Six Bad Things_ A Novel - Charlie Huston [94]
I point at the TV.
—We should be listening to this.
Rolf waves his hand.
—Dude, he’s just all, blah blah blah, jurisdiction, blah, good work of local authorities, blah, nobody panic ’cause I’m in charge now, blah.
Tate indicates a video monitor behind him and the camera zooms in on it. The image is fuzzy; a TV image of a TV image of a bad photo, but it’s still easy to recognize Sid in his driver’s license picture.
SID STARES at the picture of himself on the TV. After a few moments, they pull back to the shot of Tate talking at the podium, then cut back to the studio, then to a graphic showing an outline of Nevada with a series of concentric circles centered on Las Vegas. Something swirls up out of the dot that represents Vegas. It resolves into my NYC booking photo and is followed by another swirl that becomes Sid’s photo. Then letters are smashed down below them one by one, as if by a giant, red-inked typewriter: WANTED. And cut to an antacid commercial.
I look at Sid. He looks at me. And nods his head, like some suspicion he has long held has at last been proven true.
Rolf stands up.
—And on that note, dudes, I’ll be using the can.
He heads off down the hall.
Sid and I sit next to each other, the TV still on, silently trying to sell us things. He reaches across me for the remote, picks it up, and turns the TV off.
He pulls his gun from his waistband. It’s an older model Colt .45, a Gold Cup target pistol. It’s a good gun, accurate and powerful, not the kind of thing you get off the street, but a tool you buy because you know its quality. He sets it on the coffee table and stares at the floor, elbows on knees, head hanging.
—I thought about what you said, about killing people being wrong. And, dude, it’s not like I don’t know that. I know people are, like, all sacred and life is a special thing. A gift? It doesn’t have to be from God or anything, it can just be that life is this gift from the universe and it’s special because, as far as we know, there isn’t any more of it, so it’s really, really rare. And what you do with your life? What you do with this gift, dude, that, like, totally makes you who you are. I really believe that. But. I don’t think that makes killing people wrong? ’Cause if our lives are gifts, are special, then all lives are, whether it’s a bug or a cow or whatever, and we kill them all the time. So death and killing is just a part of life, a part of the universe whether God made it, or whatever, it’s just this natural thing. And some things, dude? Some animals? They kill, that’s what they do, and it just makes them what they are? And people? We’re just animals. So why shouldn’t some of us be killers? Why can’t that be just what makes some of us who we are? So I really kind of think you may not be right, and killing people isn’t “wrong.” It’s just a thing some people do.
I look at the gun. I could make a grab for it. Grab the gun while Sid is listless, his eyes on the floor. I’ll have to shoot Sid. Grab the gun, shoot Sid in the top of his head, run down the hall, and shoot Rolf while he’s still trying to get his pants up from around his ankles. I know what it looks like when people get shot, what it feels like to shoot them. I have experience with sudden violence. And violence is like anything else, the more you do it, the more you get used to it. And the better you are at it. I could make the grab and kill them both. But I don’t. Because I think I’m gonna need them.
Also, I’m afraid of Sid.
ROLF IS just coming out of the john when the phone rings again. He runs down the hall and stands in the middle of the living room. Sid picks up his gun and tucks it back in his pants. I flip the phone open and look at the clock. It’s about forty-five minutes since the first call.
—Wade?
—Hey, Sandy.
—Hey, hey look.
—Where’s T?
—Oh, baby, he passed out. You really should have come over.
I think about T while I listen to her light a cigarette. I try to imagine him passing out with anything but an elephant tranquilizer stuck in his neck. Not likely. Sandy exhales.