by Bill Parsons
“You got anything?” Pickin’ Pete asked, looking back at Bill the Pill as they got under way. Bill the Pill’s head was leaned back against the seat, eyes closed. Pickin’ Pete noticed a thick sheen of sweat across Bill the Pill’s forehead, while a few beads streaked clean down dirty cheeks. His blue t-shirt was soaked through, and the few blond strands that curled out from under a black baseball cap dripped sweat. And he was dirty, as though he had been crawling under and through brush. Pickin Pete was used to seeing him in this condition, for this was the way he looked every time he emerged from the woods after making dope. He reminded Pickin Pete of a wild boar who had been out in the woods rutting wildly. This was merely one of the many manifestations of feeding the monster that inhabited Bill the Pill’s psyche. It seemed every time Bill the Pill went out to make dope at some point he did a geeker shot and became stuck for hours in a paralysis of paranoia, indecision and distraction.
Without opening his eyes Bill the Pill said, “Yeah. Give me a smoke.” Pickin’ Pete lighted a cigarette and handed it back to Bill the Pill, who opened his eyes just long enough to accept the cigarette. “What’s that smell? It smells like something dead,” He added after puffing a few times on his cigarette.
“Sarah’s arm. It’s bad, man,” Pickin’ Pete said.
“Open the window or something. That’s terrible,” Bill the Pill said. All the windows opened simultaneously, admitting a sudden rush of warm, humid air.
“Are you going to ride to the hospital with us?” Stringy Sarah asked over the rushing wind.
“No, chick, sorry. I need to get home and take care of something,” Bill the Pill answered as the car turned left onto a short stretch of road that ran along the river for about three miles. They rode through a dense fog at about thirty while the odor off the river, fishy and damp, blew in on the wind, replacing the putrid stench of Stringy Sarah’s rotting abscess.
“She needs to go now,” Pickin Pete said.
“She’ll just have to wait, man. I have to go home,” Bill the Pill insisted. “You’re straight with that, ain’t you, sis? I really need to get to the house. Thirty extra minutes. Your arm’s not going to fall off in the next thirty minutes, surely,” Bill the Pill jested.
“Of course not,” Stringy Sarah said. Then, at Pickin’ Pete’s Worried look, she added, “Don’t worry, Pete. I’ll be okay. This way you can do a big shot of dope when we get to the house.” Stringy Sarah, herself, rarely did meth, said it made her very unstable and without control of certain of her biological impulses.
“Alright, then, head to the house,” Pickin pete reluctantly agreed, glaring back at Bill the Pill, who seemed to be sleeping. However, the half burned cigarette between Bill the Pill’s fingers belied the fact, especially after he brought it to his mouth and drew. Afterward he flicked the butt out the window and remained with his eyes closed.
They rode without speaking, wipers timed at intermittent, pushing slowly through a thick, misty fog. A Hendrix CD played--Pickin Pete was a child of the sixties and seventies--Crosstown Traffic, Wind Cries Mary, or something. Pickin’ Pete wasn’t really listening. His mind was on the big ol’ shot of dope he was about to do.
At the end of the road, instead of turning left--the way to the hospital--after stopping at the stop sign, Stringy Sarah turned right and headed toward Pickin” Pete’s place. Here, the fog thinned dramatically, and no sooner had she begun to pick up a little speed, strobing blue lights suddenly appeared behind them, along with one lone wail of a siren.
Cops!
“Oh, God, Sarah, you’re not supposed to be driving. Switch with me,” Pickin, Pete said, panic stricken. Stringy Sarah got the car pulled over and they were able to switch places, she contorting her body and climbing over seats like a little monkey, crying out in pain every time she bumped her wretched, rotting arm.
After they switched Bill the Pill said, “I’m going to jail, Pete. I’ve got a parole violation. I cheeked the dope, so listen--if there’s anything else in the car, it’s mine. You got that? Mine.”
