Read Online The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories by Etgar Keret - Free Book Online Page B

rooms, we were silent as mice. He tried talking with us, but we didn’t really answer. Each boy got his present, said thank you, and hurried back into bed. I got a dartboard. When I said thank you, he reached for my face. I cringed. Thought he was going to hit me. Grace ran his hand over my hair, gently, and without a word he lifted my shirt. In those days I used to shoot off my mouth a lot. Grace could figure that out by the look of my back. He didn’t say anything at first. Then he said the name of Jesus a few times. Finally, he let go of my shirt and hugged me. While he was hugging me, he promised that nobody would ever hit me again. Needless to say, I didn’t believe him. People don’t just act nice to you for no good reason. I figured it had to be some kind of a trick; he’d be slipping off his belt any minute, and letting me have it. The whole time he was hugging me, I just wanted him to go. He went, and that same evening we got a new director and a whole new staff. From that time on, nobody ever hit me again, except that nigger I wiped out in Jacksonville. Did that one pro bono. Since then, nobody’s lifted a finger on me.
    I never saw Patrick Grace again. But I read about him in the papers a lot. About all the people he’d helped, all thegood things he did. He was a good man. I guess there was no finer man anywhere. The only man I owed a favor on the whole face of this ugly planet. And in two hours I’m supposed to be meeting him. In two hours I’m supposed to be putting a bullet through his head.
    I’m thirty-one. I’ve had twenty-nine contracts since I got started. Twenty-six of them I completed in one go. I never try to understand the people I kill. Never try to understand why. Business is business, and like I said, I’m a pro. I’ve got a good reputation, and in a profession like mine a good reputation is all that counts. You don’t exactly place an ad in the paper or offer special rates to people with the right credit card. The only thing that keeps you in business is that people know they can count on you to get the job done. That’s why I’ve made it a policy never to back out on a contract. Anyone who checks my record will find nothing but satisfied customers. Satisfied customers and stiffs.
    I rented a room facing the street, right opposite the café. Told the owner that the rest of my belongings would be arriving on Monday, and paid two months’ rent up front. There was half an hour to kill till the time I figured he’d get there. I assembled the gun and zeroed in the infra-red sight. Only twenty-six minutes left. I lit a cigarette. I was trying not to think about anything. Finished the cigarette, and flicked what was left of it into the corner of the room. Who’d want to kill a person like that? Only an animal or a complete wacko. I know Grace. He hugged me when I was just a kid. But business is business. Once youlet your feelings in, you’re through. The carpet in the corner began to smolder. I got up off the bed and stepped on the butt. Another eighteen minutes. Another eighteen minutes, and it would be over. I tried thinking about football, about Dan Marino, about a hooker on Forty-Second Street who gives me head in the front seat of the car. I tried not to think about anything.
    He was right on time. I recognized him from behind by that special bouncy walk of his and the shoulder-length hair. He took a seat at one of the tables outside, in the best-lit spot, so that he was facing me head-on. The angle was perfect. Medium range. I could take this shot blindfolded. The red dot showed on the side of his head, a little too far to the left. I corrected to the right till it was dead center, and held my breath.
    Just when I had it all set, an old man wandered by carrying all his earthly possessions in a couple of bags—a typical homeless. The city’s full of them. Right outside the café, one of the handles snapped. The