Yellow Mama E zine

payables

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Bill Mesce, Jr.

 

 

you know what I’m learning?

 

i’m learning that friends are just enemies

 

that don’t have the guts to kill you.

 

                                                                            judy tenuta

 

          Passaic, New Jersey – November, 1983

 

       “YOU LOOK KINDA DOWN,” TINY TERRY SAYS TO BIG FRANK.  “What’s a matter?  You know the guy?”  Terry nods at the TV mounted over The Roma’s bar.           “Don’t tell me you know the guy.”

       The two of them are sitting bent over the bar, buried in their coats.  Like it always is this early in the morning, The Roma is freezing, but B.B. won’t turn up the heat.  With hardly anybody there and nothing going on, B.B. says he can turn the heat up all the way and it’d still take all day to get the place warm.  “I’m not makin’ a fuckin’ Arabs rich burnin’ all that oil ’n’ it’s still gonna be freezin’,” he says before he locks himself in his office.

      “Who’s he think he’s foolin’?” Terry says to Frank.  “Cheap prick just don’t wanna pay for heat for non-payin’ customers,” and Frank laughs.

         The picture on the TV doesn’t show much.  It’s still night in the picture, and Frank can make out a bunch of cops milling around the parking lot of a 7-11 shooing the camera guy away.  Beyond the cops, Frank can see yellow crime scene tape around the doors of the store, and a lot of flashing red and blue lights.  For effect, there’s a cut to a close-up of a bullet hole in one of the 7-11’s front windows, and then there’s another cut and, from a distance, Frank sees a crew of EMTs slipping a stretcher into the back of their rig.  There’s a filled body bag strapped to the stretcher. 

          “Tell me that don’t suck,” Terry says.  “You get munchies one night, take a walk, go in there for a pack a Twinkies and BLAM!”

         “Hostess cakes,” Frank says.

         “Entenmann’s,” Terry says.

           “Ooooo, Entenmann’s,” Frank says.  “I could go for some Entenmann’s.”

         “Well,” Terry says nodding at the TV, “Don’t go there.”

         Big Frank has an elbow parked on the bar and his chin balanced on his fist.  His other hand is on Mouser.  The cat is on his back, his front paws loosely clutched around Frank’s hand.  Frank has his hand flat against Mouser’s chest and he’s moving just his index finger back and forth a little bit on Mouser’s chest.  That’s enough to give Mouser a look like he’s stoned.  “They give a name yet?” Big Frank asks.

       “Nope.”

        “Then I don’t know I know the guy.”

         Tiny Terry shakes his head.  “I’m not askin’ you know him just to see you know him.  I’m askin’ you know him to see why you got such a puss on.”

         “When you called, I got up, I went inna kitchen, one a my fish was dead.”

Terry frowns.  “You got a puss on ’cause another one a those fish went belly up?  That’s what they do, Frank.  You think they live forever?  They swim ’round for a while then blurp.”  Terry turns a hand palm up and makes like it’s a floating dead fish.          “I mean, Jeez, Frank, it’s a fuckin’ fish!”

        “He didn’t go blurp.  I went inna kitchen ’n’ he was layin’ onna counter.  He musta jumped outta the tank.”

           “So?”

         “Well, I mean, that’s like suicide for a fish, right?  You jump off a building; they jump outta the tank.  Why’s a fish do that?  You ever hear a that?”  Frank turns to Mouser.  “You ever hear a that Mouse-Mouse?  You ever hear any cats killin’ ’emself?”

         Frank sighs.  He wishes Terry would turn the channel to something else besides the news.  Maybe they could find a movie on one of the cable channels, or some cartoons.  But he can tell Terry really wants to know about what happened last night, so he doesn’t even suggest it.

         Frank’s bored.  He looks into the marbled mirrored tiles on the wall behind them.  “Glug glug,” he goes, like he’s underwater.  He makes moves with his arms in slow motion, like he’s swimming.  “Glug glug.”  Terry gives him a look.  Mouser gives him a look, too; Mouser wants him to go back to rubbing his chest.

