Kill 'Em With Kindness, page 7
Nick laughed. “Yeah, real good. Growing pot, stealing cattle.” He leaned in despite himself, feeling the pitcher loosen his lips. “Burning down churches.”
“Don’t put too much stock in deed,” Chad said, “if the end is noble.”
“And what noble end are we reaching for?”
Chad shrugged. “Don’t know yet! Ha!”
Nick laughed and said, “Was Tommy’s end noble?”
Chad stopped laughing. “Whose version did you get? Hers? That son of a bitch had her blind. She was a beautiful thing and she belonged to him? You know she was just thirteen when he started in on her? Grown man messing with a child. You can’t call it anything but noble.”
“She doesn’t see it that way.”
“I knew it was her. Like I said, he got her all twisted up. He was in the wrong, doesn’t matter what she thinks, foundation of her mind is built on the muck he laid down.”
“You sure you just didn’t want her for yourself?”
Chad laughed again, took another long pull from his plastic cup. “You watch it.” He smiled. “I like you. You want to know why? Because you’re your own man. And you’re smarter than most of the dumb fucks around here. I’m not claiming to be a genius but compared to most folks here, shit.” He took a pull from his beer. “And you’re a smart guy too, Nick. Stay smart. You’re the kind of mind I want working with me. I said you’re good people and I mean it. You took her home, no thought of who I was. Yeah, she gave me some of the story and I pieced together the rest from those assholes who would have let Kimmy kill that girl. You got a good foundation in you, Nick. So it doesn’t matter what you do, it’s going to be good.”
Nick was somewhere between flattered and wanting to call bullshit on Chad’s whole self-serving philosophy. He did neither.
They lit more cigarettes and poured another round from the pitcher. A group of young kids came in, the Cutter brothers and a few others, chased the goofy, little, white-haired Bizbang kid out of the arcade next to the bar.
Nick watched Chad take his place behind the computer scoring table and boot up a new set of frames. “Let’s go so I can whoop you again,” Chad said.
Nick studied the man as he bowled his frame. Large, but not Chief large, he threw the ball with real force, putting his will into each shot as the spinning orb curved right into that sweet spot. And Nick knew he was dealing with two men, and you never knew if he was going to bite. He’d bitten Kimmy good. He could bite anyone. But when he wasn’t in the biting mood, he was a charmer. Nick didn’t really care for biters or charmers and he was starting to wonder when this guy would be dead, and maybe if he wasn’t the one to do it after all.
They left the bowling alley around ten o’clock and Chad pointed to his truck. “C’mon Nick, we aren’t done.”
Chad delivered him to the edge of the Horton Square. The street held the bulk of city parking—peppered with resident housing—all with on-street parking, four full blocks, both sides in each direction. Erik and Russell were waiting, baseball bats in hand. Chad sped away and Erik gave Nick a bat.
Nick followed the pair as they chose vehicles at random before delivering a solid strike of the aluminum bats to the windshield. Erik turned to Nick with a grin. “Fucking bust one. Earn your keep.”
So Nick went to work, following the instructions, not too many on a street, a small crack better than a big one. “Don’t want them all calling on the insurance tomorrow.”
Nick watched Russell as he tucked a D and D Glass Man card under the driver’s side wiper of each car the trio hit.
“Who’s the Glass Man?” Nick asked.
“Cousin,” Russell said. “Good guy. Went to Coopersburg.”
“Shut up,” Erik said. “Don’t tell him shit about shit.”
Nick stayed quiet and let loose on another window. It was cathartic. Though the dogs yelped from blocks around, they did nothing but drown out the sound of the crime. Porch lights turned on here and there but the men passed through the shadows like ghosts.
“He’s all right. He’s smashing windows. Hell, he stuck his arm up a cow last night so you didn’t have to.”
Erik stopped and turned to Russell, looked at him with the disdain reserved for brain-damaged pets. “And he got paid for that. But this, this here is twenty-five a window split two ways and now we got to split it three? Chad doesn’t want us doing more than twenty windows a week so there you go, can’t make it up in production. Fucking up my shit.” Erik hit another window.
