Andrew Vachss - Two Trains Running

“And you don’t want to impress me anymore?” Tussy said, smiling.

“I wish I could,” he answered. “Only I know you. And I know a car would never do the trick.”

“Even after I got you to take me to the most expensive restaurant in town?”

“Well, that was like… an adventure, right? It wasn’t how much it cost, it was just that you hadn’t done it before.”

“Yes! And now this,” Tussy said. “I feel like a teenager. I mean, in a car like this-boy, those mufflers are loud-dressed like we are, going to the drive-in…” Her voice trailed away into the silence. “Do you feel like that, too? A little bit?”

“No,” said Dett. “But I don’t look like it, either.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, you do, Tussy. You look like you’re sixteen.”

Tussy pulled a cigarette from her purse, put it in her mouth. Before Dett could react, she reached over and patted his jacket pocket, then extracted his little box of wooden matches. Christ! Dett thought, his mind on what else he was carrying. I didn’t expect that.

“You know what?” Tussy said, thoughtfully, once she got her cigarette going. “If I was sixteen, and my folks were still… with me, I wouldn’t be going to any drive-in.”

“Your father wouldn’t let you?”

“I don’t think he would have. I never asked… never got the chance to ask him. A couple of boys asked me, when I was around fourteen, but I didn’t even dare to mention it. Dad would have hit the ceiling.”

“Nice girls don’t go to drive-ins?”

“I don’t think that was how he felt. He took us, and there were always plenty of girls there. But he never said anything, except…”

“Except what?” Dett asked, as his eyes swept the mirrors for any disturbance in his visual field. He could not have explained what he was looking for, but the years had taught him to rely on his sense impressions, and the scanning habit was now so encoded he wasn’t aware he was doing it.

“Well, he did say that nice girls didn’t wear skirts to a drive-in. I didn’t even know what he meant until I was older.”

“And you’re still taking his advice,” Dett said, nodding at Tussy’s jeans.

“Well, it’s not that,” she said, blushing in the darkness of the front seat. “It’s just more comfortable than a skirt. I should know: I have to wear one every day. But at least they’re nice and loose.”

“The skirts?”

“The waitress skirts. In some places, they make the girls wear tight ones. And you know what happens: men get all… grabby.”

“Where you work?”

“Oh, no. We get a very nice crowd. Families, mostly. Or couples, on dates. Now, my girlfriend-”

“-Gloria?”

“Yes!” she said, laughing softly. “Gloria used to work over at the Blue Moon Lounge. They made her wear these outfits that were just… scandalous, my mother would have called them. Gloria said, some nights, when she got home, she was too sore to sit down, from all the men pinching her.”

“Is that why she quit?”

“No. She was… Well, you have to understand Gloria. I’m not saying she liked strange men pinching her, but she would have been pretty annoyed if none of them even tried. I don’t mean she’s like a… loose woman, or anything, but she likes it when guys notice her.”

“I’ll bet you don’t go out together much.”

“Why would you say that?”

“I know girls like her. Gloria, I mean. It’s like you say, they’re not… sluts, but they want the attention. And, standing next to you, she wouldn’t get any.”

“Oh, stop it! You don’t even know what she looks like.”

“It wouldn’t matter.”

“You make out like I’m Marilyn Monroe or something, Walker.”

“You’re prettier than she is.”

Tussy turned to face Dett’s profile, curling her legs onto the seat so she could move close despite the floor shift lever. “I know I’m not so gorgeous, okay? But I also know you’re not lying. I mean, you mean what you’re saying.”

“You could be on one of those calendars,” Dett said, defensively, looking through the windshield. “You know, like they have in gas stations. I’ve seen plenty of those.”

“You know, a man once asked me to.”

“Be on a calendar?”

“He sure did. Right in the diner. He was a professional photographer. With a business card and everything. He said I’d be perfect for… well, he said ‘glamour shots,’ but I figured out what he really meant.”

“So you didn’t do it?”

“Of course not!”

“Those girls… in the calendars, I mean… they have their clothes on.”

“I didn’t think he was talking about those kind of pictures, Walker.”

“I don’t, either,” Dett said. “I just didn’t want you to think…”

“What?”

“That I was saying… you know.”

“You are the strangest man, Walker Dett. That never even occurred to me. I knew all along what you meant. And it was very sweet.”

Dett exhaled, without realizing he had been holding his breath. “Is up there where we turn off?” he asked.

1959 October 06 Tuesday 19:29

“You sure we can do this on the phone?” Dioguardi said.

“And why not?” Shalare replied. “All I have to tell you is that I spoke with our friend, and he agreed that these petty business disputes are getting in the way of the bigger objective.”

“So he’s going to play ball?”

“I believe that he is. But, first, we have to make a little good-faith offering.”

“What we talked about before?”

“That. And all of that, mind you. The best way to prove you don’t want what another man has is to step away from it.”

“I get it.”

“A big step,” Shalare said. “Right out of his field of vision.”

“I said, I get it,” Dioguardi said, cold-voiced.

“How long to make it happen?”

“No later than tomorrow. There’s people out now, working. I have to wait until they come back to give them the word.”

“That would be lovely, indeed,” Shalare said.

1959 October 06 Tuesday 19:34

“Silk’s not going to be around tonight?” Rufus said to Darryl.

“I could say ‘no,’ brother, but that would be a guess. The man does come around, you know. And the nighttime’s his time.”

“Who gets along with him best?”

“Gets along? None of the men want anything to do with-”

“This is a job, Darryl. Understand?”

“If it’s a job, I’ll do it myself. I’ll take him over to the-”

“Can’t be you, brother.”

“Why not? All you need is for him to be someplace else, right? So, if he shows, I’ll just slide in and-”

“I need you there tonight,” Rufus said. “There’s someone I need you to talk with. I’m going to get him, right now.”

“This the man you don’t want Silk to see?”

“Don’t want him to even know about. Now, who we got to babysit a pimp?”

1959 October 06 Tuesday 19:41

“Where would you like to park?” Dett asked, as he steered the Ford over the pebbled surface toward the giant screen.

“Not too near the refreshment stand,” she said.

“Okay,” Dett said, creeping along in first gear, “is over there too far to the side for you?”

“No, it looks perfect.”

Dett slid into the last spot in a left-side row, rolled down his window halfway, and attached the speaker. As he twirled the knob to make sure it was working, a dull orange Oldsmobile sedan went by, heading down front.

“Would you like anything to eat?”

“Well… I guess I could go for a hamburger. And a Coke.”

“French fries?”

“You know, I serve so many of those-people eat them with everything-I can’t bear to look one in the face. Besides, they’re supposed to be the most fattening food of all.”