Stiffed (9 page)

‘You’re a dead man, Red. 
Dead.’

‘I told you I can’t drive,’ I stutter.

‘Everybody can drive.’  He stands back and swipes the gun across the side of my head.

FUCK.

The pain is mild for a nanosecond, then erupts into molten lava.

FUCKITY FUCK.

I cradle my arms round my head.  I’ve no great desire to repeat the feeling of gun metal whacking skull bone.

A
cowboy booted foot lands at warp speed.  I think he must have been trying to kick me over the van.  Instead he’s sent my balls rocketing up into me so that they’re spinning in my eye sockets like slot machine reels.

FFFFUUUUUCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK.

They were still sore from Kate’s heel.  Now they’re indescribable.  Crushed.  Exploded.  Cracked.  Flayed.  Fried.  Throbbing like a pneumatic drill attacking granite.

I
don’t remember dropping to the floor, but there’s gravel pressing into the side of my face.  I’ve one hand on my ear, the other on my crotch.  I’m aware that someone is talking, but I’ve no idea what they’re saying.

I open a watery
eye and look up.  Cowboy is hovering above me, saying something to Jason, who’s standing near the back of the van.

Oh sweet Jesus.  I
don’t know what hurts worse, my head or my balls.

My balls.
  By some considerable margin.  In half an hour they’re going to be swollen to the size of coconuts.  Highly fragile coconuts that are under considerable stress.  The only way I’ll be able to walk is as if I’m sitting on an imaginary horse.  I need a bag of ice and a morphine drip.

Jason steps down off the cu
rb and helps me to my feet.

‘What the fuck
are you doing, you fuckwit?’ he whispers harshly.  ‘Are you trying to get us all killed?’

So much for
sympathy.

He guides me up onto the pavement
that skirts the motel rooms.  Both of my hands are cupped around my manhood, hoping that their presence will somehow leach away the pain.

Cowboy has his back to a
door, the sub-machine pointed at us.  He looks skittish and pissed off.  However, despite all the commotion not one person has shown their face.  Typical.  It’s only a matter of time though and Cowboy knows it.

He knocks on the motel door at the same time
saying: ‘Open the van door, Fat Boy.’

Jason lets go of me and I stagger off to one side,
then teeter back.  How’s this balance thing work again?  Oh, yeah, legs; keep them under the torso.  Maybe it would be better to just drop to the pavement.  Get it over with.  It’s now or in a few moments.

Jason has the doors open.  Paavo is standing in the frame.
  Marino and Junior are lying near to the cab.

‘Don’t try anything stupid, Rambo,’ Cowboy says.  He
raps on the door again.  ‘Come on, Juan, open the fucking door.’

There’s no response from inside.

‘Fuck,’ Cowboy mumbles.  ‘Fucking wetback.’

He fishes a keycard from the back pocket of his jeans.  He tries to slot it into the card reader
while keeping his attention fixed on us.  Eventually he turns slightly to glance at the lock, slotting the card home and whipping it back out again, nudging down the door handle with his elbow.  The door cracks open.

In that moment Paavo pounces.  It’s a couple of yards between the van and Cowboy.  Sensing Paavo’s movement,
Cowboy is already starting to turn back, but it’s too late.  Paavo lands just as Cowboy squares up, crashing into him, shoving him back into the door.  As they tumble through into the room, Cowboy’s arm bashes off the door frame, the gun dropping from his grasp.  Thankfully the damn thing doesn’t spark into life.

Paavo and Cowboy are writhing around on the
cheap carpet, their heads close to an empty queen sized bed, its covers ruffled.  Paavo seems to be trying to grab Cowboy’s arms and pin them down.  Cowboy in contrast seems to be trying to punch and kick the Finn.  It’s only a matter of time before Cowboy gets the upper hand and beats Paavo half to death.

Jason pushes me out of the way, scoops up the machine gun and enters the room.  He holds the gun by the barrel, swings it back and then forward as if it’s a bowling ball.  It cracks into the side of Cowboy’s head with a sickening thump.

That had to hurt.  Compared to Jason’s version of cranial assault, Cowboy barely tapped me.  And I’m still reeling.

Cowboy is
out for the count.  When he comes round his head is going to feel like a nuclear explosion has occurred in a confined space.  He and Redneck will be swapping headache stories until they retire.

Paavo rolls off and rises to his feet
.

In general, I’m not a vindictive man.  I can forgive and forget with the best of them. 
Most of the time.  This is not most of the time.  I’ve been shot at, made to drive a car, and hit and drop kicked.  I step forward, swing back my foot and weakly kick Cowboy in the balls, losing my balance so that I topple past him onto the bed.

I’d say that’s a fair swap.
Cowboy got more of a whack to the head, less to the balls.

God
, I could fall asleep here.  No bother.  Smother me in ice and I’d be as happy as a pig in mud.  I close my eyes and feel myself start to slip away, collapsing to nothing but the dull throb of my balls.

‘Tadhg!’
Jason says, shaking my leg.  ‘What the fuck are you doing, man?’

‘Sleeping.’

‘No you’re not. Come on, we’re leaving.’

‘You go.  I’ll stay and mind the place.’

‘Can’t you hear them, man?’

‘Hear what?’

‘The fucking sirens.  Come on!’  He tugs me upright.  ‘Tadhg!’

I can’t hear any
sirens.  All I can hear is a general ringing in my ears mixed with the sound of waves crashing on a shore.

‘Tadhg!’

I stand and follow him to the door practicing a new entry for Monty Python’s Ministry of Silly Walks.  Cowboy is spread-eagled on the floor.  The rest of the room appears to be empty.

Paavo already has the van started.  We close the
motel door behind us and scramble in to the van.  Paavo pulls out at a sedate pace, skirting round the motel building and exiting onto a side road.

