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derick dupre

LITTLE CACKLES by Derick Dupre

April 3, 2018

A windy morning outside Denny’s in Carefree. Windshields and gas pumps ping with dust. Rosettes of yucca twitch and sway. Inside it sounds like a light rain passing through. A waitress saunters up to a table where three men sit. Her dirndl skirt swishes in time to the dust, and for a moment it seems like the only sound in the world. The three men are John Huston, Rich Little, and Orson Welles. She recognizes Little right away and fangirls out in front of the two older men.

Oh my god I knew it, it’s him, can I have an autograph Mr. Little? Make it out to Sue. No to Ralph.

Make it out to Ralph. Oh my god. Do Nixon. Do Bing.

Little smiles uneasily, accepting Sue’s pen, knowing that in a just world she should be asking for John’s or Orson’s hasty scrawl, not his, not that of one whose sole talent is sounding like other people. But what do other people know, anyway. The older men fidget on the leatherette. To Ralph, he writes aloud, best, wishes, always. Rich. Little slides the napkin to Sue.

Joan! It’s the man of a thousand voices! Sue shouts to a coworker. Oh my god. Do Jimmy Stewart.

Do Jack Benny. What are you doing in Carefree, Mr. Little?

Little, doing Johnny Cash, says, Well we thought we’d check up on the Carefree sundial. We were driving through and John here wanted to know the time, so I said, let’s make a stop in Carefree.

Johnny Cash! Joan get over here. Oh, we do have quite the sundial, don’t we, Sue says.

Joan saunters up and twitches a hip to the right, indicating Welles, and asks Little, So who’s your fat friend?

Welles, nosedeep in a menu, shifts his glance from Hot n Hearty to Lean n Low to Tempting Desserts.

Little, in a rare moment of speechlessness, slowly widens his eyes. Huston, not known for his whipcrack humor, clarifies: We actually don’t know this man. Wepicked him up on the highway and he seemed undernourished. We were planning to feed him and send him on his way.

Little cackles.

Huston just stares at the menu, forgetting whether or not Denny’s serves scotch. Welles squirms against the leatherette. Huh. I’m not surprised. I used to work up at the Denny’s up in Seligman. All kinds of freeloaders there. So, big boy, what’ll you have? Sue says.

Peaches, cottage cheese, hold the rye wafers, please, Welles says, as though delivering a line he’s waited his whole life to give. His order has the tone of a funeral toll. An atmospheric shift disrupts the dining room, in the way it will if somebody farts or breaks a glass. Other tables are silent. Meandering jowls now pause midchew. The dust outside is again the only sound in the world. After a few moments, Joan breaks the trance. I know that voice. I’ve heard that voice. Mr. Little, who’s this friend of yours?

Little, doing John Wayne, says, This man here is the bravest man I know. This man staged an entire war. This man is as good as any general, the great Orson Welles.

Duke! Joan squeals.

Orson Who? Sue says. Oh my god I can’t believe I’m taking Rich Little’s order. What is your order, Mr. Little?

Little does Cagney, delivering his order and snapping his fingers with immense menace. Jumbo Dennyburger, got it? Hold the lettuce, I don’t wanna see no lettuce at all. Cook it well-done - bravo, you got it? There better be extra ketchup, and a coffee.

Sue can hardly contain her squealing. Extra kitchup! Did you hear that Joan? Jimmy Cagney - she winks at Little - wants extra kitchup! Of course! Well-done!

Huston sighs and says, Is there any chance you have single malt.

We have all kinds of rich and creamy malts sir, yes.

Huston looks at Welles, indicating he’s run out of fucks to give. I’ll just have a coffee, please.

Two coffees all day. And what’ll your fat friend have to drink?

Welles fidgets and thinks of Oja, of her love and cunning, thinks by now she would’ve stabbed one of these women. He thinks of something rich and creamy. A hot tea, please, with a slice of lemon.

Another atmospheric disruption befalls the Denny’s in Carefree, Arizona. The dust sings. Joan says, I don’t know who that man is but he sure knows how to talk.

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scott mcclanahan

INTERVIEW WITH SCOTT MCCLANAHAN

April 2, 2018

Scott McClanahan is the author of The Sarah Book, The Incantations Of Daniel Johnston, Hill William, Crapalachia, and The Collected Works of Scott McClanahan Vol. 1. He is the owner the finest small volume library in the state of West Virginia. 

What’s a book that first put the hook in your heart? Or if there isn’t a single book or author that got you hooked on reading, maybe you can tell me what age you were when literature started playing the pied piper song to you.

I think I’ve always fetishized books. There was a ton of children’s stories my mom used to read to me. “The Little Fir Tree” and “The Shoemaker and the Elves.” The stories she told me about herself were just as important though. I checked out John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men from the Rainelle Public Library when I was in fifth grade. My mom said, “You’ll like this. He’s easy to read.” I read that book the same weekend I played Tecmo Bowl for the first time. Sort of a life changing weekend. I was a weird kid though, reading a lot of biographies. Weird shit like Oliver North’s autobiography and Norman Schwarzkopf.

I think probably the book that made me start discovering things was a biography of Jim Morrison called No One Here Gets Out Alive. It’s embarrassing to say, but true. I found out about Antonioni, Artaud, Godard, Van Morrison, Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie, Beat writers, Saint Exupery’s The Little Prince. It was all stuff that I had absolutely no access to in West Virginia. That would have been in the 8th or 9th grade. I always used books to find out about other books.

I used to imagine books before I read them just simply because I couldn’t find them. I don’t know if we do that anymore in the age of on-line books. I used to imagine what a book was like and sadly the book was never able to measure up. I remember reading about The Executioners Song in high school for a long time before I actually found a copy. I used to read the World Book Encyclopedia and that book was mentioned in three different places, but then when I read the book I was like, “This sucks.” I feel differently now, but you know.

  

IMPORTANT BOOKS TO ME (MINUS ISAK DINESEN, JEAN RHYS, JOHN AUBREY)

The Collected Short Prose of James Agee

The Life of Alexander the Great by Plutarch

Mishima: A Biography by John Nathan

The Portable Rabelais (The Viking Portable Library) by Francois Rabelais

First Love by Ivan Turgenev

My Life by Benvenuto Cellini

An Egyptian Childhood by Taha Hussein

A Christmas Memory: One Christmas, and The Thanksgiving Visitor by Truman Capote

The Western Lands by William S. Burroughs

Pages From A Cold Island by Frederick Exley

Death On The Installment Plan by Celine

Epitaph Of A Small Winter by Machado de Assis

The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers

The Nick Tosches Reader

Ravelstein by Saul Bellow

The Whole Motion: Collected Poems by James Dickey

Careless Love: The Unmasking Of Elvis Presley by Peter Guralnick

 

Do you read compulsively? Do you feel like reading is an addiction for you, sometimes? What do you think is the main driving force behind your desire to read more and more books? Are you looking for something?

