The Best of Lucius Shepard (87 page)

—You
the one’s acting superior, Ava said, and forked up some slaw.

—Fuck,
I am superior! Superior to this shit. Maybe it gets you wet listening to the
criminal genius here, but it don’t even give me a tickle.

Squire
told me to watch my mouth, I was talking to a lady, and I said, Come on, you
fucking chihuahua! Step to me!

Leeli
caught my arm and said, Maceo! I jerked free and swatted my shrimp basket,
backhanding it across the deck. People bespotted with ketchup splatter from the
basket stared at us from the adjoining tables. The assistant manager, who could
have passed for fourteen, looked like he was about to cry. Leeli was yelling at
me, Squire was avoiding my eyes, Ava was calmly wiping her sleeve with a
napkin. Carl giggled and said, Fucking chihuahua!

One
of the citizens I’d splattered, a thick-necked, Hawaiian-shirt-wearing,
Chevy-Suburban-driving son of the suburbs, his belly sagging like a
hundred-year-old hammock, gave his pregnant wife a comforting pat on the
shoulder and heaved up from his cheeseburger, but Ava saved his ass by
intercepting him on the way to our table and slipped him a twenty for his dry
cleaning bill. Other folks put in their claim and once she had satisfied them,
she sat back down and said to me, Temper like that, it’s a wonder you still on
the street.

Calmer
now, I felt no call to answer. I gave her a fuck-you smile and popped one of
Leeli’s shrimp into my mouth. It was covered with grit that had blown up from
the beach, which made it extra crunchy.

—You
so smart, Ava said, whyn’t you tell us how you’d handle the Toyland?

—Wouldn’t
nothing but a damn fool mess with it. Too many cops. Too many boyfriends might
wanna play hero. You feel the need to rob something, head out on the freeway.
You know the back roads along the exits, you can take down two gas stations
easy and be sitting in a bar before the cops get motivated.

—I
suppose it was your expertise landed you in prison.

—Oh
I was a fool. No doubt about that. It don’t mean I’m still a fool.

Challenged,
I delivered a lecture on proper criminal procedure, most of it learned in
Raiford, but salted in with personal experiences that I embellished for
dramatic effect. You gotta terrorize a place, I told them. People ain’t always
scared, they see the gun. Sometimes they can’t believe you’re for real and they
go to debating what to do. You don’t want that, you want ‘em scared. So you say
something lets ‘em know how scared they oughta be.

—Yeah?
Squire said churlishly. Like what?

I
made my hand into a gun and pointed it at his chest. Hands up! Who wants to
die? You say that, it gets their attention every time.

—I
like that, Carl said, grinning. Hands up who wants to die?

—Takes
the punch out of it, you say it with a smile, I said. Tell ‘em like you mean
it.

With
that, Carl jumped up and snarled, Hands up! Who wants to die?

The
pregnant lady yipped and the people at the table behind me grabbed up their
belongings and scooted. Ava pulled Carl down into his chair and I said to him,
That’ll get it done.

Leeli
stood and said, Can we just go? Please!

We
set off down the boardwalk toward the car and she fell into step with Ava and
Carl. Irritated by this, not wanting to be stuck with Squire, I dropped off the
pace, lollygagging along. That’s how Leeli wanted to play it, I told myself, to
hell with her. I’d find myself a sweeter can of tuna. I started eye-fucking the
bikini girls strolling past and when one made a smart-ass remark, getting her
friends to laughing at me, I told her once she lost that babyfat she oughta try
a real dick, but right now it’d likely be too much for her.

*
* * *

Ava drove south and then west
on State Road 44 toward Orlando. She went to talking about the old days, the
60s, when there was so many UFOs in the sky—because of the rockets at the Cape,
she guessed—you could see them from out on 44 every night. Boys useta take us
down here to see ‘em, she said, ‘cause they thought we’d let ‘em get fresh
while we were stargazing. Leeli, who was riding shotgun next to Carl, said, I
bet they were right, huh?

—’Course
they were, Ava said, and they shared a laugh.

—You
ever see any UFOs? Leeli asked.

—All
the time! You look up in the sky, you couldn’t help seeing ‘em. Pretty soon
what you thought was a group of stars would get to darting around, making these
really sharp turns, flying in formation.

She
asked Leeli to fish around in her tote bag and find her cigarettes. Once she
got a smoke going, she said, Couple times we saw one real close.

—A
flying saucer?

—Uh
huh. We saw this one shoot a green light from its belly. Straight down to the
ground.

—Maybe
it was Santa Claus you saw, I suggested. Waving his green flashlight.

Ava
took a glance back toward me. You don’t believe in UFOs, Maceo?

—’Bout
as much as I believe in liberty and justice for all.

—Don’t
listen to him, Leeli said. He’s a contrary sort.

I
told Leeli she didn’t know squat about me and then said to Ava, Whatever you
saw, wasn’t no flying saucer. Ain’t no sense to any of that business.

—That
might be, Ava said. Most things don’t make sense, especially you try and
understand ‘em too hard.

—I
suppose that’s profound, but I’m just a dumb Florida Cracker. It goes right by
me.

Ava
flicked ash and sparks out the window. You might catch up to it one of these
days, she said.

