An Examination of Collegial Dynamics as Expressed Through Marksmanship or: A Ladies' Day Out Read online

  “Pilar.”

  “Yeah?”

  “I really don’t care.”

  ***

  Three days after dropping off an old but well-functioning revolver with Pilar, I climbed out of the water an hour on the wrong side of dawn with a tiny bag of very valuable cargo in my pocket. The Coast Guard was still chasing the wrong boat, and the erstwhile couriers of the tiny bag were clinging to some wreckage far out in the Pacific. I’d ridden the vectors of the ocean’s flow on a chunk of fiberglass hull, jumping from one current to the other like I was skipping between conveyor belts.

  I was cold and drenched and my throat was sore from the lungfuls of seawater I’d gotten during the fight, but I was very, very satisfied.

  My sopping clothes dragged at me as I hiked down the shore, the salt tightening my skin. Fortunately, I’d projected my travel into land almost perfectly during prep—the knapsack with my phone and a dry set of clothes was in a hollow only a few hundred meters down, and I had a car parked just up on top of the bluff.

  I reached the knapsack and dug out my phone to call my client and report on a successful retrieval, only to find I had two missed calls from Pilar—one near midnight and another two hours later. I hit the button to dial her back immediately. “What’s going on?”

  “Cas? Oh my God—Cas—he came, he came after us—”

  “Your roommate’s ex?” The knapsack hit the rocks and I raced up the incline for the car, normal force and loss of friction flickering through my brain and guiding my wet boots, my waterlogged clothes slapping. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes—yes, we’re both fine. I he came and started pounding on the door, and he was shouting so loud, and such horrible—he was so obscene—and I kept yelling I had a gun, but I don’t think he heard me, and then he came around to our window and he smashed it in with a bat—I think he was drunk; it was terrifying—”

  “What happened? Did he hurt you?”

  “No, I—Ilsa ran into her room calling 911 and I came right into the living room across from the window and I pointed—I pointed the gun at him. I was shaking so hard I thought I would drop it, and I was screaming at him, and he was screaming at me. And he said something like, ‘are you really gonna shoot me,’ only with more cuss words, and I screamed yes at him, and I took a few steps forward and he ran away shouting. And I thought I was going to faint, or maybe accidentally shoot myself in the leg or something, but then the police came, and they took our report and then went and tracked him down. We just got word they arrested him.”

  I’d slowed down as she reached the end of her tale and relief replaced my adrenaline; I loped the last few steps to my car and leaned against it. My clothes and hair were sticking to my skin, and a wind had picked up, cutting through the wet and freezing me to the core. “Good. That’s good,” I said to Pilar. “The cops give you any trouble?”

  “No. I just told them what you said to say, that the gun was my grandfather’s from the war. They told me to stay where they could reach me but they didn’t even confiscate it or anything.”

  “Because you didn’t do anything wrong. Any chance this guy will get out on bail?”

  “I—I don’t think so? Apparently he went berserk on the arresting officers with the bat when they tried to take him in, and he’s not exactly an employed sort of person. It doesn’t look like he’d be able to afford it, unless someone helps him out, and Ilsa says his parents are the sort of military tough love sort. She doesn’t think they’ll post his bond.”

  “Good,” I said again.

  Her voice went small. “Cas, I was so scared.”

  “I’m told that’s normal when someone busts in your window with a baseball bat.”

  “I always thought—I kept thinking if something happened it would be, like, because of one of Arthur’s cases, or maybe a random mugging. I never expected—Ilsa’s just, she’s normal. She just dated a really, really, really bad guy.”

  “There are a lot of bad people in the world. At least you were able to defend yourself.”

  “I—I don’t know,” she said miserably. “I didn’t—I didn’t like it.”

  “You’re not supposed to like it,” I said. “You’re supposed to stay alive.”

  She was silent.

  “Hello?”

  She cleared her throat. “When can I meet you to give the gun back?”

  “I’ll swing by this evening. Around six or so. You should really get your own.”

