The Boys Of Summer

Crime Fiction by Scott Lyerly

I was a kid when I first heard Don Henley’s “The Boys of Summer”. Riding in the back of the station wagon, my parents at the tail-end of their marriage, the only sounds the road noise and the radio. 

I didn’t understand it. I was maybe six or seven, but how could anybody get away with having a “dead head sticking on a Cadillac.” Only later did I get the real lyric and the reference. 

But it was the next line that stuck. “Don’t look back, you can never look back.” I remember thinking, who’d want to look back at a car with a murder victim’s head mounted on the front? Don’t look back.

I should have followed that advice. 

All they wanted was to borrow the garage. I knew these guys. Everyone did. I thought of them as the “boys of summer.” Summer’s when they’re out cruising, top down, driving around just to be seen. One actually had a Deadhead sticker on his car. I’d joke with them when they came in for service, but carefully. The wrong joke could cost you a kneecap. And I paid them. I like my kneecaps. My brother-in-law laughed at me. Called me a rube, saying nobody buys into that shakedown shit anymore. My wife told him to shut it or get out of her kitchen, but she felt the same. We don’t have much except the garage. Plenty of flammable stuff in a garage. All the boys of summer would need was a lighter. I paid every month and they left me alone and everything was fine.

Until they wanted to “borrow” the garage. 

I stupidly asked what for. That earned me a mind your own fuckin business, that’s what we want it for. I stammered that I’d like the shop to stay clean. They asked me if they looked like slobs. I said I just meant I wanted it to stay off the radar of anybody acting in a, uh, official capacity. Which made them laugh. Hard. Jesus H, said one, stop being a fuckin pussy and come right out and say you don’t want cops sniffing around. Well, I don’t, I said. What, and we do? The laughter vanished. I don’t have a choice, do I? They agreed I did not. 

I closed up the shop and waited well past dark. Headlights appeared around one and flashed at me. I opened a bay door and they drove in. Before it was back down they were dragging some guy out of the trunk, duct-taped hands, hood over his head, across the floor to one of the lifts. How do I raise this thing? one asked me. I showed him. He played with it, raised, lowered a few times. 

Muffled thuds. I looked back over. They had ripped the guy’s shirt off. Bruises where they’d hit him. They wrapped a length of chain under his arms, looped it over one of the car lift arms and raised it until he dangled. He was trying to shout but must have been gagged because everything was muffled. 

Three guys stood around the poor dangling bastard. I knew the three, but so what? Keep your mouth shut. You never saw them. Don’t look back.

The guy in charge came over to me. He peeled several hundred-dollar bills off a roll from his pocket. 

“For your trouble.”

I thanked him quietly and asked if there’d be anything to clean up later. He gave me a look. I added quickly that I’m not the first one in in the mornings. He told me don’t worry. Now get the fuck out.

I was almost outside when I heard the first scream. The voice. My face prickled. I stepped slowly, softly back. I looked through the crack between the shop door and the frame. The hood was off. They were going at him with a pair of tinsnips. Two fingers and an ear already on the floor, now they were laughing, cutting off his pants while he cried and begged behind the gag. I turned away, wishing I hadn’t turned back. Wishing I hadn’t seen my brother-in-law.

---

Bio: Scott Lyerly is an author whose latest work, The Last Line, was published by Crooked Lane Books. His short stories were included in the speculative fiction anthologies Silverthought: Ignition and Thank You, Death Robot, as well as several short story publications. He lives in Massachusetts
.
Cover photo by:Pexels/Paco DP, Edited by The Yard

Read more Flash Fiction on The Yard: Crime Blog

Follow us on:

Looking for a book to read? Try our Bookstore, or True Crime Library

Support The Yard through Patreon

Find yourself a new cell phone through the affiliate button below. Maybe there’s a deal.

Buy a Sabre door stop alarm. These things are LOUD. They will wake you up if someone tries to enter a home. Get for travel. Place in front of a hotel door or a door at an Airbnb. get pricing and details through the affiliate button below. Read a Review