Ham On Rye - Charles Bukowski [36]
Arnie Whitechapel threw down his wrench and walked up to Mr. Farnsworth. Arnie had a big grin on his face. “Hey, Pop, what the fuck?”
“Get back to your engine, Whitechapel!”
“Ah, come on, Pop, what the shit!”
Arnie was a couple of years older than the rest of us. He had spent a few years in some boys’ correctional school. But even though he was older than we were, he was smaller. He had very black hair slicked back with vaseline. He would stand in front of the mirror in the men’s crapper squeezing his pimples. He talked dirty to the girls and carried Sheik rubbers in his pockets.
“I got a good one for you, Pop!”
“Yeah? Get back to your engine, Whitechapel.”
“It’s a good one, Pop.”
We stood there and watched as Arnie began to tell Pop a dirty joke. Their heads were close together. Then the joke was over. Pop began laughing. That big body was doubled over, he was holding his gut. “Holy shit! Oh my god, holy shit!” he laughed. Then he stopped. “O.K., Arnie, back to your machine!”
“No, wait, Pop, I got another one!”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, listen…”
We all left our machines and walked over. We circled them, listening as Arnie told the next joke. When it was over Pop doubled up. “Holy shit, oh lord, holy shit!”
“Then there’s another one, Pop. This guy is driving his car in the desert. He notices this guy jumping along the road. He’s naked and his hands and feet are tied with rope. The guy stops his car and asks the guy, ‘Hey, buddy, what’s the matter?’ And the guy tells him, ‘Well, I was driving along and I saw this bastard hitch-hiking so I stopped and the son-of-a-bitch pulls a gun on me, takes my clothes away and then ties me up. Then the dirty son-of-a-bitch reams me in the ass!’ ‘Oh yeah?’ says the guy getting out of his car. ‘Yeah, that’s what that dirty son-of-a-bitch did!’ says the man. ‘Well,’ says the guy unzipping his fly, ‘I guess this just isn’t your lucky day!’”
Pop began laughing, he doubled over. “Oh, no! Oh, NO! OH…HOLY…SHIT, CHRIST…HOLY SHIT…!”
He finally stopped.
“God damn,” he said quietly, “oh my lord…”
“How about a movie, Pop?”
“Oh well, all right.”
Somebody closed the back door and Pop pulled out a dirty white screen. He started the projector. It was a lousy movie but it beat working on those engines. The gas was ignited by the spark plugs and the explosion hit the cylinder head and the head was thrust down and that turned the crankshaft and the valves opened and closed and the cylinder heads kept going up and down and the crankshaft turned some more. Not very interesting, but it was cool in there and you could lean back in your chair and think about what you wanted to think about. You didn’t have to bust your knuckles on dumb steel.
We never did get those engines taken apart let alone put back together again and I don’t know how many times we saw that same movie. Whitechapel’s jokes kept coming and we all laughed our heads off even though most of the jokes were pretty terrible, except to Pop Farnsworth who kept doubling over and laughing, “Holy shit! Oh, no! Oh, no, no, no!”
He was an O.K. guy. We all liked him.
24
Our English teacher, Miss Gredis, was the absolute best. She was a blonde with a long sharp nose. Her nose wasn’t much good but you didn’t notice it when you looked at the rest of her. She wore tight dresses and low v-necks, black high-heeled shoes and silk stockings. She was snake-like with long beautiful legs. She only sat behind her desk when she took roll call. She kept one desk vacant at the