by Leon Mauvais
The Dust Fields of Underburb
By Leon Mauvais
Published by JMS Books LLC
Visit jms-books.com for more information.
Copyright 2019 Leon Mauvais
ISBN 9781634868792
Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com
Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.
All rights reserved.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published in the United States of America.
* * * *
For those whose hearts beat out song.
* * * *
The Dust Fields of Underburb
By Leon Mauvais
Where was he again?
Where had he landed this time?
I never have a boarding pass,
I’m always just crashing!
Mar’Bo had written that. No album credit, but still an achievement.
He’d carved out his very own golden key to crack open Master-T’s sesame.
Untethered, Mar’Bo woke in a sea of sheets, damp with sweat and nocturnal emissions. Kicking his legs free of last night’s dream, he pulled himself to sit at the edge of the California king. His imprint remained. But what had he left back in his dreams? Where had he gone? There was a place? What was the name of it? It had echoed in his head like a GPS just a few moments ago.
Mar’Bo looked down at his impression in the mattress. The crux of his head outlined by a moist halo. Where his shoulders had sunk, two puddles like wings expanding. A clutch of pearls dried where he’d released.
Mar’Bo touched the shape left from his dreams.
He refrained from making the “F” or “C” words the first of his day.
Bundling silence was an effort, but sometimes good enough.
It’s all he wore nowadays.
That and kicks.
He reached below the bed.
His fingers running along the puffy tongues. Sneakers of woven gold and limited editions. Kicks and a lid—that was the uniform. Trunks and shades optional. Pants only worn if a tall milky exec was near. And even then, depending on what they preferred.
Mar’Bo fondled the buckles and laces. He roved past the ridges of foam. Fingers searching specifically, gliding above soft ranges and valleys of plastic.
Collissschhz!
He’d found them.
Mar’Bo’s pair of Master-T curated, Meteorites.
Like High Tops covered in an intergalactic armor of combat green.
“To match the fight in your pair of olive eyes, making me thirsty for that dirty martini” Master-T had said.
His fingers skiing down Mar’bo’s hip bones, “Congrats on our single.”
Our single.
Master-T took sole credit.
But Mar’Bo got the customized kicks.
The only other identical pair—in Master’s-T’s closet.
They could both don them and it’d be, as if they were strutting the sidewalks together even if the concrete was poured on different sides of the world, Master-T said.
The rap god said he almost fired his assistant for forgetting to pack them on his last world tour.
Mar’Bo tried not to look for them as Master-T launched across talk-show stages and arenas. He stopped counting the times Master-T had worn them while performing.
Mar’Bo knew his identical pair of Meteorites by touch alone.
His hands transformed into ships as they glided across their sleek sides. To Mar’Bo they were the sneaker/boots worn by revolutionary lovernauts.
They were also the only pair of kicks his toes didn’t scrunch up in protest to board. For they felt roomy as a starship, yet with the strong cushioned sides of a captain’s chair.
Mar’Bo stood up. Guided by the sunlight, he passed through his gauzy curtains. A swoosh of sliding glass and his night sweats burned off before Mar’Bo leaned along the balcony’s lip.
“Well…well…well…the stork also rises…”
The voice rose up with such rhythm and force that Mar’Bo’s ears were taken captive, and his head bobbed along to the beat. Jizzy’s.
Mar’Bo’s shoulders sagged.
Master-T called them all his sparrows, till Jizzy had taken the opportunity to free-style one night, ripping into Mar’Bo’s gawky gait and string bean arms too skinny to hold much muscle. A nose too big for his face like a beak.
Not man nor boy, but a stork.
Stork—Jizzy coined the nickname and it singed like a brand.
The pool below was no kidney bean, but edgeless and spanning infinity if you tilted your head right. Still, it possessed that turquoise shimmer if you screwed with its lights at night. The sun was breaching the sky. Its beams skidding across the water’s surface more excited to ripple across Jizzy’s body than anything else.
Skin like volcanic glass, shadows fled and everything that touched its surface sparked. A body of muscles forged methodically. A display of engineered eroticism. Even his nipple rings glowed. Regally supine on a lounger, two of the newest sparrows kneaded the meat of Jizzy’s inner thighs. While others of Master-T’s flock flitted around for oils, kush, and shots, muttering their latest stabs at verse.
Jizzy continued, “Where you be, Storky?”
Mar’Bo knew his games and it was too early to battle, but his dream lingered.
And its name came for the first time in his wakeful state and he called down.
“I’ve been to Underburb, Jizzy, under your mamma.”
No howls or whoops coughed up from the other sparrows lounging. Their fingertips stained with resin and ink. They’d all stopped acknowledging Mar’Bo weeks ago.
After they detected his block.
Mar’Bo had always been the first in and the last out of Master-T’s on-site studios.
For a while, some of the flock had claimed Mar’Bo didn’t even leave to piss some days. Just filled up the belly of the newbs who brought more indica and redbulls, thirsty for Mar’Bo’s magic.
