“Channel locks.”
“Whatever,” Ed said, waving his hand.
Earl grabbed the big pair of blue-handled channel locks from one of the side pockets. Bending over the body once more, he went to work on the teeth.
“Man, this is
nasty
. Some of these teeth are crumbling like chalk,” Earl muttered. “All those years of crank, man. These teeth are fucked up.”
Ed could hear the crunching sound reverberating through his head. “Oh,” he mumbled as he heaved over the side again.
Earl stood and grabbed a rag, careful not to wipe the blood onto his pants. “That's about the best I can do.
There's not much there. Think that's good enough?”
Without looking, Ed stammered, “Yeah, that's good.”
Earl proceeded to the bow, dug through an old milk crate, and returned with four big sinkers.
“What's that for?” asked Ed, wiping his face.
“Weight him down.”
“Well, that won't do. Shit, let's use the anchor.”
“Can't use the anchor.”
“Why not?”
Earl paused for a moment. “My name's on it.”
“What?”
“My name is written on it.”
“You're shitting me! What the hell for?”
“Shit gets ripped off in my neighborhood all the time,” Earl explained.
“The fucking anchor?!”
“Look, them fucking little niâ” He stopped himself and then continued, “Kids in my neighborhood will steal anything!” He began to tie the weights to the body.
Ed watched his brother as he worked. “Jesus, Earl, this fucker's gonna drift all over the bay once he bloats up and that tide gets hold of him. You got any more weights than that?”
“Just these little half-pounders and a handful of three-ouncers.”
“Fuck!” Ed shouted.
“Look, we could always gut him,” Earl suggested.
“Oh man,” replied Ed, on the verge of panic.
“That way he won't bloat up.”
“I can't handle this!”
“Look, Ed, you don't have to do any of it. I'll deal with it. It'll be just like cleanin' a deer.”
“Cleaning a deer?!” Ed shrieked. “Earl, two hours ago you guys were laughing at faggot jokes together and now you're slicing him up like it's nothing. Man, I didn't like the guy, but this fucks me up! I think we've gone over the edge here, Earl!”
“Yeah, Ed, no shit! We've gone way over the edge, but it's survival now, man!” Earl was roaring wildly as tears welled up in his eyes. “That's my best friend lying there, so don't tell me it's nothin'! It fucks me up too. But when I think of that son of a bitch with his dick in my wife's mouth, man, I can slice him. I can slice him, I can smash him! I can beat the fuck out of him! MOTHERFUCKER!” Earl was yelling at the top of his lungs. He was now directing his words toward the corpse. “How could you do that?! You cocksucker! I was always your friend when no one else would be! You shit on me, you fuck!! FUCKER!!!”
Earl raged uncontrollably, tears streaming down his face and snot now dangling from the end of his nose. Ed reached for his brother's arm to calm him just as Earl, with a grunting sob, kicked Donny hard in the ribs. “Fucker,” he muttered one last time under his breath.
The two brothers stood side by side, staring blankly. Each avoided eye contact with the other. Both scanned the horizon, trying to come to grips with it all.
Suddenly, a horrifying gasp erupted from their feet: “HUUAAEGLCHH!”
Donny heaved and gurgled, lurching straight up into a sitting position.
“AAAAYYY!!” Ed screamed.
“HUUAAGHH!!” Donny inhaled loudly and grotesquely as he sucked at the air. He was mumbling in confusion, first staring bug-eyed straight forward, then darting his eyes around. He lifted himself clumsily, looking at his arm where his tattoo used to be and the random weights tied with bailing wire to various points on his semi-naked body. He stared at his bloody fingertips and then at Ed, who was shrieking at the top of his lungs. Then he turned to Earl, who stood frozen and numb, unable to move or speak. Donny tried his best to speak Earl's name through the matted blood in his broken mouth.
“ERWWWLLmmpphh! ERWWWLL!” he sputtered and wobbled. Donny reached to his mouth with his raw fingertips and stumbled backward in a daze. Losing his balance, he staggered, tumbling overboard. Earl lunged forward in an effort to grab him. “Donny!!” he screamed, as his best friend disappeared down into the murky water, leaving a ring of crimson on the surface.
Earl dove in after him. Ed stopped screaming and shouted, “Earl!” as he watched his brother go over the side. Earl popped up, drew a deep breath, and then went down again.
