Tim Dorsey - Hammerhead Ranch Motel

“Only when I have to.”

“I mean for fun,” said Lenny. “You know, you want to break the routine, so you drive across town and check into a seedy motel and pretend you’re on the run. Act mysterious, arouse people’s suspicions, maybe rock star the room. There’s a lot of style you can put into being a fugitive. It’s a damn American art form!”

“Turn here, David Janssen.”

“Where?”

“Here!”

Lenny checked his watch as Serge sprinted in and out of the video store and vaulted back into the passenger seat without opening the door. “Two minutes, eight seconds,” said Lenny.

“Gotta get it down under a deuce,” said Serge.

They skidded into the parking lot of a thrift store, and Serge raced in. Two minutes later, he hurdled back into the car and threw a T-shirt in Lenny’s face. Lenny held the shirt out and read the front. “ Treasure Island Police Athletic League.” Serge had an identical one, and he had already stripped off his other shirt and was wiggling his arms through the holes of the new one.

“Put that on,” said Serge. “Whenever I’m fleeing and eluding, I hit the thrifts for local law enforcement T-shirts. Makes traffic stops go much smoother.”

Back in the motel room, Lenny shoved more bottles and cans down into the ice-filled tub. Coke, Sprite, orange and grapefruit juice, Bloody Mary mix, Budweiser, Heineken, Absolut, Finlandia. Serge arranged a row of Florida keepsakes along the back of the writing desk. Above them he taped an autographed black-and-white photo of a scuba diver to the wall.

“Who’s that?” said Lenny, shotgunning a beer on the way out of the bathroom.

“Lloyd Bridges,” said Serge. “The immortal Mike Nelson from Sea Hunt. Originally, Nelson operated out of Marineland in California. But later he went freelance, and they shot several episodes in the Florida Keys, which made him technically eligible for inclusion in my shrine.”

Lenny reached into the shrine and started to pick up a Flipper thermos, but Serge slapped his hand.

“It’s burned into my mind,” Serge continued. “The end credits of every episode, Bridges sailing off in his boat, the Argonaut, and then the trademark emblem of Ziv Productions.”

“You have a good memory.”

“That’s because I don’t smoke that shit you do. I wouldn’t want to be abnormal.”

Lenny looked again at Bridges’s smiling face in the yellowed photo and the inscription, “To my pal, Serge.”

“This is all very interesting, but why put his picture up?”

“Inspiration. It’s important to build on the shoulders of the giants.”

Lenny poured vodka, lit a joint and took some speed.

Serge duct-taped the edges of the curtains to the wall, taped over the message light on the phone and the battery indicator on the smoke detector.

“What are you doing?” asked Lenny.

“Establishing theater conditions. I hate it when people watch a great movie at home with a bunch of lights on. Wrecks the whole medium. If there’s any other light source in the room except the film, it completely ruins it for me.”

Serge unplugged the pine-scented nightlight in the bathroom and taped over the blinking “12:00” on the VCR. Lenny took a small brush out of a nail polish jar and painted his joint with a brownish liquid.

“What are you doing?” asked Serge.

“Putting hash oil on this doobie,” said Lenny. “I’ve been refining the technique. The speed counteracts the dovetail-drowsiness of the weed and the depressant effect of the alcohol. The booze files down the rough edges of paranoia from the pot and hyperagitation from the amphetamine. And the marijuana heightens self-awareness to prevent you from pulling something stupid that the liquor and pills are trying to talk you into.”

“What if you, like, didn’t do any of that stuff, then you wouldn’t have to worry about neutralizing all the bad effects?”

Lenny looked at him blankly. “What are you talking about?”

Serge popped Goldfinger in the VCR, and Lenny got ready for another pill.

“Look! Look!” said Serge, pointing out the scene where Bond meets Goldfinger in the Fontainebleau in Miami Beach. Serge’s yelling startled Lenny, and he inhaled the pill and began choking. He staggered, clutching his throat with one hand and bracing himself against the TV with the other.

Serge hit pause on the remote, stood up without urgency and gave Lenny a roundhouse kung fu kick in the solar plexus. The pill flew out and plinked off the TV screen.

“Now the movie’s ruined,” said Serge. He went over to the writing table and immersed himself in the tedium of taking apart and reassembling the homing signal receiver for the fifth time since they got to the motel.

“What are ya doin’?” Lenny asked.

No answer. Serge wore safety goggles, and the soldering iron gave off a tentacle of smoke when he touched it to a capacitor.

Lenny reached under the bed and pulled out a sturdy nylon travel bag with zippers, pockets, compression bands, D-rings and Velcro.

He suddenly had Serge’s attention by the short hairs. “What’s that?” Serge asked, unplugging the soldering iron and coming over to the bed.

“My special bag,” said Lenny. “It’s got more little pockets and compartments than I have stuff.” He dumped the contents onto the bed. “Take out all my crap and-boom!-molded rubber bottom and insulated sides. It becomes a cooler-perfect for the barfly on the go!”

“Cool!” said Serge.

“I got something even better,” said Lenny. “Put out your hands and close your eyes.”

“They’re closed.”

“No peeking,” said Lenny.

“I’m not peeking! Hurry up, already.”

Lenny reached out and placed a small plastic cube in Serge’s cupped hands. Serge opened his eyes.

“It’s just a rock in a clear plastic box,” said Serge. “What’s the deal? Does it have a gem inside? A core of Uranium 238?”

“No, it’s just a rock. But it’s where it’s from that’s special.”

“Give.”

“The moon.”

“Baloney!” said Serge. “It’s against the law to own moon rocks-they’re all in government vaults. All eight hundred and fifty pounds from the six landing sites.”

“And where else?” Lenny asked with a smile.

“All except the ones the president gave as personal gifts to foreign dignitaries.”

Lenny’s smile broadened.

“Get outta town!” said Serge, and he punched Lenny in the shoulder.

“I hear it’s from Honduras. Look, it’s got this nifty certificate, too.”

Lenny pulled a wallet from his back pocket. He opened the bill section and removed a piece of paper that had been folded six times and had a circular coffee stain. Serge recognized the authentic Richard Nixon signature.

“You sonuvabitch,” Serge said, and he punched Lenny again. It hurt a little, but Lenny kept smiling.

“How’d you get it?”

“I fronted a guy a lid of weed in Deerfield Beach, and he couldn’t pay me back. You know how it gets, after you have to bug a guy over a pot debt long enough, they start getting mad at you like you’re the one who’s in the wrong. So we’re there in his apartment, stoned again-my weed of course-and I say, ‘Look, it’s been three weeks. Put up, man. Show some good faith. Whatever you got. A lottery ticket, a burrito-I just need some collateral.’ So I follow him into his room and he pulls out his sock drawer, and taped to the back is this rock.”

“What are you doin’ with it here?” asked Serge.

“I’m gonna sell it. I’ve been making some calls to get an auction together. I bet it can fetch at least ten large on the black market.”

“Like hell you’re gonna sell it!”

“Why not?”