Until the Last Dog Dies

by Robert Guffey

  A long silence followed as we passed a diner on Pier Avenue that looked as if it had been picked up by a UFO in the 1950s and set down here in the middle of 2014. Next door was a funky used bookstore. During the day one could usually pass by the windows and see a black cat lounging in a sunbeam atop a stack of books, the color of the dust jackets being leached away by the sun. At the moment all the lights were out and there was a sign that read CLOSED hanging in the door. We stopped anyway to look at the books in the window. I was perusing the cover of an oversized collection of M.C. Escher drawings when I said, “You know, I think I’ve finally discovered someone who has more of an overactive imagination than I do.”

  “Say what you want. All I know is that the doctors wanted to study me, to show me off to their colleagues like a freak, but there was no way in hell I was going to let myself be turned into a living trophy for a group of fucking men all over again, not after I—” She stopped herself before she could say more. She turned away from the window and continued walking westward, toward the pier. I followed her.

  She said, “I left that hospital as fast as possible. I swore I’d never enter such a sterile place again. I mean, think about it, if hospitals are so fucking great how come people are always dying in them?”

  I have to admit I never looked at it that way before. Esthra seemed so distraught, so serious, that I began to believe her unbelievable tale. If she was lying she was one of the best actresses I’d ever seen. But what reason would she have to lie?

  We crossed the street, passed the elegant 1920s Art Deco building that once housed the eclectic Bijou Theater where I remember seeing City of Lost Children when I was eleven years old (it’s now a branch of the Chase National Bank, alas), a coffee shop where I could hear a woman playing acoustic versions of Janis Joplin tunes, and a series of quaint oceanside cafes. We strolled down the pier and paused only when we could go no farther without drowning. We leaned over the railing and stared down into the night-black waters. The moon wasn’t visible. The night was so black you couldn’t tell where the ocean ended and the sky began; it was as if an infinite dark void lay out beyond the beach.

  I said, “When did you first find out that you had the disease?”

  Esthra sighed. “Oh, about six months after I met Mike and joined his band. That was the best six months of my life. Then everything turned to crap.”

  “How’d you hook up with him?”

  “Now there’s a story. I met Mike in San Francisco. He’d been singing in another band called Lavender Brain Tumor. He has a knack for horrible band names. Anyway, I came to the show to avoid going home to another beating. I was living with a guy named Daniel at the time. No one called him Daniel, though—not if you wanted to stay alive. He liked to be called

  D. He was pimping me out to raise money for our heroin habit. I went along with it because I thought I loved him.” Though I was slightly shocked she was telling me all this, I found her total lack of self-consciousness refreshing. “Go ahead, feel free to call me stupid, everybody else does.”

  “I don’t think you’re stupid.”

  “Well, you’re in a minority. But maybe you’re right. Maybe I was just temporarily insane. So, like I was saying, I went to the show just to have a place to hang out. I saw Mike up there on stage, lookin’ so fine with all his tattoos. He was in much better shape back then. He was well-cut and had these huge arms that looked like they could just scoop you up, wrap around you, protect you from the rest of the world. I went backstage specifically to talk to him, though I hate doing such stupid little groupie things. I hate feeding the egos of attention-starved rock gods. But somehow I thought Mike was different. I think it was his lyrics, and the way he carried himself on stage. He didn’t dance around like a monkey on speed, he was very reserved, almost shy. It was so refreshing, so different from what you usually see in places like that.”

  She sighed again, grabbed a pile of pebbles off the planks of wood, then began tossing them into the sea one by one. Her red lips arced into a wistful smile. “We were only talking to each other for a little while when I happened to mention that I’d played guitar a little bit as a kid. Right then and there he asked me to play in the very next set to replace the original guitarist who’d fallen face down on stage in a drunken stupor only a few minutes before. I told him I hadn’t played in years, but he said, ‘Don’t worry about it. Just make as much noise as possible and no one will notice.’ It was good advice. I still follow it to this day. After the show he asked me to play at their next gig up north after they decided to abandon the original guitarist in Golden Gate Park. I didn’t even pick up my things from D.’s apartment, I just took off.

