Screwed (32 page)

So I lie here on the bed and indulge myself in a mopey funk, replaying the week’s events over and over, but always coming back to the glassy adoration in Sofia’s eyes when Carmine darkened her door. Shit, she would chug the Kool-Aid right out of the bottle for that guy.

I was fooling myself. I never meant anything to Sofia.

Nothing. Not a thing. She couldn’t even remember my name.

For long hours my thoughts go around and around in ever-decreasing self-esteem circles until eventually I cry fuck it and trudge into the bathroom, where I find a bottle of triazolam that is almost in date and dry-swallow three pills.

I lie down again and watch the sun climb behind my linen blind like a cheap special effect in a silhouette puppet show.

Surely I will sleep now. Surely.

Even Sofia can’t compete with three triazolam.

I sleep like a dead man and my dreams are vague— filled with dark shadows and glinting edges. The only splotch of color is the crimson circle of a rising sun, which turns into a pink thong, and any guilt I feel over the fates of Fortz and Krieger evaporates with the last wisps of the dream.

“Good riddance to those dicks,” I say to the ceiling, then roll out of bed for four score push-ups to prove to myself I ain’t over that hill just yet. It is also a positive sign, physically and psychologically, that I am sporting a wake-up boner that any decent caveman could start a fire with, which means the push-ups aren’t as deep as they would normally be.

There is life in the old dog yet, in spite of Sofia.

Yet even thinking her name deflates me more effectively than the memory of Fortz in an apron. I collapse in a heap of frustrated sweat and realize that I am not out of the emotional woods just yet.

Casino noise drifts up between the floorboards, which means that the crew is still renovating or I have slept right through the grand opening, which would be just dandy with me. Jason telling me to cheer the hell up is the last thing I need right now. But I gotta go down there, what kind of douche would I be if I didn’t?

I throw on the Banana Republic gray suit that I bought in their January sale especially for this occasion, but it doesn’t give me the boost that I’d hoped for.

Now you are a cuckolded moron in a suit.

I check my phone for time and messages. I have missed plenty of both. It’s eight thirty in the
P.M.
and I have a dozen missed calls and a psy-Tweet.

To all my Twits: Be happy. Seize the day. Live in the now. What do you people want from me?

Looks like Dr. Simon is tiring of his online practice. Maybe universal full-time access is not as much fun as he thought it would be.

I slip through the adjoining door from my apartment stairwell straight into a heaving throng of humanity. The club is seething with customers.

I am frankly amazed.

Jason has put in the effort with e-mail drops and so forth, but I never expected a turnout like this. There are guys crowded around the roulette wheel. A bunch of college boys are doing shots and tossing twenties at a blackjack dealer, and the booths are crowded with young bucks sharing pitchers.

Something about the crowd seems off but I brush it away, glad to have a reason to celebrate something. Anything.

This is a good start. We can build on this.

I spot Jason working the room. Shaking hands and clapping shoulders like he’s king of the hill.

He deserves it. If it wasn’t for Jason this place would just be another casualty of the recession.

I have to worm my way through the crowd to reach his side.

“Jason,” I call to him. “Hey, J.”

Jason is wearing a powder-blue suit with a brooch at the neck of his shimmering silk shirt. He’s had highlights put in, and replaced the diamond in his incisor with a ruby.

He looks good.

Jason sees me and I swear he seems nervous for a second.

“Dan. Where’ve you been? What do you think?”

I grab his shoulders like he’s my brother. “What do I think? This is amazing. Unbelievable. How the hell did you get all these people here?”

The big lug actually blushes. “Social media, partner. I worked the keyboard. Lotta guys looking for a place like this.”

I grab a glass full of green stuff from a passing tray and salute him. “To you, buddy. We might actually be able to pay the bills if we can hang on to some of these customers.”

Jason fake punches and I fake block, spilling half my drink. “Fuck bills, man,” he shouts to the ceiling. “Were gonna make bank.”

Looking around me tonight that’s not hard to believe so I decide to ignore the Irish Catholic voice of sanctimony and pessimism that prevents me from ever getting too contented and for once in my life enjoy the moment.

I sink what’s left in my glass. Tastes like lime jelly but there’s a kick to it.

“What the hell was that?” I ask when I finish coughing.

Jason blows a kiss toward the bar. “Marco is a genius with cocktails. He calls that one a One-Eyed Serpent. You want another?”

I gotta stop now, or commit to the hangover.

