Planet Willie Read Online Free Page A

get the truck to turn over yet again, which would
be enough cause for celebration on a regular day. She’s stood by me through
thick and thin, my truck. Silver to my Lone Ranger, if you’ll permit me. But
God bless her, she’s seen better days. Not worth the trouble to sell, if you
want to be blunt about it. Not more than a thousand miles left in her either,
but that’s enough to get me into town and the savings and loan, where I cash
Shore’s check and come walking out with a stack of hundreds not much thicker
than a pack of cards. Maybe I should have gotten it in twenties for sheer
effect, I’m thinking, as I stroll down the block to Felicity Liquors to buy a bottle
of Wild Turkey for Jimbo.
    Then I decide
I may as well stop by Fabien’s and pay Junie a visit. She’s bobbed her hair
real short, which personally I don’t think becomes her, but she is pleased to
see me. Together we pick out this real slick blue Italian suit in what they
call Super-100 wool, the sort of suit where they’ve still got the stitching on
the shoulders and the sleeves are still unhemmed. I try it on, and man that’s
luxury. I feel like Mr. Marcello Mastroianni, the Italian movie star. Junie
seems to agree as she goes around pinching me under the arms and between the
legs. Giggles a little and says, “Which way do you hang, Willie?”
    “Hell, Junie,”
I say. “You know me. Guess they’d better go ahead and sew in that third leg.”
    She giggles
some more and sticks some pins in me like I’m some voodoo doll, all while
giving me the kind of looks like she’s trying to see into the depths of my
wasted soul or whatever. Once we’re done she steps back to look me over. “Boy,
Willie,” she says. “You look like Super One Million.”
    “Hell, I’ll
take it,” I say. “How soon can you make it fit?” She tells me they can get the
tailor working on it after lunch and I can try it on that afternoon. Says she
won’t mind staying late if necessary.
    “Thanks,
Junie,” I say. “I’m taking a little business trip tomorrow and won’t be
detained.”
    She says she
thinks she can manage it, and we go over to the register where I take out my
stack of green, split the pack, shuffle them up and deal out seven
hundred-dollar bills. Then I give her the little smile I like to call the
Heartstopper. I mean I just bring it all out at once and hope we’re both still breathing when it’s over. Junie is not unaffected. She rests her cheek on her shoulder and
does something cute with her eyelashes. “I’ll see you later, honeybunch,” I
say, and stride right out of there, La Dolce Vita.
    From a payphone
out on Las Colinas, I call to book an airplane ticket. Flying may be my only
remaining phobia, which I guess is funny when you consider where I spend most
of my time, but contrary to popular opinion, they don’t give you wings up
there, which suits me just fine. Given the circumstances, however, I don’t have
much other choice. I’ll be lucky if the truck gets me to Houston.
    Then it’s just
a matter of the worldly goods. We’re talking a suitcase of clothes hidden under
the backseat and a thirty-eight caliber Colt I’ve carried since I was a kid.
Fired only twice in all those years, once through the minibar in a motel north
of Omaha, once through my own hand which required a few stitches. Lonesome
nights, you don’t want to let them go too late. Nevermind. The truth is I do
occasionally enjoy walking down the sidewalk feeling it there against my leg. I
mean you just notice more when you’re lethal. That sun just seems to shine a
little brighter.
    Once I’m organized,
the weather’s shaping up so nicely that I decide to drive up the coast to Big
Merl’s for a king crab extravaganza. I do seconds, and I even do thirds. Clean
out the local population, so to speak. Tastes so good, Greenpeace’ll have a
citation on me by dawn, I fear, but by then I’ll be long gone. Crab killer on
the run.
    From the
restaurant I check in on Jimbo.