Grungy Noir

Not Quite a Year, Feeling Inspired

2009-01-27T17:35:00.000-08:00

So I've been inspired by various and sundry sources to reinvigorate this blog. For one, I'm writing more creatively with [dog] and [pony]. That always serves to get the mind juices growing.

Then I read a couple of posts about Six Word Memoirs and the Raymond Carver flash fiction Little Things, masterful and succinct. And there's Ernest Hemmingway's "Baby Shoes" which I will print right here:

For sale: Baby shoes, never worn

And I think it's something I should get back into.

With all that in mind, I present to you some Six Word Memoirs in the style of Krister Rollins:

Sometimes, everything just falls into place.

I enjoy what I stumble across.

There's beauty in everything we do.

Tall guy, big heart, no clue.

They always make beer for that.

My answer is "Beer and puns."

The little things carry us all.

And here's one that I don't think applies to me, but perhaps for every Blues Musician ever...

I'm laughing to keep from crying.

I invite you to contribute, weigh in. Offer your own suggestions. Offer your own memoirs. Direct me to more flash fiction, or "Skinny-Fic," if you will.

Lover Damage

2008-04-06T16:47:00.000-07:00

I just found this poem in the archives. I kinda like bits of it.

I drink 22 ounces
can't handle a 40
Can't stomach much more
than a snifter of porty

Ever since my baby left me
I been drinkin' an ocean
Just tryin' to find me something
to drown these damn emotions

I tried beer, whisky, red wine and gin
put 'em in all in one cup, baby, look at me grin

I was doin' fine without you
long as I had some liquor
Now I'm in a bind without you
Cuz I'm killin' my liver

The doctors all keep sayin'
I gotta give up this habbit
I'm drinkin myself down six feet
Whatever, I'll Pabst it

I went to the clinic
cuz I couldn't feel my fingers
but the shit of it all
is some pain still lingers

I got a well in my heart
and no drink will fill it
You left a burning fire
and no drink will kill it

I got a liver damaged heart
or a heart damaged liver
whichever it is I just
can't forgive her

My last sober day
was the day that you left me
My next sober day'll
be after the cops arrest me

I tried a special cocktail
of scotch, miller and wine
and when I ran outta that
oh babe, I drank turpentine

I tried beer, whisky, red wine and gin
put 'em in all in one cup, baby, look at me grin

I know all this hootch
cures nothing but clear thinking
but it all makes sense to me
but maybe that's the drinking

I know somewhere
there's a malt beverage calling out
wants to get inside me
maybe work on my gout

I'm killing myself quick
with the silver bullet
Could have life without you
But just couldn't pull it

I don't want to be thinking
You're out there living your life
Just want to be drinking
cuts sharper than a knife

I got a liver damaged heart
or a heart damaged liver
whichever it is I just
can't forgive her

I got a well in my heart
and no drink will fill it
You left a burning fire
and no drink will kill it

I got a liver damaged heart
or a heart damaged liver
whichever it is I just
can't forgive her

Whichever it is
I just can't forget her.

First Love, Pure Love

2007-11-29T04:12:00.000-08:00

He saw her from across the bar, Alice, drinking in her down vest and blue hoodie and what could well be her little black dress. Alice, her black hair catching light as she laughed with radiant vibrancy (or maybe vibrant radiance). The tendrils of vitality that sparked from her eyes with a near audible crackle whenever he looked at those brown, sensual pools was the important thing.

He looked into his beer.

He breathed out lust, desire, hate, sin, blood and guts.

He breathed in clean, purposeful air.

He stepped up to the bar. Her bar.

The rest was easy: walking to the apartment, his apartment, picking a movie they wouldn't watch, pouring night caps, fumbling into bed. Undressing.

When his fingers closed around her throat, though, he only thought of the frustration of squeezing the studded black tires over the rusted silver steel rims and around the flacid inner tubes of his mother's Schwinn.

When she stopped writhing and scratching he stood and looked at the bed. Her black hair was a dye-job. He could clearly see she was a blonde.

He breated out lust, desire, frustration, memory.

He breathed in clean, purposeful air.

He lit a cigarette.

Study Hall

2007-01-31T07:37:00.000-08:00

Jim Shaughnessy pines for somehting he can never have again.

"Hey, Jimmy," she begins, leaning over and giggling against Theresa, "Remember that time we were making out at that party?"

She giggles again and his face brightens like a hot ember. He looks back to his buddies to see if they heard and back to her.

"Remember when we were making out?"

He doesn't nod or anything.

"Well, John was wicked mad. But I told him it was a one time thing." She laughs again and Jim's face loses some of the color and his eyes might scrunch up a bit and the corners of his mouth might drop a bit. But he hides it well.

"I mean," she says to everyone in earshot, "Jimmy's like a brother to me!"

And she turns away and Jim looks after her and does something, anything with his mouth and looks away and sits down.

Is this my memory?

2007-01-30T08:12:00.000-08:00

The porch had been converted into his bedroom when he was old enough to be out of his crib. The camp had no extra rooms and so a sacrifice was made. Not like the porch was used as a porch anymore, anyway. The other half of it was already his parents' room.
He pushed the heavy wooden door into the big, dark living room and a wave of heat from the fireplace swept over him. He'd only recently been able to open the heavy door that stuck at the terminations of it's swing and he still did it with caution and care. The big door easily weighed equal to his father and if it swung shut on him he'd be seriously wounded.
So he stepped clear of the door and into the main living and dining area and the attack came swift and his father's fingers were in his sides and he was giggling and laughing and pleading and collapsed on the floor. The affection flowed in equal parts with frustration at being forced to laugh through something so awful and yet so delightful.
"Stop, please," he gasped for breath, tears forming at the tops of his grin, turned on his side and curled up on the floor.
And it ended and he uncurled like a dewey flower in the morning. Eyes opening over wet cheeks to see the dark, orange glow on the pine planks on the walls and floor and the dirty ceiling.
He sat up to see his father settling into the chair under the window to read.

Sort Of.

2007-01-10T07:29:00.000-08:00

She was my first girlfriend.
Sort of.
We never had any dates.
Really.
But we had a special art class together.
And those classes on dark winter Wednesdays giggling in the back seat
And making strange voices
And considering stars through the black-checked edges
Of the back window of Mom's Red Hatchback Subaru
And listening to cool, new music
for the first time. Not our parent's music.
Those car rides were our dates.
Sort of.
20 minutes twice a night. One night a week.

And it makes sense to me that she said, "Krister?"
-And I could tell what was coming from her tone of voice-
"I think we should just be friends again."
And it makes sense to me that she said that to me
On a green back seat in a yellow school bus.
Sort of.

