Burying a Body at the Beach

"Last call, gentlemen." The chronically pissed-off bartender did not bother to hide his contempt.

"Big spender," the bartender mumbled. He took our empty glasses, pocketed two singles from in front of Mickey and then refilled the glasses under the tap without bothering to rinse them. If the bartender weren't half a foot taller and fifty pounds thicker, and if he hadn't kept a tire iron under the counter, Mickey would've told him to go fuck himself a long time ago.

Mickey and I had been sitting in O'Malley's since midnight. We'd been watching the Knicks losing out in L.A. on the flickering, fading 27-inch Zenith bolted to the wall. There used to be more of us - like Louie and Maxie and Ralph, like Cheap-Ass Charlie and Jimmy the Gimp - but most of the them had moved away, gone away or passed away. And when the bartender slunk away, Mickey tossed out the question to me like an old man feeding pigeons. "Lenny, uh ... how'd you like to pick up a coupla hundred bucks?"

"We go to pick up something up in the Bronx. We take a ride out to the beach in Montauk and then get rid of it."

Mickey looked around to see if anyone were listening. Putz. We were the only ones there, except for one of the regulars and his bleached-blonde bimbo back in the corner booth. They were wrapped in a knot - like snakes mating in the dark, I thought - so they probably didn't give a damn what anyone else was saying.

"I'm into the sharks for twenty large. It's a quick way of working some of it off."

"Why're 'ya being such a pussy? It's only a few hours work. Easy money. C'mon. I'll even buy you breakfast when it's over."

When we finished our beers, Mickey gathered up his bills and we slid off our stools. We ignored the prick bartender, who ignored us right back, and we walked out of the joint. I filled my lungs with a couple of breaths of fresh air. Despite the no-smoking law, the place still stank from booze and smoke and stale piss.

We got into Mickey's Oldsmobile Aurora, which belched into life when he turned the key. Its rough idling turned into a misfiring roar when he stomped on the gas. It needed a new muffler, and the damn thing already smelled from wet upholstery and burnt oil.

I had told him not to buy it, that Oldsmobile was going out of business. They must've seen him coming. But he told me to go fuck myself, insisting, "Oldsmobiles run in my family." He's always said, "'Ya gotta understand ... my dad had a '56 Super Eighty Eight, then a '63 Ninety Eight. There was a picture of me and my ma on the way home from the hospital in a Delta 88 convertible. A '72, bright yellow, I think. But his black Toronado - a 1980 - that thing was fast. Had front wheel drive; handled like a race car. That was the one he took off in. Never saw him again. Boy, that car was one sweet ride."

We crossed over the Throgs Neck, took the Third Avenue exit off the Cross Bronx and then headed down into the industrial section. In the dead of night, the starkness and desolation were magnified by the harsh orange glow of sodium-vapor street lights, and traffic lights that turned from green to yellow to red and back to green again. Chain link fencing topped with razor wire. Steel-shuttered doors. Graffiti-covered walls. Plastic bags and shreds of paper air-dancing in the breeze. After we passed a burned-out husk of a nondescript sedan parked halfway up on the sidewalk, Mickey stopped in front of a squat, cinderblock building. "Wait here," he told me, and he disappeared around the side. I'm glad it wasn't too cold; I would've hated to keep the engine running.

I must've dozed off. I awoke to a thud and the car bouncing on its springs. The trunk lid was slammed closed - it took a couple of tries - and then Mickey got into the car. A couple of goons in hooded sweatshirts lumbered back to the building and we took off.

The Cross Island and the L.I.E. were empty but Mickey kept it under the speed limit. The last thing he wanted was to get stopped by the cops.

Three long hours later, he skidded into the turn when we came to a sign that said "Hither Hills State Park." I thought he was going to bust right through the chain across the road, but at the last minute, he swerved around a stanchion to get in.

A neon-orange sun had just begun to rise over the ocean as Mickey backed the Olds to the edge of the parking lot. We got out and stretched. He popped the trunk and slid a shovel out from under the body, a bent-up, chewed-edged shovel that he always keeps in his car. He started digging in the sand a few yards away while I stood watch, not that anybody'd be around that early in the morning. After a minute or so of frenzied digging, he pulled off his T-shirt, tucked it into his waistband and then continued. It wasn't a pretty sight. Flab was hanging over his belt and his man-boobs were jiggling. I started to laugh but stifled it with a cough.

