Dave Zeltserman - Fast Lane

“If I found out I had,” he went on, “I would have no choice but to destroy the bastard, or at least use all the paper’s resources trying. I would feel obligated to hound him incessantly. Publish stories to get the public so incensed they’d as soon hang him as spit on him. Of course, the courts would soon enough feel they had no choice but to go after this bastard, and I’d make sure they did so with a vengeance. In the end, his life wouldn’t be worth a nickel.”

He winked at me. “I’ll tell you, Johnny, it’s a good thing those letters are crap.

* * * * *

God only knows how I sat there. The pounding in my ears had gotten so bad I could barely hear above it. I guess we shook hands, but I couldn’t say for sure. All I really knew was I somehow got out of there without harming anyone. And I don’t think even God could’ve figured that one out.

Leaving the building, I was staggering, a red haze blinding me. Even with my eyes wide open I couldn’t see anything more than shadows. I guess nature works in miraculous ways, because if I could have seen any of those smug goddamned self-important faces, I would have turned them right back into the crap they really were. So I reeled down the street like a stinking drunk, bumping into people along the way, and lucky for all concerned no one made as much as a peep because that would have been all I needed. And in the long run that wouldn’t have done me any good.

I don’t know how I ended up where I did, but whatever self-preservation instinct had blinded and deafened me also delivered me right to that bar.

Of course, there was no truth to those letters. Eddie Braggs had sense enough to know it, and he could’ve asked each of my clients and they’d tell him that. Still, it was another burden to bear. If those letters were sent out to enough people they’d hurt me some. Maybe more than some. And it wouldn’t matter whether there was a word of truth in them. I was going to have to look into it. Sooner or later, I’d find out who was sending them and why.

* * * * *

The pounding in my ears had died down and the haze was all but gone. A glimpse of myself from a mirror behind the bar showed a hard smile frozen onto my face. I tried correcting it and a woman sitting a few bar stools away started laughing. I asked her what was so damned funny.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “You must be having a real bad day. You’re spilling your drink all over yourself.”

I looked down at my hand and she was right. There was a shot glass in it and some of the whiskey was trickling out onto the front of my jacket.

“What’s the matter, your best friend just die or something?”

I gave her a quick look, a real quick one because there wasn’t really much to look at. Nothing except a small redhead who had let herself get bloated from alcohol.

“I just found out,” I remarked, “that I won’t qualify for this year’s Miss America contest. I guess you must have been told the same thing years ago.”

I was sorry as soon as I said it. I guess I was still too rattled to think straight, but that was no reason to be mean to her. She turned away from me, facing straight ahead with her eyes as blank as stones and a hurt look playing on her mouth. I apologized and bought her a drink.

She grudgingly accepted it. “Where have I seen you before?”

“Probably in the Examiner.”

“That’s it, must’ve been in the funny pages. You’re that talking dog who’s always getting dropped on his head. Arf arf.”

“I can’t go anywhere without being recognized by my fans. You got a trick for an old dog?”

“I know who you really are,” she said, slyly. “You’re Johnny Lane, the detective. You really think I’m that bad looking?”

“Not at all,” I lied. “I was too wrapped up in some stuff to see straight. I should be struck dead for being so wrong.”

“Well, in that case,” she said as she moved next to me. She held out her hand and introduced herself as Margo Halloran.

I took her hand and it felt small and warm in mine. Holding it started giving me ideas.

“I was really named Marge,” she continued, showing an easy smile. “But Margo sounds so much more exotic, don’t you think?”

“Doesn’t even begin to do you justice.”

She scrunched up her face and gave me a hard look, trying to decide if I was being insincere. I wasn’t, though. Not at all. I wasn’t trying to make up for before, either. Maybe it was the way she had held onto my hand a good deal longer than was decent. Or maybe after the day I had suffered I didn’t see how I could make it alone. Or maybe a vein had popped in my brain, leaving me witless. Whatever the reason, I wasn’t about to let her looks interfere with me.

She made up her mind that I was just being sweet and her face melted back into an easy relaxed look. “So,” she said. “You find me sexy and desirable?”

“Now, darling, how in the world could I possibly not?”

“That was a pretty nasty crack you made before,” she said, her mouth hardening a little with spite. “What makes you think I like the way you look?”

“How in the world could you possibly not?”

She laughed. She didn’t want to, but couldn’t help herself. From below the bar, I reached over and started rubbing her leg. She froze for a moment and then her leg relaxed, and she put her hand on top of mine.

“Well in that case,” she said, trying pretty badly to look shy, “you can buy me another drink.”

I did just that. Actually it ended up being quite a few drinks. And it didn’t take much convincing on my part to get her to leave with me. Nothing more, really, than raising an eyebrow.

I got my car and drove both of us back to my place. We didn’t say much during the ride, and I don’t think we said a word on getting there. We went straight to the bedroom and silently took our clothes off. And then we went at it. Half way through she fell asleep on me.

I didn’t really appreciate that, but I didn’t let it stop me. When I finished I rolled off and looked down at her; oblivious to the world, with her mouth wide open and snoring like a sick dog. I couldn’t help feeling insulted. What I wanted to do was dump her out into the street in all her glory and let the rest of Colorado take a crack at her. But what I did was put my foot against her side and push until she toppled off the bed. I closed my eyes and eventually felt myself sliding into something cold.

I woke the next morning feeling groggy and stiff. After a while I realized the low moan I was hearing wasn’t coming from me but from the floor on the other side of the bed. I remembered Margo. There was nothing else to do but wake her and get her on her way, so I leaned over and started shaking her. She opened her eyes and slowly sat up, rubbing her neck and grimacing.

She asked how she ended up on the floor.

I shrugged. “You must have tossed yourself over while you were sleeping.”

“How did that happen? You have me bouncing off the walls or something?”

“Yeah, you could say that.”

She made a face as if she were going to sneeze, and instead groaned. “Next time, be a little easier on me. I don’t think my neck could take that again.”

She stood up, all stiff-legged and awkward, and collapsed backwards onto the bed. Rubbing her head with both hands she said, “It looks like it’s too late to be bashful. How was I?”

“Like a doll.”

She turned and gave me a puzzled look, but didn’t say anything. Maybe she picked up the sarcasm in my voice, but decided I was just talking goofy. Anyways, she collapsed back onto the bed and started with the moaning again.

Right then I got my first really clear look at her. The haze and the booze must have screwed up my vision before because I was all wrong about her. There was a lot to look at. Maybe the light in the bar wasn’t flattering for her, or maybe she needed to dry out some from the alcohol, or maybe I was just too damned mad to see straight. Whatever it was, lying there looking at her stretched out on my bed, I could see she was certainly something.