The Mechanics of Melody

2006-12-18T07:38:00.000-08:00

He had long admired the way she spoke. There was a clear, concise precision in her every syllable. Fluid sibilants and pure plosives. Never a slurred word.
He imagined that if Autumn spoke - Autumn the season with the tart, sharp, pressed cider and the crisp crack of dried leaves. The brisk wind that snapped flags and brought collars up high over hunched shoulders. The virgin air filtering wood smoke against the blue, cooling skies. The way the sun dropped and stayed in that sweet spot maybe 20 degrees above the horizon for just a little bit longer - it would sound like her.
Her bright and perfect speech had never seemed sterile or forced and the way her lips glid soundlessly across her teeth to form the next phoneme fascinated him. The smooth cheek skin expanding and contracting and faintly puffing out over a long, smooth ribbon of air. Her mouth was a wonderful ode to the artistry of speech. Her teeth and tongue and lips and vocal folds working in harmonious unison to produce that mellifluous, unparalleled voice.
He pondered that now as he added her tongue to his collection.

Sometimes

2006-12-03T16:12:00.000-08:00

Sometimes you meet someone
and you have some drinks with them
and you have some words with them
and it's big and huge and you get more than you could imagine from it.

Sometimes you meet someone
and you discuss, theorize, philosophize and talk
and you exchange banter and witty repartee
or you share laughter and it sounds like green ivy climbing up a picket fence

Sometimes you meet someone
and you look at her, she looks at you
and you bump into her with your hands jammed in your pockets
and she flutters her eyelashes and touches your hand and you can't stand it.

Sometimes you meet someone
and you can't imagine how your life
and your very innermost self
and your being could possibly exist without having met her.

Sometimes you meet someone.

Tuesdays

2006-12-02T15:52:00.000-08:00

The third and final time his face hit the pavement it already looked like poorly loafed meatloaf. He'd felt his nose break twice already. Bits of face you weren't supposed to see under normal operational standards were out and broadcasting their pain for all to see. But then, this wasn't a situation for normal operational standards.

The last time The Big Guy knocked him over was a real doozy, too. Jim hadn't done him the minutest molecule of damage, except the secondary stuff from knuckles colliding with flesh and zippers and buttons. The Big Guy looked a little out of breath, maybe, it was hard to tell under the veneer of red stuff that had suddenly coated the world. And all Jim's peripheral input was gone, too. Just him and The Big Guy. Kept pummeling and pummeling. Punching and laughing at the horrible slaps his fists made on Jim's face. Like jumping into a puddle of mud on a hard dirt road.

So as The Big Guy knelt over Jim and grabbed him by his lapels he couldn't help but think, 'The nurses at the hospital better be some cute.'

The evening started normal enough, punch out of work - couldn't even remember what he did these days, moving boxes probably - go to Lance's for a cold, watery beer and a sandwich thrown together out of old meat and older bread, swing by the bodega for a forty of Shipyard Battleground Ale (the worst part of Lance's was the shitty beer. At least it was served cold, though, to numb the taste buds and make you not realize the crap you're forcing down) and a pack of Marlboro lights to look at and wind up on the porch, watching the people and trying not to think about smoking.

Jim figured that if he had the cigarettes around him he could always not smoke 'em himself and if anyone offered he could say, "No, thanks," and flash his own pack. Wink maybe.

So he had settled into the porch to watch the people come and go. Usually before 7 people mostly came home from work. Then between 8 and 9 people mostly went to bars and clubs and restaurants and movies and shows. Then people started trickling home and then at 1 people started flooding back in a great big groups, stinking of beer and sex and hormones and maybe if they got lucky lipstick and perfume. But tonight there was something strange happening. A green sedan screeched up at the apartment building across the street and a distressed dame - always a dame - stamped out. She yelled something back at the car as it tore off, leaving a track of rubber as the door slammed shut. She started marching inside and a truck pulled up. Blue, with it's lights off. Just as the door to the house swung shut The Big Guy jumped out of the truck and followed after her.

"Ah, geez," Jim put down his beer. He stood up.

So, he went over to check out the situation, citizen's got to do everything these days. Police aren't gonna do anything. So he goes over and knocks on the door and it swings open and he walks in and finds out "She's been unfaithful" or something - which makes sense to Jim. The Big Guy has no manners, respect for women or hygiene skills, judging from the foul odor.

All right, so that explains the beatings and the pain and the situation Jim's in. Standing up for someone. But, now what?

Jim put all his money on a wimpy little cough.

The Big Guy grabbed his lapels, picked him up off the ground a little bit.

"You ready, buddy, here it comes."

The fist, monstrous and jagged, cocked back.

"Hope you got good dental."

Jim bet this was the time for the cough. He let it out. Blood sprayed everywhere.

The Big Guy dropped him. It worked, kind of, Big Guy dropped him awfully hard.

"Ah, geez, you got it all over me. Look at my shirt!" Big Guy stopped for a moment and looked back at Jim. Jim tried to wink but mostly his face just kinda... winced.

"I guess you've learned your lesson, buddy. Stay outta my business. Leona!" He turned to the dame, "We're not through yet."

He whistled loudly and the truck pulled up. The Big Guy got in and it took off.

Sometimes a guy just needs to blow off some steam.

Bananas

2006-04-16T23:27:00.000-07:00

He chewed his pencil eraser.
He leaned back in the chair behind his desk. This looked like a good case. Big shipment gone missing. Famous company, willing to throw a lot of money his way just for finding out where it went, didn’t even need to secure the shipment or nothing.
He picked up the fat cigar off the ashtray and put it in his lips, chewing thoughtfully.
Of course, part of the intrigue in taking a case like, if of course, the detective was to take it, is that he already knew something about it. Something important. Something big.

There it was at the top of the letter. Right above the “Dear Mr.” and the crease from folding the paper for the envelope. Dole. Big money. Got big in Hawaii with the pineapples. But they weren’t after pineapples today, no, today they were after bananas. A whole tractor trailer truck full of bananas missing. The driver checked in at his checkpoint in Southern Pennsylvania and hadn’t been seen since. He was supposed to be at the docks by 2 PM and the ship waited as long as it could before taking off a container less.
Dole lost money on that, ship costs the same going out whether it has 50 or 250 containers. Of course, there’s more taxes on 250 containers. But it’s a cost easily offset by having it all on one ship where one agent can quickly and easily bribe one customs agent.
This missing container business is bad luck.
Dole has but one clue. It’s a good one, too. The serial number on that container ship. Find that and you’ll find the missing shipment, the note says. It goes on to insinuate he might find “a fortune in bananas,” also.

