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EXCERPT 9
I drove them over to the Castaway and the only thing I could think of to say was, “You girls from around here?” The blond answered yes and the brunette said no. Then they laughed and stared out the windows. I did the same, still trying to think up something clever to say, to no avail. The town looked gray and dirty and the few people on the streets, ugly. I parked in front of the club and the chicks shuffled through their purses for the fare. I figured they must be exotic dancers. Why else would a chick go to a strip bar? Unless maybe they were lesbians. And that would be all right, too. They sure were pretty.
I was just about to ask their names and maybe their phone numbers—at least the tall one, anyway—when I saw this scrawny punk of a guy come scrambling out the side door of the Castaway and start running across the parking lot like the devil himself was chasing. The dude’s shirt was torn up and there was blood and spit all over his face. And I knew the guy. Harvey Dornan was his name. A small-time dealer/hustler who anybody with any brains steered clear of. He’d been missing from the scene for a few years but recently I’d seen him back on the streets and in the bars.
Shortly after Harvey went rocketing by, two big guys in oxblood leather jackets and creased trousers came busting out after him. They were pointing and yelling and running when a third guy—sandy haired pompadour, short leather jacket, blue jeans and a sadistic look—jumped out the door of a brown Lincoln and dished out a forearm shiver to the throat of the running hippie.
I jumped out of the cab and yelled Hey. But they didn’t pay me any mind. I started running to where Harvey was down but one of the husky dudes pulled a huge black gun from under his jacket and pointed it in my direction. I needed only that one hint. Harvey was fucked up anyway.
I ran back to the cab and jumped in and looked back to see if they were coming my way. Much to my relief they threw the kid in the back of the Continental and drove off. Then I realized the girls were gone. Three dollars for the fare lay on the front seat along with a dollar tip. I lifted up the bills and put them to my nose to see if the ladies’ scent was still on them. It was. I made a mental note to go to the Castaway for a show real soon and got the hell out of there.
I laid low in Bay City and waited for my regular Monday-through-Friday fare, taking a guy from the Androy Hotel to the grain terminal for the overnight shift. But after that I was still a little shaky so I drove back over to Zenith City and sat outside the Norshor Theatre for a few minutes to calm my nerves. Close Encounters of the Third Kind, it said on the flashing marquee. My nerves didn’t calm down at all. And even though I could have used a few more bucks I drove to the Blue and White office and checked out for the night. I didn’t tell Al the vein-nosed phlegm factory of a dispatcher anything about the incident, just said I was a little ill.
I got in my Olds and wasted no time getting back over the bridge.
Going by the Castaway I couldn’t stop thinking about that girl—the dark eyed one—but I kept on driving. I was a little short on cash. I drove to the gray-shingled barn-like duplex where I’d lived for the last three months and parked in a circle of amber light under a sodium lamp in the alley. I walked up the faded back stairs to the faded entryway, stepped around the empty cases of Leinenkugel’s and the old paint cans and put the key in the lock of the ugly Aqua-Velva-blue door.
My roommate Mick was passed out on the couch in the living room kicking out jackhammer snores, a beer bottle balanced on his slightly rounded stomach, the thumb and forefinger of his right hand holding it upright in a nocturnal death grip. I settled back into the weakened springs of the easy chair and watched the dust mites drift up into the yellow glow of the table lamp. A black and white movie droned on the old tube; Daniel Webster was being seduced by the devil. People and shapes and disembodied voices were trying to pull Daniel over to the dark side.
Shit was eerie. Webster must have had a hard time making his dictionary with those bastards on his ass.
I got up and turned the dial, found a Kojak rerun on channel thirteen. Kojak made me feel secure. If Kojak was your daddy and you ever got in trouble, you can bet he’d get you out of it. But I never liked the dude who played the sidekick so I shut off the TV and went to bed.
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