American Nocturne Read online

  “He’ll be there. His car’s been in the lot the last two nights.”

  Lance stirred in the passenger seat. As was usually the case, he seemed to be trying to sleep.

  “You spending your evenings at the Congressional nowadays?” Lance asked.

  Pepper shot him a glance, but was careful to yank his eyes back to the street before it could take. Everyone knew Pepper called the shots only because Lance let him. Lance was a big guy, cool as the day was long. Cory figured out right off he didn’t as much follow Pepper as he just refused to exert himself enough to lead.

  “I told you I’d find the fucker.”

  Lance yawned, shifted his weight. “Congratulations.”

  “Can’t wait to see the look on that cocksucker’s face. This’ll send a message. A big message.”

  “Yeah, like tough-guy Pepper knows where to find homos.”

  “More like, no fuckin’ faggot pulls that kind of shit with me.”

  Lance snorted, turning his head to the side. “No wonder you flunked anger management. How many times did the judge order you back? Three?”

  “Hey, you were there. You saw it. Nobody talks to me that way.”

  “I saw you walk out in front of a guy’s car and he hit the brakes and punched his horn.”

  “But you heard what he said.”

  “Yeah, after you slammed your hands down on his hood, sure. That was my ride, I’d a wrung your scrawny neck.”

  “Well, you ain’t no homo, now, are you? Anyway, he called me loverboy. Eat shit and die, loverboy. You heard him.”

  “And he blew you a kiss,” Dino added. He was as skinny as Fish was fat, with acne scars that checkered his face like weather marks.

  Pepper nodded. “That’s right. The fucker puckered up like some drag queen.”

  “Are you sure he’s a fag?” Cory asked. It was a spontaneous question he immediately regretted. He had only moved into that ratty apartment complex next to Pepper a few weeks ago, and was still not sure of his status. In the silence that followed, he wondered whether a dozen idiots were born. “I mean, I was just thinking, maybe he was playing you. Trying to get under your skin, you know?”

  “Why would his car be at the Congressional, then? See you around the Congressional, he said. Remember? Besides, I could just tell from the way he looked at me. Like I was some whore he was sizing up. Hell, you don’t even need gay-dar, someone looks at you like that. Ya’ll were there. Tell me I’m wrong.”

  He had a point, Cory had to admit. After Pepper had shouted some threat, the guy had stepped a foot outside of his car, one hand on the doorframe, his other arm on the roof, and looked all of them over pretty hard. Cory could tell the move had caught Pepper off guard. Pepper was probably used to guys in suits going out of their way to avoid altercations with tattooed delinquents. But this guy just took off his shades, looked Pepper up and down like he hadn’t a care in the world, then let his eyes drift over to the rest of them. They hadn’t darted into the lot like Pepper had, but were only a few feet back and got to watch the whole thing. Cory remembered the feeling when the stranger’s pale blue eyes settled on his, just for that extra second. There was definitely something lustful in those eyes. Then the guy smiled, made his loverboy comment, and blew Pepper a big, dewy kiss before driving away.

  “Tell me I’m wrong,” Pepper repeated, more urgently. Something in his voice intimated he may have wanted someone to do just that, but nobody said anything and a moment later the sign for the Congressional House appeared ahead.

  Pepper put on his blinker. “We’re here.”

  “Wake me when it’s over,” Lance said. Cory had assumed all along Lance was going to put a stop to this, that beneath his unflappably calm exterior, Lance was always calculating whether he should intervene in any given circumstance, his eye out for whether Pepper was ever crossing some line and going too far, provoking the big guy to step in. Now he realized he’d been wrong. Lance just didn’t give a shit about anything.

