Skunk shifted in his seat. For some indefinable reason, Bulldog’s truck made his skin crawl. But there were very few heroin connections in Liberty Hill and Jim “Bulldog” Chody was one of them.
Jim had been sixteen when his father pulled strings to get him a job with animal control, and he had used the city truck as his personal vehicle for the two years since. Clint Chody had been Sheriff of Williamson County for nearly two decades and counting. He’d helped make Wilco famous across the entire state for being the last place in Texas anyone wanted to get caught with drugs or driving drunk. Especially if they got caught while not being white. Jim was of course exempt entirely.
Several years ago, Sheriff Chody had been scandalized for giving illegal incentives to officers for excessive violence during arrests, but never faced consequences. He was protected by his political affiliations from top to bottom. Jim was acutely aware of how his father affected people’s opinion of him, both positively and negatively, and he used both to his greatest advantage.
Jim sneered at the burnt plastic cigarette wrapper in his lap that served as a makeshift baggie for three pink morphine pills.
“Three.” He shot a vicious sideways glare at Skunk.
“Dog, that’s all I could…”
“Nope!” Jim threw up his hand between them. “Shut it. I wasn’t going to start shit around Shorty, but you’re done with that nickname now. You never blocked a tackle for me. Never caught a touchdown pass. You call me Jim.”
Neither said anything for a moment and the silence seemed to enrage Jim even more as he stared at the pills. His face grew dark and terrifying as his jaw clenched tight. “Am I stupid? You’re not sweating. Not scratching. Your eyes are wide open in broad daylight. You really think I don’t know where my last pill went, junkie?”
“I was hurting so bad, Bulld-ow!” Jim hit Skunk’s head with an open palm, slamming his skull against the windowpane.
“Jim! Jim! Last warning! I’m not one of your doped-out street dealers, you little worm! You mess with me, you’re messing with a son-of-a-bitch! This was the party tonight!” Jim held the baggie under Skunk’s nose. “Guess who doesn’t get stupid now because you couldn’t wait one hour? You think I’d short my crew? You think I’ll let you rip me off? Me?” Jim shook his head with a snarl. “Fucker. Go back and get another.”
“Ok, ok, but… uh…” Skunk raised both hands in surrender when he saw Jim growing even angrier. “Jim. I’ll get it. It’s just. I need, I don’t have the…”
“I already paid for all four, you little weasel! You get the money however you have to or I’ll…”
“I know. I know. I’m all in the game, Jim. I could. I can. It’s just, see… uh, while I’m out hustling, my guy may sell the rest. Those suckers go so fast…”
“Mother…” Jim whipped two bills from his pocket and tossed them at Skunk, “…Fucker!”
Skunk looked down at the cash in his lap and slowly gathered it up and sat a moment holding the bills in one hand. He pulled in his shoulders and seemed to shrink on the seat.
“Well, what now? What are you waiting for?” Jim spit out the words with a sadistic grin.
“Oh, uh.” Skunk glanced up at Jim weakly. Wearing a mask of deep sorrow, he writhed like a snake as he choked back dubious tears and croaked, “I’m not… not really fixed yet, you know? I mean, uh…. It was the pills for a fat balloon, you said. I didn’t get the H yet is all…”
“Damn right, you didn’t!” Jim announced triumphantly. “What am I, stupid? You’ll get your tar if I ever get my pill! You expect me to play fair even when you cheat me, jackass? Hurry the fuck up! ‘x’ me when you get it. And take a damn shower next time you plan on getting in my truck. Jesus!”
Skunk dropped out of the vehicle and clumsily mounted his bike. The bicycle had a motor that rested on the wheel, but he rarely used money for fuel anymore. He lit the stale cigarette butt he’d pulled from Jim’s ashtray, took a drag or two and got moving.
As he pedaled up to John’s house again, Skunk thought it might be a good thing that he didn’t have gas. The motor was noisy, and he was hoping just maybe to slip in and out unseen. John was a lightweight when it came to dope, a noob. Skunk was almost certain John had taken a pill and nodded out by now.
He leaned his bike against the side of John’s house, slithered nervously into the back yard and peeked through the little window beside the shed door. John was indeed asleep. Skunk had already worked out four weak excuses for why he needed another pill, but now he wouldn’t have to try them. Slowly he edged open the door, aching with every creak, and crept toward John who snored peacefully in his easy chair.
