Death at the Double Kiss by Lituo Huang
Lonnie is cheating with Greg's wife and is found dead in the bathroom after a game of pool at the Double Kiss.
It wasn't supposed to snow as much as it did the night Lonnie got killed at the Double Kiss.
Two men guard the door of the pool hall. They don't work here. They exhale smoke into the dim evening air, snowflakes dancing around them.
My late father's brother Francis, who recently took me on as his eight-ball doubles partner, nod to the two men. We step between them and Francis opens the door, sucking cold cigarette smoke inside the pool hall. I feel quiet tension. Maybe because it's playoffs, or maybe because of the unexpected snow.
Albert, the owner of the Double Kiss, takes a knee in front of one of his pool tables. He pokes at something and peers through his thick glasses with his baseball cap turned backwards for a better view of the malfunction.
The redheaded cashier behind the counter, Sally, greets me.
"Hey, Justine! Kick ass for me, okay?"
I nod back at Sally. She waggles a hang ten symbol. She's wearing a purple t-shirt with rhinestone lettering that reads Not today!
There are only a few other people here so far. We're an hour early because Francis insists on warming up before we shoot, even though it never seems to make me any better or worse. A couple is on an early date at one of the corner bar boxes. We know they're civilians because they look like they're having fun. Around the nine-foot table are the same group of men who are there every night, playing buchacara and collecting empty Modelo bottles on the sideboard. They order up cumbias on the jukebox and keep to themselves.
Aside from these few customers, Albert, and Sally, the only other person here so far is Marv. He is propped up at his usual table with a bottle of candy-pink juice in front of him that he brought from somewhere else and a half-empty grocery bag. I don't know too much about him, except that he's always here, rarely plays, and never pays. He waves limply. "Hi Marv," we say.
Francis picks a table for us and chalks his cue until I see faint blue dust floating in the air, echoing the exhalation of the smokers, who have since come back in and peeled their hoods back. I recognize Jason, a hot-tempered and talented guy in his twenties, and his older, silent teammate who wears a camo trucker hat.
"Focus," Francis says.
"On what? You're breaking."
"I was talking to myself." Francis bends down, light glinting off the top of his head, and scratches. The couple in the corner kisses between bites of pizza. We play.
The pool hall's buzzing. I must have focused after all. Both the other teams are here now. The winner of our match against Jason and Camo Hat, whose team is named Hot Pockets, will face off against Lonnie and Alicia's team, Beauty and the Beast, for a trip to nationals. Alicia is looking beautifully angry tonight. She glares from under black blunt-cut bangs, screwing her cue together. Francis would say she's intent, but he's more magnanimous than I am. I think she looks pissed. A skinny, tall man with a patchy, mouse-colored beard rubs her shoulders. It's her husband Greg. Alicia shrugs him off. His hand drops and hits the back of her chair. Alicia glares, not at him, but at her doubles partner Lonnie.
Lonnie is a small man with a soft belly in a tan polo shirt tucked into his jeans. Fortyish. White sneakers. Thinning orange hair slicked over a shiny freckled forehead. He carries the chronically aggrieved air of one who has never received his due. He is a sore loser and an ungracious winner, and he holds his beer even worse than Jason. Francis told me that in the fall, Lonnie snapped a cue over his knee during a friendly game against the owner. They'd gotten into it and Lonnie almost got a ban. I wish I'd been there to see it. Tonight, however, Albert appears conciliatory as he sets an uncapped bottle of beer on Lonnie's table next to a woman with maroon dyed hair and her left arm in a sling.
"Who's that again?"
"Lonnie's wife," Francis whispers.
"I knew that. I meant what's her name?"
"Belinda."
"What happened to her arm, or should I ask her myself?"
Francis raises an eyebrow meaningfully. "Best not to."
He didn't answer the first part of my question. I'm surprised, because if there's one thing Francis loves more than pool, it's gossip. Through him, I know the personal business of nearly everyone in the pool hall tonight: Albert's financial issues that led to his nearly closing the Double Kiss twice this year, Marv the barfly's penis size, Sally's close call with a vehicular manslaughter charge that led to her sobriety, Jason's still-thriving drinking problem, Lonnie's Alicia problem, and Alicia's Lonnie problem. Francis didn't have to tell me about the last two, because it's been apparent to everyone with eyes that Lonnie and Alicia have been having an affair since at least mid-season, when their respective spouses had stopped attending the weekly games. Belinda and Greg had either gotten bored of watching the games, which I could understand, or Lonnie and Alicia had dissuaded them. In any case, we'd all spent the second half of the season getting more uncomfortable watching Lonnie and Alicia get more comfortable, until even Marv, whom I hadn't pegged as observant, told me that he'd noticed them leaving the bathroom together once.
"And they didn't even wash their hands," Francis had dryly remarked.
Our match against the Hot Pockets goes well. For me. I make an above-average percentage of my shots, considering the playoff pressure. Francis, who is light years ahead of me, plays like shit, so we lose. Jason cannot hide his high spirits. He high fives Camo Hat. Then, remembering his obligations to us, he shakes our hands and compliments my shooting and my haircut, which I got months ago. I'm still waiting for it to grow out.
"What about me?" Francis pats his thinning hair and laughs. His affable manner doesn't change with Jason and Camo Hat, but as everyone prepares for the match between Hot Pockets and Beauty and the Beast, I spot Francis by himself a ways off. One hand is on his hip and the other drumming the rail as he stares interrogatively at the sea-calm expanse of cloth on the pool table that betrayed him.
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| Photo by Kyle Miller, from Pexels |
Two men guard the door of the pool hall. They don't work here. They exhale smoke into the dim evening air, snowflakes dancing around them.
