Blog Short Story Project 3

Burning Down The House
By Anthony Rainone

The bull thrashed his flanks and churned in a circle using his massive front hoofs as anchors. George Yepes thought you had to have balls to get on that. A sixteen hundred pound monster, with eyes like train lights coming down hard, spittle flying from its mouth and nose.

After the cowboy was thrown from the bull’s back in a cloud of sawdust and red dirt, and after the clowns led the animal from the arena, Yepes turned his attention back to the man in the white hat three rows down.

The man was hugging a curvy blonde seated next to him. The man’s name was Robert Lupo. It had taken Yepes a few weeks, and hitting five rodeos, but he had eventually found him. The blonde’s blog had been the key.

Yepes was a former Tecumseh State Correctional inmate, number 077-A-0211, and Lupo was an ex-cop for the Kearney PD. Years earlier, the two men had robbed and assaulted drug dealers for their money and stash. They once killed a man. Their spree stretched from Omaha to the Wyoming and Colorado borders.

The fun stopped when Yepes was captured by the Nebraska State Patrol, after he tried to sell stolen drugs to an undercover investigator. Lupo evaded arrest by crossing over into Kansas. He took their money with him.

Yepes was sentenced for assault, armed robbery, possession and distribution. He walked on the manslaughter charge, since no weapon or evidence was found. He never said a single word in his defense.

That first week in lockup, a man Yepes had never seen before came to visit during first morning session. He had a shiny bald head, stubble on his face, and hands that could fit heavy pipe, or crush a man’s throat. He said he had a message from Lupo.

“Keep your mouth shut,” the man said. “You don’t say nothing to patrol, the DA, or any of the fellers here. No deals to shave that nut down. Otherwise, you’ll die in Tecumseh.”

“Where is he?”

“Off the radar. He gone.” The man stood up. “There’s a bright side, pardner—this prison is a sight better than them meatpacking plants you worked in.” The man laughed, and somehow through the partition, Yepes could smell his foul breath.

The visit pissed Yepes off. Over the years in the hot joint, Lupo stayed a recurring note in the white noise of Yepes’s thoughts. Yepes had to join a Latino gang to protect himself, but he kept clear of any real trouble. No inmate was allowed access to the web, but Yepes worked a few favors because of his reputation, and could occasionally use a computer in the religion building.

One day while he was surfing, the white noise stopped and Lupo reared up full throated. Yepes had used a search engine to read about an Argentinean rodeo rider, whose cousin was in lockup with him. He came across the curvy blonde's blog by accident. Her name was Misty Bale, and she called her site rodeoqueen.

Bale was a circuit junkie and had posted photos on her blog. One included her and her boyfriend taken in Cheyenne. Yepes focused on a tall woman with nice tits standing next to a man in a white cowboy hat.

“Robert Lupo,” said Yepes.

The words came out involuntarily, like instinctual words given utterance from primordial DNA.

He started to think of ways to get out.

The next cowboy lasted five seconds on his bull, and then ate a mouthful of dirt. Before the cowboy could make it to the fence, the bull hooked the cowboy under his black protective vest, and hurled him another ten feet in the air. The crowd yelled, while the cowboy remained motionless on the ground.

Lupo got up and made his way down to the concession stands, and Yepes followed. Lupo went past the beer and hot dog vendors, and made his way to a port-a-john.

Yepes waited. On the rodeo loudspeakers overhead, Patsy Cline was singing about being “back in baby’s arms.” His anger flared and he thought about the courthouse in Beaver City, where no one came to his trial.

The last job they had pulled together was in North Platte, and it was their only murder. They followed a dealer to a Starbucks, where Lupo shot him in the parking lot. Inside his car was a mother lode—vials of crank, bags of heroin and marijuana fresh off the interstate from Mexico.

Lupo tossed the gun to Yepes. “Ditch this,” he had said.

Tucked into Yepes’s waistband tonight was the gun used in North Platte. Rather than toss it, Yepes had kept it. It was the only smart thing he had done back then.. A knife with a taped handle was in the right front pocket of his cargo pants.

When Lupo came out of the bathroom, Yepes charged and pushed him behind the plastic structures into a darkened, dank area.

“Are you fucking cra—Yip? You’re out?”

“Cut my time. I helped stop a prison break. They assaulted a guard.”

“You got me going there, dude.” He laughed softly like a sigh.

“You shouldn’t have threatened me in Tecumseh.”

“Those were crazy days, right? I was scared. I didn’t know how much the cops had on me. It’s all water under the bridge.”

“What happened to our money?”

“Yip, come on.”

“You should have stayed out of Nebraska.”

Yepes stabbed Lupo with three quick punches in the torso. Lupo collapsed holding his chest, trying to keep his blood from coming out. Yepes took the gun from his pants waistband and threw it down. He left his former partner lying behind the stalls, gasping in the urine-soaked air.

Yepes had blood on him, but it didn’t matter. He made his way back to the stands, and relaxed as the next rider came out of the chute. He watched Misty turn her head several times looking for Lupo. He thought he should go down there and thank her.



There are others involved in the Blog Short Story Project 3, and you should read all these stories:

JT Ellison
Mike Maclean
Paul Guyot
Karen Olson
Stephen D Rogers
Gerald So
Daniel Hatadi
JD Rhodes
Dave White
Pari Noskin Taichert
Patti Abbott
Stephen Allan
Christa Miller
David J Montgomery
Bryon Quertermous
Bill Crider
John Dumand
John Rickards


And a huge thanks to Bryon for setting this up. You da man, dude.