Ronny Has A Cat

** - Please note: This is an unfinished, rough draft. Please only rate or comment if your intention is honest/constructive criticism. I am looking for honest commentary about the piece. If you think it sucks, fine, just tell me why. If you think it's great, then great - but please tell me what elements made it so. Thanks in advance!

Monday, November 8. P.M.

Same bar, same seat, same gin until my head collapses. What else is there? Nothing moves in this world. Nothing big anyhow. In fact if there’s one lesson I can take from my experience it’s that big things don’t happen. Instead it’s a series of little movements – little, innocent events in your every day life and before you know it you’re an unemployed, divorced alcoholic sitting at a bar asking Carl The Bartender for another glassful.
“Going for it again tonight?”
“Let me tell you something Carl. This aint some chop-job movie bullshit you know.” He had no idea what I meant. I had no idea what I meant, so I explained: “Look - it aint like your just sitting at the dinner table with your wife eating fucking steak and potatoes and drinking a beer and then – next frame – your sitting in some stink hole bar blabbering your life story to some fucking – I don’t know what. It aint like that shit at all.”
“Right Tom.”
“A little more in there . . . it’ll fit.”
He filled the glass to the rim, no ice. Here’s one of the good guys, a big stupid looking fellow with nothing but smiles and patience. He’ll listen to my drunken ramblings and smile – a true friend. I started hanging around Carl’s bar about two months ago when my boss tired of paying me to stare at noise canceling ceiling tiles for 8 hours a day. In fact today marks our two month anniversary, Carl and I. I raise my glass to him and he returns a wrinkled brow.
I can still remember parts of my old life, before the booze. I remember that job of mine although it seems humorous and distant now. All I know is that I created nothing, for nothing, and received nearly nothing in return. I suppose that’s the current state of things – the engineers create Product, the marketers convince us we need Product, the salespeople give us Product, and once we have Product we start figuring out what else we can do to enhance, improve, and accessorize Product. In the end it’s all for naught – the real winners are the shrinks who help us manage our self-induced, market-propelled insanity. I think Carl just noticed that I’ve rested my head in a bowl of popcorn.
“Listen why don’t you get on out of here. Go get some sleep.”
“Hang on – I got some friends coming. I better wait here.”
“Don’t make me walk you out of here, eh Tom?”

Carl knows me – he can see when things are about to get messy. In fact, I trust him better than myself in that regard so it’s to the pavement with me, a two-mile walk home on a beautiful Arizona night. If you catch me on a good night’s walk home it’s a one-man parade for all too see. Laughter, leering, maybe even an exclusive solo performance from the hood of a car. Those nights I might even pick up a beat cop escort. Right into the house he takes me – tucks me in real snug with a little kiss on the cheek. Tonight is not one of those nights.

Stumble, stumble, catch yourself.
Slobber a little and trip.
Get up, Tom, the pigs are out and they don’t like you slopping in their shit.
Stay out of sight.
Take the alleys, follow the shadows to the dark corners and duck.

Once home it’s even worse. These nights the numbers on the elevator buttons don’t sync. Fuck all if you ever know that you got the right floor anyhow – whatever you end up with it’s left or right into a hundred identical rooms with identical doors and their funny numbers. Concentrate. Four stories up the stairs. It’s the left side, five doors down. The key . . . the key – where the hell? She opens the door.

Tuesday, November 9. A.M.

“Good morning.”
Normally I would respond in kind, but the voice is strange. As is the bed, and – more importantly I suppose – the room it’s in. Especially odd is the fifty-something lady standing before me with a cup of coffee in each hand. She extends one cup to me.
“Where am I?”
“Next door to your apartment. I’m Liza, even if you seem to prefer calling me Wendy.”
I take the coffee. It’s lukewarm, and bitter - I wish it was gin. Next door? I suppose that’s the one fringe benefit of drunkenness – those things I do which I wish I couldn’t remember, I can’t. I hope if something good does come my way that I write it down before I black out. She said Wendy.
“Wendy? I didn’t?”
“You did, and no – we didn’t. You sure did try though, I almost gave in just to shut you up.”
“Jesus, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. Hell, if you weren’t so drunk I might have been flattered.”
She plops herself on the bed, drinking her coffee and looking at me. Next door? A feint memory of this same scenario is trying to wrestle itself into my consciousness, but it is drowned out by more current issues. Am I naked under these sheets?
“Who is this ‘Wendy’ anyhow? She sure has you strung out.”
“Ex-wife. Listen, I’d better go Lisa.”
“Liza.”
“Right – well – Liza. Thank-you.”

