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Fathers and Sons Chapter 4 All three of Ricci’s goons ambled up to the car. “Nah, we’re fine,” I said. Reached in the open window of the Rev’s car and turned the key off. “Thanks anyway.” “We looked for you yesterday,” Anthony said. The one with the piece. “Couldn’t find ya. Thought maybe you took off.” “Why would I do that?” The Rev was up on the sidewalk, looking at his car like it was some weird kinda animal. Charles was holding his hand. Hanging onto him. He’s a smart kid. I walked over to ‘em, I was thinking of taking the Rev’s arm, getting him back in my car, so we could get outta here…… “Mr. Ricci says you ain’t gonna run off, but we ain’t so sure.” The goon wasn’t gonna let it go. He walked over and stood in front a’ me. “Yeah? Probably why he’s the boss and you ain’t. Come on, Rev, let’s get in the car.” One a’ the other goons stood behind the Rev and Charles. The third one leaned against my car. “We been asking around about you. You’re some big fucking deal here, ain’t ya?” “Beats me. Am I?” “Whatsa matter with your leg?” “We gotta go. You wanna get outta the way?” “You always been a gimp? Probably a good excuse to get outta stuff, huh?” I thought about shoving him outta the way and driving off, but he was looking for a fight. Could be he wouldn’ta let me go without one. And I had Charles and the Rev to think about. He stuck his leg out, tapped me on the shin with his wingtip. “I’m watching you,” he said. “You try to run away, and I’m gonna come after you. I don’t give a shit about your gimp. Ain’t gonna get you outta nothing with me.” And he gave me a shove. I must be getting old. Or something. Charles ran in front of me, drew back his little fist, and jammed it right where it would do ol’ Anthony the most good before I could catch him. “You leave my dad alone!” he said. Anthony grunted, and bent over for a second; I could see what was coming. He snarled; pulled his hand way back to let Charles have it----and stopped, ‘cause my .38 was poking him in the nose. “Touch my kid, and you’re gonna be dead.” “Fuck you,” he said and laughed. Sorta. He was outta breath, and trying to pretend Charles punch hadn’t hurt him, he was trying to laugh. I pulled back the hammer. You don’t have to do that to fire a .38, but the click got the goon’s attention. He looked in my eyes, and decided to believe me. “We’re gonna go now,” I said. “Be a good idea for you and your pals to get outta the way. Tell your boss trying to scare me ain’t gonna work. Charles---get the Rev in the car.” They moved back outta the way. We got in the car. We drove away. I drove until there was plenty a’ distance between us and them, before I pulled over. “You’re pretty pleased with yourself, ain’t ya?” I said. I looked at Charles, sitting in the front seat between me and the Rev. He grinned. “What the hell’d you do that for?” “I got mad. He called you a name.” “Yeah, well, he coulda beat the living daylights outta you. You might wanna think about that the next time.” “Nah, he don’t scare me.” “He oughta scare you. He’s ten times bigger than you are.” “Nah. If he does anything, you’ll shoot him.” Shit. “What if I ain’t around?” “Then I won’t hit him.” “Yeah, we’re gonna have to talk about this some more, champ. Right now, though,I think we need to get the Rev home.” The Rev’s head was tilted back, laying on the back of the seat; his mouth was open, he was snoring. “What’s the matter with him?” I shook my head. “I don’t know.” “I don’t like it.” I ruffled his hair. “Me, neither.” Put the car in gear, and turned east. “You even know what a gimp is?” “No. Is it something bad?” About what I figured. Maybe Anthony wasn’t the only one who was spoiling for a fight back there…….. Richard’s pickup was in the Rev’s driveway when we got to his house. We walked the Rev inside. He seemed fine by the time we got there, but I wanted to tell Richard to keep an eye on him. He laughed when I told him about the Rev’s car. “I think you’re making too much outta that, Bud. The Rev’s always been a little dense about cars. He thinks maybe it started by itself? That sounds about right.” He was sober. He had supper cooking, I could smell it. Pork chops, maybe. “Just watch out for him, would ya? Just in case.” “Sure. Say, I’m gonna come over tomorrow night and finish up. Take the last of the forms down and smooth out the rough places. Not tonight.” He grinned. “I got a date.” “Yeah? Anybody I know?” He shook his head and grinned some more. “I’ll see you tomorrow night, then, and you can tell me all about her.” He shook his head again. “Nope, not yet.” He told us we could stay for supper; I said we had to get back. I told the Rev we’d get his car checked out, and bring it back by. He said good-bye to me, then he bent down to Charles and said, “Good-bye…….” And paused. Like he couldn’t remember. “….young man,” he finished. Richard might not be worried, but I was. Maybe not as much as I shoulda been. The goons parked outside my house the next afternoon. Lynn noticed ‘em. I guess she could tell I wasn’t surprised to see ‘em; so she asked me about ‘em. I was hoping she’d feel safe letting me handle it, like when the crazy woman threw a brick