Here. All Yours. Complete piece of utter **** this untalented hack of a teacher made me write like under suppressed protest. Check out the last paragraph. The WORST. ****. EVER.
The Poolside Girls
He said, “Do you want to stop for coffee?” and she just shook her head in the way she usually did, then shut her eyes and leaned her head against the window. He sighed, let himself ignore it again, then turned up the radio.
He pulled into the 7-11 anyway, stopping short to avoid hitting a car pulling out of a space.
“Douche bag,” he muttered, then pulled into the space. He shut the car off, let its roaring motor cease, pulled the key out of the ignition, looking one last time at her, then slammed the door. He opened the door, holding it open for a young woman, who smiled at him, gave her thanks, then went on her way out of his life.
He walked to the back of the store, breathing through his mouth—there was stale smell in the store, and it sickened him—and poured himself a cup of coffee, ripping open two blue bags of Equal and pouring about a half tablespoon of half and half into the twenty ounce cup. He stirred it with a red stirring stick, then chose a lid and covered it.
He walked up to the counter, tapping his foot impatiently behind a bald man who was counting out his pennies precariously, and then decided to buy five more lottery tickets. He rolled his eyes, then stepped up to another man who had just opened his register.
“Pack of Marlboro Reds,” he said. The cashier reached above his head, then handed placed the cigarettes carefully on the counter—far away enough so that this man couldn’t just grab them and run. The cashier’s eyes widened when the man pulled out a fifty-dollar bill and slid it across the counter, just past the pack of cigarettes.
He watched as the cashier counted the change carefully, but then he took it upon himself to double-check it. He nodded at the cashier, then made his way out the door, but held it open for a fat man accompanying a small child. He made his way to the car—it was just starting to rain, the kind of rain that gave him a headache, the rain that plopped big, fat drops on his forehead, the rain that was arrhythmic and confusing, the rain that he hated driving in. The windshield wipers were old—it would leave a residue on his view.
He got back into the car, started it up, watching her sleeping. He turned up the Howard Stern broadcast, turned on his lights, then proceeded to back out of his parking space, not really looking one way or the other, and then got back onto the main road.
He reached between the seats, searching for a lighter, looking intermittently at the floor and to the road, and he felt around for awhile until he felt the sleek, slender figure between his fingers and lifted it from the ground. He put the lighter on the console between the seats, then packed his pack of cigarettes against the steering wheel, bending the top of the pack, and then ripped off the plastic with his teeth. He pulled out a cigarette, then reached for the lighter again, flicked it with his thumb and fired up his cigarette. He opened the window a bit, just as it started to rain harder.
The nicotine made his headache grow worse. His stomach tightened, his chest heavier, but he loved every drag of it, every single moment he could suck down the sweet, sweet nicotine until his next fix. It held him over, she knew it.
Her eyes opened, and she sat up.
“Pull over!” she demanded, and he slammed on the brakes, steering out of the swerve. The car stalled.
“God damn it!” he yelled, slamming his hands on the steering wheel. She kicked open the door, then leaned over, vomiting on the side on a brush of dried weeds growinf through the asphalt, wiped her mouth, sighed, then sat back. He looked at her.
“Are you all right?” He didn’t really care; he just thought he should ask.
“Yeah,” she answered. He stepped on the clutch, turned the key. The engine rattled.
“Well, the car’s not.” He stepped outside into the nothingness, popped the hood. Steam rose from the radiator. He put his hand on the cap, quickly withdrew his hand from the hot top. “****.” He looked at her, falling back asleep in the car. “The water pump’s busted, I think.” She didn’t hear him.
He told himself he could trek back down this lonely road in the middle of a meadow that stretched for miles without a marking, an name, an end, to the convenience store and make a phone call, maybe buy a jug of water and fill it back up, just long enough to make it to a mechanic or a gas station—somewhere. At least by then, the anti-freeze would cool and not explode as soon as he removed the radiator cap all over his The Clash vintage jacket.
She stirred and groaned, slamming her fist against the dashboard, rattling the hood. He looked up, rolled his eyes at her, then bent down again.
“I’m so sick and tired of this goddamn… nomad life! You told me that it wasn’t going to be like this? Why can’t you just get a real job so you could actually stay in a place longer than three ******* months without getting evicted? And this ******* car! It breaks down more than it drives, for Christ’s Sake! I can’t have this life, this ******* baby can’t have this life—not with you, not like this!” He paid no attention to her, let her slam her head back on the seat in frustration. She’d shut up for another month and a half now. It was about time she’d explode, and then she’d live silent for awhile. That suited him just fine.
Today was different, though. Today he was annoyed. Today he wasn’t doped up on smack.
He looked out from under the hood, stormed over to her door and yelled at her through the window while she cowered and listened, lips clamped shut.
“Why can’t you just shut the **** up and be happy for once? All you ******* do is ***** and moan about every little ******* thing … and maybe I can’t take your **** anymore. That’s why you don’t ******* speak to me. No, it’s not because you’re pissed. It’s because you’re a ******* ***** who can’t say anything ******* nice. So, you know what… keep doing that. Unless you’re going to get up off your fat *** and help me solve this problem… as a … ******* team, then you can just sit there and shut the **** up!” He shook his head and cleared his throat, then went back to work, glaring helplessly at the car parts lying before him under the hood. They were rusted and rattling, though it had been at least three minutes since he had turned the engine off.
