"At The City's Edge" - читать интересную книгу автора (Sakey Marcus)

CHAPTER 3

The door to his brother's bar was unlocked, and a stool lay on the floor like it'd been knocked over.

Jason had blitzed to get here, the sun streaming in the windows as old Gordon Downie sang that he didn't have no picture postcards, didn't have no souvenirs, that his baby she didn't know him when he was thinking 'bout those years. He'd swung onto the shoulder when the Drive jammed up, then jumped to the Dan Ryan, slapping the steering wheel. Riding south in the express lanes, skyline in his rearview, the corporate monstrosity that had replaced Comiskey Park on his right.

Even after he'd pulled off the highway and into the sweltering decrepitude that was Crenwood, he'd barely touched the brakes. Just let the tires squeal as he rounded corners where hard-eyed boys in long white T-shirts postured before crumbling storefronts, gang tags and liquor stores and rusted fences sliding by in a blur of heat and failure. And all the while, Jason told himself that this errand was nothing. Mistaken identity. No way could Michael really be in serious trouble.

But the door to his brother's bar was unlocked, and a stool lay on the floor like it'd been knocked over.

Jason slid into the cool of the interior. The silence wasn't reassuring. Hiking up his T-shirt, he eased the Beretta from the waistband and disengaged the safety. Leaving the door open and holding the weapon low, he moved in. The animal part of him wanted to sprint. But he didn't know the situation, and a soldier didn't run in blindly blazing. He placed his feet gently, glad for his running shoes. A newspaper was spread open on the bar, the fallen stool in line with it, like someone had been dragged away while reading. Broken glass winked from a pool of dark liquid on the floor.

"Freeze!"

Jason's heart shot into his mouth. The voice had come from behind and beside him, and he whirled, pulse-pounding, pistol up, finger on the trigger, staring down the barrel-

At his nephew.

Billy stood behind the bar, arms braced and pointed like Starsky, fingers curled into the shape of gun.

"Jesus!" Jason jerked the Beretta downwards, then blew a breath as his heart hammered his rib cage. Sweat slicked his armpits.

Billy stared at him wide-eyed. "Uncle Jason."

"You scared the crap out of me, kiddo." He held a hand to his chest, made himself take slow breaths. The image of his nephew lined up dead between the pistol's rear sights burned on his retinas. "Where's your dad?"

"He's not here. Why do you have a gun?"

"Did he say where he was going?"

"Nuh-uh." Billy stared at him. "You're not in the Army anymore, right?"

Jason fought a grimace, knowing his nephew didn't mean any harm, but still feeling the Worm twist in his belly. His wet-palmed panic and greasy shame had built every day for months now. He'd named it just to have something to hate. "No."

"So why do you have-"

"Your dad left you alone?"

"Mrs. Lauretta was here for a while. But she had an appointment. Besides," Billy straightened, "I'm eight. I'm not a little kid. Can I hold your gun?"

"No," Jason snapped, harder than he intended, and he saw Billy recoil. "Listen, this isn't a toy. And your dad would kick my butt if I let you touch it." He cocked his head. "Actually, your dad would kick my butt if he even knew I showed it to you."

Billy sucked a bit of his lip between his teeth. He seemed to be weighing something. After a moment, he nodded solemnly. "Okay."

"Okay?"

"I won't tell."

"Thanks, buddy. I appreciate that." Jason forced a smile, then tucked away the pistol. He closed the front door and bent to retrieve the stool. The broken glass lay in a pool of what looked like soda. "What happened here?"

"Oh, I knocked it over when I was reaching for… ummm…" The boy rocked from foot to foot and stared at the floor. "I just knocked it over."

Jason laughed. He went around the corner of the bar and ruffled his nephew's hair, then took two pint glasses. Filled the first with Coke, then pulled Bud into the second, the beer splashing sweet and cool as a memory of swimming, a lake he wanted to throw himself into. "Tell you what," he said, and handed the soda to Billy. "I won't rat on you if you don't rat on me. Deal?"

"Deal."

They clinked glasses on it, and Jason took a long open-throated swallow. The first hit off the first beer of the day was always the best, a deep and satisfying shiver of relief. Budweiser wasn't his favorite, but cold beer was cold beer.

He helped Billy clean up, gathering the big chunks of glass by hand, then sweeping the rest into a metal dustpan. His nephew bounced around like a cat with its tail on fire, and part of Jason was wondering whether another soda had really been a good idea.

But most of him was thinking of Soul Patch, the steady gun hand, the look in his eyes when he had said he wanted to talk about Michael.

He finished two Buds quickly and poured a third, let it settle on the counter while he went to the stockroom. The dim space smelled of stale beer and wet cardboard. Jason had just returned the broom and dustpan to the rack when he heard the front door open.

