Such a Shame

Herr Ratten, an old Nazi dressed in black double-breasted dress tunic, black trousers, and black leather boots, sat on a bed and suckled from his great-granddaughter Gertrude.

“Ja! Is Matilda’s breast!” he said.

Milk dribbled from his mouth. Gertrude, sitting with her legs crossed, wearing only white cotton panties, giggled and wiped his chin with her thumb. She, like her great-grandmother, enjoyed a rare condition where the breasts filled often, though without child or pregnant. Ratten had travelled far to taste again Matilda’s milk.

Ratten held Gertrude’s babyish face. He ran his knobby fingers over her smooth, shaven head.

“A perfect angel, my Gertrude,” he smiled.

“Do you like my ink, Pappy?” she said.

Over her entire body were tattoo symbols of the Neo-Nazi. A crucified Hitler nestled between her tits.

Ratten shrugged. “Eh, I can admire passion.”

Gertrude pouted.

Ratten patted her hand. “My darling, you must be subtle. Appeal to common factory man, and middleclass type. This body art is silly. Is much too much. A Nazi today must blend.”

“Like the shape shifting Jew,” Gertrude said.

Ratten stood. “Insolence! You subvert our Reich with your idiot intentions and, and picture book ideations. The Space Reich does not need you. You serve Jew purpose like on puppet strings. Earth is a decadent Jew paradise! I’ll have this planet blown to bits! Yes, by Hitler! Mars is preferred to this toilet!”

Ratten prepared teleportation transport to his orbiting Space Reich vessel.

“No!” Gertrude shouted. She knocked the device from his hands.

Ratten stared at her. “Perhaps you are correct. A purification, as planned. We’ll clone Aryan race while we wait for shrubbery to regrow.”

He jabbed Gertrude with a prick point, and obtained her blood. She swore.

Ratten chuckled. “Your environment ruined you. We’ll raise you proper in test tube.”

“I want a baby,” Gertrude said.

“Excuse me?” Ratten replied.

“Now!” Gertrude shouted. The door to her room burst open. Two shirtless, muscular skinheads, each with matching tiny swastikas tattooed over their nipples, seized Ratten.

“What is the meaning of this?” Ratten demanded.

Gertrude undid Ratten’s belt and separated his tunic. “You will fuck me, and give me a baby.”

“An horrendous idea.”

Gertrude lowered Ratten’s pants and took his cock in her mouth. Ratten swelled.

He chuckled. “Still got it, ja? Do not do this. I warn you.”

Gertrude stood and slapped him. “Shut up. Put him on the bed.”

Ratten giggled. “Have your way. I surrender!”

Gertrude crawled over her great-grandfather, moved her panties to the side, and lowered herself over his old, throbbing, 5-inch dong.

She punched Ratten in the nose. “Come.”

She hit him again. “Come you bitch. I am the mother of the Reich. My baby will be Messiah!”

Ratten laughed. His spittle was blood. He ejaculated. He looked at Gertrude.

“Goodbye, my angel.”

Gertrude’s chest thrust upward in quick jerk motion. Her head fell backward, jaw slack. She began to heave, gurgle dry sucking air as she did. Milk dripped rapidly from her boobs. Her throat swelled, cracking apart underneath her skin. A large sperm head popped from her mouth. The sperm wiggled up, flailing back and forth, and continued to grow. Gertrude’s body slumped over. The sperm found a skinhead and wrapped around him. The sperm constricted. Bones snapped. The skinhead screamed. The other skinhead attacked the sperm. The sperm tail snapped his neck with a whip crack. Ratten rose calmly, fastening his belt. The sperm slithered over and rubbed against Ratten’s crotch. Ratten petted it.

“Good boy,” he said. He gripped the sperm with both hands and brought it to his mouth. He bit the sperm’s head, and tore from it a chunk of sperm flesh which he chewed. Holding the sperm midpiece like it was the cone of a hefty cotton candy, he ate and pondered Gertrude’s cunt. She had fallen so that her upper body rested on the floor, back against the bed, and her thighs were spread just so. Ratten rubbed her cunny with the partially eaten sperm and shook his head.

He clicked his tongue. “Such a shame.”

Plenty of Fish

“Can I get you a menu?”

The bartender’s question pulled Ed out of his funk. He had been sitting there drinking for a good two hours, becoming more and more despondent with each swig.

“Sure,” he said resignedly. “Might as well.”

His Saturday lunch date was late. Two hours late. No call, no text, nothing. It was official. Another no-show.

