I’m at a restaurant. I think lunch is a good idea, but I have no way of knowing how or why I know it’s lunchtime. I check for a clock, then look for a watch. I find one on my wrist and it reads 12:10 p.m.—just a dime after lunch. A waitress scurries across the room, hopping from table to table like a hummingbird, her green T-shirt clinging too tight to her firm, supple body. I order some potato skins and a hamburger. I thank her and call her Hummingbird. She smiles a gap-toothed grin that reminds me of Madonna and I’m reluctant to smile back, fearing I look like Jay Leno, though I have no reason to believe I do. I don’t really remember what I look like.
I grab a spoon off the table and spit-shine it while I’m waiting for my potato skins and hamburger. I squint at my reflection and only see a bug-eyed freak in the streaked and scratched stainless steel of ordinary mealdom. I flip it over and try the inside, but my reflection is squashed and distorted. But at least I don’t have bugeyes. The waitress returns with my meal and I call her Hummingbird again. She seems less enthused this time.
Across from me in a booth is a woman in a tight dress with brilliant red lips and flowing auburn hair. She raises a glass of orange juice. FRESHLY SQUEEZED, the sign on the door says. Somehow I think it’s the same watered-down orange juice of every diner. She looks directly at me and blows me a kiss. A potato skin hangs from my mouth. I give her the finger, then draw a .38 from my sports coat. Some piece-of-shit Saturday night special that will most likely explode if I fire, but I do anyway. As my finger squeezes the trigger, I think I’m indifferent. Flip the switch.
I’m sweating like a pig in a beat-up Chevy Malibu headed down a highway in what I can only assume is the desert Southwest. The heat leaps off the pavement frantically, distorting everything. I feel distorted as well. Where the hell am I going? All I know is that I need to get away from whatever is behind me and I have to get away now!
There’s a .45 Smith & Wesson on the seat beside me, bullets spilled out of a half-empty carton of hollow-points. A bottle of Smirnoff sloshes on the floor. The dashboard has a gaping hole in it that is vomiting out its cheap foam filling. The bench seat is maroon vinyl, the slick ass-varnished vinyl of a high-mileage car. This one’s tallied up well over two hundred thousand. The back window has three holes in it, which I’m assuming are bullet holes and which I’m assuming explain the ragged puking hole in the dash.
A moan comes from the backseat and I almost lose control of the car. It’s her, dressed in a white T-shirt loosely tucked into her too-tight jeans. I can see she isn’t wearing a bra, because of the way the blood from the gaping wound in her chest makes the cloth of the tee stick to her nipples and form to her breasts. For a second, I think, This must be how a vampire wet T-shirt night must go and she’d win. I just know it.
With her mouth bloodied and her eyes wild, she looks at me. I think she’s dying; I blow her a kiss. She coughs and blows blood across the back of the seat and the side of my face. I think I love her. The switch.
I’m in excruciating pain. Oh, Christ. Nothing has hurt like this in my life. Pit-of-your-stomach sick pain. And it’s dark—very dark—ink-black dark like a woman’s mascara, black like a windowless basement. I can’t tell what hurts anymore. It feels like my body is in pieces. I can’t move.
Four lights overhead flip on. A woman in army-green nurse’s garb leans over me, her auburn hair tucked into her surgical cap. I think there must be red lips beneath the mask. Searing pain from the shrapnel wounds in my gut, my ass, and my legs because of a Bouncing Betty. I wonder if her name is Betty, but now she’s the doctor and the scalpel gleams like the spit-shined silverware in my mother’s dining room. Utensils untouched by the stained enamel of relatives and the potbellied belching coworkers Pop used to bring home.
She slices into me and her soft crepe shoes make a farting sound on the tile that reminds me of sweaty thighs on vinyl. I gurgle blood out onto my shirt. I must look like a vampire buffet. She gives me the finger, then drives it deep into my gut, digging for the shrapnel buried in my bowels. I gasp for air like a freshly caught mackerel and she thinks I’m blowing her a kiss. She puts a bloodied hand to her mask and mimes a kiss back. My mind wanders, wondering if she’s a Bouncing Betty. Maybe a Bobbing Betty. Did I say that out loud? A stabbing pain rockets to my brain. Switch.
