Charlie Huston - The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death

I stopped for the red light, looked at Jaime.

– Soledad's?

– Her pops, asshole.

– You hooked him up with Harris?

– What? No. You listen to anything? Told you I'm in movies. Old man Nye, he was a professional. Shipping and trade, man. Westline Freight Forwarding, man. That's what he did. You have something going overseas, Pacific Rim, you pay him a fee and he lines up shipping, all the paperwork, even find a buyer for some products. All that shit.

– But how's he? How'd they find him? I mean, why'd they go to a guy like that to smuggle almonds? Why'd they?

The light turned green. I didn't move.

– Why? Asshole, anyone with any savvy knows Westin Nye is the man to go to you got shit that needs to come clean through the Port of Long Beach. That's just smuggler's 101 in this state.

Drivers honked.

– So you worked for him?

– Fuck no. Asshole. I mean him, not you. I mean, he was OK, but he wouldn't let me work for him. No. I only got involved after he bit it.

He turned and flipped off the cars behind us, looked back at me.

– I mean, I never would have had this opportunity if Soledad hadn't asked me to step in after her pops ate his own bullet.

I looked at the road, took my foot from the brake and drove under the banners. The biggest one in red paint, Jenny, I promise I'll never do it again!

Down Gaffy, under crisscrossing phone lines, between once decorative and now weedy palms, past a glut of gas stations and fast-food places and the Ono Hawaiian BBQ, just across from the Payless Supershine Car-wash, but before the Club 111 at the Holiday Inn, Jaime pointed at the curb.

– Here.

And I parked us outside the one-stop shopping opportunity promised at the Bait-n-Liquor.

– Where's the can?

– Around. This is the first stop.

He opened the door and I grabbed his arm.

– I'm not waiting while you get stocked up on Malibu and go all shitfaced on me again.

He looked at my hand.

– Dude, I could just beat the hell out of you if I wanted to.

I didn't let go.

– Yeah. You could. So what?

He pulled his arm free.

– So come in. Fuck do I care. Just keep your mouth shut. Let a man conduct some business.

So I went in with him.

The shop was, as advertised, devoted to both bait and liquor. Although liquor seemed to have the upper hand.

Jaime raised his chin at the old salt central casting had sent up to play the proprietor.

– Homero.

Homero looked away from the screen of the laptop he was playing Free-Cell on, pushed up the brim of his fishing cap and took the pipe from between his teeth.

– Jaime.

He stuck out his hand. Jaime looked at it, took it.

Homero smiled.

– You come down to do some fishing, boy?

Jaime ducked his head.

– No, no, man. Just saying hey. Business, she calls as usual. No leisure.

Homero nodded, waved a fly from in front of his face.

– Sure, man. You want leisure, you got to grow old. No one young should be standing still. Sitting around with a fishing pole in your hand, that's for old men like me. You got to hustle up there, eh? Dog-eat-dog, that business, eh?

– You know it, man. And the more success, the harder you got to work. Everyone, they come for you.

– Gunning for the top dog. Yes, yes.

Homero smiled and nodded.

Jaime shifted from foot to foot.

– Homero, that stuff? You know?

The old man rubbed the stem of his pipe across his lips.

– Yes, yes.

– I need that now. It ready?

Homero tugged at the collar of his baggy V-neck T.

– Yes, yes.

He turned back to the laptop, closed his card game, opened a browser and typed in an address. From beneath the counter he uncoiled a cable and plugged it into the laptop. His index finger slipped across the touch pad as his thumb tapped left-right a few times, and a printer began to whir as the carriage zipped back and forth. The printer clicked twice and went silent and he reached under the counter and came out with a couple pieces of paper.

He held them up, both sheets dense with print, and pointed at a bar code.

– They're gonna have to scan this. Your driver gotta show his license, but this is what they're going to scan. OK?

He came from behind the counter and passed the papers to Jaime.

Jaime took them and folded them in half.

– That other thing?

Homero nodded and walked to a row of Styrofoam coolers sitting on upended milk crates down one wall of the shop.

He waved me aside.

– Make way, make way.

I scooted and he shuffled past, down the row of coolers to the last one.

He took the lid off and set it aside and looked back down the shop at Jaime.

– You talk to your mama?

Jaime was staring at the rum bottles behind the counter, he kept staring at them.

– Sure. All the time.

The old man stuck his hand into the cooler.

– Good. You're a good son.

He pulled his hand from the cooler, the tentacles of a small squid wrapped around his wrist, a plastic bag dripping water between his fingers.

– Your mama, she take care of you, then you take care of your mama. So many sons, they don't know that.

He peeled the squid free, looked at me.

– For the sharks. Gray smoothhound. Leopard.

He dropped the squid back inside the cooler.

– Maybe for guitarfish.

He put the lid back on the cooler and came back to the front of the store with the dripping bag.

I made way for him and he walked past, wiping one hand on his T.

– Or mackerel. A nice bloody piece of mackerel for rays and for sharks.

He circled back around the counter, untwisting the neck of the bag.

– Jaime, what did I teach you for croaker? When your mama left you with me? What did I teach you?

Jaime never stopped looking at the booze.

– Mussels. Bloodworms. Ghost shrimp. Live ghost shrimp for croaker.

Homero smiled, putting a hand inside the bag and coming out with a zippered vinyl bank envelope.

– Mussels are easiest. Dig them up.

He showed Jaime the envelope.

– But ghost shrimp are best.

Jaime reached for the envelope, the old man pulled it back.

– Still owe a hundred.

Jaime knuckled the corner of his mouth.

– Gave you a grand.

– Yes, yes. Paid the grand. That was for the paperwork.

He nodded at the cooler full of squid.

– For storage, it's another hundred.

Jaime looked at me.

– You got a C?

– What?

– You want this deal greenlighted or what? I need a hundred fucking dollars.

I went in my pocket for what was left of the cash Po Sin had paid me the last couple days, what I hadn't spent or given to Chev.

– I got seventy-nine and some change.

I walked over and dropped it on the counter. Jaime looked at it, looked at the old man.

The old man shrugged and handed Jaime the envelope.

– You owe me the rest.

He scooped the money from the counter.

– Don't forget, ghost shrimp for croaker.

Jaime headed for the door, I followed.

Homero opened his cash register to put the money inside.

– And tell your mama I said hi.

Jaime pushed out the door, mouth closed, waiting for me at the truck until I unlocked his door. He jerked it open and climbed in.

I walked around and got in and put the key in the ignition.

– Uncle or something?

He shook his head.

– Mom's first pimp.

He looked at me.

– Croaker is the worst fucking fish in the world. Rather eat shit.

He looked out the window at the old man waving from inside the shop.

– Rather eat shit like a fucking dog.

– What went wrong?