Ed peered at the menu. He craved some old-fashioned beef tacos with crunchy shells. Of course he would’ve preferred a taco of the hairy variety, but this wasn’t happening. Not today, anyway.

He placed his order.

“Another beer?” the bartender asked.

“Sure,” Ed said.

This online dating game wasn’t working worth a damn. Women were more than willing to exchange messages, but when it came time to actually meet . . .

Today marked the third time that he had been stood up. Third and last, he thought. Enough is enough. No more online dating for Ed.

***

Back at his apartment Ed deactivated the account and grabbed another beer from the fridge. He had bought a six-pack of tallboys on his way home from El Palacio; nothing to do today but get shit-faced and wallow in self-pity.

He grabbed his cigarettes and went out on the little balcony overlooking the pool. Eye candy galore. Women laid out on chaise lounges soaking up the afternoon sun, others swimming, laughing, talking. Good-looking women, too. Young, probably single.

Ed was young. And single.

But he had no desire to join them. He had gotten plenty of sun in Iraq. And now he was home and working a shitty job and trying to meet a woman.

One of his coworkers at the garage had recommended online dating; this guy claimed to get all kinds of action. Desperate and horny, Ed had been intrigued, so much so that he had opted for the premium membership package with all the bells and whistles. Now he felt like a total fool for wasting his money.

Ed smoked and drank and tried to enjoy the view, but it was hard. Those women down there in their bikinis were out of reach, unattainable. He might as well have been watching supermodels on TV. They didn’t want some grease monkey veteran plagued by nightmares . . .

He finished his cigarette and went back inside. It was too hot out there. Unless you were swimming. Ed regarded the dreary walls of his apt. A dip might make him feel better, help him sober up. He wasn’t supposed to be drinking at all.

Dr. Libby would’ve been disappointed.

***

Ed slammed the door to his apartment, threw the bolt, and rushed to the bathroom. He stood at the sink and splashed cool water on his face, hoping this would extinguish his shame and rage. His excursion to the pool couldn’t have turned out worse. The whole thing had been a bad idea from the beginning.

All that beer, the tacos, the savage sun and heat, the supple flesh, everything had made him dizzy and sick and he had managed to climb out of the pool but that’s as far as he got before it came out in a torrent. Some had actually laughed when he puked. Heartless bitches . . .

Four months ago, in the leasing office, he had all but demanded a unit with a view of the pool. Now he never wanted to see the pool again.

Unless . . .

Ed’s rifle was in the bedroom closet.

He pulled it out.

The AR-15 was loaded, ready to rock, ready to roll. He opened the sliding glass door and stepped out on the balcony. They were still down there, all of them. A few guys had shown up since his ugly departure.

He felt the reassuring pressure of the stock against his shoulder. Just like old times, he thought. Ed was back in Fallujah.

The opening round pierced a brunette’s eye, bored through her brain, and exited the back of her head in a fine pink mist.

A young woman with a horrifying secret embarks on an erotic adventure punctuated with bloodshed…
A displaced holiday figure enacts his messianic calling in the cavernous subway below New York City…
Two brothers carry their father’s ashes across a flooded town in an apocalyptic American South devoid of rainfall…

In these stories and more, DeCoursey effortlessly transports readers from the familiar, to the uncanny, to the downright surreal! At once chilling and darkly humorous, vulgar with pronounced moments of tenderness, VIVID GREENE explores the humanity within monsters and the monstrosity within humans.

BUY A COPY HERE

 

 

A Big Star, Part 1

A ghost made of egg shampoo flew through the air in broad daylight. Mr Johnson held an over-designed remote control ray gun. He made the opalescent UFO shuttle back and forth from nowhere to nowhere in a game of video ping-pong. When he got bored, he hit the freeze button. 

“That’s me, basically,” he said. “Or half of me. This is where I come into the picture, if the story’s true.”

He pushed another button and the load splashed down on a high cheekbone and the bridge of an upturned nose. The brunette whom those features belonged to ran her tongue over her lips and slightly crooked teeth.

“Mom,” the client said. He sounded sad.

In the final frames, a sunken face mimed, “Phew!”

“And there’s Papa.” He softly repeated, “If the story’s true.”

Mr Johnson pushed another button and the TV screen died. He went to his desk, pulled another remote-control from a drawer, zapped open the wooden blinds to reveal the Hollywood hills where the porn loop was shot. 

The client was some species of Hollywood executive. 

He looked into the distance from his office window. A woman with flowing blond hair drove a jeep slowly up the canyon. “My mother already wasn’t looking too hot the last time I saw her.”

