Dirty South

54

Summer heat baked oil puddles in the eight-story garage where I sat on the hood of Trey’s new silver BMW with a rusty crowbar in my hand. I’d taken Annie back to the warehouse and spent my last hour counting people walking off the elevator, checking out trucks in the garage, and noticing all the oil spots that reminded me of presidents’ heads. I thought about Maggie and her farm, Polk Salad Annie taking a crap on my sofa yesterday, and ALIAS stealing from JoJo. I tried to remember what JoJo had told me about the liquor-license changeover and a bouncer he knew we could trust.

With restocking the booze, booking the bands, and making schedules for the waitresses we’d have to hire, I hoped I’d still have time to teach. I just wanted to keep the bar running half as smooth as it had under JoJo. I wanted to keep everything the same.

A small bell rang and the doors opened. Footsteps echoed through the concrete cavern and I heard laughing and a woman’s voice playfully telling someone to “shut up.”

“I’m fuckin’ starved,” Brill said as he punched his key chain and the BMW’s horn honked and lights winked. I didn’t move.

Trey caught my eye. I shifted the crowbar into my right hand.

He began to walk faster, leaving the woman in his wake. She tilted her head, looking toward me, sitting hard on her friend’s car. She was in her midtwenties and blond. Boy-short hair and pixie face. A tight white top, Capri pants, and a pink sweater tied around her shoulders.

“What the fuck?” Trey asked.

The woman ran, her arms flouncing on each side of her body, heels wobbling beneath her tanned calves. “Trey, don’t. Trey.”

He reached for his cell phone and I assumed called 911.

No light crept into the floor of the parking garage from the windowless walls. The air smelled like carbon monoxide and garbage.

Brill gave his directions and the little blonde hung on his arm.

“Where’s Dahlia?” I asked.

“Fuck you.”

“Let’s talk.”

“About what?”

“How you stole from Jimmy Riggins and raped a drunk little girl. Or how you were grabbing the ass of the woman who conned ALIAS the other night at Whiskey Blue.”

He began to walk away.

I popped three hard ones with the crowbar into the hood.

“Shit!” Trey screamed.

“Malcolm was a good guy,” I said. “He knew about you siphoning off money from Teddy. Right?”

He shook his head and ground his back teeth together. His face was red and blotched. He wore a blue dress shirt and loose tie. Khakis and big brown New York designer shoes.

“How much did you pay Dahlia?”

“Who’s Dahlia?” the blonde asked.

“Shut up,” Brill said.

A red Toyota truck circled up the curving drive of the parking deck, light casting over me, Trey, and the girl. The car kept rolling, tires squealing, as it headed upward. Trey stood still. “Fuck you,” he said. “Fuck you. Beat my car. I don’t give a shit.”

He turned to walk away. I felt a surge inside me, my hands shaking at my sides, and I ran toward him, the crowbar clanging to the ground. I grabbed him by the back of his shirt and threw him against a dirty minivan. It knocked the wind from him and he dropped to his knees as the woman screamed.

The minivan’s alarm began to sound with the impact.

I gripped the front of his shirt, lifting him to his feet.

He was crying now and trying to catch a breath. His lower lip twitched and he babbled some obscenities at me.

With one hand, I banged him against the van again.

“Listen, you spoiled little shit,” I said. “I know what you are. You wipe your ass with people like that little girl. I know you left Christian holding the bag while you ran games on Jimmy Riggins and some of my teammates. I know Dahlia was the girl who conned ALIAS along with Marion Bloom. She told me. But I bet this was the first time you ever had someone killed. I don’t care who strung Malcolm up in that tree or what kind of shit you planted in his house. You called it. And you had that same street freak you hired come for me.”

I tightened my grip on his oxford cloth. “Malcolm worked for what he had. He wasn’t a twisted little fuck like you.”

When I stood back, I noticed that part of his shirt had come off in my hands.

The girl kneeled, weeping, and holding out her hand. Her fingers stretched out to Trey, who was getting to his feet and pointing at me.

Trey moved inches from my face. I could smell coffee on his breath as he yelled hard. “Don’t you see? Don’t you fucking see?”

The girl screamed, “No. No.” She tugged at his arm, pulling him away. “He’s going to kill you.”

“It’s ALIAS,” he said. “Ask Teddy. There was no con. Teddy knows. Did you ask Dahlia about ALIAS? She’s been with him for months. They took the money together. He lied and told Teddy he’d been conned. Did you ever ask Teddy about the charges he filed against ALIAS last year and the ten thousand ALIAS stole? Or when he caught Dahlia giving ALIAS head in the back of his Bentley?”

“ALIAS doesn’t know Dahlia,” I said. “She was with you at Whiskey Blue.”

“She’s just some ass, man,” he said. “She’s fucked everybody at Ninth Ward. She was there because that’s where the rappers go. Man, I was drunk when she came over to me. Have you seen her? What would you do?”

The girl behind him began to sob harder. I noticed a gold sorority insignia around her neck.

“Bullshit,” I said.

“Why would I fucking kill Malcolm?” Trey yelled, grasping his hair in his hands. “He ran the whole company. The only thing Teddy can do is fuck it up. Malcolm was my friend too. I miss him.”

I stepped back, his words flying into me with blood and foam from his mouth. The woman pulling him away, the alarm on the car still blaring into my ears.

“That kid is evil, man,” he said. “Ask Teddy if I’m lying.”

I watched him.

“You hate me because I have money,” he said. “All guys like you and Riggins want to be my friend and then hate me for what I am. Fuck you. Fuck all of you.”

I gritted my teeth and stood by the car, watching Brill and the girl slip into the BMW, back up, and spin away. The car fishtailed, nearly striking a Cadillac, before disappearing down into the parking deck.