Duncan Delaney and the Cadillac of Doom (12 page)

He jumped up and fell to the floor. He grabbed for the bat under the couch, panicked when he could not find it, relaxed when his hand touched cold, hard wood. He stood outside the bathroom, bat held tight and poised to knock the head off the poor unfortunate emptying his bladder behind the battered bathroom door. The sound of urine joining water stopped.

“Get the hell out here,” he said.

The toilet flushed. Duncan raised the bat and waited for the door to open. He heard the sounds of brushing teeth.

“I’m not kidding,” he said, “come out or I’m coming in after you.”

The urinator rinsed and spat. Duncan imagined the fiend behind the door flossing his teeth. That stopped him. What if the urinator was, in reality, a urinatrix? What if it was
Sheila Rascowitz?
The shower went on.

That’s it,
Duncan thought.

He flung the door open and stepped inside. Something moved to his right, but before he could swing, unseen hands turned him and shoved him into the tub. He dropped the bat and fell beneath the shower. The urinator picked up the bat and turned off the water. He was short and lean with high cheeks, dark eyes, and long black hair falling across wiry shoulders. The smile he sported and the hand he reached out were two of the nicest human features Duncan could hope to see. Duncan allowed himself to be pulled out of the tub. He hugged the naked man with all his feeble might, his clothes dripping unnoticed onto the cracked tile floor.

“Benjamin,” Duncan said, “am I ever glad to see you.”

Misty required nine days to accrue sufficient nerve to return to Duncan’s studio. It was noon on a crystalline Saturday. She had been up preparing since six. She wore a lace teddy under a silk blouse, tight jeans, and hundred dollar Italian leather sandals. Her hair fell light and dense around her face. Her glossy violet nails duplicated her lipstick. She had never received more second looks as she did that morning driving into town from her apartment in Venice in her BMW convertible with the top down.

She imagined she looked like crap.

In truth she was a winsome young woman who, if graced by God with a few more grams of brain cells, might have succeeded in numerous professions not requiring a college degree outside the adult entertainment or food service industries. She was hard working and loyal and not afraid to go for what she desired. Right now, lurking below the first centimeter of cortex, was the desire to seduce Duncan. But as she stood below his studio listening to his stereo she was nervous enough to vomit. She bought a Snickers and a diet Coke from Assan. She slumped against the wall by the pay phone and ate the bar and quaffed the soda. She belched twice softly. She inhaled deeply until she became dizzy.

“All right, Misty,” she said, “he’s just a guy.”

She did not believe it though, intellectually (so to speak), she understood it was true. He was an artist. He created. He did not pump gas or strum variations of the same three chords or program computers or add numbers like the dozens of losers who filled the Hollywood Bar and Grill each day. He had vision, and Misty wanted to be part of what he saw. She stalled as long as she could, but finally her excuses were depleted, and she strode past a ratty old truck, took the stairs two at a time, ducked under the pipe in the hallway, and rapped on the door with a fist of fine tan knuckles. A young, lean, dark-haired man answered her knock. He was naked save for red candy striped boxers and a necklace of mountain lion teeth. His eyes set off the smoke alarm in the bedroom of her mind.

“Come on in,” he said. Misty smelled bacon and butter. “You hungry?”

“I just ate.”

“You must be Pris. Duncan told me about you.”

Her heart sank to where her arch supports would be if she had worn running shoes instead of sandals.

“My name is
Misty,”
she said.

“Whoops.” He flipped bacon with a fork. “I’m Benjamin.” Hot grease splattered his chest. “Jesus that smarts,” he said, and then, “Duncan just left for the laundromat.”

“You ought to put on a shirt.”

“Sure. That’s what they’re expecting me to do.”

Misty wondered who
they
were, but inferred he was fooling just as she opened her mouth to ask. Despite her cranial weakness, Misty pegged Benjamin as a wise guy who had already exceeded life’s allotment of trouble. She closed her mouth and lay her carnal thoughts aside. She required innocence in a man, not just raw animal appeal. Duncan better fit the job description from what she had seen.

“What’s he doing at the laundromat?” she asked. Benjamin looked at her. She nodded. “Oh, right. Laundry.”

He slapped the bacon on a plate beside a mound of scrambled eggs. He put four slices of buttered toast heaped with grape jam over the eggs. He sat on the couch and ate with his fingers. Misty sat beside him.