The woman in the jeep disappeared behind a blind corner. Nothing left on the hills but the landmark sign and TV antennas. 

“I know a man,” the client went on, “whose mother claimed he was Jimi Hendrix’s love-child before she died of a drug overdose. He’s the right color, got long fingers, but he can’t play. This guy lives in a car. Parked permanently on Venice Blvd. With a crazy German lady who sells love beads on the Boardwalk.”

“Life’s hard.”

“My mother’s life was. I’m glad she ditched me with her father in Palmdale. The old guy taught me values.”

The client pulled $500 cash from his pocket, and slid a copy of the videotape across his desk.

“She said that,” he tapped the black plastic rectangle, “was the high point of her life. I want you to find out if her story’s true.”

The client winced when I lit a cigarette. “Not my kind of case, Mr Johnson,” I said. “I’m in the living missing person line. This’d be a matter for the Coroner’s Office.”

He snorted. “The moral of the story about Hendrix’s alleged son is that he might not be living in a car if he could prove paternity. He’s got nothing to go on except his mother’s say-so. The music biz, in case you don’t know, makes the film industry look soft.”

“I doubt there’s a John Holmes estate. He smoked whatever he earned up a crack pipe.”

“I’m not concerned with that sort of inheritance. Holmes didn’t contribute much to the culture, but he was a star. Understand?”

I didn’t, but said I’d do my best. We didn’t shake hands. Mr Johnson didn’t show me out. 

 

In The Mirror

I’d only been there for a few minutes working on my first beer when she came over and thrust her finger into my face.

Hey she said. I thought I told you last time you were in here not to come back again.

I grinned at her. Oh I said. I just thought that meant you couldn’t live without me.

A look of disgust swept across her face. You’re a piece of shit she said.

I laughed. Hell I told her. Tell me something I don’t know. I grabbed the back of her head and pulled her beautiful face right up next to mine. I kissed her hard on the mouth and when I let her go she slapped me across the face. Another drink for this lady I yelled at the bartender.

I touched my cheek. It felt hot. In the mirror behind the bar I saw what I looked like. I opened my mouth and stuck out my tongue. I knew I looked crazy but I didn’t care. I picked up the glass in front of me and drained the rest of my beer.

When I was finished I banged the empty glass down on the table and shouted at the bartender. Another beer, barkeep and keep them coming.

While I waited for the next beer this scrawny guy with a shaved head came up and tapped me on the shoulder. He looked like a cancer patient who was losing the fight. What’s the big idea? He said to me. Kissing my woman like that?

The waitress came by and slipped another beer in front of me. She did it so quickly I didn’t have time to thank her.

Your woman? I said to the scrawny guy with the shaved head. Really? How much did you have to pay her? I heard laughter from somewhere behind me. I raised my glass to them before bringing it to my lips and draining half the beer.

The scrawny guy with the shaved head just glared at me then he turned and walked away.

Hey buddy I said. You better strap a two by four on your ass the next time you fuck her. I yelled it loud enough so the whole bar could hear. In the mirror behind the bar I saw the woman and the scrawny guy with the shaved head having a lively discussion. She looked angry and he wasn’t very happy.

You can’t win, fucker I thought to myself. Then I laughed and drank some more beer.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw her coming at me again. When she got close I quickly turned and faced her.

I said Yeeesss? Then I laughed again. I could tell she was furious with me. Her whole body shook and I really liked the way it made her tits bounce.

Why you gotta say things like that to my man? She screamed. She balled up her fist and punched me in the arm.

Your man? I said. Is that what that was?

She punched me again and all I could do was laugh.

You know I said. You’re really beautiful when you’re angry.

She leaned her face a little closer to me. Well she said. I think you’re absolutely revolting.

Then she turned her whole body like she was doing a scene from some B-grade movie and stomped back to her seat. In the mirror behind the bar I saw the different faces and they all looked the same to me. I finished the rest of my beer and called for another one.

It was early on a Tuesday but I could already tell it was going to be a good night.

Walking Aberration

I set out around noon, I was feeling a little queasy but I didn’t think much of it then, ten minutes into my journey I got a filling sensation in my stomach, like a sudden gas build up came out of nowhere and began to expand. I continued on but the pain was increasing and it felt like I had a fucking boulder in my intestines, I had no clue what was going on inside me but it sure as hell wanted its way out one way or the other.

