Hustle Read online

  Bear went back downstairs.

  “You find anything?” asked Donny.

  “No,” said Bear, “you?”

  Big Rich said, “You want some wine?”

  “I think there’s a liquor cabinet above the fridge. Pour me a glass of whiskey, would ya, kid?”

  ***

  Gabriel leaned his head up against the window. Every few moments he let out a quiet moan. The night was black and fog filled the streets. He paid no attention to what direction Dustin drove.

  “Where are we?” he asked.

  “Where the fuck do you think we are? In the middle of San Francisco.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “We’re going to finish up the work we started. We have some unfinished business, you and me.”

  “Dustin, I told you, I can’t do as you asked. It’s impossible. The courts will never ratify it. It’s not even legal.”

  “Of course it is, all you have to do is make it legal. And you know what’ll happen if you don’t.”

  Gabriel looked out the window and said, “I know, I know.”

  They were rolling downhill now and Gabriel knew that they were heading to the Mission District. Soon the streets leveled out and they were in the flat underbelly of the city. The fog had thinned to a mist and the sky began to lighten to a shade of dark blue. Dustin pulled into an all-night gas station. He rolled the Bentley up toward a set of payphones near the back of the lot by the air and water pumps. The shiny black car magnetized the few homeless guys who were waiting around to pump gas for strangers.

  Dustin stayed in the driver’s seat staring at the phones he took from the intruders. There was a gentle knock at the window. Dustin rolled it down.

  “Hey buddy, nice car. You want me to do the windows?” An unshaven bum with only a few teeth left in his head stood there holding a bucket and squeegee.

  “Get the fuck away from the car before I cut you, scumbag,” Dustin hissed.

  The man frowned and backed away. To the next bum walking up to the vehicle, he said, “Don’t bother. Guy’s an asshole.”

  Inside the car, Gabriel asked, “What are we doing here?”

  “I gotta make a phone call.”

  Gabriel waited for a moment before asking, “Why don’t you make it?”

  Dustin looked at him, blaming him. “Because I left my fucking phone book at the house.” He got out of the car and paced between it and the phone booth, hoping to conjure the number he wanted to call. Gabriel watched him. When the conjuring didn’t work, Dustin climbed back into the driver’s seat.

  “Where are we going now?” asked Gabriel.

  “Somewhere else.”

  Gabriel said, “I’m thirsty.”

  “You still haven’t told me who those bastards were tonight.”

  “I’ve told you, again and again, I don’t know. I didn’t even see them. I don’t know who they are.”

  “You know,” said Dustin. “You know something.”

  Gabriel swallowed. His throat was dry. He didn’t mention it again. He just stared out the window.

  ***

  “Fucker took our phones.”

  The three sat at Gabriel Thaxton’s kitchen table. The two boys with sodas in front of them and Bear with his whiskey and the contents of Dustin’s black address book spread out in front of him, separated into piles—neat piles, trying to make sense of something that made no sense to him.

  “So what? Buy new ones,” said Bear.

  “No, I have to have that one; it’s got pictures of my kid when she was just a baby. Tons of ‘em. It can’t be replaced. I have to have that one.”

  Donny stared at the Coke can in front of him, not listening.

  “Pictures of your kid, huh?” There was clear doubt in Bear’s voice. “You fellas never told me what exactly you were doing here tonight.”

  Big Rich wasn’t listening. “I have to get my phone back.”

  “You think it’s more important than Thaxton’s life?”

  “I’m just saying I gotta get that phone back. Doesn’t mean I don’t care about the old man.” Rich took a sip of his soda. “I do. I do care about the old man. If we can get him, we should. We should save him from that ugly fucker.”

  “We, huh?” said Bear.

  That breezed right past Rich, too. “Yeah, and when we do, I want my phone back.”

  Bear went back to puzzling through the scraps of paper before him. The book itself turned out to have very little written in it. Mostly, it was made up of the scraps of paper. A chaotic product of a chaotic mind. He had no idea what he was looking for.

  Rich asked, “Find anything good in there?”

  “Good?”

  “Yeah, you know, like, useful.”