“There ain’t nothing in the car,” Pickin’ Pete asserted. “Is there?”
Pickin’ Pete’s question was met with silence.
The cop--tall, lanky, mid-thirties--strolled up to the driver’s side window, flashlight in one hand shining brightly, the other hand resting lightly on the butt of his revolver. “Please turn off your lights, sir,” the cop commanded.
Pickin’ Pete complied and the cop continued, “Driver’s license and registration.” As Pickin’ Pete reached for his license and Stringy Sarah the registration and proof of insurance from the glove box, the cop added, “Ma’am, I need to see your license, too. I saw you driving.”
“No way. You didn’t see me driving,” Stringy Sarah protested, but the cop cut her short like the thwack of a guillotine blade.
“Ma’am, don’t insult me by lying. You’re in enough trouble. I saw you two switch. The best thing you can do is stop talking and comply with my orders.”
“I don’t have a license, sir,” a now compliant Stringy Sarah admitted.
“I didn’t think so.”
After the cop received Pickin Pete’s information he shined his light through the interior of the car. “Bill McPherson,” the cop announced. “Been awhile since I’ve seen you.”
“Hey, Fleenor, what’s up?” Bill the Pill answered, resignation thick in his voice, as though he was about to lose everything in the world that mattered to him.
“What you got back there with you,” Fleenor asked, “A math lab?”
“Why, no. Who’d be stupid enough to ride around with a meth lab in the car?”
Of course Bill the Pill would be that stupid guy, because later, after the cop had pulled them from the car; and Pickin’ Pete had eventually given the cops permission to search his car--“He was gonna take it, Bill”--Bill the Pill shouted out as Fleenor and his newly arrived backup was about to begin their search, “There’s a meth lab in the back floorboard and it’s mine.”
Pickin’ Pete looked at Bill the Pill in wide eyed wonder. “What? How did you get a meth lab in my car without me seeing you?”
So the cops took the three of them to jail. “Why you taking me to jail?” Pickin’ Pete asked from the back of Fleenor’s cruiser. “Bill told you it was his lab.”
“Not my call, Mr Cantrell,” Fleenor explained. “Meth task force said take all of you to jail. You’re being charged with initiation and conspiracy. But because McPherson took his charge I’m not seizing your vehicle. It will be in the county impound.”
*****
Pickin’ Pete sat in the county jail for two of the most miserable weeks of his fifty-seven years of existence and kicked pills cold turkey. The pain and sweating was horrible, the stomach cramps and diarrhea tortuous. He could sleep only in short snatches, and his every thought was obsessive: pills, pills, pills. Even during his short naps he dreamed of pills--big ones, small ones--and of needles. In his dreams--nightmares, really--he would shoot, feel nothing and get so frustrated, over and over, every time he went to sleep. And they gave him nothing, save what they called “opiate protocol,” an ibuprofen, along with an anti-nausea, twice daily. It helped not one bit as far as he could tell, except to allow him to sleep a little more soundly for an hour or so and have more nightmares. Pickin’ Pete hated this and could hardly wait to get out of jail to do a pill--remember, smart was in short supply in Pickin’ Pete’s life. Always had been, pre and post wreck.
Then came court day, Pickin’ Pete’s preliminary hearing. By this time Pickin’ Pete had pretty much recovered physically: no more body aches and pains, chills and sweats. Had begun even eating these past few days. Mentally, however, every thought seemed to center on his desire--no, compelling need--to get high. He fantasized about getting high, told and listened to stories about getting high and thought about getting high obsessively. Still, this entire experience had traumatized Pickin’ Pete. Although he was mostly unconscious of it, little thought snippets like stray
bubbles rising up through a thick bog had begun breaking through and surfacing in his mind. These snippets manifested themselves more as feelings rather than cognizant ideas. Pickin’ Pete felt regret, remorse, even anger. And then, when he learned why Stringy Sarah wasn’t in court today, that she was in the hospital recovering from the amputation of her arm, he felt an extreme sorrow. Stringy Sarah was his friend, had been for years, and now she had no arm. At least in the hospital she was high. He was sure of that. So high she wasn’t thinking about her arm. That was his hope anyway.
