Onion Street

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

The big man stayed in the Onion Street Pub for about a half hour, and when he came out he didn’t act any drunker than when he went in. Everything about him — his size, his swagger, the tilt of his head, the way he puffed out his chest — was menacing and seemed to send a warning. Stay back. Keep away. Just keep the fuck away. I’d known guys like him in my life. You can’t grow up where I grew up and not know guys like him, but the van driver was different. It’s hard to explain, but he wore his menace the way a pro athlete wears his grace or a pit viper its tail rattle. I was likely projecting. He probably wasn’t half as menacing as his shotgun.

He saved me the trouble of having to turn around, because after starting up the van, he made a U-turn right from his parking spot. I let a few cars pass me before heading out after him. I wasn’t sure why I still bothered. The shotgun scared me, but it also intrigued me. What kind of cargo had the van contained that needed a shotgun for protection? What business could Bobby Friedman possibly have with such a man? Besides, I had nowhere else to go. I figured I might as well play out my hand and see what the cards had in store.

Twenty minutes later I was following the van through College Point, another unfamiliar Queens neighborhood. Again, like in South Ozone Park, it became difficult keeping enough cars between Aaron’s car and the van. I was forced to hang further back than I wanted to, and twice lost sight of the van for a few seconds. The last time I caught up, I came around a corner and saw that the van was halfway down the block. Its motor still running, it had stopped near a dilapidated wooden garage that looked like a set piece from The Great Gatsby. There was even a faded ad for a long-forgotten shirt company painted on the flank of the garage. The name of the shirt company had been lost to history, but the outline of a man’s face and some of his slicked-back black hair remained. I think his fingers were buttoning a top button. Oddly, his smile, of all his faded features, had stayed most intact. It was a white, knowing smile. What it knew was another matter altogether. I imagined the doomed Myrtle Wilson living in the tiny apartment above the garage, staring out her filthy window through dingy curtains, longing for escape. There were many such places in New York City, slivers of the past hidden amongst the glories of the space age like Princess phones and color TVs.

The driver got out of the van, undid a heavy padlock on the garage doors, and swung open the old wooden doors. He didn’t get back in the van. He disappeared into the garage, and a moment later drove out in a chestnut red ’62 Ford Galaxie. He pulled it over to the sidewalk and got out. He loved that car. You could just tell by the way he eased the door shut instead of slamming it. He wiped some dust specks off its fender as he might’ve wiped a tear from his lover’s cheek or tucked a stray hair behind her ear. At that moment, he didn’t seem quite so menacing. He got back in the van, turned its flat face out, and backed it into the garage. The driver swung the garage doors closed and locked up, got back in his Galaxie, and was off.

He was like a different person driving the Ford. Whereas he drove the van like the apocryphal little old lady from Pasadena, he drove the Ford with a lead foot. I was pretty proud of myself that I managed to keep up with him, let alone stay undetected. We were almost at the Whitestone Expressway when Aaron’s Tempest decided it had had enough cloak and dagger for the day. It coughed a little and decelerated. No matter how hard I pressed my foot on the gas pedal, it wasn’t going but for another few feet. Gas pedals, I quickly realized, were kind of moot without gas in the tank to feed the carburetor. I rolled to the side of the street, fished the gas can out of the trunk, and started walking back to the Esso station I’d passed ten blocks back.

• • •

First thing I did when I got home was to make a preemptive call to Bobby. He wasn’t home. I hated calling his house, because his parents were so damned unfriendly. His mom especially made me feel uncomfortable. She spoke in this condescending monotone that on the one hand sounded like a news reader giving you the crop yields for the state-controlled farms in the central Ukraine and on the other dripped with disdain. Every time I got off the phone with her, I felt like she had spit on me and on everything I believed or ever would believe. I had no faith that she would relay my message to her son, so I tried him at Burgundy House. No one picked up. It was too bad, really. I had my excuse about this morning all worked out. I’d had plenty of time to think it through on my long walk to and from the gas station.

The next call I made was to Lids’s house. When his mom answered, I hung up. The palpable desperation in her hello told me all I needed to know. Lids wasn’t home yet. She’d answered hoping that it would be her son on the other end of the phone. I didn’t need to add to her dread and disappointment with lies she might or might not have believed.

The last call was to our insurance agent, Murray Fleisher. Murray was a nattily dressed charm merchant who was as vain as the day was long. Problem was, Murray had hit the upper limits of middle age, and middle age had hit back with a vengeance. He’d been reduced to wearing a rug, a nice one, but still pretty obviously not something that grew out of his scalp. He was also going a little deaf. I guess all those years with an office on Brighton Beach Avenue under the el had finally gotten to his ears. Unlike with the hair piece, Murray hadn’t yet reached a satisfactory compromise with his vanity that would allow him to wear a hearing aid. That worked for me … at least, I hoped it would.

“Murray Fleisher here.”

“Mr. Fleisher, this is Aaron Prager.”

“Who?”

“Aaron Prager,” I shouted.

“Oh, Aaron. Sorry, there’s so much noise in this office. How’s that sexy mother of yours doing?”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or gag. Murray’s charm was lost on me. “My folks are fine.”

“What?”

“My folks are fine.”

“Give your mom a kiss for me.”

“Whatever you say, Mr. Fleisher,” I said, more than a little repulsed by him.

“Huh?”

I yelled, “I’ll do that.”

“So, what can I do for you, Aaron?”

“I’ve got a problem,” I said loud enough for him to hear.

“Why else would you call old Murray? That’s what I do, solve people’s problems. Any problem you got, I can fix.”

I found myself wishing I was deaf. Jesus, this guy was even a bigger schmuck than I remembered him being. “I gave a friend a lift to the airport and when I came out of the terminal, there was a dent in my rear passenger side fender. Two witnesses said they saw it happen and took down license plate numbers. The thing is, Mr. Fleisher, the two license plate numbers don’t match.”

“I understand.”

No he didn’t, but that was okay. I kept the volume up so that the Cohens in the next apartment could hear me. “You see, I have no way of knowing if any of this is accurate. Before I put in a claim — ”

“I gotcha, kid.”

If he had really been speaking to Aaron, my brother would have reached through the phone and strangled Murray for calling him kid. Aaron was born an old man and always hated being referred to as son or kid. And once Aaron hit twenty-one and could vote, forget about it. He was the only person I knew of my generation who liked being called mister.

“You do?”

“Sure. You want me to track down those plates for you, so you can approach the drivers and see if you can reach some sort of ‘arrangement.’” Fleisher made the word arrangement sound dirty, like it should have been wrapped in brown paper. “While what you’re asking me to do is not strictly kosher, it’s a clever move, kid. No one needs their premiums to go up for some stupid fender bender, right? Your dad always said you were the shrewd one. How’s that lazy brother of yours?”

“Still lazy,” I screamed. “So you’ll do this for me?”

“Sure, why not? Here’s the thing, kid. I want you to think about coming to work for old Murray. I’m telling you, a clever fella like you could make us both rich.”

“I’ll definitely think about it, Mr. Fleisher.”

“What?”

“I’ll think about it, Mr. Fleisher.”

“Murray, kid. Call me Murray. After all, we’re practically partners, right?”

I ignored that. “So, when should I give you a call, Mr. — I mean, Murray?”

I swear I could hear his smile. “Tomorrow afternoon should be good.”

“Until then,” I said.