She thought at one point that maybe she could change him. She was a naïve little thing, attracted to the rock star disguise he had going, and when she finally realized he was nothing more than an addict wearing the skin of someone who talked big and fulfilled promises, she had already fallen hopelessly in love with him. She thought she could help him defeat this thing. Now, she couldn’t care less. She was second best, he was in love with something else, she knew it, she cried, she hated him, she was knocked up and tired, so she stayed.
She laughed. She laughed a lot. Sitting in the broken car, watching him cluelessly fumble with car parts she couldn’t name, in the middle of nowhere, in the rain, she laughed. Laughed, laughed, laughed.
“What the **** is so funny?” he asked, looking around the propped-up hood at her.
“You,” she replied. “You’re so goddamn clueless.”
He wanted to slug her. He wanted to open up the passenger door and grab her out by the hair and just go ape-**** on her, but instead, he stood back and lit a cigarette.
“Shut up,” was all he said.
* * *
He heard about a guy named Juarez from the clerk at Motel Six, so he called the number that he was given—wondering if it was just a set up, but didn’t care—and arranged to meet Juarez in the Wawa parking lot down the street.
The front office Mack said Juarez was a distinguishable character, with a fake glass eye colored differently than his real one, a large scar across his throat. He spoke with an electric larynx, and propped himself on a cane to support his peg leg.
“Hey, are you Juarez?” he asked, running his fingers through his hair, looking around nervously. A car pulled away.
“Who are you?” came the demonic reply. His heart raced, and he tried to lower his glance so not to offend the stranger.
“We talked a little while earlier, on the phone,” Adrian replied, winking, wondering if Juarez had some sort of secretary, because he sounded human on the phone. Instead of replying—to the delight of human ears—Juarez leaned his cane against the Wawa, raised both hands and brought them to Adrian’s chest, then let them explore. “What the hell are you doing, man?” Juarez grabbed the metal voice box from around his neck, brought it to his throat.
“Checking for wires,” it answered. Adrian looked toward the store entrance--a clerk fixed his eyes on the pair, under the pretense of cleaning the panes of glass on the door. He used generic Windex.
“Oh,” he said nonchalantly, though it had never happened to him before. Inexperienced ****, he thought. “So, like, is fifty good?” He reached for his wallet.
“For now,” the robot voice answered. Adrian winced, an insatiable urge to rip the faux voice from around his neck and stomp it into little irreparable metal pieces chilled him. “You will owe me one hundred more for today, though.”
“Can you get me more for tomorrow? Like, around six in the morning? I’ll have more money by then, and I’ll give you the rest for today and tomorrow then,” he lied. He had no money; he’d figure it out.
“Six? That’s fine.”
“Could you…just…not…talk? It’s like, freaking me out, dude. Seriously.” He brought a cigarette to his lips, flicked the lighter a few times, got a flame, then lit it. Juarez stared at him, pointed at the cigarette. “That’s a little unprofessional, isn’t it?” He rolled his eyes, handed Juarez a cigarette. “Need a light?” Juarez held up a hand and shook his head. “Shouldn’t you…you know, not smoke? Since…” he began, pointing to his own throat. Juarez shook his head, then licked his lips, before sticking the cigarette back in his mouth.
“I sold my voice for ten grand,” he replied. “In 1994. They just sawed it right out. Some kid in Iowa has it now.”
“Oh,” Adrian replied, wondering how much one of the electronic voices cost and if the profit exceeded the loss. “So…umm…you want to…get to it?” he asked, cocking his head toward the side of the building, away from the lights. Juarez nodded, followed him. He swallowed, pulled out a fifty from his wallet. He was smarter than that, too, but he figured the gimp wouldn’t pull a fast one on him. When he was seventeen, a dealer robbed him and left him dry. On the way home, a Puerto Rican stabbed him and stole his shoes. It was a bad day.
Juarez instead reached inside his pocket like an honest business-man and pulled out a small plastic bag filled with white crystals. He handed it to him, and Adrian inspected it between his thumb and index finger.
“Wow,” was all he could say, salivating at the thought that snorting these crystals directly into his brain was less than ten minutes away. Adrian himself was more of an injector, but with junk this great, why boil it down, prepare the syringe, flick all the air out of it, and then go through the trouble of finding a vein without pock marks all over it? With the Asian heroin, though, you were supposed to appreciate all of it. He was getting his money’s worth, so he’s taking it up his nose.
The difference between snorting coke and snorting heroin was the burn. Coke burns just as bad, but the throbbing arteries from the brain to the heart and the constant pulsing in his temples often made him confused. Heroin was different, though. The burn would subside, and he’d enjoy a lax and stress-tax free life. No pain, all gain, as he said.
“Thanks, man,” Adrian said. “Can I get the same stuff tomorrow morning? Or do you have anything else?”
