Brooklyn Noir

Triple Harrison by Maggie Estep

East New York

She was wearing her t-shirt but she’d shed her jeans and her bleach-stained panties. She had me pinned down by the shoulders and her long dirty hair was tickling my cheeks as she hovered over me. I kept trying to look into her eyes but she had her face turned away. Even though her body was doing things to mine, she didn’t want me seeing what her eyes thought about it.

“Stella.” I said her name but she wouldn’t look at me. She took one hand off my shoulder and started raking her fingernails down my chest a little too violently.

“Hey, that hurts, girl,” I warned, trying to grab at her hand.

“What?” she asked.

“You’re hurting me,” I repeated.

Her eyes suddenly got smaller, her mouth shrank like a flower losing life, and she slapped me.

“Hey! Shit, stop that, Stella,” I protested, shocked. I didn’t know much about the girl but what I’d seen had been distinctly reserved and nonviolent.

“What’s the matter?” I asked her.

She slapped me again. I tried to grab her hands but she made fists and pummeled my chest.

“You fuck!” she screamed.

I was pretty baffled. I’d been seeing Stella for a couple of months. She never said much, but up until now, she’d seemed to like me just fine. She would turn up on my door-step late at night, peel off her clothes, and get in my bed. I’d bought her flowers once and taken her out to dinner twice. I’d never said anything but nice things to her and I didn’t think I’d done anything to incur her fists.

“What’s the matter, Stella?” I asked again, finally getting hold of her wrists and flipping her under me.

“Get offa me, Triple,” she spat, wiggling like an electrified snake.

I released her wrists and slid my body off hers. I lay there, panting a little from the effort of the struggle.

I watched Stella scramble to her feet, then pick her panties and jeans off the floor. She yanked her clothes on. She was so angry she put her pants on backwards.

“I don’t get it, what’d I do, Stella?” I asked her, as she furiously took her pants back off then put them on the right way. She ignored me.

I was really starting to like Stella. Maybe that’s what got her mad.

She zipped her pants, slipped her feet into her cheap sneakers, then went to the door and walked out, slamming it behind her.

“What the fuck?” I said aloud. There was no one to hear me though. My dog had died of old age and the stray cat I’d taken in had gotten tired of me and moved on. It was just me and the peeling walls of the tiny wood-frame house. And all of a sudden that didn’t feel like much at all.

Ever since Stella had come along, I hadn’t dwelled on any of it. On being broke and close to forty and living in a condemned house that was so far gone no one bothered to come kick me out of it. But now, for mysterious reasons, Stella probably wouldn’t be back and there wasn’t much to distract me from my condition. I only had one thing left that gave me any hope, and that was my horse. As it happened, it was just about time to go feed her, so I put on my clothes and went out, heading for the barn a hundred yards down from the house. I don’t suppose too many Brooklynites have horses, period, never mind keep them a hundred yards from the house. But real estate isn’t exactly at a premium here at the ass-end of Dumont Avenue, where Brooklyn meets up with the edge of Queens.

It was close to dawn now and the newborn sun was throwing itself over the bumpy road. Two dogs were lying on a heap of garbage ten yards down from my house. One of them, some kind of shepherd mix, looked up at me. He showed a few teeth but left it at that.

Our little neighborhood is technically called Lindenwood but most people call it The Hole. A canyon in a cul-de-sac at the edge of East New York. It had been farmland in the not-so-distant past, then, as projects sprung up around it, it became a dumping ground. A few old-timers held on, maintaining their little frame houses, keeping chickens and goats in their yards. I don’t know who the first person to keep a horse here was, but it caught on. Within five years, about a dozen different ramshackle stables were built using old truck trailers and garden sheds. Each stable had its own little yard, some with paddocks in the back, all of it spread over less than five acres. Now, about forty horses live in The Hole, including my mare, Kiss the Culprit. I brought her here six months ago. It’s not exactly pastoral but we make due.

I reached the big steel gate enclosing the stable yard, unlocked it, and pushed it open. The little area looked like it usually did. A patch of dirt with a few nubs of grass fighting for life in front of the green truck trailer that had been converted to horse stalls. Beth, the goat, butted me with her head. The six horses started kicking at their stall doors, clamoring for breakfast, their ruckus waking up the horses in the surrounding barns so that, within a few minutes, the entire area was sounding like a bucolic barnyard in rural Maryland and, in spite of my troubles, I suddenly felt good all over. Particularly as I took my first look of the day at Kiss the Culprit. She had her head hanging over her stall door and was looking at me expectantly. She looked especially good that morning in spite of the fact that, by most standards, she’s not considered a perfect specimen of the Thoroughbred breed. She’s small with an upside-down neck and a head too big for the rest of her. She’s slightly pigeon-toed and, back in her racing days, she’d run with a funny gait that only I thought resembled the great Seabiscuit’s.

“Hey, girl,” I said, putting one hand on her muzzle and leaning in close to catch a whiff of her warm creature smell. She wanted breakfast though, not cuddling. She pinned her ears and tried to bite me.

“All right, then,” I laughed, and walked off to the little feed room.

I fed all six horses even though only Culprit is mine. I keep her here free but I have to look after other people’s horses in exchange. Which suits me fine. The only job I have right now is working as a lifeguard at a pool in Downtown Brooklyn. No way I could afford to pay board for my mare.

As the horses ate their grain, I started raking the stable yard’s nubby dirt, trying to make the place look presentable despite the fact that there were ominous puddles in front of the stalls and the lone flower box near the tack room had a propensity for killing anything we planted in it. This week it was working on terminating some hapless petunias.

I was raking pretty violently, trying to keep Stella out of my mind. The way her black hair fell in her face. The way her ass had hung out of her crappy cutoffs that first night I’d met her at the bar. I started focusing harder on the rake I was using and how it was falling apart. I envisioned a trip to the Home Depot out at Coney Island to get a new one. I imagined the brightly lit aisles full of useful items. Then I imagined Stella in there with me. I stopped raking.

I was standing there half-paralyzed by my thoughts when the front gate rattled and Dwight Ross suddenly appeared in the stable yard.

I wasn’t glad to see him and the feeling was obviously mutual.

“Triple Harrison, I want my fucking horse back,” Ross said.

Dwight Ross had always been on the thin side, but now he looked like a whisper would knock him down. His red hair needed cutting and, as he came close, I could see that his navy blue suit had pea-sized pills all over it.

“You stole my mare,” Dwight hissed, coming to stand two inches away from me. “Don’t fuck with me, Triple, took me six months to find you and I’m not leaving without my horse.”

“She’s mine now,” I said, trying to seem calm even though I was anything but. I pulled air into my lungs, trying to make myself huge. Dwight backed up a little and started looking around at the horse stalls. He located Culprit’s and started unlatching it.

“Don’t go in there, Ross,” I said. “Don’t touch that horse.” I felt myself getting hysterical.

“You want to take this to the law?” Dwight asked, as he got the latch undone and went to stand next to my mare.

“I don’t think you do,” I warned. Six months earlier, I’d been working as a groom, looking after Dwight Ross’s string of horses at Aqueduct Racetrack. One day about a month into my tenure there, I caught Dwight trying to inject E. coli into Kiss the Culprit’s knee. Of course, I hadn’t realized what was in the syringe at the time, but I could tell by the way Dwight jumped when I walked in that the massive syringe did not belong in Culprit’s knee. I’d already been suspicious about some of the stuff he was doing to his horses, though it wasn’t till that moment that I fully realized he was one evil motherfucker. He was trying to kill the mare to collect the insurance and split the proceeds with the owner.

I happened to have a pitchfork in my hand and I didn’t hesitate to use it. I pinned Ross to the wall and made him hand the syringe over and get out. He issued a few choice threats as he backed out of the stall. I figured it wouldn’t take long for him to make good on the threats, but for that moment, he had hightailed it away from the barn. I had skipped bail on a beef in Florida two years earlier so I wasn’t in a position to go to the authorities. I couldn’t stand the idea of leaving the horse there unprotected though, so I decided to take her. I went into Dwight’s office and forged the paperwork, then I loaded the mare into Dwight’s horse trailer. She walked into the trailer without fussing. It seemed to me she knew I was saving her. As I passed through security and drove the trailer away from the Aqueduct backside, I kept expecting to hit a snag and get caught. But I made it. I stashed Culprit at a little stable near Prospect Park while I figured out what to do. I was now unemployed and broke with a horse to take care of. I figured I’d make do though. All my life I’d been taking care of things, stray cats and dogs and crazy women.

After a week, I got the lifeguard job — swimming was the only thing I was good at apart from taking care of horses — and, not long after I’d made arrangements for keeping Culprit at The Hole, I’d moved into one of the abandoned houses just down the road. I hooked into the electric at one of the stables, and ran a hose in from the yard for water. Culprit and I had settled into a nice daily routine and we’d both been doing just fine. Until now.

Dwight Ross was still standing in my mare’s stall.

“Come on, Ross,” I said in a quiet voice, “get out of there. Now.”

At that he smiled. I didn’t see what was funny though.

“I had the crazy idea you’d be reasonable about this,” Dwight said, leveling a gun I didn’t know he had at me.

“That was a crazy idea, all right,” I told him. I could see worry in his eyes even though he was the one with a gun.

“I’m taking my mare back and I will hurt you if I have to,” he said in a shrill voice. He stepped out of the stall to reach for Culprit’s halter.

I didn’t think. Just grabbed for something. Turned out to be a shovel. Ross had his back to me. He heard me move but not in time. I slammed the business end of the shovel into the side of his head. He went down face first. Culprit spooked and her eyes got huge.

I walked over and put my palm over the end of my mare’s nose and brought her big head against my chest.

“It’s okay,” I told the horse as I scratched her muzzle.

I looked down at Ross. He wasn’t moving. I pushed on his shoulder, trying to turn him over. His body felt funny. His eyes and mouth were open. There was blood matted into his red hair. I realized he wasn’t just unconscious.

I started feeling dizzy and I couldn’t get myself to move. Culprit was looking at me with curiosity, her ears pricked forward.

“What do I do now, girl?” I asked. She just kept looking at me though.

It was getting close to 7 a.m. Pretty soon, people would be arriving at the other barns.

I left Dwight’s body in the stall but led my mare out and tied her up in the yard. I didn’t want her looking at the body.

I walked back to my house to get the car keys. My stomach was doing backflips. I went inside and it smelled a little like Stella. That didn’t help any.

I got my keys and went back outside. My ’86 Chevy Caprice Classic had once been blue but now it was just dirt-colored. It still ran though. The engine coughed to life and I drove to the front of the stable yard. I opened the big metal gates wide enough to get the car in, nosing it ahead slowly so as not to alarm Culprit. She stared at the car but she didn’t spook.

I dragged Dwight’s body out of the stall, pulling it by the feet. The head bounced along the dirt making a funny sound that made me sick.

I had to shuffle the shit in my trunk around. There were some empty feedbags, a small cooler, a horseshoe, and a pair of Stella’s panties. I made room, then hoisted the body in. Dwight Ross was much heavier in death than he’d ever been in life. I had to bunch him into a fetal position to get him to fit. I put the empty feedbags over his body, then closed the trunk. My heart was beating too fast.

I went and put Culprit back into her stall. I stood for a few minutes leaning my head against her muscular neck, getting strength. My mare just stood there, seeming to understand.

I made sure all the horses had enough water before getting in the car, driving it out, and locking the stable gates behind me.

The minute I pulled out onto Linden Boulevard, I found that I needed a cigarette. I hadn’t had one in four years. I drove a few blocks through thickening morning traffic. The sun was up high now, a glowing yellow ball in a faultless blue sky. The brightness made me need that cigarette even more.

I pulled off the road when I came to a little grocery store. Nosed the Chevy near the front door of the place and ran in. Asked for a pack of Newports. I was dying for a smoke but I didn’t want a brand I actually liked. I paid the thin old man at the counter and took the wrapping off the pack.

“No smoking in here,” the old man said. I nodded, pulled one cigarette from the pack, and stepped outside to light it. I figured I would smoke it there so as not to stink up the car. But my car wasn’t there. I looked left and right and ahead, to the thick traffic of Linden Boulevard. My car was gone.

I went back into the store.

“Yeah?” the old man said, cocking his chin at me.

“You seen my car?”

“What?” He sounded angry.

“My car, it was right there,” I said, motioning to the store’s tiny parking lot.

The old man just looked at me like I was a fool.

I went back out. Looked around some more. I felt my body getting heavier. I couldn’t stand up anymore. I sunk down to the lip of the sidewalk and held my head between my hands. Eventually, I lit the cigarette. It scorched my lungs and felt nice. A car pulled into the tiny lot and went right where my Caprice had been. Two teenaged girls got out. They both had oil in their black hair and the sun made it shine.

I smoked.

I’d had a lot of problems in my thirty-nine years of life, but never this many. I lit a second cigarette. I coughed a little but kept smoking anyway. The girls emerged from the store, both clutching bottles of Yoo-hoo. Seemed to me Yoo-hoo would be unpleasant at 7:30 in the morning.

Eventually, the thin old man came out of his store and told me to leave. I guess for the price of a pack of smokes, I was entitled to twenty-some minutes on his sidewalk, but no more. I got up and walked.

The air was getting warmer and the sun looked too big looming above Linden Boulevard. I imagined the giant orb swelling so much it got too heavy for the sky and came plum-meting down, plunging the world into darkness.

As I walked the few blocks back to The Hole, I kept glancing over at the cars that passed by on the busy avenue. None of them were mine.

