A Set Of Wheels Page 6

  Can’t, dear. Outta coffee. One of the reasons you’re all making the food run, no doubt. I’ll make you some when you get back.

  Hell, I’ll probably want to live by then. Nothing ever frigging works out for me. Let me take the car over to The Mech, Lee. I need to talk to that reactionary bastard.

  I’m sure she sees the disappointment on my face. I really like to deal with The Mech myself. But I tell her yes, take it over any time she wants, and hand the keys to her.

  You got a heart of gold, Lee, she says. Which somehow seems the appropriate material for your heart. See you, Emil. And be on time for the briefing, Lee. Chuck gets pissed if you ain’t punctual.

  She laughs. It’s got the sarcasm in it, but it’s such a beautiful musical laugh I don’t care. Emil and I are silent for a long time after she goes out the door.

  Would you like a Danish, Lee? Emil says.

  What?

  A Danish. Sweet roll. I’ve kept one stashed.

  He takes out this Danish, in a cellophane package with blue marks all over it on the inside.

  It’s a few days old, Emil says, but we can pick away the moldy parts.

  You’re crazy, Emil.

  I told you that.

  Yeah, but now I believe it.

  Because of a Danish?

  Something like that.

  Well, you’re the type sees symbols everywhere, I reckon. Even where you don’t want to look for them.

  You sound crazier by the minute.

  Be nice to Cora.

  What?

  You heard me.

  He opens the Danish, starts tearing away the whitish blue moldy parts. My stomach starts climbing and I swing my stool away, watch Cora stand beside the Mustang which is parked just outside the front plate-glass window. She’s goddamn dusting it with an old rag. Her movements are easy and gentle, loving.

  — 3 —

  What does that asshole think he’s doin’? Cora says. Even with a pillow under her, she seems to be peeking over the top of the dashboard. I keep finding myself looking down to make sure her feet really reach the pedals.

  What asshole? I say. I am very sensitive about such words lately, always want to verify that she is referring to someone else.

  That asshole. Chuck. What does he—he think he’s honchoing a funeral or something? What kinda creepshow is this?

  He’s just being cautious, Cora. A lot of fuzz out lately.

  Cautious, hell. He’s a coward. He’s got a retractable prick. Acts tough with us back there, but out on the road he becomes Miss Prissypants.

  Take it easy.

  But Jesus, Lee, Chuck used to be the fastest. The Roadrunner God, somebody called him. He’s been spooked. I don’t know, maybe it’s the cares and woes of leadership. The old lousy loneliness at the top. It’s been since he’s started running things that he’s started actin’ like your average village schoolmarm.

  Oh, can it, Cora. Chuck’s looking out for us.

  She leans back against the bucket seat, works her shoulders against it. Her head’s tilted back, but she keeps track of the road.

  Sorry, love, she says. I’m edgy. That’s all, just edgy.

  She leans in toward the steering wheel and, before I realize what she’s up to, she’s pulled out to the outside lane.

  But I’m dying of this goddamned snail’s pace, she says, and rams her foot down on the accelerator. The rush of the engine, heard from inside the car, is like a sudden blast of thunder. Somewhat neurotic thunder, but thunder.

  Don’t Cora! I say, but she just laughs. It takes her about half a minute to reach the head of the convoy. Twisting her body upward, Cora leans partway out the open window and yells:

  Happy trails, Chuck!

  She settles back behind the wheel. I twist around in my seat and watch the convoy diminish behind us. I sit back, put my shoulder against the door, watch her stare at the road ahead, the happiest possible grin on her beautiful gamin face, spots of reflected light gleaming off her newly applied AfroBlack, and I decide against saying the obvious things—which would, after all, only draw the obvious responses. She knows Chuck’ll try to ream her out later and she’ll try to ream him back. What good is it for me to do a sneak preview of it now?

  Hey Cora, I say, what’re ya draggin’ tail for? Faster, c’mon, faster.

  She shrieks with laughter, and lifts her tiny ass off the pillow by at least two inches. She laughs harder as she slams down the gas pedal and continues to bounce on her pillow.

  Hey Lee, she says. I love you, you know that? I love you to pieces.

