“I’ll be back Friday. I promise I’ll make it up to you then. Crap… I’ve gotta get back to work. I love you, Lando Cooper.”
“Love you too.”
We disconnected. I bent to grab my knapsack, went lightheaded and nearly fell on my face. I took some deep breaths until the dizziness passed. Then I faced myself in the full length mirror on the door that led to my bathroom.
“Yahweh of the Israelites, you are gettin’ hitched come hell or high water.”
One night, years earlier, I’d gotten drunk and tried to improve my appearance. I lost control of the power and turned myself into an embryonic blue whale. It had taken me two hours to change back, another twenty minutes to repair the floor, and another two weeks to clean up all that afterbirth.
My mortal body was just below average height, thin yet cursed with a jiggly ring of baby fat around my midsection which, at the biological age of twenty-nine, was maddening enough to make me consider re-reincarnating myself with a lower BMI. My hair was my best feature: a decent sized afro that I labored not to maintain on a daily basis. Other than a persistent itching in my nether regions, that was it.
I worked out four days a week in the basement with my father’s old gym equipment: push-ups, sit-ups, “medicine hurls” and other “old school” calisthenics calculated to rupture me when I most expected it. In an attempt to rebuild me into the kind of man of which he could be proud, Herb insisted on murdering me: character building through physical suffering.
I flexed both biceps: string cheese had better tone.
Why not just give yourself a little boost? Just move a few proteins around; bump up your hormonal output. It’s not like anyone’s watching. You could be an Adonis.
“No.”
I was determined to look at the life I had given me as a gift: billions of people in the world had to make do with less.
I took a hit from my inhaler and coughed: recently my “childhood” asthma had set its sights on my adulthood. As the pressure on my chest lessened, my other burden made itself felt.
“Lando Calrissian Darnell Cooper, don’t make me come up there!”
Jesus.
Some people name their offspring after their favorite doctor or beloved religious icon. My mortal father named me with his favorite actor in mind.
“Mister Billy Dee Williams, dammit.”
I can still remember my mortal parents arguing about it only hours after I was Embodied.
“Billy Dee sounds like a pimp’s name, Herbert. Do you really want to name your son after a pimp?”
My father was trying to figure out a way to smoke in a hospital maternity ward. At that time Herb dearly loved smoking. He once claimed he could read the stock market in piles of flicked ashes the way African griots read flung chicken bones.
“Woman, I keep telling you: Billy Dee Williams is the greatest actor of our generation. ‘Billy Dee Cooper.’ It has a special kind of music.”
“It’s music to whip whores by.”
“I defy anyone to watch The Empire Strikes Back and not be emotionally affected.”
“You are not naming any son of mine after a pimp!”
Barbara would look harshly on the Star Wars franchise in later years, but Herb remained a devoted fan of Empire and Return of the Jedi, largely because of Billy Dee Williams’ performance as “Lando Calrissian”. Darnell was my mother’s dead father’s name so that was a no-brainer. Since they both agreed that “Lando Calrissian Darnell” sounded powerful without being too “ghetto”, they settled on all three.
“Lando Calrissian Darnell Cooper.”
I remember wondering, as awareness of my former godhood faded, how much divinity it would take to crawl back up my mother’s fallopian tubes and pretend the whole thing never happened. As the Coopers cooed and snickered at me, I lay there, awash in my own meconium, unable to express the horror unfolding in my postnatal gut. And as my divine candle flickered out, I understood that this was to be only the first step down a long, ugly road with humiliation as my most frequent companion.
“Coming!”
I checked my hair, squeezed a pimple that had teleported onto the end of my nose, picked my afro till I struck sparks, then hurried downstairs.
My agent hated to be kept waiting.
“What took you so long? My pitch meeting’s in less than an hour and if I’m late Corroder will fry my balls for lunch.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled through a mouthful of Granola. “Migraine. I’m pretty sure a vicious pixie took a dump in my head last night.”
“Dude,” Yuri growled. “I’m late and you’re talking about pixies. You plan on growing up anytime soon? Jesus.” He snatched up his Blackberry and sent his thumbs flying over the keypad. “I’m texting Corroder to tell him we’re stuck in traffic.”
