Matias Nespolo - Seven Ways to Kill a Cat

Just as I’m about to squeeze the trigger he nudges me to make me miss. And I miss, but not by much. I aim again, holding my breath.

‘What are you doing?’ he yells.

I ignore him and concentrate. I remember what Toni used to tell me when I was a kid about how to fire a gun. He’d take me down to the patch of waste ground that used to be on the other side of the stream before they fenced it off to make a golf course and build a gated community. Toni always managed to bag a partridge, sometimes a hare. They say the place is teeming with animals these days. And it’s not hard to believe — even without going inside the gate it’s obvious the golf course is nothing but scrubland. But no one goes in there any more, and with all the security guards watching the perimeter they sure as fuck wouldn’t go strapped.

It’s like riding a bike, you never forget, I tell myself, spreading my legs to distribute my weight, right foot forward like Toni taught me, tracing an invisible line between the eye, the sight and the target. It was easier with Toni’s shotgun, even if it did weigh a ton, because it was like a ruler — all you had to do was line it up, hold your breath and gently squeeze the trigger. If your aim was a bit off, the spread of shotgun pellets helped. Obviously if the partridge was on the wing, it was harder because then you had to trace a moving invisible line, but anything on the ground was easy. I got sick of shooting rats and weasels. I even managed to do pretty well with the.22 Toni used to have. The only difference was you had to stretch your arm out and use that as your ruler. Oh, and the recoil didn’t fuck your shoulder up. With the.22, the recoil was just a quick jolt, but Toni’s shotgun had a serious kickback to it. If you didn’t brace it properly, you’d end up with bruises on your shoulder.

Chueco’s talking to me, but I’m not listening. I hold my breath and I fire. The can whips up into the air and falls back almost in the same place, now presenting the full moon of its base. I raise the.38 and fire again. The can shudders again.

‘What the fuck are you doing, dickwad?’ Chueco says, snatching the gun from me. ‘D’you know how much bullets cost?’

He fires a couple more shots, misses, keeps firing until the chamber’s empty. He takes a box of bullets from his jacket pocket and reloads. He goes on shooting, not bothering to pass it to me any more, until he finally hits the can.

‘Who would have thought little Gringo could handle himself with a gat …?’ he says like he’s talking to someone else.

There’s not a trace of the gangster face he had on a while ago. Now he’s looking at me strangely. Seriously. Part defiant, part devious as he stuffs the gun back in his belt. God knows what’s going through his head.

‘Why don’t you get yourself a bit of kit like this one? Then you can be my sidekick,’ he suggests. ‘I’ve already got a couple of bits of business lined up. You want in, fine, if not, don’t come whining to me when I’m rich and fat.’

‘So what’s this “business”, Chueco?’

‘Come by El Gordo’s later and I’ll fill you in.’

‘Farías’s place? Are you off your head?’

‘What’s the matter? Chicken?’ he taunts me. Here we go again.

‘Fuck you, you fucking jerk! You go ahead. You do your shady little deals and you’ll wind up with your arse facing north.’

I storm off, giving him the finger as I leave. I feel calm, but I know me. I know sooner or later I’ll swing by the bar.

‘YOU’LL NEVER GUESS who I ran into in Buenos Aires yesterday …’ I say to Mamina, as she sips the sweet mate I’ve just brewed for her.

I wait for her to ask who, but nothing. She doesn’t even look at me.

‘Someone who was asking after you, abuela . Don’t you want to know who it was?’

‘Who?’

‘Toni!’

Mamina doesn’t react. Or she does, but in her own way. She stares out the window. For what feels like a century. She empties the rest of the sachet of sugar into her mate and adds some more hot water. She takes a sip, then looks at me. I’ve seen this look before, cold as hoar frost, but I don’t understand it. I’ve never been able to understand it. And I certainly don’t now. I open my eyes wide, raise my eyebrows, feeling a wave of panic grip me. I’m waiting for her to explain. Mamina knows that. She’s not stupid. She calmly finishes her mate and then says abruptly, ‘Toni is dead.’

‘What do you mean, dead?’ I explode. ‘I just said I saw him, that he said to say hi … What are you talking about?’

Mamina answers, her voice low. Almost inaudible. She always hates it when people raise their voices. When they do, she starts whispering. I used to think it was funny when I was a kid. I’d do it deliberately to wind her up. The softer she spoke, the louder I shouted. Never worked. Mamina always won. Didn’t matter how violent the argument, we always ended up whispering.

‘He’s dead to me. He doesn’t exist … And I don’t want to discuss it any further.’

‘What’s up, Mamina? What did he do?’

‘You don’t know?’

‘Obviously not, since I’m asking you …’ I retort, but I’m careful not to raise my voice above her whisper.

‘Good, that’s good. It’s better if you don’t know …’

I clear away the mate . There’s no point carrying on. When Mamina decides a subject is closed, there’s no arguing. It’s closed, full stop, end of story.

I go back and sit at the kitchen table. I rack my brains but I can’t remember anything. I was only a kid. I would have been — what? — ten, maybe, when Toni disappeared. Not even. Whatever shit he got himself mixed up in must have been serious. Really fucking serious, if Mamina still hasn’t forgiven him. She’s not the kind to hold a grudge.

All this just makes me suspicious, tarnishes the image I’ve had of Toni. Makes me see him differently. Like he’s a traitor, a son of a bitch. Toni said he couldn’t come back to the barrio because he had ‘unfinished business’. I’m guessing this unfinished business is the same thing Mamina refuses to talk about. I used to think Toni disappeared because the Feds were looking for him, but that’s bullshit. Nobody leaves the barrio just because the cops are after them. Nobody gives a shit about the police round here; the only law is the law of the barrio, and most kids are careful to abide by it. Anyone who doesn’t would do well to fuck off before they get sent to a barrio six feet under. That must be what happened with Toni, but I can’t think what shit he could have got himself mixed up in that meant having to vanish without trace. And is whatever it is the same shit that Mamina can’t forgive him for?

I can’t seem to square the two. For Toni to disappear like that means a vendetta, a mejicaneada , score-settling for some scam that went wrong — but all those things are about honour, about the code of the barrio. And Mamina’s not the kind to turn her back on one of her own for something like that. She has her own personal code, and it’s very different. So, what then? She can’t forgive him for abandoning her, leaving her in the lurch and not showing his face for years? I can’t believe that either. It’s not like her. It’s a luxury she can’t afford. The luxury of a middle-class mother more interested in her own pain than the fate of her ungrateful child.

Too many questions. I hate people asking me questions. I hate it even more when it’s me doing the asking and I don’t have any answers. I lie on my bed and try to take my mind off things by reading the whale book, but I can’t focus. I keep turning it all over and over in my mind. I keep turning the book over and over, until the money and the scrap of paper with Toni’s address fall out. I count the money again, and read the note again: they’re my ticket out of here, but now I’m not sure I want to leave. At least not until I find out what the fuck went down between Toni and Mamina.