Your Thighs Are Generous

Previously: The sisters learn that Gas Mask is the son of Estra Maxie but more importantly the reader learns how Fort Hook was founded by some punk kid who slept with his boss’ wife and then drowned, and then came back to life with a creepy connection to the ocean and all its inhabitants.

— 50 —

Batya and Mina find themselves in a troubling part of town called the Crater, and find themselves seems like the right phrase. You never decide to go to the Crater, the Crater just happens to you. It’s where Fort Hook kind of collapses in on itself, layers of crumbling streets winding downward like a whirlpool, leading to what the guidebooks euphemistically call Historic Old Town, the undercity about which the less said the better, but from what I hear is mostly populated by horsehead ghouls, torso phantoms, cold folk, doppelgänger banshees, finger fiends, that sort of thing.

But the Crater is also the home of Blackout Bakery, to die for, where Bat eats an entire pecan pie, and Delfino’s Tailoring & Sail Repair, there next to the tobacconist.

A bell dings as the sisters go inside, and they are greeted by a tiny, beautiful man with a glorious mustache that looks like two starfish arms.

“You Delfino?” Bat asks.

His bow is basically imperceptible. “At your service, Miss.”

“Hey Delfino. I need some new pants.”

He looks at her current getup and his eyebrows go up one millimeter. “Did you perhaps get entangled in a rose bush or threshing machine?”

“Had a busy couple days,” she says. “Lots of running around, got in a couple fights. Tussled with a deer demon in the woods. Some dick named Jakey Jakes tore this pocket right off. Oh and the whole crotch area is a disaster. Here, have a look.”

Delfino sighs mournfully. “This garment, she has served you well. Kindly remove it and I shall give it a proper burial.”

“You want me to strip down to my nude nudes right here?”

“Just to the smallclothes. I assure you no one will see, I’ve not had a customer in weeks.”

“OK Delfino,” Bat says, dropping her thrashed pants and kicking them across the shop.

“What are we thinking, with regards to fabric?” he says, unfurling a tape measure like a bullwhip.

“I dunno, man, it needs to stretch, it needs to breathe, it needs to capture the magic.”

He crouches down and starts taking measurements. “I believe I am being visited by the angel of inspiration.”

“Think you can sew some secret pockets in there?”

Delfino makes a skeptical murmur. “Your thighs are…generous.”

“Nice, right?” Bat swings a leg around his neck and squeezes his throat, just a little bit, just all in good fun.

“Can you not,” Mina says, flinging herself into a leather club chair. “You are a menace.”

Bat makes a blushy tee hee oh you sort of face and unthighs the tailor, who wheezes and retreats to the racks.

“This job tomorrow,” Mina says, thumbing through a magazine called Cufflink Aficionado. “You thinking what I’m thinking?”

“I’m never thinking what you’re thinking.”

“I’m thinking Estra was smart, delegating the delivery to two fools who can’t afford to say no.”

“Seems like you had the hots for her.”

“I had the hots for her setup. Free agent, no boss. Follow her own compass.”

Delfino comes back with a pair of gabardine slacks draped over his arm. “If you would kindly indulge me and try these on, signorina…”

“Free to do exactly whatever you want,” Bat says, stepping into the pants. “Which always happens to be the best and most perfect thing.”

“I didn’t say that,” Mina says.

“Not weighed down by your moron sister who’s only good for breaking jaws.”

“I didn’t say that, either.”

“You sure don’t say lots of things.”

Delfino floats in between them like the professional he is. “What is your response to those, Miss? Be honest.”

Bat examines herself in a mirror. “My legs feel like they’re being hugged by someone real special to me.”

“It is as I’d hoped. Please move around, make sure they accommodate your specific wants and needs.”

She squats down, grunts, hops back up, turns to her sister. “You got a plan for tomorrow?”

Mina tosses the magazine onto a nearby trunk. “The plan is we get on that ship and do the job. We’re messengers. We’re nobody. We’re not a threat. We’re just relaying information. Everyone in this business understands that and will let us come and go.”