Shouldn’t I be taking charge here? Shouldn’t I be making sure everyone’s pulling their weight?

Then again, after the week I’ve had.

“What the hell,” I say. “Keep ’em coming.”

Tonight, for once, I embrace the Irish stereotype.

Some time later, I am slouched in my office drunk-mumbling to myself. Whenever I drink there are three distinct stages: optimism, reproach, singsong. I am bang in the middle of stage two at the moment, right on the guilt edge, berating myself that I am just like my father, and this sort of carry-on is what got my family killed before their time. One more drink and I’ll be on the table crucifying the Pogues’ “Fairytale of New York,” which is a song no one should be allowed to sing except Shane MacGowan and Kirsty MacColl.

“I am not my father,” I tell myself, then: “You sure act like him. You sure look like him now. A drunken bum.”

And then, the saddest words a man can say aloud:

“Nobody loves me.”

I thump my heart as I say this to make it more pathetic.

“Sofia doesn’t even remember who I am. Oh yeah, she likes looking at my thing when I come out of the shower. What am I? An object?”

Zeb arrives, as he was bound to with free booze floating around, and elbows his way into the office, and for a moment the thump of club sound waves enters with him and slaps me with a giant hand.

“Holy shit! Close that door,” I say.

Zeb obliges, swiping the door with his boot. His arms are full of cocktail glasses and there’s a bottle of Jameson sticking out his jacket pocket.

He plonks his booty on my desk, squints at me and says: “Fuck me, stage two. We better get some more booze into you, pal. I don’t want to spend my night in here with a depressed Catholic. I’d rather take my chances out there with the ass bandits.”

I snort. “Jason and Marco have both each other and standards, so I think your skinny ass is safe from banditry.”

I’m not sure if banditry is even a word, but for a man with the amount of alcohol in him that I have, that was not a bad sentence.

Zeb settles into the guest seat and downs three shots in quick succession.

“I gotta hand it to you,” he says. “This took balls, literally, but you pulled it off. I should reach around the desk and give you a shake.”

Zeb then collapses in a sneezy fit of giggles like he’s made several good jokes. I do not know what in the bejaysus is going on.

“Zeb, are you mocking me? Am I the butt of some joke?”

More giggles. Zeb actually sneezes into a shot, then drinks it anyway.

“Butt? Yeah, you’re the butt all right.”

I am too emotionally delicate for this crap.

“Zebulon. I’m bloody drunk, okay? Your stupid labyrinths are too bendy for me.”

Zeb loves that one too. “Bendy? Dude, we all gotta learn to bend.”

Okay. He’s baiting me. Leading me toward that holy-grail moment when I lose my cool and turn into a big lumbering bear. Well, it ain’t gonna happen.

Compose yourself, soldier. Be the bigger man.

With this in mind I take a handgun from the drawer and place it on the desk.

“Zeb. I am feeling delicate and not in the mood for your cryptic shit. Spell it out.”

“What? You’re gonna shoot me?”

I look him in the eye. “Probably not, but this has been a tough week for me. I’ve been kidnapped for a snuff movie. Tortured by cops. Shot at by hoodlums and I lost my girl. So, tell me, what’s with all the innuendo?”

I see a new expression on Zeb’s face. I realize that the expression is pity. It doesn’t suit him and won’t last long.

“I can’t just tell you, man. That’s not how I roll.”

“But?” I prompt.

Zeb grins and his teeth have a greenish tinge from the drink. “I can give you hints.”

I sigh. “Right. Hints. Make ’em obvious, though. My brain functions are compromised.”

Zeb pulls a sheet of paper from his Armani jacket.

“The new cocktail list.”

“Whatever.”

“Did you read it?”

“No. J gave me a One-Eyed Serpent.”

“Classic,” says Zeb, chuckling. “Lemme list a couple more.”

“Knock yourself out. Before I do it for you.”

“There’s the Manjoos.”

“Yeah, I think that one has mango in it.”

“Really? What d’you reckon the Twinkletown is made of?”

I know that one. “That has a lit sparkler. Looks pretty cool.”

Zeb nods. “Cool as all fuck, like the new color scheme.”

I’m getting closer. “Yellow and green.”

Zeb is vibrating with pleasure. The payoff must be huge. “Yeah, yellow and green, or to put it another way. Green and yellow. Which is what it says over the door now.”

This hangs in the air for a minute.

Green and yellow. Green and . . .

The penny drops with a deafening clang.

I get it. Holy reach-around.

