The sun was out in the afternoon, something strange for New Orleans, but probably not for long, which was not strange for New Orleans. People noises blew in through my open window overlooking Plum Street, the curtains dancing in time with the traffic. I was in a good mood because even if they could see up to the second floor and in the little window that overlooked what passed for a balcony in my one-room apartment, they would not be able to see the gun.
I looked in the mirror and turned around a couple times to check my appearance from all angles. I was dressed in an XL New Orleans Saints T-shirt, something odd because I don't even watch football. I did know who the Saints were, though, mainly because they shared the Superdome with the Tulane football team, which is where I went to school, explaining why I was in New Orleans in the first place, although it did not explain why I was still there two years after a History degree. However, I can explain that I was wearing the really big Saints shirt over a small, one-sixty frame mainly because I was not a football fan, and anyone who knew me would say that I would probably not even own a Saints shirt. It was true, sort of, I hadn't before yesterday, and I would not after later today. And the extra large size covered the gun well.
I guess that's why in the TV shows and books and movies they all wear their guns in the small of the back, tucked into the trousers. They fit, they don't pull your pants down to the one side, and the back of an extra long shirt covers it well. Of course, all I had was a small bore gun—I almost giggled at the thought of it like that. Of course, some people would say that even a nine millimeter Glock would be a small bore gun if I carried it, and I almost giggled at the thought of that, too. I suppose there is some power trip that comes from carrying your first gun that makes you think all little things like that are really clever. Made me think they were anyway.
As I was saying, I was dressed in that Saints t-shirt. And a nice pair of blue jeans, and a cheap pair of sneakers. I grabbed a white with stripes button-up shirt and put it on, unbuttoned, over the Saints shirt. I hoped it would add a layer of camouflage to the ensemble, covering any bulges with folds, and I turned around. I knew it would cost me time getting the gun out, but it was going to be a sneak attack anyway. No one at the Fredericks, Martin and Shipley marketing firm picnic was expecting a lunatic with a gun. Not that I am a lunatic with a gun. I know, at this point, I am supposed to say something like, "Oh, you think I am mad, but listen how carefully I planned it out! Do you think that the work of a mad man?" Well, regardless of if I am a lunatic with a gun, they were not expecting one at the FMS picnic, and/or they were not expecting me.
So I gave myself one twirl in the full length mirror, checking out the short, thin young man in the mirror, hidden beneath medium length blond hair and liquid blue eyes. Not really hidden, but I never saw past them, not deeply anyway, or maybe too deeply, but that is too deep for me. I gave myself that twirl, adjusted the piece, and went outside.
The FMS picnic was held in the park just in the Garden District, not far from the universities, Tulane and Loyola, within walking distance, and I chose to walk. There is something more confining, at least in the alibi sense, of riding a streetcar. The driver and the people on the car might see me and place me going to the Garden District at ten-thirty on a Saturday morning. More people would see me walking, but not know where I was going exactly. You see, I am not mad! I am just kidding about that. Well, maybe. I once asked a friend if you really could be mad if you went around saying you were mad. Crazy people never think they're crazy, so they never acknowledge it, but most people who say they are crazy don't really believe it, so saying you are mad does not mean that you are not. Could I be mad and saying I am mad, but not believing it? He said, the guy I asked I mean, that thinking about it too much would make you mad, and so I should not. So I haven't, really, much.
So what was a little guy like me heading into the District with a gun under my shirt for on a lovely, sunny Saturday morning? Of course, the root of it all is a woman. Just like always, sort of.
Her name is Brittany, oddly enough, but she sure didn't look like a spaniel. Not that I would even vocalize the Brittany Spaniel joke near her, well, anyway. She goes to Loyola in some humanity—not History, but something where the problems of modern society are bantered about and diagnosed but never solved. Sociology or Psychology, I think. She sometimes comes into the coffeeshop where I work. Which explains why I don't mind that most women think I am a jerk. I am a jerk. A coffee jerk. I jerk the levers on the various beakers and flasks that make mixed coffee drinks. So what of it?