“I’ll be ready in ten seconds. Why lie?”
Yuri glared at me with an expression that managed to convey pity and exasperation simultaneously.
“When are you gonna get a haircut? Afros are so 2000.”
“My hair is a political statement.”
“Right: ‘I don’t know how to groom myself. Please kill me.’”
“That’s a little dark.”
“Dude… I’m a cable television executive and I can’t pay my cable bill. ‘Dark’ is what I do.”
Yuriel Kalashnikov was handsome in a California beach bum sort of way; muscular without being obnoxious about it, with dirty-blond hair and electric blue eyes; a young Clint Eastwood armed with a Blackberry instead of a Colt 45. He was born of a handsome Swedish immigrant couple from San Francisco’s “Little Trollhattan” neighborhood: Ulrik and Ingeborg Rolfstaddtsen. Ulrik was an independently wealthy organic beet farmer and yoga instructor. Ingeborg was a vegan animal rights activist/ecoterrorist/singer-songwriter. They met in 1974 during a street festival dedicated to ending the war in Korea despite the fact that it officially ended in 1953. Ulrik, however, had uncovered evidence while astral projecting, that the American Military Industrial Complex was waging a covert, CIA-funded police action in Pyongyang. While attending a seminar on how to empower the little-known but highly-endangered Native American coon rat, Ulrik watched Ingeborg sing the song that would make her a minor national sensation: Coon Rat vs Fat Cat. The song scurried halfway up the Top 40 pop charts before relegating itself to the 99 cent music rack of history. Yuriel Kalasknikov Che Guevara Rolfstaddtsen was born eleven months later. Now, the leftist socialist Yuri, a bisexual yoga devotee who belonged to PETA, Greenpeace, ACTUP, MOVEON.ORG and the NAACP; who was a subscribing member to National Public Radio, The Daily Anarchist and Oprah’s Book Club… Yuri Kalashnikov was the angriest pacifist on Earth.
We’d met one night five years earlier at a comedy club on the North Side. He was there representing a client, a terrible Indian comic with a wooden leg. He’d watched my set and declared himself a fan. He represented me for three months before being offered a job as an assistant to a television development executive. We’d remained friends and occasional collaborators ever since.
“Can we go please? I can’t be late because of you. Again.”
I grabbed my satchel and headed toward the front door.
“Wait one. Goddamn. Minute.”
My mother stepped out of the kitchen. Barbara Cooper was tall, light brown; the “high yellow” to my father’s “milk chocolate”. She was wearing an ultratight, leopard print microdress that might have contained her in the Eighties but had long since given up the fight. She was the kind of “thin” that never translated into “fit”, her breasts as dangly as the udders on an undermilked heifer. For some reason, she’d chosen that morning to show off the network of fine scars from her latest unsuccessful varicose vein removal surgery. She was wearing her favorite pink “chacha heels”, the ones she only broke out when she was trying to seduce one of my friends. She took a drag off her Virgina Slim and French inhaled.
“Aren’t you boys going to compliment a lady on her appearance?”
“Barbara,” I
said. “Why are you dressed that way?”
“I’m on a voyage of self discovery.”
“You hoping to discover the Island of Sad Old Hookers?”
Barbara blew a perfect menthol smoke ring across the living room. “I’m trying to ‘discover’ why you haven’t introduced me to your handsome friend.”
“It’s Yuri, Barbara. You’ve only met him a hundred times.”
“Sarcasm makes you look ignorant, dear.”
“Herb quit smoking, you know. He’s healthier than you are. Doesn’t that fill you with rage?”
Barbara laughed while her eyes checked out Yuri’s package.
“Some of your darker skinned blacks look ridiculous with cigarettes dangling between their big, Ubangi soup coolers, Lando. You know that. Mama can pull it off because I’m one of the sexy people. Right, Yuri?”
Barbara batted her eyes and shook her “junk” in a way that made it nearly impossible to look at her without screaming.
“Yuri… what is that? Polish?”
“No, ma’am. It’s Russian.”
“You mean my boring son is hanging out with a communist? How’s that for a poke in the shitbox?”
