Read Online We Will Be Crashing Shortly by Hollis Gillespie - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Hollis Gillespie
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them to Atlanta, and put them back together before a single status hearing was held on the subject of my custody. My only comfort is that Ash’s spanking new wife Catherine, a WorldAir attorney as well as my former guardian ad litem to the court, did end up in prison for her part in the bombing and embezzlement attempt. She promptly annulled their marriage from behind bars and hasn’t spoken to Ash since. This according to an article in the Southern Times .
Until today Otis was staying with me in my mother’s townhome located in a swanky neighborhood just north of downtown Atlanta, which, if you ask me, was kind of like asking a spider monkey to watch over the animal lab. My mother is partial to pastels in her décor, and Otis blended in like a biker at a tea party. Steel-toed work boots, band-merch T-shirts, and grease-stained jeans was his staple ensemble. He used to wear his long curly hair in a ponytail until it got caught in the cooling fan of an engine he was working on. He was lucky there was a hacksaw within arm’s reach so he could saw himself free before the engine ate his whole head. Today he wore his blond hair at chin level, just long enough to cover the two quarter-sized patches of bald spots from the incident. Oddly, it worked pretty well with the eye patch.
Otis turned to Roundtree and asked, “Who’s this?” I introduced them and Roundtree, who held Trixi in one hand, extended the other to Otis, who shook it enthusiastically. “Nice white suit,” he said.
“Nice black eye patch,” Roundtree responded.
“Come on in. Can I get you a drink?”
“Do you have sherry?”
“Will tequila do?”
“Perfectly.”
Flo had already opened the giant metal gate that was Otis’s front door. As I mentioned earlier, Otis lived in a renovated old biscuit factory—a big concrete box, essentially, with 24-foot ceilings, giant clerestory windows, and leaking skylights. The entire structure was secluded by a forest of bamboo trees and accessible solely via an almost invisible easement alley. The front third of the building housed his machine shop, the middle third made up his living quarters, and the back third contained his exercise equipment, collection of sophisticated computers, security monitors, scanners, and 3D printers. The floor throughout was concrete, riddled with rusty tools and containing a drain in the center. This was his home. My mother referred to it as “Uncle Otis’s House of Sharp Objects and Flame.” When I was a toddler I wasn’t allowed inside for fear I’d end up with a bunch of fishhooks in my head or something. As I got older it became one of my favorite places to hang out.
Otis closed and locked his gate and followed us through the covered alleyway that was his living room. He gathered us around his kitchen island, poured five shots of tequila, drank two, then dispensed the rest. “So,” he said, “what the hell is going on?”
It was left to me to recount the night’s events, seeing as how I was the only one not drinking tequila. Anita had one shot and was looking all wonky, flushed and smiling. Flo matched Otis shot for shot, and probably had half a flask of vodka from her purse as we spoke. It was well known she could rival Otis in the drinking department any day of the week. Roundtree belted his first shot and then sipped his second like it was a fancy liqueur. Fifi Trixibelle curled up in a soup mug on the counter and fell asleep, snoring surprisingly loudly for such a miniature dog. Mr. Colgate’s suit jacket lay on the floor in case any more canned pumpkin rumbled forth from her bum.
Once I finished filling Otis in, he asked to see the objects we’d extricated from Trixi. I lay the four items on the counter and noticed that Anita had done an admirable job of scrubbing them clean. “Anything else?” he asked. “Anything from the house?”
I remembered the handgun, pulled it from my cargo pocket, and placed it on the counter. At the sight of the gun, Roundtree
Until today Otis was staying with me in my mother’s townhome located in a swanky neighborhood just north of downtown Atlanta, which, if you ask me, was kind of like asking a spider monkey to watch over the animal lab. My mother is partial to pastels in her décor, and Otis blended in like a biker at a tea party. Steel-toed work boots, band-merch T-shirts, and grease-stained jeans was his staple ensemble. He used to wear his long curly hair in a ponytail until it got caught in the cooling fan of an engine he was working on. He was lucky there was a hacksaw within arm’s reach so he could saw himself free before the engine ate his whole head. Today he wore his blond hair at chin level, just long enough to cover the two quarter-sized patches of bald spots from the incident. Oddly, it worked pretty well with the eye patch.
Otis turned to Roundtree and asked, “Who’s this?” I introduced them and Roundtree, who held Trixi in one hand, extended the other to Otis, who shook it enthusiastically. “Nice white suit,” he said.
“Nice black eye patch,” Roundtree responded.
“Come on in. Can I get you a drink?”
“Do you have sherry?”
“Will tequila do?”
“Perfectly.”
Flo had already opened the giant metal gate that was Otis’s front door. As I mentioned earlier, Otis lived in a renovated old biscuit factory—a big concrete box, essentially, with 24-foot ceilings, giant clerestory windows, and leaking skylights. The entire structure was secluded by a forest of bamboo trees and accessible solely via an almost invisible easement alley. The front third of the building housed his machine shop, the middle third made up his living quarters, and the back third contained his exercise equipment, collection of sophisticated computers, security monitors, scanners, and 3D printers. The floor throughout was concrete, riddled with rusty tools and containing a drain in the center. This was his home. My mother referred to it as “Uncle Otis’s House of Sharp Objects and Flame.” When I was a toddler I wasn’t allowed inside for fear I’d end up with a bunch of fishhooks in my head or something. As I got older it became one of my favorite places to hang out.
Otis closed and locked his gate and followed us through the covered alleyway that was his living room. He gathered us around his kitchen island, poured five shots of tequila, drank two, then dispensed the rest. “So,” he said, “what the hell is going on?”
It was left to me to recount the night’s events, seeing as how I was the only one not drinking tequila. Anita had one shot and was looking all wonky, flushed and smiling. Flo matched Otis shot for shot, and probably had half a flask of vodka from her purse as we spoke. It was well known she could rival Otis in the drinking department any day of the week. Roundtree belted his first shot and then sipped his second like it was a fancy liqueur. Fifi Trixibelle curled up in a soup mug on the counter and fell asleep, snoring surprisingly loudly for such a miniature dog. Mr. Colgate’s suit jacket lay on the floor in case any more canned pumpkin rumbled forth from her bum.
Once I finished filling Otis in, he asked to see the objects we’d extricated from Trixi. I lay the four items on the counter and noticed that Anita had done an admirable job of scrubbing them clean. “Anything else?” he asked. “Anything from the house?”
I remembered the handgun, pulled it from my cargo pocket, and placed it on the counter. At the sight of the gun, Roundtree
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