through our window, but maybe she did that just because she was sick; she sure wanted to know all about it this time. They got outta the car and leaned on it, looking at my house. Didn’t go away. They had beer in the car, and a box of something, maybe fried chicken. They ate and drank and laughed, and watched my house. Lynn went to the window and looked out every few minutes. I was surprised she didn’t burn supper; I think she was at the window more than she was in the kitchen. And then she couldn’t sit still and eat. After we were done eating, she went back to the window. “What do they think they’ll gain by standing out there?” she said. “They bother you, baby?” “A little. I know you said they’re not dangerous…..I think maybe it’s just the idea that they’re watching us.” I was gonna finish reading the newspaper, but I put it down next to my chair. “OK. I’ll go tell ‘em to go away.” Anthony was picking his teeth when I walked up to him. “Hey there, bigshot,” he said. “You got the money for Mr. Ricci yet?” “You’re making my wife nervous.” “So…...give us what we want, and we’ll go away.” “No, you’re gonna go away anyway.” “Oh yeah? And why would we do that?” “’Cause if you don’t, I’m gonna have to arrest you.” He laughed. “Yeah, that’s right, you’re the big tough cop. I’m supposed to be scared a’ you.” He tipped up his beer, and swallowed the last of it. “You look like just another flatfoot to me.” Tossed his bottle up on my lawn. “And I’m supposed to believe that doll that’s been looking out the window is your wife?” He laughed some more. Turned toward the house and said, “Come on out here, dollface! I got more a’ what you need than this bum!” He was a big talker. And if all he’d done was talk, I still mighta let ‘em go; or I mighta just put the cuffs on ‘em and taken ‘em to jail……but the gesture he made in the direction of my wife—his hand in front of his zipper---pissed me off. He was lucky; he had a glass jaw, and went down almost right away. Otherwise, he mighta gotten hurt. One a’ the other goons pulled his piece and pointed it at me. I stepped over Anthony, sleeping on the ground in front of his car, walked over to the goon, reached out and grabbed it outta his hand. That mighta looked more foolhardy than it really was. I was pretty sure they had orders not to shoot me. How you gonna get your money if you shoot the guy who’s got it? I turned around and looked at the third guy, who lifted his hands and said, “I ain’t got no beef with you, OK?” Yeah, I didn’t believe that, either. The second guy thought he’d get the drop on me from behind. Thought he’d hang on to me so the third guy could hammer me. That mighta worked if ol’ Vincent woulda hired somebody with some smarts, somebody better’n these bums. Broke the guy’s nose with my head, grabbed his collar and shoved him through the passenger window head first. Number three swung, I ducked, and got him in the gut on the way back up. He held up a hand. “OK,” he wheezed. “I give.” “Yeah, right.” I grabbed his lapel. Pulled him closer and hit him in the face with his buddy’s pistol a coupla times. “Now you can give up. Put shithead there in the car, and get the fuck away from my house. Next time I see you here, you’re goin’ to jail.” I guess it didn’t seem like such a big deal to me. You know, just knockin’ some sense into a coupla punks---nothing dangerous at all. So I was kinda surprised by the reaction I got when I went back inside. Charles was standing by the window, and when I came in, he jumped up and down and pumped his fists in the air, and whooped. Becky tried to copy him. And Lynn……. If you’d asked me ahead of time, I woulda said I thought she might be a little upset with me. For fighting, you know? She always talks like she thinks fighting is bad. But I woulda been wrong. I guess I’ll never understand women. She looked at me……man, that’s the way I wanted her to look at me all the time. Like I was the cavalry, or Gary Cooper. Like I saved her from something. Like I was a hero. But I was usually wrong when I tried to figure out what she was thinking by how she looked, and I knew it…..so I said, “I’m sorry, baby, they---,”and then she kissed me. Put her arms around me and gave me a kiss she probably shoulda saved for later…..when the kids weren’t watching. I heard Charles groan. Becky laughed. She was still jumping. “You’re not mad at me, huh?” I said. She shook her head, and kissed me again, longer, deeper, sweeter. A few minutes later, I said, “Charles, how ‘bout you take your sister into the kitchen and get her some cookies and a glass of milk?” “How come she gets cookies?” “You can have some, too,” Lynn said. “Use the plastic cups.” More minutes later, after we made it to the couch, she said, “How long have we known each other?” I wasn’t prepared for a quiz. “A while.” “I’ve never seen that,” she said. “I know you’re strong, and tough, but……I’ve never seen you…….” “Beat the shit outta somebody? You like that, huh?” She shook her head. “It’s not that. It’s…….watching you. The way you move…..the other guys looked weak and clumsy. You looked strong, and brave, and……” She took a deep breath and let it out. “…..you’re mine.” Yeah. Yeah. I was hers all right. I mighta been