Roadrunner
One night my ride left so on my way out of the lot I stole a Roadrunner. It wasn’t planned, I was going to hitchhike, but as I passed by I saw that the windows were open and the keys were in the ignition.
It was an old school muscle car and I knew that whoever owned it loved it. Hood scoop and spoiler, big fat tires, rear end in the air, green metal flake paint job with wide white racing. I don’t know why it didn’t have a stick, but it didn’t so I had a ride home.
But I didn’t want to go home, driving it was too much fun so I passed through Traverse City and headed North, up M22 into Leelanau County. The road was empty and I was going as fast as I could. When I got to Northport I turned South. I slammed the pedal to the floor and It went right through it.
Directly in my path was a house and no obstructions between me and it. There was no way I could make the curve going as fast as I was. I shifted into neutral and the car spun out into the ditch on the other side of the road. The motor was screaming and I was afraid it would blow up or something so I jumped out and ran into the woods. Just like the Torch Lake Indians.
Indians take to the woods
Gabrielle and I were hitching up to our friend Nancy’s cottage on Torch Lake when an overloaded station wagon picked us up. It was filled with four of five generations of an Indian family. Not all of them I’m sure, but some from each. Gabby knew some of them. She liked to hook up with native guys. Anyone third world looking really.
We barely got a mile when smoke started billowing out from under the hood. The car pulled over and without a sound everyone piled out and ran into the woods. I considered it some sort of primitive reaction to the dysfunction of the white mans mechanical monster. They disappeared and we were left standing there. Gabrielle grew up on a farm and had some know how that I didn’t. She popped the hood and started throwing handfuls of sandy dirt onto the engine. I quickly joined in and we got the fire to go out.
A pick-up truck pulled over and the driver got out to help us. By now the engine had quit smoking but the Indians were still nowhere in sight. It was like they had vaporized. I wondered if they were still running, the fiery car a heaving monster in their minds, roaring through the woods behind them.
Sharkskin suit
I stayed in the woods too, for fear of being caught. The car was still screaming and there was the house right there. It was dawn now and I was wearing this shiny sharkskin suit. I was also wearing Beatle boots, this was my look at the time. With both of us being foreign objects in the area I’d immediately be connected to the car.
I started walking in the general direction of Lake Michigan. I thought this was what the Indians had been doing too, an instinctual pull towards water. If the world caught on fire, water would be safe harbor. At least you could see your enemies coming.
It was not a lush forest with a soft bed of needles underfoot. These woods had a lot of underbrush and the suit was getting snagged on branches. I was stumbling along for quite awhile when I glimpsed pavement between the trees.
I didn’t know what road it was or where I was but at this point I didn’t care. If a cop came along I’d just feign ignorance. I don’t know what you’re talking about, I could say.
I was so tired and dehydrated I would have drank from a puddle and slept in a ditch but I didn’t have to. I saw the trail to Vicki’s Place, and knew that if I made it there I’d have a bed to sleep in.
Showing posts with label morey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label morey. Show all posts
Monday, April 5, 2010
Saturday, April 3, 2010
The Nova
Monument
For whatever reason the Nova was still fucked up after I bailed it out, it would never run right. It sat for a month while I paid off the garage that worked on it. I may have as well been a girl to the mechanics for as little as I knew, but they couldn’t rip me off, I had no money. After awhile they just wanted it gone.
I didn’t really have to buy it in the first place, after all I was only test driving it. I just thought I should. It would have been crappy if I didn’t, although the guy was knowingly selling me junk. Aside from the mechanical failings I liked the car, the look of it. I liked it even more after the accident. It looked like it’d been bit by a shark.
I erased its mustard color with flat black spray paint. This was dumb because it drew heat causing more and new engine problems, but it looked good. I flipped the tires to hide the unsightly white walls and if no one knew how small the motor was it looked menacing.
Down the road from PC was this thing that I wanted to drive to the top of. It looked like a giant upside down planter or Devo hat. From a distance it appeared to be carved from rock but up close it was just hard dirt. It was difficult to figure how or why, or even when it had been constructed. I didn’t care, I wanted to sit on top of it. My sister was coming out to visit so I thought I’d take her there.
I was living at Beas boarding house at the time and got my sister a room there too. I had to even if it was only going to be for a couple days. Bea insisted on separate lodging. I don’t think she thought Dianne was really my sister, and she didn’t encourage cohabitation. She didn’t even rent to girls.
Beas was a big old house in the canyon at the top of Main Street. It defined ramshackle and like all the other old structures was Victorian era. I liked living there and had moved in after the mess with Tony lost me the condo. I could climb out of my window onto a roof pitched just right for tanning. I still hadn’t started using sunblock anywhere but on my face, and had atrocious spots of damage on my shoulders and upper arms. I looked bad, as in awful, but I liked it. I fit the car.
I didn’t really leave the immediate vicinity of Park City much, unless it was to go down into SLC for shows at the Indian Center or shopping at the mall. There was no reason plus I tended to get harassed by the police.
