In Laymon's Terms

“Your tires. Got a look at ’em on the way in, and it looks like at least a couple of ’em are flat.”

“What? What are you talking about? They were fine when I pulled in.”

“I dunno, man,” he chuckled. “Just tellin’ ya what I saw.”

“Terrific.” Gary fought the burning impulse to leap over his bench and wipe the punk’s smirk off his face, demand to know what the hell he did to his car.

“Hey, I’d give ya a lift, but since I got none...” He shrugged. “’Sides, I know a proper guy like you ain’t lookin’ at going where we’re headed anyhow.” He put his arm around Sherri again and shook her. “Right, baby?”

The young girl’s eyelids fluttered. She slowly lifted her head...and smiled, her dull gaze suddenly sharpening. “Right, lover,” Sherri purred, her horrible grin cutting itself into her gaunt cheeks while she stared at Gary and whimpered with pleasure under Randy’s hands.

“Damn, girl, ’bout time you stopped tripping on me. Good shit, huh?”

Gary shook his head, chiding himself for being naive and misreading the girl. He decided it was time to go and just forget it, they weren’t worth the trouble. If his business taught him nothing else, it was that drug-addled kids like these are often the most unpredictable and dangerous.

Gary turned around and carelessly gathered up his reports. He snapped open his briefcase, tossing in the paperwork before quickly closing it and clasping it shut again.

“Hey now, where you off to?”

“What?” he asked, not turning around.

“I asked you where you were off to, dude.” Randy’s voice had suddenly grown dark and menacing, his words clipped to a razor’s sharpness.

Gary’s back tensed. “Just got to start heading home. You know, the wife and kid and all.”

“Uh huh. Yeah, must be a bitch.” Rancor dripped off Randy’s words. Sherri lapped it up and began snickering.

Gary stood and grabbed the briefcase off the table. Randy’s eyes widened at the sound of something shifting with a soft, muffled thud.

“Ooo, what’cha got in there?”

He looked over at Randy. “Nothing much. Just sales samples.”

“A salesman, huh?” Randy’s mouth curled up into a sneer.

“Kind of. So, the tires. You recall which ones they were?”

“Nah. Shit, coulda been all four for all I know.” Sherri grabbed Randy’s arm and buried her giggling face in the shoulder of his leather jacket.

“I see.” Gary spied a phone on the back wall behind the counter and started toward it.

“Take it easy, sales-dude.” Gary could hear both of them laughing behind him as he walked away.

He reached the counter and asked the waitress if he could use the phone. “Seems I have some flat tires on my car outside,” he explained.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. Or so I hear, anyway,” he sighed. He placed his briefcase carefully on the counter next to the cash register. “Any towing outfit nearby?”

“Sure, I guess so.” She looked across the counter to the seated older man with whom she’d been speaking earlier. “Bert, you think—”

“Nah, don’t sweat it, friend,” Bert said, shaking his balding head. “I already called and gotcha all taken care of.”

“You did? But how’d you know my tires were flat?”

“Saw them on my way in.”

“Oh.” Gary was puzzled. Hadn’t the man been in the diner the entire time?

“Yep. Well, whattya know—in fact, there’s Bobby now. Looks like he’s getting you all squared away.”

Gary turned his head to the front window and saw his car hitched to the back of a departing tow truck, the truck’s red taillights growing smaller and dimmer as it bounced down the dark, rutted road with his car in tow.

“Wh-what the—” sputtered Gary. He spun around to Bert. “What the hell’s he doing?”

“Told you, friend. Just getting you taken care of.”

“But I didn’t ask for it to be towed away without me! Where the hell’s he taking it? For that matter, how the hell am I supposed to hook up with my car again at this time of night with no ride?”

“Yeah, guess that there might be a bit of a problem, huh?”

“Christ yeah, that’s a problem!” He heard Randy and Sherri’s laughter and the deep mutterings of the diner’s two other patrons rise up behind him. Not wanting to make any more of a scene, he took a deep breath and ran his hand down his face. “Fine, fine. Just tell me what I owe,” he said to the waitress, “and call me a cab, all right?” He pulled out his wallet and thumbed through his cash.

Damn, hardly enough to buy anything for Kelly after the cab and the tow-yard. And Linda’s going to jump all over me for getting home even later and—

“Uh uh. Can’t do that,” said Bert.

Gary looked up, blood beginning to roar angrily in his ears. “Oh? And why’s that?”

“Too late. All the cabs around here are shut down for the night.”

“Great. That’s just great. Now what the hell am I supposed to do?”

Bert shrugged. “Don’t know. Catch a ride?”