The Vocabulary of Guns

71.

I’m too cool for school. Or rather, I’m too cool to ask Terry for ten bucks. Assassins don’t do that, do they? Hell no. They roll large with fat wads of cash and diamond rings big as the Ritz. My pride is of similar dimensions, so instead of being humble and smart, I simply follow Terry’s directions and drive him back home. We say very little. Both of us seem to be more or less satisfied with the events of the morning. We do more before 8 a.m. than most people do all day, indeed. Terry asks me if I’m going to tell JW what we’ve done and I say, Yeah, I guess so. It might make her sleep easier. Cool, he says, and that’s it, we’re at his front door, he shakes my hand like a black man to another black man, then takes his gas can and walks inside his house. Okay, cool. Now I and this Honda and less than a half tank of gas have to get to Washington, Louisiana. My uncle will fill up my car and give me twenty bucks to boot. My aunt will have iced tea in a discolored plastic pitcher, or cold Fanta red in scratchy glass bottles. Maybe some leftover chicken dinner because after all it is Sunday, a day of rest, of leisure, a day to measure your worth and deeds against the words of Him. What would Jesus have done? Easy. He would have simply forgiven them, forgiven Himself and forgiven her. For them, He would have a place in His heart for the contamination of their immortal soul. He would know that those two boys were most probably plundered themselves. Behind almost every rapist is a rape victim. And for Himself, He would have had forgiveness, knowing that there was no way He could have done anything to prevent anything. For her, for JW, He would have had forgiveness for her need to tell it, to speak her secret which in her words, ‘she had to tell someone.’ He would know how powerful that urge is to tell your story. He would understand because He knew how They had altered the story of Himself. How They had used it for Their own desires, for pleasure within this mortal coil.

But I am not Him. I cannot do yet what He has done. I am weak and human and deadly with desires. And my desires have been met. I have succeeded in destroying that image that she put in my mind. I don’t imagine them tearing into her anymore, her mask of pain and shame. No sirree, Bob. Now I see Eric, broken armed and smashed of mug, staggering against a bloody, rusty fence. And when I tire of that image, I see Jamaal, blubbering in front of his mother, shit running in streams down his legs. I see that instead of seeing her, and I am happy with that and I know that He will forgive me for the evil grin dancing across my face as Houston recedes behind me. And now is the day reversed, the flat wet ricey landscape and the double Stuckey’s and the great city of Beaumont with its single tall building, a lonely and abandoned missile silo of a hotel and Orange, Texas with its row of factories that have Japanned the landscape, indeed altered it into moonscape, the black and cinder-colored trees, the lifeless lawns of glassy grass, and then the Sabine is on the horizon, you and the boaters hauling boats and the hunters in their camouflaged trucks and their three-wheelers lashed to the back and the big rigs hauling ass, cutting time, high on Bennies and homemade porn and the kids wave and the teenaged girls show their braces and mama nods and father waves and you are all right and the world is all right and if only the goddamn Saints would win a ballgame today this Sunday would be one for the all timers to all-time about. And you are back in Louisiana now and racing the descending gas gauge and sweating toothpicks and no food in the belly, nothing but coffee and OJ and stomach acid and adrenaline and now, oh now, did the gas gauge just dip again? Shit a mile. So get off the Interstate and take the back roads, there’s a back way to Washington if you can just remember it. But you can’t and you don’t and then you’re turned around, you’ve gone too far north and too far west and at last you see a sign for a place you recognize, Krotz Springs, you know it well, your aunt whom you never met died on the bridge at Krotz Springs, the old one that crosses the Atchafalaya River. And once when you were a boy you stopped in Krotz Springs and you and your brother and your father and stepmother searched the grass at the foot of the bridge for one of the markers that the state hammers in the ground when somebody dies in an automobile crash on state property. But no one could find any at all and your father said, That must be a mistake. Surely dozens of people have been killed on this bridge. But still, it was what it was and you left, you were heading to Washington that time like every time, like this time too, going home to your father’s hometown where the stories all began, where the earth was turned and the first seeds were planted by Mrs. Courvillion and the Junkman and Foot and a hundred thousand lonely walks down the stony hard streets, waiting for youth to dissipate and manhood to arrive. I’m there, baby boy. I’m there mofo. I’m there with a bullet and I am a number one stunner. Look out for me because I’m riding high and fast and in a few minutes, well another hour I’ll be darkening the doorways of my Washington home, walking down Doucette Street and sipping sweet tea.

