‘A little,’ Jack weeps. ‘It’s all fucking blurry. Who are you? Why—’
‘Sit down.’
‘You can have my wallet. There’s not much but Tripp keeps a couple of hundred in his bedroom, in the top drawer of the desk, just take it and go!’
‘Sit down.’
He takes Martinez by the shoulders, turns him, and pushes him into the bungalow chair. It’s suspended on a hook-and-rope combo from the ceiling and starts a mild rocking motion when the man’s weight hits it. Martinez peers at Billy through bloodshot eyes.
‘Just sit there a minute and get yourself together.’
There are napkins on the bar next to the ice bucket. Cloth ones, not paper, very nice. Billy takes one and goes to Martinez.
‘Don’t move.’
Martinez sits still and Billy wipes his face, getting rid of the last runnels of foam. Then he steps back. ‘Where are the other two?’
‘Why?’
‘You don’t ask, Jack. I do. Your job is to answer, unless you want another shot of foam. Or a bullet in the knee if you really irritate me. Understand?’
‘Yes!’ The crotch of Martinez’s chinos has gone dark.
‘Where are they?’
‘Tripp went to RBCC to see his advisor. Hank’s at work. He’s a salesman at JossBank.’
‘What’s JossBank?’
‘Joseph A. Bank, it’s a men’s—’
‘Okay, I know what it is. What’s RBCC?’
‘Red Bluff Community College. Tripp’s a graduate student. Part time. History. He’s writing a paper on the Australian and Hungarian War.’
Billy thinks of telling this idiot that Australia had nothing to do with the Hungarian revolution of 1848, but why would he? He’s here to teach a different lesson.
‘When will he be back?’
‘I don’t know. I think he said his meeting was at two. He might stop for coffee after, sometimes he does that.’
‘Chat up a barista, maybe,’ Billy says. ‘That is if she’s new in town and hoping to meet someone nice.’
‘Huh?’
Billy kicks him in the leg. It’s not hard, but Martinez cries out and the bungalow chair starts swinging again. It’s a swinging chair for three swinging roommates.
‘What about Hank? When does he get back?’
‘He gets off at four. Why do you—’
Billy raises the can of Easy-Off. It must still look blurry to Martinez, but he knows what it is and subsides.
‘What about you, Jack? How do you earn your beer and bagels?’
‘I’m a day trader.’
Billy goes over to the laptop on the round table. Numbers are flowing across it, most of them green. It’s Saturday, but someone is trading somewhere, because money never sleeps.
‘Is that your van out back?’
‘No, Hank’s. I’ve got a Miata.’
‘Is the van broken down?’
‘Yeah, blew a head gasket. He’s been taking my car to work this week. The store he works at is in the Airport Mall.’
Billy pulls a regular chair over to the hanging bungalow chair. He sits in front of Martinez. ‘I can be done with you, Jack. If you behave. Can you behave?’
‘Yes!’
‘That means when your roomies come home, you keep perfectly quiet. No yelling out a warning. It’s Tripp I mostly want to deal with, but if you alert him, or Hank, I will give you what I was going to give Tripp. Do you understand me? Are we clear?’
‘Yes!’
Billy takes out his phone and calls Alice. She asks if he’s all right and Billy says he is. ‘I’m with a guy named Jack Martinez. He has something he wants to say to you.’ Billy holds the phone out to Jack. ‘Tell her you’re a worthless piece of shit.’
Jack doesn’t protest, perhaps because he’s cowed, perhaps because that’s how he feels just now. Billy is hoping for that. He’s hoping even day traders can learn.
‘I’m … a worthless piece of shit.’
‘Now say you’re sorry.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Martinez says into the phone.
Billy takes the phone back. Alice sounds like she’s crying. She tells him to be careful and Billy says he will. He ends the call and turns his attention to the red-faced man in the bungalow chair. ‘Do you know what you were apologizing for?’
Martinez nods and Billy decides that’s good enough.
9
They sit there and time passes. Martinez says his eyes still burn, so Billy wets another bar napkin in the bar sink and wipes his face, paying particular attention to his eyes. Martinez thanks him. Billy thinks the man may regain his MAGA swagger eventually, but that’s okay because he also thinks Martinez will never rape another woman. He has been rehabilitated.