  “No,” said Bear. He went back to his work, fanning out the slips in front of him. One slip of paper stood out. It had a name and phone number that had been circled several times with different ink. The name was Gilly. Below it, in pencil, was one word: Marin.

  Donny, who hadn’t spoken since they’d sat down said, “Rich, I think I’m gonna be sick.”

  Bear interrupted, “If you’re gonna puke, do it in the toilet. That way.”

  “No,” said Donny, still speaking to Rich. “I think I’m gonna be sick sick.”

  “You’ll be fine; you can hang on a little longer. It only seems like it’s been a long time, but you’re still well. We gotta hang on to what we have, just in case. Go check the medicine cabinet upstairs. Find something to hold you over.”

  Donny got up slowly from the table and ambled toward the stairs. Rich called after him, “If you find somethin’ bring it back down here, don’t hold out. I ain’t feeling the best myself.”

  Bear raised his eyes from the scraps of paper. “Sick, huh? You gave up your precious phone with your baby’s pictures, but you managed to hang on to some dope? Nice to see you got your priorities straight.”

  Big Rich wanted to say, Fuck you, but decided that they were gonna need their new friend to help him find his phone and Gabriel. One without the other just wouldn’t do. He told himself that he had the big picture still forefront in his mind. The plan might still work. In Rich’s mind the phone equaled money.

  Bear said, “That’s what I thought.” And Big Rich still didn’t say anything.

  Bear sat weeding through the scraps, remembering that he had his own wallet taken. There were numbers in there that would come in handy right now. There was one number, though, he had memorized.

  “Hey, kid, you see a phone around here?”

  “You can stop calling me kid,” said Rich, pointing to the counter behind Bear.

  Bear got up and began to dial.

  Big Rich asked, “Hey, why do they call you Bear, anyway?”

  “Because I can run thirty-five miles an hour and I’m great at climbing trees.”

  Rich sneered at his sarcasm and watched him make his phone call.

  “Hey, Roberta, it’s Bear. Is Sheila workin’? I know you’re closed, but is she still there?” Bear waited, listening to the sounds of the Roadhouse. It always sounded louder on the phone than it really was—more rowdy, more fun. Now, all he heard was the clang of silverware, the hum of vacuums. There was no music, no laughter. It still seemed like a place he’d rather be. It took a while before Sheila got on the line.

  “Sheila, honey, it’s me Bear … Yeah, I do, baby, I’d really love to.” To Bear, the sound of Sheila’s voice was always warm and inviting. She had a flirty rasp in her voice even now after work, counting her tips. “… Well, you never know … I know, I’m glad I caught you, I need you to do me a favor … no, it can’t wait, not really … okay, I will, I promise … You know, Johnny Watson, right? Silver-haired guy, they call him the Doctor? … Yeah, that’s him. Sheila, listen, I need you to get his phone number for me … I know it’s late, but it’s important … You know who might have it? Davey or Victor … Yeah, I know he’s a dick, but he’ll pick up the phone. Can you do this for me? I can’t do it, I’ve lost al
l my numbers and my phone … It’s a long story, I’ll say that much … Thank you, sweetheart. When you get the number, I want you to call me back here at this one. You got a pen?”

  Big Rich watched Bear speak into the phone and thought about his own girlfriend, up in Oregon, how her voice would sound on the phone. Shit, he could never ask her for a favor in the middle of the night. She’d hang up on him. Women were bitches.

  Donny came down the stairs with two pill bottles, one in each hand. “Pay-dirt,” he said. “Two bottles of Vicodin, fives and seven-and-a-halves. This will hold us over.”

  Big Rich immediately forgot about Bear’s phone call. “I dunno, those things never did shit for me.”

  “You gotta eat a few of ‘em, but they’ll work.” He tossed one of the bottles over to Rich, the fives. Rich missed the catch and pulled them off the floor. “What else you find up there?”

  Donny reached in the pocket of his jean-jacket and pulled out two glass pipes, both blackened and thick with residue. “Check these out; I’m guessing these were Dustin’s.”

  “Nice,” said Big Rich. “I guess we’ll make it through the night after all.”

