Chicago Noir

Goodnight Chicago and Amen by Luciano Guerriero

99th & Drexel

Never know how you gonna end up. Or when and where. Or why, for that matter. You just know you will. You will end up somehow, somewhere, sometime. That something to think about. It is now, anyway.

I always been an all-purpose guy, game for pretty much whatever you got, long’s it bring me what I want or what I need. I’m mostly known as a robber, stickups and like I help jack an armored truck once, and hold up a whole bunch of stores and shit. But I also commit arson for some guy over insurance money, deliver heavy weight of drugs plenty times. Etc. and so on. Never knock over no bank yet — I always seen myself doing that, but it don’t seem likely now.

I done murders too. Three, to be exact. Usually I do murders for five heavy, my rate. I done one for half price once, as a favor to somebody. But five is my rate for murder, less there’s extra risk or something else hairy about it. Then it take more.

Back starting out, I never think I be doing hits. But my twenties they behind me and I’m trying to branch out. Since this here new hit job’s a cop, one of them “something else hairy” murders, this one takes five up front and another five behind.

Yeah, Katrina’s paying me ten large for this one and I’m happy about that. Plus, doing a cop puts me on a whole new level far as future work goes. Not every hitter will take on a cop job, and for good reason — the reaction is stone fierce, man. Still, set up for this one nice, seems sane enough to me, so it’s perfect, suits my needs.

Specially now, I need the boost. See, a week ago I got out of Joliet after four and a half on a five-to-ten for an armed robbery that went bad. Nobody inside got in my shit though cuz word spread that I’m connected, so I did my time clean and walked early.

I get connected cuz after the heist my car gets slammed by a mail truck and it break up my leg pretty good, so I get nabbed. I go deaf and dumb right away, take the whole weight of it on myself, cop myself a plea for a reduced sentence and no trial, no further investigation. Kind of guy I am. So on my taking the bust, my partner on the heist, gangsta man named Blue who’s driving the other car, he stay free and clear.

Blue one capable guy. His operation gets even bigger since I go in. Blue naturally is grateful to me, which you can understand, sends word in to his boys that I should do easy time. The brothers make sure the time I do is easy as pie. Or as easy as any time can get in prison, which sucks any way you look at it. But it could be a lot worse, is what I’m saying, cuz I’m one stand-up guy about the whole thing.

Second I hit free air outside the Joliet walls, Blue has a car there to ride me back to town. Driver tells me Blue wants me at his new bar next night, Blue’s setting me up for a sweet little payday. That’s what this cop hit is all about, far as I’m concerned. Little reward.

Yeah, okay, I know it ain’t too swift to go on parole for armed robbery and right away do some cop murder. But this ten grand gets me set up again, like a human being, not some brain-dead rodent ex-con sweeping supermarket floors. I’m sending Blue a Christmas card this year, though he never send me one inside. Kind of guy I am.

Some shit happens during the week, and seven days later, here we go, we on the job, me and this uncle named Hector in coveralls, shovels in hand. Katrina is watching us dig. Soil in this yard is good and black, smelling like rotten leaves and earthworms. Gonna turn a body to compost in, like, two seconds.

Look, she cocking her head now, listening for out-of-the-ordinary sounds that might float their way back here through the evening air. Katrina’s sharp. Hector, the guy digging with me, he got no idea how sharp she is. He gonna find out, though.

This a good spot, the edge of Blue’s turf in the 8th Ward. We digging behind some apartment houses on Drexel north of 99th Street. People in this nabe know not to get too nosy, even if they do see something. They better off look the other way, and that’s what they do. I just can’t picture nobody calling cops about the suspicious earth turned near the tree in the backyard.

I’m making like I ain’t looking at Katrina, cuz I’m s’posed to be cool. But I do see she almost topples back when them stiletto heels sink down in the wet sod. Lord, her thigh muscles flex really nice when she bends her knees and shifts her weight to the balls of her feet, sliding them heels free.

