by Ryan Ridge
The last time Bill didn’t know shit was a week ago, outside Barstow, when Playboy asked him if the sheriff’s deputy was dead.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Probably. I shot him.”
Now Playboy is feeling a twinge of déjà vu.
There’s a knock at the door, followed by another.
Bill flashes his Beretta and says, “You expecting anyone?”
Then Playboy picks up the pocketknife and says, “No one I know.”
Three Prayers for Artists
FOR SANDWICH ARTISTS
Almighty Branch Manager, please gaze favorably from your franchise in the sky and bestow a satisfactory employee rating upon this starving sandwich artist who has not only affirmed his commitment to unironically following the company account on Twitter but also vowed to serve the freshest five-dollar footlongs imaginable. Give him Adderall, Ativan, Klonopin, Vicodin, and whatever other street drugs it takes for him to make a decent sandwich on an annual salary that’s much lower than an actual artist’s yearly salary; and strengthen all of us sub-club customers in our resolve to trust in the wisdom of high-quality produce, excellent customer service, and low operating costs. May we all eat fresh in the service of slim waistlines and the Lord; in a new corporate jingle’s name, we pray. Five. Five dollar. Amen.
FOR CON ARTISTS
Oh God, the great private eye in the sky, we respectfully ask that you stop tailing us and, moreover, we pray for your forgiveness. Oh Lord, we admit that the good spirit has not always guided us and that we’ve spent decades picking pockets, cheating tax collectors, and fleecing newbs with everything from fool’s gold necklaces to timeshares on the moon. True, but all that badness is behind us. Now we’re asking you for your almighty assistance: it is our great pleasure, Lord, to pray to you and present a modest business proposal for your consideration. It is our great pleasure, Lord, to pray to you and ask you to assist us in the transfer of eleven million five hundred thousand US dollars to your bank account in heaven. Heavenly Father, should you decide to render your services in this regard you would be paid thirty-three percent of the total funds for your assistance. Reply with a rotisserie of gift cards if you are willing to work with us. Amen.
FOR CONCEPTUAL ARTISTS
Oh God, we are running out of ideas! We just realized the concept of the universe is the only concept! Now we are echeloning our notions and acknowledging you as the fundamental one, oh Lord, but we’d like to note that the first word in “concept” is “con,” which seems suitable given the long con you’ve pulled on the universe with your eternal silence. Oh, we are listening to you listening to us listening to you. Oh, this is a portrait of you because we say so. It is a diamond-encrusted skull: a memento mori for an immortal. It is a sculpture of a urinal in a museum somewhere in heaven. It is a chair where no one sits, next to the definition of the word “chair.” It is also a prayer without a prayer. Amen.
Deadhorse
Outside, the snow falls like commercial fishers falling from boats. It’s almost April here in Alaska, and although the local marijuana industry is booming, our head shop is about to bust. Today, you say, is an excellent name for a dog, and you’re allergic to dogs. Earlier I mistook a beer for the mirror, and now I’m wondering about California: What is the state of California? When we left, there was almost nothing left. Now we’re half past hungry in the Land of the Midnight Sun, but instead of setting the table, you set the teenage psychic’s business card on the table, and I set both the business card and the table on fire. Because, when you live in a place called Deadhorse, every possibility is already exhausted. And so am I.
The Summer He Went Swimming
after Loudon Wainwright
THE BACKSTROKE
That summer he did the backstroke, naked in his neighbor’s pool, while his neighbors were off dreaming in some faraway version of Kennebunkport. He swam the backstroke, naked in his neighbor’s pool, one night while contemplating his recent attempts at facial hair. The beard had failed miserably—the mustache: worse. He swam the backstroke, naked in his neighbor’s pool, one night, while his neighbors were away in some distant Kennebunkport, dreaming, as he contemplated his doomed facial hair endeavors.
It was a very clear night here, very far from Kennebunkport.
His pubic hairs glistened in the banana moonlight and his waterlogged dick shriveled beneath the movie-review stars.