At any rate, as I was saying, Brittany comes in on certain weekdays. Between her Biology 003, a core requirement she is getting out of the way this semester, and her Sociology of Small Communities classes on Mondays and Wednesdays. She talks to her friend Kelly about her classes and how she doesn't like Dr. Kitman's exams or her paper for her one history class. I can not help overhearing since I intentionally eavesdrop. Oh, not that I just eavesdrop. She talks to me, too, flirts a bit, and we are on a first name basis, which is fortunate, because I do not know her last name or she mine. Conversation would be much more frustrating if we were on those formal terms and did not know them.
So she sits there, in the dark intimacy of the coffeehouse, sipping mocha latte, her drink of choice and my specialty, telling Kelly about Tommy. Tommy this and Tommy that. And not the blind pinball wizard Tommy, I know, you're saying "The who?" and I'm not going to tell you. She tells Kelly, over a spread notebook containing her biology notes in her cute tightly curved handwriting, that Tommy is getting promoted to Assistant Director, Design, at FMS. That Tommy is going to marry her at St. Something or other's someday, a lavish wedding. Her blue eyes got far away when she did that, a far away I have never induced in anyone's eyes, much less lively blondes with hearts in the right disciplines. Behind the faux wood countertop, I mopped glasses out with half-clean rags and wished I was that guy.
Well, anyway, that's her story, sort of. I would sometimes feel a tic in my face when I smiled at her, and I always liked to see her come in, so I guess that means I was attracted to her. Okay, so I am. No big deal. I am not afraid to admit it, I mean, everyone falls for da dames, eh?
So last week, she comes in at one fifteen in the afternoon. During her Biology class. I ask her if anything is wrong, and she tells me no. Then Kelly comes in at their normal time, two ten, and sits by Brittany at their table, and I am cleaning tables nearby, wiping non-existent coffee-cup rings.
"What's wrong?" asked Kelly.
Brittany's voice cracks, and the face she had worked at keeping straight shatters. "Tommy and I....."
Kelly expletes and makes understanding noises.
"He met me for lunch. I should have known. He never took me to lunch. I thought maybe it was supposed to be something special. And he tells me I am too young for him." Brittany gasped. It took her several breaths to get it out.
"He made it a business deal he was closing, meeting you at lunch. Prick," Kelly leaned into Brittany. Brittany crashed into Kelly's shoulder and tears flowed onto Kelly's Indian-design sweater.
"He said he needed someone older, someone to make a house a home."
"Someone to be a hood ornament on his life." Kelly patted Brittany's hair. "You didn't cry in front of him?"
Brittany straightened up and wiped her eyes, her wet, blue eyes. "I told him to go blow a goat."
I shrugged my tight shoulders and straightened some chairs. He obviously didn't like kids, so how would he blow a goat? I bit that off. Not a sensitive thing in any circumstance.
Just like that, their relationship was over, and Brittany was in pieces.
And, of course, I had to do something about it.
I had cut Tommy's picture out of the business section of the paper when he got promoted. I was going to give it to Brittany sometime, whenever the conversation came around to it, or whenever I got the nerve, whichever came later. Or never, now, it seemed. Thom Creeley receiving a handshake from David Shipley himself, Tommy smiling from under thick brows and curly brown hair. I had tacked the picture up on my wall, wishing I had a dartboard. Instead, when the plan, or more importantly, The Plan, capital letters, developed, I practiced shooting at it a bit. Nine times out of ten, I got Tommy. The other time I got David Shipley, senior partner, but hey, that's okay too. If they ever say that I am a lunatic, well, I guess I should be satisfied with any body count, and David Shipley was a valid target, too. Not quite as significant, but more random, and since I was planning a nearly random act of violence.
