Cape Cod Noir - By David L Ulin Page 0,13

think he was going to do well being off in the Army fighting terrorists. But not even Mom could explain why Chad was eventually discharged and came back from Afghanistan with scripts for all kinds of things, except to say, “It’s as if your brother has taken lots of bullets inside his heart, Tommy. You can’t actually see the place that got hurt, but if you could, you’d know how badly he’s suffering.” Sometimes I could see it written all over his face, though, like that night sitting and drinking in the car at Cumbie’s.

“Remember how good it used to be?” Chad asked. “You and me, droppin’ it like it’s hot?” He took a swig from his beer and wiped his mouth.

I remembered how it was, letting Chad talk me into sneaking into someone else’s garage, their car, their house, riding away on their bikes with PlayStations and laptops stuffed into our backpacks. It was everything I had wanted to forget about myself, but for Chad. Once he left, I started trying to clean up my act, but now Chad was back and he had a thousand dollars riding on my back.

“Yeah, that was cool,” I said as we finished off our beers before heading out to find a new ride for the night. Maybe it’s cause we grew up without a dad, but it was easier to lie than to admit that I never wanted to do any of that stuff, I had just wanted to be with Chad. “Welcome home, bro,” I said. “It’s good to have you back.”

Chad passed me another bottle of beer. As he steered the car onto the dark road, I felt myself move back to that place I had been trying to get beyond, but now that Chad was home safe I knew I had never wanted to leave.

We parked behind the valet parking booth next to the Pocasset Golf Club clubhouse. Chad took a lumpy sock out of a military duffle bag and tucked it inside his jean jacket. “BRB, dude,” he said, and got out of the car and went inside the booth.

The booth sat there, dark, motionless, silent, with a blue glow coming through the blinds. I sat and downed another beer, tasting its bitterness, waiting for fifteen minutes, maybe more, for Chad to emerge.

Chad got into the car and held up a set of keys to a ’66 Mustang.

“Whoa, so how did you do that?” Like I needed to ask.

“Just a little barter. This way we get the sweet ride, we gas ’er, and return ’er by eleven. Ain’t no need to go breakin’ no law.”

Chad texted his friends: Got the ride boyz. Where U @?

In Woods Hole, we all gathered back at the dock at five, like always. Stubby was yelling into his cell phone, pacing back and forth. Second Chance was gone.

Freddie and Tiny never made it to Osterville. A coast guard patrol boat picked them up near Popponesset where the boat had run out of gas. They said they had planned to bring it back in time and would have filled it up, but they didn’t have any money because of school policy so it wasn’t their fault Second Chance ran out of gas.

The Mustang at the golf club had a full tank. So did Chad. Whatever he had done in that booth had shot his eyes through with blood.

We drove to where his friends were sliding a slim jim into the door of some shit Toyota.

“Well, I guess you won,” one of his friends said and gawked at our ride.

Chad and I had a few beers left, but his friends were out so Chad thought it would be cool to race to the liquor store over on the other side of the Bourne Bridge.

“The old Bridge Over Troubled Waters, ha ha ha,” his friend, the one who was driving, said.

“Whoever gets there last is buying,” Chad commanded, then laid down enough rubber to leave them behind in a cloud of smoke.

The more fucked up and dangerous Chad’s idea was, the more likely it was that he could pull it off. That’s what set him apart. That’s why I loved him and feared him all the same. Why I thought he was going to come home a hero. Why we were going to beat his friends across that bridge and they were gonna be buying us a case of Bud and a bottle of Goldschläger, suckahs.

Later on, the cops kept asking me what I said to