He stepped out of the back, hands at his side, alert.

Michael froze like a convict in a spotlight. His eyes darted in nervous circles. "Jason. Jesus." He wore khakis and a faded oxford, and carried a soft leather briefcase, tapping absently at the handle. "You startled me."

"Lot of that going around." Jason walked past his brother and shut the open door, then locked it. "I need to talk to you."

"Sure. Sure. Let me just," Michael hoisted the briefcase, then lowered it quickly. He turned to Billy. "Hey kiddo. Everything good?"

"Hi Dad." The boy waved, then went back to working on his crossword puzzle.

"Where's Lauretta?"

"She had an appointment."

"Ahh, right." Michael winced, glanced at his watch. "She said. Guess I ran a little long." He walked behind the bar, opened a cabinet and put his wallet and keys inside. Lifted the briefcase up, started to slide it in, stopped. He looked around, then set the case at his feet, beside the cooler. "Beer?"

Jason gestured to the one he had going, then pulled out a stool and sat down in front of it. "Where you been?"

"Errands. Nothing exciting." Michael held a pint glass under the tap. When it was finished, he set it down, picked up the briefcase, frowned, then spun in a circle and set it against the back counter. "Cheers."

They tapped glasses.

"So. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Jason looked at Billy, then back at Michael. Gave a little jerk with his head.

Michael got the point. "Hey buddy, your uncle and I have a few things to talk about. You mind finishing your crossword over there?"

Billy sighed. "I am eight years old."

"And you know what? When you're nine years old, I'm still going to want to talk alone some times." Michael smiled, then jerked his thumb toward the tables. "Git."

Grumbling, the boy collected his newspaper, slid off the stool, and moved in front of the window. A beam of afternoon sun set the paper on fire.

"So what's up, bro?"

"I was going to ask you that."

"Huh?"

"Are you in any trouble?"

"Trouble?" Michael took a sip of his beer. "Well, I haven't won the Mega Ball yet, but other than that, I'm fine."

"You're sure?"

"Sure. Why?"

"A guy tried to hijack me this morning," Jason said, then took a long slow swallow of beer. "I was jogging, this guy with a soul patch and a Cadillac necklace jumped me in the pedestrian tunnel, said it had something to do with you."

"A Cadillac necklace? He have a tattoo on his arm, some letters?"

The muscles in Jason's back knit tight. "You're kidding me."

"What?"

"He didn't have the wrong guy. You do know him."

"I know him."

"Who is he?"

Michael shrugged. Jason stared at his brother. "What are you mixed up in?"

"What're you, Jimmy Cagney? What am I 'mixed up' in? Gee willikers, little bro."

"Fuck you."

Michael laughed. He glanced at the briefcase, picked it up, then put it back down in front of his legs. With a worn rag he began wiping the bar. "Listen, it's nothing to worry about."

"Yeah, well, you weren't the one had a gun pointed at him."

The cloth stopped. "He pulled a gun?"

Jason nodded. "Said he wanted to talk about what you're doing."

For a moment, there was a flash of something that could've been fear in Michael's eyes. It went fast, and then he was back to wiping the bar. But he kept running the rag in the same circle over and over. "What else did he say?"

"Not much." Jason leaned back. "He and a buddy of his, short guy looks like he's auditioning for the WWE, tried to muscle me into their car." He ran Michael through the whole story, enjoying telling it, the way he'd once enjoyed telling war stories. "You shoulda seen it, bro. The two of them standing there trying to murder me with their glares. The short one's nose is broken, and Soul Patch, he looked like his head was about to explode."

"You call the police?"

"Nah. After my heroic escape, I figured it made more sense to see if my big brother needed any protecting."

Michael smiled. "Next time I hear this story, there are going to be four guys, right?"

"Only if my audience is cuter than you. Want to tell me what's going on?"

His brother shrugged. "You know the neighborhood."

"Not really. Not anymore." When Dad had lost his job, they'd moved from Bridgeport to Canaryville; when he'd started drinking at breakfast, they'd moved from Canaryville to Crenwood. When he'd run off with the waitress from his off-track betting house, Mom had taken a third job, but never made enough to climb back up the ladder. It'd been an interesting place to grow up, white in a black and Latino neighborhood with a high school dropout rate of fifty percent.

"Things are getting out of hand," Michael said. "You remember, it used to be manageable – the gangs drew up lines and mostly respected them. Did a lot more posturing than killing." He shook his head. "These days, though, if somebody gets killed on Monday, Tuesday his boys ride around till they find somebody from the other side to shoot. Wednesday, it's the reverse."

"So?"

