Piecemeal: Six

          Just before 11:00 the next morning Seamus and I set out in search of Ewepie. I think we were headed west but all I know was that we drove past a few cattle ranches and wound up in garlic and onion country. The air was thick with their smell for 10 or 15 minutes ‘til it wasn’t. Then all I could see for miles was hay fields.

            “Where’re we goin’?” Seamus looked at me out of the corner of his eye.

            “Don’t worry about it,” he said.

            “I’m not worried,” I said. “It’s just that I can’t figure how you aim to find someone out in the middle of a hay field.”

            He didn’t bother to look at me again, instead powering on the Buick’s stereo. Led Zeppelin’s “Tangerine” had just begun. I guess he thought the music would prevent me from further questioning, and I decided the noise was better than trying to get information out of him. Before the short number ended we approached what appeared to be a hub of the local irrigation system. Seamus pulled the car onto a dirt road, exhibiting a carelessness for the vehicle. I shook my head in frustration as I felt the suspension and steering shoulder the caution necessary for such terrain, an element for which the operator should take responsibility.

            A ways down the road stood a shake-shingled shelter with a horse corral behind it. Seamus pulled over and shifted the Buick into park.

            “Wait here,” he said.

Piecemeal: Three

          At seven past eight the next evening we got in the Buick. I was pissed that Seamus wouldn’t let me drive but too tired and weak to argue. He wouldn’t tell me where we were going, and it made for an uneasiness that made me think of leaving his place and him. I didn’t have much money but the gas tank was pretty full, so I knew I could make a start.

            “Who’re we lookin’ for?” It seemed like if he thought me well enough to join him on this mission that he ought to share a detail or two with me. “That cowboy?”

            “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “You just make sure we ain’t bein’ followed.”

            We pulled in to the Black Bear Diner parking lot on Main in Fernley and Seamus chose an isolated spot. There were only three or four cars in the parking lot and when he shifted the Buick into park, I felt like his selection drew attention to us. From whom I wasn’t sure, but I could feel my nerves binding a touch.

            “Wait here,” he said.

Piecemeal: Two

Light poured through my closed eyelids and my skull rang like a council-fire drum. I could hear Seamus’ voice asking if I was okay but I hadn’t figured out how to answer. The muscles in my face pulled the strings to make my lips move but the pounding harshened. Ten or 12 thoughts swum in my head but none of them spoke as loud as the one that wanted to darken the room. A handful of ice cubes clanked in a glass just before some liquid was poured. The image of the cowboy flickered in my mind and I hoped the Buick was parked outside of wherever we were. Seamus sipped his beverage and let out an exhale gasp of satisfaction. Some plastic crinkled and a light rapping of one surface upon another preceded the dragging sounds of a scrape. Seamus snorted.

            “Where’s Abel?”

            Seamus mimicked the sound he’d made after sipping, then snorted again. I managed to open an eye and see him hunched over a table. He clutched something cylindrical between his thumb and forefinger and one end of it was inside his nostril. The idea of a whiskey-and-cocaine combination saturated me with nausea.