And he resolved to try harder.
Keep at it.
Perhaps a goatee.
Maybe a soul patch.
No, not a soul patch.
THE BREASTSTROKE
That summer he did the breaststroke, naked, and there wasn’t any water involved. Well, that isn’t exactly true. The human body consists of sixty percent water.
Correction: That summer he did the breaststroke, naked, and there was sixty percent water involved.
(Her breasts in the midnight moonlight were like teakettles, twin teakettles—where he laid his head and dreamed of some faraway version of Kennebunkport. That place where we all end up someday, when we die.)
THE BUTTERFLY
That summer he swam the butterfly in a small, overly urinated public pool, as the small, overly urinated public pool broke from a chrysalis and became a perfectly chlorinated, Olympic-sized pool in Kennebunkport.
Perhaps this was a dream he had?
Yes, it was.
Correction: that summer he dreamed he swam the butterfly in a small, overly urinated public pool, as the small, overly urinated public pool broke from a chrysalis and became a perfectly chlorinated, Olympic-sized pool in Kennebunkport.
THE OLD AUSTRALIAN CRAWL
That summer, he did the old Australian Crawl, but it looked so damn American, so new, so ambiguous, so much like Kennebunkport.
THE SWAN DIVE
That summer he did a fifty-foot swan dive into a reservoir, and as he dove, he thought how beautiful it was that swans mate for life, but then he wondered what happens if one of the mates dies. Do widowed swans remarry, he asked, or do they move to Kennebunkport?
THE CANNONBALL
That summer, at a cocktail party in Kennebunkport, he did a fully clothed cannonball when no one was looking. And it pissed people off.
So he did it again, and again, and again.
Eventually, the people of Kennebunkport grew accustomed to it and learned to embrace it, as the good people of Kennebunkport always do.
THE JACKKNIFE
That summer he sprang from a Rhode Island high-dive in a pair of golden Speedos. Then he bent in midair, touched his toes, and straightened out immediately before entering the water.
It was perfect.
When he emerged, it was December in Kennebunkport, and his golden Speedos had turned silver.
Afterward, he resolved to not jackknife again and vowed never to return to Kennebunkport.
Soon enough, it was Christmas in Texas, and he was mostly sober.
State Secrets
WHEN IN ROME
Proceed to the nearest orifice and enter.
ROME WASN’T BUILT IN A DAYDREAM
I tried to build Rome in a daydream. Failed. Tried again. Failed again. Rome wasn’t built in a daydream. However, Paris, Tennessee, was.
SOUTH OF ROME
All roads lead to Rome, so I took one, but it happened to be a toll road and I didn’t happen to have any cash on me, so I ended up south of Rome, but I met some very nice people there.
To a nurse an IV is one thing, but to a Roman it is four things!
WHEN IN SOUTH ROME
Do as the Southern Romans do: build crucifixes and coliseums and worship Jupiter on Saturdays.
ANCIENT KNOCK-KNOCK JOKE
Knock-Knock!
Who’s there?
Jupiter!
Jupiter who?
Jupiter hurry, or you’ll miss the crucifixion and the orgy!
TWO ABHORRENT ROMANS
Baskerville and Polanski.
ANCIENT DIARY ENTRY: 4 JUNE 474
And to think they said I was wasting my fucking life when I said I was going into vandalism!
On Acid
I glance at our guru’s finger as he’s pointing at the moon, but then I realize it’s his middle finger pointed at a riot cop and it’s the middle of the afternoon.
On Broadway
I brunched with an acrobat. A nearby boy became a robot. Atop a building, two men pretended they were birds—fell, died, and were buried. The smell of jet fuel permeated. We had ideas about chem-trails and dreamed up ironic epitaphs. We heard sirens screaming, saw pigeons exploding into Alka-Seltzer.
And we knew that, at any moment, songs would burst into people again.