A friend and I had driven East to Wyoming once to register his van and stock up on cheaper beer. You didn’t need proof of insurance over there and they had real beer, not 3.2, for real world prices. The Mormons had it all jacked up, liquor wise. They didn’t believe in consuming alcohol but they did believe in fleecing the people that did.
We turned off the highway. The thing could be seen in the near distance. I’ll call it The Monument, it had to be one of some kind, like Ayer’s Rock. I wondered if anyone died at it. I wondered if we would and started laughing at the drama that would ensue if we did. Dianne looked at me but I couldn’t share the thought, it was too stupid.
There was nothing of any significant elevation near it, although far off was the ever present mountain vista, topped by snow. We climbed out of the car and into a cloud of dust we’d stirred up. We both coughed, and waved our hands around in front of our faces like old women.
The ramp to the top was little more than car width. Medium sized American. In order to stay on track I never unturned the wheel. I think we maybe made three revolutions before reaching the top. I stopped, pulled the emergency brake on and we got out. No one else was up there but I already knew that. You would have been able to see them from ground level.
We sat on the roof of the car. The sun hung low in the sky casting long shadows behind the cactus and rocks. Its rays reflected dimly off the water of a manmade lake a few miles to our south. This lake wasn’t made for recreation, and it was in no way scenic, it was simply the byproduct of some never finished industrial excavation. A slick surface surrounded by rock outcroppings. It was long, you couldn’t see the far end.
Locals did windsurf on it, and I’d been over there a couple of times. When the wind was up it was perfect for that but no matter how hot the air was no one ever went in without a full wetsuit. The water was murky green with foam piling up along the shore. It never got shallow enough to see the bottom. Fish had been planted decades before but you never saw anyone fishing and from what I saw of the dead ones I can’t imagine the kind of freak that would eat one. Or maybe I could, The Hills Have Eyes had been filmed nearby. The mutants would eat these fish. I’m sure animals wouldn’t though, they can tell when stuff’s not right, like Indians…
For whatever reason the Nova was still fucked up after I bailed it out, it would never run right. It sat for a month while I paid off the garage that worked on it. I may have as well been a girl to the mechanics for as little as I knew, but they couldn’t rip me off, I had no money. After awhile they just wanted it gone.
I didn’t really have to buy it in the first place, after all I was only test driving it. I just thought I should. It would have been crappy if I didn’t, although the guy was knowingly selling me junk. Aside from the mechanical failings I liked the car, the look of it. I liked it even more after the accident. It looked like it’d been bit by a shark.
I erased its mustard color with flat black spray paint. This was dumb because it drew heat causing more and new engine problems, but it looked good. I flipped the tires to hide the unsightly white walls and if no one knew how small the motor was it looked menacing.
Down the road from PC was this thing that I wanted to drive to the top of. It looked like a giant upside down planter or Devo hat. From a distance it appeared to be carved from rock but up close it was just hard dirt. It was difficult to figure how or why, or even when it had been constructed. I didn’t care, I wanted to sit on top of it. My sister was coming out to visit so I thought I’d take her there.
I was living at Beas boarding house at the time and got my sister a room there too. I had to even if it was only going to be for a couple days. Bea insisted on separate lodging. I don’t think she thought Dianne was really my sister, and she didn’t encourage cohabitation. She didn’t even rent to girls.
Beas was a big old house in the canyon at the top of Main Street. It defined ramshackle and like all the other old structures was Victorian era. I liked living there and had moved in after the mess with Tony lost me the condo. I could climb out of my window onto a roof pitched just right for tanning. I still hadn’t started using sunblock anywhere but on my face, and had atrocious spots of damage on my shoulders and upper arms. I looked bad, as in awful, but I liked it. I fit the car.
I didn’t really leave the immediate vicinity of Park City much, unless it was to go down into SLC for shows at the Indian Center or shopping at the mall. There was no reason plus I tended to get harassed by the police.
A friend and I had driven East to Wyoming once to register his van and stock up on cheaper beer. You didn’t need proof of insurance over there and they had real beer, not 3.2, for real world prices. The Mormons had it all jacked up, liquor wise. They didn’t believe in consuming alcohol but they did believe in fleecing the people that did.
We turned off the highway. The thing could be seen in the near distance. I’ll call it The Monument, it had to be one of some kind, like Ayer’s Rock. I wondered if anyone died at it. I wondered if we would and started laughing at the drama that would ensue if we did. Dianne looked at me but I couldn’t share the thought, it was too stupid.
There was nothing of any significant elevation near it, although far off was the ever present mountain vista, topped by snow. We climbed out of the car and into a cloud of dust we’d stirred up. We both coughed, and waved our hands around in front of our faces like old women.
The ramp to the top was little more than car width. Medium sized American. In order to stay on track I never unturned the wheel. I think we maybe made three revolutions before reaching the top. I stopped, pulled the emergency brake on and we got out. No one else was up there but I already knew that. You would have been able to see them from ground level.
We sat on the roof of the car. The sun hung low in the sky casting long shadows behind the cactus and rocks. Its rays reflected dimly off the water of a manmade lake a few miles to our south. This lake wasn’t made for recreation, and it was in no way scenic, it was simply the byproduct of some never finished industrial excavation. A slick surface surrounded by rock outcroppings. It was long, you couldn’t see the far end.
