Lights Out

My real name, Eddie thought: me. A surge of something-energy, adrenaline, endorphins, something-pulsed through him, lifted him. And then, at last, he was skimming. He didn’t feel exhaustion, pain, fear, despair. He felt nothing but the cool blue, pushing him forward, helping.

Go, Nails. Go, Nails. The voice didn’t stop until his hand smacked the wall, hard: he hadn’t even seen it coming. He got his head up in time to see Bobby touch.

Bobby couldn’t say anything at first. He just hung onto the edge of the pool, gasping. After a while he got his breath back. He said: “Fuck.”

Eddie climbed out of the pool. His muscles ached, but he made sure he got out in one smooth motion.

“Very cute,” said Bobby, still in the pool. He was smiling, but too broadly, and his voice was too loud. “The way I paid for you to get into that kind of shape.”

Eddie turned. “How’s that?”

There was a pause while Bobby made an effort to hold the words inside. They tumbled out. “You’ve been sucking at the public tit for the past fifteen years or whatever the hell it is, that’s how, and I’m a taxpayer like you wouldn’t believe.”

Eddie came back to the edge, looked down at Bobby. Bobby’s hair was plastered down on his forehead, his face was red. “If you win, say little,” Eddie said. “If you lose, say less.”

Bobby went redder, but kept his mouth shut.

Eddie walked away, into the locker room, showered, changed. He wrang out the Speedo, dried it under the blower, stuck it in his pocket. Another possession, added to the $1.55 left from the gate money, the $100 bill from El Rojo, and Prof’s cardboard tube, which didn’t belong to him. He went out into the lobby and sat in a chair. It was a wooden chair, hard and uncomfortable, but Eddie was almost asleep when Bobby appeared.

Bobby looked good. His hair, still damp, was slicked back; he wore a dark suit, glossy black shoes with little holes in them-Eddie knew they had a name but didn’t know what it was-and had a glossy black fur coat over one shoulder. He walked over to Eddie. Eddie rose; it took a lot of effort, but he didn’t want Bobby standing over him, not with all that wardrobe.

Bobby had recovered his self-confidence, or at least his composure. He took in Eddie’s wrinkled trousers, the bright green short-sleeved shirt, the dirty prison sneakers. Then he reached in his pocket and pulled out his roll. It was a thick one, jammed into a gold money clip. He peeled off a hundred-dollar bill, one of many, and handed it over. Eddie found himself staring at it, like a bumpkin.

Bobby laughed. “You and Jack couldn’t be more different, you know that?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Bobby stopped laughing, stepped back. “Nothing. He’s at home with money, that’s all. Big money.”

“He is?”

“Sure. Who do you think sicced BCC on us?”

“Jack did that to you?”

“Hell, yes. It was brilliant. We’re set for life.”

“Who’s we?”

“Dad and me. Who else is there?”

“Vic, for one,” Eddie said. And the whole fucking town. Bobby shrugged himself into his fur coat. “He didn’t have any shares, Eddie. This is America.”

They didn’t shake hands again. Bobby went out. Eddie had a drink from the fountain and left soon after. He was almost at the bus station when he realized he’d forgotten his steam bath.

11

The stubble-faced man had patterned the bus-station floor in dirty whorls and laid the mop aside. Now he sat behind the ticket counter, studying a magazine called HOT! HOT! HOT! He looked up as Eddie approached, spreading his hands over a picture of people having sex while watching a big-screen TV where people were having sex.

“When’s the next bus to New York?” Eddie asked.

“Seven twenty-two, A.M.”

“You mean tomorrow?”

“A.M.,” the stubble-faced man repeated, his fingers stirring impatiently on the magazine.

“Where can I get something to eat?”

“Search me.”

“But you live here.”

The stubble-faced man snorted.

Eddie didn’t like that. He leaned on the counter. The stubble-faced man drew away, dragging HOT! HOT! HOT! with him. Eddie laid his hand on the magazine; a page tore through a fat thigh. “Let’s put it this way,” he said. “Where do you go when you’re hungry?”

The bus-station door opened and a cop came in, stamping snow off his boots; the same cop who had stopped Eddie on the bridge. The stubble-faced man smiled. “I go home, asshole,” he said to Eddie.

“Everything okay, Murray?” asked the cop, looking hard at Eddie.

Eddie backed away from the counter.

“Best day of my life,” said the stubble-faced man. “I just love this job.”

The cop went over to the coffee machine, fed it change, pressed the button. Nothing happened. He slapped the machine with his palm.

“This thing on the fritz, Murray?”

“Guess so.”

“I want my money back.”

“Got no key,” said Murray. “There’s a number to call on the back.”