This is good, I thought. I want the slower man. Now I have a two percent chance of making this work, instead of one percent.
“Right here,” I said. “Step up and do it.”
Another mosquito landed on my neck. I could feel its needle breaking through my skin.
“Don’t get any closer,” Sugarpie said. “Come on, man, give me the gun. You’ve never done this before.”
“Get away from me,” he said. “I’m not afraid of him.”
As Dumpling came closer, Sugarpie tried to pull him away. He shook him off and came even closer to me, as if to make a point.
That’s it, I thought. That’s exactly what you want to do. I’m not even going to move. Just come right up to me and prove what a big badass you are.
He took a step closer. He was holding the gun in both hands now. He was looking me in the eye.
“Shoot you like a man?” he said. “I’m gonna show my friend here how a real man does it.”
“Will you just shut up and do it?” Sugarpie said, slapping at his arm. “I’m getting eaten alive here.”
He was four feet away. I wished it were two. Hell, would have settled for three. I stood there and I watched him raise the gun slowly. I felt another mosquito on my neck. I looked at him and I saw him sweating and I thought, come on mosquitoes, why are you bothering with me? Somebody go take some blood from that big boy.
Everything was coming into sharp relief. I saw every detail, every pore in his skin, every color and contour of every visible tattoo. The face on the Jack of Hearts, watching me with its one eye from his right shoulder. I smelled the fetid half-decomposed smells from the swamp. I heard the insects buzzing and crawling and mating and dying.
And eating.
Right there, on his neck. Go for it, mosquito. Do your thing.
He flinched and tried to rub it away by shrugging his shoulder. That was my chance. That was my last chance to stay alive on this horrible blue earth. I threw my body back like I was doing the limbo, brought my right foot up toward the gun. There was a deafening blast as it went off. I didn’t even know if the bullet had hit me. I was still frozen in time, everything moving in slow motion. My foot coming up, my leg extended as far as I could make it go. I’d never played much football, being a baseball man. I’d never played soccer at all. So I never really had to kick anything. Never in life until this very moment. My desperate last-chance gamble as I felt my center of gravity going back farther and farther and I am absolutely going to fall flat on my back but if I can just manage to kick that goddamned gun out of his goddamned hand.
Impact.
First my foot.
Then my head hitting the ground. My back immediately after, knocking the wind right out of me.
I saw the gun flying in the air. Into the woods.
Dumpling was already stumbling after it. I swept at his leg and felt him falling.
The other man was coming to jump on top of me now. I rolled over just in time and I was halfway up as he climbed onto my back. I went all the way down to my knees and let his momentum take him right over me. My hands were still tied together, so I couldn’t punch him in the face. But I could take both hands together and make one big fist and try to drive his head right into the ground. I felt the bones snap as I hit him square in the nose.
Then I was back on my feet. The big man was already crashing into the brush, a good ten feet away. He was looking for the gun and I had to make a choice right then. The key’s still in the ignition, I thought. The engine’s still running. I climbed into the driver’s seat, not bothering to close the door. With both hands tied together it was a clumsy effort to shift the vehicle into Reverse, but I managed it. Through the windshield, I saw Sugarpie up on one knee now. He was doubled over and there was blood running from his nose. Dumpling was still in the brush, looking for the gun.
I stepped on the gas and felt the wheels spinning under me. Then all of a sudden I was moving backward. Too fast. I tried to steer but it was hard to do with both hands so close together. It was impossible to look behind me at the same time. The door was catching all of the branches and I heard a metallic screech in the hinges as it hit the trunk of a tree.
I was backing down the trail, doing everything I could to keep it straight. Not far to go, that much I remembered. He made this final right turn so all I have to do is back it right up and get it pointed in the right direction.
More branches scraped at the open door as the tires were throwing mud, and every other yard they were just spinning and spinning and me not going anywhere at all and then finding hard ground again and almost driving right off into the trees.
I hit the main trail and I tried to whip it around in a two-point turn but I couldn’t turn the wheel fast enough and both right tires went off the edge of the road. I gunned it and the tires were spinning again and that’s when I heard the gun go off again and this time the back window exploded.
I snapped back into real time. Everything speeding up from the slow-motion fog I was in. I looked out the open door and saw Dumpling coming down the trail, the gun raised. I reached to close the door and realized that wasn’t going to work. It would have taken several days in the body shop just to get the damned thing to close again. I gunned the engine one more time and that’s when I felt the shot ripping right through the fabric above my head. I rolled over to the other side of the front seat and opened up the far door. I dived out onto the ground.
Except there was no ground.
It was swamp. It was quicksand. I don’t know what the hell it was, but it swallowed me up and held fast as I tried to get to my feet. I tried grabbing on to the side of the car but there was nothing to hold on to. With both my hands together I could barely push myself up. I kicked at the muck and tried to roll myself out and I was counting down the precious seconds because I knew Dumpling was coming up fast on the other side of the car. When I finally managed to push myself forward, I was on both knees, then one knee, and that’s when I finally looked up and saw his shoes and tattoos on his legs. He was standing at the back of the vehicle. The gun was pointed at my head. This time, there would be no chance to knock the gun free. This time, he had me dead.
“You broke his nose,” he said.
I didn’t say anything. I was just trying to breathe.
“Get over here,” he said to Sugarpie. “Come watch this man die.”
Sugarpie was coming down the trail, holding his nose. There was enough blood to paint his shirt half red. He seemed to be wincing with every step. The blood was still running through his fingers.
Then blam! the air was torn apart by another gun blast. They both jumped at the noise.
Nobody moved for a long moment. Then Sugarpie went down. There was a hole in the side of his neck, just under his jawline. He took his hands away from his ruined nose and grasped at his throat. He tried to speak but the only sound that came out was a bloody gurgle.
“What the…” Dumpling said, looking down at him.
He looked back at me, like I had done this somehow. Like I had some sort of magic secret gun I could fire from any direction. Then he brought up his own gun again but this time he didn’t even get to aim. The next shot caught him just above the left eye. He went down, dead on the spot, his hand still holding the gun.
Lou came running down the path, holding that gun we’d taken from Andy Dukes, the gun we had stashed in the glove compartment. The gun that had forced Lou to take the ferry instead of the plane. He had the gun trained on Sugarpie, who was still alive.
“Don’t shoot him,” I said. I bent down and looked at him closely.
“Can you talk?”
He was still clutching at his throat. He was still making the gurgling noises.
“You have to tell us where they are,” I said. “Where are Vinnie and Buck?”