that for, all chromed up? I sure as hell wouldn’t take it into combat.”
Louis said, “It ain’t bad for holding up liquor stores.”
Melanie rolled her eyes at him.
Gerald shrugged. “That’s about its speed.”
Louis, at first, had thought the guy was suspicious, even the way he looked at Melanie. What were these people doing here? Or he was annoyed for the same reason and because of it barely opened his mouth. The way Louis saw him now, the guy liked being on the muscle; he had to be challenged in some way to get his head to work. Gerald was about fifty or so; he could suck in his stomach but not that big butt on him. He believed no doubt he looked slick in his Desert Storm camies and was too confident to know he had a narrow brain in his crewcut head. This type pissed Louis off. The convict in him liked the feeling of heat he got looking at the guy, knowing he could control it and mess with him.
Louis, figuring the guy’s age, said, “Gerald, you ever been to war?”
“I been to tactical encampments,” Gerald said, “in Georgia and here in Florida. Going way back, I trained for the Bay of Pigs and just missed it.”
“Have you ever looked death in the face?”
“Meaning what?”
“Combat—what did you think?”
“I’ve taken part in combat exercises with live ammo,” Gerald said, “put on by former recon marines. Don’t kid yourself, I know what a fire fight is like.”
Louis had never been in combat either. No, but he’d seen two men shot—one running from a work gang at Huntsville, another climbing the fence at Starke—and had seen a man stabbed to death, a man set on fire, a man right after he had been strangled with a coat hanger, and believed these counted for something. So he said to Gerald, “Bullshit. That ain’t looking death in the face, that’s playing. That’s what kids do.” Louis taking it to this asshole standing there in his combat boots in a roomful of guns. Louis working himself up for what he knew was coming.
Ordell moved away from the window as he started in, saying, “Big Guy’s been training, getting ready for the black revolution.” Ordell playing with the zipper tab on his coveralls, zipping it up, zipping it down. “He hears us saying we shall overcome and knows it’s gonna happen.”
Louis had looked over his shoulder at the window. He heard Ordell, but not that popping sound outside. It had stopped. He saw the two bikers by the gun-range counter, maybe reloading.
Ordell saying, “It won’t be like the A-rab war out in the desert. Unh-unh, the nigger war’s gonna be in the streets. Gonna be a job stopping us natives, huh, man?” Ordell provoking the guy, saying, “You think you and your racist brothers can handle it?”
Gerald said, “You talking to me like that in my
Ordell had his coveralls zipped down to his waist, his hand going inside. It was about to happen. Ordell was going to shoot the guy. Louis felt it and wanted him to come on, hurry up if he was going to do it. Louis anxious—he had to look out the window again, quick, check on the bikers.
They were leaving the gun range: two heavyset guys coming with pistols and rifles.
Louis turned from the window. He said, “Those guys are coming,” trying to be cool about it, wanting Ordell to know without throwing him off.
But it did, it stopped Ordell and he looked over, his hand still inside his coveralls.
In that moment Melanie yelled, “Shoot him!”
Louis saw her pulling the knit bag from her shoulder, that much, before he swung the Mossberg at Gerald, putting it on him as the man got to Ordell and slammed a fist into him. It drove Ordell back to land hard in a leather chair, the Colt auto cleared, in his hand, and Gerald took it away from him: punched him in the mouth, twisted the gun from his hand, and threw it over on the sofa, out of the way. He got into a crouch then and hooked his fist into Ordell’s face, then threw the other hand, bouncing Ordell’s head against the brown leather cushion.
Melanie yelled it again, “Shoot him!” and Gerald paused, sinking to one knee as if to rest, then to look over his shoulder.
At Melanie, Louis thought. But the man was looking this way, right at him, staring. Louis squeezed the grip and saw the red laser dot appear on Gerald’s forehead. Gerald grinned at him.
“You got the nerve? Asking have I ever looked death in the face. Shit, you ain’t ever seen any combat, have you?”
Melanie’s voice said, “What’re you waiting for?”
Gerald turned enough to look at her. “He’s got buckshot in there, honey. How’s he gonna get me without hitting his nigger friend?” He said to Louis, “Am I right? Shit, you don’t have the nerve anyway.”
Louis went for him, raising the Mossberg to lay it across his head, aiming at that crew cut, and caught the man’s shoulder. Gerald rose up in his GI T-shirt, all arms, grabbed the barrel and gave it a twist, and Louis, hanging on, was thrown against the chair on top of Ordell. Louis slid off, scrambled out of the man’s reach to have room to move. Got to his feet . . . Gerald was standing with his back to him.
Gerald, and now Louis, watching as Melanie’s hand came out of her knit bag with a stubby bluesteel automatic. Gerald said, “Now what is that you have, some kind of low-cal pussy gun?”
Melanie was holding it in both hands now, arms extended, aimed at Gerald.
He tossed the shotgun to land on the sofa, looked at Melanie and said, “Okay, now you put that down, honey, and I won’t press charges against you.” Confident about it, as though it would settle the matter.
Melanie didn’t say anything. She shot him.
Louis felt himself jump—the sound was so loud in that closed room. He looked at Gerald. The man hadn’t moved; he stood there.
Melanie said, “I’m not a whore, you bozo.”
Christ, and shot him again.
Louis saw Gerald grab his side this time as if he’d been stung.
She shot him again and his hands went to his chest and his knees started to buckle as he moved toward her and she shot him again: the sound ringing and ringing in this room full of guns and animal heads, until it faded away and the man was lying on the floor.
Ordell said through his bloody mouth, barely moving it, “Is he dead?”
Melanie said, “You bet he is.”
Ordell said to Louis, “They coming?” And to Melanie, “Girl, where’d you get that gun?”
Louis was at the window now.
He saw the two bikers standing in kind of a crouch with their rifles, shoulders hunched, looking this way, nearer the house now than the gun range. He saw them out there in the open, cautious. Saw them both look toward the driveway at the same time and start to turn in that direction, raising their rifles. Louis heard the sound of automatic weapons, not as loud as he heard them in Ordell’s gun movie or in any movie he had ever seen, and watched the two bikers drop where they were standing, seem to collapse, fall without firing a shot, the sound of the automatic weapons continuing until finally it stopped. Pretty soon the jackboys appeared, the kids with their Chinese guns, curved banana clips, looking at the men on the ground and then toward the house.
Louis wondered if combat was like that. If you had a seat and could watch it.
He heard Ordell say, “They get ’em?”
Louis nodded. He said, “Yeah.”
And heard Ordell say, “Man, my mouth is sore. I think I’m gonna have to go the dentist.”
Heard him say, “Now I have to get those boys to load up the van. We going home in Louis’s car, if it makes it.” Heard him say, “You ever shoot anybody before?”
And heard Melanie say, “Hardly.”
He watched the jackboys poke at the bikers with the muzzles of their guns. Now Ordell appeared, walking up to them, and it surprised Louis; he hadn’t heard Ordell leave the room. Louis turned from the window to see Melanie on the sofa, still holding the pistol.
She said, “Why didn’t you shoot him?”
Louis said, “You did all right.”