When I got to Dumont Avenue, I stood there for a minute, at the periphery of The Hole, looking at the newly constructed houses that had recently sprung up all along the edge of the little canyon. Square cement boxes that already looked depressed, even though they were brand new and hadn’t killed anybody’s dreams yet.

I walked on down the dip where paved road gave way to dirt. The barns were humming with activity now. Feed was being dispensed, stalls were being mucked. These were comforting, normal sounds, but I didn’t feel comforted.

I went into Culprit’s stall and started currying her. Taking extra care with every aspect of the grooming procedure, knowing maybe this was the last time.

Two weeks passed. There was fear in me but I didn’t cultivate it. All I kept thinking was how I hadn’t meant to kill the guy. I’d never killed anything in my life. Not even a goddamned bug.

Now that I had no car, I had to take the bus to work. It was a long ride but I used the time to read some horsemanship books I’d picked up. I studied these books, and every afternoon, when I got off my shift at the pool, I’d take the bus back to East New York, take my mare out, and work with her in the tiny paddock behind the barn. I wasn’t even riding her much, mostly just worked her on a lunge line, getting her used to my voice commands. There were pure moments when it was just me and my horse and we saw into each other. Then worry would creep in and sully the joy.

One afternoon, I was in the paddock with Culprit, working on some things. I called out “Canter,” saying it slow and drawn out. I said it a few times, and then she threw her head around a little, protesting awhile before finally transitioning into the canter. Something red caught my eye and I looked over my shoulder and saw Stella sitting on a barrel outside the paddock. She was wearing a red sweatshirt and she’d cut bangs in her hair. I told Culprit to halt. My mare looked surprised and then obliged and came to a standstill.

“What’s up?” Stella said like it was nothing at all.

“Hi Stella,” I said in the same way, even though I’d never expected to see her again.

She watched as I finished up with Culprit then put the mare back in her stall. As I took care of barn chores, Stella sat on a trunk and didn’t say much. I didn’t ask.

When I’d finished feeding and watering the horses, Stella followed me back to the house.

“Where’s your car?” she asked as we walked up the two crooked steps to my porch.

“Stolen,” I said.

“You reported it?”

“What for?” I shrugged, not wanting to share the details with her.

“They turn up,” she said. “I had one stolen before. Cops found it two months later. You gotta report it.”

“Nah,” I said, not knowing why she cared about the damned car. She kept on about it too. Asking how I was getting to work and whatnot. She’d never asked so many questions before, about anything. Maybe she was turning over a new leaf.

I was hungry but I’d run out of food, so instead of eating, Stella and I went to bed.

I had some questions for her, but they’d keep.

I put my hands on her hips. She was wearing cutoffs even though it was chilly out. She looked up at me but there was nothing to read in her eyes. She wore a small smile but even that wasn’t saying much. I moved my left hand from her hip and up under her t-shirt, tracing her nipple with my fingertip. I lifted the shirt up and bit a line from between her breasts down to her shorts. She wiggled a little, responding, coiling, ready. I peeled her shorts down over her ass. She wasn’t wearing panties. She turned around then, showing me her pale and pretty ass. I bent her over the bed and entered her. There was some violence in it.

Stella and I had gone at it twice already and had both passed out on the floor, exhausted. I’m not sure how long I’d been sleeping when she woke me by putting her mouth on me.

Then we were making love again. After a few minutes, I pulled back from her and cupped her dark head in my hands.

“Where’ve you been, Stella?” I asked softly.

“I was mad,” she said.

“At what?”

“At you, Triple.”

“You wanna tell me why so I don’t do it again?”

“Not really,” she said with a small shrug. Her shoulders were narrow. They looked cute shrugging.

Okay. I picked her up and carried her into the kitchen. Propped her ass up against the sink and fucked her there. I’d never fucked anyone against a sink before. It got Stella pretty worked up. Her black eyes showed fire. Something close to passion. And, at the same time, she was nicer than usual. Almost tender.

In the morning, she didn’t leave. Was still lying in my bed as I got dressed. I felt a little conflicted about it. Half of me wanted her to stay as long as she pleased, but the other half didn’t want to go through the changes when she left me for good.

“I gotta go to work soon,” I told her.

“Okay,” she said.

“Don’t you?”

“What?”

“Have to go to work?”

“I got fired,” she said casually.

She’d been working at a convenience store over in Howard Beach. I couldn’t really imagine how anyone could get fired from that kind of job.

“What happened?” I asked her.

“I got mad,” she said, leaving it at that.

“And now you’re moving in with me?” I asked.

“If that’s all right,” she answered, looking at me, not showing anything.

“I guess it is,” I said.

I’d had a few women move in with me before. For various reasons having little to do with love or affection. One to get away from a rough husband. Another to be closer to work. I hadn’t had one move in out of poverty though. Always room for a first.

I told my new roommate I was heading out to the barn.

“Okay,” she said.

I put my clothes and boots on and went out. Fed the horses and mucked their stalls. The sun rose up from its hiding place and another bright day came on like a curse.

I walked back to the house to get some money out of my drawer before heading in to work. I did this in plain view of Stella. If she wanted to hit my little stash then so be it. As I stuffed a twenty in my pocket, Stella actually got up off the bed and kissed me goodbye like an old wife.

I walked to the bus stop.

I sat lording over the pool, reading my horse books. Once in a while Stella would come into my mind, but I didn’t let her stay there. Thinking about her too hard might make her vanish.

At the end of my shift, I got the bus back to The Hole. I wanted to spend a good hour working with Culprit. I went into the house first to see if Stella was still there. She was lying on the floor, wearing a pair of baggy gym shorts, reading a tractor manual that for some reason I’d held onto from my days working on a horse farm in Maryland.

She glanced up and smiled. She looked so sweet and good. I got a hard-on and had to do something about it.

We were rolling around against the filthy carpet when I heard the car and saw the flash of cherry lights against the window.

“What’s that?” Stella asked.

“Police,” I said. I’d been expecting it so long it was almost a relief.

“What do they want?” Stella asked, standing up.

“No idea,” I said.

A few heartbeats later they were knocking on the door. I put my pants on, gave Stella a minute to go in the other room, then opened the door.

One cop was white, the other black. They were both wide but built low to the ground. They looked like shrubbery.

“Yes?” I said.

“Triple Harrison?” the black one said.

“Yes?”

“’86 Chevy Caprice Classic? Blue?” the white one asked.

“Yeah, it was stolen,” I said. My insides felt funny.

“Right, we got the report,” the white one again. What report? I wondered.

“Vehicle was abandoned in the Rockaways. It’s at the tow facility near JFK. You’ll have to deal with it,” the black cop said.

“Oh,” I replied, waiting for the other shoe to drop. It didn’t.

The black cop had me sign some papers and wished me a nice day. I stood in my doorway, watching them get back in the patrol car. Mrs. Nagle from next door had her head sticking out of her house.

“They found my car!” I shouted over to Mrs. Nagle. She cocked her head but said nothing. She was mostly senile.

“Your car turned up?” Stella asked as I closed the door. She hadn’t found a reason to put her clothes back on. “Yeah, my car,” I said, frowning.

“I reported it stolen,” she said proudly. “I went and filled out the forms while you were at work. They found it fast.” She smiled, showing teeth.

“Oh,” I said, deciding not to tell her this might lead to my being locked up for life.

“Let’s go get it,” Stella suggested, her face lighting up like we were planning a trip to Disneyworld.

“In a minute,” I said. “I got some business with you first.” I pressed my body against hers, ran my hands down her sides, then tucked them under the slopes of her ass cheeks.

A half hour later I told her I was going to get the bus over to the tow place. She wanted to come but I told her no, without offering an explanation. She pouted a little. She’d never done that before.

I went and gave the horses an early supper. Figured I’d use my one phone call to tell Cornelius, the cowboy who owned the stable, that he’d have to feed and muck in the morning.

I walked up the slope of 78th Street and out to North Conduit Avenue to head to the bus stop.

The sky was still violently blue.

The people at the tow facility didn’t do anything quickly. There was a lumpy white woman who was mad to be alive. By the time she’d gone through all my paperwork and I’d been taken to my car, night was coming on like a headache. My skin felt cold even though it was hot out.

I got into my car and saw that all the trash was gone. I’d had empty soda cans and candy wrappers in there and they were no more. There was one big muddy boot print near the gas pedal.

I pulled the car out onto the road. Expecting some kind of ambush. Dozens of cops, maybe even the feds. Nothing happened. I drove two miles, then finally, when it seemed certain no one was following me, I pulled off onto a side street not far from Aqueduct. It was a narrow road choked with vinyl houses. American flags stood guard over flatline lives. Some kids were throwing a ball at each other. I drove a ways, till the residential area surrendered to a strip mall. Went around the back of the shops and parked the car. Got out and unlocked the trunk. There was nothing there. Not only was Dwight’s body gone, but so was all my crap. The empty feedbags, the horseshoe, the cooler, and the panties. I closed the trunk, got back in the car, and drove. I decided to head on over to the upscale stables off the Belt Parkway. Whenever I felt rich, I went there to buy nice alfalfa hay for Culprit.

For once, I had plenty of room in the trunk.

Fade to… Brooklyn by Ken Bruen

Galway, Ireland

Only the Dead Know Brooklyn.

Man, isn’t that a hell of a title. I love that. Pity it’s been used, it’s a novel by Thomas Boyle. I read it years ago when the idea of moving to Brooklyn began to seriously appeal. Don’t get me wrong, I’m going, got a Gladstone bag packed. Just the essentials, a few nice shoirts. See, I’m learning Brooklynese, and it’s not as easy a language as the movies would lead you to believe. I’ve had this notion for so long now, it’s “an idée fixe.” Like that touch of French? I’m no dumbass, I’ve learned stuff, not all of it kosher. I don’t have a whole lot of the frog lingo, so I’ve got to like, spare it. Trot it out when the special occasion warrants. Say you want to impress a broad, you hit her with a flower and some shit in French, she’s already got her knickers off. Okay, that’s a bit crude but you get the drift.

I’m hiding out in an apartment in Salthill. Yeah, yeah, you’re thinking… but isn’t that, like, in Galway, Ireland? I like a challenge.

Phew-oh, I got me one right here. If only I hadn’t shot that Polack, but he got right in my face, you hear what I’m saying? So he wasn’t Polish, but I want to accustom myself to speaking American and if I don’t practice, I’m going to be in some Italian joint and sounding Mick. How the hell can you ask for linguini, fried calamari, cut spaghetti alla chitarra, ravioli, scallops with a heavy sauce, and my absolute favorite in terms of pronunciation, fresh gnocchi, in any accent other than Brooklyn? It wouldn’t fly. The apartment is real fine, huge window looking out over Galway Bay, a storm is coming in from the east, and the waves are lashing over the prom. I love that ferocity, makes me yearn, makes me feel like I’m a player. I don’t know how long this place is safe, Sean is due to call and put the heart crossways in me. I have the cell close by. We call them mobiles — doesn’t, if you’ll pardon the pun, have the same ring. And the Sig Sauer, nine mil, holds fifteen rounds. I jacked a fresh one in there first thing this morning and racked the slide, sounds like reassurance. I’m cranked, ready to rock ‘n’ roll. Sean is a header, a real headbanger. He’s from South Armagh, they grow up shooting at helicopters, bandit country, and those fuckers are afraid of nothing. I mean, if you have the British Army kicking in your door at 4 in the morning and calling you a Fenian bastard, you grow up fast and you grow up fierce.

I was doing a stretch in Portlaoise, where they keep the Republican guys. They are seriously chilled. Even the wardens give them space. And, of course, most of the wardens, they have Republican sympathies. I got to hang with them as I had a rep for armed robbery, not a very impressive rep or I wouldn’t have been doing bird. Sean and I got tight and after release, he came to Galway for a break and he’s been here two years. He is one crazy gumba. We had a sweetheart deal, no big design — like they say in twelve-step programs, we kept it simple. Post offices, that’s what we hit. Not the major ones but the small outfits on the outskirts of towns. Forget banks, they’ve got CCTV and worse, the army does guard detail. Who needs that heat?

Like this.

We’d drive to a village, put on the balaclavas, get the shooters out, and go in loud and lethal, shouting, “Get the fuck down, this is a robbery, give us the fucking money!”

I let Sean do the shouting, as his Northern accent sent its own message. We’d be out of there in three minutes, tops. We never hit the payload, just nice, respectable, tidy sums, but you do enough of them, it begins to mount. We didn’t flash the proceeds, kept a low profile. I was saving for Brooklyn, my new life, and Sean, well, he had commitments up north. I’d figured on another five jobs, I was outa there. Had my new ID secured, the money deposited in an English bank, and was working on my American.

Sean didn’t get it, would say, “I don’t get it.”

He meant my whole American love affair. Especially Brooklyn. We’d been downing creamy pints one night, followed by shots of Bushmills, feeling mellow, and I told him of my grand design. We were in Oranmore, a small village outside Galway, lovely old pub, log fire and traditional music from a band in the corner, bodhrans, accordions, tin whistles, spoons and they were doing a set of jigs and reels that would put fire in the belly of a corpse. I’d a nice buzz building, we’d done a job three days before and it netted a solid result. I sank half my pint, wiped the froth off my lip, and said, “Ah, man, Fulton Ferry District, the Brooklyn Bridge, Prospect Park, Cobble Hill, Park Slope, Bed-Stuy, Bensonhurst, Bay Ridge, Coney Island.”

