Old Fashioned

5 gangsters in heavy, Mackintosh overcoats and matching fedora caps burst into the quiet, city bar. Right on schedule, this would be their third and final stop tonight. They were hefty and loud, more muscle than brains among them, and more ammo still. And there he was in the middle; the boss, Pinky Magazine. Despite a reputation for punching people to death, he was half as tall and musclebound as his guards, but what’s gang muscle for if not to compensate for… something.

The mob half-stumbled, half-marched their way to the booth in the dimly lit back corner. But their outfit isn’t the type to hide; they own the neighborhood after all. They’re the big boys in the brigade, VIP of the club. It would take a pretty solid pair of unlucky 8-balls to penetrate the human armory insulating those four-and-a-half, checked coats. Or at least skill, a motive, and an alibi.

At a nod from Pinky, one of the boys shouted, “Hey, waiter! The fuck’s service around here?!”

A slow Thursday night hardly warrants a full staff in a bar barely 400 square feet and 8 tables. One talented bartender can do the job. A salvo of shots and beers starts them off.

“Hey that’s why they call you ‘Santa’ this time of year, cuz you got a little something for everybody, naughty or nice!”

“Yeah, gave your ma a good lump of coal last night.”

“Oh yeah?! You wanna open your Christmas present a little early, son of a bitch?!”

The overcoats rattled as they launched punches amongst themselves, spilling the booze fueling them.

“Boys,” The boss’ calm but weighted reprimand cut the clack of ammo and gunmetal like a jugular by a practiced hand. The rowdy grunts holstered hot in their seats, flash sober.

With a power-soaked smirk, the boss held up his beer and declared, “Tonight, we’re toasting to my gracious acquittal, courtesy of a crappy, well-paid lawyer and a matching stooge of a judge.” His captive arsenal shook the booth laughing and cheering.

“Yeah, Pinks, the DA didn’t see that coming!”

“Don’t be dumb. Of course he saw it coming. He just couldn’t do a damn thing about it.”

“Yeah, you run this district!”

Pinky grinned with satisfaction, “And don’t you forget it, boys. One dead hooker ain’t gonna do me in.” He brandished his knuckled weapon of choice.

8 seconds. Harry the banker had come in just behind the gang and sat at the table next to the VIP booth, shifty-eyed and disheveled. Harry’d had it rough for a suit, but that’s what love can do to any man once he’s had it. Never fall for a girl who starts sentences with dollar signs. He’d ordered an old-fashioned just before he sat down, presumably to stoke the fire behind his eyes and in his chest.

It took 30 minutes to down the drink and up his moxie. There was roughly a sip left to drown the orange peel when the words slacked off the boss’ mouth. In the 8 seconds that followed, Harry’s face transformed from the simmer of sheer distress to the shiver of cold terror and finally to the rouge of rage and resolution.

With a shouted invocation, Harry twisted amazingly and leapt sprawl over the short wall between him and the gang’s booth, two hands wrapping sparse ‘round ol’ Zine’s throat! For a galaxy of a second, victory and catharsis was thin as silk but right there in his bean-countin’ grasp! 

“Her name was Stella, you murd—!”

Then the coats were on him. One unbalanced hook from the boys was the black hole that stole his light. Two more extinguished it. Autonomic groaning was the man of prior loneliness and resolution as he was dragged by two of the boys to the back alley for a consummate rapping. It was a bold but ultimately wasted effort shot from his pair of 8’s.

Besides, her real name was Linda, but that was just between us.

The bar settled neatly as the other unarmed customers closed tabs to drown their night elsewhere and the boys cleaned up. I picked up the pieces of Harry’s table. He didn’t finish his drink, but his night had been unceremoniously hemmed, so I closed his tab out of respect. The vigor of the coats’ celebration slowly resumed enough to crowd their corner of the bar. But curiously, the half-size boss was quieter, colder. The boys were of course oblivious to the subtlety of it, but my experienced eye couldn’t miss a loose stitch at 300 yards let alone the close-cut insecurity that stains a man when his life is abruptly and so easily threatened in the midst of his layered haven. It’s a cold, bitter aura. The eyes wander distant into a nightmare tangle of fabric moonlighting as a chiffon daydream. I’ve seen it hundreds of times in my line of work. Even the devil’s face can turn blue.

The boss has one of his boys order a double whiskey, neat. As I begin to prepare the drink the boy calls out, “Hey, pal, make that on the rocks!” I nod as I drop 2 transparent cubes of ice into a glass. I count 1.5, 3 ounces from the jigger into the short vessel. It gets a dash of both orange and cherry bitters, but, breaking the recipe, I hold the sugar. I then skewer an oval-shaped orange peel through one of it’s narrow edges followed by a deep crimson maraschino cherry and finally the other narrow edge of the peel. The lanced maraschino drips red juice cooly into the bottom of the drink.

I deliver the dry old fashioned to the table, placing it on the table directly in front of Pinky Magazine. His eyes go wide either from confused rage or curiosity. The booth falls silent with the boys’ collective breath bated for explosion. It’s not what he wanted, and mister little finger here is known for emptying magazines to get what he wants. 2 seconds pass as I wait deviantly for his verdict. The boss lifts the drink and takes a sip. He squints and sucks air in as his eyes glaze over with the burn of spirit before tapping the drink firmly back on the table in front of him, sinking the skewered cherry. A repulsive 32 tooth grin erupts from his face.

“Now this guy knows how to get my good side!”

The boys laugh as the nitro tension dissipates into the warm atmosphere. I smile wryly and walk back to my station behind the bar.

The night had worn thin when the captain and his cronies finally clacked up to leave. I watched as the boss slapped 10 filthy bills on the table and tipped his cap approvingly. I deflected the gesture with a nod, and a salute. The racket shuffled out the door with as much noise as they’d come in with. I watched them disappear around the northwest corner of the complex.

I leap three flights of stairs to the roof. Sprinting, I fly level at an altitude of 11 yards above the narrow alleyways. 92 seconds later I’m crouching near an aging iron cornice 3 blocks south tracking the 4 ½ Macs through the scope of my M1903 Springfield rifle as they enter the alleyway that leads to their hideout. 408 yards. The streets are almost empty. The wind is behind me.

5 seconds. I had loved her 3 times before she was murdered. A sweet girl from outside the city, I could tell Linda lived her life like she had something to prove to the world, to her parents, to herself. You lose as much as you gain in this city, living like that. Every dirt-trawled dollar drove her further into the asphalt until that sky full of innumerable stars she’d dreamed about dimmed to red light, bruised knees, and black tar, and there wasn’t any white light at the end of that tunnel. Or maybe for her, at the end, there were flashes, piercing flickers from the concussions sewn from the murderous fists of the fucker in the half Mac. 4 seconds.

One final time, I address my angel, “I don’t count on what comes after, but, baby, I hope you can count the stars tonight.”

2 seconds. 1 shot, and I skewer that demon’s good side bare into the street. This one’s on the house.

I leave the boys to scramble, decommissioned, to their hole to hide from the vultures sure to rip what’s left of this city to shreds in their scavenge for power. 30 seconds and I’m wiping down the last table near the street window at my bar. Before cutting off my lights, I throw on my famous B-15 flying jacket, letting the streets get a good look at me. It’s a cold night, but this city’ll talk. I’m counting on it.