  I resist saying that pieces is what we’re going to wind up as. Then I realize the rest of what she just said and suddenly know what people mean when they say they feel a glow and I lean back in my seat trying to keep the glow going, as I listen to the Mustang rattle, registering its protest against a high speed which it nevertheless manages to maintain.

  * * * * *

  Cora parks in a side street about three blocks away from the rendezvous point. The Mustang gurgles a bit as she shuts off the ignition. High speeds aren’t always kind to it, so I guess I’ll let The Mech give it a lookover again tomorrow. The street is dark. Either the houses are abandoned or everybody in this part of town retires early.

  Why here? I ask Cora.

  I got my caution, too, she says. Even behind the supermarket we’ll be vulnerable. Since we’re early, wouldn’t be a bad idea to look things over first. Case there’re any traps set, we can flush ’em out before the rest get here. Chuck shoulda thought o’ this in the first place, the stupid bastard. C’mon, let’s get rolling.

  We walk the three blocks to the rendezvous point. This street is quiet, too, but not so dark. I keep looking over my shoulder. It bothers me more that I don’t see anything than it would if there was an occasional passing car, or maybe a drunk in a doorway. I begin to feel that the street and the side streets are all facade, all fake with no people living there. I’m glad to get to the rendezvous.

  The supermarket’s an old A&P, somewhat gone to seed. One of its overhanging signs says Double Coupons and, with the rest of the message broken off. Front windows have been broken, wide taped patches cover their many cracks. A couple of bullet holes have been corked with some kind of hard putty.

  Around the back, Cora says.

  What?

  Rendezvous point’s around the back. You know that. C’mon.

  We keep to the side of the building, although the parking lot, carless, stretches about a hundred feet or so away from us. I can smell a garbage area ahead and I make Cora circle around it, even though she doesn’t want to go out into the light. I convince her it’s still dark enough so nobody can see us from the road, even if there were somebody in the road. The garbage is piled high, as if waiting out a sanitation-men strike. Boxes are soggy from ancient rainstorms. We round the corner of the building and proceed to the loading platform where, in a matter of minutes, we expect to be piling goods into convoy vehicles. Everything’s quiet. I pull myself up to the platform edge and sit.

  Any gentlemen around here? Cora says.

  What?

  Give me a lift, mamadiddler.

  I pull her up and she sits beside me. She can’t sit still. She bounces her leg off the pilings of the platform, pulls at splinters with her fingers.

  I don’t like this place, she says.

  How come?

  I don’t know. The rhythms are wrong. Something.

  There is a noise on the far border of the parking lot and we both tense. A person comes out of the bushes there, takes a cinemascopic look around, seems to think everything’s okay and motions back toward the bushes. I expect to see a gang emerge from the foliage, but instead it is a much smaller form who scampers to the legs of the first figure, taking its proffered hand. The two of them approach the A&P. Cora is coiled, ready to leap off the platform and make a run for it.

  Take it easy, I say. Nobody can book us for lounging around an A&P.

  Maybe, maybe not. I don’t
like the look of this dude.

  As the two figures approach, I can see that the taller one is a black man, dressed in dark shirt and levi’s. The smaller is a child dressed similarly. I hold my breath, put my hands against the surface of the loading platform and am ready to move.

  Lee my man, what’s happening? says the black man. And I let my breath out in a loud sigh.

  He know you? Cora says.

  Friend of mine, I say. Name of Lincoln Rockwell X.

  You’re the last person I expected to find here, he says.

  Same for me, I say. What’re you up to?

  Just the usual. Just dealing. You cats with Chuck?

  Before I can answer, Cora says:

  Don’t call me cat.

  Lincoln Rockwell X smiles, more engagingly even than his usual, and says:

  That’s straight with me, babe. But what’s the A to the Q?

  Yeah, I say, we’re with Chuck.

  That’s where you wound up then, huh? he says. Better’n I might’ve thought. Chuck honchoes a good outfit. Wheels still operating?

  Good as gold, I say. He seems surprised. Astonished might be the better word.

  Well, what’d I tell ya? I make the deal, you know you got the goods.

  You’re the stingman sold him that dirty asshole of a Mustang? Cora says.

  Lincoln Rockwell X drops the smile, superimposes the mean scowl.

