The Overwhelming Urge

2008-08-10T21:03:00.000-07:00

The Overwhelming Urge is a collection of short stories from bizarro writer Andersen Prunty.

To learn more about the bizarro genre of literature, visit Bizarro Central.

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www.andersenprunty.com

The Inconsequential Man

2008-08-10T21:02:00.002-07:00

Adjusting my ascot and staring outside, I notice a man sprawled face down in the middle of the road. I adjust the ascot all wrong and make a high bleating noise of despair. The maid comes over to help me. Her hair smells like oranges as her deft fingers manipulate the ascot into the perfect shape.

“There there,” she says, trying to stop my bleating.

I gesture outside and say, “Did you notice...”

“The guy out there?” she says. “Yeah, I seen him.”

“Should we do something about it?”

“I don’t see how it’s our responsibility.”

I shrug. She has a point, I guess.

“I’m gonna go clean all them jars,” she says.

I nod. We did indeed go through a lot of jars last night. I can’t take my eyes off the man out there in the road. What could possibly be wrong with him? Was he dead? Did he pass out? Was he drunk? Beaten?

A loud car with flames painted on the side, driven by a guy with a mullet, comes roaring down the road, running over the man. The car does not stop or turn around. I pull up a chair and continue to stare out the window. I bellow at the maid to bring me a sandwich. She brings the sandwich and I tell her I don’t have time, just shove it in my mouth. She goes about it with a bit more brutality than I appreciate and I tell her she’s this close to being let go, holding my thumb very close to my forefinger. She looks over my shoulder at the now pulped man out in the road. “Still out there, huh?” she says.

“It’s fascinating,” I say.

“I gotta get back to them jars.”

I wait for one of the passing cars to stop. None of them do. I wait for someone to show up. No one does. Again, I bellow at the maid, this time for a phone. I tell her to dial emergency. She does this with fingers puckered from cleaning and hands the phone to me. “I ain’t talkin to no cop,” she says.

“Are you aware of the situation on C Road?” I ask.

“What!?” a gruff man shouts.

“There’s a man out on the road...”

“Is this a prank!?”

“No. I’m afraid it’s fairly serious. There’s a man...”

“You got the wrong line buddy!”

“Is this the police?”

“You got that right.”

“Then I have an emergency I need to report.”

“We don’t have time to deal with that!”

“I’m pretty sure he’s dead.”

“Jesus, would you leave us alone!? Take your business elsewhere!”

Then he hangs up the phone. I continue to watch the man. Sometime during the night, the maid tells me she’s pregnant and leaves. She doesn’t come back.

The man stays in the road for days. Eventually two burly old men in t-shirts and sweatpants come outside and gather around the pulpy lump in the road. One of them complains about the stink. The other one tells him he’ll take care of it. Both men depart. One of them comes back about a half hour later with a shovel and a wheelbarrow. He scrapes the man up off the road and carts him away. I wipe the sweat from my brow and call the maid service, looking for a replacement.

The Joke

2008-08-10T21:02:00.001-07:00

As a joke, a man’s wife serves him with divorce papers. She has them sent, already signed by her, to his place of work. Understanding dawns on him as he reads through the papers. He still doesn’t get the joke so he assumes his wife wants a divorce.

“Oh boy,” he says, placing his forehead against the smooth wood of his desk. The man’s name is John, but everyone calls him Foot because of his condition. He remains with his head down, gently tapping his forehead against the wood. This is completely out of the blue. Just last week, he and his wife took a vacation to the remote island of Gonop. How could she? Why would she? He just doesn’t understand...

Later that day a coworker comes by his office and sees him still in the head down position. “What’s wrong, Foot?” the coworker says.

“It’s my wife,” Foot says, not raising his head.

“I’m sorry. Is something the matter with her?”

Foot raises his head. His eyes are red and watery. “She wants a divorce.”

“Welcome to the club,” the coworker says, raising a fist of solidarity and strolling back into the office.