Then one of the thought snippets broke through the bog without dissipating into a feeling. It emerged as a complete thought, whole and articulated: this game was beginning to become dangerous.
Oh well. It was what it was. Nature of the beast and all that. Nevertheless, he wished he had a pill.
Still--his friend, arm gone, so sad.
Pickin’ Pete was dejected.
During Pickin’ Pete’s hearing Bill the Pill took the stand in Pickin’ Pete’s defense, testifying that neither Pickin’ Pete, nor Stringy Sarah, had been aware a meth lab had been in the vehicle, that he had slipped it into the car while they had been talking to his mother. Consequently, all charges against Pickin’ Pete--and Stringy Sarah--were dropped, and by four ocklock that evening Pickin’ Pete was sitting in the passenger’s seat of his father’s car, being driven to the county impound to pick up his car.
“Son,” Began Pickin’ Pete’s father, who was eighty-two years old and spoke in a rasping, gravelly voice. “I’ve got some bad news for you. That mean old landlady of yours took out an eviction notice against you. She said she was tired of all the druggies in and out of your place all the time. And the police. She called you and your friends a menace to the good people who live in her trailer park.”
Good? Had that woman lost her mind? Just about everyone who lived there were pill heads, or on one type of drug or another.
“So I sold your trailer, had your stuff put in storage and rented you an apartment in east Maple Ridge,” Pickin’ Pete’s father finished.
“You sold my trailer?” Pickin’ Pete exclaimed. This action had been within Pickin’ Pete’s father’s legal right as Pickin’ Pete’s guardian. The courts had ruled Pickin’ Pete legally incompetent years ago.
“Yes, son, to your landlady for five grand.”
“You sold my trailer with the large, covered front deck, gas grill and tall shade trees to that mean ol’ witch?” Pickin’ Pete was in shock, for he didn’t like his landlady one bit. She had been pestering to get rid of Pickin’ Pete for years. Now she had accomplished that goal and, therefore, won. Not only had she succeeded in getting rid of him, but she had ended up with his trailer.
Suddenly more feelings arose, anger and resentment, followed closely by a thought bubble: first he went to jail; then his friend lost an arm to a missed shot; then he lost the most favorite place he had ever lived because his landlady hated druggies. It was enough to make a man want a pill. Still, he was seriously considering changing those he called friend. And Bill the Pill would be first in line.
Oh, that was so close, but no cigar. He just missed the rake. However, next year around this time, he would step right on it.
*****
Pickin’ Pete adjusted fairly well to his new living arrangements. The apartment was small, two-bedroom, located in a brick building with five other apartments. It was nice, central air and heat, a modern kitchen and roomy living room. Cable and internet was included. He resumed his doctor visits and within two weeks was as strung out as he was before, except he had done no meth. He had taken seriously the thought bubble that sludged up through the muck of his mind and broken the surface that day in his father’s car. He changed his friends. In fact he now had no ftiends--and so no one from which to buy meth--except Stringy Sarah, and she didn’t do meth. Nor did she know where to get it.
Pickin’ Pete loved Stringy Sarah and could never turn her away, even though she had lied to him in the past, stolen his pills on several occasions--and money once--and talked incessantly about nothing when high on pills. Losing her arm didn’t change much: she still did pills, pilfered his when she could--which was a little more difficult now that she had only one hand to work with--chirped on and on about nothing, and lied, although he was unable to catch her at it. It wasn’t because she was glib--she was--or exceptionally gifted--she wasn’t--but he was dumb, and forgetful, and burdened with a brain that found connecting A-to-B very difficult. The only discernible changes were that she could no longer hit herself--Pickin Pete now did that for her, which meant no more misses and, therefore, no more abscesses--and she hardly ever went out in public anymore. She seemed to have lost the desire to interact with people, other than Pickin’ Pete. Oh, and she no longer traded sexual favors for pills. Pickin’ Pete reckoned there just wasn’t much demand for a one-armed prostitute. Her gumption, what little of it there had been, now seemed to have petered out.