  Don’t rile me, babe.

  You got me wrong, Cora says. I don’t mean to get your bile astir. I just want to shake your hand, man, you gotta be number one.

  The intricate set of handshakes and slaps they go through makes me nervous. How come neither one of them ever gave me handshake lessons? The way Lincoln Rockwell X grins, I can see he likes Cora. A whole lot. Maybe too much. I’m getting edgier by the minute.

  This your woman, Lee? he says.

  Don’t answer that, Cora says. I run my own life, man.

  I don’t like the way she says that. What happened to all that loving me to pieces she was talking about back in the car?

  You want to stay in town a couple o’ days, Lincoln Rockwell X says, I can show you the grids where the heat is, babe.

  Not this time, Cora says and I feel better. Maybe later, man, she says and I feel worse.

  The child who’s holding on to the one loose spot behind the knee in Lincoln Rockwell X’s tightfitting levi’s watches us with wide eyes, and the side of a finger stuck in her mouth. She’s a bit chubby and looks to be about five. Her hair is twisted in curls close to the scalp.

  Who’s this? I say to Lincoln Rockwell X. He lights up, gets back to the easy smile.

  My daughter, Lee, he says. The fruit of my loins.

  She’s gorgeous, Cora says. What’s her name?

  Norma.

  At the sound of her name, Norma puts her arm around her father’s leg as a defensive measure.

  I didn’t know you had a kid, I say.

  No surprise, he says. I never told you.

  And five years old. Norma, how’re you, Norma? Norma Rockwell X.

  As I say the name, I realize its source.

  Hey, I say. Norma Rockwell? You don’t mean you named her after—

  Sure shit, man, and I wouldn’t make critical footnotes, I were you.

  No, course not. Sounds good. Norma Rockwell X, sounds good.

  Righto, old chap. Thing a beauty is a Norma forever, right? I got a right to my sense of Americana, too, dig?

  Sure.

  He is about to say more, but the first platoon of the convoy quietly edges into the parking lot and creeps over to the loading platform area. The other sections arrive soon after, Chuck among them. Chuck nods at me, says nothing to Cora, and we get to work.

  * * * * *

  One thing about Chuck, he’s got the operation planned well. After Lincoln Rockwell X opens a bunch of locks from keys on an overcrowded chain, Chuck puts each group of us into action, motioning the motions he’d demonstrated at his briefing, directing the traffic in and out the doors leading to the loading platform with an alert, crisp, often graceful efficiency.

  As Cora and I enter the store, Chuck stops us, putting a massive hand on my less than massive shoulder.

  Where’s your wheels? he says.

  Um, I say, parked near here. Side street. About three blocks away.

  He looks like he’s about to ream us out, then sucks in a breath and nods.

  You want me to go back for it?

  No, the time’s off. You fucked up, Lee. You two just go help others for now.

  God, Chuck, I’m sorry, I—

  Get moving, will you? Haven’t got time for a formal debate right now, okay? Hey you guys, yeah you, be more careful, you might break every damn glass in the damn box, damn it!

  I think he’s irritable, I mutter to Cora as we slink away from Chuck. My stomach linings feel singed by his words. I don’t like him disappointed in me. Cora apparently isn’t feeling sorry.

  That shitface motherfucker, she says.

  He’s right. We’re not supposed to go off on our—

  That don’t make him no less shitface nor no less motherfucker. I’m gonna stick his balls into an overheated radiator.

  Best not to argue with her in this mood. So I say:

  Who’ll we help out?

  Let ’em all do the fucking work. Let ’em all be drones. You and I, we’ll trouble-shoot. Wander around, find something of more value than Sugar Pops and meatloaf mix.

  But Chuck said—

  Screw what Chuck said. C’mon.

  I follow her down a dairy aisle, sneaking looks over my shoulder for Chuck, hoping he won’t catch us goldbricking. We skirt around colleagues who are busy loading milk cartons and cheese packages into shopping carts which, when full, are rushed to the loading platform. I feel lousy. Somehow I am sure that Cora no longer loves me to pieces and I got to get back to that. Somebody tugs at my pants leg. I look down. It’s Norma. She smiles up at me.