“You want me gone?” Nick said. “I’ll go home. Keep your cut. Jesus. Got to put my house back together anyhow.”
Erik conceded nothing with his cool stare, but his eyes had lost their will to fight over the point any longer. “Isn’t up to me,” he said.
Nick remembered a guy from school, nice kid, choking out other kids for fun between classes. He dropped them in the hall to be stepped over, and they came to only after the halls had cleared. He remembered a homecoming freshman year where he and another, Chad or Russell no doubt, duct-taped Darius Clark to the gazebo behind the small varsity stadium. This part came out in the papers. They found the boy the next morning with the dew clung to him like he was just some naked thing, his slender throat slit and his asshole turned inside out.
Nick watched Russell tuck a card and just looking at him Nick could tell that inside the guy’s slow mind the wheels were still turning. After the conversation about payouts and percentages was all but lost he said, “It’s like it was before. When Chad still came out with us.” The words held a hopeful quality, excitement over the prospect of being correct.
Erik didn’t answer but he didn’t choke Russell either, so the conversation just died and the men continued cracking windshields and distributing the repair cards. It was a near brilliant scheme when Nick thought about it: the damage cost the consumer nothing but time. Hell, they even got a gift card as a promotion and insurance footed the bill. Work was then performed by D and D, payouts here and there. Legit. But still, in its way, little more than petty vandalism for profit.
Nick felt he was back with the boys he ran with in high school—the broken windows and tire-torn lawns of youth. Empty bottles in the backseat as they cheated death night after night. They saw the world through smoke and wet glass, colors streaked to misshapen jewels across mirrors. These were the nights he best knew Grete. And a person needed to keep that vision, if they wanted to sleep with the knowledge that their actions, though inadvertently, led to the sodomizing and murder of a peer. It was news back in ninety-three. Denis Hopeflore was arrested for the crime, or was going to be before he turned himself in, still half-dressed and bloody from the encounter.
“Did they figure it’s me yet?” he said with a smile before he pulled the dead kid’s cock out of his pocket and dropped it on the counter. “Personal effects?” he inquired to the horrified officer, and he added his keys to the cock pile. “Yeah?”
Little details like that made it an interesting, accessible story, and the media moved in to give Horton a quarter hour of infamy. It took hold, the tragedy of a beautiful boy; glee club standout, honor roll student, and an innocent. It didn’t hurt that one hundred percent of the population was experienced either having or not having a dick. It had the whole town of Horton glued to their sets.
But Darius was forgotten as was Horton soon after. Denis claimed all of it, but pointless rumors remained, gossip of Erik’s involvement, even after justice was served. Life went on—for everyone who wasn’t raped and murdered.
“I’m out of cards,” Russell said. He cracked another windshield.
“Fuck it,” Erik said. “I’m done. C’mon third wheel, let’s get you home.”
Nick sat in the back seat as the radio played low, nearly inaudible, only a hum to accompany the faint light it cast.
“How’s Kimmy?” Erik said to the back of the car. He socked Russell in the arm and the man gave a little chuckle.
“I don’t know. Ask her next time you see her.”
“Can she talk? Or is her face wired shut?” Erik turned to Russell. “Probably why he did it, right? Shut her up.” He laughed to himself and Nick caught his eye in the rear view.
“You like being her errand boy?”
Nick shrugged. “Beats some jobs I’ve done.” He reached into his jacket for a cigarette, lit it. “You like being his?”
“Heh. Watch it boy. You end up dead, me and Russell can put together a story easy. What you think, Russell? Want to tell Chad a story?”
Russell gave another grunting laugh. “Aw. He’s all right.”
Erik took a Harkins tall boy from the console, cracked it and drank. “Tommy was ‘all right’ too, wasn’t he?”
Russell spit out his beer. “Well, not anymore.” He laughed.
“No. Not anymore,” Erik said.
Erik stopped the car in front of Nick’s place. Nick couldn’t open the door quickly enough.
“Wait,” Erik said as Nick started up his drive. Nick turned around and Erik was holding cash. “Your cut of the windows.”
