“Just because because you shot Jesse James, don’t make you Jesse James.” Mike Ehrmantraut
Hey, a junkie will steal whatever isn’t bolted firmly to the floor, including infamy.
Hey, a junkie will steal whatever isn’t bolted firmly to the floor, including infamy.
459 by William E. Wallace
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George Adams leaned against
the kitchen counter. A trickle of snot dripped from his nose to the floor and
he trembled as his arms and legs began to cramp.
He stared at his
reflection in the mirror next to the refrigerator. The pasty, skinny bastard
that peered back at him looked like an extra from a George Romero movie.
Junkie motherfucker, he
thought, staring at the sweat beads dotting his forehead. You look like shit.
It was the smack he’d shot
up the day before: the damned dope was real but it had been stepped on as many
times as a Macy’s escalator, until it was more horse shit than horse.
He’d felt fine for the
first couple of hours after banging, but the high was gone before midnight,
leaving him in the first stage of withdrawal: watery eyes; muscle and joint
aches; chills and fever; nausea that would soon have him puking up his guts.
Big screen TVs and stereo
gear were out. He’d have to cart what he stole down the hill to his 1989
Cougar, so he needed small, valuable items that would fit into pockets:
silverware, jewelry, antique coins.
Plus he had to find them before
he started seriously kicking: it is bad form for a thief to pass out on the
floor of the house he’s burglarizing. People go to prison for that shit.
He pushed himself away
from the counter and rummaged through the kitchen without success. The
silverware in the dining room armoire was plate, not worth hauling to his car.
There was some good crystal, but it was too bulky.
He did better in the
master bedroom upstairs where he found an unlocked jewelry case. As he stuffed
gold chains and rings into the pockets of his army surplus field jacket, he
felt his gorge rise. He barely made it to the shitter in time to blow chunks.
The nightstand next to the
bed was fat city: more than $200 wrapped with a rubber band, probably a secret stash
set aside to purchase a gift.
“That’s more like it,” he muttered,
dropping the bills into his jacket next to the jewelry.
The real show-stopper,
though, was in the nightstand on the other side of the bed: a big semiautomatic
pistol with two full magazines.
He scooped the extra clips
into his coat pocket, then hefted the weapon and sighted down the barrel. The
name “Beretta” was stamped on its side. Its solid feel and weight were
seductive: despite twenty years as a junkie and a thief, he had never held a
gun.
Still, he’d seen them in
movies and TV shows. It took him only a few minutes to figure out how to remove
and replace the magazine, load a round into the receiver by pulling back the
slide, lower the hammer and toggle the safety. He could do it even though his
hands shook so badly he could barely control them.
Adams was no expert on
guns, but the pistol seemed valuable: Beretta was a famous brand. The gun would
probably sell for at least $500, even without the spare magazines or ammo. That
was a lot of money to a junkie.
Still, he felt like
holding onto the gun for a while. The pistol seemed to graduate him from pissant
addict to honest-to-God outlaw, like Jessie James or John Dillinger. It made
him dangerous.
Besides, the gold jewelry
had to be worth quite a bit, maybe thousands. The cash alone would buy enough skag
to last a few days. He could always fence the gun later if he needed dough.
*
He was halfway down the
stairs when he heard someone unlock the front door and saw a man standing in
the open entrance, just a shadow against the hazy morning sun.
“Hey!” the man said with
surprise. “Who the hell are you?”
He wanted to answer, “the
guy robbing your house, of course,” but he said nothing.
With an angry look on his
face, the man started up the stairs. He probably had forty pounds on Adams and
looked trim and fit.
The Beretta found its way
into Adams’ hand, and without thinking he pointed it at the stranger, releasing
the safety.
Maybe the guy didn’t see
the pistol; maybe he was so mad he didn’t care about it. With a yell he rushed Adams.
He pulled the trigger, twice.
Adams jammed the gun under
his belt and stared at the homeowner’s slack face as he stepped over his legs. The
man’s eyes were empty and dead, like the junkie Adams once found OD’d in his
hallway with the BD sharp still sticking out of his biceps. It wasn’t until he
was sitting in the Mercury and had its engine running that Adams realized he was
shaking with excitement.
He had started the morning
as a heroin addict and petty thief. Now he really was an outlaw, a real killer,
just like Jessie James.
But he’d think about that
later. Outlaw or not, he was still an addict.
He still needed to score.
