Bones by the Wood (10 page)

“Sure.  Unless it sucks.”

“I’m sure it won’t, but I’d like to see it anyway.  Have you got any ideas for the Science Fair?”

“No, not yet.  I was gonna see what Mr. Callaghan says about it first.  Hey, can I go round to Billy’s house after school?”

“It’s okay by me if it’s okay with his mama, but you make sure he’s asked her first.  Don’t you just go turnin’ up on her doorstep.  I’m at work at five, though, so I want you home for dinner by then ‘cause Clarice will be cookin’ and it’s not polite to be late for her.  Tell Billy’s mama to let me know if you need me to come pick you up, okay?”

“Okay.  I’ll get Billy to send you a text if I’m not goin’ to his.”

Thea felt bad for Josh that he didn’t have a cell phone like his friends, not least because it would be much easier for him to keep in touch with her if he did, but her own was an ancient brick of a thing, and she couldn’t afford one for him, too.

“That’s good, bud.  Thanks.”

Thea didn’t drop Josh off directly outside the school because the traffic there was absolutely crazy, but there were plenty of kids making their way along the sidewalks from the point that she let him out a few streets away.  She was touched that she still warranted a quick kiss on the cheek before he clambered out of the car and followed the hordes.

She went by the store on her way home to pick up the few groceries she needed and spent the rest of the day at the laundromat.  She was relieved to get a text from Billy’s mama, confirming that Josh was at her house and that she’d make sure he was back at their apartment building for five.  Her own dinner was another bowl of cereal and a slice of toast before she pulled on her uniform polo shirt and headed to her shift.

Mondays were always a quiet night, and this one was no exception.  It was the lack of excitement that had made it the ideal day for her to schedule a regular double shift.  Nine hours of no fun and no frolics, but also no stock checking or deliveries.  If anything, the hardest thing about her Monday shifts was the struggle to keep her eyes open.

Thea had been dozing on her feet, her eyes closing in long blinks, for at least the last hour, when the sound of the doors opening roused her.  She checked the time on the display on the register, just after midnight – thank god – she only had a couple more hours to go.  When she looked up to check who had walked in she just about fell off her feet.

“I hope you’ve got your good panties on tonight.”

Dizzy had come almost right up to the counter, which in itself had been a surprise, but his smirk and eyes were telegraphing dirty thoughts which took her mind right back to the dream she’d woken from that morning.  She had to take a beat to find her voice, but when she did she was beyond glad that it came out normal and not as a squeak.

“My panties are none of your business, thank you very much.”

“Maybe not right now.”  Thea clenched her jaw rather than let it fall open at the sheer arrogance of that statement. But she still watched his retreating back as he wandered off deeper into the store, and okay, maybe she checked out his ass a little too.

Her head snapped around when she heard the doors go again. It was always the way. No customers for hours, then everyone came in at once.  At least it was too late for her to worry about ending up with a line full of people huffing and tapping their feet like it was her fault that they’d all picked the same half-hour window to shop in.

The man who had come into the store loped straight towards the counter.  Thea figured that he just wanted smokes, but something about him set her inner alarm bells clamoring.  He was wearing a padded jacket with the hood pulled up; it was torn and stained in places and had definitely seen better days.  As he got closer, Thea had to resist the urge to step back, or to turn and flat out run away.  The guy looked like he was an extra out of that TV series about the zombie apocalypse.  His cheeks were shrunken, and the skin of his face that she could see was blotched with scabs.  It looked like he was thin all over; his clothes were hanging off him.  His eyes were wide and wild; she could see the whites all the way round the iris.  Oh shit, this was not good news.

Even though she was expecting trouble from him, the gun he tugged out of his jacket pocket still shocked her with an immense jolt of fear.  It was a big hunk of metal and looked far too heavy and solid for what must have been a twig of arm to hold.  That arm was shaking.  Fuck, a fucking junkie in the grip of a comedown.  Most likely he’d be feeling like fire ants were crawling over his skin, and that was not good news for her with that cannon not two feet away with his itching finger on the trigger.

“Empty the register, bitch.”

Thea dragged a long pull of air into her lungs.  This wasn’t the first time the store had been held up, nor was it the first time that she’d been on shift when it happened, but it was the first time that the perpetrator had been so obviously unstable.  But this wasn’t her first rodeo in that respect, either.  She’d had her share of dealing with withdrawing junkies.  Not panicking was the first thing to remember.  If she got jittery it’d just set him off more.  She swallowed, hard, and managed to keep her tone calm.

“Okay.  I’ll empty the register. Just don’t shoot.”

“Now, bitch!”

His arm was shaking more violently.  Thea hoped by all that was good and holy that the gun didn’t go off by mistake.  Making sure to keep her movements slow and even, she stepped over to the register.  She was trying to keep her mind clear of everything but emptying the register and letting the junkie get out of the store without her getting dead in the process, but she hadn’t forgotten that Dizzy was still in the store.  Surely he must have heard what was going on.  As much as she wouldn’t have minded a little help, she really hoped he didn’t do anything that got either of them shot.

She carefully pulled the bills out of the drawer, taking care to keep the stacks neat.  The last thing she needed was to drop the money all over the floor. Clumsiness would make him angry, and that would ensure a trip to the ER at the very least.

“Do you want the change, too?”  She asked quietly.

“No!  Just give me the fucking cash, bitch.”