Mickey stopped for a moment to catch his breath, wiped his forehead with the shirt, and said to me. "Okay. Go get it, now."

I reached into the trunk and tried to pull out the body. It was no longer "in rigor," as they say on CSI.

It was a struggle getting the damn thing out. Dragging two hundred pounds of dead weight over the lip of the trunk was no picnic. Plus, the stiff was wearing a nylon jumpsuit, so it was hard to grab on to. When I'd pull the legs, the torso'd slide back. When I'd pull the shoulders, the legs wouldn't budge. I shouted back, "Gimme a break, would'ya please?"

"Listen, Alf. I ain't got all fuckin' day." Now he's calling me Alf. Yeah, I know I've got a big nose, a honker, a beak, a goddam shnoz. He doesn't have to keep on reminding me. I've asked him nicely not to. I've warned him. I've threatened him. But the prick forgets, or does it on purpose. He really pisses me off.

Mickey again: "Would'ya get that fuckin' thing out, already. I've gotta be somewhere."

Fuckin' this. Fuckin' that. Mickey was one child whose mother never washed out his mouth. For me, it wasn't with Joy - it was with a bar of soap - and it was no joy. It was always Ivory, and the soapy washcloth jammed in my mouth, while she held the back of my head until I started to choke.

Mickey was leaning on his shovel, glaring at me. His smug look told me that he had finished his job, and wondered why the fuck I hadn't done mine.

With one final heave, the body tumbled out of the trunk. It lay sprawled on the ground, while I stood above it, panting.

I tried hooking my hands under its arms to drag the body over to the hole he had dug. "Hey, Mickey ... would'ya help me with this?"

"For chrissakes, Alf. Don't 'ya even know? Drag the body by the fuckin' legs. It's easier that way." All the while, he didn't move an inch.

I grabbed onto the Nikes and the suit, but the first shoe, then the other, got yanked off. So I ripped off the socks and tucked the two cold, blue feet under my arms and pulled on its knees. I was finally able to haul the body into the hole, which was more of a trench, only a couple of feet deep. I would've dug it deeper. On second thought, I wouldn't've buried the body there at all. What if there were a storm? What if the tide came up and washed away the sand? It was bound to be discovered, sooner or later.

I figured that Mickey was taking the easy way out, doing something half-assed, as usual. I shrugged towards the hole, and said, "What gives?"

"Just doing what I was told. Just being a good soldier." He mock-saluted me and handed me the shovel. "Go ahead. You can do the rest."

"No way, Mick." I pushed the shovel back at him. "You can bury it yourself." I started walking across the sand towards the water's edge.

I waved my middle finger overhead as I walked down to the shore. I stood at the water's edge and watched wave upon wave roll, crash, and then lap up towards where I was standing. The sun soothed my face, like a woman's caress. I slipped out of my shoes and socks and took several tentative steps into the icy-cold water. I closed my eyes and felt the pounding of the surf in my feet, which started to numb. I listened to the rhythm of the waves, the whoosh of the water approaching and then receding, the squealing of birds. I took deep raspy breaths of salty air that burnt my sinuses and made me cough. And I felt myself smiling for the first time in a long time.

Then, I heard Mickey's shout above the surf: "Hey, Alf! Let's get the fuck out of here!"

Damn it. I wanted to shout back, "Go on ... I'll get back on my own!" but it was more than two hours back to Queens, and so far out in the boondocks that I was afraid I couldn't make it back. There was also that two hundred bucks he owed me.

I trudged back through the sand. Mickey was waiting in the car with the engine running. Blue smoke was spewing out of the exhaust. When I got near, he stuck his hand out the window, gave me the finger, and gunned the engine, leaving two lines of black rubber. Then he squealed to a stop.

I slowed my pace and continued on towards the car. Again, he pealed away and then braked. Burnt rubber and smoke, thick and nauseous, hung in the air.

This time, I stopped and waited. It was an impasse. The moment of silent expectation seemed to last forever.

