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  She had, indeed, created a website, an attractive one, featuring pictures of the wind chimes and some of the paintings on plywood, inflating prices, "just to see if they'll bite," she said. And even though Yoder couldn't argue with that, he was incrementally taking more and more offense to her intrusive, bossy ways. "You need to at least post something personal on your page," was one of the many you-need-to remarks he got from her.

  "That's your job, isn't it? You're the administrator."

  "Yes, but if you personalize it more, cultivate some fans, we'll add a Facebook page. The Facebook page is really where you'll find your numbers."

  "Fans? Facebook? What the hell? Sounds like you want me to be somebody that doesn't even resemble me. Back off."

  "Sure, I'm a pit bull," she allowed, "but you need a pit bull, somebody who will lock their jaws down hard for you—it's for you, after all!"

  And Yoder would let it be. Gary seemed happy enough, though over the weeks his demeanor gradually became tinged with apathy. "She ain't so easy to live with," he conceded. "Kinda high strung, you know. But she's driven. Them kinds of folks—folks that's driven—tend to be high strung is what I think."

  "So is it worth it, the sex?"

  Gary smirked. "Always, man."

  In the meantime, Yoder's library research into the benzene component of oil, and into the Corexit 9500 and Corexit 9527 used in the cleanup, was causing him to filter government conspiracies through his brain. The toxic brew of Corexit was banned in the United Kingdom, he discovered, and health professionals in general were definitely not fans. Why would the US be willing to put such a chemical into the already-poisonous soup that was the Gulf of Mexico? Did President Obama give the okay? If not, then who? Was it not enough to sacrifice the marine flora and fauna on the altar of tourism? Shouldn't someone calculate how many human lives were worth the salvaging of the sugar-white sands? It gave him a headache, the mulling of it.

  Then, on the day of the septic tank killing, Misty rolled out some cockamamie idea about making Turkey Branch an incorporated entity, a move that would require a shared bank account, for business purposes, of course. "I can make this work," she insisted. "I've done it time after time!"

  "Like when? Like where?" Yoder pressed.

  "What the hell?" she shrieked. "Are you questioning my legitimacy? Do you hear him, Gary? Nobody appreciates a goddamn thing I'm doing around here! You two are a couple of witless idiots—you wouldn't even have a website if it wasn't for me!" And she strode off into the afternoon. By now both men knew that the snit would last for a few hours, possibly a day, with plenty of passive-aggressive behavior to dish out until said snit subsided.

  But this day, Yoder pushed back: "Exactly what do you actually know about this chick?"

  "Man, I know she's a great piece of ass. Which, I gotta tell you, I'm not looking to miss out on no nookie. What's with you?"

  "I'm not looking to have her putting her paws all over my money, that's what."

  "She ain't no thief. Come on, this is the first pussy I've had in years."

  "Jesus."

  "We'll work it out, man," Gary said. "I'll talk to her."

  But for someone who was living it up with a great piece of tail, Yoder thought his friend didn't have much fight in him. No, not much fight at all.

  It made him wonder: Why had Misty insisted on meeting up with Gary over in Blountstown? Why had she pushed so hard for him to sign on for cleanup? What the hell was her angle?

  * * *

  October blew in and so did a flatbed truck carrying the brand-new, sure enough state-of-the-art septic system that turd wrestler Ronny was so excited to sell him. Forget a rusting metal tank; this concrete one would last at least forty years, probably much longer, long past Yoder's life span.

  Yoder set a folding lawn chair out near the work site, brought along a cooler of beer, plenty of smokes, and settled in. He was loath to allow any repairman of any stripe—electrical, carpentry, refrigerator, whatever—to work without being under his supervisory gaze; he trusted no one to do the job "right."

  He hollered at Gary, laid out on the hanging bed, to come out and join him.

  "Naw, man," came a faint response.

  "Why the hell not? Nookie time?" he joked, expecting a laugh he didn't get.

  "No, Yodie—I'm lying down."

  "What's the matter?"

  "Nothing, man. Just feeling a little tired, like I'm running out of gas, that's all."

