threatening Vic into making full restitution on those St. Louis hospital bonds.
I crack open the passenger door. The evening is oppressive with heat and moisture. “Thanks for the ride, Walter. I’m going to miss your air-conditioning.”
“I’ll miss your hot air. See you tomorrow, pal.”
Hobbling across the warm asphalt, my knee starts to throb. The temperature has to be over ninety. Bruise-blue thunderclouds build in a gray sticky sky.
Good thing I don’t need a left knee to drive. What the hell would I do if I couldn’t captain my camper?
I’m slipping the key into my lock when a vise clamps shut around the back of my neck. The pain is excruciating, then paralyzing, numbness radiating down my spine to the tip of my big toes. A second clamp grabs my belt, lifting me off the ground, my body weightless and disassociated. I feel nothing as I am slammed against my camper’s window.
Under painless pressure, my face and neck are flattened against the glass. Never have I felt so helpless. Like a bug under some kid’s thumb.
Thunder booms in the distance. Remnants of that hurricane. A dead fish smell permeates the tiny amount of warm humid air I’m able to breathe. A gagging fog of bait, blood, and fish guts. Just a hunch, but I think I’m in the grip of Psycho Sam.
“Hello, puke.”
I can see his left shoulder, that skull and crossbones tat. Plus the voice is unique. Real high, like a nine-year- old. But hey, and even if I couldn’t see the shoulder tattoo, even if I didn’t recognize the smell of dead fish or the little league voice, who the hell else could lift and hold me up like this? There’s no doubt I am in the clutches of Psycho Samson Attica, proud owner of fifty thousand dollars in St. Louis hospital bonds, current value forty-five hundred.
“Mr. Attica?”
“I want my money back. Every freaking penny.”
“You’re hurting me, Mr. Attica. And this isn’t going to get your money back.”
“I whip your ass a while, it might. You’ll believe me when I promise to bust your freaking neck. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do if I don’t get back that fifty grand. Understand? I will twirl you by the head, snap your freaking neck like my Momma did her chickens.”
Is that how they kill chickens on the farm? Yuk. I heard Psycho grew up between cornfields, inhaled too much of those chemical fertilizers. But breaking chicken necks?
“Mr. Attica?”
“ Yes?”
“Listen. I understand you’re pissed off. Heck I would be, too. It’s a lot of money.”
Ouch. My face is pressed so hard against the glass, my teeth cut into my cheek. That’s the bad news. The good news, I feel pain again. The numbness is leaving. Little yellow lights pop on and off inside my flattened eyeball.
“It’s difficult to talk like this, Mr. Attica. How about letting me down? Perhaps we can work something out, reach some satisfactory compromise.”
Hey, if it’ll save my life, even keep me out of a wheelchair, I’ll sign a freaking IOU for a million dollars. Why the hell not add Psycho to my long and growing list of creditors?
“Okay, puke,” he says. “But up first, then down.”
Whoa. Suddenly I’m flying, soaring across Shore’s parking lot, the blacktop zipping by beneath me like I was watching out the window of an airplane.
I break the fall with two hands and a body roll, but my crash landing still feels like I fell off a two-story roof. I start checking myself for broken bones, then change my mind. Think I’ll hang quiet here a while on the warm, sun-drenched asphalt. Austin Carr, playing dead.
“Get up and take your beating like a man,” Psycho says, “or I’ll kick you like a dog.”
Tough choice. In fact, I still haven’t made up my mind ten seconds later when I hear another sharp crack of thunder. At least I think it’s thunder. Close enough to rattle the marrow in my bones. Maybe it’s time to say a prayer. Dear God…
“Get your ass out of my parking lot.”
Hey. The new
I crack open the passenger door. The evening is oppressive with heat and moisture. “Thanks for the ride, Walter. I’m going to miss your air-conditioning.”
“I’ll miss your hot air. See you tomorrow, pal.”
Hobbling across the warm asphalt, my knee starts to throb. The temperature has to be over ninety. Bruise-blue thunderclouds build in a gray sticky sky.
Good thing I don’t need a left knee to drive. What the hell would I do if I couldn’t captain my camper?
I’m slipping the key into my lock when a vise clamps shut around the back of my neck. The pain is excruciating, then paralyzing, numbness radiating down my spine to the tip of my big toes. A second clamp grabs my belt, lifting me off the ground, my body weightless and disassociated. I feel nothing as I am slammed against my camper’s window.
Under painless pressure, my face and neck are flattened against the glass. Never have I felt so helpless. Like a bug under some kid’s thumb.
Thunder booms in the distance. Remnants of that hurricane. A dead fish smell permeates the tiny amount of warm humid air I’m able to breathe. A gagging fog of bait, blood, and fish guts. Just a hunch, but I think I’m in the grip of Psycho Sam.
“Hello, puke.”
I can see his left shoulder, that skull and crossbones tat. Plus the voice is unique. Real high, like a nine-year- old. But hey, and even if I couldn’t see the shoulder tattoo, even if I didn’t recognize the smell of dead fish or the little league voice, who the hell else could lift and hold me up like this? There’s no doubt I am in the clutches of Psycho Samson Attica, proud owner of fifty thousand dollars in St. Louis hospital bonds, current value forty-five hundred.
“Mr. Attica?”
“I want my money back. Every freaking penny.”
“You’re hurting me, Mr. Attica. And this isn’t going to get your money back.”
“I whip your ass a while, it might. You’ll believe me when I promise to bust your freaking neck. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do if I don’t get back that fifty grand. Understand? I will twirl you by the head, snap your freaking neck like my Momma did her chickens.”
Is that how they kill chickens on the farm? Yuk. I heard Psycho grew up between cornfields, inhaled too much of those chemical fertilizers. But breaking chicken necks?
“Mr. Attica?”
“ Yes?”
“Listen. I understand you’re pissed off. Heck I would be, too. It’s a lot of money.”
Ouch. My face is pressed so hard against the glass, my teeth cut into my cheek. That’s the bad news. The good news, I feel pain again. The numbness is leaving. Little yellow lights pop on and off inside my flattened eyeball.
“It’s difficult to talk like this, Mr. Attica. How about letting me down? Perhaps we can work something out, reach some satisfactory compromise.”
Hey, if it’ll save my life, even keep me out of a wheelchair, I’ll sign a freaking IOU for a million dollars. Why the hell not add Psycho to my long and growing list of creditors?
“Okay, puke,” he says. “But up first, then down.”
Whoa. Suddenly I’m flying, soaring across Shore’s parking lot, the blacktop zipping by beneath me like I was watching out the window of an airplane.
I break the fall with two hands and a body roll, but my crash landing still feels like I fell off a two-story roof. I start checking myself for broken bones, then change my mind. Think I’ll hang quiet here a while on the warm, sun-drenched asphalt. Austin Carr, playing dead.
“Get up and take your beating like a man,” Psycho says, “or I’ll kick you like a dog.”
Tough choice. In fact, I still haven’t made up my mind ten seconds later when I hear another sharp crack of thunder. At least I think it’s thunder. Close enough to rattle the marrow in my bones. Maybe it’s time to say a prayer. Dear God…
“Get your ass out of my parking lot.”
Hey. The new
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