Smiling In the Sunshine: the Job

The Job

What Blix Does, More Or Less

     As I pulled up at the job behind the old bait shop I saw what I had come to see. The job was a new custom home, far too large and far too expensive for a little surf town like ours, but only one of dozens going in up and down the beach. The “old bait shop” next door was now some kind of New Age boutique coffee shop microbrewery bookstore with authentic barn wood siding that replaced the authentic (and original) wood bait shop siding we had pulled off last winter. There were ferns inside and very expensive fishing gear that none of the locals could afford (or want) and the new owners were from Vermont or some such. But they still sold bait. Probably designer bait.

     I climbed out of the jeep, listening to the satisfying whine and grind of singing saws and the steady ker-chunk! of banging nail guns. The boys were going good. I saw Rusty down in the dark shade of the inside of the house, stacking scraps of wood and sorting through boxes of nails. He saw me getting out of the Jeep.

     “Big Dog is here,” he shouted. “Everybody pretend you're working!”

     “You're the only one out here that has to pretend,” came a voice from up high. I looked up as a figure rose up over the ridge of the roof. Broc Branham. My foreman for almost fifteen years now. As my business had dwindled almost to the point of dying completely, it was Rusty and Broc who had stuck it out. How Broc managed to keep his home life intact during the breakup of mine was a kind of miracle. Rusty, an eternal bachelor, could care less if he worked or not. Surfing, fishing, work, it was all the same to Rusty. But if Rockin' Broc wasn't building something for me, he would be doing it for someone else. He never stopped working.

     “Born to Build”, we always said, clinking our shot glasses together. He was my favorite guy to drink whiskey with. He came down to the edge of the roof.

     “You need me, Boss?”

     “Nah, stay up there. How's it look?”

     “Looks like a roof.”

     “Can you finish today? You need me?” It was mostly a courtesy question.

     “Nah, we got it. We might have to work late.” I could hear groans coming from the part of the roof I couldn't see. The rest of the crew had stopped sawing and hammering while they listened to our conversation. I grinned up at Broc. I raised my voice enough so the others could hear.

     “Well, get it dried in and call it eight hours. There's beer in the truck.” The saws started up again and the nail guns were making twice the noise as before. Broc smiled back at me, shook his head and went back over the ridge. He was small and lightweight, all gristle and grit. Rusty came down the ladder from the elevated first floor and came over to me.

     “They'll skip lunch and have it dried in by one o'clock,” he said.

     “I know.”

     “There's only three beers left in the cooler. What the hell did you and Cromwell get into last night?”

     “We sailed in through the inlet and caught up with the last of the party animals at Disappearing Island. There were a couple girls from Ohio there who had never sailed on a beach cat before. We did our civic duty to uphold tourism and a good time was had by all.”

     “Any survivors?” Rusty asked.

     “Never,” I said. “Surviving is for the weak.” I pulled a twenty out of my pocket. “If they aren't done by one o'clock, knock 'em off anyway and get 'em some beer.”

     “Aye, Aye, Skipper. Never push a Monday too hard, I always say.”

     “Wise words, little buddy, wise words.” I patted him on the back and got into the jeep. As I pulled off I heard him yelling at the crew.

     “Faster dogs! Work faster slaves! His Majesty is displeased! Don't make me get out the whips!” I headed back north up the beach to Cromwell's studio. It was ten o'clock on a Monday morning.

Smiling In the Sunshine: Phil's Backyard

Phil's Backyard

Paleo Playground

     Old Phil Stine ran past the leavings from the morning hog feeding. His dog Tuesday, a yellow dog of indeterminate age and breeding, kept pace on his left flank. Running easily past the clearing, they cut left through a dense thicket of scrub pine and palmetto and broke clear into the vista that was Phil's backyard. While Phil's old family holdings were a mere one hundred or so acres, they were acres that backed up onto a vast wetlands of both public and private holdings, many square miles of untouched land except for the cattle that roamed throughout and the handful of men who rode the fence line and also the occasional hunters who illegally found their way onto the place.

