Authors: Stephen Schottenfeld
Ten-karat and fourteen-karat and eighteen-karat and some dental gold and a little bit of platinum. More gold to sell than diamonds, but the transaction takes less time; diamonds is an opinion, whereas the gold is on the scale. Huddy wishes he were getting jewelry value and not scrap value, but he’s gonna be a big boy now, just get it over and get the cash and know that gold’s bringing good money. He stares at the monitor, at the empty parking lot save for Tom’s car and inside the store Harlan staring at the empty cases and then out at Tom’s car, the reason for the emptying.
The gold separated and weighed and traded for cash, an in-and-out deal and the sold gold gets Huddy over halfway, and he can do the rest with guns. He watches Tom leave and then phones Joe.
“How’s the fire sale?”
“It’s going,” Huddy says.
“Well, my funds are ready.”
Two kinds of financing, Huddy would say, but he’s happy to hear it.
“How are we with the vehicle?”
“You offering?”
“Thing is,” Joe says, which means he isn’t. “They got my name on it. Company logo, and I don’t wanna drive up like that.”
“You think it’d look better if it said U-Haul?” Huddy saying. Or Wells Fargo, he nearly adds, but not with Harlan in range. Joe asking if they need a truck to say he’s got plenty but can’t be used. “Don’t worry,” Huddy laughs. “I’ll get it.” And when he does, he’ll be driving.
“What’s this?” Harlan says, gesturing at the door to a black man holding a liquor bottle, which Huddy sees is Barnes.
“Came by to say bye,” he says, and Huddy saw a truck pull in earlier, which he realizes now was a deliveryman carrying
out
the merchandise. Barnes approaches and sets the bottle down.“Thought you might like some dessert wine. Taylor’s. The port never rolled out of here fast. I’m getting my percentage on the regular stock, but the sweet stuff’s been sitting, so the distributor says I’m stuck with it.”
Huddy doesn’t want to hear about getting stuck, about what never got sold, not on a day when he’s unloading.
“Taking some Burnett’s vodka home with me. You want a bottle?”
Huddy about to say no when he hears “Sure” beside him. “My brother,” Huddy says.
Barnes looks over and back. “I’ll get you two.”
Huddy lifts his arms up, to say he ain’t asking, because today feels all wrong for these gifts.
“Not supposed to give bottles away,” Barnes says. “The law. Guess I’m breaking it. Don’t tell no one.”
“Me and him won’t say a thing,” Harlan says. “More you give us, the quieter we be.”
“You might get some regulars coming around, asking where I at. Gonna send a few of ’em into a panic. But they’ll just migrate over to King’s Liquor. They won’t miss me. Me—I’ma miss the people that paid cash.” Barnes looks around at Huddy’s shelves. He sees the empty cases and he frowns, as if the jewelry got hit; must not have been a smash-and-grab if the glass is still intact. “I’ma miss when it snowed, ’cause the customers always came to me, even before they hit the grocery store. Can’t think what else. Anyway, I’ll get you that Burnett’s.”
Huddy wants to say don’t worry, that he’ll be gone, too. He’s leaving, Huddy is, and he shakes his head, because he’s got more important things to think of than beverage policies, on liquor that Barnes is giving him illegally to drink.
Different gun collectors all asking why he’s letting these choice pieces go, and Huddy gives them the same answer with different lines: Just thinning out, just selling down, just thought it time to reduce.
“You’ve been waiting on this gun for years,” Huddy tells the shotgun collector. “Time for you to buy it.”
“You never showed me this one,” the big-bore man says. “Never knew it was here.”
“Well, now you know I had it.”
“You got any more?” the pistol collector asks.
“Oh, I’m sure I’ll have something you like.”
“Well, call me first,” says the buyer who spreads everywhere.
Huddy puts the guns in cheap sleeves, watches the collectors carry ’em out and load ’em in their trunks. So that’s it. He’s made his bet. “Shop stays closed tomorrow,” he tells Harlan, whose eyes sink. Without the job, he can’t even buy an Egg McMuffin in the morning.
