blurring_the_edges_2_hands_are_tied birdmad You ride in the van for about twenty minutes, losing your sense of direction as the van navigates the twisting streets. Lighting another clove, you bide your time until you think it is safe to light up another one of Eric's special blend. Mike feels his shirt pocket and awkwardly rifles through the other pockets of his clothes. Finding only his lighter, he meekly gestures to you to bum a smoke. You suspect he is attracted to you as he is always contriving opportunities to hang around you and make small talk even though he seems to hold everyone else in some small, but visible degree of contempt. While it comes as something of a surprise to you that Mike seems to fancy you, it is no surprise that he is gay. Such things have ceased to bother or surprise you since that night back in high-school when your best friend planted that kiss on you during an episode of commiserating over the flaming wreckage of both of your love-lives. You shake the thought of it out of your head. Time for darker things. Business to be done. You can try and break it to him gently later that you aren't so inclined. After twenty minutes, the van again begins to undergo a series of twists and turns. The view out of the back window is unfamiliar. In the immediate distance, you can see that just off to your left out of the back of the van, the roads running in the opposite direction seem to end. You are also aware by the relative smoothness of the trip that much of the road you have traveled is either new or has been repaved. The lack of road in one direction says "new" to you. "Just great," you think to yourself, "more of the open desert soon to be fucked over into golf-course properties." Eventually, you also become aware that there are very few streetlights in this area and no overhead powerlines. The houses are very sparse here just yet, and most of them appear to be custom-built. Letting your eyes suck up as much detail as your limited view will allow, you crack your knuckles and twist your neck in such a forceful way as to make the rest of the guys in the back wince. The van rolls to a slow stop and as it does, Mike says "Here's where we get out. Jimmy D, you take the wheel and bring the van into the driveway. Alex, you come with me." Reaching into a gym bag, Mike pulls out what looks like a brick with an antenna on it. It is the first one of those you have seen that doesn't need a battery carried around with it. You watch as he dials and are surprised for a moment that it goes through. In the quiet chill, you can hear the phone inside the house ringing. As Mike and the man inside finalize the details, you see the small antenna building that serves it off in the near distance. You find yourself standing in the middle of the street, looking at the number of construction sites are all around and realize you are close to a half-mile away from any neighbors. Adjusting your gloves, rapt and focused, you are startled when Mike and Greg clap you on the back and give you the high-sign to go inside. Greg takes a pry-bar to the doorjamb and dislocates it from it's frame with disturbing ease. Inside, just beyond the entryway, you see a guy in a black t-shirt and grey dress slacks sitting in a chair with an expectant look on his face. "Well, Terry," Greg says to the man, "you ready for the fun?" "Yeah," he says, looking younger than the grey streak on his temple would suggest. You are aware of a look of resignation in his eyes, but you are not really moved by it just now. Tony comes in and throws you a length of rope and goes for some of the household items on the checklist he unfolded from out of his pocket. "Follow me, kid," the guy says, leading you up the stairs. Looking at the picture he was pondering on the table, you start to wonder if maybe his the resignation on his face is over the what you are about to do to him, or if it has more to do with the woman in the picture with him. Paying no attention to the interior features of the house, you envision the woman in the picture. Strikingly beautiful with a look in her eyes that reflects a certain cruelty. With her olive complexion and long curly black hair, she reminds you in a small way of Zoe's favorite girl, Danielle. The thought crosses yout mind to diffuse the tension with a bit of small talk, but the man shuts you down in much the same polite bit obvious fashion as the way you try to deal with Mike's overtures to you. As you reach the master bedroom upstairs, He hands you the beer-bottle he has been nursing for who-the-hell-knows how long. Listening to the bustle of activity downstairs, you can't help but feel a little nervous. Peeking into the bedroom, you see that the bed is un-sheeted. There is a kitchen chair by the window. You move the chair closer to the door and tell him to go into the room and poke his head out as if he had heard something You swing the beer bottle in your gloved hand as soon as he sticks it out of the doorway smashing it into a million green glass fragments. The guy drops to the floor with more of a thud than you expected. "Ow." "Sorry" "Don't be." You help the man to the chair and lash him to it. As soon as you realize he isn't going to fall out, you backhand him hard across the face with the miner's glove on your hand. The shot brings a small trickle of blood from his mouth and causes a little bit of scraping on the cheek that it made contact with. It dawns on you suddenly that you don't have to expend so much effort with the glove on your hand. The hard, rough leather is cruel in how it contacts the guy's face. You spend a solid ten minutes hitting the man until he is no longer the pleasant faced man in his early forties but the bruised and battered piece of meat who looks like he just went ten rounds with Mike Tyson. From downstairs, you hear the call to wrap it up and you are relieved by it becuase it is starting to bother you how non-chalantly the man is taking the abuse. You untie him and take the rope, dragging him gingerly to the bathroom after deliberately kicking its door in. Putting the cat-hair laden ski-mask in his hands, you tell him to sprawl out under the door so that it will at least look like he tried to defend himself and preserve the illusion for when the cops come. As you make for the door, you hear him trying to say something. "Thanks, man, i appreciate this, a lot." You tell Mike that you are done and cram yourself into the first van with some of the bits plunder that the rest of the guys packed into it. Some antiques, some jewelry, some things you can't identify in the dark. Mike calls the lawyer and without saying anything obvious, lets bim know that the job is done. The van ride seems to take twice as long with Tony at the wheel, driving just under the speed limit to be inconspicuous. The rest of the guys in the other van are taking what Greg described as "The Long way" so that the two vans wuldn't be rolling together out in the open. By the time you reach Greg's house, you need the laced Camel from your cigarette case. Tony and one of the Jimmys look puzzled by your agitation in the wake of the big score. Weird, wasn't it, Alex. The way he didn't even squirm in tha chair as you rearranged his face. Check the time, buddy-boy, you've got to play the churchyard masquerade tomorrow and it is getting late. 030407 what's it to you? who go blather from