“I have some Jake, if you want,” Juarez replied. Jake? He never heard of it. It probably wasn’t what he said, but Adrian couldn’t figure it out.
“Um…nah. This is cool. I’ll meet you here at six?”
“Call me before. And if you don’t, this is what my boys do.” He tapped his peg leg, then winked. Adrian swallowed, wondering whether to take the demon-voiced dealer’s caveat as truth.
“Okay.” Adrian walked away, whistling to himself. The fear of payback subsided. On the way back to the motel, he started skipping like a schoolboy, “I’m going to get high, I’m going to get high” to the tune of “Nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah” on his mind. Now all he needed was money, but it was going to be cake.
The sun was starting to warm up the air, after the residual rain had rescinded. In the distance, Adrian could hear a group of girls, giggling—in the pool. How happy they must be, he thought, as they came into his sight, but not as happy as I’m going to be.
He kicked the door open, and she was sitting on the Murphy bed, sobbing, staring at the crooked painting of a waterfall mounted above the television—which was running a Honeymooners marathon—but she couldn’t care less.
“Lucy, I’m home!” he announced, collapsing onto the bed, then sitting up, taking out his newfound crystalline treasure. “I love you,” he said, poking the bag with a finger. He smiled. He looked back at her staring at him. “What?”
“You’re a ****-up.” Visions of him digging through the interior of the Oldsmobile under the driver’s side seat, pulling out his hidden Walther P99 and expelling the single-action bullet square into her chest ran through his mind. He bought the handgun two years ago after an incident out in West Hollywood that left him anally deflowered and out of three hundred dollars. Now this ******* ***** was inspiring him to use it.
It was no matter now—she wouldn’t bother him anymore once he got high. She would just disappear, like everything else.
“Nice. Thank you. I love hearing that from you. Makes me feel great.” He held the bag up to the light once more, flicked it with his finger, just in case h
“Is that where you went? To go get ******* heroin?”
“Where do you think I was? Volunteering at a children’s hospital or something?” He flicked the bag with his fingers, breaking up the little clumps, inspecting in the dim light of the only lamp in the room.
“I hope that **** kills you,” she muttered.
“Well, you know what…if this is the way I go, at least I’m going happy.” He licked his lips, emptied the contents onto the night table next to the bed.
“If you’re going to spend the night shooting up and shitting yourself, then I’m going out.” She stood up and glared at him from behind the bed. She could feel the baby kicking in protest—in her uterus, in her heart, in her mind.
“See you later,” he replied. She stood behind him, hands on her hips, half-expecting with the shred of hope she had that he’d turn around, denounce the habit and love her. It didn’t happen. He just turned and looked at her, then turned back to the business at hand, forming neat little lines with his fingernail. He brought his small finger to his nose, sniffed at it, lest a single crystal get away.
She never left. She sat on the bed, stared at the television.
“I thought you were going out,” he finally said, holding up the bag to the light and inspecting it—he may have neglected some stray grains in the corners of it. Nope.
“I don’t have any where to go—the ******* car is broken, idiot.” She watched him for awhile. First, he pulled out his maxed-out MasterCard—it was still useful now—and then he straightened the makeshift lines into perfect linear rays of beautiful little crystals. Now, he pulled out a twenty—the Washington dollar bills were just not stiff enough, and neither were the fives or tens—and rolled it into a tight little tube. He used to say using money was dangerous, because there could be crystals caught in the cylinders of makeshift rolls that escaped him—it’s a waste of money, he’d say. Ironically, since he was using money to snort it. He’d laugh after thinking that, and even more so when he said it aloud. She never got the joke, nor the addiction. That’s how it always was for people who didn’t know.
Now, he was bending down to snort it, holding a nostril closed, because he wouldn’t get the full force of the blow if he didn’t. Half of it would be left on the table, useless and strewn all over the place.
“You’re ******* pathetic,” she said as he finally exhaled, then drew in a deep breath through his right nostril, the heroin going straight up his nasal passage, through the mucosa, right to the opioid center of his brain. The acetyl was breaking down now—now it was just pure and unabashed loveliness.
“Why do you have to knock it, dude?” he said. God, it was so fast. The way it was seconds ago and the way it was now, damn, it was good. To him, anyway. It ******* moved through his brain, down his spine. He was already “******* good.”
Another line, another time, another quote, some ******-up kind of love he had and he was spent, but took another, and wondered why it was acting so fast.
“This is some good ****,” he said. “It’s like I’m seventeen again.”
“Yeah, well…you’re twenty-eight and you act like it,” was all she could say, arms folded. She kept talking and whining, but he didn’t listen. By the fourth line, he was done, the supplies were out, and he was ready to get moving. He couldn’t. He just sat there, pleased with himself. He felt beautiful and useful and placid and content. He could feel again.
He lit a cigarette, and upon the first drag, the nicotine pleasured him like his first ********, the second like a nice Thanksgiving dinner. He felt satiated. He took a third drag, just to be able to feel it.
“Baby, come here,” he said.
“**** you,” she replied. “I’m going to bed.” That was fine. He leaned his head back on the headboard, watched her crawl under the covers. She turned out the light. After several minutes of nodding off in the dark, he was stressed again, wondering how he was going to get money so he could get some more of this really great heroin from Juarez.
