four MARGARET part 7
I checked my bag and case and used the last of Vincent’s cash to buy gum mints and trashy magazines full of surveys, numbered lists of allegedly crucial sex tips.
I was circling answers to a pop quiz about my vagina when Vincent sat beside me, fresh haircut, shaved clean for the first time in months, smelling like chewed Altoids and a few too many beers. His old suit fit him well.
Can you believe this? he asked. He’d already drank enough to be loud and was well on his way to being annoying.
Years of nothing okay? Years of shit and now your fuckin’ friend hooks us up with another shot. It’s like a movie.
He squeezed my arm, much too hard, handled me way too familiar.
I twisted away, checked my volume. Glared and selected the right tone to remind him we were over.
Vincent. You need to shut the fuck up right now.
He shrank from me theatrically, smiled and whispered:
I got recognized. Here at the bar. Guy taps me on the shoulder and he’s sitting right next to me playing “Owen” on his phone. Says his wife forwarded our song to him, he just flew in from Denver. He took a picture with me, bought me a beer and then the bartender played it and now she’s a fan.
I put down my magazine, looked him in the eye. Saw the cranks and levers going, confirmed the other Vincent was loose in there like a coked-up squirrel running laps inside a hot tumble dryer.
What the fuck was I thinking? This experience was going to feed and inflate everything about Vincent. Hang an exponent over his unknown sums, good and bad. I vowed on the spot that I was not going to ride shotgun on this adventure. Win or lose I was damn sure going to drive starting right fucking now.
He rolled on babbling as I nodded and stood. I took his hand and led him from the seating area to a private corner. Pushed him with my fingertips into a quaking pane of glass and felt thunder from burning jet engines blasting against the terminal through his ribs, into my arms, up the backs of my legs.
Anger compressed my eyes to dry diamond points and I let him know:
You absolutely have to understand this Vincent. We’ll never share a room. We’re not even sitting together on this flight.
I shuttled my hands across the space between us, fanning a cloud of exhaled alcohol and peppermint and I reminded him:
This? Us? Performing together? The only way it’s going to last, the only successful model we can follow is to run this like a business okay? Okay. So this is a business decision. We’re co-workers and that’s it. Colleagues. Nothing more.
He looked at me, affect flat. His gaze transmitted bloodshot blue-eyed static.
I reached up and put my hand around the base of his throat. Saw a torn-open DHL courier envelope stuffed inside his jacket pocket, identical to the one that delivered our E.U. work permits and my own per-diem debit card from the promoter that morning.
I was pleased he’d made it here on his own, arrived early in fact. He still had his new phone and the screen wasn’t broken yet. These were good signs but I had to know I was getting through to him.
I pressed the web of my left hand against Vincent’s throat and leaned in. Stood taller on my toes and pushed harder.
Vincent’s eyes went red, ran wet. When I had his full attention I said:
Can we do business, Vincent? Get out of debt, make some cash on top of that and get ahead? Behave like professional artists, maybe make some connections? Can you grow the fuck up and keep your shit together for sixty-five days and do business with me?
He nodded. Smiled like maybe he understood.
I stood down and let him breathe while I pulled my contract from my purse. I pressed the stapled pages into his chest.
Now he leered.
I’m not signing this without read-
I shoved him, bounced the back of his head off the tempered glass. I wanted to squeeze his throat again, pinch and probe until I found some part of Vincent healthy enough for me to hurt. Discover any remaining afferent systems still reliably wired and kept up to code.
So go sit down and read it, Vincent.
I went back for my carry-on and magazine. Moved to a seat between two families and counted off ten deep breaths. Finished my quiz, grateful to disengage my brain from the week I’d just endured.
©2017 J.R. Schaefers — all rights reserved