     Approaching a mud bog that could have been inches deep or bottomless, Phil increased his speed, bounding forward and leaping onto an old swimming pool diving board that he had cemented firmly in place there, gaining no small amount of height and speed and throwing him physically clear of the bog, as Tuesday ran around and over with a small leap of her own. They were moving fast now, dodging and leaping and cutting through small openings that would have been invisible to someone who did not know how to see them. Blasting forth into yet another small clearing, there stood a magnificent old Florida live oak, its huge branches spreading out and commanding and sheltering the clearing with a kind of patriarchal presence. 

     

     Beneath the tree was an ancient Reo Speedwagon Fire Truck, abandoned there by Phil's grandfather many years before. Phil and his dog leaped into the rear of the truck, then onto the roof and from there he climbed into the lowest branch, a broad, sturdy limb that served as a night time highway for all manner of wild nocturnal creatures who were also aware of these wild domestic creatures; for Old Phil and Tuesday sometimes made this run at night, when an August full moon lighted the area in a misty benevolent glow that brought forth all the many creatures of the swamp, and yes, it also would at times bring forth Old Phil Stine.

     With Tuesday waiting on the roof of the antique truck below Phil scrambled into a wide spot in the tree two dozen feet off the ground. Stashed there were a handmade bow and some roughly hewn arrows, their points hand carved from flint, perhaps crafted by some New Age artisan who was fond of old things and old ways; but these were not. These weapons were hundreds of years old. Where they came from was anybody's guess, perhaps relics of the tribal Timacuan from so long ago, when all of this was a primordial place; but again, no. Old Phil Stine knew where they came from. Old Phil Stine knew how to use them. 

    

    Notching an arrow, he let fly with one rapid movement, and the shaft buried itself into a small, five inch circle that had been blazed into the side of a burned stump, a reminder of the vast fires that sometimes raged through the place. The dog Tuesday, leaping from the roof of the truck, dashed forward and struck a tense pose a yard from the target. These arrows did not always find their mark in a stump, you see, and yet Phil never missed. But had this stump instead been some animal, say, that had spent the winter eating free corn and molasses and table scraps, then the dog Tuesday would have been ready to delay the creature's escape with an iron clamp of her doggy jaws.

     Phil replaced the the bow in its hiding place. He loosened an old rope from a small branch, and swung easily down to the stump and his dog. Tuesday and master embraced joyously, then dashed off once again into brush and swamp that could be deadly to anything tame. There were other stone-age weapons hidden throughout their course, knives and spears and also herbs, strange concoctions that could ward off insects and heal small wounds. Old Phil Stine knew these things, he learned them from his grandfather, who learned them from his...this place, this old Florida place, remained primordial; it always was a place of power and danger and life. This now half-wild man and his dog were romping free and happy in an ancient place. Their dance of life was at one with the place, and the creatures of the wetlands glorified in their presence and felt ennobled by their passing.

     In this way Old Phil Stine and his animal Tuesday were gods, they were the stuff of myth and yet...oh, they were real. Very real and very ready. Trouble was coming.

Smiling In the Sunshine: A Crate of Crap

A Crate of Crap

Cromwell the Expert Buys Some Abandoned Pottery

     “We normally don't keep stuff this long after they don't pay the rent, but somehow this unit just fell through the cracks. We didn't know this crate was in here until we rented the space to a new customer.” The property manager jangled one of those big jangling key rings that always remind me of Captain Kangaroo. In fact, the manager had that Down East Yankee look vaguely reminiscent of Mr. Greenjeans. The day was warming up. As the manager bent over to unlock the door, I looked around me. This was one of the four or five new storage complexes that had popped up in Ruby Beach in the last few years.

     “What's your occupancy rate these days?” I asked.