“The dealer was weird,” he said. “He looked ******-up. He had this fake leg, and like…he had no voice box, so he had one of those robot voice things—you know what I mean? He told me he sold his voice box for like…all this money.... Could you imagine?”
“Shut up.”
“He was a cool guy, all in all. I mean…”
“He’d throw you in front of a ******* train for ten dollars. Shut up.”
“Isn’t that weird, though? Like, just let somebody saw your throat out?”
“If you don’t shut up, I’m going to sell your voice box.” That was a good idea, for the time. He could sell his voice—she was the only one around, and she didn’t want to hear it anyway. It was bad for the band, though. He was the singer, you know? Like, you can’t sing if you don’t have a voice box. ****. He kind of wanted to hit her.
The phone rang. Who the hell knew they were there? Was it the front desk? Did Dolores’ check bounce? Did Adrian drop a dime bag of weed on the floor of the clerk’s office? If he did, then it was awful nice of the clerk to let him know.
“Get the goddamn phone,” she snapped. He sighed, reached for it slowly, wondering if the trajectory his hand was taking was suddenly misfired. Nope. He picked it up, nearly dropped the handle, then caught it again.
“Hello?” he asked warily.
“Adrian?” the voice on the other end spoke. It was a young male, he could hear, possibly foreign.
“Yeah? Who’s this?”
“This is Paul, Juarez’ friend. I just want to let you know, dude…Juarez just got back, and we know you owe us a hundred more for today, so don’t dick us around, man. Juarez is a nice guy…I’m not that nice. You **** around, you get ******. Understand?”
“Yeah, yeah…sure, no problem,” Adrian replied, winking at Dolores. “I’ll have it tomorrow at the time we said—same place.”
“You better, scumbag,” Paul snapped. Adrian heard the click on the other end followed by the deafening alarm of the dial tone. He had no volition to hang up, but he had to. He cleared his throat, hung up the phone. Dolores was staring at him now, glaring at him with guiltless eyes into the guileless soul of the sire of the zygote inside her. Unbelievable.
“I’m going to play guitar.” No answer. He stood up, feeling a little heavy—he’d been doing heroin for years, and it never made him feel this good—and took the acoustic guitar out of its case, strummed a few chords, but he couldn’t find the focus or the energy to hold the strings down. He tried, but ended up getting tired of trying.
“I think I’m going to go to the…bar. Next door. I saw it,” he said. No answer again.
“Go drink your junkie *** off, stupid,” she said. He just looked at her—glared at her, really—shook his head, grabbed the room key and slammed the door behind him. He looked to his left as he made his way toward the bar down the road. The girls in the motel pool—he could hear—were still there. A pretty bikini-clad brunette had fanned out her legs, stretching herself out across the pool surface—unaware that the sun had gone, unaware that now he was transformed into something better.
He threw another five down on the counter. The bartender nodded toward him.
“Another Beck’s?”
“Please,” he answered, sliding the bill further toward the forbidden side of the counter, next to the tap. If he wasn’t quick enough, he’d climb over and put his mouth to the ******* fountain—he just didn’t care. It was dark and dead in there, except for some blaring music, a lit Budweiser sign blasting in red, the single TV silently televising the Angels baseball game, and a few local barflies. If there was a conflict, he might as well have it alone with the server.
“Rough night?” the Redneck asked. The Redneck had been sitting next to him for quite some time, but until he had four Jack Daniels in him, he was completely and utterly unable to execute any sort of social skill.
“You could say that,” Adrian asked. The bartender set down the Beck’s over a paper coaster, walked toward two women on the opposite side of the bar. He’d **** them if he had the will. But to get the will, he needed money. Lots of money. For lots of junk.
“Women?” The Bon Jovi song, “Wanted” ended. Adrian hated it.
“Among other things.” He looked at the Redneck. “What’s your story?” he asked, his eyes falling to the empty glasses in front of him.
“Oh, these?” he asked. “These are for show.” He winked. Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “That Smell” was queued up. The Redneck stopped, ****** his head, pointed to the ceiling. “Great song,” he commented, smiling. Adrian shrugged.
“Yeah, it’s okay.”
“Okay? Do you know anything about music?”
“Yeah. I’m a musician,” Adrian replied. Five months ago, it would have been true. Now when he said it, he had to keep himself from scoffing.
“Oh, yeah? What do you play?”
“I’m the lead singer in a band—“
“Singing’s for chicks,” the Redneck interrupted. “You some kind of fairy?”
“…And I’m the lead guitar player. And no, I’m not some kind of fairy.”
“You got all them pretty jewels and tattoos. You sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.” He rolled his eyes. The Redneck stared at him, then broke into laughter, nudged his arm. Adrian gripped his forearm where Redneck had poked him. So, so annoying. What is he going to do about the money? If this Redneck doesn’t shut up…
“You’re all right, you know that,” he said. “So, where you from, pretty boy?”
“New Jersey,” Adrian replied, reaching in his jacket pocket for a cigarette.
“Well, that’s a while away, ain’t it? What are you doing around here?” He stuck the cigarette in his mouth, letting it rest on his bottom lip.
