The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

Taking Care of Business

Previously: "Whose Life Is It Anyway?" 

When you get right down to it (you decide later after thinking about it) Chen isn't asking you to do anything that you weren't proposing to either him or Caleb. The only difference is that you'd be using Evans and Mendoza and Thomason to do it. And you're pretty sure you can pull their strings. As Chen, you already are.

So you'll go along that far with his scheme. Before lunch is over, you've shot each of them a text, telling them to make no plans for Saturday afternoon. Meeting, you tell them.

Seventh period: Gardinhire is waiting for you right outside the door of Muniz's classroom. "I got someone to talk to you," he stammers. "I also brought—" He fumbles inside his backpack.

"Not here, man," you mutter, and glance around.

"The restroom?" he suggests.

"Don't be a fucking moron. Meet me outside." You nod at the nearby doors. "I'll be hanging out, and you and your friend can find me."

You saunter outside and lean against the wall. Restroom, you snort. Fucking Gardinhire should know better than that. Restrooms are the most dangerous spots at the school. Mostly on account of guys like Chen and Kirkham, but even they can't singly take on the roving packs from the lower classes that sometimes erupt into them. Your already low opinion of Gardinhire's intelligence falls—

And it craters further when he appears with his "friend." It's Marc Garner. His face freezes when he sees you, just as yours freezes at the sight of him. Obviously, Gardinhire has already told him that he's to meet the AP gang's "dealer" so he can take over the purchases.

"This is Marc Garner," Gardinhire tells you. "He—"

"I know who he is," you snap. "Hey man," you say to Marc. He doesn't reply. "So I guess he told you what we need to talk about."

"Yeah," Garner says through clenched teeth. "He didn't tell me with who, though."

"Obviously." You turn to Gardinhire. "Wait for us inside."

"Sure. I also got—" He takes out an envelope.

"Put that away. Put it in a book and hand me the book at the end of class. I'll pass the book back when you're coming out of the music wing after seventh. Now fuck off."

He scampers away. You jerk your head to the side, and Garner follows you off a little way. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised it's you," he says.

"Love you too, man" you retort, then decide it's better to relent. "Listen," you tell him, trying to keep your tone mild and friendly. "Coupla things I wanna get straight. One, I don't 'deal', whatever Gardinhire said. I procure. People tell me what they want, and I'm able to get it for them. Sure, I make a profit, but that's 'cos I'm moving it from one place to the next, like a trucking company."

Garner snorts.

"Okay, second, I don't procure for anyone on the team. I wanna be straight on that. You—" You jab him in the breastbone. "You are the only guy I know on the team I will be doing this with. And I'm not thrilled about it. I don't use this shit myself, and to be fucking frank with you, Garner, I'd like it better if I knew you didn't either."

"Pozniak uses," he says.

"Pozniak's a fucking loser and you should use your pull with Gellman to bounce him from the team, him and Maddox both. I know he uses but I wouldn't sell to him even if he came to me."

"So I'm a disappointment to you," Garner says with a sneer.

"I'm not saying anything. If you can handle it, you can handle it, I won't say anything about it to anybody. Naturally I won't, 'cos you're our best guy, and I'm not gonna fuck the team over by putting your dick in a wringer. I just don't want you lookin' at me like I'm a lowlife when you and your friends are the ones who give assholes like me a way to scrape a few nickels together."

His face tightens, and his eyes drop.

"So here's how it works, the fifteenth of every month at the latest, you get me word how much you and your friends wanna buy. Price is four hundred an ounce, you knew that already, right? You give me an amount, and by the last day of the month, no later, I'll have it for you. We'll figure out an exchange point where I'll trade you the product for the cash. Sweet and simple. Talk to Gardinhire about how he sorts and binds the money, he's good at it, I like how he does it."

"And that's all?"

"That's all. You can get it cheaper on the street if you know where to look, but you and your friends don't know where to look, right? So all you're doing is hiring me to get it off the street and bring it to you. If you wouldn't have a problem buying it on the street, you shouldn't have a problem buying it from me, 'cos I'm not even the street."

"Alright then," he says, and with that apparently swallows your bullshit story.

