Pudding

Fluids secreted. Blood pooled beneath the moistened tissue. Warm turned hot with the pressure. Skull bugs quivered the waveform nuance. Translated proper tremble. Only these chemical geometric skull bug ejaculates emulate the sputter notation. We are nothing, if not instruments. I don’t know if I or died. All I knew was white hot wet slithering. I licked its drip. No breath. Soul forced into small Robot hole. My tits turned jelly. Flesh pudding slopped into the sheet. Tickled my armpits, almost a come in itself. His skin poured over my front. Mixed in all gloppy and stank. My immune system ate. My whole exposure was a tongue. I could taste his soggy flesh at a million points. I uh I started hallucinating (god lord them tingles! I sparked so much I turded). I stabbed a fork into my clit. I was spread out on the kitchen counter bleeding, rubbing whipped cream all over. I puked, but it was really him collapsing. Our bodies fused. I didn’t want to. He was dead. Psychologically speaking, a hollow nothing, even when alive. I was just out to get banged and have a good time, get bullshit off my mind. Took me a freakin’ week to eat his stupid carcass. I had to be careful because if I absorbed to quickly, and mutation occurred, it would probably be cancerous. The dude was a real PTSD, methhead piece of fucking shit. Definition of junk food. I doubt any part was useable. Except, of course, his wiener. I preserved his penis. A simple modification of the secreting chemicals in the uterine wall will create protective placenta for any object within the womb. This can be perfected through careful practice. Simply take a sanitized, smooth object and push it up the vagina while thinking of the object as a baby. After becoming convinced that the object within the womb is a child, proceed to gently coax it out. Soon beautiful feeling will fill the pleasant existence. If placenta is not ejected after the object has exited, please try again. This is an important gift God has bestowed. I jerk off with his dick inside my womb. Honestly, it is better than the sex. I was thinking, maybe, to see if it can combine with my eggs. I’ll turn it into a pet I can fuck or something. A little dick dog. I don’t know. If anything, I’ll eat it too. Dick on the cob. I want my teeth in the shaft. Tear the flesh. Chew the sucker. I want to swallow. The dick should keep for a year or so before it gets all sick and gross. Besides, I like the little bump it makes. I pretend I’m pregnant. I want to get pregnant just to play with myself. Not really. I want kids. Maybe. No I don’t. But I will masturbate while -IF- I get pregnant. A lot. Swollen dripping tits and moon bellies make me giddy. I watch preggo porn on my phone. Makes my toes twiddle.

Buenas Madrugada (Greeting To Dawn)

She just looks at me with these big charcoal eyes and doesn’t say a fucking word. She’s got a beer in one hand and a joint in the other and she’s sweating like a whore in church. The motel room has the AC cranked . It’s so cold you could hang meat. She stands there naked, paralyzed with fear. There’s another Angel of the Night passed out naked on the bed. The knocking at the door continues. It’s not the typical Cop knock. In the United States, Colombia and Mexico the policia golpea con fuerza (knock with force), but I’m in Perez Zeledon, San Isidro, Costa Rica, and the knock is soft and unassuming.

I begin to laugh at the bizarre spectacle taking place. The knock is now accompanied by a male voice.

“Este es el guardia de seguridad. Responder.”

Just the security guard. I got this, I tell myself.

“Voy,” I yell

The panic stricken girl takes refuge in the bathroom locking the door.

I answer the uninvited visitor with a cheerful “buenas” after opening the door.

“Señor, hemos tenido una queja sobre el ruido (we’ve had a complaint about noise).”

Who would complain about too much noise. I hear music , loud talking and laughter leaking out  from other rooms. The sounds flooding the predawn darkness with acoustic precipitation ,but I make a sincere effort to handle this situation without confrontation.

“Yes no problem. I’m sorry for the disturbance,” I say in Spanish.

“And a question.  Is it possible you could give me a beer?” he asks.

“Of course, no problem.”

I grab a cold cerveza and hand it to him.

“Anything else, sir?” I ask.

“If you have a cigarette I would like that very much.”

I give him a couple of smokes, he shakes my hand and nods his head in a grateful manner.

“Good night or morning,” I say with a laugh.

So the reason for his visit wasn’t about the noise. It was purely a search to satisfy his vices. Gotta love the Ticos, constant quest for immediate self gratification and without ever saying por favor or gracias.

I knock on the bathroom door.

“Andrea todo bien mi amor. Era sólo el guardia que sólo quería una cerveza. Abre la puerta, nena,” I beg of her.

I hear the lock click and I  turn the knob but she has blocked the door with wet towels. I push with force and it gives way. I see her cowering in the shower, shaking with a terrified expression.

“Baby, what’s going on with you? No more coca porti. Come on, Diosa, get outta there. Take an Oxaforte,” I offer, “it’ll make you feel better.”

“Bigotes soy muy high,” she whispers.

“Yo se bebe. Ya venga conmigo. Quien te cuido? (Come with me. Who takes care of you),” I ask.

I have known Andrea for 5 years. She stole my heart first time I spent a night and fifty dollars with her. It was Quepos, Costa Rica on the Pacific Coast when her cousin Diana  introduced us. Sometimes there’s this connection, a fire, an electricity between two souls. And there was truth in her flame no doubt in her spark. Unfortunately, it always becomes convoluted and gets messy, the sheets, the libretto,  the emotions and living.

“I had her trapped between my skin and my soul.” Mana.

She stands still holding the beer and joint then hugs me not out of affection but with the emotion of a child seeking security.

“You’re safe baby. You trust me, right?” I say.

“Si papi siempre contigo,” she answers.

I carry her to the bed and take the unlit joint from her hand but she refuses to relinquish the warm half  can of beer.

Yaneth, my other companion and friend of Andrea’s, wakes then heads to the bathroom.

“Que hora es Bigotes? Es madrugada?” she yells from the doorway.

“Si yo creo casi. Y ser tranquilo que sólo tenía el guardia de seguridad aquí. No aumente la música así que...”

And just as I ask her to be quiet and not play the music loudly, she cranks up the volume on the TV and the music screams. She begins dancing and it’s difficult to stop the sexual display. Naked, with a body that would make men beg for just one chance to touch her gossamer skin. She’s fucking gorgeous and every move defines sensuality with refinement.

I give Andrea an Oxaforte and an Ambiene to take the edge off. She swallows the pills with a hit of beer and gives me a tender kiss.

“Adelante, sé que la quieres. voy a ver,” (go with her I will watch) she says.

“It’s ok? Just me and Yaneth without you?” I ask.

You need to understand that there’s an etiquette or code of conduct when dealing with prostitutes, especially Ticas. A special client or boyfriend such as I am to Andrea is considered property or a possession. It’s a depraved twisted relationship where the doctrine only applies to my actions and doesn’t take her’s into consideration.

Andrea is a working girl and can fuck anyone she chooses for of course a price. Which is on a sliding scale depending how much she likes the client. If I fuck someone else (especially a friend of hers), that is a violation of the terms to the supposed agreement.

I was involved with a Tica off and on in a Liaison de Amor for a couple of years sometime ago. Veronica was a working girl that considered my involvement with another woman as a betrayal.

“If I fuck other women you say I am cheating on you. But how is it ok for you to fuck other men and I am suppose to accept your behavior?” I asked. “If you fuck other people then I fuck others too.”

