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“Sure, sure. Anything else you wanna waste my time with?”
“You came all this way just to blow me off?” I ask.
“Temples got word to me so I came. I like Temples,” Paulie says. “I don’t like you. But like I says, you’re a pussy cat now, Dick. I figure, what’s the hurt?”
“I know the folks in those houses that burnt down. I’m looking for answers.”
“So? Keep looking.”
“I will get answers, Paulie.”
“I’m sure your tough guy shtick will work on somebody. Not me.”
“Maybe if I just told you the MOs you could think about who might’ve been able to pull this off.”
“Sure. I got a couple of more smokes. Tell me about the burn.”
“First house was an invasion. The guy attacked—”
“Nope. No idea. Next one, please,” Paulie says.
“Second house had personal messages written on the un-burnt portion of a wall—”
“Sounds terrible but doesn’t ring a bell,” Paulie says, smiling big and wonderful. “Let me guess, the third house—”
My turn to interrupt. “The third house you don’t know about either, right?”
He snubs his smoke out on the dashboard. “Nope. Sorry, Dick. Tell Temples I said hello.”
Paulie opens the car door to step out and I grab him by the back of the head and bounce his face off the dashboard. The car bounces. Paulie slumps over and I open the door before he can bleed on the upholstery. He slides out like a wet noodle.
I get out, find him limp and face down on the pier. “How many times do I have to tell you, Paulie. Do not call me Dick.” I put my foot just below the base of Paulie’s spine, grab his head firmly and yank it back so hard his neck breaks in two. Drag him to the water and throw him in.
Paulie Torreno, the man the mob used to hire to burn down the homes of their enemies, complete with women and children inside as it lit, floats face down on the incoming current next to the ice sheets and other garbage of the city.
Waste of time. I look around for a little while for anyone who might have come with him. No one stirs. No bullet to my chest. Paulie was old and he had outlasted his usefulness, but I’m sure someone besides Temples knew he was here with me. It might not mean shit, but it becomes just another thing I file away. Another reason to check the shadows.
I wish Paulie would have talked if he knew something but this, this was a long time coming.
This was a long time coming.
48
My place: third floor, the smell of the smokehouse next door filing the air with hickory and applewood throughout the night. It competes with the comforting linger of tobacco.
Wood floors, chewed up. Unimaginative trim and baseboards. Simple lines. Front door opens to the first room, occupied with a couch, TV, lamp and bookshelf. Door to the east leads to the toilet and shower. Door to the west leads to the closet I stuffed my bed into. Little else.
In one corner is a kitchen sink, a set of cabinets and an incompetent refrigerator. Toaster oven takes up most of the counter space. Two stove burners set by the sink. I only need one. No microwave, no oven, no dishwasher, no butcher block island with hooks to hang skillets from.
For a time I had a four-legged barstool to make drinking at home alone seem more casual. A guy by the name of Tony Francis Stalwein stopped by my place one night and I had to break that barstool over his head. Long story. I never replaced it.
Curtains cover the one window in the first room. The shower has a window right in it. I have no idea why.
I come in, toss my coat over the couch arm that serves as a coat hanger. Kick my shoes off next to the floorboard heater. Light a smoke off of the left stove burner. It’s better for lighting cigarettes than the right. Pour a whiskey and dig through the refrigerator. Half a chicken parm sandwich from yesterday. Good enough. A few minutes in the toaster oven and I’m on the couch, swishing bourbon around in my mouth to numb the taste of ash long enough to detect how little basil is in this marinara on the sandwich.
I keep looking at the other door, the third door in the place. The coat closet door.
The memories I have of her are stored inside that space. Every year I have Father Bentley from Saint Erasmus’s come over and bless the coat closet. Not the apartment; just that space.