“Mother! You’re ‘thinking out loud’ again.”
Barbara shrugged this away. “I’m sorry, Yuri. I’m sure Lando has told you about my condition.”
“Yes, ma’am. It’s not a problem, Barb.”
Barbara giggled. The vodka gust scorched the air between her mouth and my nostrils.
“He’s a winner, Lando. And so handsome...”
Yuri offered up his most rakish smile. “Coming from a looker like you, I’ll take that as high praise, Barbara.”
“…for a big dumb Polack.”
“Barbara!”
“You gentlemen still haven’t commented on my appearance.”
“That’s because you look ridiculous.”
Barbara dropped her cigarette and ground it out on the carpet. Then loosened her straps and winked at me.
“Good.”
“Look out!”
Yuri wrenched the wheel sharply to the left, swerving into the far lane to avoid the elderly man who had just stepped out of his ancient white Cadillac. We’d never even come close to hitting him, but we nearly rear-ended the biker on the Harley stopped at the red light in front of us. We screeched to a halt inches from the Harley’s rear wheel. Yuri overreacted. Of course.
“Will you stop doing that?”
“I wasn’t sure you saw him.”
We were log-jammed in downtown rushhour traffic. In the sweltering heat inside his beloved second generation electric car, Yuri started doing his deep breathing exercises.
“Barbara’s been acting very strange lately.”
“‘Strange’ for your family or ‘strange’ for normal people?”
“What’s wrong with you?”
“Sorry. I’m pitching something to Corroder today and I’m nervous. I think it could be really big.”
“Swell. What is it?”
“I woke up with this idea in the middle of the night. It was so powerful I started developing it right then and there…”
“Here’s my stop. Stop now!”
Yuri jammed on the brakes, throwing me against the dashboard. I bounced. Then I grabbed my backpack and opened the door.
“You up for a movie tonight?” Surabhi’s got to work, and I’ve got two tickets to see Namaste, Brahma Blumberg at the Biolark.”
“I hate when you do that.”
“What?”
“Ask me what I’m up to and then change the subject before I can answer. Besides being the worst backseat driver on Earth, you’re also incredibly self-centered.”
“No I’m not.”
“You make everything about you.”
Yuri shrugged, and lit a cigarette from the box he’d recently begun keeping in his glove compartment. “Sometimes it’s hard to be your friend. I’m just sayin’.”
“Hurtful. Come on, hang out with me tonight.”
“Negative. Corroder and I have a dinner meeting with the Vice President of Comedy Development at Fox. He’s in Chicago looking to scare up some talent.”
“OK, meanwhile, I’ve got the gig at Coconut Jose’s on Thursday; a proposal dinner to plan for Friday night; and my parents are about to kill each other and take a Korean callgirl with them.”
“You’re gonna kill at Coconut Jose’s. This is going to be a big gig for you. I can feel it.” Yuri glanced at his Greenpeace Whale Watch. “Damn. I gotta jet. You want me to pick you up Thursday night?”
“No thanks. I finally got a monthly bus pass. You’re a carpool-free agent, my friend.”
“Bus pass? One of these days you’ll work up the balls to actually drive a car.”
“I prefer public transportation. Why add to the black cloud of toxins already hanging over our fair city?”
“Dude,” Yuri sneered through the passenger’s window. “When the Hell are you going to stop fooling yourself?”
CHAPTER III
THE ELEPHANT WAS DOUBLE BOOKED
“Livin’ on borrowed time.”
(Response to the question, “What are you doing?”)
God’s Twitter Page
In the twenty years he’d owned and operated Cooper & Sons Auto Supply, Herb Cooper had skydived on camera while playing an accordion, and waterskied across the Chicago River towed by a speedboat covered with tastefully nude pictures of himself. Once, he attempted to ride a bull in front of a screaming crowd during a rodeo at the United Center. He’d actually stayed on for four seconds before the bull, a bovine killing machine named Assassin, bucked him off and nearly trampled him to death while he screamed at the camera crew to “…keep rolling! No matter what!” The bull hurled Herb over the retaining fence. He landed in the lap of the Governor of Illinois.
