Tales of Ordinary Madness (3 page)

NUT WARD JUST EAST OF HOLLYWOOD

I thought I heard a knocking, looked at the clock – it was only one-thirty p.m., jesus christ, and I got into the old bathrobe (I always slept naked; pajamas seemed ridiculous to me) and opened one of the broken side-windows near the door.

“Yeah?” I asked. It was Mad Jimmy. “Were you asleep?” “Yes, were you?” “No, I was knocking.” “Come on in.” He'd ridden up on a bicycle. And had on a new Panama. “You like my new Panama? Don't you think I look handsome?” “No.”

He sat down on my couch and looked up into the full-length mirror behind my chair, tugging at his hat, this way and that. He had two brown paper bags. One contained the usual bottle of port wine. The other he emptied out on the coffee table – knives, forks, spoons; little dolls – followed by a metal bird (light blue with broken beak and chipped paint job) and other various forms of junk. He peddled the shit – all of it stolen – at the various hippie shops and head shops along Sunset and Hollywood Boulevards – that is, the poor man's area of these boulevards where I lived, where we all lived. I mean we lived near there – in broken-down courts, attics, garages or slept on the floors of temporary friends.

Meanwhile Mad Jimmy thought he was a painter but I thought his paintings were very bad and I told him so. He also said that my paintings were very bad. It was possible that we both were right.

But I mean Mad Jimmy was really fucked-up. His eyes, ears and nose were essentially negative. Some wax in canals of left and right ears; mucous membrane of nose slightly inflamed. Mad Jimmy knew exactly what to steal to sell to these shops. He was an excellent and also a petty thief. But his respiratory system: upper borders of left and right lungs – some rales and congestion. When he wasn't smoking a cigarette he was rolling a joint or sucking at his wine bottle. He had a Systolic 112 and Diastolic 78 giving pulse pressure of 34. He was good with the women but his hemoglobin was very low; being 73, no, 72 percent. Like the rest of us when he drank he didn't eat and he liked to drink.

Mad Jimmy just kept playing with the Panama in front of the mirror and making little awesome sounds. He smiled at himself. His teeth were essentially negative and the mucous membrane of his mouth and throat were inflamed.

Then he took a drink of wine from under that stupid Panama and that made me go get two beers for myself.

When I came back he said, “You changed my name from ‘Crazy Jimmy' to ‘Mad Jimmy.' I think you're right – ‘Mad Jimmy' is much better.”

“But you're really crazy, you know,” I told him.

“How'd you get those two big holes in your right arm?” Mad Jimmy asked. “Looks like all the meat is burned away. I can almost see the bone.”

“I was high and trying to read
Kangaroo
by D. H. Lawrence while I was in bed. My arm got tangled in the cord and brought the bed lamp down on my arm. Before I could rip the fucking thing off the light globe almost did me in. It was a hundred watt General Electric.”

“Did you see your doctor?”

“My doctor's pissed at me. I just always sit there, diagnose myself, recommend treatment and then walk out and pay his nurse. He bugs me. He likes to stand there and tell me about his days in the Nazi army. The French captured him, you know, and they put the captured Nazis in a boxcar on the way to the prison camp and the civilians of the towns threw gasoline and stinkbombs and used rubbers full of ant poison at the poor innocent fellows and I get so damned tired of his stories....”

“Look!” said Mad Jimmy, pointing to the coffee table. “Look at this silverware! Genuine antique!”

He handed me a spoon. “Now just
look
at that spoon!”

I just looked at the spoon.

“Look,” he said, “do you have to let your robe fall open like that?”

I threw the spoon on the table. “Whatsamatta, never seen a man's cock before?”

“It's your
balls!
they're so big and hairy! Awful!”

I left the robe open. I don't like to take orders.

There he sat once again twisting that Panama. His stupid Panama and his palpitation over McBurney's point (appendix). Inferior border of liver also tender to palpation. Spleen negative. Everything negative and palpitation. Even goddamned gall bladder palpitation.

“Look, can I use your phone?” Mad Jimmy asked.

“Local?”

“Yes, it's local.”