  She didn’t say anything.

  ***

  When I arrived at Pilar’s apartment building, she was sitting on the steps outside. One of the first-floor windows behind her was boarded up above the hedge, crisscrossed with blue masking tape.

  Pilar had her head down with her face somehow both long and scrunched, like she wanted to cry.

  “Shit, did he get out?” I said. She hadn’t called me; I’d had my phone on me all day—a very frustrating day, going back and forth with a client I suspected was about to try to stiff me, but that was neither here nor there. Pilar appeared to be in one piece, no blood or bruises or bullet holes “Did he come back? What happened?”

  “Huh? No, no. He’s still very much in jail.” She reached behind her and handed me the case with the revolver. “I just, I’m still—Cas, I almost shot someone. I could have killed him.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Can I ask—” She rolled her lips together. “Do you ever think about it?”

  The glib answer was that of course I thought about it, because I hadn’t killed anyone in four hundred and fifty-one days. But the truth was

  “No,” I said.

  “Not ever?”

  “Not usually.”

  “How?” she pleaded. “There are times I don’t know if I’ve chosen the right pair of shoes in the morning. This is, it’s so much power—how can you always be sure you’ve decided the right way?”

  “You can’t,” I said. “That’s why I don’t think about it.”

  Pilar stared at me. “That is literally the worst thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

  I shrugged.

  She slumped and blew out a long breath. “I keep flashing back to that instant. I don’t know if I would’ve done it. I don’t know. And what about next time? What if he gets out, or what if ”

  “I keep telling you, you should get your own sidearm,” I said.

  “That isn’t—Cas, you know that isn’t what I’m talking about.”

  I shifted my weight from foot to foot, wondering if I could go. People didn’t usually use me as a sounding board for personal problems—probably because I was crap at it. “Do you want me to shoot him for you?” I finally offered.

  “What?” Pilar popped up straight. “No! No no no no, Cas, no. No, I do not want you to go shoot the guy the police already took to jail—oh my gosh, I can’t even tell if you were kidding. You were kidding, right? Wait, don’t tell me, I don’t want to know!” She threw her arms dramatically over her head, covering her ears.

  My mouth quirked in something like a smile. “Well, if you change your mind, just text me.”

  She dropped her arms and heaved a sigh. “You know what the craziest part of all this is? I’ve honestly been enjoying learning it all. The part that isn’t at people, I mean—all the lessons we’ve been doing and stuff. I’ve really liked it. But if I’m going to carry like you and Arthur, I have to think about all the rest of it, and I just, I don’t know.”

  “You realize I’m not the best person to ask about all this, right?” I said.

  “Yeah, I do,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “Hey, um. Will you take me out again tomorrow? Just to I want to see how I feel.”

  “Sure,” I said. “Are we done now? I have to go threaten someone.”

  Pilar made a face and shooed me away.

  ***

  My client didn’t allow anyone to go before him armed. I’d balked back when he’d first asked to meet, but he’d been offering a lot of money. A lot of money.

  And now
I needed to get in front of him again to make him pay it. This time, after I made a few creative threats regarding what I would do if they didn’t let me in to see him, his goons not only took my Colt but marched me in at gunpoint. That was not a good sign. They did miss the knife in my boot, though, so “unarmed” was a relative term.

  I stood in the center of the room, surrounded by six goons and facing where my client was seated in an absurdly large chair. He was an extremely small man, so I wondered if he did that on purpose, to rub it in people’s faces that he didn’t care.

  “I got you your gemstones,” I said, skipping the pleasantries. “And now you’re dodging me. We had an agreement.”

  He twiddled his fingers.

  “They’re nearby,” I said. “You show me the money and we can walk there.”

  “Well, see,” he said. “You don’t have my gemstones, actually.”

  I narrowed my eyes.

  “I might have let your ego think you were the only one working for me, but you were not. I told you how savvy this family is. They used several couriers, by sea and land and air. Only one transferred the real stones, the rest traveling with fakes, so the ones you have are worth perhaps fifty dollars.”