My late father's brother Francis, who recently took me on as his eight-ball doubles partner, nod to the two men. We step between them and Francis opens the door, sucking cold cigarette smoke inside the pool hall. I feel quiet tension. Maybe because it's playoffs, or maybe because of the unexpected snow.
Albert, the owner of the Double Kiss, takes a knee in front of one of his pool tables. He pokes at something and peers through his thick glasses with his baseball cap turned backwards for a better view of the malfunction.
The redheaded cashier behind the counter, Sally, greets me.
"Hey, Justine! Kick ass for me, okay?"
I nod back at Sally. She waggles a hang ten symbol. She's wearing a purple t-shirt with rhinestone lettering that reads Not today!
There are only a few other people here so far. We're an hour early because Francis insists on warming up before we shoot, even though it never seems to make me any better or worse. A couple is on an early date at one of the corner bar boxes. We know they're civilians because they look like they're having fun. Around the nine-foot table are the same group of men who are there every night, playing buchacara and collecting empty Modelo bottles on the sideboard. They order up cumbias on the jukebox and keep to themselves.
Aside from these few customers, Albert, and Sally, the only other person here so far is Marv. He is propped up at his usual table with a bottle of candy-pink juice in front of him that he brought from somewhere else and a half-empty grocery bag. I don't know too much about him, except that he's always here, rarely plays, and never pays. He waves limply. "Hi Marv," we say.
Francis picks a table for us and chalks his cue until I see faint blue dust floating in the air, echoing the exhalation of the smokers, who have since come back in and peeled their hoods back. I recognize Jason, a hot-tempered and talented guy in his twenties, and his older, silent teammate who wears a camo trucker hat.
"Focus," Francis says.
"On what? You're breaking."
"I was talking to myself." Francis bends down, light glinting off the top of his head, and scratches. The couple in the corner kisses between bites of pizza. We play.
The pool hall's buzzing. I must have focused after all. Both the other teams are here now. The winner of our match against Jason and Camo Hat, whose team is named Hot Pockets, will face off against Lonnie and Alicia's team, Beauty and the Beast, for a trip to nationals. Alicia is looking beautifully angry tonight. She glares from under black blunt-cut bangs, screwing her cue together. Francis would say she's intent, but he's more magnanimous than I am. I think she looks pissed. A skinny, tall man with a patchy, mouse-colored beard rubs her shoulders. It's her husband Greg. Alicia shrugs him off. His hand drops and hits the back of her chair. Alicia glares, not at him, but at her doubles partner Lonnie.
Lonnie is a small man with a soft belly in a tan polo shirt tucked into his jeans. Fortyish. White sneakers. Thinning orange hair slicked over a shiny freckled forehead. He carries the chronically aggrieved air of one who has never received his due. He is a sore loser and an ungracious winner, and he holds his beer even worse than Jason. Francis told me that in the fall, Lonnie snapped a cue over his knee during a friendly game against the owner. They'd gotten into it and Lonnie almost got a ban. I wish I'd been there to see it. Tonight, however, Albert appears conciliatory as he sets an uncapped bottle of beer on Lonnie's table next to a woman with maroon dyed hair and her left arm in a sling.
"Who's that again?"
"Lonnie's wife," Francis whispers.
"I knew that. I meant what's her name?"
"Belinda."
"What happened to her arm, or should I ask her myself?"
Francis raises an eyebrow meaningfully. "Best not to."
He didn't answer the first part of my question. I'm surprised, because if there's one thing Francis loves more than pool, it's gossip. Through him, I know the personal business of nearly everyone in the pool hall tonight: Albert's financial issues that led to his nearly closing the Double Kiss twice this year, Marv the barfly's penis size, Sally's close call with a vehicular manslaughter charge that led to her sobriety, Jason's still-thriving drinking problem, Lonnie's Alicia problem, and Alicia's Lonnie problem. Francis didn't have to tell me about the last two, because it's been apparent to everyone with eyes that Lonnie and Alicia have been having an affair since at least mid-season, when their respective spouses had stopped attending the weekly games. Belinda and Greg had either gotten bored of watching the games, which I could understand, or Lonnie and Alicia had dissuaded them. In any case, we'd all spent the second half of the season getting more uncomfortable watching Lonnie and Alicia get more comfortable, until even Marv, whom I hadn't pegged as observant, told me that he'd noticed them leaving the bathroom together once.
"And they didn't even wash their hands," Francis had dryly remarked.
Our match against the Hot Pockets goes well. For me. I make an above-average percentage of my shots, considering the playoff pressure. Francis, who is light years ahead of me, plays like shit, so we lose. Jason cannot hide his high spirits. He high fives Camo Hat. Then, remembering his obligations to us, he shakes our hands and compliments my shooting and my haircut, which I got months ago. I'm still waiting for it to grow out.
"What about me?" Francis pats his thinning hair and laughs. His affable manner doesn't change with Jason and Camo Hat, but as everyone prepares for the match between Hot Pockets and Beauty and the Beast, I spot Francis by himself a ways off. One hand is on his hip and the other drumming the rail as he stares interrogatively at the sea-calm expanse of cloth on the pool table that betrayed him.
We sit down next to Marv, who is scooping something out of his grocery bag into his mouth. It's Frosted Flakes cereal. Probably store brand. He offers me some, but I shake my head.
Jason and Camo Hat each pluck a beer out of a crowded ice bucket. Jason downs his. His cheeks are as red as sunburn. Lonnie and Alicia are waiting. Lonnie's making his beer last, looking sullen and bored while Alicia flips through the jukebox. Alicia's husband Greg, to my surprise, is reading a book. I try to see what it is, but the cover is folded around the back like a scroll.
"Path of daggers," Marv says through a mouthful of cereal.
"Huh?"