  “Six months later I came down with the disease. In a weird bit of synchronicity we met Ogo and Jesse that same week. When we realized what we all had in common we decided to dissolve Lavender Brain Tumor (by that point we were ready to kill the drummer and the bass player anyway) and formed Doktor Delgado’s All-American Genocidal Warfare Against The Sick And The Stupid. That name was Mike’s idea too.”

  “What the hell does it mean?”

  “The name Delgado comes from José Delgado. He was a mad scientist who moved from Spain to research electrical stimulation of the brain at Yale University. Most of his research went to the military, or so Mike says. Delgado wrote a book called Physical Control of the Mind. You might want to check it out, just for the hell of it.”

  “Mike’s really into conspiracies, isn’t he?”

  She tossed the last pebble into the ocean, then shrugged. “Yeah. Some of the conspiracies are imaginary, some of them aren’t. Just like everything else.”

  “He’s really paranoid about you.”

  The smile left her face. She stared up at the stars and said, “I’m a man-killer. I don’t know why, I just am. I don’t think I’m the most attractive woman in the world. I can be in the worst shape and men are still falling all over me. When I was in the hospital kicking heroin the doctors had me on all this weirdass medication that made me gain forty pounds. Yeah, hard to believe, isn’t it? My belly was hanging over my belt as if it were trying to run away. Not only that, acne broke out all along my forehead right here. Looked like someone had tattooed the Milky Way on my skin. Not to mention the track marks on my ass, but we needn’t go into that. Anyway, even in this sorry condition guys still seemed to be attracted to me. Hell, more than attracted—obsessed. This one guy I know named Zack (short for Prozac), who I met when I was locked up in this mental ward, wouldn’t leave me alone after I kicked my drug habit and realized he was a fuckin’ shithead. He even burned all my clothes when I told him I didn’t love him anymore, as if I ever did. He asked me to marry him every fuckin’ day and wouldn’t stop calling.”

  “Guys get attached very easily. They’re screwy that way.”

  “I think it’s more than that. Even if I’m dressed like a slob and walking down the street without any make-up on guys still come onto me. I’ve developed a theory.” She held up her index finger like a college professor, then coughed into her fist. “My theory is this: My body gives off some weird-ass pheromones that attract men to me no matter what. I could be wearing a potato sack or a barrel, I could be three feet tall with a harelip and a hole in the middle of my fuckin’ forehead and it wouldn’t make a difference. Penises would still be slithering down the sidewalk after me like snakes. What the hell is it with penises? They’re such funny looking things too. I always thought they looked like roosters, roosters without legs.”

  I know it may sound cockeyed, but I wanted to say I loved her right then and there. Guys get attached very easily. They’re screwy that way.

  We talked for a long time out on that pier. There were more than a few times when I felt like leaning over and kissing her, but I didn’t think she wanted that, despite what that schmuck Eddie had said. Besides, it felt nice just listening to her, talking to her. I had never talked to anyone as openly as I had with Esthra, except perhaps for Heather. Even with Heather it had taken me mon
ths to get past the joking phase with her, while with Esthra it had taken me only a few hours. I thought it might be kind of nice to have a girl who was just a friend. I was usually too busy trying to con girls out of their pants to ever allow such a relationship to develop. In the back of my mind I wondered how many potential friendships I’d passed up on because of my single-mindedness; of course, I was also wondering what Esthra would look like naked. I’m sorry, I can’t be reformed in a couple of hours.

  Once our little talk began to wind down Esthra suggested we return to the party. “Before Mike comes out looking for me,” she added. Since I knew such a scenario could only end with me being dumped in the drink, I followed her advice. On the way there I suggested we enter through the back so as not to draw attention to ourselves.

