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“Eli? Hey, it’s me…”
    It turned out to be a great night, a dozen barrels from seven restaurants—all full and all with oil clean enough to earn serious cash. Probably a couple thousand bucks total.
    “Fortune’s just a day away,” Eli said as they lifted the final barrel into the plain white box truck, a beast of a vehicle that he originally bought for what turned out to be a remarkably unsuccessful attempt at a legitimate moving business.
    With his battery-powered lantern, Putter climbed into the back where his job was to make sure none of the barrels tipped over. Eli lowered the door but left it unlatched, always did, so Putter wouldn’t spaz.
    Minutes later Putter heard what sounded like a police siren. Eli pulled the truck to a stop on the side of the road.
    Slamming his fist on the metal wall behind Eli’s head, Putter yelled, “What the hell? That a cop?”
    Eli yelled back, “Don’t panic! I’ll handle this.”
    Putter panicked.
    He had done time once, just a few months but long enough to know he couldn’t handle going back.
    “Shit, shit, shit,” he muttered. “Shit.”
    He turned off the lantern and tried not to make any noise.
    Officer Bill Evans approached the driver’s side door. “License and registration, please.”
    “Of course, Officer. I have them right here.” Evans could tell the driver was struggling to keep his voice calm.
    “What’s in the back of the truck?”
    “It’s…it’s empty.” The driver handed him the documents.
    “Stay here,” Evans said.
    Walking back to his patrol car, Evans knew he had one for the chief county detective. Apparently some yahoos had been stealing used cooking oil from restaurants. Local police departments had been notified earlier in the week to look out for an unmarked delivery truck, probably smelling like french fries. This truck reeked.
    A rhythmic noise from inside the truck caught Evans’s attention. He pounded on the backdoor, yelling, “Police! Who’s there?”
    Sudden silence. Putter realized he had been oblivious to his own foot tap-tap-tapping on the floor. His body tensed. “Shit,” he whispered.
    The cop banged on the door again.
    “I’m opening this door! Whoever’s inside, I want to see your hands in the air!”
    Putter said to himself, “I can’t go back. I can’t…”
    He knew he had to run for it, at least give himself a chance to escape. He crouched in the dark, ready to sprint.
    As soon as the door started rolling up, Putter ran forward. His knee hit one barrel, and then he lost his balance and slammed headfirst into another. Dizzy, he fell to the floor as the second barrel tipped over, spilling fifty-five gallons of used cooking oil all over him.
    “Ah, fuck me,” Putter said, losing consciousness. “I’m never getting laid again.”

    T HIS STORY WAS FIRST PUBLISHED IN
S HOTGUN H ONEY.
    Erik Arneson lives in Pennsylvania with his wife, Elizabeth. His stories have appeared in
Needle: A Magazine of Noir, Mary HigginsClark Mystery Magazine,
and the charity anthology
Off the Record 2: At the Movies,
in addition to the websites
Shotgun Honey, Near to the Knuckle,
and
Out of the Gutter.
He blogs at ErikArneson.com and tweets @erikarneson .

ONE PERSON’S CLUTTER
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    Albert Ashforth
    D etective Steve Stewart watched Eric Swanson’s reaction closely as the morgue attendant silently drew back the sheet covering Peg Falkner’s lifeless body. Swanson went pale, nodded, and then turned away. Sometimes people asked to ID a murder victim keel over. In Stewart’s experience those are often your murderers, and all that remains is to nail down a confession.
    But Swanson, though shaken, remained upright. After he’d signed the form, Stewart offered to drive him back to One Person’s Clutter, Swanson’s downtown memorabilia shop.
    “Peg and I’d decided to marry,” Swanson said as he unlocked the rear door. Inside, he ran his fingers through his thinning blond hair. He was a gangly six-one, not a