“NO! You fuck other women to have pleasure.” came her retort. “To have an orgasm and pay them for that. Sex with others for me is work and not for pleasure.”

Of course I never believed  for a moment that she never enjoyed her work.

I just don’t subscribe to that type of logic. And so ended that relationship. However, I discovered that school of thought was a widely practiced rule by many.

Yaneth continues to dance, rubbing her breasts against my face, placing my hand between her legs.

“VENGA BIGOTES FUCK ME!” she implores.

Andrea pushes me towards Yaneth. She sways gracefully to the music.

“Un chino porfa BEBE!” Yaneth asks.

Now a chino for you rookies is, yes, the word for a Chinese person in Spanish. However, in street lingo, it also identifies a cigarette minus some tobacco with cocaine added in. It’s a pleasant high which I prefer over smoking crack. Crack instantly takes me to a level of euphoria that makes it impossible to function socially.

I comply with her request and twist up a monster, removing the filter and inserting a small piece back in its place. I look at Andrea and she appears relaxed, having opened another beer. I can’t believe she’s still awake.

She smiles and extends her hand for me to pass her the chino.

“I don’t think so baby,” I say. “A half-hour ago you were freaking out. Wait a while and pass on this one, ok?”

Then it happens. A Tica displeased with being told what she can and cannot participate in by a man is  considered disrespectful.  She objects with a display of anger that would make a weaker man tremble in terror.

“Who are you to tell me no! You’re not my fucking husband or my father. You can’t tell me what to do!” she screams.

I immediately hand her the chino and strike a flame with the lighter. She inhales then passes it to Yaneth. She takes a hit and passes it back to Andrea, completely bypassing me.

“Hey, what’s going on here? What about the Gringo? Are ya gonna share?” I protest.

They both start laughing and hand the chino to me. Yaneth starts kissing Andrea and pulls down the sheet, uncovering her goddess-like naked body.

Now we’re back to the original game plan, I think to myself. I take a short hit and pass it back to Andrea, and she blows me a kiss.

“Te amo Bigotes. (I love you Mr. Mustache),” Andrea sings.

Just at this moment in time, it can all change in the flutter of a butterfly’s wings.

“Yo tengo tu amor. (I got your love.) Yo tengo tu amor. Yo tengo tu love.”

The song serenades us from the music video on the TV. Who said the darkest hour is always just before the dawn? They were so far off course.

“Buenas madrugada,” I say.

Hope there are no more interruptions.

Hell Is Writing

I sat there bored and hung-over.

I sat there and I had no fucking clue why.

The little coffee shop was filled with other poets or in all truth yuppies that called themselves writers.

Social assholes whom thought reading their work aloud made it good.

It was terrible enough sober, but add a gut ravaged by a night of heavy drinking and it was dam near torture.

I was there due to a friend’s request.

I seldom read for people,

My work was either love or hate with the reader but usually I didn’t have to experience this first hand.

I herd some people whispering behind me.

“Hey who’s that guy?”

“He new or something?”

“That’s the guy I told you about he never comes to these things.”

“Got a few things published here and there total asshole from what I’ve herd.”

“How’s his writing?”

“Oh I never read him, he’s too much into drinking and antics like I said he’s a real asshole.”

I herd the woman repeat this to the guy beside her.
It was funny how my reputation as a prick seemed to follow me everywhere.

Some woman with a nose ring and flat ass took the stage if you could even call it that.

“I’m going to read you a haiku.”

I threw up in my mouth held it in.

My stomach was really kicking my ass today.

I got up walked outside I never wasted my time with crap.

I wasn’t saying the woman was a bad writer I just hated neat nice shit.

I loved the flawed things in life.

I sat outside lit a cigarette sat down on a bench watched the cars pass.

It was far more original than the stuffy room filled with judgmental moody bastards all needing their egos stroked.

“Jack is everything okay?”

Sheryl was looking down at me her face shown the concern she new I was about two steps from the nearest bar.

And already over the coffee shop shark tank.

“Yeah feeling like shit is all, Had to get some air sweetheart.”

“I was scared you were going to leave before you read for us.”

“I know how uncomfortable it is for you at these things.”

“Yeah, not my scene.”

“So why did you come to begin with?”

“You asked me to.”

“Yes but you really don’t seem very interested in the other poets.”

“Cause I’m not.”

“Why some are very promising?”

“They’re shit and their work has no life.”

“It’s just the same boring fucking thing over and over.”

“And what makes you so much better?”

“Cause I don’t care what they think, and my work is many things it’s but never boring.”

“Even when it’s shit least it can only be mine.”

Cheryl laughed.

“You’re such a prick! I think that’s what draws me to you.”

“Yeah, I can be a charming bastard on occasion. Wanna ditch this party, go have some drinks?”

“I can’t, I’m hosting, and you still haven’t read yet.”

“Yeah, I don’t think they will mind.”

“Come on and cut the crap, Jack. Just go in there and be you, relax. Besides, we can go have a drink afterwards.”

Against my better judgment, I went back in.
It was time to face the hangman so to speak.

They called my name and suddenly I was facing the crowd.

“Look, before I start, I want to say hello to a certain someone in the back. I’ve heard I’m an asshole, thank you for such kind words.”

I read my poems and some were pretty damn good, but I never let them see me.

The page does my speaking for me.

Such Unholy Shapes

All three of us had our hands outstretched touching the cold spot and then it happened. The acid kicked in, widening my eyes like breakfast plates.

‘Look Kev, this is going too fast for me. You obviously know what your doing but I’m sorry this is freaking me out.’ I say, pulling the plum-red robe hood back.

‘What do you mean? Are you not game? We have come so far. We have made a break-through!’

‘Aye to what though? We don’t know what this cold spot really is.’

‘He’s right,’ says Matthew, lightning another cigarette, pulling the hood of his robe back, revealing a stubbled, pock-marked face.

Kev shouts ‘Your both breaking the intent! Leave your robes as they are. Can you not smoke please?’

Matthew inhales longer on it, then blows out a plume.

Kev pulls his robe hood back. His eyes magnified through the lens of his glasses. The left lens is blood-smeared.

He repeats ‘Matthew can you not smoke when we are trying to make contact!’

The acid had its grip on Matthew, you can see a menace work behind his eyes.

He says ‘Should it not be warm and inviting this celestial realm? Ouija boards are full of shit. I believe you spoke to someone Kev, but we have been misguided… Look! over there at all that death. All we get is a cold spot?’

I think we should stop I said shaking my head at Matthew.

Kev just looks at both of us.

I say ‘Look man, I’m feeling this trip. I need to lie down now.’

‘It’s not for lying down, I got us the acid to focus on the intent. That was the point of the chant,’ says Kev.

Earlier Matthew and I followed Kev’s voice with the chant notations. It was simple, more like a mantra. We did this for three hours.

The sacrifices were hard. It had to be personal or otherwise the ritual would fail. I went first and picked my dog Eerie, Matthew chose his Mum and Kev his ex-boyfriend.

‘To the new life!’ I said as I dropped a boulder from shoulder height right on Eerie’s head. Red mush poured out his mouth all over the wild garlic stemmed next to the glen.

Matt got his Mum during housekeeping, said her screams were muffled by the Dyson 40000 model but she saw him in the reflection of the half-moon mirror.

