Moorpark Palms - 23. Chapter 23

The new problems started as soon as Denny and Pete began stacking Donna’s furniture in the courtyard.
“That’s Mine!” Mack huffed like the Wolf. “Where you taking it?”
“The dump,” said Pete.
“The dump,” echoed Denny.
“The Dump!” shouted Mack. “I can get cash for that shit.”
Pete and Denny didn’t have an answer. They were doing what Donna asked. And she never said, “Don’t let Mack have my stuff.”
Pete and Denny didn’t mind. It would be easier, and they liked easy. Besides, they’d already looked at everything there and decided it wasn’t worth salvage.
“There are a couple of nice pieces,” Pete admitted. “Or were, before they kids got to them. Now, we’d only take them if we had to.”
“And we’ve got decent furniture,” Denny added. “Table and chairs. A couch that’s a little beat. But it’s better than Donna’s. And who wants someone’s bed?”
“He doesn’t mind sleeping in strange beds,” Pete joked. “Just doesn’t want to own them.”
Mack wanted it all. So they let him have it.
“She’s my sister-in-law!” he insisted, a lie we hadn’t heard since Donna moved in.
“Auntie Donna!” Gini squealed, sliding down a couch that was now tilted against the courtyard steps. Kyle kick-boxed throw pillows to the balcony.
“Stop that!” Joni bellowed.
“Why?” he shouted back. “Bordeaux’ll fetch ‘em for me.”
“Donna wanted to trash the stuff,” Joni calmly told Mack.
“She didn’t tell me!”
“She has a restraining order against you.”
“US!”
“Yeah, right,” Joni said, laughing. She pried a pillow from Bordeaux’s teeth and tossed it back on the pile..”
“Donna’s so full of crap,” Mack grumbled.
“Well, where are you gonna sell all this shit? You can’t pawn it. Goodwill doesn’t want it. You’ll end up dumping it in some parking lot.”
That stopped Mack, who seemed to think for a moment. He’d been ignoring Pete, Denny, and me, but now he turned to them. “You got a truck?” he asked. “How were you gonna get this shit outta here?”
Their office pick-up was parked behind the building, but I guess Mack had missed it.
“We have a truck,” Pete acknowledged. “You tell us where to go, and we’ll drive.”
“He’s been telling you where to go for two months,” Joni said, laughing. When Mack scowled at her, she just laughed at him.
“Load it up,” Mack ordered. “I know a store.”
Denny didn’t move. Even after Pete glared at him.
“I’ll buy you a case of beer,” Mack bargained.
“Now that’s something I’ve always wanted,” Pete told me later. “A beer with Mack! Denny didn’t care. He’ll drink any time someone else buys.”
“What happened?”
Pete grinned. “Mack watched like a prison warden while Denny and I did all the work. Whenever Denny tried to quit, I said, “Look, what’s it matter if this stuff goes to a dump, or if it feeds his kids for a couple of days?’”
“That was nice of you.”
“Anything to get Mack outta here. It’s worth staying on his good side.”
“If he has one.”
“There is that.” He shrugged. “Anyway, once we got to the store he knew, the guy wouldn’t give him enough money. ‘ARE YOU JERKING ME OFF?’ Mack yelled. ‘THIS STUFF IS FUCKIN’ WOOD!’ ‘Battered,’ the furniture guy said. Finally, he matched what Mack wanted , but as a check. ‘CASH!’ Mack hollered. ‘CASH OR BULLSHIT!’ Which is almost what he got.”
I was laughing. And Pete seemed to be enjoying himself.
“But the guy somehow wanted the furniture, so he finally opened this huge old safe. It was like something from the 1920s. And he paid Mack in bills so groady I wouldn’t’ve touched ‘em with a baseball mitt.”
“How much did Mack get?”
“I don’t know. Almost five hundred bucks, minus what it cost him for a case of decent beer – he came through on that, though I was betting he’d stiff us. Then he took off to an audition. Can you believe that guy’s an actor?”
“It could’ve been worse.”
“Nah... you didn’t have to smell that furniture store. And packed high with shit like Donna’s. That guy must be a hoarder.”
So Mack was tamed for a couple of weeks. Until Denny gave him a second eviction notice.
“This time we couldn’t hide,” Pete admitted. “We taped the damn thing on their door and hip-hopped to work.”
“There were like three messages by the time we got in,” Denny said, adding, “That guy only knows a few words. Unless if you leave out body parts.”
“We weren’t going to answer him, but he phoned again, and I absently picked up. He was screaming. Our bosses could hear it on the speaker. He kept threatening legal stuff he clearly knew nothing about. Subpoenas. Warrants. Child Endangerment.”
“One of our bosses got so mad, he slammed down the receiver. So Mack invaded our office.”
“Bringing his dogs.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Who knows? Maybe he thought we’d be afraid.”
“The white one immediately barfed,” Denny said, laughing. “And the other one peed. All over our bosses’ carpet.”
“That started a shoving match.”
“With one boss and Mack.”
“The other was calling the police.”
“Only Mack grabbed the phone. Hung up.”
“Making the cops call back.”