         Frank nods at the mirror.  “Don’t it look like we’re underwater?  I always thought it looked like you’re underwater in these things.  This stuff is like seaweed.”  Frank means the marbling on the mirrored tiles.

         Terry shakes his head.  “You scare me sometimes, Frankie.”  He turns back to the TV.

         Frank wants to ask Terry if he remembers when B.B. was fixing up the place, turning it from The Zone into The Roma, and the time they came over and were up to their asses in little Roman statues.  “Hey, Terry,” he says.

         But Terry waves at him to shut up.  Terry is glued to the TV, skipping through the channels to find more news.  All Terry wants to know about is last night.

         There’s a knock at the door and Frank’s hand moves to the .32 auto on the bar.  B.B. had given it to him and told him to hold on to it until he could find out what was what about this business at the 7-11.

        Terry waves at him to relax.  “That’s probably the kid from the store down a corner.  I told him to bring me the papers when they come in, see if they say anything.”

         Terry slides off his stool, takes a few steps, then comes back and grabs the pistol off the bar.  He gives Frank a look that says, You never know, and Frank gives him a shrug that says, You don’t have to tell me.

         Terry goes down the bar to the door, opens it holding the pistol behind him, then comes back with the morning editions of The Star-Ledger and The Bergen Record.  He sits back on his stool next to Frank and shoos Mouser away with one of the papers.                 “Scoot!” he says to the cat.  “Uncle Frank’s gotta do homework,” and he puts The Bergen Record down on the bar in front of Frank.

           “Gimme the other one,” Frank says.  “I like their funnies better.”

            “I don’t want you readin’ the goddamn funnies, Frank.  See if the paper says anything ’bout last night.”

           “I’m freezin’ my ass off in here.  Go ask B.B. again ’bout the heat.”

           “You ask him.”

           “I’m gonna go get some coffee.”

           “He said he don’t want us onna street.  I’ll make the coffee.”

           “You don’t make it right.”

           “I make it fine.”

           “You make it fine for you, but you don’t make it right.”

           “Hey, Frank.”  Terry stands up over the stool and pokes his ass out, giving one of the cheeks a pat.  “Kiss this.”

           “You’re awfully snippy today.”

           Terry points to the TV for justification.

           The office door opens and there’s B.B. looking like he’s spent the night in the office on the phone.  Frank’s not used to seeing B.B. looking wrinkled, so it surprises him to see whiskers on B.B.’s chin, the $25 haircut in a tangled mop, the rumpled shirt, the slacks with the crease wilted out of them.  B.B. sits at the bar, pushes his teacherly half-moon glasses up on top of his head, and rubs his red eyes.  Frank notices something he doesn’t remember seeing before; some of the whisker stubble on B.B.’s chin is gray.

         “Where’s a coffee?” B.B. says.  “Nobody made coffee?”

         “I was gonna go out for coffee,” Frank says.

         “What’re you, fuckin’ nuts?” B.B. says.  “Nobody goes out.  Somebody make some coffee.”

         “I got it,” Terry says playing with the Bunn-o-matic behind the bar.  “So, what’re you hearin’?”

         “Nothin’.”

         “Who’re you talkin’ to?”

         “Everybody.  Nobody’s sayin’.”

          “Did you talk to -- ”

          “I’m talkin’ to everybody there is, Ter,” B.B. says, not in a mood to repeat himself.  “That’s everybody.  Who else am I supposed to talk to ’sides everybody?  I’m onna phone all fuckin’ night, all fuckin’ mornin’.  What else I’m suppose’ to do?”

Terry gives him an I’m-sorry shrug.  Terry wants to say something else but winds up just shaking his head and going back to the Bunn-o-matic until he gets the coffee going.

         “There milk down there?  Sugar?”

         “Um, there’s milk in the cooler here,” Terry says.  “Sugar, yeah, they got the packets.”  Terry sees B.B. holding his stomach.  Terry’s been seeing that a lot lately.              “Should you be drinking coffee?”

        B.B. gives him a look and Terry shrugs, like he’s saying, Hey, do whatever you want.

        B.B. nods at the TV.  He doesn’t even look to see what’s on.  “You got the news?”