Kev’s kill was Marcus, his ex-slut boyfriend who gave him chlamydia. Marcus had a black bin bag pulled over his head while the hammer smacked all around until it softened.

Anyway. We, were stationed at the entrance to the communal living room. My words were coming out slurred. I didn’t even understand them anymore. I left the chalk circle. Walked past the sacrificial bodies lying head to toe starshaped. I fell on the couch with many-sized cushions, exhausted. Drained. Empty.

‘I love you both,’ Kev shouts ‘But, you need to understand what we are doing is very real. When it opens you will understand and witness its almighty glory!’

The muted television glows behind him. The static frost crackles silently illuminating the white walls with a majestic spectral glow.

Kev loses his balance, knocking the pyramid stacked empty beer-cans onto the floor, beer dribbles onto the ouija-board fashioned from old bathroom tiles. Kev reaches for his rucksack, pulling out a Polaroid camera. The acid has him now. I just lay there between the cushions, staring at the cold spot. Something terrible is coming from that spot, in the form of geometries? then a white flash before my eyes.

CLICK!

I turn to the flash and see Kev pointing the polaroid at the cold spot.

‘Kev man, can you not take any photos of me in this state,’ says Matthew with a furious sneer.

‘It is my duty to archive this moment. It’s content for the website!’

CLICK!

‘I told you to stop that’ said Matthew, pushing Kev.

‘Matt calm down, I’m ju…’

‘I TOLD YOU, DON’T TAKE ANY FUCKEN PICTURES!’

I see the geometries meld into a little black hole that silently grows into a huge 8-foot oval shape behind Matthew, just as he moves forward punching Kev twice in the face, Kev cups his nose, screams and lunges at Matthew pulling him down while smacking with his left fist into the side of Matthew’s face. They both roll back and forth on the ground, punching savagely into each other.

Something sifts within the infinite depth of the oval, a long black thin arm stretches from the hole.

Reaching over the hand touches Kev’s back as rolls on top Matthew. He raises his left fist to strike again. The portal disappears. The television switches off as Kev’s eyes turn red.

He looks down at Matthew. Strikes down with the left, grabbing the jugular, white-knuckled, squeezing all his fingers deep inside making loud tearing sounds. Matthew’s gagging drowns out the flesh sounds as blood shoots out in all directions; over me, over the bodies, the walls and the carpet.

I pull myself up from the couch, swaying with psychedelic intoxication. I fall back on the cushions.

Kev’s red eyes stare towards me as he rises.

‘TO THE NEW LIFE.’

He walks towards me.

I should probably scream but I don’t know how to.

90 pages
Burdock Press

Brief Perversions is a collection of flash fiction and prose poetry. The title of the collection reflects the brevity of the individual pieces and the various twists they often take. On a broader level, the title also reflects the collection’s theme of life as a brief perversion, as a short and twisted journey.

Many of the pieces engage with pop culture in various ways—alluding to and quoting celebrities, songs, poems, novels, textbooks, commercial products, cereal boxes, etc. In addition, many pieces call into question aspects of western culture (our treatment of the elderly, the emphasis on physical attractiveness, the reality vs. the fairy-tale of love, male-dominated politics, and much more), hopefully without moralizing. That is, the collection, ideally, is a philosophical conversation about what society values and what many of us consider normal.

BUY A COPY HERE

Don’t Call Me Thunder Slut

After three hours of shaking every proverbial tree, checking bars, searching alleys and breezeways for my dealer I had to settle on scoring my wake-up hit from the Chinos. I am not comfortable in their barrio especially when I’m jonesing. I’m not familiar with the territory and I risk getting ripped off. Their “heir-on” is always top shelf but they charge more and their papers are small. You gotta do what you gotta do to feed the monkey. My man is M.I.A. and I owe him twelve dollars from the shit he gave me on the arm last night. Saves me from the humiliation of having to beg. As if I had any pride left in my pathetic character. Scraped away like the  charred part on a piece of burnt  toast.

I head back toward my digs at a quick pace so I won’t be sidetracked by anyone. The strategy proves ineffective and I’m confronted by every Junkie in the  neighborhood. It’s as though every dope fiend I’ve ever been associated with is on the look, all asking me the same questions. “Where’s the Dope Man? Can ya spare a bump, I’m Jonesin’ bad. Getting sick, man help me out.”

I answer in a desperate an apologetic voice.  “I couldn’t find the man. No hay, got nothing, I’m looking. I don’t have any cash, trying to get a front.”

They know I’m lieing but don’t challenge my integrity.  Integrity, what a laugh, another moral standard of ethical behavior I seem to have pissed away. Did I choose this addiction or did the addiction choose me? I planned on just experimenting with Heroin but somewhere the

procedure went horribly wrong. It’s the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. High syndrome. Intended to only pawn my soul but the pawn ticket was lost and my time ran out. I don’t give a shit about these addicts . These are the streets, the rule here is to cover your own ass. It’s not my job to coddle these junkies. I’m not responsible for their habit.

I’m holding and still have seven dollars left to buy a tall boy and some “loosies.”

The entrance to my pad is littered with crackheads pushing their pipes made from stolen aluminum car antennas. Their tecolote (owl) eyes stare at images only visible to them, sweating profusely in the morning chill. They move aside letting me pass, trying to speak but the words come out garbled.

I start the frantic search for my key to unlock the door. In desperation I  turn the door knob and the door opens.

Son of a bitch I didn’t lock the door? I mentally interrogate myself  only mouthing the words.

Surely I ‘ve been robbed and in this neighborhood they steal everything. Forks, spoons, soap, toothbrushes down to the light bulbs.

Inside I investigate and I’m relieved to discover that nothing has gone missing.

Jessica who calls herself my girlfriend is sleeping on the mattress on the living room floor. She slowly rolls over, stretches , smiles  and then farts.

“Morning baby did you score?” She asks

Now I can’t lie to her not

about that, other subjects sure, not this she’ll know if I get high.

“Yes Thunder Slut I certainly did just that. Jenk was a ghost I had to score from the Chinos. So I want you to know there’s not much because their papers are smaller”

“Why didn’t you get two? I want to get high shithead.

It’s always about you. You don’t give a shit about me. I’m selling my ass around town to drunks and perverted sons of bitches for twenty here thirty there all night long. And what do I do? Come home to you and give you my money while you sit around on your lazy ass the whole night getting high or drunk or something. I don’t know?

And don’t call me Thunder Slut! You know I don’t like it!”

She delivers a poignant  soliloquy with a Marisa Tomei sexiness. I don’t need to hear this bullshit first thing in the morning.

Then sometimes I think maybe I do. Jessica may be a prostitute and I know there’s some of you that have a derogatory view of her and others working in the world’s oldest profession. Let me take a moment to comment on the subject.

Jessica as well as those now and in the past provide a fundamental service in every society. They are what most men secretly desire and almost everyman wishes his wife was in the bedroom.

They have performed more charitable acts than Mother Teresa. They don’t ask for your respect or understanding, only that you shove your snide comments and puritan opinions up your ass. And speaking for all the Angels of the Night, “Go Fuck Yourself.”

Now Jessica is a prostitute but she is defined by so much more.  She’s not comfortable with her beauty which makes her all the more beautiful. She’s the most compassionate, sincere, emotional amazing, evil, vengeful,  psychotic creature you could ever love. So yes she’s a prostitute but she is my prostitute! Now back to damage control for a situation that I have no responsibility for causing.