Detective Kong settled back down in his chair. He grabbed a bamboo shoot from the stack in the corner and lazily chewed it, his massive mouth crunching the bitter-sweet plants like sugar cubes.
He got up, knew what he had to do. The time for pensive bamboo chewing was over, the time for decisve action had begun.
Kong got out of the chair, put on his mammoth trench coat and grey, beat up fedora and headed out the door.

The night was dark, like he liked it, and the streetlight on the corner glowed orange in the mist. He locked the loading door he used as an entrance. It’s a shitty neighborhood and even a giant ape doesn’t put the fear of God into the hearts of lowlives like you’d imagine it would.
Kong sucked the cigar. Good stuff. Cuban. Got it from his vacation down there three years ago. His supply was running low even though he only pulled out a Cuban on the most special of occasions. And then he made sure to suck it right down to his lips. Being a 25 foot tall monkey demands a 3 foot long Cuban, and that kinda product’s none too easy to get.
He’d lit it up in celebration of his last case. Big deal, Fay Wray - the goddess, how he missed her - her son had gone missing. Little tyke was only 11 months old. Crap like that gets Kong pissed anyway. Doubly so because it’s Fay’s kid.
Fay.
Anyway, after he rescued the kid from the warehouse they had him in at the docks and roughed up the kidnappers but good he’d felt like celebrating. He lit up a Cuban and drank some of that fermented mango juice he’d been saving and painted the town red.
He’d hoped that was all he’d done. He didn’t remember most of the night. The cigar and mango juice at home in front of the TV. Watching some shitty sequel he never should’ve sold his name to. The anger building up. Just snapshots of a night of mayhem after that. Smashed cars. Smashing up run-down buildings in the abandoned projects and finally getting on the highway. He remembered smashing and he remembered taking something. But he couldn’t remember what exactly.
And he’d been afraid to go to the hiding spot and check and see.

The warehouse in the garment district had served as a hidey-hole for all his sins and transgressions ever since they drug him out of the warm, wild jungle where he was free to smash and take and eat and swing and swim and fight dinosaurs and eat whatever and whoever he felt like.
But they didn’t approve of that here in The City. No siree, not here in Civilization. Here it was all walk slowly and work quietly and don’t beat things and yell and scream.
Ah! How he yearned to really roar across the sterile landscape. So rigid and blocky. To confuse it and deafen the unnatural honks and horns with his raw, primal scream.
But he couldn’t. Not in this town. The police had already warned him and he’d seen the big tranquilizer gun they had for him. They weren’t going to give him another chance, either. Not after the first break out from the theater and the second time he lost control when he threw a bus at the cross-town ferry.
But he had a job now, good paying, too. People are willing to pay a lot of money to a famous ape to find their spouses and kids, to spy on unfaithful husbands and investigate insurance claims. Kong was doing quite well for himself.

But something about this last letter had struck him as odd. It brought back memories of the freeway and of letting lose. Of smashing and throwing and flipping. And this Cuban. The taste was reminding him of something he didn’t eat all the time. Some delicacy he hadn’t been able to get a hold of lately because they’d been out of season.
It reminded him of the taste of bananas.

Kong rounded the corner and arrived at the abandoned warehouse on the dock that served as his hide-out. His house of shame. He looked around to make sure he hadn’t been followed and darted into the alley beside it and hurried around back where he quickly undid the lock on the big door and slipped inside.
It always took a minute to adjust to the dark of the warehouse, even coming in late at night as he was. There was always the initial moment of confusing and a sense of loss. Then the darkness resolved into form in front of him. Smashed autos and hot dog stands, street lamps and traffic lights. Here a park bench and there, ha, he hadn’t really regretted that one, there a big blue mail box with suspiciously monkey-like canine bite marks.
A small ape laugh escaped him to see that.
After discovering Jelly Beans at a circus they’d tried to sell him to, Kong had seen the mailbox on the way back to his room at the zoo. It stuck in his mind and in the night he snuck out to sample it. Much to his disappointment it would turn out. But he kept the mail box just the same.
And there it was. A tractor trailer truck. Shit, dead driver in the cab and all. Big letters spelling out “DOLE” in front of a yellow sun on the side.
And the serial number?
The very same.
Bananas spilled out of it like intestines from roadkill. Kong stepped back in horror. There were bananas everywhere, half eaten, half digested. Looks like the mango juice had gotten to him pretty good. He’d stolen the truck. He’d brought it back and gorged himself on it’s fruity innards. Then in his drunken stupor he’d puked it all back out.
It was a Kong sized problem.
Not only did he have this dead body, but he had this tricky situation with the good people at Dole.
Two thoughts entered his brain in quick succession. The first was, “What is a fortune in bananas?” and the second was “Can I play Dole?”

Bones

2006-04-14T23:48:00.000-07:00

Horatio was in a right tight spot.
The skull in his hand was balanced delicately, slick from his sweaty palms and rocking steadily with the motion of the ladder. His other hand grasped for dear life on the ladder.
His vertigo was terrible.
The ladder rocked ever so slightly at the ground level, but by the time it got to his height - 25 feet, give or take - that wobble had turned into a vertiable tsunami for Horatio.

Museum work was his passion. Ever since a his childhood in Montana he’d have his fun not out in the sun, digging around with the other kids, but inside, cataloguing their finds. In the quiet solitude of his room, examining the bones and rocks and bits of trash the other kids would bring to him, Horatio found a kind of peace. After cleaning and organizing the bits of tibia and coke cans, the quiet that builds up around researching when Coke put cursive on their cans, the astonishment of finding a bit of volcanic glass in Montana, returning the specimins to the other children and seeing their grins was the capper. And the best part was when they were grateful but no longer cared about the item. When their brains had scampered on to the next adventure, Horatio’s was stuck in the past.
His father’s garage had turned into quite the cabinet of curiosities. He had shattered Native American skulls, the teeth of some great prehistoric land dwelling mammal, a page from a 1929 Sears and Roebuck catalogue (even with the hole for being nailed up in the bathroom for toilet paper), fossil imprints of plants, trilobytes. The summer afternoons spent in the garage with harsh sunlight pouring in and bouncing off bits of dust were innumerable. Walking along his shelves, trailing his hands across the jars and displays. Dusting when he needed to. The museum of Horatio.

It only made sense that he’d study it. He excelled in history and biology, throwing himself into them with equal zest. His degrees from the University of Montana and Colby hung in his garage next to his first dinosaur fossil and his favorite skeleton, a toad he’d discovered under a rock the day after Prom, when he’d kissed his first girl.

Turned out to be a lie, he fancied men. Still a groundbreaker for him.