Yeah I’m compulsive. Reading has always been kind of weird necrophilia. I can’t think of a more intimate act with a living writer as well than reading. The only thing that can compete with it is music and even that’s not the same. I usually go through 2-3 books a week. I’m sure it’s tied in to OCD or some slight autism. I always think of that robot from Short Circuit. Need more input. At this point I don’t think I’m looking for anything. But when I find a new writer like Machado De Assis or Lu Xun (two writers I read for the first time last year) it feels like a conjuring. I may be the only person who went bankrupt buying books.

  

BEST BOOKS I'VE READ IN THE LAST SIX MONTHS

Tonight I'm Someone Else by Chelsea Hodson

Roughing It by Mark Twain

garden, ashes by Danilo Kis

The Garbage Times / White Ibis by Sam Pink

The Collected Essays of Elizabeth Hardwick

Gargoyles by Thomas Bernhard

Memoirs From The House Of The Dead by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes

Coma by Pierre Guyotat

The War by Marguerite Duras

The Kingdom by Emmanuel Carrere

The Anatomy Of A Moment by Javier Cercas

Dom Casmurro by Machado de Assis

Wartime Lies by Louis Begley

The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes

Outline by Rachel Cusk

The Atlas by William T. Vollmann

 

How often do you put a book down? Do you have rules about how much of a chance you’ll give a book before moving on to something else? If I book doesn’t catch me by page 75, I usually throw it out. But some books are late bloomers.

I don’t put down any books usually. I have lists of books that I want to read. If it gets slow, I start to skim and sometimes by skimming you can get back inside the book again. Most of the times I’ve read about the book so much that I know I want to read it. This is what is in my Amazon cart right now.

Denton Welch, In Youth is Pleasure

George Perec, Life: A Users Manual.

Imre Kertesz, Fatelessness

Nathalie Sarraute, Tropisms

Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca

Sei Shonogan, Pillow Book

Rebecca West, The Return of the Soldier

Gustaw Herling, A World Apart

Anita Brookner, Look at Me

Hopefully someone will buy these books for me and send them to me.

   

IMPORTANT BOOKS TO ME

The Pump House Gang by Tom Wolfe

Nothing Like The Sun by Anthony Burgess

Rimbaud Complete (Modern Library Classics) by Arthur Rimbaud

Justine by Marquis de Sade

King Of The Jews by Nick Tosches

The Thief's Journal by Jean Genet

Miracle Of The Rose by Jean Genet

Nikolai Gogol by Vladimir Nabokov

The Selected Letters of John Keats

The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein

My Childhood by Maxim Gorky

The Bible

Martial's Epigrams

Confessions of Zeno by Italo Svevo

The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

Our Town by Thornton Wilder

The Diary of Samuel Pepys

 

You seem to read a lot of biographies, which is a big blank spot in my reading life. Can you recommend five or six great biographies that I should read this year?

Oh I don’t know. I guess these are my favorites.

Elizabeth Gaskell Life of Charlotte Bronte, Richard Holmes: The Pursuit: A Life of Shelley, James Boswell: The Life of Johnson, Emanuel Carrere: Limonov; and I am Alive and You Are Dead: A Journey into the Mind of Philip K. Dick, Enid Starkie’s Rimbaud and Baudelaire. Ellmann’s Oscar Wilde. Judith Thurman’s bio of Isak Dinesen is pretty great.

I also love a book by Gorky called Reminiscences’ of Chekhov, Tolstoy and Andreyev. Not a biography, but just these little moments or impression and anecdotes. The description of Tolstoy’s hands is something else and easily tells us more than a 1,000 page biography would.

 

THE BEST BOOK THAT NO ONE HAS EVER READ

Reminiscences Of Tolstoy, Chekhov, and Adreyev by Maxim Gorky

 

Does a biographer need to be trustworthy, for you? Should a biographer carefully research a life and stick to the facts as much as possible, like a journalist? Or should a biographer just try to tell the most interesting and entertaining and compelling story they can, even if it involves exaggerating or making up lies? Does a journalist need to be trustworthy?

1. No. 2. Not necessarily. 3.Yes to an extent. 4. Yes trustworthy journalists are essential to any representative republic.

 

IMPORTANT BOOKS TO ME

Poems by Pier Paolo Pasolini

Criminal Desires: Jean Genet And Cinema by Jane Giles

Selected Poems And Prose by Paul Celan

Classic Crews: A Harry Crews Reader

The Complete Poems Of John Keats

Hellraisers: The Life and Inebriated Times of Richard Burton, Richard Harris, Peter O'Toole, and Oliver Reed by Robert Sellers

The Beleaguered City by Shelby Foote

Patriotic Gore: Studies In The Literature Of The American Civil War by Edmund Wilson

The Lives Of The Artists by Giorgio Vasari

The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski

The Creators: A History Of The Heroes Of The Imagination by Daniel J. Boorstin

Oscar Wilde by Richard Ellmann

You Can't Win by Jack Black

The Sarah Book by Scott McClanahan

The Life Of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell

Sex and Rockets: The Occult World of Jack Parsons by John Carter

New York Tyrant Vol 1 Number 1

Seven Plays by Sam Shepard

 

In an interview, you said: “I don’t think there’s a novelist today who can even compare with Robert Caro.” What do you like about his biographies? What can novelists learn from him?

Oh the usual. I think all great writers have just three skills. The ability to surprise and transform, the ability to propel you through a narrative, the ability to conjure emotion or laughter in a reader. Caro and John Richardson and Hilary Spurling and Jimmy McDonough all have that. Even some of our best writers can only do two out of those three things. Somehow I feel like biography still feels sort of primal or primitive and still connected to something very old in stories and magic. They're sort of still interested in these things. Also, some of these folks are spending whole decades writing these books. I'm talking about losing homes and running through advances in order to make something. I think that's beautiful and almost monastic in the age of corporate fiction, and experimental tenure fiction.

 

IMPORTANT BOOKS TO ME

Joe Gould's Secret by Joseph Mitchell

Monsieur Proust by Celeste Albaret

The Civil War: Volume 3: Red River to Appomattox by Shelby Foote

Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

Finnegans Wake by James Joyce

Selected Writings by Gerard de Nerval

Lectures On Russian Literature by Vladimir Nabokov

The Rise And Fall Of Athens by Plutarch

A Confederate General From Big Sur / Dreaming Of Babylon / The Hawkline Monster by Richard Brautigan

Collected Poems by Dylan Thomas

The Complete Works Of Nathanael West

Genet by Edmund White

The Twelve Caesars by Suetonius

Selected Writings by Antonin Artaud

 

If you had all the time in the world, whose biography would you write? (I’m thinking about a famous person or a historical person, but it could be anyone.) Would you be a trustworthy biographer?

I’m going to write about my mom and dad. So no. It’s going to be a book called Vandalia or Rainelle Stories or something like that. A big family book. Like a Tristam Shandy or Rabelais almost. I’m going to see if I can’t take what I’ve learned from these books and write about two people who are just ordinary. I'm going to write it for my kids. Been struggling for six months though so who knows. This writing shit is hard.

