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Michael Leever << continued from Part 1 "Fucking shit!" you yell, and grab a dirty plate out of the sink-the first thing you can reach-and slam it against the skillet. Instead of moving over to the next unheated burner like you'd hoped, the skillet slides off the stove completely and falls onto the linoleum, sizzling and sending up the smell of burning plastic. You cover your hand with the sleeve of your hoody and try to pick it up, but it's still too hot, and you motherfuck this, motherfuck that some more, which wakes up your mom, who starts swearing too-"What the fuck? Who the fuck?"-and lunges around on the table, knocking off a plate that shatters on the floor, and the bottle of vodka that doesn't break but instead hits the floor and starts rolling. In her alcoholic stupor, that bottle of vodka is like oxygen, and she goes after it with everything she's got, reaching down from the table, but reaching too far and toppling over head first onto the floor, taking the ground beef with her, sending it flying all over her face, hands, hair, some of it even making it into the skillet scorching the floor a few feet away. And as the scent of cooking meat, cooking linoleum, and the general stench of the house fills your nose, as your mom starts cursing you for ever sliding out of her, as you look around at the filth and depravity that fills the world, your mind turns to crystal, and you have a pretty good idea where you can find it. * * * Benny Stolinitski is the only person in your life who's never let you down. He's the only reliable person you've ever known, the only person you can truly count on to be there for you. You always know where to find him. He's always happy to see you. He always knows just what you need, and gives it to you. If he wasn't your drug dealer, it'd be beautiful. You walk the mile to his house, cutting through the nature preserve, to the big subdivision houses where Benny lives. When you knock on his door, the corner of the curtain in the front room swings to the side, and a moment later the door opens, and there's Benny standing in front of you with a big grin on his pudgy Russian face. "D Money! Long time no see, man," he says, as you slap hands and bro-hug in the doorway. "Just got home yesterday." "And you waited this long to come see me?" He leads you inside, over the child-gate in the hallway, into the living room. As your foot hits the other side of the gate, the dogs swarm around you. Benny has seven of them—three pits, a Pomeranian, some mutts, and one giant Irish wolfhound named Benny Jr. Benny’s little brother, Declan, is in the Stratolounger watching UFC highlights and smoking a bong. You bump fists, and ask about the rest of the family. Everyone's good, they tell you. "Rico, got a girlfriend," Benny says. "A hot mixed chick, black mixed. Huge tits. Nice ass." "Nice." "Yeah, we're happy. We thought he might never get laid." "What about you?" you ask. "Pulling anything these days?" "More than my weight, son," Benny says and pats the sizeable gut he's developed since you've been gone. "And I'm fat as fuck now." "Dad bod," you say. "It's in these days." "Gains," he nods. Benny fills you in on his latest DUI-drinking, pills, going to see a girl, truck, Skyline Chili sign-and on his upcoming court date. You tell him Uber is a hell of a lot cheaper than Lawyer, and Benny laughs and seems completely unfazed at the prospect of, since it's his third, losing his license forever and potentially going to jail. But that's Benny, and pretty soon you're high and as close to happy as you've been in a long time. A part of you knows it can't last, though, and it doesn't. Benny gets a call, and it's from Sean, he says, after he hangs up. "He's going to stop by and pick up." "Sean, Crazy Sean?" "Yeah, he's better now though," Benny says." "Better," Declan says. "Better than Adam Lanza. Maybe." "Who's Adam Lanza?" "You're behind, dude," Benny says. "He's the cocksucker that shot up that elementary school." "Oh, yeah, sounds about right," you say to Declan. There's a knock on the door a few minutes later, and when Benny comes back into the living room, Sean's with him, and you guys slap hands. Just looking at him you can tell Declan's description is more accurate than Benny's. Sean's all amped up about something, talking a mile a minute and fidgeting constantly. He keeps standing up to make a point and then sitting back down. "That's the thing," he's saying. "Tower number seven, they're saying it's already fallen down before it even has. How's that happen? Oh definitely not because the media is all owned by Rupert Murdoch, a card-carrying member of the Elders of Zion. What happens after the towers go down. War. Patriot Act. Death. Rights, liberty freedom, who cares about that shit, right?" You and Declan exchange a look, and Benny laughs, and says, "Smoke some weed, dude. Mellow the fuck out." You don't stay long after Sean arrives, just long enough to slip Benny a ten, and come away with a nice little baggie that's worth at least thirty. There are always people like Sean coming over to Benny's. You wouldn't be able to handle it. But, then again, you're not sure what you are able to handle these days. You're relieved to get out of there, but standing on the stoop you realize you now have nowhere