Dave Zeltserman - Small crimes

He started to walk away, but stopped to tell Jamie to stick with me.

'Make sure he don't go near Pop,' he said.

I watched as he and Duane walked down the hallway. Jamie stood next to me, smirking. When Junior was out of sight, I told Jamie to beat it. He seemed to find something amusing in that and got a good chuckle out of it.

I started in the direction of Manny's room.

'Hey, asshole, where do you think you're going?'

Jamie's smirk grew wider as he put a hand out to stop me. I turned and kicked him hard below the knee with what you'd call in martial arts a front snap-kick. He let out a howl and hopped on one leg, grabbing at his injured knee. Before he could do much else, I took hold of his head and slammed it as hard as I could against the wall. It made a loud clanging noise. He groaned at that. I let go and he slid down the wall. He wasn't out, not entirely, but he wasn't in either. I saw that his head had taken a large chunk out of the wall. If his skull hadn't been as hard as concrete, I probably would've killed him. I looked behind me to make sure no one saw anything and then kept walking.

Taking him out was easier than I would've expected. I guess he didn't expect me to do anything. I guess over the years he had gotten used to people just pissing in their pants at the sight of him. This time, though, it looked like I left him pissing in his own pants.

It was a few minutes past seven. I got to Manny's room and found him alone. He was sleeping with his mouth wide open, and as he breathed, he made thin grunting noises. What was lying there was only the skin and bones of what used to be Manny. It was as if all his flesh had been sucked out of him. Yet there was enough of him left to screw me over. All I could think of was why he couldn't just die already.

I was watching him from the doorway when a nurse I hadn't seen before squeezed past me.

'Visiting hours are over,' she said, shooting me back an annoyed look.

"That's okay. I was really trying to find Charlotte.'

'Charlotte Boyd?'

'Yes.'

'Her shift's over. I think she headed home.'

I thanked her. I took a few steps away from the door and watched for a moment as she took Manny's pulse, and then got out of there. Jamie was still sitting on the floor when I walked by, but he had company; a nurse and a doctor were checking him out. He looked up, but I don't think he recognized me. I don't think he knew what planet he was on. I kept going. A security guard ran past me while I walked out of the hallway.

No one bothered to stop me as I made my way through the hospital and out to my car. As I drove to Charlotte's apartment, I thought about Junior. I couldn't make up my mind whether he was putting on an act or not. He seemed convincing about not knowing I'd been shot at. I had to think if he had shot at me he would have found a way to rub my nose in it. But if he didn't take those shots at me, somebody else did. I couldn't imagine Dan doing it. If he had decided to go to his Plan B, he'd find an easier and less public way to take me out. And I couldn't imagine Phil doing it either. No matter how strongly he might hate me, I couldn't imagine him doing something like that. And it made no sense, especially if he expected to crack Manny and have me locked away for life. His daughter, Clara, though…

Yeah, she was another story. There was so much rage still in her. When I saw her in church, she was chalk white and trembling with it. I could see her trying something like that, or maybe talking a friend into it. I could see her playing up the attempted rape and showing off her bruises, and getting some dumb football type worked up enough to try blowing my head off. It could've been something like that…

Or it could've been a friend or family member of one of the boys I'd put in the hospital. Other names popped into my head, names of people who I knew would have no problem taking a shot at me.

Over the years I've learned to trust my first gut feeling, and usually nine times out of ten it's been right. But the more I thought about it, the more the shooting smelled like something an amateur would try. Someone would've had to park and wait by the curb until I was visible through a window. It was still possible Junior did it, but I was beginning to have my doubts.

As far as the affidavit went, I had been expecting something like that ever since I shot my mouth off. I knew it was a mistake as soon as I said anything to Manny about Ferguson's murder. I knew it, but I couldn't help myself. Maybe I was a little hurt that Earl went along with it, but I could understand it. Junior probably offered to lower his weekly take. P couldn't blame Earl. The only person I had to blame was myself. I never should have said a word to Manny about trying to wrap Junior up with Ferguson's murder. I knew it at the time, but I let him get under my skin. My price for that was the affidavit.

I checked several times along the way and saw that Hal Wheely was still following me. I figured it didn't matter. He'd know the apartment complex, but he'd still have no idea who I was seeing there. And I had no plans on being seen with Charlotte anywhere in public.

When I arrived at the Maple Farms apartment complex, I waited until Wheely parked, and then drove behind his car so I would have to walk past him. When I did, I gave him a wave. That pissed him off. He rolled down his window, spat, and then looked away, pretending not to notice me.

I had to ring Charlotte's buzzer several times before she answered. She buzzed me in, and later when she opened her door, looked surprised.

'Joe, you're forty-five minutes early.'

'I've been anxious to see you,' I said, which was mostly true. I couldn't wait any longer.'

'Well – why don't you come in?'

I followed her into her apartment. After sitting down, I asked whether she had any more samples of the allergy medication she'd given me the other day.

'You won't need it,' she said, showing a secretive little smile. I put my cats in a kennel for the night. Joe, I was planning to surprise you and make you dinner. Would that be alright? If you want to go out instead, we could still do that.'

'No, dinner here would be nice. Do you want me to help?'

'Why don't you sit down and relax. You can watch TV if you like, or listen to music. Can I get you a drink? I bought a bottle of Scotch today.'

'Scotch on the rocks would be great.'

She gave me a puzzled look so I explained, 'Scotch with some ice.'

She made me the drink and brought it back to me, and then went into the kitchen to prepare dinner. I brought the drink over to her CD collection and looked at what music she had. It was mostly classical and operas. She did have one of old Frank Sinatra songs, 1940s-era stuff. I settled on that, and after putting it in the CD player, I went back to the loveseat.

I leaned back, stretching out my shoulder muscles, and then took a sip of my drink. The kitchen was open to the living room, and I could see Charlotte pounding chicken breasts with a mallet. She smiled at me when she noticed me looking at her. It was a nice smile. I smiled back.

'What are you making?' I asked.

Looking very pleased with herself, she told me, 'Chicken Cordon Bleu.'

I felt relaxed sitting there. On the surface it was nice, and I guess it was the way some people actually lived; just sitting back and listening to Sinatra as you sipped Scotch and had a pretty woman make you dinner.

Of course, the woman in this case had deep issues and probably bordered on psychotic. But as I sat there, it didn't matter to me. And I had to admit that Charlotte, at least for the moment, was pretty. I'm not saying she was beautiful by any stretch – she wasn't anywhere near in the same league as someone like Toni – but in her own way, she was pretty. Her nervousness was gone and she had fixed herself up and had put on some makeup. Her hair was set so it fell past her shoulders, and she was dressed nicely, wearing black Capri pants and a pink short-sleeve sweater. And again, she had better curves than I would've thought after seeing her in her nurse's uniform. The pants she was wearing made her hips look slender enough that I started daydreaming about what it would be like to take them off her. Maybe her coloring was a bit too pale, and maybe when I looked at her from a certain angle I could see blue veins crisscrossing her temples, but it was okay. It didn't matter. It didn't change the way I was feeling. For a few minutes I almost forgot what I was there for. I almost forgot about her murdering those people.