  Bear hung up the phone and looked at the two boys dividing up their finds. “Don’t smoke that shit in here. We’re not through. There’s still a pretty good chance the cops’re gonna show.”

  “Why? Don’t you think if they were gonna show, they would’ve by now?” Big Rich stared into the bowl of the pipe, admiring the crystals, guessing how much was in there, marveling at how much had been smoked through the thing.

  “Just hold off, alright?”

  “What are we doing? Did you find out where they went?”

  “We’re waiting,” said Bear with a sound of finality.

  “Then wait, we shall,” said Rich, touching a lighter to the bottom of the glass bulb.

  They sat waiting for the phone to ring, Bear with his whiskey and the boys alternately chasing their painkillers with Coke-a-Cola and hitting the speed pipes. The two discussed how the effect of the two drugs were cancelling each other out, how they couldn’t really feel either one, but Bear could tell that they were both getting higher and higher. And more annoying. He settled in with his drink, got himself a Coke chaser, and listened to the boys yammer.

  He wasn’t following all their drug talk. He didn’t care. These were conversations he’d listened to a thousand times. His mind was on Thaxton, where that freak might have taken him. He tried to recall some of the stuff from the articles he’d read. The only things that came to mind were the grisly details of the murders.

  The phone rang. It startled both of the boys. Bear picked it up by the second ring.

  He spoke for a brief moment, hung up, and dialed again.

  “Doctor Watson,” he said. “How you doing?” He listened to the voice on the phone and watched the boys, disinterested by the answer. When the voice finally stopped, he said, “I got a problem. I need to find somebody, somebody you know. Gilly … Yeah, that Gilly. Does he still live up there? I think he may know a guy I’m looking for … No? Where’d he go? … Where in the city?” Bear went on, pressing the Doctor for answers but getting none.

  The boys stopped talking when Bear mentioned Gilly’s name. Rich kicked Donny under the table.

  When Bear was done, he sat back down at the table and said, “Hey, you know, considering all that screaming we heard earlier, your friend,” he made little quotation marks with his fingers, “is gonna probably need them pain pills when he gets back home.”

  Big Rich thought he was kidding and ignored the comment. He asked, “So, Bear, right? What’s the plan?”

  “What do you mean, what’s the plan? The plan is: I’m gonna go and rescue my friend from that piece of shit and you’re gonna go back to Polk Street and suck dicks. The plan is that I won’t ever have to be in the same room with you two dope fiends again. How’s that sound?”

  Donny asked, “You know where he took him?”

  “That’s what I’m gonna find out.”

  “How am I gonna get my phone back?” said Rich.

  “What’s with you and that phone anyway?”

  “I told you …”

  “I know, I know, it’s got pictures of your kid, your wife, your real life. The one you lead when you’re not sucking dicks for dope money.”

  Donny interrupted, “He’s got all our phones, and all our wallets.”

  “You’ll live,” said Bear.

  “We can help you,” said Big Rich.

  “How?” The whiskey was starting to effect Bear, he was ready to laugh in the kid’s face.

  “We know Gilly.”

  Chapter 11

  The three of them crowded into the Toyota, Bear and Rich in the front with Donny in the back. They started out toward the Mission District to see if the Gilly in the notebook was the same one that Rich and Donny knew. Bear thought it was pretty likely; how many Gillys could there be in San Francisco? He’d taken a chance calling Watson; he’d found his number, too, in Dustin’s address book. Watson was a scumbag, a tweaker, but at least it was a name he recognized. Maybe, Bear thought, Watson knew this Gilly character. It was worth a shot. All these fucking tweakers seemed to know each other. Maybe they had clandestine union meetings at some dumpster in an alley somewhere.

  Big Rich described Gilly as a wayward soul from Texas, spun in the City. He was a meth-head who dabbled in computer scams, identity theft, stolen property, and, of course, drugs. Rich had said the guy lived in a flat on Treat Street at 22nd in the Mission District. He also said that he had a lot of roommates; Big Rich was pretty sure that someone would be up. Big surprise.

  “How do you know this guy?” asked Bear.

  “Oh, he’s a good guy. I used to trade him computer stuff for speed. And for a while I was cashing checks for him.”