But that’s where the problem lay. Horatio, in college, found that he enjoyed the study of men as much as, if not more than, the study of dead things. After years of quiet frustration and interminable fumbling with girls in cars and parks he realized why it never clicked in place for him. But that realization caused such a sea change in his being, his world was shook to it’s core. His pursuit of men went above and beyond all reason.
He realized it was destroying his life. He missed most classes to pursue men and couldn’t pay attention in the ones that he was in for all his lust.
Lust was his sin, he had a lust for things at first, dead ones, long gone by the wayside. Now his lust for living things and his future with them overpowered the old one.
When Horatio realized his problem, he sought help. The Christians annoyed him, Sexaholics Anonymous was a joke. He turned to the bottle.
The last year and a half at Colby was rough. He drank to excess most every night, sweat sheets of booze the next day. Cranked out a dissertation through jittery claws at the wee hours of the morning. He graduated, but a different man than the one who’d entered school.

Professor Phillips had sympathy for him. Horatio never figured out why, but it was because Phillips saw a bit of himself in Horatio. Just never got the balls to really do it. Phillips got him the job at the museum.

But he’d had a rough time since then. Missing work and meetings, poor cataloguing, poor references. His work was not what it had been in high school, let alone college.

They’d given him this one last chance. A big shipment had come in. Horatio was putting together the display for a skeleton army. Armies across the ages. Each skeleton was equipped with different armor, different weapons. Each represented an important battle or war. It was two groups, caught mid struggle, bodies stacking up and mounting each other like Horatio wanted, minus the flesh, of course.

And this skull was the coup de gras. Napoleon’s. On loan from Les Invalides. This was an incredible honor for him. One he didn’t deserve. It was going right on top, the centerpiece, the focus. He was mounting it himself to make sure nothing went wrong.

And then he sneezed.

Not even much of a sneeze really, a little whimper. It shook his chest maybe as much as a light hiccough would. But it was enough to send him toppling off the ladder. Off the ladder and into the display. Horatio tumbled down through centuries of armed combat, he fell through Viet Nam and World War II and the Spanish-American war and the Crusades and Rome and Alexander’s army. He crushed them all with the simple force of gravity.

His last thought before he hit the ground was “The skull!” And then blackness for a bit. It felt like it stretched on for ages. He saw a great field before him and his father’s garage rising out of it. Opening the door up, he looked inside. The jars and displays were full of the heads of teachers, lovers and co-workers. Professor Phillips had the prime location in the middle, a full skeleton with a flesh covered head on the top.
“Hi, Horatio,” he said, waving. A pleasant smile crossing his face. He crossed a his legs which emitted a clickety clack sound.
Then he woke up. Some of the bones he disturbed above him were still falling. He hadn’t been out more than a second.

He looked down in his hands.

Napoleon’s skull. Still intact.

Horatio thanked everything he could think of.

Leonardo

2006-04-13T23:16:00.000-07:00

Crawling into the crawlspace, I could see why maybe plumbers charge so much to crawl around under your house. The furnace crawlspace was wretched. First off, there’s the dark. I’ve never had a good handle on dark ever since I accidentally shocked myself plugging in a lamp into a faulty socket as a tyke. Then there’s the smell. Wet earth and mildew. Maybe some animal lived under here for a while, too. It has that lived in smell, like when you visit someone’s house who has a lot of dogs. There are cobwebs everywhere. Thick, smokey fuckers that get in your hair and on your face and stick fast, like you’re Paul Simon and it’s Art Garfunkel. Sure he had some famous stuff in his own right, and wasn’t so bad, but we all know what Simon and Garfunkel was really about. Finally there’s the claustrophobia of the place. Forced to crawl around, slither like some god damned snake under your own house. You can’t see but what’s right in the beam of light in front of you and there’s this creaking sound that you don’t like. Was that something skittering behind you? Turn quick and check but whang my head off a pipe.

Damn, I hate it under here.

And all because of that fucking mutt.

So my marriage hasn’t exactly been peachy. We married right out of high school because she was pregnant, then the miscarriage came. Then another. Then another. Doctor tells us we can’t have children on account of the wife’s hips. Something wrong with her bones. I figure that’s all right, I probably got one running around somewhere out there anyway. She went to college while I stayed at home working. What can I say? I got a little frisky. But that’s all behind me now and the missus, she knows about it. I mean, I never told her about it, but she knows. They say a woman knows and she knows.

So after a couple years of slipping relations, strained by the lack of kids, which she gets particularly touchy about certain time of the month, and the cloud of my infidelities hanging over us - like I said it’s behind me, but it’s not behind us - and coupled by the fact that money was tight and her degree in bull shit wasn’t paying off, well, things got a little stable and people started really coming to my boss’s shop, I bought her a dog.

I don’t know, some mutt. A dog. It has scruffy ears, I like him all right. He’ll sit next to me in the back yard in the summer and I’ll have a beer and he’ll bark at girls I think are cute and I’ll scratch his ear. Janet named him Leonardo after some shit head painter or something. Most of the time I just call him ‘dog’ and we get along just fine.

But today he got all in a huff about something. I don’t know what but I was sitting there with my breakfast and the paper at the table and Dog comes marching in, nose to the ground. Stands in the middle of the floor looking down and sniffs deep and hard. I’m surprised he didn’t get a nail up his nose, way he was sniffing. I was amused, I looked over. “Y’all right there, bud?”

He howls! Howls like I’ve never heard this animal make noise before. Howling worse than when Ray next door backed into him drunk one night. Still limps from that. So Leo’s howling at the floor and then scratching and he won’t let up. He just refuses to stop. We tried treats and force and ignoring him and he just spent all his time staring at the floor like maybe it was a steak that wouldn’t give up it’s meat for the animal.

Man could he howl.

Finally the wife comes down on me. We’ve got the dog locked up in the laundry room but he’s still pacing and sniffing and she marches in while I’m having my beer and watching TV.

“We’ve got to do something about this.” Her hands on her hips. Her head cocked to the side like it does when she’s mad and determined as all hell to get something her way right now.
“Yeah.”
“I mean it, this situation has got to go.”
“That it does, honey, that it does.”
“It’s got to go, Ed, and it’s got to go right now.”
She lets that hang out in the air.
What the hell, I’ve got nothing better to do anyway. Besides, least I can do is get that neighbor kid’s frisbee from under the house.
“Well, why don’t I just crawl under there and have a look, see if I can’t see what the trouble is. Maybe get Kenny’s disc back to him.”

I don’t think she was expecting me to give in that easy. She opens her mouth to snap something at me and then it processes.
“Yes, sugar, why don’t you do just that.”