I should look away, though, before Hector notices me checking out her legs. But shit, why not look? Not only do Katrina got bitchin’ legs, but that fine piece a ass knows it too. Yeah, I take myself a decent look. Long as we keep digging, what she gonna say? This ain’t church.

Damn, it’s getting cold, though. October breeze down out of Canada, gusting off the lake. Every so often the hem on Katrina’s thin little mini goes up and I can see every bit of them Tina Turner thighs. Yeah, and look, she know she distracting us, which I can tell by how she folds her arms across her chest, hiding them nips like we ain’t already been checking them out too. It’s her way of trying to get this here business done, not cuz she some prude. Katrina definitely not no prude.

Every so often a shovel clangs against a stone and we all freeze and look around the backyard. I can understand their feelings. Digging somebody’s grave some serious business. But if I’m thinking at all, it ain’t about a shovel hitting a rock. I’m thinking mostly about this ghost watching us.

Katrina tells me before we come here ghost all taken care of, nothing to worry about, so we do this thing tonight and nobody gonna step in early. Now, though, Katrina’s playing the whole thing straight, making like she don’t know about no ghost, I guess to keep Hector’s head in the right place. I’m playing along, freezing when she do, giving nobody reason to squint their eyes at me later. I can just picture Katrina later, telling everybody in the bar how I’m one hell of an actor, which I’m gonna love. She look down now and see me smiling at that, which I can see she don’t understand.

Katrina breaks up the freeze with a nod toward the hole we standing in waist deep. Me and Hector start digging again, making the pile to one side. Way she look at Hector, I can tell she expect my boy to say something stupid, and my boy don’t disappoint.

“Ain’t this goddamn hole deep enough yet?” he whispers loud.

“Dig it my way, Hector, head-deep,” she spits back, eyes flashing all serious. “No more static, now, you dig.”

Hector give a pause looking at her like he don’t like her tone. On cue, she repeats herself, even more serious, “Just dig.”

I smack him on the arm and he get digging again. Hector can’t tell, but I see Katrina worried about his attitude. She wants this thing to go smooth and if he’s all belligerent and shit, could be trouble. Guess she don’t know I’m here to take care of any and all business tonight, no matter what. S’okay. This my first job with her. If seeing’s believing, she find out good what she got in me, and soon enough.

Can’t help thinking while I dig, though, my mind moving around. Thinking about the night after I get out of Joliet, hanging around Blue’s bar when Katrina comes in. Place is on Dobson Avenue right near to 95th Street. Busy spot, but not too busy. Neighborhood place, mostly people Blue know coming in.

“Don’t make that much money, but it’s just like I like it,” Blue say to me, cranking the music. Always great music playing in Blue’s place, just like his crib.

They call the man Blue cuz his skin so black they say it looks blue, which all I see is dark brown, but then I don’t care about that shit. Always funny to me how the brothers and sisters always got their skin tone in mind, like it matter somehow, while a white boy like me don’t give it no real thought. I never understand that.

Katrina goes back in the office with Blue that first night and right quick they send word out I should come back. Blue introduces us and right off she flirtatious. I look at Blue and he laughs with Katrina coming off all mad hot for me, which is all the okay I need. This, you know, like, especially being inside Joliet for that amount of time, kinda gets my attention.

You also have to understand one thing, I’m impressed as hell with the fact Blue and Katrina bringing me in this way, me being white and all. Hardly ever works that way in Chicago, or anywhere that I know. But I tell myself they smart, cuz all they interested in, and all they should be interested in, is talent. That and loyalty, which I proved to Blue some years back.

So I’m thinking right away in the bar this Katrina chick’s got a thing for me, partly cuz of what I am to Blue, and I’m real happy about that. Right off, I’m taking my time sucking in air and eyeing her up and down, like some kind of real stud, which let’s face it is a stretch for somebody look like me. But ‘tude always counts for a lot with chicks and I got plenty a dat, so in half a snap Katrina has me in a cab back to her hotel and I’m already thinking I da man.

