Free Vapor Trail by Chuck Logan Page B

The three red 7s were engraved on his tanned right forearm.
    Harry had a Lucky Strike dangling at a sporty angle between lightly clenched teeth. But his eyes betrayed his jaunty smile, looking about as easy as two chunks of indigo dye melting in tomato juice. A clip of toilet tissue was nailed to his chin by a rusty dot. He blinked and raised a hand to knuckle at a runny nose. He was busted inside. Stuff was leaking.
    “Is this guy here to play or what?” someone said.
    Harry’s eyes were fever brilliant but so very empty as he said, “Nah, he don’t gamble with money, but he’ll sure as fuck gamble with your life.”

Chapter Nine
    “Cash me in,” Harry said, pushing back his chair. One of the guys came over from the side table, began counting chips and entering numbers in a small notebook.
    Harry stood up, studied Broker, blinked several times, and tried to stand erect, but gravity was toying with his internal bearings. Harry was listing to port in Ole’s Boat Repair.
    He smiled. “So John gave you a badge and a gun and everything, huh? My own official escort to the booby hatch.”
    One of the guys said, “Aw, it ain’t so bad; I been to St. Joseph’s.”
    “I been there twice,” someone said.
    “The groups are fucked, though. They don’t let you smoke anymore. Gotta go outside,” someone else added.
    Broker gauged the patter, which was along the lines of a reluctant but firm farewell. He shifted his weight, kept his hands at his sides. Waited.
    Harry put his right hand behind his head and massaged his neck, stretched, turned, and looked at Broker.
    “Look at you. Nothing ever gets to you, does it? You just keep going like the fuckin’ Energizer Bunny. Why is that?”
    “This isn’t the time,” Broker said.
    “I mean, don’t it ever bother you?” Harry said. Then he raised his hands in mock surrender. “I know, I know, it’s not the time.” He waved a hand in a cavalier farewell, turning toward his poker buddies, who came forward to gather in a group. Then he stopped, snuck a quick look at Broker, and said defiantly, “I want to finish my drink.”
    Broker shrugged. “Sure, what the hell.”
    Harry leaned over the table, picked up the glass, and raised it to his lips. But instead of downing it, he left half an inch in the bottom and hoisted the glass as if to say, See, I’m in control. He placed the glass down on the table with an emphatic thump and called out, “Well, guys; this is it.”
    A chorus of send-offs ensued, handshakes, a few hugs even though Harry was definitely not the hugs type.
    As he started for the back door, Harry paused and grimaced. “Christ, kidneys are shot. I gotta take a leak.”
    Broker made a stymied spontaneous gesture with his hand which someone in the crowd captioned accurately: “You gotta go, you gotta go.”
    Harry walked quickly toward a door inside of the room. As he pulled it shut, the gang of guys moved forward.
    “Is he gonna lose his job over this?” one asked.
    Broker shrugged. “Nah, it’s not exactly routine, but in-patient is covered by insurance.”
    “Can he still, you know, hang out and play cards?”
    “I suppose he could drink Sprite,” someone speculated.
    It suddenly occurred to Broker in the course of this amiable little chat how the card players were forming a circle around him, a cordon as it were. Surrounding him shoulder to shoulder.
    “Wait a minute,” Broker said, starting toward the door through which Harry had disappeared. The group, amoebalike, oozed along with him and separated him from the door.
    Broker feinted left, shouldered hard right, burst through, and yanked open the door. Shit. It led to a hallway running the length of the building with an exit door going out the side.
    He sprinted for the exit door as a scornful voice sang out, “Ha, you sucker. He’s gonna get his whole two weeks before you pry the bottle from his cold dead hand.”
    Out the door fast. Then not so fast as his adrenaline floundered, the heat