  Misty joined him, though. She dragged an outdoor lounge chair up to his, and he offered her a beer. She declined, as she usually did. She rarely drank and never smoked and seemed to like the high moral ground it gave her, though she was never overt or verbal in her self-righteousness. Hell, Yoder thought, she was a goddamn braless, LSD-taking, marijuana-smoking hippie back in the seventies, when she first fucked Gary.

  She didn't waste a second. "I wish you wouldn't be so stubborn about forming a real business. You need to look into it. Do some," she enunciated, "research."

  "Not real thrilled with anybody who uses the words you need with me. You need to cut that shit out."

  "Well, I know what I know. And I know you love some research."

  "Just like Gary," he said automatically, "a goddamn know-it-all," certain she had just smugly tossed him some bait. He was baffled, but knew enough that he refused to take the minnow.

  She pounced. "I have a limit, you know. I'll only go so far for people who have no appreciation for me."

  "Does it count that you're living at my place?"

  "Fuck you!" she cried out, catching the attention of the septic crew. "Tell you what. You like to do stupid fucking research. The old-school kind of research. So why don't you research this, for your friend, who's not doing so great. Yeah, research this: black, tarry stool. Goddamn research that!" She executed her dramatic stride to her camper truck and gravel-slung her way down the driveway.

  Yoder took a sip of beer, narrowed his eyes, wondering how she knew so much about his doings, making leapfrogging connections in his head, noting dark and tarry. "Hey, Ronny! You say that concrete tank's going to outlast me?"

  "Damn right."

  "It'll handle the waste?"

  "Sure thing. 'Course, you got to treat it right. But you'd be surprised what folks put in these things that they ain't supposed to. Hell, tampons, paper towels, dead goldfish, even rodents."

  "But it eventually breaks down, huh?"

  "Long as it don't get too cluttered. I mean, the solids is gonna go to the bottom, the scum to the top, the liquid to the field lines. It all breaks down if it don't get backed up."

  "You're a damn septic savant, Ronny. Not going to argue with that."

  * * *

  Yoder watched in fascination over Gary's shoulder as his computer-savvy buddy mouse-clicked through a series of websites, a virtual wizard at private investigation. Talk about a savant. He was a little surprised that Gary put up no resistance when Yoder, having abandoned his monitoring of the septic installation, shook him out of the hanging bed, demanding, "Get on that damn computer right now, asshole, and show me how to find out about this bitch you've hauled into our lives."

  What they found, pretty quickly, was that there was no residence in Portland, ever, as far as they could tell. There was a series of marriages, even one to a plastic surgeon, but in Boulder, Colorado, not California. There were hefty divorce settlements, some unimaginative aliases, a few restraining orders against her, a couple of arrests, one for theft of property and another for harassment described as hacking into a cell phone. She moved often, every year or two at least. Employment records were nonexistent.

  "Phone hacking, huh?"

  "Yeah, you can track a person's whole life, where they are, what they're saying even, just by hacking in their phone. Misty told me she does it all the time."

  "Well, that explains that."

  "What?"

  "Never mind, Gary."

  "Okay," he sighed. "Never-minding."

  The reality of
the whole sorry business settled in on Yoder. "Holy crap, she's a bullshit artist," he said, "only without much artfulness to speak of. She played you, big-time. Sorry, Gary."

  "Hell, I figured it was too good to last." Gary was pale, haggard, and Yoder only now realized just how hollowed-out he was, how that succubus of a criminal bitch had sucked the endangered life right out of him.

  "What I don't understand is why you didn't check her out, research her, before you let her come here. I mean, you obviously know how."

  Gary sighed, picked up a glass of whiskey. "Age-old story, ain't it?"

  "I guess so."

  "Well, I had me some pussy for a little while."

  "Yes, you did."

  "I reckon we're gonna have a knock-down drag-out when she gets back." Gary looked down at his hands. "I ain't got much use for that. Outta gas. Damnedest thing."

  Yoder studied his friend's profile, the slump of his shoulders, the drop of his chin, his obvious fragility. "Don't worry, buddy. Don't you worry. You go lie down. I'll take care of it."

  "I know. Thanks."

