You walk into the bar to meet your friend. You’ve known each other for twenty years, been best men at each other’s weddings, helped each other through your divorces, never gone more than a week without a text or call, completed each other’s sentences, lent each other money.

Your friend glances in the mirror behind the bar and turns his head your way. He lifts a hand, acknowledging your presence. The stool next to his is empty, and you take it. You shake hands, but it feels perfunctory.

The bartender asks you what you’ll have, and you consider ordering something strong, but the moment passes, and you order what you always do. A New England IPA. It does nothing to take the edge off, but that’s not why you’re here.

Your friend’s hair is cut close to the scalp, and in the bar’s dim light it is more shadow than bristle. He reminds you of those middle-aged action heroes you see in trailers for movies you’ll never watch. And if he’s not exactly an action hero, your friend has fast hands and knows how to work a knife.

Above the bar, baseball plays on the TV. It’s a West Coast game, so it’s just getting started. Before you catch the score, your friend says, I didn’t think you’d show.

After these last few weeks, you feel an emotion you didn’t think yourself capable of. Surprise.

And why’s that? you ask.

I thought you’d lost your nerve, he says.

It’s true, you did lose your nerve. Your friend had to yell at you to get you to move. And the part of your brain that wasn’t recoiling from what you’d just seen went on automatic pilot. You even saw yourself from above, straining to lift the body into the trunk. Your friend drove deep into the woods, where you took turns digging.

Unsure what to say, you drink more of your beer.

I’m worried about you, your friend says. You need to stay strong.

You turn away and lift your glass, but it’s empty. You don’t remember finishing it.

Another? the bartender asks.

You nod and push the mug forward.

Your friend’s glass is half full, the head gone, the beer probably warm. So different from before, when you couldn’t keep up.

We did everything right, your friend goes on.

You remember how easy the digging was, the ground soft, no tree roots or rocks. You scattered the excess dirt at the edge of the woods and raked the soil with branches.

What about security cameras? you ask.

Your friend glares.

Forget it, you say.

He answers you anyway. There weren’t any.

###

It happened in a part of town you didn’t know, and you want to take his word for it. Like you took his word for how the buy would go.

I know this guy, he said. He’ll make you well.

Well isn’t what you want. What you want is to be healed. You want the damage to your spine and nerves to be repaired. To be like they were before the accident.

Initially, the doctors spoke of pain management, and for a while, you managed. Opioids became your new best friend. But the law changed, and the doctors began to suggest alternatives. Meditation. Visualization. Practices that won’t cost them their licenses.

Your friend had a better idea.

###

You’ve got nothing to worry about, he says now.

You don’t think the police knew he was meeting you? you ask.

Your friend shrugs. We used first names only, and a burner phone. Just like that TV series.

You remember how everyone in that show ended up dead.

It’s just a matter of time, you say.

Why are you so goddam negative? your friend hisses.

You stare at him, until he turns away.

###

You’d both been drinking. Celebrating the end of your marriage, he said. Mourning it, you thought. Because you’d been willing to forgive and move on. She said she didn’t love you anymore. You thought she needed time.

You wanted to call an Uber. Your friend slapped your phone from your hand and insisted he could drive. He put on his seatbelt. You tried to put on yours, but stuffed the tab between the seat cushions instead.

What happened after, you piece together from the police report, from the medical bills, from the insurance statements. The paperwork described a single-car accident and its aftermath. It should have been written in ones and zeros, for all the emotion it conveyed, for all the deciphering it required.

###

I’ll find a new source, your friend says.

You used to trust him. How long? you ask, but the answer doesn’t matter.

These things take time, he says, his voice tight.

You watch his eyes, looking for the lie, but there’s no tell.

You signal the bartender for another beer. The drinking is part of your story, not the story your friend thinks your life has become, but the one you’re writing now.

You’re going to be fine, your friend says.

You look into your glass. I know, you say.

Now you face him. I don’t blame you, you say. I never blamed you. For the accident, you clarify.

He lifts an eyebrow.

In that moment, you wonder if he can see beyond that simple truth to what’s behind it.

I blame myself, he says. I should have made sure you were buckled in.

Hindsight is pointless, you think. You drink more of your beer. Part of you wonders if you have the nerve to do what’s right.

I’m glad we cleared the air, your friend says.

Have another, you say.

All right, he says, and signals the bartender.

Already, you’re missing what you once had. Not your health, because that’s irrelevant, but the friendship. Which never existed, or never existed the way you thought it had.

###

Your ex got a new phone and changed her number. But you had access to the bills from your old plan. They were paid automatically, so you never checked. You wonder if she wanted you to find out, if using her own phone was a kind of confession. She told you she’d strayed, just not with whom. Someone from work, she said. He’d been transferred, she said. But you recognized the number.

###

Look at that, your friend says. The game’s tied.

You watch the TV for a moment before you stand. I need to get rid of those beers, you say.

Your friend laughs.

The bar has gender-neutral bathrooms lining a back hallway. Inside, you take out your cellphone.

You’re nervous when you speak. The woman on the other end of the line doesn’t believe you.

Shut up and listen, you say.

In the silence that follows, your mind stills.

You tell her where you buried the informant. You tell her where he was killed. You tell her your friend’s name, what he drives, where he can be found.

She asks your name.

You spell it for her.

You end the call.

You wash your hands and roll up your sleeves. Sitting on the toilet, you tie off. You procured this package from a high school kid you caught breaking into your car. You pointed to the Ring camera on the house, gave him a choice.

You hear raised voices and the thud of footsteps. You depress the plunger. Pain seizes you, until you are swaddled by numbing warmth. Your eyes close. A smile touches your lips.

Tom Milani is a crime fiction writer living in Alexandria, Virginia. His short fiction has appeared in Groovy Gumshoes: Private Eyes in the Psychedelic Sixties, Illicit Motions, and Black Cat Weekly.

http://www.tommilani.com/

X: @tom_milani

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