I’m on a table. I’m strapped down, unable to move, with some sort of rubber chuck driven into my mouth. It has a hole so I can breathe. I feel vinyl beneath my hands and beneath my ass where the hospital gown doesn’t quite close. I also notice that the braces that hold my head still are also coated in unnaturally green vinyl. I try to twist free, but the vinyl clings to my cheek like a kitchen table chair on a naked ass. I wonder why art deco was ever so popular. It was the art of chrome and strange squared angles, repeating, repeating, repeating, and forcing you to like it.
I’m sweating and I can feel it plastering the material of the hospital gown to my chest. I think it’s a shame I don’t have breasts, as I’m sure the thin material would show the darkness of my nipples and the doctor would get a hard-on. I hear her crying from the corner. I can see her in my mind’s eye. Her lips red and her eyes just as red, crying what I am sure are crocodile tears. Her mascara running down her cheeks like some cheap imitation of Tammy Faye moved by the spirit of Jesus. I once thought I was Jesus. Hallelujah, I was wrong. The doctor, as if speaking through a mouthful of crackers, says, “Only one more,” and I grasp the vinyl. I hear my fingers squawk across it as my teeth clamp down reflexively. For some reason I think of baked fish. He throws the switch.
The room is too bright. Even under the hood that is supposed to obscure my vision, I can tell the room is way too bright. I hear the deep voice of the warden swearing in the background. Jon Doe Executioner’s voice counters. Something about the juice. Weak juice. I wonder if the sign on the door read FRESH SQUEEZED. The warden cries, “For Christ’s sake get it right this time.” I hear women crying and a man say this is seven. My hands hurt from the leather straps that hold them down. Something smells burnt, fishy…and I know it’s me. So here I am in the death knell. I somehow thought it was grander, like waiting for a button to pop, or maybe a cherry, cherry red. I can smell the remnants of my last meal, fishy fish, the most fragrant of fish, baked mackerel with potatoes and peas. A special tribute to all my bouncing and bobbing Betties. I can feel the leather of the seat and back of the chair. I’m finally important enough for leather.
I think of her with her auburn hair and her lips so cherry red. She swished and swayed in her tight T-shirt, braless and unashamed. Her ass poured into her too tight jeans. Her thumb was cocked up in the air like some pagan phallic symbol and I stopped to give her a ride. And that I did. She offered me a blow job if I took her to Houston. I balked. She offered me vodka. I shot her with the .44 magnum I had under the seat. She squeak, squeak, squeaked against the seat of my station wagon, occasionally making the vague sound of flatulence as her skin caught on the vinyl. The blood from the single shot to her chest stuck me to her with each thrust. It plastered my T-shirt to her breasts. I held her dead hands above her head and when I was done, one fell to her mouth and bounced away almost like she blew me a kiss. I gave her the finger and pulled out my .44 and shot her again just to be sure. I held her and kissed her forehead and called her Momma even though she said her name was Christa and I knew I’d left Momma for dead long ago. I buried her in the desert.
I hear the click before the jolt hits me. I hear the leather squawk as my shoulders strain against the backrest. Funny how I was wrong about flatulent chairs. Even leather sticks to searing flesh, fart, fart, farting as each jolt of electricity flows through me.