“Coming back from California,” he answered, then lit it up.
“That’s the Pretty Boy Capital of the World,” Redneck said.
“Yeah, well…that may be. Me and my band, we had some shows out in California.”
“Now, how do people in California know about your New Jersey band?” Redneck asked, taking a drink of the whiskey.
“Well, we have a record out.”
“Really now?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s the name of your band?”
“As Darkness Rises,” Adrian replied, noticing the cigarette had extinguished itself, so he covered the end with his hand and lit it again.
As Darkness Rises had a minimally successful six track EP that circulated throughout underground circles across the country. A guy named Steve had recorded it in his homegrown studio, and soon enough, Adrian and the boys had record deal offers and sponsorship deals and a U.S. Tour ahead of them.
Adrian broke up with his seven year-girlfriend—the girl who had gotten him into the habit, and every time he shot up, he felt like she was ******* him over all over again. Apparently, the girlfriend had thought better of the idea to sleep with his drummer than he did. So, it was over. With a clean slate, a seemingly endless supply of drugs and freedom and fun, Adrian played shows and slept with all sorts of different sluts from across the country.
They eventually came back to New Jersey, where Adrian met Dolores in a bar, laid on the charm, took her back to his “artist” loft, screwed her, decided he liked her, took her out again, and she stuck with him. The first time she caught him doing heroin, she was so appalled and shocked, but instead of chasing her as she stormed out, he injected, figuring she’d get over it. She did.
They went on a mini-tour again—six stops—and ended up in California, where the band had a chance of getting picked up by a major label. Our hero, doped down on heroin, showed up fifteen minutes before the band was supposed to play. Instead of injecting it, he got some China from a guy named Easy C down in West Hollywood, six blocks from the venue, smoked it—an old vagrant actually called it “chasing the dragon.” Who said that anymore—woke up in an alley with his pants around his ankles, headed toward the venue, but the show was over and he was ****** up.
The band had enough of him, threw him out of his ***, took their van and headed back home. Adrian took Dolores, found a cheap car for 500 bucks and started to drive it home. It kept breaking down and needing repairs, so the four-day trip was extended into something like four months, but Adrian called it a sabbatical from stress. Dolores called it something else.
Some people said, “Why not just take a bus or a train?”
That’s why Dolores called it “abduction.”
“Never heard of ‘em.”
“Well, like…we had this guy we know like, press a thousand CDs, you know…and well, we got popular, I guess.”
“One of those underground kind of things? My kid knows all about that ****. He’s a ******, you know.” The Redneck pressed his forehead against his palm. “What’s with these kids? You know? You try to raise them right, teach them how to be a man, to be responsible and strong, to appreciate the female body, and they just get on their knees and put a dick in their mouth. What’s…what the **** did I do wrong?”
“Well,” Adrian replied, clearing his throat, “I don’t really think you, per se, did anything wrong.” He nearly smirked, thinking that if this guy was his father, he probably would’ve run off to some cult or something. “I think when you’re gay, it’s like, something you’re born with.”
“You ever wonder if you’re a fairy?”
“No. I mean, at one point, I’m sure everyone is like, ‘I wonder if I’m gay,’ … and then they think about being gay and realize it’s not for them and then…that’s that.” Adrian shrugged.
“I haven’t gotten laid in seven years,” Redneck said. He leaned in close. “I would do almost anything for pussy right now. You want to be my pussy boy?” No, he didn’t want to be Redneck’s pussy boy. But, he wondered just how bad did Redneck want sex? As bad as he needed money?
“What would you do for it?” Adrian asked, leaning in.
“I…I don’t know,” Redneck answered, taken aback. Adrian leaned in closer.
“If I told you I can get you some real pussy for three hundred bucks, would you pay it?” Adrian asked suddenly, turning on his inner salesman. Adrian licked his lips, raised his eyebrows.
“I…suppose.”
“I know of a chick who will definitely do you. She’s cute, too.”
“Where is she?”
“You have to pay me first. I won’t rip you off, I don’t even have a car, and you can tell by my accent that there’s no way I’d be in these parts if I wasn’t stuck here.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out a plastic card. “This is what I’m going to do. See this?” he asked, holding up the plastic card. “You know the motel next door? This is a key to Room number 9. It’s your key.” He slid it across the counter. Redneck reached for it. Adrian pulled it back. “Uh-uh. Wait. Inside Room Number 9 is a really cute, really available chick—do whatever the **** you want to her, because she’s mine and I said it’s okay. But…like I said, you have to pay me first. “
“I don’t have three hundred. I have like two, though.” Adrian bit his lip, thought for a moment. He could probably bargain with Juarez.
“Good enough.” So, they traded. Adrian took the money, got another beer, and Redneck went off in search of the mystery girl of Room Number 9.
Four thirty a.m. and Redneck never came back with his key. It would work out better anyway, he figured, leaving the bar. He could just say he lost his key and she’d be crying, saying she was raped or whatever and he’d never be suspect to conspiring the entire affair.