  My skin began to tingle with anger. “You knew this.”

  “I knew their setup, not who had the real stones. I doubt even the couriers knew. But one of the other talented and unscrupulous people I hired brought me the correct package earlier today. So you have nothing to offer me, and frankly, I am unwilling to pay for nothing.”

  And nobody else would be, either. He was leaving me without even something I could fence. “We had an agreement,” I said again. “That agreement was for the retrieval of the jewels on that boat, and that’s exactly what I did. You wanted this to be contingent on what they were worth, you should have told me what the fuck I was looking for and given me all the information. I went and got what you commissioned me to get, and that means you’re still going to give me my fee.”

  “Or what?” He smiled.

  “Or I’ll make you,” I said evenly.

  The goon with the gun to my head raised it slightly. Another few put their hands on the butts of their own weapons.

  “Draw those and I’ll kill you,” I said.

  “I’ve heard about you,” said my client. “I’ve heard you make life very difficult for people you don’t like.”

  “That’s right.”

  “And knowing that, what would you have me do?” He gave me an elaborate shrug, grinning. “It was stupid of you to come here. Good-bye, dear.”

  Pilar had talked about guns giving people power. In this case, it’s what gave them a fighting chance.

  The man with the pistol on me tightened his finger on the trigger, but the moment it tripped I wasn’t in line with the muzzle anymore. The slipstream of the bullet whizzed by, tickling my skin as I dove in close to the shooter. Fear engulfed his eyes. My foot came up to my hand as I pivoted, my fingers diving into my boot, and I hesitated for the barest instant—four hundred fifty-one days, four hundred fifty-one days—but fuck it, I was just so tired, and there were seven people here who wanted to kill me and leaving any one of them with enough life to pull a trigger while I took care of the rest it wasn’t fun, wasn’t moral, wasn’t an interesting challenge; it was just fucking stupid.

  I twisted my hand and buried my knife between my would-be killer’s ribs.

  Behind me, everyone else went for their weapons.

  Twelve seconds later, I stood in the midst of the blood and bodies, the floor a red slick around my feet, my face and hands smeared with it.

  Four hundred fifty-one days since I had killed someone.

  I’d been honest when talking to Pilar: I didn’t feel a thing.

  ***

  My job at an abrupt and unexpected end, I made a beeline for the nearest bar and knocked back six tumblers of whiskey.

  I’d retrieved my Colt before leaving the scene. Its weight at the small of my back braced me.

  “Is that blood?” the young bartender ventured as he served me the fifth drink. Brave of him. “You okay, man?”

  “It’s not mine,” I said, before I realized that probably wasn’t reassuring. “I was in a car accident,” I added.

  I winced after I said it, but he must have thought the fake over-loudness was because of the booze or shock or something. He gave me a sympathetic nod and a “that sucks, man” and poured me another whiskey. “On the house.”

  I hated it when people tried to talk to me. I finished the alcohol and left without tipping the bartender.

  ***

  I walked for a while, letting the buzz simmer in my veins. What did it mean, that I’d just ended the lives of seven people after over a year of avoiding it and I didn’t feel anything about it at all? Except, maybe, relief—relief that I didn’t have to try anymore, that it was over, that I’d inevitably fallen back down where I belonged and no longer had to wait apprehensively for when that day would happen.

  I wrapped my jacket around myself tighter.

  Arthur would be pissed.

  He’d make me feel bad about the whole thing, wouldn’t he, in that indefinable way Arthur had that made me feel shitty about myself even when he hadn’t said anything.

  It all sounded so tiring. I was so tired. So tired of living up to someone else’s standards.

  My phone buzzed. It was a text message from Checker. UR JOB DONE? GAME NITE 2NITE U IN?

  Where did they get off, expecting me to be a normal fucking person? I wasn’t normal. Time to stop fucking pretending.

  I deleted the text message.