I wake up. I’m bound to a kitchen chair. Red vinyl on chrome. Mom’s kitchen. It’s Wednesday. Market-fresh mackerel cooks in the oven. The scent of orange juice heavy on my lips, its sticky sweetness running down my cheek. She touches me as my naked ass slides and groans back and forth. Sweaty vinyl, farting out my shame. The juice-hidden Stoli is a hot coal in my stomach
even though it was ice cold from the freezer. I think of the weight of her tits on my thighs, her lips, her frantic and perverse suck, suck, sucking. I beg her to stop. Mom, please don’t. She stops, then slaps me hard. She won’t look me in the eye. She takes a drag off her cigarette and a haul off the bottle. Her breasts loll in her threadbare blouse, nipples like dark half-dollars peeking out. She grins and blows me a kiss. She reminds me sweetly to call her Betty and that she loves me. I’d give her the finger if my hands weren’t bound. Then her auburn hair bobs away again. Vodka-driven pressure builds, then bursts, shooting. Shooting. Shooting into Betty, betrayed by my own gun. I love her even though I hate her. I close my eyes and succumb to the darkness, dark, like Betty’s mascara. Whore black like my soul. Maybe someday I’ll find a way to shut off the pain. Flip it off, you know, like a switch.
Big Load of Trouble
Greg Bardsley
I came through the front door and found Cujo and Angel snuggled in the kiddie pool. Nude and hairy. Tattooed legs intertwined. His beard flowing over her head like a kinky black wig, her arms around him, water beading atop his body fur. The television flashing raw footage of a white toy poodle trying to mount a morbidly obese opossum.
“Hey, dude, check it out. Animal Kingdom Humpathon, Volume Eight. Some little poodle’s getting it on.”
I stood over them. “Cujo, you promised.”
He laughed at the screen, sighed happily, and glanced up at me. “So?”
“And so you’re here.”
Cujo lidded his eyes and grinned. “I am.”
“You promised.”
He cocked his head and gazed at the water, raising an eyebrow. “I did.”
I tried to be stern. “I’m really disappointed, Cujo.”
He looked at me for a moment, bit his lip, and broke into a prolonged cackle.
An hour later, I returned to the front room and tried again. The television was flashing shaky footage of two gerbils squeaking as they made fast and frantic love. Angel watched openmouthed and laughed. “Duuuuu-uuuuu-uuuuude.”
I stood over them again. “I’m surprised you’re not bored.”
Cujo kept his eyes on the screen. “Yeah?”
“I mean, I just figured you’d be more of a get-out-and-explore guy.”
“Nah, it’s better here.” A gerbil squeaked extra loud, and Cujo giggled. “We love it here, bro.”
They did look comfortable. They lay in the pool, happily soaking in a mealy mixture of dirty water and black body hair, all of which had reduced my roommate’s kiddie-pool cleaner to a thrashing, moaning tangle of plastic. Drowning insects rolled around in the floating hair as others struggled to climb back onto Cujo. Empty cans of Coors Light and Colt 45 encircled the pool.
“Cujo, this isn’t home.” I paused. “You agreed.”
Eyes still glued to the screen. “Hey, dude, have you heard? I’m an artist now.”
What do you do?
What do you do when you have a six-foot-five, 295-pound Raiders fan in your house? A paroled Raiders fan you barely know. A friend of a friend; an acquaintance of an acquaintance, really. A large furry mass of delinquency and physical aggression. A big load of trouble soaking in your indoor kiddie pool, groping his new lover with this triumphant look on his face, like he’s saying, Look at what I can squeeze, bro. A guy who doesn’t like to work, a guy who’d rather get high in your kiddie pool, fuck in your kiddie pool, and doze off in your kiddie pool. A guy who has the goods on you, a guy who knows you can’t call the cops and make him leave, on account of the illegal activities and substances that could be found in, and around, your rental house. A guy who knows that if you’re gonna call the cops on him, you’re gonna have to be okay with going to prison.
What do you do?
What you do is, you go to the fridge, pull out a Pale Ale, and take a long pull. And you lean against the counter and watch as he laughs and points at the television, the screen showing a couple of bush babies getting it on, their eyes extra large as they squeak and chitter and shiver.
And you stew, thinking of what he said.
Now he’s an artist.
“Me and Angel got a gig tonight, dude.”
I was still leaning against the counter, still nursing my beer. I had no idea what the hell he was talking about. “Gig?”
“Yeah, dude. Some artist chick saw me and Angel dancing around out front. Had my Black Hole clothes on.” He let his eyes cross for a second. “She says we’re artists.”