When he came into full view of John’s small table, Skunk cursed silently. The pills weren’t there! He looked around the room and in John’s lap. “It’s so dark in this fucking hole,” Skunk thought. John wore a blanket over him that had all kinds of folds and shadows. He could see nothing.
Skunk began to panic, but quickly calmed himself. “Think!” He paused a moment, realizing that the likelihood of John having budged an inch within the hour and a half since he’d been there last was slim to none. The pills had to be here.
And suddenly, there they were. Skunk spied the top of the bottle peeking out from under John’s chair.
Up to this point, the only thought in Skunk’s mind had been to swipe the one pill and save Bulldog’s money for himself. But it occurred to him that he could take a couple and leave the bottle open on the floor and John would be none the wiser.
Skunk swiped the entire bottle with all the pills and scooted out the door. He hopped on his bike and pedaled away hoping he’d escaped the notice of the purple-haired Hispanic girl he saw slamming the front door as she left the house. He looked over his shoulder to see her walking off in the opposite direction.
Once he made it around a corner, Skunk stopped and typed an “x” into the cracked screen of his Moonfön 5 and sent the message to Bulldog. Skunk bared broken yellow teeth that matched the glorious setting sun, wistfully thinking of the extra heroin he would score. Tonight was going to be a good night. He just had to figure out how to convince Bulldog he’d somehow scored two pills for the price of one.
……..
“So he gave me a ride home in case Alice tried to stalk me again. And we had a chat about our favorite Dantalion songs. He was cool enough I guess.”
Talia was speechless. She sat on Lucy’s bed staring at her with an open mouth. The blood seemed to have vanished from her face.
“I know. I know he’s the enemy. And the son of the county ogre. But I figure it’s also ironic that his power-hungry fat cat father just funded my ticket to Dantalion’s Water. If he only knew!”
Talia had been holding Lucy’s copy of The Tome of Artemis. She had the fine leather cover gripped between two slightly quivering hands as she said, “He’s going to rape you. Or worse.”
It would have sounded so typically like “drama queen Talia” if it weren’t for the severity in her voice.
“What?”
“He…” Talia gulped, unblinking. Her voice grew louder as she pleaded, “You can’t do this. Don’t go, he’s going to… I don’t even know. You’re going to wind up like Robin!”
“Oh God, Talia. You’re so melodramatic. I’m well aware that he and his whole family are scum but don’t play on my sister’s…”
“She was my friend before your dad ever met…” Talia stopped herself from bringing up Lucy’s dead mother. She realized how petty she sounded, but said sharply, “Bet he got handsy in that fucking meat wagon of his, huh?”
Jim had in fact squeezed Lucy’s knee a couple of times. After she didn’t stop him, he stroked her leg and brushed her breast “accidentally” while playfully pushing her around during their conversation about the band. But Lucy wasn’t conceding this to Talia. And she was still angry at herself for not speaking up for fear of missing the show. As he probably knew.
“The prick,” Lucy thought. Then protested to her friend, “Oh, hell no! He knows better than to try that with me!”
“Pfff.” Talia looked unconvinced.
“Well, what’s your beef with him anyway?”
Talia looked down. She shook her head as though she were arguing internally with her own demons. “People in my neighborhood know better than to talk about it, ok?”
“That’s ridiculous! You just don’t want me to see Dantalion without you!”
Gaap had been lazily listening to the conversation until this point but perked-up at the sudden shift in tone. He understood very little when humans communicated with one another, but he knew now that he had something he could use to inflame Lucy’s wrath and keep her on the hook for the show as Sabnock had requested. Gaap knew well that resentment was the crowbar of his trade. He was just about to drop into Lucy’s soul when he saw the sweaty man had returned and was leaning his bike against the wall just outside. He decided to stay outside Lucy’s mindscape and split his attention for now. Lucy seemed to be riling herself up well enough without his help anyway.
Talia glanced around the room as though she might spot a listening device in the walls, or some spy hidden behind a curtain. “You can’t tell…” Talia sighed nervously. “He steals our dogs.”
“What?” Lucy shook her head, genuinely confused.
“He steals dogs. From back yards. Front yards even. People in my neighborhood call him ‘El Cazador’. He lures them with meat or cuts their chains. For almost two years now. You can’t ever say I told you this. Don’t repeat it…”
Lucy laughed derisively. At that Talia dropped Lucy’s holy tome on the ground with a bang and reached for her backpack.
“Wow. Wow, chica.” Shaking her head. “Never mind. You’re right. I made it up. Just don’t ever repeat that.” Talia started to walk out of the room.