These names were like a mantra to me, prayers I never tired of uttering, and I got carried away, let the sheer exuberance show. Big mistake, never let your wants out, especially to a Northerner, those mothers thrive on knowing where you’re at. I should have heeded the signs — he’d gone quiet, and a quiet psycho is a fearsome animal. On I went like a dizzy teenager, saying, “I figure I’ll get me a place on Atlantic Avenue and you know, blend.”

I was flying, seeing the dream, high on it, and he leaned over, said in a whisper, “I never heard such bollixs in me life.”

Like slapping me in the tush, cold water in my face. I knew he was heavy, meaning he was carrying, probably a Browning, his gun of choice, and that occurred to me as I registered the mania in his eyes. ’Course, Sean was always packing — when you were as paranoid as him, it came with the territory. He’d always said, “I ain’t doing no more time, the cunts will have to take me down.”

I believed him.

The band were doing that beautiful piece, “O’Carolan’s Lament”… the saddest music I know, and it seemed appropriate as he rubbished my dream, when he said, “Cop on, see that band over there, that’s your heritage, not some Yank bullshit. You can’t turn your back on your birthright. I’d see you dead first, and hey, what’s with this fucking Yank accent you trot out sometimes?”

I knew I’d probably have to kill the cocksucker, and the way I was feeling, it would be a goddamm pleasure.

Clip

Whack

Pop

Burn

All the great terms the Americans have for putting your lights out.

Sean ordered a fresh batch of drinks, pints and chasers, and the barman, bringing them over, said, “A grand night for it.”

I thought, little do you know.

Sean, raising his glass, clinked mine, said, “Forget that nonsense, we have a lot of work to do. There’s going to be an escalation in our operation.”

I touched his glass, walloped in the Bush, felt it burn my stomach, and wanted to say, “Boilermakers, that’s what they call it. You get your shot, sink the glass in the beer, and put a Lucky in your mouth, crank it with a Zippo, one that has the logo, ‘First Airborne.’”

What I said was, “God bless the work.”

And got the look from him, supposed to strike fear in my gut. He asked, “You fucking with me, son?”

Son… the condescending prick, I was five years older, more probably. I raised my hands, palms out, said, “Would I do that? I mean, come on.”

Sean had the appearance of a starved greyhound, all sinewy and furtive. He didn’t take drugs, as the Organization frowned on it, but man, he was wired, fueled on a mix of hatred and ferocity. He belonged to the darkness and had lived there so long, he didn’t even know light existed anymore. He was the personification of the maxim, retaliate first, always on the alert. His eyes bored into mine and he said, “Just you remember that.”

Then he was up, asking the band for a request. I was pretty sure I could take him, as long as his back was turned and preferably if he was asleep. You don’t ever want the likes of those to know you’re coming. They live with the expectation of somebody coming every day, so I’d act the dumb fuck he was treating me as. The band launched into “The Men Behind the Wire.” Sean came back, a shit-eating grin in place, and as the opening lines began, “Armored cars and tanks and guns…” he joined with, “Came to take away our sons…” Leaned over, punched my shoulder, said, “Come on, join me.”

I did, sounding almost like I meant it.

Thomas Wolfe said that in “Only the Dead Know Brooklyn.”

I’d never been out of lreland but I was getting to know Brooklyn. I had a pretty good notion of it. In my bedroom there is a street map, place names heavily underlined in red. I’ve pored over it a hundred times, and with absolute joy. Using my finger, I’d take a few steps to the corner of Fulton and Flatbush, check the border between Downtown and Fort Greene, I’d glance at Brooklyn’s tallest building, the Williamsburg Savings Bank, smile at the idea of taking it down, but I’d be a citizen then, running a small pastry shop, specializing in babka, the polish cake. I learnt that from Seinfeld. Then maybe stroll on Nassau Street to McCarren Park, heading for the south end to the Russian Church of the Transfiguration, light a candle for the poor fucks whose money I stole.

As well as the books on Brooklyn, I managed to collect over a long period the movies. Got ’em all I think.

Whistling in Brooklyn.

It Happened in Brooklyn

The Lords of Flatbush

Sophie’s Choice

Moscow on the Hudson

Waited ages for the top two to come on TV, I mean those were made in 1944 and 1942.

Saturday Night Fever?… Bay Ridge, am I right or am I right? Last Exit to Brooklyn, book and movie, yeah, got ’em. Red Hook, a fairly barren place is… lemme see, give me a second here… Ah, that’s easy, On the Waterfront.

Writers too, I’ve done my work.

Boerum Hill? Washington Irving and James Fenimore Cooper lived there. I’m on a roll here, ask me another. Who’s buried in Greenwood Cemetery? Too easy, Mae West and Horace Greeley.

When I was in the joint, other guys did weights, did dope, did each other. Me, I read and reread, became a fixture in the library. I didn’t get any grief from the other cons. Sean had my back, better than a Rottweiler. What happened was, he’d got in a beef with the guy running the cigarette gig, the most lucrative deal in the place. I heard the guy was carrying a shiv, fixing to gut Sean in the yard. I tipped off Sean only as this guy had come at me in my early days. He was trailer trash, a real bottom-feeder — if it wasn’t for the cigs, he’d have been bottom of the food chain. Mainly I didn’t like him, he was a nasty fuck, always whining, bitching, and moaning, bellyaching over some crap or other. I hate shivs, they’re the weapon of the sneak who hasn’t the cojones to front it. Sean hadn’t said a whole lot when I told him. He nodded, said, “Okay.”

Effusive, yeah?

The shiv guy took a dive from the third tier, broke his back, and the cigarette cartel passed to Sean’s crew. From then on, he walked point for me.

Back in the eighties, a song, “Fade to Gray,” blasted from every radio — it launched the movement, “New Romantics,” and guys got to wear eyeliner and shit. You knew they always wanted to, but now they could call it art.

Gobshites.

But I liked the song, seemed to sum up my life, those days, everything down the crapper, a life of drab existence as gray as the granite on the bleak, blasted landscape of Connamara. That’s when I met Maria.

Lemme tell you straight up, I’m no oil painting. My mother told me, “Get a personality ’cos you’re fairly ugly.”

I think she figured the “fairly” softened the blow.

It didn’t.

Nor was I what you’d call a people’s person. I didn’t have a whole lot of them social skills.

I was at a dance in Seapoint, the massive ballroom perched on the corner of the promenade, the Atlantic hurling at it with intent. Now, it’s a bingo hall. That night, a showband, eight guys in red blazers, bad hairpieces, with three bugles, drums, trombone, and a whole lot of neck, were massacring “Satisfaction.” They obviously hated the Stones. Those days, there was a sadistic practice known as “ladies’ choice.”

Jesus.

Pure hell. The guys used it to nip outside and get fortified with shots of Jameson. I was about to join them when I heard, “Would you like to dance?”

A pretty face, gorgeous smile, and I looked behind me to see whom she meant. This girl gave a lovely laugh, said, “I mean you.”

Hands down, that is the best second of my life. I haven’t had a whole line of them, but it’s the pinnacle, the moment when God relented, decided, “Cut the sucker a little slack.”

’Course, like all divine gifts, he only meant to fuck with me later. That’s okay, I’ve lived that moment a thousand times. And yeah, you guessed it, she was American… from Brooklyn. I loved her accent, her spirit; hell, I loved her Miracle two, she didn’t bolt after the dance, stayed for the next one, “Fade to Gray.” A slow number, I got to hold her, I was dizzy.

Walked her back to her hotel. I stood with her, trying to prolong the feeling, and she said, “You’re kinda cute.”

Put it on my headstone, it’s all that counts. She kissed me briefly on the mouth and agreed to meet me at 7 the next evening.

She didn’t show.

At 10:30, I went into the hotel, heard she checked out that morning. The clerk, a guy I went to school with, told me her surname, Toscini, that she was traveling with her mother. I palmed him a few notes and he let me see the register — the only address was Fulton Street, Brooklyn, New York.

I wrote letter after letter, all came back with, “Return to sender, address unknown.” Like that dire song.

I began to learn about Brooklyn. I’d find her. Her not showing or leaving a note, it was some awful misunderstanding. Her mother had suddenly decided they were leaving and Maria had no way to contact me. Yeah, had to be that. I made it so. Got to where I could see her pleading, crying with her mother, and being literally dragged away. Yes, like that, I know.

Mornings, like a vet, I’d come screaming, sweating outa sleep, going, “Maria, hon, I’m on my way!”

Shit like that, get you killed in prison. They’re not real understanding about screamers, though there’s plenty of it.

No more than any other guilt-ridden Catholic Irish guy, I’m not superstitious. But I tell you, the omens, they’re… like… there. You just gotta be open to them.

Listen to this: A while ago, there was a horse running at the Curragh. I’m not a gambler but read the sports pages, read them first to show I’m not gay. At 15/1, there was one, Coney Island Red. How could I not? Put a bundle on him, on the nose.

He lost.

See the omen? Maria wouldn’t want me gambling, lest I blow the kid’s college fund. Over the years, if I was asked about girlfriends, I’d say my girl was nursing in America, and came to believe it. She was caring and ideal for that. ’Course, when the kids arrive, she’ll have to give up her career — I wouldn’t want my wife working, it’s the man’s place to do the graft — know they’ll appreciate those old values in Brooklyn.

Sean came to see me about the new plan. He was wearing one of those long coats favored by shoplifters or rock stars. The collar turned up to give him some edge. I made coffee and he said, “Nice place you got here.” I sat opposite him and he launched: “We’re going to do the main post office.”

I didn’t like the sound of that, said, “Don’t like the sound of that.”

He gave the grin, no relation to warmth or humor, said, “It’s not about what you like or don’t like, money is needed and a lot of it. This Thursday, there is going to be a massive sum there, something to do with the payment of pensions and the bonus due for Social Benefit. It’s rare for them to handle such a large amount so we have to act now.”

I went along with it, there wasn’t a whole lot of choice, he wasn’t asking me, he was delivering orders.

We went in hard and it was playing out as usual, when I took my eye off the crowd, distracted for one second, and that’s when the guy came at me, grabbed my gun, and it went off, taking half his face. Then we were out of there, running like demented things, got in the stolen car, then changed vehicles at Tuam and drove back into town, the exact opposite of what would be anticipated. Sean was breathing hard, said, “You fucked up.”

“Hey, he came at me, it was an accident.”

He gritted his teeth, a raw sound like a nail on glass, said, “This is going south.”

He was right. The dead man was a cop, in plain clothes, and the heat was on. Sean called me that evening, went, “You wasted a fucking policeman, there’s going to be serious repercussions. I’ve a meet with my superiors and I’ll let you know what’s going to happen.”

He slammed down the phone. So I waited, checking my travel arrangements. I’d fly from Shannon to New York, and hell, splurge a little, grab a cab all the way to Brighton Beach, because I liked the sound of it. Then I’d find Maria.

I’d already packed and was trying to decide what movies to bring, when Sean called. “It’s bad.”

“Tell me.”

“We can’t have a cop-killer on our hands, the pressure is enormous.”

I took a deep breath, said, “You’ve given me up.”

For the first time, he sounded nervous, then, “I’m giving you a chance, I wasn’t even supposed to call you.”

“You’re all heart, Sean. So what’s the bottom line?”

Deep breath, then, “They’re sending two guys to pick you up, they’ll be there in twenty minutes, so get the fuck out and run like hell.”

Curious, I asked, “And these guys, they’re not bringing me to the authorities, are they?”

“You’re wasting time, get moving.”

Click.

I’ve poured a Bush, opened a beer, and am going to have a boilermaker. The Sig is in my lap and I have that song playing, here comes my favorite riff: “Fade…”

Dumped by Nicole Blackman

Fort Greene

I met her at this party on Clinton Street. When I’d see her around the neighborhood I’d just stare at her, like she was unreal. I saw her in the deli, talking on her cell-phone, so I followed her around the store just to listen to her talk. She just seemed, I don’t know, special, you know? I guess I had a crush on her. One night we both end up at this party, we started talking and I was just blown away. We talked about everything and I kept bringing her drinks just to have something to do. She was smiling and laughing like she thought I was funny, and I think I’m doing really good here, so I’m not going home any time soon. We stayed really late and the sun was coming up and a couple of people were passed out on the couch, so we just crashed on the floor with some blankets and stuff. I’m lying there with my hand on her thinking maybe I’ve got a shot. I didn’t think it would become anything, I thought she was messing with me, you know?”

Brian just listened as Sean spoke. The light cast stark, flickering shadows on his face as the cargo van rocked slightly. They’d been on the road for a few hours or more and they still had no idea where they were going.

“Anyway, so she comes over the next night, and then she wants to see me three, four nights a week, and I didn’t know how to handle it, or, like, handle her, you know? I guess I was just… afraid of her. I mean, why was she dating me? It’s like you dream about something for so long… a girl, a car, a new job, whatever. Then if you get it, you still don’t think you deserve it. It’s a mistake, or someone’s playing a trick on you like that movie Carrie when they dump pig’s blood on her head and it’s all a joke.

“She just… wasn’t like anyone I’d ever dated before. The girls I usually dated worked at indie labels or were somebody’s assistant or read manuscripts and fucking hated their jobs, and we’d go out for pizza and see some special effects movie where stuff blew up, you know? We’d get drunk and they’d wake up at my place, hung over and ugly, and maybe we’d see each other again, maybe we wouldn’t. I had a system and she didn’t fit the system. At all.”

Sean sighed, silenced for a moment by the memory of her. He seemed to forget he was sitting in the back of a van, his wrists and ankles bound in gaff tape, arms tied behind him to the van’s wall bars, with two other guys he didn’t know.

