The Otsego House
/The scene through wall-sized picture window was a low-lighted relaxed atmosphere of about fifteen people––it resembled an Edward Hopper painting.
————
Along New York State Route 51, which runs north and south through the village of Morgan’s Landing, there was the Otsego House where local drinkers gathered morning, noon and night.
They were the regulars. The men and women. Fat and skinny. Short and Tall. Cute and ugly.
There was fifty-year-old Red––called Red, not for his thin red hair, but for his perpetually bloodshot eyes, and he liked to tell stories about when he was in the war. Truth was Red never left the valley to go anywhere. And there was fifty-two-year-old, Billy-boy, the martini-drinker. During the daytime Billy-boy went door-to-door selling women’s clothing. He’d then go to the Otsego House every night at five-thirty sharp with stories of the housewives he screwed that day. Truth was, and according to a few of the Otsego House women, Billy-boy was useless, his pecker was dead––ten martinis a day would do that to a man. And there was Ruthie, one of the House women. Back in her day Ruthie was a looker with a big rock-hard ass, solid thunder thighs and a 38DD package. But now, at fifty-five, Ruthie was a bourbon-and-water souse whose body sagged like an old chicken coup––all that she had left for excitement was to take a few high school boys into the alley alongside The House on Saturday nights and get them off. And there were Louise and Edna, the unwed forty-five-year-old twins––who were attractive in an odd way––they had been winos for the past twenty years. If there were men in their lives then nobody knew about it.
The Otsego House was a two-story, rundown 1920’s white with black trim clapboard building in dire need of paint. Its frame leaned dangerously to the left and more dangerously backwards, and the inside hadn’t been cleaned in decades. The wood flooring was not only buckled but it was so grimy that when anybody walked over the planks there’d be snapping and clicking sounds from the soles of their shoes sticking to the crud. The men’s bathroom was a stench-filled sewer, so foul-smelling that the regulars would piss in the alley and hose it down to the drain at the back. The local building code and health inspectors avoided The Otsego House, as if it didn’t exist. Eventually it would fall down on its own, and that was good enough for them. The hotel part, the twelve rooms upstairs, had been unusable and closed down for twenty years. The owner and bartender, fifty-year-old John Nowak, had been running the place for twenty-five-years. Everyone called him Big John. He was a relaxed, big-bellied, barrel-chested, bull-like ex-Army Sargent with so many bumps and lumps on his huge round face that he looked like a leprosy victim. During the war he claimed to have killed fifty Nazis at the Battle of the Bulge, most of them with his bare hands. It was said that Big John took a double-barrel shotgun and, with brute force, bent both barrels until they folded under the wooden stock––so the story goes. He also kept a couple of peacemakers under the bar: a sawed-off shotgun and a baseball bat. Ruthie claims ten years ago Big John screwed her so hard and for so long that she passed out and didn’t wake up for a day and a half. When she finally woke up the insides of her thighs were bruised and sore, like she had been fucked by an angry bull over and over again.
It was Friday night, five-thirty. Billy-boy had just arrived at The House from a day of, as he put it, “selling clothes to lonely housewives and screwing ‘em.”
“I sold $500.00 worth today …” he announced, “drinks are on me.”
There were only two other people at the bar, Ruthie and Red, plus Big John, when the door opened. Two young sailors in dress seamen’s uniforms walked in. They were about twenty-years-old. Muscular and dumb looking. Murphy and Swan were their names, and they didn’t have a full brain between them. They looked around the room first, then sat at the empty end of the bar.
“What’ll it be, sailors?” asked Big John.
“Two double whiskeys, two beers.” Murphy answered, while Swan checked out Ruthie’s big ass, and asked her,
“What’ll you have, honey?” There was a pause, “Unless your boyfriend objects to me buying you a drink.”
“He’s not my boyfriend, nor my husband. Bourbon and water. Thank you.”
Murphy asked Big John if he knew of a women’s clothing salesman, “… some jerkoff who goes door-to-door.” Said his seventeen-year-old wife was harassed by him this morning. She said he walked into the bedroom while she was trying on clothes. She was in between outfits, “in her skivvies.”, and he walked in on her. She screamed for him to get out, to leave the house. But instead of leaving he tried to talk her into “one little kiss”, as she put it. She reached into the dresser drawer pulled out a Colt 45. He called her a cock-teaser and hightailed it out the front door.
“Your wife get his name?” asked Big John. “There are at least eight salesmen who work the valley.”
“No. But she said he was an old fart with very little hair and an ugly face. Much like that ugly turd over there.” He pointed at Billy-boy.
“What do you do, buddy?” asked Murphy, “What’s your business?”
Billy-boy didn’t answer, nor did he look at the sailor. He sipped his martini and looked at Big John.
“Hey, ugly man. I asked you a simple fuckin’ question.”
Billy-boy remained silent, looking at Big John. Swan walked over and stood behind him and said, “Answer my buddy’s question, dip shit, or I’m gonna’ slap’ya upside the head.”