He stumbled down the highway, just him, the stars, the crickets in the field of weeds, and this long, dead road—doped up and drunk. Would he be able to keep a straight face when she cried about being raped? He wasn’t sure, so he went through what he imagined the scene would be like and rehearsed everything he would say.
“Oh, my God!” he’d say upon her telling him. “What’d he look like? Honey…what … oh, God. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” That’d work, and he’d hug her while she sobbed on his shoulder. By then, it should be nearing six a.m., so he could go meet Juarez.
By the time he got back to the motel, found his room door open, turned the light on, saw her lying on the bed in blood, it was nearing five. He had stopped several times during his half-block odyssey to gather his senses by sitting on a curb, chain-smoking cigarettes until he collected enough will power to walk again.
“Dolores?” he said, poking her, but she didn’t move. He didn’t know if she was dead or if she was just sleeping, but the blood smeared all over the bed and across the wall made him think that perhaps it was the former. He picked up the phone, called Juarez, said to meet him at the Wawa in a half hour.
Humdrum ho hum. He tapped his fingers on his kneecap as he sat beside a bleeding Dolores, debating on whether or not to actually meet Juarez. That was a hundred bucks that he’d have to spend for stuff he wasn’t going to get—he already used it yesterday.
What about Dolores? Should he leave her here and wait? Or what? Who the **** killed her like that? Was she even dead?
The pressure was too much. He lit a cigarette, staring at her, until the cigarette resting between his lips had fallen to the floor. He was too ******-up to begin to wonder what the **** he was going to do.
He stomped on the cigarette, extinguishing, but not before it nestled itself into its own burn-made quarters on the blue-green carpet.
“****,” he muttered. Another thing he’d have to pay for? He thought not. What the **** was he going to do? Okay. He’ll just go meet Juarez. He’ll get his stuff and say that other stuff happened and…um…he couldn’t get the money, and he’d give it to him tomorrow. All of it. Plus more for his trouble. He’d give fifty today, and then all the rest of it tomorrow—why give him all of the two hundred? He could buy a pack of smokes or get the car fixed or…
The room was breathing. He could hear it now. Dolores was okay. She was breathing just fine. He looked back at her, coughed, watched to see if she stirred at all—no—and made his way out the door to meet Juarez.
Curious, he thought. The sun was already up. He realized he was late. Very late. He’d spent the last hour getting sobered up without realizing how much time he’d actually wasted being suspended in dead thought.
He shuffled his way across the motel parking lot, hiding his eyes from the effect of the desert daybreak, his forearm the only shield to sunlight.
The Wawa was already busy with bodies, and he crossed a young woman gripping her child’s hand, with a coffee in the other. She looked at him with fear, he could feel, and she rushed her son into the car and drove off. Another car pulled into the lot of the convenience store, and he jumped out of his zone and back into consciousness—out of the way of the car. He sneered at the driver, who seemed to be yelling profanities in silence behind the windshield. Seconds later, he was thrown against the wall of the store. Juarez.
“Where the **** where you? It’s seven thirty,” Juarez demanded with a pointed finger in Adrian’s face, though the vocal affect of anger was completely lost to him. Adrian just swallowed.
“I’m sorry, man…I got tied up—my girlfriend got in this thing, and…”
“Shut up. You got the money?”
“Dude…that’s the thing…See…I—I tried to call you and all…and like, my girlfriend, she’s pregnant and …um…we had to...go to this doctor, and long story short,” he scoffed, then stifled a laugh through an insincere smile, “um…I only got fifty. I mean…please accept it.”
“Fifty? ******* fifty?” Juarez shook his head, then whistled, made a beckoning motion with his right hand. Adrian looked out into the lot and saw two men emerge from a tiny black Mustang convertible.
“******* shame,” a heavyset man, the driver, commented, shaking his head. Adrian began to twitch, his knees buckling beneath him. He’s not in this now, he can’t be.
“There’s got to be a misunderstanding…I mean…come on…Guys, guys…we can talk this out…you know, make a deal,” he reasoned, bobbing his head to the last three words, like the incident were nothing more than the inspiration for the anti-melody of a Darkness Rises song. He winked at Juarez. “Come on. Right, man.”
Juarez just shook his head. Adrian’s smile faded.
“We made you a deal,” Heavyset Man replied, inches away from Adrian, standing behind Juarez. He backhanded Juarez arm. “I told you this piece of **** wouldn’t make good on anything.” The Heavyset Man shook his head at Adrian in disdain. “Paul,” he began, pointing to a skinny, tall fellow with a discernible scar cutting through his facial orifices, from head to chin, “told you—he told you, he dialed you personally and gave you a ******* courtesy call, for Christ’s Sake—not to **** around with us. And what do you do? What do you do? You **** around.” Heavyset Man opened his jacket and revealed, tucked neatly in between his overbearing belly and sagging waistline, a handgun of which type Adrian couldn’t place, but it was there. He sucked in a breath as Heavyset Man grabbed his arm and ordered him into the car.
“Dude…I mean, sir…I mean…please…we can work this out. I mean it.” Adrian’s face was flushed, the anguish of what would ultimately happen and what already did tearing up his sense of place, of purpose, of solution—and it was cited all over his countenance.