"So, this my neighborhood, man. I'm trying to raise my son here. Right now, I can't even let him play in the front yard."

Jason groaned. "I get it."

"What?"

"You're at it again, aren't you?"

"At what?"

"You're running some kind of crusade."

"I got involved." Michael shrugged. "After Lisa died."

Jason softened. "That was an accident. This is different."

"Is it? My wife was killed by a thirteen-year-old in a stolen car. He was running from the police. That sound like the sign of a healthy neighborhood to you? And things get worse every day. Why shouldn't regular people fight back?"

"Because…" Jason held his hands open, all the reasons in the world between them. "These guys are dangerous, for Christ's sake." Behind him he heard a faint rumbling, something rhythmic. He spun to look past Billy out the window, where a shiny drop-top with four men drove by, music trailing behind them like a bad smell. "What exactly are you doing?"

Michael shrugged. "Everything I can. I work with Washington Matthew's gang recovery program. I talk to local business people. I organize community-watch groups. I even met with the cops, not that it did much good."

"You talked to the cops?"

"Sure."

"You mean you informed on a gang?"

"Don't be so melodramatic. I just talked to the police."

Jason stared across the bar, his mouth open. Growing up here, you learned certain things. The cops were good guys. They fought for the real people, the ones with jobs and homes and children. Some innocent kid got killed for his sneakers, they rolled in hard. But sooner or later they rolled out again.

The gangs lived here. They were eternal.

"Why haven't you told me any of this?"

"I don't know." Michael sipped his beer, looked out the window. "I didn't want to burden you with it. I mean, I know you're dealing with your own baggage. From whatever happened in – over there."

"You can say it. Iraq."

"Okay, tough guy, Iraq. After everything there, I know it's been bad for you. Besides," Michael shrugged, "you've made it pretty clear how you feel about taking responsibility." He said it in the older-brother tone of voice he reserved for Jason, like he was a puppy that might piss the rug.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Let it slide."

"No." Jason set down his glass. "You got something you want to say?"

Michael sighed. "Brother, you were always the smart one. You could make something of yourself. Put down roots. Fight for something."

"Like you?" The anger was quickening in Jason's chest. "Pretending you're Charles Bronson?"

"Keep it down." Michael nodded to where Billy sat.

Jason lowered his voice. "And that's another thing. It's not just you. You're putting him at risk, too. Do you know what you're doing?"

Michael hardened. "I'm trying to make a better place for him to grow up."

"Bullshit." He shook his head. "I've tried to save the world, okay? It doesn't work." The Worm looped another knotted segment around his ribs. Jason looked at his hands, the wrinkles that lined the flesh between thumb and forefinger. He could almost see his pulse jumping there.

"Bro," Michael spoke softly, "I know something happened, and I know you blame yourself for whatever it was. But this is different."

"You don't know shit, bro."

Michael ran his tongue around the inside of his mouth, making the cheek bulge. He just stared at Jason. "I know you could have been the first of us to get a degree, until you blew your scholarship. I know your longest relationship lasted three months, and that you got busted for stealing televisions when you were twenty." Michael snorted. "I know that if it weren't for Washington, your ass would be in jail."

"That was kid stuff. And ancient fucking history."

"Kid stuff? You haven't changed."

"I was in the Army for seven years," Jason hissed.

Michael shrugged. "Sure."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Never mind."

"No," Jason said, feeling sweat in his palms, "what does that mean?"

"You really want to know? It means you're twenty-seven years old and only qualified to flip burgers or carry an assault rifle. It means you're willing to fight for something, you just don't want to decide what, or have to stick to it. I think you enlisted so other people would do that for you. And when that didn't work out, you fell back into what you knew. Drinking at noon and trying to get laid."

Jason stood up, his stool scraping across the floor. "Fuck you, man."

"Yeah, fuck you too."

Their voices had risen, and Jason saw Billy staring at them from the front table, his mouth wide. He felt bad about that, his nephew seeing them this way, but it wasn't his fault. It was the old dynamic, Michael pushing that same old button, and Jason blowing up over it. Shaking his head, Jason hip-checked the stool and headed for the front door. Behind him, he could hear Michael sigh, and he knew if he stood there for three seconds his brother would apologize, but he didn't have it in him.

The bell on the door tinkled, and the sun hit like a slap. He kicked at a chunk of broken glass, sent it skittering to break against the plywood facing of a burned-out store. The Caddy was parked with two wheels up on the curb; he'd been in such a hurry to make sure Michael was okay.

Brothers. Shit.

He fired up the engine and cranked the radio, then stomped on the gas. He needed a shower. And then a drink. Several drinks.

Michael saw him as a flake? Fine.

Jason could play the part.