The bell rang while you were talking, and you quickly return to class. "Soccer stuff," you tell Kirkham when he asks what it was about; after class, Gardinhire hands you one of his textbooks. At your locker, you extract from it an envelope containing six hundred-dollar bills and seven tens. At the next break, outside the music wing, you return him the book with a firm clap to the arm and a cheerful thanks.

And that marks the climax of the day. After school you pick up your customary meal from Aunt Sue and go by the elementary school. You wonder if you'll find Caleb there, but you don't; and besides, he never called or texted you during the day. You feel a strong twinge of regret. And inside the basement you find that fire still burning, and still giving off no heat.

Then it's up to the country club. Work there is exhausting and boring, but after the excitement at school, it comes as a relief.

After that: Home, where the old man is screaming in the living room, and though you are almost too tired to move your limbs, you help your parents clean and change and quiet him.

* * * * *

"You look like you're having fun," says Chelsea Cooper as she gets out of her car. It's noon, and you're downtown in front of Ben's BBQ. "How's my grandfather doing?"

"You look like you're having fun too," you retort. "How's Gordon's cock doing?" She only grins at that. She does flinch, though, when you yank the black ski cap off her head. "Don't be so fucking obvious."

"Fuck you, I can wear—" She lunges for the cap, but you put it behind your back.

"Later. After we talk to Mathis. You'd just look lame in it. Even more lame. Christ, where did you find that shit? Don't tell me—"

Somewhere in Chelsea's closet, apparently, Chen found some heavy green work pants; a short, black, midriff-exposing t-shirt; and an overlarge green-camo jacket. For accessories he's got black boots, a black leather belt that's three inches wide, and that ski cap.

"I bought it yesterday. I've got a credit card with no credit limit," she brags. "Well, in practice no limit. Mom and Dad pay for everything I put on it, and this girl hasn't hit a limit yet. Her mom says that as head cheerleader she has to look good." She sniggers. "If you're nice and let me wear my new cap I'll take you shopping when we're done."

"You turnin' queer in there, 'cos I'm not. You even look at yourself in the mirror?"

"I look good!" she bridles.

"You look like a fucking doctor's daughter on her way to a costume party. Mathis is gonna take one look at you, and then he's not going go along with this gag about you bringing him the money. So here." You jam the cap back onto her head, pulling it halfway over her face. "Wear it in fucking health, you bint."

She yanks it off, and her hair flies all over. "You're really starting to—!"

"It was your idea to do this, so come on." You take her by the elbow and pull her into the restaurant.

Ben's BBQ is a local landmark and semi-legend, being over seventy years old. It's in the middle of downtown, close to the railroad tracks, and inside it looks like what it is: converted warehouse space. It's all part of a cluster of businesses owned by a local businessman, Karol Mathis, who quietly collects his revenues and rents and makes no splash on the local scene.

Probably because he's also the banker to the local underworld.

Inside, a short, fat girl just this side of thirty looks up cheerfully from the register and asks for your order. You take a sandwich and fries; Chelsea a diet cola (she'll have part of your meal, she says); as an almost casual afterthought, you ask if you can speak to the owner. The girl shouts back into the food prep area, and takes your money. You and Chelsea stand off to the side.

Mathis comes around a corner. His calm demeanor doesn't flicker when he sees you, nor when his eyes light on Chelsea. You try moving your head in a way that suggests you want a private conference in the back; Mathis leads you down a narrow corridor to one of his offices. He doesn't sit.

"Hey, if it's alright," you stammer. "I'm not going to be able to come in here anymore, it's complicated, but— This is, uh, Chelsea, and she's a friend, and she's going to be bringing you the, uh, the payments I owe and passing messages?" You hate the interrogatory lilt you end your request with.

Mathis studies you and he studies Chelsea for a long time. Then he shrugs, as though the whole thing bores him. You mumble a thanks, and pull Chelsea back out. Your order is already waiting at the front.

"He thinks you're my fucking bitch, you know that," you say as you settle into a booth with her.

She laughs. "And what he doesn't know is that you're my bitch."

Next: "Chen's Boyfriend Trouble" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 2)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)"