It
struck me that Ava must be a lot older than I’d estimated, she was dating back
in the 60s, but I didn’t stay with the thought. I was a six pack along into a
decent buzz and still feeling sour about Leeli, fully occupied with self-pity
and scorn. When we stopped for gas I pulled Leeli aside, fed her all the
I’m-sorry she could swallow and persuaded her to switch seats with Squire. I
discovered a sensitive spot under her ear and before long I had her squirming
pretty good, though each time my fingers traipsed near the old plantation home,
she’d give them a spank. Squire began telling a lie about a beauty queen he’d
gone with in high school and Ava shut him up quick, saying she needed to
concentrate on the road. That clued me in she was upset about Leeli, and I felt
satisfied in mind.

Scattered
around the edges of Disneyworld were a number of shooting ranges where for a
few dollars you could fire assault rifles. Given the encouragement this surely
offered the freaks who flocked to the ranges, you had to wonder if the city
fathers of Orlando didn’t unconsciously long to see TV coverage of a giant
blood-spattered mouse. While Carl and Squire were busy playing soldier at
Buck’s Guns and Sporting Gallery, me and Ava and Leeli walked to a nearby 7-11
and bought some forty-ouncers, one of which I chugged walking back to the
parking lot. The girls sat talking on the hood of Ava’s truck. I wasn’t drunk
enough to feel mean, but I felt separate from things. The cars racing along the
six-lane were shiny toys with glaring headlights and dabs of meat inside. The
strip malls lining the road were grimy slot-car accessories. The heat came from
a neon tube inside my head and the starless orange-lit sky was a
gasoline-soaked rag someone had throwed over the whole mess so’s to hide it
from company. What I’m saying, it wouldn’t have taken much to upgrade me to
mean. Ava was pitching hard at Leeli, touching her thigh, the back of her hair.
I just kept working on my second forty. If I could drink fast enough, I
wouldn’t care what they did and I’d be able to ignore some deeper thoughts that
were trying to gnaw out my brains like a squirrel with a nut meat.

When
Squire and Carl returned, all hotted up from proving their marksmanship, Ava
announced a surprise. She had reserved us rooms at the mouse’s hotel. We’d have
a few cocktails, go on some rides, and see what developed. This made Carl
happy, but Squire and Leeli didn’t seem to care. I sucked down a third forty on
the ride over and after Ava checked us in, I told her I felt poorly and was
going to my room.

—Me,
too, said Leeli. I’m awful tired.

This
surprised Ava as much as it did me. You sure? she said to Leeli. Space
Mountain’ll juice you right up.

—Naw,
we’ll catch y’all later. Leeli started walking so fast, she beat me to the
elevator.

I
had a shower while Leeli ordered room-service cheeseburgers and Cokes. The food
left me placid and sleepy. I laid out on the bed in my skivvies and Leeli stood
at the window, her arms folded, stern of face, like she was taking stock of a
brightly lit country she’d just done conquering.

—You
don’t have to worry ‘bout me making a move, that’s what’s keeping you vertical,
I said. I’m through for today.

She
made a noise that didn’t tell me much.

I
grabbed the remote from the bedside table and found a wrestling show on TV.
Wrestling hasn’t been the same since the prime of Hulk Hogan and the Giant and
Macho Man Savage, you ask me. Back in the day your superhero had a gut just
like the asshole sitting next to you in the bar and so when you smacked him
with a beer bottle, you had a greater sense of accomplishment. Now there was
too many pretty boys and it was more tumbling and role-playing than the
honest-to-God fake it once was.

Leeli
wriggled out of her jeans. Ava gave me money to buy clothes, she said. Reckon
we better do it soon.

—We
can get some fine clothes here. Get us some mouse shirts and mouse hats with
the ears. Maybe you can get some panties with the mouse on the crotch and wear
‘em inside out.

She
pulled off her tank top and threw it at me in a ball. You
always
have to
be a shit?

—It
was a fucking joke! Jesus!

She
stared at me as if she didn’t believe it.

—I
swear, I said.

She
held the stare a second longer. Damn! she said. Why do I like you?

—You
want a honest answer?

—Naw,
I know why. She sat down on the bed, glum as old gravy, picked up the remote
and went surfing, changing channels so fast, there was only little blurts of
sound. Know what Ava told me? She says she works for the government. The FBI.

—No
shit! I said. Is she a friend of Spiderman?

—She
showed me her badge! Leeli bugged her eyes and stuck out her tongue.

—Give
me ten bucks and I’ll show you a badge. I can probably find one in the gift
shop.

Leeli
threw herself down on the pillow like she was trying to hurt herself. You wanna
hear this or not?

—Sure.
Lemme have it. I turned to lie facing her so she’d know I was listening, and
rested a hand on her waist.

—She
said she was an agent and Carl and Squire are in some sorta experiment. She’s
in charge of ‘em. She says she’ll pay me a ton of money to be part of it. The
experiment.

—Want
me to say what I’m thinking?

—I’m
not an idiot! I know she likes me, and I know it could all be a story. But
she’s willing to pay twenty thousand dollars! For one month!

—You
see the money?

Leeli
gave a vigorous nod. I get five now, the rest after.

—Well,
shit. I rolled onto my back. I guess this is goodbye.

—Not
necessarily.

—Yeah,
necessarily. I can’t compete with someone throws around twenty thousand bucks.

She
sat up cross-legged and muted the TV. Look, I’m not no shiny apple been sitting
on the shelf like you think.