The Indestructible Man (5 page)

Brooks would supply the weapon: a double-barreled twelve-gauge, conveniently sawed-off, normally kept under his bed in case federal agents came in the night. Bobby took extra time off to plan and prepare; rather than firing him, his bosses kept asking if everything was all right. With a pang of guilt he told them everything was fine.

A week before he and Brooks were to make their move, Cindy came to his flat with a canister of margarita mix. “I’ve been trying to get hold of you for days. Something going on I should know about?”

“Oh, nothing,” he said. “I’ve just got a lot on my mind right now.”

“
Wanna
talk about it?”

“I can’t,” he said. “Not right now.”

“You can tell me when you’re ready,” she said. “Hey, got a blender? The mix was on sale.”

Cindy mixed the margaritas far too strong and they were both drunk after one helping, but they finished the pitcher and laughed like idiots for hours, slowly peeling off their clothes until they ended up in his bed, the window half-open. He was too drunk to function properly, so he held her instead, her head resting on his chest.

“I’m really glad you’re here right now,” he said, gently squeezing her.

She reached up and tweaked his nose, laughing. “Me too. Where’d that come from?”

“Oh, nowhere,” he said. “I might not get to see you again for a while.”

“Why not? Work? You’ll still get days off, won’t you?”

“It’s not that,” Bobby said. A sad, heavy feeling came over him; he was sure to be locked away after his business with Romulus was over, and he wondered if she would wait for him.

“Then what is it?” She rested her chin on his breastbone and looked into his eyes.

Though at first he thought it was the tequila and triple sec, Bobby felt as whole as he had ten years before, in those few seconds with Abigail Wheat. He told Cindy about the fall, Brooks’ plan, what would probably happen to him afterwards. When he was finished, she laughed so hard she snorted. “Hey, no fair,” she said. “You’re having fun with me. You’re more sober than I am.”

“It’s the truth,” Bobby said.

“Oh.” Her eyes widened. “But you could go to jail.”

“Probably.”

“Then why do it? Why not just let it go?”

Bobby shrugged. “I can’t.”

Cindy curled up beside him and yawned. “Doesn’t seem worth it.”

Bobby held her until she fell asleep, hoping she was too drunk to remember any of it. He wished he could call it off, forget his revenge, and be with her. Happiness was sleeping next to him, its face buried in the pillow. It was almost enough to make him change his mind.

Cindy worked half-days every Saturday
and had run home to shower and change so she wouldn’t feel disgusting all afternoon. He watched her dress, memorizing every detail about her: the way her clothes fit, the smudge of purple lipstick under her bottom lip, the way her hair was flattened on one side from the pillow. It might be the last he ever saw of her, and he wanted the memory to stay vivid.

“See you later,” she said, leaning over to kiss him. Smiling, she rubbed his bare shoulder once, then gathered her purse from the bedside table. She stopped at the door, looked back, and the smile left her face. “You were kidding about that Romulus guy, right?”

“Oh, yeah. Of course,” he said, angry at himself for telling her, and angrier still for lying.

“Just blowing off steam.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’m glad,” she said. “I’ll call you.”

He spent the rest of the day in bed, his pillow wrapped around his head to blot out the light and sound, trying to stop himself from phoning Brooks to call the whole thing off.

6

Brooks’ minibus jerked and sputtered
, and clanked alarmingly every time he pressed down on the gas, but it had room enough for them to sleep in case Romulus and Abigail did not arrive right away. The day before Thanksgiving they headed for the Colonel’s house, passing the old junior high on the way. Bobby asked Brooks to stop.

“You sure that’s such a good idea?”

“Just stop, okay?” Bobby said. “It’ll only take a minute.”

School had let out for Thanksgiving break, and the parking lot and playground were empty. While Brooks waited, Bobby wheeled himself across the courtyard and through the grass. The hedges lining the building seemed a recent addition, but the high reddish-brown walls were the same as he remembered. He looked up at the roof, eighty feet above the brown sod, and saw himself at thirteen, in his last moment as a fully-functioning being, standing at the edge and launching his body into the air. He wished he could call out, warn his younger self of what would come of his stupidity. But nothing would have changed.

He found a slight dip in the sod, decided that was where he’d hit the ground, and gazed out at the courtyard until he heard Brooks’ black cowboy boots clomping on the sidewalk.

“You okay?” Brooks asked.
        

Brooks’ thin, raspy voice intruded into Bobby’s trance, and for a moment he was caught between two worlds. Brooks leaned in close to check on him, his thin whiskery face finally jolting him back into the present. “I’m all right,” he finally said, blinking rapidly to refocus. “Give me a minute.”

“Come on,” Brooks said. “It’s getting cold.” Brooks gripped the handles behind him and pushed him back across the courtyard.

