Time and Chance (31 page)

Stella said, “I'll
have the hash. Tell 'em just a small portion and forget the egg.”

“Thank you.” The
server left.

Stella inhaled and
blew smoke through her nose, “I heard another guy talking about your weather.
Said you was pretty good.”

Peggy squeezed her
coffee cup and a purple vein bulged on the back of her hand. “I've never been
stood up in my whole mother fucking life! That son of a bitch.”

“Don't work yourself
up about it.” Stella avoided Peggy's eyes. “Maybe he just forgot.”

“Oh, stuff it Stella.
Maybe he just forgot.”

The waiter brought the
corned beef and hash for Stella and heated up Peggy's coffee, smiled, “Anything
else, ladies?”

Stella shook her head.

He left and Stella
began pushing her hash around with a fork.

Peggy fought back a
sob.

Stella said, “Will you
forget about that loser. You have to do your show in a couple hours, it'll just
make it worse. Just go over there and pretend like nothin’ happened.”

“Pretend like nothing
happened.”

“Want a Bloody Mary?
I'll have one with you.”

“No, I don't want a
Bloody Mary!” Peggy bit her lower lip, “I been thinking, maybe something
happened, accident or something, way he drinks….”

“Didn't look like an
accident to me.”

Peggy narrowed her
eyes. “What's that supposed to mean?”

Stella sipped coffee,
touched her hair, “I have to make an appointment to get my color touched up.
Whaddaya think? Roots are showing. Maybe I should just get a new wig.”

“Stella.” Peggy tapped
her fingers on the table top.

“I'm thinking
something similar to your color.”

“Stella.”

“I want to get a
facial too. And I haven't had a good pedicure in a….”

“Damn it! What didn't
look like an accident?”

“He was out.” And it
flowed out of Stella like a thin vinaigrette: “Sunday afternoon, we was driving
round looking for Jackson, you was passed out, I saw Jackson and her riding on
a motorcycle. I'd bet a dollar they spent the weekend together.”

Peggy, “Her who?”

 
“That new one? Gillian Phoenix, one looks like
she's got some blood.”

Peggy's eyes becoming
primordial dark and deep pools, “You knew this Sunday afternoon and didn’t tell
me?”

“I didn't….”

“Shut up!” Peggy
stared out the window. “You tell Snakebite?”

“I'm afraid he might
kill the messenger.”

“Hah!”

Stella: “Jackson is
either brave as hell or crazy as a loon. Somebody is going to get cooked. I
might quit working this dump too, just to keep the peace.” She exhaled with a
satisfied smile, “I told you about that Jackson, you wouldn't listen.”

Peggy dragged her cigarette
and exhaled slowly, eyes narrow slits, said, “You're really enjoying this,
ain’t ya?”

“Don't look at me like
that, I'm just the messenger.”

Peggy inhaled like she
was sending smoke to her toes. After ten seconds the smoke seeped from her
nostrils: “Anything else you ain’t told me, Ms. Stella?”

“I….”

“Shut up.” Peggy
thumped the table with her fingers. “I wonder if Mr. Carr is in his office.”
She dragged a quarter inch off her Parliament.

“Don't you go over
there blabbing and get me in trouble with Snakebite and Berry….”

“Shut up.”

CHAPTER 31

Jack’s Time

No Gillian at the
farm, doors locked, nothing; back in my office, I didn't follow Berry's
instructions to call Peggy. You see, I knew, despite Stella's note, I would be
seeing Ms. Moore face to face, sooner than later. I was more concerned about
Gillian.

* * *

I hit my desk, “How
could you not get Gillian's phone number?”

Feeling low, I
loosened my tie, unbuttoned my collar, leaned back and up popped a familiar
friend.

Don't get too attached.
You get attached and bang, car runs a red light.

“Get lost.”

He left.

I didn't want to think
about red lights because it brought that awful black empty loss and with that a
desire to have a short visit with Jack Daniels and I have of late never had a
short visit with Mr. Daniels.

Mulling things over, I
checked Blancpain, 2:59 and, as a rustling at first, like autumn leaves whipped
up by a brisk wind, I heard an approaching sound. Joy stopped typing. The
rustling got louder and Peggy, all decked out in black leather, blew into my
office, wide eyed and bristling.

“HEY!” She threw a
bulky red purse on my desk and began peeling off her gloves. “Just who in hell
do you think you are, anyhow?”

Not surprised, I had
expected her sooner, but I was not prepared for the full frontal assault.
Second thought, maybe I was.

Joy closed the door.

Peeling off gloves,
Peggy said, “I'm waiting.”

I looked at her fake
eyelashes and blue eye shadow. Her thick makeup looked cooked on and her red
lipstick appeared to be dry clay. I smiled, “Kinda hot for gloves, isn't it.”

Staring at me, she
finished peeling off her gloves and slapped them on my desk.

Long red fingernails,
sharp.

“I ASK you a
question,” she said.

“What was that?”

“Just who in hell do
you think you are, anyhow?”

I thought, better not
saying anything. Nothing. I didn't.

“Well, don't just sit
there. Say something.”

From the look in her
eyes, I had a hunch, despite what Stella's note said, she had talked to Stella,
knew everything.

She put her hands on
her hips. “I'm waiting.”

I leaned back in my
chair and put my hands on top of my head. “Is this what they call the direct
approach?”

“Up yours, buddy.” She
tapped her foot like she was waiting for a bus. She looked around the office.
“I'm waiting for an explanation!”

“Why are you yelling?”

Her nostrils flared,
her eyes narrowed, she stabbed the top of my desk with her fingernails. “I'm
not yelling.”

I stretched my arms
and yawned.

“Tired?” She smirked.

“No, just stretching.”

She spread her fingers
out and leaned forward, “Where were you Friday night?”