     “Oh, we're almost always full. People just don't have the room for all their stuff anymore, it seems.” I wondered why people would keep so much crap that they couldn't have it in their homes. Did they come visit their stuff? And what was this “stuff”? The manager pulled open the overhead door. 

     

     “Well, there it is,” he said.

     It was a standard shipping crate, about three feet by three feet, with a built in pallet for transport by forklift. The top was pried open and some packing was spilled out. It was the excelsior type of packing, the kind of thing you don't see anymore in this age of plastic and styrofoam everything. Shoving his arms deep into the crate, he pulled out a small terracotta figure and handed it to Cromwell.

     “What is it?” I asked. It looked pretty crude and pretty old. Cromwell blew and brushed the dust and packing straw away. “That's Mexican, isn't it? I asked.

     “Yeah”, Cromwell said. He was staring pretty hard at the thing. I heard gears grinding somewhere far off.   

     “Just some cheap tourist crap somebody left behind.”

     “Well, what do we do with it?” the manager asked. “How much is it worth?”

     “I don't sell any of this stuff in my shop but you might find someone who wants it,” said Cromwell. I noticed a weird glint in his eye. I had seen it before. “I don't have any use for it myself.” 

      “Well, darn. OK, well, I tried.” The manager looked as though he was at a loss. “Problem is this is the only 10x12 unit I got left and that darn crate has got to go or I'm gonna lose a customer. Seems a shame to throw all this stuff in the dumpster. I was hoping you would want to take it off my hands. You were the only pottery shop in the yellow pages in Ruby Beach.”

     Cromwell looked at the guy like he was a panhandler outside a saloon. “Well, what do you want to do, pay me to haul it off?” He looked at me with a very theatrical 'Can you believe this guy?' look. I have found myself playing the straight man for Crom more than once. I looked at my watch, which I wasn't wearing.

     “Look, Crom, this trip to the museum was a blast but I've got to get back to work.” I started to walk back to Cromwell's big Dodge van. The outside bell for the storage place's office telephone started ringing. The manager was torn. The phone kept ringing. Cromwell cut loose with another dramatic turn, cupping his chin in his hand and gazing thoughtfully at the ceiling of the storage unit.

     “I guess I might be able to unload some of this junk at the flea market in Daytona next week”, he said. That was a pretty good one. He didn't even have any idea if there actually was a flea market in Daytona. If the pottery thing ever went flat on him, Cromwell had a promising future as a used car salesman. “I guess I could give you twenty bucks for the lot of it.”

     “Sold!” yelled the manager over his shoulder, already hustling back towards the office and the ringing phone. Cromwell watched him go, then called out: “I'll need a receipt!”

     He turned to me. That glint in his eye was a positive flame now. “Quickly, Blix! And for the love of Montezuma don't even scratch any of these little fuckers! He went to the back of the van and got a big two-wheeled dolly and pulled out the ramp built into the back. He could move pretty fast when there was a profit involved.

     “These are the real deal, aren't they?” I asked.

     “We gotta get this crate out of here pronto,” he said. “Lift up on the corner there and let me get the dolly under the edge.” We wheeled the crate up the ramps and into the van. It was heavy and this was starting to feel like a regular job. Cromwell was on fire. He threw the ramp back into the undercarriage. He hustled around to the driver's side, jumped in behind the wheel and off we went. He stopped at the office door. “Look,” he said, handing me a twenty dollar bill. “Get the receipt and make sure he puts the shop name on it and not mine. And make sure he dates and signs it.” I took the twenty and got out of the van.

     “Am I on the clock, Boss?” I asked.

     “Just hurry!” He wasn't in a joking mood. I went into the office to get a receipt from Mr. Greenjeans.

Smiling In the Sunshine: Secrets

Secrets

     “What's the situation with your warehouse out by the Airport?” Cromwell asked as we pulled away from the storage place.

     “Well, it's still there, if that's what you mean.”