A
police cruiser screeches by on the corner, its lights swirling red and blue, its siren howling.  Joe Gerlach to the rescue.  Somebody obviously did see our skirmish outside the motel room.

Damn
.

Paavo drives calmly away. 
God knows whether Jason has managed to kill Cowboy.  There’s no doubt, however, that we still have two dead bodies in the back of the van.

* * *

‘We need to get ice,’ I say, in my head composing a longer list – plus painkillers, fresh underpants, clean clothes, new identities, a way across the border, a week in a health spa.

‘We need to swap vans,’ Paavo replies.

‘We need to check on Annabelle,’ Jason says, ‘then go back and get my stuff.’

Oh
God, Annabelle.

‘Annabelle first,’ Paavo says.

I find my cell phone and call her.  The phone rings out.  I try the landline to the house.  Again no answer.  Paavo has already increased our speed.

I slip the phone into my pocket.

‘Shit,’ Jason mutters.

‘Will you stop playing with that fucking gun,’ I snap, unable to keep the edge out of my voice
, venting some of the stress built up over the last couple of hours and my worry for Annabelle.

‘If I want to play with the fucking gun, I will okay?’ Jason snaps back, twisting the sub-machine gun in his hands.

‘Put the gun on the floor,’ Paavo says.

‘Fuck off, Paavo!  You’re not in charge.’

Great, we’re turning on each other.  We’re strung out, we’re tired and we haven’t got a clue what’s going on.  The easiest people to lash out against are those nearest to us.

‘Look, let’s just calm down,’ I say
, trying to ease the tension.

‘You’re not in charge either,’ Jason cries, waving the gun around.  ‘If it wasn’t for you, we wouldn’t be in this
fucking mess.’

True, but stating it isn’t going to help us. 

‘Nobody’s in charge, Jase, okay.’

Paavo swings the van hard to the left taking a corner too fast,
the wheels screaming, the bodies in the back slamming into the side.  The gun kicks into life, filling the cab with a loud rattle.  Instinctively we all duck, the van swerving to one side, glancing off a parked car with a loud bang and firm judder.  We careen down the road until Paavo gets the van back under control.

There’s a neat row of bullet holes crossing the roof of the cab.

‘Fuck,’ Jason murmurs.

‘Put the gun down,’ Paavo says.

Jason lowers it gently into the foot well.

We continue on in shook-up silence. 
Nothing like a bit of friendly fire to dampen a good argument between friends.

Eventually Jason says, ‘Sorry.  I was being an idiot.’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ I say.  ‘At least you now know how to fire it.  Next time, make sure it’s aimed at the bad guys.’

‘You owe me a new roof,’ Paavo
says, ever the practical Finn.

Jason lets go an enormous fart.

‘I guess there’s no need to open the window given the new air vents,’ I say, pointing up.

Paavo cracks them open anyway.  He’s
right, the stink would fell an elephant.

* * *

‘So, how do we want to do this?’ I ask.

We’ve already driven
slowly past my house and are now parked on the driveway at the front of the Choi’s, the rear of the van facing down the side alley.  There’d been no sign of Annabelle, my abode appearing quiet and empty; nothing out of the ordinary except for the missing pane of glass in the front door. 

Neither Paavo nor Jason reply
.

‘How about we get the Raptor.
  Myself and Paavo go in through the front door, Jason covers the rear with the machine gun.’

‘How about you cover the rear by yourself,’ Jason says.

‘I’ll take the rear,’ Paavo says.

‘No!’ Jason and I say together, making it clear that we both want Paavo to
go in through the front door as point person.  He’s the John McClane character amongst us.  He’s the one with the army training.

‘I’ll take the rear,’ I volunteer.  Plenty of places to hide in the garden if the shit
hits the fan.

Paavo nods his head.  ‘You take the Uzi.  I’ll take the Raptor.’

So that’s what it is.  I should have guessed.  My ability to name a sub-machine gun extends as far as Uzi.  I even know that it was named after the man who invented it – Uziel Gal, a captain in the Israeli army.  It fires bullets and it kills people.  And there my knowledge ends.  I have no desire to know the names of other makes or their specifications.  One is enough.

‘What about me?’ Jason whines.

‘What about you?’ Paavo asks.

‘What weapon am I going to have?’

‘Weight,’ I suggest, seeking some levity.

‘Fuck you, Tadhg.  I’m serious.  What the
hell am I meant to do if bullets start flying?’

‘Run,’ Paavo says.  He means it.

‘You can take the back if you want,’ I offer.  ‘I don’t mind either way.’

‘
Shit,’ Jason mutters and lets another fart rip.

That’s our cue to exit the van and head down the side of the Choi’s house to retrieve the Raptor
from the garage.

* * *

The air is hot and humid.  By late afternoon it’s going to be baking.  If we don’t get rid of Marino and Junior they’re going to slow roast in the hot confines of the van.  I’ve made my way gingerly along a back alley and in through the rear gate to the garden.   

I
take up a position a few yards from the kitchen door in amongst some shrubs, the sun directly overhead.  Thank heavens for the Crusaders cap, the sun is a killer for redheads, we fry in milliseconds.  Become one gigantic freckle.

Jason and Paavo
should be arriving at the front door any second now.  Hopefully what they’re going to find is Annabelle guarding Redneck, the battery on her cell phone run flat and unwilling to answer the landline for fear of having to explain what she is doing in the house.

The backdoor flies open and a woman
in a flowery summer dress and sandals dashes out.  Instinctively I drop the gun and move to intercept her, tackling her around the thighs, sending us both sprawling on the dry grass.

‘Get off!  Help! 
Help!’  She’s hitting me with small, hard fists.

I crawl along her body and clamp a hand over her mouth.