Revenant

Chapter 37

Even someone as calm and collected as myself can get frustrated beyond all measure on occasion.

The hotel wasn't really all that far away from my place, so despite forcing myself to keep to the legal speed limit I'd still figured I could make my way over to it pretty quickly. Even after the first obnoxiously long red light I encountered en route I figured I was doing okay, time-wise. The second red light had me a little edgy, and I found myself thrumming my fingers against my steering wheel impatiently as I stared at the crimson traffic signal, willing it to become green.

At some point during the third red light, probably close to a minute in, I completely lost my shit.

"Ass-munching, banana-peel-smoking mother fucker!" I half-screamed through my windshield and up at the red light in front of me, which somehow managed to remain red despite my angry outburst.

I took a breath, then another. Then, I slammed my fist into my dashboard about five or six times, after which I glared up at the traffic signal.

Red. And no traffic to speak of, in any direction.

I cranked the car's gear into reverse, rolled back a few feet, then rolled forward a few, just in case there was some sort of pressure-sensitive monitor buried under the asphalt that I'd failed to trigger. I looked up at the light and waited a few seconds.

Still red.

It wasn't until that moment that I realized I was scouting around, looking for cop cars, and seriously considering running this particular red light...

...in a car containing a duffel bag full of guns. Not exactly the brightest idea, Joe. Get a grip.

I sat there, breathing noisily.

"You're right," I eventually said aloud, willing myself into a state of calm. "This is not the way you want to behave going into this situation. Being frustrated and getting upset only leads to mistakes. You're heading to the last known whereabouts of two, possibly three Mafiosi who are probably very nervous, and expecting an enraged bulletproof berserker to come and kill them all with a knife. Best if you didn't barge in looking like an enraged berserker, since we both know you're not bulletproof."

For whatever reason, I find that chastising myself in the third person is more effective.

And so I waited. About ten seconds later the light finally turned green. I was about to pull forward into the intersection when I noticed a police cruiser approaching fast down the street perpendicular to me. It turned on its flashers briefly, and sounded its siren for half a second so that it could legally run the red light... one of those oft abused 'cop privileges' you encounter from time to time. I hadn't seen the cruiser turn onto the street, and if I'd actually run the red like I'd been thinking they probably would have pounced on me.

I watched as the cruiser roared past me, turning off its flashers as it passed through the intersection and continuing on down the street. Once it was no longer in view, I allowed myself a sigh of relief.

See? Sometimes it pays to just sit tight, remain calm, and obey the rules.

Or most of the rules, in my case.

A few blocks worth of driving later and I was at my destination, West Biddle Street, maybe five or six minutes later than I figured I would be there. While I didn't exactly think five minutes would make much of a difference, you never knew with these sorts of things. That's the same amount of time it might take to run to the corner store for a drink, or pop outside for a quick smoke, or for a dozen other things that would change the entire scenario I was about to walk into. True, I had no real intel aside from the fact that they were here, or at least had been here an hour and fifteen minutes ago, so there wasn't exactly a 'plan' that could be upset due to an ill-timed smoke break in the first place.