Next door it’s horrid and familiar. The lights went out a week ago due to nonpayment. Turning them back on would cost me another week in libation so it’s darkness for now. The only furnishing is a huge four-poster bed. Beautiful really – it was all she left me. I worked overtime every week to buy a house and fill it with furniture. Shit - I bought a car and kept it full with gas so she could drive over to my friend’s house and fuck him nine ways to Sunday. For it all I get the bed.
Wendy and I started dating a couple of years out of high school. She was a college girl, and I was a party boy. Through some odd stroke of fortune we hit it off really well and we were soon married. She set me straight, made sure I was finished with the club scene, the recreational drugs, and most of the drinking. I got a real job, got things going to make a life. Things never seemed to sour, then one day she wasn’t around. She came home in the afternoon and told me, just as calm as if she was telling the weather, that she’d been over at my friend Martin’s house and that I could guess the rest. She told me that she was bored, that I was a loser, and that I was never going anywhere in life. Then she left.
Right then things began to regress. This woman who had insisted that I walk the higher ground undertook the task of dismantling all I had built under her direction. She took all of my possessions, the house, and almost everything in it. She destroyed me. I hung on to my job for as long as I could but soon that was gone too. Soon I will lose this apartment and I will be on the street. If I can make it that long – there are easier ways through these times than living.

Tuesday, November 9. P.M.

Gin. If I have it right this stuff was invented by a Dutch doctor as a cure for stomach ailments and one hundred years later Parliament was busily trying to ban it because every man, woman and child in London was dead drunk. Well either way I started this story yesterday – right in the same damned bar, at the same damned seat drinking this same blessed drink. Tonight is a slow night for me, I think. Hard to say for sure considering the memory troubles inherent to my hobby, but normally by this hour I should be head first into the business end of a toilet and wondering what the hell had happened. It doesn’t matter. If, like me, you’re apt to do exactly the same thing on any given night, then remembering one nocturne versus another loses its importance and you tend to stop looking back. Look forward, or don't look at all. Look at the lights on the ceiling - try to forget. While you do that I need to take a leak.
A lot of people don’t realize it, but pissing outdoors is one of life’s greatest pleasures. If you’ve got a good 20 ounces of hard liquor floating around inside you it’s got to come out, and usually by the time you realize it you’re nearly too late. The combined sensations of bladder pressure, public exposure, and probably a bit of instinctual wildness make a powerful recipe for drunken bliss . . . this is life – living fragrant and magical – healing.
“Hey!”
A cop’s voice if I ever heard one – he’s calling from behind and I can’t see. I should zip up, but I have to finish so I don’t piss on myself right before they haul me in for indecency. So I continue.
“Hey! What the hell? Tom? Tom Lane? Hey – Tom!”
This guy knows my name. I don’t know any cops and I’m finished now so I turn to see that it’s no cop at all. In fact, I think I know this guy.
“Do I know you?”
“Shit – you’d better! You don’t recognize me?”
“Sorry – I . . .”
“Yeah – you’re drunk as hell, Tom. You waiting for a hooker to finish that off?”
I zip myself up. I can see him now – see his face.
“Ronny?”
“Yeah! Come on in buddy let’s get you another one!”
Ronny Doyle was doing fine. We hadn’t seen each other in years – he’d say “too long,” but I wouldn’t. Back then we were a couple of bachelors with a little money and fewer brains. We made a name for ourselves as reckless but strong. We made enough friends in the club circuit that Ronny quit working and went full-time supplying coke, weed, and speed. He stopped coming around after Wendy entered the picture – Ronny never liked being second best, even when it came to my love for a woman.
Let me be very clear about this: I am not a homosexual. Ronny - he went both ways, but when he and I were together we might as well have “been together.” No two people really ever understood each other as much, and certainly nobody understood the two of us at all. In our prime there was almost a sixth sense between us – one just knew what the other was about to do or say, and whatever it was it was wonderful. These kinds of friendships spring up amongst the young and drunk sometimes, and while they last they are a blessing. Or a curse. Wendy changed everything. I couldn’t be the same way around Ronny without upsetting her, and upsetting her always seemed to frighten me. Then Ronny began to frighten me. He would sneak around the house at nights, and became violent at times if there was any disagreement. Soon, we both agreed it was better to part ways – Ronny back to the scene, and I to Wendy.
We’re still sitting inside when Carl announces last call. We’d caught up – Ronny had been married and divorced the same as I had. He never did settle down though. Lately times have been tough for the pushers, he says, and as he gets older he is finding it hard to keep up with the kids. What you need, he says, is some quick cash to get a leg-up on them, and for this he has a plan. By the time he’s done explaining it we’re outside and Carl has closed up shop.
“No way – no way.”
“What do you mean? What you made out of money? Got too much of it lying around – don’t need anymore Tom?”
“It’s not that . . . look at me man, I’m a wreck.”
“I know. You look like a damn train hit you dead in the face. Whatever, who cares? This is just what you need. Look, I can’t go this alone, and I trust you.”
“Why the fuck would you trust me? When was the last time we even spoke?”
“A long time ago, but you’re the same guy. Look man, I love you. I don’t want to see you waste away like this. This is it – a way out for both of us.”
“Take me home, would you?”