Fuck him, I decided. I turned and walked back through time, back to the water's edge. And closed my eyes to the sun.

The crashing surf masked all sound except for the cawing and crying of the birds. After a while, I felt Mickey's presence behind me. It was the way he took up your space and breathed your air, especially when you didn't want him there.

He poked me hard in the small of my back. Made me flinch. Made me want to swing around and sucker punch him.

"Whoa, man." He put up his hands, as if to surrender. "Don't get all hostile with me."

"It's the Olds ... I couldn't get it back around the chain." He turned his face into a pout and made his voice sound like a pitiful child. "And it got stuck in the sand."

I started to chuckle and then burst out laughing. Usually he'd bitch-slap someone who laughed at him, but I figured he needed me.

I took a couple of steps and turned back to face the ocean. Closed my eyes. Inhaled the salty wet air deeply, through my nose. Let it out slowly. Waited.

It would take him a while to trudge to the car, and back out again. He'd be sweatin' up a storm. That'd teach him. And it would give me a chance to enjoy - truly enjoy - being out where I was.

What do they say? "Revenge is sweet"? Well, for me, revenge was salty, so salty I could taste it. I reveled, breathing deep, as the ocean licked at my feet.

Too soon, he returned. I imagined him tossing the bills at my feet, but I didn't think he would be that stupid, with the wind gusts and all. I felt him standing next to me, puffing hard, gasping for air, waiting, deciding.

He tapped me on the shoulder. His stink was now mixed with desperation. "C'mon, Lenny ..." - a wheezing breath - "... let's do it." He handed me some crumpled bills, and I stuck them in my pocket without bothering to count them. He turned and lumbered off.

"Gimme a break. I just wanna get the fuck outa here." He continued on to his Olds. I waited a few moments - enough to piss him off - and then followed him back. I sat on a log, and took my sweet time wiping the sand off my feet, pulling up my socks and tying my shoes. I considered the upside and the downside. Like, what if Mickey wanted to get rid of me? I didn't want to become just another body buried in the sand. But I figured that wouldn't happen; he was just too damn lazy. I patted the switchblade clipped into my jeans pocket and thought about gutting the bastard. It would do us all a favor. But it would be too messy, too much like work. I'd have to bury him, and ... Nah, that wouldn't work either.

"C'mon already, would'ya please?" What a pain in the ass. I got up and went over to the car. He was right; the rear tires were dug in real deep. Mickey, muttering curses to himself, got into the car and started it up. He revved the engine and spun the tires some more until I banged on the trunk and yelled, "What the fuck're you doing?" He eased off the gas and popped it into neutral.

I considered digging out, but then I remembered the floor mats: the ones Mickey boasted about, the ones he said were the "goddamn best" that Pepboys sold.

I opened the back door and pulled out the two rear mats and the shovel he hadn't bothered sticking back in the trunk. I walked around the front and got the one from the passenger side. "What the fuck you doing?"

I ignored him. Without saying a word, I reached under his feet and pulled out that mat, too. Then, I got on my knees and dug some sand away from under one of the rear tires and slid a mat under it and the longer one ahead of it. I did the same with the other tire. I got up and walked around to the driver's side and said, "Mickey, I've gotta do this right. Let me get behind the wheel, and you get behind and start pushing when I tell you."

I kept my left foot on the brake, shifted into low, stepped lightly on the gas pedal, and lifted slightly off the brake. I yelled out the window, "Okay ... now push!" The car started to rock forward. I gently let off the brake while giving it a little more gas. "Give it all you got!" The car began climbing up and out of the sand, and, in the rearview, I saw Mickey slip from view. I hoped he got a mouthful of sand.

I thought about flooring it and driving off. Or taunting him like he did me. But I resisted the temptation. I put it in park, and slid over to the passenger side. Sweating, grunting, and covered in sand, he slapped the floor mats against the car and tossed them onto the back seat. He brushed himself off and got behind the wheel. He didn't even look at me as he put the car in gear and drove off.

For a while, Mickey stewed while he drove, saying nothing. Finally, as if it were going to kill him, he said, "I'm impressed. Where'd you learn that?"

Rev 9 / April 13, 2007

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April, 2007…Copyright © 2007, Lloyd B. Abrams

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