So now here I am, flashlight in my mouth, spiderwebs in my hair, screwdriver in one hand - in case it get’s ugly - and Kenny’s frisbee in the other.

I can hear her walking around upstairs. I think she might be on the phone, talking about Leo to one of her college friends or something. I don’t know.

I crawl forward a bit and there it is, there’s definitely something up ahead. Looks like maybe something’s built a nest down here. Rats maybe, I can’t imagine anything else wanting to live in this shit hole.

I squirm up next to the mound, some blue blanket shreds and sticks and dirt chewed together into a roughly circular lump and peer in.

Fucking mutt.

Well, if this doesn’t give us something to do for a bit, I don’t know what will. And how the hell did it get down here? Is it a prize or a curse? Is it both?

Regardless of that, what it is is a little baby boy. Premature, by the looks of him. Swaddled up in a little blue blanket. Flashing the light around I don’t see any point of entry. I load the little guy onto the frisbee, he’s just about exactly the length of the diameter, and begin the squirm back to light and air and freedom and my beer.

Someone sent us a boy.

Well, at least it’ll shut the wife up.

We're Talking about falling in love

2006-04-12T09:13:00.000-07:00

All right, maybe what I meant to write was "a daily piece of short something" a day. Written of course. Today's piece might actually be lyrics to a slow jazzy song I hear in my head:

It's night time and we're in a moonlit café listening to some grumpy barista's Indie Rock and Roll.

The table to the right of us is discussing Nietschze and Supermen.
The table to the left is talking about color palettes and Monet and Kandinsky
which is a pretty weird combination if you ask me.

But we're sitting here sipping the cheapest coffee they have and
We're talking about falling in love.

The day wakes up bright and early on time and I stretch and roll around in my too hard bed tangled in my too rough sheets.

Miles away you wake up with me and we shower together apart but
I make my breaksfast before brushing my teeth and you do the opposite
which seems pretty strange to me.

But pretty soon we're done with all that we turn to our pets and our televisions and
We're talking about falling in love.

The afternoon is a restless walk through the park for me, looking at dogs and kids and couples on blankets under trees.

You spend your time with the newspaper and while you try to read about death and sports and taxes and business somehow the pages always fall open to the wedding announcements and the love advice
which is quite the coincidence in my opinion.

I give you a call at four thirty and we agree to dinner at eight thirty and
We'll be talking about falling in love.

My hair's a mess from the windy ride over and I couldn't find a tie so my shirt might be unbuttoned too low.

But you tell me I look nice just the same. I don't have to lie when I tell you you look gorgeous in your bohemian dress and your slinky skin
which is a pretty damn good combination if you ask me.

And for the duration of the downtown walk to Mario's Italian Bistro, a dim little place where you can get wine in a styrofoam cup
We're talking about falling in love.

The maitre'd seats us with the smokers in the rear and as we light up we order vegetarian fare. Not out of aversion to meat but in ironic acknowledgement of the cigarettes.

Conversation runs from books to hemingway to sharks to gangster and our fingers touch softly over the Italian loaf and we giggle and apologize as we pull our hands away to light up again and we dart our eyes around trying not to look at each other
which is damn near impossible for me anyway.

We don't talk about love again because there's no way to avoid it all anyway because we're struck.
We've fallen in love.

Change

2006-04-11T10:35:00.000-07:00

Perhaps more than any other creature in the universe, the Plopworths are stuck in their ways. They have been existing in the same evolutionary rut since well before the Dinosaurs got all extincted on our planet and they don’t forsee changing in the future.
The Plopworths are an interesting people. They discovered a formula for living 100 million years ago that worked for them and have stuck to it. They have no art, no science beyond metallurgy and no math beyond algebra. The Plopworths are so resistant to change that when one young Plopworthian by the name of Olegagi suggested that maybe their planet, Dagsbord, revolved around their sun Chipwoteth he was summarily executed.
The Plopworth mind couldn’t take it.
Another Plopworthian named Sucropietz’s head exploded with the mere thought that there might be more in the sky than points of light. That maybe those points of light represent something. The Plopworths are not accustomed to even looking up, so Sucropietz’s death might be seen as a great step forward by species of another planet. The rest of the Plopworths, however, felt that he was an arrogant and chibweezil Plopworth, not to be trusted or looked up to. Chibweezil is a plopworthian word meaning “different thinker” and is used to insult.
Ruts are worn well into the paths the Plopworths walk. They’ve been walking the same paths for millions of years and as such have developed great canyons all around them. When it storms on Plopworth you’d better get out of the roads right quick or else you drown. The average death toll for a Plopworth storm is 3700. And this is just your average every day tinkler. The water all gets funneled into the footpaths.
The change into canyons was gradual enough that the Plopworths didn’t notice it happening. But repairing the paths or making new ones would require such change that the entire plopworthian population might die in one massive, simultaneous explosion of brains.
There is no grafitti on the walls of those canyons. The few Plopworths that do carry writing utensils would never think to stop and use them on something other than paper. And then only for reporting news.
A Plopworthian newspaper looks like this:

Plopworth Chronicle

April 11, 2006.
50 Crumpki.

NOTHING HAPPENED

Even if something did happen, which it doesn’t, the Chronicle would not report it. It’s a change of pace. It’s something different and it is not fit to print.
The paper has cost Fifty Crumpki, roughly equivalent to two cents, since it’s inception 84 Million Years Ago. There was a big uproar and the streets ran red with exploded heads to see it happen, but after the first day the danger of taking it away was greater than the Plopworthian people could imagine.
Aging, growing old and dying, is not accepted on Plopworth. The Plopworths invest great amounts of time and energy into their cosmetics and beauty methods. But not even that industry is allowed to change. The current generation of Plopworths hides their hair loss and covers their wrinkles the same way as their parents who did the same as their parents who did the same as their parents backwards for millions of years.
They wear masks that cover their heads. They come into work in the same suit they left in last night. There is no great ceremony to celebrate the passing of a full year on their calendar (which is about 249.35 Earth Days). They don’t even have calendars. It would acknowledge that this day is different from that day.
Planet Plopworth is resistant to change.

