Don Winslow - The Power of the Dog

“What?”

“I came here to get away from all that.”

“Then why are you in here?” he asks. Shit, every other song they sing in the place is about all that-about the Troubles, past, present or future. Even now, Joe Burke puts down the flute, picks up the banjo and the band launches into “The Men Behind the Wire”:

“Armoured cars and tanks and guns

Came to take away our sons

But every man will stand behind

The men behind the wire.”

She says, “I don’t know-it’s where the Irish go, isn’t it?”

“There are other places,” he says. “Have you had dinner?”

“I’m here with friends.”

“It'd be okay with them.”

“But not with me.”

Shot down in flames.

Then she says, “Another time, though.”

“Is that 'another time,’ like a polite blow-off?” Callan asks. “Or another time, we make a date?”

“I’m off Thursday night.”

He takes her to an expensive place on Restaurant Row, just outside the Kitchen but well within his and O-Bop’s sphere of influence. Not a piece of clean linen arrives in this place without him and O-Bop give it the pass, the fire inspector don’t notice that the back door stays locked, a beat cop always finds it convenient to stroll past the place and show the colors, and sometimes a few cases of whiskey come straight off the truck without the hassle of an invoice, so Callan gets a prime table and attentive service.

“Jesus,” Siobhan asks as she scans the menu. “Can you afford this?”

“Yeah.”

“What do you do?” she asks. “For work?”

Which is an awkward question.

“This and that.”

“This” being labor racketeering, loan-sharking and contract murder; “that” being dope.

“It must be lucrative,” she says, “this and that.”

He thinks she’s maybe going to get up and walk out right then, but instead she orders the fillet of sole. Callan don’t know shit about wine, but he stopped by the restaurant that afternoon and let it be known that whatever the girl orders, the wine steward should bring the right bottle.

He does.

Compliments of the house.

Siobhan gives Callan a funny look.

“I do some work for them,” Callan explains.

“This and that.”

“Yeah.”

He gets up a few minutes later to go to the bathroom, finds the manager and says, “Look, I want the check, okay?”

“Sean, the owner would fucking kill me if I gave you a check.”

Because this isn’t the deal. The deal is, whenever Sean Callan and Stevie O'Leary come in they eat and no check appears and they leave a heavy cash tip for the waiter. That is just understood, just like it’s understood that they don’t come in too often, but spread their visits around the places on Restaurant Row.

He’s nervous-he don’t go out on a lot of dates, and when he does usually it’s to the Gloc or the Liffey and if they eat at all it’s a burger or maybe some lamb stew and they usually just get shit-faced and stagger back and screw and don’t hardly remember it. He only comes into a place like this on business, to-as O-Bop puts it-show the flag.

“That,” she says, wiping the final remnants of chocolate mousse off her lips, “was the best meal I’ve ever had in my entire life.”

The bill comes and it’s a fucking whopper.

When Callan looks at it he don’t know how the average guy can afford to live. He pulls a wad of bills from his pocket and lays them on the tray. This gets him another curious look from Siobhan.

Still, he’s surprised when she takes him to her apartment and leads him straight into the bedroom. She pulls her sweater over her head and shakes her hair out, then reaches behind herself to unsnap her bra. Then she kicks off her shoes, steps out of her jeans and gets under the covers.

“You still have your socks on,” Callan says.

“My feet are still cold,” she says. “Are you coming in?”

He strips down to his underwear and waits until he’s under the sheets to take off his shorts. She guides him inside her. She comes quickly, and when he’s about to come he tries to pull out, but she locks her legs around him and won’t let him. “It’s okay, I’m on the Pill. I want you to come in me.”

Then she rolls her hips and that settles it.

In the morning she gets up to go to confession. Otherwise, she tells him, she can’t take Communion on Sunday.

“Are you going to confess us?” he asks.

“Of course.”

“Are you going to promise not to do it again?” he asks, half-afraid the answer will be yes.

“I wouldn’t lie to a priest,” she says. Then she’s out the door. He falls back asleep. Wakes up when he feels her get back in bed with him. But when he reaches for her, she refuses him, telling him that he’ll have to wait until after Mass tomorrow because her soul has to be clean to take Communion.

Catholic girls, Callan thinks.

He takes her to midnight Mass.

Pretty soon they’re together most of the time.

Too much of the time, according to O-Bop.

Then they move in together. The actress Siobhan has been subletting from comes back from her tour, and Siobhan has to find a place to live, which is not easy in New York on what a waitress makes, so Callan suggests she just move in with him.

“I don’t know,” she says. “That’s a big step.”

“We sleep together almost every night anyway.”

“Almost being the operative word there.”

“You’ll end up living in Brooklyn.”

“Brooklyn’s okay.”

“It’s okay, but it’s a long subway ride.”

“You really want me to move in with you.”

“I really want you to move in with me.”

The problem is, his place is a shit hole. A third-floor walk-up on Forty-sixth and Eleventh. One room and a bath. He’s got a bed, a chair, a TV, an oven he’s never turned on and a microwave.

“You make how much money?” Peaches asks. “And you live like this?”

“It’s all I need.”

Except now it isn’t, so he starts looking for another place.

He’s thinking about the Upper West Side.

O-Bop don’t like it. “It wouldn’t look good,” he says, “you leaving the neighborhood.”

“There’s no good places left here,” Callan says. “Everything’s taken.”

Turns out that’s not true. O-Bop drops a word to a few building managers, some deposits get returned and four or five nice apartments become available for Callan to choose from. He picks a place on Fiftieth and Twelfth with a small balcony and a view of the Hudson.

He and Siobhan start playing house.

She starts buying stuff for the place-blankets and sheets and pillows and towels and all the female shit for the bathroom. And pots and pans and dishes and dishcloths and shit, which freaks him out at first but then he kind of likes it.

“We could eat at home more,” she says, “and save a lot of money.”

“Eat at home more?” he asks. “We don’t eat at home at all.”

“That’s what I mean,” she says. “It adds up. We spend a fortune we could be saving.”

“Saving for what?”

He don’t get it.

Peaches sets him straight. “Men live in the now. Eat now, drink now, get laid now. We’re not thinking about the next meal, the next drink, the next fuck-we’re just happy now. Women live in the future-and this you better learn, you dumb mick: The woman is always building the nest. Everything she does, what she’s really doing is gathering twigs and leaves and shit for the nest. And the nest is not for you, paisan. The nest is not even for her. The nest is for the bambino.”

So Siobhan starts cooking more and at first he don’t like it-he misses the crowds and the noise and the chatter-but then he gets to liking it. Likes the quiet, likes looking at her as she eats and reads the paper, likes wiping the dishes.