Authors: Craig Spivek
“Who?”
“Bridgemont Salon, on Canon Drive a long time
ago. I think he was engaged to someone at the time.”
“Oh, my God,” she whispered.
“He was an asshole too.” I announced.
“I mean, I love him, he’s my cousin, total womanizer.”
“Is this what this is all about?
Your cousin?”
“What? No! You …” I was about to say
idiot, but I didn’t want to be like all the rest. “You make horrible
choices, Carin. And now my face is mangled because of it.”
“That’s
not my fault.”
“You
let Gino in. And I shouldn’t even be here, Carin.”
“We
were hungry.”
“There’s food in the fridge.” My nose
started to pinch. My eyes were foggy. “Maybe you felt guilty or
something, I don’t know. It needs to stop.”
“Look, honey, I appreciate the concern.”
“Don’t ‘honey’ me, Carin. You need to grow
up.” I stopped for a moment. “We both do. Look at me, I’m in my
thirties and I still sleep on couches and sling pizzas. We got work to
do.”
It has been said the reason shamans receive
visions is because whatever it is they are trying to heal in others they are
trying to heal in themselves. My life was a patchwork of shitty jobs,
lost causes and mania. I was sent here to help Carin, but more important,
I was here to get help
from
Carin.
The TV, the
visions, the voices, all of it put in my path because I needed it to be there.
Carin had retreated back to her loveseat as
a blankness
came over her. She brought a hand up to
her forehead and stared off. She was on her beach, in her happy place.
Silent.
I stood up. I grabbed the peas and
put it to my nose. “I’m sorry, Carin, I’m in pain. I will help you
pry away from Gino and Dickie and all of the Ginos and Dickies in the world.
They are evil and you allow evil into your home and expect it not to be
evil. I’m right and I don’t care if you think I’m wrong.”
“Get
out,” she whispered.
“No.”
She stared at me. She looked over at the
green packet Geraldo had left. The green packet that reminded her how
much of a thieving asshole her now ex-husband was. She needed a drink.
A series of drinks.
“Did Geraldo put you up to this?”
“No, but I’d do anything he told me to do.” I
looked over at the packet. I had seen it the night before. I
couldn’t figure out exactly what it was or why it was there until Gino hit me
in the face. “And I’m glad to see he tipped you off.”
“You knew?”
“We all know, Carin. WAKE UP! He’s robbing
you blind. “
“Why didn’t any of you say something?”
“Because Dickie’s a monster. He said he
would fire anyone on the spot if it got out. Geraldo had been talking
about tipping you off. I’m glad to see he did it. Wish I had those
kind
of balls. I guess I’m here to help you with other
stuff, Carin. I don’t know why. I just am. I’m just crazy.
And so here I am.”
“You’re not crazy.”
“No trust me. There’s some weird shit
goin’ on up here.” I pointed to my head. “I can’t rightly explain
it.
Maybe just my subconscious telling me to get a job.
But I KNOW for fact that I am NOT an
asshole.” I looked over at her. She hadn’t blinked once. “Yet
I stand before you, so that tells me I must be here to help you in some way.
And now I know exactly what I’m gonna do.” I walked to the kitchen.
“It is so refreshing to have a plan.” For a second Carin scanned the room
in search of the phone. She thought about calling the cops.
“There’s no batteries in the phone, Carin. You can use mine if you
want to call the police. But then I get to tell them all about the
asshole in his underwear who assaulted me while I was innocently delivering you
a pizza.” She’d dealt with stalkers before. But this one didn’t
quite fit the mold. She leaned back into the couch. Too tired to move.
I grabbed a box of Hefty garbage can liners and
pulled one out. I began to throw away all the crap that had piled up.
It had been lying around everywhere and anywhere. I filled up one
bag, then another. The recyclers would make a fortune off this place.
Pizza boxes, Chinese food containers, napkins, condom
wrappers.
All of it finally being removed.
Then I made the big move. The move that I knew would wake her up.
This was when it would get fun for me. I grabbed a large discarded
cardboard box. Dumped out the crap that was in it and began to gather up the
alcohol. I started in the kitchen grabbing up half-empty bottles of Jameson,
Absolut, Bacardi 151, some type of cheap off-brand Brandy, Drambuie, Kahlua,
wherever they were lying. I made a tour of the entire
apartment
grabbing
bottle after bottle in room after room. Wine in the
bedroom, scotch in the study.
A left-behind six-pack of an
off-brand beer with one beer missing.
It was probably Gino’s.
That broke Carin out of her thousand-yard-stare to nowhere. She
looked over at me. “What are you doing?
“Being an asshole, Carin. Being the
asshole you need me to be.” I walked back to the kitchen sink. Moved the
faucet out of the way and began dumping bottle after bottle’s contents first
into the sink, then into a newly appropriated garbage liner I had attached to a
knob of one of her cabinets. The empty vessels started to shatter in the
bag as I threw them down into their destined abyss.
Carin came up behind me and tried to halt my
progress. Her voice was calm at first but deteriorated into screams quite
quickly. “STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT!!!
”,
she
roared, fighting with me from behind while both of us were poised over the
sink. She grabbed at my wrists and tried to wrestle bottles away from me. “DEAR
GOD STOP IT
STOP
IT!!” She started to cry.