“All I said was it’s small. I’m gonna share. It’ll be enough to numb the withdrawals and subdue the Jones. Also where am I going to get the coin to buy two? We can figure out how to score more this afternoon. How come the door was unlocked?”

“I must of forgot to lock it after I let the cat out. She was driving me crazy, meowing.”

“What fucking cat? We don’t have a damn cat!” Are you high?”

“See that’s what I mean. You don’t pay any attention to me or this relationship. You gave me a cat two weeks ago for my birthday you shithead. Thank you for remembering and my birthday isn’t for another month. Must have me mixed up with one of your other girlfriends, Santihole.”

What the hell has happened here. I risk my life in the dangerous jungle of the city “dragging myself through the negro streets a dawn looking for an angry fix.”

I know that’s Ginsberg the master of bohemian genius. Just seemed so fitting. Ok back to the story…

There I am foraging through the neighborhood for dope to get me feeling almost normal. The sickness waits in hiding ready to bushwhack me at any moment and she is giving be misery for something I haven’t done. Of course I was going to do the whole paper myself but now I had to share. God Damn it!!

There’s something amiss with me today. I’m unable to focus on any particular issue and my mind wanders finding cognizant thoughts to ponder. Could it be possible that I’m sober. Is this what it’s like?

“Danger Will Robinson” most of the poor decisions I have made in my life were made while I was sober.

Listen to her still going on and on with her relentless tirade. I know where the switch is to shut her off.

“Here Diosa you take the Dope. I would rather you have it. I’m sorry that I’m so insensitive and selfish. You’re right once again, I need to exhibit more  appreciation for your sacrifices. You know how I feel about you. I’m sorry mi amor. Please forgive my callousness.”

“Oh Santiago you softie. You know how to get straight to my heart. You just made up for all your stupid ass screw ups. And we do have a cat.”

“Don’t refer to me as softie again. It’s not a particularly enduring description if ya know what I mean.”

She takes possession of the dope and heads off to the bathroom to do a hit. Her ass exposed wearing my  Barcelona Soccer jersey which I don’t appreciate but I don’t dare to mention.

Then there’s a knock at the door. Let me share a piece of wisdom. Opportunity doesn’t knock, in most instances it’s Jehovah Witnesses. Opportunity has been on vacation and hitting on your lover while you’re at home anticipating its arrival.

“Who is it?”

“Barry the manager. Everything ok in there?” he asks.

I open the door to interact to keep him from calling the cops.

“Hey Jerry what’s going on? How you been doing?”

“My name’s not Jerry.”

“Okay not Jerry. What can I do for you this morning?”

“Santiago why do we have to go through this game every time we talk?”

“Sorry Larry, I’m not good with names. There’s been times when I couldn’t remember my own name. What’s the scoop?”

“The people in the next apartment said they heard yelling and screaming coming from your place. I have to investigate and make sure everything is okay. I’ve had to come up here so many times. Can you two please stop fighting all the time? I’m getting tired of your bullshit. Next time I’m going to have to take legal action and call the police. And your rent is two weeks late again. I need the money by tomorrow afternoon or there’s gonna be a problem with the owner. Do you understand?”

“Only two weeks late? That’s good to know. I’ll see what I can do to rectify the problem. How did my neighbors tell you there was a problem? They don’t speak English and I know you don’t speak Spanish.

Terry are you fibbing? It wasn’t my neighbors. Are you spying on Jessica again? If you don’t stop your peeping activities I’m going to have a talk with the owner. And the money you’ve been pocketing from overcharging the undocumented residents to support that voracious cocaine habit of yours… we don’t want anyone to mention those activities to Mr. Landlord do we?

So Harry I think we have a mutual understanding of how we’ll be addressing problems in the future. Entiendas gringo?”

“Please Santiago don’t rat me out. I’m trying to warn you about what’s going on. See if you can get me the rent by next week. Is Jessica around I wanna say hello.”

“She’s in the bathroom right now. I’ll tell her for you Gary. You have a wonderful day.”

“My God Damn name is Barry. Will you please just call me by my right name?”

“Ciao” I whisper as I close the door.

“Hey Santiago is this your cat at the door? You know there’s a strict policy against pets in your apartment!” he screams.

“Please don’t yell. Keep it down. You don’t want to upset the neighbors. We don’t have a cat.”

“Who you hollering at through the door? And I told you that we do have a cat, you son of a bitch!”

I put my finger to my lips giving the shush sign.

“It’s your boyfriend Perry, he wants the rent and said we aren’t suppose to have a cat.”

“Okay, here, take this,” she whispers “I saved it for you. Do you have cigarettes?”

She hands me a syringe loaded and ready to fire. Self loathing is in most cases along with confessing your imperfections are a catalyst to favorably end a disagreement. They have a saying in Colombia. When a man and woman are in an argument. The man always has the last words.

They are “si mi amor.” Yes my love.

I accept her gift and place a tender kiss on her lips. She giggles and gives me a hug. This is the woman I’m accustomed to. When she’s high she’s so much more concerning.

“So baby do you have a cigarette? Si o si?”

“No JJ but I’ll make a run right after I do this hit. Get dressed and come with me. Before you head off to work.”

“I’m not going to hook for a couple of days because I got my regla,(period) and I’m not into giving blow jobs for five or ten dollars a cum. It’s ok with you baby?”

 “Ya, it’s just fine now get dressed.”

I head off to the bathroom to do my fix. Surprisingly, it gets me perfectly numb. Not nodding out or nose scratching high but enough to subdue the monkey.

“Hey baby it’s chilly outside so wear a jacket. Where’s my suit jacket the black one ? I haven’t seen it for a while. Have you seen it baby?”

“Have you looked in the closet? That’s where civilized people put their clothes. Not on the floor or slung over a lamp. I put it on a hanger.”

“Thanks smart ass I found it. Do you know where the key is? I misplaced…”

She dangles the key in front of my face before I can finish my sentence.

We exit the apartment and she puts her arm in mine, then places her head on my shoulder as we walk.

I put my hands in my pockets and touch what feels like a pack of cigarettes. I pull it out and it’s an almost full pack. And there’s a balled up piece of plastic shoved in the cellophane of the cigarette pack. I immediately tear at it and discover it’s a large amount of heroin that I have forgotten about. I check the inside breast pocket and retrieve seventy three dollars from inside. Jessica begins to scream with excitement from the find.

“Santiago you didn’t know you had all that? Where did it come from?”

“The last time I wore this jacket was when we went to the casino to celebrate your birthday, which I  now  understand is the wrong date,” I say, handing her the cigarettes. “You didn’t say anything about it at the time. I was winning at the blackjack table. Then we left came home and got so fucking high we didn’t remember. Here, happy birthday mi corazon.”

She stops and puts a hand on her hip, holding out the other hand palm up and tapping her foot impatiently.

“Well, and the money?”

It wasn’t really your birthday and you played me. Okay, here.”

I place the cash in her hand but not before peeling off a twenty.

Suddenly the cat cozies up to Jessica meowing.

“I know let’s put her in the apartment before we go. Hey what did you name her? “

“Thunder Slut seemed like the perfect name. Now hurry up put her inside. You know you’re taking me to breakfast don’t you? It is after all my birthday.”

