The Duration Read online

  I pushed open the door.

  Inside, the overhead light was unflattering. A short, scruffy guy in jeans and a hoodie was sitting at the desk, and a longer, balding guy with a potbelly was lying on Chick’s bed. The longer guy was wearing a Danny Ainge replica Celts jersey under a tracksuit. Fucking Ainge. They were watching the Bruins on NESN.

  “What’s up, gentlemen?” I asked.

  The smaller guy looked up quickly, his eyes darting around for exits and weapons. The longer guy was more languid. Sloth-like. He looked familiar.

  “Oh, hey,” said the scruffy character. “Uhh, Chick with you?”

  He stood up, stuffed his hands in his pockets.

  I shook my head no.

  “Haven’t seen him. I thought he was with you guys.”

  I looked at the smaller one.

  “You LaBeau?”

  He looked at me nervously, then nodded.

  I nodded back and turned toward the other one, who was still lying on Chick’s bed.

  “Feet off, please,” I said, pointing to his boots.

  Dude said, “Oh hell yeah, sorry,” and swung himself up to a sitting position. A fat Beantown Buddha. Then I recognized him.

  “You’re Robbie Golack,” I said.

  Dude nodded.

  “I know you?”

  I shook my head.

  “Naah. But I just had a beer with your brother.”

  He tilted his head, not so much thinking as trying to remember.

  “Well, you must mean Tim-Rick, because ain’t no beer where Ronnie’s at.”

  The scruffy guy gave a courtesy laugh.

  “Yeah,” I said. Whatever. “Tim-Rick. Down at the Heirloom.”

  Robbie looked almost wistful.

  “Yeah? I haven’t seen that kid in forever. How’s he doing?”

  I shrugged.

  “You all must be excited about the baby. Gonna be an uncle, huh?”

  Robbie looked up, semi-sharp, a butter knife of attention.

  “No shit?”

  He looked bewildered and, for the briefest of moments, hurt.

  “Little fucker never calls anymore. When I see him, I’m gonna kick his ass.”

  Well, that should fix it.

  LaBeau checked his pager even though it hadn’t buzzed. Dude had a pager.

  “Yo, we gotta go,” he said.

  Robbie shook his head.

  “I ain’t leaving until that motherfucker shows up with the money.”

  LaBeau blew air out of his cheeks.

  “Shut the fuck up,” said Robbie Golack.

  “You guys got something for him?” I asked.

  LaBeau didn’t say anything but Robbie Golack did because he was dumb as a stump.

  “Shit yeah, we got something for him,” he said, looking me over. Seemed like he was doing it more for my benefit than his own, like he wanted me to know I was dealing with a seriously bad dude. “And he already owes us from this afternoon.”

  “How much does he owe you?”

  Robbie shrugged.

  “Fuck.”

  He gestured to LaBeau without the decency to look at him.

  “All in? Two fifty,” said LaBeau.

  “Goddamn,” I said. “For what?”

  This was one Golack could handle.

  “For this,” he said, taking a small plastic pill jar out of his tracksuit pocket and rattling it. “Yahtzee.”

  He put the jar back in his pocket.

  “And for lunch.”

  “Easy, Rob,” said LaBeau.

  I thought for a minute.

  “Okay,” I said. “You guys going anywhere?”

  “Fuck no,” said Robbie Golack, swinging back onto the bed. “And I’m gonna put my boots up until that piece of shit comes back.”

  LaBeau sank down into the desk chair but kept his hands on the sides, as if, should an opportunity present itself, he might get right back up. Any opportunity at all. Elvis LaBeau did not want to be there, which made two of us.

  “Give me five minutes,” I said.

  Golack shrugged. “Give you all night, fuck I care.”

  I cut through the parking lot, stealing a glance at the Escalade’s interior. It was dark and still. I jogged across the Knotsford-Gable Road to the gas station, where there was an ATM. I took out $300 and slushed a large cherry Slurpee into a cup. I stuck a straw in it but left the lid on the counter. The attendant, a pockmarked woman in her early thirties, barely looked up.

