Tee

Chapter 1 -2: Once high-powered attorney who falls on hard times after an office shooting

Chapter One

A framed photograph on the nightstand captures a lie—three smiling faces arranged to resemble happiness. Across the bedroom, Thibaut "Tee" Falgout fastens the buttons of his silk shirt. Tailored to fit his frame perfectly, it costs more than most people make in a week. At forty-two, he maintains the physique of a man who can afford both a personal trainer and the time to use one. Three mornings a week at the New Orleans Country Club gym. Never misses.

He checks his reflection one last time, then leans down and kisses his sleeping wife, Lauren, on the cheek. Her face is peaceful in sleep in a way it never is when she's awake. She snores softly, the smell of alcohol rising from her—vodka, he thinks, could be gin. Always something clear, something she thinks he won't notice on her breath. Slips out quietly, a departure perfected over two decades of marriage.

In the kitchen, he finds his eighteen-year-old daughter Kris hunched over a bowl of cereal, the newspaper spread before her like a barrier. The sports section, he notices. She's always been more interested in the Saints' offensive line than anything happening in her own life. She doesn't glance up.
"Morning," Tee says, pouring himself coffee from the expensive Italian espresso machine that Lauren insisted they needed.
Silence. Kris flips a page.

His Cajun accent thickens with irritation, the way it always does when he's annoyed. "You know, in polite society, when someone says hello, y’all supposed to respond in kind."

Kris huffs. Grabs her bowl and leaves the room without a word, her footsteps echoing on the marble floor, fading toward her bedroom.
"Y’all have a wonderful day too," Tee mutters. The coffee tastes bitter.

Tee rinses his cup in the sink, one of the few domestic tasks he ever performs, then checks his diamond-encrusted Rolex watch, a bonus for the Decker settlement. Already running late, he grabs his leather briefcase and heads out the door.

Outside, the antebellum mansion rises behind him—all white columns and old money pretension. Lauren's family money, to be precise. The Dougets have owned this house for five generations, and she never lets him forget. Built in 1847 on the profits of sugar and human misery, the kind of history polite society prefers not to discuss at dinner parties. The slaves' quarters are long gone, demolished in the 1920s and replaced with formal gardens, but the big house remains, a monument to wealth extracted from other people's labor

His Mercedes SL-450 waits in the circular driveway, freshly washed and gleaming. The license plate reads "NOT POOR," a joke that seemed funnier when he ordered it six months ago. Now it just feels obvious. He slides behind the wheel, the leather seat conforming to his body, and guns the engine. The sound reverberates off the mansion's façade as he tears out of the driveway, the mansion disappearing in his rearview mirror.
On the freeway, the traffic becomes an obstacle course for Tee as he weaves between cars at reckless speed, one hand on the wheel, the other punching speed dial. The city slides past—oak trees draped in Spanish moss, shotgun houses giving way to strip malls, the bayou visible in glimpses between buildings. He knows this route by heart and could drive it blindfolded. Home to office, office to home, with occasional detours to Dana's apartment in Metairie.

The phone rings twice before she answers.

"I'm not talking to you." Dana Thompson's squeaky voice comes through the speakers. Twenty-four, though looks younger. Blonde, petite, with a combination of innocence and calculation in equal measure that Tee finds irresistible.

"Aw, Che'. Don't be like that."

"You were supposed to come over last night." She's pouting. He can picture her lower lip pushing out in that way she does.

"Couldn't. Wife had people over. Important people." He swerves around a pickup truck going too slow in the left lane. Some idiot with a Confederate flag bumper sticker. "The lieutenant governor and his wife. The DA. Half the city council. Had to be there."

"More important than me?"

Tee rolls his eyes. This conversation, again. They have it at least once a week, this same dance of reassurance and complaint. "No one's more important than Che."

"I wonder." A pause. "I sat all night waiting. I even made dinner. That chicken thing you like."

"I'm sorry, baby. I really am."

"I wonder," her voice smaller now.

"Tell you what. I'll make it up to you. Dinner tonight. My treat. Anywhere y’all want."

"What about your wife?" The pout is gone now, replaced by something harder. Dana knows how to negotiate.

"She's got one of those cause things. Save the nutria rat or something…. Come on, y’all can even pick the place."

