The bar was closed. Two men nursed whiskeys. The bartender kept glancing at the clock. The two men ignored him. One man had grey shoulder-length hair and a silver earring. The other man wore Addidas shoes, sweats, and headband. Both of them had .45 caliber automatics in holsters on their shoulders.
"Walton. Remember him?" the grey haired man said.
The other man nodded and sipped his whiskey.
"Read his obituary the other day."
The both nodded and sipped their drinks. The grey-haired man looked up at the bartender.
"You gotta go to the little boy's room or what?"
"No, sir. I'm fine, sir. Thank you."
"Then stop staring at the damn clock."
"Yes, sir. Refill, sir?"
The grey-haired man snorted and motioned the bartender away with a short wave of his hand. The bartender walked to the end of the bar and watched the two men for a second. He reached beneath the bar.
Both men put their hands on their automatics.
Very slowly, the bartender brought a book out from under the counter with one hand. The other hand was above his head. When the two men saw the book, they relaxed.
"Got it in a 415F thing. Out in Jersey some god-forsaken place," the grey-haired man said.
"Hey," the other man said. "I'm from Jersey."
"You don't look like no friggin' cow."
The other man shrugged his shoulders. "You should see my wife." Both men smiled.
"November 2." The grey-haired man shook his head. "Can you believe that?"
"Sure."
They stared at the counter. The grey-haired man rubbed his mustache and picked his nose.
"What's with November 2?" the other man asked.
"You know where Walton was from?" The other man nodded. "And you don't know shit about November 1st and 2nd?"
The other man nodded. "Yeah, I don't know shit. Didn't Kennedy get capped on one of them days?"
"No." The grey-haired man sipped his whiskey. "Moron." The two men stared at the bottles on the shelf behind the bar. "Kennedy got capped November 20."
"Hey, I was close."
"Yeah, right." They looked at their glasses, then up at the bartender. He was reading; too engrossed to notice their need. "Hey, Ronnie, how 'bout a re-fill?"
Ron looked at them, glanced at the clock, then walked toward them.
"We closed an hour ago, gentlemen. If a cop comes by..."
Both men laughed and pushed their glasses toward Ron. He gave both of them one more shot.
"This one's on the house," Ron said. "And for the road."
"Yeah, yeah," the grey-haired man said.
"And for what it's worth, Kennedy didn't get killed November 20th. He got it November 22. Any junior high school twerp knows that."
"Hey," the grey-haired man scowled. "Don't you start getting nasty with us, Ronnie. We're old enough to be your fathers."
"You probably are my fathers," Ronnie muttered as he returned to his book at the end of the bar. As he was about to open it, the public phone rang. He looked at the phone, glanced at the clock, then the two men. "Either of you two gentlemen expecting a call?"
Both of the men shook their heads. The phone continued ringing. Ron opened his book. The phone rang and rang.
"Answer the damn thing," the grey-haired man ordered.
Ron walked to the phone.
"Yeah," he said. He listened, he looked at the grey-haired man. "No, he ain't here. We're closed." The person on the other end said something and Ron nodded. "Yeah. Night." Ron hung up and looked at the grey-haired man. "You know a guy named McIntire?"
The grey-haired man stared at Ron. The other man stiffened, grabbed his drink and downed it in one gulp.
"Gotta go, Gummo. Gettin' late. Thanks for the drinks."
"Hey, what about November 2," the grey-haired man said.
"Some other day," the man said and was out the door before the grey-haired man could say anything else.
"Friggin' cow," the grey-haired man said.
"So, before you go, you know this McIntire guy?" Ron asked.
"What if I did?"
"What am I, a cop? Don't get all paranoid on me, Gummo."
In one quick motion, the grey-haired man had his automatic out and shoved up Ron's nose. With his other hand, he grabbed Ron's string tie and yanked him closer. Ron could smell the whiskey on the grey-haired man and the grey-haired man could smell the fear on Ron.
"No one calls me Gummo but my friends," he spit into Ron's face.
"Yes, sir. Sorry, sir."
"You smart ass punk. Get me another whiskey."
Ron couldn't move. The man had his tie in one hand and a pistol shoved up his nose. "Sir," Ron said. "I can't move."
"You're lucky you're still breathing, you little brat. What'd McIntire say?" He shoved Ron away.
Ron picked up his glass and gave him another shot. "He said to meet him at, uh, some place. He said you'd know."
"Damn."
"What?"
"It must've started."
"What?"
"Shut your face, punk."
The grey-haired man stumbled out of the bar. Ron locked the door behind him and watched through the window as he careened his way down the nearly empty street. When he had gone around the corner, Ron pulled a cell phone from his pocket. He punched in a number. He waited.
"Yeah, he just left." He hung up and turned around.
A .45 stared him in the eye. The other man stood behind the gun.
"Who'd you just tip off, Ronnie?"
"I, I, I, I don't know what..."
The other man shot Ron in the foot. Bam! Without warning. Ron fell to the dirty floor, howling and cussing.
"Now, one more time. Who'd you just tip off?"
"I, fuck, I, fuck this fuckin' hurts, I..."
The man slapped Ron across the face with the pistol. He smiled down at the wounded, bleeding bartender. "Last time, then I get serious. Who'd you tip off?"
"This, this guy. Shit this hurts. This guy, don't know his name. Uh, tall."
The other man twirled the muzzle of his automatic around Ron's left eye. "Tall. He talk funny like? Like maybe somebody beat the living crap out of him one day and left him with half a friggin' tongue?"
Ron nodded.
"Yeah. Lisping mo-fo. They call him the Singer. You know why?"
Ron shook his head.
The man holstered his automatic. "Cause 'fore he got his tongue sliced and diced and sushied up, he wanted to be a friggin' jazz singer like he was Frank Sinatra or something. What you wanna be, uh, Ronnie? You going to college, right? Big NYU man. What you wanna be?"
"I, I, I, I don't..."
The man kicked him. "You know what you know, Ronnie. You wanna be a big shot, high-priced, doctor, right?"
Ron nodded. He watched blood seep out of his shoe.
The man pulled a knife from his pocket, flicked it open, and smiled. "You need fingers to be a doc, doc?"
"Oh, shit, no, man, please, don't..."
"What kind a doc you wanna be, Ronnie? Gyne-friggin'-cologist? You gotta have fingers for that, don't ya?" He put his foot on Ron's hand.
"Please, don't. Look, I don't know nothing. I don't know..."
The man kicked Ron. Hard. In the head. Blood squirted all over the man's shoes as Ron passed out.
"Hey, brand new friggin' shoes!" He whipped his automatic out, aimed it at Ron's bleeding head, and squeezed the trigger.
A shot cracked the silence. The man flew over Ron and crashed into a table. He slipped onto the dirty floor. His gun swirled around and hit the juke box. It started to play Redding's "Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay." The man was dead before Redding started to sing.
"Hey," a voice said. "I got a 217 here. Need an ambulance. The address is..."
Ron struggled back from unconsciousness and looked up. "You," he mumbled.
"Yeah, me," the grey-haired man answered.
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Next: Coming Soon
