The Last Known Residence of Mickey Acuña by Dagoberto Gilb

Author:Dagoberto Gilb
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grove Atlantic
Published: 1994-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

It was a windy night, and cold, yet Omar left his window open, and the yellow curtains flapped. He’d come in late but also with a six-pack, which he was sharing with Butch and Mickey. Omar said he was depressed. There was no telling with Butch how he was feeling. In any case it was, except for the wind, too quiet. The three men sat there with light jackets on, none of them even considering sliding the window shut.

So Mickey found himself talking, trusting them more than he trusted anyone. Mickey wouldn’t tell them all of the circumstances, he wouldn’t, but he told them about being on the West Coast, and he said how he’d been into this thing there but he didn’t want to say what it was exactly, they just had to take his word on it because that was best for them all. He told them how he came back here, ended up at the Y, how he was waiting. Told them how, at the beginning, he’d been confident that the deal was going to work out, but that now, after all this time, he wasn’t sure. How now he was afraid something real bad might happen, but he wouldn’t guess what. Not exactly anyway. Just how it would be bad. Something serious. He could be the problem now, he said. Told them how the shit might hit soon and only then was it going to be over. About how he knew, he said, like a premonition, but a strong one based on experience and information. So either good news or bad, but news, something, and soon. It was going to happen. Payment, or payback, he told them, if they knew what he meant. Told them he had to hole up here and make sure. How he was playing it out all the way to the end, win or lose. That that was how he thought anyway. How he wasn’t sure, but how he didn’t want to fuck it up, he’d been hanging in here this long.

“So whadaya think?” he asked at the end. It was like he was shuffling his feet, toeing the floor nervously, except he was sitting on a chair.

Omar seemed more disturbed about his own trouble. There was never any telling with Butch.

“How would you handle it?” Mickey asked again, now pleading for a reaction.

“Sounds tough,” Omar finally commented. “Sounds like a real outlaw situation.”

Mickey wanted understanding.

Butch sipped on the beer.

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