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  “We’re not shooting anyone. We’re not going to lay a glove on this guy.”

  “He stole from you.”

  “He’s harmless.”

  “He stole from you.”

  “He’s homeless.”

  “Yeah, but he stole from you. You should set an example.”

  “For who—all the other homeless guys lining up to steal my bag so I’ll chase them into a house where I’ll get the shit kicked out of me?”

  “Them, yeah.” He took another swig of vodka. “And don’t give me this ‘He’s homeless’ shit.” He pointed the bottle at the condemned building across the street. “He’s living there, ain’t he?”

  “He’s squatting.”

  “Still a home,” Bubba said. “Can’t call someone homeless if they have, ya know, a fucking home.”

  On some purely Bubba level, he had me there.

  On the other side of Savin Hill Avenue, the door to Donovan’s bar opened. I nudged Bubba, pointed across the avenue as Webster crossed toward us.

  “He’s homeless, but he’s in a bar. This guy has a better life than me. Probably has a fucking plasma and a Brazilian chick comes Tuesdays to clean and vacuum.”

  Bubba threw open his door as Webster was about to pass the SUV. Webster paused and, in that second, forfeited any chance to escape. Bubba towered over him and I came around from the other side and Bubba said, “Remember him?”

  Webster had adopted a position of half-cringe. When he recognized me, he closed his eyes to slits.

  “I’m not going to hit you, man.”

  “I will, though.” Bubba slapped Webster on the side of his head.

  “Hey!” Webster said.

  “I’ll do it again.”

  “Webster,” I said, “where’s my bag?”

  “What bag?”

  I said, “Really?”

  Webster looked at Bubba.

  “My bag,” I said.

  “I gave it back.”

  “To who?”

  “Max.”

  “Who’s Max?”

  “He’s Max. He’s the guy paid me to take your bag.”

  “Red-haired dude?” I said.

  “No. Dude’s got, like, black hair.”

  Bubba slapped the side of Webster’s head again.

  “What the hell you do that for?”

  Bubba shrugged.

  “He bores easily,” I said.

  “I didn’t do nothing.”

  “You didn’t what?” I pointed at my face.

  “I didn’t know they were going to do that. They just told me to steal your bag.”

  “Where’s the redheaded guy?” I said.

  “I don’t know any redheaded guy.”

  “Fine, where’s Max?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Where’d you take the bag? You wouldn’t take it back to the same house where I chased you.”

  “No, man, I took it to a garage.”

  “What kind of garage?”

  “Huh? Like a place that fixes cars and shit. Has a few for sale out front.”

  “Where?”

  “On Dot Ave., just before Freeport, on the right.”

  “I know that place,” Bubba said. “It’s, like, Castle Automotive or something.”

  “Kestle. With a K,” Webster said.

  Bubba slapped him upside the head again.

  “Ow. Shit.”

  “You take anything out of the bag?” I said. “Anything?”

  “Nah, man. Max told me not to, so I didn’t.”

  “But you looked in there.”

  “Yeah. No.” He rolled his eyes. “Yeah.”

  “There was a picture of a little girl in there.”

  “Yeah, I saw it.”

  “You put it back?”

  “Yeah, man, I promise.”

  “If it ain’t there when I find the bag, we’ll come back, Webster. And we won’t be all sweet and shit.”

  “You call this sweet?” Webster said.

  Bubba slapped the side of his head a fourth time.

  “Sweet as it’ll ever get,” I said.

  • • •

  Kestle Cars & Repair sat across from a Burger King in the part of my neighborhood the locals call Ho Chi Minh Trail, a seven-block section of Dorchester Avenue, where waves of Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Laotian immigrants settled. There were six cars on the lot, all in dubious condition, all with MAKE AN OFFER painted in yellow on their windshields. The garage bay doors were closed and the lights were off, but we could hear loud chatter from the back. There was a dark green door to the left of the bay doors. I stepped aside and looked at Bubba.

  “What?”

  “It’s locked.”

  “You can’t pick a lock no more?”

  “Sure, but I don’t carry a kit on me. Cops frown on that shit.”