  Well, you like me, I can see that, I say to Norma.

  Cora glances back at us, smiles.

  Hey, little lady, where’s your daddy?

  Norma shrugs and continues to walk alongside me, her chubby little hands keeping a firm grip on my pants leg.

  I think we got an accomplice, I say.

  I think you got a friend, Cora says. She grabs a package of Hershey Kisses off a shelf, opens it, carefully untwists the silver wrappings on one candy, and hands it to Norma. The child stares at the chocolate bit as if she’s not sure what to do with it.

  It’s all right, Norma, you eat it, Cora says. Norma stuffs the candy into her mouth. She lets it melt down on her tongue. Cora tosses me a Hershey Kiss, starts nibbling on one herself.

  We roam the aisles. Cora keeps muttering under her breath as she eyes the shelves trying to find that elusive something of value she wants. Norma stays by me. I offer to pick,her up, carry her a stretch, but she shakes her head no. Apparently she’s unwilling to give up the security of a clutched pants leg. I grab off a bag of marshmallows, which I intend as another treat for Norma. Before I can open it, I bump into Chuck, who’s riding herd on a couple of dilatory workers. He sneers down at my bag of marshmallows.

  That your contribution to supplies? he says.

  No, I was just—

  Ah, hell, just stay out of my way, okay? Hide Cora someplace. Jesus, why don’t you two hook up with some other outfit?

  Chuck, you got everything mixed—

  Move on! C’mon, you guys, put a little spirit into it, some muscle, we only got a few minutes left to use.

  Now I can’t find Cora. She’s disappeared into the darkness of an aisle. I remember how bright a store like this used to be with lights full on. I always hated that fluorescent glare, now I long for it. I offer Norma a marshmallow. She doesn’t want it, makes a face. Taking it out of my hand, she throws it, scoring a neat two-pointer into a wicker basket of ChoreMaid dish scrubbers. I toss the whole bag into the basket.

  C’mon, Norma, let’s go
hunting Cora and your daddy.

  I can find Daddy. This is the first time she’s said anything. She has a sweet husky voice.

  You know where he is?

  Nope. But I can find him. You want to find him?

  Sure, let’s do it.

  We proceed down an aisle which turns out to feature pet food.

  Since our outfit has little need for pet food, the aisle’s unpopulated, a small blessing. Norma pulls me along determinedly. I’m sure we’ll find her father any minute, perhaps peeking out from behind a sack of Cat Chow.

  Suddenly there’s a thunderous sound of gunned motors coming from the parking lot. Streaks of light dance along the top of the aisle, glance upward toward the ceiling. Somebody to our left hollers, Fuzz!, which is followed by the sound of general scrambling. I feel frozen to the spot. Norma blithely walks ahead of me a few steps, then looks back as if she wonders why I’m not following her like I’m supposed to. In the darkness I can just see her, just read the expression on her face.

  There’s a resounding crash of glass at the front of the store, then a lot of rustles and clumps—probably the sounds of thousands of cops diving through the A&P front windows. Ceiling lights begin to flicker on in erratic rhythm. I am still rooted to my spot. Down front, a cop races past our aisle. He doesn’t even look down it, guess he doesn’t expect to see anybody looting pet food.

  Norma walks back to me in what is a pretty confident stride for a five-year-old.

  What’s that noise? she says. She’s genuinely annoyed, I can tell.

  They’re called policemen, Norma, I say, and we are in trouble.

  Oh, fuzz, she says. We got to hide. Scrunch down.

  Immediately I scrunch down, although I feel a bit ridiculous for following the orders of a five-year-old so obediently. Yet there’s a sense of knowing the turf in that child voice and I’ve always believed that when-in-Rome shit. Norma scrambles into a low shelf of pet food sacks. C’mon, she says. I manage to fit myself into the narrow space, lying flat next to her. Straining every muscle in my body I manipulate a couple of sacks to the front of us. The sacks might not be necessary, no cop seems at all interested in checking out the animal food section. The smell of cat chow and doggie treats is even mustier at this low level. It’s making me sick. I turn my head, seeking clearer air, and am immediately assaulted by birdseed odors worse than the pet food. For a moment I’m sure I’m going to throw up.