I turned back home and staggered down the sidewalk clutching the walls and fences, screaming bloody murder. People tried to help but the pain was so debilitating that I could only speak by howling at the top of my lungs; the people from the buildings came out on their balconies to check out the scene, families passing by stayed to see the show, the best show in town, a madman screaming in the street holding his ass for dear life.

I was half way across the street blocking traffic when the police and ambulance showed up to hear my deafening torturous wails, I could see that the crowd had formed a circle around me, keeping a good distance as if they were suspecting a bomb to go off out of my ass and blow a hole in the street, which wasn’t too far from what actually did happen.

I couldn’t take any more; and this thing, this gigantic enigmatic thing, was without question coming out now, with the grace and determination of a newly anointed Queen raging on PCP. I yanked down my pants and assumed the fetal position, I screamed louder than I ever have and pushed through that sphincter as fearsome as a kraken, I felt like my whole asshole was coming apart, I thought it was the end for my ass and I forever, so I prayed to the only god I knew might be listening; I chose the “BOSS” for some abstract reason.

Ah! The serenity that followed that torture was sublime but my relief quickly faded as reality moved in. What I just blasted out of my ass was a fucking donkey, a painted donkey, paintings of hippie shit like; flowers, peace signs, love the world, shit like that.

I stood up, pulled up my pants and joined the crowd, now focused on the donkey; it just stood there and didn’t seem at all distressed about the clusterfuck that just took place, however, he didn’t just shit out a medium sized horse like creature like I had. I pushed through the crowd and walked up to the donkey, I can’t explain where the urge came from but I had a certain need to pet the thing, almost like we were connected in some fucked up wrath of god cosmic slapping sort of way.

As the crowd eventually dispersed the cops and paramedics came over with expressions on their faces that would scare the hell out of small little children. None of them said a goddamb word; they just stood and stared like deer’s caught in the headlights. I was exhausted and thoroughly embarrassed, and really didn’t feel like trying to explain what happened, due to the fact that I hadn’t a clue about what just happened, I felt as though what I went through was quite personal as well. So, I took the fucking donkey and I went home. All the people remaining watched as I left the scene knowing in their hearts that they would probably never see something as fucking weird as what went down that day.

 

Pleased to Meet Me

A standard capsule includes photos, snippets of articles, and obituaries if applicable. This costs about $300 if you attend a timeshare presentation, and tends to be a popular graduation gift. The deluxe package includes everything in the standard capsule as well as a one-on-one interview with your future self. The price varies depending on the client, and baseball scores and lottery numbers are strictly off-limits. Discussions are meant to involve relationships, career choices, health, and so on. I figure most clients that can afford it merely want to see if they age well, as a sort of unprovoked expression of vanity.

The deluxe package is a bit less desirable than it once was. Rival toy companies now offer similar services, and clients are generally unhappy with the results anyway. My article about the process wasn’t exactly well received either, which I can’t imagine was helpful. With innovations formerly regarded as impossibilities, there’s a certain taboo towards journalists giving the whole thing away, as if the masses preferred magic as an explanation. My former editor insists this was the case as far back as the invention of the telephone.

I suspect censorship of being a more likely culprit than outright lack of demand, even if only because I can’t be the first to write about the whole experience. Most of which involved sitting on impractical, sculpturesque furniture in pastel-colored waiting rooms. The facility itself is actually quite large for being attached to a mall, and manages to stay empty on weekdays. Each room stays quiet, aside from the occasional fax, and the receptionist asking me to proceed to the next waiting room every half hour or so. Which happens to be more than enough time to get through the reading material of each room.

The reading material is fairly personalized, mostly consisting of photos and articles from the standard capsule, as well as inevitable things like natural disasters. Each room is a little smaller than the last one, and each stack of the reading material from a little further into the future than the last, and so on.

The first two rooms are the same as I remember, with the same reading material: a DUI, rehab, therapy, and a suicide attempt. The standout ones being performance and production credits on an album considered to be a cult classic, and a seemingly passionate article where I’m referred to as a “tortured soul.” The magazine in question used a blurry photo of me in a hospital gown, having a cigarette with a sickly woman in a Dead Kennedys tee shirt.

The third waiting room was roughly the size of a broom closet, which is considerably smaller than I remember it being. The reading material was entirely different this time around, too. There was a murder trial and an eventual formation of a cult, but I couldn’t justify forcing myself to read any further. I felt a sort of disconnect, as if it weren’t possible this could be me, since it wasn’t the same version of me I last spoke with. A document taped to a glass table served as a final warning, and something to sign if I wanted to leave without a refund.