She says spilling laughter all over the morning.

I recall a proverb from the Furry Freak Brothers.

“Dope gets you through times of no money better than money gets you through times of no dope.”

And so that’s that.

“Ok breakfast, but no pancakes!”

New Aeons Still Will Not Answer

I wish I didn’t remember this river. My mother and I used to eat here, sitting against a rock with cucumber sandwiches from her garden, eating the bread she baked. The courts allowed her to spend one day a week with me. Something is better than nothing. Across the river I see a man with a small boy, probably his son. But maybe it isn’t his child. Maybe they’re just there, the older man feeding the younger. Men think they love feeding, that they understand justice.

Men think their gray hair has something to do with honor, that using foundation to cover your skin cancer and red puffiness makes you as vain as a politician. I don’t want to remember this river but I’m walking alongside it for a very specific reason. After my mother entered a permanent state of departure my father took me here to fish. I refused and there are several places in the United States of America where refusing to eat an animal means Satan is speaking to you, much like the way Satan spoke to your mother. Parents and priests will tell you they’re concerned. These are the fathers who let physicians remove their wives and daughter’s clitori and are just thankful there’s something to be done, a way to help their families.

This river mouths out at the Catholic Church my dad always took me to. Last night I saw my father, today I am going to visit another father. There is something I want to tell him, memories I want to remind him of. I’ve finally graduated from college. I left my apartment back in the Twin Cities with my degree from U Minnesota and a plane ticket to Italy. The last paper I wrote was a personal one. I used to think nothing could be worse than Haldol. Then I read about one of the earlier treatments for hysteria. Patients were put in comas with insulin treatments. Force fed nothing but red meat. This is what happened to people who enjoyed having cocks inside of their mouth.

River towns tend to have a lot in common common. My father never thought anything was wrong with our community. He thought it was a place worth living in. Old women trying to control their children by filling them full of pie and cookies. Writing my research paper on the history of insulin treatments was very triggering. I had to stop, go for runs. I would come back to my apartment and drink glass after glass of water.

Walking by the river, on my way to the church, I pass a tree. When I was fifteen dad sat me underneath it so we could talk. He said that it was good that I loved my mother but that I needed to understand, she didn’t love me. It wasn’t because she didn’t want to love me, it was because she couldn’t. She was sick. I ran from him. He tackled me and pinned me down and started yelling that I needed to listen, that I needed to understand things were different, that it was good things were different.

He told me things needed to change. We were going to go to Mass every Sunday. If I refused to go, he would take me out of public school. Tough love, like a basketball coach. There are a lot of things to hate about highschool. But my guidance counselor promised to walk me through my college applications. She told me I could apply to as many colleges as I wanted, “They can be anywhere, in any state,” she promised. She said she could get money from the school district to pay for my applications fees. The school district got money from the state if they had a high number of kids enrolled in college. My father also had the legal right to pull me from the school and enroll me in a Catholic highschool. The Catholics wouldn’t help me get to the University of Minnesota. I had to play along. But after sitting in that fucking shit church, seeing those people sucking their dead god’s cock every fucking week, I began to snap.

One Sunday I spat the communion wine in Father Michael’s face. My dad took me out behind some bushes near the church and beat the shit out of me. I could smell the River from where we were. My mother always joked about wanting to spit wine in Father Michael’s face. He was her priest, too, when she was my age. The priest’s body was stuck to our town, a rot the diocese wanted to preserve. My mother knew how to transform rot into something holy, how to grow things in compost. “When people die we should feed the Earth, not be put in a box and prayed for.” She called Jesus a corpse and they said she was ill. She liked to grow things in her garden.

My father drug me back to his car, after beating me. Father Michael was standing outside of the Church, smoking a cigarette. Everyone else had gone. The priest saw me bleeding and he told my father, “Don’t worry, Jim, it gets better.”

I don’t care when they find either of them. I can move fast. And that hurts because the smell of the river still reminds me of my mother. I want to sit with the River, I want to sit with my Mother. But I have already committed to revenge. I need to be in Italy by tomorrow night, absolute latest.

As highschool crawled on, Father Michael offered to help my dad deal with me. One night Dad came home from work early and found me fucking a girl I went to school with. Allison brought a strapon and a harness that her older sister gave her. The dildo she brought over didn’t fit with the harness so I tried to ducktape the bright purple cock onto the harness. Mostly all we did was laugh while the cock kept falling off inside of me. Allison would try to work her hips, the tape would give and she fell on top of me over and again. We gave up on the dildo and just kissed and rubbed eachother’s tits. We were having fun, the way your first time should be. After my Dad threw Allison out the first thing he did was call the priest. Father Michael was the one who gave me a black eye, all my Dad did was scream.

I met Allison at the coffee shop she worked at. She was a senior when I was a sophomore. I talk as much shit about rural, conservative areas as anyone. But there are people who live in such places who are cool. Just like there are fucking idiots who live in the most progressive spaces. When I met Allison, when we scheduled our first date, I finally thought I could survive highschool. I spent the week before our date masturbating to thoughts of her slapping a dildo against my face, making myself cum thinking about the way her cum would taste.

I’ve avoided dating Catholics. I did go out with a girl in the Twin Cities who was still Catholic after coming out. The priests on campus weren’t that bad, she told me. She thought Pope Francis was a nice man. She didn’t understand why I wanted to fuck him up with a razor. I asked her why she thought things were getting better because Francis knows better than to give bad soundbites.

Sadly, Satanists aren’t much more fun. During my Junior year in college I spent some time with a Satanic Coven. One night we walked out to a lake wearing nothing but purple robes we sewed ourselves. We had to climb over a traffic barrier on a bridge and walk down a grass hill to get there. None of the cars driving by honked, no one even seemed to notice. These girls spoke their rituals in Latin. I’ve never understood why people think Latin is so Satanic. I mean, if your rituals were written by Roman Satanists from the fourth or fifth centuries, sure. Why not. But I don’t think Satanism should be so tied up to the Roman religion. Moving away from artifice would be a good tenant for contemporary Satanism. Feeling things with your intestines, learning to read the messages encoded in your shit, that’s where truth is. But I guess it’s also okay to want to feel sexy, to let someone spread your asshole wide the way a whore in Corinth would have.

But other than the ritualized group sex there wasn’t much else going on with their coven. Eventually I told them I thought LaVey was dangerous, his antipathy towards social activism dangerous. It’s fine if you’re in love with yourself but he isn’t trying to get people to fall in love with themselves, he’s trying to get people to fall in love with him. They told me I didn’t understand so I quit having sex with them.

My Mother dated a Satanist, once. He wasn’t so bad. The three of us came out here to the

River and ate lunch together once. He made these wonderful garlic and hummus sandwiches. I think he worked in a health food store or something. I thought of him later on when I read LaVey talk shit about people who shop at health food stores in the Devil’s Notebook.

We drank tea and ate his sandwiches and then he and my Mom went off to have sex in the bushes while I watched the water. I was so mad at my mother for fucking him while I had to sit by myself and wait for them to finish. Why could she have fun and not me? Why couldn’t I take someone from school behind the bushes and investigate them?

