David Putnam - The Replacements

I sat on the bed, dressed in the new clothes Marie had picked up while I slept, and returned Eddie’s stare. “Can you talk?” I asked. “You going to say something soon?” He stared, his eyes big, gut-wrenching big, and filled with innocence. My own inadequacy hung thick in the air. I wanted in the worst way to do something for him now, not later. “You want to go on a trip?” He shook his head “no.” “You wanna go on a trip with Marie?” Caution crept into his expression. He nodded “yes.”

“Good man, so do I.”

The knock at the door interrupted us. I opened the door a crack. A slice of sunlight cut across the room. I had one second to recognize Drago before he shoved his way into the room. “Wait, what are you doing?” I whispered. I didn’t want him scaring Eddie. Drago scared me , and I’m not a traumatized little kid. “Hey, hey, I said you’re gonna scare the kid.” Eddie didn’t cringe as I’d expected him to or crawl away. He sat unmoving, watching us.

“What? Scare this little guy?” Drago took two giant steps over and held up his fist. “Wus, up little bro?” Eddie didn’t smile, but he held up his fist, and Drago knuckle bumped it with his. Drago said, “We’re old pals. Aren’t we, bro?” Drago held up his fist again, and Eddie tapped it again, his head tilted away in shyness.

I guess I had slept through a lot last night. Drago wore relaxed denim pants with an obvious lump around his thigh from the bandage. A huge white and blue football jersey with the numbers “00” draped over his big belly. What else would have fit? The jersey, an improvement over all that pale white flesh with the disgusting tattoos, went a long way to mask his lack of sociability.

Drago stuck his nose in the air and sniffed. “I smell something sweet.”

Marie was right; Drago hadn’t quite evolved from caveman knuckle-dragger to intellectual human. I picked up the bag on the floor and handed him some chocolate cakes and two chocolate milks.

He took them and sat on the bed, almost capsizing it. “Cool, man. Little Debbie cupcakes. Haven’t had these in…in goin’ on twelve years.” He tore open the first one and shoved the whole thing in his mouth.

“You know, if you chew them a little, you might even be able to taste them,” I said.

Drago stopped eating, and tearing open the next package, looked as if I’d slapped him. Eddie smiled, slid off the bed, and came over to me. He put his hand up and pulled down the goodie bag. He took out a Little Debbie cupcake, went back to his nest, and burrowed back in. Drago looked at Eddie then at me and smiled. He continued to munch as he opened the chocolate milk. He spoke around the now black load of mush in his cavernous mouth. “Hey, our job just got easier.”

“What are you talking about now?”

“Talked to a bro of mine. He said the FBI has a pole camera pointed right at the front of the clubhouse. They’re watchin’ the SS, it’s some kinda RICO investigation.”

“Are you kidding me? How does that help us? It means the job’s off. We can’t go in with the FBI watching. And what are you doing calling friends and asking about the clubhouse? You tipped our hand.”

Why had I not thought that the FBI would be watching the clubhouse? Of course they were. It’s what I would’ve done had I wanted to use Drago as a staked goat.

“Man, you need to take a chill pill. Everything’s cool, trust me.”

I should never have lain down to sleep. In that short time the plan had gotten away from me. “Take a chill pill? Explain to me how you think this is going to go down with the Feds watching?”

Drago looked at Eddie. I stood there stunned that Drago had the sense to be concerned about the child in the room. More stunned that I hadn’t seen the error before Drago had.

I nodded toward the bathroom. Drago struggled to his feet. The mattress righted itself but still had a huge dent where he’d been sitting. He took the goodie bag from me and led us the short distance into the bathroom. He filled the bathroom with his bulk, leaving little room for me. I had to shove in to get the door past me to close it. He took out a bag of Doritos Cool Ranch chips, tore them open, and dumped half in his mouth, spilling little shards down his front. I waited for the grinding machine to process the food before he could talk.

“I don’t see how you think this is a bad thing,” Drago said. “If the Feebies are watching the clubhouse, then the boys aren’t going to pull any shit when we drive up.” He stopped eating and sniffed the air, leaned over and sniffed me. He flashed a broad smile. “You two just don’t give up, do you? Any chance you get, you just get after it, don’t you? Man, I’m jealous.”

I ignored that last part. “We? You’re not going. You never were going.” Originally, Marie and I were going to try and bluff our way in wearing the FBI insignia and yelling that we had a search warrant.

Drago opened his mouth wide, more bits of Doritos dropped onto his chest. “Whoa, there, my Negro cowboy. If Drago’s not goin’ in, then no one’s goin’ in.”

“I’m confused here, my Aryan brother. How, in your pea brain, did you think you were goin’ to make your Sons of Satan friends think you were an FBI agent?”

“They’re not my friends.”

But my question caught, made him think. I could see it in his eyes. “I could lay down in the backseat and-”

“And what, sneak in when no one’s looking? No, the deal’s cheesed, we’re done.”

Someone knocked on the bathroom door loud and high up. Not Eddie, for sure. I opened the door, expecting to see Marie.

John Mack had his hand in the air about to knock again.

Mack peeked around me at the hulk. “You two reliving a little bit of that prison love?”

I ventured out cautiously, half expecting to see a squad of cops behind Mack, ready to take down the federal fugitive who came back to kidnap more children and spark fear in every household in America. What was he doing here? How had he found us? He didn’t know where we were. We were supposed to meet in two hours on Hospitality Lane.

“How did you find us?” I asked.

He slugged me in the stomach, hard. I bent over, choked and gasped and fought to keep down my Sno Balls and chocolate milk. Drago pushed by me, his big paws up, going for Mack’s throat. Mack took several steps back, his legs parted in a strong horse stance, hands up, ready to take on the tsunami headed his way. No fear in his expression where there should have been one of impending doom. I rasped, “No, hold it. Don’t.”

They both froze, inches away from grappling. I coughed and choked. “Everyone take a breath and relax.”

Mack leaned around Drago. “I owed you that one and you know it.”

“That right?” Drago asked. “He owe you that?” I nodded.

“Karl Drago, meet Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Detective John Mack.”

Drago didn’t hold out his hand. His eyes narrowed. “A cop? A county cop? Are you kiddin’ me? I hate cops. I mean, I really hate cops.”

“He’s a friend.”

“No cop’s a friend of mine.”

I waddled over to the bed, cradling my stomach, and sat down. Eddie continued to eat his Little Debbie cupcakes as if he always watched adults play their stupid games.

“Where’s Marie?” asked Mack.

“How did you get here?” I asked.

“Drove.”

“Don’t be a smart-ass, how did you find me?”

Mack didn’t need to answer. In an instant, my mind had tracked backward until I came across what happened and realized I had probably subconsciously done it on purpose. I had called John with a burner phone and got Barbara. I didn’t pull the battery or destroy the phone after the call. They had pinged me and got the coordinates. He came to the motel as a sign; he wanted to show me he could be trusted.