Ronny dropped me off at my apartment building and told me to think it over. He’d come by in the morning to pick me up. I didn’t even know why I had him bring me here. I will not sleep in this bed unless I black out. Tonight I haven’t had enough to drink, and my head is a tidal wave of thought. Memories – useless, troubling memories of things I can never have back, times I will never recapture. I’m a child with two parents, then a child with one, a student with promise, on scholarship at the state school, then a drunken idiot failing out. Now I have a partner in crime, then I have a girlfriend, then only the girlfriend, then a wife. A house, a job, a divorce. Now I’m lying in bed alone, half-drunk – I’m not even a good drunk – watching the morning sun come in through the blinds. Fuck it – alright Ronny, I’m in, but you’re driving.

Wednesday, November 10.

Monkeys. Smart monkeys, but – really – just monkeys. You, me, the whole lot of us. Most people are okay with this – they see the evolutionary patterns and they can swallow that we are descended from tree-dwellers in our past. They also harbor an idea of some inherent human goodness which separates us from the animal kingdom. They are wrong. There is evil underlying everything, and everybody in the world. It comes out when you have given up, when there is no more of America's plastic beauty facade to placate your inner being. It comes out, too often, when you are at the end of your rope, and sometimes you embrace it because there is nothing else to embrace. I’d rather embrace this bank teller – blonde hair, red lips and cleavage. She smiles at me knowing that I have just withdrawn my last dime. Now broke, I exit the bank and get in Ronny’s car.
“You’re sure about this?”
“This is a sure thing.”
“How do you know this guy in Flagstaff?”
“Sean?”
“Yeah – that’s the guy, right?”
“That’s the guy alright. I don’t know – how do you know anybody these days. We met a long time ago through Martin – remember Martin?”
“Yeah yeah – I remember Martin.”
“Anyway – this Sean guy can turn the weed around at twenty times our price if he dimes it up. What the hell do we care?”
“Right. Let’s get going then.”

Ronny's plan was simple, almost beautiful - one of those "too easy" things that would scare off anybody except the destitute. The two of us take a day to drive down to Nogales, Arizona, right at the Mexican border. Ronny has a guy there sitting on two hundred pounds of quality weed who’s original buyer never showed. He wants to get rid of it fast, so Ronny low balled him and the whole damn bail is ours for 20 grand. The trick is that the hard part is done – it’s sitting on the American side waiting for us to pick it up and escort it to Flagstaff where another guy wants to buy it for $500 a pound - $100,000. Our biggest concern is that someone else might give a better offer, so we have to hurry and close the deal.
We are already on the road. Ronny hands me a flask of whiskey which I take a long sip from and pass back. It is a miserably hot day, like most days here, and we have three hours of it to look forward to. Southern Arizona is at some points the ugliest, and some points the most beautiful place on Earth. All along it is dotted with golf courses and Indian casinos to entertain all of the retirees who got lost on their way to Florida. The heat comes off the highway in waves and overpowers even the best air conditioning. And it all leads to nothing. The end of the road is Nogales, Arizona – a real shit hole which makes it’s living off of illegal immigration, small-time drug smuggling, and under-aged American drunks.
All of the action is on the Mexican side of the border. In the pharmacy windows they advertise half-off the latest date-rape drugs, and they pimp white-collar prescription drugs. You can have your teeth molested by unlicensed dentists, and you can rent a 15-year old schoolgirl for a hundred bucks an hour. There are nightclubs which offer all-you-can-drink specials and have federales waiting at the exit to bribe young Americans – “I don’t care if you did it or not, Amigo, the fine is $40 or you have to go to jail.” The guys who are selling $10 sombreros to tourists seem to have missed the whole point. They reeked of failure. The whole city did, really, and everywhere you looked were bars serving up to the Mexicans the same solution I had found back home. Ronny and I found a seat at an old favorite of ours, the Pancho Villa Bar.