“‘Cause you can’t just dial 911 then ditch.”
“And while I was trying – as calmly as possible,” Pete explained, “to somehow work things out...”
“The cops overhear this riot...”
“And sent a squad car!”
“As soon as he heard the siren, Mack vanished!”
“You wouldn’t believe how fast!”
“Maybe he was afraid of the restraining order,” I suggested.
“Who knows?”
“Not that it solves anything.”
“He’s still not planning to move.”
“And he can’t pay us.”
“And our bosses blame us for everything.”
“Forgetting they’re the ones who hired Mack.”
“It’s so fucked.”
They laughed but looked a little stressed, so I walked around the corner and bought them a couple of six packs of far better beer than they were used to. That got them happily through the evening.
The final battle began with an oil leak.
Mack’s Caddy was always a mess, constantly puddling oil in the carport next to my car. One afternoon, with almost everyone at work, Mack parked out front in what was normally Kaz the painter’s spot. Then the Caddy lost so much oil it practically flowed onto the concrete. Kaz came home, politely parked next to the Caddy, but getting out of his van, slipped on the oil, cut his head, and twisted his wrist. Not good.
After he cleaned up, he went to Pete, but no one was home. Just about then, Mack must have remembered where he was parked, and he went to move his car. Kaz told him he might have to miss work because of his wrist. Mack claimed Kaz was too spastic to paint even with two hands. Then it got loud, and they were in the courtyard, which made it seem louder. One of the women in the next building thought someone was being murdered and called the police. And this was either a very slow day at the station, or the dispatcher was being especially nice to older women. Because the squad car showed up immediately, scaring Mack practically blind. It seemed you only had to whisper “cops” to him, and he melts. While the officers took his name, he whimpered, and twisted, and begged, and turned himself into a jellyfish. It was really sad, and I missed the old Mack. He promised to pay Kaz if he had to miss work. He promised he wouldn’t fight. He almost promised to lick the cement. That cooled things, and the cops left. But the moment they did, Mack told Kaz to go fuck himself and then took Kyle and Gini out for pizza.
All this was gleefully reported by Vic. “You should’ve been here,” he told me. “It was great fun to watch.”
The next day most of us again went to work – even Kaz, whose wrist was feeling better. While we were gone, Mack and Joni rented a truck, crammed everything they owned into it, and scrammed. Sally was so happy to spread that news, she set up a lawn chair in the courtyard, to tell people when they came home.
“Why didn’t you call us?” Pete asked. “We could’ve stopped them.”
“I didn’t want to,” Sally said. “You know I’ve never liked them.”
“They owe us money”
“You were never going to get that.”
“It’s true,” Pete admitted.
“It’s not that easy,” Denny insisted.
“Wait till you see their apartment,” Sally went on.
She’d had time to explore, and it became the event of the evening. The carpet was ragged and stained. Every mini-blind was crunched, and those that were still dangling, barely held onto their brackets. The wood walls were scraped and cracked and scarred. The plasterboard was often pounded in. Ceiling fixtures trailed wires. Windows were broken. In the kitchen, most of the cabinet doors were unhinged, and the drawers were seemingly punched through. The linoleum was scabs. The bathroom shower doors leaned against the wall, and a moldy vinyl curtain swagged in their place. Every faucet dripped, and the toilet was black and blue. Most amazing: the bottom foot of one door had been chewed completely through, we hoped by one of the dogs. Not to mention the smell, and the bugs, and the layer of plane crash debris that coated everything.
“God,” said Lindsay, shaking. “I live right next door.”
“We live over this,” Bobby said, squirming.
“Anyone else have bugs?” Pete asked.
No one, fortunately.
“Probably ‘cause they’re all here,” Claire offered.
“Why are we even standing in this?” Meg asked. “I’m taking a shower.”
“This is gonna cost big,” Denny moaned.
“And we don’t even have a deposit,” Pete said, laughing. “Since they started as managers.”
“You know whose mistake that was?” Denny said, smiling a bit.
“He’s gonna shit on his leather chair.”
“I’d like that.”
“It wasn’t this bad two months ago,” I told them. “When we lit the pilots.”
“Then they did it on purpose!”
“Better believe it.”
“We’ll get them!” Denny vowed.
“How?” Pete asked.
When Denny couldn’t say, he turned to Sally. “Any idea where they went?”
She didn’t know. She’d waited for them to leave before she’d risked unbolting her door. “You could try watching commercials,” she suggested. “Until their son’s on again.”
“Who wants to watch TV all day?” Pete asked.
I waited for Vic to volunteer, but he didn’t.
“Tomorrow’s gonna suck,” Denny predicted.
“What’s the worst thing that can happen?” I asked. “You won’t get fired. You’d cost too much to replace.”
That didn’t cheer them up.
“C’mon,” Lindsay offered. “I’ll make you dinner,”.
I fronted more beer. Claire offered a salad, and Vic got hot dogs. Sally ate with us, in Lindsay’s small-but-neat apartment. We had a tiny party, and Pete and Denny were more relaxed when it was over. They might not survive the morning, but – for that night – they were surrounded by friends.