Lonnie's wife, Belinda, is still in the exact same position as when I saw her last, sitting at their table, her injured arm in its yellow sling like a wet floor sign. She must have eaten, since there's now a dirty fork and a half-consumed basket of something brown and battered cut into pieces in front of her, but she's easy to overlook.
Lonnie swallows the last of his beer. "Let's get this show on the road," he shouts to Alicia, who has been jabbing at the jukebox this whole time. A few moments later, REO Speedwagon starts playing. You should've seen by the look in my eyes, baby, there was something missing.
Handshakes all around and wishes of luck conveyed. It's a race to four for both teams, so we brace for what could be a long night. Lonnie and Jason bend down at the far end of the table for the lag, which Lonnie wins. Marv chews handfuls of cereal. Francis has conjured several peeled hardboiled eggs from somewhere on his person. It's after eight and I realize I'm hungry.
The first two games go to Hot Pockets. Both teams are warming up in more ways than one, as they continue ordering buckets of Miller Lite. I notice Alicia is the only one not drinking. That must slightly advantage her team, because Beauty and the Beast take the next two games. Greg watches absently, his thumb holding his place in the book. Belinda leans over her chair to him and says something. He nods and passes her a bottle of orange juice. I squint and finally make out that his book is a fantasy novel called The Path of Daggers.
Hot Pockets only need one more to win the match, so the stakes for this next game are high. Alicia taps her silver and black nails against the rack. Clack, clack, clack. Jason breaks. Runs. Almost. Scratches somewhat improbably on the eight. He slams his stick on the side of the table, and it clangs on the lights above, sending them and the shadows swaying.
"Hey," Francis says, "that's expensive!"
That makes it hill-hill. Jason racks for the final game. I've never seen anyone cry here, but it might happen tonight. His lips are pressed together so hard that the color leaches from them. I have to look away. The buchacara players are long gone, as are the couple who were kissing in the corner. Empty beer bottles crowd the sideboard, and the couple's pizza grows cold and hard on the corner table. Sally the barkeep has stopped bussing. Like the rest of us, she's focused on the outcome of the final game. Even Albert is here, standing aside a little with his meaty forearms crossed, his restless baseball cap sitting high on his head with its brim tipped back, watching. Greg is pointing out a page in his book to Belinda. Must be interesting.
Alicia's break pockets three stripes and a solid. I didn't think she had it in her. Lonnie sinks the nine with practiced ease. Alicia misses her next shot, so Camo Hat from the Hot Pockets is up next, and he combos the three obediently into the two. His partner Jason approaches the table with reluctance, chalking his cue unendingly.
"I hope he's not still thinking about that last game," Francis says of him. I'm not thinking about anything myself. I'm deliriously tired, gumball thoughts in electric blue brain. Jason bends down, intent on the seven. He draws back. Lonnie scoffs.
Jason pops up again and makes an inarticulate noise. "Say that again," he says. A murmur of consternation from the crowd. Lonnie has a look on his face I can't place, somewhere between a smile and a grimace. A sweat stain marks the chest of his shirt.
Camo Hat stands up from where he was sipping his beer and puts a light hand on Jason's back. "Everything's good, bud."
Francis clears his throat as if he's about to speak. The lights flicker. We all look up. The lights go out.
Only the exit signs above the two doors are shining. We're all silent. In the darkness, someone says, "Shit." Someone else flicks a lighter. Camo Hat's face is lit from below like a gargoyle. There is fumbling from behind the counter, and several flashlights stream on and bob towards us. Albert and Sally hand them out to the rest of us.
"What should they do?" I ask. Soft crunching from Marv in response.
"Call the league operator?" Francis's suggestion cuts through the darkness.
"No," replies Lonnie, stridently. "We got enough light." He grabs two flashlights and hands them to Greg and Belinda. "Get up, Billie, and light this table."
Greg and Belinda stumble over and shine their flashlights over the pool table like children helping Daddy fix his car.
"Or are you scared of the dark?"
Jason, to whom this last question was directed, steps up. "Nah. Let's play."
Beside me, Francis clucks quietly.
Jason aims. The flashlights waver and still. He shoots. The one ball bounces off the rail and rolls impotently to the middle of the table. Too bad. As Jason backs away, the overhead lights flicker back on. Whirring starts again from the refrigerator behind the bar.
Jason and Camo Hat never get another shot. Lonnie and Alicia clean up the rest of the table. They shake hands with Camo Hat, but Jason turns his back to everyone and starts putting his things away.
"What a sore loser," mutters Lonnie, passing us by on his way to the bathroom.
"We should go," I say to Francis. But he is instigating a conversation with Camo Hat about some shot from three games ago. A lost cause.
I turn to Marv to ask him what's new. Marv starts telling me about what his landlord did to him. A few people gather near Francis and Camo Hat, who are now arguing the merits of and demonstrating their favorite three-rail kick shot systems. There's movement all around us. I keep my sleepy gaze on Marv and nod at intervals as he talks about the squirrels in his walls.
Suddenly, Marv stops talking and stops chewing his cereal. The squirrels are nesting. His eyes move past me. I turn around.
Sally is stumbling out of the bathroom, her face white. I see her scream before I hear it.
Albert reaches her first. "God, Sally, what happened? Did you get hurt?"
Sally stutters. "I touched him." She looks to the bathroom and back at her hand.
The door to the bathroom is open. We can see inside the storage area but not where the two small stalls are. Albert takes a step towards the doorway when Francis rises. "I'll go with you," Francis says. The two of them walk in together.
A few moments later, Albert staggers back out, followed by my uncle.
"The police," he says. "We have to call them." He goes into the kitchen for the phone.
Francis, his face set, takes Sally by the elbow into the kitchen too. We hear water running.
The rest of us make our way into the bathroom.
