Blacktop Wasteland(15)
Beauregard finished his beer. “Alright, let’s get on this damn transmission,” he said as he tossed his beer in the trash.
“Oh hey, a guy came by saying Ronnie Sessions was looking for you. I think it was Ronnie’s brother. He never did get you straight about that thing with the horse, did he?” Kelvin asked. Beauregard sighed. He was sighing an awful lot these days.
“No, he didn’t.”
Ronnie Fucking Sessions. The mastermind behind what Bug liked to think of as the Fucking Horse Job.
Ronnie had approached him one night out at Wonderland. The way Ronnie had told it, some fancy-ass horse breeder out of Fairfax was selling a healthy young thoroughbred to some famous trainer in Kentucky.
One of the farmhands at the breeder’s ranch was buying OxyContin from Ronnie’s cousin and had let the cat out of the proverbial bag while making small talk during a transaction. Ronnie had come sidling up to Beauregard to help him steal the horse and sell it to another trainer in South Carolina so he could put him out to stud. Beauregard had taken the job, then set about planning it out because, as Ronnie said, he was an idea man. Beauregard was the details guy. Beauregard had gone out to Fairfax and studied the breeder’s farm, the horse trailer, the hitch on the trailer, the weight of the horse, everything. He ended up building an exact replica of the horse trailer, right down to the fist-sized dent on the right side. Put the equivalent of the horse’s weight in sandbags in the trailer. When the boys towing the trailer stopped to get something to eat at the same diner they always stopped at when transporting a horse for the breeder, Beauregard and Ronnie were waiting. The fellas parked around the back of the diner and went inside. Beauregard and Ronnie parked next to them, towing their fake trailer covered in a tarp. Under the weak sodium arc lights in the parking lot of the diner Beauregard and Ronnie switched the trailers. It was just past midnight in the middle of nowhere in the Roanoke Valley when they pulled out of the parking lot and hopped on the interstate headed for South Carolina.
“Goddamn if that won’t work just like a fucking magic trick!” Ronnie had said as they jumped on I-85.
Unfortunately, what Beauregard didn’t know, what no one outside of the breeder and his vet knew, was that the horse had a fairly serious medical condition. A condition that required a certain type of medication. Medication that was in the pocket of one of the boys they had left behind at the diner. Rich Man’s Folly was as dead as Dillinger when Ronnie and Beauregard had reached South Carolina.
Beauregard had not been pleased.
“I ain’t got nothing to say to Ronnie Sessions,” Beauregard said. It was a simple sentence but Kelvin felt the weight of the ominous intent that clung to it like a shadow.
By the time they got the transmission out, the heat in the shop had reached Saharan levels. They were both soaked in sweat despite the air running at full strength. The transmission had fought them every step of the way. Beauregard had busted one of the knuckles on his right hand after it slipped off of a socket wrench. Kelvin wiped his face with a red shop rag. Beauregard had the sickly sweet scent of transmission fluid so far up his nose it felt like it was infecting his brain. Kelvin looked at his watch.
“Shit, it’s almost five. You want to call it for today? That torque converter is all the way fucked anyway,” he said.
“Yeah. But we gotta get here early tomorrow. I wanna get both of them outta here so we can get paid. I owe Snap-on a grip and the light bill is two weeks past due,” Beauregard said.
“Damn, do you ever feel like Jean Valjean?” Kelvin asked. Beauregard squinted at him. “Cynthia likes the movie. Anyway, I’m gonna get gone. See you in the morning,” Kelvin said.
Beauregard grabbed his own rag and began to wipe his hands. He only succeeded in moving the dirt and grease to different locations. Kelvin headed for the door. Halfway there he stopped.
“Hey, Bug. We gonna be alright. You’ll figure something out. You always do,” Kelvin said.
“Yeah. See ya tomorrow,” Beauregard said.
After Kelvin left, he started closing down the shop. He turned off all the lights except for the one in his office. He lowered the roll-up doors. Turned off the air compressor and the overhead air handler. On his way back to his office he stopped by the Duster. He ran his hand over the hood. The metal was warm to the touch. Like it was alive. His father had left the car at his own mother’s house when he went West. It had sat in the backyard for five years while Beauregard was in juvenile detention. When he got out, his grandmother Dora Montage had handed him the keys and the title.
“Your Mama wanted to sell it to Bartholomew for scrap. I wouldn’t let her do it. Her name might be on the title but this car belongs to you,” she had said.
Beauregard remembered how strange it felt hearing Boonie’s Christian name. He walked around the front of the car and got in the driver’s seat. He ran his hands over the steering wheel.
His father was dead. He was sure of that now. Probably buried in a shallow grave or chopped up and tossed in a river by the same kind of men he had worked for as a driver. Just another job to killers who didn’t care he had a son who loved his bad jokes. Anthony Montage always seemed so full of life it was difficult to accept the fact he was dead. Beauregard had no doubt that if his father was alive he would have come back by now. Most of the folks around here who wanted him dead were either in prison or the ground. When he hadn’t shown up for Grandma Dora’s funeral, Beauregard had finally believed he was gone. Kia wanted him to sell the Duster. He could probably get at least twenty-five grand for it if he spruced up the paint job. That was never going to happen. She didn’t understand that the Duster was his father’s tombstone. Beauregard let his head rest against the steering wheel. He sat that way for a long time.