“I mean, I do ad sales and I do okay, but she made a lot more money than me, you know? I didn’t know where to take her. We’d go out to dinner and she’d order stuff I couldn’t pronounce much less pay for. Dating her was like dating a movie — she’d show up at my place in a black town car, wearing a trench coat with nothing but black lace panties underneath, and dare me to fuck her in the car. I mean, she wanted to go down on me in a taxi as we were going across the Brooklyn Bridge, like she thought it would be a huge turn-on, and I… I just couldn’t do it.”

“A woman wants to blow you in the back of a cab and you flinch?” Brian spat.

“I know, I know, but the only thing I could think of was, what if the driver saw? What if other people saw?”

“Who the fuck cares?” Brian really didn’t like him now. Besides, he was short, and short guys were usually weird, like they needed to compensate.

“I cared! It was… I guess I just chickened out.” Sean was flustered now. “Come on, she knew all kinds of stuff, everywhere we went she had a story about something cool that happened there, and she’d run into people she knew wherever we went. On Sundays I’d wake up and she’d be sitting on my couch reading the New York Times Magazine. I didn’t know girls like that. Then there’s the morning I wake up and she’s laughing her ass off.”

“About what?”

“She looked at my bookshelf, and she saw a whole row of paperbacks on the shelf facing backwards so you couldn’t read the titles. So she started turning them around and burst out laughing.”

“What were they, porn?” Brian snorted.

“Nah. Worse,” Sean muttered to the floor, glum.

“What’s worse than porn?”

Star Trek novels.”

“Dude…” Brian exhaled a long, pitying sigh.

“I know, I know. Whatever. I like them,” he pleaded.

“So why’d you turn them around on your shelf then?” Brian leaned as far forward as he could.

“Because it’s embarrassing. I didn’t want people to know that’s what I read. Anyway, I knew it wasn’t going to last. At first, it was like Christmas every day. I mean, I’d had my eye on her for months, and I’d have fantasies about her when I’d jack off in the shower. The first time I fucked her in that shower I nearly passed out. Come on, she’s beautiful, she’s smart, she’s up for anything, and she wants to be with all the time. I’m thinking, you’re kidding, right? After a week or two, I was like, how do I do this? I don’t know how to order off a menu with her, much less make conversation, she’s going to get bored of me fast. I knew that! Shit, even my friends were like, ‘She’s so out of your league, enjoy it while it lasts, pal.’ So I did what any guy would do to keep a woman hooked on him.”

“What, spent all your money on her?” Brian rolled his eyes and leaned against the van wall. They’d spent a long time trying to figure out what they had in common — he couldn’t believe it was a woman.

“Uh uh, I went down on her every chance I had. I knew her pussy better than her gynecologist.” Sean grinned, sitting back. “I’d look up at her and there would be nail polish streaks on the wall over the headboard. Fucking streaks the wall I’d work on her for like twenty minutes and she’d come so hard she’d push my head away and just twitch like she was electrocuted…”

Brian thought he saw him wink. God, this guy was such a tool. He wished the blond guy passed out in the corner would wake the fuck up.

“… Then I’d start all over again. I’d make her come three or four times and she’d be pulling me to her, begging me to fuck her. Now she needed me for something, now I had something she wanted really bad…”

Brian chuckled softly and smirked at Sean, knowing he couldn’t possibly have anything she wanted. Brian slid his feet as far forward as he could to stretch his legs. He tried to figure out how long they’d been in this van. They had to have been sitting here talking for two hours, another hour or two on top of that when they were passed out. So, three… four hours, maybe? When he tried to rub his wrists together he realized his watch was gone. They took his fucking watch.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

“… Sure, I’d fuck her occasionally,” Sean said, carried away by the memory. He could smell her now, feel the curve of her waist. “Really slow, so she’d be moaning for it. I’d get her really worked up and then sometimes I wouldn’t finish her off. It was like a control thing, totally passive aggressive, you know?”

Brian was bored. This kid was such a fucking amateur. “Cut to the chase.”

Sean had thought about it a lot, he just never said it out loud.

“After two or three months, we went out to dinner and I had it all planned out. It was going to be farewell sex, like a last meal before an execution, you know? In the morning, I just bit the bullet and as soon as she woke up, I told her we needed to talk, and she wrapped herself around me in bed. She got nervous like animals do when they know they’re going to be killed, you know? The worst part was she held my hand while I told her all this, like she thought I couldn’t be cruel to her if she was holding my hand.”

They sat in silence in the windowless van, listening to the sounds of cars and trucks on the highway.

“I told her that I wasn’t interested anymore, it was me and not her, this isn’t what I wanted, you know, standard dump speech. But I kind of twisted it a little and said I didn’t like how she was always doing stuff for me, buying me things and taking me places like she just thought she was just being nice when it was actually a control thing of hers.”

“Nice touch. How’d she take it?”

“She just curled up in a ball and cried for an hour. I was in the other room watching TV when she suddenly comes out with her stuff in a bag. She’d called a car service and didn’t even look at me, she just grabbed her shit and left. I mean, I felt awful, it was a shit thing to do, but I’d rather have her angry at me than drag everything out.”

The silence hung in the air, cold and thick.

“You want to know the truth?” Brian said gently.

Sean nodded, hesitant.

“You were a pity fuck,” he spat.

Sean’s face hardened.

“She told me about you,” Brian continued. “She laughed that you were Transitional Guy, like you were a comic book character, except you didn’t know how it was supposed to end. She was supposed to end it, not you. So, yeah, it fucked her up and she had serious damage, but what can I tell you? That’s my thing, so I moved in.”

“What do you mean?” Sean said, chilled.

Brian sized him up carefully, to see if he was worth telling. “I bartend over at the Alibi by the park. This was, like, three years ago. September… a couple months after you dumped her. She came in one night with two or three other girls and I just zeroed in on her, ’cause she looked like she hadn’t been out in a while. You could tell that her friends took her out to cheer her up, so I kept making eye contact with her when I was at the other end of the bar. I gave her some quarters for the jukebox, asked her to go pick out some Tom Waits, kept her glass filled. Lot of attention, just kept looking at her and then looking away like she caught me. I’m good, right? By the end of the night, her friends are gone, the bar’s empty, and it’s just the two of us talking.

“She’s smiling and playing with her hair, looking up at me, stroking her collarbone and fiddling with her necklace, leaning forward on the bar, it’s all body language. You know the thing about showing their palm, right?”

Sean shook his head, his light brown hair falling in his eyes, making him look even younger. This was a master class, and he tried to keep up. He couldn’t believe guys like this actually existed and this was what he was up against.

“When a woman shows you the palm of her hand, she’s open,” Brian explained patiently. “It’s a major sign. It means she’s vulnerable and she’ll probably show you something else, know what I mean? So anyway, I’ve got her, I’ve totally got this chick. It’s classic… classic. Everyone has one thing they’re born knowing how to do, right? This is it. This is what I do better than anyone else.”

Brian tried to move his arms.

“Fuck, my arm’s asleep. Anyway, I know what to talk about: stories about my family, what kinda pets I’ve had, how much I like to travel, where I’ve been and where I want to go next. Always say Morocco or Thailand, by the way, just trust me. It gives her a way to size me up, decide if I’m a quality guy, right? And she’s just glowin across the bar at me. She even says I’m not like the other guys and, you know, I do the blushing thing. You know the blushing thing, right?”

Sean shook his head, confused.

“You have to do it like this,” Brian confided, as he leaned forward a bit on the box and looked down at the floor of the van. “When she gives you a compliment or you ‘confess’ something, you look down like you’re a little embarrassed or trying to hide a smile. Then you keep your face down and look up with only your eyes, like this.”

He demonstrated, his eyes peeking up shyly through his lashes. “Slays them every time, I’m telling you.”

Brian’s expression morphed seamlessly from innocent and charming to cold and hard again, and then he grinned as he leaned back against the van wall. With his black hair and sharp eyes he looked even colder. “The best part was she thought she was the one pursuing me because I was acting like I had a serious crush, like it was love at first sight and this had never happened to me before.

“We talk about artists we like, so l ask for her number like I’m real shy, say there’s this Bill Viola show she might like to see. She’s actually blushing, like she’s already thinking of how to tell our grandkids how we met. I just knew it.”

Brian was smug. “I’ve never hooked a woman so easy, so fast. Never

“So what did you do?”

“I didn’t even touch her that night, total gentleman. Called her the next day, said I couldn’t wait to talk to her, that I’d been thinking about her all day, and she’s totally charmed, right? So we made plans to see the gallery in the afternoon and I kind of kept it rolling to dinner and finally back to my place to hang out. We started talking about ecstasy and how she hadn’t done it in so long, so I said I had some at my place and we could share it, right?

“She was so wrapped up in the moment,” Brian snorted, “thinking I was so easy to talk to, that we had so much in common… Fuck, I could have gotten her to do anything… I probably could have gotten her to shoot heroin I mean, my place is kind of a dump and she’s going on about how amazing the view is and how cool the paintings are and whatever. She’s totally delusional at this point, she thinks it’s karma, like we’ve really connected.

“So we have sex and she says it’s spiritual and amazing, you know, but it’s just E-love. Sex on ecstasy just fucking bonds you, except she’s never had sex on E before so it’s new to her and she thinks this is chemistry. Yeah, it’s chemistry, it’s fucking lab chemistry. So now we’re rolling and I love this part, this is where the head-fuck gets deep

“Then it just became a question of how little could I do and still have her want me? It became a game and I stretched it out for months Little by little I pulled away, real small stuff like I stopped kissing her, wouldn’t hold her after sex, never went down on her. No foreplay, no talking, it was just fuck her and go to sleep, like when I’m done, we’re done. I wouldn’t even kiss her when she’d cry. I’d roll over with my back to her, and I swear I’d just be lying there, grinning in the dark. She’d sob for a while then finally she’d go to sleep. The next morning I wouldn’t say a thing, act like nothing happened. I know, cold, right? But you know what?”

“What?” Sean asked nervously. This is who she ended up with after him?

“She’d call me that night, want to come over, act like nothing ever happened,” Brian said, incredulously. “And I’d always blow her off, wouldn’t call her back for like a week! I’d wait for the voicemail to pile up and she’d get panicky, thinking it was something she’d done. I’d be out with the guys and we’d brag about who has the craziest phone messages from a woman, who can string some bitch along the longest, right? And there was no question, I won. I was the king of this, I had proof right here. I’d save the messages and play like a dozen of them to everybody, and they’d start with her all sweet. ‘Hi, it’s me,’ became annoyed, like, ‘Hey, where have you been?’ and then she’d get concerned, ‘Are you okay?’ and finally, after a week, it’s, ‘I’m sorry you’re so upset at me, I miss you, please forgive me.’ She didn’t even know what she’d done to make me disappear but she was already begging me to take her back! The next time I’d see her, and I’d always wait like at least a week or two, she’d apologize to for being such a basket case, and promise it’d never happen again!”

“Jesus…”

“I know! Totally fucked up, right?” He was on a roll now, and his dark eyes flashed. “But here’s the thing: If a woman thinks she’s worthless, if she’s been dumped by enough guys and her self-esteem is that low, she’ll excuse anything to keep you. I was so under her skin, she was dependent on me like a drug, she was hooked just like a junkie and she’d put up with whatever she had to.”

Brian was grinning hard now. He’d never had an office job, never made serious money, kept getting fired, and had the shittiest credit of anyone he knew, but in this one sport, he was a champion. “Here’s the secret, and I know it’s so fucking wrong, but the worse you treat them, the more they want you. It’s totally fucked up, but the sooner you understand that, the better off you’ll be. I’m telling you.”

Sean was quiet and let Brian’s story sink in. He was colder now, inside and out. The van hadn’t stopped once and they still had no idea where they were going or why. The back of his head was throbbing from where he had pounded his head into the van wall to try and get someone’s attention. He looked over to his left and saw the blond guy’s eyes were still closed, though he wasn’t slumped over anymore.

“Hey, look at him,” Sean whispered to Brian. “Is he awake yet?”

“Hey, buddy! You awake?” Brian barked.

Blond guy’s eyes opened, suspiciously, like he’d been awake and listening to them for a long time.

“Yeah, Brian,” he sneered. “I’m awake.”

“How do you know my name?” Brian accused.

“You and your pal, Sean, have been using up all the fucking oxygen in this van for the last hour or two, that’s how, genius.”

“So who are you, asshole?”

“The name isn’t Asshole, it’s Frank.”

“Do you know why we’re here?” Sean said flatly, now a good cop to Brian’s bad cop.

“We must all have something in common, right?” Frank smiled. “I’ll save you two some time: I’m a trader for Pettigrew Dean and I live on the Upper East Side in the city. I’m forty-one, single, I don’t gamble, I don’t owe anybody money, I don’t deal with the mob, I don’t have a criminal record, I don’t go to the Alibi, although I own some property in Fort Greene and Park Slope, and I don’t read Star Trek novels…”

Frank was kind of enjoying this.

“… And, oh yeah. I know her too.”

The air in the van went ice cold as Sean’s eyes shot quickly to Brian, then back to Frank. This was seriously fucked up now.

“I heard all about you guys.” Frank narrowed his eyes at Sean. “The time she brought a glass of fresh orange juice and a clean towel to you as you were stepping out of the shower and you just walked right by her. That fucking slayed her. She never forgot it.”

Sean crumbled at the memory; he’d never told anyone about that. He felt nauseous.

Frank turned to Brian. “And you? Yeah, she told me all about you and how you twisted her inside out like a game. How cold you were, how you used her for fun and then fucked her over. She didn’t see anyone for almost a year after that, she just holed up in her apartment and didn’t go out. Did you know that?”

