by Ed Kurtz
"But why did he go over me anyway?"
"Shit, I dunno. It's fucked up, though. Stealing Verx's name. I grew up with him. I had some of the best experiences of my life, some of the moments that made me the man I am with him. Verx. And this kid stealing his name."
"How'd you find him anyway?"
"Started searching around online after I saw that someone was writing Verx. These fucking kids nowadays, they put all their shit online, should know better. So I hit up one of his friends and this so-called friend of his sells him out to me for a sketch in his blackbook."
"But aren't his parents going to be home?" I asked as we got out of the car.
"Nah, that's part of what I got out of this kid's friend. The little shit's home alone tonight. I get first punch, Verx was my fuckin boy. He's yours after that."
No one was around. We walked up and rang the doorbell, casual as that. This kid opened the door. He's really skinny, a big white t-shirt hanging off him, baby-faced with curly hair, he reminded me of a boy whose Bar Mitzvah I got kicked out of back in middle school. I saw him looking at us kind of confused and maybe a little worried, but trying not to show that last part. Neither of us tough-looking enough to actually make him scared. He opened his mouth to ask us what we wanted, and DGAF just decked him straight out.
The kid goes tumbling down over backwards and DGAF stepped calmly through the door, motioning me to come with him. The kid's down on the floor, hunched over grabbing his face, and then he looks up expecting another punch maybe. I could see a big bloody nose starting to run down his face and he's trying, trying so hard not to cry. All that pent-up anger I had towards him, the fantasies of making someone hurt for taking my spot, all that was gone when I saw him there as a small kid forcing himself to be brave.
"You know what? I want my bat. I'm gonna go back to the car for it. Like I said, he's yours until I get back," DGAF said to me before turning to the kid and adding, "You need to learn some fucking history before shitting all over the streets."
I just stood there and looked at the kid while DGAF went back to the car. I couldn't think of anything to say to him. The kid seemed confused that I wasn't hitting him.
"Why?" he finally asked me, "what did I do wrong? Why are you guys going to beat me up?"
"Your name," I said, "Verx. He used to be a writer here. He died back when you were little. Why did you go over me?"
"What?"
"The water tower. Chinatown. Why'd you go over me?"
"The stuff on there was mad old and faded. I thought it would be okay because it was so old. I didn't know. Is that what this is all about?"
"Not really. Verx was friends with DGAF, he's the one who punched you in the face."
This was about when DGAF walked back in carrying a titanium baseball bat, closing the door behind him.
"You're DGAF?" the kid asked him, "you're my favorite writer. I see your shit everywhere, and…and that fucking throw…oh man. If you're gonna beat me up could you at least give me a sticker or something so people know it was really you?"
"What the fuck is wrong with toys nowadays?" DGAF asked. "No I'm not gonna give you a fucking slaptag. I'm gonna break your legs."
That's when the bravery broke. The kid started crying. Not loudly, not making any noise at all actually, but I could see the tears come out of his eyes and outrace the blood from his nose down to the chin.
"Look," I said, "he's not worth it. He just did it to impress you. The Verx thing. He saw old pics on the internet and thought that you'd appreciate it if he threw up Verx's name around his hood and crossed out my shit with it. Like you'd want to take him out bombing if you knew that he'd continued your boy's name."
"Is this fucking true?" DGAF asked him while gesturing with the bat.
The kid just looked back up at him, still sitting down on the floor. Come on kid, I thought, don't be stupid. Don't fuck this up.
"I'm sorry," the kid moaned.
DGAF apparently took this as confirmation of what I said. If anything his glare toward the kid got even colder.
"He's right," he said, "you're not fucking worth it. You think you were paying tribute? You're nowhere near what he is. Imagine your mom died and then one day you come home and there's someone else dressed as your mom, living in your house, telling you she loves you, all that shit. That's you right now. You're that other person. You have no idea what he meant to me. You stop writing. Period. Not 'stop writing Verx.' Stop writing graff altogether. I found you out here, I'll find out if you write any other names. This shit's over. Enjoy the rest of your life."
We walked out of the house, DGAF casually carrying the baseball bat on his shoulder before popping it in the trunk. We pulled out and started driving back through the residential neighborhood.
"You know," DGAF said as he rounded a corner, "I'm at the top of the heap right now. I never been more famous. No other time in my life have I been this known. But I feel like all the best shit is behind me. The good shit in my life. I can crush shit out so much now because I have nothing else left, nothing more to lose, naw mean? Graff's like a fucking game you never win. There's no endpoint. And all these toys so ignorant of the shit that's so real to me. Shit. New York's changed since I started writing. I got my name up more now than anytime before and it still doesn't feel like my city at all anymore."