  “That’ll look like we’re trying to hide something,” she said, horrified. “I’m not slinking around like some filthy whore. I’m walking right through the front door.”

  What could I do except go along with her and pray she knew what she was doing? We walked through the front door to find Mike still at the center of attention. In fact, he had about a dozen pretty young groupies circled around him on their knees. They gazed up at him with lovey-dovey moon-eyes as he said, “Here’s a new little ditty I’ve been playing around with. It’s not quite finished, but … well, tell me how you like it. It’s called ‘Masonic Stew.’” With a hip-hop delivery he belted out the following lyrics:

  Freemasons here

  Freemasons there

  Freemasons everywhere

  Freemasons from all parts of the world

  Comin’ to Washington just to unfurl

  An esoteric flag and rape a young girl

  Punch her big belly and cause her to hurl

  Up comes a fetus for a weird Masonic stew

  A bubbling witches liquid, a black mystic brew

  Filled with yeti armpits plus an undiscovered flu

  Two copper Tesla coils and nigger lips too

  Bubble and bubble, toil and trouble

  Masons in orbit and lurking inside the Hubble

  They’re floatin’ out there just waitin’ to perform

  A ritual most rare to make us conform

  They’ll heat up the ionosphere and conjure up a storm

  That’ll wipe out Jupiter and its alien lifeforms

  Freemasons here

  Freemasons there

  Freemasons hiding in your girlfriend’s hair

  Freemasons at the post office, Freemasons at work

  Freemasons at the Pentagon love to circle jerk

  Bubble and bubble, toil and trouble

  Masons kill Washington, replace him with a double

  Hop to your feet for the Masonic sockhop

  Bop to the beat of Adam Weishaupt

  Freemasons here

  Freemasons there

  Freemasons lurking in their underground lairs

  Hip to hip, cheek to cheek

  Masonic feet dancin’ to a weird wild beat

  Bubble and bubble, toil and trouble

  Masons dancing in the nuclear rubble

  Jitter-bugging fast to an ancient tune

  Amid the lost remains of Solomon’s tomb

  Fuck, we’re dying while they’re flying to the moon

  The world’s ending, couldn’t happen too soon

  All the groupies laughed and clapped as if they were in on a private joke I didn’t fully understand.

  Esthra pushed her way to the very front of the crowd. I stood beside her. Mike couldn’t miss us. Upon seeing Esthra he said, “This is a song I just made up on the spot. It’s called ‘Kiss Me, Kill Me.’”

  Esthra grabbed my hand and pulled me away from the crowd, while behind us Mike improvised a clever little song about a girl who “gives head to get ahead”; she clings onto a talented rock star just to get famous, then abandons him when he needs her most. The entire song was a not-too-subtle insult against Esthra and it seemed as if everybody in the room knew it. The entire mood of the party had become quite uncomfortable.

  Esthra cleared a path through the crowd and dragged me into the hallway. I didn’t know where she was taking me. She swung open various doors in the hall. The first was a closet, the second a bedroom filled with strange people smoking pot, the third a bathroom. There was a teenage boy and girl sitting cross-legged and smoking pot on the fluffy white rug. Esthra yelled, “Get the fuck out!” and kicked the guy in the ass with her boot. They both scrambled to their feet and dashed out of the room. Esthra slammed the door shut, then locked it.

  “What are you doing?” I said.

  “If he wants me to be a whore so bad, then maybe I should become one.” She pressed her face up against the door and moaned loud enough for everyone in the neighborhood to hear, “Oh yeah, Elliot, yeah, that feels so good, touch me right there, right there, oh yeah, yeah, fuck me like a monkey in heat, unh, unh… .”

  My right hand shot to my mouth as my other hand gestured wildly for her to stop. Who knew what they could hear outside? “Esthra, please, what’re you doing?”

  She whispered, “Giving him what he wants,” then yelled, “Oh yeah, baby, that’s it, give it to me good, give it to me hard, harder … !”

