The Retirement Plan

Chapter 5

Reggie drove uphill along the winding, serpentine road. Large gated properties flanked the narrow asphalt strip. Behind those tall walls stood villas of various sizes and design. Overhanging palms threw shade over the pavement outside.

"Know what this remind me of?" Reggie said.

Ricky, preoccupied with checking for numbers, and house names. "Huh?"

"Hollywood hills, man."

"What's the name of this house again?"

"Ain't no house, it's a villa," Reggie said, then giving it the Spanish accent, "Villa Martin."

"Uh-huh."

"I keep expecting to see Britney stroll outta one of these gates, in a short-assed tennis skirt, racquet in hand."

Ricky turned his head, eyebrows elevating, "Britney Spears doesn't play tennis."

"Man, all those fine-assed Hollywood women play sports, keep their glutes tight. So when paparazzi snap 'em in their short shorts, out walking their Chihuahuas, they looking wow-wow."

"Nah, man, they all into their pilates. Got their medicine balls and personal trainers."

Reggie laughed. "Medicine ball? You thinking of the Swiss ball, big squishy bastard, look like a space hopper."

"There's a difference?"

"Medicine ball what they use in physio. They smaller, weigh about twenty-five pounds, build arm and core strength. Had us using them when we was in hospital in the Gulf—"

"You were in Iraq?"

"Desert Shield, baby."

"You never mentioned being shot."

"Who said anything about getting shot? Humerus fracture, which is a fancy way of saying I broke my arm."

"In combat?"

"Playing ball. Man, we hardly saw any combat. We sitting on our asses in that burning desert heat with itchy fingers, waiting for shit to happen. More danger of catching melanoma than catching a bullet. Time Desert Storm come about; it's the boys in the bombers got to do all the G.I. Joe shit. All that stuff you saw on your TV, that was air-force boys."

"I remember that," Ricky said. "Must've been about eleven. Used to stay up watching the news every night. Looked like a video-game."

"Not for the poor bastards them bombs landed on. I hear folks talking 'bout the streets resembling the apocalypse when this pandemic kicked in." Reggie shook his head. "They don't know what they be talking about. We went into some of them Iraqi towns, after the air-force boys did their thing—now, that was some apocalyptic shit. You shifting through the rubble, come across an arm just lying there, sleeve on it, an' everything. Arm was waving at their kid, or hugging their moms, just the day before. A hundred and twenty degrees out, and you feel cold as hell."

"All for the black gold," Ricky said. "When it comes to armed-robbery, George Bush was the biggest and badest."

"Man's a bitch. Sent in kids barely outta diapers do his dirty work. My shorty ass still reading comics when I sign up. Bruce Banner and shit. Every night 'fore I go to sleep... Time my second tour finished, I need two roofies and half-a-mutherfuckin' bottle o' whisky to catch any shuteye."

"Stolen dreams..."

"Stolen dreams? I wish they were. What you think the roofies and liquor was for? To erase—"

"This is us." Ricky interrupted, pointed up at the white mid-century home poking out from behind the two large sycamores and the three smaller willows that dominated the rolling lawn. Sprinklers, spinning like rotor blades, watered the earth beneath. A pristine condition silver Jaguar F-Type parked in front of the shuttered two-space garage. Mounted CCTV cameras peered down from either stonework gatepost like mechanical vultures.