Throughout the day, Foot’s anger builds. She has no right to do this, he thinks. Not without any explanation whatsoever. That kind of thing just isn’t done. By the time he gets home, he is ready to tell her all of this. He is ready to throw the papers across the room and tell her they are meaningless but, upon opening the door to his house, Foot is once again shocked.

Taking the joke one step further, his wife has decided to sleep with another man. She and her lover are actually in the act when Foot walks through the door. They are on the couch. The man wears a buckskin coat and nothing else as his hips dive vigorously between Foot’s wife’s legs.

“Oh,” his wife says between moans. “You’re home.”

The man continues to pound away.

Foot, still holding the divorce papers in his hands, brandishes them at his wife. “Jesus Christ!” he shouts, strolling across the room to grab the buckskinned man by the shoulder. “Get the hell off my wife!” He jerks the man away. His wife makes no attempt to cover herself. The man only looks emptily at him, absently toying with his huge penis.

His wife looks surprised. “I don’t understand why you’re so upset, Footy.”

“You serve me with divorce papers and then I come home to find you fucking another man. You don’t understand why I’m upset?”

“It was... just a joke,” she says, giggling.

“A joke!” he shouts.

“Yeah,” she says. “Just a joke. Pretty good one, huh?”

The buckskinned man laughs. His laugh is very deep. The laugh of a simpleton, Foot thinks.

Still, a sense of relief washes over him. Sitting down on the couch beside his wife he says, “You mean, you don’t really want a divorce?”

“Of course not,” she says. “I told you, it was just a joke.”

“A joke, huh?” Foot puts the divorce papers on the coffee table. The buckskinned man is edging toward the front door, still naked except for the coat. “What about him?” Foot says.

“Oh, he was part of the joke. That’s Norman. He works at the hardware store on the corner.”

“I thought he looked familiar,” Foot says.

“You just need to lighten up,” his wife says, swiping his arm with her hand. “You’re such a stick in the mud.”

“Yeah,” Foot says. “I guess I can be.”

Norman leaves through the front door and, looking at his wife sitting complacently on the couch, Foot finally gets

Frogs

2008-08-10T21:00:00.002-07:00

Three white thugs are playing leap frog on the sidewalk in front of my house. It is very late, nearly four in the morning. Throwing on my most intimidating robe, I wander out onto the porch. One of the thugs stares impishly at the two engaged in the game. The one in the black backward baseball hat expertly jumps over the one in the oversized basketball jersey. The one watching grabs his crotch and says, “Oh, man, you fucking rocked that one.” Then he hops up and down and says, very rapidly, “I wanna play! I wanna play! I wanna play!”

“Hey!” I shout from the porch, pulling my robe tightly around my neck. “Can you guys keep it down? I’m trying to sleep.”

The two playing the game continue to leap over one another. The third wheel hikes up his pants and glides over to the porch. “Hey, motherfucker,” he says. “Wanna come down and play some fuckin leap frog with us?”

“No thanks,” I say.

“Hey motherfucker I din’t say you had a fuckin choice.”

“Just keep it down,” I say.

But he is already coming up the walk, approaching me. It doesn’t look so good. “C’mon man, don’ be such a fuckin honkey motherfucker. Me and my homies got us a good game goin, dawg. ‘Sides, if ya don’t, I’m gonna bust yer ass.” He brandishes a shiny gun, held in one of his oversize pants pockets. I guess I don’t really have much of a choice. The other two have leaped nearly to the end of the sidewalk, giggling wildly with each leap and shouting “Fuck!” a whole lot. “Name’s G-spot,” the one in front of me says, grabbing my arm and pushing me down to the sidewalk. I shake my arm away from him.

“You don’t have to grab me,” I say.

“Now get down, motherfucker. I’m gonna fuckin go first.”

I loosen my robe and crouch down on the sidewalk. It occurs to me that I’ve never played leap frog before. What if I screw up and accidentally land on the punk, G-spot?

“Here I fuckin go!” he shouts and leaps over me. The crotch of his pants hits me in the back of the head, thrusting me forward onto the sidewalk.

I stand up, angry. I want to kick him in the back of the head but I’m not wearing any shoes and he has a gun. He’s crouched down, waiting for me to leap. “You almost broke my nose,” I say.