The car runs out of gas about ten minutes later. As I get out and start to walk, it begins to rain. And now the hallucinations must begin. What was dream will become nightmare. Just as the hero thinks all is well, the day is saved, he has safely reached an Ithaca of the mind, he finds himself once more compelled to get out in the weather and hunker down with his jacket over his head, disguised perhaps, and trudge through the rain in the general direction of his fellow man. He’ll put a thumb out, ridiculous of course, no one in their right mind picks up hitchhikers these days, and no one in their right mind expects to get a ride. Therefore when the beat to shit Nova slows and then pulls over on the shoulder going the other way and the driver rolls down the window of the dingy white car and says, “Where you going?” you think it’s some kind of red neck joke. But you answer, say “Krotz Springs. I’m outta gas,” and he says something to the guy in the passenger seat and then the driver says, “Hop in, we’ll give you a ride,” and you can’t believe it, saved, saved again, another messiah, or in this case two, to help an unlucky voyager on his last voyage home. So you run across the highway and climb in the backseat behind the passenger and you sink into the sweaty dank filthiness of their car and you say to yourself, Thank God. I thought I’d have to walk forever.

And so I sit back and watch the driver, a Fatboy in overalls, no undershirt, and the Skinny Dude, tattooed, scarred, half a front tooth missing, I watch them argue about the radio as we turn around and head towards Krotz Springs.

“Put on some rock,” says the Fatboy as the Skinny Dude punches buttons on the radio. “Find some Zeppelin.”

“Man, Zeppelin sucks,” says the Skinny Dude. “I’m tired of that old ass shit.”

Fatboy takes one hand off the steering wheel and punches the Skinny Dude hard in the arm. “Never say that in my car,” says Fatboy. “No, fuck that. Never say that around me ever. I should kill you for even thinking that shit.”

The Skinny Dude rubs his shoulder. “Thanks for fucking my arm up. Now it's dead.”

“Good,” says the Fatboy. “You should be dead.” He looks at me in the rearview mirror and says, “You like Zeppelin, right?”

“Love them. Best band ever.”

He nods and purses his lips. “It sucks you ran out of gas.”

“Yeah. I’m really screwed. I lost my wallet at a Stuckey’s in Texas.”

“Whoa,” says the Skinny Dude. “You are screwed.”

“Yeah. I’m gonna have to call my uncle collect to come save my stupid ass.”

“Well,” says Fatboy. “We got a gas can.”

“Sure,” says the Skinny Dude. “And we can give you a few dollars for gas.”

“Really? That would be great man. I just need enough to get me to Washington. I can mail you the money later if you want.”

“Sure man,” says Fatboy. “We’ll work something out.” He finds some AC/DC playing. Hells Bells. “Perfect,” says the Fatboy as the opening bells chimes and the grind of Angus Young’s guitar begin to short circuit the mind. And it’s all perfect, indeed. I’m rolling thunder, falling rain. I’m coming on like a hurricane. And for a few perfect moments you three are one, you’re of one mind and one dimension and the music is loud and the speakers are just crappy enough to lend that soupcon of gravel and the window won’t roll up and rain flies in through the gap and lands on the seat and it’s good, it’s like flying in a biplane over the sea, you and them, all of you tapping something and humming a little and Hells Bells indeed, Hells Bells indeed. And then Krotz Springs appears, the bridge that killed your aunty paralleled by a brand new bridge or at least a much newer bridge. And the contrast in styles could hardly be more apparent. The old one only travels east now, and was built by Huey Long. It is all cast iron and rust and will last a thousand years. The newer bridge goes east and west and seems to be a parabola held by the hand of God. Below is a hundred and fifty foot drop to the muddy and placid waters of the Atchafalaya. And each of these bridges is a larger thing than itself. The old is the past, the way things used to be. Our old family and our old family sins. And the new bridge is the future, what I am and what I can achieve. I will take it again someday, to the west and the great beyond. To California if I am lucky and to the love that will save my soul.

But not today. Today I’m filling up a can with a dollar’s worth of gas, nearly the whole plastic gallon can, identical to Terry’s, is full of sloshing, sweet smelling petro. And there’s a nice view of a blonde filling up her yellow Mustang ragtop. She’s got pretty legs and a pretty smile which she shares with me and Hells Bells the world is looking right as rain. And the rain has stopped. And the Fatboy and the Skinny Dude are not holding up the cashier like I imagined they would, no, they exit the store with beer, stopping to hold the door for the blonde who is exiting too. And they get in the car and offer me a beer. Why not? And the Fatboy starts the Nova and turns on the radio and he is rewarded with Zeppelin, the opening franticness of Immigrant Song. And he backs the car up and drums on the steering wheel and instead of heading back the way we’ve come, back to my car, we’re following the yellow Mustang as it pulls out of the gas station and onto the highway and onto the old bridge, passing over the very spot where my aunt passed from this place. And I say, “What are we doing?”

