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Blur - Part 1: Friday
By Parasaur.w
This short story is rated R, by the Pete FanFiction of America Association for:
Violence, blood, bad language, drug use, and graphically descripted scenes. Don't read.
Friday afternoon…
“Was that Robby?” Remy asked as a streak of gold flashed by the car.
“That was Robert’s car. But he wasn’t in it,” Luther replied, frowning.
>>>>>
Robert’s shirt, a Polo button-up, was saturated with the sticky wetness of congealing blood. That was the first thing Luther saw. Immediately he thought Robert was dead. He certainly looked it. The thirty-year-old lay on his back, with his head propped awkwardly against the tire of a rusted car, which Luther could not identify. His dirty blonde hair concealed his eyes some, but not enough to hide the fact that they were closed. His jaw was slack and his legs bent in an angle that suggested he’d not moved since he fell. One hand was gripping the sopping shirt, the other dead looking, a side arm loosely resting in it. He was completely motionless.
Luther Shores frowned and pushed his sunglasses up on his forehead, looking more clearly at his friend. Dead, very dead. He cut the ignition of the Cadillac, and stepped out, immediately slipping the shades back over his eyes. The parking lot was bare, except for the car and the carcass of Robert. Heat waves rose from the black pavement as the hot Nevada sun bore down on it. The structure off to the side, some old industrial building, had long since been abandoned and neglected. As he walked toward Robert, he saw a dark stain, blood, in a long, streaking line leading to the body. The blood shined under the glare of the sun, and in this heat any liquid exposed on black pavement would dry quickly. The blood was fresh.
Luther came to the still figure and shook his head. He bent down and reached for the gun and suddenly Robert’s eyes opened, whipping the handgun up to Luther’s face.
For a moment, Robert held his gaze and his weapon at Luther.
Then he smiled dazedly and lowered the gun. Luther grinned. “How you doing, man?” he asked, resting a hand on Robert’s shoulder.
“Been…better,” Robert’s words came slowly and quietly.
“I bet. Come on, let’s get in the car.” Luther turned to his Cadillac, and saw the man already stepping out of the passenger side. “Hey, Remy, he’s alive. Let’s get him out of here.”
Remy Webb, a heavy guy with curly blonde hair, jogged to them. “Robby, man, fuck. What the hell happened out ‘ere?”
Robert made no reply as Luther wrapped the arm holding the gun around his shoulder. Luther motioned for Remy to get the other arm. They hoisted him up off the pavement, a pool of blood that had been collecting in the folds of his shirt spilled down onto his khakis. His sweaty head drooped and his feet dragged limply as the two men slowly hauled him to the white Cadillac.
He flopped down lifelessly onto the white leather of the back seat, betraying the faint animation he’d just displayed. Luther made a face as freshly pumped blood gurgled from somewhere on Robert’s chest and ran down the plush leather. Remy had already gotten into the passenger seat.
Luther climbed into the driver’s seat and started his car. “Watch him,” he told Remy, putting the car into drive.
Remy glanced back at the inert man. “What the fuck do you want me to watch, him bleeding?”
Luther scowled. “Make sure he doesn’t fuckin’ die.”
“What does it matter if I watch that or not? If he’s gonna die, than he’s gonna die. It’s not like watching him is gonna stop him from dying.”
“God damn it, just fucking watch him.”
“Fine, fine. Hey man, how you doing?” he asked Robert.
Robert groaned.
“What happened, man?”
He opened his eyes briefly. “I was…he told me that I wasn’t going to take anything from him…I just was fucking holding my hands up, not fighting…peace, that’s what the rendezvous…was about. No fucking guns…but he shot me.”
“What the hell?” Remy played with his gold earring as he always did when he was confused or nervous.
Luther floored the accelerator. The white car buzzed passed the ruins of old houses and buildings of this particular abandoned sector of the city. The apartment was a good twenty minutes away, but they’d make it in ten. How the hell they were going to get Robert in there without being noticed was the problem.
“Lawrence shot Robby, man, that’s unbelievable,” Remy said.
“Was that Lawrence’s car?”
“Yeah. He must have taken Robby’s.”
“Lawrence is going to be real sorry, Remy. Real sorry.”
“You got that right.”
Suddenly Robert was retching blood. The sour scent of bile filled the constricted air of the vehicle and the stench was overpowering. “Jesus…” Luther pressed the buttons on the arm console and all four windows lowered, whirring. A blast of dry desert wind filled the car and ventilated it quickly. Robert was groaning deathly sounds. Low, sorrowful noises that were freaking them both out. Luther glanced in the mirror to see him sitting up, his face in his hands.
“You guys – I’m – dying,” he said, his voice hollow. He breathing came in short, gasping breaths. “Take me home.”
“We’re going, man.” Luther rounded a corner that was now taking them into the more occupied district of Carson City. His Cadillac was pushing 90 miles an hour and the busy streets of the downtown just after lunch was not the place to be tripling the speed limit. He let off the gas but didn’t touch the brakes. The apartment was still a good five minutes away.
>>>>>
Luther had checked on Robert for the fourth time in an hour when he finally sat down on his couch. It was Ivan’s orders that he stay in bed, stay resting. Robert was having no trouble accomplishing that. Since Ivan had removed the bullet from his abdomen, and stitched the quarter-sized hole, Robby had woken only once to ask for water, but fell asleep before he could drink it. Luther left it on the bedside table.