“Don’t be such a fuckin pussy. Come on!”

I rear back on my haunches and attempt to leap over him. My robe gets all tangled and I land on G-spot, rolling off and sprawling half on the street and half on the sidewalk. He lays face down, twitching. The other two thugs come running. “Fuck, dawg, what happened!” Baseball Hat shouts.

I straighten my robe and gesture down at the fallen youth.

“He fuckin killed G-spot!” Basketball Jersey says. “That’s some fucked up shit, dawg!”

It’s possible I did kill him. Luckily, the thugs are distracted by an ice cream truck coming down the road, playing its haunting tune at top volume. I think it’s “Fur Elise” but I can’t tell because it’s so distorted. The ice cream truck, spotting the thugs, comes to a screeching halt. The driver leans out and vomits. “Hey!” he shouts. “Hey! Anybody want any ice cream?” He gets out of the truck, staggering around, falling into the side of it, vomits again, and makes his way to the back doors.

“Aw, fuck, man,” Baseball Hat says, bending his knees and waving his arms in the air. “He’s fuckin wasted.”

“Hey, dawg,” Basketball Jersey says to me. “You got any ho tickets?”

I put my hands in the pockets of my robe. Since I don’t know what he’s talking about, I pretend I didn’t hear him.

“Hey, dawg, I’m talkin to you. You got any green?”

“Money?” I say.

“Fuck yeah.”

“Not on me.”

“C’mon. You get us some cream we’ll forget all about G-spot.”

“I didn’t do anything anyway!”

“The fuck you didn’t. He fuckin sucked at leap frog but you were the one took him down.”

“He almost broke my nose!”

“You ain’t the one that’s dead, motherfucker.”

The ice cream man throws up the door at the back of the truck, grabs various ice cream products and throws them at the thugs before passing out. The thugs gather up the ice cream bars and stuff them in their pockets. “Shit man,” Baseball Hat says, “Let’s take this motherfucker for a ride.” He climbs into the driver’s seat and Basketball Jersey crosses over to the passenger side.

“What are you going to do about...” I begin.

“G-spot?”

“Yeah.”

“Leave him. I guess it serves him right. He’s your responsibility now. Sucks though.”

I look down at the sad youth sprawled on the sidewalk. The two thugs speed away in the ice cream truck, the back doors flapping open and closed. I think about dragging him inside or calling someone. Then I think better of it. Best just to go inside and pretend this never happened. Maybe, if anyone finds him, they’ll just write it off to some sort of gang violence. I go back inside and, exhausted from the leap frogging, fall quickly asleep. When I wake up the house is filled with the pulsing rhythm of rap music. I’m not surprised when I go downstairs and find G-spot in the kitchen, dancing some ridiculous dance and eating a bowl of cereal. The kitchen smells like marijuana, sweat and cheap beer. My soul hurts. I sit at the table and massage my throbbing temples. I feel very white and very old and very snobbish. G-spot’s gun sits on the counter, apparently it impedes his dancing, and I stare at it, wondering how I’m going to get him out of the house.

Drugs

2008-08-10T21:00:00.001-07:00

My balls are swelled up. I am in the bathroom about ready to puncture my scrotum with a huge needle, figuring the swellage must be something fluid related, when the doorbell rings. It startles me and the needle flies out of my hands and into the bathtub. “Shit,” I think, “this is going to be really embarrassing.” I rush to find the baggiest pair of pants I can and cross the house to answer the door.

Upon opening the door I am a bit startled to see four men in dour gray suits standing on my porch.

“Mr. L?” the man in the forefront asks.

“No, I’m Mr. C.”

“Is this 2300 Rosewood?”

“Yes it is.”

“I think we need to have a look in your basement.”

“May I ask what for?”

“Hiding something, Mr. L?”

“No, no, not at all, it’s just, well...”

“Drugs, Mr. L. We’ve had complaints of drugs.”

“I assure you that’s ridiculous. You’re more than welcome to have a look.”