“Keep it,” Nick said.
“If Chad says pay you, I pay you.” Nick looked at the money and Erik added, “I just work here. Take it.”
Nick took the money. For all his talk and tough routine, Erik was as much a dog as anyone connected to Chad. Nick looked at the car as it pulled away from the curb and he remembered the last car of note that had been parked in that same spot.
The Mustang had been a gift. Before Kurt DeVries had ratted him out, he was taking in a decent salary plus what he made on the side. Things were tighter financially, with the baby coming in a month, but Nick still had a piece of his once small fortune squirreled away. He put one-hundred percent cash down in hopes to drag Grete out of her muck. He knew she loved this car, and if nothing else perhaps she’d find words for him; they hadn’t said more than two words in weeks at that point. He’d take anything.
She’d never said anything about the car. She hadn’t had to. He’d caught her ogling them online, and he noticed the way her head would swivel hard as they passed one on the road. It was a beautiful car and when he saw the sweet thing on the side of the road with the ‘for sale’ sign in the window, he knew he had to buy it. He pulled a wad of cash from his pocket, and though he’d withdrawn the full price from Horton Credit Union, Nick offered the man a thousand less than the white shoe polish on the windshield was asking. Just like that Nick bought Grete her car.
He drove the car home that afternoon. The spring air was the perfect benign cool that begged a man to lie in the grass and sleep and read. He hung his arm out the window and played with the gas and the Boss Shelby lunged forward like an animal on the attack. Nick swelled with a real happiness he hoped was only a taste of what the future might bring. He expected no miracles. He knew it wasn’t going to cure her of whatever nightmare she’d fallen into, but if it could spark a memory of when things were good, when they had love and her brain was awash in a different chemical cocktail, the antithesis of whatever nightmarish spirit she’d fallen into.
Nick called in and told voicemail not to wait up for him even though he knew it wouldn’t be checked. He drove around until dark, on back roads, past old gravel pits and other ancient haunts he wanted to remember. When he finally did park the Mustang in front of the house that night, it was a struggle not to wake her. She needed sleep, so he paced around the house until the sun struck through the bay window and into his eyes, leading him to Grete’s bed with the retinal burn of flashing gold fireworks that tunnel-blinded him to everything but the periphery.
She’d rolled over with a flat look and clear eyes and it struck Nick how old she was, as if she’d been away and he only now was seeing her again. He wondered if he looked older to her.
“Come outside with me,” Nick said. “I’ve got something for you.”
She rolled over. “I don’t want anything.”
“Baby, please. You’ll love it. I swear.”
Her voice began to choke up. “If I come will you leave me alone?”
Those words dug out his guts but he shook off the slight. She was sick. “Okay,” he said.
He’d led her outside, thought of trying to cover her eyes but thought better of it and simply pulled her gently by the rigid hand into the front yard. She saw the car and he released her. She took two steps forward and stopped.
“What is this?” she said.
“It’s your Boss,” he said. “I got it for you.”
Grete shuddered and Nick knew she was crying and he put a hand on her shoulder which she ripped off and slapped him hard across the neck and again in the chest. He stepped back and she fell to the ground. Nick knelt beside her and she began slapping at him again. He jumped back.
“What the hell is the matter?” he said.
Her belly quivered and her eyes found him with more interest than he could remember in a very long time.
“How did my Dad die?” she said.
“In a wreck,” Nick said. His mouth betrayed his disappointment and annoyance until he puzzled together what that could possibly have to do with the beautiful automobile in front of their house.
“I didn’t know. I’m sorry. I just. Jesus, I’m sorry, Grete.”
She looked at him with eyes that wanted to slay him but couldn’t raise the effort. She collapsed into a sobbing, pregnant heap, shaking under her cotton robe. Neighbors poked their heads out to see what the commotion was about and Nick felt their eyes. He looked closer at the car and saw the windshield was cracked on the driver’s side and he could see her father’s car superimposed over hers, crushed and tree warped as the man was thrown through the glass.