“No, I didn’t know that,” Brian admitted quietly, as the bravado slid off his face like he’d been caught by his mother. He leaned back, away from the light of the van’s harsh bare bulb. It never occurred to him that there would be real dam-age. Everybody played hard, it was part of the game.

“Yeah, guess not,” Frank said coolly, his pale hair and pale eyes seeming to soak up the light. “Did you know she six different anti-depressants that year? Did you know she started having a hard time leaving her apartment? Did you know she thought everything was her fault, that she was a terrible person? She thought there had to be something wrong with her for everyone to keep treating her like this, right? By the time I met her, she was so fucking fragile, I thought I’d break her if I held her hand.”

Frank was furious now.

“How did you meet her?” Sean asked quietly, staring at the floor. Was that blood?

“At a dinner party.” Frank’s voice quieted at the memory. “We were sitting next to each other and she was just starting to go out again, but she was so gun shy, she was really having trouble talking to me. It took an hour to even drag a conversation out of her. She couldn’t function at all, so I asked her about what she did, and then we talked about movies, cool flea markets, what we were reading, all kinds of stuff.

“I liked her,” Frank recalled, moving his head from side to side. His neck was cramped from leaning over for hours. “She seemed sweet and, I don’t know, textured in some way. She wasn’t glossy at all and I could tell by the way she hunched her shoulders and shuffled when she walked that something bad happened to her, she’d been thrown away. She seemed really hurt and tired when she finally told me about it all. It made me furious, and sad, like, how dare they? How dare… you?

Frank seemed larger now, and Sean and Brian had lost their swagger, shamed.

“So I kissed her hand goodnight, really gently, and I gave her my phone number so she could decide if she wanted to talk to me. I left it up to her, we’d talk when she was ready. I wasn’t going to press her. It was two or three weeks before she called me, and she was so nervous that I knew she’d been practicing what she was going to say. I’ve gotta tell you, it was so sweet it tore my heart out. She said she had to find a bedside table and did I want to go scout some places on Washington Street? Saturday afternoon, easy enough, no pressure, so I said, yeah, sure. I got there and she was dressed up more than usual, like she’d really thought about what she was going to wear. She had this flared black-and-white tweed skirt and black shoes with a strap across them, like showgirls wear, with this burgundy coat that had a fur collar, and this dark red lipstick sort of smudged like it was an accident. She looked like an old-fashioned movie star on her day off. Adorable, totally adorable.

“We started dating and I spent a lot of time with her. She was real cautious and warned me to go slow with her, that she needed time to work some things out and could I deal with that? I said, sure, she was worth it. So we started talking every day, then we were traveling together, like she’d come out to my place in the Hamptons for the weekend and she’d stay over at my apartment a few nights a week. We were going to the opening of a new club, Plush, you know that one? I took her shopping for a dress, and I guess that freaked her out because she wasn’t used to being treated well. Do you believe no guy had even sent her flowers? I mean, fuck.”

Sean looked at Frank and Brian across from him. He wondered who was thrown in the van first.

“So I took her on as kind of a personal project. Get her out, get her to take some classes… We started to take trips together, she got more social, and I started seeing a real difference in her. We’d go to art openings, I took her to some dinner parties, and I’m thinking she could be a good corporate wife, like do charity work during the day and take care of the house stuff. Plan the vacations and take care of the kids — I mean, I’ve got to start thinking about that because I’m not going anywhere without the wife and family thing… Company’s not going to promote someone who doesn’t fit the picture. Clients don’t trust a guy handling their money who’s not like them. Like, if you’re forty-five and still running around? Forget it. Doesn’t matter how good you are.

“Now it’s been a few months and I’m thinking she might be the one. So I start training her like they trained me at PD — I start teaching her about my job, how to make chitchat at a charity event, negotiate with antiques dealers… had to get her out of that place in Fort Greene. I’m thinking if it works out, I just might marry her, but we never talked about it.

“Anyway, we’re out at a club for some party and we end up barhopping all over town with friends. It’s really late and she says she wants to go to this one bar by her place, some shithole on Myrtle Avenue, so we end up there and she’s drunk, really drunk. She’s wearing this little foufy lavender dress and the place is pretty crowded, it’s hot, she’s almost cross-eyed she’s so plowed. She wants to dance, and I’m like, forget it, but she drags me downstairs to the basement, it’s like this private VIP room, real dark, no bouncers, couple of guys in suits getting smashed at a table, two or three people smoking, whatever. She starts dancing with whoever, but she keeps looking back at me to see if I’m watching her, like it’s a private show for me, like it’ll turn me on or something.”

Frank’s legs were pressed tightly against each other, as though he needed to push against something, but he could only push against himself.

“She doesn’t get the response she wants from me, like she’s trying to punish me, get me jealous, see how much I really care about her. So she gets on a table to dance and she can barely stand up, and everybody’s looking at her. Her hair’s all over the place, and her makeup’s smeared and she’s glistening like she’s sweating to death or her body is trying to push all that fucking booze out, and I look at her. I just look at her, horrified. This is who she is No matter how much I try to do for her, how much I try to teach her, she’ll never be what I need. She’s not marriage material, she’s a fucking mess and now she’s looking uglier and uglier. I kissed that? I thought I could love that? And I start getting pissed off, she wasted my time, I tried to her and this is how she humiliates me?

“Now, I’m not that buzzed, and when I see this going on, I sober up real quick. She’s dancing with any guy in the room and rubbing up against them, rubbing her ass against their crotch like she’s a fucking stripper and she wants me to watch. She wants me to watch her. She hasn’t had sex with me because she says she needs ‘time,’ and I’m fine with that. For fuck’s sake, I’m patient as hell because I think she’s worth it — and she ends up rubbing her pussy up against some drunk guy in a bar?”

Frank’s eyes were blazing now.

“The place empties out and it’s just us and these four guys in suits, and they’re out celebrating a birthday or big promotion or something, and they are nasty drunk. They all take turns dancing with her — well, it’s more like dragging her at this point, she’s so dizzy. She keeps looking around like this isn’t fun anymore, and she’s trying to find me so I can save her, but I’m just sitting in this one shadowy corner and she doesn’t see me. The other guys don’t know we came in together, and they can’t see me either, so they think it’s just them and her. Like, time for a private show, okay?

“Then she falls over backwards on a cocktail table, knocking all the glasses on the floor, and she’s yelling, ‘Frank! Frank!’ but she’s slurring so bad they think she’s yelling, ‘Fuck! Fuck!’ And one guy says, ‘Whatever the lady wants, right?’ and they all start laughing as they unzip their pants. Now she’s screaming and crying and trying to push them off, and they turn her over so she’s face down on the cocktail table, and the ashtray flips over and a glass breaks on the floor, and one by one they all fuck her. They fuck her till she throws up. She’s covered in come and sweat and vomit and she’s moaning, her eyes are rolling in her head. Her dress is shredded and her panties are twisted around one leg like they just got ripped off the other, and there’s blood on her leg…”

Horrified, Brian and Sean couldn’t take their eyes off Frank as he spoke, but they didn’t see him. All they saw was their own picture of her, helpless and screaming on a table, like a still photo from their own personal film.

“… And all I can think is: You fucking whore. I mean, we never even slept together! When she said she needed ‘time’ to work some things out, I was fine with that, but hey, give it away to some guys you meet in a bar? Go ahead! I’ve gotta tell you, though, when I saw her face all blurry and mashed on that table, slumped over like a rag doll, I thought, ‘Well, guess you worked it out, huh?’

“After they all left, I dragged her out of there to her apartment and she was moaning and crying the whole way. It was around 5 a.m., and I left her in front of her apartment. I was done with her. Done. This was the fourth time I had to teach some woman a lesson and I was sick of it. After everything I do for them and they… Why can’t they just… Yeah, I dumped her. I fucking dumped her on the sidewalk.”

Frank sat back, satisfied. Sean and Brian stared at each other with their mouths slightly open, knowing their rankings had changed.

For a long time, they sat in silence in the windowless van. No one knew what to say. Close enough to talk but not to help each other. Sean wondered why they weren’t gagged too? Why would someone want them talking to each other? What were they supposed to figure out?

As the van slowed and finally stopped, they looked at one another anxiously, listening to the sound of water in the background. Ocean? Lake? River? They couldn’t tell. Then the clang of equipment, metal and heavy.

“I know why we’re here,” Sean gasped, his voice crumbled like soft charcoal. He was always the last to figure everything out.

“It’s our turn to get dumped.”

Slipping into darkness by C.J. Sullivan

Bushwick

It wasn’t supposed to happen like this — not here. What was she doing on this filthy block back in Bushwick? This was not how it was supposed to play out.

She shook her head as she thought about her parents’ warnings. She had been taught — over and over — to stay away from ghetto gangsters, those who lived to pull down their own kind who try to get ahead. She had been raised to be a striver and an achiever — a woman who would reach and attain the American Dream, and bring pride to her Puerto Rican ancestors and family name.

Rosa Lima silently cursed herself as she made her way up Knickerbocker Avenue. At the corner of Himrod Street a bone-chilling winter wind ripped through her suede coat. She shivered as she thought of her parents. They had been right. Every last frightful thing they ever told her had come true. The longer she lived the smarter they became. But since she was little, Rosa always had to test limits. She took nothing on face value. Now it was all right in her face.

A few months ago everything was going so well. Maybe too well. And she let her guard down and let him into her life. It felt right. He was smooth and handsome — looked and styled himself after the actor Benjamin Bratt. She liked that he was a Latino on the fast track to a better life. As her mother would say, “He cleaned up well.” And she liked his recent pedigree. He went to NYU, was pulling down good grades and talked a good game.

Now she saw just how blind she had been to who he really was. The warning signs were all there. She just hadn’t seen them. Or didn’t want to. It was like she saw only his shadow. She knew he was rough around the edges and had a temper. When she rode around Brooklyn with him in his leased Acura he was always getting into arguments with other drivers. She’d seen the sawed-off baseball bat under his seat, but he’d never attacked anyone — at least while she was around. She wrote it off to his Latino temper. More telling — and how she ignored this was still a mystery — was that he was always getting called on his cellphone and whispering to whomever was on the other end. Then he had to rush off and end their dates because, “I got some business I gotta go to take care of.”

But she found it easy to go light on him. Rosa felt bad for him because she realized he was up against being born and raised on the rough streets of Bushwick, and the ghetto was stronger than any emotion Rosa could muster. The darkness of these streets couldn’t be cracked by sunlight or love. But Rosa believed that she would get him out of this and they could start a new life.

Now the whole script was flipped. She was being pulled into his world. A world her parents had invested a lifetime of savings to keep her out of.

His left arm was hanging around her shoulders and he was getting heavier. She took a deep breath and hoisted him up. He gasped and said, “Rosa, Rosa, easy, please. It hurts but keep moving. Just don’t stop.”

“I got you. Don’t worry.”

She held him tight as she waited for the light to change. An old woman in a worn cloth coat stood on the curb staring at them. The woman took a hesitant step away and said, “Child, that man he is bleeding. Bleeding bad.”

Rosa wanted to scream and run. She said, “Yes, I know… I know. He had an accident at work. We’re going to the doctor.”

“You should call an ambulance.”

“The doctor is on the next block. We’re fine, thank you.”

The woman walked away shaking her head. Rosa crossed the street as two Latino youths walked by leering at her. One kid looked her up and down, licked his lips, and then kissed at her. The other one laughed and said, “Yo, mami, you got some fine high-water booty. Drop that dope and come with me.”

Rosa shot them a dirty look and hissed, “Punks. Get out of here, you little maricons.”

The kids kissed at her and walked away laughing as they bopped into a pizzeria. Rosa kept moving. She let out a long sigh and realized he was getting heavier and she didn’t know if she could drag him the whole way. She wanted to stop for a moment and lean against a car. Get her breath and strength back.

“Rosa, come on. Keep going. Don’t stop! I’m bleeding, dammit. It hurts. It’s burning my gut. Oh, man, it hurts. Oh, it hurts so bad. Damn. I’ma get that punk-ass Chino. He dead. He a dead man!”

Rosa put her head down and pushed on. She turned to look behind and saw drops of blood in the dirty slush and snow on the avenue.

“Carlos, listen baby,” she said, “you’re bleeding bad. Real bad. That wound could kill you. You have to get a doctor to take care of it. We should go to Wycoff Hospital. It’s just around the corner.”

Carlos hissed, “Dammit, woman! Listen to me. Just get me to Mama’s! No hospital. What do you think, they just going to stitch me up and not call the cops? Mama will take care of it. She always does. Come on, hold my weight and let’s step.”

Rosa and Carlos hobbled down the street as shoppers passed by, staring at the attractive girl holding onto a grimacing young man with a hand to his stomach, thick blood dripping through his fingers.

Rosa had been raised in Bay Ridge, the only child of an accountant father and a mother who worked as an administrator for the Parks Department. Her parents had saved for many years to leave Bushwick and buy a two-story brick on Colonial Road near the water at 91st Street. They always joked with Rosa that they were “cash poor and house rich.”

Rosa loved running through the sprawling home but she’d been lonely in Bay Ridge. She was the only Puerto Rican child on her block, and the other kids — and most of the parents — shunned her. She was teased constantly. As she walked home from school, a clique of older girls on her block would chant, “Mira, mira, on the wall, is Rosa the biggest spic of all?”

She would pass them and not even blink. Kept her eyes straight and acted like she didn’t hear a thing. Her mother told her that they were nothing more than a pack of barking dogs.

“Would you get mad at a dog in a yard behind a fence yapping at you? You ignore it and walk away. Treat them the same way.”