     “No, I mean did Mona ever get her hooks into all that old saloon stuff or does she have a key or is her lawyer hanging around or anything?” He went past the turn to his pottery shop and continued north up Old Dixie Highway. Towards the airport and towards my old warehouse full of salvaged saloon fixtures, antique wall panels, old brass lamps, a British phone booth, stained glass windows, stacks of choice hardwood lumber and other oddities I had collected in my years working throughout the South. This was the first time Cromwell had ever expressed any interest whatsoever in the place.

     “No, Crom, no harpie's hooks or bushwacking barristers. And yes, you may stash this crate of whatever it is we just stole in my warehouse. I changed the lock a month ago and Mona never had any more interest in that stuff than you did, until now. But is it too much to ask what is happening? And if you will be buying lunch?”

     “Lunch is on me, alright, after we unload this crate.  I want to get a better look at what's inside and see if I can find a shipping manifest or anything else that might tell us if this stuff is what I think it is.” He blew through a yellow light and cut left across the railroad tracks over to the little warehouse district behind our small municipal airport. “Which one is yours?”

     “Right over there, next to the welding shop.” He pulled up in the front next to the big sliding door.

     “Wait a minute,” I said. “Look, if you pull over there to the side a little, see that block wall between my shop and the other building? It's not a wall, exactly. Let me push it open and you can back down in between the buildings where we can unload this thing with privacy.” I hopped out before he could ask any questions and jogged over to the “wall” between the two buildings, waited until he had the van positioned properly then reached over the top and hit the little button that you had to know about to push. That released the magnetic lock and the big block wall section swung inward, taking with it the planter and ornamental shrubs that were attached to it and gave it the appearance of being a solid, fixed wall. Cromwell backed the van into the ten foot space between the two buildings and I shut the gate.

     “You have a secret passage?” He said. “I'm impressed. But why?” I was busy unlocking the compact roll up door, and when I sat the big padlock on the shelf next to the opening I hit another little switch that Crom didn't see. It killed the security system.

     “Don't be too impressed,” I said, “It came with the place. All the same, let's keep it between you and me.   Now, let's get the contraband out of the truck, I'll rustle up some boxes and we can inspect the booty.” He opened the van and we pulled out the crate with the dolly. It came out a lot easier than it went in. I got a couple big oak planks and put them on a pair of sawhorses, creating a makeshift table. Cromwell got busy digging into the crate, brushing off the pieces and setting them on the table. They were terra cotta figures, oddly shaped.

     “They remind me of a chia pet,” I said.

     “Well, these will sprout some green, indeed, if they are what I think they are...but listen, Blix, I have some checking to do. It is imperative that not one word of this crate leaks out. OK?'

     “I never imagined I would ever hear you say 'imperative'', I said. “But sure. Don't worry about it. Who's the one with the secret passage, anyway? I'll let you out the gate. The secret gate.” I wasn't too happy about any of this. Whatever that crap was in the crate, I realized I had just added some convolution to my already convoluted life.

Smiling In the Sunshine: Capone

     Capone

Blix considers, Summer returns

     “You remember that local legend about Al Capone having a house down by the river, with a speedboat in the basement ready to go at any minute?” I was doing my bad Monday habit of collecting all my olives into one glass in order to gain proper nourishment in one blast of oliveness. And yeah, I knew about Capone's house. It had belonged to his mother, actually. There was a fish carved into the mantlepiece. The house was built of brick and my great-grandfather had built the place. The bricks came from Chicago, the boat had come from Miami and the legend had come from Cousin Al's general awfulness. He...well, wait:

     “I don't know that one, Crom. There are basements in Florida?” I waved at Summer. She was waiting tables at the Breeze this year, having narrowly escaped some kind of wackiness down in the Islands. It was Martini Monday happy hour, dollar martinis from noon 'till midnight. It was two in the afternoon.