Hello and Goodbye

2006-04-11T10:11:00.000-07:00

My April 10th resolution, because resolutions mean just as much on April 10th as they do on January first, is to create a short story a day.
In that vein, I present to you "Hello and Goodbye":

On the far distant planet of Baopalon the entire flora and fauna are being executed by one man. He’s going through species by species and systematically shooting everything.
His gun needs no bullets. It draws its shots from the little particles in the air and dust kicked up from wind and leaves falling from trees.
Incidentally, he is the only man to have ever been to Baopalon. He has had to name everything before he destroyed it. He is, for intents and purposes (which he thinks is “intesive purposes”) God to these plants and animals. He comes out of the sky and gives name to these beings. In so naming, he validates their existence. Their entire being. Before him this planet could have been two shits in the Pacific, for all anyone knew.
Then he shoots them.
First were the Sandawhoppers, like giant crabs with great prehensile snouts. Then Jormundos; scaly dog like things that constantly fart sulfur. He killed Debranzils and Chefors, Liplids and Snoogers. When he finishes with one species he turns around and shoots the very next thing he sees.
“Take that, Radsnarp!” for example, then a quick turn and, “Hello and Goodbye, Jumbywhumper!”
He always starts the killing with “Hello and Goodbye” because it is succinct. He doesn’t know about the words “Shalom” or “Aloha.”
He has been working for years alone on Baopalon. He is not sure how many. Could be as many as two decades. His ship is broken beyond repair and he is beyond rescue range. But he has a purpose.
As a result, though, of his years of isolation, he has forgotten his name. A fact he became aware of only recently.
“When they ask who killed the Jumbywhumpers,” he yelled to no one or everyone or the last Jumbywhumper or his creator, who is on Earth and in bed writing this now, “Tell them it was...”
The Jumbywhumper, a purple rabitty creature with only two legs and whiplike antennae in place of our rabbit’s ears, looked at him, cocking his head as if perhaps this man with the steel cylinder has something very important to tell him.
It was the last Jumbywhumper, though it has no way of knowing.
“Tell them it was...” he trailed off. All he could think of was something he had been called in grade school.
Lardo!
He had a weight problem in grade school.
“Tell them it was John Wayne,” he said, deciding to use the name of his childhood hero.
“Hello and Goodbye, Chilbwack!”

Alaska is for Lovers

2005-12-21T14:30:00.000-08:00

I don't really know if this post belongs here. But it's the closest place for it.

EXT. CITY STREET - DAY

JIMMY, 25, walks down the street. He's wearing a suit and stubble from the day before. A laptop bag slung over his shoulder.

JIMMY (V.O.)
What is it with girls I like
and Alaska? I've had one
girlfriend from Alaska. Two
who've left me for it and one
whose great great grandfather
was William Seward. That's
right, The William Seward of
Seward's Folly. Maybe if he
hadn't bought the damn state,
I wouldn't have the troubles I
do. And lets not even get
started on tertiary and further
relationships to the state;
girls who've vacationed there,
who've fallen in love with other
men on vacations there, who've
left me for alaskan men and
women, though not to reside in
that state. I've never even been
to Canada, god damn it, let alone
Alaska. So you can see why my
next reaction is going to make
perfect sense to you.

A HIPPIE, in a green drug rug, natty dreads under his knit Rastafarian hat, walks up to Jimmy. He's handing out pamphlets and stopping passersby. He grabs Jimmy.

HIPPIE
Hey, man, save the Alaskan
Wilderness.

JIMMY
What did you say?

HIPPIE
The African Wilderness man.
Bush wants to drill holes
in it for his beloved oil.

Jimmy stops. He turns around and grabs the hippie by his collars

HIPPIE
Hey, man, I just got this
sweat-

JIMMY
Have you ever been to
Alaska?

HIPPIE
No, man, that's not
what this is about!

JIMMY
So for all you know
it could be the seventh
circle of hell. Fuck
Alaska! That's what I
say! Miserable fucking
state way up North. Who
gives a shit?

HIPPIE
I do, man. There's
seals and shit up there.

JIMMY
Seals? Seals! Fuck
seals! What the fuck is
wrong with you! Who
gives a fuck about
fucking seals in fucking
Alaska! You see any seals
walking around here?

HIPPIE
No...

JIMMY
Well if you do, let me
fucking know. I'm gonna
club the shit out of 'em.

HIPPIE
Dude, you gotta-

JIMMY
Fuck Alaska. And Fuck You.

Quota

2005-10-03T14:21:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure this story really fits here, but it sure as shit doesn't fit anywhere else. Here it is:

Jed sits in his car. The unlit country road before him hasn’t had any traffic all night. Looks like he won’t meet his quota again. And so close this time, too. One more moving violation ticket. But at 11:30 on the 31st of May, and a Tuesday, at that, what’re the chances of a speeding car in the boondocks. Especially with some of these country drivers.
A lot of these Mainers don’t seem to take driving as seriously as they should. They piss along at rarely more than five miles over the speed limit, often it’s five under. It’s enough to drive Jed into fits of frothing, spittle-spraying bouts of road rage. His native New Yorkers know how to handle a car. A car shouldn’t just be a means of conveyance. It should be an extension of the id. Good driving is like good art, it’s cathartic and when you see it, awe and respect overwhelm you.
Mainers have no idea about the power of driving. It is strictly utilitarian for them.
Maddening.
Jed unlatches his belt. The recent move has left him little time for his normal work out. And his stomach is now swelling quickly past his already tight waistband. He sips at the coffee in his thermos.
Still no sign of traffic.
Jed leans back and rubs his eyes. He picks at a booger and flicks it through the cup holder.
“Ten points.”
He hears something, something low, but steadily increasing because of the doppler effect. It’s a car. A car with a big engine. Sounds like something sporty.
Sounds like it’s moving fast.
Hot Damn, maybe he’ll make quota after all.
Jed gets behind his radar gun and points it up the road. A faint glow up the road...growing brighter. Quickly brighter.
Jed’s breath quickens, so does his pulse. He always gets excited just before he pulls someone over. Yeah, it’s routine, yeah, it’s simple. But the thrill that the car could have any number of potential illegalities in it... The driver could be fleeing a bank robbery... or there could be smuggled drugs... Jed steadied himself.
The car really was coming quickly. Good. His first year on the job shouldn’t end with him missing quota. He can see the other cops faces. Newbie can’t catch simple speedsters on the back roads of Maine.
Jed starts his car but keeps the lights off. The car rounds the bend.
97 mph. Cruising.
It zips by as Jed pulls out and turns on all his lights. He throws on the siren, too. Hell, why not, rarely get the chance to these days. Wake up the townies, give ‘em something to gossip about when they get their coffee at Four Corners General Store in the morning. “you hear the siren last night, Phil?”
“Sure did, Tim, Jed, that new cop from New York, he caught Len Williams fleeing his burning house with his wife’s body in his trunk.”
“You don’t say? I knew there was something good about that Jed. Didn’t I tell you?”
“I know it, I know it.”