  Then, ignoring a BAC that made it very illegal to get behind a wheel at this moment, I stole a car and went to buy a crate full of cheap vodka. I drove to the apartment I’d been living out of and, having freed myself of Arthur’s challenge, set myself a new one: finish the entire box of vodka that night.

  ***

  I woke up to the smell of my own vomit and Pilar holding a glass of water to my lips.

  “Here, drink,” her voice said.

  “Go away,” I slurred.

  Her hands moved, wiping my face with a wet towel. I meant to shove her away, but I didn’t.

  “You’re not breathing too slow and your temperature’s normal,” she said matter-of-factly, “and now you’re responsive, so I don’t think you’re in any danger. Did you take anything other than alcohol?”

  “What, are you a doctor now?” I asked snidely.

  She hesitated for a beat. “No. My mom was an alcoholic. Is. Is an alcoholic. But she manages it now.”

  “I’m not an alcoholic,” I said.

  “Oh, trust me, I know,” she answered. “You’re just a mess.” She pressed the water on me again. I took it this time.

  “What are you doing here, anyway?” I demanded, when I’d managed as many sips as my rioting stomach would allow. My head was starting to clang, a lot, and the light in the flat was way too bright, even though the blinds were shut.

  “You’re welcome,” Pilar said, taking the water glass back from me. “We were supposed to go out shooting today, remember? It’s not like you to miss without letting me know, and nobody’d heard from you. I figured I should check.”

  “So you broke into my apartment.”

  “Well, you weren’t answering. And Tabitha’s been teaching me to pick locks.”

  “Who’s Tabitha?”

  “Oh! Um. Just a friend.”

  I wasn’t interested anyway. “Don’t do that shit. If I’d been awake I would’ve shot you.”

  “I knocked and called out first, obviously,” Pilar said. “Besides, come on. You wouldn’t risk breaking your streak.”

  My streak.

  I let my head fall back. I was on the floor. Next to my couch. I didn’t remember falling off the couch.

  Whatever.

  “Oh,” Pilar said, once again proving I had no poker face. “Oh, Cas. I’m sorry.”

  “I’m not,” I said.

&nbsp
; I was pretty sure the ensuing silence was awkward, but I wanted Pilar to go away too badly to notice it much. Instead I tried to focus on breathing through the clanging in my head without throwing up.

  Fuck. The familiar weight at my belt was missing. I wondered how I hadn’t noticed right away. Something like that almost always would have woken me instantly and with great prejudice, but then, the same went for someone breaking into my apartment.

  I’d knocked myself out pretty good this time.

  “You took my gun,” I said. I meant it to be accusing, but I wasn’t sure I managed.

  “Of course I did,” Pilar said. “I didn’t want you to wake up and shoot me accidentally. Or, like, fall on it and shoot yourself. You should really keep the safety on.”

  “Fuck you,” I said. “I’m the one who taught you what a safety is. Where is it?”

  “On the table. Unloaded.”

  “Fuck you,” I said again.

  “Have some more water,” she answered.

  “No.” I said it just to be childish. I was definitely dehydrated.

  “Can I help you back up on the couch?”

  “Don’t need help.” And now I was just being petty.

  “Please have some more water.” Pilar curled one of my hands around the glass.

  I lay there limp. Pilar stayed kneeling beside me for another few minutes, then got up and started moving around my apartment. Cleaning, by the sound of it. Empty bottles clinked into piles, and the faucet ran intermittently between her footsteps.

  The floor was, in fact, terribly uncomfortable, and I wanted my Colt back, but moving sounded like a ridiculous idea. I managed to sit up a little and drink a few more sips of water before my stomach revolted and bucked and I vomited into the glass. It didn’t make me feel better.

  Pilar came and took the glass and then brought me a fresh cup of water, along with a damp towel. “Want me to hold your hair and rub your back?” she asked.

  She wasn’t very good at mocking me; it was too obvious she was trying not to be amused. I shot her as poisonous a look as I could muster and winced when it hurt my head. “You haven’t known me long enough for that,” I said.

  “Oh, I think cleaning up your puke skips me ahead.”