        “They’re not sayin’ nothin’,” Terry says.  “I got the papers, too.  Nothin’.  I don’t think anybody knows anything.”

        “That’s what I’m sayin’,” B.B. says, a little annoyed it wouldn’t fly when he’d said it.

        Terry gives a look to Frank, and Frank knows what he’s supposed to do.  He reaches under the bar for the hook where the key for the pinball machine is.

        “I’m gonna, um...,” Frank says, goes over to the machine in the corner away from the bar.  He plugs the machine in, unlocks the coin box so he can play by feeding the same coins back into the machine without having to go into his own pocket.  The machine is called “Gorgar,” and there’s a big devil-looking guy on the back board, and Frank thinks this is the coolest thing because if you hit the right bumpers, Gorgar will talk.  It doesn’t take long for Frank to get frustrated playing the machine, though, because he can’t remember what he has to hit on the table to make Gorgar say, “You hurt me.”  Frank tries to concentrate on the machine and not listen to Terry who’s now bending heads together with B.B., but between the flutter of the bumpers and the clatter of the flippers and occasional announcements from Gorgar, he hears bits and pieces.

        He hears Terry say, “...anything to do with that business you had me on the other night?”  Then B.B. says something he can’t hear, then Terry says, his voice rising, “Ya know, if I’da known what I was gettin’ into -- ”

        “Look,” B.B. says, cutting him off, “Guy calls up, says he wants somebody to drive.  I don’t know why, I don’t ask.  You call up, say you’re lookin’ to pick up a few bucks.  I hooked you up.  Whaddaya want from me?”

        Then Terry says something he can’t hear because Gorgar is telling him, “Me got you.”

        Then B.B. says, “I’m the only guy inna world knows you were at the wheel.  You don’t know the other guy inna car, he don’t know you.  Relax; you’re invisible.  This is gonna turn out to be some coupla tzitsoones knockin’ over a 7-11, wrong guy is in the way.”

        “Yeah?”

        “Yeah.”

        “Then why were you up all night?”

         B.B. laughs.  After all the glum, hard faces, it’s nice for Frank to hear him laugh.  “’Cause I don’t know yet.”  And Terry laughs with him.

         There’s more after that, but Frank starts his next game and can’t hear any of it.

         The game finishes and Frank sees B.B. heading back to his office with his cup of coffee.  B.B. takes a sip of the coffee and makes a face.

         “Jesus, Terry, wha’d you do?  Piss inna pot?”

         “Just for you,” Terry says.

         They’re smiling and Frank thinks maybe things are back to normal.  B.B. goes back into his office, closing the door behind him.  Frank unplugs the machine and locks up the money box.  He goes back to the bar, hangs up the key, sits back by Terry looking up at the TV again.

          After a bit, Terry nods and says, “B.B.’s a pretty up-front guy.”

          “Yeah,” Frank says, but he thinks the way Terry says it almost sounds like he’s asking instead of saying.

 

          It drives Frank crazy that all they watch on TV that morning is the news, with Terry flipping around the channels trying to catch all the reports to see if anybody says anything they haven’t already heard a hundred uninformative times.

         “They don’t know nothin’,” Frank keeps telling Terry so Terry will let him put something else on, but Terry doesn’t listen.

          When the morning news spots are over and the TV shows start changing over to the kinds of things the ladies stuck at home like to watch, Terry turns the remote over to Frank and says, “Here.  Watch Donahue.  Watch I Love Lucy.  Live it up.”

         But then Terry turns on the radio under the bar, tuning to the all-news station, and he makes Frank turn down the TV to where he can barely hear it.  Frank thinks, What’s the fucking point? and turns off the TV, but Terry makes him turn it back on in case there’s a bulletin.

          Frank gets bored with hearing the news over and over, and not being able to hear what Regis and Kathie Lee and the other morning TV folks have to say.  He’s getting sleepy, too, since the call from B.B. dragged him out of bed so early.  He climbs up on the bar, stretches out, wraps his coat tightly around himself, and closes his eyes.  After a bit, he can feel Mouser climb up on his chest.  Mouser climbs to the highest spot on Frank’s chest, and Frank can feel the cat kneading the fabric of his coat, making himself at home on a spot where he curls up, purring against the faint thump of Frank’s heart.  Frank lays a hand on Mouser’s side, feels the vibrating motor of the cat’s purr under the soft fur, and falls asleep.