“Why would he steal dogs? Just to bring them to the pound? Dog catchers don’t have quotas. And what has this got to do…”
Talia spun around and put her finger in Lucy’s chest. “I don’t know! But it’s not just dogs.”
Lucy shut up. She looked puzzled a moment, then grew deadly serious. “What are you talking about, Talia?”
Talia sighed. “It’s… it’s a rumor in my neighborhood. Even before Robin disappeared, we had a little girl go missing the same night as her dog. She was younger than Robin. Supposedly an abuela saw it happen and reported it to Police. She was dead the next week. The news said stroke, but her neighbor started asking Police to investigate it as a crime and talked about the missing dogs. Then their daughter went missing as well. After that the whole neighborhood shut up. No one talks about it anymore. But whenever a dog goes missing everyone has this worried look on their face for a week. Some people even started leaving dogs out at night for ‘El Cazador’ hoping he would be satisfied and not take their kids.”
Lucy dropped onto her bed white as a sheet. Then grimaced and lashed out. “No way… no way! What is this? Are you trying to scare me? You… You don’t want me to see the show, so you make up this thing about abductions! You’re manipulating me!”
Talia clenched her fists and walked toward the door, but Lucy moved in front of it. “Fuck you, Lucy!”
“No, let’s have it. I wanna hear the rest. If this is true, how could you pretend to be my friend while hiding something like this from me? Who even says it’s Bull… who says it’s Jim stealing dogs?”
Talia clamped her mouth shut but stared Lucy in the eyes. She sucked in a deep breath.
“Nobody. Just me. No one knows who El Cazador is. But… look.” Talia was clearly struggling to choose her words carefully. “I… I am your friend. I was trying to protect you. You were safer not knowing.”
From his perch on the bookshelf, Gaap could wait no longer. He would soon be losing all that wrathful energy Lucy was bleeding off. Soon she’d form an imp and he’d take a significant loss. He had to act now.
Gaap glanced at the shed one last time and saw a brilliant flare from Skunk when he swiped the bottle. He watched the cone of energy shoot from the man’s flickering soul toward Merlin’s newest god machine, the energy storing device he called “The Bath of Souls” located on the Moon. The machine’s sole operator was General Leraje’s demon spawn, Avi. Gaap always felt a kinship with Avi as another of the cast-offs from the General of Pride. Avi’s work in the Legion of Addiction under the army of deadly sin of Gluttony had made General Malphas a monthly contender for the top slot with seemingly relative ease. And Lieutenant Avi had clearly just received another nice payoff.
But Gaap’s lot was now cast with General Forneus and the deadly sin of wrath. The junkie was a distraction. It was time to get to work. He jumped into Lucy’s mindscape and started billowing the angry aspect of her personality and draining off every ounce of wrathful mana the golem exuded.
“Bullshit! You’re making all this up. Just admit it!”
Talia’s bottom lip quivered. She spun away from Lucy and clenched her backpack. “Ok, look. I saw him one night! Don’t you dare say a word of this to anyone!” Talia teared-up for a moment but choked it back and gathered her strength. “This puts my family in danger too! My whole neighborhood!”
“Saw him what?”
“I saw him take the neighbor’s dog. Right off the chain. He had some kind of dart gun. He just dragged it off. I didn’t know if it was dead or what, but I guess he didn’t get a good shot because it woke up while Jim was closing the cage. The dog kept trying to get out and Jim slammed the door on it over and over. Then when he thought it was locked in, the dog broke out again. Jim hit it with another dart. I guess he had broken the cage door and had to put it on the other side. I was horrified. It was like 3 in the morning. I was hiding, sitting there drenched in panic. Peeking just above the windowsill. He looked like a monster. So big and angry and…”
Lucy started to shake and moved away from the door. “Just get out! I don’t believe you anyway! Just go! Liar! You’re making all this up! I thought you were my friend! My sister’s friend!”
“Fine! Don’t believe me! Go dance with that goddamned devil! But don’t you fucking repeat what I told you! It’s all just lies, like you say!” At that Talia burst out of the room, stomped through the house, and out the front door, slamming it behind her.
Lucy fell on her bed crying as Talia violently yanked her backpack higher on her shoulder and stormed down the street.
Lucy screamed and kicked the ground like a child. She picked up the tome, threw it across the room and wondered how the hell she was supposed to meditate now.
Gaap laid on the floor of Lucy’s now dark and hellish mindscape and burped.
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