"Not everyone -" Francis cries from the kitchen, but it is too late. We crowd into the small bathroom that smells dirty and clean at the same time. Jason, his jaw furiously working on a piece of gum before it goes still. Camo Hat scratching the back of his head through the mesh of his hat. Alicia making a noise that sounds like a balloon slowly releasing air. Belinda, silent, her right arm on her heart. Marv goggling, towering over our heads. Greg slipping in the back and making his way to take Alicia's arm, dumb as a mannequin. And Lonnie, on the grimy tile of the cramped bathroom, his face the color of cooked liver and his eyes bulging and a little rill of blood sliding down the steak knife stuck in the right side of his neck.
We file back out. Marv is the last and closes the bathroom door softly. Greg holds Alicia's hand as she collapses into a chair, crying. Belinda remains steely. She sits alone. I go to comfort her, but she doesn't respond to anything I say, so I give up and go sit by Marv. Jason and his teammate Camo Hat stand off by themselves in a corner.
After a few minutes, Francis leads Sally out of the kitchen, followed by Albert. Sally wipes her hand mechanically on a crumpled brown paper towel.
"When will the cops get here?" I ask Francis.
He and Albert share a look.
"We couldn't call out," said Albert. "The phone's not working."
"But the power's back on," someone retorts.
Francis says, "The surge must have blown the base."
"Then someone has to go to the police station." These are the first words that we have heard from Belinda. She says them without emotion, staring into her lap. In contrast, Alicia's continued crying annoys me in a way I can't explain, as Greg tries to give her napkins to wipe her face.
"I'll go," Jason volunteers. He's already pulling his coat on. For a few moments, nobody speaks.
Then Francis says what we all must have been thinking. "Maybe it's better if you stay." His voice is quiet and authoritative.
"Why?" Jason's face expresses his bewilderment. Then, he realizes the meaning in Francis's words. "You don't all think -"
"We don't think anything," Sally pipes up, her voice hoarse. She is still wiping her hands as if they will never get clean.
Jason turns on her. "You were the one who found him!"
"What's that supposed to mean?" Sally snaps back.
Albert interrupts them. "I'll go. It's my responsibility." Francis nods his assent. He has become the one we all look to for direction.
After Albert has gone, shuffling through the deep snow to the police station a mile and a half away, we sit huddled around one of the pool tables as if watching an invisible match. Marv, Sally, and I are on barstools. Greg, Alicia, and Belinda sit at a separate table against which several cue cases lean. The cue cases are already relics of a lost age, when the game mattered. Francis paces the length of the pool table with hands clasped behind his back, staring at the ground. Jason and Camo Hat speak in low tones. Camo Hat shakes out a cigarette from a pack tucked into his breast pocket. He holds it up to the light, considers it solemnly, and puts it back into the pack.
"What's this?"
We turn. Greg's pointing to something white and red sticking out of the zipper of Alicia's cue case. Alicia frowns through her tears. Greg plucks it out, and it falls on the table like a deflated balloon.
"My glove," Alicia says, reaching for it, holding it up to the light. She gasps.
Francis is on top of it. "Don't touch it." He flicks her wrist gently and the glove lands back on the table. "It's blood."
Alicia pushes her chair away from the table like a cat scrambling away from a litterbox. Everyone gets up and crowds around this new object of interest. The white glove with its three limp fingers is smeared with blood the color of cherry syrup.
"But I didn't do anything."
"Nobody accused you of doing anything," Francis says soothingly.
"Though we could," observes Sally with an acid note in her voice. "Sit down, Alicia."
"What do you mean?" Alicia is about to cry again.
Sally's thin nose is twitching. Maybe she has started back on something harder than alcohol.
"Do you need me to spell it out for you? We all know that you and Lonnie were two-timing together. Maybe he was getting tired of you. Who wouldn't be? You saw that he and Billie were rekindling things, and you couldn't take it. You took the knife from her plate and stabbed him." Sally looks a little guiltily at Greg. "Sorry."
Greg keeps his arms wrapped staunchly around his wife.
"It's not true," Alicia cries to the rest of us. "That little drunk has always had something against me. Maybe you wanted Lonnie for yourself."
"He wishes," Sally scoffs, tossing her red curls. "I don't appreciate what you did to my friend Billie."
"And I don't appreciate the way that you -" Alicia begins to say, but she can't find a way to finish her sentence.
Francis cuts in. "Let's not throw accusations around. Most of us wouldn't be immune."
But Sally has worked herself up and won't be silenced. "Like who? Jason? You?"
Francis lets her wild questions drop unanswered, but Jason speaks up.
"Lonnie was a cheater in more ways than one. But I didn't kill him. I only wanted to kick his ass." Jason turns to Belinda, recalling her existence. "I'm sorry I said that. But I know he wasn't - good to you."
"Are you satisfied, Sally?" Francis scolds. "Is there anybody else you'd like to accuse? We all know that Billie herself has greater cause than anyone - would you like to interrogate her?"
Belinda exhales softly. She finally raises her head and says, without emotion, "I didn't do it."
"We know you didn't," Sally says.
Francis nods. Belinda's broken arm. She holds it in the sling conscientiously, as if it were a foreign object. Francis sits down in between Marv and me, tracing patterns on the table.
Jazz saxophone starts playing softly from the jukebox. Camo Hat is leaning against the wall next to it, his hat pulled down over his eyes and one leg up against the wall. Could he have done it? I wasn't aware of any motive he might have had. I didn't even know his real name. I remember that after Lonnie had passed me on his way to the bathroom after the final game, Francis and Camo Hat had been talking together. Camo Hat could have had time to peel off from the conversation and sneak into the bathroom to stab Lonnie while I was trying to stay awake listening to Marv and his squirrels.
I look around the room and study each person in turn. I divide us up into two groups: those who had a motive and those who didn't. Belinda, Alicia, Greg, Sally, Jason - those were the ones who I thought might have a motive. Marv, Camo Hat, and Albert didn't. I look around for a pencil that I can use to write on the back of the scoresheet in front of me. In detective stories, they always make a chart.