I lit a Salem, looked
at her clenched jaw, and thought I better say something. “I was sick.”

“Bastard, bastard,
bastard!” She knocked my in-basket to the floor. “Damn it, damn it, damn it!”
She thumped my desk with clenched fists. “I hate you. I hate you!”

I glanced at my mail
scattered over the floor then looked back at her. Beginning to feel like I had
enough of this, I said between her eyes, “That's enough.”

She widened her eyes,
meek, like she wanting to reconcile, sat in the chair facing my desk, and
crossed her legs. Naked knees gleamed white above black boot.

The silence like a
Cezanne still life, I thought about my before life. Just a few days ago, not
really giving a flying Mallard duck about anything, courting green snakes, cockroaches,
and red toads, I would have told Peggy to take a long walk on a short plank.
But now I wanted to think of tomorrow, and next week and living this thing out.

She changed gears and
simpered, “I just want to know something, Mr. Carr.”

“I know. I know.” I
held my hand up and glanced to the newsroom window. Much slow movement
accompanying binocularly glances our way, I stood and, walking to the window
said, “I didn't feel good,” closed the drapes, added, “Flu or something.”

“Awww, poor thing.”

I returned to my desk,
began picking up in-basket stuff, said, “Really, I felt rotten.”

“Reeaally.” She served
up a more generous portion of leg. “Feeling better?”

“Much.” In-basket back
on my desk, some mail still on the floor, I sat.

She lit a Parliament
and blew the smoke toward the ceiling. “Jack, I can handle a one night stand as
long as you're….” she touched my desk top, “still mine.”

What can you say?

 
“Well?”

“What?”

She smacked the chair
arm. “I want to know where you were all weekend!”

 
I glanced at her eyes then looked away. She
knows. “Look, let's meet later for a drink and talk it over.”

“NO. I don't want no
damn drink and I don't want to meet later.” She puffed her Parliament, crossed
her legs the other way (more leg than boot), and exhaling said, “We're going to
get some things straight, right now, buster.”

I leaned back in my
chair and smiled. “Okay, what are we going to get straight?”

“It's a big laugh to
you isn't it.”

I decided to stick
with my original story. “No, I told you, I was sick.”

“Ha! Why didn't you
answer your phone?” She pressed her lips together in a thin smile like a CIA
movie guy who knows the answer. “Hmm, too sick.”

“I took some medicine …
knocked me out, didn't hear anything.”

She dragged Parliament
and held the smoke in for a good ten seconds then the smoke began to dribble
out through, “All this is because of Snakebite, ‘haint it?”

I took my earlier
advice, say nothing, best to shut up.

She sustained a very
cold stare at me with no end in sight.

Then again, maybe
talk, “Heck no. I told you. I was sick. Flu or something I ate. I think it was
something I ate. Bad shrimp. That's all … look, Peggy, be nice and let's talk
about this some other time, out of the office.”

She lowered her head,
began a no-tear cry, blotted her nose with a tissue. “What do you think we were
doing these past weeks?” She blew her nose.

I thought of just
telling her the truth. No, stay with the sick thing. No, tell her the truth—ours
was a reciprocal use thing in another time. “Peggy look, I'm sorry if you
thought … if I misled … I thought we understood … it was just a reciprocal use
kind of thing.”

Confused, “A what?”

I was never good with
this stuff. “What can I say, I got really plastered Friday night, didn't want
to embarrass you at the party, and that's it.”

She stood and, moving
behind my desk, turned my chair so that she stood between my legs. “Don't you
understand you dummy? I don't care what happened.” She kneeled between my legs
and reached for my fly.

I turned and pushed
her away.

She shot up, smacked
my face with a pretty good right and, looking like a million miles of hot
desert, she'd kill for a sip of water, said, “I knew you were a wimp from the
beginning. That first night, walked away when I was doing ya. Whoever heard of
a real man doing that.”

“Bravo.”

She went to the front
of my desk, “It's not that simple, Mr. Carr. Not by a long, long shot. I am not
accustomed to being treated like some little whore you pick up in a bar.” She
began pulling her gloves on. “Drunk, huh. Sick, huh. Should have stuck with 'it
was something I ate'. I heard about your little escapade. I should think you
could do better than a bar maid.”

I smiled.

“A whore bar maid at
that.” She flared her nostrils.

“Beautiful. Just
beautiful.
Bravura
.” I clapped my hands. “Wonderful.”

“Whore.”

“All depends on the
point of view, doesn't it, Peggy?”

“You're sick. Better
go see a shrink.”

“Funny, I was thinking
the same thing about you.”

Peggy flipped her
gloved right middle finger in my face. “Kiss off, fancy pants. You wanna play
games, we'll play games, buddy boy, I might even call the E.E.O.C.”

Heck’s fire, I
thought, Snakebite, Berry, Big Joe, Stella … the E.E.O.C. sounded like the
Sisters of Mercy. Knowing I shouldn't, I couldn't help it, I laughed.

Peggy tight fitted her
gloves to each finger. “Go ahead, laugh, Mr. Fancy Pants. Maybe from here on
out I'll be the one doing the laughing.”

I wondered at the
marvel of it all, thinking back when this began, Berry's debt to Snakebite, my
stupidity for getting involved with his solution. But how can you know in the
land of busy intersections, faulty red lights, who you're going to run into. I
thought of Gillian. Gillian was worth anything, even this nightmare unfolding
in the full light of my dingy office.

Peggy snatched up her
purse. “Like I said, nobody, not even the great Jack Carr treats Peggy Moore
like a two-bit pickup.” She went to the door and paused, looking back at me,
hunkered down, like a wounded wolverine. “You know, Jack, you ought to be more
careful, there's all kind of things going around these days.”