Bob noiselessly slid into the gloomy bathroom. He tapped each of the three stalls along the left wall to see if anyone else was there, and then the three on the right. When he was sure of his privacy, Bob reached into his back pocket, watching himself in the mirror as he did. He practiced his poker face as he held up the bag of powder for a last check.
This would be his last meet. He could finally retire to someplace nice, like a sanitarium in the Keys. God knew he must have been crazy to have ever gotten into this line of work at all. He’d only done business with three people, and he still felt a slime covering him that wouldn’t wash off, however many times he showered. Maybe after tonight, the feeling would go away.
He heard the door behind him open and instantly stuffed the bag into his right pocket as he turned to see who it was; a middle-aged man in a heavy coat, and his right cheek had a scar from his earlobe to the corner of his mouth. Something on his belt flashed in the light as he reached up to pull out the door to one of the stalls.
Bob counted the seconds the man was inside, pretending to be preoccupied by washing his hands with meticulous care. Bob heard the man do his business from the other side of the door behind him as he hit the button on the hand dryer. The man came out as Bob was drying his hands off. Bob looked back as the man leaned over to wash his hands as well, his coat opening up more, and a revolver in a shoulder holster drew his attention until he made out the number on the detective’s badge: 186.
When the cop finished washing his hands, he passed back through the door, but not before giving Bob a look. What did it mean? He didn’t know, he couldn’t! Either way, Benny wouldn’t like this. Bob could only hope he wasn’t outside to see the cop leave. Thank God this was the last time.
Minutes passed. Bob sat down in one of the stalls, laying toilet paper on the dirty seat before he graced it with his rump. He heard the door open again, and sat stock-still, holding his breath as he listened. Footsteps. They moved slowly in the direction of his stall against the far wall. The light between his stall’s door and wall was blocked out for a moment, as the other passed by and stopped right outside. Bob could see the feet turning to face the door to his stall, their patent leather quality contrasting with his tennis shoes. One of the shoes rose out of his view.
The door crashed inward against its hinges’ intended direction, and Bob flinched as the little deadbolt bounced off the wall. He looked around quickly in the confusion, for something he could use to defend himself but all that was there was the toilet paper. He saw the intruder’s face and realized it was the detective who’d just left.
“Mr. Cannen, I’ve heard so much about you, but nobody seems to know who you really are. It’s nice to finally meet you.”
“Me! What-?”
The man grabbed Bob by the collar, yanked him up to his feet and out of the stall before he could say anything else. “Our mutual friend Benny owes me a favor, and going by my records, you owe me quite a bit.”
Bob had trouble comprehending just what he meant by “his records.” His face must have given him away, because the man hit him in the stomach. As he gasped for air, Bob heard the man speak again. “You’ve been in my city, doing business for how long now?”
The man had stopped, and Bob felt this was a good time to chime in, before he was reminded of his natural affinity for respiration. “Four… months?”
The man made a noise, but Bob couldn’t tell whether he should consider it good or bad. “And you’ve come to see me exactly how many times?”
He got the impression his answer here wouldn’t make much of a difference to this guy. His silence earned him another punch in the gut. “Exactly. None whatsoever. That means that all this time, you’ve gotten a free ride. That isn’t fair to the others who follow the rules, now is it?”
Bob waited for what he now knew was coming.
“So here’s how it goes. By my calculations you’ve had enough time to make, oh, around 800k,”--showed what he knew--“Get me half of that in three days, and we’ll be even. And you’d better start paying up like everyone else.”
“How do I contact with you? I don’t even know your name.”
“I’ll find you when your time is up, and you’ll find out then.”
The cop released his grip on Bob, letting him slide down against the restroom wall, and turned to leave. The detective, Benny… he wondered if anyone else was in on this. Bob rested on a loose-seated toilet in a stall across from the broken one. His previous qualms having vanished, Bob was already planning.