"Fontaine's." She says it immediately, like she's been waiting for the opportunity.

Tee’s grip tightens on the wheel. Fontaine's is in the French Quarter, on Royal Street. Everyone goes to Fontaine's. Everyone who matters, everyone who knows everyone else. "No, Che'. Y’all know I can't be seen in town. Pick something in Metairie or…”

"Fontaine's."

"Can't we just…”

"Fontaine's." Firmer now. She's not budging.

Tee sighs, defeated. This is what happens when you date someone young enough to think discretion is negotiable. "Okay. Fontaine's. Eight o'clock… Get a table in back."

"I'll wear that black dress you like." Her voice soft now, victorious.

He ends the call and mutters, "Gold digger with no sense of direction." But even as he says it, he's already thinking about that dress, about the way it clings to her body, about the look on her face when he gives her the necklace he's been hiding in his desk drawer. Three thousand dollars at that boutique on Magazine Street. She'll love it.

The Mercedes flies past a billboard on the right where the face of Ashley Reeves stares out at traffic. Blonde, thirty-two, her hair teased high in that way Southern women do for special occasions. Her smile is wide and white, frozen in time, and beneath it words are printed in harsh red letters: "BRUTALLY MURDERED - AUGUST 8, 2007 BY HER HUSBAND BECKER REEVES. GOOD OLD BOY ORLEANS PARISH REFUSES TO PROSECUTE."

But Tee doesn't see this as the billboard disappears in his rearview mirror, another piece of someone else's tragedy that doesn't touch his world
As Tee exits the freeway, the law firm comes into view ahead, a sleek, modern building that stands out amid the older architecture around it. The parking spot reserved for "Thibaut 'Tee' Falgout" waits for him, prominently positioned near the entrance. He whips the Mercedes into it, cutting off a paralegal who was about to take the adjacent space. She glares at him. He pretends not to notice.

Above the building entrance, gold letters proclaim: "DOUGET, DOUGET AND FALGOUT - ATTORNEYS AT LAW." His name, last. Always last. The two Dougets, Lauren's father and uncle, would always come first. Tee married into the firm the same way he married into the mansion, into the life he now leads. Sometimes he forgets there was ever a time before this, before the money and the prestige and the weight of expectation.
Tee breezes into a lobby gleaming with the kind of wealth that announces itself in leather furniture and polished marble. The receptionist, a new girl, can't remember her name, smiles at him. He doesn't smile back.

On one of the couches sits Jim Roy Richardson, a man in his sixties whose fraying cuffs and scuffed work boots mark him distinctly out of place. He clutches a brown paper bag in both hands, like a lifeline. When he spots Tee, his face lights up.

Tee stops at his secretary's desk, where his secretary Debbie sits, heavily pregnant and looking more tired than usual. In her twenties, she’s expecting her first child.

She hands him his messages without a word. She's worked for Tee for three years now, knows his routine better than he does, knows when to screen his calls and when to let them through.

"How about them Saints, Deb? Didn't think it was humanly possible to blow a twenty-point lead in five minutes."
She raises an eyebrow. "You mean 'humanly'?"

"I was there. Trust me when I say inhumanely." He was there, in the firm’s box seats, watching the fourth quarter collapse with increasing horror. Lost a grand on the game. "Our defense couldn't stop a wheelchair convention."

"You have a visitor." Debbie nods toward Jim Roy, who's now standing, straightening his jacket.

Tee glances over. Jim Roy's face is hopeful, eager, and pathetic all in one.

As Jim Roy steps forward, Tee grimaces and makes a quick beeline for his office, pretending he doesn't see Jim Roy's hand rising in greeting, doesn't hear his name being called.

The office door closes behind him with a solid thud.

Inside his ego fills the room. LSU memorabilia covers one wall, along with every animal head known to man staring down with glass eyes. A twelve-point buck he shot in Mississippi. A wild boar from a hunting trip in Texas on the Bush ranch. On the other wall, framed newspaper clippings celebrating massive settlements: "$245.5 Million Verdict in Chemical Plant Explosion," "Local Attorney Secures Record Settlement in Decker Suit," "Falgout Wins Again." His father would be proud if he was still around. A roughneck from Thibodaux who worked the oil rigs and drank himself to death by fifty-two… before seeing his son become somebody.

