ coat pocket, dropped it to the floor, and pushed an enormous audio-visual cart aside side to expose the bare wall. Using the spray can, he marked a red arch tall as he stood and three times as wide.

“That should do it,” Kenneth said.

“I’ll say,” James agreed.

With the nose of the rigid blade firmly against the wall at the peak of the arch, James pulled the trigger. The electric saw immediately jumped back and almost leapt from his grasp. Slightly embarrassed, he tried again. This time he was careful not to hold the trigger down. He leaned his whole body into the tool as he tapped the trigger in short, controlled bursts of energy that allowed the sharp tip to plunge slightly deeper each time. Within a minute, he was able to hold the throttle wide open. The saw efficiently divided the thick plaster rock and the hidden wood studs. In twenty minutes, the wall would be nothing more than rubble.

The machine was loud in the undisturbed silence. Unable to hear anything over the saw’s motor, James felt a slap against his shoulder.

“I gotta use the john,” Kenneth yelled in his ear.

James shook his head yes, never taking his eyes from his work. The notch-toothed blade devoured the wall. When he reached the floor, he followed the red line to the left and then to the right. Finished with the dust-covered tool, he could still feel the motor still vibrating in his palms as he used the sledgehammer to expose the office on the other side.

There was enough light from the library to see half a dozen computers in the darkened office. Every desk accented with a flat top monitor. James only hoped that they would have enough time to poke through the drawers. There was probably a dozen of those IPods and a couple hundred bucks worth of trinkets stashed. Kenneth couldn’t have been more right about this score if he worked here. It was going to take all night to carry all this stuff to the van.

Aggravated, Kenneth still hadn’t come back, James went to hunt him down. Lazy asshole, he thought. It was one thing to tear the wall out by himself. It was another to expect him to haul all this shit alone like some kind of goddam mule.

When he pushed the wood, bathroom door open, careful not to put his hand against the shiny brass push-plate, he found Kenneth.

“Jesus H. Christ!” James yelled, his voice echoing off the tiled walls.

Kenneth stood in shock. Not sure what James had said, unsure if he was cursing at him or himself. He knew what he meant though. No two ways about it, they were fucked.

The bald headed man in the gray blazer was dead. A knife with the Swiss Army logo on the handle stuck out from his chest. His eyes were frozen in perpetual surprise unlike the smiling picture that hung from his neck by a lanyard. The insignia of an embroidered library logo over his left breast ironically read
‘Know Better.’

“I was finishing my business, coming back to help you,” Kenneth said. “I was going to wash my hands when this guy kicks the door open, holding that knife out. Before he could say boo, I rushed him. All I wanted to do was get by, leave him flat on his ass, but he grabbed me by the throat. We fell on the floor, him on top of me. He did it to himself, man.”

James noticed an unusual bulge inside the dead man’s coat. Opening the guard’s jacket with the toe of his shoe, a dog-eared copy of ‘Spider Man’s Amazing Powers’ fell out.

Kenneth’s shirt was crusting in coagulated blood. The red tide had become a sticky, black puddle under the man. Easy money, my ass, James thought.

“What do you want to do now?” James asked.

“Man, let’s get the fuck out of here.”

“Without the computers? No fucking way.”

“I don’t know, man.”

“You don’t know. The hell you say.” James stood eye-to-eye with his partner. “Don’t you go chicken shit on me now. This is bad, no doubt, but…shit happens. Now deal with it.”

***

They worked in silence, disconnecting the computer cables with a pair of lineman’s pliers, careful not to cut the power supplies to the hard drives or the monitors. They made trip after trip to the van through the back stairwell, filling the mini-van’s ample cargo space. They had planned to use the elevators, but neither could take the idea of having to pass the corpse in the bathroom over and over again.

***

After going back to Kenneth’s house for a shower and clean clothes, while his mother bitched the whole time about her having to take the bus to work, they drove to Big Pop’s place.

Soft jazz played through a small transistor radio bought new before Kenneth or James had been born. The tortoise shell case had faded over the years, but the sound was as clean as the day Big Pop bought it.

The little bell jingled above the barbershop door. Big Pop sat in his chair, hidden behind his newspaper page. He knew who it was without looking.

“What’s up, Pop?” Kenneth said.

“Morning, boys,” He said as he laid the newspaper over his lap. “You two read the paper much?”

“No, sir,” James said. Kenneth smiled as if Big Pop had recited a favorite joke.

“I guess your generation gets all its information from that Internet.”

“Sure, Pop,” Kenneth said, “whatever you say. Its been a long night and all I want to do is go to sleep. Where do you want these computers?”

“You can throw them in the Mississippi for all I care.”

“Now wait a minute,” James said. “We’ve gone through a hell of a lot of trouble to get these here. You made us a promise.”

“True that,” Big Pop said, “Of course our deal went dead as disco when that guard got killed.”

“What the hell you talking about, Pop?”

“I’m talking about that ‘brave guard’ who was killed last night, who happens to be the Chief of Police’s godson.”

He handed the folded newspaper over to them, the smiling picture from the guard’s ID badge was in full color, three times bigger for the front page. James mind flashed to the guard lying on the floor, lifeless. The knife embedded in the middle of his chest. A quote from the Chief promised ‘quick justice.’ James believed him.

“All that work for nothing,” Kenneth said.

***

James took the crumpled, dirty bills from his pocket and combined them with the change on the bar. It had been a slow morning. It was always like that after the holidays. People were broke and the suburban guilt that had made him flush had now been replaced by the hangover of credit card debt. He had collected twenty-one dollars in six hours and felt damn fortunate to have done so well.

The bartender moved slowly with his right arm in a sling. He placed a beer next to James’ half-empty shot glass, before he leaned against the bar with his good hand.

