A Man Named Doll by Jonathan Ames (popular books to read TXT) 📗

been small and brave like a bullet, and he nodded at me and left.

I swiveled in my chair and stared out the window; it was streaked with tears. Rainy season.

2.

Shelton left around five p.m. I finished my joint, locked my office, and headed out to the Dresden. The bar, not the city, and I ran up the street in the rain. The Dresden was only half a block away, and I wanted a drink. I wanted to mix some tequila with the marijuana and think about what Lou had asked of me.

The bar, which had just opened for the night, was empty, the way I like it, and the place hasn’t changed much since circa 1978: long oak bar, lots of shadow, no windows, red leather booths, and a battered piano, like an old horse that still wants to please, in the middle of the floor.

I took a seat at the end of the bar, and Monica Santos, my beautiful friend, drifted over, smiling. Monica’s got a long scar down the left side of her face, parts her silky brown hair down the middle, and is one of those people that has an actual twinkle in her green eyes. And I don’t know what that twinkle is, exactly, but there’s something in Monica’s eyes that is alive. She said: “What are you drinking, Happy?”

Monica knew my real name and liked it, and I didn’t protest. She had license to call me whatever she wanted.

“A child’s portion of Don Julio,” I said.

I always order alcohol that way—stole it from an old mentor, a cop long dead. But he used it for food because he had diverticulitis. I use it for alcohol because I’m Irish. But that’s not entirely true. I’m also half Jewish. On my mother’s side. I’m half Jew, half Mick, all ish. My father was a redhead and she was dark. I got his blue eyes and her black hair.

Monica gave me another smile, went off to get my drink, and as she reached for the bottle, I studied her profile. The one with the scar. Then I looked at the rest of her—she’s tiny but strong. She was wearing some kind of yellow halter frock, and her bare arms looked pretty. She had recently turned thirty-eight and had been bartending a long time.

She brought me my drink and rested her hand on mine.

A few years ago, when I was heartbroken, she had taken me into her bed. In the morning, I cried about the other woman and she never slept with me again. I had squandered her love. But not her friendship. She liked my dog and looked after him on occasion. And sometimes we met for coffee. But mostly we saw each other at the bar.

She squeezed my hand and said: “You doing okay?”

“Yeah. A friend wants a kidney, but I’m good.”

“What?”

“Only joking,” I said.

Just then a couple of regulars, old-timers, wet from the rain, sauntered in, and Monica went to them. They all love Monica, and she loves them back. She likes broken birds, and old men are her babies, her specialty. I hoped, sitting there, that I wasn’t in that category, but I may have been fooling myself.

So I took a sip of Mr. Don Julio and got off that depressing topic and moved on to another one: the pros and cons of the kidney question. I started with the cons: giving Lou a kidney, if I was the right blood type, was the definition of throwing good money after bad. How long would it last him? Two years? Less? His body was shot.

Another con was that I was a little squeamish. The idea of someone reaching into my body and taking something out made me feel funny.

I took another sip. And thought some more.

The cons ended there. At squeamish.

The pros?

Lou had saved my life. I wasn’t wearing my vest that day. That .45 would have ripped right through me. Lou was wearing his vest and the bullet caught the edge of it, which blunted some of the impact, so the bullet only nicked him but still took out his spleen. And he lived. I wouldn’t have made it without a vest—.45s punch holes in you that you don’t come back from.

Then I took another sip.

The tequila filled in the marijuana. Liquid in smoke. And I felt good. Generous. Magnanimous. Loving of my fellow man. Loving of Lou.

And I made my decision.

I’d get my blood tested and if I was O, he could have one of my kidneys, the right or left, whichever he wanted. And free of charge. No $50K.

And where was he going to get that kind of money anyway? He didn’t have any savings and his LAPD pension check went to his daughter every month. He must have been dreaming that he could come up with fifty thousand dollars.

I took out my phone to call him, but the battery was dead. I was always letting it run down. Because I hated the thing. Hated the phone. Hated being its slave and not its master.

I left Monica a twenty—I always overtip her; how can I not?—and started to head out. I was due at work at six, but I needed to stop at the house and walk the dog, and at the house, I could charge the phone. My car, a ’95 Caprice Classic, was too old for that kind of thing. Charging phones. It was from a simpler time.

As I got to the back door, Monica ran to the end of the bar and called out: “Have a good night, Happy. See you soon.”

“Yeah, see you soon,” I said. “Probably tomorrow.” And she laughed. I was in there most every day—because of her—usually around the opening bell, at five. Then she said, for no reason, kind of wistful, something she had never said before: “You know, I love you, Hap.”

I just looked at her, stunned, couldn’t say it back, though I wanted to, and so all I said, before stepping outside, was: