Every Shallow Cut Read Free

took my father’s coins and the battered remnants of my mother’s prints from me. His shelves were stacked with the vestiges of my life. It was like walking into some alternate version of my house. Even a few literary awards I’d won over the years were tagged as paperweights and bookends.
    In a display of mercy he waved me forward and offered to set my nose straight again. I swallowed a squeal while he placed his blunt hands on my face and cartilage crackled and snapped. He let me wash my face in his bathroom and then packed my nostrils with gauze and taped the bridge of my nose. When he was done he said, “Not so bad.”
    In the shine of his glass counter top I saw that my nose looked like hamburger. I glanced down at Church and he did a nervous little dance and snorted at my knee as if to push me back to the home we’d once had.
    The pawn shop owner offered me a pittance for the coins and prints, the same as he’d robbed me on all the rest of my shit, but it was no less than I’d get anywhere else in these times. I took it.
    Church groaned. He was hungry. We started for the door and were almost there when I turned.
    The walk back to the counter was the longest walk I’d ever taken.
    Longer than the stumbling blind flight from my mother’s grave. Longer than the staggered half-jog from the bedroom following my wife as she carried her bags out to Sweetie’s well-polished black truck. Longer than the shattering retreat down the driveway when they hung the foreclosed sign on my front door.
    Church began to whine. I looked down through the glass-top case. I pointed at one of the items.
    The owner nodded.
    “Good eye,” he said.
    I’d done a lot of research for a novel of mine entitled The Bone Palace. I’d printed out pages of material and studied up.
    He unlocked the case and brought out the Smith & Wesson .38. I handed him back most of the money he’d just paid me. He set the .38 in my hand. I’d never held a gun before. I knew better than to dry fire it. I snapped it open, cocked the hammer, checked the line of sight. I eased the hammer back down. I’d done my homework.
    He said, “I’ll give you the cleaning equipment for free.”
    “Throw in a box of ammo too,” I told him. “And a speed loader.”
    The voice still didn’t sound like mine, but I knew I was going to have to start recognizing it from now on.
    His face registered some surprise. “Speed loaders are illegal.”
    “I know, but you’ve got them. I want one. Get it.”
    His lips parted and he started to argue, but I flared at him and he shut his mouth. He handed me some paperwork to fill out. I shoved it aside. He stared down at it and took a breath. I took one too. It went on like that for a dozen heartbeats or so. Then he got the ammo and the loader and slapped them on the counter in front of me. I filled my pockets. I caught sight of my reflection in the glass. My eyes were so black they looked like they’d been gouged out with an ice pick.

With the Rockies in my rearview I drove east across Denver and pulled into the drive-through of a fast food joint. I ordered four burgers and fries and a large drink. It’s what I used to have for lunch every day when I was busy writing. No wonder I’d been so much fatter and softer and sleepy. No wonder my wife would have to climb up on top of me during sex because she didn’t want my weight bearing down on her. No wonder the minimum wage kids would practically laugh in my face whenever they saw my fat ass pull up again.
    I rolled down the driver’s window and Churc-hill crawled over my lap and balanced himself against the driver’s door with his chin jutting. When we got up to the cashier she was afraid to take my money. Church looked that hungry. I asked her for a cup of ice. She said it would cost an extra dollar.
    “But I don’t want another soda,” I told her, “I just want some ice.”
    “It doesn’t matter. That’s what it costs.”
    “But it’s just ice.”
    “That’s what