Swan Dive

pray Terdell, he don’t fart till we in some fresh air.” Terdell chuckled, saying, ”Which one you want me to hit him with?”
    I said, ”Which one?”
    ”Terdell, he name his farts, so I can pick one. His favorite is the Doctor J fart.”
    ”The what?”
    Terdell said, ”The Doctor J fart. On account it hang in the air so long.”
    I said to J.J., ”How do you stand him?”
    ”Terdell and me, we the perfect team, mon. The candy, it just about wipe out my sense of smell, and Terdell, he just can’t help himself, that the way he is.” We were riding along Columbus Avenue , roughly paralleling the transit system’s Southwest Corridor subway construction effort. ”Where are we going?”
    ”Don’t be too anxious to find out.”
    Terdell left Columbus and started using streets whose identifying signs were long gone. A couple of the blocks looked like news footage of West Beirut . The traffic around us began to lighten. After another ten minutes, I was pretty sure we were past the city limits. Then Terdell swerved onto a dirt road that had a lot of deep ruts, like heavy trucks make. After two hundred yards of bouncing and yawing, we pulled into a construction area and Terdell brought the Mercedes to a halt about twenty feet from a poorly lit drop-off.
    Terdell got out, drew his weapon, and opened my door. I climbed out my side, J.J. out his.
    J.J. looked around, smiled, and said, ”Start walking,” gesturing with his Colt in the direction of the slope.
    I moved to the brink, stood sideways, and started down the incline in that hopping, stable way they teach you in basic training. My shoes immediately began to fill with dirt and pebbles. At the bottom of the slope I could see huge concrete pipes, six or eight feet in diameter, some connected with each other at forty-five or ninety-degree angles, some just lying separate, as though a giant’s child had tired of the game. Terdell followed me down while J.J. drew a bead on me from up top. When Terdell could keep his gun steady on me again, J.J. came down. Careful and professional. Bad omens.
    ”Over there,” said J.J.
    We walked to an area near the apparent entrance to the pipe system. There were some makeshift benches, with broken tools, pieces of lumber, crushed tonic cans, and other debris lying around.
    I glanced back at J.J. The car was out of sight behind the top of the slope. ”I think Terdell forgot the picnic basket.”
    J.J. said, ”Word on the street say you in good with the Boston police. Wouldn’t do for us to have our talk where they got sway.”
    Terdell edged around to my right, still holding his gun.
    I said to J.J., ”What was it you wanted to talk about?”
    ”Mon, you can’t figure that out, you in for a long evening.”
    Terdell kept moving, now just out of my peripheral vision. I heard him bending and scuffling with something on the ground. I pivoted, but Terdell was already swinging a five-foot section of two-by-four that caught me on the right side, belt high. I went down like the knight in Ivanhoe who’s supposed to lose.
    I inhaled deeply. No pain yet, just numbness on the side. I tested my right leg. It seemed to flex normally. J.J. said, ”You ready to talk with us now?”
    ”Ask your questions.”
    ”Why you do my mon Marsh?”
    ”I didn’t.”
    ”Terdell.”
    I was up a half-count too slow, expecting Terdell to go for the home run stroke again. Instead, he used the wood the right way, jabbing like a riot baton into my solar plexus.
    I fell backward, staring up at the night sky and making oomph noises while I tried to remember how to get the breathing muscles working again.
    J.J. said, ”Terdell, he can do this all night.”
    ”All week,” said Terdell.
    ”Now, why you ice my mon Marsh?”
    ”Set up... don’t know who...”
    J.J. shook his head. ”Before I turn Terdell up another notch, let me explain to you what it is, slick. Marsh, he a piece of shit. He snort like a pig, and fuck like a goat. But he my piece of shit. And he have my stuff on him like two hours before he got the deads. I know, because I give it to him. And that means the dude who did him has my stuff now. And I want it.”
    ”You want to... hear me out... or just raise blisters... on Babe Ruth here?”
    J.J. uncocked the Colt and scratched his ear with the front sight. ”Talk. I like what I hear, might be you get a break.”
    I levered up on one elbow, which seemed to open my lungs a little more. ”I never met Marsh till Friday