At some point, the receptionist—an unremarkable woman in a pantsuit—gently opened the door, clutching a clipboard. Her light tap on the door might have meant to serve as something like a retroactive knock, and she may have said something to the effect of right this way, please but I was rightfully a bit beside myself. I followed her to the room where the interview was to be conducted, which was a little different this time around.

Pink pastel walls, a Persian rug, one-way mirrors, and reel-to-reel tape recorders; I’d addressed nearly everything else in the room, likely to delay the inevitable. Two red leather lounge chairs were positioned in the center of the room, with a small glass table between them, bearing two ribbon microphones and two cups of bubble tea. It looked like something between a late-night talk show and a fever dream, and I was being greeted by my own venomous smile.

He waved his finger at my chest, likely to keep me from talking, and asked me if the cigarettes in my shirt pocket were tobacco or green tea. I rolled both, and lately I was sprinkling green tea leaves over my tobacco. I initially thought the tea would help me quit, but at some point I acquired a taste for it. He scoffed when I told him this, but took one anyway. I didn’t notice the door was shut behind me until I finally took a seat, nor did I notice the barely audible hints of jazz piano with no discernible source.

I struggled with my moody brass lighter for a moment, before being handed a matchbook with an ad concerning matchbook advertising. Smokers do read matchbooks, you are doing so now, it said. I glanced over at him as I dragged on my cigarette, noting that it was like looking into a hazy mirror. Much of his features remained the same as mine, with silvered hair and tired eyes being the notable differences. His voice was a fair bit raspier than mine, sounding more like a recording of my voice than how I actually hear myself.

My focus shifted to the audio equipment as I briefly watched the tape reels spin. He told me interviews with him are elusive, and this particular one being recorded was the only reason these discussions have been so affordable. It wasn’t that I didn’t believe him, but I was under the impression that it was meant to be something clinical or therapeutic. You absolute moron, he’d say, between disgusted cigarette drags and sips of bubble tea. Insisting that I was to blame for anything remotely psychological, as well as the meetings themselves. Narcissism is a hell of a drug, he said.

Ignoring the fact that he was the one that told me to come back soon, I believe I’ve only been here twice, or maybe three or four times at most. My memory of the first interview is distorted, to say the least, as I can almost remember it twice from differing perspectives. I can only imagine the same or worse must’ve happened to him, likely for each interview, as if new and old memories of the same event were competing. All I mentioned was the distortion, to which he nodded and stayed silent, aside from the rattle of his straw chasing unattainable drops of bubble tea.

He picked the microphones up and unscrewed them from their tiny tripods, handed me one, and held one to his face as if we were being filmed. He told me we should have the sort of interview they publish in magazines. Cheers, he beamed, slapping the microphones together. If someone was listening, it’s safe to assume they now have at least mild tinnitus as a result. He grabbed me by the shirt collar while the needle on the tape machine’s VU meter danced with the numbers in red. If you have any sense, you’ll steal one of those tapes and take on a new identity in another country, he whispered.

Several seconds went by at this point, and the more I thought about it, the easier it was to rationalize taking one of the tapes. It was one way to ensure I don’t come back for another interview, likely at least slightly preserving my sanity. If an interview with him is as elusive as he says, it’s also possible it could be worth something to someone at some point, regardless of what changes. I lit another cigarette, and nodded. It was all I could think to do to let him know that I’d actually do it.

He started doing this bit where he’d act like an obnoxious radio host, asking me questions about my childhood, and eventually promising to end the interview when we ran out of cigarettes. At times, he’d pretend to have a caller on the line, usually to voice complaints about the station not taking song requests. It took a while before he was willing to switch roles, and a condition of doing so was that he’d offer bad advice as he went along.

My initial assumption was that advice he’d give would pertain to things he wished he’d done differently, or not at all, and sometimes this was the case. I was told to quit trying to write for newspapers, as those articles get censored and turned into advertisements anyway. He went on to say that writing for zines is what got him into music, and interrupted himself to tell me not to trust banks or credit unions. My favorite piece of advice was this: if ever you feel like jumping off a building, he said. Do a flip.

We were down to our last couple cigarettes, and only a few seconds of silence passed before he chimed back in. He said the murder trial I read about was an overdose, and it’s best to just avoid those people altogether. People live on their own terms, he’d say. Because people are absolute morons. I hadn’t given it much thought, but I’m sure there are self-destructive people that aren’t entirely brain dead. Some of which are probably worth sticking around for, I’d say, but he disagreed.

