“Whaddaya mean he ran out the back while you were calling the cops? Why didn’t you bring the bastard out front by the phone, just keep him covered?”
“Look, the kid shit his pants, he was so scared. He stunk. I didn’t want to get near him. I don’t know, I just didn’t think he had it in him to try anything, not after the way he was scared.”
“You shoulda shot the fucker in the knees. Then called the cops.”
“Christ, Eddie, he was only a kid. Maybe fifteen or so. I mean, for Christ’s sake, I was a little rattled, y’ know. What the hell do you want? I mean, I never shot a guy before. I never even got shot at before. I mean, the guy’s standing there with a fucking twenty-gauge aimed at my head. I’m lucky I’m alive. You woulda had a heart attack.”
“I woulda shot
Both men are silent for a few seconds. Then Eddie says, “Look, I’m sorry. It’s just that I hate those bastards. Fucking coons sit around taking welfare while we work our asses off, and then they come around with their fucking shotguns telling us to give ’em all our money. You know?”
“Yeah.”
“No, you did good, kid. I’m proud of ya. No shit. You swacked a nigger and saved the day’s take.”
“Well, I’d already made the deposit anyhow,” Bob explains. “There wasn’t any money there. The register was empty.”
Eddie doesn’t quite understand. What was Bob doing at the store, then, if he’d already made the deposit?
“I … well, I went out with someone, for a couple of drinks. Friend of mine. Then the transmission, the throw-out bearing, I think it is, got jammed. You know, like it does. So I went into the store to call Elaine or somebody to come get me.”
“Oh, yeah? You getting a little on the side, kid?”
“Oh, no, no, nothing like that. A friend of mine, guy I know.” He can’t use the story about the Budweiser salesman on Eddie.
“Sure, sure. I don’t give a shit you’re ripping off a piece of poon now and then. Just don’t do it on my time, okay? You get all the pussy you want on your own time, but I ain’t paying you to wet your dick, you know.”
“Yeah.”
“Who’s at the store right now?”
“Cops. State and local.”
“Okay, I’ll get right out there,” he says. “You, you go on home and get some sleep. I’ll see you in the morning. Is the place a mess?”
“Yeah. Lots of broken bottles. I got cut….”
“Okay, I’ll be there in the morning too. Don’t clean up until the insurance guys get there. You understand. It’s better for a big claim if the place looks like it got hit by a shit storm.”
They say goodbye and hang up, and for several minutes Bob stands by the phone trembling, as waves of rage, fatigue, horror and regret run through him, one hard upon the other, until he can no longer distinguish between them. He barely knows what part of the country he’s in, and he no longer remembers why he came here, why he left the place where he knew who he was, knew what he felt and why, knew how he felt about the people he lived with — his wife and children, his friends, his boss, his girlfriend, all of them living in the place where all the people were white and spoke the same kind of English and wanted the same things from life and knew more or less how to get them.
