Jillian Abbott's: Queens Noir

“No, Clayton, I’m not Spanish. Shit, will you let me fucking work?”

“Everything okay over here?”

I looked up and saw Vito looming over the table. Vito is a stocky, hairy man who is some kind of low-level mafioso or mafioso-wannabe who owns a few cheap horses and fancies himself a gifted horseplayer.

“Everything’s fine,” I said, scowling at Vito. Much as Clayton was pissing me off, it wasn’t any of Vito’s business. But that’s the thing with these Vito-type guys at the track: What with my being a presentable woman under the age of eighty, a real rarity at Aqueduct, these guys get all protective of me. It might have been vaguely heartwarming if Vito wasn’t so smarmy.

Vito furrowed his monobrow. He was sweating profusely even though it was cool inside the restaurant.

“I’m Vito,” he said, aggressively extending his hand to Clayton, “and you are...?”

“Clayton,” said my soon-to-be-ex paramour, tentatively shaking Vito’s oily paw.

“We all look out for Alice around here,” Vito said.

Go fuck yourself, Vito, I thought, but didn’t say. There might be a time when I needed him for something.

“Oh,” said Clayton, confused, “that’s good. I look out for her too.”

Vito narrowed his already small eyes, looked from me to Clayton and back, then turned on his heels.

“See ya, Vito,” I said as the tubby man headed out of the restaurant, presumably going down to the paddock-viewing area to volubly express his opinions about the contestants in the first race.

A few races passed. I made a nice little score on a mare shipping in from Philadelphia Park. She was trained by some obscure woman trainer, ridden by some obscure apprentice jockey, and had only ever raced at Philadelphia Park, so, in spite of a nice batch of past performances, she was being ignored on the tote board and went off at 14-1. I had $200 on her to win and wheeled her on top of all the logical horses in an exacta. I made out nicely and that put me slightly at ease and reduced some of the Clayton-induced aggravation that had gotten so severe I hadn’t been able to eat my omelette and had started fantasizing about asking Vito to take Clayton out. Not Take Him Out take him out, I didn’t want the guy dead or anything, just put a scare into him. But that would have entailed asking a favor of Vito and I had no interest in establishing that kind of dynamic with that kind of guy.

The fifth race came and I watched with interest to see how the colt Big Fred liked fared. The Todd Pletcher — trained horse Fred hated, who did in fact go off at 1–9, broke alertly from the six hole and tucked nicely just off the pace that was being set by a longshot with early speed. Gang of Seven, the horse Big Fred liked, was at the back of the pack, biding his time. With a quarter of a mile to go, Gang of Seven started making his move four wide, picking off his opponents until he was within spitting distance of the Pletcher horse. Gang of Seven and the Pletcher trainee dueled to the wire and both appeared to get their noses there at the same time.

“Too close to call,” said the track announcer. A few minutes later, the photo was posted and the Pletcher horse had beat Big Fred’s by a whisker.

“I’m a fucking idiot!” I heard Fred cry out from four tables away. I saw him get up and storm out of the restaurant, probably heading to the back patio to chain-smoke and make phone calls to twenty of his closest horseplaying friends, announcing his own idiocy.

“Guy’s got a problem,” Clayton said.

“No he doesn’t,” I replied, aggravated. While it was true that Big Fred had a little trouble with anger management, he was, at heart, a very decent human being.

I got up and walked away, leaving Clayton to stare after me with those dinner plate — sized eyes.

I went down to the paddock, hoping that Clayton wouldn’t follow me. I saw Vito there staring out the big viewing window, his huge belly pressing against the glass. As I went to find a spot as far away as possible from Vito, I craned my neck just to check that Clayton hadn’t followed me. He had. I saw him lumbering around near the betting windows, looking left and right. He’d find me at any minute.

So I did something a little crazy.

“Vito,” I said, coming up behind him.

“Huh?” He turned around.

“Favor?” I asked.

His tiny black eyes glittered. “Anything, baby,” he purred.

I already regretted what I was doing. “Can you scare that guy I was sitting with? Just make him a little nervous? Make him go home?”

Vito’s tiny eyes got bigger, like someone had just dangled a bleeding hunk of filet mignon in front of him.

“You serious?” He stood closer to me.

I had a moment’s hesitation. Then thought of Clayton’s love pronouncements. “Yeah.”

“Sure. Where is he?”

I glanced back and didn’t see Clayton. “Somewhere around here, let’s look.”

Vito lumbered at my side. We searched all around the betting windows of the ground floor, but no Clayton. Then I glanced outside and spotted him standing near an empty bench, hunched and cold and lost-looking under the dove-gray sky.

“There,” I said.

“You got it, baby,” said Vito. Without another word, he marched outside. I saw him accost Clayton. I saw Clayton tilt his head left and right like a confused dog would. I thought of Candy. Later this afternoon, I’d go home to her and just maybe, thanks to Vito, I wouldn’t have to worry about the big oaf turning up with his big eyes and his inane declarations. Me and Candy could have some peace and quiet.

Now Clayton and Vito had come back inside and were walking together. They passed not far from where I was standing. Where was Vito taking him? I figured he’d just say a few choice words and that would be that. But they seemed to be going somewhere.

I followed them at a slight distance. I didn’t really care if Clayton saw me at this point. They went down the escalator and out the front door. Vito was only wearing a thin button-down shirt but he didn’t seem to register the bite of the February air. Clayton pulled his coat up around his ears.

They headed over to the subway platform. I saw Clayton pull out his MetroCard and go through the turnstile. Then he handed his card back to Vito, who went through after him.

What the fuck?

I stopped walking and stayed where I was in the middle of the ramp leading to the turnstiles. The two men were about a hundred yards in front of me but they had their backs to me. There wasn’t anyone else on the platform.

They started raising their voices. I couldn’t hear what was being said. There was wind and a big airplane with its belly low against the sky. Then the sound of an oncoming train and a blur of movement. A body falling down onto the tracks just as the train came. I braced myself for some sort of screeching of brakes. There wasn’t any. The train charged into the station. The doors opened then closed. No one got on or off. The train pulled away. There was just one guy left standing on the platform. He was staring down at the tracks.

My fingers were numb.

I slowly walked up the platform. Found my MetroCard in my coat. Slid it in and went through the turnstile. I walked to the edge and looked down at the tracks. There was an arm separated from the rest of the body. Blood pouring out of the shoulder. The head twisted at an angle you never saw in life. I wasn’t sure how the train conductor had failed to notice. The MTA has been very proud of its new One-Person Train Operation system that requires just one human to run the entire train. Maybe that’s not enough to keep an eye out for falling bodies.

I felt nauseous. I started to black out and then he steadied me, putting his hands at the small of my back.