“Earl!” Ed shouted again.
Earl made dive after dive, and Ed noticed that the boat was drifting rapidly away from him.
“Earl!”
His brother saw the boat drifting and began feeling the fatigue. He had been diving the entire time with his tightly laced work boots on. He realized that if he didn't get to the boat soon, he would go down for good in the frigid murk.
Ed started the boat and motored toward his brother. Earl felt his muscles tighten. A shooting pain rushed down his left thigh. To avoid catching Earl in the propeller, Ed shut the boat down just above him and let the vessel drift into position. He grabbed the gaff and extended the bloody hook toward his brother. Earl, now feeling his whole body stiffen up, gave one mighty kick and lunged for the gaff, grabbing it with his right hand. Ed maneuvered him to the stern, anticipating that he would never be able to help him over at the side. Once at the stern, Earl was able to get a foothold on the bottom plate of the lower unit on the out-drive, pushing himself up into a position from which Ed could more easily pull him out of the water. With a forceful heave, Earl fell doubled over on the transom, coughing, shivering, and wet.
“I need to get a swim-step on this bitch,” he belched.
I
t was sunset when Earl's Skipjack pulled into the marina. As they idled into the boat ramp, Ed and Earl's faces were drained and stoic. Earl pulled the boat up to dock, and his brother jumped out and tied off the bowline to the nearest cleat.
“I'll go get the truck,” Earl announced, hopping onto the pressure-treated decking of the launch ramp.
Ed nodded in acknowledgment. As he finished tying off the aft line, he stopped to examine his hand. Things appeared to be pretty much back to normal, though with an occasional optical twitch. He watched pensively as Earl backed the trailer down the ramp, noting the precision of his effort. The two men pulled the boat out of water and drove over to the wash-out area, where they began to clean the cockpit, hull, and gear, as well as flushing the out-drive. Ed stood on the asphalt below as Earl rinsed from inside, occasionally handing over some garbage or equipment for Ed to dispose of or store. A game warden approached.
“Howdy,” the warden said. He was a middle-aged man of moderate height with a wild crop of salt-and-pepper hair protruding out from under his green official
State of California Game Warden
cap. He wore a matching jacket with the same insignia patch on the left breast pocket.
“Howdy,” replied Earl.
“Howdy,” echoed Ed, a bit startled by the man's appearance.
“How'd you fellas do today?”
“Eh, got skunked,” answered Earl matter-of-factly, as he watched the warden eyeball the boat. The warden took note of the blood coming from the scupper.
“Whatcha fishin' for?” he asked, looking at Ed.
“Sturgeon,” answered Ed.
“Sturgeon, huh? If you didn't get nothin', what's all the blood from?”
“Chum.”
Earl was impressed by Ed's quick and calm response.
The warden put his foot up on the trailer to boost himself high enough to look into the boat.
“Well, boys, do you know it ain't legal to chum for sturgeon?” He looked around the vessel and, finally satisfied that there were no fish to account for, he stepped back down. “I'm gonna have to write you both citations. Let me see your licenses.”
Ed and Earl handed over their licenses as the warden began to write tickets. Ed could feel his heart pumping fast but was too fatigued physically to show any sign of panic.
“You know, boys, let me give you some advice. Not only is chumming illegal, but as far as I know, you ain't gonna get shit for sturgeon usin' a bloody chum like that.” He continued writing. “You're just a pissin' in the wind, and today it's gonna be an expensive piss.”
As the warden wrote the tickets, Ed and Earl continued washing the boat, hosing away the blood. Ed removed the second hose from the out-drive flush unit and began rinsing off the hull. When he blasted water at the transom, a small piece of debris resembling a bit of wet brown paper bag hit the ground at his feet. Ed immediately recognized it as the piece of skin from Donny's tattoo, and he looked up in a panic to see Earl staring down in tense recognition. Before either of them could react, the warden walked up with the citations, stepping near the piece of flesh.
“Here you go, boys. Next time, use your heads a bit. Pick up a copy of the California Fish and Game Regulations. You can get one at any bait shop or sporting goods store,” said the warden, adding, “You might wanna talk to some of these old timers around here and get some pointers on sturgeon, cuz like I said, I ain't heard of nobody gettin' nothin' but maybe mud sharks using blood-chum in San Pablo Bay.”