  He grimaced and pulled a small leather case from his pocket. He unrolled it and selected a pick. “Is there anything you can do anymore?”

  “I cook a mean swordfish Provençal,” I said.

  He gave that a mild shake of his head. “Last two times it was pretty dry.”

  “I don’t make dry fish.”

  He popped the lock. “Then a guy who looks like you does, and he served it last two times I was at your house.”

  “Shit’s cold,” I said.

  The back office smelled of trapped heat, burned motor oil, stale gusts of ganja and menthol cigarettes. We found four guys back there. Two I’d met before—the fat guy with the audible breathing and Tadeo, sporting a ridiculous bandage over his nose and forehead that made my own bandage look just a little less ridiculous. The fat guy stood to the far left side of the room. Tadeo stood directly in front of us, half his body behind a metal desk the color of eggshell. A third guy, in a mechanic’s overalls, was passing a joint when we walked in. He wasn’t yet drinking age and fear seized his face when Bubba entered behind me; unless the fear made him stupid ballsy (it happens), he’d be the least of our problems.

  The fourth guy sat slightly to our right, behind the desk. He had dark hair. His skin was covered in a sheen of sweat, fresh droplets popping through the pores as we watched. He was about thirty-going-on-a-coronary, and you could smell the crank singeing his veins from Newfoundland. His left knee jackhammered under the desk, his right hand patted a steady bongo beat on the top. My laptop sat in front of him. He stared at us with bright eyes pinned to the rear wall of his skull. “This one of the guys?”

  The fat guy pointed at me. “That’s the one fucked up Tadeo’s face.”

  Tadeo said to me, “The re-up’s coming on that shit, homes. Believe it,” but there was a hollow catch in his voice that came from trying not to look at Bubba.

  “I’m Max.” The tweeker behind my laptop gave me a broad smile. He sucked oxygen into his nostrils and gave me a wink. “I’m the IT guy up in this shit. Nice laptop.”

  I nodded at the table. “My laptop.”

  “Huh?” He look wildly confused. “This is my laptop.”

  “Funny. Looks a lot like mine.”

  “That’s called a model.” His eyes popped against their sockets. “If they all looked different, they’d be kind of hard to manufacture, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah,” Tadeo said, “you fucking retarded and shit?”

  I said, “I’m just a girl standing before a boy looking for his laptop.”

  “I heard you’d got your head in the right place about this,” Max said. “We were never supposed to see you again. No harm, no foul. You want to bring us into your life, you don’t fucking understand how bad that will be.” He closed my laptop and placed it in the drawer to his right.

  “Look,” I said, “I can’t afford a replacement.”

  He rocked forward into the desk, his whole endoskeleton surging against his skin. “Call a fucking insurance company.”

  “It’s not insured.”

  “This fucking guy, bro,” he said to Bubba, then checked the position of his men. He looked back at m
e. “You’re out of this. Just let it go and you’ll stay out of it. Run back to your little life.”

  “I’m going. I just want to take my laptop back with me. And the picture of my daughter that was in my bag. Bag’s yours.”

  Tadeo moved all the way out from behind the desk. The fat guy stayed against the wall, breathing heavy. The kid mechanic was breathing heavy, too, and blinking like crazy.

  “I know the bag’s mine.” Max got to his feet. “I know this office is mine, that ceiling, the O-ring in your ass, if I feel like it.”

  “Uh, okay,” I said. “Hey, who hired you, by the way?”

  “Man, you with the questions.” He flung his hands at me like he was auditioning for a Lil Weezy video and then scratched the back of his head furiously. “You don’t make demands. You go the fuck home.” He shooed me with his fingers. “Bro, I say one word and you’re fucking—”

  Bubba’s shot spun him in place. Max let out a sharp shout and fell back into his chair. The chair slammed off the wall and dumped Max to the floor. He lay there for a bit with blood pouring from the vicinity of his waistline.

  “What’s with all this ‘bro’ shit lately?” Bubba lowered his gun. It was his new favorite, a Steyr 9mm. Austrian. Hideous-looking.

  “Ho, shit!” Tadeo said. “Holy fucking shit.”