“It’s a . . .”

Zeb doesn’t let me say it. “It’s a gay bar. You own a gay bar, dude.”

“All those guys out there?”

“Gay as game shows, brother. What are you? Blind?”

I feel blind. Blind and stupid.

“I know you’re hoping for the big meltdown, Zebadora, but I ain’t angry.”

Zeb’s eyebrows shoot up. “Angry? Are you kidding me? Jason’s a fucking genius. These guys are not just gay, they’re super-gay. Statistically the biggest spenders on the planet. Super-gay is a tough market to crack, but if you can tap into it, it’s a frikkin’ gold mine.”

“A gold mine?”

“You betcha. These guys have got fat wallets and they ain’t shy about opening them. Super-gays will pay twenty bucks for any cocktail with a dirty name. Tomorrow night, I’m parking a Botox mobile outside.”

I am feeling a little stunned so I revert to my bouncer habit of repeating what’s been said to buy myself a little time.

“You’re parking a Botox mobile outside. You have a Botox mobile?”

Zeb is delighted at how drunk and slow I am. Usually by the time I’m in this condition, he’s having his stomach pumped in the ER.

“Yeah, I got a Botox mobile. It’s on the roof beside my Transformer, you shmendrik.”

Aha! That’s total crap.

“You don’t have a Transformer,” I say. “They’re just in the movies.”

“No shit, McSherlock,” says Zeb, then downs a shot that appears to have an eyeball floating in it. He shudders as the alcohol hits his stomach.

“Was that supposed to represent an eyeball?” I ask.

Zeb chews and swallows. “The drink is called a Ball Buster, so what do you think?”

The door opens and in walks Carmine, and before I know what’s going on there’s a gun in my hand and it’s pointed at his face.

“Hey,” says Carmine, raising his hands. “What the hell, man?”

Carmine sounds different: more California, less New York. Maybe it’s the stress.

“This is the guy,” I tell Zeb. “This is the prince who stole Sofia from me.”

Zeb folds his arms and leans back to watch the show. “Well, I guess you better shoot him.”

Carmine kicks the leg of Zeb’s chair. “Screw you, Zeb. That ain’t funny.”

It takes a second for these words to penetrate the Jell-O coating my brain, then I say:

“You guys know each other? I guess I better shoot both of you then.”

Zeb is not in the least worried. I think I have been overplaying the threatening to shoot him card of late.

“Whatever, Dan. Just pay the man his money.”

“Yeah, pay me my money,” says Carmine. “I was waiting outside that apartment for hours, man.”

Hold it a minute. What is going on here?

“Pay you? Pay him? For what?”

Zeb gets that mischievous look in his eyes that tells me he’s gonna drag this out until I explode. Like I said, pushing my buttons is Zeb’s thing.

“Come on, Danny boy,” he says. “You’re a smart Paddy. Use your brain.”

Zeb miscalculates my tolerance levels and reaches across the desk to tap my forehead. I might have tolerated this had I not once been tapped in much the same way by a guy who went on to do his utmost to make me dead. So maybe I associate one tapper with another, and perhaps I’ve had a few too many super-gay shots to drink, and so it’s possible that I overreact a little.

I grab him by the wrist and yank him bodily across the desk. Zeb laughs because he knows that deep down I am a big softy, so I smack him in the rice-pudding cheek just enough to smart.

“Hey, fuck you, Danny. After all I’ve done for you.”

Sure. After all Zeb’s done for me I should snap his spine across my knee like the spear of a vanquished enemy. But Zeb has me pegged and knows that he’s in no real danger. All Carmine knows about me is what Sofia told him, which I would be willing to bet is sweet shag-all.

So I twist Zeb’s scrawny arm up around his back and frog-march him out of my office. Too late my little pal realizes what’s going on and shouts over his shoulder.

“Don’t say nothing. He’s just a p—”

The rest of the p word is truncated by the slam and lock of the office door. I imagine the p word was not pal or prince.

Carmine stands in the corner all clenched fists and puffed chest.

“What the hell is going on here? I just want my money.”

I sit at my chair and begin casually removing bullets from my revolver. “Here’s the deal, Carmine. Zeb likes to string things out. Delay gratification as much as possible. Give me a goddamn migraine with all his bullshit. I ain’t got time for that now.” I leave a single bullet in the cylinder, snap it shut with a flick of my wrist and spin it a few times. “So what we’re gonna do is play a little game I picked up in Nam.”