“Morning, Russ.”
Monty’s looking chipper. When he turned up in the news as the victim of that brutal beating, we all trapsed down to the hospital to see him. Seeing us all looking half his age did the trick- he asked us if he could join in with whatever we were hatching!
Can’t blame him; Jane’s looking nice and perky, her hair a dark, slick jet-black with a few strands of gray in it. Jake’s out of the wheelchair, his hair almost all grown back except for a bald spot at the top he claimed he’s had since he was nineteen. Mitch looks- well, dang it, he looks sharp, like a lady killer if there ever was one. He’s got his hair back, too, plus his beer gut’s all but disappeared.
And me?
I can’t stop looking at my hands.
I can flex them without the pain that arthritis used to bring. They aren’t gnarled and crooked in a vain and fruitless attempt to stave off the pain that came if they twitched or were bumped.
I can walk, talk, urinate, excrete, all on my own. My hair is back, black, lookin’ good, jack, with just a touch of gray at my temples. Damn, maybe I should grow a pair of chops?
Nah. For now, I just love doing everything I can do with my hands. My fingers. I pick up the clicker and turn on the TV.
The news is on. One of the bigger new heroes in the city is the feature. Okay, she’s been around for a decade or more. But when you were in your prime back when they were dropping atom bombs on Hirohito and his gang, anything under a quarter-century is ‘new.’
“Who in the nine hells is this?” Monty asks, aghast. He looks like a man who’s date just ordered a burger, fries and coke from the waiter at a five-star restaurant, with the Queen of England sitting at the other end of the table.
“Eh, her name’s Gladiatrix. Says she fought in the Colosseum or something, and some goddess brought’er back to life to help women.” Jake’s trying to fill his voice with disdain, but it’s obvious he finds her attractive.
“But she’s African. The Colosseum is in Italy!” says Monty, like it matters.
I watched her fly around the city a bit. She looks cute in that outfit of hers, what with the spear, the bronze brasserie and the steel helmet and all. “I dunno, Monty. Maybe she was an import?”
“Pretty much,” said Mitch, strolling in. “She claimed in an interview that she was an African slave, sold to a Roman master who sold her again to some outfit to cover a debt. The outfit trained gladiators, and eventually she ended up fighting in Rome. She won a bunch of times, but Nero was a total bugger and ‘thumbs-downed’ her even though she’d won. Something about her spurning his advances.”
“And a Greek goddess brought her back to life?”
“Roman, actually. In the interview she said Juno, wife of Jupiter, brought her back to life to stop crimes against women, or something like that.”
“A lovely story, Mitchel. But if that were the case, why is she staying in America? Why not rip the burkas off of women in Saudi Arabia, or save them from being trafficked? Or mutilated in Muslim Africa?”
“Monty, are you always this much fun at a reunion?”
“Only when I’m right.”
“Meyah,” Jake says, walking in on his now two very strong legs. “I don’t care where she comes from or how good she speaks English. She just looks damn fine in that metal skirt o’hers. If she’s for women’s rights, I wish she’d fight for the right for the babes to go around topless.”
“Do you still let your groin dictate your political and domestic positions on the issues, Jacob?”
“Hell, yeah, Monty the mudeye!” Jake says, plopping himself onto one of the couches. He’s already got a half-finished drink in his hand. “When the broads up in New York were pushing to go topless, I backed ‘em all the way. You think I gave a shit about women’s rights? Hell, no! I just like seein’ a good set o’ boobs!”
“Geez, Jake, there’s a lady in the house. You’re sleeping in one of her rooms.”
“Aw, Mitch, if Jane thinks I’m bein’ an asshole she’ll tell me so- won’tcha, Jane?”
Jane’s walked in already, looking like she could be either a gal from the old Bonanza TV show in her Jeans, flannel shirt and boots, or maybe a pinup for ladies just entering middle age.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
“Alright, guys? Everyone’s here?”
“Everyone but Miguel. He comin’?”
“Nope, Russ. I found him and he’ll be helpin’, but he’s busy the next few days. It’s better if he stays outta the picture until his part in this comes up.”
