Kill Whitey

As I grasped for the knob, Otar reached the side of the Cherokee. He was puffing hard. I could see it from where I sat. His cheeks looked like a blowfish. Before I could pull away, he glanced into the back. His eyebrows narrowed. He shouted something in Russian and grabbed the door handle.

“Fuck!”

I stomped the accelerator and we shot forward. Otar held on to the door handle for a moment, and then tumbled face first to the pavement. As we raced into the street, I saw him jumping to his feet, pointing at us and screaming. The rest of the Russians were running towards him. There was a flash of light, followed a second later by a loud explosion.

“Motherfuckers are shooting at us,” Darryl screamed. “Drive, bitch, drive!”

Sondra spoke up for the first time. “They will kill you if they catch you. Kill us all. Please go. Fast. Now.”

“Listen to the lady,” Darryl urged. “Get us the hell out of here!”

I did. The Cherokee’s tires squealed and the vehicle shuddered, as if the engine was going to leap right out of it. The RPM and speedometer needles wobbled back and forth. We sped down the road and took the on ramp for Interstate 81. There wasn’t much traffic; just a lot of tractor trailers. I darted in and out of them, watching for signs of pursuit, but if Whitey’s men had followed us, we’d lost them.

“Why the fuck did you let that guy catch up to the car,” Darryl shouted. “Did you think he wouldn’t see the bloodied up bitch in the back seat?”

“I know, I know. I wasn’t thinking!”

“Damn straight, you weren’t. Jesus fucking Christ, Larry!”

Sondra sat up and I saw that she was crying again. I grabbed some tissues from the console and offered them to her.

“Here you go.”

“Thanks. You are nice to help.”

Darryl shook his head. “Son of a bitch…”

Sondra wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She looked around for some place to put the tissues.

“I can take them,” I said softly. “Hand them here.”

“Is…how you say? Snot…is snot in them.”

“That’s okay. Really, I don’t mind.”

She handed them back to me. I dropped them on the floor at my feet.

“How you know my name?” she asked.

“Huh?”

“My name. You say it to your friend when you help me. You say, ‘Sondra’. How is it you know my name?”

“Oh…” I laughed, nervous. Already, the gunshot and escape seemed distant and unimportant. This—having the girl of my dreams in my backseat—was far more unlikely.

“My name’s Larry Gibson. I watch you dance.”

“Yes.” She nodded, studying us both carefully. “Yes, I see you both at club. You talk to the other girls but you watch me long time.”

“Well,” I said. “I guess I do watch you a lot. I enjoy your show.”

“Me, too,” Darryl said. “And my name is Darryl Moore. And now that we’ve made introductions and we’re all friends and shit, how about you fucking tell us what the fuck is going on and why the fuck you were hiding beneath Larry’s fucking Jeep and why the hell those motherfuckers were fucking shooting at us?”

Sondra pursed her lips. “You curse very much.”

“You’re goddamn right I do,” Darryl said. “Now talk.”

Before she could respond, my hands went numb and I started shaking. I managed to roll the window down, but then I turned on the heat. I felt cold all of the sudden, but I was sweating like a pig. The road blurred. Darryl said something to me, but I couldn’t understand him. His voice sounded like it was far away. He grabbed the steering wheel and I tried to focus on him.

“Pull the fuck over,” he said. “You’re going into shock.”

I was and I did. I felt weak and tired and out of breath. Darryl and I switched places. I wasn’t worried about him wrecking the Cherokee. Not anymore. Such concerns seemed silly and trivial now. It’s not every day that someone tries to kill you. They’d shot at us. They’d actually fucking shot at us. It wasn’t like a movie or a TV show. This was real fucking life.

While Darryl readjusted the seat and familiarized himself with the Jeep, I lay back in the passenger’s seat and tried to get my breathing under control. Sondra leaned forward, staring at me. It felt good, seeing the concern reflected in her eyes. She reached out and touched my forehead.

“Thank you again,” she said. “For help. You good. Both of you.”

Her fingers slowly caressed my skin. They felt cool to the touch. I closed my eyes and sighed. Then her hand went away again.

Darryl pulled back onto the Interstate and fumbled out his cell phone. He flipped it open. The keypad glowed green in the darkness.

“Who you calling?” I asked.

“The cops, man. Who the fuck do you think?”

“Nyet,” Sondra shouted. “You no call police. Very bad. Much trouble if you call them!”

Ignoring her, Darryl began dialing with his thumb. Sondra leaned farther forward and snatched the cell phone from his hand. The Cherokee swerved into the passing lane. A GPS tractor trailer blared its horn at us. Darryl jerked the Jeep back into our lane. Before we could react, Sondra rolled down the window and tossed the phone outside. It smashed against a concrete construction barrier. The trucker blew his horn again.