Black Hole clothes. That would be the spiked dog collar, the black shoulder pads with spikes, the black cape fastened underneath, the little rubber horns attached to his frontal lobe, and the ass-kicker boots. Cujo liked to wear his Black Hole clothes when he was feeling frisky.
“Artist chick,” I said, more to myself.
“Angel and I are grinding out there, and this hippie-looking piece of ass comes walking up and starts yammering about how much she likes the way I express myself. Next thing I know, she’s writing directions to some fancy coffee place where they’re doing some kind of performance-art thing all night. Café Popana or something. I guess we got the eight-thirty slot.”
And then he broke into another prolonged cackle.
I lay on my bed in the back room and stared at the ceiling, reviewing my options one last time.
My out-of-town roommate, David, had a crop of cannabis skunk growing in the backyard. Big fat fuckers with huge buds. Probably worth ten thousand, he was saying. Everything had been going okay until Cujo and Angel paid us an unexpected visit, noticed the crop out back, and decided to use that knowledge to extort free lodging out of us until they had someplace better to go—which probably would be the game in Oakland this Sunday. If I called the cops, David and I could be spending the next year or two in orange jumpsuits. But if I let them hang out a few more days, the chances were they’d be gone by Saturday night, headed for the Black Hole, and that would be that. Only problem was, someone could get hurt by then.
After all, it was only Tuesday.
David was three hours away, visiting his dad in the hospital. I didn’t want to bother him, but I was starting to think it was necessary. I sat up, grabbed the phone, and rolled the receiver from hand to hand, thinking about it one more time—at which point Cujo and Angel pushed through my door, dripped naked across the room, and slipped out my back window.
Cujo popped his head back in. “You got a pig out front, dude. We’re not here.”
The cop looked like a rookie—soft skin, rosy cheeks, a full head of blond hair. Even so, the sight of him there on my porch—in uniform, his radio buzzing every few seconds, the badge almost glowing—rushed blood to my face and shot convulsions to my stomach.
Harboring a parole violator. Growing pot. Fuck, I don’t want to go to jail.
His eyes locked onto mine. “We have a problem in the neighborhood.”
I stared back, feeling like a fucking idiot, my heart pounding, my eyelids fluttering, saliva welling up, my lower lip feeling like it was drooping past my chin.
“Have you seen a large bald man, long black beard, approximately six foot five, three hundred pounds, heavily tattooed?”
I feigned confusion. “What’s happened?”
The cop smirked. “Well, let’s see.” He flipped open a tiny notebook. “I’ve got home invasion, theft, robbery, vandalism, assault.”
“Home invasion?” I blurted.
“Got a house a few doors down saying they were watching TV when a bald bearded suspect entered their house, unplugged the television, and walked out with it.”
I crinkled my brow and looked away. “No resistance?”
“No resistance.” The cop referred to his notes. “Got another house where this guy walks through the front door, makes a beeline for the fridge, removes a twelve-pack and a pizza box, turns around, and exits the premises.”
I mumbled to myself, “Raiding fridges.”
The cop was staring at me now. “And he’s cleaned out the entire block of
car batteries.”
My heart was pounding so hard I could feel it in my arms, but I knew what I had to do. I had to lie. “Wish I could help you.”
The cop looked at the kiddie pool, then at my walls. “Who did this?”
“What do you mean?”
He laughed. “Are you kidding? The holes in your walls, the giant erection drawn over the sofa there.”
“Oh, that.” I looked down and scratched my head. “We just had a party that got too big, too rowdy”—I glanced up at him—“too quickly.”
Studying my face. “Right.”
I found them in my backyard shed, still naked, and sweating heavily. The odor in there was atrocious, a mix of warm rotting milk and body cavities, but Cujo didn’t seem to mind. He was sitting on the unfinished plywood floor with Angel spread out beside him, belly up, snoring loudly. Stacked neatly to their left were the car batteries and the stolen TV set.
“You know what I do to Willards that don’t knock?”
Sex, Thugs, and Rock & Roll Page 23