I walk them over to the door of my basement, my legs slightly bowed on account of my huge scrotum. A casual glance over my shoulder reveals that they are traveling in a single file line. I open the door and click on the light, standing aside to let them enter. They all go down into the basement. After a few moments, I hear one of them call, “You better come down here, Mr. L!”

I walk down the steps. At first, the basement seems impossibly bright. As soon as I reach the bottom of the steps, I realize why.

The entire floor is covered in marijuana plants that reach chest-high. The ceiling is lined with sun lamps.

“Impressive,” I say, and then, “I know absolutely nothing about this.”

“We’re going to have to confiscate your house, Mr. L.”

There is no argument. Even though I know nothing about it I am clearly cultivating a drug field in my basement.

“Yes, of course. Will you be taking everything else in the house, also?”

“Well, we’ll be taking all of this marijuana.”

“I see.”

We all go upstairs. The man in charge makes a few calls with my phone. The others periodically shoot accusing looks at me as I struggle to move the couch out of the house. This task is made all the more difficult because of my swelling. I get the couch out to the curb and sit down on it, homeless, both my back and my balls hurting immeasurably.

I can't resist checking on my condition so I stand up and glance down into my pants. Amazingly, my underwear is stuffed with the marijuana leaves. The men are coming out of the house, the man in charge tossing the keys up in the air and catching them. They stand at the curb and make casual chit-chat until a bus comes and they all board.

They come back later that night with their wives, girlfriends and children. The next day a moving van brings all their stuff over. They leave the house every morning smelling like pot. People of all ages visit the house at all hours.

Two days later, the garbage man comes and tells me he has to take the couch. “It’s on the curb,” he says. I reach down into my pants and hand him the marijuana, moist from being in my crotch for days.

“Please, one more week,” I plead.

Blood

2008-08-10T20:59:00.001-07:00

We go see a movie called Bloodfest. The title is horribly misleading and it ends up being a four-hour documentary of people with all different ethnic backgrounds donating blood. Midway through, my date turns and starts making out with the man on her right. I tug on her sleeve and tell her she’s confused. A woman behind us shushes me.

Fatigued, we exit the theater onto the bright city street. From behind my date, I notice a large red blotch on the back of her skirt. I tap her on the shoulder and point to her behind. Lightning fast, she throws a right hook at my face. I stumble backward, lose my footing, and collapse onto the street. Once I can focus again, I look up at her. She has discovered the stain. “Oh, gosh, I’m sorry,” she says before coming over and lending a hand, helping me up. She then sticks her hand down the front of her skirt, bringing it back out and smelling her fingers. “Yep, that’s blood all right,” she says. “Damn, I don’t have a san nap!”

I am briefly taken aback by her crudity until I remember. “Here,” I say, reaching for my wallet. “I've got something.” I pull a pad from my wallet, warm and smooshed. She snatches it away.

“Oh, God, thank you,” she says.

Amazed once again, I watch as she pulls down her skirt and underwear in the middle of the sidewalk. I see an old couple walking out of the theater and I rush to shield them from my date, blocking their view with my expansive coat. “I liked the part where that Cuban fellow has a crisis of conscience when he realizes he can’t go through with the donation because he is getting over a cold,” the old woman says. The man casts a cold, suspicious glance in my direction.

“Hi there!” I shout, not knowing what else to say. He grabs his wife a little tighter and they move closer to the road.

“All ready,” my date says.

Relieved, I put my coat back on. I look at her and shake my head. She has merely used the device to mop up some of the excess blood and now has it fastened to her wrist like a bracelet.

“You're hopeless,” I laugh.

Walking away, I notice she has hiked her skirt up in order to hide the stain beneath her shirt and now her buttocks are practically hanging out... but I can’t see the stain. I think about letting her borrow my long coat, its hem drifting just millimeters above the sidewalk, and then think better about it.

A Self-Contained Walk

2008-08-10T20:58:00.001-07:00

It is a grainy black and white day.

Mr. Gravel’s small house sits back a long driveway. They call it a lane in the country. He steps out of his house and looks at the low hill horizon. He walks down the steps of his front porch. There is a man with sunglasses on doing pushups in the front lawn. Mr. Gravel pays no attention to this as he heads for the lane. He has to get the mail. The box is way down off the road.