“What the fuck are doing on the Mexican side, Ronny?”
“Waiting for Miguel.”
“You said he had the shit through already – what the hell are we doing over here?”
“We’re waiting. Christ man, just sit tight.”
We had crossed over the border by foot, just like we used to when we were teenagers. Back then it seemed different – the neon lights and rush of freedom must have covered the dirt, the smell of open sewage, and the desperate eyes on every face. Back then I felt like I was the king of this town, running around spending my American dollars like I couldn’t run out. Now I seem to fit in with the muck. My eyes are desperate too.
“Ronny! Who the fuck is this guy Ronny?”
It was Miguel. Miguel was a shirt, but stoutly built man and he wore the standard Mexican smuggler’s uniform: Baggy jeans, alligator-skin shoes, and a sleeveless undershirt which revealed an arm, back and chest covered with tattoos venerating this and another Catholic such and such. Apparently Miguel didn’t like that Ronny had picked me up on the way down.
“Shit man, this is Tom – Tom Lane. A good friend from way back – no worries, Amigo.”
“Fuck you, ‘Amigo’. You should be sucking my big amigo dick for this deal, we are not friends. Let’s go.”
We went by foot. Off the main streets, into the unpaved neighborhoods where kids played with chains and three-legged dogs. Up a hill so steep no car could make it – even if the people living here could afford a car. Miguel’s house sat atop the hill with a precariously perched patio supported by stacks of cinder blocks overlooking the Northern end of Nogales. He was least poor of the very poor here, and from atop this hill he oversaw his little kingdom.
Inside the home had been half finished in faux luxury – surplus marble tile in places, mirrors everywhere, dark-stained wood furnishings with worn upholstery. Miguel showed us out to the patio which was a bare concrete crescent with bare wrought-iron poles along the perimeter. He walked out the edge to look over his city, and with his back to us:
“You see this fucking place? I been working for these Columbians for many years, and this is how I am repayed. What a shit – I am surprised everyday this thing doesn’t collapse and slide down this hillside.”
I started, but Ronny signaled me not to respond. Miguel continued.
“This will be my last goodbye. When the Columbians find out what I have done with their drugs they will come to find me here, but I will be gone. You two Americanos – you make sure they do not find you.”
Miguel turned and faced us, staring intently for a moment before walking past us and into his home. Like two kids unsure if we were allowed, Ronny and I followed him into the kitchen where he had begun making margaritas in the large kitchen. While he worked on the drinks there was a new life in his eye – a glint of happiness.
“You know what the problem is with you Americans. You have no idea about drinking. Drinking can be magical – but you need the right ingredients,” he handed us each a shotglass full with tequila and continued, “take the Margarita. Here is a chance for simple magic – easy to make. But you fucking gringos – what you do to your margaritas is a disgrace. Drink!”
We all took our shot. The tequila felt good – I hadn’t much booze today, and now the appetite was whet. I was handed another glass, a low ball with a fresh Margarita on rocks. I drank it quickly and was happy to find that Miguel was liberal with the good stuff.
“You like that – see! Here is my secret recipe!”
“It’s very good. How about another?”
“Ha! Ronny – I like your friend more than I like you.”
He mixed another which I quickly drank. It was coming now, the sweet numbness I needed. I poured a glass of tequila and finished it off as well. I could get used to this drink. Ronny and Miguel had moved across the room a bit and they were discussing something. The pleasure in Miguel’s eyes had gone the way of sobriety and he was waving something around at Ronny like it was important. I had ceased to care, I was miles away from them now, watching through a looking glass and not caring in the least about what they said. More, I poured more, and ate a slice of lime. I tried to focus on reality a moment, but it made my head hurt. I went outside.