I lit my last cigarette, took a drag of it, and stood up to admire the spinning tapes. He kept talking, mostly about how corporations function as a sort of shadow government. I’d nod every few spins or so, but at some point I just stopped listening. Not because I necessarily disagreed, it was more about no longer having the capacity. Until next time, I said, stuffing two tape reels down my pants. Until next time, he nodded.

It was a calm and casual exit, not exactly the high-risk stakes of a heist film, but I was anxious enough to get a safety deposit box anyway. I quickly realized I made the mistake of leaving the key at my apartment, however, when I stopped there to pack up. My first instinct was to abandon it. I spent a few days in a motel outside of town, who seem to charge more for using their phones than using a room. I had people I know ask around, but no one seemed to be looking for me. I didn’t see any harm in going home at this point, at least long enough to grab the key. I opened the door to find my elder doppelganger in bed, mounting and strangling a younger doppelganger. You absolute moron, he shrieked.

Time & Space

Six days after we had discovered the ship was no longer functioning properly and we realized we were nothing more than a hollow metal tube drifting through the darkness of space Halverson turned to me and said Barlow?

Yes I replied.

Barlow, I need to tell you something.

Okay, Halverson I said. But first just let me give you a quick update concerning our current situation.

Okay.

Well I said. First of all, I don’t know where we are. I’ve made some calculations but there are just too many unknown variables so, the bottom line is, I don’t know where we are.

Alright said Halverson.

And I said. I can’t be sure about how much air we have remaining. We could have days or, even, weeks or, it could be just a matter of hours.

Well, Barlow said Halverson. I’ve been having an affair with your wife for the last year and a half.

What? I said. You’ve been fucking my wife?

Yes said Halverson. And your sister three, no, four times last summer. I just wanted you to know. He leaned forward and pretended he was studying the instrument panel in front of him.

Well, hell I said. What do you expect me to do with this information?

What do you mean?

What I mean, Halverson I said. Is that we’re not going to make it. So what purpose does it serve for you to tell me about the affair between you and my wife.

And your sister said Halverson.

Will you forget my goddamn sister!

Okay said Halverson. He leaned away from the instrument panel and started looking out the window. I just thought you should know, okay? I guess I wanted to clear my conscience.

Well, hell I said. That’s fine for you, now, isn’t it? I turned and looked out the window on my side of the ship. All I saw were long stretches of darkness and pinpoints of light scattered here and there, too far away for me to make any sense out of them.

Hey said Halverson. Let me try the radio again. Okay, Barlow? Let me try the radio.

Okay, okay I said. Try the goddamn radio.

Halverson leaned forward and pushed a couple of buttons. Halverson to Earth Base One he said. Halverson to Earth Base One. This is ship HCB2094. HCB2094 to Earth Base One. Come in, Earth.

There wasn’t any answer only a dead silence that permeated the entire cabin before falling down on top of us like a heavy weight. Halverson looked at me then began his transmission again but this time his voice sounded a lot more desperate.

Forget it, Halverson. We’re sunk.

So what are we going to do?

Well, hell, Halverson I said. I got up from my seat and started rummaging around. I threw a couple of boxes aside. Here we go. I lifted up the bottle and showed it to Halverson. I opened the bottle and took a long drink. I handed the whiskey to Halverson.

Okay, Barlow he said. Halverson took a drink and handed the bottle back to me.

The ship drifted and we kept drinking the whiskey. It could have been morning or afternoon or three o’clock in the middle of the goddamn night. We had no way of knowing what time it really was or how much of it either of us had left. I felt warm. I felt more than warm. My face felt hot and I started to laugh.

Listen, Halverson I said. You goddamn son of a bitch. I’m gonna kick your goddamn ass.

I lunged at him and we spilled onto the floor. I was on top of Halverson punching him in the face. I saw his nose and mouth starting to turn bloody. Then, the next thing I knew Halverson was on top of me and I felt my eyes exploding. I saw a white flash followed by a myriad of pretty colors. We crashed into the instrument panel and I heard the sound of things breaking apart. I struggled against Halverson and felt something cutting into my arm.

Shit Halverson said.

Fuck I replied.

Earth Base One said the voice suddenly blaring from out of the radio. Earth Base One to HCB2094. Come in, Barlow. Come in, Halverson. Hello? Anybody there?

I stopped and looked at Halverson. Halverson stopped and looked at me. I crawled over to the radio and pushed the buttons. This is Barlow I said. Come in, Earth Base One.