Behind his desk, on the credenza, sits a small statue of Priapus, the Greek god of fertility, anatomically correct and proudly so. His erect penis points toward the ceiling, nearly a foot long, grotesque and fascinating. It's a conversation piece, something to make clients uncomfortable or amused, depending on their sensibilities. Tee bought it at an estate sale in the Garden District for two hundred grand. Thought it was hilarious. His wife refuses to enter his office because of it. Purpose served.

He settles into his leather chair and flips through his messages. Calls to return, appointments to confirm, the usual Monday morning pile of administrative detritus. Most are routine. A few require his attention. And then—

His eyes light up.

"Hot damn!"

The door opens. Debbie enters with his espresso in a small porcelain cup, his mail sorted by importance, and the Wall Street Journal folded precisely the way he likes it.

“Good news.” She says, setting the coffee down.

"Next best thing to sex, Sid Cohen called. Atlantic Chemical wants to settle. Thirty and a half mil. Bam. In the bank."

Thirty and a half million. The firm's cut will be forty percent, minus expenses. His bonus will come in at about one point three million, give or take. Not bad for six months of depositions, negotiations, and making Atlantic Chemical's lawyers squirm.

"Maybe now's a good time to ask for that raise?" Debbie touches her swollen belly.

He looks at her, really looks at her for the first time this morning. She's enormous, ready to pop.

"Any day now, huh?"

"If by 'any day' you mean 'still a month to go,' then yes." She shifts her weight, one hand on her lower back.

"Who'd y’all get to cover?" He sips the espresso. Perfect temperature, perfect strength. Debbie knows how he likes it.

"Cindy Garrett."

Tee rolls his eyes so hard it almost hurts. Cindy Garrett, the office manager's cousin or something, a girl so spectacularly stupid that she makes rocks look like Rhodes Scholars.

"She's not that bad," Debbie says, lacking conviction.

“She’s the reason they put instructions on shampoo bottles.”

"You're exaggerating."

"She thought France was in Canada." Tee looks up from his messages. "Swear to God, I heard her tell someone on the phone that France was in Canada. Not French Canada. France. The actual country."

Debbie sighs. "I know, but she needs the work and…

"You’re too nice for your own good,” Tee says, rising from his desk and going to the door. He cracks it open and peers out at the lobby. Jim Roy is still there, sitting now, the paper bag in his lap. Waiting with absolute certainty that Tee Falgout can fix everything. That Tee can make someone pay for the cancer that took his wife, for the medical bills that bankrupted him, for the insurance company that denied every claim.

"Every Monday," Tee says.

"What?"

"Jim fucking Roy Richardson. Every Monday, like clockwork. Y’all could set your watch by him."

Debbie joins him. “Want me to call security?"

"I don't know." He actually doesn’t. Part of him admires Jim Roy's determination, his refusal to accept that some things can't be fixed. The bigger part is just annoyed.

"I feel sorry for him." Debbie says.

"Sorry?" Tee looks at her incredulously.

"He lost everything… his wife, his house, his savings, everything. He's living in a trailer park now, for Christ's sake," Debbie says.

“Living in a trailer park isn’t that bad, Che.” Tee chuckles. “I mean it’s like having a front-row seat to a reality show, except the drama is free and the popcorn and beer are BYOB.

Debbie glares at him. "Jesus Christ, am I the only one with a compassionate bone in their body around here?"

"Your fervent, misguided sense of compassion is stunning. But there's just no case." Tee lets the door close. "I've looked at it six ways from Sunday. There's nothing there. That piece of crap insurance policy he bought didn’t cover squat. It's tragic, but it's not actionable."

"You mean no money." Debbie's voice has an edge now.

"That kind of thinking won't help get that raise."Tee returns to his desk. "This is a business, Deb. We're not a charity. We take cases we can win. Cases that pay. That's how it works."

"I know how it works."

"What y’all think Jim Roy's got in that bag? Opossum or armadillo?" Tee says, trying to lighten the mood, but Debbie doesn't smile.

"My imaginary friend says you need a therapist."
"Your imaginary friend sounds like my wife." He settles back into his chair. "Get rid of him."

Tee watches Debbie start towards the door, her movement slow and awkward. The baby is sitting low, he can tell. Soon she'll be gone for six weeks, maybe eight, and he'll be stuck with Cindy Garrett and her confusion about basic geography.

