Nobody Move by Denis Johnson Read Free Book Online Page B

deal. Probation and lifelong restitution. If I miss that date, the judge’ll void the deal and max me out. That’s six years at least.”
“Kind of a long time to wait to spend your two million.”
“Have you lost count already? Two-point-three.”
“What’s a point or three among friends?”
“I haven’t got any friends. And I’m flat broke.”
“Not according to the Federal Bureau of Jehovah’s Witnesses.”
“I haven’t got the money. I just know who has it and how to get it.”
No more flip commentary from Mr. Jimmy.
“Doesn’t that interest you?”
“You’re interesting every way there is.”

    This Jimmy was your basic bus-station javelina, but a nice enough guy. He insisted on handing her two Ben Franklin hundreds before they left the lounge. “You’re with me now.”
“That’s not established.”
“By ‘now’ I just mean now—right this second. That gets you at least a couple hundred.”
He led her into JCPenney’s, where he stacked generic-looking items on one of his arms and went into the dressing room wearing his shiny black pants and white tuxedo and came out in khaki chinos and a flannel Pendleton.
“Where’s your fancy threads?”
“On the floor in there. I shed those babies like a sunburn.”
“You’re fast.”
“These days, life is fast.”
She picked out a JCPenney pantsuit, a JCPenney blouse, a JCPenney skirt, and the best underwear they had, which wasn’t much. While Jimmy stood around waiting for her she sat in the dressing room momentarily naked with these latest humiliations at her feet and rage in her heart. JCPenney.
She changed into the pantsuit, gray pinstripe, and made sure she had her shoulders back and her smile on before she swept aside the curtain. “Does it fit?”
He stared, and then he went for his Camels and put one between his lips, realized where he was, dropped the cigarette into his shopping bag. “It fits.”
“You’re sweet,” she said, and she sort of meant it. But not as a compliment. “You’re homeless, right?”
“I have a home. I’m just not going back there, is all.”
“So right in that shopping bag is everything you own.”
“Everything I need.”
“And your white canvas bag—what’s in that one?”
“Everything else I need.”
“I know what’s in it. A sawed-off shotgun.”
He seemed completely unsurprised. “It’s not a sawed-off. It’s a pistol-grip. And it isn’t mine.”
“I peeked in the bag while you were in the shower.”
“You zipped it up real nice,” he said. “Good for you.”

    Jimmy Luntz drove the Caddy north. He watched the dial and kept under the limit. Again they passed through the blond country. Some vineyards here and there, lots of vineyards. Either vineyards, or orchards with very small trees. He asked her if those were vineyards.
“What do you care? Are you a wino?” Anita drank from an extra-large Sprite in a go-cup, doctoring it with vodka.
Orchards. A roadside stand selling Asian pears spelled ASIAIN PEARS. Then higher country, the road winding. They lost the jazz station. He found another, just geezer rock. Tight curves, tall pines, and geezer rock. “Is that the Feather River?”
By way of answer, she took a swig and coughed.
“Hell of a lot of trees,” he said.
“That’s why they call it the forest. I hope we’re not going camping.”
“We are if I can’t find this place before dark.”
“Look, Jimmy—who is this guy?”
“I knew him in Alhambra.”
“Is that a prison?”
“It’s a city a few hundred miles from here. In your state. California.”
She pushed the button and her window came down and the wind thudded in the car as she pitched her empty and listened for the small musical sound of the bottle shattering behind them.
“You’re nice,” he said, “when you’re sober.”
“Have you ever seen me sober?”
“I think I did for about a minute.”
She lay her head back on the headrest and closed her eyes.
Luntz turned down the radio and kept his eyes going left and