All Americans
Hastings had his repeater leveled at my lungs. I said, “Elevate your aim, son.” He was a little older, but I had him smoked by rank. “Something about those hills scares me,” he said. “The shadows are strange. I intend to light them up and see what’s what, Captain.” I said, “Hey, have at it.” The sunlight was fading fast. We were outside a city with a name I couldn’t pronounce. It was one of the ones with the word “bad” at the end, and this village was worse. It had a name, too. Our translator told us. “Here comes some local talent right now,” he said. From a mud hut, a lady emerged in robes and tears. She held her child aloft like a prized bass and chattered away in Pashto. There was a sadness to her words and an urgency in her eyes. I told the translator to figure out what it was she wants. He translated. He said, “She says, ‘There is no future here.’ Her son has no future. She says she has no future either. She wants you to take the boy to America.” “Uh-uh,” I said. “Tell her the Tenth Mountain boys are a lot of things, but one of the things we aren’t is a goddamn adoption agency.” The translator translated, but who knows what he said because, next thing I knew, Hastings was holding the kid and the sad mother was pedaling an ancient ten-speed up the dirt road and into the sunset. I’d never seen someone pedal a bicycle so fast. It was something else. It was snowing in the mountains, and we stood there feeling stupid and cold as nightfall fell all around. “Ideas?” I said. “Anyone?” Hastings rocked the kid to sleep in his arms and said, “I bet I can teach him to shoot. He looks like a stone-cold little dude, a sniper in diapers.” Hastings had an understudy now. All winter long at the base, he taught the toddler to volley and aim and zero his scope. The kid was a crack shot, too. In Kandahar that spring, he shot a wild boar between the eyes one afternoon and later that night he shot our translator through the neck by mistake. I was openly surprised and secretly pleased because I never liked that guy. “Each beginning comes from an ending,” I said to the boys after the translator died by the dugout of our makeshift softball field. Back then, I was always plagiarizing the great philosopher Seneca in conversation because I’d never had any original thoughts in my head and so, when our tour ended, I stayed on for another. I thought: Hey, maybe we’ll catch the rotten cocksucker who took down the towers this time around. It turns out I was wrong. Meanwhile, Hastings took leave. He resumed life and wife stateside and assumed custody of the kid in a Fort Collins, Colorado, courtroom. Then he quickly set to work teaching his adopted son everything he knew besides firearms, which wasn’t much, and so he sent the boy to school. On the playground, he learned the crossover dribble and an unblockable rainbow shot from the deep perimeter. Now he’s all grown up into an All-American at the University of Kentucky, a true freshman at the two guard. Man, he can shoot. He could always shoot. He takes after his adopted dad. They say he’s a lock for a lottery pick after his efforts in the Final Four. As for me, I fell out of the army and into the private sector overseas. For someone like me, it’s easy money and a lot of it at that and, despite the exaggerated reports, I am possibly half-nuts but entirely alive.
Kilroy
He went west.
His wife was there. Somewhere.
Days sputtered and stalled. Nights collapsed. The windshield spidered and cracked. The road looked fucked.
Still, he drove. He drove all day. Night. And then some.
After the sunset, there was another sunset. His helmet phone hummed. He toggled the talkbox, speakered the lobe: heard birds—gulls?—and then someone said through a low voice modulator: “Kilroy?”
“Yes. Who’s this?”
“Pull over. Now! Then get out of the car. Slow. Don’t be a hero. They don’t last.”
“What?”
“Are you pulled over?”
“No.”
“Get out of the car, hero.”
“Uh-uh.”
“Are you out yet?”
“Hold on.”
“Now look around. Do you see me?”
“It’s too dark. There were two sunsets tonight. I don’t see anything.”
“But I see everyone, you see? I see everyone at once, including you. Night vision, baby. I love the future! I didn’t even invent it. I’m just living in it. Living in it and loving it.”
“Who’s this?”
“Your future boss, boss. I’m everyone’s future boss. The name’s Mister Donny.”
