The Heart of Revenge (22 page)

Daddy didn’t answer, only stared. Mi know he
couldn’t bear to go back to Vance’s grave. His face was falling
apart. The time passed and we never got to Leelia. Vance was and
should be dead.

“What now Daddy?” Daddy’s mind went fishing.
No response. Body froze. “Daddy!” He jerked and jumped back into
reality. “What now?”

“Come we go get a little sip and come
back.”

“Daddy? ... Now? What’s wrong with you?”

“Yeah man. Now. Mi stress out Pinks.” I
akimboed.

“Is joke you making. Don’t? Mi not going
inside no bar with you enuh. Try know that.”

“Alright. You can wait here so then.”

“What’s wrong with you and rum? You don't
learn from what did happen? It spoil your life and up to now you
still paying for it and you still won’t stop drinking. You need to
stop!”

Daddy’s mind went to a small town in China,
deep in thoughts as he stared through my forehead. His head slowly
went down and then he waltzed off, almost in a trance-like state or
doing some deep reflection. He headed in the direction of the
bar.

I looked shockingly at Aubrea’s phone.

This couldn’t be what I believed it was.
Aubrea wouldn’t even dream of doing this. Would she? She must be
frigging mad! No way.

by: David Lexings

Pinky can’t even begin to understand the heap
of stress mi going through. How mi mustn’t have a drink? Mi head
feel like it’s busting up to bloodseed. Mi can’t even gather myself
to go back to the hospital. Vance out to die and it feels like is
mi dying. Even though I don’t think Vance is ... well, at least mi
still not sure that Vance is my child, and the rumours make it even
worse. You know, the more mi think ’bout this, is the more mi
want... the more mi need a drink. Vodka. No ice. Maybe Pinky’s
right. I should try and slow down my drinking. Mi stop in my
tracks, turned ’round, looked at Pinky, and my body swelled then
deflated as I breathed out with a big round puff, dropped my
shoulders. Bloodseed yaah man, Hsst ... Mi need a strong drink. I
turned back around and walked down the scanty street, heading
straight to the bar. Vodka.

I stopped at the bar door. Right by the door
was a chalkboard, it was about waist high, it stood on two thick
wooden legs. The writing on the black of the chalkboard was in two
colors, white and pink. Written in pink, big and bold and in all
capital letters was, ‘WELCOME TO YOUR FAVORITE RUMSHOP’. I nodded
my head, yes. Underneath it, written in white was, ‘Rum on Special
Today and Everyday.’ I smiled, nodded, ahhh, my kind of place.

You know what, I still wasn’t so sure if I
should go into a bar now. You know. My mind was cloudy about the
decision, I thought twice before I set foot through the rumshop
door. Looked across the street at the police car parked up. Looked
up the road at Pinky again; she was pressing the buttons on
Aubrea’s phone as if she were searching it. Just one drink won’t
kill mi. That would help, Just a quick drink, one or maybe a little
more than one. Mi head mash up bad yaah man. Mi just going drink
till mi satisfied, blurt-naught man, drink till mi red. I felt
someone pounced into my back as they walked by me, it was a young
man, he was apologising,

“Sorry sir, sorry.”

What’s wrong with this brother man? Hsst, I
wondered, why young men wouldn’t wear their pants on their bom-bawt
waist? The youth was wearing a long sleeve beige shirt and his
beige jeans shorts was one shade darker than his shirt. His pants
was buckled almost exactly where his shirt tail ended, mid-way his
thigh. Lord these young men need Jesus. I shouted at him,

“Draw up your backside pants man! Look how
the sidewalk big and empty and you still come and bounce up behind
people, with your pants draw down to your knee. You is what?
Faggot?” He didn’t look back.

That couldn’t be me just awhile ago. It
wasn’t like me to lose my temper. See, I really needed to wash this
stress away in some white rum or something strong. I sucked in a
deep breath, shaking my head, walking into the bar and stepping out
the bright sun.

After one step into the dimly lit bar, I
stopped, looked around. Inside the bar looked like midnight to my
eyes freshly leaving out the blinding sun. I squinted my eyes to
see as inside slowly got brighter and brighter to my vision. Maybe
because it’s early Sunday evening why inside this bar so empty. I
looked to the left, towards the L-shape bar counter. Mi come here
already. Or so it seemed. Mi sense something kind of familiar, the
feeling, a vibe, the place, something.