  The bright red, white and blue bulbs of the Congressional House marquis gave off a festive, circus-like radiance, shimmering off the glossy finishes and glass of the cars. The parking lot was almost full. The place was hopping. What that meant as it pertained to the goings-on inside, Cory wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

  Congressional House was by far the largest gay nightclub in town, and touted itself as the largest in the entire Southeast. It was attached to a small hotel of the same name that catered exclusively to homosexuals. Everybody within a hundred miles knew about it, though no one could seem to agree on when the place went gay. Some said during the 1970s, when hippies migrated from campuses and the idea of free love metastasized. Others claimed it was long before that, the place only going more or less public during that time. Nowadays, it hid in plain sight. It advertised female impersonators and lesbian bands, stand-up comics and AIDS fundraisers. It was the source of teenage jokes and largely ignored prayer vigils. Beyond that, nobody seemed interested in calling attention to it. Cory wasn’t sure whether that was due to embarrassment or sympathy. The owner was an eighty-something straight woman, a former actress who, the story went, inherited it from her husband, who – depending on who you listened to – had been a preacher leading a double life or a businessman who saw a way to serve a hidden market. Everyone else, right down to the security guards and valets, was in-your-face bent. Rumor had it even the illegal labor hired to keep the grounds and clean the rooms were gay.

  “Here we are,” Pepper said. “New fucking Gomorrah.”

  “I thought it was the Congressional House,” Dino said. Cory could smell his breath, rancid and warm, as it mixed in with the overall odor of the interior. He was somewhat known for it, with Lance calling him Hal instead of his real name half the time. The smell had the effect of making the air away from him seem fresh, even with the musty, stale scent of old vinyl, moldy carpet and second-hand smoke hanging like a fog, and the gamy whiff of b.o. also making its presence known.

  “It’s a nickname,” Cory said, after waiting for the derisive comments and laughs from the others to play out. He’d heard it had been called New Sodom by some back in the day, but that there was a club downtown by that name a few years back prompting a change. He’d also heard that club inspired someone to give it that nickname in the first place, so he wasn’t sure which was true. That other place didn’t last long. Cory wasn’t surprised. It was goth. Goths didn’t have money to spend. Not like gays. Goths were just fucking weird.

  All that gay money was evident in the selection of automobiles. More Saabs and Beemers and Range Rovers than you could shake a stick at. Pepper’s Monte Carlo stuck out like a sore Yugo amidst all of the foreign high performance serried in neat rows. He drove past the front of the building, keeping some distance from the entrance.

  “That’s a damn shame,” Lance said. Cory followed his line of sight and spied a pair of Harleys lined up near a wall. A glistening Fat Boy and an even newer Road King. The Fat Boy had a custom paint job, a deep purple with hot pink striping. Cory couldn’t tell if Lance’s comment referred to the color or the ownership.

  “There it is.” Pepper pointed to a silver Mercedes. “Same spot as before.”

  Cory looked the car over. “Is that the right plate?”

  Something about it made Cory wonder, though he hadn’t actually noticed the number during Pepper’s encounter.

  YY2DI4U.

  “Sure as hell is. Took me a while to figure it out. The guy is such a homo. You got to read it backwards.

  “I don’t get it,” Fish said.

  “U4 I d-too to-wice. Get it? You four I’d do twice.”

  “What does that mean?” Dino asked.

  “I think he’s talking about the four of you. The fairy actually went down and changed his plate after that shit happened. He’s saying not only would he fuck me, he’d do you guys twice afterwards. He was probably hoping to drive by us again sometime. Have a good laugh.”

  Cory thought this made no sense
at all, but before he could complete the thought, somebody banged a fist against the passenger window. Everybody flinched, except Lance, who barely turned his head to look.

  A large, uniformed guard bent down and glared through the glass. “This is private property.” He jerked his thumb across and away. “You boys get the hell out of here.”

  The guard was an imposing guy, almost as big as Lance. He had a moustache and a scar across the bottom of his lip running down into his chin. He looked like someone who could spot a carload of good ole boys spoiling for some bloodsport a mile away, especially when they were piled into a beat-up 1980 Monte Carlo. Cory had heard all the security guards were ex-cops. Both management and customers liked it that way. Mostly for the statement it made. The other statement.

  “We’re leaving,” Pepper yelled, adding fucking queer under his breath as he peeled out of the parking lot. Lance laughed and closed his eyes again.

