I drop from the toilet seat onto the floor as he pulls the trigger, exploding the toilet tank. He kicks at me as I reach through the billowing steam and grab hold of his gun hand. The long sleeves of my shirt give me a moment’s protection, and then the water has soaked through and is burning my arms, droplets splashing onto my face and eyes as I try to grip his slippery, naked skin.
He’s flailing at me with his feet, kicking me in the ribs as I lean over the edge of the tub, one hand holding his wrist and the other peeling his finger back from the trigger, bending it. He’s slapping at the hot water knob with his free hand, trying to turn it off, but he twists it the wrong way and it pounds down on us, scalding the side of my face. His finger snaps and I bend it until it’s pressed flat against the back of his hand. He lands a kick on the side of my head that sends me falling backward into the cold toilet water pooling on the floor.
The sudden cold makes me feel just how bad my burns are and I scream. Sid’s mouth is wide open, but a whistling rush of air is the only sound coming out. He pulls his legs into the tub and gets them underneath his body and starts to stand up. The water is still crashing on him and he’s twisting the knob with his left hand. I reach back into the tub and grab one of his legs. He points his gun at me, but his broken trigger finger dangles uselessly. The stream of water fades to a dribble and I yank on his leg and he falls back into the tub, swinging the gun at me on the way down and cracking me in the skull.
The world flips.
The world rights itself.
The gun has bounced out of Sid’s hand and landed in a puddle of steaming water at the hair-clogged drain. Sid paws at it with his lobster-red left hand and shoves his mauled right hand in my face, trying to hold me at bay. His broken finger slips into my open mouth and I bite it. He screeches and slaps his left hand against my right ear, setting off an explosion of pain. I swing my right arm up in an arc, wrapping around his left arm, bring it down, and squeeze my elbow into my side, pinning his arm in my armpit. He’s on his back now writhing in two inches of seething water. His right hand is squirting blood into my mouth, the other is trapped, and his legs are useless inside the tub. I punch him in the face with my left fist, and throw myself on top of him in the tub.
He’s pinned beneath me. He pulls hard on his left arm and it starts to slip free. The flesh at the break in his finger is starting to tear between my teeth. I wrap my left hand around his throat and let his left arm free and he grabs my lower lip and pulls down, trying to free his other hand from my jaws. I reach beyond his head into the puddle of hot water and wrap my fingers around the butt of his pistol. Too late, he realizes what is happening and grabs at my right arm. I lean all my weight into my left arm, squashing his throat. His mouth flies open and I shove the gun inside of it until I feel the tip of the barrel hit the back of his throat and he starts to gag on it.
I pull the trigger. Water drains from the new hole in the bottom of the tub.
WHEN I open the trunk Sandy hits me in the arm with the lug wrench. I take it from her and we get T into the back seat. I give the keys to Sandy and she gets behind the wheel and drives us to Tim’s apartment.
The only place left to hide.
SANDY PLAYS nurse. She gets us inside, puts T in Tim’s bed, fills the tub with cold water, and cuts the clothing from my body with a scissors from Tim’s desk. Once I’m in the tub, she empties all the ice trays into it.
My right arm and hand are raw and red and dotted with white blisters. My knees are also scalded, but not as bad. I know the right side of my face and neck are bad, but I can feel the pain, so the tissue damage can’t be too deep. My vision is speckled with black dots and I don’t remember what happened right after I shot a hole in the back of Sid’s mouth. I try to remember some details and the black dots blur into a single huge dot and I find myself choking on ice water. Sandy pulls me up, out of the tub before I drown. I get up and stand on the linoleum floor while she blots my skin dry as gently as she can. I think it’s a safe bet that Sid aggravated my concussion when he smacked me with his gun.
There’s no burn cream in Tim’s bathroom, but there is a bottle of aloe. We smear that over my scalded skin. There’s nothing to use as a burn bandage except some Saran Wrap from the kitchen. Sandy carefully wraps it around my knees, arm, shoulder, and neck. My face and hand will have to go without. She drapes a sheet around me like a toga and helps me into Tim’s room and I sit on the edge of the bed. T’s awake.
– My dog.
– I’m sorry, T.
– My fucking dog.
– I know.
– Gonna kill the fuckers.
Too late.
Sandy has already stripped him and wrapped a towel around his calf. It’s still bleeding. My hands are shaking from the speed and I don’t think I could hold a needle in my burned right hand anyway. And I could just black out again at any moment. Sandy shakes her head when I ask if she thinks she can sew him up. We have to stop the bleeding.
I give T two Percs and he goes out. I tell Sandy to try and clean up his face and I go in to the kitchen. I want two Percs. Really, I want all the Percs in the world, but I’ll have to live with the one I took back at El Cortez. In the kitchen I find a serving spoon. I turn one of the stove’s gas burners to high and set the handle of the spoon in the flame and go back to the room with a whiskey bottle. We unwrap T’s leg and bathe it in Tullamore Dew and I have Sandy hold a clean towel around it while I go for the spoon. I hold it, the glowing handle sticking out of a wet rag, and press it into one end of the hole in T’s calf. He jerks and I tell Sandy to hold the leg tighter and she gags at the sound and the smell and then it’s over. Then we do it again, cauterizing the other end of the hole, as well.
That’s all I can do for my friend. There’s a murdered body at his home and his car was seen speeding away from the scene of another murder and soon the cops will be after him, and when they catch him they will send his ass back to California and lock it up for the rest of his life.
So he has to go now.
SANDY DRESSES T in a pair of Tim’s shorts and a Les Paul Live at the Iridium sweatshirt. I find a pair of overalls that touch as little of my burned skin as possible.
T comes to as we slide him into the backseat of the Chrysler.
– What the fuck?
– Hey, T.
– What the fuck?
– Yeah, I got that.
Sandy gets behind the wheel and buckles herself in. I sit in the passenger seat, but don’t close the door. T focuses his good eye on me.
– You look all fucked-up, superstar.
– It’s going around.
– I wanna go home.
– I’m sorry, T, you can’t.
– Fuck you.
– I’m sorry about your dog, T.
– Said, fuck you.
– Thanks for helping me. I.
I shake my head, unable to finish. He reaches out a hand, puts it on my arm, and closes his eye.
– Fuck. You.
His hand slides off and he’s asleep again.
I close the door and go stand next to Sandy’s open window.
– You sure?
She runs a finger around the steering wheel and nods.
– Yeah. My fault he’s all fucked-up, anyway.
– OK. Just find a place out of the way, over the state line where the cops won’t look for him. Arizona, not California.
– I’ll find someplace safe.