“Nope. Sorry. Get the **** in the car.” He swallowed again. Would no one help? Not the man in the overalls with the submarine sandwich? Or the teenaged kid following who had just illegally purchased a pack of cigarettes—he’d be just like Adrian one day, wouldn’t he? Did no one see what was going on, that he was about to be murdered over money?
Heavyset Man pulled him away from the wall and wrapped an arm around his neck.
“You shut up and don’t make a sound, hear me?” he whispered into Adrian’s ear. Juarez followed.
“Kid’s a dead man,” Paul whispered.
“I know,” came the voice of the demon. Instead of not taking heed of the words Juarez spoke, Adrian knew now that they were set in stone.
They only drove a short while, to Adrian’s dismay, to a small, decaying farmhouse on a plain just down the road from the Wawa and the motel. He could easily get out of this, he decided.
He was thrown carelessly through the plain—he rolled twice—then looked up, greeted with a muddied boot stamped down on a chest and a ****** Glock in his face. He guessed maybe he was wrong in his escape assertion.
“Thought we were small-timers, ******?” Heavyset Man mused, his lips ****** in a contorted grin. Juarez and Paul stood by, leaning against the car, arms crossed.
Heart pounding, temples throbbing, he managed to eke out a sharp-toned, “No!”
“Got any last words before I blast your *** to hell, ****-head?” He was going to die. Plain and simple—like this, out in the middle of this middle-of-nowhere. He always thought it’d end with a needle in his arm, not of the pull of a trigger by a crooked Colorado dealer.
“Yeah…yeah…I-I got your money. Let me—please!—just let me get it.”
“Too late for that ****. It’s too late for you.”
“Please! Please! Please! I…I…my girlfriend’s pregnant, and I…we’re broke, but…please, please…I’ll give you money! I—I got it… just, please, let me live! Please!” he begged, red-faced, sobbing and blubbering, bubbles of saliva rolling down his kneaded chin. Heavyset Man pursed his lips, turned to Juarez and Paul, leaning against the car—looking on with a sense of satisfaction that one less scumbag would get over on them again—shrugging.
Heavyset Man, sighed, then took his foot off Adrian’s chest.
“I got 15 rounds packed in this ******—you make any ******* false moves and I guarantee you all seventeen will be lodged in your ******* brain.” Why, oh why, didn’t he bring his gun? Why was it sitting there, cold and killing-less, under the rug of the driver’s seat? All he had to do was fire three rounds and—pop!—problem solved.
Adrian helped himself up, first resting on his elbows, taking a few deep breaths to regain his composure.
“Get the ******* money,” Heavyset Man demanded, “before I change my ******* mind.” The pistol still pointed at his head, the barrel only feet away, Adrian swallowed. In one swift motion, the tip of his foot flew toward the barrel—careful not to dispel the already ****** hammer— disarming Heavyset Man and startling his concentration. Adrian brought the top of his shoe to the bottom of Heavyset Man’s testicles, and with one forceful kick, brought Heavyset Man to the ground, wincing.
A placid Paul quickly sprung to action, diving for the pistol as Adrian crawled across the puddle of mud to arm himself with the ill-gotten Glock. Juarez tried to subdue him, sacking him as Adrian’s fingers wrapped the barrel of the gun.
Juarez dug Adrian’s face into the mud, suffocating him, as Paul tried to wrest the gun carefully from his fingers. Heavyset Man cowered on the ground in pain, grabbing his groin, cursing Adrian.
Blindsighted, Adrian brought his left hand to Juarez face, trying to divert him. He ran his fingers down Juarez’ throat, stuck two fingers into his stoma and pulled down on the skin, stretching it, suffocating him.
“You ************,” Adrian muttered.
He pulled the trigger and shot Paul in the leg, who yelped and fell backwards into a pile of dirt, nursing his leadened knee.
“Oh, my God! Oh, my God! He ******* shot me! He ******* shot me!” One was never enough for Adrian, never, so he closed one eye, drew the gun up once more and popped another bullet into Paul’s left thigh. “Holy ****!”
Still yanking on Juarez’ throat hole, he shrugged Juarez off his back, stood up, kicked Juarez over onto his spine, and kicked him in the face.
“You know, I never liked you,” Adrian sneered. Juarez shook his head frantically, waving his hands. Adrian watched his eyes, saw that they had now focused on a figure directly behind him. Acting on instinct, Adrian pointed the barrel behind him, pulled the trigger, and shot Heavyset Man in his stomach. He fell to the ground with a disturbingly loud thud, splashed muddy residue all over Juarez’ face. Adrian winced, then craned his neck quickly to the ground behind him. He was pretty sure Heavyset Man was dead.
Adrian held out his left hand.
“Give me the ******* heroin.” Juarez shook his head. “I’ll ******* kill you, jerk-off. Give me the ******* ****.” Juarez lifted his head and looked to the bleeding legs of a screaming Paul.
It was overcast, and just starting to rain. The headache rain. Adrian sighed, kicked Juarez’ metallic voice over to him, still pointing the gun. Adrian put a foot to Juarez chest as he tried to grab it.
