Leighton Gage - Every Bitter Thing

“Hang on. You’re in a bar, right? It was ten at night. It was dark. And you notice her hands.”

“Hell, yes, I noticed her hands. I didn’t look at them; I felt them. She wanted to shake on the deal.”

“What deal?”

“I’m getting to that,” Sacca said.

Sacca asked for a cigarette and got one. Then he asked for a Guarana, and Hector went inside to get one from the guards’ canteen. By the time Sacca had finished drinking it, he was back into single tics.

“You’re gonna get me a lawyer, right?”

“I’m going to get you a lawyer,” Silva said. “I promised, didn’t I?”

“Cops don’t always keep their promises.”

“This cop does,” Silva said. “Keep talking.”

“All right, all right, keep your shirt on. So this Maria coughed up the money, the other five grand. Then she asks me if I want to earn more. Sure, I say. How? So she spells it out. It’s Ecstasy. You know Ecstasy? It’s that pill kids take when they go to-”

“I know what Ecstasy is,” Silva said. “Go on.”

“This Ecstasy stuff, she tells me, used to come from Holland, mostly. But now, with a lot of kids there in the States into it, she knows a Dutchman who makes it right there in Miami. And there’s another guy in Sao Paulo who will buy everything she can send him. That’s where I come in.”

“She wants you to carry Ecstasy from Miami to Sao Paulo?”

“Yeah. But there’s a catch. She’s not about to put the stuff in my hands and just let me walk away with it. What’s to prevent me from stealing it, right?”

“Right. So what did she suggest?”

“This: I buy the stuff from her. She can get it really cheap, and she’s already got the guy lined up to buy it. She marks it up fifty percent to me, I mark it up fifty percent to the guy in Sao Paulo, he marks it up a hundred percent to the kids who distribute it in the clubs, and they mark it up god knows how much. Everybody wins.”

“Except the kids who consume it,” Silva said.

“Hey, nobody’s standing with a gun to their heads. It’s a free country, right? They want to take the stuff, it’s their decision.”

“Finish the story.”

“I’m getting there. So she makes the proposition, and there are two problems with it.”

“She might be lying about the numbers, and she might give you sugar pills instead of the real stuff.”

Sacca looked at Silva with something approaching admiration.

“Right. Exactly right. Although, to tell you the truth, I didn’t come up with those problems on my own. While I’m sitting there, turning the deal over in my head, she does it herself. And then she gives me the solutions. She tells me to call somebody in Sao Paulo, anybody I want, and check on the street value of the stuff. That’ll prove she’s not lying about the numbers. She even offers to pay for the call.”

“And to make sure she was selling you the real stuff? How were you going to convince yourself of that?”

“By trying it. She says she’ll meet me at the airport, says I can put my hand in the cookie jar, pick out any pill I want, and pop it. If it works, odds are the other pills are gonna work too. And I don’t hand over the money until I taste the goods.”

“It didn’t worry you that you were only going to try one pill, that she might have mixed some duds along with the real article?”

“I thought about it. But then I thought why should she? That’s like killing the chicken with the gold eggs. She’s talking about a long-term relationship here and, by this time, she knows I’m fixed up with a phony passport that will take me through customs like shit through a snake.”

“And how does she know that?”

“Because I told her, okay? She’s selling the deal to me, and I’m selling me to her. I’m interested, see? If it all checks out, I can make easy money.”

“So you did what she suggested? Called Sao Paulo? Got a fix on the street price?”

“I did. And it was just like she said. And I got to the airport early and met her. Early, so the pill I was gonna pop would have time to work before I paid her the money.”

“And?”

“And she’s got the pills.”

“Which are in containers labeled as vitamins?”

“Yeah, that’s right, labeled as vitamins. I choose one of those containers, break the seal, mix around with my finger, and choose a pill.”

“And?”

“And I popped it.”

“Right there in the airport?”

“Right there in the airport. Anybody who sees me, they think I’m popping a vitamin, right? It was cool. I never had Ecstasy before. I had my MP3 player with me, and I can see why the kids-”

“Get on with it.”

“Okay. So I paid her.”

“How much?”

“A thousand dollars. Not much, but then there weren’t that many pills either. It was gonna be a trial run for both of us.”

“And then?”

“And then she takes back the container I opened, pours the pills into a plastic bag and fills the empty container with some other pills from another bag. ‘What are those?’ I say. ‘Vitamins,’ she says, ‘just an extra precaution. If the Customs guys want a closer look, they’ll stop here instead of opening the two that are sealed.’”

“All right. What happened next?”

“I went through security, which gives me no trouble at all, and I took a seat in the departure lounge. That’s when I saw the cop.”

“Cop? What cop?”

“This detective, from Santo Andre, named Georgio Parente. I didn’t notice him at first because I’ve got the buds from my MP3 player in my ears, listening to Chitaozinho and Xororo and grooving on the music. But then I look up and there’s Parente with some lardass, who must be his wife, and a couple of kids almost as fat as she is. The kids are wearing hats with ears. I practically fell off my chair.”

“Hats with ears?”

“Mickey Mouse ears. I figure Parente took the family to Disney. I put my hand over my face and sink down in my seat like I’m sleeping. Every now and then, I look through my fingers. Parente’s kids are running around yelling and stepping on people’s toes. The other passengers don’t like it a bit. They’re whispering to each other and shooting nasty looks at lardass, who’s got her nose in a magazine and isn’t doing a damn thing to stop it. But Parente is, and he’s got his hands full, so he doesn’t notice me.”

“What makes you think he would have recognized you?”

“He’s busted me three times. The last time wasn’t six months ago.”

“All right. What did you do then?”

“I sat right where I was until they called the flight. By this time, I’m thirsty as hell. That’s another thing that Ecstasy stuff does to you: it makes you thirsty. I’m still buzzed, but I can’t groove on the music because I’m worried about Parente. They call the first-class passengers. They board. Then they call business class. I get up, keep my back to him, and line up. On my way to my seat, I grab a newspaper off the rack. The paper’s in English, and I can’t read a word of it, but I buckle up and hold it in front of my face until we take off. He musta walked right by me on his way to economy.”

Silva had an intimation of what was coming. “You were afraid of running into him during disembarkation?”

“Goddamned right I was. My tic was acting up like you wouldn’t believe. He woulda taken one look at me and known something was up. If he’d asked to see my passport, I woulda been fried. Then they woulda gone through my baggage for sure.”

“So,” Silva said, “you decided to get rid of the evidence.”

“Wouldn’t you? It was the last thing I wanted to do. Those damned pills cost me a grand. But I figured it was either lose them or go down.”