We get in the room and things don’t quite go like I think. I mean, Katrina lets this inner tigress out to play. This stone freak Amazon lady is surprising the hell outta me, all pure aggressiveness and shit, and I’m thinking, hell, not what I’m used to but this gonna be good. She pulls out this box of toys, and I’m like, okay, fine, she must be one of them electromagnetized robo-chicks who gets off on modern technology, plenty of those around. But then she announces the toys are for me, not her, and now I’m in way too deep to refuse.

Let’s just say we go at it real good, till we both like totally wrung out. And I’m thinking later she uses me maybe like some prison daddy might, only I don’t give a shit what she do to me, it being a long, long time for me.

After all that, she figures I’ll do whatever she wants — even dig a grave. For her. And even though I see that clear enough, she right about it anyway. I mean, I take the job for the money alone, but she show me some personal interest and it’s just what the doctor ordered. I leave that room sure she got a thing for white boys, sure she wants me to be her Chicago man for a while. Cuz all the signs are there. And I need ‘em all to be true.

Next night, things with me all arranged, she comes back to the bar and Blue puts her in touch with Hector. Blue got some mad blues playing on the system and I’m watching them from a stool down the other end, sipping drinks while Blue’s driver goes on about how Blue got some big-ass moves in the works. I want to see how Katrina plays it with Hector, see if last night’s jag was for me alone or if she do that with just anybody.

Katrina start doing the flirt thing with Hector and he’s real funny, man. He’s like drooling at hello, and right away she know he so totally into her she don’t even need to toss him a tumble like she did me. She just shoot him some hot looks, and tease him with a little dirty dance in the middle of the floor. Seems like the dance leaves him half-unconscious with desire. And that is that. Deal is sealed. She tells me later in her room that Hector even buys her excuse why they can’t go somewhere and do it tonight, so I figure Katrina really plays that macho muchacho hands down, bitch is something else.

After that, though, when Katrina tells me Hector’s the goddamned uncle we gotta take care of, you could push me over with a fingertip. I would never make that guy as an undercover cop. She tells me they find out he the one sours a whole bunch of gigs they got going on while I’m in the joint, tells me it’s Hector put some of Blue’s key guys in jail, and now they gotta put an end to it. That’s when I’m thinking maybe Hector allows Katrina to play him that way in the bar that night, cuz cops ain’t supposed to get it on with the women they working to put away.

Probably both are true — Katrina is truly hot enough to get Hector thinking with the little head, but also Hector made it easy for her to seal the deal without having to seduce him cuz he a goddamn cop. Hell, this crazy game’s all good to me. One way or another don’t change a thing. Just pay me and point the way and I am there.

But like I say, once Katrina lets me in on the job details, one question keeps nagging at me, all night: What’s going on with Hector’s ghost? These uncle guys almost never work undercover without some other cop keep an eye on them from the shadows. Some cop watching me do away with his partner puts me in mind that this job could toss me in the deepest of shit in a freakin’ heartbeat. And nobody do short or easy time off a cop murder, cuz they make sure every single minute you do inside is a living hell.

Katrina quick. She see my concern, tries to calm my nerves by telling how she and Blue have this sweet arrangement with Hector’s ghost, this old cop Eddie.

“Eddie?” I say, that name perking me right up. “Eddie McClusky?”

“Yeah, you know him?” she say.

“Bad-ass mother,” I say. “Eddie’s an Unknown Chicago Legend.”

“What d’ya mean, unknown?” she say.

“To the public,” I say. “But not to half the population of Joliet. I even hear about Bad-ass Eddie Mac when I’m on the street before I do my stretch. How you so sure Eddie ain’t playing y’all?”

“Don’t you worry,” she say. “Me and Blue don’t do this if it ain’t all in place.”

“Do me favor,” I say. “Lay it out for me and I decide if I should worry or not.”

I see she pissed at my question, but I guess she decides it’s fair to ask, so she gives me the respect I deserve and answers me. “First off, Eddie played ball with Blue plenty in the past.”

