Work Text:
Fucking Dutchman munching on that fucking apple. Who the fuck came up with the idea to load the table with blood-red apples? It’s a wonder that they turned out to be edible while looking like wax models.
‘Red is always favoured by idiots’, said AR to Lucky when he came to show off proudly his new suit. After that incident Rothstein’s young associate wore only blue for years.
Still, those fucking apples were so tempting. Leave it to Shultz to grab one and start smacking on it, sprawled in the chair as if he were granting an audience in his own office. It’s not even the disrespect that bothered him - God knows that all the men around this table were loyal, they’ve known him since he still went by Salvatore, and they couldn't care less about the antics of some piss-beer baron. But Schultz was eating the damn apple with such gusto that Lucky could feel his mouth to start watering and had to suppress the urge to sneakily take just one fucking apple that nobody would miss. As if he were still a child.
Charlie hated to remember what childhood felt like.
Always a little too cold and a little too hungry. Home was also a little too scary a place to be, especially when his father came back from work in a foul mood. All of it felt too muted now - either the time washed out the intensity or little Sal did not let himself feel too much because he could not afford it. He could afford very little back then. Mostly friends.
Genovese and Costello were engrossed in a heated argument by the window. Frank was holding himself with deliberate politeness, making Vito look comical with his wild gestures . ‘Prime Minister of the Underworld’ would probably keep fucking smiling even if Vito started brandishing a gun. Those two hated each other’s guts on a primal level, like Charlie’s Bambi hated pitbulls. But Lucky was a good master and knew how to curb unnecessary fights in the bud.
Frank caught Lucky’s stare and smiled apologetically, asking wordlessly for help. Luciano rolled his eyes and was going to step towards the window and get between Costello and Genovese when he heard a quiet voice behind him:
“Charlie, wait.”
And Luciano halted, obeying a time-honed reflex. Even when he was the whole of 15 and Meyer had just hit 11, Lucky knew that this kid was worth listening to:
“What, you want to see how long their standoff will last without an intervention?”, Charlie smirked but Meyer remained stone-faced, and Luciano became even more grim than the drooping eyelid usually made him look. “Is it the accounts?”
The idea with the accounts set up in Havana seemed flawless, but anything would do in a Ritz swimming pool filled with naked swimming girls. And Meyer knew more than most about Havana, perhaps other than… “Trafficante?..”
Meyer shook his head. What could it be - Dutch? Benny? Journalists? Some shithead Nazis whom Meyer insisted on dealing without involving goyim friends?
Meyer looked pointedly at Frank who was trying to explain something to Vito, and Lucky nodded at the door which led to the small office. It was a pity to leave the bright and vast hall, he liked being here, but Meyer wanted to talk in private and Charlie could hardly send off Costello and Genovese to fetch halva from around the corner.
“Things are that bad?”, quietly asked Lucky, closing the door behind them.
Again, Meyer only shook his head without looking at Luciano. In the following silence they both reached for the cigarettes and lit them up as if mirroring each other’s movements.
At last Meyer looked at Charlie:
“It’s Dewey.”
“He’s in our pocket, Mey.”
Silence enveloped the office once again, but this time it got on Lucky’s nerves as much as Dutchman’s smacking did before. Damn Lansky’s silent reproaches which Charlie could read in the tight thin line of his lips better than a fucking fortune teller could read your palm.
“I swear, Meyer. It’s all under control. What will Dewey do without me? Live on a special prosecutor’s salary? He’d have to switch to shitty cigares. Nobody refuses such generous gifts.”
Meyer, still silent, shook off the ash into a giant metal ashtray with a horse on top. A souvenir from Saratoga Springs.
Lucky hastened to add: “Dutch is not a problem, Mey. He is mad but he’s not that mad. All this trouble with Harlem pennies stays in Harlem, where it belongs. And when the Queen and her men will corner Dutch, I’ll send Frank to talk to them both. He’ll get us a good deal. It’s not like Dutch knows his numbers.”
The joke fell flat but it was worth a try.
“Otto is good at numbers.”
“I know. But at least I got you to say something.”
Meyer let out a heavy sigh of the kind that usually were prompted by Benny.
“Charlie, Schultz is only one part of the problem. Dewey is afraid to take our money, afraid of journalists. We need someone who brings up a greater fear in Dewey.”
“Me.”
“No, Charlie, not you.”
Lucky stubbed out his cigarette, cramping it against the ashtray with the force of his annoyance: “Who says that? You don’t have anyone in Dewey’s office”.
“You don’t know…”
“...what you have. Yes, I remember!”
Meyer turned away sharply, and Lucky wished he had not destroyed the cigarette - he badly wanted to take a deep drag. It’s been a long time since he let anybody see him unsettled, but Meyer could always rile him up, especially when Lansky was right.
“Remember the white tablecloth?”
Lucky could barely hear Meyer chuckle but he could see his shoulders relax visibly.
“It was beige, Charlie.”
“You know that I can’t tell the Committee that they need to pay double for the upkeep of the esteemed men of the law”, - Lucky came up to Meyer from behind and embraced him with age-old familiarity. Little Meyer fit so well in his arms, “Do you remember why we stopped doing that?”
“We grew up, and even you are no longer thinking with your balls.”
‘When was the last time we did it? After Maranzano?”
“Rest his soul. No, after the first Committee meeting, in your suit, on the couch.”
They fell silent together for the third time, reliving the same memory. Lucky was again the first to break the silence:
“And after that?”
“And then we learned not to act on our impulses. Like you not grabbing that apple today”.
Lucky laughed, holding Meyer even closer to himself: “You noticed”.
“I always pay attention to things”.
“And you are always right. Will you be seeing me in prison?”
The joke was ill-timed, and Lucky felt Meyer’s back stiffening again. It was not a simple strain that Charlie could try to chase away with a kiss to the neck, no, it was something deep and cold, which has been coiling inside Meyer for a long time - and which finally broke through the surface. Meyer took a step forward and Lucky made way for him.
“No. No, I won’t, Charlie”.
Meyer turned to him, and even in the mundane electrical light his face looked like a mask of some cruel god, filled with inescapable rage. When he stepped forward, Charlie shrunk back without meaning to, but Meyer took him by the shoulder, and with surprising force brought him closer - and kissed him. A working girl would have gotten quite a tip from Charlie for such a kiss.
“I won’t see you there until I find a way to get you out”.
In the time it took Charlie to get his wits together after a sudden kiss and promise, Meyer managed to adjust his suit and tie and head for the door. With a hand on the handle he turned and said curtly:
“I will come to you tonight. Order the apples in”, - and turning the handle, he added barely above whisper: “And be careful, Charlie”.