To entertain himself for this long walk, he raises his arms above his head, fingers extended, and begins hooting. He hoots with each step he takes. “Hoo, hoo, hoo.” The gravel crunches beneath his feet.

About halfway down the lane, he gets excited because he can see a large package bulging from the mailbox. He has always been afraid someone will steal his mail. He hopes this is the package he has been expecting.

He breaks into a light jog, his arms still extended toward the sky. Within no time at all, he is at the mailbox, his hands on the thick brown package, greedily pulling it out. Too excited to carry the package all the way back to his house, he rips it open.

He pulls the gun out, letting the bubble-lined paper fall around his feet. He tosses the pistol from hand to hand, feeling its heft. Mr. Gravel smiles knowingly. He is pleased. Placing the cold barrel of the gun against his forehead, he pulls the trigger, thinking that it’s so cold because it’s been outside all day.

His head erupts.

A dying spray of red against the black and white day.

Mr. Gravel’s body staggers before falling to the pavement of the road. The neighbor’s dog, always loose, wanders over and begins licking at the wound.

Trash Face

2008-08-10T20:57:00.001-07:00

My face melts off so I pick it up and put it back on, runny and twisted as it is. Putting on my shoes, lumpy black things that look more fitting for a janitor, I step outside into the fresh, early morning air.

A Boy Scout troop is collecting dandelion specimens from my front yard. Their leader is blowing a whistle and shouting at them to collect more, more! Eventually, they all spot me. One of them shouts: “Oh God, look at that guy’s face!”

The leader blows his whistle furiously and says, “I think it’s best we get outta here.”

A little kid who has been busy urinating in the corner of the yard runs up to me and shoves a wad of grass down my pants before hurrying to catch up with the other boys.

“Yeah!” I call after him. “Well you’re fat!” But he isn’t fat at all. My face, however, is indeed hideous.

I go back inside, remove my face, and throw it in the trashcan.

The Call

2008-08-10T20:56:00.001-07:00

I’m in a room full of people, all of us wearing wigs. I have the nagging suspicion that mine is on crooked and try to adjust it while studying my reflection in the wineglass in front of me.

A man with a crazy mustache has just made an ass of himself by trying out a new style of dancing.

The phone rings from the kitchen and we all drunkenly scramble to reach it, trying to squeeze through the door at once. An older man with a worn-out thin white wig and strange buttocks is the first to answer it.

“Hullo,” he says. “Mm-hm. I see... No... Yes, of course... I understand.”

The man gently places the phone back in the cradle, takes off his scraggly white wig and tosses it on the stove. Dejectedly, he slumps his shoulders and slinks past all the staring eyes. He reaches the door and looks back. On the verge of tears, he raises his hand in a half-hearted wave and leaves the room. We all adjust our wigs and take a deep, collective breath, knowing we’ll never see him again.

Gravedigger

2008-08-10T20:55:00.001-07:00

Gladys goes downstairs and aggressively taps on her husband’s shoulder. Her husband’s name is Hank.

“You gotta go upstairs and talk to that boy,” she says.

“What’s the little jackass done now?” Hank asks.

“Why, I left him alone for two minutes and he done cut off his balls and glued them to his forehead.”

“For Christ’s sake,” Hanks says. “Let me get my pants on.”

He puts his pants on and heads for the stairs. Gladys calls out from behind him. “And remember to call him Snake or he won’t answer ya!”

Hank gets upstairs and opens the door to the boy’s room. The boy, “Snake,” lies on the bed, wistfully staring out the window, his balls glistening on his forehead. Hank snaps. He rushes over to the bed and begins shaking the boy.

“You listen here,” he says. “If you think you can get away with murder just ‘cause you got them damn leg braces, then you got another thing comin. Get them balls off your head.”

“I can’t,” Snake says.

“Well you better find a way.”

“You try it. They’re glued.”

Hank angrily reaches out and clutches one of the testicles in his fingers. The thing won’t come loose. It just squishes there between his fingers.

“That does it,” Hank says.