   

BOOKS I'M READING/REREADING FOR THE BOOK I'M WORKING ON

Reminiscences Of Tolstoy, Chekhov, and Adreyev by Maxim Gorky

Tristram Shandy & Sentimental Journey by Laurence Sterne

Hopscotch by Julio Cortazar

Montano's Malady by Enrique Vila-Matas

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien

The Oresteia by Aeschylus

True Stories by Sophie Calle

Soldiers of Salamis by Javier Cercas

Memoirs From Beyond The Tomb by Francois-Rene de Chateaubriand

This Is Not A Novel And Other Novels by David Markson

Dark Back Of Time by Javier Marias

One Hundred Years Of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The Collected Writings Of Joe Brainard

Bartleby & Co. by Enrique Vila-Matas

King Lear by William Shakespeare

The Rings of Saturn by W.G. Sebald

Vertigo by W.G. Sebald

In Search Of Lost Time Volume 6: Time Regained by Marcel Proust

The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

 

What are some poems or other pieces of literature that you have memorized and could recite at any time? Do you have a trick for memorizing things like that, or just have a good memory?

Oh gosh I have reams of stuff. I've known Whitcomb Riley's "Little Orphan Annie" since I was a boy. I've done that so many times in readings I'm sure people are sick of it, but it makes me think of my mom. There's some Neruda I know, a section of Under Milk Wood, John Donne always kills. I used to do a section of Virgil's Georgics in a reading. I don't know if it's a trick, but I can memorize pretty easy. I've always liked doing it in readings because it gives you an element of control. You can move around, etc. I wanted to memorize the whole of Sarah Book for these final readings I was going to do, but I ran out of time.

 

IMPORTANT BOOKS TO ME

The Portable John Steinbeck

The Red And The Black by Stendhal

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe

Ramones by Nicholas Rombes

Limonov by Emmanuel Carrere

The Blacks: A Clown Show by Jean Genet

The Art Of Destruction: The Films Of The Vienna Action Group by Stephen Barber

Of Walking In Ice by Werner Herzog

Swann's Way by Marcel Proust

The Book Of Laughter And Forgetting by Milan Kundera

Ferdydurke / Pornografia / Cosmos by Witold Gombrowicz

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Odi Et Amo: The Complete Poetry of Catullus

Laughable Loves by Milan Kundera

Lost Highway: Journeys And Arrivals Of American Musicians by Peter Guralnick

My Mother's House and Sido by Colette

 

Who are some of the readers, living or dead, that you most admire?

I guess Amelia Gray is always the gold standard. Lindsey Hunter as well. I think Sam Pink is the most likable reader I've ever watched. He just has that quality about him. People like him. Chelsea Hodson is a great reader too. I saw Kiese Laymon read in Iowa City a few years ago and he really blew me away. It sort of feels like readings are dead now or something, but maybe that's just me. Five years ago people used to talk about them more and seem excited. Now it seems like they've dried up or something. I had a great time though at the Franklin Park Reading Series a month ago, which is easily the best reading series in the country.

Oh and I'm biased, but I saw Juliet Escoria give a reading with a video back drop in Brooklyn a few years ago. It was with some witches. One of the top three readings I've ever seen.

  

IMPORTANT BOOKS TO ME

Son Of The Morning Star: Custer And The Little Bighorn by Evan S. Connell

Lipstick Traces by Greil Marcus

The Big Sea by Langston Hughes

The Education Of Henry Adams by Henry Adams

Boswell In Holland, 1763-1764 by James Boswell

Cruising Paradise by Sam Shepard

Nothing If Not Critical: Selected Essays On Art And Artists by Robert Hughes

Voyage In The Dark by Jean Rhys

The Poems Of Francois Villon

William Faulkner And Southern History by Joel Williamson

Satan Is Real: The Ballad Of The Louvin Brothers by Charlie Louvin

Psychotic Reactions And Carburetor Dung by Lester Bangs

The Georgics by Virgil

 interview by Chris Dankland 

READ NEXT: INTERVIEW WITH SAM PINK

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juliet escoria

OUTTAKE FROM JULIET THE MANIAC by Juliet Escoria

April 1, 2018

We waited all evening for Nicole’s parents to leave, a cord of excitement running taut between the two of us. When their Land Rover finally pulled out of the driveway, we waited ten extra minutes, just in case her parents forgot something and came back. Only then did we take the rolled-up scarf from Nicole’s closet, a neat package containing a lighter and two perfectly rolled joints, the result of Nicole practicing with tobacco while me and my clumsy fingers sat and watched. We took the bundle and crawled out her bedroom window onto the roof.

We pressed ourselves against the building in case her neighbors could see, lit the first joint. The days were finally starting to get longer and even though it was almost eight there were still traces of light in the air, the sky that cobalt blue right before it turns black. We held the smoke in, the way we’d seen people do in movies. It made us cough. It made us feel cool.

We’d gotten the weed from the Ryans, the only other friends we had at the Christian school. Except “friends” wasn’t entirely accurate. The less cute Ryan, Ryan M, lived down the street from Nicole, so the three of us carpooled each morning. Ryan D was Ryan M’s best friend. We sat together at lunch, occasionally hung out voluntarily after school and on weekends. We liked the same music and swapped mixtapes. We smoked. We got sent out of class for talking, sometimes stayed in at lunch for detention.

That was the friend part. But the Ryans could be mean. They liked to call us “flat-tittied bitches.” They made fun of my acne and Nicole’s thick thighs. They asked us if we liked non-existent bands and if we said we weren’t sure but thought we did, they called us posers. I tried to brush it off – maybe they saw us as their little sisters – but in truth their comments made me cry. I never admitted it, not to Nicole, not to anyone, but it was hard to go into the bathroom and be confronted with the smattering of red bumps on my forehead that wouldn’t go away, and not hear their nasty voices telling me I was disgusting. Saying things like “Hey pimple girl,” the way they did when my skin was especially bad. It made me envision stabbing my pencil into their eyes, blood running squishy and their screams.

Also, they were always going on about all the weed they smoked. But I never saw them do it, never saw them stoned either. I’d never smoked pot before but I wanted to. Same with Nicole. But we had no idea where to get it. Partially we didn’t ask them to get us some because I wasn’t sure the Ryans were telling the truth, but mostly I was afraid they’d make fun of us.

One day we were sitting around Ryan M’s room after school, video games because we had nothing better to do, and once again they wouldn’t shut up about how they’d gotten so high that weekend, drawing out the vowels the way the skateboarders did in the skate videos we sometimes watched. Finally I got to the point where I couldn’t stand it anymore so I just came right out and asked where they got it.

They were quiet for a moment, and I thought they were trying to think of some sick burns. But then Ryan D said, “None of your business,” at the same time Ryan M said, “From my brother.”

Then they called us dumb little babies for never having smoked pot.

“Fuck you,” Nicole said.

“Yeah,” I said. “Fuck you.” I was so sick of their shit, of them acting like they were so much better than us when they were two stupid junior high boys, with no facial hair and skinny chests. “You’re fucking lying anyway.”

“Let’s bounce,” Nicole said.

