Moondogs - Alexander Yates [82]
“Well, I just got here,” Benicio said. “And I haven’t read any newspapers, yet.”
“They don’t tell you about it back home?” There was surprise in Ping’s expression, but none of it in his voice. “They don’t tell you that your army has troops fighting in our country? Against our constitution. You didn’t know that? Our constitution says no armed foreign troops, but you are here, and you are foreign, and you are armed.”
“I’m not anywhere,” Benicio said.
“Cop-out!” Baby Cookie singsonged from across the table.
“That’s right,” Ping said. “Everybody’s somewhere. Everybody’s either active or complicit. Are you going to tell me that you only use that harsh judgment on daddy?”
Benicio leaned closer to him, trying his best to steady his voice. “If you’re trying to pick a fight, you’ll get one.”
“Oh, that’s classic.” Ping was uncowed. “That’s your answer to everything, isn’t it? You sure know how to be nasty, don’t you? Tell us, nasty—why, after so many years, have you finally decided to grace your father with a visit? What caused this sudden generosity of spirit?”
“Guys,” Bobby interrupted, “enough. It’s a happy night, and you’re all officially in violation of the no-assholes policy I’ve just instituted.”
“We’re not being assholes,” Ping said. “We’re talking about them. There’s a difference. And don’t pretend you don’t feel the same way.”
“You don’t know what I feel,” Bobby said. “So don’t try to guess.”
This caused an awkward silence to descend on the table. When Ping started talking again it was, ostensibly, just about politics. Benicio went to the bathroom to wash his face and cool off, but when he got back they were still at it. Bobby’s friends hopped between topics like reliable stones in a frequently crossed stream. Iraq. Trade and unfair trade and downright evil trade. Global warming and the poisoning of the world. Iraq. All those crazy whack-jobs with wide brimmed hats who need gun racks to hold all their guns because they have so many guns. Iraq. Benicio didn’t even try to participate. He sensed with a kind of articulate drunk certainty that they wouldn’t have let him share in the warmth of a common opinion even if he had one and wanted to. Instead he watched the stage, where Katrina was in an open-mouth kiss with the microphone, mangling something from Paul Simon—diamonds on the shoals of her choose. She paused to wink at him, as if to say: I may be hamming it up now, but it’s a choice. I can also be very serious. Looking at her, he felt angry and drunk and a little turned on. He decided it was time to go.
“Off so soon?” Ping said as Benicio got up, even though it wasn’t soon—he’d been out and drinking for hours. “I guess it’s easier not to listen, right? I mean we’ve hardly touched the good stuff. Guantánamo and—”
He fell into shocked silence as Benicio reached over and fished the pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of his black dress shirt. He opened the pack and turned it upside-down, sending the cigarettes rolling across the table, some tumbling down to the dirty floor and others waylaid in pools of condensation around the bases of warming San Miguels. “Anyone have a pen?” Benicio asked. Bobby handed him a ballpoint and he wrote, Suggestion Box, USA, on the front of the now-empty pack. He held it up so Ping could read it. “Tell you what,” he said. “Just write down everything I miss. Put it all on little strips of paper, and put the paper in the box. Then, when I go back home, I can share your thoughts with everyone. I’ll go door to fucking door.”
Bobby, and even Baby Cookie laughed at this. Ping looked from Benicio, to the floor, to Benicio. “What’s wrong with you?” he asked. “Those were my cigs.”
“I’m sorry about this,” Benicio said to Bobby. “Thanks for inviting me out.”
Ping stood and took him roughly by the collar. “Those were my cigs,” he said.
“Let go of me.”
Ping let loose a string of Tagalog words that Benicio couldn’t understand, punctuated by a spit-flecked and familiar “Puta!” He brought his open palm to Benicio’s cheek—not quite