The Animals: A Novel (32 page)

She’s doing all right. Needs surgery. So that’s coming up.

Jeez, I’m sorry to hear that, Milt said. What kind of cancer?

Lung, Nat said. He looked at the cigarette in his hand. I guess I shouldn’t be smoking this either.

Probably not, Milt said. You could quit right now.

I could, Nat said. But I’d just start again when I got home.

That’s the choice you make.

Is it?

Absolutely. Everything’s a choice.

Nat looked at him then. He wanted to tell him that he was wrong, that just because he had choices did not mean that those same choices existed for Nat or for anyone, that the life and experiences of the proprietor and owner of Milt’s Reliable Ford-Lincoln-Mercury were by no means transferrable. But instead he only nodded and said, I guess you’re right.

I am right, Milt said. You work the lube station and then you move to, I don’t know, brakes or something, and at some point you’re running the whole service department.

Maybe so, Nat said.

Not maybe, son. You just have to keep your eyes on the ladder. Rung by rung. You understand what I’m saying?

Nat nodded. Down below, on the frontage road, the rust-colored vehicle he thought he had seen a few minutes before had returned, idling down there in plain view now. It was as he feared, the dull, dented El Camino he had seen at the Peppermill the night Mike had broken his finger, and although he could not see the driver he knew it had to be the tattooed man from Landrum’s, idling there, plotting his revenge. He knew the driver could see him, could see him and could see Milton Wells standing next to him, and in the next moment it sped off with an ostentatious screeching of its tires, the sound of which seemed to run through Nat’s body like some shivering wire.

Plans for the holiday? Milt said.

Going to visit my mom, he said, his voice faintly wobbling.

It was Battle Mountain, right?

Yep, Nat said. Battle Mountain.

Well, you give her my best.

I will.

Milt stepped forward across the parking lot. Behind them, the shop’s service manager appeared and began to pull down one of the bay doors, the sound of it rattling out across the asphalt. Evening, Milt, the manager called.

Milt waved briefly, hardly looking up, and then stopped and turned back toward Nat, fumbling for a moment with his wallet and finally extracting a bill. Look, he said, you get your mom a nice turkey or something. On me. All right?

It was a twenty and Nat reached for it automatically. Thanks, he said. That’s really really nice of you.

It appeared for a moment as if his boss might say something more, but then he simply nodded and walked away across the parking lot to where his long shining LTD was parked in a slot labeled with his name.

He’s a nice guy, the service manager called from the next bay, his hand on the partially closed roller door.

Sure is, Nat said.

You wanna give me a hand with these doors?

He nodded, staring at the bill in his hand before stuffing it into his coat pocket and reentering the shop to pull down the remainder of the doors, kicking the latches into place and wrapping the chains around the metal pegs beside them, his splinted finger pointing everywhere as he worked.

When he walked outside again, the wind was gusting down hard. He looked toward the road but the El Camino was nowhere to be found.

His car was parked in the employee lot and when he rounded the edge of the building the wind struck him so hard that he had to tilt his body into it to keep walking, reaching the little Datsun and opening the door and sliding inside. The car shook under him with each gust and even when he had started it and was driving down to the road he could still feel its force, the car creaking and trembling all around him as if afraid.

The first thing he saw when he reached the road was a police cruiser pulled over to the side just a few yards away, a green sedan parked just ahead of it, red and blue lights flashing. The second was the El Camino, moving slowly toward him on the opposite side of the street.

Nat slowed and stopped, his car remaining there at the edge of the employee parking lot as if waiting for a break in traffic. But there was no traffic. Only that rust-colored El Camino sliding soundlessly toward him, the windshield reflecting at first only the flat gray pane of the sky and then, suddenly, clearing all at once so that he could see the tattooed man’s smiling face through the glass. The man’s hand came up slowly, his two fingers mimicking the act of firing a pistol through Nat’s windshield. Then he had passed, the El Camino rolling away, so slowly, two red taillights adrift along the road before the car turned the corner at the edge of the dealership and was gone.

Nat looked at the police cruiser again and the officer glanced up at him and Nat raised a hand in greeting. Then he pulled out into the street.

When he reached the Peppermill he returned to Wild Wild Nights, and within the hour he had no money left in his wallet at all.

WHAT THE
fuck? Rick said when he told him about the El Camino.

I don’t know, Nat said. He’s freaking me out.

I haven’t seen him.

I’m telling you he’s watching me. Probably watching both of us.

Fucker, Rick said. I guess he needs another lesson.

They sat at the Peppermill café once again, waiting for Susan to materialize, eating club sandwiches that Rick had brought out from the kitchen at the end of his shift. Nat waited for her with a kind of nervous tension that he ascribed to the El Camino, to Mike and to Johnny Aguirre, to the entire situation he had found himself in, but he knew it was actually because of her. She had come to feel like a thin barbed hook inside him, something that he continued to tug at despite its stinging, its pulling and tearing, all the while telling himself that he was either Rick’s best friend or he was not. Not even a decision but rather a kind of creed to live by. When they were children there had been no one to take care of them but each other, especially after Bill died, Nat’s mother drinking herself into oblivion day after day on the tattered recliner, the television waffling between game shows and soap operas, and Rick’s mother a lifetime hypochondriac who was finally diagnosed with cancer the year after they moved to Reno. So they had taken care of each other. He knew that Rick was still taking care of him, or was trying to. As for himself, he had no idea what he was doing. No idea at all.

