Hooligans (23 page)

about to kiss her. She had the softest lips. You could get buried in those lips. I never felt her teeth. I

don‟t know how she did it. Her lips were as soft as a down quilt.

Three years, that‟s how long I had waited, watching her grow from a fifteen-year-old tease to an

eighteen—year-old woman, playing the brother-sister act when they came up to Athens for football

weekends. That was to appease Chief. When she was about sixteen, her good-bye kisses started

getting softer. And longer.

Talk about strung out.

Get off it, Kilmer. Think about something else. Details, concentrate on details. And events. Reality is

what we‟re after here.

I concentrated on her eighteenth-birthday party. It came to me in flashes, like a movie when the film

breaks and they lose a few frames.

She wouldn‟t let me see her all that day. The way she acted, you‟d have thought it was her wedding

day. About midmorning Chief, Teddy, and I went to the Findley office on Factors‟ Walk. It was part

of the ritual when we came down for the weekend, going to the office on Saturday morning. We had

to wear ties and sports jackets, setting an example so the workers wouldn‟t get the feeling that they

could take it easy because it was the weekend. Chief was big on setting examples. The office was only

open half a day, so the employees thought they were getting a break. “Gives us four hours‟ jump on

the competition come Monday morning,” Chief said with a wink. He winked a bit for emphasis, a

habit Teddy had picked up.

He‟d always pull off some kind of deal, usually on the phone, just to show us how it was done. When

he was wheeler-dealing, his left eye would close about halfway. Teddy called it the Evil Eye. When

the Eye started to narrow, watch out, he was on to something, closing in for the kill. It‟s one of the

things the rich inherited, that predatory sense. I guess that‟s why they‟re rich— they have a built-in

instinct for the jugular.

I never got a true handle on the business. They were into everything. Cotton, shipping, real estate,

industry, farming, you name it. All it did was bedazzle the hell out of me. I don‟t think Teddy got into

it either, He was more interested in hell-raising. And poon. That‟s what he called it, poon. “Let‟s go

down to the beach, Junior, check out the poon.”

I got another flash. On that particular morning the office was closed in honour of Doe‟s eighteenth

birthday. When we got there, the janitor let us in and we went up to t}e third floor. I always loved that

building. It was all brass and oak and everything was oiled and polished so it sparkled.

Chief stood in his office, which seems now like it was maybe half the top floor. He stood there and

swept his hand around.

“I‟m going to divide this room up into three rooms, boys,” he said. “I‟ll take this corner. One of you

can have the river view; the other one, the park.” Then he flipped a coin.

“Call it, Jake,” he cried. I don‟t remember what I called. He covered the coin with his hand and

peeked under it, looked up very slowly, and smiled at me. “You win, Jake. Take your choice, river or

park?” I figured Teddy wanted the river and he had a right to it because it was obviously the choice

view, so I picked the park.

And I remember Chief looking at me and that left eye narrowing down for just an instant, and then he

said, “That‟s very generous of you, Jake.”

The Evil Eye. Looking back on it, I think Chief saw that move as a sign of weakness. To him, it was

winner take all.

The more I got into it, the faster arid faster the flashes came. The way the place looked, Daisies all

over Windsong, hundreds of them. And candles—my God, there must have been ten thousand

candles. It was a fire hazard there were so many candles.

And people. Three hundred maybe the top of the list. Black tie, a live orchestra, champagne, the

„works. Chief had seen to that. It‟s what you call taste, another thing the born rich inherit.

“I got to give you credit, Junior,” Teddy had said as I was straightening his black tie. “Three years,

man, you really stick in there.”

Was that it? Was it a test?

Before the guests arrived, Chief took the two of us out onto the porch and popped a bottle of

champagne and we stood there watching the sun go down. We drank a toast to Doe and threw our

glasses at the big oak tree at the corner of the house.

“One more year, boys,” Chief said. “And you‟ll be off to law school. The time‟ll fly. You‟ll be back

here in business before you know it.”

That was another part of the trap, Chief laying it all out for us that way, planning our lives. Only then

it felt good. When you‟re on the inside, it always feels good. When he put his hand on my shoulder,

there was lightning in his fingers. That‟s the way Chief was. That‟s the way all three of them were.

They were Lightning People. You could feel their aura crackling around them.

“It‟s a helluva night, lads,” he said. He didn‟t know the half of it.

It was dark and all the candles were lit and the guests were all assembled when she made her entrance

I still have trouble breathing when I think about that moment. My mouth gets dry and my hands shake

thinking about her walking into the eerie candlelight, dressed in white, with a scarlet sash that

tightened her waist and molded every magnificent line of her body. Talk about lightning. Everybody

applauded when she came in. She went straight to Chief and kissed him. Chief always came first.

Then she came to us and that soft spot was twitching like crazy and it was all I could do to keep my

hands off her. It was like that all night. I couldn‟t get close enough to her. I guess I never will.

The party ended about three in the morning and we were all a little drunk from champagne. Teddy had

latched on to this kind of dippy girl and the four of us piled i9to the dune buggy and drove out to the

beach. He threw me the keys. He was in the back, working up a little poon. When we got in the car it

was all Doe and I could do to keep our hands off each other. Well, we didn‟t. She leaned over and put

her hand down inside of my thigh and wrapped her fingers around my knee and squeezed it hard and

the electricity started humming.

When we got out there we took some dunes and spun around a few times in the moonlight. Teddy

popped a bottle of champagne, shook it up, and used his thumb to squeeze off a stream of it. We were

all soaked with champagne and the dippy girl jumped out and ran down to the surf and jumped in,

clothes and all, Teddy right behind her. We drove off and left them there, clawing at each other in the

surf.