“Wait a sec, you saying Eddie Mac ain’t righteous?” I say. “That ain’t the word I hear. How about all them arrests he bring down?”

“When it suits Eddie to play straight, he bring arrests down,” she say. “When it don’t, he don’t. That big Irish gang bust over in Bridgeport? Believe me, Blue helped Eddie out with that. It don’t happen if Blue don’t come through big.”

I’m laughing now. “You saying Blue helping Eddie Mac lock up the bad guys?”

“Blue and Eddie only do deals when they both get something out of it. If they don’t, they enemies again.”

“Okay, so what’s Eddie getting out of knocking off this uncle Hector?” I say.

“Hector knows Eddie play both sides of the street, Eddie don’t trust him to be cool. We do this for Eddie, Eddie do something else for Blue,” she say. “But I don’t know what, cuz that’s ‘tween Blue and Eddie, and it don’t matter to me.”

I see it do matter to Katrina, but I leave it right there, cuz I can also see she knows Eddie’ll be cool when it all goes down and that’s what really matters to me.

“Heavy duty, baby,” I say, smiling again. “That’s the real deal.”

She puts her hand flat on my chest, all sincere and tender.

“We gonna have to lay real low after the job, though,” she say. “Think maybe you and me go somewhere and enjoy the quiet life for a little bit?”

“Sounds good,” I say, cuz it do sound good.

“I got a place in Costa Rica.”

“Gotta get around my parole thing here, baby, but you singing my song.”

“Good, Zane,” she say. “You gonna like it down there.”

I want to ask her about how she first get involved with Blue’s business, but I leave that for some other time. Maybe when we in Costa Rica. And I’m wondering how I got this lucky all of a sudden, money in my pocket, beautiful woman all into me. All this shit going through my brain as me and Hector are digging the hole toward head-deep, like Katrina orders us to do, and I keep on thinking and thinking and thinking like this. Wondering what I know.

I know what Katrina say about Eddie, about Blue and Eddie, that’s what. And I know Blue owe me. And knowing Blue and Katrina got my back is good enough for me, or I wouldn’t be here. But I still can’t help coming back around to Eddie Mac, Hector’s ghost, lurking out there in the dark watching his partner dig his own grave. I know I should be scared out of my skin over this job, but now that Katrina and Blue lay it out for me, I’m cool. Except for the sweat soaking through my dark green coveralls, about ten percent fear sweat and the rest shoveling sweat, even in the chilly night air.

All this digging is boring now, and I’m sneaking peeks at Katrina checking her watch. We been working this pit a good while, breathing heavy, and my eyes are level with her toes. Hector’s head don’t even reach up to the grass, he being one short Puerto Rican. Got dirt in my coveralls, dirt on my face, dirt soiling my brand new White Sox cap, dirt in my boots, blisters on my hands, but from this angle I ain’t thinking of none a that, cuz I can see right up under that miniskirt, right to Katrina’s white thong against her smooth coffee skin, and what a heavenly sight that is. I want to just pull her down and get us both really dirty right here in this black soil.

But she surprise me.

“Good enough,” she say. “Zane, use your shovel to get out first.”

Show Time is at hand. I prop the shovel against the end of the grave, spade end down on a rock, and use it as a step to boost myself up. My heart’s racing now cuz I been thinking about everything else but the big moment.

Katrina back off a step or two as I climb out. Like me and Katrina plan, I hold my hand down to Hector and say, “Don’t leave it behind,” and he hands me his shovel.

Then he looks down to step on my spade end, his hands grabbing at the sod above, ready to boost himself out of the grave. He still looking down as his head comes up, and I take a full swing with his shovel right down hard on his head. Only it don’t hit quite square and the edge of the shovel scoop off a hunk of Hector’s scalp and skull bone, which goes flipping onto the grass at Katrina’s feet like a bloody tea saucer.

You could even see some of Hector’s brain sitting in it like some freaky Fear Factor stunt. Sight gross me out, man, don’t know why cuz I seen that before. Lying back in that grave, Hector give out this puny little cry and his body start in on some serious shaking.

