being again. You were a good one once. You just forgot the steps.”
Mike leaned forward and his eyes blazed at me with rancor. “I got news for you, Jack. You ain’t the captain of all the teams anymore. High school’s over and let’s face it, little Mike’s doing better than anybody. From
People
magazine to
Who’s Who
to Oscar night, Michael Hess is someone to be reckoned with in the world of film. All of us at this table’ve done damn well. Ledare writes her celebrated screenplays. You write cookbooks for fat tourists and a couple of travel books to tell assholes how to get to the Sistine Chapel. But I win the sweepstakes.”
“Please shut up, Mike,” Ledare said. “Listen to yourself. Bragging about being in
People
magazine for God’s sake. It’s too pathetic.”
“I’ll say what I want to say. Look at Jack. So self-righteous and smug. For what, Jack? For what goddamn reason? You burn the check up like you’re Francis of fucking Assisi. But here’s what I’ve learned, pal. I make that check large enough, I keep adding the figures, and eventually I’ll hit the price when you go to your knees and give me a blow job.”
“You’re gonna be writing a long time before you hit that number, Mike,” I replied, smiling in an attempt to defuse the tension at the table. But Mike seemed hell-bent to continue the frontal assault.
“You sneer at me. You sneer at Capers Middleton, whose only sin is trying to make South Carolina a better place to live. We may not live up to your high fucking standards, Jack, but none of our wives ever went up on the bridge. All of our girls are still walkingaround with their Gucci bags and credit cards. None of them had to be fished out of the river. Sorry to be so blunt, ol’ pal. But those are the facts.”
I closed my eyes and did not open them until I felt under control. I wanted to lunge across the table at Mike and beat his face in until my fist ran with his blood. Then I thought about Leah and Shyla and did not respond to Mike’s attack.
“Go ahead, Jack,” Ledare said calmly. “Kill him. He deserves it.”
“I’m sorry,” Mike said suddenly. “Jesus, I’m sorry, Jack. That wasn’t me that said that. Open your eyes. You can see remorse written all over me. R-E-M-O-R-S-E. Remorse. As pure as it comes. I swear to you, Jack. That wasn’t me talking. No one loved Shyla more than I did. You gotta give me that.”
I opened my eyes and said, “I give you that. You loved Shyla and that’s the only reason I’m not drowning your sorry ass in the Grand Canal.”
“Let me drown his ass,” said Ledare. “Boys get to have all the fun.”
“Great line,” Mike said. “Write it down and I’ll get it typed up in the morning. That’ll go in the screenplay.”
The evening ended. As we walked back to the Gritti Palace, Mike tried to undo the damage and was perfectly charming and even made me laugh a little.
I said nothing and contented myself with listening to Mike. I knew him well enough to understand that jokes and laughter were part of his elaborate ritual of apology. But beneath my laughter, my mind was spinning. I had to return to Rome to warn Jordan Elliott that Mike Hess was hot on his trail.
Chapter Five
I drove Martha to the Rome airport, and once there she checked and rechecked her tickets to South Carolina as soldiers from the Italian Army walked by her carrying machine guns.
“I’ll never get used to all these machine guns in airports,” she said.
“It cuts down on shoplifting,” I said. “Let me buy you a cappuccino here. They won’t let me go to the gate with you.”
“Because of terrorism.”
“I guess. The Red Brigade’s about petered out. But the PLO’s still frisky. Libya’s making noise. The IRA’s around. Even a liberation movement in Corsica.”
“Why do you live here with all this going on?”
“Wasn’t Atlanta the murder capital of the U.S. last year?”
“Yes, but the airport’s perfectly safe,” she said.
We
Mike leaned forward and his eyes blazed at me with rancor. “I got news for you, Jack. You ain’t the captain of all the teams anymore. High school’s over and let’s face it, little Mike’s doing better than anybody. From
People
magazine to
Who’s Who
to Oscar night, Michael Hess is someone to be reckoned with in the world of film. All of us at this table’ve done damn well. Ledare writes her celebrated screenplays. You write cookbooks for fat tourists and a couple of travel books to tell assholes how to get to the Sistine Chapel. But I win the sweepstakes.”
“Please shut up, Mike,” Ledare said. “Listen to yourself. Bragging about being in
People
magazine for God’s sake. It’s too pathetic.”
“I’ll say what I want to say. Look at Jack. So self-righteous and smug. For what, Jack? For what goddamn reason? You burn the check up like you’re Francis of fucking Assisi. But here’s what I’ve learned, pal. I make that check large enough, I keep adding the figures, and eventually I’ll hit the price when you go to your knees and give me a blow job.”
“You’re gonna be writing a long time before you hit that number, Mike,” I replied, smiling in an attempt to defuse the tension at the table. But Mike seemed hell-bent to continue the frontal assault.
“You sneer at me. You sneer at Capers Middleton, whose only sin is trying to make South Carolina a better place to live. We may not live up to your high fucking standards, Jack, but none of our wives ever went up on the bridge. All of our girls are still walkingaround with their Gucci bags and credit cards. None of them had to be fished out of the river. Sorry to be so blunt, ol’ pal. But those are the facts.”
I closed my eyes and did not open them until I felt under control. I wanted to lunge across the table at Mike and beat his face in until my fist ran with his blood. Then I thought about Leah and Shyla and did not respond to Mike’s attack.
“Go ahead, Jack,” Ledare said calmly. “Kill him. He deserves it.”
“I’m sorry,” Mike said suddenly. “Jesus, I’m sorry, Jack. That wasn’t me that said that. Open your eyes. You can see remorse written all over me. R-E-M-O-R-S-E. Remorse. As pure as it comes. I swear to you, Jack. That wasn’t me talking. No one loved Shyla more than I did. You gotta give me that.”
I opened my eyes and said, “I give you that. You loved Shyla and that’s the only reason I’m not drowning your sorry ass in the Grand Canal.”
“Let me drown his ass,” said Ledare. “Boys get to have all the fun.”
“Great line,” Mike said. “Write it down and I’ll get it typed up in the morning. That’ll go in the screenplay.”
The evening ended. As we walked back to the Gritti Palace, Mike tried to undo the damage and was perfectly charming and even made me laugh a little.
I said nothing and contented myself with listening to Mike. I knew him well enough to understand that jokes and laughter were part of his elaborate ritual of apology. But beneath my laughter, my mind was spinning. I had to return to Rome to warn Jordan Elliott that Mike Hess was hot on his trail.
Chapter Five
I drove Martha to the Rome airport, and once there she checked and rechecked her tickets to South Carolina as soldiers from the Italian Army walked by her carrying machine guns.
“I’ll never get used to all these machine guns in airports,” she said.
“It cuts down on shoplifting,” I said. “Let me buy you a cappuccino here. They won’t let me go to the gate with you.”
“Because of terrorism.”
“I guess. The Red Brigade’s about petered out. But the PLO’s still frisky. Libya’s making noise. The IRA’s around. Even a liberation movement in Corsica.”
“Why do you live here with all this going on?”
“Wasn’t Atlanta the murder capital of the U.S. last year?”
“Yes, but the airport’s perfectly safe,” she said.
We
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