Charlie Huston: Six Bad Things

– Sure.

– And I think I should get you out of here.

– Sure.

He stands up. I hold up my finger.

– Hang on just a sec, I got something for you.

I reach out my burned right hand and pick up the Anaconda. He takes a step back.

– Hank.

The revolver feels like it’s on fire. I point it at his stomach.

– Don’t worry, Timmy. This is gonna hurt me a lot more than it’s gonna hurt you.

And it does hurt. The huge weapon bucks in my hand and the pain flares up my arm. But it probably hurts him more.

A LOUD noise wakes me up.

I’m sitting on Tim’s couch. The TV is on. It’s a cartoon. A Charlie Brown Christmas. It’s the part where Charlie tries to decorate his pitiful tree and it collapses and he thinks he’s killed it, but then his friends come and make it beautiful. It’s the end.

– Hank.

I look at the floor. Tim is sprawled there, a huge hole in his stomach, his hands pressed over it, trying to keep the blood inside, but it’s spilling everywhere. Something is hurting my hand. I look. I’m holding Wade’s Anaconda. I drop it.

– Timmy?

– Oh shit. Oh shit, Hank.

Nonononono.

I slide to the floor.

– Timmy.

– What? Hank? What?

– Oh. Oh. OK, we can. I can.

– Hank. I did.

– What?

– I did what you told me. I did.

– It’s OK, man, just be.

– I went. Ohgodohgodohgod. This guy from, from New York was, I heard this guy was coming. A Russian. Hank, there’s a Russian.

– I know. Shhhh. I know.

– And I did what you said. And I. You told me if anyone came to. You told me.

– I did. I know. It’s OK.

I’m pressing my hands into the wound, but there’s too much of it to cover.

– You told me to get out if anyone came, and I did, I took the money and I.

– Of course you did, you’re a good friend, Timmy, I knew you’d.

– And my beeper. Ohshiiiiiit. I’m such a idiot. You were gonna call my beeper. But.

– It’s OK.

– No.

– OK.

– I’m a idiot and I forgot the, I forgot my beeper.

Tears are pouring out of his eyes, his teeth and tongue and lips are sheened with blood.

– And the news, I saw it, I saw they said you were here in Vegas and.

He breathes a couple times.

– It’s starting not to hurt as much, Hank.

– Good, that’s good.

– You were in Vegas and, but I didn’t know how to find you or call you.

He winces and blood wells up out of his mouth and over his chin. He spits.

– I came back. I came here. I thought. And you were here, Hank, and it was all OK.

– I know. You did what I told you. That’s all, Timmy, you just did what I told you.

– And, Hank. The money, it’s OK.

– No.

– The money is OK.

– Don’t, I don’t wanna.

– No, it’s OK.

– I don’t wanna know, I don’t wanna.

He’s nodding his head up and down, still talking, but there’s no air coming out of his throat anymore. Only blood. He tries to talk through the blood, tries to say words made out of blood, but there’s too much of it.

I COVER Tim with a blanket.

I WILL be the last one to die.

And could it have ever ended any other way?

For the last time, I close my eyes.

I OPEN my eyes.

Something is in my mouth, stuck all the way to the back of my throat. I picture the barrel of Sid’s .45 stuck deep in his mouth, him gagging on the steel. I throw up. Someone pulls my head forward so I puke between my legs, and then the thing is back in my mouth and I puke again. And one more time. I fall back onto the couch, gasping.

– Here.

A glass of water. I spill some in my mouth and swish it around and spit.

– Drink it.

I take a swallow and cough.

– I feel terrible.

– Yes, I would imagine that to be the case.

A voice I don’t know. A Russian voice. I look up.

He’s in his fifties, close-cropped salt-and-pepper hair and beard, an expensive-looking gray suit. He’s wiping the finger he shoved down my throat on a silk handkerchief. He points at Tim’s body.

– Did he tell you where the money is?

– No.

– Hm.

He leans over and looks at my pile of vomit.

– How many pills did you swallow?

– Ten.

He covers his finger with the handkerchief and sifts through the mess.

– Yes, they are all here. That is good.

My guns aren’t on the coffee table anymore. I look around the room.

– I’ve hidden them.

– Kill me.

He drops the handkerchief so that it covers the vomit.

– And waste my efforts? No.

– I need to die.

– No, Henry, you need to live. It is very important that you live.

– Who are you?

– David Dolokhov. I am Mikhail Dolokhov’s uncle.

– I don’t know.

Oh, fuck. I close my eyes.

– Mickey.

– Yes. I am Mickey’s uncle. His father’s brother.

DYLAN IS a liar.

– Dylan Lane is a liar, Henry. He is a debtor and a welsher and a liar and he does not do the things he promises he will do for his partners.

I’m sitting on one of the barstools in front of the kitchen counter. David Dolokhov is making coffee and toast.

– When Dylan needed money for his start-up, he went to the usual places. He went to California, to Sand Hill Road where the venture capitalists are, and asked them for money. But they did not give it to him. So he went to the banks. But he had problems with the SEC and his credit was bad. So he went to his family and friends. But they had given him money before and he had lost all of it. So he came to us. And we gave him the money. And with our money, he was able to attract more money, because money loves money. And at first, we were very happy. His company had an IPO. Very exciting. The stock. The stock, it topped at one sixty-four and one half! We were very happy. But Dylan? He is a greedy man. He is bound by laws of the SEC that prevent him from selling his shares just then, and he is greedy. Rather than using his new leverage to finance a loan to pay us back, what does he do? He uses the leverage to invest in commodities. A long story short, he trades on margin and the market craters and his margins are called and his personal fortune is destroyed. And his company’s own stock becomes valueless. And when we encourage him to sell off the company’s assets to repay our money? There are no assets. The company has been a shell game all along. So now, Dylan Lane is in the shit.

The coffeemaker beeps and he picks up the pot. He pours two cups and hands one to me. I lift it with my unburned left hand and bring it to my lips and sip, feeling the heat radiate into the burns on the right side of my face.

– So now Dylan hustles. He hustles this and he hustles that and he makes just enough as a hustler of this and that to make his interest payments. But he has dreams of being a big man again, and he is always looking for an opportunity to make enough money to pay us back. And then he hears the story of Henry Thompson and the four-and-a-half million dollars. And he comes to me with a proposal. He will, as he says, Buy the debt. But with what I ask? He still has no money. He will buy it, he says, on credit, and pay it off along with his own debt when he has the money.

The toast pops up. He butters it and cuts the slices diagonally and puts them on a plate in front of me.

– Eat.

I take a small bite and chew. It hurts.

– I ask Dylan his plan to get the money and he tells me that he has a man who will watch your parents and tell him if you appear. Well, this is bullshit. This is a bullshit plan. And I tell him no. And he leaves. And then nothing. Until a year passes. And my nephew is killed in Mexico.