More Than They Could Chew by Rob Roberge

Author:Rob Roberge
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: More Than They Could Chew
ISBN: More_Than_They_Could_Chew
Publisher: Dzanc Books
Published: 2005-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

DAY 5

DECEMBER 29

The Troubles We Share

The sign above the door is from the seventies. The light’s purple fluorescent and a guy who looks like Tony Curtis with a silly ascot flowering out of his collar, he’s giving the thumbs-up sign and has a cartoon bubble above his head that says TC’S—A PLACE WHERE THE SINGLES MEET.

I walk inside and the doorman, a guy I sort of know named DJ, holds me back with a redwood of an arm. “We don’t want any trouble.”

“Neither do I,” I say. “I’ve had plenty.” I look at him, but his face is blank. “It’s me, DJ—Nick Ray.”

I must look bad, because it’s taking him a long time to make sure it’s me.

“Honest,” I say, and walk toward the bar, where Mr. Frank Carr is sitting drinking a tap beer.

I sit down next to him. He turns and looks at me. He doesn’t seem shaken by my appearance.

“I should see the other guy?” he says.

“The other guy’s in a straitjacket at St. Mary’s,” I say.

I try to get Shine, the bartender’s, attention. She’s leaning with her back to the mirrored glass at the other end of the bar. She wears a clingy silver skirt that looks like some futuristic metal—like its out of a sci-fi movie, a cutoff black T-shirt that shows a muscular stomach with a silver belly stud and a sunburst tattoo that explodes from the navel. She’s into bodybuilding—all tension and angles and beautiful hardness and looks like she could be a cartoon superhero. We slept together once—she didn’t seem to have much interest in a second time, but Tara’s still jealous—she’s got a crush on Shine and when I want to hurt her feelings I remind Tara that I slept with her and she hasn’t.

Timothy Shay/Mr. Frank Carr doesn’t want to hear about my troubles, about my bloody, pounding, suffering head or any other wrong turns I may have taken. “You’ve got your troubles,” he says. “I’ve got my troubles. Some troubles we share, and that’s why we gather and talk.”

“So what troubles do we share?”

He takes a sip of his drink. “Two—one is that we’re both in contact, or getting close to contact, with Spencer Durrell, which is very bad.”

How would he know this? “Who?” I say.

He makes a face. “Don’t fuck with me, kid. You’re leaning on me, you have to have something to lean with. There’s only a couple of people who hold a hammer over me—and Durrell’s one of them.” He looks at me. “So—are we done fucking around?”

I nod.

Mr. Frank Carr says, “I know him—you don’t. You do not want a part of this.” He looks at me for a minute. “I’m making a decision here—a decision to trust you, okay?”

“Okay,” I say, though I doubt that he trusts me—he only wants me to think he does.

“You’re small-time,” he says. “I say that in the most sincere, nicest way possible—but look at yourself, pal.” He holds his hand up to stop me from saying anything. “Sit

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