Remy neatly evened out the lines on the coffee table with his credit card, making sure to scrap the last specks into the small piles.
Luther wished he wouldn’t snort right now. He’d watched his friend get high ever since they’d returned, and his perpetual euphoria made him a pain to deal with. Especially with Lawrence’s death to plan. “Cut it out.”
He wiped his nose unabashed. “Cut what out?”
“The coke. Cut it out.” Luther scowled callously at Remy.
Remy knew the cold glare, the damning, glowering face that Luther made when he was pissed. He knew what it meant. “Cool, man. Gotcha.”
“Yeah, you do.” Luther slid his black coat off for the first time. His Hawaiian button-up was dank with sweat and looked bizarre with his shoulder-strapped gun holsters. He slid the two silver 9mms from their leather pockets and set them down, grateful to be rid of their burden.
“How we gonna find Lawrence, man?” Remy asked.
“I don’t know. We’ll find him. But for now, I gotta go talk to someone. He owes me twelve grand.”
“Oh, boy. Gonna break his knee caps?” Remy grinned a child’s grin.
“Only if he doesn’t have it,” Luther responded, and for the first time that day, smiled.
Earlier that day…
Lawrence was a particularly pallid guy, Hooky thought, as he snipped the tendrils of greasy hair from his head. “Don’t move,” he told Lawrence for the tenth time.
Lawrence shifted slightly in the seat, wiping the itchy wisps off of his neck.
“Now, what were you saying?” Hooky asked, maneuvering the scissors.
“So, like I said, Robby’s coke turns out to be that freaky shit. My cousin Ken, you remember Ken, he overdoses on the shit and gets rushed the hospital.” Lawrence gazed at himself in the mirror as he spoke. Thin and scraggly looking. He hadn’t slept in three days. He’d been drunk for two of them. He felt like vomiting. His eyes were small, and deep-set in his skull, his thin, pale face was ghostly, his lips colorless.
Hooky continued trimming. “And?”
“And he’s on life-support. He might have brain damage. I don’t what the fuck that coke was about, but it might have been laced with crystal meth. No good, Hooky. You know how it is.”
“My brother died like that. My sister came damn close. My sister is very dear to me. How long this bad coke been circulating?”
“Couldn’t say, Hooky. I know that Robby cat supplied Ken and I with it two weeks ago. I’m lucky I didn’t try the damned stuff.”
“My sister overdosed about three months ago. Think it’s the same stuff?”
“It’s probably the same shit, but I don’t know if Robby’s been the seller the whole time, you know?”
The neckline looked even. Hooky clipped the one last strand from Lawrence’s head and turned him around. “There ya go,” he said with a self-satisfied smirk, observing his work.
“Hey, thanks Hooky. I needed it.”
“Yeah, you also need a damned shower.”
Lawrence grinned, revealing seedy teeth.
“Now listen too me, Larry,” Hooky said with a dropped voice. He glanced around at the other patrons of the barbershop, reading magazines and newspapers as they got haircuts. No one was watching, no one listening. “Larry, get Robert alone. Get him in a deserted parking lot and blow him away. Robby Sheldon has to die.”
Lawrence face went from pale to deathly white. “No, no, no, Hooky, no.”
“What are you, fuckin’ friends with ‘im?”
“Course not, Hooky, no. But Robby rolls with that loan shark Luther Shores. Remember him? He’s the guy that broke Carlino’s knees. An-an-and, also that motherfucker Remy. Remy…oh, what’s his last name…Webb! Remy Webb. I used to hang out with those two guys. They’re kind of like friends. But they’re dangerous as hell, Hooky.”
Hooky looked at Lawrence in revulsion. “I know who they are, Larry. Don’t be such a woman. Go do it. And if Luther and Webb want to start some shit, then they can come here and start it. They don’t fuckin’ run Carson City, Larry. I do. Got that?”
Lawrence put his face in his hands. Today’s hangover just got worse.
And later on…
Robert’s gold Mercedes growled as Lawrence stomped on the accelerator. The red needle hit 100 and kept going. He had to get back to the barbershop. He glanced at his knee. Blood gushed from it, soaking his jeans to the thigh. “Oh shit,” he said aloud.
He had felt the bullet tear into it, and pain was instantaneous. He knew it had hit the kneecap, and that it was ruined. “Fuck!” he punched the leather-wrapped steering wheel. Hooky could handle this. He could just imagine the tall, aging, bald man telling him in his gruff pitch, “You’ll be fine. Just a couple of stitches.” But he knew that wasn’t true. He’d heard a horrific crunch on impact that could only have been bones shattering. “Aww, shit. Oh, shit….oh no…”
Robby should have died. Point blank range to his chest. How did he live long enough to pull out his own gun and blast Lawrence’s knee to hell? He’s dead now, though. That’s for sure, he thought, grimly.
His knee was burning in pain, throbbing, aching, and stinging at the same time.
Lawrence Leithold saw a dash of white flicker by. It looked like a Cadillac. That’s probably Luther and Remy, he thought. “Oh damn it.” He pushed harder on the Mercedes’ accelerator, but the needle was already buried.
>>>>>
That's it for Friday
Saturday coming soon!
Now comment, or Luther will come and break your knees. >:)
4/5/2003 11:35:51 PM
Comment on this fan fiction!
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