Angels by Denis Johnson Read Free Book Online Page B

bespeaking sincerity. Hundreds of times, almost daily, he had lived this robbery in his mind, making all the right moves, playing the hero, beating the thief senseless and shrugging it all off as the police slammed the doors of the van. Bill Houston knew him like he knew himself. In this state of things Bill Houston claimed all the power.
    The people left. Nobody else in the place. Everything was as solid as a diamond.
    â€œWhatta you need tonight?” the kid called down the aisle.
    â€œHow much is this here?” Bill Houston held up a plumber’s helper.
    The kid was disgusted. “I got ten thousand a dese items in here,” he said. “You think I got every price memorized?” He came around the counter and walked down the aisle.
    Bill Houston moved to meet him halfway, his finger jamming up his coat pocket. The kid looked surprised a second, and Bill Houston grabbed him by the throat with his free hand, sticking the pocket-finger into the kid’s crotch, slamming him up against the shelves. “You motherfucker!” Bill told him. “You piss-ant kike! You’re a dead motherfucker! You’ve lived the slimiest fucking life you could live and now it’s over! ” He could feel each hair and pore of himself as he spoke. Every tiny thing in the place cried out with the fire of God.
    The clerk had no words on this occasion. He was going limp, so Bill Houston drew out his bandaged and swollen gun-hand and slapped him a couple of times. He turned the clerk around and kicked his butt down the aisle to the cash register. “ Get the fuck around there you dead mother fucker! I want every dollar you can get your hands on and I want it now! Not later. You understand, dead man?”
    The kid whipped open the cash register and started laying out the contents rapidly. He was all white, and his lips were turning purple. “Go! Go! Go! I’m clocking your ass!” Bill Houston watched him move. Time to shift gears. “You’re doing fine,” Houston told him softly. “You’re gonna live through this. You’re doing just like I tell you, you’re saving your life, we’re gonna get you through this alive. One pile for the bills, that’s right, now a bag for the change. Double-bag it. Good strong bag. Good boy, good boy, good boy.”
    The clerk was doing all right, but he dropped the bags trying to get one inside the other, and had to stoop down to pick one up. Bill grabbed him by the hair and yanked him to his feet. “ Move! Do like I tell you! You’re dying!” The kid got a grip and did correctly with the two bags. He poured the change into them and as if in a trance picked up his stapler, folded the bags, and fastened them shut with two staples: snap, snap. Bill Houston loved it. He put the bills in his pocket:, grabbed the kid’s apron front, and threw him onto the floor. “I want you to pray,” he said softly. “Pray for your life. Pray for a long time. Pray I don’t come back.” On the floor, beside the counter, the kid looked a little confused. “Pray.” The kid took his glasses off, and looked at them. “Put your hands together and pray,” Bill told him. The kid put his hands together, holding his glasses between them. “Pray loud, so I can hear you.”
    â€œOur Father, Who art in Heaven,” the kid whispered.
    â€œLouder,” Bill Houston said, stepping out the door.
    He could hear the clerk saying, “Our Father, Who art in Heaven, oh, Jesus Christ, oh, Jesus Christ,” as he headed rapidly up Clark.
    Ten PM , and the town of Chicago was shining. He moved up Wilson and into the El station, paid his fare and was up on the platform at the best possible moment, ducking into a train one second before the doors shut.
    The lives of strangers lashed out at him through their windows as the train sailed down to the Loop. He witnessed their checkered tablecloths and the backs of