“I’d like to the question the fairness of that last statement, dear Jane.” Monty again, standing and trying to look like some kind of elder statesman with a cup of Sanka in his hands. And you know, for a change he’s almost pulling it off. “Considering how he was treated at the conclusion of our victory against the National Bank, I’d posit that he deserves-”
“He deserved a decent share of the profits. An’ Monty, he’s gotten that. I found him a few years after and gave him a quarter mil, just like each of us got, plus a good ten grand outta my own pocket as a way of sayin’ sorry for the shit he hadda walk through. He was mighty happy that day, and now he runs a gym downtown to help keep punks off the street.”
“Well, that’s splendid. I do wish you’d availed us of this information; I spent the first decade or so after that job was finished looking over my shoulder, wondering if he was going to be popping out of the shadows and digging one of those signature claws into my neck.”
“You got nuthin’ to worry for, Monty. Now,” she says, looking around at us, “you guys ready to make some serious money?”
“Serious as a heart-attack, Janey girl. And thanks to you and that little blue rock-candy of yours, that’s one’a the last things I gotta worry about now.”
“Glad you liked it, Jake. Now, Here’s where the hooves meet the trail. Y’all siddown, while I get things in order.”
They all sat. I slumped in one of the deep couches next to Mitch, who’d sat close as he dared to Jane. Jacob, now out of his wheelchair, had still arrived in the stupid thing and surprised everybody by standing up once he’d gotten safely inside with the door shut and the blinds drawn.
Effin’ showoff, Mitch had thought to himself when he saw how much of a fuss Jane made over Jacob’s new ability to walk.
“We’re looking,” Jane said, “at stage one through three. We’re here to get rich, stinkin’ rich, each of us six-plus-zeroes rich, with one last job.”
“Foolproof, of course,” said Monty, reminding everyone how much they’d always disliked his sarcasm.
“Eh, nothing’s foolproof, Monty.” Jake said. “If you made something that was really foolproof, then only a fool’d use it, right?”
Everyone chuckled inside. Jake always was the quicker one, the one who could take the wind out on Monty’s sails.
“If we could focus, please?” Jane was getting more than a little frustrated, and it sounded in her voice.
The room was quiet. She turned to the screen and touched a button on the slide projector.
Three lines of text appeared on the first slide:
1.ACQUIRE CAPITAL
2.HIRE STOOGES
3.PRACTICE RUN
4.REAL THING
“Do you truly believe we’re going to acquire capital this easily?” Monty again.
“You ain’t,” Jane says calmly. “That’s gonna be Jake’s job, and Russ is gonna help.
“You sure I can’t be here, Chica?”
Miguel is at the door! Looks just a bit older than the twenty-something we knew back in the day, but he looks dressed to kill- like Edward James Olmos in the cop show set in Miami. White blazer, dark pants, shoes so white they look like were made of shiny vanilla ice cream. Damn. where’d he get his money from?
The whole crew was up. All up in seconds. Handshakes, hugs, all the rest. Not an ounce of awkwardness. Later, Jane will reveal that she’d told them how she’d made up with Miguel first before he dropped in, just to make sure no one worried that they’d get killed with a tigerclaw in their neck. The group hug is as much a happy release of tension as it is a greeting and an apology.
“Gentlemen, now that we’re all here . . .”
“Jane?” Russ again. “Is Bee coming?”
“Queen Bee can’t make it. And by that I mean she’s still married to that silver-stringed pansy-cop-husband of hers who used to pretend he knew how to ride a horse.”
“Did you even ask her?”
“Russ, you want the wife of a cop to know we’re getting the band back together? Nope. And doncha go tryin’ to hook her back in, niether. She’s gone over to the capes ‘long time back, and we all knows it. Even them’s what had a little crush on her.”
They were all quiet. All except Miguel, who started laughing.
“What?” says Mitch. “What’s so funny?”
“You guys! I was the only one who never let myself get all twisted up over Bee, and she’s the first thing you ask about when I walk in.”
“She’s not your type?”
“Oh, friend, she was my type. But I learned from my brother’s mistakes: getting mixed up with a crazy gringo woman was the stupidest thing a young chicano like me could do. When the breakup comes? She could yell you abused her in some way and life is one-and-done.”
“If we could focus?”
Jane’s voice suddenly filled the room. The cheerful banter stopped. Mitch looked at Jane and blushed three shades of red in less than ten seconds.
“Alright then,” she said, commanding the room like a circus ringleader directing horses under the bigtop. “Russ? Hit the lights. Guys, here’s the target:”
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TO BE CONTINUED...