The car pulls right over. Damn. There goes the high speed chase. Jed sits in his car for a minute and stews. Give Mr. Speedster a chance to sweat, too. Let him worry about what the big bad cop is gonna do. Well, Jed’s going to give this guy everything he’s got. All the anger he’s built up, all the stress from the move, from the new job, from his wife, his ex-wife, from his lousy kids, from the other cops, from the neighbor’s dog that won’t shit in it’s own yard.
This guy was gonna get it.
Jed gets up. He re-latches his belt and puts his thumb in the belt-loop. He slams the door and saunters toward the speeder, the criminal, the soon to be owner of a moving violation citation. It’s a nifty little red porsche. Jed bets the driver is some yuppie’s son. He peers into the open window.
“Evenin’, Jed,” man inside says, “I hire you?”
It’s the chief.
There goes his quota.

Too Much

2005-09-15T23:52:00.000-07:00

I'm new to town, but I'll never get to know it if I don't investigate. The bar scene looks pretty good. Dark. Orange neon advertising my favorite domestic cheap brew. Smoke lazily curling around the fans that spin slowly. I've always wondered why they bother having the fans spin that slowly, it can't do anything for circulation. Maybe it's an aesthetic.

I pull up a stool and order a longneck and the guy next to me pulls out a cigarette. He's got a blue button up shirt with the sleeves cut off and about three days of stubble. Hairy shoulders. The bags under his eyes must give him trouble walking. He reaches into the pocket on his keg of a chest and pulls out a beat to shit match book.

"D'you mind?"

"Go right ahead."

"Filthy habit, this. I'm trying to quit though."

He lights up and inhales. His eyes shut and a slow smile creeps up his cheeks as he exhales slowly. The smoke wanders up to the ceiling and those improbable fans.

"I hear you. I just quit myself."

"What, you saying your better than me? You think you're some hero just 'cuz you quit fuckin' smoking?"

"No, no, man, not at all. I'm trying to say I understand, it's a tough time. Look, here's a toast to tough times."

He glares at me.

"And I'll buy you another round."

He laughs out loud, "Buddy, you got no need to do that! But how about that toast?"

We tap beers. He winks at me. I nod and pull at my beer, turn back to the bar. A jazz quartet is squeezed onto a pint sized stage by the door. The break into their first song.

My head rocks slowly with the beat and a windswept sliver of a girl slips onto the stage and hides behind the microphone stand. All the sudden she's crooning with a voice ten times bigger than she is, smoky and cool. The whole band is smoking. The guitarist has his cigarette wedged into the strings near the head. The bassist puffs on a cigar and the singer, she's holding hers in a cigarette holder. I can't see the drummer or the sax too well from this angle, but they're sending up smoke signals, too.

I love bar music.

The beer is good and the atmosphere in this place is irreplaceable. This might not be such a bad town. Almost makes up for getting the shit kicked out of me as soon as I got in town.

Misunderstanding, some guy thought his car belonged where my car was. My car was stopped at a red light. He was drunk though, and so were the five other people in his car.

It was the cops, though, who kicked the shit out of me. I guess the guys were their fishing buddies or some shit.

The guy next to me, Ed, if his name tag is right, is really getting into the music. He's rowdy and excited. Almost a ten year old with a bad stink and cheap drink. He slaps my back.

"Some band, huh?"

"Yeah, they're really something."

"I ain't seen you around here before."

"Yeah."

He looks at the band for a bit more.

"Man, they are really cooking."

My beer is empty. I order up a second. The bartender, a fifty-ish woman with a limp and a sandblasted face sets it down hard and the head foams up.

The singer is really getting into her set. Her face is hidden behind her black locks. Her arms swing out too wide for the small stage, but she somehow manages not to hit the bassist or burn the guitarist with her cigarette.

I finish my beer and head to the bathroom.

I'm finishing up when Ed walks in. He looks me up and down. I nod at him and zip.

"Now why'd you go and do that?"

"I had to piss."

"No, I meant zip it back up."

"What?"

"Come on, man. I drive a rig across the country. I don't get the chance to get my rocks off all that often. Especially with someone as big as you."

"Sorry, man, you got the wrong idea. I'm not-"

But now he's pissed.

"Not what?!" he yells, "Not a faggot! Like I am?!"

"I didn't say that, I just don't like dick"

"What? And because I do I'm a faggot? A fuckin' fruit? Some cum sucking, shit kicking, dipshit pansy with weak wrists?!"

"I didn't-"

"I'm not a fucking faggot. I like pussy as much as the next guy. I just want a dick every now and then."

"That's-"

"This is exactly what I'm fucking talking about! You fucking hateful shits won't let a man be a man true to himself."

"Hey, now I never said anything about-"

"Fuck you, dipshit." He spits on me. And I just washed this jacket. "You wanna see how much of a man I am?"

What the fuck do I say to that?

"Huh, do you, faggot?"

"Hey, I'm not and that's exactly why-"

"Shut up, shit eater"

He pushes me into the urinal, which cracks and drops to the floor. Thank Christ I flushed. He runs out the door and into the bar. I follow him.

"Hey, buddy, come back here."

"Fuck you. I'll show you how much of a man I am!"

The band has stopped, everyone's watching this fucking drunken loser defend his manhood.

"I am a man!"

The bartender with the sandblasted face speaks up.

"Now, Gary," I guess the name tag was wrong, "Gary, we all know you're a man."

"Fuck you, Lucy. Stay out of this."

"Gary, calm down."

I look over to the bartender, I'm soaking with urinal water and she understands. He's a regular.

"Fuck you, man, watch how much of a man I am."

He targets on the jazz singer, who's turned around and telling the band what the line-up is. He marches up toward her.

"Fuck, Stacy, look out!" "Stacy, behind you" "Stacy!"

But he's on her and out the door with her tucked under his arm. I see them move by the window and dash after them.

On the street I see she's not making it easy for him. She's struggling and kicking and cursing.

"Shut up, you fucking bitch. I'll show you I'm a man."

"Fuck you, man, I've got a show to do."

"I've got a show for you, sister." He tightens his grip on her, he's got her in a pretty serious headlock. She's beating on his back with her hand, I see she's still got the cigarette holder.

Then she stabs him with it. Right in the shoulder. He screams and drops her for a minute. She darts away but he's quick, too. He grabs her flailing arm and pulls her in hard and fast. I think her arm might be broken from the way it's bent now.

"YOU FUCKING CUNT! GOD DAMN! JESUS FUCKING SHIT!"

He grabs her hair and pulls, hard. He's got a handful. She screams and he takes her into the alley.

I've caught up now. He's trying to rip off her shirt.

"Hey, Gary, you fucking shithole. Look at me."

"Fuck you."