Locals did windsurf on it, and I’d been over there a couple of times. When the wind was up it was perfect for that but no matter how hot the air was no one ever went in without a full wetsuit. The water was murky green with foam piling up along the shore. It never got shallow enough to see the bottom. Fish had been planted decades before but you never saw anyone fishing and from what I saw of the dead ones I can’t imagine the kind of freak that would eat one. Or maybe I could, The Hills Have Eyes had been filmed nearby. The mutants would eat these fish. I’m sure animals wouldn’t though, they can tell when stuff’s not right, like Indians…
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Deer Killed by Beauty Van
Not working was always a key element in my philosophy of life, but every once in a while, lacking in regular cash, I'd have to pick up some dumb job. I had no marketable skills but I did have a driver’s license and that was enough to get me hired delivering beauty products.
My route was on the other side of the state, the Lake Huron shoreline, The Redneck Riviera. I’d never been over there. I thought of it as the wrong side of the state but I considered anything more than thirty miles away from Traverse City wrong. For me wrong meant ugly scenery sparsely populated with rednecks. I didn’t see myself as a snob; I thought Traverse City was a dump too, just that these outer realms were worse.
My vehicle was a big brown snub-nosed van. I'd load it up with shampoo, dye, chemicals and electronics then head north and east stopping at house and garage based salons along the way. These beauty shop ladies were creepy and my favorite drops were ones without any social interaction.
If I needed a signature I was out of luck and would have to field their nosy questions, Was I married? Did I have a girlfriend, children?
They seemed stupid and it occurred to me that they might be experiencing brain damage from inhaling perm solution and nail-polish remover all day. These women were accidental huffers. Later of course I realized that they were collecting gossip fodder to pass on to their homebound associates and possibly a visit from the delivery boy was a highlight of their day. I had a friend who delivered flowers and he was always getting frightened by sexually aggressive housewives. Some of them were not hideous but he was afraid that if he had sex with one he’d have to have sex with them all. Word would get out.
It was a dull drive that was easily enhanced by liquor, so I started drinking on the way home, usually when my route was almost over. This was when I still thought drinking and driving was a safe practice and I guess it was, I had no repercussions from it, until I hit the deer.
I was driving south through pitch black woods. I had one more stop that I knew I would never find. Not because I was on my second bottle of Lambrusco but because I’d never been there before and it was remote. A town called Higgins Lake. I didn’t know if it was a town even, it could just be a lake. The drop was tiny anyway, a couple bottles of toner, so I planned on skipping it. I passed by this XXX drive-in theater that always distracted my imagination. It was off in the woods, and aside from the sign by the road all you could see of it was the top of the screen. What I imagined was what kind of people patronized it, the beauty shop ladies for sure, what sort of vehicles they used and what they did in them. I was just getting into that last bit, trying to gross myself out, when a big animal face blotted out the road.
There wasn't much to the front of the van and the deer was up and across the windshield almost before I could blink, long enough though for its bulging eye and rolling tongue, its little teeth, to be imprinted on my retina. Later when I retold this story, my memory enhanced by time I'd envision the animals head ripped from its torso, blood veined eyeballs popping out of its skull, thick black lips curled back revealing razor sharp teeth. A monster born of the woods.
I hoped it was dead and not crippled but I didn't get out to look, I didn't want to and as it turned out I didn't have to. It was November 14th the day before hunting season opened, and the woods were already filled with hunters horny for a kill. My view of these men as freaks was reinforced as I watched a handful emerge from the mist at the edge of the woods; swamp muck sucking at their boots as they sniffed at the air.
Drawn by the squeal of tires and the smell of blood, they lurched towards my van like movie zombies. One of them approached and seemed to be trying to speak so I rolled down my window. He was fat and gasping for air from trudging thru the woods or, it occurred to me, in anticipation for the dead deer and the promise of sexual release it held. I looked down to see if I could spot an erection but his trousers were all bunched up and I couldn't tell.
“It gawn blow!” A newly dead deer will bloat with gaseous fumes and explode if not gutted immediately. This was what the hunter was trying to tell me. He wanted the deer and I said “sure”, glad to have it removed from my sight while I waited for the wrecker.
I watched through the busted windshield as he unsheathed a huge knife. He bent over, exposing an ass so big it almost dwarfed the deer, and with some difficulty slit open it’s belly. Blood flooded the pavement and settled into a dark pool. Steam rose up as the heat of the animal met the cool night air.
They're gonna fuck that thing, I thought, watching him and another man drag the carcass off the highway and into the woods. I rode to a nearby gas station in the cab of the tow truck. The driver owned the station and told me that although the van still ran it wouldn't make it back home without a replacement radiator. He would see if he had a used one around.
I checked into a nearby motel and then walked to a party store for beer. Across the road from the store was a bar, a roadhouse advertising music and dancing. I wondered if they had food and what kind it would be, I was hungry, but eating food in remote places like this could be risky. I was served a plate of rotted meat at a restaurant in the U.P once. It was just like this one, stuck in the middle of nowhere. When I told the waitress it tasted weird she asked if I was from the city, that I probably wasn't used to wild meat. I tried to imagine what a wild cow might look like? Maybe it would resemble the bony ones with horns from Texas; Longhorns.