Francis whispers, interrupting my plans. "What bothers me," he says, "is this: Who put the glove in Alicia's case? Why did they want to incriminate her?"
"Incriminate?" I repeat. "What kind of movie are you in?" I feel embarrassed and a little annoyed, because he's already taken Alicia out of the running, so he must have seen something that I missed. Francis ignores my question. He continues talking, this time to himself.
Suddenly, he digs out a pencil from his pocket and starts scribbling on the blank scoresheet that I had wanted to use. After a moment, he passes the paper to me.
On it is one question: Where's the blood?
I stare at the scoresheet uncomprehendingly, trying to make sense of what feels like a minor detail. I think back to the scene in the bathroom. Lonnie's body is splayed on the tile, his limbs starfished. His head swivels to the right towards us, face terracotta, bloodshot eyes bulging, knife just to the right of his Adam's apple, a line of blood dripping down its black plastic handle. It cut through his neck just like an underdone steak. Getting stabbed in the neck should create more blood, unless -
I start to see dimly what Francis is hinting at. There should have been more blood, but there wasn't - only the little bit on the knife handle and on Alicia's pool glove. Lonnie's heart must have stopped beating before he had been stabbed.
Which meant that when he was stabbed, he was already dead. Of course! His face, his bulging eyes - someone strangled him before they stabbed him.
I grab the pencil from Francis. He was dead, I scribble on the scoresheet. Francis nods, as if I am confirming his own train of thought.
Who could have strangled him? Despite Lonnie's size, I doubt any of the women could have overpowered him. I go back to my list of people with motive. Both men on that list, Jason and Greg, could have. But neither would have been able to catch Lonnie unawares in front of the urinal like that. Lonnie had been strangled from behind and then a knife thrust into his neck from behind. That meant whoever had done it had used their right hand.
The glove was left-handed.
None of it made sense to me.
When I look up again, Francis is gone. For some reason, he's sitting next to Alicia, talking to her idly, flipping through the cast-off Path of Daggers volume lying on the table, creating a barrier between her and -
Greg and Belinda.
I don't understand all of it, but glimmers are coming to me. And, as it appears, to Marv. We both get up and move towards Alicia. Francis catches my eye and nods. I know he means for me to do something helpful, but I don't know what to do. I sit next to Belinda and try to engage her in conversation, while Marv hangs around by Greg. Belinda ignores my attempts at conversation again, just like she did the first time. I wonder when Albert will finally return with cops in tow. I'm sweating.
Marv asks Greg a question. "How's that book?"
Greg glances at Marv as if he is coming back to earth. He reaches towards his back pocket.
"Watch out," I cry. Everyone turns to me as Marv lunges for Greg's hand and wrenches it. A bookstore receipt flutters to the table, and I finally hear the sirens.
Months later, on a warm spring evening, we are back at the Double Kiss. Daylight savings has kicked in, so I can see the sunset through the glass door. Albert's in the kitchen deep frying. Sally stands at the counter and watches the new TV set that's been installed behind the bar. It's playing a commercial for a local community college. Sally watches intently. Marv is sitting at his usual table. He is eating tomato soup.
Francis holds court around one of the pool tables, half teaching nine-ball to a couple of tipsy college students he just met, half expositing on the murder while jabbing the air with his cue. He has told this story dozens of times that I've heard and maybe hundreds that I haven't.
"- of course, the reason that there wasn't much blood was because he was already dead when he was stabbed! Now, who could have done it?"
The drunk students shake their heads.
"Think about it. Only someone that the victim trusted could sneak up on him unawares. Chiefly, his wife. Let's call her B. But she was not alone. The husband of the victim's mistress was there too, following silently behind. Let's call him G. The two of them were in it together. G sneaks up as the victim is using the urinal and strangles him. After G ensures the victim is dead, the two conspirators work quickly. G removes from his pocket his own wife's pool glove. It is a left-handed glove. But being still behind the corpse with the weight pressing on him, G turns the glove inside-out and puts it over his right hand. B removes the steak knife from - where else? - her sling. G plunges the steak knife into the neck of the corpse, and both G and B exit the bathroom casually, one after another.
"Later, when everyone else in the venue is crowding into the bathroom, G turns the bloody pool glove right-side out again and hides it in his own wife's cue case. The conspirators tried to kill two birds, as it were, with one stone. B hated and feared her husband. At the same time, G's wife was the victim's mistress. For that reason, G wanted to seek vengeance against them both - by killing the one and framing the other for the crime.
"It was the lack of blood that puzzled me. But after G drew attention to the pool glove, I knew! I tried to distract G from his wife while we waited for the police to arrive. I was afraid he might become desperate and do something. Thanks to my quick thinking, she stayed safe."
Safe from the deadly receipt, I think. I walk over to Marv. Along with the tomato soup, he has a ham sandwich. "Our quick thinking, don't you agree?"
But Marv is focused on his food. He's looking better these days, and he has a fresh haircut to boot. After all the media attention, some wealthy do-gooder in town financed Marv's lawsuit against his landlord. They settled, and Marv was able to move into a nicer place in town with fewer squirrels.
I leave Marv to his dinner and cross to the table where Francis is racking. The college students have wandered back to their pitcher of PBR. Albert finally installed taps. Business has been booming.
My uncle Francis pushes his glasses back up his nose with one finger. "Your break," he says.
Jason and Camo Hat each pluck a beer out of a crowded ice bucket. Jason downs his. His cheeks are as red as sunburn. Lonnie and Alicia are waiting. Lonnie's making his beer last, looking sullen and bored while Alicia flips through the jukebox. Alicia's husband Greg, to my surprise, is reading a book. I try to see what it is, but the cover is folded around the back like a scroll.