     “Yeah, I thought you were up on all this stuff. The story is that sometime in '29 John Dillinger went on a little vacation south to Daytona. But first, he had contacted Capone about doing some side work in Miami while he was in the area but The Boss shut him down quick on that idea and instead asked if he could drop by the Field Museum and pick up a package. Dillinger was so eager to get in with the big dogs he jumped at the chance. The package was a crate of pre-columbian artifacts that were worth plenty, but certainly not enough to get Capone in bed with a scumbag like Dillinger. That was the story, anyway.” Summer came to the table with a big tray covered with little plastic fake martini glasses. We got four each.

     “How ya been, Blix? How's that fucked up boat of yours?”

     "Lonesome, darlin', me and the boat both. When we goin' out again?”

     “Any time, sweetie, give me a call.” She winked and turned on her toes and padded away. Not every saloon has barely-dressed barefoot waitresses, but the Breeze did.  I got a little lost remembering some fond memories...

     “Blix!”

     “Yeah, buddy?”

     “Al Capone!”

     “Where?”

     "Christ, man, I think you're turning into a wet brain! What did that bitch do to you, anyway?”

     “Summer?”

     “No, dammit, that fucking Mona. You haven't been right since the divorce.”

     “Well, I did lose everything, you know. And business hasn't been so hot.”

     “It's you that hasn't been so hot, brother. You need to snap out of it.” He killed two miniature martinis in two gulps. I carefully picked the olives out of mine and put them in my oliveness stash. I really liked Cromwell. He was a smart one and he had a graduate degree in pottery or something but at the same time, I could feel a trouble coming. There were things I needed to think about and being chastised by a drinking buddy was okay; he knew not what he did. I learned way back in college to cover confusion with apparent drunkenness and I was drunk enough, most of the time; but not right now. Right now I was worried and trying to sort out this mess that we had dropped into and there were people who would be also thinking about this, soon enough. I needed to talk to my Uncle Phil.

     “I'm sorry, Crom old buddy, I really am. I'll try to do better.” I slammed each of the four baby martinis in rapid succession and stood up. The room tilted about the axis of reality and then settled back into horizontal and vertical lines. I tossed back my olives and chewed and spoke at the same time.

     “Lunch was on you, remember?” He smiled and nodded okay. I turned and walked to the door. I never did any work here at the Breeze. It was a new place on Coronado Avenue. Cromwell didn't know that Mona had told me about sleeping with him while I was up in Alabama three summers ago, before the divorce.

     “Blix!” shouted Summer, standing on delicious tiptoes and stretching up from a table across the room, her halter top revealing more than it concealed. “Call me!”

I waved at her, then turned and headed out the door.  I wasn't feeling too good.

Smiling In the Sunshine: Homeland Security

Homeland Security
Ponce Is Here!

     The twenty-five foot Defender-class Fast Boat, one of the old original Homeland Security models, was making its way across a calm sea at twenty knots. The fifty caliber on the forward deck was mounted and armed. A seaman was lounging against the gun mount, eyes on the near horizon. Inside the cabin, there was a clear image on the Sat-screen of their destination: a seventy-foot trimaran anchored in 100 feet of water. This was unusual, a private yacht of this type anchoring so far out, out here in the waters typically roamed by commercial fishing vessels; such an anomaly bore investigation. Drugs, perhaps, or perhaps the boat was disabled. Whatever the case, it was the job of the Coast Guard to look into such matters.

     Meanwhile, below deck on the trimaran in question, Juan Ponce sat fondling the big laser and thinking dark thoughts; dark and amusing (to a Conquistador) thoughts that were tinged with regret at not being able to do battle, this time. Not yet, anyway. He punched the code into the keypad on the stock of the alloy weapon and it transformed, clicking and folding and telescoping in on itself until it resembled something else, something not familiar, but nothing that resembled a firearm. Reaching overhead, he placed it into its niche in the cabin roof and the panel slid shut. He glanced around the cabin, then shut down the reactor. Only a thorough search by NASA technicians in a dry dock would be able to find any of the many things hidden on this odd vessel. The titanium alloy panels could not be opened with any manner of crowbar or ax. This boat was a spaceship, of sorts, not something routine, by any means.