“Make
sure
it's local. I almost killed four guys the other night. Chased them all through town in my car. Finally, they pulled over. I parked behind them, cut the engine. I didn't realize they still had theirs running. When I got out, they pulled off.
Very
disappointing. By the time I got rolling, they were out of sight.”

“They made a long distance call on your phone?”

“No; I didn't know them. It was another matter.”

“This is a local call.”

“Go ahead then, mother.”

I finished my first beer and smashed the empty beerbottle into the big wooden box (coffin-sized) in the center of the room. Although the landlord gave me
two
garbage cans a week, the only way I could get everything to fit into the things was to break all the bottles. I was the only two garbage can man in the neighborhood, but then, they say, everybody's good at something.

Minor problem, though: I always liked to walk around barefoot and some of the glass from the broken bottles did flip out on the rug and I picked up chunks of stuff with my feet. This also pissed off my good doctor – slicing the stuff out every week while some dear old lady in the waiting room was dying of cancer – so I learned to incision the larger pieces out by myself and left the small ones in to do whatever they wanted to do. And of course, if you are not too stoned you feel the things going in and get them
then.
That's the nicest way. You pluck the thing out right
then
and the blood squirts out like jism and you feel just a little bit heroic – that is,
I
do.

Mad Jimmy looked oddly at the telephone in his hand. “She doesn't answer.”

“Hang up then, asshole!”

“The phone just keeps ringing.”

“And I'm going to tell you one last time to hang up!”

He hung up. “– A woman sat on my face last night. Twelve hours. I finally peeked out from under her cheeks and the sun was coming up. Man, I feel like my tongue is split in half, I feel like I got a forked tongue.”

“That would be a real break.”

“Yeah. I could do two pussies at once.”

“Sure. And Casanova would shit in his grave.”

He played with his Panama. Rectally, he showed some indication of hemorrhoid tissue. Rectal sphincter very tight. The Panama Kid. Prostate somewhat enlarged and tender on palpation.

Then the poor fuck jumped up and dialed the same number over again.

He played with his Panama. “It just keeps ringing,” he said.

There he sat, listening to the ringing, musculoskeletal system fucked-up – I mean, shitty posture (kyphosis). At 5L (lower spine) shows possible anomaly.

He played with his Panama. “It just keeps ringing.”

“Of course,” I said, “she's fucking somebody.”

“Of course. And it just keeps ringing.”

I walked over and hung the phone up.

Then I screamed out, “Oh shit!”

“Whatzamatta, man?”

“Glass! There's glass all over this fucking floor!”

I stood on one foot and picked the glass out of the other. It was a nice. one. It beat squeezing boils. The blood popped right out.

I walked over to my chair and took an old paint rag I used to wipe my brushes with and wrapped it around my bloody heel.

“That rag's dirty,” said Mad Jimmy.

“Your mind's dirty,” I told him.

“Please
close your robe!”

“There,” I said, “You
see
?”

“I know I see. That's why I ask you to close it.”

“All right. Shit.”

I very reluctantly threw the robe over my genitals. Anybody can expose their genitals at night. At two p.m. in the afternoon it took some balls.

“Listen,” said Mad Jimmy, “you know the other night you pissed on a police car in Westwood Village?”

“Where were they?”

“About fifty yards off, settling something or other.”

“Probably jerking each other off.”

“Maybe. But that wasn't enough for you. You had to go back and piss on the car a second time.”

Poor Jimmy. Really fucked-up. 1, 5 and 6C (neck) luxated.

There was also a weakness of the right inguinal ring.

And there he was complaining because I pissed on a police car.

“All right, Jimmy, you think you're hot shit, huh? With your little stolen bag of trinkets. Well, I'm gonna tell
you
something!”

“What?” he asked, looking into the mirror and twisting the Panama again. Then he sucked at his wine bottle.

“You're
wanted in court! You don't remember but you busted Mary's rib and then came back a couple of days later and hit her in the face.”

“I'm wanted in COURT? In COURT? Oh no, man, you don't really
mean
I'm wanted in COURT?”

I smashed my second beerbottle into the huge wooden box in the center of the room. “Yes, my boy, you are crazy as hell, you need help. And Mary has an assault-and-battery out against you ...”