 

        A gorilla comes at Frank out of the dark and grabs him around the neck with its furry paws.  The paws grab him around the throat and shake him, and the gorilla is growling and screaming and some of it sounds like the gorilla is saying, “What the fuck are you doing?  What the fuck are you doing?”

        “Jesus!” Frank says.  His eyes shoot open and the bad dream disappears.

        “I’m sorry,” Sweet Pea says.  “Did I scare you?”

         Awake now, Frank sees no gorilla, just Sweet Pea with one of her little hands on his shoulder, only able to look down into his face by standing tiptoe.  As for the furry paws around his neck, that’s Mouser.  The cat has moved up from his chest and curled around under Frank’s jaw.

         “Now we know what you’d look like with a beard,” Terry says.

        Gently, Sweet Pea picks up Mouser from Frank’s throat and holds the cat against her like a baby.  “This is Mommy’s big baby,” she says to the cat, patting him on the back like she’s trying to burp him.  “This is Mommy’s big furry baby!”  Mouser bows his head to Sweet Pea so she can rub the top of his head with the tip of her nose.          “Yesssss, who’s my big fuzzy baby?”

         Sweet Pea is so small and soft Frank has always thought she looks like a little kid, now even more so cuddled up with Mouser.

       “Hey, Frank,” Terry says, “Climb off.  She’s gotta get ready to open.  They got a health law ’bout your ass bein’ onna bar.”

         Frank climbs off the bar and stretches.

         “Ya know, babies are fuzzy,” Terry says.  “I mean human babies.  When they’re still inna womb, they go through this time when they’re covered with some kinda fur.  I guess you’d say ‘hair’ since it’s human.”

         “No shit,” Frank says, and Sweet Pea looks at Terry like she thinks he’s pulling one of her short legs.

         “No, really.  When my sister had hers, that’s how I know.  Hers was a preemie, like six weeks early or somethin’, so small you coulda held him in your hands like a kitten.”

          “Like Fuzzy here when he was a baby,” Sweet Pea says, hugging Mouser closer to her cushy cheeks.  “Like Mommy’s little fuzzy wuzzy when he was a baby.”

         “Yeah,” Terry says, rolling his eyes a little bit, “Somethin’ like that.  Anyways, since he was early, he still had all this fuzz, this hair all over him.  My brother-in-law told me, my sister sees this – ’n’ ‘member, she’s all ragged ’n’ everything from the labor ’n’ all that, she’s beat – she looks up, the doctor’s showing her the baby, ’n’ she goes, ‘Oh my God!  He looks like a monkey!”

         B.B. comes out of his office, walks straight to the bar.  He’s got a look on his face Frank’s never seen before, something he can’t read, but it scares him.  Terry stops laughing about the monkey thing and Frank can tell Terry’s feeling the same kind of thing about B.B. and that scares Frank even more.

         B.B. stands for a bit looking down at the bar.  Then he says to Sweet Pea, “Gimme a glass.  Highball glass.”

         They all look at each other; B.B. never drinks highballs.

         “What can I make you?” Sweet Pea asks.

         “Just gimme the glass.”

          Which has them all looking at each other again.

          Sweet Pea sets the glass on the bar in front of B.B., and then, not liking anything about this, she steps off to a far part of the bar.

          B.B. stands there for another little bit, then he scoops up the glass and whips it toward the back of the barroom, over the pool table to explode against the back wall.

         Terry gives Frank a what-the-hell-was-that look, and Frank gives him one back.

         It’s quiet in the bar now, so quiet they can hear B.B. breathing because the air is going in and out of him like he’s been running laps.  Then he nods at the TV.  “The guy in the 7-11.  It was Kip.”

          It doesn’t sink in right away.  Terry and Frank are looking at each other again, this time wondering if they’ve heard it right.

         “Our Kip?” Frank asks.