     He could hear the motors now, on the Coast Guard boat. He pulled on a loose cotton shirt and went on deck to await the inevitable boarding. They would be young, the approaching crew, and they would banter with him in that jocular but serious way of cops everywhere, presenting a friendly face but cautious and ready inside. No matter. His papers were in order and there was no contraband on board the El Condor Pasa; at least nothing they would find and even if they did, they would have no idea what they were seeing. He took his satellite phone out and typed in a number. A phone rang in the pocket of a lean, shaggy haired man sitting in the boughs of a giant oak tree only a couple dozen or so miles away.

     “The boarding crew is here,” said Ponce.

 
      “Don't kill anyone,” said Old Phil Stine. Ponce laughed, his dark, humorless laugh that sometimes was the last thing his victim ever heard, in this world. He switched off, replacing the phone in it's holster just inside the companionway. Meanwhile, Phil Stine dialed a number and a phone rang at the local Coast Guard Station. There would be other calls, confirmations and a certain amount of frustration on the part of the Station Commander, currently having brunch as a special guest at the Ruby Beach Yacht Club.

     “How the hell am I supposed to do my job if Washington insists on tying my hands like this?” He asked no one in particular. The big group of civic leaders and rich men at the table nodded and grunted in a knowing way. The waiter came through the door to the kitchen with an overflowing tray of shrimp and lobster. Behind him was a cute waitress with a tray full of the third round of drinks.

     “What's your name, sweetheart? You must be new here.” The Commander was a regular at the Yacht Club.

      “I am new, sir. My friends call me Summer.”

Smiling In the Sunshine: Old Phil In Town

     I was sitting at the bar at the Crooked Angel. It was late. I should have staggered home, across the back parking lot, a couple hours ago. Home to my shack. The saloon had been roaring along just fine a bit ago, but the band had stopped and the crowd had dwindled and I was sitting here on my usual stool, waiting for my ass to take root, waiting for the Voice of God, waiting for the clean up crew. Molly had long ago given up on me. She said she would rather I fall off a bar stool in her place than down the street. She didn't like it though.

     A couple of guys just slightly less drunk than me came in the back door. Orange County wise-asses. They were the frat boys of Ruby Beach, the ones who lived in Orlando where the money was and came slumming over here on the weekends. They liked to play tough and some of them were. I had given up on that challenge many years ago, but every time...whatever. Much to my dismal delight, they took the stools next to me. Molly's Number Two, Little Missy, came over to take their orders. All of Molly's bartenders were ex-dancers. Survivors.

     “What's up, boys? What can I get ya?'

     “Two Bud drafts. And there's a dead dog tied up to the bicycle rack out back.”

     “What's that, sweetheart?” She started filling the beers from the tap marked Budweiser. It was Busch.

     “Yeah, as we were coming in we saw this dog on a leash laying on its side with its legs stuck out stiff and there was a little drool coming out of its mouth. It was gross. Karl nudged it with his toe but it didn't move. It was gross.”

     Little Missy finished topping up their glasses and said “I'll get somebody to go see. Here ya go. Last call is only a minute or so. Want me to pull you a couple more?” Molly was gonna be rich as hell someday.

     I heard the whole thing and as soon as I heard 'dead dog' I raised my head and looked around the more or less empty bar.

     Missy said, “Blix, could you go see what that dead dog is all about?”

     "Yeah baby, no problem.” There he was. My Uncle Phil. He was back in the corner by the pool tables. He saw me looking, winked, and ran out the rest of the table with one hand while he carried on a conversation on his cell phone. Yet another pair of Orlando frat boys were watching, stunned. I knew from long experience how this was going to go. Missy took a little ceramic bowl from under the bar and filled it from the tap in front of me. The Red Stripe. I was wobbly as I carried it out but I made it to the back door well enough, without spilling much of Tuesday's beer. As I passed by the pool tables a couple of beefy Orange County college boys slid off their stools.