“Like to keep making money,” Harlan says.
“How’re your arms feeling?”
“They’s good. Arms are strong. Legs are hollow.”
“Got a decent shirt?”
“Like your outfit last night?” Huddy studies Harlan. Sits in my house watching how I’m dressed coming home. “Looking like you flunked debonair school,” Harlan says.
“Yeah, well, the place we’d be going, there’s a dress code. If I was a horse rolled in mud, she wouldn’t care about dirty.”
“Horse?”
“We
all
gotta be somebody else over there. A new look for everyone.”
“All mean Joe, too?”
And Huddy doesn’t say no.
“You tell big brother I’m helping?”
But Huddy just told himself, how could he have told Joe? This time, his silence won’t mean yes.
“Yeah, well, he can’t be somebody else when he been somebody else his whole life.” And Huddy watches and knows Harlan can’t help but ask more. “What’s his end?”
He stares at Harlan, his eyes like flashlights shining out of the dark to search his brother’s face. “You best drop that line. You best drop all of ’em.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means, don’t ask about any deal. Don’t ask what Joe’s getting or got and what you ain’t, and what’s luck or ain’t and how you feel sorry. He went his way and you went yours and I went mine. I got a job for you today. For tomorrow. Hauling. And I need you on this. Let’s keep it simple. You start feeling inferior, I’m asking someone else.”
“All right,” Harlan says. But his head tilts at his middle brother to ask another question. “How ’bout you tell me what I’m hauling?”
Huddy shrugs. Just my life, is what you’d be lifting.
Harlan’s head tilts again, down to the three bottles that Barnes delivered. “Thought he was some derelict, standing there.”
“Wasn’t.”
“I seen. Nice what he brought you. Us.”
Huddy shakes his head. “Barnes had a fire once. Long time ago. Not a big one, but still, he said the alcohol commission told him all the inventory had to go. Strict that way. They took it all to a dump. Crushed it, buried it.”
“Okay,” Harlan says, but he doesn’t see the point, and he doesn’t see why Huddy’s scowling.
“You take ’em,” Huddy says.
“If I take ’em, they getting drunk.”
Huddy imagines Barnes next door, pulling the signs from the windows. “Get rid of ’em all the same.”
For dinner that night, Huddy wants Sonic. They drive to North Parkway, and when the road becomes Summer Avenue and he doesn’t hang the usual right onto East Parkway, Christie asks where he’s going. “Thought I’d try a different one,” he says, passing the Midas and the tire shops and body shops, crowded with wrecked cars, and then driving beyond the lumberyard and the self-storage lots.
“Closer than Poplar?” she asks.
“’Bout the same.”
“Okay . . .” she shrugs. “Another Sonic. Let’s get some fast-food variety.” She half-laughs, as if Huddy’s picked the strangest adventure.
He slopes up and down the overpass, and passes a crumbling trailer park that must’ve been built before the street expanded and took a tumble, then the thrift stores and antique shops, and then a pawnshop—twice as much competition here, but even more times the business supply. The Goodwill lot is still full at this hour, the street traffic is heavy, cars moving in and out of the wide turn lane. It’s like Lamar, only busier, and it doesn’t feel like all the cargo is going elsewhere.
“Longer, Huddy,” Christie says, and she’s right, they would’ve already reached the Poplar Sonic, but it’s not much farther to make her suspicious, an honest mistake.
“Here we are,” he says, after another half-mile, passing a car wash with soaped-up cars, and he turns left into the restaurant’s entrance and swings around and parks in one of the angled stalls facing the street. He pushes the red button and asks Christie if they want the usual and she nods; he hears the squawked voice and he orders into the intercom.
