Six Bad Things_ A Novel - Charlie Huston [77]
PART THREE
DECEMBER 14–17, 2003
Still Two Regular Season Games Remaining
T was a quiet kid in junior high, one of the Dungeons and Dragons crowd that kept their heads down, trying to draw as little attention as possible. In the summer following eighth grade, his mom died, eaten from the inside by stomach cancer. He showed up the first day of freshman year with a brand new mohawk, safety pins in his ears, and a Clash shirt with the sleeves ripped off. The only punk in a school full of jocks, cowboys, and lowriders, he spent the next couple months getting gang-tackled and having his face stuffed in a toilet every time he turned a corner. Until he bit off Sean Baylor’s earlobe. After that, everybody decided the risks of beating on the school freak outweighed the pleasures.
The only group that would have anything to do with him were the burnouts, and that was only after he started selling off his mother’s leftover pain medication. Then Wade’s mom died, and he and T started hanging out. By the time I came around, T was a regular in stoner circles. He was the guy that could get his hands on good weed, acid, speed, mushrooms, and coke from time to time. But that didn’t make him any less freaky.
Going to T’s house to score an eighth was a roll of the dice. He might be zonked in front of his Apple II playing Zork, or he might be in the backyard, shirtless and frenzied, the Dead Kennedys screaming from the house stereo, bench-pressing a board with cinder blocks balanced on either end until veins bulged over his scrawny torso like swollen night crawlers.
We didn’t talk much. He was just too strange for me to handle, and I was just the crippled jock tagging along with his pal Wade. He was the only guy in school who actually gave me a bad time about my injury. Hey, superstar, how’s the leg? Hey, superstar, race ya to the corner. Hey, superstar, that joint ain’t a talkin’ stick, pass it over here. My bad, I’ll come get it, you need to stay off your feet.
Last time I saw T was at graduation. He had spent four years smoking, sniffing, and eating anything he could lay his hands on, alienating virtually every member of the student body, faculty, and administration, and he graduated with an effortless 3.9. Someone told me he had scholarship offers from the computer departments at Berkeley and Stanford. Instead, he did a quarter at Modesto Junior College, started dealing crank, and ended up taking a jolt in county, and later another for the state.
—EASY, HITLER.
I wake up shivering.
—Easy, Hitler.
Why is it cold in the Yucatán? Because it’s not the Yucatán maybe? Ass. Hole. Something growls.
—Shush, Hitler.
I open my eyes, and see a dog as big as a truck. It’s growling and showing me all of its teeth. It’s wearing a collar, but no leash. I tilt my head and look up. Elvis Presley is standing behind the dog. He’s about five eight, wearing pegged black Levis, black engineer boots, and a black leather vest over a white T-shirt, is beanpole skinny, and has sideburns down to his jaw and an oily black pompadour.
—Who the fuck are you and why are you on my fucking porch?
What am I doing on his porch? I start to sit up.
—Don’t fucking move or Hitler’s gonna eat your face.
I don’t want my face eaten by anyone, let alone Hitler. I stick out my hand to ward off any face eating and Elvis grabs the Christmas card that I’m clutching. He opens it.
—What the fuck?
He looks from the card to me, and does the best double take I’ve ever seen in real life.
—Holy shit! Holy piss, shit, motherfucker, tits. Fuckshit. Holy fuckshit, fucking Christ. Fuck me. Fuck me. Fuck me.
—Nice to see you too, T.
He picks up all the money, drags me to my feet, hauls me into the trailer, and dumps me on a couch in only slightly better repair than the one on the porch.
—Still havin’ trouble walkin’, huh, superstar?
He takes the two guns from my pocket. The dog stands in front of me, teeth still bared, assuring that I stay put. No problems there. I close my eyes.
—WAKE UP, superstar.
I open my eyes. T is sitting on the coffee