He yanks Snake off the bed and throws him to the floor, the boy’s leg braces clattering.

“Get your pants down. I’m givin you the spankin you deserve.”

The boy moans pathetically and frantically tries to crawl to his bathroom.

Gladys comes into the room before Hank has a chance to spank Snake.

“Hank! You cut that out!” she yells.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he says. He kneels by the bed and begins to pray.

Snake makes it into the bathroom. He finds a razor and slashes at his wrists. The blood courses out and Snake discovers that he can now walk without the aid of the braces. With blood-covered hands, he removes the braces and tosses them into the bathtub. He throws open the door to his bedroom and charges across the room, launching himself through the glass in his window. He plummets to the ground outside. His parents call the ambulance but a hearse shows up instead. Which is appropriate because Snake is dead. He lies in a crumpled heap on the front lawn. A huge man gets out of the hearse.

The man is a gravedigger.

He takes an enormous shovel from the back of the hearse and proceeds to dig a hole in the front yard. Once the hole is deep enough, he nudges Snake into it with his foot.

Snake’s parents stand on the front lawn, crying as the gravedigger finishes filling in the grave. After tamping down the dirt, the gravedigger tips his hat to Snake’s parents and gets back into his car.

Hank and Gladys go back inside the house to begin anew.

The Bright Side

2008-08-10T20:53:00.001-07:00

I go downstairs to the kitchen. I have designs on finishing off all those chops. As I pass through the living room, I hear a low moaning.

“Dad?”

The moan again. He must be sitting in his easy chair, sunk down in the dimly lit room so I can’t see him.

“Dad? You feeling all right?”

“God no.”

“Indigestion?”

“Worse.”

“It can’t be all that bad.”

“You wouldn’t say that if you were an antelope.”

I rush around to the front of the chair.

“Come on, now. That’s ridiculous.”

But the words are barely out of my mouth before I see my father. There he sits; a slender, beautiful antelope. He looks very sad.

“Life is miserable.”

He reaches his hooves over to the end table, trying to grab his beer can between the two small things. It slips away from him and foams onto the floor. He leans his head back in the chair and groans again.

“I hope you’re not ashamed of me,” he says.

“Of course not.”

I pick up the beer can and pour what’s left into my palm. I proffer my hand toward my father. As though he can't control himself, he laps greedily at the beer. He politely wipes some foam from his fur with a shiny hoof.

“Better get some sleep,” I say and playfully shake one of his antlers.

In the kitchen, eating my chops, I hear him get out of the recliner.

“Hey!” he calls. “This isn’t so bad!”

I go into the living room.

“Look at this! I can walk on my hind legs!”

He’s drunk, I think. He obviously licked the remainder of the beer out of the carpet. I try not to think about him doing such a degrading thing. Now he’s heading for the stairs.

“You be careful with those stairs,” I caution.

“Oh, I think I can handle it,” he says and twitches his little tail as he shakily climbs the stairs.

I don't want to think about what he’ll do next.

The Murderer

2008-08-10T20:52:00.001-07:00

Heinrich had rented the place at 401 Kenwood for a year. The small house was incredibly run down. The paint was peeling. The pollution from a nearby factory had turned it a dark gray. The windows leaked. Train tracks were fewer than twenty feet behind the house and trains ran all the time. But the things that bothered him the most were the cockroaches. When he flipped on a light, he saw them covering the floor. They climbed the walls and hid under things. He could hear them in the walls whenever the house was quiet. For the past year, he had called his landlord every week, an answering machine answering each time. “Please,” Heinrich would say quietly into the receiver. “Do something about the roaches.”

Over the weeks, his plea was eventually reduced to, “Please, roaches.”

Eventually, he had an idea. He decided to collect the roaches. He used a large trash bag to put them in whenever he could catch them. The effect, he realized, would be best if they were alive but he couldn’t figure out a way to do that. So he saved and he saved. Within three weeks, the bag was bulging. He set out for his landlord’s house, surprised the absentee maggot had actually told him where he lived. The check has to go somewhere, Heinrich thought.