  Bubba pointed the Steyr at Tadeo and then the fat guy. Tadeo put his hands on his head. The fat guy did too. They both stood there shaking and awaiting further instruction.

  Bubba didn’t even bother with the kid. He’d dropped to his knees and lowered his head to the floor and kept whispering, “Please, please.”

  “You fucking shoot the guy?” I said. “A bit harsh, no?”

  “Don’t bring me out on this shit if you’re going to leave your pair at home.” Bubba frowned. “Goddamn embarrassing what a civilian you’ve become, man.”

  I got a closer look at Max as a burst of air left his mouth. He ground his forehead into the cement floor and pounded a fist on it.

  “He’s fucked up,” I said.

  “I barely hit him.”

  “You blew one of his hips off.”

  Bubba said, “He’s got two.”

  Max began to shake. The shakes quickly turned to convulsions. Tadeo took a step toward him and Bubba took two steps toward Tadeo, the Steyr aimed at his chest.

  “I’ll kill you just for being short,” Bubba said.

  “I’m sorry.” Tadeo raised his hands as high as they could go.

  Max flopped onto his back. Kettle hisses preceded his gulps of air.

  “I’ll kill you for wearing that deodorant,” Bubba told Tadeo. “I’ll kill your friend for being your friend.”

  Tadeo lowered his hands until they shook in front of his face. He closed his eyes.

  His friend said, “We’re not friends. He gives me shit about my weight.”

  Bubba raised an eyebrow. “You could lose a few but you’re not an orca or anything. Shit, man, just lay off the white bread and the cheese.”

  “I’m thinking Atkins,” the guy said.

  “I tried that.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You gotta give up alcohol for two weeks.” Bubba grimaced. “Two weeks.”

  The guy nodded. “That’s what I told the wife.”

  Max kicked the desk. The back of his head rattled off the floor. Then he was still.

  “He dead?” Bubba asked.

  “No,” I said. “But he’s heading there, he don’t get a doctor.”

  Bubba produced a business card. He asked the big guy, “What’s your name?”

  “Augustan.”

  “Well . . . No, really?”

  “Yeah. Why?”

  Bubba looked over at me and shrugged before looking back at Augustan. He handed him the card. “Call this guy. He works for me. He’ll fix your friend up. The fixing’s free, but the drugs’ll cost you.”

  “That’s fair.”

  Bubba rolled his eyes at me and let loose a sigh. “Grab your laptop, would you?”

  I did.

  “Tadeo,” I said.

  Tadeo lowered his shaking hands from his face.

  “Who hired you?”

  “What?” Tadeo blinked several times. “Uh, a friend of Max’s. Kenny.”

  “Kenny?” Bubba said. “You got me out of bed so I could shoot some prick over a Kenny? That’s fucking humiliating.”

  I ignored him. “Redheaded guy from the house, Tadeo?”

  “Kenny Hendricks, yeah. He said you knew his old lady. Said you found her kid once when she went missing.”

  Helene. If it smelled of stupid, Helene just had to be somewhere nearby.

  “Kenny,” Bubba repeated with a bitter sigh.

  “Where’s my bag?” I said.

  “Other drawer,” Tadeo said.

  Augustan said to Bubba, “I can call your doc now?”

  “Augustan always?” Bubba asked. “Never Gus?”

  “Never Gus,” the big guy said.

  Bubba gave that some thought, then nodded. “Go ahead. Call the number.”

  Augustan flipped open a cell and dialed. I found my bag in the desk drawer, found Gabby’s picture and my case files, too. As Augustan told the doctor his buddy was losing a lot of blood, I put the laptop in my bag and walked to the door. Bubba pocketed his weapon and followed me out of the garage.

  Chapter Eight

  In my dream, Amanda McCready was ten, maybe eleven. She sat on the porch of a yellow bungalow with stone steps, a white bulldog snoring at her feet. Tall ancient trees sprouted from a strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street. We were somewhere down South, Charleston maybe. Spanish moss hung from the trees, and the house had a tin roof.

  Jack and Tricia Doyle sat behind Amanda in wicker armchairs, a chess table between them. They hadn’t aged at all.