He moved forward and handed over the tickets, then stepped backwards onto the piece of flesh.
“Thanks, sir, I appreciate the information,” responded Earl as humbly as possible.
Earl looked at his brother's face and saw the tension. As the warden walked off, the flesh stuck to the bottom of his shoe. He stopped and lifted his foot. Ed felt suddenly faint and had to struggle to keep his composure, nearly losing control of his bowels. His watch alarm went off, but neither he nor Earl noticed the sound.
BEEEP-BEEEP!
“Jesus Christ!” said the warden, examining the bloody mess hanging from his shoe. He reached down and scraped the flesh off with the tip of his pen. “What the hell is this shit anyway?”
BEEEP-BEEEP!
“That would be pig,” Earl replied.
BEEEP-BEEEP!
“Jesus,” muttered the warden, as the piece of flesh dropped to the ground. He wiped the pen on his pants and started to walk away.
Ed and Earl heard a metallic rattling sound, followed by the familiar panting and clicking of a dog's toenails on asphalt. A large, happy, yellow Labrador bounded in and swooped up the fallen flesh in its mouth, carrying it off with a wag of its sprightly tail. The dog was followed by a dreadlocked young man holding a Frisbee.
“Skipper! Skipper! C'mon, boy. C'mon, Skip!” he shouted, giving a nod of acknowledgment to Ed and Earl when he ran past.
BEEEP-BEEEP!
Earl and Ed stared dumbfounded at the scene. They turned and looked at each other with blank expressions. Ed finally reached down and switched off his watch alarm before heading back to his task. They both worked silently as the sky turned a dark shade of pinkish orange.
O
nce they finished washing the boat, Earl tossed his keys to Ed and instructed, “Here, take the truck and follow me.”
“
Where are you going?”
“We gotta dump his bike.”
“The fucking bike,” Ed remembered.
Earl had had the foresight to snatch Donny's keys when they were disposing of his clothing. He leapt warily onto Donny's motorcycle. Concerned about the possibility of being seen, he rode off in haste, followed by Ed pulling the boat. They drove to a remote pier at the base of the San Rafael Bridge, where they ran the bike off the end of an old delinquent dock. Earl tossed the keys in after it, muttering, “I never did like that piece-of-shit bike.”
The two men climbed into the cab of the truck and drove toward home, neither one saying a word, radio silent, the only sound the low purr of the Ford V8. Ed was deep in thought.
You know how that whole food chain thing is: your whole life always looking out over your shoulder for something to come and gobble you down,
the voice of the large shrimp echoed in his head as the truck rolled back toward El Sobrante.
The leftovers.
*Â *Â *
The truck pulled off the interstate at the Dam Road, passing the
Welcome to El Sobrante
sign. As they approached the old A&W, Ed noted the ominous change in the look of the town, compared to what he had seen in that morning's sunlight. In fact, the whole Dam Road had an eerier vibe in the artificial light. The hair on the back of his neck bristled with the accompanying rush of further memories, triggered by the dark shadows of the familiar landmarks. The words
CHRISTIAN LIFE CENTER
beamed off the marquee just below the defunct Park Theater neon light. Ed felt a chill as he flashed back to one particular night from his younger days.
It was the opening of the new Burt Reynolds film,
White Lightning
, and their father had dropped the two boys off with a couple of friends.
“Now call me when it's over, and I'll come get you. I'll be at the Green Lantern,” their father had told them, as Earl heaved the door shut on the old green Chrysler. “And damnit, quit slamming the gaw'damn door!”
“Okay, Pop, sorry.”
Like most kids in their neighborhood, they knew the number at the Green Lantern Bar by heart, and Friday night was just as much a gathering there for the parents as it was for the youngsters at the Park Theater.
Ed and his buddy Jeff weren't allowed to sit in the back row near Earl and Donny. Instead, they grabbed their Royal Crown Colas and Hot Tamales from the snack bar and headed down to the front, where they were randomly pelted in the back of the head with Jujubes throughout the showing. As Burt Reynolds was pursued in a high-octane, high-speed chase by the sweaty, good-ol'-boy sheriff played by Ned Beaty, the younger boys ran their fingers through their hair to detangle themselves from the sticky candy.