“HOW DARE YOU!” She began to melt. I pushed her back and she landed
flat against the refrigerator. Hysterical, crying, she began to slide
down to the floor where she lay crumpled.
Her head in
her hands.
Powerless to resist.
Exhausted, hungover, thieved, taken for granted and left for dead.
I continued on with the dumping. She was crying, sobbing, then finally
subsiding into a dead calm. She was a little girl whose dad drank too
much and never paid any attention to her. “You’re such an asshole,” she
whispered through her tears. I could hear her lungs grabbing at oxygen as
the crying began to make her hyperventilate.
“Yes I am.”
PUDGIE MAKES A CALL
The
phone rang and rang. Rick finally picked up. “Hello?”
“Hey, Rick, it’s me.” Slight pause. “So, what
are you up to?” Pudgie had a nice
sing-song
tone to
his disposition.
A long pause from Rick.
“You’re
up early, Pudgie.”
A long pause.
“Did you do this
Pudge?”
“Do
what?”
“Don’t
play Pudge, not with this.”
“I can help.”
offered
Pudgie.
“That right?” Rick’s tone sounded scary.
“Are the police involved yet?”
“They’re about to be.”
“Look, first, don’t get mad, I have what
you’re looking for, so don’t get mad. I think there’s just been a
whole…uh…misunderstanding.”
“YOU SNATCHED MY KID!”
“No. Rick. It wasn’t me.”
“WHERE’S MY SON
?!!
”
“Take it easy, Rick, baby Kevin is fine.”
Pudgie sounded extra soothing. Pudgie was good at this sort of thing.
He was learning all sorts of new things about himself. “Apparently,
Lisa had a bit of a freak-out and felt safer leaving, but she didn’t want to
leave the kid so she took your kid with her, to freak out safely… That’s all.
But it’s all groovy now, okay?
“What are you talking about?”
“She was upset.”
“Where are you?”
“She
just had to get out of there. She kinda thought you and Randi wanted to
have a threesome with her or something.” It was silent on the end other
end. “Hello?”
“What kind of horseshit is this, Pudge?
Randi and I haven’t had a threesome in weeks!! Randi is a mess.
Where are you? GIVE ME BACK MY KID!”
“Uh, no problem, we’re in Victorville,
I’ll tell you how to get here,
who
did you have a
threesome with?”
“The babysitter. Victorville? Why
are you in Victorville? Just come back here!”
“It’s probably best if you come here, my
car just died, and I don’t want Lisa driving anytime soon. Rick, she’s not
well, I think she may need an institution or something.”
“Dear God.”
“Look, you have my word, everything’s good,
the baby is fine. She called me two hours ago in tears. I had no
idea what was going on until I pulled up here. As soon as I saw I called
you, buddy. Okay, Rick?” Long Pause. “Rick?”
“How’d your meeting go?”
“What meeting?”
“Weren’t you supposed to have some
meeting with some big shot agent friend of Lisa’s?”
“No, what? It… wasn’t a meeting…uh…”
Pudgie felt thrown, but adjusted. “
uh
...it
went great, Rick. Come out and I’ll tell you some good news.”
“Don’t move, you’re where?”
“Victorville, 10 east, Perkos coffeeshop off the
interstate, can’t miss it.”
“We’re leaving right now.” Rick hung up.
Pudgie paused. One had to be smart when
dealing with Rick. He went over his checklist. The exchange should go
smooth then he would get Lisa out of there. He thought about sending her
off alone. He’d hold onto the baby and get a ride with Rick. It
would insure Lisa’s safety but put
his own
at risk.
No, Pudgie had to play it cool. This was tricky. As Pudgie walked
back to Lisa’s car he started to do the math. He placed the cell phone
back in his pocket as his sandals clicked against the dirt and the rocks, and
knocked on Lisa’s dirty window. Lisa stared up at him for a second and
then unlocked the doors. Pudgie sat in the passenger seat and looked back
at the baby. There seemed to be a glow coming off of the crib.
“Boy, he sure is quiet.”
“He’s beautiful
.
”
whispered Lisa. Pudgie held her hand. In an instant he realized he would
love to start a family with Lisa. He loved her. He’d never seen
this kind of emotion displayed out of her.
It showed such vulnerability, and passion. He wanted more.
He hadn’t realized how guarded she was. This was a whole new side
to her. He was struck. But at the same time he was heartbroken,
because he knew what he was about to do would not only save her from jail, but
it would take her from him forever.
SHOES
I
plopped them down right in front of her. She was curled up against the
cabinets underneath the sink. Some type of dried red substance had
encrusted on the door and edge behind her, framing her perfectly. Her
head was in her hands. I stared at her. She looked up finally. Her
eyes ran with several days worth of old makeup. “Put these on.” I
kept staring. No way in hell was I backing down. My face had become
one huge, swollen lump, black and blue. I looked like a boxer, like I had
just gone ten rounds the night before and now I was ready to take it out on
her. I hovered. I didn’t move. She stared up at me
blankly. Vacant. “Let’s go.” She stared at the ratty
tennis shoes.