“Cody’ll just munch on our fries,” Christie says. The sky is dark but the streetlights provide an outline of the shop across the road, and the name on the marquee is visible and unchanged:
liberty pawn
. He nods at it. Just like it should say, until it says him. He glances up and down the street. He imagines his future customers driving down Summer, his new business accessible from so many highway points. If you miss the Highland exit, just head on up to Graham and loop back. Soon he’ll be able to buy in, and he smoothes his hands along the dashboard, as if he hadn’t already bought this.
The carhop brings the food and Huddy makes the exchange. He hands the bag to Christie and pops the drinks into the cup holders. He feels like he’s on a stakeout, planted here. The dashboard clock reads 6:07. It would be funny if he called Keller and said, “Guess where I’m at?” He doesn’t have the number and Keller’s already left—no car in the big parking lot—but the scenario still entertains him.
“What?” Christie says.
“What?” he answers back.
“This food funny?” She twists around to get Cody started on his milk and fries.
“Don’t know. She must’ve given me a Happy Meal.”
“Ha.” She rolls her eyes at his dumb joke.
He searches the bag, grabs a burger, and unwraps it on his lap. He bites and says, “Mmm.”
“Yeah. Tasty.”
“
Real
tasty,” he says, and she looks sideways at his cheerful voice.
“You auditioning for one of their commercials?”
He’s not gonna tell her anything, and yet he’s brought her here to see the promise across the street. He shoves several fries into his mouth. He’s not gonna talk but he’s not gonna stop himself either. “I think this is my favorite Sonic,” he says.
“Oh yeah?”
“Ain’t yours?”
“Gee, Huddy,” she says, chewing, “I can’t really say I like this exact food better.”
He takes a sip. “Maybe I’m just hungrier. No, it’s more than that. Maybe I should ask Cody. What you say, Cody, these the best fries you ever had?” He looks in the rearview mirror, where he can see Cody directly, now that he’s facing forward in the purchased car seat. “It’s a new thing for you, but your mama thinks she’s eating clone food.” He watches his son smile. “I think every other burger I ate is one thing, but this one here is another. Maybe it’s the location. This here drive-in.”
“Well, then, there’s our preview.” And she points at the sidewalk, at two black men, one with a skullcap, the other a bandanna, the bandannaed one wearing pants slung so low they’re barely held to his ass. “Happy trails. Are those pants or knee pads? A couple more steps, they might even be socks.”
Huddy studies his feet, watches him shuffle and sidestep. “Can’t run fast that way.”
“He ain’t looking for speed.” She opens her bun, pulls a piece of the burger and extends it back to Cody.
“If he came into my pawnshop and tried to rip me off, he’d just be duckwalking.” Huddy’s said
pawnshop
, but he’s got the better slanted angle for seeing; he might even be the blind spot between her and his future store. If he leaned back, she might get a view, but why would she be looking for the Liberty sign? He wipes his hands on the napkin. “I like this street.”
“It was something, way back when.”
“Oh, no,” he says. “It’s good now. Might not be what it was, but in other ways, it’s humming. Just gotta know which way to look.”
“You think?”
“Sure. We’re here.”
“You brought us here.”
“That’s right. All this traffic. If I was this store, I’d be in the perfect spot. Right location. Busy busy.”
“Well . . . good for them.”
“Good for them. Good for us.”
“Good for us?”
“Sure. ’Cause we can get to it. So many ways to reach this food.”
“Maybe you wanna buzz the intercom and ask about investing.” And maybe saying a word about money jolts her a bit. Because she stares down at her cup and then slowly raises her eyes over to him. “Huddy? Am I supposed to be following what you’re saying? I mean, I’m following, but are you saying something else?”
“What you mean?”
“I mean, you eating this same old food. But you acting like a mystery.”
“I am? The mystery meat.” Everything out of his mouth feels funny to himself.
“See. There you go. Teasing again.”
“Going. I’m right here.” He grabs the box of fries, shuffles the ones from the bottom till they stand up straight.
“No you ain’t.”
“I’m right here. In the driver’s seat.”
“You ain’t here.”
He’s not, Huddy thinks, he’s right over there. He looks away, sees another carhop stationed and making change at a nearby car.