“What's ‘battery' mean?”

I trotted off for two more beers (for myself), came back.

“Listen, asshole, you know what ‘battery' means! You haven't driven a bicycle
all
your life!”

I looked at him. His skin was somewhat dry with loss of natural elasticity. I also knew that he had a small growth on his left buttocks (center).

“But I don't
understand
this COURT thing! What the hell does it mean? Sure, we had a little argument. So I went to George's place in the desert. We drank port wine for thirty days. When I came back she SCREAMED at me! You should have
seen
her! I didn't mean any harm. All I did was kick her big ass and tits ...”

“She's frightened of you, Jimmy. You're a sick man. I've made a very close study of you. You know when I'm not jacking-off or stoned I'm reading books, all kinds of books. You are demented, my friend.”

“But we were all such good friends. She even wanted to fuck you but she wouldn't fuck you because she loved me. That's what she told me.”

“But, Jimmy, that was
then.
You have no idea how things change. Mary's a very fine person. She ...”

“God oh
mighty!
Close your robe! PLEASE!”

“Ooooops! Sorry.”

Poor Jimmy. His genital system – left vas deferens and somewhat on the right there appears to be some scar or adhesion tissue. Probably caused by some pathology in the past.

“I'll phone Anna,” he said, “Anna is Mary's best friend. She'll know. Why would Mary want to take me to court?”

“Phone then, mother.”

Jimmy adjusted his Panama in the mirror, then dialed.

“Anna. Jimmy. What? No, it can't be! Hank just told me. Listen, I don't play these games. What? No, I didn't bust her rib! I just kicked her big ass and titties. You mean she's
really
going to court? Well, I'm not going. I'm going to Jerome, Arizona. Got a place. Two hundred and twenty-five a month. I just made twelve thousand dollars on a big land deal ... Oh shut up, goddamn you, about that COURT thing! You know what I'm going to do right
now?
I'm going over to Mary's right NOW! I'll kiss her and chew her lips off! I'll eat every cunthair off her snatch! What do I care about court? I'll jam it up her ass, under armpits, between the tits, in her mouth, in her ...”

Jimmy looked at me. “She hung up.”

“Jimmy,” I said, “you should flush your ear canals. You show indications of symptoms of emphysema. Exercise and discontinue smoking. You need spinal therapy. For your weak inguinal ring there should be care in heavy lifting, straining at the stool ...”

“What is all this bullshit?”

“The growth on your buttocks appears to be verracae.”

“What's verracae?”

“A wart, mother.”

“You're a wart, mother.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Where'd you get the bicycle?”

“It belongs to Arthur. Arthur's holding a lot of shit. Let's go over to Arthur's and smoke some shit.”

“I don't like Arthur. He's such a delicate little snit. Some delicate little snits I like. Arthur's the other kind.”

“He's going to Mexico for six months next week.”

“Many of those delicate little snits are always going somewhere. What is it? A grant?”

“Yes, a grant. But he can't paint.”

“I know that. But it's his statues,” I said.

“I don't like his statues,” said the Panama Kid.

“Listen, Jimmy, I may not like Arthur but I have been very close to his statues.”

“But it's the same old stuff – the Greek shit – gals with big tits and asses in flowing robes. Guys wrestling, grabbing at each other's cocks and beards. What the hell is it?”

So, reader, let's forget Mad Jimmy for a minute and get into Arthur – which is no big problem – what I mean is also the way I write: I can jump around and you can come right along and it won't matter a bit, you'll see.

Well, the
secret
of Arthur was that he built them oversize. Very very impressive. All that fucking cement. His
smallest
-sized man or woman loomed over eight feet tall in sunlight or in moonlight or smog, depending upon when you arrived.

I tried to get into his place in the back there one night and here were all these cement people, all these big cement people just standing around outside there. Some of them were as high as twelve or fourteen feet. Huge breasts, pussies, cocks, balls, all about the place. I had just finished listening to
The Elixir of Love
by Donizetti. It didn't help. I still felt like some kind of pygmy in hell. I'm out there screaming, “Arthur, Arthur, help me!” But he was on the hash or something, or maybe I was. Anyhow, the god-damned fear builds.