Rosa’s mantra as a child was, “Sticks and stones can break my bones but names can never harm me.” But that only worked until she reached her room, where she would fall on her bed and scream into her pillow. She knew her mother didn’t want to hear it. She was on her own as most children are. Adults forget to ease the pain of youth. Wiping her eyes, she would look up at her wall at her favorite poster of Lou Diamond Phillips posing as Richie Valens for his role in La Bamba She would stare into his face for hours until she would hear him sing softly, “Oh, Rosa.”

Rosa’s parents dealt with her lack of friends and empty social life by enrolling her into scores of after-school activities. At one time or another, Rosa had studied karate, gymnastics, soccer, trumpet, French, modern dance, ballet, and chess. None of these stuck except for dance. That she loved. As she got older Rosa excelled at school. Her parents took out loans to pay for a private all-girls school in Downtown Brooklyn. Her teachers were pleasantly surprised that a Latina could be so smart and dedicated to her studies. Because of this, the principal saw to it that the white kids left her alone.

She blossomed as a teenager and was thought to be the prettiest girl in her school. The older girls who once taunted her on her block had moved on. Now the white kids in Bay Ridge wanted to hang out with her. She was becoming cool and her ethnicity was no longer an issue. She was one of the most popular girls at her school.

In her junior year she aced her SATs, and as senior she was given a full scholarship to NYU to study Political Science. Her career goal was to work at the UN. As a freshman in college Rosa pulled down a 4.0 index, but she did find some time for socializing. She dated a few boys at school — she lost her virginity to an Irish boy from Bay Ridge whose older sister had once taunted her. To Rosa it seemed that all the boys at NYU wanted was a hot Spanish chick who would put out for them. Rosa wanted more than that. She wanted to fall in love. Crazy love like when she was a kid and had that crush on Lou Diamond Phillips. She knew that someday somewhere she would find that. She had to. It was what she had always dreamed of.

Rosa grew tired of the dating scene in college and decided to just concentrate on her degree. And then it hit her. Like a thunderbolt she knew that the promise of love might have walked into her life, and his name was Carlos.

They met in Loeb cafeteria. Rosa was sitting by herself munching on a tuna sandwich when this handsome man sat down next to her and started a conversation. He told her his name was Carlos Hernandez and they bonded right away over their Brooklyn and Puerto Rican roots. Rosa liked that Carlos was a self-assured junior going for a degree in Business. After her last class that day he took her out to Lusardi’s Restaurant — an upscale Italian joint on the Upper East Side. The owner treated him like an old friend and set them up with the best seat in the house. Carlos ordered the food and wine like a veteran.

After dinner they went down to the Roosevelt Island tram, and as the car inched over the East River, Carlos took her hand and gently kissed her. She felt her body jolt. They walked around Roosevelt Island and watched a group of men fish for striped bass. They stood on the promenade and watched the New York skyline as Carlos told her how he was going to knock the city dead. Rosa hung on every word and told him about how lonely she had been. He looked into her eyes and told her he knew all about loneliness, he had felt it his whole life.

The next week Carlos took her home to meet his parents in Bushwick. While his mama and papa were sweet, they lived on a dark and dangerous block and were first-generation o New York. Mama stayed home and kept their railroad apartment and Papa was the super of the building. Papa t-shirts and khaki jeans and grunted and nodded. Mama was a short, chubby woman who always wore house-dresses. She had a pleasant face but had what Rosa’s mother would say was “the look of a peasant.”

They were poor and Carlos was their only child, not because of any birth-control choice but because of poverty. That made Carlos even more attractive to Rosa. He was the one. He was raising himself out of the ghetto and would take the strength he had to be a success in business. Rosa thought that no one could stop Carlos but Carlos. On that she was right.

She fell hard for him and he seemed to love her right back. He took her to every hot nightclub in the city and everyone seemed to know him and like him. He was always walking off meeting people and telling her he had to do a little business. Carlos told her he did computer-hacking for cash and some of the folks he worked for were a little seedy, so she would be better off not getting to know them.

Then today it all came down on her. After Rosa’s morning International Law class, Carlos met her in the hallway and told her to come with him. Said he had a little deal he had to make and then they would go over to Mama’s for lunch. They walked up Broadway to 14th Street and huddled to keep warm from the bitter winter chill. They took the L train to Bushwick and then walked down Knickerbocker Avenue. Carlos told her he had to pick up some serious money from an up-and-coming Latino rap star who Carlos had developed a website for. Carlos had Rosa wait outside Rico’s Bodega as he walked across the street to talk with two young Latino men.

Rosa saw that Carlos was getting angry at the men and then — as if Rosa was watching this in a dream — Carlos pulled out a gun. A gun? A gun! Why would a computer programmer need a gun? One man ducked and rolled on the sidewalk and then she heard a shot and Carlos fell to the ground. Carlos landed under a car as Rosa ran across the street screaming. A gypsy cab screeched to a stop, just missing her. As she reached the sidewalk she saw Carlos weakly stand and let off a round at one of the men running away. The man fell to the ground as the other man shot back. Carlos grabbed Rosa and threw her down to the ground.

As she pushed herself up from the cement, it went quiet. Carlos stood and grabbed her, saying, “Get me to Mama’s house.”

“Carlos, Carlos, what happened?”

Three schoolkids stood on the corner staring at her and Carlos as they staggered up the block.

“I’m hit. Damn, he shot me,” Carlos moaned.

“What was that?” Rosa was crying. “Why do you have a gun? Why were you shooting at that man?”

“Because he was going to shoot me, Rosa. This here is Bushwick, not Bay Ridge.”

“Why would he shoot you over a website?”

Carlos laughed as a clot of blood spilled out of his mouth, “Website. Oh, baby, I don’t do websites. I deal. You know, drugs. Perico and chiva, like that. It pays for college.”

“You deal coke and heroin?”

“I do. And now ain’t the time to judge me. Do that later. I got to get to Mama’s. Get me there. Help me.”

“Carlos, you’re shot! We got to get you to an emergency room.”

“Shut up and take me to Mama’s.”

How could she not have seen it coming? Everyone was giving him cash. He was always getting calls on his cellphone and having to grab cabs to take care of business. How could she be so stupid? Who needs a website at 2:30 in the morning?

As Rosa turned onto Harmon Street — Mama’s house was now 200 feet away — she realized she had believed Carlos because she wanted to. She wanted to believe he wanted out of the ghetto even though he kept going back to it.

“Hold on, Rosa. We’re almost there.”

Rosa reached the front stoop and rang Mama’s bell. Carlos’s eyes were closed and his breathing was shallow. Mama opened the door and looked at her son.

“Díos mío! Mi hijo, mi bebe!”

“Mama, he got shot.”

“Inside. Avanza!”

Mama grabbed Carlos’s other arm and the women led him down the hallway.

“See, it was meant to be that we live on the ground floor,” Mama said as she kicked the door open and then yelled, “Papa! Carlos has a balazo. Put all the towels down on the couch. Cover it. Your hijo is hurt.”

Papa walked up the narrow hallway and ignored Mama and Rosa. He gave his son a sour look and grabbed a stack of towels from a hall cabinet and piled them on the couch in the front room. Mama and Rosa gently let Carlos down, and he slumped on the couch.

“Mal hijo!” Papa hissed as he looked at his son.

“Go! Get out!” Mama yelled at him.

Papa scowled at her and turned and walked quickly down the hallway. He slammed the door as he left.

“Papa’s flojo… You know, a weak man. Carlos takes after his mama. Strong. Fuerte. Like steel.”

“What do we do now?” Rosa asked.

Carlos moved and pulled out his gun from his pants and groaned, “Mama, Mama, get rid of this.”

Mama nudged Rosa and said, “Grab the pistola and bring it to the kitchen.”

Mama waddled down the hallway and Rosa followed her, holding the gun like it was a wild animal. Mama held out a plastic bag and Rosa dropped it in.

“Rosa, we have to stop the bleeding. Go and hold the towels to his wound till I get out there.”

“Mama, we need to get him to a hospital.”

“Hospital? That is where people go to die. My bebe no die. Not today. I know his death day. I saw it in a dream when he was two. He stays here and we take care of him. Stop the sangre. His blood has to clot. He’ll be fine. Be a good novia and help him.”

Rosa watched Mama place the gun in a drawer and then reach into one of the pockets of her red house dress and pull out two small strips of tinfoil.

“Rosa, go. Carlos has a herida de bala Stop the bleeding. Avanza.”

Rosa turned and ran down the hallway. In the living room she saw that Carlos was leaning back on the couch holding his stomach. She moved his hand and put a towel on the wound and pressed.

Carlos grimaced and turned his head. Rosa held the towel and then pulled it off when it became full of blood. She put it on the floor and picked up a clean one. She jumped when Mama silently touched her shoulder.

“Let me look.”

For a little old woman, Mama was strong. She gently moved Carlos forward and looked at his back.

“This might not be so bad. The bala went right through him. First we take away his pain. Here, Carlos, sniff.” Mama patted Carlos on the face as she held a line of white powder on her thumb.

“What’s that?” Rosa asked as Carlos took a long snort.

“Chiva… for the pain. Here, bebe, take another.”

“Heroin? You’re giving him heroin?”

“Rosa, you know what you read in your school books. Chiva is the best thing for pain and this chico is going to have pain when I clean this wound.”

Carlos leaned back on the couch and looked like he was sleeping. Mama took out some more white powder, lifted the towel, and poured it on Carlos’s stomach, inside the small hole where the bullet had entered.

“Now this, Rosa, is perico, which will freeze the nerves.”

Rosa watched with her mouth open.

“Now hold him by the shoulder.”

Rosa moved behind the couch and held onto Carlos.

“Tighter. Strong. He’s going to jump like a fish on a line.”

Rosa grabbed Carlos’s shoulder as Mama poured peroxide into the wound. Carlos’s body jolted and he screamed. He collapsed back on the couch.

“Just sit with him,” Mama said as she went into the kitchen. She came back in a moment stirring a glass of cloudy water.

“Now we use this dropper and put penicillin down his throat for infection. Hold his head back and open his mouth.”

Rosa tilted his head back, and Mama squirted the mixture from the dropper into his mouth.

“Now sit him up and hold the towel. The blood is slowing down. He’ll be fine and so will you.”

Rosa looked down at the wound and saw that the bleeding had slowed to a trickle. She sat down on the couch and gently held the towel as Mama went into the kitchen.

Rosa sat up on the couch, afraid. The room was dark. Had she slept? She blinked and saw Carlos leaning against her, breathing slowly. She heard a tapping on glass and saw the silhouette of a man trying to look into the window. The shadow moved, and then silence. She just sat there not moving — hardly breathing — when someone banged on the front door. In the hallway she could see Mama opening the door and say, “Sí?”

Then Mama flew back against the wall as a young Latino man stormed into the apartment, yelling, “Where’s that cobarde Carlos?”

The man looked down the hallway and came at her. She saw he had a gun, and Rosa closed her eyes. This is what Carlos has given me. A cheap, stupid death in a ghetto apartment. Rosa jumped as a shot rang out. She heard a moan, and then another shot. She opened her eyes and saw Mama standing over the body of the man. Mama held a black revolver in her hand.

“There, that’s for you! You come into my house to kill mi bebe You pendejo. Cheap-ass bandido…” Mama kicked the man, then smiled at Rosa. “How’s Carlos?”

“Is he dead?”

“Him, yeah. Come help me drag him into the bañera.”

“Why are you taking him to the bathtub?”

“Why you think? Think I want to clean him up? We got to get rid of this body. Come on.”

Mama grabbed the man’s feet and Rosa stood up. She stared at Mama. Mama dropped the feet and walked over and slapped Rosa in the face.

Mama yelled, “You do as I say! You hear me? You brought this here, and you will help me. Now!”

Rosa bent down robotically and took the man by his boots as Mama grabbed the arms. They dragged him down the hall, leaving a trail of blood on the linoleum. Rosa looked down into the dead face and saw he’d been no more than a boy — maybe eighteen. Why was he dead? What was she doing here?

“In here.” Mama motioned to the bathroom door. Rosa kicked it open, and with great effort she and Mama lifted the man into the tub and dropped him.

Mama smacked her hands and said, “Got to get rid of this body.”

Rosa wanted to scream and run, but she just said, “No.”

“Go and get Papa. He’s down in the bodega playing dominos. Tell him we need to turn up the furnace all the way. We have something to burn.”

Rosa didn’t move and just stared at Mama.

“Rosa, go. Now! Avanza! And come back. Don’t think of going to the cops, because you touched the gun. Your finger-prints are all over that gun. You’re one of us now. I hope mi hijo picked a good one.”

Mama reached into a hall closet and smiled when she turned. “What, you want to watch?” She had a small axe in her hand. She motioned with the hatchet for Rosa to get going. Rosa dully nodded, put on her coat, and opened the door. She moved out of the apartment and floated down the hallway. She opened the lobby door and stepped out into the cold night air and stood on the stoop staring out at the Bushwick street. A gypsy cab cruised by and the driver stared at Rosa. She turned away and saw a shadow move in the alley across the street.

Rosa let out a long sigh and walked down the block, feeling like her body and soul were dying. She would never get out of this neighborhood.

Ladies’ man by Chris Niles

Brighton Beach

She was lush like an old-time movie star in black patent-leather shoes, fishnet stockings, and a fur coat. Her hair had been blonded, rolled, sprayed, and teased so that it stiffly circled her face like a halo on a medieval Madonna. She had Angelina Jolie lips and her heavy-lidded eyes were shaded aqua and rimmed with kohl. Crimsondipped nails grasped fake Louis Vuitton. She didn’t look anything like Ana, but that didn’t stop me staring.