“Are you Mexican?”

“Arapaho.”

“Oh, wow,” Misty said, “you’re from Italy?”

Benjamin laughed so hard he spit out his food. He kept laughing while he wiped masticated meat and poultry from the floor with a paper towel.

“Native American,” he finally said.

“You mean like an Indian?”

“You’re not the brightest candle, are you?” Her blank look answered him. “Never mind.” He put his plate in the sink. “I have to perform my morning ablutions.” He saw her embarrassed look. “That means ritual washing.”

Misty relaxed. “Oh.”

She studied Duncan’s paintings while Benjamin showered. Edward’s portrait moved her to pity and the one of the Guardians scared her. The painting of Champagne and Cassandra made her jealous. The collected canvases made her horny as hell. She lifted the sheet from the Harley. She knew Sheila’s bike had been stolen but she missed the connection. She spotted a fourth canvas covered by a cloth behind the Harley. She lifted the cloth and looked. She was sobbing on the couch when Benjamin emerged from the bathroom, her head in her hands and her elbows on her knees. He knelt and pushed the hair from her face. Her eyes were red and her make up streaked.

“You okay?” Benjamin asked.

“Sure,” she said, “just wonderful.”

Then she jumped up and ran from the studio.

Duncan sat on a washing machine, his clothes spinning infinitely beneath him. He wore his Stetson and a tank top. His legs poked white and mostly hairless through a pair of shorts. He was reading a Dear Duncan letter.

Dear Duncan,
it began,
Danny has asked me to be his bride. I said I would answer in one week. That’s time enough for you to come to your senses and get home where you belong. If I don’t hear from you by Sunday, the next time you see me you better call me Mrs. Carpenter.

P.S. I don’t think you should hang around Benjamin anymore. He was fresh with me and refused to give your mother or me your address.

Love, Tiffy.

Benjamin had told him of Tiffy’s aborted attempt at seduction. He was surprised but not shocked. Nor was he upset for several reasons. First, he and Tiffy were broken up. That made Tiffy fair game, even for Benjamin. Second, he had since fallen for a crazy woman, so the affections of what Benjamin termed
that whore former girlfriend of yours
no longer mattered. And third, he was proud that Benjamin possessed the moral conviction and fortitude to resist Tiffy’s bountiful charms in deference to a friend. Duncan pocketed the letter and put his clothes in a dryer. He thought about Tiffy and he thought about Pris. He thought about Benjamin and he thought about Sheila. He thought about Fiona and Sean and imagined how his father would answer Tiffy’s ultimatum. He remembered the dream.

Tiffy doesn’t love you,
Sean Delaney had told him and,
you will love again
.

He reflected on his life’s peculiar course as he loaded his warm, clean clothes into a basket. He stepped onto the street, speculating on what it was like in Cheyenne and where Tiffy was and who she was with and it took him a minute of walking and thinking before he realized he no longer cared.

Duncan breathed deep a nostalgic odor fresh from his childhood as he climbed his stairs. It was the sweet, smothering smell of violets, not overpowering in the orthodox sense but insidious in its infiltration of the sinuses. He opened the door and dropped his laundry basket.

“Jesus God!” he yelped.

Fiona and Woody stood by the window looking down to the street. Duncan put his hand to his beating chest. A fragrance reminiscent of Fiona was one thing but the woman in person was another. In a practical sense, even if he had made the connection he still would have ascended the stairs and opened the door. He just would have been better prepared. His mother wore a staid green business suit, light green stockings, and black pumps. Woody stood awkwardly by in a western shirt with a bolo tie, brown nylon pants, and brown penny loafers over white socks. Benjamin lay on the couch, naked save his boxers, leafing through a
Playboy
purchased from Assan in the interim between Misty’s departure and Fiona’s arrival.

“Duncan,” Benjamin sang, “your mommy wants you.”

“You scared the hell out of me,” Duncan said.

“It’s nice to see you too,” Fiona said.

“You know that’s not what I meant.” He hugged her. “Hey, Mom. Hey, Woody. What brings you out here?”

“I’d guess an airplane,” Benjamin offered.

Fiona ignored him. “It’s time to come home.”

Duncan released her and picked up his basket. He knelt and sorted his laundry into his clothes box.