Well, hot damn said the voice. Hang tight, boys. We’re monitoring your coordinates and sending out a rescue team.

Okay I said. Okay.

Halverson got up and went back to his seat. I didn’t look at him. I didn’t speak to him. I turned and looked out the window. I wiped the blood from my face with the back of my hand. The radio was silent again.

I found the whiskey bottle and took another drink. When I was done I handed the bottle to Halverson. He took the bottle from me and held it in his hand. He sat there. I sat there.

We both sat there and waited.

Rainbows and Lollipops

The garden is overgrown. Low maintenance cacti prevail and a tangle of dried up vines threaten to swallow the purple door. I rip off the note he’s scrawled: Come on in, the water’s warm! and with it a large swatch of paint, which I toss in the sandy dirt.

I flip off my flip flops and walk down the hall.

I can hear the shower running and him singing Satisfaction by the Stones. “Cuz I try and I try and I try and I try and I try and I tryyyy.”

He’s trying too hard, as usual. Mick Jagger only tried four times before succumbing to the fact that he couldn’t get no satisfaction.

He is in the shower at precisely the time I am scheduled to arrive to let me know that his chubby little cock is clean and ready to suck.

There are naked photos of a trashy blonde with balloon-like implants on his computer screen. I pretend not to see them because I know he wants me to.

I hear the shower door close and he lumbers in with nothing but a hopeful look in his eyes.

“Hey, you! Lookin’ good as usual!”

If this were what I usually looked like, it would be cause for concern. My hair is oily and and I have been wearing my T-shirt dress since this morning when I used the dirt I’d pilfered from the community garden to plant the petunias that I’d been collecting from the walkways late at night. No one would miss the flowers since they grew like weeds and the rich folks had their gardeners replace them every 6 weeks anyways.

I look good compared to him though, if we are basing his compliment in relativity.

Wide pink stretch marks criss-cross his gut, loose moles hang around his neck, his nostrils are flared like a bull waiting to charge and doughy kneecaps nearly buckle under his weight, making him a sight few would call ‘good as usual’.

He wants a hug. I can feel it shooting from behind the pathetic longing that are his eyeballs. A hug is not what I have in mind though.

I’m thinking more of ramming the heel of my hand upwards into his nose and then laughing joyfully as he falls backward into the fireplace and I stomp on the four pounds of testicles that swing between his mushy thighs.

I set up my massage table, accidentally glancing at the twit on the computer screen, as he looks on expectantly.

“You like her?” he asks.

“I don’t know her.”

“She’s a friend of a friend. My friend spends time with her and thought I might like her. I think she’s a prostitute.”

“That’s fairly evident, yes.”

He’s doing two things: he’s letting me know that he has other options thereby trying to get a reaction of competitiveness while also aiming to incite a conversation about prostitution. He’s hoping that maybe that will turn into some liberal-leaning heart-to-heart in which I decide that’s it’s cool to fuck him for money.

I choke down my vomit to speak. “Prostitutes are the safest people you can sleep with next to porn actresses.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because they’re professionals. They always use condoms.”

“Do you like sex with condoms?”

I’d like to pull a giant condom over his head and get my satisfaction watching him flail and choke to death because his fingers are too fat to find its edge to free himself.

“Okay, hop on the table.”I say with caustic pep.

There is no such thing as hopping for him though; there is only hoist and roll.

I stare at the metal filing cabinets as my reluctant hands move down his ample back. Stray hairs, a puss-filled whitehead and a scaly texture greet my fingers and palms as I apologize silently to them.

I will deposit the two hundred and fifty dollars to my account immediately upon leaving here and finally being able to pay the minimum on my credit card before being charged a thirty-five dollar late fee again. I can also get the oil changed in my car if that mailer I got hasn’t expired. Will that make the light go out?

I get down to his ass and he moans and clears his throat. “I make sure I wash real good every time before you come over in case you want to go deeper.”

Is there a bat anywhere in this room? Anything sharp? Oooh, that metal ruler. That would work. It’s an odd shape, but maybe if I put some of this oil on it first and use force…

“Why would I want to do that?”

“Oh, in case you want to get deeper into the muscles.”

“There are no muscles in your butt crack.”

“You sure? Best to double check.”

A bat would be better. A bat with spikes. I’ll make one. I’ll plan ahead next time. Fail to plan, plan to fail.

He laughs nervously, knowing not to push me again for now. He’s conveniently forgotten that he’s encouraged me before to get closer to the most unfathomably grotesque part of his physique and that I’ve given him a firm no.

