The Southside of Paradise - Chapter 12

​Chapter 12 - As Seen Through Dirty Windows

    Rigo swung the golf club like a baseball bat and then started jumping up and down like a demented clown."Take that you son of a bitch! Take that you tire shooter outer mother fucker!" Then he started laughing like an old assed wino who had slipped off over the side. No Neck didn't even crack a smile as he walked up to the tee.

      "Shut-up, Rigo! My dad's friends are all over this place, and you better not get us kicked out of here," yelled Mickey.

      What Mickey meant by here was the Riverside Country Club where the three of them were playing the back nine. The club was in Hartford, the county seat, as there was no course in Concord. The Country Club was a beautiful course nestled against the river with the fairways and greens laid out in a forest of ancient, majestic looking oaks.

    No Neck took a few practice swings and with a resounding smack propelled the ball straight down the middle of fairway. Micky was sitting in a golf cart in the shade of small grove of oak trees.

     " I told you both that you can't be acting like fools out here!" He gave them both the icy glare that he had been practicing in front of his mirror at night. It worked immediately on Rigo who quickly apologized. No Neck responded by giving Mickey his own death glare, something he had also practiced in front of a mirror as he felt it helped intimidate his opponents in football. 

       "Fuck you, Mickey. You can talk like that to the retard as he don't seem to mind," they both looked at Rigo's smiling face, "but if  talk to me like that again, and I'll stuff your head so far down your neck; you'll shit out your asshole." No Neck, unlike Rigo, had no fear of Mickey as he possessed a more realistic view of their relationship. If Rigo wanted to pretend that they were all friends that was his problem.

      "You already shit out of you asshole, Bobby. It's supposed to be that you'll have to look out of your asshole," laughed Rigo, "And you called me the retard." He started to laugh again but looked at No Neck's face and decided against it.

      No Neck, embarrassed, sputtered out, " He knows what I meant," nodding toward Mickey.

       Mickey took the gaze in stride, and responded quickly," What you getting worked up about? All I'm saying is we can't be acting all stupid out here. My dad will come down hard on us all."

        " And all I'm saying is you should've said WE the first time."

      "Fuck this!" Mickey hissed while tossing a beer can in the general direction of a green rubber trash receptacle, "I'm sick of playing golf. I need some action."

     "You're the one said we needed to lay low for awhile after putting Danny Wilson in the hospital the other night," Rigo still smiled like the lunatic he was.

       "Well, it's been a week and a half, and my Pop ain't yelled at me yet, so Wilson probably kept mum."

        No Neck nodded and added, "Them south side dudes never do go the cops. They are either cowards or like to handle their own business."

        "Probably both!" Rigo chimed. "That one who set my cousin's cars on fire wasn't chicken. He lit the match while the cops were walking up."

       "They don't go to the cops because they're all a bunch of criminals. Their grandpas probably ran moonshine back in the hills they came from. The only cops they see is when they're being led away in handcuffs," Mickey smiled at the sudden vision of Danny being arrested in  the Emergency room.

        "In the meanwhile, your daddy's golfing with the Police Chief and the Mayor," laughed Rigo.

         "Exactly!" They all laughed at that. They almost stopped once, but Rigo acted like it was being led away in cuffs and they exploded again.

      No Neck recovered first, "Hey, there's a place about two miles from here where most the kids at Hartford go swimming. I'm friends with Guy Borges, Leo Nunes, and couple of other guys who played football at Hartford. Guy's the one told me about it; said I should come by. He said there were lot of sweet looking girls there."

     Mickey smiled wickedly, "You sure? Last time we followed up a lead like that, all we saw was hippos wallowing in the mud."

      No Neck answered, "That was Rigo's fucking fault." Rigo shrugged at the comment. No Neck continued, "Guy ain't goin lie about such things. He said they were some real nice girls." He held up his hands to signify that the girls in question had nice racks."


    Mickey straightened up in the seat and blurted, "We're so out of here!" They all piled into the golf cart with Rigo standing on the back. They left so fast, they failed to notice the two expensive clubs they had left lying on the ground. They did, however, swing around to pick the blue and white igloo ice chest they had forgotten in their haste. Rigo sat beside it and rode with his arm across the lid to hold it in place.

     When Mickey returned home later that evening after dropping off Rigo and No Neck at a girl's house in the Estates, he opened the door and found his father waiting up. Mr. Porcine was wearing a red smoking jacket and held a half empty gin and tonic in right hand.

         "Hey, Dad. Your never up when I come in, to what do I owe the pleasure," He enjoyed trading sarcasm with his dad.

        " A little bird told me a rumor today; I wanted to give you a head's up."  

       "In the first place, Pop. Ms. Hasslett is not a little bird. She got breasts for days!"