“This is home now.”

“Now, Duncan,” Woody said, “maybe we should talk about this.”

“How can you live in this, this …” Fiona encompassed the room with a sweep of her hand. “Words fail me.”

“It’s not so bad,” Benjamin said, “once you get used to the roaches, the drug dealers, the discarded needles, the squalid toilet, and the fetid, stinking, haggard whores who ply their trade on the boulevard.”

Fiona glanced about the room. She went for the baseball bat, but Duncan got there first. He set it out of her reach in the hall.

“You’re not helping any, Benjamin,” Woody said.

“Still bang …” Benjamin remembered his jailhouse resolution. “Never mind.” He put his pants on. “I’m off for beer. You want one Woody?”

“Sure, I’ll have a beer.”

“No, you won’t,” Fiona said, “you’re driving the rental.”

Woody hung his head. “On second thought maybe I shouldn’t.”

Benjamin theorized that Fiona had impounded Woody’s testicles long ago and held them hostage in a jar of murky liquid in the back of the refrigerator at the Circle D. Duncan claimed the jar held old olives. Benjamin did not buy it. He could not discern other grounds for Woody’s craven conduct. Sure, Fiona sporadically warmed the testicles in the microwave to allow Woody their use, but that was not the same as operating one’s gonads one’s self.

“And what about Tiffy?” Fiona demanded after Benjamin left. “You’ll lose her if you stay here.”

“She’s already lost, mom. She made that clear enough.”

“I am through arguing.” She searched in her purse. “If you won’t listen to reason maybe you’ll pay attention to this.”

Fiona found her checkbook. She opened it and wrote. Benjamin returned with the beers. He popped two and handed one to Duncan. Woody licked his lips but said nothing. Fiona ripped out a check and handed it to Duncan. Benjamin looked over his shoulder and whistled.

“That’s three thousand dollars. It’s yours if you come home.”

“This isn’t about money, mom.”

“All right.” Fiona wrote another. “Five thousand. No job required. You can rent an apartment in Cheyenne and paint there if you like.”

“Tell you what.” Benjamin took a wad of hundreds from his pocket and threw it on the floor at Fiona’s feet. “I’ll give him six thousand to stay.”

“Holy Jesus,” Woody said. “Where did you get that kind of money?”

“Stole it from a church collection box no doubt,” Fiona said, “or maybe telemarketing.” She wrote a third check. “Seven thousand.”

“I may be a lot of things but I’m no damn telemarketer.” Benjamin took a wad of bills from his other pocket and threw it down. “Eight thousand.”

Fiona scribbled a fourth check and held it to heaven like a bible in the hands of an evangelist at a snake handlers’ prayer meeting.
“Ten thousand dollars!”

Benjamin shrugged. “Out of my league.”

Duncan took the check. It would buy a hell of a lot of paint. But in the end it made no difference. He offered the check back.

“Thank you, mom. But no.”

Fiona’s spine became an iron rod in opposition to Duncan’s defiance. She had never struck her son but she now experienced the urge. The last time she had felt this way towards a relative was two years before Sean Delaney’s death, when he voyaged to Ireland for his father’s funeral. Patrick Delaney was an alcoholic womanizer and petty thief known for smash and grab burglaries until a thrown brick bounced off a jeweler’s plexiglass window and hit him in the forehead. He awoke bloody in the gutter with the brick under his chin and an alarm ringing in his ears. After that he could not throw a brick without breaking out in a shivering sweat. He tried picking pockets, but his hands were clumsy. He eventually gave up thievery and made a living as a beggar, charming tourists into tossing as much as a fiver into his outstretched cap.

Patrick had left Sean’s mother when Sean was twelve. A month before his death, he had appeared on Mary Delaney’s doorstep with a liver as big as a goat’s and a cancer eating from colon to throat. Mary took him in and cared for him. She was Catholic, never divorced, and only God knew why she still loved her errant husband. Fiona blew up when she heard the tale. She would have journeyed to Ireland herself to kill the bastard for his sins. But Patrick Delaney was five days’ cold, murder was moot, and an overseas trip for a rogue’s funeral was just so much squandered money. Fiona did not realize until Sean was gone that he went for his mother’s sake, not his father’s, and because it was the right thing to do. And now she saw Sean in Duncan, and it subdued and moved her virtually to tears.