         “Our Kip.”

         “Kip takes book back a Fat Leo’s deli?  That Kip?” Terry asks.

         “Kip from Fat Leo’s deli.”

         “Man,” Terry says, “Talk ’bout bein’ inna wrong place at -- ”  But now he’s starting to put things together with this bad vibe off of B.B.  “Are you sayin’...?”

B.B. doesn’t say anything and that’s answer enough.

         Terry’s shaking his head.  “He was such a nice kid,” he says.  “Who the hell’d whack Kip?”

         Frank’s shaking his head, too.   “It don’t make no sense.”

         “Wrong,” B.B. says, “It makes a shit-load a sense.  Go get the car, Frank.  I gotta make a call.”

          B.B. goes back in his office, the door slams behind him.

          Terry lets out a long breath.  “This can’t be good,” he says.

 

          When Frank shows up in front of The Roma with the car, B.B.’s just thrown on a coat and jumps in the front seat.He shoves a pistol at Frank, the .32.

        “Put it in your coat pocket,” he says, and Frank gets a chill because the piece isn’t going in his pants but in his coat pocket where he can get to it quick.“Let’s go.Don’t be cheap with the gas.I wanna beat this fucker there.”

        “Where’s ‘there’?”

        “The bridge.”

        This is bad, Big Frank thinks, really fucking bad.They’re going to the park by the George Washington Bridge and that means a meet with Joe Moss since he’s the only person they ever meet there, but none of this feels like a Joe Moss meet; the rush, the gun in his coat, no stop for coffee, the “this fucker.”

        And once they get to the park, Frank starts feeling worse about things because when B.B. sees the parking lot is empty, he tells Frank to turn around and park the car on one of the neighborhood streets across from the park, out of sight, then they quick-hoof it to the usual meeting place overlooking the bridge.

       At the bench where they always meet Joe Moss, B.B. is pacing and Frank can see by the way B.B.’s face is twisted up that B.B. is royally pissed.“I want you to be ready,” he says after a while to Frank.

         “For -- ?”

• ​

        Frank nods because his throat is so tight he can’t say anything.He puts his hands in his pockets and his right hand fishes around until it closes around the grip of the .32.

Big Frank has done a lot of things for B.B. and they never bothered him much.Hurt people, sometimes pretty badly.But he’s never dropped the hammer on anybody, and it’s been long enough now that he thought he never would.That was something other guys did, another club, another fraternity, another league.Frank has never been hungry to join that league.He knows guys in that league, they don’t seem different from anybody else he knows, and he’s wondered, off and on, in those rare times he ever gets to thinking about stuff like this, what the difference is between them and him, what it would take to step up into that league, and what he feels he’s saving of himself by not taking the step.How big a difference is it to snap some deadbeat’s leg and not think anything of it, and do what these other guys do?

        But those rare times are also brief, and, like anything else Frank can’t figure out, he lets those thoughts quickly evaporate.

         But they’re coming back to him now and making it a more complicated bunch of thoughts is this Joe Moss, B.B.’s goombah.If Frank was ever going to have to join that league, he figures it shouldn’t be with Joe Moss.

          They’re not at the bench very long before they see Joe Moss followed by Snap coming up the path.They freeze when they see B.B. and Frank already there, and the look on their faces is not one of pleasant surprise.Frank thinks they’re probably figuring everything’s as wrong as Frank thinks it is.Snap quickly steps up to Joe Moss’s side, says something quiet into Joe Moss’s ear, Frank sees Snap’s right hand start unbuttoning his coat, and when it does Frank’s hand tightens around the grip of the pistol in his pocket.But then Joe Moss shakes his head, makes some kind of take-it-easy motion with his hand, Snap’s hand drops to his side, and Joe Moss puts on a big happy-to-see-you smile that Frank thinks is way too big.

         Joe Moss and Snap start down the path again.“Hey, kid!Where’s my coffee?I don’t see any coffee!”

          B.B. takes a stand behind the bench.“Right there is fine, Joe,” he calls out when Joe Moss is still about twenty yards away.Snap is a little behind him and moves to catch up, but then B.B. says, “Tell your man right there is fine.”