"Quietly," he adds pointedly.

Debbie pauses at the door. "Don't forget. Partner meeting at two."

He opens his mouth to object.

"Your father-in-law says you miss one more, you'll be sorting mail."

The threat lands with a thud. The old bastard would do it, too. Not to make a point, but just to humiliate Tee in front of the entire firm. Family or not, Tee is still the outsider who married in, still the dirt-poor Cajun kid from Thibodaux who got his darling daughter Lauren pregnant in college. Not that Tee particularly cares. The old man can threaten all he wants, but Tee brings in more money than anyone else at the firm. They need him more than he needs them.

"Never marry for money, Che… Y’all can borrow it cheaper."

As Debbie leaves, Tee props his feet on the desk, opens the Journal, and sips his espresso. The morning has settled into its usual rhythm. Outside his window, the city goes about its business. Cars honk. A siren wails in the distance. Somewhere, a jackhammer pounds concrete.
He reads about the Federal Reserve, about interest rates, and inflation. Skims an article about tech stocks. Checks the price of oil. His portfolio is definitely up. He should call his broker. Maybe move some money around.

The espresso is cooling. He takes another sip.

Then the scream.

Not surprise.

Not shock.

Terror.
"No... NO!!!"

It’s Debbie.

Gunfire explodes.

The sound is monstrous—too loud, too close. One shot, then another. The air seems to buckle with the rapid succession of blasts that don't stop
Tee crashes to the floor, his body moving before his brain catches up. The espresso cup shatters on the tile. The Journal scatters in white pages. His chair spins, empty.

More screams. People crying out, begging, breaking. He can hear them through the door, through the walls, everywhere.

Tee crawls toward the door, carpet burning his palms. His heart slamming so hard it hurts. His breath, short, sharp, in gasps.
He reaches up, fumbles for the lock. His fingers find it. Turns it. The deadbolt slides home with a solid click.

Another burst of gunfire. Closer.

Someone slams into the door.

“Please!” Debbie screams. Pleads. “Tee—please!” She’s right outside the door.

Tee's hand inches for the lock.

His fingers hover there, touching the cool metal.

Debbie pounds harder. "Tee! Please!"

The baby. She's pregnant. The baby.

His hand trembles.

Another scream. Closer. A man's voice, cut short.
More gunfire.

Tee’s hand drops.

Just… drops.

The pounding continues. Harder now. Wild.

“Tee! Oh God…”

The words dissolve into screams. The sound of people dying just beyond the door, just feet away.

Then... nothing."

Silence falls like a curtain, broken only by the sound of his labored breathing, loud, fast.

The doorknob jiggles.

Once.

Twice.

Harder.

Eyes wide, Tee scrambles across the room, papers scattering under his hands. Frantic. Graceless. He bangs his head hard on the desk leg. Barely feels it. Wedges himself under his desk. Pulls his knees tightly to his chest, then covers his ears with both hands, squeezing, trying to block out the world.

The doorknob stops.

Footsteps.

Moving away.

A single gunshot.

Then quiet.

Real quiet.

Tee presses his hands over his ears, breath coming in thin, broken gasps, surrounded by trophies, headlines, and mounted dead things.

He waits.

Chapter Two

A strip center swelters under a June Louisiana sun like something left to die. Between a laundromat bleeding detergent smell, a nail salon, and a payday loan shop promising "CASH NOW," the boarded storefronts decay like missing teeth in a meth’s mouth.

Tee’s dented Mercedes pulls into the lot. Faded paint, no left mirror, a spiderweb crack across the windshield. The engine coughs twice before shutting off.

Tee steps out. Forty-seven now, though he could pass for older. Fifty-five, sixty on a bad day. The expensive haircut is gone, replaced by something he does himself in the bathroom mirror. Three days of salt-and-pepper stubble darken his jaw. A soft gut strains against a white button-down that looks like he slept in. Which he did. In the car. Again. The backseat of a Mercedes SL-450 wasn't designed for sleeping, but you'd be surprised at what you can get used to.

He sips watery, gas station coffee from a chipped ceramic mug that reads "WORLD'S GREATEST DAD" in faded letters. Two dollars and thirty-seven cents, and he counted out the change in nickels and pennies while the clerk watched with dead eyes.