  “Now what?” Fish asked. Cory noted the overly deferential rise in his voice at the end of the question. Fish was policing himself.

  “We park a bit down the street and we wait.” Pepper scouted the nearby parking lots. The blacktop appeared deep and lustrous in the glow of halogen street lamps. Perpendicular lines of white paint surrounded an occasional car. “We wait and we follow.”

  They didn’t have to wait long. A few minutes later, a silver Mercedes pulled out of the lot of the Congressional and headed their way. It accelerated smoothly as it passed by. Pepper shifted the car into drive and eased out after it.

  “What if he goes some place there’s a bunch of people?” Fish asked. “How’re we supposed to get him?”

  Pepper leaned his body toward the steering wheel, hunching over it. “Don’t you think I’ve thought of that? I just want to see where he ends up. Maybe where he lives, even.”

  Cory waited for Fish to ask the natural follow-up question, but then he remembered what a pussy he was. Lance looked like he had managed to get close enough to actual sleep that he couldn’t be bothered to part his lips, and Dino was too much of a mouth-breather to ever think of it. But it was obvious to Cory that Pepper was more piss than balls. He could have followed the guy by himself any of those other nights. Either he hadn’t thought it through, or he’d thought it through more than he cared to admit.

  “So, this probably isn’t happening tonight,” Cory said.

  Pepper shifted, gripping the wheel close to his body like a sailor in a storm. “Bullshit it’s not.”

  He reached into the pocket of his denim jacket and pulled out a carpet knife. He pushed the small, ribbed slide on its side forward, exposed a length of triangular razor.

  “I’m just being flexible. First chance he gives me, this thing is so happening.”

  After a few blocks, the red taillights of the Mercedes were barely visible in the distance, and getting smaller. Pepper sped up, but without conviction. Cory figured that didn’t necessarily reflect Pepper’s lack of enthusiasm. Getting much closer risked being obvious. Pepper’d already had to run one red light and was one minor delay away from losing his quarry, but there weren’t many cars on the road to provide cover. The issue became moot after a few more miles, when those taillights veered to the right and climbed the entry ramp to the interstate. Ten minutes later, both cars were merging onto the state turnpike, seconds apart.

  “Where the fuck’s he going?” Lance muttered, sitting up. He blinked a few times and rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. “Ain’t nothing out this way.”

  “Maybe he’s heading to Lakeland,” Fish said. “Are you sure you’ve got enough gas for this?”

  The question was reasonable, but Cory braced himself. The old whine had crept back into Fish’s voice, the nasally I-don’t-want-to-be-here stress on the words ‘sure’ and ‘gas’.

  “Lance, hold this, would you?” Pepper angled his upper body back between the bucket seats, elbowing past Cory as Lance gripped the wheel. Without hesitating, he backfisted Fish on the bridge of his nose. Then he pushed himself back toward the front with a violent shove to Fish’s head.

  “I’m sick of your fuckin’ griping,” Pepper said, settling back into his seat. He stomped the accelerator and brought the car back up to speed.

  Fish said nothing, cradling his face in his hands. The back of the car was draped in shadow, but when he raised his head, Cory could tell his eyes were wet and red. He alternated between rubbing something from his nose, staring at his hands, and wiping his fingers against his pants.

  When he finally worked up the nerve to say something, his voice was quiet. “Am I bleeding?”

  Cory shook his head. “I think it’s just snot.”

  The sound of the glove compartment clunking open came from the front. It was followed by a hand draping itself over the back of the passenger seat, holding a napkin. Something from a McDonald’s or Burger King drive-thru. The napkin fluttered impatiently with the twitching of Lance’s fingers.

  Dino stuck his arm between the two front seats and pointed. “He’s getting off.”

  “Thank you, Captain Obvious,” Lance said.

  Pepper followed, grumbling as he handed over a dollar and change to the attendant at the booth. The Mercedes disappeared around the curve of the exit ramp. Pepper sped after it.

  The ramp emptied onto a desolate farm road. The lights of the Mercedes could be seen roughly a quarter-mile to the right, sinking into the darkness.