         Joe Moss holds out a hand to freeze Snap where he is.“I don’t like this, kid.What the hell’s going on?”

        “That’s funny,” B.B. says, “that was gonna be question.”

          Joe Moss does a big nod like he’s starting to understand.“You talkin’ ’bout what happened to your guy?”

          “No, I’m just a little pissed off ’bout the lousy weather we’re gettin’.What a fuck do you think?”

          “Look, kid, I get you’re upset -- ”

           “Picked up on that, didja?What was your first fuckin’ clue?”

           Joe Moss holds up his hands to say calm down.“I’m not arguing you don’t got a right to be pissed -- ”

          “Well, goddamn, I ’ppreciate that, Joe, thanks a fuckin’ lot!We were right here in this spot,” and B.B. points to the ground, “right fuckin’ when the word was there was trouble, ’n’ you looked me inna eye ’n’ told me it was over.”

         Joe Moss is still doing the thing with his hands.“I told you what I was told, kid.”

          “Oh, what you were told, well, that makes it okay I got bullshitted.”

          “I wasn’t trying to bullshit -- ”

           “Tell you what, Joe, you come to my guy’s funeral and that can be the eulogy:‘that’s what I was told’.So, let’s try it again:what-the-is-goin’- on?”

          Joe Moss is giving his I-understand nod, again, but Frank’s feeling is it’s not only total bullshit, but it’s not even a good performance.“What can I tell you?Probably what you already figured out.Little Abe stepped out of line somewhere, they wanted to -- ”

         “Yeah, send a message, I get it.I don’t think he’s gettin’ the message, Joe.gettin’ the message, I’m gettin’ it right up the ass!They wanna send Little Abe a message, why don’t they try sendin’ it with one a people?”

          “Look, relax -- ”

          “You’re fuckin’ kiddin’ me, right?Relax?”B.B. is so pissed he has to burn it off somehow and he’s walking around in a circle behind the bench.“Fuckin’ relax,” he says to no one, to the trees, “What kinda, what a, what a and it echoes around the park.

Joe Moss and Snap take a quick look around to make sure there’s no audience for this.Joe Moss tries talking in a calm voice, as quiet as you can be from twenty yards away.“It’s like I told you before, this wasn’t about you -- ”

         “Kind a hard to buy that, Joe,” B.B. says, and he’s making his circle faster, “when it’s one a guys goin’ inna ground.I wanna know why every time guys crosst a river think Little Abe needs to get spanked it lands on ass!Don’t jerk me around with any a that wrong-time-wrong-place shit!I never did dick to that asshole, ’n’ I never did dick to the fellas crosst a river.I always stayed in my box, and I always kicked to you square.I don’t deserve this.I wanna know who’s feedin’ my people to the sharks.”

Joe Moss was giving you’re-right-you’re-right nods, but Frank reads those as more total bullshit.

        “Look,” Joe Moss says, “I’m gonna dig into this and see what I can find out.You’re right, it doesn’t make sense and you don’t deserve this.I feel bad about this, B.B., I don’t want it like this between us.”Joe Moss is looking here and there on the ground like he thinks that’s where he’s going to find something good to offer B.B.“You should know, kid, I always stood up for you and it wasn’t always easy.The ol’ Petes, even Big Abe, it used to bother him you got spics on your crew, you got the big Irish there -- ” and he pointed at Frank “ – your crew don’t look like other crews.You know, they don’t get it’s a new day.But I always told ’em, I always said, Hey, B.B., he’s good people, you ask a favor and you got it, I ask something tough from you and you come through.I tell ’em, he’s an earner.I don’t care he’s got a minstrel show working for him, you should all earn like he earns.”

        B.B. stops his circle, goes back to his stand behind the bench, and he’s staring ice at Joe Moss.“That’s very nice, Joe, I ’ppreciate that, very nice.But, all respect, right now that ain’t worth when I gotta bury one a my people!”