  On the way back, I could see LaBeau in the parking lot, peering into the passenger side of my truck.

  I walked up.

  “Who’s that?” he asked.

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  He looked at me, and then whistled back toward the room.

  “Hey, Robbie!”

  “Give me the stuff for Chick,” I said.

  LaBeau just fidgeted. Cars went by, and they were making him nervous.

  Robbie Golack appeared at the door of the room, looked around, and did a fat-man jog across the parking lot, all shoulders and tiny, shuffling steps.

  “Give me the stuff for Chickie,” I said, when he got to us. He was about my height, but slouchy and balding already.

  LaBeau pointed to the truck.

  “Chick’s in there.”

  “He’s passed out,” I said. “From lunch.”

  Robbie Golack looked at me, then peered into the passenger seat.

  “Look, here’s three hundred dollars,” I said, taking the money from my pocket. “Give me the stuff. I’ll make sure Chickie gets it.”

  I made a point of looking around the parking lot, like we might be under surveillance. Prodding them toward a decision.

  LaBeau focused on the money. Robbie Golack kept peering into the truck.

  “Rob,” said LaBeau.

  Golack kept looking, but reached into his pocket for the vial. He gestured toward LaBeau.

  “Fuck it. Give him the money.”

  I handed LaBeau the wad. He counted it, the new bills both slick and sticky.

  “Three hundred,” he said.

  Robbie Golack gave me the vial. I stuffed it into my pants pocket.

  “He nodded out, huh?” he asked.

  I shrugged. “Stuff must be good,” I said.

  It seemed like a thing to say in a situation like this. Vaguely complimentary.

  Robbie looked at me.

  “Well, next time we ain’t waiting around. You tell him to get his shit together or I’m going to kick his ass.”

  It had been a long day. I felt like I’d made good choices for most of it.

  “Cool,” I said. “But let’s do it this way instead.”

  I took a sip from the Slurpee and handed it to LaBeau.

  “Hold this,” I said. “Don’t spill.”

  He looked at me for a second, then took the Slurpee in his right hand.

  “Two hands,” I said. “Please.”

  Robbie Golack smiled.

  “Hold up,” he said. “Why he gotta hold that shi—”

  When LaBeau put his left hand on the bottom of the cup, I coldcocked Robbie Golack—bam!—caught him right where his jaw line would’ve been if he wasn’t such a saggy turtle-headed fuck.

  I hadn’t punched anybody in a long time. But it’s sort of like riding a bike. You don’t really forget how to do it, and when you finally get a chance, you remember how much fun it is.

  The punch made a noise like a ball hitting a glove. Robbie Golack made a noise like “Guunh” and went down hard on the tail of the Trans Am. Something flew out of his mouth—a tooth, spit, part of his tongue, I didn’t really care. I could see it in the neon from the Horse Head. While he was down, I kicked him once in his midsection, not super hard but hard enough to lay him low for a minute.

  I turned to LaBeau. It seemed like he might initially have felt obligated to jump in, albeit reluctantly, if he hadn’t been trying not to spill a Slurpee, but now that it was just the two of us he sort of froze. I was a pretty big guy. />
  “Here’s the deal,” I said to him, getting right up close. “I see you anywhere near Chick again, two things are going to happen. First, I’m gonna kick your ass. Like bad. Second, I’m gonna turn you all in to the cops.”

  LaBeau still had two hands on the Slurpee.

  “You got it?”

  He nodded.

  “Keep the money. But no more rides, no more nothing. I see you again, you’re fucked. I know where you live. I know your parents.”

  That last bit was a nod to Officer Grevantz, who’d employed it so successfully on me as a kid. I reached into my pocket and LaBeau flinched. So I left my hand there.

  “You have thirty seconds to get out of here.”

  I took the Slurpee from him.

  “Put that underachieving son of a bitch in the car,” I said.

  Robbie Golack was struggling to his knees back by the fender.

  “Mother-” he said, reaching for his pockets.