“Okay, boys, fun’s over.” said Big John, “I run a peaceful joint. Doesn’t sound like your wife was hurt. So how about ya both just drink up and move on.” ––under the bar Big John’s hand had wrapped around the baseball bat inching it off of the shelf when Swan stretched his upper body across the bar and got into Big John’s face,
“Wha’ chew-gonna do bout’ it? Ya ugly ole’ far.”
Big John head-butted Swan’s nose so fast it was like it didn’t happen. Swan fell across the bar and slithered to the floor like a sick worm. Blood gushed out of his nose. He tried to get up but passed out, and his pretty Navy whites turned the color of a used tampon.
Murphy pulled out a knife. Big John pulled out the shotgun walked around to the front of the bar stood two feet from Murphy––shotgun aimed at his balls.
“Looks like it’s time for you to go home to that young wife before I leave you nut-less. And take that piece of trash on the floor along with you.”
Murphy got Swan to his feet and, more-or-less, dragged him out the door moaning and groaning.
“Billy-boy,” asked Big John, “was it you?”
“No, Big John. It was Tony––Tony Regatta. I heard him tell the story at Winnie’s Bar.”
It was late Saturday night. The House had a good crowd. It was the regulars, along with a group of good-looking out of town boys and girls from Hamilton College, and two off-duty village cops. Louise and Edna danced to country tunes from the jukebox. Two of the college boys danced with them. Red, Billy-boy, Ruthie and Big John were holding down the right-corner of the bar.
Ruthie threw back her third straight bourbon, then walked outside to the alley––she always switched to straight bourbon when getting ready to screw some local teens.
Four high school boys were waiting at the back of the alley, and they were as drunk as fish on air. One of them was on his knees puking down the piss covered drain. The other three were smoking cigarettes and rubbing their nuts, like a bunch of young apes.
It took Ruthie only six minutes and twenty seconds to finish off the three boys, while at the end of the alley the other boy was passed out, face-down, in a puddle of vomit, with his mouth pressed to the urine-stained drain-cover, like he was French Kissing it.
Ruthie came out of the alley and noticed a black ’67 Buick Riviera parked in front of the bar with six guys sitting inside. She’d never seen the car before, but to her it smelled like trouble. When she walked into The House Ruthie whispered something in Big John’s ear. He then walked over and said something to the cops. They nodded. One of them got up and stood next to the door drinking his beer. The music and laughter was loud when the door opened. It was Murphy and Swan, with four other muscular idiots from Goon Island. All of them dressed in civilian clothes. Swan’s nose was bandaged and his eyes were black and blue. Together they walked over to the left side of the bar where Murphy stood staring at Billy-boy the whole time.
Big John walked over to the goons,
“Drinks are on me boys. No hard feelings about last night. What’ll it be?”
“Six whiskeys, six beers.” replied Murphy, not taking his eyes off Billy-boy.
And like the dumb-nut that he was, Swan right-away went over to Billy-boy and stood behind him. Ruthie and Red got up from their stools and stood next to the cop by the door. Billy-boy continued to sip his martini while watching Swan in the mirror behind the bar.
“Hey, ugly man. Tell me, now, about what business you’re in.”
Billy-boy sipped his martini and said nothing. Big John came over. He looked Swan square in the eyes, smiled and said,
“You’re pecking at the wrong food, birdbrain. It’s best that ‘cha all drink up and leave.”
Now Swan wasn’t the brightest color in the crayon box. He reached for Billy-boy, but Billy-boy turned around, faster than a lightning bolt strikes, and smashed his martini glass into Swan’s face. While Swan was screaming, Big John reached across the bar dragged Swan over the top to the backside and beat him to a bloody pulp. Murphy and the other four goons started to draw pistols. The cop sitting at the table flung his beer bottle at Murphy’s head and knocked him out, and both cops reached for their pistols, and Big John reached for his shotgun, but one of the college boys had a black belt in Kung Fu. Within five seconds, he dropped the other four goons. And the country music continued to play: “I fell into a burning ring of fire ...” Louise and Edna continued to dance with the college boys, while inching a little closer to them. The cop standing by the door sat back down at the table with his friend. They called out for two more beers. Big John dragged Swan out from behind the bar, washed the blood from his hands, and made Billy-boy a fresh martini, and handed it to him with a wink. Ruthie and Red sat back down at the bar next to Billy-boy. Big John made a quick phone call, then brought the cops their beers, and he joined Ruthie, Red and Billy-boy at the end of the bar in conversation. Two new couples walked in and sat at a table. Big John went over and took their orders, and the music played, “I went down, down, down and the flames went higher …” The dancing and conversations continued. The laughter got louder, and you could hear sirens off in the distance, like some weird opera, and coming closer to the bar.
When the Military Police and the local cops pulled up to the crime scene at The Otsego House all they could see through the wall-sized picture window was a low-lighted relaxed atmosphere of about fifteen people––it resembled an Edward Hopper painting. And stacked up and out of sight by the latrine the goons were lying together on the grimy floor in deep sleep, like tucked in babies.
By D.A. Helmer
From: United States
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