I did know enough not to tell my Father about the different people Mom fucked. I didn’t hate Mom, I was just jealous but still knew these are all things best kept hidden. Before my father had her institutionalized, one of my Mom’s other boyfriends gave me a hammer and a screw driver. He said tools are the instruments of curiosity. I used them to pull up a couple floor boards in my room. The same boyfriend gave me tapes from his old AV collections. I kept all of the horror films in the space I created underneath my bedroom floor. Last night when I snuck into my Dad’s house I pulled up the boards and they were still there.

VHS copies of Fulci, Bava, Rollin, Franco, Argento. Cinematic guides to perversions and the right questions to ask. Under the floor was also a tape I made of my Mom having sex with one of her girlfriends. When my Mom broke up with the AV boyfriend she stole abunch equipment from his car and then I stole it all from my mom. Late at night I would practice working the cameras and manipulating video on these old tape decks.

My Dad always worked the traditional first shift. When he was at work and I was at school my Mom usually had her partners come over to our house. When I filmed her it was summer. I was probably thirteen or fourteen. I didn’t hide the wireless camera very well, and I love my Mom, but she was never the most observant person in the word.

Last night, or I guess this morning, before I left my Dad’s house I plugged in an old VCR from the closet and watched the whole tape. My Mom looks great. She is propped up, sitting in a chair while her girlfriend slurps and sucks her. My Mother’s hair is long, her partner’s hair is the color green. They kiss, the green haired one uses her fingers to make my Mother cum.

I’m close to the Church and I’m looking forward to seeing Father Michael. I’m looking forward to the look on his face when he remembers me. Dad wouldn’t let me eat breakfast if I didn’t go to confession every Saturday. I didn’t have money to buy breakfast and lunch both at school. But if I was forced to go to confession, I wanted to have fun with it.

I started confessing things that I saw in porn videos. A friend and I were hanging out after school, walking around down town. Out of no where he jumped inside of a dumpster and after a second screamed, “Holy Fuck! There are a ton of fucking porn tapes in here!” At least half of the Where the Boys Aren’t series were in that dumpster. I started telling myself the things Janine Lindemulder and Dyanna Lauren and Jenteal did with eachother were things I also did, with the community college girls that worked at Target, with the older women who worked in the garage. Sometimes when I smell bad popcorn or gasoline I still get wet.

I made sure my Father knew it was me. He was just sitting in his fucking house alone, watching television. McDonalds wrappers on his kitchen table. I thought about him realizing he was hungry, driving to McDonalds, choosing what to order. I wondered if he ate his food in his car, if he was sad when he got back home because he already ate.

Sneaking in and out of my bedroom window is the first artform I ever perfected. I took my hammer and hit him first in his right shoulder, then in his left. He screamed and I hit him in each foot. He kept screaming and looked up at me and flailed so I punched him in the chest and he fell back. I smiled. I wanted to enjoy it.

I climbed on top of him, I wanted him to smell me. I punched him in his nose. I clawed at his face with my nails. He never even knew how many times Mom was raped inside the hospital. He visited her there just to make her suffer. He told her that he loved her, that she needed to get better for my sake if not for his.

I maintained my mount on top of him. I told my father one story that my Mother told me, how the night watch would flush her medicine down the toilet and tell the doctors she spit her pills in their face. Dad was about ready to give up. I punched him in his nose, again. I saw he had a cross on the wall and decided to improvise. I told myself to stay in control. I got up and grabbed the cross, I started sucking the tip of it. I wiped my ass with the long, wooden end. I stuck it in his mouth and pissed on my father. No one would find him for at least a day.

Father Michael will be found sooner, because people will look for him when he doesn’t show up for daily mass. And unless someone finds my dad sooner than I expect, I won’t be a suspect. I didn’t tell Mom my plan. I didn’t tell her she wouldn’t see me again. That would be too hard for both of us. And at this point, things are different. Most of the girls are raped and abused by the people who work at her hospital. My mother is a veteran of this system. She teaches the new patients things they need to know. She teaches them how to communicate, how to tell doctors what they want to hear. How to find friends once they get discharged, where to find good jobs that will keep them away from home or the books they needed to read while they spent their summers alone in their room at their parent’s house.

And besides, when she hears what happens to dad and father Michael, she’ll know. She’ll be questioned and won’t tell anyone anything. She’ll play the silent, mentally ill woman. She’ll be happy for me, proud. I’m an atheist but when I was in college a miracle happened. Her doctor let her take the bus to St. Paul and she spent a few days with me, in my apartment. We cooked dinner, we made salads, we drank wine and she met my current lovers. We traded stories. One night she went out and met some lovers of her own and I hung out at a coffee shop while they used my apartment. When I got back they were all curled up on my living room floor. I started to leave again but they all insisted I stay and watch a movie with them. I made a big pot of turmeric and ginger tea and we all got underneath blankets and opened my apartment windows and breathed the Midwestern October Air and watched Mario Bava’s film, Black Sunday.

The next day we were waiting for the bus and my Mother said, “Imagine that, Black Sunday coming out of you. It’s Mario Bava’s first film. Imagine writing your first book, making your first record and making Black Sunday.” She didn’t say anything after that. I told her goodbye when the bus came and she didn’t look back at me. I had on a black sweatshirt and purple leggings. My hair was down to the small of my back, my mother’s hair fell down on her shoulders.

God doesn’t understand justice and neither does Satan. Before my Father died he started crying. He was covered in blood, sobbing, and I knelt down and looked him in the eyes and said, “I’ve been waiting for this moment for so long.” I told him I dreamt about killing him while I slept, thought about it while I fucked. I told him I wished he had cancer and I could have came to his hospital every day to rip out his IV and whisper in his ear all of the pain he still hadn’t experienced from his chemo. But God isn’t real, Satan doesn’t answer prayers.

Father Michael is the only one in the Church. Back behind the altar he has a little office where he keeps his robes. Once in confession I told him that I had sex while ovulating. I described making the boy I was with eat my pussy, how I refused to kiss him after he was done. Father Michael took me back to this office and beat the shit out of me himself. He told me when he was first assigned here, fresh out of seminary, my mother confessed the exact same sin to him. He told me he still hadn’t got over the disgust he felt for her then. He said we must have had the same demon in us, a generational curse. He told me his only regret was that he wasn’t able to help my father lock me away in the same hospital my mother was in. He told me he was the one who convinced the judge to sign the papers my father brought him, signed by the loving husband and concerned family priest.

I told Father Michael it’s a terrible sin for a priest to break the seal of confession. He just beat me harder. I’m glad he’s back here, that this is where I find him. He doesn’t even turn around. He just assumes I’m there to ask about the schedule for Eucharistic ministry. He tells me he’ll be right with me. I close the door behind me and lock it. I hold my hammer in my hand and think of my Mother, I think about the joy she must have felt getting fucked at a time when she really wanted it, when she really needed it.

Human Consumption

Get lost is good advice, unless you take it too far.

The man behind the drugstore counter said we were standing in Michigan. I shook my head. I was sure I was in Canada. The friendly pharmacist said nope, no doubt about it, and told me to help myself to concentrated Bunn-O-Matic coffee and the remaining day-old doughnuts on a scalloped cardboard salver, if I was hungry.

The last truck driver said he was bound for Ottawa. The idea was to roll across The Border stashed in the back of the cab, asleep. I couldn’t remember getting off, so I must’ve had some assistance. Maybe I snore, or said something offensive about truckers in my sleep. Anyway, I woke up on a bus stop bench. A bus pulled up. The driver wheezed the door open and said get on I ain’t got all day.

