What
is taking so long with the coffee?
I
know this isn't the Ritz, or even the fucking Hampton Inn, but come
on.
What
is he up to?
It's
forty years since I had a steady job in the teams and, all of a
sudden, it's important to them about Barney?
I
don't buy it.
This
has nothing to do with Barney.
Couldn't.
It's
serious because they're spending important money, but why are they
spending it like this?
Doesn't
make any sense.
They
got super computers and all kinds of high-tech bullshit to look over
your shoulder and up your nose that it makes no sense to break out
the Geezer Squad on me.
Christ,
how old is Jim anyway? He must be pushing ninety, if he's a day.
It's
a wonder he can still walk, let alone put together a major play.
Nobody
in their right mind would trust anybody his age with the day of the
week.
Maybe
it's not Jim.
That
would make sense: have somebody walk the walk. Christ, look at the
operator that took me for a ride this morning.
Cinnamon.
If
that even was Cinnamon.
Sure
seemed like her though, I mean after the phone said it was.
My
head is killing me.
Where's
the damn coffee?
What
if they're not...?
What
if I'm not...?
Nah
couldn't be. If our side wouldn't spend this kind of money on me,
why would anyone else?
What's
he playing at? He's always playing at something, always working an
angle.
“Where's
Barney?”
Like
they even care....
All
this time since the sheet cake, I bet nobody ever asked where I was,
what my life was like. They show you the door and it doesn't have
any knobs on it—either side—only locks. You go through that door
and there's no coming back and nobody's coming to look for you.
There's no such thing as a retirement home for people like me,only a
roach motel.
It
makes no sense, does it?
I
can't stand looking at that mirror.
I
wish they'd bring the damned coffee....
I
know there's people watching me, looking for tells and keys to break
me down, but all I can see is this old guy looking back at me. He
looks kind of familiar—the eyes I think—but like a distant
relative.
The
eyes are hardest to fake—always were. That's why, when you're
under, they have you wear glasses, preferably dark, or with thick
lenses: throws people off. Operators don't want to tip they are
checking you out by staring. There's ways of doing it, but the
glasses slow them down, give you options.
I
am ready to go to sleep.
Must
be pumping in oxygen, like they do in the casinos. More than once,
we made use of that to have our way with folks.
Don't
think they do it much anymore. It's supposed to make the players
last longer, that was the story anyway.
If
that's what they're doing, they won't be able to pump enough to keep
my attention. That coffee doesn't show up, I'll be unconscious
before long.
I
need my coffee.
Need
a good story too, a legend to put them off the scent. Barney
deserves that.
We
had some good people, back when I was working. They could write you
a legend that was rock-solid and provide you with the props—the
pocket litter—to back it up.
They
must have had the world's largest collection of matchbooks because it
didn't matter where you needed to be from, they had the right
matches. And not just the ones from the hotel bars, but the clubs
and dives that couldn't find their way to the beaten path.
We
sold a job once on the strength of a book of matches. We were
playing an operator who had us cold. His people had walked away with
the straight skinny on some pretty important projects—works in
progress—and there was no way were getting it back. Phelps worked
out a play where we got his network to confirm the intel, but we got
him to distrust the confirmation, to turn on his own people.
One
of their contacts was left-handed and Phelps arranged it so that the
operator would get a book of matches from the contact that were used
by a right-handed person. Wrong hand, wrong contact, wrong
information.
Heard
that the operator threw out the intel, thinking it was phony. Threw
out some of his own people too.
Matches
can get you killed.
Nobody
carries matches anymore. If you can't do it with a fucking
smartphone, then people want nothing to do with it.
That
guy is still watching me.
That's
the one thing they don't prepare you for. You go into this work with
a head full of spy movies--hard liquor and harder women--and the
reality is hours and hours freezing your nuts off in some
uncomfortable van, or run-down warehouse.
Waiting.
You
wait for the tools to come in.
You
wait for the headliners and the day-players.
You
wait for instructions.
You
wait for the go.
None
of those things run on schedule, but they all, sure as shit, expect
you to.