“Good idea.”

So we left. We went back to her house and watched TV.

The next day at school, they acted like nothing had happened. At lunch, they came and sat with us and were nice, asking us what we were doing that weekend and did we want to record Ryan D’s new Descendants album. Nicole and I just looked at them. Yesterday we had agreed we were sick of them. This niceness was fucking everything up. And then Ryan M said if we really wanted pot, he could get us some from his brother. We pretended it wasn’t a big deal, that we didn’t care either way, but I could tell by the look in Nicole’s eyes and the flutter in my chest that we were excited.

After we smoked the joints and felt nothing, and waited half an hour just in case, we took the rest of the “weed” and compared it to the herb jars in the kitchen. Just as we thought. It was oregano.

We should have known the weed was bunk when they didn’t try to smoke it with us. We should have known the weed was bunk when Ryan D said that sometimes you had to smoke weed a couple times before you got high. But we didn’t know any better, had no idea what weed was supposed to look like other than a dried green plant. And a dried green plant is what they sold us.

So we made a plan. On Wednesdays, Ryan M didn’t carpool home because he had tutoring. His older brother had baseball practice every day. His mother didn’t get home until at least 4. We didn’t know his dad’s work schedule but we figured it was a dad work schedule, and he wouldn’t be home until 5 or 6.

We told Nicole’s mom we were going to buy ice cream. The door to Ryan M’s garage was unlocked, just like usual, tools perfectly lined up on the wall by their hooks. From there we walked into the house, and then up the stairs to his room. I kept thinking someone would catch us, his brother home sick or the cleaning lady, but then I remembered what dickheads they were, the twenty dollars they’d stolen from us, and I told myself the house was empty and it was fine and he deserved everything we’d planned for him.

We opened the door to his room. There was underwear on the floor, dingy white boxers, and the bed was unmade, but otherwise it looked the same as it always did. Posters on the wall of hot chicks and Kelly Slater. A wall of CDs, a big TV, a big stereo.

We’d bought a can of sardines a few days earlier at the grocery store. I popped it open, the metal lid flicking the nasty oil onto my hand. We put the fish where we figured he wouldn’t look, grabbing them by their slimy tails. In the heating vent on the floor. Underneath the bed. I went into his closet, and Nicole boosted me up while I hid one on the top shelf, behind a plastic bin of baseball cards. His bookshelf only held old schoolbooks – a Latin dictionary, the textbook from Pre-algebra 1, To Kill a Mockingbird – so I pulled them out half an inch and tucked one behind. We put two behind his stereo.

Nicole went to put one in his desk drawer, but when she slid it open, she found a big rusty hunting knife. I wanted to keep it, but Nicole said she wanted it too. We stood there, trying to figure out who got to keep it. But I started thinking about Ryan M’s stupid face, his cocky smile, the fact that he seemed completely unaware he was an idiot with dirty boxers on his floor. And I took the knife and stabbed it into the desk, which looked expensive and heavy, pretending I was stabbing him. Stab stab stab. It felt so good. I imagined his screams.

Nicole laughed. The knife made neat little gashes, splitting the thick waxed coating of the desk. She took it from my hand, stabbed again. The wood splintered this time. Then I stabbed it, a whole bunch of times, hard, like I was trying to kill it. Like I was trying to get deep at the bones. Nicole did the same, yelping this time like a warrior. I was laughing. She was laughing. We were two maniacal bitches, and the Ryans would be sorry they fucked with us. I took the knife and stabbed it in the desk one final time, deep enough that it stood up straight on its own. Then we changed his radio from the rock station to a Spanish one, turned the volume up, so loud the bass crackled in the speakers, and then turned it off so the next time he went to play it, it would scare the shit out of him.

We left his house, skipping and laughing our way back to Nicole’s, throwing the empty can of sardines in the gutter. My heart beat fast in a way that wasn’t fear. It was beating fast with power, a warrior drum that kept me strong. It was the heartbeat of a maniacal bitch. I kept imagining Ryan M’s face when he walked in and saw the knife, when he turned on the stereo, when the fish started to rot.

I hoped it made him afraid.

I hoped it made him feel small.

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michael mungiello

A BOLD NEW KIND OF STORY by Michael Mungiello

March 31, 2018

Something new…

Something new…

I need to do something new…

Something new…

Something new…

I need to do something new…

It will be new…

It will come now…

Somehow…

Somewhere…

I know…

It will start on the next page…

One time I was reading important books…

It was very important that I read them…

They addressed concerns…of the people…of the elites…history…art…religion…politics…

I was interested in those things…

People I admired were interested in those things…

So I read in pursuit of these people’s interest…

In the hopes that one day…a book would be written…about me…by all those I admired…

When we are young we believe such things…

We feel born to be admired…

Books feel like they can go on forever…and we can keep riding the train…along with these writers, their writing, their voices, their faces waiting for us at the station of arrival…

I was on a train…

I saw a sign…a train sign…

A sign for the train…

To tell it what was coming…

How fast to go…

How far away it was from somewhere…

What it was leaving behind…

I don’t know…

It was in another language…

I was travelling by train, to see a woman I was in love with…

No I wasn’t…

I was there to visit my Dad…

He was on a business trip…

I was abroad…

But I was reading a book about a love affair…

And I thought to myself…

My, what splendor…

The romance…

What it must be like to be young and travel in a train in Europe to the woman you love, whose role in your life is…mysterious…

Yeah…

Hey…

Give me a break…

I was young…

Books made an impression on me…

But this sign distracted me from this book…

Which I thought meant so much to me…

And which I thought would continue to mean very much to me my entire life…

But I looked up from the book…

To contemplate a line I’d read in it…

To look out the window and think…

Oh, wow…

What a good line…

So true to life and my heart…

Look, the landscape…

It almost reflects what that line means…to me…

But I saw the sign…

And the font…was so much bigger…

And I thought to myself, That…

That contains more meaning…

Than anything I’ve ever seen before…

I couldn’t read it…but it was telling me something…

Not just me…but the whole train…

The letters were so big that even people who couldn’t read would be interested…

The letters were so big…God would be interested…

This…

This was something new…

This was something I would never forget…

I forgot the exact letters…

But I have never forgotten the sign…

The feeling…

To perceive something I knew was important but also knew nothing about…

I have tried all my life to capture that feeling once again…

I had the feeling that I could recapture this feeling by…

By…

By…

Doing something new…

Getting back there…

But how…

Become…rich…

No…

Become…good…

No…

Become…strong…

No…

Become…pure…

No, haha…

I could do it one way and one way only…

By writing a book of my own…

To make my own letters…

My own signs…

Charting the course of my own voyage…

That was the ticket…

But how could I write a book…I had nothing to say…no argument…no expertise…no polemic…no religion…no politics…no art…only the desire for people to never forget something that didn’t mean anything to them, beyond being unforgettable…