“No thanks.” Canadian buses looked awfully familiar.

I thought it’d be a good career move to be an American who knows how to cook Mexican in Canada.

The drugstore manager couldn’t use a Mexican cook, but if I had a degree in Pharmacy, they needed a night man. He didn’t ask to see a framed diploma, but I didn’t want to lie to him.

There were no Mexican restaurants in Sault Ste. Marie. A more entrepreneurial Joe would’ve seen an opportunity. He’d do what needed to be done to turn a new tamale joint into a hot spot. The usual process is a cakewalk through municipal offices, fees paid, hands shaken, but liquor licenses entail organized crime. I’d been there already. Couldn’t do it.

So I thought I’d walk across the Canadian border.

On the way out of the country, I passed a funeral parlor. A woman, still alive, was on her way out too. Her hair was so red it became a traffic signal.

Not her natural color, she said. Nobody alive has hair this red.

She was on her way to bed after an all-night rush-job, a tough case, a murder victim, a local big-shot. The deceased had sustained massive shotgun damage to his face, but his survivors wanted their flesh-and-blood presentable for his last ride down Michigan Avenue. She had to glue down skin-shreds, reshape scattered eyebrows, mould mangled lips. The teeth were a relative snap, she said. Remove the ruins with pliers, snap in the one-size-fits-all-more-or-less-OK dentures. Nobody examines the dead the way they do horses.

Sanitation workers keep whatever they find. Morticians excavate gold teeth. Got to be somebenefits to jobs no one else wants to do. But I didn’t know Michigan’s Upper Peninsula was infested with gangsters. “Do they run unpasteurized cheese rackets?”

The red-headed mortician asked if I was a professional comedian. When I told her my area of specialization, she said I could make myself useful in the form of huevos rancheros. She had a car.

When we got to her place she said, “Back me up,” like we were rookie cops on TV. Her boyfriend Ern was in there, she said, and she wanted him out. She’d felt this way about him for a few months, but the right moment hadn’t come till right then.

At the door, she silently counted three and we went in.

“Sorry honey but it’s time for you to find your own place and maybe even get a job. Let me know where you settle and we can arrange the transfer of your…your louse-infested garbage, you drunken Indian.”

Her shrieks awoke Ern into what you could see in his eyes was a miserable hangover. He grabbed a potato chip bowl, vomited weakly and wiped his mouth on a hairy forearm instead of his sleeve because he was dressed in a T-shirt, a drab gray number, stained. Ern was missing crucial teeth. Grabby mortician treasure-pliers clanked like alligators in fantasyland while I observed a final domestic squabble in progress.

All I could think was, how long before she throws me out. And she hadn’t even formally invited me to move in yet.

The Sins of the Leopard

I was 19 years old and not long out of school. I was working with my father in a factory downtown. He more or less ran the place and got me in with him to keep me from lying around the house and wasting my time. He was the hardest working man I’d ever met, and still is to this day. I couldn’t measure up to his prodigious work rate. I didn’t have it in me. Then, like now, all I saw was waves of scattered ass I couldn’t get with and a dead end on every road. A cruel thwarting of dreams and row of slowly closing doors. The factory was dusty and cold and owned by some brothers from Turkey who had come to this country to make good and ended up somewhere around the middle. They worked hard, too. I was a daydreamer and a loafer. All I wanted to do was write and be left alone. Not too much has changed, really. Whenever I bristled at some aspect of the job or the day that I didn’t like they just kept on saying ‘welcome to the real world’ like I’d arrived at the airport of some new destination. What the fuck did that mean, the real world? My Dad kept saying it too and it pissed me off. Where did they think I’d been living these past two decades?

So, there I was lugging boxes onto delivery trucks and trying not to let my father down. They were sex obsessed, these Turkish brothers, and that would be all they’d talk about all day long. Who they’d fucked, who they were going to fuck, and who the best fuck they’d ever had was. I was still awkward and useless around the ladies back then. Later I’d get daring and lucky. The sun even shines on a dog’s ass some days. But back then I couldn’t catch any sun ortail if I’d wanted to. And I did really want to. So, when they’d ask me who I was fucking and who I’d fucked, I’d grin in great discomfort and mutter some useless remark that trickled out of me like weak piss. I didn’t even have the flair to be a smart ass and say I’d laid Marilyn Monroe, or some shit like that, the way I would do now. I was uncomfortable in that world of men. It was a whole new language and way of being, and I neither understood nor cared to understand, how to operate in it. I was really a tragic case, looking back on it. They would just laugh and go back to talking about fucking while I slinked away to lug more boxes.

One night the younger of the brothers, Nazmi, the only man who ever came close to working as hard as my father, had me stay behind late to help him clear a large delivery out of the way before another one came the next morning. They were running out of storage space but had big ideas so were loading up on cheap stock while they could. Nazmi would work the factory most of the day and then go off to work in a pizza place they had recently bought until around 2am. Then he’d be back at the factory bright as a button, talking about who he’d fucked in between. I kinda liked Nazmi. He was the guts and the brains of the operation. Him and my father. The oldest brother, Arkun, was work shy and not too bright. The middle brother, Mohammed, was a mixture of the other two. But Nazmi was the driving force. That night Nazmi and I lugged boxes for hours; way after my father had gone, even. Every now and then he would nod at the huge walk in fridge that held all kinds of meats and trays of drinks and let me pry open a crate of cold Coca Cola, handing him one while I thirstily drained the other. We were sweating and covered in the kind of muck and dust that comes from lugging boxes around a factory floor all day. Outside it had gotten dark. The place looked different at night, all the other factories bathed in the eerie orange glow of the streetlamps. We finished our drinks and lugged some more. Eventually we were done. Either we were done or even Nazmi had finally had enough.

“Come on a-sunshine” he’d smile wearily, scooping up his keys and putting on the alarm but leaving everything else until morning, “let’s go home.” They were some of the best word I’d ever heard.

We jumped into one of the white vans I spent most of my day loading for deliveries and pulled out of the yard. Nazmi was always the life and soul of the place, very focused and smart, very driven. Alone, though, I always detected a kind of sadness in him. Could be he was just tired. Either way, he would never say much when he drove us home. It was winter and cold outside. He turned the radiator on and the heat filled the van immediately. Instead of heading home the usual route Nazmi drove a different way tonight, and I wondered aloud where we were going. Was there more work to do, I asked, trying to sound like I’d be ok if there was, but secretly hoping that there wasn’t.

“No. No more work” he said, to my relief. He looked at me. “You’re all baby batter. You’re a smart kid but we need to get some of that cum off your brains. You need to be a man, like me or your father. You need to be clear and clinical and sharp. We need to get that cum off of your brain so you can grow up.”

I dribbled another useless comment, as I was wont to do at the time. I realised we were in the seedy side streets of Union Street, next to the bus depot and the closed down auto repair shop. There were no orange streetlights around here.

“What are we doing here?” I wasn’t so much worried or confused as tired and hungry. I was off the clock and out of work. I wanted a shower and something to eat.

“Just looking a-sunshine. Just looking. Whatsamatta? You don’t wanna fuck a hot woman?”