Of course, the landlord lived in a huge clean house in one of the best neighborhoods.

Heinrich rang the doorbell.

No answer. He waited.

He rang the doorbell again and heard a familiar sound. Just someone approaching the door, he reassured himself.

When the door finally opened, Heinrich felt his gorge hit the back of his throat. The landlord was an enormous cockroach. He held a martini in one of his legs and wore a gaudy Christmas sweater, obnoxious green trees knitted into a red background. Heinrich threw the bag of cockroaches into the house and ran away, back to his own house that was, by law, the landlord’s house.

Three days later he received an eviction notice in the mail. There wasn’t any type of explanation, just Heinrich’s full name and the address, both scrawled out in angry cockroach handwriting.

The Wise Man

2008-08-10T20:51:00.001-07:00

The wisest man in the world comes to my door. He has a very long white beard and wears a series of richly textured and flowing robes. He, more or less, lets himself in. I know he’s the wisest man in the world and I plan on having him answer some questions.

He strolls to the middle of the living room and reaches down, trying to push my heavy wooden coffee table up against the couch. He labors for nearly a minute.

He looks at me. “Some help?” he asks.

“Oh, of course,” I say and help struggle with the coffee table.

By the time we finish, both of us have worked up a pretty good sweat.

The wisest man in the world stands in the middle of my luxurious white carpet. He looks at me and raises a finger of proclamation.

“These are the days,” he says, “when everything has value.”

Then he squats down a little, grunts, and defecates on my carpet.

“Ah,” he says, “that’s done with.”

Instead of staying in the room to ask him my series of important questions, I quickly go to the hallway closet and retrieve an abundance of cleaning supplies.

I return to the living room. The wise man is gone. He has accidentally stepped into his mess and tracked it all the way to the door.

The Chancellor

2008-08-10T20:49:00.001-07:00

I look up and the Chancellor is standing in my doorway once again. Filling the doorway. This is the fifth night he has put in an appearance and I already know how the evening is going to turn out. He trundles into my room, modeling a pair of skin tight black leather pants, cellulite jiggling wildly as he turns in robust circles of pride. The twin loaves of fat-filled flesh above the waistband bob rhythmically. Aw hell, I wish he’d leave me the fuck alone. Of course he’s going to ask me how he looks, modestly referring to himself as a fat cow, trying to evoke pity, conjure up a compliment. Then he’s going to drag me away from my writing to go watch the hangings at the Dangle Bar, laughing as the accused ejaculate all over the stage the moment the rope snaps their necks, taking enormous gulps of his Bavarian ale and hollering for them to bring out the next one, his gaseous breath blowing off the clinging flecks of foam from his mustache. He’ll turn to me and tell me how some of the hanged are fags, he just knows it. Or he’ll shout, “Don’t he look like somebody who masturbates?!” Yes, of course, whatever, Chancellor, can’t you just leave me alone? I have some writing to do. Feeling a little tipsy, think I’ll just—No, no, you sit right down here. Free drinks! No free thinks! Then we stagger out of the bar and I’m too drunk to even get it up but he insists on buying us whores. The only good thing is that he usually gives me the more attractive one because he likes to watch us while he fucks his. Even though I don’t want to let him watch, don’t even want to be anywhere near him, his power is such that I have to acquiesce. He is the Chancellor. Then we’ll go back to the hotel and he’ll make me read him stories until he falls asleep, which sometimes takes hours. He prefers Bible stories and any children’s books that in some way or the other involve the mother as an integral part of the plot. He’s developed an extensive guideline for this. Then he’ll sleep, occasionally crying out for me to come ‘rub salve on his feet.’ But tonight, to my dismay, he collapses in mid-pirouette. I roll him out of the room and continue writing.

The Lift

2007-09-25T23:09:00.001-07:00

I got mad, went outside, and tried to lift a truck. It was dark. I couldn’t tell what color the truck was. I squatted down and put my hands under the rear bumper and, struggling, attempted to raise the truck above my head. I could only manage to get it to rock a couple of inches. The tires didn’t even leave the ground. With every bit of strength I had I strained to lift, veins bulging in my forearms, cords standing out on my neck. My head felt full of blood, like a balloon, like it could explode any minute. I got tired and, breathing heavily, decided to sit on the rear bumper and rest a little. Already, much of the anger had melted away, replaced with a sense of gratifying fatigue.