I walked back to the cabin and lay on the bed drinking beers and watching scrambled porn on the TV. I thought about what I'd do if I lived over here, and couldn’t come up with anything. I became filled with boredom and wanted more beer so I decided to walk back to the store. The land was flat and the woods just sort of took off into nothingness on either side. I knew there was water off to my left cause the motel cabins were on the lake but I couldn't see it. No glimmer of lights in the woods no signs of people. It was creepy but not scary really. Scary were the hunters earlier, and where they might be now, lurking behind trees, waiting for midnight, or getting hammered at the bar.
They were getting hammered at the bar, a handful anyway. The store was closed and I was still hungry and only half drunk so I walked over to the roadhouse. I would order bar food, it was frozen, came from elsewhere, and was deep fried. It was safe. Earlier I'd hung out at the garage for a bit with a couple local guys while I waited on news about the van. That's when I found out I'd be there over night. If there's been more than just me and at least one girl it could've been a set up for your average strangers off the main track horror movie. Young people stranded in a town filled with ominous uglies. Someone would have sex and then they would be killed, horribly.
One of the guys from the garage was at the bar so I walked over and sat next to him. “What's with the whores?” I asked by way of greeting. There was a trio of sluttily attired women around a table by the dance floor. I wasn't worried about insulting anyone's sister or mom, I'd noticed the short bus version of a Winnebago in the lot. It was not a rig locals’ or even hunters would drive. I had no personal knowledge but had heard that these mini-campers were the chosen ride for the hunting season hookers.
“Oh” said my friend turning to look, “They fuck the hunters” he tells me what I already know but appreciate the validation of a local.
“The hunters come up here to kill and the women follow to suck their dicks for money” he adds succinctly.
“Gross” I say thinking They suck the cocks of the killers! Would be an interesting movie ad blurb.
“I don't know why they don't just stay where they are and do all that”
This makes so much sense that I take another look at the guy. He's maybe my age but at first glance looks older, growing out haircut under a trucker hat; quilt lined plaid flannel shirt and indefinable brand jeans. His baby face poorly hidden under raggedy facial hair. I thought he was a rube and he looks like a rube but clearly he isn't. He just doesn't care about appearance. I'm tempted to offer him some beauty products but don't want him to stop talking to me. I have a compulsion to kiss him on the lips but quash it when I catch him looking at me oddly. He probably saw it in my eyes. I don't know what came over me, probably the beer. Right now we're cohorts, and I'd like to keep it that way.
“Don't you need their money?” I ask under the impression that places like this depended on outsider influxes of cash.
“Not me, I'm on welfare, I just need the bitches to pay their taxes and vote democrat” I like this guy.
“What was your name again?” I ask.
He tells me his name is Ronnie and points out one of the hookers, “I think that's a dude,” he says.
He could be right, boxy of shape and wearing an obvious wig, she's holding court with her chair tilted back, legs spread, longneck in hand.
“Go find out” says Ronnie.
“No, you”
“I live here, you'll be gone tomorrow and I'm gonna be running into the dude all weekend, I could end up with my ass kicked, or worse”
This makes sense so I think about it, how to do it without instigating some extended interaction. You talk to a stranger in a bar and it can turn into a short term relationship.
“Okay” I decide “I'll ask her for the time but I won't refer to her as sir or mam, I'll call her Mrlady” I don't know how this is going to resolve the mystery but I think it's funny. So does Ronnie.
Mrlady and her table watch me approach. To her left is a stringy haired woman with a shiny face and drawn on eyebrows. If she had an expression it would be rage. Across from her is a small pink ball of a woman, a girl, with a short pony tail sticking out the back of her head like a dart. Up close our Mrlady's got a big female-sized rack but it's stacked on top of an equally dense roll of fat. Her face is heavily made up even under the dim bar lights but so are her buddies. I look close and see no sign of beard stubble trying to bust through.
“Excuse me Mrlady douyouhavethetime?” I blurt out. She points over my shoulder in the general direction of where I know there's a clock above the bar. Her expression reads as non-plussed, maybe even pissed off, which turns out to be correct. As I turn to walk away, our question unanswered but at a loss for a follow-up, I’m stopped short by a deep bass voice barking, “Get back here Asscrack!” I assume this is me and turn around.
“Listen you little weasel, if you and your boyfriend at the bar there think you can fuck with me you're dead wrong, and when I say dead I mean that the coffin is empty and the lid is open,” she grabs my wrist, digging in so hard one of her nails pops off, “Got it, fuck?”
“Yes mam,” I say heading back to Ronnie and the safety of the other side of the room.
“He’s a dude” I tell him, “and she’s scary”
“She made it clear she’s got her eye on us both” I point at my eyes and then his for emphasis. I decide to leave.
“I gotta go,” I grab my sack of fried food off the bar, “I’ll look for you when I pass through again, hopefully you’ll still be mobile.”