It is time for the dreaded flip-over. His prick has emerged slightly from its rolls of blubber and drips with a translucent slime that nearly makes me gag. I wipe it roughly before getting a grip and focusing again on the filing cabinet.

I could puke all over him and this table and this room right now. I could drown him in thick, steamy vomit and get double satisfaction as he slides into its pool on the floor writhing like a puffer fish yanked from an aquarium.

“Tell me what you’re thinking about,”he coos.

“Rainbows and lollipops.”

“You’re hilarious!”

It takes him a minute to get hard. If I’d done his arms by pulling them up over his head and letting him fondle me with his sausage fingers, he would have been fully erect, but I don’t need him commenting on my tampon.

I roll his four inches of flesh in my hands like I’m making gnocchi and then grab it like my gear shift, as he exhales deeply and I bury my nose in my armpit in an effort to dodge the rancid odor.

“Grab tighter,” he whispers. “Tight like your pussssy.”

Would my hands be able to grab tight enough around his neck to cut off his air or would the fat get in the way? How hard would I have to squeeze? As hard as he is squeezing my ass right now?

I clench my cheeks together, so he can’t slip his hand in anywhere and think about which ATM I will go to when my freedom is restored. The parking on Sepulveda is free, but will my car make it that far without oil?

“You have the best ass in America,” he hisses.

He jerks and convulses on the table and I think maybe we’re getting to the end, but he’s just being dramatic. Fucking L.A. with all of its unrealized actors.

“Slow down,” he says. “As if your mouth is just pulling me up, pulling me up, pulling me up, up, up.”

If I can’t successfully choke him would he be able to get up quickly enough to defend himself? I could definitely run faster than him. Would he chase me out into the road? Nah.

I slow my tug obediently, desperately wanting this to end as much as my aching forearm does.

“Squeeze my balls. Real tight, like.”

I grip a handful of the hairy flab as it oozes between my fingers in rebellion, shifting my weight, stepping on something sharp. I look down at potato chip crumbs.

“Tighter!” he grunts.

Next time he leans in for a hug/grope I will stick him with a knife I have concealed in my sleeve. Maybe in the neck. I will research where the jugular is, so my efforts aren’t wasted on a surface wound and I will quickly step out of the way so as not to get blood on myself when it starts to spurt like a faucet needing its washer replaced. Then I will stand over him as he thrashes about, much like he is now, only dying and confused, and I will say all the things I’ve been wanting to say. Don’t ever ask me for a hug again motherfucker! Stop fucking pushing me. Take a hint! I don’t want to touch your asshole! I would rather pour acid in my eyes than see you naked. Put some fucking clothes on! You make me sick! Do you see me? Do you see that even with my greasy hair and my gardening clothes that I would never ever, EVER be attracted to you? Are you fucking stupid? Are you a fucking moron? Yes, you are! You are a stupid, shallow, moron that likes me only for my body, but I hate you for so much more than yours. I hate you because I’m here. I hate that partying became more important to me than high school and that I never had the urge to ‘apply myself’ as my teachers encouraged. I hate that I deserve so much better, but that eventually I won’t if I keep coming here. Slowly this will become normal and as you continue to push or offer me more money, I might succumb. I will stab myself in the jugular if that ever happens.

He continues to thrash about on the table, getting my hopes up.

Do it! Do it now! Come, you fat fucking fuck!

Finally, one hundred thousand years later, he squirms on the table and his legs raise up stiffly as thick yellow snot exits his vile organ. He whinnies like a horse and before he can open his eyes, I am in the bathroom washing my hands with enough soap to drown in.

I don’t look in the mirror.

From the mean streets of East London to the intoxicating thoroughfares of Mexico City emerges a tale of two young men disconnecting from all forms of technology and society at large in a mad chase for freedom. Fed up with the monotonous trap of dead end jobs in the city Joe and compadre Ronnie need out, by any means necessary.

Burrito Deluxe tells of drunkenness, East End underworld escapades, thieving, prostitutes, drug-fuelled trips to sacred Mayan temples, psychedelic peyote visions, hippy lifestyles, romantic liaisons, and the search for the legendary Lost Elation at the mystical Beach of the Dead.

A study in pathological behaviour at close quarters, this is the first of cult author Joseph Ridgwell’s unique novels – the true story of two young men in search of freedom and adventure, but finding nothing but lies, dreams, insanity and death. Described by the author as a ‘cosmic road novel’, it chronicles the end of youth and idealism, and a total rejection of the modern world.

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