Two days later Grete started up the Shelby again, pulled it into the garage, and closed herself in. And that’s where Nick found her hours later.
Nick continued to stare at the empty space in front of his home, and a small detail he’d forgotten nagged at him. He entered the garage and stepped to the car, pulled off the cover. He stared for a long time at the crack in the windshield. Nick pulled the card from under the windshield, an older, cruder version of the card, the name and number of the service handwritten. But the name was the same, D and D Glass. It made him realize that everything set into motion was a long time coming. It was inevitable in a place like Horton, the price you paid to stay.
Nick watched the taillights until they were gone and walked to the door. It was open a crack. Nick shook his head, fucking tired of the shit and just tired in general. He opened the door to find Kimmy at the kitchen table. She held a bottle of Boone’s Farm kid-friendly wine and a six pack of High Life. Double fisting it, glassy eyed and gabby.
“Hi! Welcome to your home.”
Nick didn’t shut the door. “You need to go. Get.”
“I can’t drive,” she smiled. “You aren’t going to let me drive, are you?”
“Where’s your car? I’ll drive you.”
She slumped in her seat, not hurt but coolly resigned. She cocked a smile that was mostly just annoyed. “Not a bit of fun are you, Gillis?”
Her car was two blocks over. Nick stopped as he approached the slumping vehicle.
“You got a flat.”
“Yeah. I forgot to tell you.”
“Spare?” Nick asked. She shook her head. He had her keys so he opened the trunk for himself. There was the spare and Nick was ready to call her out on the lie, but this tire was also flat, chewed-up steel belts spilling from the rubber like scratching, tetanus-laced tentacles.
Nick slammed the trunk. “Let’s go. I’ll walk you.” He started off and waited for her to protest or further stall him, but heard only the clicking of her feet as she caught up.
“How long’s it going to take?” she asked.
“A while. You know, if you’d just stayed home you’d be there already.”
He took the remainder of the six pack from her hand and cracked one to kill time and lighten his load. The pair trekked the roads around the muck fields and the smell of onions was strong in the warm air.
“What did you and Chad talk about?” Kimmy said.
“Nothing much. Bowling. We bowled.”
“You his friend now?”
“That bother you?”
She didn’t answer and Nick thought she was considering it, or withholding, but he turned to find her sucking out the last of the wine. “No. Give me a beer,” she said. “He took me to lunch the other day. To say sorry he said, but he talked about you the whole time. I think he likes you,” she teased.
“He thinks I can make him money.”
“He can make money. Doesn’t need you. He wants a bro.”
“He’s got those.”
“He thinks they’re retards,” she said with a belch. “Just high school buddies, you know? But they do what he says. He says ‘jump,’ they say ‘into which pile of shit?’ I bet they didn’t even talk any shit while you were out smashing fucking windows. Am I right? You ever meet a couple of dumb asses like that didn’t talk shit about the guy they work for? They’re no better than his dogs.”
At her door she turned to him. “There’s a bottle inside. You want to come in, Nick? You want to come inside?” She let the empty Boone’s Farm fall from her hand.
It hit the porch with a muted clink.
“No thanks.”
She opened the door to the long hall and looked over her shoulder. “See you early?”
“For?”
“You’ll see. Just get me early. Eight.”
NINE
“I NEED YOU to run me to the campus,” Kimmy said. “I got class in fifteen minutes. And then I need to you to stop at the vet for me. Pick up some dead dogs for my art installation.”
Nick shook his head, incredulous. Two hours this morning dealing with Kimmy’s tires and now this. “Art installation? Un-fucking-believable! You’re going to get me killed by your man, and what do I have to show for it? Art made of dead dogs.”
Kimmy leaned to Nick, too close. “First off, he isn’t my man, no matter what he says. I don’t belong to anybody but my girl. And second, you aren’t going to get killed. Chief told us what we needed to do and that’s what we’re going to do. I need you to get me to school and then get to the vet and I promise you things are going to work out just fine.” Kimmy squeaked as she tried to turn to him, her head still caught in the grips of the halo. “Fuck this! Pull over.”