The rhythm of the train tempted her to doze. Her head dipped. She woke, glanced around, trying not to look anxious, yet tightening her grip on her bag. Falling asleep on the subway. Not a good idea. It was late. The car was filled with a typical assortment of booze-and drug-fueled crazies, myself included. I’d spent the previous few hours with a couple a friends of the family — Eric Ambler and Comrade Stolichnaya.

Brighton Beach, end of the line. She got out. I did too. I stumbled down the steep steps, my eyes blurry from the booze, but my ears sharply focused on the clip-clip of her stilettos She walked west on Brighton Beach Avenue, long strides. It was cold, few people around. I stuffed my hands in my pockets, fingers searching for the Marlboro I knew was lurking somewhere. My head was fuzzy, the cold seemed to be making me drunker. I lit the cigarette and kept pace.

I liked Brighton Beach, it reminded me of my old life. I liked the stores selling canned fish, the babushkas hawking homemade trinkets on the sidewalk, the signs in Russian, the shabby exuberance. After years of exile, the extravagance of Manhattan made me feel ill. Out near the sea, where the choices seemed simpler, I could think again.

She turned left onto a side street lined with nondescript brick apartment buildings. Clip-clip. My cigarette was ashes and the promise of cancer by the time we reached the board-walk. I tossed the butt, dodged dogshit. It was spring, but a vindictive wind taunted my exposed skin. I turned up my collar and wondered what shape she was under that big fur coat, what her voice sounded like, what she whispered when having sex.

We passed the handball courts. For an instant my attention was diverted by an old guy in a t-shirt sprinting along the boardwalk. In as long as it took me to think, Don’t these people ever feel the cold? the woman had gone. I spun around, looking, listening. She was nowhere.

Shrugging, I headed to Ruby’s for a drink before my shift began.

People don’t tell you this about New York: The reason some never leave is because you can burn up on re-entry. It was almost that way with me. I had tried to make my fortune, or at least my name, as a foreign correspondent, and had failed. Eastern Europe worked for a while and then it didn’t, so I headed to Southeast Asia for some professional relaxation. I could have stayed, I suppose, lolling on a beach in Thailand, but there were too many reminders there of the kind of person that I would become — a fat, feckless ex-pat who couldn’t have survived a day in any city of consequence. Eventually there was no choice but to make things hard for myself again. So I came back to New York.

I hit the tail end of the 1990s and found it was a very, very different city from the one I had left almost a decade ago. It was as if real journalism had died and nobody had given it a decent funeral. CEOs were now celebrities and all celebrities were gods. The scary thing was, nobody seemed to have noticed. In some sort of crazy bait and switch, all the vicious, crazy, thrilling, real live New Yorkers had been replaced by a bunch of plastic people. The women were a discombobulating combination of perky and dull. The men talked about business school as the high point of their existence. All of them believed that every so-called obstacle in their trivial lives could be overcome if only they put in enough hours at the office and hired a personal trainer.

I did not fit. I missed real people. People who know that life’s often unfair. That sometimes, through no fault of your own, things just don’t work out. So I shunned Manhattan and my old life. I took a job copy-editing, overnights. The pay was crap and the hours were worse. I didn’t care.

“Why don’t you just fucking go back, man?” Paul Schneider, my companion in hell, asked as he assigned me yet another story about Donald Trump’s sex life. “So you hate it here, so leave.”

“Can’t.”

“Yes, you can. You buy a ticket. You get on a plane. Have a crappy meal, drink too much wine, and wake up in Budapest or Bucharest or wherever the fuck you’d rather be. People do it all the time. I’d lend you the money if I had any.” Paul was expecting a baby, or at least his wife was, and he was working double shifts so they could afford to move out of their 400-square-foot apartment.

“I’d steal it if you had any. But I can’t go back.”

The newsroom was quiet. We were both smoking. We’d stuffed a screwdriver in the smoke detectors and bribed Bart, the security guy. Smoking was the only thing that made this bullshit job even close to bearable.

“Why?”

I sighed, pretending to be annoyed at his persistence. “After the Berlin Wall fell, organized crime became the new growth industry in Eastern Europe. I made some trouble. Wrote some stories that made a few gangsters decide I deserved a whole new face.”

“So what? Aren’t journalists supposed to be fearless?”

“Very funny.”

“And what else?”

“Nothing else.” I reached for the cigarettes, Paul withdrew them.

“What else?” He held the packet up between two fingers just out of my reach, a practiced move. My lousy pay didn’t even come close to covering all my vices. Paul was used to me bumming off him.

“Fuck you.”

“Ah, a woman.” Paul handed the packet to me after taking one for himself, desperate for a story, anything that would distract him from the numbing hours that stretched before us. “Do tell.”

“Ana,” I sighed. “Her name was Ana.”

“And she broke your heart.”

“If you want to put it like that.” I struck a match, it snapped in two. I struck another one and the same thing happened. My hands were shaking. Ana could do that to me still, after all these years. Paul took the box from me and deftly lit the match. I started talking to smother my embarrassment. “She decided one day that she didn’t want to see me anymore I used to pick her up after work — she worked nights — and so I’d sit in this bar in Budapest and wait for her to finish and then walk her home.” I shook my head. “And one night she’d reassigned the job. That was it. No explanation, no nothing. I had no idea what I’d done wrong. Still don’t. She wouldn’t speak to me.”

“So no closure.”

“No.”

“Bummer,” Paul said.

“Yeah.” Maybe all those yuppies who paid 150 bucks an hour for a shrink were onto something. I hadn’t talked to anybody about Ana, I guess I’d been enjoying my own private hell a little too much. But now I felt as if a small burden had lifted. “All the time I was in Hungary it was as if I had an evil cloud hanging over me. Because before Ana, there was Mike McIlvaney.”

“He broke up with you too?” Paul stubbed his cigarette out on his shoe and flicked the butt into the bag we used to remove evidence of our illegal habits from the office.

“In a manner of speaking.”

They called it the Highway of Death for a very good reason. A two-lane stretch of asphalt between Vienna and Budapest where bunches of flowers, crosses, and stuffed animals bore witness to its incapacity to deal with the enormous daily volume of traffic.

The problem was this: Food and wine were cheap in Budapest and the Viennese were fond of getting into their late-model German automobiles and making a bargain-shop-ping day of it. Racing the other way for a taste of the West were their less fortunate Eastern European cousins, shaking behind the wheels of their unreliable, two-stroke Trabbants. Most American lawnmowers have more power than the Trabbant, and there were no passing lanes on the Highway of Death. The Austrian drivers, spoiled by superior technology and frustrated at having to sit behind an aerodynamically challenged global-warming machine, took frequent, stupid risks. Trabbie drivers, too, pushed their impotent cars past what they were capable of.

Mike had a Fiat. He, like me, was freelancing, building a name for himself. He had dark hair, a rangy build, and although his parents were American, he’d been raised in Brisbane and had an Australian accent. We’d become friends.

It was a quiet week when we made our decision. The Hungarians had just elected a democratic government and the transition had been fairly smooth. There were rumblings of trouble between Romanians and ethnic Hungarians in Transylvania, and between ethnic Albanians and Serbs in Pristina, but not enough for us to warrant a trip to either place just yet.

“Man cannot live by beer alone, mate,” Mike said one night, slightly drunk in a Pest bar. Food in Budapest was good but mostly limited to what the Hungarians could grow — peppers, cherries, tomatoes, meat, bread. “I feel like avocados. Can’t remember the last time I had an avocado. Let’s go to Vienna.”

The next day we set off.

Trouble met us on the way home. Dark had fallen and we’d just crossed the Austrian border when the Fiat choked a couple a times and died. Mike pulled over, popped the hood, took off his seatbelt, and reached into the glove compartment for a flashlight to check it out.

There’s not a day that I don’t think about what happened next. It was timing that Satan would have been proud of. The nano-second after Mike unbuckled, a Mercedes hit us from behind. It was a heavy car, going fast. I later found out the driver was drunk. The Fiat shunted forward and the impact popped Mike through the windshield, just like that. If he’d had his seat belt on, like me, he’d still be alive.

“Christ,” Paul said, sucking deep on a new cigarette when I’d finished.

“Yeah,” I said. “Watching someone die, it messes with your head. Between Mike and Ana, I guess I went to pieces.”

He studied me, eyes narrowed through smoke. “I guess you did.”

This woman had dark hair cut in a bob, dyed ruby red, and glowing olive skin. She was wearing tan pants tucked into knee-length boots and reading a library book in Cyrillic. Someone who’d got on the wrong train asked her for directions and she replied, smiling, in a softly accented voice. I sat across from her from Atlantic Avenue. I caught her eye at Avenue J and smiled. She looked away. I’d been considered good-looking once, but personal grooming wasn’t high on my agenda anymore. It was months since I’d had a haircut and I’d become a haphazard shaver.

She got off at Brighton Beach, walked north, and turned left on Coney Island Avenue, clutching her suede coat closely to her even though the evening was mild. She went into a restaurant, ordered two chicken kebabs and a can of Sprite. Food seemed like a good idea for me too, so I had some, although I didn’t notice what I ate. She sat silently at her table and didn’t look my way, not once. Then she went to the bathroom, where I guess she must’ve made a phone call or something, because a few minutes later, a guy joined her. She said something to him and he glanced my way and frowned. I could see his pecs flexing under his thin white shirt.

I avoid trouble these days. I called for the check.

“So why don’t you start freelancing some articles or something?” Paul asked over our customary breakfast beer at the end of our shift. “You know, get back in the saddle.”

“There’s nothing to write about.”

“That’s defeatist crap.”

“All right, I can’t be bothered.” That wasn’t quite true. Once, just after I got back and was desperate for cash to make the deposit on my new rental apartment, I had dashed off a travel article about the grand old cafés of Budapest. It didn’t require any research, it bored me to write it, but the airline magazine paid promptly and the money was sweet.

Money. For a minute the thought pleased me.

“It’d be better than this crappy shift,” Paul said.

“Nah,” I said. “It’s not my thing,” I looked at our glasses, both of which were empty. “Besides, I like the company on this crappy shift. Fancy another?”

“Gotta go, Amanda’s having an ultrasound this morning. For some reason she wants me there.” Paul stood up, throwing some money on the bar. “You should get some sleep. You look like death.”

“Sure.” I signaled the bartender for another beer.

The gangster placed his passport, open at the correct page, in front of the immigration officer at John F. Kennedy Airport. The name on the passport wasn’t the one his parents had given him, but he thought the photo nicely captured his likeness. “Good afternoon,” he said in only slightly accented English.

The officer nodded as he checked the paperwork. “How long will you be staying in New York, sir?”

“Just one week.”

“Is this your first visit to America?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have friends or relatives here?”

“Some business acquaintances.”

“So this is a business trip?”

The gangster smiled. “I hope also to have a little enjoyment in your great city.”

He looked like any other guy, he thought, as he checked his reflection in the automatic doors. Any American guy. He wore Levi’s, Adidas running shoes, and a t-shirt that said “Just Do It.” His thick black hair and goatee beard were neatly trimmed. A tiny gold earring in his left ear was a new addition and the lobe was still slightly swollen. He put his hand to touch it, and remembering the piercer’s advice, stopped. He didn’t want an infection.

There was a line for taxis. He waited patiently, feeling exhilarated despite jetlag. He was in New York! For him, the greatest city in the world.

It wasn’t until the yellow cab was speeding toward Manhattan that he unfolded the magazine article that was the reason for his visit. A story about Budapest café society, and, at the bottom, a biographical line that said the author lived in New York City. The gangster believed strongly in fate. Why else would he have chanced upon the year-old copy of an airline magazine while on holiday in the Costa del Sol? He’d gone into an English pub to escape the heat of midday, and seeing a picture of his hometown, had idly turned the pages while waiting for his Guinness to be pulled.

And it was there that he had found him: the shit-fuck guy

“Got you,” the gangster had whispered softly as the bar-man slapped the beer down on the bar and demanded an extortionate amount. For once, the gangster, who was careful with money, having been raised in a household where there wasn’t much, was happy to pay. “Got you,” he said again, and raised the drink in a toast to the goddess of fortune.

He checked into an anonymous hotel near Times Square and went out in search of a payphone. Times Square was a dazzling disappointment; he’d expected a smorgasbord of vice, not toy stores and “family” restaurants. He located a phone and called his contact, making a note to ask him, once business had been conducted, what a family restaurant was and how it differed from a regular one.

“Glock 9mm, as ordered,” his contact said, sliding the bag across the park bench. “Plus ammo. Price as agreed. U.S. dollars, no fucking kopecs or whatever it is you people use.”

“We use dollars, same as you,” the gangster murmured, handing him the money. He decided this guy probably wasn’t the one to ask about restaurants. He didn’t seem that friendly.

“And here’s the address. Tracked him through the DMV. Everything was like you said. It was a good guess.”

The gangster shrugged. “It’s what I would have done,” he said. “If I was little bit lazy.” He took the piece of paper and looked at the address. The words meant nothing to him.

“It’s Brighton Beach,” his contact said. “Plenty of Russians out there. You’ll feel right at home.”

“I’m Hungarian,” the gangster replied.

A woman passed on rollerblades wearing tight little white shorts. The gangster could see dimples of cellulite in her butt as she pushed herself forward. Her mouth was set in a grim line.

“She looks like the devil is after her,” he remarked sadly.

“Nobody in this town’s having any fucking fun,” his contact said.