  “He’s got money?”

  “Nah, he ain’t got shit. He was printin’ ‘em up on the computer. He’s good with that stuff. He can do ID’s and everything.”

  “Sounds like a real class act,” said Bear.

  They drove down Gough Street with Big Rich monopolizing the conversation. He went on about how Gilly was a great fence, and, then, paper-hanger. How he’d employ tweakers to root through garbage cans and dumpsters looking for discarded checks and other information. He’d take the checks and print them up on his own, using special ink and printers, then, he’d forge ID’s for people to take into the bank, California driver licenses with the same name that was on the check. The banks eventually got wise and technology got better. Rich got popped a few times. They took his fake ID and he spent a few nights sick in County lock-up. Gilly had to find a better scam. That’s when Gilly moved into selling speed, and then manufacturing it, too. Right there in his flat, said Rich. The whole placed smelled like paint-thinner.

  Donny stayed quiet in back while Rich rambled on about his criminal accomplishments. It took a while to sink in, but Bear’s comments about sucking dicks had stuck with him. The man was obviously disgusted by their company. In truth, Donny couldn’t blame him. They were dope fiends: the lowest kind of criminal. He was already thinking about getting high. Even now, he was wondering if he could find a way for them to cop, wondering if he could just get out of the car and go fix at his hotel and forget all about tonight. Donny tuned out completely from the conversation in the front. A fragment of a pop song he hated played over and over in his head.

  He snapped out of his daydream when he heard Big Rich ask Bear, “If you’re a biker, how come you’re not on a bike?”

  “’Cause all three of us couldn’t fit on a bike.”

  Rich nodded like this seemed to make sense to him.

  “Okay, 22nd and Treat,” said Bear, “Where’s this guy’s place at?”

  Rich told Bear to take a right onto Treat Street and they crawled up the block. Rich pointed the place out, a decrepit-looking two-story in need of a paint job. Bear kept going.

  “What are you doing? Looking for a place to park?”
>
  “I’m looking for the old man’s car, the Bentley. See if it’s near here.”

  They tooled around the surrounding blocks. Each time they passed the flat where Rich had said Gilly lived Bear would slow and look up the marble stairs, hoping to see some kind of activity. Nothing. Bear kept going, and, after not finding the Bentley, looked for a parking spot of his own.

  They found a spot about a block away and walked back to the house. As they walked up the steps toward the door, Bear could hear music, voices. Rich rang the bell. No response. Rich knocked on the door. They waited until they heard footsteps.

  The door cracked open and a prematurely aged woman stuck her head out. Bear could tell she would have been a looker in her youth, but the speed had obviously taken its toll. Her teeth were gray and she had that sickly pallor that all drug fiends get when the years stack up against them.

  “Kathy,” said Big Rich. “Is Gilly up? I need to see him.”

  Kathy said, “Tommy?”

  “No, Gilly.”

  “No, I mean, are you Tommy?”

  “No, I’m Rich. Remember me?”

  “Not really. Who did you want to see?”

  “Gilly.”

  “Hang on,” she said and shut the door. They heard her footsteps pounding up the inside stairs, and, after a few moments, heard them coming back down. The door opened, “What was your name again?”

  “Rich, Big Rich. Tell Gilly it’s important. He knows who I am.”

  She shut the door again and went back upstairs to give Gilly the message. Rich said, “Fucking cunt. I stood next to her every day at the methadone clinic for six months and she don’t even ‘member who I am.”

  “Yeah,” said Bear. “Drugs fuck people up.”

  Big Rich missed the joke entirely, but Donny smiled. Bear caught him and shot Donny a wink. The door opened again, wide this time, and another person stood there, fat and greasy, face full of acne framed by glasses so thick they made his eyes look like they were being squeezed out of his head. He wore a dirty white T-shirt that clung to his humid body and a pair of dark blue sweats that were peppered with burn-holes. He said, “Hey, Rich. Gilly says c’mon up.” The man didn’t inquire as to whom Rich’s guests were, so they all followed him up the stairs single-file. When they reached the top, the fat man turned and said, “Just wait in the kitchen for a minute, okay? Gilly’s finishing up some business.”