But that still had something to do with Dad…

With love…

With journeys…

Was that enough to make a book for… with…towards…against…

Well…

Well…

Well…

I don’t know…

But then I thought…

Well…

Well…

Well…

If I just…make the font…really big…then…

Then the book will write itself…

All I need to do is provide the…elementary materials…

A narrator…(me)…

A setting…(Europe)…

A character…(my dad)…

A plot…(the quest to recapture a feeling)…

A point of view…(mine, the correct one)…

A theme…(literarture)…

And it’s all there…

And everyone will root for my demise…

The end of the book…

The return back to life…

Which you didn’t like while you were there…

But now that it’s been interrupted…by this story about me and my Dad…and my imaginary lover…and Europe…

Now that you’ve come this far…

You’re back in your life…and you can regard your life…the same way you would home…after a trip…the pleasure of return…

Thank you for reading this…

It is a mystery, is it not…

The ways we deserve each other…

How we see each other across the tracks…

Books are like trains…books are like tickets…books are like stations…

But reading is boring…

We just do it for…some other reason…

 

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lanny durbin

LIBERTY KID by Lanny Durbin

March 30, 2018

I saw the kid's face when he got hit by the car. He was standing there on the sidewalk with a blank look and then the car jumped the curb. Just nailed him. The blank look stayed on his face when he flew through air, stared right at me. Like he meant to do it. A party trick.

He was wearing a statue of liberty costume, which, for a short moment, made the visual a little funny. He stood out in front of the Liberty Tax building a few nights a week, one of those preying fast tax return spots in the same lot as the grocery store I work in. He stole a pack of smokes out of my car one night I'm pretty sure, but he was just a kid, seventeen at max. I wished it was the regular guy standing there that day, the day shift statue. That guy danced and waved at the passing cars like he really cared. Either he would have seen the car coming and been vigilant enough to dodge it or he would've been the one to get creamed. Both seemed like better outcomes. The kid was just there for a couple extra bucks—he wore the foam green hat and matching frock with no pride and stared at his cell phone. Lady Liberty's lost disappointment of a son. The hat caught the wind and drifted away when he careened over the hood of the Nissan. It looked like he was doing a killer move on an invisible skateboard.

The EMTs showed up, cops showed up, blinking lights and stoic professionalism. They set out orange cones, scraped the kid up off the asphalt. I watched them work quickly. I stocked shelves most of the day. I opened the store and counted the till. I dealt with the customers, took the trash out, locked up the store at 9 PM. I watched the EMTs take the kid away and thought that I could probably do that. A little training and I’d be alright, but then someone would need to be here to receive the produce delivery, so I’ll leave the rescue work to guys with nothing else to do.

The officer was terse when taking my statement, like, this dipshit in his work uniform better give me a straight answer. I thought, hey man, we both wear uniforms. Yours is dark blue, mine's orange and white creamsicle. We both have our names on our shirt pockets, but hey, mine's only safety pinned—they stitched yours right into the fabric. Officer Ottman. You’re locked into the force, like a blood oath. I could take my name tag off right now and disappear to a new life. I can stock shelves anywhere. A valuable skill set.

Maybe I don't know how to hold a pistol or book a perp at the station but I do know when the frozen goods delivery is coming, what'll be on it, where to stock it. You don't have to deal with Ms. Henderson when I tell her the Amy's Chile Relleno meal was out of stock, she'll have to wait until Friday. Your stern bullying wouldn't work on her—she requires a more delicate approach. I'd like to see you be the shift supervisor in this goddamn place. I'd love to see it.

They towed the woman’s Nissan away while she gave her statement. She was crying, inconsolable. Was on her cell phone and bam, jumped the curb. She probably killed a teenager but she did get to read that Facebook notification. I recognized her from the store. She came in to buy slivered almonds, which reminded me that the bulk order was due in by noon and all this police business was holding me up.

The next morning, the regular Statue of Liberty guy was out on the curb, inches from where the kid was nailed. The guy danced and waved like a real dipshit. I went out and asked him if he’d heard about the kid.

“Yeah,” he said. “Heard he broke his legs and ruptured his spleen or something.”

“So he’ll live, huh?”

“Sounds like it.”

“Can’t you live about the same without your spleen?” I asked. “I think I read somewhere your liver just takes over for it.”

“Heck if I know,” dancing statue said with a big dopey grin. “Hey, I’ve got to cover his shifts until he gets back, so hopefully one can live without a spleen. I should get back to work now.”

I walked back inside to the office in the backroom and googled spleens. I thought about the kid without a spleen. I read that you sure can live just about the same without one; you could just become more susceptible to infection. I thought, hey, that’s not so bad, considering. Plus, working in the vitamin section here at the store, I’ve picked up a few things about nutrition. The kid would want to cut back on dairy fats, for starters. I decided that, if I saw him again, I’d offer the kid a job on the spot, here at the grocery store. Your life was rarely on the line in here, Nissans rarely careened into you in here.

I knew that Officer Ottman wasn’t going to help the kid get back on his feet. Offer the kid a badge? Yeah right. He didn’t really know anything about protecting and serving his community. I’d love to see Officer Ottman try to run this store. I’d love it.

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marisha gene hicks

EVERYTHING GOOD I REMEMBER ABOUT MY REAL DAD by Marisha Gene Hicks

March 29, 2018

He called his old white SUV the White Elephant. We sang “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” in rounds. We had a secret handshake. We celebrated unbirthdays. He made us unbirthday cakes. He taught me how to make cream cheese frosting. He taught me how to ride a bike in the park. He said I looked like a doll when I was born. He bought me a mountain bike. He let my sister and I rent Mannequin and Puff the Magic Dragon every time. When I was older he let me rent Repo Man. He had a three-legged dog named Lucky or maybe it was one-eyed. He was a triathlete and maybe he still is. I think he competed in IRONMAN one year. He once took us to George Strait’s house when he was doing construction on it. He showed me how to use a drill. He bought me Lemon-Lime Gatorade every time he stopped for Coors tallboys. He took us to eat menudo. He bought us Sprites at the bar. He let me sip his beer. He let me take the wheel. He made a really good venison stew once. He bought us personalized clothing and jewelry and accessories. He bought us binoculars and monoculars and cool glow-in-the-dark astronomy books. He carried a beeper. I think that’s it.

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LONGBEARDS by Chris Dankland

March 28, 2018

Before The Smiths signed the contract for the brand new house they were set to purchase, the real estate broker said: I have to tell you that in the last few weeks a few of the construction workers have sighted some Longbeards near the woods. I'm only mentioning it because you said you have a small dog.

Yes, said Mr. Smith. Thank you. We'll be sure to keep him inside the house at night.

That's what I'd do, said the real estate broker, nodding. Just in case. I'm sure that as more and more people move into the neighborhood, the the Longbeards will retreat further into the woods. Longbeards like to be left alone. Maybe you'll hear them howling late at night.

Gregory! said Mrs. Smith, playfully poking their seven year old in his chubby belly. Are you excited about hearing some Longbeards howling? Sounds like fun, huh?

Gregory nodded ecstatically, lifted his head and cried: A-WOOOOOOOOOO!

Laughter filled the office like the bubbles in their glasses of champagne.