I left the next afternoon, stopping at the store for a bottle of wine to lessen a hangover headache. As I drove past the roadhouse I spotted an orange vested hunter on his knees outside of Mrlady’s Winnebago. Vomit was pouring out of his mouth. I wondered if she had some deal with the bar owner, setting up shop in the lot like that.
My route was on the other side of the state, the Lake Huron shoreline, The Redneck Riviera. I’d never been over there. I thought of it as the wrong side of the state but I considered anything more than thirty miles away from Traverse City wrong. For me wrong meant ugly scenery sparsely populated with rednecks. I didn’t see myself as a snob; I thought Traverse City was a dump too, just that these outer realms were worse.
My vehicle was a big brown snub-nosed van. I'd load it up with shampoo, dye, chemicals and electronics then head north and east stopping at house and garage based salons along the way. These beauty shop ladies were creepy and my favorite drops were ones without any social interaction.
If I needed a signature I was out of luck and would have to field their nosy questions, Was I married? Did I have a girlfriend, children?
They seemed stupid and it occurred to me that they might be experiencing brain damage from inhaling perm solution and nail-polish remover all day. These women were accidental huffers. Later of course I realized that they were collecting gossip fodder to pass on to their homebound associates and possibly a visit from the delivery boy was a highlight of their day. I had a friend who delivered flowers and he was always getting frightened by sexually aggressive housewives. Some of them were not hideous but he was afraid that if he had sex with one he’d have to have sex with them all. Word would get out.
It was a dull drive that was easily enhanced by liquor, so I started drinking on the way home, usually when my route was almost over. This was when I still thought drinking and driving was a safe practice and I guess it was, I had no repercussions from it, until I hit the deer.
I was driving south through pitch black woods. I had one more stop that I knew I would never find. Not because I was on my second bottle of Lambrusco but because I’d never been there before and it was remote. A town called Higgins Lake. I didn’t know if it was a town even, it could just be a lake. The drop was tiny anyway, a couple bottles of toner, so I planned on skipping it. I passed by this XXX drive-in theater that always distracted my imagination. It was off in the woods, and aside from the sign by the road all you could see of it was the top of the screen. What I imagined was what kind of people patronized it, the beauty shop ladies for sure, what sort of vehicles they used and what they did in them. I was just getting into that last bit, trying to gross myself out, when a big animal face blotted out the road.
There wasn't much to the front of the van and the deer was up and across the windshield almost before I could blink, long enough though for its bulging eye and rolling tongue, its little teeth, to be imprinted on my retina. Later when I retold this story, my memory enhanced by time I'd envision the animals head ripped from its torso, blood veined eyeballs popping out of its skull, thick black lips curled back revealing razor sharp teeth. A monster born of the woods.
I hoped it was dead and not crippled but I didn't get out to look, I didn't want to and as it turned out I didn't have to. It was November 14th the day before hunting season opened, and the woods were already filled with hunters horny for a kill. My view of these men as freaks was reinforced as I watched a handful emerge from the mist at the edge of the woods; swamp muck sucking at their boots as they sniffed at the air.
Drawn by the squeal of tires and the smell of blood, they lurched towards my van like movie zombies. One of them approached and seemed to be trying to speak so I rolled down my window. He was fat and gasping for air from trudging thru the woods or, it occurred to me, in anticipation for the dead deer and the promise of sexual release it held. I looked down to see if I could spot an erection but his trousers were all bunched up and I couldn't tell.
“It gawn blow!” A newly dead deer will bloat with gaseous fumes and explode if not gutted immediately. This was what the hunter was trying to tell me. He wanted the deer and I said “sure”, glad to have it removed from my sight while I waited for the wrecker.
I watched through the busted windshield as he unsheathed a huge knife. He bent over, exposing an ass so big it almost dwarfed the deer, and with some difficulty slit open it’s belly. Blood flooded the pavement and settled into a dark pool. Steam rose up as the heat of the animal met the cool night air.
They're gonna fuck that thing, I thought, watching him and another man drag the carcass off the highway and into the woods. I rode to a nearby gas station in the cab of the tow truck. The driver owned the station and told me that although the van still ran it wouldn't make it back home without a replacement radiator. He would see if he had a used one around.
I checked into a nearby motel and then walked to a party store for beer. Across the road from the store was a bar, a roadhouse advertising music and dancing. I wondered if they had food and what kind it would be, I was hungry, but eating food in remote places like this could be risky. I was served a plate of rotted meat at a restaurant in the U.P once. It was just like this one, stuck in the middle of nowhere. When I told the waitress it tasted weird she asked if I was from the city, that I probably wasn't used to wild meat. I tried to imagine what a wild cow might look like? Maybe it would resemble the bony ones with horns from Texas; Longhorns.
I walked back to the cabin and lay on the bed drinking beers and watching scrambled porn on the TV. I thought about what I'd do if I lived over here, and couldn’t come up with anything. I became filled with boredom and wanted more beer so I decided to walk back to the store. The land was flat and the woods just sort of took off into nothingness on either side. I knew there was water off to my left cause the motel cabins were on the lake but I couldn't see it. No glimmer of lights in the woods no signs of people. It was creepy but not scary really. Scary were the hunters earlier, and where they might be now, lurking behind trees, waiting for midnight, or getting hammered at the bar.