"Path of daggers," Marv says through a mouthful of cereal.
"Huh?"
Lonnie's wife, Belinda, is still in the exact same position as when I saw her last, sitting at their table, her injured arm in its yellow sling like a wet floor sign. She must have eaten, since there's now a dirty fork and a half-consumed basket of something brown and battered cut into pieces in front of her, but she's easy to overlook.
Lonnie swallows the last of his beer. "Let's get this show on the road," he shouts to Alicia, who has been jabbing at the jukebox this whole time. A few moments later, REO Speedwagon starts playing. You should've seen by the look in my eyes, baby, there was something missing.
Handshakes all around and wishes of luck conveyed. It's a race to four for both teams, so we brace for what could be a long night. Lonnie and Jason bend down at the far end of the table for the lag, which Lonnie wins. Marv chews handfuls of cereal. Francis has conjured several peeled hardboiled eggs from somewhere on his person. It's after eight and I realize I'm hungry.
The first two games go to Hot Pockets. Both teams are warming up in more ways than one, as they continue ordering buckets of Miller Lite. I notice Alicia is the only one not drinking. That must slightly advantage her team, because Beauty and the Beast take the next two games. Greg watches absently, his thumb holding his place in the book. Belinda leans over her chair to him and says something. He nods and passes her a bottle of orange juice. I squint and finally make out that his book is a fantasy novel called The Path of Daggers.
Hot Pockets only need one more to win the match, so the stakes for this next game are high. Alicia taps her silver and black nails against the rack. Clack, clack, clack. Jason breaks. Runs. Almost. Scratches somewhat improbably on the eight. He slams his stick on the side of the table, and it clangs on the lights above, sending them and the shadows swaying.
"Hey," Francis says, "that's expensive!"
That makes it hill-hill. Jason racks for the final game. I've never seen anyone cry here, but it might happen tonight. His lips are pressed together so hard that the color leaches from them. I have to look away. The buchacara players are long gone, as are the couple who were kissing in the corner. Empty beer bottles crowd the sideboard, and the couple's pizza grows cold and hard on the corner table. Sally the barkeep has stopped bussing. Like the rest of us, she's focused on the outcome of the final game. Even Albert is here, standing aside a little with his meaty forearms crossed, his restless baseball cap sitting high on his head with its brim tipped back, watching. Greg is pointing out a page in his book to Belinda. Must be interesting.
Alicia's break pockets three stripes and a solid. I didn't think she had it in her. Lonnie sinks the nine with practiced ease. Alicia misses her next shot, so Camo Hat from the Hot Pockets is up next, and he combos the three obediently into the two. His partner Jason approaches the table with reluctance, chalking his cue unendingly.
"I hope he's not still thinking about that last game," Francis says of him. I'm not thinking about anything myself. I'm deliriously tired, gumball thoughts in electric blue brain. Jason bends down, intent on the seven. He draws back. Lonnie scoffs.
Jason pops up again and makes an inarticulate noise. "Say that again," he says. A murmur of consternation from the crowd. Lonnie has a look on his face I can't place, somewhere between a smile and a grimace. A sweat stain marks the chest of his shirt.
Camo Hat stands up from where he was sipping his beer and puts a light hand on Jason's back. "Everything's good, bud."
Francis clears his throat as if he's about to speak. The lights flicker. We all look up. The lights go out.
Only the exit signs above the two doors are shining. We're all silent. In the darkness, someone says, "Shit." Someone else flicks a lighter. Camo Hat's face is lit from below like a gargoyle. There is fumbling from behind the counter, and several flashlights stream on and bob towards us. Albert and Sally hand them out to the rest of us.
"What should they do?" I ask. Soft crunching from Marv in response.
"Call the league operator?" Francis's suggestion cuts through the darkness.
"No," replies Lonnie, stridently. "We got enough light." He grabs two flashlights and hands them to Greg and Belinda. "Get up, Billie, and light this table."
Greg and Belinda stumble over and shine their flashlights over the pool table like children helping Daddy fix his car.
"Or are you scared of the dark?"
Jason, to whom this last question was directed, steps up. "Nah. Let's play."
Beside me, Francis clucks quietly.
Jason aims. The flashlights waver and still. He shoots. The one ball bounces off the rail and rolls impotently to the middle of the table. Too bad. As Jason backs away, the overhead lights flicker back on. Whirring starts again from the refrigerator behind the bar.
Jason and Camo Hat never get another shot. Lonnie and Alicia clean up the rest of the table. They shake hands with Camo Hat, but Jason turns his back to everyone and starts putting his things away.
"What a sore loser," mutters Lonnie, passing us by on his way to the bathroom.
"We should go," I say to Francis. But he is instigating a conversation with Camo Hat about some shot from three games ago. A lost cause.
I turn to Marv to ask him what's new. Marv starts telling me about what his landlord did to him. A few people gather near Francis and Camo Hat, who are now arguing the merits of and demonstrating their favorite three-rail kick shot systems. There's movement all around us. I keep my sleepy gaze on Marv and nod at intervals as he talks about the squirrels in his walls.
Suddenly, Marv stops talking and stops chewing his cereal. The squirrels are nesting. His eyes move past me. I turn around.
Sally is stumbling out of the bathroom, her face white. I see her scream before I hear it.
Albert reaches her first. "God, Sally, what happened? Did you get hurt?"
Sally stutters. "I touched him." She looks to the bathroom and back at her hand.
The door to the bathroom is open. We can see inside the storage area but not where the two small stalls are. Albert takes a step towards the doorway when Francis rises. "I'll go with you," Francis says. The two of them walk in together.
A few moments later, Albert staggers back out, followed by my uncle.
"The police," he says. "We have to call them." He goes into the kitchen for the phone.
