Chapter 9
After a bit, Trudy and Howard came back with our drinks, and I sat on the couch with them. Leonard got the gutted chair, and Paco and Chub pulled the folding chairs up close. Howard sipped a beer and went through the stuff Trudy had told us about the money most likely being laundered. Then he started waving his hands and working his best facial expressions; threw in a few cents about how the spirit of the sixties need not die; how the money we were going to get could be used to push the ideals of that time forward; said the survivors of that noble era need not fall by the wayside; that unlike the dinosaur our generation had been compared to, we were not in fact extinct or even on the endangered species list, we were merely hibernating like a bear, and now was the time to awake to a new and productive spring.
Although Howard pretended to be talking to both me and Leonard, it was pretty clear it was me he was trying to interest. Trudy had told him about my past, about my involvement in 'the movement,' and he thought he might jump-start my old battery if he could find the right words.
He couldn't.
I was curious about what they had in mind, but felt it would be a mistake to go the next step and ask. I'd open a whole new can of germs that way. Once they knew I was interested they'd try to work their virus into my bloodstream and take over, and I couldn't see any reason to go through the process.
From the way Trudy looked at me, I think she was both surprised at me and disgusted with me. I don't know if it was my lack of interest in their cause, whatever it was, or the realization she was losing control over me.
During Howard's dissertation on the sixties and what it meant to him and should mean to all of us, Chub threw in a few 'right ons,' but for the most part was mercifully silent. Paco yawned a lot, and Trudy tried to stare me into submission. I attempted to look pleasant but a little dense, like a dog listening to a talk on nuclear physics.
When Howard was on his third run of rephrasing what he'd already said, hoping to sneak up on my blind side, Leonard said, 'Since I don't see we're talking much business, pardon me, will you? Because like the bear coming out of hibernation and feeling the first intestinal stirrings of spring, I've got to take me a big, greasy shit. When y'all get to the folk songs part, maybe I'll come back. I'm good on 'I Got a Hammer.' '
'Wrong era,' I said. 'We're talking Beatles and Doors here.'
'I never can fit in,' Leonard said, 'and I try so goddamn hard.'
He went in search of the bathroom.
'Your friend doesn't seem to like us much,' Howard said.
'No, he doesn't,' I said. 'He wasn't involved in any movement during the sixties except moving out of the way of bullets, trying not to get his ass shot off in Vietnam.'
Howard nodded like that explained some things. 'He knows about guns, I presume?'
'Yeah, got a medal or two in Vietnam. But on the negative side he's a little weak on the social graces and Bob Dylan lyrics, and I've caught him in a few mistakes when we're discussing the ballet and the history of Marxism.'
'I don't get the impression you're all that interested in reviving the spirit of the sixties, either,' Howard said.
'Can't imagine why you thought I might be. Well, I can imagine, but whatever Trudy's told you about me, that's in the past. This sixties talk is embarrassing. You sound like a first-year college guy who's just gotten away from mom and dad and discovered weed and liberal politics.'
'The sixties were a positive time, a good time,' Howard said.
'Some of it was. Some of it wasn't. But that was the sixties. I'm happily selfish now. I'm in this for money and money alone. Besides, sounds to me like you're trying to justify theft with sixties rhetoric, and you're too goddamn secretive for my taste. You sound like more illegal stuff than I've agreed to, and I don't want to hear about it. I'm not going to prison for some idealistic rush. This idealism crap has got me nowhere but tired and broke and cut to the bone. Money I can spend, and might get away with.
'I can take it and go someplace warm with cheap whiskey and loose women.' I looked at Trudy. 'Women that want nothing more than hot, sticky sex down Mexico way or on some tropical island where you can run around with your ass hanging out and your dick slapping your thigh, and nobody asks you to do anything but mind your own business. You people fight the good fight, whatever it is, because you're going to have to do it without us.'
Paco grinned, got out a cigarette pack, lipped a smoke and lit it with a cheap lighter.
'Don't make us breathe your bad air,' Howard said.
'Screw you,' Paco said. He blew smoke across the room.
Normally I'd be on Howard's side, but I enjoyed seeing him irritated. I almost asked Paco for a cigarette.
Howard sighed, looked at Trudy sadly; he was a smart, hip guy dealing with a bunch of nincompoops. What could he do?
'Anytime change is encouraged,' Chub said, 'there's always someone who argues for the status quo, or decides to run off and take it easy, concludes mat the best and simplest way—'
Paco reached over and slapped Chub on top of the head with his fingers.
'Damn you,' Chub said. 'That was childish, Paco. You're frustrated about something, you should discuss it, not resort to—'
Paco slapped Chub again, this time with the palm of his hand, said, 'Shut up, will you, Chub?'
'Whose side you on, Paco?' Howard asked.
'Yeah,' Chub said, rubbing his head.
'I'm not choosing up,' Paco said. 'I'm tired of Chub's bullshit is all. He keeps talking like he's done some things. Hell, leave Hap alone. He isn't interested. Let him and Leonard do their job, then let's do what we're gonna do. They couldn't care less. If they want it that way, let's leave it that way. You guys are starting to sound like evangelists, and I hate those fuckers.'