  * * *

  Gary slept fitfully that night, images of billowing clouds of smoke in thick jungles, huts ablaze, the screams of women as the planes came in low, misting the vegetation, aiming to strip away Charlie's cover. He half woke a few times, and reached to see if she was there, but he was alone with these fever dreams racing, like the spirits of dolphins chasing across the waves.

  He caught a sleep-soaked glimpse of the moon, hanging like the blade of a scythe in the clouds. It reminded him of the Vincent Price movie The Pit and the Pendulum, of the last, chilling scene, the torture dungeon being locked, the door shut forever on the evil Elizabeth, trapped, all alone yet still alive, in an "iron maiden." Then the dark closed over him, pushing through his consciousness, force-flashing images of dead baby dolphins washing up on the black-blotted sands of the gulf, seagulls stained slick with poison, and watercolors of pastel children picking at the tar balls between their toes. And he wondered, in his stormy dreams, if the coral really could die.

  BUBBA AND ROMY'S PLATONIC BENDER

  by Kirk Curnutt

  Pike County

  Romy's elbow was in Bubba's rhomboid when she said the name: Otis Owen. Dr. Otis Owen, she actually said, no s on the end. She started to add that even though she'd banged Dr. O when he taught her basic microcomputing her one semester of college, they were only friends now—no sex, no kissing, all touches strictly business. Before Romy could say that, though, Bubba, bare-bellied on her massage table, looked up with a hurt face.

  "Otis Owen? You hang with that creep?"

  "Dr. O comes here to work out the same kinks you do." She pushed Bubba's head into the table's fleece-lined face cradle. "I feel sorry for him. I'm the age he was when he'd fuck me in his office ten minutes before class. He was a god to me then, but not anymore—he's putty. I've never known a guy to go so squishy."

  "What you do for him out of pity you won't do for me out of friendship?"

  "I give you both what you want. Rejuvenation through humiliation."

  Her elbow descended into Bubba's latissimus dorsi, grinding until his pancreas threatened to burst. He tried to ignore the discomfort, but her turquoise-painted toes entered his peripheral vision, along with the familiar smell of verbena and lavender, Romy's favorite lotion, and Bubba knew his aches and pangs were inescapable.

  "Listen, I know things about Otis Owen. It's intel you should have, but intel's not free. Humor me, and afterward I'll not only pay your rip-off $85-per-hour rate, but I'll take you out for drinks. What you should know about Otis goes down better with tequila."

  "No more humoring, Bubs. You're just hurting yourself, and I've got a license to lose if anybody ever peeked in my window."

  She started to step back, but the only reliable man she'd ever known clutched her wrist. Lifting his torso, Bubba stared into her eyes, firm in need but weak with want.

  "I had a manicure today," she pleaded. "You'll ruin it."

  "We've been friends twenty-five years, Romy. You've always needed me as a big brother, maybe a dad. I care for you enough that unlike Dr. O I've never taken advantage of that. Never even tried. That's how much I respect our friendship. Otis Owen's pulled some snaky shit; I'm not protecting you if I don't tell you. But I need you first." Bubba released her arm. "I'll rest better too," he added, "if you lose those cutoffs."

  Romy grunted at the obligation as Bubba recradled his face. He didn't want to watch her wriggle down her shorts, didn't want to know what she wore under them, two more tokens of respect for their friendship. He just liked the warmth of her—that part of Romy Bubba knew he was too good of a friend to ever get to experience—as she straddled his tailbone, her butt atop his. As her weight settled on his glutes she sank her nails into his skin, and he tensed in expectation. Then Romy raked her fingers along his spine in a long, euphoric scratch.

  "Deeper," Bubba told her.

  "The oil's getting scooped under my nails. Like ice cream. The skin's too slick to break."

  "You've managed every time."

  The second scrape was shorter but more intense. Bubba whinnied softly. Romy reached back and swatted a flank.

  "Don't buck me, Seabiscuit. You do and no oats for you in the stable."

  On the fourth try she drew blood. On the fifth Bubba gripped the table legs and chewed his lips. Romy clawed until her friend lost count of how many times she stopped to crack her knuckles and stretch her fingers. Perspiring, Bubba felt furrowed, carved, whittled.