Well, I did and I didn’t. I did, but not one of thesewomen. Plus, I really wastired and hungry. I’d worked all day. She probably wouldn’t be getting the best me I could have offered. Not that it mattered. Two pumps and a squirt would have been the best I could have mustered back then no matter what the time of day. Kids are horny bastards and eager to get started. They don’t care about performance or what their grade was. It’s only when you get older you start to care about shit like that, and then perhaps a little too much. Nazmi drove slowly around the corners and peered into the shadows.

“You a-scared a-sunshine?” he asked

“No” I replied. I actually wasn’t. Why would I have been?

Eventually he put his foot on the gas and we eased back out into the centre of town, heading for home. He hadn’t seen anything he liked.

“Don’t worry” he said with a wry smile, lightening up again. “Tomorrow we’ll go to Amanda’s.”

That had done it. I was too beat to worry about it when I got home. But once I woke up it was all over my mind;

‘What and where was ‘Amanda’s?’

All next day I thought about it and imagined it to be all manner of places, but fairly certain which one it would be. When Nazmi showed up for work he was his usual smiling self. He never mentioned anything about last night or tonight and nothing in his demeanour around me even suggested it had happened. My Dad would have killed him if he’d known. Would have killed me too, probably. I kept quiet for all concerned. Besides, I thought, Nazmi was full of talk. All three of these brothers were. They can’t have been getting as much pussy as they always said and, even if they were, now I knew where it was coming from. It didn’t count, to me. Any idiot could pay for it. It wasn’t real.

Still, that night, with my father headed home and what seemed like hundreds of wrapped kebab meat to move, Nazmi and I got to work, our hands getting greasy and stinking of donner meat, me pulling the Coke cans from the fridge. Eventually he looked at me and said

‘Are you ready?’

I shrugged, trying to play it cool. I just wanted to go home again and watch T.V, play some music and laze around.

But we were going to Amanda’s.

We didn’t drive where we had done before. Instead we headed a little way out of town, passing farms and all the rural areas I’d pass if I was helping do deliveries with Maurice, the dim-witted delivery driver who drove the vans we filled all day. After what seemed like a long time but was probably only ten minutes we came to a building with its light on. It said ‘Amanda’s’ on the window and right away you could see it was a hair salon. What the fuck are we doing now?I grumbled to myself with an empty, surly stomach.

Nazmi led the way. When we got inside, he smiled and exchanged hellos, obviously on familiar terms. Right away I saw a girl around my age, helping another woman cut an old ladies’ hair, but really just standing around ineffectual and looking bored. She looked at me and our eyes met before we both hurriedly looked away. She seemed shy and my stomach did that cart wheel flip I’ve since come to learn means you’re about to fall into a world of trouble. She gave off this confident vibe but seemed nervous and shy. She had this pretty brown hair, long and shiny, falling onto the shoulders of a grey cardigan. She had on blue denim shorts and black leggings, chipped black nail polish. She had the deepest, most exotic brown eyes I’d ever seen. I instantly felt weak and a little sick. Then another woman, older, perhaps in her mid-30’s, emerged as if by magic from behind some door I hadn’t even realised was there, and embraced Nazmi with a smile. I saw the younger girl fleetingly look at the scene before her eyes darted over me and back to what she was doing. I understood right away from the similarity between them this was her mother that was greeting Nazmi and me.

‘Come through, come through’ she smiled, ushering us both through the door she had suddenly emerged from. The girl quickly looked once more then turned away.

We were in some strange red corridor that had two rooms to it; one immediately to your left, the other up ahead on the right. The woman closed the door behind us and engaged in some pointless chit chat with Nazmi as he took off his coat and scarf. I just stood there, unsure what to do and out of place.

“Choose a room” the woman said. I had gleaned by now that this was Amanda.

I looked at a beaming Nazmi. Not wanting to walk any further in this strange place than I had to I turned to the white door immediately on my left and, swallowing hard with a dry throat, tentatively opened it. Nothing happened. I peeked nervously inside, and then Nazmi burst into laughter over my shoulder and yanked the door shut.

“It’s ok a-sunshine, we’ll take this one.” He brushed past me with a laughing Amanda, and then closed the door on me with a smile. Standing there alone and not knowing what I was meant to do, I waited a couple minutes, hearing giggling and groaning coming from the other side of the door Nazmi had went through. I looked up at the other door on the right. Was I supposed to go in there? I didn’t know. Why hadn’t he explained it to me? He’d fucking brought me here and not even explained the rules. Twice I went to step forward and changed my mind. Eventually I turned and went back through the door we’d come through, back out into the hair salon.

I felt like an idiot, embarrassed and awkward. I was pissed off at Nazmi for bringing me here and making me feel like this. Was it some game? Had he even meant for me to get laid? I went up to the young girl and, out of not knowing what to say and wanting to make her understand I was a good guy, said ‘I didn’t do anything in there.” The fact that I’d only been through there two minutes probably told her that. Or maybe it didn’t, I don’t know. I was new to all this. She looked at me blankly for a few seconds and then put her hand out and said ‘I’m Natalie.’ I took it and felt that flip in my stomach again.

“Claire” she suddenly said to the other woman, the one actually doing the hairdressing, “I’m taking my break.” Claire didn’t seem too bothered, not bothered enough even to reply. Natalie turned and began walking out of the place, out onto the street, leaving me feeling heavy footed and marooned. Then she turned around.

“Come on then” she said, looking right at me and holding open the door. Another flip. I was really in trouble now.

We walked a short way in the dark, away from the light of the shop until we reached the entrance to a grassy area. We climbed over the locked fence and stood on the gravel and mud. Natalie lit a cigarette and exhaled into the cold, damp night. My heart was beating out of my chest and my mouth was dry as cardboard.

“So, you work with that guy?” she asked, looking directly at me.

“Yeh” I replied, unsure of what to say. “Only part time, though. I’m trying to write a book. Might join a band.”

She nodded slowly and I felt like an idiot. How the fuck did I know what girls wanted to hear or thought was cool? A brief silence passed between us there in the dark.

“Do you think your dreams mean anything?” she then asked, holding the cigarette between two fingers and fiddling with her necklace with the other three.

“I, er, I dunno. I guess I’ve never really thought about it.” She nodded again and I silently cursed myself for not thinking of something better to say. Eventually she finished smoking and we headed back out of the field, back onto the street and towards the light of the shop. It hadn’t happened. I felt sick. I felt like I had just failed some sort of test.

We stopped outside the shop and sat on the roadside. She still had a few minutes of her break left.

“Do you have any gum?” she asked. I did. I always did and handed her a piece. I watched her chew it for a few seconds then take it back out of her mouth, wrapping it around her index finger. Then she leant over and began to kiss me. I kissed her back and it lingered there for a few seconds. Then it got heavier. Then she pulled away.

“What’s the matter?” I asked, nervous I had done something wrong. She stood up abruptly, ready to leave.

“You kiss like your father” she said coldly. Then she headed back inside.

I sat there a few seconds, stunned and reeling, before quickly standing up. I felt dazed and my mind was swimming. Before I could follow her inside Nazmi emerged onto the street, zipping up his fly and grinning broadly.

“You ready a-sunshine?” he said, noticeably happier than earlier, lighter in foot, heading to the drivers’ side and cheerily pulling out his keys. In the harsh light of the shop window Natalie had returned to work. Everything seemed to be going on as normal, but nothing felt the same.

We got in the van and headed for home.