Francis, his face set, takes Sally by the elbow into the kitchen too. We hear water running.
The rest of us make our way into the bathroom.
"Not everyone -" Francis cries from the kitchen, but it is too late. We crowd into the small bathroom that smells dirty and clean at the same time. Jason, his jaw furiously working on a piece of gum before it goes still. Camo Hat scratching the back of his head through the mesh of his hat. Alicia making a noise that sounds like a balloon slowly releasing air. Belinda, silent, her right arm on her heart. Marv goggling, towering over our heads. Greg slipping in the back and making his way to take Alicia's arm, dumb as a mannequin. And Lonnie, on the grimy tile of the cramped bathroom, his face the color of cooked liver and his eyes bulging and a little rill of blood sliding down the steak knife stuck in the right side of his neck.
We file back out. Marv is the last and closes the bathroom door softly. Greg holds Alicia's hand as she collapses into a chair, crying. Belinda remains steely. She sits alone. I go to comfort her, but she doesn't respond to anything I say, so I give up and go sit by Marv. Jason and his teammate Camo Hat stand off by themselves in a corner.
After a few minutes, Francis leads Sally out of the kitchen, followed by Albert. Sally wipes her hand mechanically on a crumpled brown paper towel.
"When will the cops get here?" I ask Francis.
He and Albert share a look.
"We couldn't call out," said Albert. "The phone's not working."
"But the power's back on," someone retorts.
Francis says, "The surge must have blown the base."
"Then someone has to go to the police station." These are the first words that we have heard from Belinda. She says them without emotion, staring into her lap. In contrast, Alicia's continued crying annoys me in a way I can't explain, as Greg tries to give her napkins to wipe her face.
"I'll go," Jason volunteers. He's already pulling his coat on. For a few moments, nobody speaks.
Then Francis says what we all must have been thinking. "Maybe it's better if you stay." His voice is quiet and authoritative.
"Why?" Jason's face expresses his bewilderment. Then, he realizes the meaning in Francis's words. "You don't all think -"
"We don't think anything," Sally pipes up, her voice hoarse. She is still wiping her hands as if they will never get clean.
Jason turns on her. "You were the one who found him!"
"What's that supposed to mean?" Sally snaps back.
Albert interrupts them. "I'll go. It's my responsibility." Francis nods his assent. He has become the one we all look to for direction.
After Albert has gone, shuffling through the deep snow to the police station a mile and a half away, we sit huddled around one of the pool tables as if watching an invisible match. Marv, Sally, and I are on barstools. Greg, Alicia, and Belinda sit at a separate table against which several cue cases lean. The cue cases are already relics of a lost age, when the game mattered. Francis paces the length of the pool table with hands clasped behind his back, staring at the ground. Jason and Camo Hat speak in low tones. Camo Hat shakes out a cigarette from a pack tucked into his breast pocket. He holds it up to the light, considers it solemnly, and puts it back into the pack.
"What's this?"
We turn. Greg's pointing to something white and red sticking out of the zipper of Alicia's cue case. Alicia frowns through her tears. Greg plucks it out, and it falls on the table like a deflated balloon.
"My glove," Alicia says, reaching for it, holding it up to the light. She gasps.
Francis is on top of it. "Don't touch it." He flicks her wrist gently and the glove lands back on the table. "It's blood."
Alicia pushes her chair away from the table like a cat scrambling away from a litterbox. Everyone gets up and crowds around this new object of interest. The white glove with its three limp fingers is smeared with blood the color of cherry syrup.
"But I didn't do anything."
"Nobody accused you of doing anything," Francis says soothingly.
"Though we could," observes Sally with an acid note in her voice. "Sit down, Alicia."
"What do you mean?" Alicia is about to cry again.
Sally's thin nose is twitching. Maybe she has started back on something harder than alcohol.
"Do you need me to spell it out for you? We all know that you and Lonnie were two-timing together. Maybe he was getting tired of you. Who wouldn't be? You saw that he and Billie were rekindling things, and you couldn't take it. You took the knife from her plate and stabbed him." Sally looks a little guiltily at Greg. "Sorry."
Greg keeps his arms wrapped staunchly around his wife.
"It's not true," Alicia cries to the rest of us. "That little drunk has always had something against me. Maybe you wanted Lonnie for yourself."
"He wishes," Sally scoffs, tossing her red curls. "I don't appreciate what you did to my friend Billie."
"And I don't appreciate the way that you -" Alicia begins to say, but she can't find a way to finish her sentence.
Francis cuts in. "Let's not throw accusations around. Most of us wouldn't be immune."
But Sally has worked herself up and won't be silenced. "Like who? Jason? You?"
Francis lets her wild questions drop unanswered, but Jason speaks up.
"Lonnie was a cheater in more ways than one. But I didn't kill him. I only wanted to kick his ass." Jason turns to Belinda, recalling her existence. "I'm sorry I said that. But I know he wasn't - good to you."
"Are you satisfied, Sally?" Francis scolds. "Is there anybody else you'd like to accuse? We all know that Billie herself has greater cause than anyone - would you like to interrogate her?"
Belinda exhales softly. She finally raises her head and says, without emotion, "I didn't do it."
"We know you didn't," Sally says.
Francis nods. Belinda's broken arm. She holds it in the sling conscientiously, as if it were a foreign object. Francis sits down in between Marv and me, tracing patterns on the table.
Jazz saxophone starts playing softly from the jukebox. Camo Hat is leaning against the wall next to it, his hat pulled down over his eyes and one leg up against the wall. Could he have done it? I wasn't aware of any motive he might have had. I didn't even know his real name. I remember that after Lonnie had passed me on his way to the bathroom after the final game, Francis and Camo Hat had been talking together. Camo Hat could have had time to peel off from the conversation and sneak into the bathroom to stab Lonnie while I was trying to stay awake listening to Marv and his squirrels.