The heat is oppressive, even at ten in the morning. His shirt sticks to his back. Sweat beads on his forehead. A blue suit jacket hangs in the car. He gave up wearing it months ago. None of his clients expect him to show up in a jacket. Most of them expect him to show up drunk.

His Italian leather shoes, the last remaining artifact from his former life, now scuffed and splitting at the seams, scrape along the asphalt as he drags himself toward the glass door of his office. His hangover loosening its grip. Slowly, cruelly, just enough to hurt. The door announces:

THIB UT “TEE” FALG T
ATTORNEY AT LAW

Most of the letters have peeled away over the years. Nobody bothered to fix them. Least of all, him. What's the point? The letters that remain paint a perfect metaphor for everything in his life.

A padlock hangs from the door handle along with a red notice fluttering in the breeze.

Tee stops. Stares at the notice. His jaw works, grinding his back molars side to side, the way he does when his anger builds, which is most of the time these days. He reaches up, rips the notice free. Studies it as if it might say something different if he reads it again.

The words don't change. Thirty days past due. Sixty days past due. Ninety days. Final notice. Premises must be cleared within 24 hours; otherwise, contents will be disposed of. Legal action may be pursued for damages and unpaid rent totaling $4,750.

Tee smirks. Four thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars. Might as well be ten thousand. Might as well be a million. Might as well be the national debt.

He wads up the notice. Drops it. The ball of paper bounces once, rolls into a storm drain,

His jaw clenches tighter, muscle twitching in his cheek as he turns back toward his car. He takes three steps, then stops when his eyes land on a chunk of broken curb. Eight inches of concrete, jagged on one end, smooth on the other.

He picks it up. Weighs it in his hand. Feels the heft of it. Five, maybe six pounds. Rough against his palm. Warm from the sun.

He stands there, staring at the door. His reflection stares back at him in the glass—a ghost of who he used to be. Where's the man who won a $245 million verdict? Where's the man who drove a Mercedes with a "NOT POOR" license plate? Where's the man who wore diamond-encrusted Rolexes and silk shirts and had a mistress in Metairie?

Slowly, the curb slips from his fingers, landing with a dull thud at his feet.

He gets back in his car. Hands gripping the steering wheel, knuckle-white, his face twists. Five years of failure, of decline, of everything falling apart compressed into a single moment. The office. The mansion. Lauren. The firm. Debbie. Jim Roy Richardson. The screaming. The gunfire. The deafening silence.

Suddenly, he erupts from the car, as if something detonated inside him. Snatching up the curb and with a primal roar that comes from deep in his chest, somewhere he didn't know still existed, he hurls the curb through the glass door.

CRASH.
The glass explodes in a shower of glittering shards as an alarm pierces the air.

Tee dusts his hands together. A smile crosses his face—his first genuine smile in months. Maybe years. Satisfying. So goddamn satisfying. Let them come. Let them try to collect. You can't get blood from a stone, and Thibaut "Tee" Falgout is a stone now. Broke. Broken. Beyond caring
He slides back into his Mercedes, guns the engine. It sputters and catches. The smell of burning oil fills the air as he peels out of the lot.
________________________________________

The Horseshoe Lounge sits as a monument to the term "hole-in-the-wall." Nothing's level. Plywood covering two broken windows. One with "SAINTS FOREVER" painted on it from when they won the Super Bowl in 2010. Neon beer signs flicker, Budweiser, Abita, Dixie. A broken Miller High Life buzzes constantly. The jukebox hasn't worked since Katrina. A large mirror fills the back wall, cracked in one corner. The place smells like stale beer, cigarettes, and desperation. The kind of place where people come to disappear for a few hours. Or days. Or forever.

Behind the bar, Natalie, sixty-something, arms covered in faded ink from a time when women with tattoos were still scandalous, watches "The View" on a flickering black and white. She coughs between drags on a cigarette that seems permanently glued to her bottom lip. The kind of wet, rattling cough that says years of smoking have caught up with her. She doesn't care. Gave up caring about her health around the same time she gave up caring about most things. A couple of old-timers sit nearby. One sleeps, head on the bar, a line of drool connecting his mouth to the wood. The other nurses a Lone Star, watches the TV without really seeing it. They're here every day. Have been for years. Probably will be until they die.

