Gincy arrived at Steve’s apartment at six, half an hour after Steve called him. The monkey was whispering again, telling Steve what a prize jerk he was for trusting a con named Johnny LaSalle with a father like Eldon.
Didn’t help to argue, to scream inside that Johnny could be innocent in all this, could be a victim himself.
The monkey did not care for fine points, and when it turned to screeching, Steve called Gincy, because if he didn’t he knew he’d fall big-time.
He wanted Gincy there, not just on the phone. Something about Gincy’s disposition always calmed the beast.
“Let’s get out of here,” Steve said as soon as Gincy walked in. “Let’s drive, go see a movie or something.”
“Got a better idea,” Gincy said, flashing his famous smile.
“What?”
“Trust me.”
Gincy he could trust. They piled into Gincy’s red and white MINI Cooper. Gincy’s weightlifter arms seemed bigger than the car. He popped in a U2 CD and said, “So what’s going on in that lawyer head tonight?”
“I got a new client,” Steve said.
“Oh yeah?”
“Only this one’s a little different. It’s my brother.”
“Your brother? I thought — ”
“It’s him. The one who we all thought died.”
“Wow. How’d you find him?”
“He found me.” Steve told him the story, and about Eldon LaSalle and Booth Speaks. Gincy took it all in without comment.
When Steve was finished, Gincy said, “One day you think all those guys’ll have dried up and blown away. Then you find out there’s enough people who still think this way that you want to get yourself a gun and get ready for when they come for you.”
He paused. Bono filled the space for a minute.
“I remember a Klan rally when I was a kid,” Gincy said. “Right in our town. A town where my daddy was on the fire department. I remember him telling me to stay in the house. I remember him getting down the shotgun. And I remember his face. He wasn’t scared. He was disgusted.”
“So what do I do about my brother?”
“You talked to him about it yet?”
“No.”
“Then you talk to him. You be up-front.”
“And if I find out he’s just as bad as his old man?”
“Maybe you’re the one who can get him turned around. Maybe that’s why this has all happened. God works like that.”
“Not exactly great work, if you ask me.”
Gincy finally pulled into a lot at the park by his own apartment. Steve was greeted by the multicolored lights and giddy screams of —
“A carnival?” Steve said.
“Hey,” Gincy said, “Cotton candy is the single most underutilized antidepressant in America. Let’s go get ourselves some pink happiness and walk around.”
“Carnival?” Steve put his head back on the seat. “Oh man.”
“What?”
“I asked Ashley to marry me at a carnival. Shall I just shoot myself now?”
“Oh man, I didn’t know!”
“Why should you? You have a shotgun in the trunk, I hope?”
“Will you knock it off?”
“A .22? Anything will do.”
“Shut your pie hole, Dilbert.” Gincy sometimes called him the name of the well-known comic strip character to jolt him out of complacency.
Then Gincy was out of the MINI Cooper and on his way toward the lights.
Steve paused, then decided walking was preferable to car sitting. He caught up with Gincy at the entrance.
“Is this great or what?” Gincy said, waving his arms at the attractions.
Steve said, “What makes you so happy all the time?”
“I have my reasons, and — ”
“Well, cut it out.”
“Cut out being happy?”
“Don’t you realize there’s only a certain amount of happiness in the world?”
“Huh?”
“Yeah. The amount of happiness is constant and has to stay in balance. So every time you smile, somewhere in the world a unicorn’s getting punched in the face.”
“No such thing as unicorns.”
“Oh? Maybe you’ve made them extinct with all that gladness.”
“Let’s get some cotton candy, boy.” Gincy clapped Steve on the shoulder. Hard. The slap made a popping sound. They did get their pink confections, then walked the carnival. Kids were everywhere, playing games and riding rides and hanging onto balloons and whining at their parents. Real Americana. Something Steve and Gincy had both missed.
They were near the Ferris wheel. It was stopped, and a couple of kids at the top looked down, screaming.
Gincy faced Steve. “Is there anything else you want to tell me before we venture on?”
Steve looked at the ground.
“Steve, what’s going on?”
“I met a girl,” Steve said.
“Whoa.”
“She works for me.”
“And you want it to be more than that, huh?”
Steve said nothing. He felt like screaming, like the kids on the Ferris wheel.
“Who is she?” Gincy asked.
“Law student from DeWitt. There’s something else about her.”
“Now what?”
“She’s pretty religious.”
“She’s pretty and religious?”
“Okay, yeah.”
Gincy started laughing. He rocked back and let it go. “I love it!”
“What’s so funny?”
“God has a sense of humor, maestro. I mean, here you are, Mr. Hardcore Atheist, Mr. I-Can-Do-It-All-Myself, Mr. There’s-NoHigher-Power, and God hooks you up with a religious chick.”
“Don’t get all giddy about it. She wants to keep it strictly business.”
“But you don’t?”
“I don’t know, I — ”
“Oh man! Look at that.”
He pointed to that sledgehammer attraction. “Remember those cartoons where the guy knocks the bell off, he hits it so hard? That’s your stress level, dude.”
“It’s not that bad.”
“Your divorce final?” Gincy asked.
“Almost. And Ashley wants me to move my stuff from the house.”
Gincy got his serious sponsor look. “You been going to meetings?”
“Here and there.”
He put a hand on Steve’s shoulder. “Anything else you want to tell me? Aliens landing in your apartment maybe?”
“Isn’t that enough for one night?”
“You got it.” Gincy made a hunk of cotton candy disappear. “You’re under a lot of stress. Maybe more than when you got hooked on blow. It’s all coming back.”
They moved on, past the milk-bottle pyramid and ping-pong-ball-in-the-cup game.
“So what’s your advice, sponsor of mine?” Steve said.
“My only advice is the same as always. Give up.”
“Excuse me?”
“Give up. Quit trying to do everything on your own. Go to God. That’s how — ”
“Not tonight, man.” Steve tossed the rest of his cotton candy into a trash can. “I’ve had to look out for myself for twenty years.”
“And what’s come of that?”
What Steve didn’t need right now was another one of Gincy’s higher-power lectures. They were near one end of the carnival now. At a ride called the Zipper. Gincy turned to Steve, his eyes reflecting the red, blues, and greens of the carnival lights.
“You ever been on that?” Gincy pointed at the Zipper.
“What? No. I hate those rides.” The Zipper went around in a fast, tight oval, almost like a small Ferris wheel. But as it did, each individual car — more like cages — spun around too. “If I got on that thing I’d color the inside pink.”
“You afraid?”
“I just don’t like ’em,” Steve said.
“You have to take a risk in this life, bub. It looks scary to you, but it’ll take you to a whole new level. And faith is the same way.”
“I’m fine where I am, feet on the ground.”
“I don’t think you are.”
“When did you get a license to practice psychotherapy?”
“The day I met you, man. Wait here. And think about what I just told you.”
Gincy licked the last of the cotton candy from the paper, tossed it into a can, then handed a ticket to the guy running the Zipper.