“What the fuck was that about, Tom?”
Now I was walking, quickly. Ronny’s hand was tightly squeezing my elbow to guide me through the crowd of tourists that had developed while he were at Miguel’s place. We were headed out of Nogales.
“Where are we going?”
“We’re going to do what we fucking came here to do – which, by the way, is not to become slobbering drunk at a drug dealer’s house.”
“Hey fuck off man, we were all drinking.”
“We were having a drink – oh – fuck it. Look try to act normal going through the border, would you?”
Border checks in Nogales are about as secure as if they didn’t exist at all. The guy at the counter asks you if you’re an American citizen. Yes. Did you purchase anything during your stay in Mexico? No. Any food, alcohol, or prescription medication? No. Okay, go on through. Ronny and I had nothing to worry about – we had left the cash at Miguel’s so we were technically coming through with less than we came with.
Once through, Ronny explained that Miguel had given him a map and a key to a house on the American side where the stash was being kept. We went straight there, and after a quick check for anything mildly suspicious we went in through the front door. Once inside I realized we had a small problem: two-hundred pounds of weed is a lot of weed. Impossible to hide without better planning. My drunk was going, my head started to weave a bit.
“How the hell are we going to hide all of this?”
“Fuck it – we can get it all in the car. Who cares – the chances of us getting pulled over are slim to none. If we do get pulled over there’s a gun in the glove compartment . . . worst case.”
“I aint gonna shoot no fucking cop.”
“Whatever – look – who cares? It won’t come up. Help me load this into the car.”
We loaded the car. I felt ready to burst, too much build up then this all seemed so easy - we may as well have been loading girl-scout cookies. Miguel had even left a gallon bottle of water in the house for us to drink. Three hours later we were pulling into Ronny’s drive. He had a small house in a low-rent central Phoenix neighborhood with a full surrounding wall for privacy. We would leave the stash in the car overnight and get it up to Flagstaff tomorrow. Ronny put the car into park and looked over at me from his driver’s seat. He looked at me with the same eyes I remember from our club days – they danced with the excitement of the moment.
“Holy shit, Tom, what did I tell you?”
“I need a drink.”
“Me too – I’ve got some stuff inside. Nothing special, but you don’t seem like the picky type.”

Thursday November 11.

Ronny has a cat. More accurately, Ronny has a cat with bad breath who has chosen me as his crying post this morning. Right in my face: meow meow meow. Not even a cute little kitty meow – this is more of a snarl. I push the cat off my chest and off the couch where I had passed out. I am forced into the world of the living.
The house is littered now with the remains of a hard night’s drinking. Bottles, half-eaten frozen dinners, cans, furniture laying on it’s side. If there’s one thing missing from this post-bender picture it’s my partner-in-crime. His bedroom is empty, as is the bathroom and every other room in the house. Check the windows. It’s gone – the car is gone, and Ronny with it. Half-way to Flag by now I’d bet.
He let me smell it: the scent of success. He let me see the way out of my hole and maybe into a brighter one. He let me see it, smell it, almost touch it and now he’s pulled away with it. I gave him my last dime for this chance. A flood of anger hits me – all the anger in the world all at once. My wife, my job, my house, my best fucking friend – a thousand knives in my back and I’m the one who’s twisting. Now I’m finished – I can’t even go back to the bar for relief. Carl may be a friend of mine, but he can’t let me drink for free.

Meow
meow
meow
meow.

Okay, kitty, come here, let’s celebrate.

I have the cat now by the throat, it’s little arms swinging claws at me at snarling. We are dancing, this cat and I, we are dancing the Fuck Ronny dance. Yes yes! Fuck him, fuck this whole plan. You are Ronny’s cat – your soul is dirtied with his sin – we must cleanse you! To the ritual toilet! Head first, dear cat, head first to salvation and flush! Don’t struggle you little shit, I quickly release the cat and drop the lid. His pleading echoes from his porcelain cell. Stupid fucking cat.

