bad road to the dead river - 23. the slip

by nick nelson

part twenty-three of thirty-two

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watching the kid was a lot tougher than pablo had expected it to be. he felt like everybody knew what he was doing. how was he supposed to watch the kid without anybody noticing? he couldn’t look directly at him - for what, eight hours? - without somebody noticing, could he? but if he took his eye off him, for one second, how did pab;lo know he would not disappear. pablo had followed people before. he was an old hand, though not particularly good at it. he figured that was why mister brown had hired him. but he had never done anything like this before. first off, following a little kid gave him the creeps. second, the kid hardly moved. and third, and worst of all, pablo really had no idea who or what mister brown was. at least with the toughest, meanest guys you sort of knew where you stood. he had only been “on the job” for a couple of hours and it felt like twenty-two. he decided to finish the cup of coffee in front of him, take a whiz - surely the kid wouldn’t disappear while he did that - and then take a little walk around the block, before coming back and finding a new spot. a new spot where his two thousand dollar coffee card wouldn’t be good, but he didn’t care. that was another thing - the more he thought about it, he decided mister brown must be a complete idiot, a) for calling attention to him and b) for tying him down to one spot. it was almost as if he, pablo, was being set up. but he wasn’t worth anybody’s time to get set up! if there was one thing pablo was sure of, it was that. then again, if mister brown would pay two thousand dollars for the card, maybe that meant he had so much money two thousand was like two cents to him… pablo made up his mind to get up as soon as the last few drops in his cup were gone… a long black limousine pulled up to the curb in front of the kid, obscuring pablo’s view of him. nothing special there. there were a lot of limos on the street as they were only a few blocks away from the imperial compound, and several had already stopped and bought the kid’s [aper. but this one was taking a long time. finally it pulled away. and the kid was gone! and his papers, and his tarp, and his rock were all gone! he must have gotten in the limo! after his first shock, pablo was almost relieved. maybe this was the end of the job, and good riddance. mister brown had told him what to do. not looking like he was in any hurry, pablo took out his phone and texted the number he had been given. he had also been given some simple code words. manny just quit his job. the message came right back: wait until four. jerry might call. that meant he should wait - maybe until four - six more hours! - until somebody from mister brown came along , to relieve him, take him somewhere for a new job, or give him new instructions, he decided to take the whiz and that he deserved a walk around the block - just a quick one. a young woman came into the coffee shop just as pablo was getting up from the counter. he thought she looked familiar. 24. joanie