At the opposite end of the bar, Tee hunches on a barstool, an empty shot glass before him, studying the Daily Racing Form with the intensity of a man trying to decode the meaning of life. His finger traces down the listings, lips moving slightly as he reads.

“Did you actually bring the curb with you?”

The voice comes from behind. Female. Familiar. A voice he hasn't heard in months.

Tee looks up in the mirror. Sees the reflection of Kris standing near the door, letting her eyes adjust to the darkness. Twenty-eight now, tailored suit, charcoal gray, perfectly fitted. Hair pulled back in a professional bun. Light makeup, just enough. Beautiful, poised, confident. Everything he's not.
"Plausible deniability," Tee says, not turning around.

"Doesn't apply." She walks closer.

"Witnesses?"

"None."

"Not much of a case, Che'." He finally turns to look at her. God, she looks like Lauren did twenty years ago. Before drinking. Before Xanax. Before everything fell apart.

"And if I dust the curb for prints?" She says, settling onto the stool beside him.

"Orleans D.A.'s office got nothing better to do?”

Kris sighs the kind of sigh that says she's been through this before. "Just pay for the door. I can probably make it go away."

"Well, if..." Tee squints at the Racing Form, taps a name with his finger. "... Slap Your Mama doesn't win the third at Fair Grounds, that prospect looks highly unlikely."

Tee motions to Natalie with two fingers.
Natalie shuffles over with a bottle of Old Grand Dad, the cheap stuff, the plastic bottle kind, the kind that burns going down and tastes like regret. She fills his glass. Looks to Kris with raised eyebrows.

"It's ten in the morning," Kris says, checking her watch. “Actually, nine forty-five.”

Tee and Natalie exchange a look. So?

"It's never too early to drink, Che." Tee holds up the glass, examining the whiskey in the dim bar light. "Just too early to have the problems that make y’all want to."

He tosses back the shot. It burns, but it's a familiar burn, almost comforting now.

Natalie pours another without being asked. She knows his rhythm, knows he'll want five, maybe six, before noon. Walks off.

Tee lifts the glass to his lips.

Kris grabs his hand.

"I'm serious. Zayden wants to press charges."

Tee jerks his hand away, whiskey sloshing over the rim and onto his fingers. He licks them. Waste not.

“Let him.”

"You'll lose your license. And I won't be able to help you… this time." Her voice has an edge of desperation he's heard before, usually right before he disappoints her.

Tee contemplates for a moment. His license. Does he even care anymore? What's he going to do with a law license? He hasn't had a real client in two years. The last one was a slip-and-fall at a Winn-Dixie that settled for three thousand dollars. His cut was twelve hundred. Lost that in two hours at the crap table at Harrah’s.

He throws back the shot.

"Sure. Why overthink when you can overdrink?" Kris says.

Tee gives her a look. The look that says he knows exactly what he's doing, thank you very much.

"How'd y’all find me, anyway?"

"Simple. Asked Zayden where the nearest sleaze-bucket bar was and..." She gestures around the bar with both hands, as if presenting evidence.
"Ta-da."

"Hear that, Natalie?" Tee calls out. "Something you can post on Yelp."

Natalie flips him the bird over her shoulder.

"What are you going to do now?" Kris asks.

Tee looks genuinely puzzled.

"For a job?"

"Something." He returns to the Racing Form. Slap Your Mama. Maybe he should bet on a different horse. Maybe he should bet on all of them. Maybe he should just burn his money in the parking lot, save himself the trip.

"'Something' is not a career path."

Tee shuts one eye, pondering this revelation like it's profound. "You know I always wanted to try my hand at freelance gynecology."

"I'm serious."

"Me too. Thinking of calling it 'Saddle Up.' Start a franchise. Wouldn't happen to have a saddle would you?"

"You mean like the one that came with that pony you always promised me?"

Direct hit. Something shifts in Tee's expression—a flicker of pain, quickly buried. The pony. Every year for her birthday, from when she was six until she was twelve. "Next year, Che'. Next year for sure." Next year never came.

Thunder rumbles from outside.

"And on that note." He signals Natalie with his glass. Returns to his form, suddenly fascinated by the stats on Slap Your Mama's performance in muddy conditions.