Then one hot sultry day, a year after the day Pickin’ Pete had gotten out of jail, there came a knock at his apartment door. He hadn’t been expecting anybody, and couldn’t think of whom it might be. Perhaps it was one of his neighbors, wanting to bum a pill until doctor day. Several of them were prescribed pills and they helped each other out in times of need.
But it wasn’t one of his neighbors. It was the cops with a warrant for his arrest for initiation and conspiracy, the same charges that had been dismissed a year ago. He tried to explain this to the cops, to no avail.
“Sir, you have been indicted by the Henderson county grand jury,” they told Pickin’ Pete at the county jail. Then they handed him a document that listed his charges and bond--twenty-five-thousand dollars.
How could this be? They dismissed this charge. Yet here it was. They had brought it before the grand jury and indicted him. Perfectly legal, according to everyone he mentioned it to.
It may have been legal, but it sure didn’t seem fair.
So Pickin’ Pete again went through two weeks of torture: chills, sweats, aches and pains, diarrhea, nausea and nightmares. Then it took another two months to convince his father to go his bond, that he wasn’t in jail as a result of new charges, that these were the same charges that had been dismissed a year ago.
“They can’t do that, son,” Pickin’ Pete’s father said.
“They can, too,” Pickin’ Pete said and gave his father his lawyer’s number.
Meanwhile, as Pickin’ Pete waited for his father to speak with his lawyer and eventually make his bond, he ran into Bill the Pill, whom had been in jail since that night. Pickin’ Pete hardly recognized the man. He was astounded at the transformation. Before, Bill the Pill had been thin. Now he was huge, muscular, with thick, beefy arms.
“How’d you get so big?” Pickin Pete asked.
“I eat now, buddy, and do pushups,” Bill the Pill replied.
“What did they do to you?”
A frown replaced Bill the Pill’s smile. “Ten years to serve,” Bill the Pill answered.
“Are you going to testify for me?”
“Of course I am, Pete. Go to trial. I’ll be there for you, buddy,” Bill the Pill said, clapping Pickin’ Pete on a thin shoulder. “Don’t take anything. We can win this.”
Pickin’ Pete looked sad. “I’m sorry you got so much time, Bill.”
“Don’t sweat it Pete. I’ll be alright. This time has made me do a lot of thinking, man. I’m through with it. I’ll be forty by the time I get out. I’d like to have a life, kids, wife, start a family, do what’s right. You know?”
“You mean quit getting high?”
“Yeah, man. I’m over it.”
Pickin’ Pete laughed derisively. “Yeah, right. I know you Bill. You’re Bill the Pill. Never quit, never will. If I had a pill right now you’d do it.”
“No, little buddy, I wouldn’t. I’m serious. Been studying the bible, programming, changing my outlook, all that. I want a life, man, one not centered on getting high,” Bill the Pill ex
plained.
“C’mon, McPherson, time to go,” a jail guard said to Bill the Pill as he approached. They were in a hall and Pickin Pete was on his way to court, stalled, waiting for other court goers to emerge from a unit. Bill the Pill had stopped on his way to his jail job when he had spotted Pickin’ Pete.
“Love you, Pete. Don’t take anything they offer. We got this beat. See ya,” Bill the Pill said, scurrying off.
Pickin Pete watched Bill the Pill go, wonder in his gaze. And then, as Bill the Pill disappeared from sight, Pickin’ Pete got to wondering if perhaps Bill the Pill didn’t have something there, which was exactly when the rake reached up and smacked him
THE END
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