     Mr. Porcine grimaced at the mention of his assistant's name and nodded toward the stairs then placed his left forefinger to his nose. " I heard that that hippy Danny Wilson ended up in the hospital the other night with a four inch gash and a cracked rib."

       "I heard that too; he must have messing with something that he shouldn't have been messing with."

       "I also hear somebody hit him in the head with a billy club out in front of that little girl's house. That hot little number you used to go with."

        Mickey looked into his father's eyes trying to gauge what he knew. "Jill is still my girl, Dad. We're having a few problems, but we'll work them out.

         "And the billy club?"

         "Dad, please! You really think  I'd need to use a club on a skinny ass hippy?" Mickey laughed to add credence to the question.

          "Well, I don't mind cracking a few heads and stuff. Did a lot of it myself when I was your age. I just don't like the ideas of knives and clubs being used to settle scores. Hell, it takes the fun out of smashing your fist into some punk's face."

          " How about using a gun?" Mickey tried to look sincere.

         Mr. Porcine decided his son was joking and laughed uproariously, " Just make sure you hide the body and the weapon!" Mickey joined in the laughter as his dad put his arm around his shoulders, and they started walking towards the stairs.

       "You're too much, Pop. You're way too much."

      His dad lightly punched him on the shoulder when they came to his parent's room. As he opened the door, his mother's voice leaked out.

     "Mickey, did you see the note by the phone? Jill called you while you were out."

     " Thanks, Mom. I'll call her in the morning." He turned toward his room with a smile on his lips and an evil gleam in his eyes and mumbled to himself. "Just like Romeo and Juliet with an ass whipping thrown in. Dad, if you only knew, You'd be proud."

      He didn't call the next day, but showed up at Jill's front door at nine in the morning knowing that she didn't have to start school until 10:00. Mickey rang the bell several times and waited. When the door finally opened he could tell Jill was surprised.

   "Good morning, gorgeous! Mother said you'd call yesterday and I couldn't wait to talk to you, so I stopped at the bakery and got you a raspberry filled and an orange juice, your favorite."

     There was a prolonged silence, and Mickey stood there for a moment with the bag and the juice bottle hanging in the air between them. Jill hadn't even bothered to invite him in.

      Instead, her eyes looked puzzled and her voice projected anger, "Mickey, what are you doing here?"

       "You tell me, Jill. Mom said you called me. I just figured that you had finally come to your senses and were willing to put this ridiculous nonsense behind us and to get on with our future."

      " I called to ask you about putting DannyWilson in the hospital and hitting him with a club right in front of my house. And cheating on me is not ridiculous nonsense, at least not the way I see it."

       "That punk asked for it. First, shooting out my tire is an act of war by itself, then having the nerve to come across town and park his car right smack dab in front of my girlfriend's house was really asking for it." He sat down the doughnut and the orange juice on the side walk and pounded his fist into his palm to add emphasis.

     We are not a couple, Mickey, and the way you've been going, we might never be a couple again." Jill glared at him and the fire in her eyes caused him to waver but only for a moment.

      He went on the attack, "This is your fault, Jill, at least as much as mine. I told you I was sorry weeks ago remember. I bought you that bracelet you liked so much." It was his turn to get angry, " None of this would have happened if you acted like a normal girl, but no you have to rub my face in it every day hanging out with the low life bunch of hillbillies. Besides you didn't get mad when I beat the bejeezus out that piece of shit, Mikie and that guy with the porn mustache."

      "Both of them deserved what they got. They both tried to pin my arms down and force themselves on me.  I kept yelling for them to stop, but they wouldn't. I thought we were just going out on a date, and the next thing I'm fighting for my life. Frankly, I didn't much care if you and your friends hurt them."

       " Well, how am I supposed to know the difference. You and Danny looked like you were wrestling pretty good when he kissed you goodbye the other night." The veins in his temples were pounding and both his fists were balled at his side.

      "Danny's not like those other two guys. He's actually a sweet guy, and he's definitely no hillbilly either; he's actually very smart. He wasn't forcing me to do anything I didn't want to do." She had never meant to tell Mickey that but couldn't stop it from coming out."

    His shoulder's went back and his mouth was as hard as crack in granite, "You mean....?

      Mickey's face was frightening to see, He had turned bright cherry red. Jill cut him off before he could finish speaking, "Don't even go there! That girl you were messing with at the river yesterday was my mom's Goddaughter. She called me five minutes after you dropped her off; she wanted to make sure we weren't still together."

     She waited for the words to sink in then turned and gently closed the green door behind her leaving Mickey, who was itching to fight, with no one to fight. He kicked the doughnut and coffee over. The coffee from the cup flowed across the red bricks then over the edge. He ran to his car, slammed the driver's door and left skids marks taking off from the curb.