They were getting hammered at the bar, a handful anyway. The store was closed and I was still hungry and only half drunk so I walked over to the roadhouse. I would order bar food, it was frozen, came from elsewhere, and was deep fried. It was safe. Earlier I'd hung out at the garage for a bit with a couple local guys while I waited on news about the van. That's when I found out I'd be there over night. If there's been more than just me and at least one girl it could've been a set up for your average strangers off the main track horror movie. Young people stranded in a town filled with ominous uglies. Someone would have sex and then they would be killed, horribly.
One of the guys from the garage was at the bar so I walked over and sat next to him. “What's with the whores?” I asked by way of greeting. There was a trio of sluttily attired women around a table by the dance floor. I wasn't worried about insulting anyone's sister or mom, I'd noticed the short bus version of a Winnebago in the lot. It was not a rig locals’ or even hunters would drive. I had no personal knowledge but had heard that these mini-campers were the chosen ride for the hunting season hookers.
“Oh” said my friend turning to look, “They fuck the hunters” he tells me what I already know but appreciate the validation of a local.
“The hunters come up here to kill and the women follow to suck their dicks for money” he adds succinctly.
“Gross” I say thinking They suck the cocks of the killers! Would be an interesting movie ad blurb.
“I don't know why they don't just stay where they are and do all that”
This makes so much sense that I take another look at the guy. He's maybe my age but at first glance looks older, growing out haircut under a trucker hat; quilt lined plaid flannel shirt and indefinable brand jeans. His baby face poorly hidden under raggedy facial hair. I thought he was a rube and he looks like a rube but clearly he isn't. He just doesn't care about appearance. I'm tempted to offer him some beauty products but don't want him to stop talking to me. I have a compulsion to kiss him on the lips but quash it when I catch him looking at me oddly. He probably saw it in my eyes. I don't know what came over me, probably the beer. Right now we're cohorts, and I'd like to keep it that way.
“Don't you need their money?” I ask under the impression that places like this depended on outsider influxes of cash.
“Not me, I'm on welfare, I just need the bitches to pay their taxes and vote democrat” I like this guy.
“What was your name again?” I ask.
He tells me his name is Ronnie and points out one of the hookers, “I think that's a dude,” he says.
He could be right, boxy of shape and wearing an obvious wig, she's holding court with her chair tilted back, legs spread, longneck in hand.
“Go find out” says Ronnie.
“No, you”
“I live here, you'll be gone tomorrow and I'm gonna be running into the dude all weekend, I could end up with my ass kicked, or worse”
This makes sense so I think about it, how to do it without instigating some extended interaction. You talk to a stranger in a bar and it can turn into a short term relationship.
“Okay” I decide “I'll ask her for the time but I won't refer to her as sir or mam, I'll call her Mrlady” I don't know how this is going to resolve the mystery but I think it's funny. So does Ronnie.
Mrlady and her table watch me approach. To her left is a stringy haired woman with a shiny face and drawn on eyebrows. If she had an expression it would be rage. Across from her is a small pink ball of a woman, a girl, with a short pony tail sticking out the back of her head like a dart. Up close our Mrlady's got a big female-sized rack but it's stacked on top of an equally dense roll of fat. Her face is heavily made up even under the dim bar lights but so are her buddies. I look close and see no sign of beard stubble trying to bust through.
“Excuse me Mrlady douyouhavethetime?” I blurt out. She points over my shoulder in the general direction of where I know there's a clock above the bar. Her expression reads as non-plussed, maybe even pissed off, which turns out to be correct. As I turn to walk away, our question unanswered but at a loss for a follow-up, I’m stopped short by a deep bass voice barking, “Get back here Asscrack!” I assume this is me and turn around.
“Listen you little weasel, if you and your boyfriend at the bar there think you can fuck with me you're dead wrong, and when I say dead I mean that the coffin is empty and the lid is open,” she grabs my wrist, digging in so hard one of her nails pops off, “Got it, fuck?”
“Yes mam,” I say heading back to Ronnie and the safety of the other side of the room.
“He’s a dude” I tell him, “and she’s scary”
“She made it clear she’s got her eye on us both” I point at my eyes and then his for emphasis. I decide to leave.
“I gotta go,” I grab my sack of fried food off the bar, “I’ll look for you when I pass through again, hopefully you’ll still be mobile.”
I left the next afternoon, stopping at the store for a bottle of wine to lessen a hangover headache. As I drove past the roadhouse I spotted an orange vested hunter on his knees outside of Mrlady’s Winnebago. Vomit was pouring out of his mouth. I wondered if she had some deal with the bar owner, setting up shop in the lot like that.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Rehab Nipple
There always seems to be some old queen hovering around the all male rehabs and at Harbor Hall it was Walter. He was the money man and when he was around we were supposed to pay attention to him, be grateful I guess, I spotted him as a predator early on. He liked to hug the better looking and/or younger residents. When he moved in on me the first time I blocked him by extending my hand between us as a rigid barrier. He had no choice but to abandon his intended flesh-press and grab the hand for an awkward shake. The aborted embrace left our faces no more than a couple inches apart. I briefly glimpsed my own reflection in his rheumy eyes then looked over at JD to see if he had caught the maneuver. His smile indicated he had. He’d told me that the old man had blindsided him with a hug that’d quickly turned into a discreet dry hump before he could break it off. I told him about the hand trick and that I’d demonstrate it for him if I got a chance although I wasn’t sure if I was in his target group. Turned out I was.