“Reach for it!” Adrian ordered. Juarez wrapped his fingers around the dirtied piece, brought it to his throat.
“I don’t have heroin,” he answered.
“Where the **** is it, then?”
“In the car,” he replied.
“Lying?”
“No. It’s there. Open the mirror, and it’s sewn inside the cloth. You’ll see.
“Give me the car keys.”
“They’re in my pocket.” Adrian rolled his eyes, knelt down, pushed Juarez over, holding the gun to his spine, fished out the keys, then backed away towards the convertible, still aiming the Glock at his hostage.
Adrian sat down sideways in the driver’s seat, pointing the gun as he felt through the ceiling cloth for the only thing he cared about in the world. A lump, an imperfection swept across his fingertips and he used the key to rip the cloth. Oh, jackpot!
The rain was just starting to come down heavier, drowning out Paul’s scream, bathing him in blood, as Juarez looked on helplessly as the water collected in his exposed airway, smothering him. Heavyset Man would be boiling in the sun tomorrow like the pig he is.
Four bags of heroin fell from the ceiling onto his lap, and he eyed them happily before he shoved them into his jacket pocket. He started the engine, listened to it roar and started to back away before he realized he left Juarez alive.
He shifted the car into parking gear, sloshed a black boot in a muddy puddle, walked slowly to Juarez, who was lifelessly staring at the sky, waiting for the moment when Adrian would drive away and he could save himself from drowning. Adrian snatched the metal voice box from his fingers, got back into the car and sped down the road back to the motel.
He set the voice box and the gun on the seat next to his, shook his head, then eyed himself in the rearview mirror with a smile. He was going to get high. Finally.
* * *
He pulled into the motel, screeched the car into park, then whistled as he sauntered to the driver’s side door of the Oldsmobile. He reached under the front seat for his own gun—something told him he needed it—and found it was missing. ****. There’s danger ahead, he thought. Where the **** is my gun? Did I take it inside? Should I bring the Glock inside? No, because if something happens and it’s not registered to me, they’ll know what I was up to, he reasoned. They’d find out.
He could feel it—he hated feeling it—the imminent peril, the enveloping blackness that triggered the psychic sensation of sin approaching. He needed to do a line, like, right now.
He walked calmly through fear to the door of Room Number 9 and kicked it open, like he owned the ******* place.
Oh, yeah. Dolores was dead. ****. If he snorted a line now, it’d be hard for him to act upset when the cops came. He couldn’t wait, though, he just couldn’t. He sat on the edge of the bed, hoping he wouldn’t be stained with her blood as he pulled out a bag from his jacket pocket, flicked it with his right index finger, then spilled the contents onto the night table.
Something told him he needed a gun. Now.
“I want my two fifty back,” a voice said. Adrian gasped, turned and saw Redneck in the doorway of the bathroom, covered in blood.
“Holy ****!” he screamed, plastering himself against the wall. “Hey, what the **** did you do to my girlfriend, **** bag?” he demanded, pointing a lame finger to a dead Dolores.
“She was dead when I got here, you sick ****. She was ******* dead!”
“You’re full of ****!”
“She was ******* dead! Bullet through the ******* head—she was against the wall, brains spilled out all over the floor.” Adrian bit his lip. “It looks like she shot herself.” Redneck took a few steps toward Adrian, grinning. “Or somebody else shot her.”
Adrian, adrenaline still high, was prepared for another fight. He lunged towards Redneck and tackled him against the television stand, smashing it into the floor. Redneck crawled backwards through the path of broken glass, hit his head against the wall. Adrian brought his hands to Redneck’s neck and began to strangle him. Redneck hooked him in the face, cocking Adrian’s head to the right. Adrian flung himself backward and kicked Redneck under the chin.
“Son of a *****!” Redneck yelped, flying forward and sending Adrian into the bloody body of Dolores. Redneck reached into his back pocket, holding Adrian down by the throat. He whipped out a shiny blade as Adrian spied his Walther lying on the floor next to the bloody mess of brains and neural build-up. He reached for it as Redneck dug the blade right of his carotid artery, saw it already ****** and dug the barrel into Redneck’s chest.
He pulled the trigger, blasting Redneck into the depths of the wall. Adrian himself flung his back into the wall from the force of the bullet blow and cowered on the floor.
“I…call…the cops,” Redneck blurted out, before his eyes rolled back into his head that fell to his chest.
Adrian gasped, took a few deep breaths, tossed the gun aside, sat next to his dead girlfriend on the bed, pulled out his wallet to chop his lines, and set out to snort one after the other. Four lines later, he collapsed against the still heart of Dolores and laid his head on her cold, dead breast.
Six hours later, just as the last of the police sirens had silenced and pulled away from the motel parking lot, the last spectator had lost interest in the otherwise quiet surroundings, they tore him from the bloodbath and led him towards an unmarked Ford at rest in the far region of the lot.
He was a dead man now. His head bowed, his hands cuffed as he walked the line, he looked up for brief moment to study the incidence of laughter. There they were, the poolside girls—the pretty brunette had just taken a dive followed by smiles and applause—completely oblivious to the twilight, like always, the darkness rising.