I didn't say anything, I just checked my phone and saw that there still weren't any messages from Nadia. At least now when I got home I'd be able to say that it was over. Because I've realized that it was never really our city. Writing our names on it was a nice way to feel like the city belonged to us. But it was an illusion. It was never ours. It was never anyone's. We change regardless of the city, and the city changes regardless of us. So we drove on silently through other people's streets, feeling the time pass us inevitably by.
AUTHOR BIOS
S.A. COSBY didn't send me a bio, so let's just say he attended the Vinnie Boombatz school of dentistry, where he studied creative writing. He once beat Bruce Lee to a parking space.
AARON FOX-LERNER currently lives in Beijing. He used to write his name on walls, but now he just writes stories on a computer. His writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, Thuglit, Newfound, and other publications.
ED KURTZ is the author of A Wind Of Knives and the forthcoming crime novels The Forty-Two and Angel of the Abyss. His short fiction has appeared in Thuglit, Needle, Shotgun Honey, Beat to a Pulp, and numerous anthologies. He lives in Texas where he is at work on his next project. Visit Ed online at www.edkurtz.net.
EDWARD HAGELSTEIN continues to spew out ugly, immoral fiction from a damp abandoned fallout shelter in Florida, where he lives an otherwise average life.
TERRENCE MCCAULEY is an award-winning writer of crime fiction. His latest novel, Slow Burn is currently available from Noir Nation Books. His first book, Prohibition, published by Airship 27, is a full-length novel set in the colorful, exciting world of 1930 New York City. Quinn's boxing career is also featured in a prequel—Fight Card: Against the Ropes—published by Fight Card Books. Terrence has had short stories featured in Thuglit, Action: Pulse Pounding Tales Vol. 1 and 2, Atomic Noir and Big Pulp among other places. He recently compiled Grand Central Noir, an anthology where 100% of the proceeds go directly to a non-profit called God's Love We Deliver. A proud native of The Bronx, NY, he is currently working on his next work of fiction.
MARK MELLON is a novelist who supports his family by working as an attorney. Recent short crime fiction pieces of his have appeared in Noir Nation, Criminal Class Review, and Midwestern Literary Magazine. A Western, The Pirooters, was published by Treble Heart Books (now defunct). His steampunk/alternate history novel, Napoleon Concerto, was also published by Treble Heart Books. His fantasy novella, Escape From Byzantium, won the 2010 Independent Publisher Silver Medal for fantasy/science fiction. Most recently, Roman Hell, a horror novel, has been published by Amber Quill Press—www.amberquill.com. His writing website is at www.mellonwritesagain.com.
ERYK PRUITT is a screenwriter, author and filmmaker living in Durham, NC with his wife Lana and cat Busey. His short film FOODIE has won several awards at film festivals across the US. His fiction has appeared in Mad Scientist Journal, The Avalon Literary Review, Speculative Edge and Pantheon Magazine, to name a few. A full list of his credits can be found at erykpruitt.com.
TODD ROBINSON (Editor) is the creator and Chief Editor of Thuglit. His writing has appeared in Blood & Tacos, Plots With Guns, Needle Magazine, Shotgun Honey, Strange, Weird, and Wonderful, Out of the Gutter, Pulp Pusher, Grift, Demolition Magazine, CrimeFactory, All Due Respect, and several anthologies. He has been nominated three times for the Derringer Award, short-listed for Best American Mystery Stories, selected for Writers Digest's Year's Best Writing 2003, lost the Anthony Award in 2013, won the inaugural Bullet Award in June 2011. The first collection of his short stories, Dirty Words is now available and his debut novel The Hard Bounce is available from Tyrus Books.
ALLISON GLASGOW (Editor) was the only woman to achieve placement on the Spike's Hot Dogs (Fall River MA, now sadly defunct) Wall of Fame.
JULIE MCCARRON (Editor) is a celebrity ghostwriter with three New York Times bestsellers to her credit. Her books have appeared on every major entertainment and television talk show; they have been featured in Publishers Weekly and excerpted in numerous magazines including People. Prior to collaborating on celebrity bios, Julie was a book editor for many years. Julie started her career writing press releases and worked in the motion picture publicity department of Paramount Pictures and for Chasen & Company in Los Angeles. She also worked at General Publishing Group in Santa Monica and for the Dijkstra Literary Agency in Del Mar before turning to editing/writing full-time. She lives in Southern California.
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Table of Contents
A Message from Big Daddy Thug
Houston
Walk Up
Our Lady of Mercy
Death Of A One-Percenter
Nothing You Can Do
For Whom No Bells Toll
The Rat and the Cobra
Traces of a Name
Author Bios
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