Can’t say I feel nothing much as I watch Hector shiver and bleed out the top his skull, ‘cept maybe tired and dirty, just want to finish and go clean off this dirt. So I lean down and grab my shovel up out of the pit, and just when I straighten up — BAM — this explosion slams the inside of my head — and everything goes queer and too slow — and then I’m coming out of this blackness and I find myself looking up from inside that pit, Hector underneath me trying to shake even with my weight on top of him.

After I don’t know how long, I’m coming out of another darkness and I see Eddie Mac and Katrina looking down at me. Eddie Mac holds a nine with a silencer on it. Then things go black again.

Next time I come back from the dark, I’m half covered with dirt. I can’t hardly see cuz dirt’s on part of my face and some in my mouth and I can’t lift my head to shake it off. I try to call out to Katrina, but can’t make no words. I try to get up but my body don’t care what I try, it won’t budge.

With my one eye that can see, I see that Eddie Mac’s busy shoving dirt down from the pile, working at the end where my feet are. I can hear him pant cuz the old guy’s working hard. I can move my left arm and I try to bring it up and take the dirt off my face. On the way up my stomach, I feel my strap under the coverall, hanging just under my arm. Real slow, inch at a time, I crawl my hand in and slip my nine out. They don’t see me move cuz... well, I don’t know why, I guess it’s too dark or they think I’m already dead.

I ain’t thinking about what happened or why. It don’t matter to me now if Katrina done me dirty this way, or Eddie, or even Blue, though all of them must have, I’m sure now. It plain this is where I’m gonna be for, like, ever. I don’t even give that much of a damn, really. Never know how you gonna end up. Or when and where. Or why, for that matter. You just know you will. Somehow, somewhere, sometime. That, and how’d you use your time? Those all some things to think about. Now, anyway. My line of work, I always figured I have something like this shit coming.

I coulda finished high school, coulda fixed cars. I could say I shoulda done all that. But this is what I want, so this is what I do, and this is what I get, no big deal.

They say before you leave the world you see your life flash before your eyes like some kind of big movie, which amounts to making some kind of sense of things. Nothing big and grand like that happening for me right here and now, probably cuz my life never make much sense anyway.

So I can’t even say why I’m looking up with my one free eye, lifting my nine out from under the dirt and pointing it at Eddie Mac. I can’t exactly say why it makes sense for me to put two quick slugs in him and then turn my wrist and put another two in Katrina. But as soon as I do, it feels okay.

Eddie Mac, he falls on top of that dirt pile and I can see his legs shaking bad as they stick down over the edge of the grave. More and more dirt slips in and I know it’s only a matter of time till his body slides down here.

Meantime, sweet Katrina, she down to her knees on the other edge, gurgling and gasping as she holds herself, red spreading across that blouse, down onto that cute little mini. She look so beautiful to me. And so sad. She cries a little bit, but I guess the pain cuts into that, and then she loses her balance and she fall right in on top of me.

Time short now. I can’t see nothing. I guess that’s Katrina’s blood making my face wet. I like the warm feeling. I like it’s her blood, not some stranger. She making it hard for me to breathe, which is just as well, I don’t mind. The kind of guy I am.

Just before the dark closes in on me again, I’m laughing on the inside, cuz we all four ended up in this pit here, all four headed underground no matter what other plans they had. And I’m also laughing cuz when anybody, Blue maybe, come looking to find one uncle, one ghost, and two gangstas, all they gonna find themselves is four ghosts, surprise surprise. Like to see them try to figure this one out.

Still can’t form no words, but in my mind I’m saying, Don’t you worry, Blue, you be in here soon enough.

And now that I finish thinking all these last thoughts, weak as I ever been in my whole idiot life, heading into the darkness again, all I can think to add is four more silent little words in my grave in the big, bad Southside, not one mile from the place where I was born: Goodnight, Chicago, and amen.