What he had come to understand, perhaps what he had always understood, was that Rick was a survivor, was like a wolf or a coyote, some canid that had come out of the desert fully prepared to survive, tooth and claw. He had been that way for as long as Nat had known him, since they were children, certainly since they were teenagers. It was his natural condition. But the metaphor fell apart when Nat tried to apply it to himself. He was no canid; that much was clear. But then what the hell was he? When he watched nature documentaries on Sunday afternoons in the apartment, he sometimes felt like he could almost see into some truth beyond any he had imagined: a kind of thread that was nearly visible to him. Each animal, each insect, built to serve a particular and specific function and each performing its function without question and seemingly without will or logic, even though the structures built by creatures he deemed the least intelligent—ants, wasps, bees, spiders—held within them a will and logic and beauty that he could hardly comprehend. What will and logic he possessed had led him to complete oil changes and lube jobs and gamble away all his money and fear for his safety everywhere he went. What use his will if this was where it would lead him? But then most of the time he did not feel like he had any manner of free will at all.

As if to punctuate this thought, from somewhere inside the casino one of the slot machines let out a shrill hard ringing and a loud excited voice called out, I won! I won! The sound of it turned in his chest, pulling at him, everything pulling at him, always.

Hey, so I talked to my mom earlier, Rick said. I told her we’d be there around two or three.

Yeah, that works, Nat said. How’d she sound?

Pretty shitty.

When do they want to do the surgery?

A couple weeks.

They can’t turn her away for treatment, he said. Even if you don’t have a way to pay them.

It’s not just that. Last time she went through this my cousin
Charlene came out from Elko to help, but she’s not gonna be able to do that this time.

Why not?

I don’t know, Rick said. She’s got a job or something I guess. It’s not her responsibility anyway. It’s mine.

So what does that mean?

Means I’ll either have to move back there or hire someone to take care of her.

Dang, Nat said. Move back there?

I don’t know what else to do at this point. I’m pretty much out of time.

It was silent for a long moment and then Nat said quietly, I can’t move back.

I’m not asking you to.

No, I mean, Johnny Aguirre told me that I can’t leave. He said if I leave he’d find me. And he knows I’m from BM.

How does he know that?

He asked me when he was giving me the first loan.

Rick looked out into the casino now. Christ, man, you really got yourself in it, didn’t you.

I didn’t mean to, he said. It just kind of happened.

I don’t get it, Rick said. I don’t get it at all.

I’m trying to pull it together.

Are you?

Yeah, Nat said. Totally.

Seems like you’re just digging yourself deeper.

What do you want me to say?

Rick shook his head. I’m done talking about it, he said. He looked up past Nat and called out, Hey, babycakes.

Susan had arrived and she slid into the booth next to Rick. How are the boys? she said.

Boys are OK, Rick said. He glanced over at Nat briefly. How is the girl?

The girl is tired of stupid video store questions, she said. Do you have that one movie about that guy who did that thing? Um yeah, we have that. It’s over there. She gestured vaguely around the room. I swear I’m going to shoot someone one of these days.

Did you get a video machine? Rick asked.

I tried, she said. Everyone wants one for the weekend.

Damn, Rick said. That’s too bad.

Yeah, well, the store’s pretty much picked through anyway.

Rick shrugged and then lifted his coffee cup and sipped at it.

I gotta hit the bathroom, Nat said.

He slid out of the booth and skirted the slot machines and then stood at the mirror in the bathroom, staring at his own reflection. There were no thoughts now, no guilt or fear, only his own face staring back, his eyes, his hair, his mouth. His hands on the edge of the sink. This is who you are. And no one can save you.

He turned on the tap and splashed water into his face and when he stood upright once more he thought the image of Johnny Aguirre staring back at him from the mirror was only his imagination. But then that reflected image spoke: You’re a hard guy to track down.

Mike stood next to Johnny. On the other side stood a large, block-shaped man Nat did not recognize. He felt himself go cold. His finger throbbed.

Johnny, he said, his voice wobbling. I was just thinking about you.

Were you?

Totally.

Turn around.

He did.

Behind them the door opened and Mike’s hand caught it. Bathroom’s closed, he said.

Uh … my friend’s in there, Rick’s voice came.

Who’s your friend?

Nat Reed.

He’s busy, Mike said.

Uh … I think I can help, Rick said.

Mike looked up at Johnny. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve heard all day, Johnny said. Mike smiled. The other man, the one Nat did not recognize, only stood there expressionless, his face mashed in like a gangster from some old black-and-white movie.

All right, Johnny said. It’s a party. Open the door.

Mike pulled the door open and Rick stepped into the bathroom, Mike frisking him quickly, Rick finding Nat across the room, their eyes locking for one single moment.

So who are you?

Rick Harris.

All right, so here’s the question, Rick Harris: Does your friend have money for me or does he not?

Rick had moved to stand next to Nat and now he looked back at the trio standing near the door: Johnny and his two bodyguards. Yeah he’s got money, he said. He just got paid on Monday.

That true, Nat? Johnny said.

Nat was silent for a long moment, his eyes on the floor.

What the fuck? Rick said. You just picked up your check two days ago.

Still Nat did not respond. He could feel himself falling out of his body somehow and he could feel himself stuck inside it, not only his body but the town, the desert, the basin from which no river reached the sea.

This is starting to get pretty old, Johnny said.

Whoa whoa whoa, Rick said. Hang on.

Nat looked up now. Johnny held a black pistol in his hand, its angles square and sharp.

We’ll get you the money, Rick said.

Yeah, I’m sure you will, Johnny said.

He stepped forward then and with one quick fluid motion struck Nat in the side of the face with the pistol. Nat went down all at once, the pain sharp and terrible, and in the red darkness he could hear Johnny’s voice: Get the fuck back.