I look around the room and study each person in turn. I divide us up into two groups: those who had a motive and those who didn't. Belinda, Alicia, Greg, Sally, Jason - those were the ones who I thought might have a motive. Marv, Camo Hat, and Albert didn't. I look around for a pencil that I can use to write on the back of the scoresheet in front of me. In detective stories, they always make a chart.
Francis whispers, interrupting my plans. "What bothers me," he says, "is this: Who put the glove in Alicia's case? Why did they want to incriminate her?"
"Incriminate?" I repeat. "What kind of movie are you in?" I feel embarrassed and a little annoyed, because he's already taken Alicia out of the running, so he must have seen something that I missed. Francis ignores my question. He continues talking, this time to himself.
Suddenly, he digs out a pencil from his pocket and starts scribbling on the blank scoresheet that I had wanted to use. After a moment, he passes the paper to me.
On it is one question: Where's the blood?
I stare at the scoresheet uncomprehendingly, trying to make sense of what feels like a minor detail. I think back to the scene in the bathroom. Lonnie's body is splayed on the tile, his limbs starfished. His head swivels to the right towards us, face terracotta, bloodshot eyes bulging, knife just to the right of his Adam's apple, a line of blood dripping down its black plastic handle. It cut through his neck just like an underdone steak. Getting stabbed in the neck should create more blood, unless -
I start to see dimly what Francis is hinting at. There should have been more blood, but there wasn't - only the little bit on the knife handle and on Alicia's pool glove. Lonnie's heart must have stopped beating before he had been stabbed.
Which meant that when he was stabbed, he was already dead. Of course! His face, his bulging eyes - someone strangled him before they stabbed him.
I grab the pencil from Francis. He was dead, I scribble on the scoresheet. Francis nods, as if I am confirming his own train of thought.
Who could have strangled him? Despite Lonnie's size, I doubt any of the women could have overpowered him. I go back to my list of people with motive. Both men on that list, Jason and Greg, could have. But neither would have been able to catch Lonnie unawares in front of the urinal like that. Lonnie had been strangled from behind and then a knife thrust into his neck from behind. That meant whoever had done it had used their right hand.
The glove was left-handed.
None of it made sense to me.
When I look up again, Francis is gone. For some reason, he's sitting next to Alicia, talking to her idly, flipping through the cast-off Path of Daggers volume lying on the table, creating a barrier between her and -
Greg and Belinda.
I don't understand all of it, but glimmers are coming to me. And, as it appears, to Marv. We both get up and move towards Alicia. Francis catches my eye and nods. I know he means for me to do something helpful, but I don't know what to do. I sit next to Belinda and try to engage her in conversation, while Marv hangs around by Greg. Belinda ignores my attempts at conversation again, just like she did the first time. I wonder when Albert will finally return with cops in tow. I'm sweating.
Marv asks Greg a question. "How's that book?"
Greg glances at Marv as if he is coming back to earth. He reaches towards his back pocket.
"Watch out," I cry. Everyone turns to me as Marv lunges for Greg's hand and wrenches it. A bookstore receipt flutters to the table, and I finally hear the sirens.
Months later, on a warm spring evening, we are back at the Double Kiss. Daylight savings has kicked in, so I can see the sunset through the glass door. Albert's in the kitchen deep frying. Sally stands at the counter and watches the new TV set that's been installed behind the bar. It's playing a commercial for a local community college. Sally watches intently. Marv is sitting at his usual table. He is eating tomato soup.
Francis holds court around one of the pool tables, half teaching nine-ball to a couple of tipsy college students he just met, half expositing on the murder while jabbing the air with his cue. He has told this story dozens of times that I've heard and maybe hundreds that I haven't.
"- of course, the reason that there wasn't much blood was because he was already dead when he was stabbed! Now, who could have done it?"
The drunk students shake their heads.
"Think about it. Only someone that the victim trusted could sneak up on him unawares. Chiefly, his wife. Let's call her B. But she was not alone. The husband of the victim's mistress was there too, following silently behind. Let's call him G. The two of them were in it together. G sneaks up as the victim is using the urinal and strangles him. After G ensures the victim is dead, the two conspirators work quickly. G removes from his pocket his own wife's pool glove. It is a left-handed glove. But being still behind the corpse with the weight pressing on him, G turns the glove inside-out and puts it over his right hand. B removes the steak knife from - where else? - her sling. G plunges the steak knife into the neck of the corpse, and both G and B exit the bathroom casually, one after another.
"Later, when everyone else in the venue is crowding into the bathroom, G turns the bloody pool glove right-side out again and hides it in his own wife's cue case. The conspirators tried to kill two birds, as it were, with one stone. B hated and feared her husband. At the same time, G's wife was the victim's mistress. For that reason, G wanted to seek vengeance against them both - by killing the one and framing the other for the crime.
"It was the lack of blood that puzzled me. But after G drew attention to the pool glove, I knew! I tried to distract G from his wife while we waited for the police to arrive. I was afraid he might become desperate and do something. Thanks to my quick thinking, she stayed safe."
Safe from the deadly receipt, I think. I walk over to Marv. Along with the tomato soup, he has a ham sandwich. "Our quick thinking, don't you agree?"
But Marv is focused on his food. He's looking better these days, and he has a fresh haircut to boot. After all the media attention, some wealthy do-gooder in town financed Marv's lawsuit against his landlord. They settled, and Marv was able to move into a nicer place in town with fewer squirrels.
I leave Marv to his dinner and cross to the table where Francis is racking. The college students have wandered back to their pitcher of PBR. Albert finally installed taps. Business has been booming.
My uncle Francis pushes his glasses back up his nose with one finger. "Your break," he says.
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