///

The first time the family heard the Longbeards was two weeks after they moved in. A sound like seven singing trumpets broke the seal of night. It was 3am. Mr. and Mrs. Smith sat up in bed at the same moment.

Longbeards! said Mrs. Smith in a hushed gasp, touching her lips.

There's a lot of them, said Mr. Smith. He headed toward the window.

Gregory appeared at their bedroom door. Mommy! he shouted. On stubby chubby legs he ran in and dived into their bed.

It's okay baby, said Mrs. Smith, cradling her son to her stomach. It's just Longbeards.

Everything's fine. Listen! Do you hear them howling?  Gregory moaned and pushed his face deep into his mother's side.

Sparky ran into the bedroom and hid beneath the bed.

They sound sort of spooky, don't they? said Mrs. Smith. The Longbeards' howls were a combination of tornado sirens, rat screams, and alligator snarls. Woe to the usurping inhabitors of the earth, they howled. Woe to those who wear the crown of pride. Woe to those who scatter and destroy the sheep of the pasture. Woe to the wicked gluttons. Woe to you all on the day of our furious wrath.

Mr. Smith nodded. They do sound strange, he said. A wave of unease rolled through the room. But they're much more frightened of us than we are of them, he added.

///

The Smiths were one of the first families to move into the new neighborhood. All day the surrounding streets were filled with the sound of hammers and buzzsaws and the chatter of Latin American construction crews. But at night, after the construction crews had gone, the neighborhood was as still and silent as a stone dropped in the ocean.

Mr. Smith was proud of the new house that he'd bought for his family. It had not been acquired easily. It had cost tens of thousands of hours of toil at the law firm where he worked. His legal specialty was handling peanut allergy lawsuits. Mr. Smith worked for a candy company that made a small chocolate covered confection called Bloopers. The candies were sold in nearly every movie theater in the country.

But, six or seven times a year, some unfortunate soul with a deadly peanut allergy would purchase these candies, consume them in the dark theater seats, and go into immediate anaphylactic shock. Due to the contents of the candies, which contained a particularly potent peanut butter cream center, these allergic reactions were sudden and almost always fatal. Men, women, and children alike would swell up and suffocate in a matter of minutes, choking in their seats even before the previews were over. This created terrible litigation problems for the company. It was Mr. Smith's job to ensure that lawsuits from grieving families had a minimal impact on company profits.

But they are gone! the families whined. The ones we loved are dead forever! And now we are alone.

It's the unfortunate nature of the universe, answered Mr. Smith. The universe gives and the universe takes away.

You are responsible! the families cried.

We are not responsible, answered Mr. Smith.

You are the cause of all our misery! You have destroyed our happy home! the families cried.

It wasn't on purpose. We all just want nice houses, answered Mr. Smith.

///

The house is on fire! screamed Mrs. Smith. It was ten o'clock at night.

What? asked Mr. Smith. He was in the living room, watching cable news.

THE HOUSE ACROSS THE STREET IS ON FIRE! screamed Mrs. Smith.

They ran to the backyard and poked their head over the fence. The fucking house is on fire! shouted Mr. Smith. Luckily it was an unoccupied house far away from them, in another part of the neighborhood that was still being built. Bright orange flames swirled through the house's walls and windows like solar flares on a distant star. A giant black river of smoke snaked up from the burning roof.

Longbeards! shouted Mrs. Smith.

Fifteen or twenty Longbeards surrounded the house, jumping up and down on their heavy hindlegs. They were screaming. With giant clawed paws they beat their furry chests and kicked dust into the air. Their gaping mouths were wet with slobber, silver in the moonlight. Their huge eyes glowed like yellow light bulbs. Thick mossy beards hung from their jaws all down their bodies, tangled hair tossing through the air while they danced and howled, blurring the air. They shook their fists above them as if to rip open and tear down the sky.

I'm getting the machine gun! said Mr. Smith, rushing inside. Call the cops!

A minute later Mr. Smith had his machine gun in hand, pointing it over the top of the fence. He pulled the trigger and sprayed wild bullets at the Longbeards. The Longbeards darted in twenty different directions. In less than fifteen seconds they had completely disappeared into the night.

///

Mr. Smith didn't sleep that night, but his family did. Mrs. Smith dreamed that a Longbeard arm was growing out of her mouth. At first the arm was limp and dead, but then it started moving. Little Gregory dreamed that there were thousands of lollipops in his veins. Suddenly a hundred gaping slobbery mouths appeared all around him, sucking at the air. Little Gregory rose up into the air and was pulled apart by the suction. Sparky dreamed that he was trying to run away on broken legs.

After the fire department put out the fire, after the cops came by the house and wrote down his report, Mr. Smith stayed up in the living room with the machine gun resting on the loveseat. His wife had wanted a house with lots of big windows. She loved sunlight. Mr. Smith drank coffee and sat in the living room till dawn. He watched. He listened. He waited. He worried.

///

In the deep dark woods, The Longbeards huddled in their cave. The Longbeards waited too. They lay awake, stretched longwise against the wet March soil, full of freshly sprouted spring buds not yet emerged but slowly clawing out. One by one by one the humans would all be turned to whispers, mere coils in the wind. Evaporated. Dissipated. Forgotten. Tear their poison roots from the ground and purify the dirt that life might rise anew. Better to blast the trumpet and drown the deafened world with silence than to let it mumble endlessly its parched and wicked sickbed hallucinations.

Furious breaths filled The Longbeards black twitching noses. Kill them all and eat the children.

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jennifer greidus

TUNA SANDWICH by Jennifer Greidus

March 27, 2018

He orders tuna salad because he always orders tuna salad. Today, he also orders bacon potato soup. It’s too hot for soup. He likes to wipe his pretty mouth with the back of a hand. He sneers at the waitresses and only pays attention to the ones with fat tits. One of them, Trina, is my favorite waitress. Her tits are fat. I want to tell her to cover them up. Her skirt is tight, too, and the material that’s supposed to hide the zipper is pulled too far to do its job. He’s not an ass man, though.

My mother’s tits are like that, fallen and fat. Jiggly. To the trucker sitting next to him, Tuna Sandwich whispers, “ A loose handful’s where it’s at, am I right?”

I know my mother’s a whore. But lots of the mothers that Tuna Sandwich fucked weren’t whores. Trina’s a mom, and she’s never whored. Her skin is too pale and clear to be that of a cocksucker. Plus, Trina lets me sit in her booth without ordering anything but seltzer for seven nights straight during the dinner rush. She’s kind. I bet she knits and watches TV until exactly ten p.m. Trina lets me sit here with seltzer and saltines just so I can stare at this fuck who pumped cum in my mother and sliced her cunt when he was done.

I still popped out of her, though. Nine months later. My mother likes to tell me that it’s almost a blessing, her sliced cunt, because she had a wider hole to push me out of.

I have been useless to her until now. She loves me, yeah. She always saves me the last piece of donut. But I was in tow wherever she went: welfare office, subsidized child care drop-off, the casino parking lots at two a.m., Hank’s to buy weed and share rum that I was occasionally allowed to sip if I was quiet. I was always quiet.