"Gary, I want to show you what a real fucking man looks like."

"Fuck you, shit head, I am a man." He pulls out a knife. A big fucker of a knife. He shreds her shirt and I see a little red. She speaks up.

"A real man doesn't need to steal the only pussy he'll ever see. A real man can get it easily."

"This seems pretty fuckin' easy to me!" He yells at her and menaces with the knife. I step closer and he panics, he lifts her quickly to him and holds the knife to her throat with one hand while undoing her pants with his other hand.

"Fuck you, shithead. This is all your fault and you're gonna watch while I fucking rape her."

"You're not going to rape her."

"Fuck you."

I step closer, he backs up.

"I'm serious, shit fuck, I'll cut her."

"I'm serious, faggot, you're not going to rape her."

I jump forward. He jumps back and into the alley wall and screams. He hit the wall and it drove the cigarette holder further in.

Stacy takes the hint and jumps away from him. She kicks him in the stomach and spits on him and he drops to his knees.

"Gary, you are not a man."

"Fuck you, dipshit."

I hear sirens coming. I turn around and see the red and blue lights flashing off the windows and storefronts of the street.

Gary, predictably, leaps up at my back. But his breath is ragged and loud and he's clumsy and I can hear him a mile coming. I spin and grab his throat and slam him into the pavement. The knife clatters off down the alley. He lays for a minute and coughs.

"You fucking pussy," he spits out at me.

I kick him in the face.

He shuts up.

Stacy stands at the mouth of the alley looking down at Gary. She looks at me and doesn't say anything. We sit on a stack of packing crates and I pull out a cigarette. Light it.

We share it and drop the ashes on Gary.

Can I Buy You a Drink?

2005-08-19T02:00:00.000-07:00

My grandmother's in a hospital 500 miles away with tubes sticking out of her, taking drugs in and waste out. She's weak and sick and short of breath. She's infected and broken and tired. Tired of needles and doctors and drugs and nurses. Tired of pain and fighting and living at this point. She's withered and weak, her skin like rolling papers or fine parchment. She has lost a lot of weight and her cheeks are sunken like craters but the hospital has pumped her full of saline and morphine so her torso is bloated. When I first saw her with those tubes down her throat and the IVs, sensors and monitors jammed into her she looked like a nearly bursting water balloon. Like a jellyfish on land.
Then she improved and they took out the ventilator so she could talk but her lungs aren't processing enough O2, so she's in a constant state of panic. The nose plugs aren't enough. She doesn't breath well through her nose.
Sometimes the doctors stick the nose plugs in her mouth. Her automatic reaction is to suck and obscenely tongue them. Eyes closed, gaping jaw. It's a purely unconcious thing. When that doesn't work they put a mask on her. It delivers oxygen to her better but makes her feel claustrophobic, trapped. She pulls it off and loses oxygen and panics. Her eyes wide. Lips drawn limply against toothless gums she reaches out for someone to grab. "Help me," she pleads and as I look in her eyes I try and comfort her. Show her I love her but all I see is pure animal panic, like a horse or cow.
To combat this they sedated her and put her back on the ventilator until her lungs gain more strength. Give her another couple days rest.
My grandmother's in a hospital 500 miles away. She's got tubes sticking into her gut and needles sticking into her veins. She's pumped full of downers and anaesthetics and chemicals. She's part machine. My grandmother's in a hospital bed, she's 500 miles away. But I'm here in this bar. Here in this bar with you and a beer and Jim Croce on the radio.
Can I buy you a drink?

Don't Flush

2005-07-10T12:12:00.000-07:00

We finish one round and she wants more. I'm useless to her needs, so she grinds herself to a writhing, sweaty orgasm on my thigh. Her hands rub up and down my back and shoulders and her gaping mouth sucks air. Her lips find mine and she runs her fingertips down my chest. She purrs.

We collapse onto the bed. I light a cigarette and try not to think about the damp spot of sweat I'm laying on. She drops off without saying a word.

I wake up four hours later and can still taste her. The power is out. It's dark out and it's dark in. Good. I can't see the peeling wallpaper and water stains. I can't see the splotchy carpet and I can't see the scratched and battered door with the broken deadbolt. I peel her off me and fumble over to the bathroom and the blinds are casting rays of dirty neon light from the bar across the street onto the grimy medicine cabinet mirror. The mirror reflects the light into the shower where it dances off grungy white porcelain. I open the medicine cabinet and the light shines somewhere useful, the toilet. I piss.

Fucking power outages.

I get back into the room and she's stolen one of my smokes. Can't turn your back on them.

"You didn't flush."

"The power's out."

"But you didn't flush."

I cast her a look that says she's free to leave any time. She blows smoke out her nostrils. I put my jeans on and stand over the bed.

"You going somewhere?"

"Down to the bodega. Looks like I'll need more cigarettes."

I pull on a dirty white t-shirt and grab my wallet and keys. She watches me slip on flip-flops and she starts coughing as I slam the thin door to my rotten apartment.

The rain earlier in the evening cleaned the night air. Even the gritty bar lights look clear right now. A soft breeze works its way through the streets and alleys, pushing out the stink and bringing in fresh air. Nights like these the city isn't such a bad place.

A vagrant sleeps it off in a pile of trash.

I need to move. Maybe I can do it tonight, cut myself free of her and escape. But then Jen would get mad and I'd never hear the end of it.

That's the problem with friends. They can treat you like shit and they're still your friends. I guess because you can do the same to them. And you'll still do favors for them, favors like watching her cousin while she's out of town avoiding the debt collectors. I told her I'd take care of the collectors, she said she'd rather be out of town. I'm beginning to think it's an awfully convenient coincidence she's out of town same time Maria's in.

But I owe Jen big. When I got here I couldn't have told you if Bay Street ran to the waterfront or the moon. Jen watched me, she gave me a cheap bed. She called cops when I got in trouble and called the ambulance when the cops didn't show. She saved my life a coupla times when I'd drank too much and didn't like the look on some guy's face, only he had a couple of friends I didn't see before.

Yeah, I owe Jen this much.

The bodega is dirty and dim and out of Camels. I settle for Pall Malls and a six pack of MGD.

My key is in the lock and I hear the toilet flush. I rush inside and Maria's climbing back into the bed.

"What'd you flush for?"

"You never did."

"Yeah, but we've got no power."

"Last I checked water wasn't electrical."

"No, but the fucking pumps are. Don't flush."

I take off my clothes and the bed plays the same note it always plays as I crawl in. The power comes on.

"You could've waited until now to flush."

She casts me a look that says I'm free to leave any time. I roll over and shut my eyes.

Friends.