The Fixer

8

Music was blasting from the house on Clayton Street by the time Rick pulled up in his red BMW the next morning, angry-sounding rap, so loud it was distorted. He parked behind an old Ford flatbed truck, a beater with DEMO KING TRASH-A-WAY painted on its side, and not by a professional.

The front door was wedged open. Plaster dust was everywhere. Three guys in white polypropylene coveralls and white plastic helmets, wearing respirators, were tearing off chunks of wall. Plaster chips were flying. The floors were covered with Masonite panels duct-taped together. A gray plastic trash barrel was heaped with scrolls of ancient wallpaper and scraps of lumber with nails sticking out.

A radio blared: You ain’t gotta like it ’cuz the hood gone love it.

“What the hell?” Rick said, but the guys in the white suits didn’t hear him. One of them was prying off a door casing, the nails screeching a protest as they pulled out.

I’mma kill it… I buy a morgue in a minute.

“There he is! You better put one of these on.” Jeff handed Rick a dust mask, a white cup with elastic loops. “You don’t want to breathe that shit.”

“Where’s all the furniture?”

“DeShawn and Marlon and Santiago have been working since seven-they moved stuff into the basement. Put tarps on it and all that.” He reached down and shut off the radio or CD player. The guys in the white suits turned to look. “DeShawn, Santiago, Marlon, this is Mr. Hoffman. He’s the owner.”

The three workers were huge, tatted guys, two black and one Hispanic, one bigger than the next. One of the black guys thrust out his hand. “Marlon.”

“Rick.”

The other two just nodded, regarding him suspiciously.

“Demo crew?” Rick asked Jeff.

“Construction, too. They do everything for me. I don’t use subs. Keeps the costs down.” He pointed toward one of the trash barrels. “You see the black mold on that plaster? It’s bad.” Then he pointed to a big section of the wall that was open. “The old lath-and-plaster construction. They put horsehair in the plaster, which makes it a real pain in the ass when it comes to demo. I get hives.”

“How long is this going to take?”

“Demo, a week, maybe. Most of the house gets left intact. But you’re not staying here. I, uh… I notice you didn’t spend the night here.”

“Glad I didn’t.”

“Back to your apartment across the river?”

“I stayed… with a friend. You got a minute? We need to talk.”

Jeff looked at him curiously, shrugged. “Sure.”

One of the guys, either DeShawn or Santiago, flicked the boom box back on. The angry rap blasted: Get out the way, bitch, get out the way. They resumed hurling chunks of plasterboard and scraps of timber out of the second-floor window into the Dumpster below.

Rick signaled outside and they stepped onto the front porch.

“I signed the contract,” he said, “but that wasn’t our deal.” Rick wanted it out in the open. He wanted Jeff to acknowledge it.

“These guys need to be paid,” Jeff said.

“I thought you were planning to front the money.”

“I don’t normally do that, front the money. Anyway, things have changed.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Look, I didn’t want to say anything about this, but you know, we’ve been helping out your family for years. All those years, Meghan and I kept an eye on your house. When you had those sketchy renters, we let you guys know. I used to shovel the driveway when the snowplow service didn’t show up.”

Rick blinked a few times, surprised. He knew Jeff and his medical-receptionist wife, Meghan, had been vaguely helpful, but didn’t know the specifics. He wondered if this was going where he feared it might be going.

“I appreciate all that, Jeff. A lot. You guys have been great.”

“I’m just saying. All these years, we never said anything about it. Plus the guys. They need to be paid.”

“What happened to our arrangement?”

“Like I said, things have changed. You can afford a hell of a lot more than forty thousand bucks for the job, and you know it.”

“Jeff, I don’t know how much you-”

“You really want to have this conversation?” Jeff’s eyes glittered, as if maybe he did.

Rick felt his stomach flip over. He heaved a sigh.

“I’m thinking maybe I’m owed a little… consideration,” Jeff said.

“Consideration.”

“You know what I’m saying.”

He paused, decided to change the subject. “Let me ask you something. You see anyone around the house a couple nights ago? I mean, middle of the night.”

Jeff shrugged, shook his head.

“The kitchen door was unlocked. You weren’t in the house, were you?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Someone came in, was snooping around.”

“Didn’t see anyone. Sorry.”

Rick noticed that one of the guys in the white suits was standing at the front door, watching them. The guy pushed open the glass storm door and said, “Jeff, you want us start filling up the Dumpster?”

“Yeah, Santiago, you and Marlon cart out the scraps. DeShawn can keep at what he’s doing.”

Santiago peered at Rick, then over to Jeff, and said something in Spanish. Jeff answered him in Spanish, sounding fluent. Santiago laughed gutturally and said something back, this time clearly looking at Rick as he spoke. He was gesturing with his hands. Then he turned and headed back inside, letting the storm door slam behind him.

Rick didn’t know Spanish, but he understood one word Santiago had said.

Dinero.