        “I said I’ll see -- ”

         “Well, while you’re ‘seein’’, you pass the word,” and this comes out of B.B. very cold and hard, “You’re still gonna get my envelope on time ’n’ no short-counts neither, but you pass a fuckin’ I’m tellin’ my people the knives are out no matter what we get ‘told.’Unnerstand?I’m tellin’ ’em go heavy ’cause we got bull’s eyes on us.”

          Joe Moss is doing the thing with his hands, again, and now he looks honestly worried.“Now, look, kid, that’s askin’ for -- ”

         “You pass a word, Joe, I’m tellin’ my people, somebody don’t look right to you, don’t wait for ’em to make a first move.Cut loose ’n’ if it’s a problem, we’ll square it later.But I ain’t goin’ to no more fuckin’ funerals, ”

         “I don’t like this is where things are at, B.B.”

         “You may notice I’m not exactly dancin’ neither.”

         Joe Moss stands quiet for a second.Frank sees Snap’s lips move, but just a little, like he’s trying to hide it as he says something to Joe Moss, and his hand is moving slow toward the front of his coat, again, like he thinks if he moves that slow nobody’s going to notice it.Frank’s hand flexes around the grip of the .32 and something comes over him.He feels very still inside, not nervous anymore, and he’s thinking, Yeah, ok, if this is where it’s going, I can do this.Break a leg, pull a trigger, what’s the difference?You don’t even work up a sweat pulling a trigger.

         Finally, Joe Moss’s shoulders go up and down.“Ok, kid, I get it.I understand, believe me.I don’t blame you.Like I said, I’ll see if I can figure out what the hell’s going on.Soon’s I know somethin’, I’ll be in touch.”

           “I look forward to that call, Joe.”

          Joe Moss stands there for a bit, like he’s trying to figure out some way to get things back to where they used to be but can’t find it.Snap steps up to him, keeps his back to B.B. and Frank, and Frank knows that’s not a good sign, he’s starting to ease the .32 toward the opening in his pocket.

          Whatever the discussion between Snap and Joe Moss is, it ends with Joe Moss shaking his head.He gives a last nod to B.B., a weak wave, and starts back down the path.

        B.B. lets Joe Moss and Snap get some ways down the path, then he nods at Frank to walk along with him, and they go slowly down the path, just barely keeping Joe Moss and Snap in sight.It’s only when they see them climb into Joe Moss’s Crown Vic and drive off that B.B. seems to unwind.His arm goes across his stomach and he bends over, and even though he’s trying not to show it, Frank knows B.B.’s feeling the pain.“I shoulda wacked the ol’ fucker out just for doin’ this to me,” he hisses through gritted teeth.

        It’s only then Frank realizes he hasn’t been breathing right; realizes it now that he can finally draw a deep, full breath.“Did you mean it?” he asks.

         The pain must have subsided because B.B. is standing up straight again.“Mean what?”

         “What you were sayin’ to Joe Moss ’bout passin’ a word.Were you serious?”

         B.B. unbuttons his coat, pulls back one side and shows an automatic tucked into the waistband of his slacks.

         Big Frank shakes his head.“This is kinda sad.”

          “Yeah,” B.B. says, and for the first time he doesn’t look angry anymore.  “Yeah,” he says with a sigh, “Kinda.”

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       "payables" is one of a series of short stories (some short, some long shorts, three of which have made it into final rounds of writing competitions) William Mesce has published over the last couple of years, based around a fictional "crew" working in New Jersey's dying factory towns in the early 1980s. The stories, in large part, were inspired by tales of local shady characters he heard while growing up in the region.

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        Darren Blanch is an Australian digital illustrator who constructs immersive visual illusions designed to linger long after first glances. Driven by a classic Norman Rockwell appreciation for raw human emotion and showing "life as life," Blanch infuses deep character depth into a portfolio that refuses to be boxed into a single genre. His work effortlessly bridges the gap between gritty pulp-noir, playful conceptual surrealism, and cinematic character studies. Navigating a progressive visual disability, he treats digital tools as a vital creative bridge - pushing the limits of contrast, color, and texture to craft complex visual narratives that move the mind and perfectly capture the spirit of a story. Portfolio: www.ivsma.art | FB: @IVSMAart | Insta: @IVSMAart