  In my experience, people who are drunk or on drugs, or who have just been decked, or who are wearing tracksuits, tend to have a real overestimation of their motor skills. Robbie Golack was probably all three of those, and he was still fumbling around for his pockets when I decked him again. LaBeau grabbed him and pulled him around to the passenger-side door. I opened it and LaBeau stuffed him in. Golack started to stick his head out to say something—something like “You’re fucking . . . ” something, who the fuck cares?—and I slammed the door into him, the window smacking him in his nose. For a fat guy he had a skinny-ass nose. But it wouldn’t be skinny tomorrow.

  I took my phone out of my pocket and held it up so LaBeau could see it.

  “Fifteen seconds,” I said, taking a big pull of Slurpee. I pointed to Robbie Golack. “You tell him what’s up.”

  LaBeau nodded.

  “Fuck, man,” he said.

  “That’s right,” I said, tapping myself on the chest. “Fuckman.”

  LaBeau hustled over to the driver side and slid in. The Slurpee was giving me a brain-freeze. I stood on Golack’s side and kicked the door for good measure. Just a glancing kick. It was a nice car.

  LaBeau backed up and I could see Robbie Golack yelling something, at him or at me, whatever. I put my phone to my ear and LaBeau peeled out of the parking lot. He hit the Knotsford-Gable Road heading north, running the light by the Grub-n-Grog and vanishing around a bend.

  My knuckles were red and swelling a little. I pressed them against the Slurpee. I felt good. I felt like an MMA guy. Then I felt bad, almost instantly. Almost thirty years old, a member of the bar, beating up some sad-ass mule in a motel parking lot in order to help my druggie pal. Not mature. It was the sort of behavior that one might have hoped to leave behind by now.

  I took the vial out of my pocket and looked at the label. It said “Oxycodone: 40 mg.”

  The dude behind the Horse Head’s front desk was reading an issue of Bowhunter.

  “Yo,” I said, dropping my Slurpee onto the counter with a mild thud. “Benecik. Fifteen. We need to change rooms.”

  When Chick opened his eyes, it was 8 A.M. I’d been awake for an hour, my stuff already in a duffle bag in the truck.

  “What’s up?” I said.

  He looked around. Different room. His stuff was in a pile by the bed.

  “What’s going on?” he said.

  “You had some visitors last night.”

  Chick slowly patted himself, as if checking for bruises.

  “I took care of it.”

  I held out my purple knuckles. What a badass.

  With my other hand, I took the vial out of my pocket.

  “They left this,” I said.

  His eyes focused slowly. Then he dropped his head back on the pillow.

  “Shit.”

  I put the vial on the desk.

  “You remember anything? You remember seeing Tim-Rick Golack last night?”

  Chick stared at the ceiling and didn’t answer. After a minute, he got up gingerly and went to the bathroom. I could hear him rubbing water onto his face. When he came back out, he ambled toward the vial. I picked it up, put it in my pocket.

  “When did it start?” I asked.

  He looked at me, sat down on the bed, put his head in his hands.

  “This shit. When did it start with the Oxy?”

  They called it “hillbilly heroin” in the Franchise. A blight on all these rural towns.

  “I don’t know.” He rubbed his temples. “End of high school, I guess. After my knee. Doc gave me some pills for the pain. They helped. A lot.”

  “Ten years?” I asked.

  He shrugged.

  “Off and on,” he said. “Probably more on. Varying in intensity. SmartSeeds was good, it helped. Thought I was solid. Wasn’t. Slipped up out in the Pacific, they sent me home. Florida didn’t help at all. Dudes hand shit out like M&M's down there. I get back here, scene of the crime, turns out I know half the orderlies and two of the orthopedic docs at KMC. They pegged me the minute I walked through the door.”

  I shook my head, bewildered.

  “Guy. How come you never told me?”

  He wouldn’t look up.

  “I thought you knew. Everyone else, when you have a bum knee and a reputation for being a weirdo, they overlook stuff.”

  That broke my heart a little.

  “Can you stop?”

  He didn’t look up, sort of shrugged.

  “Trying. There’s always tomorrow.”

  I looked across the room. This is where it was at, a motel room and drugs. But at least he said he was trying.

