David Levien: Where the dead lay

“To what’s left of the face,” Jean jumped in. “I heard about it. Didn’t catch it though.”

“Damn. Any way for me to get a look?”

Breathing was all that came back across the line.

“C’mon, I’ll be your best friend.”

“Position’s not open.”

“I’ll buy you a year’s subscription to Cat Fancy-”

“Screw off, Behr. I’m divorced, not a dyke.”

“Ah, what’s the difference?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll let you know when I do.” There was a beat of silence. “Come around nine o’clock, night guys will be out at dinner.”

“I’ll bring you the usual-” But she’d hung up the phone.

Terry Schlegel warmed up with one eighty-five on the bench while T. Rex played in the back office of Rubber House. The clang of a socket wrench hitting the cement floor out in the garage bay of the tire change and alignment shop reached him from time to time. After a dozen reps, he re-racked the bar, took a swig of water, and popped a creatine lozenge into his mouth. The shit tasted rancid, like sour orange chemicals, but he was all out of the flavorless powder version. He’d been drinking protein shakes for years to keep the muscle on his light-heavy’s frame, but when he’d passed forty-five he started to feel the need for some extra oomph. He’d never considered juicing though-nothing that would shrink his liver or his ’nads. No thank you. He’d never do anything to mess with his dick. That was an absolute rule. No Viagra, no Cialis, no MaxiDerm-none of that crap. So far there’d been no need, and he planned on keeping it that way. Maybe he was just being superstitious.

Terry added twenty-five-pound plates to the bar and thought about blood and business. It had been a busy time, and it was soon to be busier still. Then Marc Bolan’s voice slid in low and sly over crushed-down guitars.

“Well you’re dirty and sweet, clad in black don’t look back and I love you. You’re dirty and sweet, oh yeah…”

His mind naturally went to Vicky. It was a big song for them back when they started going out twenty-three years ago. An oldie already at the time, but big all the same. She was nineteen, only a few years younger than he was, but it seemed like a lot. She had a little slip of a body back then. The straps of her bra and panties cut white lines against her taut, flat skin, out in his car at what they all called “Penetration Park.” She was a bit more of a cruiser these days, but she still looked good, and after all the shit they’d been through and had beat-getting married and raising the boys and all-he felt a stirring even now. See, he thought, some things you just don’t mess with…

Terry took down his sets one after another, and getting close to done with the bench, he considered the squat rack and whether he should bang out a few. He rolled up his sweatpants and checked his leg. A fat bruise, purple and black, spread over his quad. Maybe he should wait another few days.

The boys. Shit, that thought was enough to take the starch out of him on its own. Raising three wild men, as he had, that was a tricky proposition. It had driven Vicky half to three-quarters crazy already, and they weren’t done yet. You try and look after ’em, shield ’em from the outside elements, he said to her, but they need their exposure too, in order not to turn out like all the other soft pukes around in this day and age. He rolled down the pant leg and loaded the curl bar for skull-crushers.

Kenny, the baby, with his black spiky hair and wiseass grin, would be in high school for another year-that is if he ever made it to class. Not that he seemed in any hurry to graduate on account of all the trim he wheeled out of there. The place was basically a poontang depot for the kid to dip into every week or so when it was time to refresh his stocks. Vicky had pretty much worn herself out yelling at Kenny about his skipping classes. Terry hadn’t gone in for that. Land war in Asia, was what he’d said to her on more than one occasion when she tried to enlist his help on the matter, just something unwinnable you don’t wanna engage in.

Then there was Deanie, the middle man, twenty years old already and always in need of a haircut, and Charlie, his big boy, more fair haired, like his mother, cock diesel at twenty-two, quiet and serious. Time was flying. Hell if it seemed they had any immediate plans to move out again. Why should they? They’d tried it when Deanie had graduated a few years back. They’d gotten a two-bedroom dung hole and filled it with secondhand furniture and beer parties before they realized there was a little thing called “rent,” and it wasn’t interested in waiting for hangovers to wear off before being paid. Terry’d had to go have a little chat with their landlord before the Ukrainian son of a bitch went and got the marshal involved with the eviction, so it turned out to be a short-term experiment for the boys.

Now? Room and board, butler and maid, butter and bread. The boys were pretty teed up, of this there was no doubt. Not that you’d know it from the funk Dean was walking around in. These bitches’ll drive you crazy if you let ’em, he’d told Dean-o a thousand times. But did Dean listen? Nope, he just kept moping around the house. And Charlie, the gang boss, he was strong as a Mack truck, even though he didn’t train much and just stayed in his room most days working the phone and laying plans for god knows what.

Terry didn’t mind. Truth was, he liked having them around where he could keep track of ’em. They were damn good boys. That’s why he was working so hard to build them a business. They were loyal to him, and they stuck together, even in the shit. Everyone knew the Schlegels were thick on the street and if you messed with one of them, you messed with them all. They kept him young and on fire too, the scrappy bastards. They forced him to stay lean and mean and one step ahead of them. Especially mean. That was his biggest edge these days.

He lay down on the bench and began pressing the curl bar up from his forehead, feeling the burn in his triceps, when the door to the main bay swung open, admitting a hot breeze along with the sound of pneumatic wrenches. He saw the upside-down image of Knute the Newt Bohgen filling the door frame.

“Look at you there, ripe for a tea-bagging,” Knute said.

“Try it, motherfucker,” Terry grunted between reps. “See what happens.”

“Don’t tease me.” Knute smiled. He found a stool and lit a cigarette.

“Open a window. Shit. I’m getting healthy, you’re taking me in the other direction.”

“Sorry.” Knute waved at the smoke and cracked the window a little, blowing out a drag.

“You could pick up a weight some time, you know. Wouldn’t kill you,” Terry said.

“Never know. It might,” Knute said. He sucked down another hit and fired his cigarette out the window.

“Probably would.” Terry dropped the bar with a crash. They slapped hands. “You hear something from Financial Gary?” Terry asked.

“Like you said, I didn’t come here for the workout…” Knute bumped his eyebrows and wiggled the partial he had standing in for the front teeth that went missing in a bar brawl long ago.

“And?” Terry asked, appraising his longtime partner. Knute was two years older than he, half a foot shorter, and forty pounds lighter, which would have made him a super lightweight. He had a droopy mustache and a pink scar on his cheek from his time in ISP in Michigan City, which was where the state sent you to disappear. Up there every trip out of the cell was a chance to get shanked, every visit to the yard an opportunity to be opened up. But Knute hadn’t died. Three years in, and now three months back. Those were long, lonely, unproductive years, for them both. A real shit time. But they were getting things back on track. They’d been real eager beavers since Knute’s return.