But then again, when you drank in as many bar
as mi, they all seemed familiar, a strange umbilical-cord or
navel-string feeling to it, to me, it felt like ... like ... my
second home. Only without the quarrels and nag-naggings from my
ungrateful wretched wife. Ahh ... Bars ... What an escape. My
escape.

I strutted over eyeing the few rumheads that
sat close to the window directly ahead of me. Took a seat on a high
stool at the counter. The short bartender wearing green blouse with
splices in the back, tight green batty-rider shorts, green bangles
and green earrings turned around from the sink when she felt my
shadow on her. She was chopping a green bubble gum like cow chewing
their cods. I ordered a drink and smiled at how she was severely
green like a fifty dollar bundle of callaloo. Mi laugh out loud.
Big laugh.

Rawtid. It looked mi did something wrong, or
as if mi mustn’t smile. The short feisty green leprechaun looked me
up and down, up and down again, knitted her thinly shaved brows
that was very obviously over-brightened with eye-brow pencil, and
said,

“Is what sweet you? Which part the joke?”

I made my order.

“Yeah, aahm,” but the look mi go look on her
again, her mouth chopping away, tongue as big as a cow’s, and
swirling the little piece of green bubble gum round and round in
her mouth, made me chuckled. Mi skin my teeth all the way through
my order “A drink ... tehehe ... of Vodka ..tehe ...No ice.”

I lifted my other foot up an rested it on the
cross bar of the stool as I begun to relax, gave it a slight
swindle, facing the bar head on. The only place that seemed to
relieve my stress. Bars. We go way back don’t we? Ahh, yes, we have
a history. The bartender tugged at the big knot of her blouse that
she tied to her side. A quick tug just to keep the knot tight and
in place, right above her belly, making sure she expose her soft
porridgy belly along with a few stretch marks mostly to the
side.

She poured me a drink quite professionally.
I, in return, gwapped it down professionally, one drink, shook the
glass, drained it, slammed the glass down on the counter. I Clamped
my teeth together, the skin of my face pushing down from my
forehead and pushing up from my chin to form all the folding in the
middle of my face, widening my nose. The harsh vodka flamed in my
throat. I cringed. Shut my eyes, hung my head down, shaking my head
side to side as the fire of the vodka spreads in my stomach and
burns inside my belly, warm, hot,

“Awsh!” I grunted through tightly gritted
teeth, “A next one baby-love.”

A familiar feeling. I sat here before, said
those words a thousand times before. Was it this very same place?
Same face? Did I dream this before? Lived it before? The
familiarity of it was so close I could touch it, grab it, squeeze
it. Deja-vu? I searched my memory but all that was flashing in my
head were pictures, scenes, still shots of my most haunting memory
twenty-one years ago. It was me and Pinky. Pinky was only three
year old and underfed.

I drew the glass closer to me along the
wooden counter. Dazed down at the clear vodka in my glass, so pure,
so smooth, so calming. The light dancing ripples spreading in small
circles and running from the centre to edge of the glass. A peace
formed within me. I took a relaxed breath. Took another deep one
and my body swelled as I inhaled deep. I drifted far in thoughts,
reflecting on memories. Cold harsh memories. That night in the
kitchen. It was dark, and Aubrea’s voice was in the background. I
felt like choking the bitch to death.

by: Pinky

Booming loud and bass kicking. The blaring
music got louder and closer, Kartel’s song ‘Back to Reality’
blasting out the speakers. I turned around on the sidewalk, faced
the road in curiosity, eyes searching to see which vehicle was
playing his new song that he did from in prison, the tune shot. I
saw a white extra-large Avalanche van. Mi jiggle mi bottom to the
rhythm, not even realising it.

Mi vision concentrated deeper in the vehicle
to see who was the driver. His little round head was the size of a
sea-shore pebble, bopping terribly offbeat to the music, a big
spliff hanging from the side of his mouth that could be mistaken
for a white ice-cream cone with a big orange fire at the head. Mi
laugh to myself, thinking, watch the little mawga stickman in that
rhinosaurus van. I laughed harder when I saw how he was trying to
look cool but looked so damn funny, bopping his head completely
offbeat. Watch the idiot. Watch him. Mi bust out laughing when the
spliff dropped out his mouth and he was hurriedly brushing out the
fire from his crotch. Damn fool. Hsst.