to go. You have an urge to walk by Kyls's on your way home, so you head that way. She lives back on your side of town, and this time you set out on the street instead of cutting through the woods because, it's starting to get dark already. That, at least, you're happy about, it getting dark. Means you're close to making it through another day. * * * To fit into the sad story of your life, a part of you knows Kyls has to be seeing somebody new, but when you walk onto her street and see another car in her driveway, it still takes you by surprise. You want to think it's one of her girlfriends, Tracy from work at the daycare, or Lindsey from high school, and you know you'd be better off giving yourself that possibility and walking your sorry ass on home, but making good decisions has never been your style. No, you walk down the block a couple houses, drop down on the curb, light up a cigarette, and look at her house. You don't know how long you'd be willing to wait if left up to you-eternity comes to mind-but the decision is made for you when a lady comes out of the house you're sitting in front of and stands on the porch with her hands on her hips. You'd like to knock the bitch off her high horse, but you see a kid peeking out the door behind her, and have to respect her looking out for her family. With the baggie on you, too, you figure it's probably best not to get into anything, so you flick your cigarette into her yard, and walk down the street the way you came, trying to decide what to do. Right when you're about to pass in front of Kyls's house, an idea hits you, and before you can think about pros and cons, you're already on the move. You run up to the front door, ring the doorbell, then sprint behind the hedge of the house next door. Through the branches you can still make out the front door, and after a few seconds it opens, and instead of Kyls or the boyfriend you know is inside, it's Kayla you're looking at, and your heart melts. It literally melts. You can feel it. The whole process. First it heats up to three thousand degrees, and then it just starts dripping, the outer layers turning liquid and falling away, one after another, until there's nothing left but that rock hard pit at the center, and even that can't withstand this kind of heat, and soon it's joined the sticky pile of goo at the bottom of your stomach. Kayla. There she is. It hadn't hit you how much you'd missed her until right then. The feeling's so intense you're not sure you could have handled it during all those lonely prison nights. Probably why you blacked it out. If you'd let yourself feel it, hell, would you have even been able to make it through? You don't know about that, but you know there's no blacking it out now, that's for sure. You feel it, hard. She steps back and disappears from view, but you can still kind of see her reflection in the glass storm-door, and you stare at it like a mirage. When you left she was a five-year-old child. Now she's a little person, all brown hair, and jeans, and a little jacket, and such a serious expression on her face, like a little grown-up almost, but at the same time still Kayla, you can see that for sure, spunky and defiant with a hand on her hip like, who has time for games like ringing doorbells and running away. She closes the front door completely, and you want so badly to knock again, to see her again, but she's gone, and you're left realizing you're hiding in a bush with a bag of crystal on you staring at a little kid in a house in the dark. For once, better judgment wins out, and you start to go. First, though, you pull out the baggie that's burning a hole in your pocket, and with shaking hands you rip it open and let the contents fall on the ground. You stomp on them like you're doing an Indian war dance, and only once it's all buried do you walk away. You take the long way so you don't have to walk in front of their house, so none of them see you as you are now, the crazy, unemployed, ex-con, addict. Let them wait a little longer. Let them see you when you're the man you're going to be. * * * Feldner tells you he's got nothing for you, sorry, wished he did, but he doesn't, he's barely getting by as it is. This crushes you. It had seemed like a given to you all these months that he'd hire you on the spot, but standing there in the dank, greasy shop, you realize how stupid that was. You turned a long-shot into a sure thing, and now you're back at square one. You walk outside, and it drops thirty degrees, and it's quiet. You're not sure if you even said goodbye. You feel like burning, but you tossed your stash, and you don't even have enough money for a baggie now. You walk across the street to the Dollar Tree, and glide up and down the aisles. There's nobody else in the place, not even an employee it doesn't seem like. You grab a plastic gun out of a bin in front of the toy aisle, point it at the wall, and pull the trigger. You carry it to the other side of the store, and pop the orange tip off the end with a screwdriver. You walk over to one of the full length mirrors, and look at yourself, pulling your hat down and your hood up, tucking the gun into your belt. Looks real enough, hell, and you could be any one of a million skinny, down-on-their-luck, white dudes |
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ISSN 2150-6795 |