  “You think he’s got a place out here?” Dino asked.

  The Monte Carlo lurched as Pepper hit the gas coming off the ramp and drifted into the appropriate lane. “How the fuck would I know?”

  “Well,” Lance said, “you two did seem kind of close.”

  Pepper said nothing, but Cory sensed he wanted to. Policing himself, like Fish.

  The landscape thickened over the next few miles. Dark, impenetrable walls of trees and growth flanked the road just beyond the berms. The dull shine of the blacktop unspooled like a ribbon in the breeze, curving and undulating as it outran the Monte Carlo’s headlights. Every time it appeared the Mercedes may have managed to lose them, the red, rearward-looking eyes of its stern would blink over a rise or flash at the end of a straightaway.

  As Pepper accelerated out of a bend, the brighter red of the Mercedes’ brake lights, the tell-tale third one above the trunk, appeared closer than they had for several miles. The car took a slow, sharp right turn, the cone of its headlights first illuminating, then swallowed by, the densely wooded thicket of pines and palmettos.

  “Shit,” Pepper said. “If we turn in behind him, he’s going spot us.”

  “I have an idea,” Cory said. “Just drive past, and then shut off your lights. Then you can back up and turn in.”

  “Shut off my lights on a dark road? And drive backwards? Are you crazy? Someone could plow into us.”

  “Don’t be such a puss,” Lance said. “When was the last time we saw a car? He’s right. It’s a good idea.”

  Before anything else could be said, the Monte Carlo cruised by what had to be the turn in, a break in the drainage furrow spanned by a flat bridge of earth. A rectangular gate of tubed metal hinged to a wooden post was swung inward, pointing the way down an unpaved drive.

  Pepper drove past, glanced back at Cory, then slowed to a stop a hundred yards or so beyond it.

  He turned off the headlights. “This better work.”

  Everything was plunged into a sudden body of shadow. Through the windows, the sky took on a lugubrious shade of blue-black, and the surrounding trees and vegetation seemed to lunge closer.

  Pepper shifted the car into reverse and allowed it to coast backwards.

  “How am I supposed to stop without hitting the brakes?” Pepper whispered.

  “Just tap it and shift,” Lance said, just as quietly.

  “Or you can use the parking brake,” Cory said. “And why are we whispering?”

  Pepper had trouble finding the entrance. Several times it seemed like he was going to slide them into t
he ditch as he inched his way off the road, but he managed to get the car onto the rutted path of unpaved access way and glided it forward. The popping and crunching of pebbles and pine cones beneath the tires was accented by the occasional jangle of tiny objects pinging off the undercarriage.

  “I see lights,” Fish said, leaning forward. They were the first words he’d spoken since he’d asked if he was bleeding. Apparently realizing this, he settled back into his seat and resumed brooding.

  “Queerbait’s got a cabin or something back here.” Pepper’s eyes were fixed in the direction of a stippling of light, a jumble of dots sliding in and out of view through the commotion of pine trunks, vines and palmetto fans.

  “What if he’s got a gun?” Dino asked.

  Pepper did not immediately respond. Cory wasn’t sure if his hesitation was because the question hadn’t been considered, or because Dino had managed to think of something intelligent to ask. He was inclined to think it was a bit of both.

  “He doesn’t have a gun,” Pepper said, finally. “Flamers like him are all commie gun-control freaks. Pansies don’t carry guns.”

  “I got a gun,” Fish said.

  Pepper engaged the emergency brake, jolting the car to an immediate stop, and turned to look at Fish. “What did you say?”

  Only on replaying it in his head the moment after he said it did Cory suspect Pepper’s surprise may have been spiced with a tiny hint of alarm.

  “I said I got a gun. My mom’s boyfriend gave it to her. For protection. She doesn’t like ’em. She thinks it’s hidden away.”

  “You got it with you?” Pepper sounded incredulous.

  “Yeah.” Fish pulled his knee up and propped his heel on the edge of the seat. He lifted the leg of his jeans and reached into his sock, producing a tiny automatic. He hesitated a moment, then handed it to Pepper.