a compact in the back. I use it when I close without Louie. You here for the duration?”
“Yeah.”
“Good.” He bent further over the desk and squinted. “Who’s that?”
“Pence’s grandson, Jimmy Broda. Or my version of him, the way I think he looks now.”
“Skinny little fucker. Where you gonna start?”
“I’m heading down to the Corps after work. You come along?”
“Sure, why not? But it’s a long time before we close this place up.”
“So?”
“So, shit,” he said, pulling the pipe and film canister from his pocket. “Let’s get our heads up.”
SIX
LEE RETURNED TO the store somewhere around five and parked her books beneath the counter. When she had straightened up, she waved to me briefly and smiled, then turned her head away in mock embarrassment. Her hair was uncombed, and I imagined it matted and spread out upon a pillow. My blood pressure jumped a bit, and I kept my stare on her until she felt it enough to look once more in my direction.
When the transfer truck pulled around back, the sales crew typically scattered. McGinnes bolted for the back room, and Lloyd gathered up his things and left for the evening.
As I went to the back door, I noticed Malone and a younger guy talking in the Sound Explosion. The man was wearing a velvet maroon jogging suit and a thick, braided gold chain around his neck. They shook hands for an artificially long time, then Malone buried his fist and its contents into his pocket.
I unloaded the truck with the help of a driver I recognized from the warehouse, a wiry, hard-looking young man who wore his Nathan’s cap backwards and had a cigarette lodged above his ear. We worked without speaking until he departed with a tough nod.
I managed the merchandise onto the conveyer belt, which ran parallel to the stairs leading down to the stockroom. I walked alongside the crated goods until they hit a flat, rollered surface at the foot of the stairs, then pulled the power lever back from “forward” to the “off” position.
I heard the crush of an empty can and looked up to see McGinnes stepping out of the shadows of the stockroom’s far corner. A fresh malt liquor filled one hand, his brass pipe the other. He handed me the can while he filled the pipe.
I drank deeply from the can. He lit the pipe thoroughly and then we traded. The pot was smooth passing my throat but singed my lungs. I made it through half an exhale before coughing out the rest and reaching back for the malt liquor. McGinnes pulled another can out from the inside of his sportjacket, popped the tab, and tapped my can with his. We tipped our heads back and drank.
We stood in a fairly thick blanket of smoke. McGinnes knocked the ash from the pipe onto his palm and filled another bowl. He lit it evenly with a circular motion of the disposable lighter flame he held above it. We smoked that while downing our Colts. I thought of how good a cigarette would taste, then thought of something else. I looked at McGinnes’ face and laughed. He thought that was funny, and both of us laughed.
“Evan Walters’ bucket came in,” I said. “You want it?”
“Yeah,” he said, and a wedge of black hair fell across his forehead. “Give it to me.”
I found it on the conveyer belt, a green cylinder wrapped in plastic and secured with a twist tie. I took a four-point stance, centered the bucket to myself, stepped back, and passed it to him with a surprising spiral. He caught and ran with it halfway across the stockroom, where he stopped and did some weird end-zone strut.
Walking back my way, he let out a short, mean burst of laughter. His jaws were tight and his eyes looked directionless, and I realized, in a sudden rush of alcohol and marijuana, that the way I felt just then was the way he felt all the time.
“Evan Walters,” he said, “deserves a little extra something for all the trouble he’s been through.” Mimicking Walters, he lowered his voice to an effete growl, and said, “I’ve been calling you for months, Mr. McGinnes, and frankly I don’t appreciate…”
He continued the speech as he unraveled the plastic, removed the top, lowered the bucket beneath his crotch, and unzipped his fly. He looked at me glumly, shut his eyes, found his pecker, and let fly a hard piss-stream into the mouth of the bucket.
“Come on, man…. ”
“I’m a