So I got to the park a little after eleven. I hadn't really meant to make an entrance, well, other than the fact that I was crashing and planning to shoot the Assistant Director, Design, but other than that I was not making a social, and, you know, visible entrance. It just took me a little longer to walk than I thought. It must have been the extra weight of the gun, well, maybe not. It was a nice late summer day, clear and not looking like rain, but New Orleans never looks like it is going to rain, it just sort of does. I spotted the FMS picnic right away. It was a combination of the three red and white canopies filled with marketing looking types and the big blue and gold FMS logo with the clever phrase "Known for Making Known" on a sign by one of the tents. "Known for Making Known." That guy probably deserved a few shots, too, but no need to cheapen this expedition with fun. Or probably euthanasia.
So I wandered over. Some of them, dressed in casual Polo shirts, looked over me with disgust. I kept the wings—well, they felt kind of like wings—of my button up shirt open so everyone could see the Saints shirt. I made my way over towards the tents, and Tommy.
Tommy was standing, all tall and heavy brow, curly hair, over Shipley. I felt better. I mean, this was just like in my apartment. Tommy gestured with his off-hand, his right hand containing a drink in a clear plastic cup. Shipley nodded, trim blond beard twitching as he smiled. Shipley saw me first, his crinkled brown eyes meeting mine and I flickered back to Tommy. Tommy's half-smile straightened. He half turned to me, pivoting at the waist.
"Thom Creeley?" I asked. I lowered my voice to a growl. I had practiced it a lot the night before, trying to get the right pitch. I didn't really get myself a tape recorder, so I could only guess how I sounded. I knew it was him, though.
"What?" he demanded pompously. Or maybe he didn't hear me. It may well be that I might have been somewhat out of breath, and trying to growl under your breath when you are out of breath might be inaudible. I mean, it's not like I pull a gun on someone every day. If I were a hardened criminal, maybe he would have heard me and said "Yes?", but I am not and don't ever plan to be, so I had to settle for a that.
"Bastard," I said. It had taken me a while to come up with exactly to say to him, perhaps some long speech about justice and love and et cetera, but I did not want it to be tracked back to Brittany, so I opted for the simple, one-word epithet. Not that he was a bastard in the real sense of the word, I mean, how was I to know? I wasn't stalking him, just shooting him.
So I went for the gun. Okay, well, you are probably going to be a bit upset that I have been holding out on you, but, well, you remember when I said it was a small bore gun? You were thinking, what, a .30, a .22? More like a 1mm. You see, it is a PlayTek squirt gun, a little green thing. It holds fourteen and a half in the magazine. The last squirt does not go very far, so I don't count it as a full squirt. But before you think I am a total wuss, I did stop at a art supply store and buy some Winsor Newton 001 India Ink, a permanent black, so it will stain, and even if they do find me, it won't be a felony, just a misdemeanor charge of, I don't know, wanton destruction of property. I don't know how much those little pseudo-flannel-short sleeve shirts go for at Land's End, but it ain't a thousand dollars. Is it?
Well, anyway, I went for the gun, and I don't know if he don't watch TV or what, but he didn't even look scared of what was coming, or what might have been coming if I had anything but a PlayTek. Which, I must say, just cheesed me off more, which gave me that little kick to carry me through. So I emptied the gun on him, resisting the urge to spray Shipley with the tenth, and then I ran like hell. I don't really know how fast hell runs, but hell can outrun six or seven marketing guys with racquetball builds, then I ran like hell. If not, I ran faster than hell. And I turned corners and made sure I was not being followed, just like they do in all the cop shows. Unless they were good shadows, which is of course a possibility, I lost them. If they were good shadows, I guess they're still there and I made you an accomplice.
So that's my sordid little story. I mean, it was better up to the point you found out it was only a squirt gun, but hey, I ain't a hardened criminal. I was just out avenging a little broken heart, like some white knight or man with no name but a PlayTek squirt gun under his shirt. Not a Saints shirt, because I stuffed that in a dumpster in the Quarter, but under my shirt anyway. Not now, because I ain't avenging anyone.
I like to think I was an avenging angel for Brittany, even if she never knew it.
But then, sometimes, I think a guy, about my age, comes up and does a college-like prank on a guy who just dumped a college girl, and it's not going to get back to her. I think they might think she set it up or it was a friend of hers, or maybe she was somehow guilty. Maybe I got her in trouble.
But I try not to think about it that much, right?