The old lady’s voice was trying to get
someone’s attention,

“Hey! Hey!” Flagging her hand through the
counter trying to get Daddy’s attention. Daddy kept walking down to
the bar. She turned her head to me and spoke.

“Sweetie, shout the brown man for mi.”

“Is what?”

“Him gone leave him change. Him soon come
back?”

“That’s cool man Mama. Just give mi a pack of
cigarette, Matterhorn, and a pack of Rizzla with the change. And
you can give me some icy mints if any jinglings leave.”

Mi really want know why Aubrea doing this.
Why this morning she’d be calling my man? But hold on there, if
this last dial time saying 8:38 a.m. that mean to say, is just
before Leelia wedding start. Something just don't look good about
this call here. I didn't even know Aubrea had mi man number much
less to call him in early tea time hours. Mi don't trust a bone in
Aubrea; that’s why mi searching through her whole damn phone. Mi
need to get down to the bottom of this today. Mi going into her
messages to see if mi see anything suspicious, mi have to find out
what’s up between them.

I pressed, ‘OK’ to open her inbox messages.
So said, so done. The third message on top, that was staring me in
the face, was from my man. The second message on top was from my
man. The last message on top, him too. Kiss mi clitoris! What they
could be texting one another so in the early morning. I wasn’t
laughing ’bout the situation. I was fuming, not over Finaral but
over my mother’s betraying me. Mi dying to find out what the
messages say, because mi sure is must some snake-into-grass,
schmoozing thing them up to. Mi select ‘Open’ on the last
message.

by: David Lexings

That night, my eyes were fixed on the black
scandal-bag on the floor at the side of our pop-down cupboard. The
scandal bag was being used as our garbage bag. Mi see a small
frisky rumbling of the bag, heard the crisp dry sound of scavenging
rats as they scuttled and rummaged through spoilts and scrags of
garbage. A roach scurried to the edge of the cupboard, then another
crawled to the edge behind the first roach. Then there was a third
roach. A small teenage one. My blood crawled internally. I frigging
hate roaches. My kitchen.

The biggest cockroach of the three was at the
front with its long feelers probing for crumbs of food, it widened
its wings in flight mode, and the hair on my skin turned yellow,
thinking about him flying about and pitching on me. Or even just
his wings batting against my face. I even hated the dry buzzing
sound that their wings made flying through the air. These small
insects horrify me. I wanted to do what all humans want to do when
they are scared of anything, any insect, any unknown. I wanted to
destroy it. Kill this roach before it took flight.

To my eyes, I could almost see through their
mahogany brown wings. It looked like more than one pair
intertwining with each other. My skin crawled. It didn’t fly but
just anticipating it pitching on my hand, or neck, or face with its
sharp nasty legs is the most blood curdling feeling. I hated
roaches. What had my life gone to? Eighteen and things were getting
worse and worse and hell-bottom. Ever since Micheal Douglas started
his landscaping company and his workers using lawn-mowers, which I
couldn’t afford to buy, me and my little cutlass got less and
lesser lawns to service. The brute drove me straight out of
business. Back then he was the big cheese and he still was ontop. I
used to get at least twenty jobs per week, now it was more like
three per week maximum or so. Aubrea’s ranting voice nagged me in
the background,

“Mi not use to this!”

The leptospirosis rat dashed out the scandal
bag at the speed of a snake’s bite. Another one followed, a bit
slower, fatter, longer, bigger, more disgusting. The stench from
the sour garbage was trapped inside by the closed windows and doors
of the kitchen, rottening the inside tunnel of my nose. I knew
Aubrea had a nose-hole too and that she smelt it, and she knew the
stinking garbage should have been taken outside. But as usual,
there it remained until I came off the road in the evenings and
took it out. Her voice sounded even more annoying as I thought
about what she did all day - nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even
the dishes. Her voice was driving me up the frigging wall in the
background. Please shut up. I was in no haste to take a breath in
my smelly kitchen. My life.