Now they all avoided him. As if Mar’Bo’s dry spell was as infectious as Diz MarX’s bussy.
“Underburb?” Jizzy lifted his shades to look up at Mar’Bo with a naked eye.
The excited sun brightened, causing Jizzy to squint, tearing, “…well wherever that is…I hope you mined some gold there. Master-T swoops down in thirty. He said he needs your track.”
The clouds clumped above, blocking the sun. A breeze borne of San Gabriel tore through the rows of palm tree sentries, toppling the inflatable unicorn and blow-up cop with workable parts in and out of water. No need for shades or lids with an approaching storm. The once dry air, dampening fast.
Mar’Bo’s curtains reached out. Animated by the fray, they encircled him, lifting him back into his bedroom before he could mutter anything but an excuse.
Not his bedroom.
&
nbsp; A bedroom.
Bedroom eleven.
Of twelve.
All full.
All the time.
Till Master-T’s cuts.
And then another, fresher voice would be invited, carried through Master-T’s pearly gates, eager and anxious to be thrust against beats.
Jizzy’s churning of rhymes kept him with an unconquerable reign of room one.
Master-T had even installed a spiral stair and second story deck on Jizzy’s balcony for private access from his own master suite. For late night collaborations, Master-T had said. Jizzy never complained. The Master had given his protégé a telescope to look beyond all he could see with his naked eye.
If Jizzy wanted, he could point his telescope past the hazy glow to galaxies far, far away; or into the bedrooms and hot tub parties at the other mansions punched into the neighboring brush-licked hills.
But no. Not Jizzy’s style. He let Mar’Bo peak through it after it’s unveiling, when Master-T’s album went platinum with Jizzy’s lyrics.
With each hit, new gifts.
But since Mar’Bo offered his one, his wellspring of words had dried up. Deserting him like a disgruntled traitor slipping away in the night. Abandoning his prince with no warning. He felt beakless. Mar’Bo could barely mumble his own name as he slipped into a speedo. At least his piece hung like a club between his legs, barely holstered in the silver Lycra.
It was the one instrument he hadn’t lost use of as it tugged out of its sling, thumping for his attention.
There was no time.
Not with Master-T on his way.
Already up in the air probably.
Flying higher than the gulls and slicing through sound waves.
Pity the voices chopped to chum in the air, Mar’Bo thought, the cool marble steps kissed the soles of his feet as he padded down into the kitchen. Chrome juicers and cappuccino machines sparkled atop onyx counters. The glare from sun caught and thrown about made it less of a room and more a prism of fractal light.
Mar’Bo clutched at the central island’s edge as the espresso machine hissed.
He pressed himself for something beyond silence, but he could only conjure curses.
Curses filled his throat.
Bland is the track with four-letter phraseology—one of Master-T’s maxims on loop in Mar’Bo’s skull.
Master-T would teach you everything he knew, if you gave him your melody and song.
In return, he gave you…
Mar’Bo’s words clumped together like tar at the bottom of his lungs.
And as one fought to the surface, Mar’Bo tongued it back down.
No.
Not everything.
But this was opportunity.
To be plucked up from the sheeples below.
One is beat to mush blocked by block on that sunset strip.
And all be deaf to gull cries.
So be the bird in hand.
In this Underburb.
Underburb: the one word that refused flight now.
Mar’Bo was interrupted by the fellow stork.
If Jizzy was Master-T’s cock of the house; then the rest, in rooms two through ten were sparrows in training to be nightingales. Which would make Jax the other stork. Though Jizzy would never say it to his face. For Jizzy knew that Jax had been there since the beginning of Master-T’s rise. He had endured somehow, when all the rest burst like clay pigeons.
Jax was over six-three. And there was a kinship almost immediately between him and Mar’bo. For within any arena’s pit or club; they never lost sight of each other. Their lids, bobbing higher—buoys above a churning sea of fans.
Both lanky, but Jax wore wounds of a former gunfight like diamonds on fire. Each entry point inked with flames on his hands, hips, and pecs. One bullet through his cheek, the shrapnel lodged in his tongue giving him that gravelly voice that Master-T had used on almost every track of Twenty-Twenty, till the accident. Slicing the curves of Mulholland like the Langer lines of a surgeon’s patient, Master-T had flipped his fuchsia Zonda F.
Jax was thrown from the passenger side. Seven surgeries later, including two on his throat and he’d live. But never speak again.
Unscathed himself, Master-T had allowed Jax to stay on. Permanently in room twelve.
As long as he played maid.
No kinky French lace required, though appreciated.
Master-T never asked him for another verse or melody.
But Mar’Bo could swear he sometimes heard Jax humming, with a jay loosely held between his lips as he swept the basketball court.
Now here he stood before Mar’Bo. Sporty in a red mesh tank, matching bikini bottoms and a Bulls lid; Jax nodded at him. Pinching a few CBD drops in Mar’Bo’s espresso, he winked.
They checked the entrances and exits.
The rest of the flock elsewhere, tightening their braids and going over and over their latest raps.