“How’s your pal doing?”

“He’s making it. Got lucky. Some big shot lawyer who hates the police took his case. His odds on the needle are still fifty-fifty though.”

James swished the hard-liquor around in his mouth letting it burn his tongue and cheeks. The taste always reminded him that life was best if you remembered to enjoy the little things. Anybody could be rich, have nice clothes, a big house, and drive fancy cars. To be truly happy though was priceless.

“Its some kind of world we’re living in,” the bartender said.

“How so?” James asked.

“Your buddy, the fucking Rams, this shitty economy. This world is going to hell in a handbasket.” Without asking, maybe out of habit or kindness, he refreshed James’ shot glass. “Know what I’m saying?”

“Brother,” James said grateful for the free drink, “It could always be worse.”

###

Free Advice

The sign on the door read ‘closed for repairs.’ From what I could see, those repairs had ceased to exist. Through the dirty panes of glass, the abandoned store looked beautiful to me.

In my mind I could clearly see it. A rainbow-colored jukebox would sit in the corner. A mahogany bar long as a school bus would serve the house special, a shot and a beer. Bottles of hard liquor would camouflage the mirror behind them and a cash register that relied upon paper receipts, not fallible computer chips would keep accounts square.

The centerpiece would be a pool table. Not one of those unleveled quarter-fed jobs. This would be regal, with claw-feet, and more oak than Grandma’s dining room table. Dressed in blood red felt with black leather pockets, a serious game table. It would be for men who played for pride in their neighborhood, not money in their pocket.

It would be the kind of place to grew old in, not rich. The money would be enough to keep the lights on, give-or-take a month, and give me something to do in my twilight years.

When I was young, I had an insatiable appetite for power and money. Before I had graduated college, I already had a thriving store. From my parents’ basement, I sold designer knock-offs. I had stole the idea from a guy I’d seen on a trip out East, doing the same thing, instead of a house he used an enormous moving truck.

The women there couldn’t get enough. Between the clothes and the people, I could hardly breathe inside those aluminum walls. These women, on the other hand, were like miners working a claim. Carefully studying the dress tags for size, product care, and, most especially name. They knew that those designer names were all forgeries, yet it didn’t stop their purchases. If anything it influenced them. The more they coveted the name of some light in the loafer seam-ripper, the more they hoarded, their arms going numb under the garments’ weight.

In the Midwest, I knew no self-respecting woman would climb aboard some filthy truck to find the fountain of youth, much less a silk blouse. On the other hand, they had no reservations about coming into a stranger’s home, walking among someone’s exercise equipment and boxes of Christmas ornaments to find a bargain. It was what I dubbed the ‘yard sale mentality.’ A frugal code by which I knew these down-to-earth people could relate.

I deliberately asked for twenty percent more than I needed to make a profit. These women loved nothing more than a bargain. It was the idea that they had negotiated the price, ‘Jewed me down’ as they were so fond of bragging to their friends in giggling whispers.

Occasionally, one of those snobby, West County bitches would come into my store. They would rub the material between their fingers like a booger into a ball. It wasn’t a discount they came for as much as to chastise me about how I made my living and the poor indentured servants in third world countries who I helped to keep enslaved. I happily accepted their phony diatribes of inflated morality along with their husband’s money.

I met Gloria in that basement. The first time I saw her I knew she was the one. She was a sweet and innocent girl. Whatever I said, despite being a tremendous liar, she accepted at face value. I found her naiveté and beauty impossible to resist. We were married exactly one year after the day we met.

She didn’t understand how I made so much money, and I didn’t feel any compulsion to tell her. However, when she announced to me after four months of marriage she was pregnant, I knew I had to get serious.

The freedom to make money and not pay taxes had allowed me to accumulate a small king’s ransom. In the closet of our one bedroom apartment, I had almost a hundred grand. My biggest problem was cautiously using the money without raising the IRS’ suspicions. If their big snouts began rooting through my finances, it would cause a shitload of grief even I couldn’t afford.

I called an old friend I knew I could trust with my life. Louie had been the one who had encouraged me to always ‘go for it.’ We had been drinking buddies and cheating fools the four years we had hung out at Saint Louis University. If we learned anything there it was money buys anything. Lecture notes, term papers, and test answers were funded by the illegal beer bashes we hosted. What’s twenty bucks to an eighteen-year-old kid eager to get blitzed? To Louie, and me, it was an income that supplemented all our deviant needs.

Louie said I couldn’t have called at a better time. Over drinks, he told me about these guys, the Russo brothers, who had been helping him. Like me, he was making cash hand over fist, but was unable to prove his income to the government. After he put his stake down, he was made a paid consultant. That initial investment, however, was non-refundable.

“Seems like a hell of a lot of money to throw away,” I said.

“What’s fifty grand, pal? I’ll tell you what it is. The cost of doing business. You think if Uncle Sucker finds you have all that script tucked under your mattress, fifty large is gonna satisfy those pricks? Don’t be an asshole.”

We went to see the Russo brothers the next evening. The dingy, gray shop cluttered with old tires and detached bumpers smelled of oil and brake dust. I felt apprehensive and would have bolted if not for Louie’s presence. What if these goombas get busted or can’t remember me a week from now or start to blackmail me until I can’t pay any more and have to start doing jobs for their bosses? Once I handed the envelope stuffed full of hundred dollar bills over, ironically, my anxiety stopped. We shook hands and the two Russo brothers, encouraged me, saying, ”Not to worry ‘bout nuffin’.”

A year later, life was great. On paper, I didn’t have shit. Russo Engine and Transmission repair owned my house and cars. The small commission checks I collected every two weeks, my claimed income, gave the federal ball-busters no reason to investigate my earnings.