I was also always useless. For sixteen years, she used the room next to mine to blow guys for ten dollars because she was too scarred up to fuck. If I were a good son, I would have gotten a job. I just stayed in bed and hoped she was focused enough to make them ejaculate quickly so I could sleep.

When she saw him--Tuna Sandwich--she peeped. My mother never does anything quieter than guffaw. It’s the only way I knew; she peeped, turned me around by the shoulders, and we left the convenience store without papers, Fritos, or grape Gatorade.

Now, I spit a thick gob onto my fingertips, walk behind Tuna Sandwich, and fling it into his greasy hair. Trina sees me and lifts an eyebrow. She smiles, then, because Tuna Sandwich calls her Trina Tits-a-lot. He has tucked money into the shirt pocket of her uniform while copping a feel more than once. Until now, her only revenge was wiping her pussy juice on his tuna sandwich white bread.

For me, Trina lifted his keys. Trina told me she serves him his last cup of coffee at 10 p.m. and that my six green pills will be crushed in it. Trina told me he's small but strong.

She joins me in the men’s room, drops his motel key in my hand, and slaps my ass. “You look so fuckin’ good tonight. I’m not going to see you in here tomorrow, am I?”

“No.”

“Do good work.” She kisses my cheek, straightens her skirt, and leaves me be.

------------

Tuna Sandwich wakes up on a creeper. When I said, “Do you sell those dolly things? You know, the ones that go under cars?” the auto parts guy sneered at me. I’m sixteen, for one, and I’m frail, for two. Also, I lisp a little. He asked me if I needed help getting it into my van, and it sucked, because I did.

If I woke up on a creeper in my motel room, it would take me a minute or two to panic. I’d be almost curious when I came to. I might take some time to assess. It wouldn’t make any sense to a good person.

It doesn’t take Tuna Sandwich but twelve seconds to panic, though, because I know the fuck knows he’s led the kind of life where waking up cocooned to a creeper with rope and bungee cords and duct tape over your mouth is the kind of thing he’s been waiting to come around the corner since puberty.

He shakes his head like a dog after a swim. He groans through the tape. I smile from the bed. I was watching Fixture, the one where Kimmy does the bull run in Barcelona. I turn up the TV, super loud. I go to him. I hover.

He’s using his feet and lower legs to push himself away from me. He bumps his head into the wall and squeezes his eyes closed. His nostrils are blown to the size of dimes. His eyes burn: what, what, what.

He knows what. It’s a hundred whats.

It’s me taking off his shoes and socks and jamming my mom’s metal emery board under his big toenail what. It’s me dragging his faggot ass over to the writing table so I can steady myself on the chair, stand on his chest, and stomp up and down on him until I’m sure I’ve broken ribs what. It’s me moving to his balls and cracking down with my heel. It’s me plunging the emery board into his right eyeball.

Best of all, it’s me struggling to cut through the cartilage of his throat with my Swiss Army knife, because I am sixteen, frail, and lispy. A hundred whats let me take my time, and his left eyeball screams at me the whole time I do.

I’m going to sit here. I’m going to sit here and see what kind of piece of shit person shows up looking for this cocksucker because they missed him. No one will miss him. No one. I’ll be sitting here for days, sucking in his stench until I’m bored and go to Atlantic City.  

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blake middleton

CHARLIE by Blake Middleton

March 26, 2018

i took some adderall the other day

and for some reason i decided it was time to replace my old washing machine with a new washing machine

my roommate got a lighter stuck in the part of the washer where all the lent and other bullshit builds up

so we were scared that the washing machine was gonna catch fire or explode

i had been putting off changing it out for weeks

i didn’t know how to change out a washing machine and hadn’t really felt like learning

i kinda hoped my roommate would do it eventually

but whatever, i was bored and on adderall, optimal conditions for doing a dumb chore you’ve been putting off forever

i hadn’t taken adderall in months

and there were reasons for this, of course

but it had been a few months, it was early, i wasn’t gonna mix them with alcohol or anything, haha, just wanted some help focusing

felt like i didn’t need a youtube tutorial, no no, none of that bullshit

just needed some fucking drugs, kids

i stared at the washing machine, trying to use my brain to think

i did some thinking and unscrewed the hose on the back of the washer a little bit

but some water shot out from around the sides

so the first step would be to turn off the water

and hey hey

goddamn

the adderall was working

it had increased my critical thinking/problem solving skills immensely

i tried to turn the faucet, but the handle was rusted and broken

i tried to use a wrench to turn the handle, but no, still wasn’t working

i thought, fuck it

removing the hose was gonna be the first step again

the adderall in my dumb-ass brain was telling me that would work, like totally, fuck yeah

the adderall was telling me that, despite the recent revelation that the handle was completely broken and fucked, i had the mental capacity and psychical strength required to unscrew the hose from the back of the old washer then, while water was spewing out from the hose, screw it into the new washer

actually no, without really thinking about what i was doing, i unscrewed the hose

and as soon as i unscrewed the hose i realized that unscrewing the hose while the water was still running was a stupid and bad thing to do

because water was shooting out everywhere

getting all my shit wet

the floor wet. the counters wet. my pants wet.

like imagine all my shit getting really fucking wet

imagine a hose spewing water full blast on a bunch of shit that shouldn’t get wet

it was bad

i tried to screw it back into the old washer

i thought, fuck it

just wanted to screw the hose back into the old washer, keep using that one until it caught fire or exploded and killed me or whatever

just wanted to read a book or lie in bed and stare at the ceiling or something

but no

wasn’t gonna work for me

mentally added ‘changing out a washing machine’ to a long list of shit that just wasn’t gonna work for me

no i didn’t do that

but in hindsight, yeah, add it to the list

it was too late to quit though

this wasn’t a time for literature or bad feelings in bed

this was a time for stopping a hose from flooding my house

really didn’t wanna have to call my slumlord and get yelled at

plus my roommates had been getting drunk a lot and spray-painting the walls

so i would get double yelled at

then my dumb-ass brain did some more thinking stuff

and oh man

i realized who i needed

i needed my boy charlie

charlie was my alcoholic neighbor

there was a good chance that he would be home because he doesn’t have a job

he spends most of his time drinking busch on his porch with his shithead buddies (also unemployed alcoholics)

he has a friend named ‘ice man’ that sells meth out of his ford bronco

‘ice man’ also does lawn service

‘ice man’ and charlie have a friend named ‘creepy chris’

‘creepy chris’ lives in charlie’s garage

he also smokes crack-cocaine and has sex with prostitutes in there too

charlie's garage: a versatile space perfect for a variety of stimulating activities such as crack smoking and illicit sex