Walter had a sort of gentlemans farm outside of town where he and his wife lived. He would choose one rehab guy to work a couple days a week as a sort of farm hand. I was offered the job and accepted. I could use the money plus anything to get away from the Hall was cool. The wife always made me a super white person lunch of a bologna and mayo sandwich, a couple of cookies from a bag and a glass of milk to drink. It was a lunch you'd send your kid off to school with back in the day.
Walter wanted me to wear overhauls at the farm, so I did. I decided this was a whores job and I would treat it as such by doing whatever Walter, the trick, needed me to do. I never wore a shirt and always left one strap undone allowing for a glimpse of nipple here and there.
Walter had a sort of gentlemans farm outside of town where he and his wife lived. He would choose one rehab guy to work a couple days a week as a sort of farm hand. I was offered the job and accepted. I could use the money plus anything to get away from the Hall was cool. The wife always made me a super white person lunch of a bologna and mayo sandwich, a couple of cookies from a bag and a glass of milk to drink. It was a lunch you'd send your kid off to school with back in the day.
Walter wanted me to wear overhauls at the farm, so I did. I decided this was a whores job and I would treat it as such by doing whatever Walter, the trick, needed me to do. I never wore a shirt and always left one strap undone allowing for a glimpse of nipple here and there.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Harbor Hall native oral
HH
Harbor Hall was a big L-shaped colonial mansion high on a residential hill. Massive injections of cash from wealthy, guilty alcoholics, had allowed it a return to its once former glory. It occupied a corner lot with inside access to the glassed-in porches along the public side, but none from the street. A roofed porch also ran along the inner flank of the shorter wing. It was bordered by the lawn and parking lot. It was out of sight from the street.
There were usually a few guys malingering on this porch til lights out. One night I hung out with them and found out it wasn’t only the last drag on their cigarette that was keeping them up late. It was also for the blow-jobs that were offered up by an old native woman who set up camp a few nights a week in an alcove between a row of bushes and the side of the vacant warehouse across the alley.
I was being a wet blanket because none of them wanted me to see what they were up to. At first I thought they were afraid I’d snitch, then I saw her, and understood their shame. She was built like a motel refrigerator, with short stick-like legs holding it up. Cropped dark hair was tucked behind her ears, her age was indeterminate. She stood still for a moment, hands on hips, and barked her presence. I couldn't tell what she said, if it was a word even.
The others were watching to see what I'd do. It seemed like a good enough opportunity to get my first female blow-job, plus it would put them at ease, so I went after her. I found her squatting with her back up against the side of the warehouse. It looked like she was taking a shit, and my penis inverted at the sight. Her head was tilted back, eyes slitted, and her nearly toothless mouth wide open, abnormally wide. Arousal was out of the question. I wondered if they paid her, they must, and dropped a five in her lap. She didn't move, she was waiting. God built her for this, I thought.
Harbor Hall was a big L-shaped colonial mansion high on a residential hill. Massive injections of cash from wealthy, guilty alcoholics, had allowed it a return to its once former glory. It occupied a corner lot with inside access to the glassed-in porches along the public side, but none from the street. A roofed porch also ran along the inner flank of the shorter wing. It was bordered by the lawn and parking lot. It was out of sight from the street.
There were usually a few guys malingering on this porch til lights out. One night I hung out with them and found out it wasn’t only the last drag on their cigarette that was keeping them up late. It was also for the blow-jobs that were offered up by an old native woman who set up camp a few nights a week in an alcove between a row of bushes and the side of the vacant warehouse across the alley.
I was being a wet blanket because none of them wanted me to see what they were up to. At first I thought they were afraid I’d snitch, then I saw her, and understood their shame. She was built like a motel refrigerator, with short stick-like legs holding it up. Cropped dark hair was tucked behind her ears, her age was indeterminate. She stood still for a moment, hands on hips, and barked her presence. I couldn't tell what she said, if it was a word even.
The others were watching to see what I'd do. It seemed like a good enough opportunity to get my first female blow-job, plus it would put them at ease, so I went after her. I found her squatting with her back up against the side of the warehouse. It looked like she was taking a shit, and my penis inverted at the sight. Her head was tilted back, eyes slitted, and her nearly toothless mouth wide open, abnormally wide. Arousal was out of the question. I wondered if they paid her, they must, and dropped a five in her lap. She didn't move, she was waiting. God built her for this, I thought.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Acton
Marc made us a quartet, not just behind the bush but in the lines too. Meals, meetings, classes, meds, bathroom. We had to wait in line for everything, but if one of us was where we were supposed to be then we all didn't have to wait. He was British and had the requisite rotted teeth. It's funny but there weren't a lot of bad teeth at Acton, probably because most of the residents had done prison time and felons got free dental care.