And I remember Doe saying, „Stop soon, Jake. Please!” I never heard that tone in her voice before,

Husky, with a lot of breath behind it. I topped a dune and slammed on the brakes and we tumbled out

before the buggy was fully stopped. It tolled down to the bottom of the hill and stalled.

We were like animals freed from a cage. Touching, feeling, pulling. I found the soft spot in her throat

and when I kissed it I could feel her heart beating in my mouth and she cried out and pulled her dress

down and her breasts jumped free and I slid my lips down to her and opened my mouth as wide as I

could and sucked her up into it, feeling her nipple grow hard under my tongue. Then her hands

reached down and found me and she turned me sideways and began stroking me. Finally I unzipped

the dress and slid it down over her feet and she hooked her thumbs in the sides of her panties and slid

them off. „Then she helped me undress and we lay back for a minute and just stared at each other.

Then there was more touching and pulling and stroking until finally I felt her open under my

fingertips and she pulled me over on top of her and guided me into her, enveloping me, crushing me,

devouring me with her soft muscles

Nice going, Kilmer. That‟s putting it all in the proper perspective. Objective, right?

Sure.

26

SILVER-DOLLAR WOMAN

Oh, Jesus, just keep it in me!

Take it, take it all, baby.

Oh,
god, don‟t stop!

You‟re
all alike, can‟t get enough, can you, baby?

Never!

There...

More. . . oh,
yes,
MORE!

There.

What are you doing?

There...

Come on, you bastard, fuck me!

Hereitcomes, hereitcomes.

OH.
. .
ohoh, nownow,
ohoh,
nownow...

Here comes the fuckin‟ freight train!

Now.
. .
yes, now...

ONE
potato, TWO potato, THREE potato,
FOUR...

Oh,
you.
.
fucking.
. .
m-m-machine...

GodDAMN!

Don‟t stop now, oh, sweet Jesus, don‟t stop now!

Gonna.. luck you.
. .
dead.
. .
l-a-a—a-d-e-e-e

Oh.
. .
God.
. . NOW!

Yeah.

NOW!

NOW...

Later..

I‟m going to be sore for
a week,
you
damn crazy...

Hey, you‟re the one keeps cryin‟.
for more.

Yes. More.

Not
enough anything for you, is there?

Not
that.

Not just
cock, ANYthing.

After
tonight we‟ll have it all.

No
such thing as
ALL,
baby. And no such thing as enough.

Fuck me again.

Gotta
save u
some
spunk, lady. it‟s gonna be a long night.

When
it‟s
over.

We‟ll celebrate. I‟ll luck your head
off.

Promise?

You
got
it.

Crazy doin‟ it tonight.

When‟ll he be here?

Fifteen minutes.

That‟s takin‟ it to the edge.

Ilove it. Gimme a kiss.

Sure. So
long, babe.

He caressed her throat with his thumbs, running them, side by side, from her collarbone up along her

carotid to her chin and back and then again, and this time he pressed harder and her face bunched

up.

Too hard...

Too late. His thumbs suddenly seemed to spasm, digging deep into both sides
of
her Adam‟s apple.

Her eyes bulged, her tongue shot out, quivering obscenely.

He pressed deeper. Something cracked. She gagged, fought, tried to scratch.

He stopped suddenly, straightened up, struck her sharply with two fingers in the temple, and her life

blinked out.

He rolled her over in the bed, arranged her as if sleeping, killed the light, and went to the window.

Ten minutes. Two black limousines pulled up. Four men jumped out of the first limo, perused the

street. Two of them entered the apartment house while the other two waited at the door.

Footsteps on the stairs, some muffled talk. He moved silently across the room and entered the closet.

One
of the men inside opened the front door of the apartment house and nodded to the two outside

and one of them ran to the second car and opened the rear door. A till, chunky man, whose face

indicated that he had once been thinner, got out and hustled into the apartment. One of the goons

checked the second floor hallway and waved him in. He was nattily dressed in a dark blue blazer, tan

gabardine pants, a pale blue shirt, and a dark striped tie. He climbed the stairs, nodded to the man by

the door of the apartment, who went back down. The chunky man took out his key and let himself in.

The four men gathered just inside the front door of the apartment and started pitching silver dollars

against the wall
in the
carpeted hallway.

The chunky man stood inside the doorway, looking at the woman on the bed, sleeping on her side, the

bed a mess. He started getting hard, thinking about it. What a wanton bitch she was. He smiled and

walked to the end of the bed and began to shake it very easily.

The closet door opened without a sound. The chunky man never heard anything until the
whirrr
of the

rope as it whipped around his throat, then the sudden, awful vise around his neck. He reacted almost

instantly.

Almost.

A leg wrapped around both his legs anal he lost his balance and fell forward on the bed. He was

thrashing, trying to break loose, but the vise tightened.

He began to jerk...

And jerk...

And jerk...

Downstairs in the hall, the boys pitching dollars could hear the bedsprings squeaking.

That Tony, he didn‟t waste no time.

Fuckin‟ bull. Go on, Ricky, pitch.

The silver dollar twinkled as it soared down the hall and hit the carpet and bounced against the wall

And the winner sang:

“Yuh kin t‟row a silver dollar, across the floor,

It‟ll roo-ool, „cause it‟s ro-ound,

Woman never knows what a good man she‟s got,

Until she lets him down.”

27

After I got out of the tub and dried off, I went in and lay clown naked on the bed to cool off. I stared

at the ceiling fan for a long time. Objectivity is a painful enterprise at best, and I had avoided it for