blurring_the_edges_29_going_back_to_cali birdmad Once again, you use the familiar ruse of the camping trip with some guys from work as your pretext to disappear for the weekend. You, Zoe, and Henry Ash grab a set of roundtrip tickets to LAX from the doped out travel agent and are on your way. It is a pleasant day except for the fact that you thought the plane was going to get stuck in mid-air due to the incredible thickness and density of the smog as you were coming in. The city intimidates you in a certain way, not for the crime in the ghetto, but just the sheer sprawl and the impossibly shitty driving that seems to run rampant in the streets. Between this, a group of über-rich and dangerously bored college kid con-artists who tried to fuck you and Tony out of a large quantity of coke and the average Lakers fan, you would not be terribly upset if the "City of Angels" became an island or sank. Of course, watching the riots on the news back in April, you kept hoping that everyone in South Central would take their anger out where it really belonged and sack Simi Valley like they were the Visigoths making that legendary pit-stop in Rome. Henry gets his own motel room and you opt to share one with Zoe, which prompts Henry to roll his eyes. It bothers him that she refuses him for not being exclusively straight, failing to realize that it's more to do with his unsafe play on both sides. Perhaps a little credit is due to you, your fanatical insistence on latex products of one variety or other may be the smartest thing you've been doing lately. Once with Zoe, once with Allison and once with Cassandra a couple of years ago have been your only instances where you are aware of not having lined the pockets of the people who make condoms, dental dams and lubes. Henry makes arrangements to meet MeeKrob and a couple of guys from West Hollywood at the Whiskey. The band on stage is some hold-over from the thankfully dying genre of hair-metal and the crowd is appropriately small. MeeKrob and Henry seem to be enjoying it, but, hey, you figure, there's no accounting for taste. Zoe, the two slightly creepy looking guys and you sit and endure the sounds. You come to realize by how decidedly not sharp these guys look that they are acting on behalf of a bigger player. It makes you uneasy and you finger the handle of the commando knife nonchalantly on your ankle. You taped the blade to your thigh near your crotch and walked gimpy around the airport. When you set off the metal detector, you explained that the gimpy walk and the set off of the machine was the result of a network of surgical screws in your pelvis. The screener pointed to a set of scars on his arm leaing to his wrist and nodded sympathetically. "Yeah, brother, I know what you mean. Hurts like sonofagun on cold-nights, doesn't it?" he asks, smiling. "Amen, man, Amen." Not fully trusting MeeKrob's accompaniment, Henry made arrangements with a guy he knows out here to have a trio of small guns handy. You are feeling reckless, but you play it smart, you know from your experience showing guns when trying to make a point with Henry and Billy back when you were not on the same team that it can backfire in unexpected and unpleasant ways. Besides, if it comes down to it, guns make noise and attract attention. Keeping your fake ID handy, you go the bar and order a couple rounds of beers which the four of you pound down at your table while Henry and MeeKrob get down to the negotiating their new arrangement. Henry needs the deal and and MeeKrob needs a mover, so if they can hammer it all out both of them should be able to work out a sweetheart deal. Tony and Greg seem less and less interested in the business anymore except for the occasional thrill of the forbidden that they get from it. Of course it was never about survival or income for them in the first place, much like the little bastards from Beverly Hills who tried to shaft the bunch of you way back when, this was all just a kid's game to them. A game they picked up when a number of their less careful classmates and peers got caught playing it a few years back. The two goofballs start hitting on Zoe, but she politely plays them off, they are still bothered by it nontheless. Henry and MeeKrob take a break from talking and Henry asks Zoe to take a brief walk with him. You go up to Jones and ask him how it's going. "Oh, man, it's fucked is how it's going. If it was going anymore slowly it would be consipated, man. I'm glad you guys showed up. Hey dude, I know about your reputation on all fronts, and man, i got a buddy who could hook you and your girl up with a little -entertainment- for the night if you get my meaning." "I'll ask her, i think she'd be up for it. I know i am." "Outstanding, here's his number." MeeKrob hands you what looks like a business card, "Tell him I sent you, and don't worry, since this seems to be going well and you guys are doing me the favor, it's on me." There is no name on the card and you have to hold it a certain way to read it under the low light of the club. A combination of embossing and watermarking on what appears to be a fairly fine grade of linen cardstock shows a number. One one hand, you think this approach is fairly ingenious, but on the other hand it strikes you as possibly a very snobbish way of implying exclusivity or backhandedly inviting attention by going to such lengths to be unseen. Leaving the club, you and Zoe ride with MeeKrob and Henry rides with Tommy and Pete, the two Hollywood goofballs. Upon getting into the car, MeeKrob informs you that there is a slight bit of business left to negotiate with some players out in Tommy and Pete's territory. A matter of getting on the good side of a small clique of nutty guys who, for the right price will transport just about anything just about anywhere. The neighborhood you pull into looks like a slight step up from your own, but not by much. You get a distinctly redneck vibe here and in your head you could almost swear you can hear the strains of "Dueling Banjos" in the distance. Pulling into the house, you are greeted in the driveway by a slightly grimy middle-aged man whose glance darts about in a way that tells you he's more than a little bit keyed up just now. He leads you all into his house which is, in comparison to the man's general appearance, unsettlingly clean. Oh, this is just not good? Alex, what the fuck were you thinking when you signed on for this? Wait, don't answer that, stupid fuck, you probably weren't thinking. Sitting in the kitchen is a skinny woman in what appears to be her early fifties with a weatherworn face smoking a cigarette and a trio of guys sitting playing poker with her. "Angie, Jones' people are here." "Cool," she says, laying her hand on the table and collecting a handful of small bills and change It makes you more uneasy as Angie starts making introductions to notice that two of the men at the table appear to be wearing uniforms of some sort. You recognize one from your childhood channel surfing as that of the CHP and the other you learn a little later is that of a correctional officer. MeeKrob looks nervous as well, which means either for reasons you are not aware of he has set you up, or you are in business with another dirty cop. There might be a scooby-snack involved in this a little later if you can manage to make it back to the hotel without getting killed, arrested or shitting your pants. You took a valium before the club, but now you are wanting another. 030429 what's it to you? who go blather from