I managed to rise on to one knee, looked out the searchlights sweeping the house, the
street, and for a moment, it almost looked like white light, biotical sheen. Eddie pushed,
said what was to become my mantra of destruction
‘C’mon Paddy, it’s over.’
I got out of there, but I’m not really sure I ever truly left.
I was trying to compose a list of all time great buddy/road movies. For Merrick.
He’d be back.
Right?
Jaysus, if a friendship can’t survive a simple gun threat, is it really a bond?
Merrick loved poetry and my only knowledge was
…………….the poetry of cordite.
Definite in it’s relentless rhythm.
I had
Scarecrow, Hackman and Pacino……….didn’t they fall the fook out a time or two?
Freebie and The Bean, Caan and Arkin, and by Christ, they spent most of the movie
wailing the be-jaysus out of each other.
Butch and Sundance of course and they sure picked pieces of each other’s verbal hide.
48 Hours………..mmph…….I think it goes on the list, they certainly had enough
testosterone to merit.
Thunderbolt and Lightning, Jeff Bridges and Clint. A classic of friction.
A rapid knocking on my door halted my list, I figured it was a stoner asking why Lizzie
weren’t loud roaring, Whiskey In The Jar.
Figured wrong.
It was Shona.
A very distraught one, shouting
‘Why don’t you pick up your goddamn phone?’
Fook this, I asked
‘Am, what happened to hello?’
She brushed past me, turned to glare, said
‘Merrick’s been shot.’
I nearly said
‘I didn’t do it.’
In light of the last time I’d seen him, and my gun in his face, I bit down, hard. Asked
‘What?’
Her hands on her hips, the female in total exasperation at the male of the species, she said
‘His wife called me, they couldn’t get you,
She glanced at the bottle of Bourbon, the sound system, added
‘Because, guess what? Ryan is partying down. You bastard, your buddy is shot and
you’re having some fun time?’
She said a whole load of other shite, the way women do, they catch you on one fook up,
by Jesus, the whole kit and caboodle is comi.ng to show.
I did the smart thing, looked contrite like I could else? And when she wound down, got
the details, sketch as they were. Merrick was at Cedar Sinai, undergoing emergency
surgery.
And that was all she really knew.
She said
“I brought my car.’
Hello?
She had a car?
A Lincoln Convertible no less. You’d think…………The Lincoln lawyer, if you knew
your mystery.
‘WHICH WAY I FLEE IS HELL
MYSELF AM HELL.’
PARADISE LOST
MILTON.
She drove well, with a controlled ferocity, I had a hundred questions but my verdict
hadn’t come in yet so I said fook all.
Up on ER, we met Judy, Merrick’s wife, who said
‘Ryan?’
I waited for abuse but worse got
‘Oh Steve loves you.’
Steve?
Stephen Merrick, didn’t ring but I kept that to meself.
Merrick had taken a shot in his back, under the lower lung and was still in surgery, I
asked Judy
‘Can you remember anything about what happened/’
I was tentative, fearful of the wrath of The Comanche’s. She said
‘He came back early, from being with you, then said he’d work on our son’s car in the
yard. He’d been about there a while and I was going to call him for a beer, he loves his
cold beer after working up a sweat, when I heard a barrage of shots.’
Whoa, barrage?
She got there before me, said
‘Lieutenant Jordan,’
Indicating a short heavy set dude in the corner of the ER. He threw me a look of what
can only be termed, distaste.
Jesus, wait till he met me!
Judy continued
‘Say’s that six shost in all were probably fired, and only one hit.’
I thought
‘Moving car and handgun.’
It’s a bitch to nail a target with a handgun at the best of times but in a moving car, you
just empty your load and hope for luck.
Things got worse, Judy took my hand, said
‘Mr. Ryan, your friendship has really made a difference to Steve, he had been so down,
with Moe in a coma and all.’
Shona stared at me, willing me to step on it. I didn’t. Irish might mean green but it
doesn’t mean stupid, ask Bob Geldof.
I asked if could get her some coffee, some food, Jesus, anything to move me from the
spotlight.
Shona had her arm round her shoulder, I mean, come on, how do women get away with
this, they seem to be able do shit we’d get crucified for?
Judy said
‘Some coffee would be nice, keep me awake.’
I looked at Shona who said
‘No thank you?’
I went to get the coffee and with luck, a cig pit stop. The vending machine was on the
floor beneath and a sign that read………Smoking Room.
Alle-fooking-luia.
There is a nicotine God.
With a sense of humor. The sign led to the an outside wall.
Ok, I could roll.
A large man was coming towards me, he looked familiar, he smiled, said
‘You don’t remember me?’
Am…………
He laughed
‘You tinker, forgot me already, I’m Charley?……I own the bar, my Mum’s from Mayo?’
‘Oh right, sorry, I’m a bit preoccupied.’
He looked solemn, said
‘Steve will be fine, you’ll see, the guy is like a buffalo and hey, don’t be a stranger, come
down, buy your Indian girl some dinner, in my place, I’ll treat her right.’
Got outside
Got fired up and the door opened, I glanced up, a guy in a grey suit, came out, a crumpled
off the rack suit and I knew
‘Cop’
Nodded at him.
He took out a battered pack of un-filtered Pall Mall, and I offered my Zippo. He took it,
fired away.
I waited and sure enough, he said
‘Ryan, right?’
He put out his hand and I took it, he had one of those steel grips but let go without
damage, said
‘I used to walk the beat, with Merrick, back in the day.’
Ok.
More waiting as he got to make a smoke ring and maybe, the point then
‘Steve got pensioned out after his partner’s, lost his taste for the street I’m thinking and
me, I got moved to computer crimes.’
Waiting.
‘The point being, I’m shit hot with encrytology, numbers, data, anagrams
A beat
“And initials.
Gotcha.
“Steve ran some initials by me a few days ago, I never got to show him, simple really as
he’d told me they were in the serial ballpark, and you being his buddy, I figured, you’d
like, you might like to know.’
He told me, explaining,
‘A serial tag team, of real sweethearts, and the guy, he liked to send roses to his dead
victims homes,…………………………..
after they discovered the body.’
Shona, the roses.
He added
‘Sick huh?’
He flipped his cig butt high and far in to the Manhattan night, then reached in his jacket,
Said
‘I’ve been doing this a time, you know, and my instincts have never let me down.’
I asked