“Yo! Tom!”
It’s Ronny’s voice from the front door.
“Tom! Let’s go – come on, I got us some chow for the road!”
Ronny had gone to the corner store for doughnuts and coffee. He even picked up a case of beer for the ride. I neglected to mention the cat as we rushed out and got on the highway – I still hated the guy, I just had one less reason for that hatred him now. We had made this trip before, Ronny and I. Flagstaff is only a couple of hours away and back in our prime the cool mountain air often lured us North. Usually we’d pick up a couple of girls, make them believe we were young businessmen, or lawyers or some such bullshit and take them to the slopes for a weekend of skiing. The funny part was heading back to Phoenix without the girls – let them take bus.
“So what’s the deal man – you scared the shit out of me this morning. You in some kind of a hurry?”
“Fuck yes!” Ronny’s eyes were wide open like a couple of airplane hangars. Coke never did suit him. When he talked his eyes seemed to bulge even more, and his nostrils flared, “I don’t know about you, but the way I see it the less time we spend with 200-pounds of the ol’ Mary Jane in the car the less chance we stand of spending the next decade in the pen!”
“Alright, I’m with you on that one. Just take it easy on the speeding there – no sense in getting us pulled over now.”
“Don’t worry about it man. Remember when we used to drive up to Flag? Never got pulled over once. Remember all those fucking bitches man?”
“Yeah, I remember. You want one?” I was opening a beer.
“Nah – I hardly drink anymore. I’m reformed!”
Ronny was playing a mixed tape of classic rock on his crappy little car stereo. Lots of guitars and intense drumming – Led Zeppelin, Steppenwolf and the like. Pretty soon we were headed up off the desert floor and into the mountains. Unlike it’s Southern counterpart, Northern Arizona is nothing but beauty. Mountains, valleys, and mesas, nothing out of place. Ronny didn’t seem to notice – he kept his foot firmly on the gas and we sped along the Interstate as though it were any other. I was polishing off beer number 6 when the sirens came on.
“Fuck!”
“What the hell – how fast were you going?”
“I don’t fucking know man! Shit!”
“Pull over man!”
Ronny pulled the car to the side of the road, his hands were planted firmly on the steering wheel and he stared at the road just as the same as if he were driving.
“Ronny – hey – look natural man! Where do you keep the registration?”
“In the glove box.”
He rolled his window down, I opened the glove box. Sitting right on top of the usual pile of napkins and auto papers was a huge pistol. I closed the glove box.
“Do you know why I pulled you over?”
From where I sat the cop was about 18 feet tall and carried a tank gun in his holster. All of this and we get pulled over for speeding. Ronny hesitated. He didn’t even look at the cop who was leaning into the driver’s windows and holding up a flashlight despite the broad daylight.
“I got you clocked at 79 back there. You know what the speed limit is around here?”
Ronny was frozen – his eyes firmly fix on the dashboard, his face becoming red with anger. The cop had started looking around. He didn’t seem to care that I was sitting there – he did seem to care about the tarp-covered cargo in the back seat.
“Did you hear me? The speed limit is 75 on Arizona Interstate, sir. Sir – would you mind telling me why you’re in such a hurry?”
4 over? We were pulled over for going 4 over? Anger – the same flood of anger from this morning came sweeping back. I drew a breath to restrain myself. Finally, Ronny seemed to acknowledge the situation.
“75? I apologize sir, I must have lost track of my speed. 4 over? So is that a ticket then?”
Fuck – we’ve just been pulled over for a misdemeanor speeding ticket, we’ve got 200 felony counts of possession sitting right behind us and Ronny gets smart. Any cop worth his salary could see through Ronny’s condition and begin to draw reasonable conclusions about our business.
“Sir, I need to ask you to step out of the vehicle.”
Ronny looked at me. It was a sad look – no tears, but a desperation I could understand. He pulled the door handle and stepped out of the car. He and the cop walked around the back of the car. I could make out bits of the conversation as they spoke. Two words stuck out, and I opened the glove box. I tried another deep breath, but my anger only grew as I sucked the air in and grew again as I let it out. Anger consumed me. I heard them again - two words - and I got out of the car.
“Sir! Get back in the vehicle sir!” The cop had his hand to his weapon before I’d even finished facing them. I raised the pistol and fired two quick shots. The first hit the cop dead in the face, right below the nose and the second grazed the side of his head taking a bit of ear with it. His body fell solidly.
“Holy shit! What the fuck?” Ronny was backing away from me.
“Stolen car?”
“Wha – what the – “ with the realization that I had heard them Ronny seemed at a loss.
“What the hell am I talking about?”
“Look – I needed a car. What are the odds we’d get pulled over?”
I fired again. I hit him in the chest and he stumbled backwards three steps and then fell on his ass. Blood poured from the wound and I knew he would die without assistance. I got in the car and I left.