“Mister Donny? Is this a job interview, Mister Donny?”
“If I said no, I’d be lying.”
“How am I doing?”
“You’re hired. Congrats. Don’t fly off half-cocked on me now.”
“What?”
“What, what?”
“Are you high?”
“Affirmative. I’m on what God’s on, son.”
“What’s the prescription? My teeth hurt. I could use something.”
“Infinite power and light. Infinite. That means immeasurable to no end. You cannot measure the power and light that I speak of. If you tried to measure it, you would fail. Don’t try it. You’re too dim and powerless and inept to attempt it, so unless you want more dimness and powerlessness to fall upon your ass forever, you’ll do as you’re told. For now, drive. Drive in a westward direction and keep on driving. Drive until you reach the bridge to the Island of California. You’ll receive further instructions when you reach the farthest point. Ciao for now.”
Kilroy powered down his helmet.
The sky decreased.
The clouds quaked.
What was left of his mind raced.
And the night, it lasted for days.
After the wars, they reprogrammed him. They reprogrammed him after the wars because he needed help. They were there to help reprogram him every day because he needed so much help. They helped so much.
He took medicine.
It was for his mouth.
The pills struck a soft chord, mood-wise, and made him drive slow, real slow. That damned dentist had replaced his front teeth with rake tines. Since the surgery, he’d developed a strange taste for dirt. He pulled over. Dug a hole. Ate some dirt. Dug deeper. Ate more dirt. Some worms. Spit out the worms. More dirt.
A vulture circled above.
Kilroy swallowed, spat, cursed. He speakered his helmet phone. Dialed out.
“Dr. Spatz’s office. Rita speaking.”
“Is he in?”
“May I ask who is calling?”
“Anton Kilroy.”
“And what is this regarding, Mr. Kilroy?”
“Well, Rita, I was in last week for a standard root canal, and I believe there’s been a mistake. A terrible mistake.”
“A mistake?”
“Yes, my front teeth are gone, Rita. They’ve been replaced with some sort of metal spikes.”
“Spikes?”
“Yes, they appear to be rake tines, Rita. Like the kind you’d find on a hand rake, for instance. Picture those as your teeth.”
“My goodness. I’m afraid the doctor is out of the office this evening, but I’ll have him call you first thing in the morning.”
“But it’s been night here for several days.”
“Night? Where are you, Kilroy?”
“Due east of west. Near the Island of California.”
“Interesting. Here in Heart Attack Country, it’s be
en evening for several evenings.”
“Strange weather, ma’am, but the other reason I called … aside from the fangs … I’ve been eating dirt.”
“Eating dirt?”
“Uh-huh. Yes.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Okay, well, keep eating it. And I’m sure the doctor will have a perfectly reasonable explanation for all of this. He is, after all, a family dentist. Do you have a family, Mr. Kilroy?”
“I do not.”
“Have you ever entertained the notion of having a family?”
“I have.”
“Well, hold out hope. Speaking of, can you hold?”
“Yes.”
He held. He watched a vulture flying a corkscrew pattern in the sky above his car. It was hypnotic.
“Kilroy?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll have Dr. Spatz call you tomorrow.” “But that could be days!”
“I hope not. I’m tired of watching this damn sunset. And I’d like to get off work someday.”
“Thanks.”
“No, thank you.”
“No, thank you.”
“No, thank you!”
“No, thank you, too!”
“No, no thank you, too!”
He went back to the wars sometimes. And sometimes, when he went back to the wars, he was at peace with the wars. And sometimes, when he went back to the wars, he was at war with the wars. And sometimes, when he went back to the wars, he was at war with his peace with the wars. Sometimes, when he went back to the wars, he lived through the wars. And sometimes, when he went back to the wars, he died in the wars. And sometimes, when he went back to the wars, he both lived and died in the wars. Because it’s possible to both live and die in a war. Quite possible. He was living proof. That was Kilroy. He was here. Kilroy was. Here. But also there.