Timothy Johnston - The Current

Jeff followed, and Marky stood alone by the raised car, still turning the socket in his fist and saying nothing to his old boss, no Good-bye Mister Burke! Because Jeff had given him a look, a face that said you just be quiet Marky, you don’t need to say good-bye to Mister Burke , and he watched them go into the office and then watched them through the bay windows as they crossed the lot toward the van, good old Mr. Burke, who looked mean and talked mean but wasn’t really mean because he let you work for him in the Plumbing Supply when you were just kids, you and Danny and Jeff, and Danny still lived at home, at the old house in town, not the farmhouse, and Poppa had died and this is how you dry-mop a floor Marky, and this is how you wet-mop a floor , Mr. Burke pushing the mops awhile and then handing them to you and patting you two times on the back to get you going, always two times, one two off you go, and here’s how you clean a window and here’s how you keep the supplies neat on the shelves and here’s what you say if a customer asks you something, you say just one second ma’am or just one second sir while I go get Mister Burke or Danny or Jeff , and all the nice people coming into the Plumbing Supply and saying Heya Marky and Danny always there to show you stuff Mr. Burke wouldn’t show you like how to clean the copper fittings and paint them with the little flux brush, stand back now while I light this torch and don’t ever do this without me Marky, I’m serious, this is just for show , and the hissing gas and the scritch-scritch of the sparky thing and then the WOOSH of the flame and see here how you heat up the joint until the copper turns that bright new penny color and the flux starts to bubble in the seam and then you touch the solder to the seam, see how it just kinda sucks into the joint and when you see the solder all the way around the seam you know the joint is filled and you can stop then and that’s how you sweat copper Marky and don’t ever EVER tell Mister Burke I showed you that, you promise, you swear on a monkey’s uncle?

And you never told Mr. Burke anything Danny said not to, not even the time Holly showed you the jewelry she had in a shoebox in her closet and made you swear you wouldn’t tell a soul and Danny said where’d you get all this and Holly said the mall and Danny said you better be careful and she said I am careful dummy, that’s why it’s here and not in the mall, and later after you went home Danny made you promise all over again not to tell anyone about the jewelry and you said but stealing’s bad Danny, and he said I know it is Marky but telling on people is worse, especially your friends, especially after you promised not to, and after that you didn’t want to go upstairs into Holly’s room anymore…

You never told Mr. Burke anything you promised not to, not about sweating copper in the back room or about Holly’s jewelry, but Mr. Burke got mad anyway, Mr. Burke got so mad and so sad and so quiet after Holly went into the river, and then one day after the sheriff came and asked questions you couldn’t go to the Plumbing Supply any more, you or Danny or Jeff, and Holly was dead, and Danny coming home from the cabin without Wyatt, and Danny so mad too and so quiet, and then going away to Saint Louis and to Houston and to Albuquerque and only coming home at Christmas and some years not even that, poor old Wyatt so sad, he doesn’t understand anything you tell him he just looks at you and he looks at the door and he sniffs all around the house looking for Danny and he lies in his bed, Danny’s bed, and he doesn’t want to play anymore and just let him be, Marky, Momma says, he’s old, and he just lies around old and sad and waiting waiting waiting…

THE GARAGES WERE just something to do—one thing he knew he could wrap up by midmorning, be back up to Rochester before noon to check on her and see if he could take her home. It was something to do other than sitting around going crazy.

Like driving down here with your sheriff’s jacket isn’t crazy. Questioning that poor girl at the station .

“I know what I’m doing.”

I know you know what you’re doing. That’s what scares me .

“Hey, I’m her father—all right?” he said, but she said no more.

At the third and last garage, three miles from the second, he pulled in and parked and walked slowly past the three bay doors, one of them just raising and four or five men at work in there, a face here, a face there, but mostly their backs, their blue mechanic’s shirts. Lug-nut removers shrilling. A radio tuned to country. In the office a redheaded woman sat tapping at her keyboard, squinting at her screen. Thirtyish. On the wall behind her a round clockface set in a small-scale Goodyear tire said ten minutes to ten.

“Hi there how can I help you,” said the woman, and Sutter waited for her to look up.

“Yes, ma’am. I’m here to see the young fella who worked on my car.”

“All right, what’s his name?”

“Well, that’s a good question.” Sutter scratched his head. “I wanna say… Bud?”

“Bud?” She frowned. “There’s no Bud here. How long ago was this?”

“Coupla weeks back.”

“No Bud then, either. There’s never been a Bud worked here since I’ve been here.”

“How long is that?”

“Sir?”

“How long have you worked here.”

“Too long. You sure it was here you had the work done?”

Sutter glanced again at the tire clock. “Well, I’ll just talk to someone else then.”

“All right, who do you want to talk to?”

“A mechanic.”

“Any mechanic?”

“Your best one.”

“Best one? I couldn’t say, sir. It depends on the problem.”

Sutter placed his fingertips lightly on the countertop. He nodded toward the glass door that led to the garage. “How about I just go on in there and talk to one?”

“I’m sorry, sir, customers aren’t allowed, for safety reasons.”

Sutter smiled. “All right.” He lifted his fingertips from the counter. How about just fuck it then, how about that?

Then aloud he said: “How about that young one then, what’s his name.”

“Which young one?”

“I forget his name. The tough one.”

She made the face of guesswork: “Ryan…?”

“That’s him,” Sutter said. “I’ll talk to him.”

She smiled thinly and said, “He might be on break, but I’ll try,” and she picked up her handset and pushed a button and said into the receiver, “Ryan to the front desk, please, Ryan to the front desk,” and through the glass door at the same instant came the same request in electronic echo.

She hung up and regarded him. “There’s coffee there, and chairs.”

“Thanks,” Sutter said and stood where he was. He looked at the tire clock again and checked it against his watch. The woman resumed tapping on her keyboard. Just go back out and walk in there and look each of them in the face and walk out and get in your car, what are they gonna do, call the cops? He’d already turned toward the glass door he’d come in through when the other door opened and a young man walked in wiping his hands in a rag and looking around. No one to see but the woman behind the counter and Sutter, and Sutter’s heart slapping once on his breastbone when he saw the lines on the young man’s face—four neat scab lines running from cheekbone to jaw, like he’d been swiped by a large housecat. The markings gave him a strange, primitive look, like some Indian brave in the making, dressed weirdly in blue shirt and blue Dickies and grease-darkened workboots, and Sutter’s first impulse was to grab the young man by the throat.

“Help you?” the young man said, stepping toward Sutter. ryan stitched in red in the white oval on his shirt.