  "I'm all nubs." Romy lasted as long as she usually did, twenty minutes. "You're done too. Any more and you'll scar."

  "How's it look?"

  "Like you've been crosshatched."

  "Then you're right. I'm done."

  He jounced hard enough to pop Romy off his sacrum. She landed on one foot and had to slide the other across Bubba's greased thighs, holding his towel in place, he knew, so she didn't have to see his hairy rump. She told him to get dressed while she washed him out from under her manicure, then left. Bubba rolled off the table, dropping the towel, half hoping she'd walk in on him, fully knowing she wouldn't. He looked around the studio, spotting what he was after on the sideboard, tucked among flickering candles: a little Ganesha statue, new to the room since his last visit. Sure enough, when Bubba shook the porcelain figure, something inside rattled. He pried out the statue's rubber stopper and tipped its contents into his palm. "Got it," he said aloud, sliding an object into a front pocket of the jeans he pulled from the floor. He was adjusting the pen clipped to his shirt placket when Romy reappeared. Her blond shag was fashionably mussed and she wore a red shift with suede boots. She looked funky, like when she'd been jailbait.

  "Sure," Bubba chuckled, "let's play dress-up, like tonight's a night at the opera." Blood driblets skied down his lumbar region. One rode over his coccyx and cascaded into his ass crack. "Because this fuckery Otis's pulled is straight-up operatic . . ."

  They drove from the bohemian district where Bubba had bartended for thirty-three years to a lounge in Montgomery's black half. Exactly where black Montgomery began nobody could really say; it tended to start wherever white people started feeling uncomfortable. But Bubba liked black joints. He could name all the legendary ones from Montgomery's past: Club 400, the Ty-Juanna on Highland Avenue, Laicos. In a booth at G's he ordered four Agave Locos and shot two before an unamused Romy reminded him he still had to drive.

  "And still a story to tell," Bubba noted. "Two things about Otis Owen: he's a bad drunk and a worse gambler. In two years he's lost $80,000 to Biloxi casinos, every cent he ever saved."

  "He still has my $85-an-hour," shrugged Romy.

  "I didn't say he's broke. I said he's blown his savings. To feed his beast he's had to cook up a profitable scam . . ."

  Romy hiked her brows. "I gotta beg for deets?"

  "I'll detail it—after you shoot that Loco. That's how this story unfolds. We come to a plot twist, you gotta drink to learn t
he next chapter."

  Romy reluctantly drained a tequila and chewed the lime. Before she stopped puckering, Bubba flagged down a hostess and ordered another round—though not straight Agave Loco this time. This time the hostess brought three firecrackers: tequila with Goldschläger and Rumple Minze.

  "Why you trying to get me drunk, Bubs?"

  "Because it's the only way you'll believe this story."

  He set his third empty down. The shot glasses on the tablecloth began resembling chess pieces.

  "Bitcoins," he said.

  "What's that?"

  "Cryptocurrency, the fool's gold of the Internet. Other types exist—Monero, Ether, Ripple. Computer dorks pay real dollars in online exchanges for this 'money.' It's legal tender on the Darknet because transactions are untraceable. The problem is cryptocurrencies are easy to steal. Cryptopickpocketing's a billion-dollar industry."

  "You're telling me Dr. O's an Internet safecracker?"

  "Even Luddites like us can learn to five-finger Bitcoins. Websites galore teach how to hack into the virtual wallets where investors store this funny money, how to phish for log-ins to trading accounts."

  "I've heard of phishing," Romy admitted. "But I thought only developed nations like Nigeria did it, not third world countries like Alabama."

  Bubba grinned before pointing at her remaining shots. "You're behind three to one."

  Romy knocked back her second Agave. "You drink too much, Bubs."

  He ignored her. "Dr. O didn't plan on hacking on his lonesome. He aimed to start a big-time operation, maybe forty hackers mining cryptocurrency side by side. He couldn't post a Help Wanted ad for entry-level cryptocrooks, though. He needed a Fagin with a labor pool of Artful Dodgers—and that, my friend, is how Dr. Otis Owen ended up in business with Iv'ry Cole."