Marc had been in a band called Sex Gang Children. I’d heard of them, maybe even seen them when I lived in MPLS. I told him that if I'd seen him I'd been drunk and didn't remember it. He said he was pretty sure they'd played there but he would've been fucked up too and so wouldn't remember it either. We had the shared human experience thing. We were both members of the worldwide drunken/drugged brotherhood of man. I asked him if he'd ever heard of the Spahn Ranch, he hadn't, but he had heard of Auschwitz and nodded knowingly when I pointed out the cinder block shower building.
I had a theory in mind that the State of California was using Acton to funnel undesirables off the streets of L.A. and into some netherworld existence further out in the vast desert. Lacking sufficient food and water, we would become dried brown husks, creaking around on stick-like limbs. Our crackly carcasses would be absorbed into the Salton Sea and provide meals for hideous fish mutations. Somehow this vision comforted me, I didn't share it with Marc though, not yet.
Marc had been in a band called Sex Gang Children. I’d heard of them, maybe even seen them when I lived in MPLS. I told him that if I'd seen him I'd been drunk and didn't remember it. He said he was pretty sure they'd played there but he would've been fucked up too and so wouldn't remember it either. We had the shared human experience thing. We were both members of the worldwide drunken/drugged brotherhood of man. I asked him if he'd ever heard of the Spahn Ranch, he hadn't, but he had heard of Auschwitz and nodded knowingly when I pointed out the cinder block shower building.
I had a theory in mind that the State of California was using Acton to funnel undesirables off the streets of L.A. and into some netherworld existence further out in the vast desert. Lacking sufficient food and water, we would become dried brown husks, creaking around on stick-like limbs. Our crackly carcasses would be absorbed into the Salton Sea and provide meals for hideous fish mutations. Somehow this vision comforted me, I didn't share it with Marc though, not yet.
Friday, February 5, 2010
pre-acton/ I meet Melba
Pre-Acton
Melba saved my ass at a bus stop on Sunset Blvd. I’d been drinking my way through
I’d forgotten that Sunset buses heading west stopped running early, like at midnight. There was no traffic, nothing. I could walk back down to Wilshire or
I’d been standing there awhile when a primer grey serial killer looking sedan rolled slowly past. The windows were dark. I watched as it did a u-turn and pulled up in front of me. It was a nice night, December, blurry stars hung in the sky. I recognized it’s potential but felt no fear. A large light-skinned black woman leaned over smiling, and asked if I needed a ride as she opened the passenger-side door. I don’t know what I was thinking as I climbed in, I was curious.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
cats at Acton
Richard was one of my cabin mates. He liked cats and had adopted one of the creepy feral ones. He’d bring it in at night so it didn’t get cold. I don’t remember if the cabins were heated at night, it doesn’t seem likely. It did get cold, and even snowed one night. I don’t like cats so when he wasn’t around or wasn’t looking I’d toss it out the front door. Next to cats, crystal meth was his favorite thing, so when he wasn’t going on about his cat back home, he told the usual meth-head paranoid conspiracy tales. Copters hovering above his house, dropping balloons filled with anthrax spores. Mexican ninos crawling into his yard with explosives strapped to their backs. He claimed a DEA agent posing as a mailman had tried to kill him by slipping a rattle snake through the mail slot in his front door. His storytelling was detail oriented and the stories were always long. He didn’t need us to respond so it was sort of calming to sit there in the sun with his voice as soundtrack. He said he wasn’t there from court, that he wasn’t hiding out. I didn’t really care. I worked from the perspective that everyone was telling the truth. It was easier.
Monday, January 25, 2010
harbor hall
Harbor Hall
An old rich guy named Walter was the CEO—or whatever—of the place. He was the money man and when he was around we were supposed to pay attention to him. I spotted him as a predator right off. He liked to hug the better looking and/or younger residents. When he moved in on me the first time I blocked him by extending my hand between us as a rigid barrier. He had no choice but to abandon his intended flesh-press and grab the hand for an awkward shake. The aborted embrace left our faces no more than a couple inches apart. I briefly glimpsed my own reflection in his rheumy eyes then looked over at JD to see if he had caught the maneuver. His smile indicated he had. He’d told me that the old man had blindsided him with a hug that’d quickly turned into a discreet dry hump before he could break it off. I told him about the hand trick and that I’d demonstrate it for him if I got a chance although I wasn’t sure if I was in his target group. Turned out I was.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
reading matter
i'm almost through another 600 page book. this one has been a total soap opera about a couple of rabbis and a priest. its written by the idiot who wrote Love Story. i can't even remember what happened. its hard to believe someone wasted time writing such a thing.
every night after i get searched I grab a sack lunch out of the mini fridge on top of the lockers, i toss the sandwiches on the tv table and eat the cookies and the apple. the sandwiches aren't right, whats supposed to be bologna is green.
Monday, November 2, 2009
bloody foot print
my foot (toe) was bleeding last night, and saturating the sock i was wearing so i made bloody foot print on the wall behind my bunk.
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