Brooks parked along the curb
in the middle of Winter Street, two houses separating them on either side from the
Wheats
’ blue tri-level and Jackson Wayne’s brick ranch. From the minibus they could see both driveways, so they each took a side and peered from behind the thin red curtains over the windows. Brooks left the ignition off and they buried themselves under layers of heavy moving blankets to keep warm.

After a few hours of watching the Colonel’s undisturbed front door, Brooks fell asleep in the driver’s seat. His scanner randomly scrolled through frequencies until it picked up a cordless or cellular phone call; Bobby listened carefully for the Colonel or Abigail’s parents on the line. Brooks’ plan was to wait until they left the house, then follow them to their destination and do their business. The “kill” was Bobby’s, no matter what.

At about nine the scanner settled on a phone conversation. Bobby immediately recognized the Colonel’s humbling baritone.

“
Hi,
Lilian
,” the Colonel said. “
I’m calling to let you know you can have tomorrow off. The kids are passing through Chicago and want me to meet up with them in some fancy restaurant
.”

“
Really
?” a woman’s voice crackled through the interference. “
Now where you
gonna
go that’s better than my cooking?
”

The Colonel laughed under the static. “
Nothing’s better than your cooking,
Lilian
. They’re treating me to an early Thanksgiving dinner at Marley’s.
”

“
Sounds nice. Give Romulus a hug for me, will you?
”

“
I’ll tell him you said hello. Happy Thanksgiving.
”

Hands trembling, Bobby turned off the scanner. Marley’s was a steakhouse just outside Chicago; he’d even been there once, on his parents’ fifteenth anniversary. He hated the food, charred outside, bloody inside. But it was a popular place, and would be packed with witnesses.

He wheeled over to wake Brooks and tell him the news. Now all they had to do was sit and wait.

They spent all night in the minibus
, Brooks snoring like a chainsaw, sprawled across the bucket seats in front, Bobby propped against the side door in his wheelchair, his head resting on the frigid window. When he woke it was almost noon; he was cold and needed a bath. After an hour or so Bobby realized he should have brought a newspaper or some magazines. The monotony became almost unendurable, the intersecting lines of brick searing their pattern into his brain. He would have smashed his forehead through the window had Brooks not grunted himself awake.

“Jesus,” Brooks said, rubbing his head. “What time is it?”

“Almost one.”

“You been watching?”
       
“Yeah. He hasn’t left yet.”

They ate stale, crumbly granola bars and played cards to pass the time, bundled in Brooks’ scratchy blankets, casting an eye toward the Colonel’s front door every few minutes. Brooks won five hands in a row, and as he scooped the last of Bobby’s nickels and dimes into an old coffee can, Bobby saw Jackson Wayne emerging from the house.

“He’s going,” Bobby said, gnashing his teeth.

Brooks turned around as the Colonel’s Buick rumbled. “Oh,” he said, and started to get up. “Better get ready.” Halfway to the driver’s seat he stopped and looked Bobby in the eye. “Are you
sure
you want to go through with this? I mean,
really
sure?”

“I’m sure,” Bobby said, throwing off the heavy blanket.

“It
ain’t
too late to go back, if you don’t have the heart.”

For an instant Bobby considered telling Brooks to drive to Roscoe’s to down a few beers. Then he thought of Romulus waking next to Abigail every morning, her long red hair falling across his chest. “Follow him,” he said, and locked down his wheels.

To avoid suspicion, Brooks waited to start the ignition until the Buick was a few blocks away. The engine whinnied angrily and chugged to a start. Bobby squeezed his eyes shut as they sputtered onto the highway, hugging the rough metal bar to stay upright.

As Brooks wove in and out of traffic, leaving a few car lengths between themselves and the Buick, Bobby mulled over all the ways they could fail. He might miss completely; Romulus might duck; the Colonel or some other bystander might intercept them. Worst of all, the other diners might think Romulus had brought his act into Marley’s to promote the show. He was beginning to panic, so he tried not to think at all.

He opened his eyes when the minibus came to a dead stop. “We’re here,” Brooks announced, killing the engine. The Buick pulled into a space two rows up; they waited until the Colonel was safely inside. Bobby peered through the enormous picture windows, looking for a glimpse of Romulus or Abigail, but saw nothing. Brooks opened the side door, pulled out the makeshift ramp, helped Bobby down. They gathered up the antique double barrel shotgun, hidden in a duffel bag, and stared at the front entrance.

“Well,” Brooks said. “Here we go.”

“Yeah,” Bobby said.

“You ready?”

“You bet I am.” Bobby thought for a minute. “At the first shot, get out of here, quick as you can.”

“I said I’d—”