Bill Pronzini - A Wasteland of Strangers

Talk to Anthony, sure. Pretty soon I’d have to. And he’d probably go ballistic, same as Daddy would when he found out. All Anthony cared about was cars, fast cars, and going down to Sears Point to watch the Formula One races and getting high and getting into my pants whenever I’d let him. It was his fault as much as mine, but would that matter to him? Would he want to marry me? And if he didn’t, what was I gonna do then?

Total crap at seventeen. If I was really pregnant.

Two missed periods now, and throwing-up sick two mornings this week. Sure I was pregnant.

That’s what I was thinking when the Porsche pulled in and this huge guy got out of it. I mean, really huge. Pretty old, around forty, with pocks and a scar on his chin and a head like a carved rock. Anthony and Mateo were staring at him, too, and it was plain they didn’t like what they saw. As if he was there to give them a hassle or something, when all he wanted was to buy some gas. He wasn’t paying any attention to any of us as he unhooked the hose and stuck the nozzle into the tank.

Anthony said, “Man, will you look at him.”

“Ugly fucker,” Mateo said. “Wonder if he’s tough as he looks.”

“Why don’t you go find out, man?”

“Yeah.”

“So why don’t you?”

“Shit, man, I can’t just go pop the dude, can I?”

“Think you could take him?”

“If I had to. Yeah, sure, I’m big enough. Look at that face, man. Makes you want to bust it up some more, don’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“Face like that... man, you just want to smash it. You know what I’m saying?”

“Like that Cisneros dude down in Southport.”

“Yeah, like him. Ugly puto like that... what’s he doing around here?”

“Go ask him, man.”

“Freak him. I don’t care what he’s doing here, man.”

I quit listening to them. Stupid talk. I don’t know what’s the matter with guys sometimes. Wanting to beat up somebody just because of the way they look. A person can’t help it if they’re ugly or deformed or something, can they? And don’t they have the right not to be hassled, same as everybody else?

Anthony isn’t always such a macho jerk. Only when he’s with his buddies, and worst of all when he’s with Mateo. His brother’s three years older and a total asshole. Always strutting around and starting trouble. Once, when a bunch of us were partying at Nucooee Point, he put his hand up my skirt and tried to tear my panties off — he was drunk on Green Death, that ale from up in Washington, and he’s even more of a pig when he’s ripped — and I practically had to scream rape before he let me alone. I told Anthony about it and he just laughed. As far as he’s concerned, Mateo never does anything wrong. Mateo could blow up the courthouse and Anthony would probably think it was a cool thing to do.

So the huge guy finished pumping his gas and came over to pay Mateo for it. Mateo gave his badass sneer and said something I didn’t hear and Anthony laughed. The huge guy looked at them, one and then the other, not saying a word. Anthony stopped laughing and Mateo stopped sneering, just like that. So then the huge guy reached out and tucked a ten-dollar bill into Mateo’s shirt pocket, hard and with a sneer of his own, and Mateo didn’t move or say a word. Not then and not until the Porsche’s engine roared and its tires laid rubber as it went zooming out of the station.

Then Macho Man gave the finger, jabbing it into the air half a dozen times, and yelled, “¡Carajo! Vete al carajo! Tu madre!” at the top of his voice.

“You should’ve popped him, man,” Anthony said.

“Yeah. Next time I see him I’ll break his ugly fuckin’ head with a fuckin’ tire iron.”

I said, “Only if you sneak up behind him in a dark alley.”

He raked me with his eyes. “What’d you say?”

“He didn’t do anything to you.”

“Came in here with a chip on. Tough guy.”

“No, he didn’t.”

Anthony said, “You saw the way the dude looked at us. Mean, man, like he wanted to break our heads.”

“Why don’t you grow up, Anthony.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

“Say that again, Trish, I’ll bust your lip.”

“Now who’s being mean?”

“I’m telling you, man. Go bitch on me and I’ll pop you.”

I’m pregnant! I’m gonna have your kid!

I felt like screaming the words at him. But I didn’t, because then maybe he really would smack me. He’d never laid a hand on me before, but there’s always a first time. His eyes were hot and squinty, his face all scrunched up like a little boy getting ready to throw a tantrum. I’ve always thought Anthony’s the handsomest hunk in Pomo and that I was, like, beyond lucky when he first asked me out; I practically wet my pants the first time he kissed me. But he didn’t look handsome now. He looked mean, like he’d accused the Porsche guy of being. And a lot uglier, somehow.

Funny, but all of a sudden I wasn’t so sure I wanted him to marry me. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to keep on being with him, whether or not I had his damn baby.

Storm’s eyes were all over the strange beast as soon as it lumbered into Gunderson’s Lounge. When it settled its hairy bulk at the other end of the bar, she shifted slightly on her stool so she could keep watching it without turning her head. Large, the way she liked ’em. Large and unsightly and endowed, no doubt, with no more than two active brain cells. What did she talk to them about afterward? Or were her postcoital conversations limited to contented sighs on her part, satisfied animal grunts and purrs on theirs?

You’ll never know, Kent.

No Stormy nights for you, bucko — past, present, or future.

I lit a weed and studied my glass through the smoke. One more swallow to savor and on to the next. Dry martinis, the universal salve. The good folks at AA tell you that if you can’t imagine a world without booze, you’re a major-league alcoholic. I couldn’t imagine a universe without booze. So what did that make me?

I knew what it made me, yes indeedy. My own brain cells pickled and expiring in daily droves. Ah, but there were still plenty left — too many, as a matter of fact. And the too many too active.

“How about another?” I asked Storm.

“No, I don’t think so.” Still staring at the Incredible Hulk who had wandered in out of the cold. “You go ahead, Doug.”

“Don’t mind if I do.”

I took the last swallow and signaled to Mike for a refill. He brought it dutifully and quickly; Mike and I have an understanding based on mutual need. His, of course, being filthy lucre.

When I had it cozily in hand and a third of the salve working its warm way into the Kent depths I said, “Bigfoot lives.”

“What?”

“Him. Humongous, isn’t he?”

“Mmm. He came into the bank today while I was there.”

“Did he now.”

“I wonder who he is.”

“Why don’t you go ask him?”

Out came the tongue to slick her lips. The tip of it stayed out at one corner. I knew that gesture and the sultry expression that went with it; I’d seen them aimed at a dozen different men in the past three years. Never at me, however. The gesture and expression I knew well, but the moist lips and tongue themselves I didn’t know at all and never would. Kent the deprived.

“I’ll bet he’s hung like a horse,” I said.

“Don’t be vulgar.”

I applied more salve. “Sure you won’t have another, pal?”

“I’m sure.” Then, delayed reaction: “Why did you say that?”

“Say what?”

“Call me pal.”

“Why not? We’re drinking buddies, aren’t we?”