  I came up the walk in my postal outfit, and the dog raised its head and stared at me with sad black eyes. Its left ear bore a spot the same black as its nose. It licked its nose and then rolled on its back.

  Jack and Tricia Doyle looked up from their chess game and stared at me.

  “I’m just delivering the mail,” I said. “I’m just the mailman.”

  They stared. They didn’t say a word.

  I handed Amanda the mail and stood waiting for my tip. She leafed through the envelopes, tossing them aside one by one. They landed in the bushes and turned yellow and wet.

  She looked up at me, her hands empty. “You didn’t bring anything we can use.”

  • • •

  The next morning I could barely lift my head off the pillow. When I did, the bones near my left temple crunched. My cheekbones ached and my skull throbbed. While I’d slept, someone had seeded the folds of my brain with red pepper and glass.

  And that wasn’t all—none of my limbs or joints were pleased when I rolled over, sat up, or breathed. In the shower, the water hurt. The soap hurt. When I tried to scrub my head with shampoo, I accidentally pressed my fingertips into the left side of my skull and produced a bolt of agony that nearly put me on my knees.

  Drying off, I looked in the mirror. The upper left side of my face, one half of the eye included, was purple marble. The only part that wasn’t purple was the part that was covered in black sutures. Gray streaked my hair; it had even found my chest since the last time I’d paid attention. I ran a comb carefully over my head, then turned to reach for the razor and my swollen knee yelped. I’d barely moved—a minor shift of weight, nothing more—but my kneecap felt like I’d swung the claw end of a hammer into it.

  I just fucking love aging.

  When I entered the kitchen, my wife and daughter clasped their hands to their cheeks and shrieked, eyes wide. It was so perfectly timed, I knew it had been planned, and I gave them a big thumbs-up as I poured myself a cup of coffee. They exchanged a fist bump and then Angie opened her morning paper again and said, “That looks suspiciously like the laptop bag I got you last Christmas.”

  I slung it over the back
of my chair as I sat at the table. “One and the same.”

  “And its contents?” She turned a page of the Herald.

  “Fully recovered,” I said.

  She raised appreciative eyebrows. Appreciative and maybe a little envious. She glanced at our daughter, who was temporarily fascinated by the pattern of her plastic place mat. “Was there any, um, collateral damage?”

  “One gentleman may have a bit of difficulty entering a potato-sack race anytime soon. Or, I dunno”—I sipped some coffee—“strolling.”

  “And this is because?”

  “Bubba decided to speed the process along.”

  At his name, Gabriella raised her head. The smile that spread across her face was her mother’s—so wide and warm it hugged your whole body. “Uncle Bubba?” she said. “You saw Uncle Bubba?”

  “I did. He said to say hello to you and Mr. Lubble.”

  “I’ll go get him.” She burst out of her chair and out of the room and the next sound we heard was her scrambling through the toys on the floor of her bedroom.

  Mr. Lubble was a stuffed animal bigger than Gabby. Bubba had given it to her on her second birthday. Mr. Lubble was, as best we could figure, some kind of a cross between a chimpanzee and an orangutan, though it’s possible he represented a primate we were wholly unfamiliar with. For some reason, he was dressed in a lime-green tuxedo with a yellow tie and matching yellow tennis shoes. Gabby had given him the name Mr. Lubble, but none of us could recall why except to assume she’d been trying to say “Bubba,” but, at two, Lubble was the closest she could get.

  “Mr. Lubble,” she called from her bedroom, “come out, come out.”

  Angie lowered her paper and ran a hand over mine. She was a bit shocked at my second-day appearance, which was worse than my first-day appearance when I’d returned from the health center. “Should we worry about reprisals?”

  It was a fair question. With any act of violence, you have to assume reprisal is a given. You hurt someone, most times they will try to hurt you back.

  “I don’t think so,” I said, realizing it was true. “They’d mess with me, but not with Bubba. Plus, I didn’t take anything from them but what belonged to me.”

  “In their minds, it didn’t belong to you anymore.”

  “True.”

  We shared a careful look.