The two storks nestled together in the light of midday.
Above the kitchen’s island, a flattened range hood dangled, never slurping up more than the smoke of joints and packed bowls, hanger higher than most eye lines.
Jax and Mar’Bo rose on their tiptoes.
This was Master-T’s compound. His pools, cars, guards, sparrows, and each of their phone lines, his. Six out buildings and a spa. This was his kitchen too.
But atop the flattened plane of range, there existed an untouched field of dust. Everyone had access to the kitchen, but no one stood this tall. Not even the help. Once in a while an heiress or Becky model in heels would be high enough to see the coating like fresh fallen blow.
They’d scrunch up their peeling noses and jut their chins before slurring, “Master-T, you’ve got to get a new maid.”
At which point in the party, Master-T would out-laugh everybody around, till he gathered enough settled space to say, “Nah, you never put down a good thing.”
Ensuring Jax on a side veranda or scraping lube from an ottoman, heard.
Mar’Bo’s finger, hovered over their field of dust, hesitant to spoil the fresh coating.
Jax pressed into the dust, U OK?
Mar’Bo read the message and lowered himself. He pinched the espresso mug handle between his pointer and thumb, taking a scorching sip. He found Jax’s observations unnerving. For one so silent, his grip on the deal was tighter than most.
“Nightmares…” He splashed the rest of the espresso down his throat, “How did you know?”
Jax snatched the empty espresso cup and stowed it below in a dishwasher rack, before his fingers flew into formation.
L….A…(missed letters.)…D…R…
“Oh…my sheets…Jax…yeah…” Mar’Bo scratched the back of his neck and tipped his lid forward, so the brim shielded his eyes. “I keep having this dream of a place…no fiery waves and mudslides, but tar and all our brothers crucified, painted white. Our tongues cut out and voices…well…gone…” Mar’Bo refused to raise his eyes to Jax so he continued, “And I woke today with its name…Underburb.”
Jax raised on the balls of his feet again and took to the dust to write, OBEY UR DREAMS.
It could’ve been the CBD-spiked espresso or the shafts of blinding sunlight, but Mar’Bo needed to dip. He felt Jax’s hand brush his shoulder. But he kept onwards. He didn’t look back to see if Jax was still up on his tiptoes.
In the den, stood a piano of pink glass. A thank-you gift from a rappers’ collab. They had produced the summer of ‘nineteen’s greatest hit together using some sparrow lyrics.
None of Mar’Bo’s.
He hadn’t been able to contribute to that album.
Or the last.
Master-T was expecting a chorus at least from Mar’Bo for the album-in-progress.
Mar’Bo’s fingers drummed the sides of the piano as he circled. He watched the sunlight fill its guts.
Underburb…Underburb…where we be…
His throat felt full of tar.
A silence like a morning fog,
refused to clear.
Words, words…at least a melody or beat.
Could he filter his nightmare through music video storyboards as a proof of concept for Master-T’s new single?
The buzzer of the North Gate blared through the compound.
The flock gathered. Colognes sprayed. Rings and chains, a few of the flock, squawking through rehearsals as they dropped poolside for their final rounds of pushups, getting in their last pumps.
“Mar’Boooooooooooooooooooooo!”
It sounded less like his name and more a cannon exploding in his ears. He spun to see Master-T, decked out in his signature black threads. A shadow king’s hungry eyes perched behind permanent shades.
Mar’Bo caught sight of his doubled reflection, framed in Master-T’s lenses. Mar’Bo’s legs twisted and he toppled into the cocktail cart by the grand.
Hails of laugher fell from all around. And he listened as they synched-up in harmony. He recognized the sparrow of room four and his princely tenor weaving effortlessly with the booming bass of the twunk in room eight. Even Jizzy started freestyling and the sparrow in room two gave out his signature, “Yeeeeeaaaaaaah.”
Master-T clapped for silence, “I hope you’re not gonna try to sell me on that new choreo, Mar’Bo.”
The young rapper lay in the silence as Master-T waited for his answer.
Mar’bo’s body was spread across the crystal bed of bottles smashed. Shards of Grey Goose and SoCo only pierced skin. He lifted himself up on his elbows. Vision blurry from the stinging spirits.
A palace of broken glass…
Underburb’s capital offense…
He felt more words rising, but the air left his chest as a large foot planted on the small of his back. Ringed toes gripping the fabric of his speedo as it slid down and off the mounds of his ass. Master-T moaned, “Clean yourself off Mar’Bo, then come up. I know how to unblock what’ve you’ve got.”
The heel of Master-T’s foot ground down on the tip of Mar’Bo’s spine. He bared his teeth as thorns of glass punctured his pecs.
This…is…Underburb
and I’m the capital offense.
Mar’Bo’s heart, a drum kit kicking faster and faster. A melody poured from his body, staining the white carpet. He kept his eyes clamped shut, feeling the rhythm kicking its way through all his veins. Deaf to the sounds of Master-T’s far off chuckle, as he pushed a krumping skeeter into one of the pools.