Johnny I know by sight. He used to drink at Callaghan’s. He’s a cop. Weird, huh? Short guy. Flashy. I think when they first got together, maybe a year ago, she was impressed. She’d split up with Frank a few months before, and Johnny was making good money then, so he could afford to take her out and treat her nice. But it was all on the surface. About six, seven months ago, things started to go bad for him. He got into debt, owed money to people. The kind of people you don’t want to owe money to. He started drinking too much. He was a good-looking guy, but he don’t look so good these days. He looks like he don’t take care of himself. He’s bigger. Put on weight around his belly. And he’s jealous. Of the other guys she saw, her friends. Of Frank, even now they’re separated.
He’s angry too. The last few times I saw him, he was so angry. Just raving—about people watching him, about being followed. He wasn’t making any sense. He sounded crazy. Maybe it was the booze.
Lou is pretty much the opposite of Johnny. He’s on the up. His business is doing well and it seems like things just keep getting better for him. It was like he was always making more money, taking Ruth to fancier places. Since things started to go bad for Johnny, she was seeing less of him, and then it got more serious with Lou. He got himself a boat and took her away for a weekend a couple of times. She’d only go if she could get a sitter. I told her she should leave the kids with Frank, get him to take care of them, but she said he’d make her life hell if he thought she was going away with another guy.
You seen Lou? He’s not a looker, but he’s got this way about him. Confident. He’s a charmer. He looks like he’s got money. And he knows how to dress: nice suits, nice shoes.
He’s pretty quiet: you’d think a guy with his money would be loud, pushy—he’s not like that. And even though Ruth would come home at four or five in the morning, she told me he was always in his office by eight. Always.
But there’s something about him. Something . . . when you get to know him a little, you get this feeling that what’s going on inside, underneath, don’t match the nice shirts or the twenty-dollar haircuts. And when you realize . . . it’s like the feeling you get when you find a worm in a nice red apple.
One time I was at a bar out in Williamsburg with Ruth, Lou, a bunch of other people. Back in the spring. It was Lou’s birthday and she made a big effort. Saved up for a while to buy him something fancy. Maybe cuff links, I don’t remember. And she bought herself a new dress, had her hair and her nails done. The whole nine yards.
The dress was a little shorter than she usually wore. She kept asking if it was okay, if she looked okay, if it wasn’t too tight. Tugging at it, you know? I told her she looked great. She was a fucking knockout. Guys were staring at her all night. But nobody touched her, nobody even asked her to dance, because she’s Lou’s girl, right? She belongs to him.
Then it happened. I was talking to one of the girlfriends, Lou wasn’t around. Maybe he was in the bathroom. So Ruth was alone for a minute. Then I heard something and when I turned around, Lou was back. Standing over to one side with another guy. This one was skinny, drunk. Red in the face, hands in the air. A dope. And he was saying, “I didn’t know, man. I didn’t know she was your girl.” And then Lou said something to him, real low. I couldn’t hear. The guy tried to walk away and, as he turned, Lou punched him in the gut. I heard the thwack as he hit him and I watched the dope double over. I thought: Jesus Christ, that was too much. The guy apologized—what more did he want? But Lou was staring at him. Just staring—like he didn’t even remember the rest of us were there, you know? Two of his men picked the poor guy up off the floor—he was groaning, he couldn’t stand up—and one of them pulled his head up by the hair. And then Lou stepped up and beat the shit out of him.
I grew up in a rough neighborhood, I’ve seen some fights, but nothing like this. The guy couldn’t move, let alone fight back. I still think about the noises Lou’s fist made. Bone on bone. He broke the guy’s jaw. And his cheekbone. It must’ve lasted minutes but it felt longer. The guy was spitting blood, teeth, his eye swelled up. And then Lou stopped and they let him fall and he threw up and then he just lay there, not moving. Lou turned around and stuck his fist in the ice bucket and said something and all his guys laughed. Like fucking apes. The guy just lay there. In the end the waiters had to carry him out. Lou just left fifty bucks on the table.
“For the inconvenience,” he said.
He meant for the cleaning bill. He meant for not calling the cops.
Soon as I could get her alone, I asked Ruth, What the fuck was that? She didn’t want to talk about it at first but I kept pushing it and finally she kind of shrugged and said yeah, maybe he over-reacted, but he was jealous. And that was it. I told her it wasn’t right. That he wasn’t a nice guy. She wouldn’t listen.
You know what? I think she liked it. She told me once that Lou was her happy-ever-after, and I think she liked he was that jealous. She said he was the only guy who made her feel really wanted. The only guy she felt could really take care of her.
It had been over an hour and Pete had hardly said a word. Gina fell silent and looked at him.
“I don’t know why I’m talking so much, Mr. Wonicke.”
He tried to sound reassuring.
“Call me Pete, please. I’m interested. I want to know about her.”