Gene was giving me that look, you know the one,
she could’ve tapped her foot with it, that look.
“They had guns Gene, guns, these people are criminals.”
“So you thought you could do crime and that
you wouldn’t deal with criminals? This whole
stealing thing wasn’t our idea Chuckles.”
“Gene’s right man, it’s not what we wanted,”
this wasn’t the time I wanted smadge chimin’
in. “Guns people, this is serious.” I’m not even sure
what I meant by that?
“Well, la dee dah, man, I’m glad you let us
in on that Chuck with all your considerable
skills. What’d you come up with, huh, a
rumor, an idea? Not even an idea, you
overheard some security, no not even
security, former security guy(!) talking about
something he thought he’d seen, and off
you went into lah lah land with us.”
As much as I thought of smadge, this was
not what I wanted to hear. “OK. I’ll admit
I got a little heavy handed.” Evidently what
I’d just said didn’t sit well with Gene?
“Heavy handed? You don’t remember saying
to me that we didn’t have any guts?”
“I remember.”
“Well isn’t that grand, he remembers Jeff,
great, that’s just great, do you also remember
saying that if we didn’t at least try to back your
play on this, your play Chuck, that we just weren’t
even family?”
“Yeah I did…”
“How could you say that to smadge, I get being
pissed at me, I really do, but smadge? Chuck,
no smadge no you, remember, out there in the
140 degree sand, in everything you tell me, in the
beans even, and how it stunk like urine constantly
in that damn bio-hazard coffin, what’d you call
them…”
“Green heat,,,”
“Yeah, green heat, that was it, how people threw
up in ‘em, start of the shift, but couldn’t take the
mask off ‘til all clear, how that mine had gone off
and then the fire, and how no smadge draggin
your sorry butt out, and you ain’ here?”
“Yeah I do…”
“So what did you expect Jeff to do, let them
get to me?”
“That’s not the point Gene…”
“Oh, oh great,” she gestured to Jeff, “that’s
not the point?” I remembered a scene out of
a movie – it was a lawyer who was drunk and
he was carrying on about how if he did what he was
supposed to do he’d end up teaching something like
how to take care of typewriters at a Federal Prison?
Don’t know why such stuff pops into my head but I
love movies…guess that’s why?
“Gene you’re goin’ off on me about the something
that turned out wrong, it just turned
out wrong, you said you were going to go
out there and follow up on what you thought
you heard those guys talking about. When I
said I was goin, you insisted that it would be
better for me to keep up appearances and just
go to work. Then I get out of the truck, and
what do I catch, this call? I think all things
considered, I’m doin’ pretty well?
Pretty well always got under Smadge’s’ skin.
“Pretty well,” Smadge had always hated half baked,
“you think you’re doin’ pretty well? Chuck I do
really wonder about you sometimes,” he
slanted his face toward me, “what’cha think this
is Chuck, war paint?” I shook my head no, so he
wouldn’t hit me, “they cut me man, they were ready
to shoot, me, Gene, whatever, they aren’t wrapped
tight, get it, while you’re doin’ pretty well?”
It had all gone south so fast that Gene and Jeff were
caught in a situation that nobody anticipated, we’d
walked into real criminals, and without knowing it, and
now; they weren’t, apparently, just going to let bygones
be bygones- at least that’s what Smithy was getting at
when they found us at the ER.
Alan and Smithy, wow, now there was a pair, but the
question was, of what?
“We don’t want to have trouble follow us around,
we know we shouldn’t have acted like we did.” And it
was impossible not to believe Alan, he had those
kind of deep blue eyes that made lying from them
hard to fathom? “We followed you over here to
see if we could help pay for what we did when
we cut your man there?”
I wasn’t concerned about money- I was, but not
really, know what I mean? Money wasn’t the
issue, Jeff’s face being cut on, was.
“It ain’ the money.”
“We kinda figured that is why we’re here.”
Gene stepped back saying, “any other reason
you might be here?” What did she suspect?
“We –“ and Alan stopped, Smithy gestured
toward a cop car pulling into the ER space.
“We are not looking for trouble here dude.”
“Yeah I got that, us neither, let’s just be cool.”
“Works for me, Al?”
“We might oughta split man?” He looked at me
like I’d know if that was the right thing to
do? I cooperated with his head – “well,
walk past ‘em, we’re sayin’ it was a fishin’
accident, they got nothin’ to say.”
That’s what he did, but it was also
obvious, we were gonna see ‘em again.
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