hers right then and there, but Charles came back from the kitchen just then and said, “We don’t have any more milk.” “Drink juice,” I said. He heaved a big sigh, turned around and went back to the kitchen. Lynn took another deep breath, and cuddled a little closer. “You wanna go upstairs?” I said. “Mmmmmm.” “What’re you thinking about?” “I’m thinking about “Gone with the Wind.” “Gone with the Wind? What for?” “I’m thinking about the part where Clark Gable carries Vivien Leigh up the stairs to have his way with her…..” I drew my fingers through her curls. “You like that, huh?” She nodded. I tilted her chin up and kissed her again. “I’m sorry I can’t do that, baby. You know I would if I could.” She didn’t say anything. I thought maybe she didn’t understand. “My bum leg. It’s not good enough for me to carry anybody up the stairs. We’d end up in a heap at the bottom if I tried it. That wouldn’t be very romantic.” She still didn’t say anything. “I’m sorry, honey. I wish I could.” “Hush,” she said. “You don’t get it.” “I guess not.” “I don’t need you to do it. I’m thinking about it because it makes me feel sexy. I just need you to love me.” “I can do that,” I said. A few minutes later, I said, “But not here. We need to go upstairs.” Becky screamed. Lynn’s forehead dropped to my chest. “And not now,” she said. She kissed me once more, and got up off the couch. Becky screamed again. “Lynn!!” Charles yelled. “Becky threw her juice at me!” There’s something to be said for waiting. Richard came by, and finished up, like he said he would. Lynn invited him to have some lemonade when he was done, and the idiot accepted. So we sat on the porch, drinking lemonade and looking at the cement and trying to make small talk, when that’s not what I wanted to do at all. I couldn’t keep my eyes off her. This was one time I knew, when Lynn looked at me, what she was thinking about, and it wasn’t cement. I caught her looking at my crotch once; let me tell you, there was something there for her to look at. Robert took his lemonade and wandered down by the little pool to make sure he didn’t leave any tools, or maybe just to admire it. I couldn’t stand it; I followed Lynn into the kitchen when she went to get more lemonade and cornered her by the refrigerator. She said, “Bud, he’ll see us,” once, but then she put her arms around me and kissed me back just as hard as I was kissing her. I was pretty glad Richard made enough noise to let us know he was coming inside before I forgot where we were or who else was around. It coulda been embarrassing. She asked me how long we’d known each other, and I didn’t know without sitting down and figuring it out, but it didn’t matter. This felt just about like those first weeks again, when all the feelings I had for her were new and strong. I don’t know why. All I wanted to do was kiss her and touch her; have her touch me. Be with her. I wanted to be with her forever. Nothing else mattered. By the time Richard left, and we got the kids in bed, we were both so hot we didn’t wait to get our clothes off. We almost didn’t wait to actually get inside the bedroom. I put my arms around her waist, lifted her just up off the floor and carried her that way through the door. She giggled, and wrapped her legs around me. I thought maybe I was gonna explode before we even got to the bed. She didn’t give me any guff this time about babies. She helped me get ready. Another one a’ those times when I coulda died happy, and I thought I might. In Lynn’s arms, inside her body, and it was so goddam good, regardless a’ that thing I was wearing……wanted to stay there forever……knew she’d hold me there forever, too, if she could…..never enough, never close enough, never long enough, the end always came way too soon……..and I thought maybe my heart was gonna bust outta my chest along with the other….. I didn’t wanna move for a while afterward. Lynn kept her arms and legs wrapped around me, and even though it was done, right there was right where I wanted to stay. I usually get sleepy pretty quick, but not always, and this time…..I wanted to enjoy the feel of her skin against me without having to do anything about it, you know? I wanted to fall asleep still inside her, my fingers in her hair, my tongue in her mouth, as close as I could get…….. She made a noise and straightened her legs out beside mine; moved her hips a little……so I moved……and then I knew something wasn’t right. Lynn knew it, too. Pulled away from her to look……and realized it didn’t matter how careful we’d tried to be……….Dammit. You never figure on ‘em breaking……… A bucket a’ cold water woulda felt better. Cursing probably isn’t very romantic. I didn’t feel very romantic anymore. We’d been kissing and cuddling long enough that there was no point in trying to do anything about it. What was done was done. I remember thinking, Be nice, huh, if this time, this one that was so damn good…….if this is the time that kills her? Lynn didn’t say anything. When I flopped back on the pillow, she cuddled under my arm, and lay her head on my shoulder. “Don’t worry,” she said. She put her arms around me, and squeezed. “It’ll be all right. Don’t worry.”
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