Adrenaline was thudding through her; her heart was pounding.  It felt like the organ should be visible, the classic cartoon shape tenting the cotton of her shirt with each resounding beat.

Movement caught the corner of her eye.  Christ, but she hoped he didn’t have an accomplice.  She made herself not look.  Whatever it had been, she absolutely did not want to spook the man holding the gun.  She kept her eyes on the cash as she handed the bills over into a waiting hand that was crusty with dirt and missing a couple of fingernails.  The robber stuffed the bills inside his coat and then, with a speed and accuracy she wouldn’t have believed him capable of, he grabbed her wrist before she could retreat away from the counter.  For such a scrawny man he was strong; the violent wrench of the drugs leaving his system provided a false vigor.

“You on your own, sweet thing?”

She was so very, very glad that she wasn’t, but she didn’t get a chance to voice that fact.  At the same time as the junkie dropped like a puppet whose strings had been cut, a hand flashed out and gripped the wrist of the arm holding the gun and pointed the firearm to the ceiling.  The falling thief revealed Dizzy standing behind him.  Dizzy had his own gun out, but was holding it wrong.  Thea took a much needed breath as she realized that he’d used the butt to crack the junkie on the skull.  Relief sang through her body, so much so that she almost smiled.

“You okay, sweetheart?”  She could see that he was concerned, but that the concern was almost engulfed by fury.

The ebbing adrenaline had taken her voice with it, and she had to try twice to speak.  “Yeah.  Yeah, I’m fine.  Thank you.”

“Can you lock those doors?”  The concern was gone now, replaced entirely by cold rage.  But she wasn’t afraid; the rage was not directed at her.  The tenuous thread of his control was almost palpable.

“Um, yeah.”

“Good.  Lock ‘em, then show me the way out back.”

Thea quickly locked the sliding glass doors, wondering what on earth Dizzy was planning.  When she got back to the counter, the pile of bills she’d handed over to the junkie was sitting on the counter.

When she went to put them back in the register, the rasp of Dizzy’s voice stopped her.  “They’ll be safe enough for the time bein’.  Come on, sweetheart, lead the way.”

Oh yeah, she was supposed to show him the way out in the back.  As she moved past him toward the door that led into the rear of the store, Dizzy got hold of the junkie, who was still out for the count.  She noticed that Dizzy had taken the junkie’s gun and tucked it into his belt.  Her brain was shuddering between thoughts of needing to call 9-1-1 and wondering how in the hell she was going to explain what the fuck was happening to the store manager.

As they passed the employee lounge
cum
Manager’s office, as advertised by a white adhesive tile with black lettering, Dizzy paused in dragging the body, which Thea hoped was still breathing, along.

“That where the security tapes are?”  Dizzy nodded towards the office.

“What?  Oh, yeah.  It’s an old system.  VHS.”

“Go grab tonight’s.  Put a blank in.”

Thea was about to ask why, but bit her tongue.  Instead she did as Dizzy asked.  It was obvious, really.  Of course he didn’t want anyone seeing a video of him knocking a man out with his gun, even if the man on the receiving end of the blow had just robbed the store and been about to do only god knew what else.  When she came back out of the office with the tape in her hand, Dizzy just nodded his head towards the end of the corridor.  Realizing that he had his hands full just at that moment, Thea kept hold of the tape and showed him where the back exit to the store was.

She opened the heavy metal door with the bunch of keys that she’d picked up to lock the front doors.  Dizzy hauled the limp body through the doorway and out into the lot.  It was a dark corner, the glow of the streetlights couldn’t quite penetrate the gloom, and the security light had blown a fuse months previously and had not yet been repaired. Dizzy dropped the body onto the tarmac without ceremony, and then, to Thea’s amazement, set about beating the junkie to a bloody pulp.

The would-be thief roused after the first couple of punches and weakly tried to fight Dizzy off.  It was a pathetic attempt that had no effect whatsoever.

“Learn a lesson, motherfucker.”  Dizzy grunted between punches.  “Shit like that don’t fly in this town no more.”  He landed a right hook that crushed the junkie’s nose in a spray of blood.  “Take your cranked up ass out of town and don’t fuckin’ come back.”

Once Thea had gotten over the shock of seeing the man who had, so far, been nothing but cheeky, flirty and fodder for her fantasies unleash such methodical brutality she couldn’t tear her eyes away.  She couldn’t find it in herself to feel sorry for the junkie, either.  He’d been a twitch away from potentially leaving her son without a mother.

Dizzy yanked the junkie up by his collar to receive a final jab and then dropped him like a piece of trash.

“The tape, sweetheart.”

Dizzy shook his hand out before holding it out to her.  Thea was transfixed by the fact that there was enough blood on his hand for droplets to spatter away from it when he shook it.  She stared at his reddened palm for a long moment before she placed the tape she was still clutching into it.

“You okay?”

She tried to shake the fog from her brain.  “Yeah.  Sure.  I... just... I wasn’t...  Mondays are usually quiet.”

“It’s okay, sweetheart.  But this is needed.  The Priests won’t tolerate this shit in our town.”

Thea was stunned, but not into silence, she couldn’t help the words that came out.  “The Rabids never gave a shit about stores gettin’ held up ‘n’ stuff.   We were robbed three times this past year or so.  No one did anythin’.” 

“The police ever catch anyone?”  Dizzy asked with obvious skepticism.

Thea snorted a laugh.  “You’re jokin’, right? They don’t come this far out unless someone gets shot and not always then.”