     “That's bullshit!” the one who looked like his name might be Biff said. “You're a fucking hustler!”

     “Either way, you have to pay,” said Phil. I went on out the door. Those assholes had no idea what 'either way ' meant. They were about to learn the meaning of 'pay'. Ruby Tuesday was laying on her back, legs stiff and straight up in the air at the bike rack. Phil's old stripped down mountain bike was behind her, unlocked. I heard shouting inside the bar.

     “Here ya go girl, here ya go, a little Red Stripe.” When she heard my voice and 'Red Stripe” she immediately flipped onto her feet, magically gaining weight and vitality in one split second and laughing her dog laugh.  I untied the leash.  “Let's move a little away from the door, girl.” I set down the terra cotta bowl and Ruby took a tentative first taste and then slurped away with abandon. I sat down on the bike rack, wondering how I had forgotten to bring a beer for myself, when the back door of the bar busted open with a violent kick from inside and the two Biffs came storming out, rolling their shoulders and steaming and getting themselves psyched up. They were obviously fans of those bloody fight contests on TV. It always looked like violent man-sex to me and I am not into that kind of thing. I have worked construction my whole life, but at school I studied philosophy and literature and while war may have symbolic merit for some, I myself would rather walk away. I don't always do that, but it is my preference. The two Biffs saw me.

     "Watcha lookin' at, homo?”

     “Ambulance meat,” I said. I looked at Ruby. She couldn't stop smiling.

     “What's that supposed to mean?” He looked at his buddy. “I thought that fucking queer hustler was coming out to fight. Where the fuck is he?”

     “You little rascals could just get in your Hummer and leave. Why do you guys drive all the way over here to start trouble? We're just a bunch of surfers and sailors and fishermen. All that he-man stuff is for you tourists.”

     “Maybe we'll just kick your ass instead!” said the previously unheard from Biff. They were getting themselves thoroughly worked up. It was sad, really.

     “Well, good luck, then.”

     There was a barely perceptible trilling from somewhere overhead. Ruby Tuesday transformed into a snarling hell hound and leaped at the throat of the nearest Biff. She could be very convincing for a recently risen dead dog. I don't think she has ever actually ripped out anyone's throat, but if you ever caught her act you would be certain that she could. Not that it mattered. Old Phil Stine leaped from the roof of the bar and was on Biff number two before he had any idea what was happening. That was it. It was over. One Biff pissing his pants, a wild wolf ripping his throat out, apparently, while some kind of flying man was crouched over a fallen Biff, holding him by the front of his shirt, speaking with fierce danger directly into his face.

     “That man you beat... Ruby!” His dog stopped slavering and growling at the throat of the unharmed bully. She backed off, stiff, every hair on her hide standing, quivering. Phil turned back to the guy he was holding by the shirt front. He banged the guy's head on the ground. Hard. “That homeless man you beat is still alive. That's the only reason you will live. For now. Change your story. Tell the truth. Or I'll find you and you won't get a second chance.” Both Biffs were crying now. They knew the truth, finally, that we all must one day learn: no matter how bad-ass you think you are, there's always gonna be somebody bad-asser. The trick is to not encounter that one, and if you do, don't cross him.

Hopefully, these college guys learned something. Probably not.

     Old Phil Stine stood erect in the parking lot, watching the two fallen varmints stumble to their SUV and get inside and pull out, quietly, humbly, as though afraid to disturb the fabric of the universe and thus encounter yet more god-like wrath and vengeance. Beside him, his dog Tuesday was standing, only a little scary now, but still possibly a rabid animal and dangerous. He turned to me, stern and serious.

     “We should talk, nephew. I need a favor”

Ruby Tuesday smiled.