  I grabbed her by the shoulders and forced her to turn around. Despite the tears streaming down her cheeks, she persisted in her act.

  “Oh yes, slap me, Elliot, hit me!”

  As softly as possible I said, “Please. Stop.”

  In mid-sentence Esthra broke off and looked at me with such sad eyes. Such sad, wounded eyes. She fell into my embrace, wrapped her arms around my shoulders, held on tightly, as if she might fall if she let go. She buried her head into my chest and cried for a very long time. I stroked her long auburn hair, whispered in her ear: “Shh, shh … it’s okay, Esthra … it’s okay.”

  After awhile she calmed down, stepped away from me a bit, keeping her palms pressed against my chest. I lifted my fingers to her cheeks and brushed the tears away as best I could.

  “God, I don’t know,” she said, “I don’t know what else I can do. I’ve stuck by him every step of the way, I’ve taken care of him when he was junk sink, I’ve never cheated on him, but it’s not enough, nothing’s ever enough. Do you know how hard it was for me to kick heroin? I was locked up in a psych ward for ten fucking months. I almost hung myself with an electrical wire I dug out of the plaster wall in my room ’cause I thought the nurses were going to rape me and cut off my toes. A couple of them did rape me.” She released a weak laugh. “At least they didn’t cut off my toes; I guess I was only halfway paranoid. They had me pumped full of so many drugs I didn’t know what the fuck was going on. I lived in a weird-ass cartoon world for almost a year. I endured all of that just to kick heroin. But with heroin you don’t give a shit about the past, or how much pain you went through the first time … or the second time, or the third time… . I still crave that damn spike, you know? Every day is a struggle, and it’s a lot more difficult if your idiot boyfriend is waving a needle in your face every two seconds. God damn it, he’s made me sit there and watch him shoot up. ‘C’mon, baby, it’s no fun without you there.’ Did he ever stop to consider what that was doing to me, ever?”

  I stroked her hair for a few minutes more, then she pulled away entirely, giving me one last pat on the chest. “Thank you for listening to me babble,” she said.

  “It didn’t sound like babbling to me,” I said. “I think you needed to get a lot off your chest. I think you’re stuck in a fucked-up relationship and you need to get out.”

  She nodded while looking at the floor. “Maybe you’re right. I don’t know.”

  “What more does he have to do to you until you’re sure?”

  “I don’t know.” I had a feeling she said those words a lot. I felt like kissing her: first a gentle peck on the cheek (when was the last time someone kissed her on the cheek?), then her forehead, her other cheek, her neck, her chin, and at last her lips. I pictured all of this as I stared at the
contours of her beautiful face, but I didn’t act on the impulse. I didn’t think it was the right time. I figured she needed a friend at that moment, not another fucked-up lover.

  I brushed the hair out of her eyes and said, “You don’t have to worry about it now. You’ll know when it’s time to dump him.”

  “You must think I’m stupid.”

  “No, I don’t think that at all. I think you’ve got yourself trapped in a situation you can’t find your way out of. That happens to a lot of people every day. Most of them didn’t get that way because they were stupid.”

  “Why, then?”

  “Because they trusted somebody too much.”

  Esthra laughed her usual sad laugh. “That’s me, all right. I’ve trusted a lot of people I shouldn’t have.”

  “But that doesn’t mean you give up on everyone, does it?”

  “No, of course not. I think—”

  Esthra’s next words were cut off by a pounding at the door followed by an angry voice: “Hey, why don’t you move it somewhere else! I need to take a piss!”

  Esthra and I exchanged amused glances, then burst out laughing. “Well, maybe we should rejoin the party,” she said.

  “Maybe so.”

  As the pounding continued Esthra took my hand and led me to the door. Just as she was about to open it I gestured toward our hands and said, “Uh, what if Mike thinks … ?” I allowed the sentence to trail off.