“That plan is very bad,” Bat says, kicking the head off a mannequin. “Your lady friend said no one can see us hand off that cute envelope.”

“Then we’ll be sneaky. We can do this, Bat. Everyone’s shaking in their boots thinking this is some kind of suicide run, but they don’t have what we have.”

“What’s that again?” Bat throws herself onto a stack of shoeboxes. “My memory’s a little hazy, probably the poison gas.”

“Two heads,” Mina says.

“Two big fat heads.” Bat gets back up. “Pants are tip-top, Delfino.”

“Outstanding,” he says, placing some pins in his mouth. “Kindly return the garment to me and I shall begin work on your clandestine pockets. In the meantime, have you considered a new blazer? My concern is this: Your gorgeous new pants will make your current coat feel disgraceful in comparison.”

“Yeah I was thinking about that,” Bat says, unzipping. “What if no coat?”

Delfino looks horrified, nauseated. His mouth moves but no words come.

“Just shirt, tie, pants. And…a vest.”

“Oh!” He slumps in relief. “Yes, yes, now I am truly sharing your vision.”

“We don’t wanna constrict these boas,” she says, flexing.

The bell above the door rings. Bat recognizes the guy who moseys in, can’t place him for a second, looks like some kind of cut-rate riverboat gambler, the face is familiar but seems oddly ruined—oh, right.

“Vinnie Vinegar,” Bat says. “You lost? Fop convention’s next door.”

“Not lost,” Vinnie Vinegar says, carefully closing the door behind him. “Seeking you out. Sorry to catch you with your pants down, but it’s time we had a little exchange.”

“Batya,” Mina says. “You know this barber’s block?”

“Palooka with the Butterfly Boys. Took out Kuniko.”

“Him?”

“Ain’t with the Boys no more,” Vinnie says, getting the jaunty angle of his stupid bowler just right. “Moved up.”

“Who else could stomach your perfume?” Bat asks.

He holds up his right hand, all fingers extended except the pinky, which is curled down.

“The Hand? Didn’t think he had need of a eunuch.”

“He had need of a collector,” Vinnie says, fiddling around in his striped pants for a moment, finally locating the pistol stashed there, taking it out and cocking it.

Delfino shakes his head sadly. “I was so happy to have two customers in one day.”

“Go in the back, buddy,” Vinnie tells him. “Don’t hear anything for a couple minutes.”

The tailor gathers up his materials. “Nothing shall stop me from preparing these trousers for you,” he whispers to Bat. “Do not do anything rash, I beg you. Think of the trousers.”

Vinnie turns the gun on Bat. “Nice new pantaloons, a deluxe pecan pie. You certainly are throwing money around. Money you owe Mister Hillers. A loan that’s getting very long in the tooth.”

Bat tries not to think about what her underwear might look like right now. “Lookit, I get you want to suck up to your new boss, but you need to tone all this way the hell down. I gave him the music box, he waived the vig, and I’ll have his cash by the weekend. Doing a big job tomorrow, matter a fact. We’ll settle up after that, just me and him, no need to worry your pretty little ugly little face.”

“I’m so relieved to hear it, Battery.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“But you’ve been on the other side of this thing enough times, you know how it works. I can’t go back to him with nothing but your hot air. He’s got his rep to consider, I got my rep to consider. Plus I think I owe you a little something for what you did to my mug.”

“Aha,” Mina says, delighted. “I knew I recognized the shape of those scars.”

“Yeah those are my rings,” Bat says.

“I thought so!”

“OK then, how we doing this?” Bat says to Vinnie, limbering up. “I let you work me over for a while, get it out of your system? Will five minutes do it?”

“I’d hate to incapacitate you on the eve of your lucrative job, one that I’m sure is real and not made up. We need you at peak physical condition to earn that cheddar for us.”

“So what then?”

“Here’s what I’m thinking,” Vinnie says, turning and firing his gun, blowing a hole through Mina’s knee.

+++

This has been Chapter 50 of Chokeville, a novel by Josh Fireland.

Next up: A Dying Pumpjack