Natalie shuffles over. Pours.

Kris bites her bottom lip. Can't believe what she's about to say.

"You could come work for me."

The words hang in the air between them.

Tee looks at her reflection in the mirror. His face, pure disbelief.

"Me? In the D.A.'s office?"

"I'm short an investigator." She's looking at her hands now, not him.

"Y’all is a few nuggets short of a Happy Meal is what y’all are."

"I'm serious."

"Yeah, I bet ol' Rufus would just love that." Rufus Walcott, the Orleans District Attorney. Old guard. Old money. Old grudges. Tee sued the DA's office once, years ago.. Civil rights violation. Won. Made Rufus look like a fool in the newspaper. Rufus is like an elephant. He doesn’t forget.

"I'll clear it."

Tee chuckles. Looks around.

"What?" Kris asks.

"Just trying to figure out if this is a bar or fucking Disneyworld."

"When's the last time you had a job?"

Tee opens his mouth.

"A steady job?"

Another hit. Below the belt this time. His mouth closes.

"Tell you what. Let's take an informal, unscientific poll." Yee pounds on the bar with his fist, the sound echoing. "Listen up! My daughter Kris here wants me to come work for her at the District Attorney's office. What say y’all, good citizens of Orleans Parish?"

The old-timer and Natalie look at each other. He snorts. The sleeping one wakes up, confused. Then they all laugh—not mean laughter, but the kind that says they know a punchline when they hear one. Tee Falgout working for the DA? That's the funniest thing they've heard all week.

"The people have spoken..." Tee throws back his shot, grimaces."...and they are disgusted."

Having had her fill, Kris gets up to leave, her stool scraping against the uneven floor. Takes two twenties and her business card from her purse. Drops them on the bar.

"Call me sometime. I'll cook you dinner."

Tee watches her in the mirror as she heads for the door. "How's your mother?"

Kris pauses. "No idea. Capri or somewhere."

"Still spending all my hard-earned money."

Kris leaves without answering. The door closes behind her with a hollow thud.

Tee stares at the door in the mirror for a long moment, then picks up her card. Kris Falgout, Assistant District Attorney, Orleans Parish. A flicker of pride crosses his face—brief, quickly extinguished, but there. His daughter. Despite everything. Despite him. She made something of herself. Went to Tulane Law, graduated top of her class, could have gone anywhere, worked for any firm, but chose the DA's office. Chose to help people. Chose to be everything he wasn't.

Moment gone, he motions to Natalie.

Natalie shuffles over. Pours. As she turns to leave, Tee grabs her hand.

"Getting kind of repetitious, don't y’all think?"

He slides one of the twenties across the bar. Takes the bottle.

Natalie pockets the bill. Goes back to "The View." The old-timers go back to their beers. The bar settles back into its familiar rhythm of slow decay.

Tee drinks.
________________________________________

Fair Grounds racetrack sprawls beneath the afternoon sun, baking. The grandstand is half-empty—Thursday people. Dreamers. The lost. The kind with nowhere else to stand. Hot dogs and horse shit rot together in the humid air, cut with beer, cigarette smoke, and the sour reek of hope dying.
Tee grips the rail, a tote ticket crushed in his fist, watching the third race charge down the stretch. Eight horses. He’s got everything on number eight, Slap Your Mama. Fifty to one. His last twenty, one of the bills Kris left on the bar.

Color and muscle explode past in a blur. Hooves hammer dirt into the air. Jockeys folded low, whips snapping. Seven. Three. Two. Five. One. Four. Six.

Then a pause. Too long.

Slap Your Mama limps across the finish line dead last, jockey standing in the stirrups, finished pretending. The horse favors his right leg. Maybe it’s hurt. Tee doesn’t care. Just another loss stacked on a lifetime of losses.

He tears the ticket to shreds. The pieces drift down like confetti at the saddest party on earth.

Tee opens his wallet. Nothing inside but Kris’s card, a couple of gas receipts, and proof of a meal he doesn’t remember eating four months ago. There’s a faded photograph too—Kris at ten, grinning, holding up a fish she caught on Lake Pontchartrain. Happy. Before everything went wrong. Before the shooting. Before Debbie. Before the nightmares started.

He slides Kris’s card out and stares at it for a long time.