  “Look,” I said. “I can’t be a part of this if it doesn’t change.”

  Chick looked up, confused.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You gotta get your shit together.”

  I handed him a slip of paper, the address of a local substance abuse clinic on it. I’d Googled it during the night.

  “Here’s a place. Have you heard of it?”

  Chick looked at the slip, saw what it was, and crumpled it.

  “Can I have my stuff, please?” he said.

  I took the vial out of my pocket and tossed it to him. It was empty.

  “I flushed it,” I said.

  Chick’s face darkened. I could see him trying to contain himself.

  “That was pretty stupid. It was a lot of money.”

  “No shit,” I said. “My money.”

  He looked at me.

  “I paid for it. And don’t bother calling them back. They’re not taking your calls.”

  He sat still for a minute, then flicked the vial across the room and through the bathroom door, where it hit harmlessly against the shower curtain. He lay back down on the bed.

  “You don’t really think that this is how it works, do you?”

  I sort of did. I think I was wrong.

  He covered his eyes. Seemed like he was having a little internal debate. When he took his hands away, he was smiling.

  “Okay. Fine. What do you want me to do?”

  “I’m glad you asked,” I said.

  I had it all figured out.

  “Go to that place. They’ve got a bed for you. Call Unsie and ask for a job. Apologize to Ginny Archey. I can’t babysit you. I have to go. But stay clean for a week, just this week, and I’ll come back.”

  He didn’t move.

  I played my trump.

  “We can look for the horn. Just one week. I’ll come back and we can look for the horn.”

  Chick rubbed his face, still smiling, his eyes focused somewhere in the middle distance.

  “You don’t understand,” he said, shaking his head. “I appreciate it. But you don’t understand.”

  I stood up.

  “You don’t understand,” I said. “I’m out. I cannot stay. If you want my help, leave your phone on and answer it when I call. Put me on your list at that place and tell them to talk to me. Do that and I’m here for you. If not, you’re on your own.”

  I went to th
e door and paused. Like I was really going to walk away.

  “You coming?” I asked.

  Chick looked at his knees. He stretched one leg out and reached for it in a weird pantomime of loosening up. Took a deep breath, then another. Finally, he stood up.

  “Where else do I have to be?” he said.

  I drove Chick out to the clinic, a drab, one-story institution surrounded by the Becket woods. The sign at the entrance to a long drive read “The Birches—Your Wellness Source,” like “wellness” was something you could buy, aisle six at the CVS. There were no fences, but Chick didn’t have a car, and the isolation seemed beneficial. Was it the right place for him? I had no idea. Was one week there going to do him more harm than good? Possibly. Here’s what I knew—it was within my budget and the only drug rehab place around that wasn’t in the Knots. I helped Chick fill out the paperwork and sent him off to intake. Right before he went in, we shared a little manly hug. It scared the shit out of me.

  I spent my junior year of college in Spain, learning enough Spanish to try and convince Spanish girls to sleep with me. I did not have much success, but when I came home I figured I should just run the labs and make sure that I wasn’t carrying any unwanted visitors from the more progressive stretches of the Costa Brava.

  I’d never been to a walk-in health clinic before, so I tore out the “Cl” page from the Yellow Pages and headed off to Great Barr. There were a few clinics listed. At the first place, a Planned Parenthood outlet off Main Street, the receptionist recognized me. She’d been in the Garden Club with my mother. I acted like I’d walked through the wrong door and left immediately. Then I went around to another place, steeled myself for the humiliation, walked up to the receptionist—an attractive young woman whom I might have hit on, were I not seeking a test for sexually transmitted diseases—and explained my predicament. She wrinkled her nose and said, “This is a mental health clinic.”

  This is a roundabout way to say that I didn’t know much about clinics and that I felt capable of dropping my drug-addled friend off at the wrong sort. But the Birches was an actual drug treatment clinic, if not a terribly in-demand one. It had featured prominently in the Scared Straight presentations our high school had put on years ago, and I’d vetted it just that morning on Yelp, where it got mostly good reviews from the drug addicts who had been sequestered there.