Fake I.D.

businessman, and my friends are businessmen, and I just thought if you had any extra cash lying around your apartment—”

“I don’t lend money,” I said.

He started to laugh. The laugh turned into a deep cough.

“Please,” he said, catching his breath. “Do I really look like I need your money?”

Yeah, I thought.

“I just wanted to find out what kind of income you had because an investment opportunity came my way recently and I figured a guy like you might be interested.”

“I told you, I don’t lend.”

“This isn’t lending, it’s investing. Lemme explain.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, then said, “See, I know this guy—Alan Schwartz. You know, Jewish guy. Anyway, Schwartz works down on Wall Street and he’s starting up this syndicate. Not one of those big-time syndicates that own Derby horses—this is just a bunch of guys putting some money together to buy a horse, or a couple of horses. The idea was to put five guys together— guys who love horse racing—and they’ll go down to the track and buy a claimer. At first, I didn’t trust the guy—I mean I’m not stupid. But then I checked it out and it was all legit. They have a trainer lined up and everything. You heard of Bill Tucker?”

I nodded.

“I met Bill a couple of weeks ago,” Pete said. “Nice Southern, grits-and-collard-greens type of guy. Anyway, he’s gonna advise us on what horse to claim and we’ll see what happens. Who knows? We might wind up with another John Henry.”

I knew the John Henry story—how he was claimed for twenty grand and went on to win millions—but I just sat there, staring.

“Anyway,” Pete went on, “that’s why I asked you how much money you were making. Not because I was being nosy, but because we have four guys lined up right now and we’re looking for a fifth. Each guy is putting up ten grand. I don’t know if that’s in your ballpark or not, or if you even want to own part of a horse, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to ask.”

The whole thing sounded like a big scam to me. Asking a stranger in a parking lot to join a horse syndicate? Obviously, Pete was just a con man, trying to sucker me out of some money, and I wasn’t the type of guy who got suckered.

“Sorry,” I said. “Not interested.”

“Just thought I’d ask,” Pete said. “Figured a racing fan like yourself would love to get in on the ground floor of something like this, but I’m sure we’ll find somebody else. Hey, if you’re ever in Brooklyn make sure you stop by one of my stores. I’ll give you an actor’s discount.”

“Your stores?”

“Didn’t I tell you? I own a couple of shoe stores out in Brooklyn. You know Kings Highway?”

“I grew up in Brooklyn.”

“No shit? I heard an accent, but I thought it might be Staten Island or Jersey. Where you from?”

“Canarsie.”

“You’re shitting me? I grew up in Coney Island, by Neptune Avenue. Now I live in Manhattan Beach. Got a big house, right by the water. Anyway, I got two stores in Brooklyn. The main one’s on Kings Highway. It’s called Logan’s after me—Pete Logan.”

I’d bought a pair of shoes at Logan’s when I was in high school, and now I remembered Pete. I could picture him, twenty years ago, standing behind the register, or he might’ve been the guy who sold me the shoes.

“Anyway,” he said, “just drop by one of my stores next time you’re in the neighborhood. If I’m not there just mention my name and you’ll get the discount. It was nice running into you again.”

I watched Pete walk across the parking lot and get into a shiny black Mercedes. So the guy owned some shoe stores and he drove a Merc, that didn’t mean he wasn’t a scammer.

I tried to get back to reading my Racing Form, but I couldn’t concentrate. It was that odor. My damn car smelled like somebody had died in it.

Two

Of course I couldn’t catch a break at jai-alai. The sport was so fixed I always felt like a sucker the second the teller printed my tickets. After losing two games in a row I ripped up my program and went to play horses and dogs in the simulcast area in the back of the fronton.

Usually, when I didn’t have any auditions to go to—which was pretty much all the time these days—and when I wasn’t working at the bar, I hung out at the OTB or at the Inside Track Teletheater on Fifty-third Street. Today I’d thought it would be nice to gamble someplace else for a change, but the way things were going in another hour I’d be back on the Turnpike, on my way back to the city.

I wasn’t hungry, but I decided I needed something to bite into, to let out my aggravation, so I got on line to buy a hamburger. A few seconds later, I turned around and saw Pete, standing at the counter, squirting catsup onto a hot dog. I made a U-turn, heading toward where they were showing the dog races. I knew I couldn’t dodge him forever. The place wasn’t very big and if they were lucky they had three hundred people today.

I never won betting on dogs, but I opened the Plain-field program anyway. I bet fifty to win on the number five and then watched the five get wiped out by another dog on the first turn. Cursing, ripping up the ticket, I went back to the concession stand and saw that Pete was gone. Thank fuckin’ God. After I downed two burgers, I counted my money. I had $216 in my wallet, but I had to save at least twenty bucks for gas and tolls back to the city. I decided that I’d bet a hundred on the horse I liked in the second at Aqueduct and play with whatever money I had left for the rest of the day.

I went to the bathroom and took a leak. I was by the sink, splashing cold water against my face, when I looked straight ahead, into the mirror, and saw Pete coming up behind me. In the bright fluorescent light the mole on his chin looked bigger, and the hairs growing out of it were darker. He wasn’t wearing his wool cap anymore. His black and gray hair was curly and messy.

“How’s it goin’?” he asked.

“All right,” I said.

“I was looking for you before,” he said. “I couldn’t find you anywhere so I figured you took off.”

I unwound some paper towel and started wiping my face.

“I’m still here,” I said.

“I can see that,” he said. “So how you doing? Catch any winners so far?”

I didn’t want to tell him that I was losing my balls.

“Hit a few things,” I said.

“Wish I could say the same,” Pete said.

“Your luck’s gotta change eventually.”

“So where you hanging out?” Pete asked. “Maybe I’ll come by and visit.”

“I’m just walking around a lot,” I said. “I’m not sitting anywhere.”

Now I could tell he got the hint.

“Whatever,” he said. “Maybe we’ll bump into each other later on.”

In the mirror, I watched Pete leave the bathroom.

I bet the Aqueduct race, putting one hundred to win on the ten horse and then I bet another fifty in exactas with the ten on top of a few other horses. The ten broke good out of the gate, then dropped back and closed late, missing by a head. I screamed at the TV and kicked a garbage can so hard a security guard came over and told me if I did that again he’d have to toss me.

Now I only had sixty-six dollars left, including gas-and-toll money. I knew this wouldn’t be enough to last me the rest of the day so I got on line at the ATM to take money off my Visa card. There were four guys ahead of me. They looked like degenerates, wearing dirty jeans, sneakers, and old winter jackets. Then I thought, How was I any better? Wasn’t I on the same line, waiting to take money off my credit card? A couple of minutes ago I probably looked like even more of a loser, kicking that garbage can and screaming like a maniac.

I only had sixty-four dollars left on the card so I took out an even sixty, figuring it would last me another