Little Village vs. NaNoWriMo: Day 9

…

It wasn’t a situation I would have chosen to put myself in, double-crossing Rosso and exiled to Iowa trying to work a new angle with the creepy dentist, but I have to admit that I was starting to feel a little intrigued and not too bad about the whole thing. I wanted out of this business, and this looked like an out. That, and not being sure who to trust, I had to default to Stan. I knew him the most, I had him now at least under fairly close surveillance what with us shacking up together in Melissa and Amy’s, and, being the smallest fish in the current fishbowl, seemed the least able to really do one over on me. Much as I disliked the Mad Dentist, I was ready to –cautiously– follow Stan’s lead.

“Alright, Stan,” I said. “I’ll stick around and see how this dentist thing plays out. But you’ve got to tell me you’re done with all this alibi business. I want you to be straight with me from now on.”

“You know it, Stash,” he said.

“Could you be a little less flip?” I asked.

“Jesus, Lenny,” Stan said. “Yeah, I hear you. I’ll be straight with you from now on. We’re partners.”

“No alibis,” I said.

“No alibis,” he said.

“Straight, I said.

“Straight as Focus on the Family,” Stan said.

And I started to feel just a little hope. What if this was my big break? What if my debts were paid? I started thinking about the things I’d do if I made enough on this dentist thing to retire from organized crime. I could just paint houses, plain and simple, no feeling like a liar when anyone asked me what I do for a living. I could make an honest living. And the truth was, I even kind of liked painting. I’d gotten the job initially as an easy cover-up, that was true, but over time the physical act of painting had become a kind of stress reliever for me, climbing those ladders above where anyone could talk to me, getting some time alone to think as I coated the boards and windowsills to be like new again. My mom’s house could use a coat. I could show up and surprise her one day while she was pulling a double; she’d return home in her broken down Rabbit and the whole front side would be crisp and fresh as laundry straight from the dryer. I could finally get a little time on the weekend to take Carol somewhere like she’d been bitching at me to do. A “bed and breakfast” she said she wanted to stay in, for a little “relaxation.” A few days earlier I’d have been gagging at the idea of spending more than five minutes among those quilts and doilies and frittatas, but my optimism at that moment was so high I felt like I could appreciate anything if I could just get out for good after the dentist gig was up.

My head must have still been in the clouds when we walked into the dentist’s place. Otherwise, I might have noticed the dream was over before a fist knocked Stan flat on his back and then came for me.

I ducked and grabbed the dentist by the arm.

“What now?” I asked.

The dentist jerked his head back towards his kitchen island where an open laptop was emitting a hot pink glow.

“We have a problem,” he said.

“I’ll say we do. You just punched my partner out.”

The dentist shook loose and I put my hand out for Stan, who was looking like he wasn’t expecting this particular wild card, either. He was staring at the dentist like his whole mouth had been numbed.

So much for following Stan’s lead on this one, I thought.

“Mind telling me what the hell is going on?” I asked.

He pointed again at the pink-lit computer.

“Your kid is talking,” the dentist said.

“What?” I asked.

“The brilliant sidekick you brought to try to bag me. He apparently couldn’t keep his mouth shut about your exciting adventures and told his girlfriend. And his girlfriend is telling all her friends.”

“How do you know all this?”

“Surveillance,” the dentist said. “Who do you take me for, Mr. Cervetti? I’ve got eyes and ears on everyone who has even the smallest speck of information. And believe me, I realize that kid doesn’t know much, generally speaking, but with regards to myself and my current operations, he’s a threat.”

“Lenny,” I said. “We went over that before.”

The doc sneered and slid the computer towards me.

I looked at the screen. It was an email.

First the cell phones, and now intercepting electronic mail. The Doc certainly was tech-savvy.

“I don’t think I need to tell you what fury will reign if Rosso gets word of your whereabouts,” he said.

I read the email:

“So it was Monday night. I totally remember because Gossip Girl was on, which is totally my fave show. It was the episode where Chuck hosts a “Saints and Sinners” party, the fancy costume kind where everyone wears masks. What is it called? …Oh, a masquerade party! Yeah, I remember now, because it totally sounds like “masks” and that’s what you wear! Duh! Anyways, Gossip Girl was on and Blair was in that gorgeous little red satin slip dress with those sheer black patterned tights– too pretty! Especially with how it really brought out the red tones in her hair, which is totally auburn, I don’t care what Jenny says, she is totally color blind that girl. Anyways, I was just drooling over that dress, you know, right into the bowl of strawberries in my lap, because that’s my thing now, strawberries, I get a big bowl of strawberries and a little bowl of sugar and I put the fan on me so I stay nice and cool and I dip the strawberries in the sugar and eat them while I watch TV. And my phone buzzes and I’m like totally going to ignore it because whatever I’m chillaxin and it’s sort of been a rough day because I had a math test and, well, I study, I really do, but math is just not my thing, I mean, it is really hard, and on top of that I got my period right in the middle of the test– can you believe it? But so anyways I look down at my phone totally ready to just ignore it and get back to Gossip Girl when I see the name lit up on the screen and it’s Kevin’s house number. Which is weird because, I’m thinking, Why isn’t he calling me on his cell? Like, what? Land line? Who uses their land line? I don’t even know why I have that number in my phone. I think maybe he put it in there once when his cell died and he gave his mom my number. So I’m staring at the phone looking at Kevin’s land line number on the screen and being totally confused and then I get scared, I think, Oh my god, what if there’s been an accident? Like my mind starts racing with all these horrible scenerios and images of Kevin like broken in half with a crane on top of him or like stuck suffocating in cement like that one time on Grey’s Anatomy. See, Kevin had told me he was leaving with his mom’s weird fat boyfriend So I picked up. And it was Kevin’s mom so like my heart was totally frozen in fear. And I’m like, Hello? Carol? Did something happen? And there’s this long pause and she says, Hi, Nicki, nothing’s wrong, I’m just calling to see if you want to come with me to pick Kevin up? Lenny has to stay on in Iowa City and can’t bring him back. So I think that’s weird, but I say okay because sure, whatever, I want to see him ASAP and oh you know I think Carol sometimes gets lonely or something. And we drive the whole way almost totally silent. Not that we have a lot to say to each other or anything, but it seems weird. She looks worried, you know? Like, her makeup and hair are kind of messy, she seems distracted. But I think maybe things between she and Lenny aren’t going so hot, something happened maybe, and I don’t think anything about it. And we get Kevin at this big truck stop, which is totally weird and huge and hicked out and gross and Carol tries to buy me a burger and I remind her for like the thousandth time that I’m on the Cameron Diaz detox fast right now. Even if I wasn’t, though, like seriously: no way was I eating there. Like, who knows what they have in that country water? But like Kevin doesn’t look all that happy to see me. He’s all quiet and distracted like his mom. And I thought at first, Oh my god, he’s still mad about me and Chad Buman. And I don’t want to talk about it when his mom is in earshot, right? So I wait the whole car ride and we go back to his house and put in a movie and finally his mom goes upstairs to go to bed and then he suddenly turns to me and starts whispering real fast about how he wasn’t really on a construction job and Lenny is shaking people down for money and they were supposed to collect from this kind of crazy dentist guy but like they messed up and he was all tied up and roofied and Lenny had a heart attack or something and Kevin doesn’t even know if he’s alive. And I was like, Shouldn’t you go to the cops? And he said that like duh the cops can’t do anything, this is real professional criminal shit, and that I can’t say anything to anyone about any of it, but of course he knew I’d tell you, Betsy.”

“I need her shut up,” the dentist said.

And then shit really hit the fan.