‘creepy chris’ helps ‘ice man’ sell meth and cut grass

sometimes creepy chris smokes too much crack and walks around the park across the street very late at night

creeping around

there goes chris again, smoking crack and creeping around in the night, there he goes

just some normal jacksonville florida bullshit my guy

but yeah, yes, charlie was my only hope

i put the hose inside the washing machine and it started filling with water

i jumped over the washing machine and sprinted out my front door, drenched in water, looking like a fucking dumb-ass

and yeah, yes

charlie was sitting alone on his porch drinking a busch

he was wearing cut-off jean shorts

and i could see his balls

dangling out, resting gently on the stoop

i got a little distracted for a minute by charlies big tan balls, you know?

shit was wet my guy

it was 11 am

charlie had been drinking, but he wasn’t drunk

which was great because charlie isn’t very helpful when he’s drunk

like one time i went over to charlie’s place to borrow a drill

i knocked on the door

and i could see charlie through the screen door

he was sitting on the couch, empty mcdonald’s wrappers on the ottoman in front of him

looking old and leathery as ever

but he wouldn’t move, he just sat there smiling, staring right at me

‘charie,’ i yelled. ‘what the fuck?’

then jane, charlie’s wife, nice old jane, came to the door, opened it

and before she could say anything to me, charlie yelled, ‘how many boyfriends you got, jane?’

so i was thinking, okay, charlie’s drunk and on pain pills again

suprise suprise

because charlie, in addition to being my drunk neighbor, is also my drunk maintenance man

and a few weeks ago he was doing some work on my roof, few too many beers deep, fell off and slipped a disk in his back

so for the past few weeks he’s been on the pain pills

calls them ‘happy pills’

usually in the context of ‘hey blake do you wanna buy some happy pills?’

so i asked jane if i could borrow a drill

jane said, ‘it’s blake. wants to know if he can borrow a drill. do you know where the drills at, charlie?’

‘bet you could find it if it was up your ass,’ he yelled

nice old jane said, ‘well, it’s not up my ass, mr. charlie’

and i said, ‘okay, i’ll come back later’

but it was early this time and he wasn’t drunk yet

i said, ‘charlie, i need you. i’ve got a fucking emergency’

i felt a little strange saying ‘i need you’ to a weird old man while staring at his balls

he stood up and his balls retracted

i said ‘follow me’ and ran to my house

he walked real slow behind me

well we got inside and Charlie assessed the situation

he stared at the washing machine overflowing onto my floor

he looked at me and shook his head and laughed like ‘haha what the fuck did you do, kid?’

then he took the hose and put it in a drain thingy behind the washer then walked outside and turned the water off by lifting up a concrete thingy in my front yard

seemed incredibly easy

made me feel like, what the fuck have i been doing on the world for 23 years. how do i not know how to do basic bullshit yet?

charlie said we were gonna need to go buy a new faucet because the current one was broken and fucked

i suggested that we go to the lowes down the street

*

we walked around lowes together

me and charlie

the two best friends

charlie would pick up a spout and mumble, ‘should have gone to the fucking home depot’

i had always thought that lowes and home depot were the exact same store but now i know that they are not

i was learning things

learning things to remember in the future

always preparing for some empty bullshit

shit breaks and you fix it

just more and more tiny breaks to fix until that last sweet unrepairable breaking

a breaking so broke you gotta bury it

wet wet wet

but yeah fuck lowes i guess

*

on the drive home from lowes we approached a liquor store

i had gotten pretty used to paying charlie in liquor

he had been mowing my lawn with ice man and chris every week in exchange for a 750 of canadian club whiskey

fucking champions these guys

so i figured i’d stop in the liquor stop and buy him a handle

so i did

and we got back to my place and charlie fixed my washer

no problem

just fixed her right up

he took a deep breath and looked at me

‘you want a mixed cocktail?’ he said

really felt like i owed him one

like if charlie wanted me to drink a cocktail with him, then i would do that, yeah

i said okay, and we walked over to charlie’s place

there was nascar shit everywhere

mostly dale earnhardt memorabilia

hell yeah

charlie walked to the kitchen and picked up two 32 ounce styrofoam cups

like those big motherfuckers you get at gas stations

he grabbed the handle of canadian club and a 2 liter of coke, handed them to me

‘mix yourself a drink’ he said, smiling like a big time motherfucker

so i poured a 2 oz shot into the cup

a normal amount

and he said ‘c’mon pour a little more’

so i poured another 2 ounces

okay, seemed fine, whatever

and again he said, ‘c’mon brother, pour a little more’

hmm not great, no no

but i poured another 2 ounces

mixed it with coke

we sat on the couch together, watching the local news

just two normal guys watching the local news alone on a couch, drinking giant-ass cocktails

a white lady was talking about a murder at a gas station in westside jacksonville

charlie yelled something at the TV

i thought, ‘okay all i have to do is finish this drink and then i can leave, cool’

so i started drinking faster

and by the time i finished the drink about five minutes later, i felt like watching the local news with charlie was a fun and normal thing to do

and i remembered that i took an adderall earlier

and that when i’m on adderall i feel like i can drink a lot more than i actually can

so i realized i drank too much too quick

surprise surprise

so i walked to the fridge and grabbed a beer

because i was already there

i was feeling good

i was feeling that invincible feeling again

felt like i was the fucking king of beer, god of the mini-fridge, the busch-light punisher

and as soon as i popped the top ice man and creepy chris pulled up in the bronco, honked the horn a few times

and it sounded like ‘daa-daa-da-da-da-da-daaaa-daaaa-da-da’

and i was drunk enough to think ‘fuck yeah, cool, all of this this is normal and good’

and the bronco had bull horns on the front and i’m not kidding, it had ‘ice man’ stenciled on the hood

creepy chris stepped out of the passenger side, looking like a praying mantis on crack

and he was holding a styrofoam box over his head with his mantis arms

he started chanting ‘chicken wings chicken wings chicken wings’

and charlie's lazy ass didn't hop up off the couch when i told him i had a fucking emergency but he sure did hop up for chicken wings

i followed him outside

‘shut the fuck up, chris’ charlie said. ‘what you got in there?’

‘chicken wings’

‘give em here’

he handed charlie the box

charlie opened the box and said ‘hey buddy’ to the chicken wings, smiling

‘hey charlie man,’ said chris. ‘i, uh, got them things for weed-eating a lawn’

‘who's garage you live at, uh? do you live at charlie's garage? is that your mattress in my garage, uh?’

‘Yeah, but--’

charlie slurped down a chicken wing

wet

he stood and chugged a beer, walked out back to the garage

we all followed charlie for some reason

and also, for some reason, there was a tire nailed above the garage

just kind of dangling there in the breeze like charlie’s balls

couldn’t seem to stop thinking about charlie’s balls

charlie grabbed two 30 pound dumbbells out of the garage

‘lifts some weights, chicken wing’ he said to chris

and instead of telling charlie to ‘fuck off’ he just lifted the weights

he counted his reps and charlie ate his chicken wings

and ice man smiled at me and pulled out a one hitter

and i took a hit of ice man’s weed

and thank god it was only weed

and yes my guy

i was drunk and stoned and on adderall

it was one of those day where you’d usually think ‘huh, didn’t think i’d be doing this today’

only right then i wasn’t thinking that

i wasn’t thinking anything

that’s what made it so good

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