And Fatboy says, “We’re following that chick.”

“I can see that. Why?”

“That’s a good question,” says Fatboy. “Why? Why are we following that hot chick?” He looks at the Skinny Dude. “Tell the man.”

The Skinny Dude, who’s been adjusting something in his crotch, looks over his shoulder at me and says, “We’re following that chick ‘cause we’re gonna fuck her up.”

“What?”

“We’re gonna fuck her up man. Me and my boy. You can fuck her too.”

“Wait, do you guys know her?”

“Ha, ha. Hell no, brother, we don’t know her. But look at her man. She’s hot. You know she wants it.”

Fatboy speeds up, closing to within two car lengths of the ragtop. The blonde exits the bridge onto river road, a long thread of asphalt fringed on one side by swamp and the other side by the emerald green levee.

“Perfect,” says Fatboy. “Fuckin’ perfect. There’s’ nothing out here. This is gonna be awesome.”

He speeds up, getting closer to the Mustang.

“Are you gonna do like last time?” says the Skinny Dude.

“Maybe,” says Fatboy. “Whatever it takes to get her to stop. And when she stops, that’s her ass.”

“Hey,” says the Skinny Dude. “Do you want me to say what I said to that last bitch?”

“Sure,” says Fatboy. “That’d be cool.” He cranks the music louder. Over the crash of guitars the Skinny Dude looks at me and says, “Last time we wrecked this bitch, I told her ‘If my buddy her thinks your ass is tight enough, he’ll let you live. And if I like how you suck my-”

“Dude, pull over.”

“What?”

“Dude, pull the fuck over. I am not doing this. Pull over right now and let me the fuck out of this car.”

Fatboy turns down the music and says, “What?”

“He doesn’t want to do it,” says the Skinny Dude.

Fatboy looks at me in the rearview mirror. “Aw come one man. Do it with us. We bought your gas and we’ll give you a ride back to your car. This will repay us. Besides man, three dudes always makes it easier. Sometimes with two the bitches get all messed up.”

“Yeah they do,” says the Skinny Dude. “They sure do.”

“Dude, I am not joking pull over and let me out of this car. You guys are fucking sick. I am not doing this.”

“Yeah you are,” says the Skinny Dude, turning in his seat to point a little automatic at me. It’s a Titan .25, the first gun my father bought for my stepmother. She didn’t like it. Too many moving parts. For a while it was kind of mine and from time to time I was allowed to empty a clip or two into the old muscle car on Bullard Road. My father traded it in for a bigger, more lethal weapon. This one however is lethal enough at point-blank range into the face. And I see that the orange sights are chipped and the Skinny’s Dude’s teeth are chipped the same way and above the weapon are his red-veined eyeballs, the irises the color of summer skies, dancing in their orbits, having the time of their lives. And the Skinny Dude says, “You’re doing this with us or I’ll waste your ass right now.”

“Yeah you will,” says Fatboy.

“Yeah I will,” says the Skinny Dude. “I sure will.”

And now like all good ninjas, you must take four deep breaths. One. Clear your mind of imperfect thoughts. Two. Imagine yourself as fluid and all powerful as the very waters. Three. Erase doubt. Four. Take action. And when the fourth breath leaves my lungs, I sweep my hand across my face taking the gun with it. And it goes off, shattering the driver’s glass. And the car swerves off the road, into a ditch, we are launched into the air with the motor gunning like a horse in labor and thus propelled we meet a thick-trunked cypress tree, it’s Man versus Nature, and Nature triumphs. All fly forward. Fatboy goes face-first into the steering wheel. The Skinny Dude goes back-first into the unforgiving dashboard, then collapses to the floorboards. I smash into the back of the bench seat, my nose bloodies, the gun improbably in my hand. Meanwhile, Immigrant Song continues to play. After a moment, I push Fatboy’s body forward in the seat and emerge from the vehicle. Car crash. There’s no feeling like it. I’m alive. I’m bloody and limping and my head feels thick as a brick but I am alive. I look back at the smoking, ticking Nova. Hammer of the Gods. No telling whether those two misguided souls are still kicking and I’m not sticking around to find out. I toss the pistol in a culvert with a flash and a bang and then head back for the bridge. Soon I am walking up the off ramp. Everything I’m doing is foolhardy and illegal but I don’t care anymore. I am bloody but I am unbowed. I’ll walk across this bridge to my sanctuary. I have done it. I am a man now. A man at last. I let out one long and loud howl, matched perfectly in amplitude by a passing 18 wheeler. Yow!