From his hospital bed Herb convinced local stations to run the footage the next day, complete with a sped up rendition of Dueling Banjos playing underneath. The stunt cost him a broken leg, three cracked ribs and a concussion… and made Cooper & Sons a household name. This was back in the early Eighties, before cable made local broadcasting a thing of the past. New York had its Crazy Eddie. LA had its Carl Worthington. And Chicago had Herb Cooper.
When I walked into Cooper & Sons Westside Auto Supply on Monday morning, my father was humping an ostrich. Someone had affixed a saddle to the ostrich’s back, and Herb, who was wearing a white cowboy outfit complete with tengallon hat, chaps and spurs, was attempting to mount it. The ostrich had other ideas. Herb grabbed the bird’s long neck and tried to throw one leg over it. The ostrich stepped lightly to its right, pivoted, and flipped Herb over its back.
“Ow! Goddammit!”
I fought back a wave of wooziness and silently counted to ten. I still struggled with the compulsion to damn things when people demanded it. If I hadn’t curtailed the practice at some point during the Civil War, the whole country would have been damned before the Battle of Bull Run.
Chick Flaunt, Herb’s second in command and co-star, sprang out of the aisle between GPS Options and Satellite Radios.
“Come on, Herbie! Get your bony butt up and tank that bird sonofabitch!”
Flaunt, a smallish barrel of a man, was wearing his “Old Elvis” costume: white spandex unitard with sequined armpit wings, oversized sunglasses, elevator shoes and plasticene black pompadour. The shiny hairpiece sat slightly askew atop Flaunt’s actual hairpiece. As the camera crew dodged around them, Flaunt herded the ostrich toward Herb. Herb was on his hands and knees gasping for air.
“Herbie! Heads up!”
While long on personality, Herb was a deceptively small man. On a heavy day, after a weighty meal and a stroll through a pounding rainstorm, he topped the scale at a buck fifty. His balding pate shone through the thin spots in his dyed black hair, which he wore long, combed backward and slicked down to within an inch of its life. During his more frenetic commercials his hair would spring up around his head, the long comb-over
bouncing furiously; a demented Cab Calloway in cowboy chaps. In another life he might have been one of the godfathers of rock & roll; a contemporary of Chuck Berry or Fats Domino. In this life, he was the lunatic who wrestled live anacondas on late night cable access.
“Herbie! We’re burnin’ daylight!”
Herb hopped to his feet and advanced, lunged, grabbed again for the ostrich’s neck while trying to sling his leg over the saddle. The ostrich swung itself around, dragging Herb along, and whipped him across the room. Herb slammed into the vending machine and shattered the glass front, sprawling among the chocolaty treasures inside.
Flaunt threw an improvised “lasso” (an orange outdoor extension cord from the service center) over the ostrich’s head. The ostrich chest butted him into the magazine rack. Issues of Autotrader flapped skyward.
“Hey!” I shouted. “Guys, wait!”
But both men leaped to their feet, Herb bleeding now from a shallow cut across his forehead.
“Flank him, Chick!”
“Yeah! Just like the ’Cong in the Ashau Valley! July 10th, 1969!”
Herb circled around behind the ostrich, who was rooting through a bucket of Puppy Chow. Flaunt countered, ducking and weaving like the referee of a crackhead kickfight.
“That’s right, Herbie Boy! I’ll get him on his blind side!”
They’d reconnected at a Republican VietNam veteran’s reunion/gambling boat trip up the Mississippi River in 1982. After bonding over tales of their heroic exploits (which included dawn patrols in a Honolulu whorehouse), Herb invited Flaunt to help him run Cooper & Sons Automotive International LLC. They’d been best friends and conjoined pains in my posterior ever since.
“Flank him, Herbie! Flank his black ass good!”
Despite what some fundamentalists claim, I didn’t hate anyone. When you’ve seen the ugly scars that mar the majority of mortal souls one is much the same as any other. But Chick Flaunt could rupture the patience of Job. My Old Testament Self would have gleefully burned him alive just to resurrect him and feed him to starving bears.
“That’s it, Herbie! Now coldcock the bastard!”
Last God Standing Page 3