“That motherfucker.”
Eli looks at Sunny’s juddering face in the rear mirror, grapples with the wide wheel of the Bolero, driving his master through the wasteland of fallow fields and derelict machinery that is now his kingdom.
Weeds sprouting.
Untended shrines.
Mangy dogs loitering beneath trees.
The black-shaded expression on his face.
His complexion like a coffin opened.
“He went over the line. He went over the fucking line. Who the fuck does he think he is?”
And Eli says, “Boss. Boss! Notice anything different about me?”
Sunny lights a cigarette.
His hands are trembling.
He takes a hip flask from his trouser pocket, fixes himself with a slug of vodka. “You shaved your pubic hair.”
“No. Very funny. This I do last week.”
Sunny almost laughs, takes another hit of vodka, looks out over the land. Calms a little. “What is it?” he says. “What’s different about you?”
“I give you small clue. You see Terminator 2?”
“What?”
“T2: Judgment Day. Have you seen?”
“Am I Osama bin Laden? Living in a fucking cave? Of course I’ve seen it.”
“So then?” Eli grins and touches his hand to his shades. “Look! See! I got this morning. Persol Ratti 58230. Count them, five-eight-two-three-zero. Very rare. Hard to find. Exactly same as in movie.”
Silence. Then . . .
“What movie?”
Eli is about to erupt in exasperation.
But he catches himself.
“Ahhh, very funny boss. What movie?”
“So,” Sunny says, “how much did you pay for them?”
“Ahhh,” Eli shakes his head. “I buy in auction. Cannot find in shop.”
“Yeah, but how much?”
Eli sighs. “Even you cannot afford.”
That makes Sunny laugh for real.
Before the silence swallows him again.
They drive on.
More scrub.
“You think you’re the Terminator?” Sunny says.
Eli shrugs. “I’m pretty tough.”
“If you’re the Terminator, what does that make me?”
“Easy! You the kid.”
“The kid,” Sunny says, “who tells you what to do.”
“Yes! I know this actually. This my job. Do what you say. Make you happy. You ask me stand on one leg. I do. Shoot that asshole. Sure, why not? Drive you into enemy territory. Oh look, this is what we do right now. You want me to wipe your ass? You want maybe I give hand job?”
“Fuck you.”
“No! Thank you! This I draw the line.”
Miles of dust and nothing.
Eli shakes his head.
Sucks his teeth.
“Boss, where we going? Because all this,” he pats the gun in his waistband, “with only Eli and Mr. Jericho for company, is really bad fucking idea. You don’t see what I see.”
“What do you see?”
“Trap.”
They pass through a small settlement of half-finished plots.
Migrant laborers have set up fires; washing lines are strung between poles.
“I need to know what this motherfucker’s doing.”
“So pick up the phone, dial number. Seriously!”
Sunny shakes his head, opens the window, and flicks the cigarette out.
“The phone isn’t safe.”
“This is not safe, driving alone in this pile of shit.” Eli begins adjusting the stereo. “Doesn’t even have Bluetooth!”
“It’s your car, fuckface.”
“This I know,” Eli nods. “This I use for driving to shops, buying milk.” He gives up on the stereo. “Not for bringing knife to gunfight. Should have brought Porsche Cayenne. Porsche Cayenne has Bluetooth. Porsche Cayenne is bulletproof.”
“Porsche Cayenne is conspicuous. You know what that means?”
“Yes, I know what means.”
“How you say in Hebrew?”
“Is bolet.”
“Bullet?”
“No, asshole. Not bullet. Is bolet.”
Ahead, on a lonely crossroad, a small, canopied kiosk. A man stands outside.
He sees the car coming, holds out a hopeful armful of brochures.
Brochures for property developments.
“One of yours?”
“No,” Sunny watches with disgust.
“You want maybe I run him down?”
“Maybe on the way back.”
“Ha! But I scare him, no?”
Eli accelerates the Bolero into the crossroads, the boxy metal shell bouncing around the road, swerving toward the man before pulling back at the last.