I
hate waiting.
Seems
to me I waited most of my life away while other people decided what I
was going to do next.
This
is not a very comfortable chair. The cushion is too thin, the slope
of the back is wrong and one of the legs is just short enough that it
rocks every time I shift my weight even a little.
It's
important to have a comfortable chair. This chair is not
comfortable.
Christ,
have I really lost that much hair? I mean, I know I am well out of
warranty, but, seriously, my head looks like a farmer's field after
last harvest.
I
never expected to get this old.
You
go into this work expecting to get caught and every year you don't
the odds only get better—and not in a good way. Right up until the
last day, you are looking over your shoulder thinking every person
who even looks at you sideways has a file folder with your name on
it.
It
was more than a few times in those last days I pulled on a civilian
thinking that he was about to punch my ticket.
They
try and get you ready for that, but there's no way. You may come in
thinking you're the biggest, baddest, smoothest operator—and maybe
you are, at first—but everybody goes out the same way, like a
character in a Jerry Lewis movie whose nerves are so shot he can't
even spell smooth.
Where's
my damn coffee? This isn't cute anymore.
I
can't stand that guy.
Every time
I look over there, he's staring at me.
It's
my own people putting me through the wringer, that's the part that
hurts.
I
should be flattered, I suppose, but....
Wait—he
moved. The old guy moved.
What
the--?
He's
at the window now, looking right at me.
This
some kind of new technique? One of Phelps' bullshit head games?
I
can feel his eyes on me.
I
try to look away, but they don't.
Now,
I can't look away.
It's
chicken and I feel the stakes are very high.
The
highest.
He
stares at me.
I
stare at him.
Nobody
blinks.
My
head is splitting; where's the fucking coffee?
Can't
think about that now; can't let this guy—whoever it is—think he's
beat me.
Got
to stay focused.
It's
like the school yard all over again.
They
called it a playground, which made the adults feel better, but it was
a prison yard, the anti-matter to the matter of the classroom, the
great equalizer.
I
was never comfortable around kids my own age; never learned the
rules. I was pretty good in class though—not the best—but pretty
good. Good enough, at any rate, that I was a target in the yard.
In
the classroom I had no trouble walking from my desk to the
blackboard, but, in the yard, I suddenly had balance problems—always
falling down around those kids who never got asked to go to the
blackboard.
Gym
class was a nightmare. There was the predictable humiliation of team
sports and then the direct and sanctioned persecution of dodgeball
and floor hockey. The teachers never seemed to be watching when the
physically gifted would go after their weaker and slower brethren
all in the name of sport.
Through
high school—right up to the point where I injured my knee—I was a
target for no other reason than that I did my homework and didn't
chase girls.
For
some of my classmates, the scariest place at school was the
principal's office, for me it was the locker room. There was only so
much of that I could stand. I changed into my gym clothes inside my
locker for as long as I could and then took to wearing them under my
street clothes. It worked great during the fall and winter, but,
once the weather got warmer....
The
day I went into the service I forced myself to get over that, but
now—here--wherever this is, I feel like I'm back in school all over
again.
I
grit my teeth.
The
old guy grits his teeth.
I
get out of my chair and walk right up to the window.
He
doesn't move.
He
doesn't move.
I
squint like they do in all those spaghetti westerns....
What's
he doing...?
Is
he...smiling?
He's
got this look on his face like he's just farted in church.
What
the fuck...?
His
right hand starts to move....
It's
like he's scratching under his left ear....
But
he's not scratching....
No,
he's not, he's pulling at something. I can't see what it is, but
then I know what it is.... I can't hear the noise, but I know what
it sounds like.... I used to love that noise, because it meant that
the show was over and it was time to break down, pack up, and head
for the barn.
I
don't know what this means.
The
more he pulls at his face, the more distorted his features become,
like looking in a funhouse mirror.
My
head is splitting and my knees are going soft.
Now,
I see two faces: one is a dead shell, like something stolen from an
open casket; the other I don't recognize.
Is
that supposed to be me?