He caught a taxi to the apartment, which was on the ground floor of a tired street so close to the sea that he could smell salty air. He let himself in. He didn’t plan to kill the shit-fuck guy right away, he wanted to have a little fun first. He was thinking about trashing the place, sending a message, like they did in the movies. Not usually his style, but he felt like being a little expressive for once. This was a special case, after all.

The apartment was a single room. There was no furniture to speak of, just a folded-out futon with a gray sheet screwed up on top of it. A small, old-fashioned television sat unsteadily on a wooden crate. A single poster was tacked to the wall. The gangster recognized it as the original election poster for the Hungarian Democratic Forum. It featured the back of a large, thick-necked Russian military officer. The copy read, in Russian, “Comrades, it’s over!” The gangster smiled as he remembered simpler days. How happy they had been to get rid of the fucking Russians.

He stepped on tiptoe through the crap on the floor — fast food cartons, empty beer bottles, dirty laundry, newspapers, odd shoes, even a tube of toothpaste. Stacks of crusty dishes filled the sink. The refrigerator door stood ajar and rusty brown liquid leaked onto the linoleum. The smell in the room was stale and thick — a hopeless, exhausted musk of despair. The gangster shuddered in disgust and wiped his hands on his neatly-pressed jeans. It was a waste of time to trash the place, the shit-fuck guy wouldn’t even notice.

“You are foreign correspondent?” Lana asked skeptically.

I tried to look mysteriously modest. “Yeah, just got back into town a few days ago, from Bosnia.”

“I don’t trust journalists.”

“Well, you shouldn’t trust me, that’s for sure.” I grinned wolfishly. Her eyes narrowed. Perhaps the lovable-roué routine had worked better when I had a decent haircut and wore a suit. I went to straighten my tie and remembered I wasn’t wearing one. “Another drink?” We were sitting in a restaurant a block or two from the beach. The food was Uzbeki, which is to Russians what Mexican is to Americans — cheerfully ethnic, but not too threatening. Arresting pictures of downtown Baku were showing on the television set. The pictures focused on a large building of Soviet design and a wide empty street. The visual tedium was relieved every few minutes by a passing Lada.

“Ever been to Baku?” I put my hand on her knee. It was plump and warm.

“No.”

She glanced at me and looked away, staring, so it seemed, at the stuffed animal heads mounted on the wood-paneled walls.

“How long have you lived in the States?”

“Thirteen years.”

“Like it?”

“It’s okay.”

“Got family?”

“Why are you asking me all these questions?”

“Just trying to get to know you.”

“What’re you doing out here if you’re big-time foreign correspondent? Why aren’t you at Stork Club or something?”

“I’m not sure the Stork Club is still in business. Anyway, I prefer Brighton Beach. It’s got character.” I swallowed some vodka, trying to pinpoint the place where the evening had gone south. She had seemed friendly enough when I’d picked her up in a bar an hour or so ago.

“Character,” she snorted.

“Is that so wrong?”

“You’re liar,” she said. “You think I live in the fucking Soviet Union for fifteen years and not learn how to tell?”

“Hey, that’s a bit steep,” I protested, holding up my hands.

“I met too many men like you.” She grabbed her handbag and stood up, spilling the last of her wine. “Fucking Americans. They think every Russian girl is slut. Tell her big story to sleep with her, then gone.”

I followed her out of the restaurant.

“Hey,” I said, plucking at her sleeve. “I like you. I’m not spinning you a line, honest. I really am a journalist. Don’t you want to come back and talk about this?”

She shook my hand off.

“Come on. Don’t be like that. Let’s grab a coffee and start over. We won’t—”

She cut me off, saying something in Russian.

I shook my head. “I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

“She’s telling you to get lost. Even you don’t need any Russian to understand that.”

I recognized the voice. I turned. Istvan Laszlo was standing about ten feet away. Lana glanced at him and then took off. I didn’t blame her.

“Mr. McIlvaney.”

“Mike McIlvaney is dead,” I said evenly.

The gangster smiled. “I’m sure you’ve told people that, but the truth is, Richard Churcher is dead, Mr. McIlvaney. And you took his name because you thought if you did that, I would never find you.”

“I didn’t know you were looking.”

“Maybe not me specifically, but you knew someone would, sometime.” He passed me the article I had written to make my apartment down payment. “A small miracle. Richard Churcher wrote a magazine article about Budapest years after he died in a freak car smash. It’s enough to make you believe in God.”

I said nothing.

“So I read the story and I have an idea. I have been looking for Mike McIlvaney for many years and I can’t find him. He’s vanished off the earth. But Richard Churcher has risen from the grave. Then I call a guy in America and he explains all about the Social Security number. I found out that Churcher was an American citizen. He was born here. Not too difficult to put it all in place. You get a Social Security number with his name and you live as him. You looked a little alike. And you grow your hair and a beard and think maybe nobody will notice. Maybe nobody would have…” He moved closer and lowered his voice. “Except for this.” He folded the article up and slipped it into the back pocket of his jeans. “Too bad for you I like to travel.”

“It’s not a crime to change your name. What do you want?” My voice shook. I could see the gun tucked into the waistband of his jeans, under a blue jacket, and my life that I’d previously thought of as sub-standard suddenly seemed shining and rare, a precious, precious thing.

“I want to walk,” the gangster said. “Let’s go to the beach.”

Rain threatened and the beach was empty. Seagulls dove and screeched, fighting over a ragged piece of food. The gangster looked out to sea.

“The Duna flooded this year. They found Ana’s body buried in a field.”

Ana. My chest tightened.

“She had been beaten to death. Cops were able to tell that, even after all this time.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“I’m sure you are.”

“What’s this got to do with me?”

“The day she went missing, I felt it in my gut that she was dead.” The gangster put his fist to his stomach. “And that you had killed her. You’d beaten her before and threatened her. That’s why she no longer wanted you as a client. She was frightened of you.”

“Isn’t this a little far-fetched?”

“You were hanging around at nights waiting for her to finish work, so I had Peter walk her home. But the night she disappeared Peter got held up and he didn’t meet her. And the next day she doesn’t turn up for work. I think immediately of you and your threats. I came to your apartment and you had also gone, rather suddenly, the landlord said.”

“I got called away on a job. This is stupid, Istvan. I can understand that you’re upset at losing one of your working girls, but I didn’t kill her. I loved her. I love her still. Look at me, my life’s a wreck because of her.”

“You were obsessed with her,” the gangster said. “Not quite love, something else. Maybe you didn’t mean to kill her, but you did it. And your life’s wrecked because you can’t live with yourself.” He pulled the gun casually out of his jeans.

“Please,” I said. “Even if what you say is true, this isn’t going to bring her back.”

“No. But what I’m doing is for the living, not the dead.” He raised the Glock and pointed it at my forehead. “You see, I loved her too. I guess you didn’t know that.”

He gently squeezed the trigger.

I could have run, I suppose. Or tried to fight him. Could have at least made an attempt to do something. But a strange thing happened: When that bullet began its deadly journey, I had a flash of clarity, the first of my whole life. Time slowed, and then slowed some more, and I could see the bullet speeding toward me, right toward my brain. Life is love. That’s it, there’s no other point, I thought, as I watched the bullet smash into my head. Saw myself fall onto the wet, hard sand. Heard myself think, Perhaps I’ll see her now, and perhaps she’ll forgive me.

A gust of wind carried the sound of the gunshot out into the Atlantic. The seagulls scattered, wings beating. The gangster walked away. He didn’t look back. He didn’t see the body being claimed by the rising tide.

About the contributors:

Pearl Abraham is the author of the novels The Romance Reader and Giving Up America. Recent essays have appeared in the Michigan Quarterly, the Forward, an Dog Culture: Writers on the Character of Canines. Abraham teaches in the MFA Writing Program at Sarah Lawrence College. The Seventh Beggar, her third novel, will be published in September 2004.

Nicole Blackman (www.nicoleblackman.com) lives in an undisclosed Brooklyn neighborhood where she prefers eavesdropping on unsuspecting people. She is the creator of the innovative “The Courtesan Tales” performance, and author of the poetry collection Blood Sugar (Akashic, 2002). She is currently wanted for questioning in the disappearance of three men in Brooklyn.

Ken Bruen, author of The Guard and The Killing of the Tinkers, is published around the world. He has been an English teacher in Africa, Japan, Southeast Asia, and South America. He lives in Galway, Ireland.

Maggie Estep has published four books, including HEX, the first in a series of “horse noir” crime novels. She has written for the Village Voice, New York Press, and Nerve.com, and gives readings of her work throughout the U.S. and Europe on a regular basis. She lives in Brooklyn and likes to hang out at racetracks cheering on longshots. For more information, visit www.maggieestep.com.

Nelson George is a noted author and filmmaker who has resided in Brooklyn all his forty-six years. His most recent nonfiction work is Post-Soul Nation (Viking), and he is the executive producer of two recent TV projects: The “N” Word and Everyday People, a fictional film made for HBO. For more information visit Nelsongeorge.com.

Luciano Guerriero is the author of one novel, a noir thriller entitled The Spin, and has been a resident of Brooklyn or Manhattan for twenty-three years. While writing plays, screenplays, short stories and poetry during that time, he has also acted in or directed sixty-five plays and acted in twenty Hollywood and independent films.

Pete Hamill is for many the living embodiment of New York City. In his writing for the New York Times, the New York Daily News, the New York Post, the New Yorker, and Newsday, he has brought the city to life for millions of readers. He is the author of many bestselling books, including novels Forever and Snow in August, as well the memoir A Drinking Life. He lives in New York City.

Kenji Jasper was born and raised in the nation’s capital and currently lives in Brooklyn. He is a regular contributor to National Public Radio’s Morning Edition and has written articles for Savoy, Essence, VIBE, the Village Voice, the Charlotte Observer, and Africana.com. He is the author of three novels, Dark, Dakota Grand and the forthcoming Seeking Salamanca Mitchell.

Norman Kelle is the author of the “noir soul” Nina Halligan mystery series, which includes Black Heat, The Big Mango, and A Phat Death. He is also the author of Head Negro in Charge Syndrome, forthcoming from Nation Books, and he edited and contributed to R&B (Rhythm and Business): The Political Economy of Black Music (Akashic, 2002). He currently resides in Brooklyn.

Robert Knightly is a trial lawyer in the Criminal Defense Division of the Legal Aid Society. In another life, he was a lieutenant in the New York City Police Department. This is his first published fiction, which is a piece of a first novel, Bodies in Winter He was born and raised in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, the locale of the story.

Lou Manfredo was born and raised in Brooklyn. He is a former New York City public school teacher and legal investigator. The father of one daughter, Nicole, he currently lives in New Jersey with his wife, Joanne, and their long-haired dachshund. Mr. Manfredo recently completed his first novel.

Adam Mansbach, a resident of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, currently on sabbatical in Berkeley, California, is the author of two novels, Shackling Water and the forthcoming Angry Black White Boy, and the poetry collection genius b-boy cynics getting weeded in the garden of delights. The former editor of the hip hop journal Elementary, he serves as an Artistic Consultant to Columbia University’s Center for Jazz Studies and is a teacher for Youth Speaks.

Tim McLoughlin was born and raised in Brooklyn, where he still resides. His debut novel, Heart of the Old Countr (Akashic, 2001), was a selection of the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program and has been optioned for a film. It was also published last year in Great Britain and in Italy, where it won the 2003 Premio Penne award. He is completing his second novel.

Ellen Miller is the author of the critically acclaimed bestseller Like Being Killed. Her fiction and essays have appeared in many literary magazines and anthologies, most recently Lost Tribe: Jewish Fiction from the Edge. She has taught creative writing at New York University, the New School, and the women’s unit of a federal prison. She lives in New York City and is at work on her second novel

Thomas Morrissey is an Army brat who grew up in exotic locations like Okinawa, Heidelberg, and Staten Island. He began writing when, as a child, he found great pleasure playing with his mother’s Sears portable typewriter. His first novel, Faustus Resurrectus, is on the way.

Arthur Nersesian is the author of six novels, including Suicide Casanova, Chinese Takeout, Unlubricated, and the cult classic bestseller The Fuck-Up. The former managing editor of the Portable Lower East Side, he currently lives in New York City.

Chris Niles was born in New Zealand. In the last fifteen years she has lived in Australia, England, and Hungary. She now lives in Brooklyn and does not intend to move for a very long time. She is also the author of Hell’s Kitchen (Akashic, 2001), as well as a series of crime mysteries featuring radio reporter Sam Ridley: Spike It, Run Time, and Crossing Live.

Sidney Offit is a novelist, author of books for young readers, teacher, member of the board of the PEN American Center, president of the Authors Guild Foundation, and curator of the George Polk Journalism Awards that originate from Long Island University’s Brooklyn center. During the mid-fifties he covered the Brooklyn Dodgers, New York Giants, and that other team from New York for Baseball Magazine. His most recent book is Memoir of the Bookie’s Son

Neal Pollack is the author of three books: the cult classic The Neal Pollack Anthology of American Literature, Beneath the Axis of Evil, and the rock ’n’ roll novel Never Mind the Pollacks A regular contributor to Vanity Fair, GQ, and many other magazines, Pollack lives in Austin, Texas.

C.J. Sullivan lived in Brooklyn on the Ridgewood/Bushwick border for seven years and loved the neighborhood. He has worked as a Court Clerk in Brooklyn Supreme since 1994. He has also been a freelance writer for the last ten years. Sullivan has a regular column in the New York Press called “The Bronx Stroll.” He now lives in Ridgewood, New Jersey with his wife Lisa and his twin daughters, Olivia and Luisa.