A burly man wearing a flannel shirt and a straw cowboy hat opened the door of the truck, climbed out, and came around to the bumper.

“You try to lift the truck?” he asked, staring somewhere just behind me.

“Yeah,” I said. “I didn’t know you were in it. Sorry.”

“Thought maybe you could use some help.”

“Sure. If you could lend a hand... I think that would be a big help.”

“No problem. I hope you don’t mind. Me bein in the truck and all.”

“No. Not at all. Is this your truck?”

“Yep. I was passed out. I don’t like to go home ‘til dawn.”

“Sure,” I said, rising from the bumper.

We both squatted down and put our hands beneath the bumper.

“Here we go,” he said and gave a great heave.

The truck nearly flew into the air, the burly man holding it above his head. I was on his right side and, while I had my hands on the bumper, I didn’t think I was really doing much of the lifting.

“Back down,” he said. His face was red and a trickle of sweat ran down his cheek. “That was a good lift,” he said.

“Definitely.”

“Say, you want to come with me for a pack of smokes. I ran out.”

“Yeah, I guess I could come with you. I have a few things I need to pick up as well.”

“Yeah, okay... You’ll have to ride in the back. I hope you don’t mind.”

“No. Not at all.” I didn’t know why I had to ride in the back. I didn’t see anyone else in the cab. Maybe the man was hiding something. Or maybe he didn’t trust me. I climbed up into the bed of the truck. The man got back into the cab, fired the engine, and we sped off into the night. He drove like a maniac, running lights and hitting cars. I contemplated jumping out if he actually stopped the truck. But it didn’t stop until we reached a convenience store on the outskirts of town. It was one I’d never been to before. Mainly because I had always thought it was abandoned. I couldn’t recall ever seeing a light on inside it and many of the windows were broken.

The man turned the ignition off and picked up a large rock. He threw it at one of the remaining windows and it shattered with a noisy crash.

“The owner gets in there and falls asleep. You have to throw a rock just to wake him up.”

I followed the man into the store. The old man, presumably the owner, was behind the counter, rising from an old army cot spread with blankets. Blearily, he staggered to the counter and stared out over the darkened store. The only light was that coming from the fluorescent lights from the road.

He gave the burly man a pack of cigarettes and said, “They’re on the house,” turning his attentions to me. I grabbed a blue bandanna and a snorkel—they had such an odd assortment of items. I could have looked around and found more stuff but it was so dark I couldn’t see very well and I had to hurry so the owner could get back to sleep. I threw the items on the counter and he charged me at least five times what they were worth. He didn’t ring anything into a cash register. He just called a number from the top of his head. On closer inspection I noticed there wasn’t a cash register. I didn’t have any cash so I gave him a credit card. He gently fingered the raised name and numbers and looked intently at the ceiling. “That’s a good one,” he said, handing it back.

“May I have a receipt?” I asked, thinking maybe I would put the items on my expense account.

“I need to get some sleep,” the old man said.

“Yeah, but, a receipt?” I asked.

“Too tired,” he said, dropping back onto his cot.

The burly man had already exited the store and sat in the cab of his truck, smoking. He smoked very fast, furiously. A cloud filled the cab of the truck and rolled out.

“I think maybe you should drive,” he said. “I’ll be busy smoking.”

He tossed his cigarette away and lit another one, scooting over into the passenger seat. I climbed in behind the wheel, wondering how I went from riding in the back to driving the truck.

I drove back home and got out of the truck. I assumed the burly man would slide over into the driver’s seat but, instead, he got out of the truck and began walking in the opposite direction.

“Thanks for helping me lift that,” I said.

He turned, a fresh cigarette in his mouth, and said, “That’s not my truck at all.”

I nodded my head as though I understood but I didn’t. I came to the steps leading to my house and stopped, holding the snorkel in one hand and wiping the sweat from my face with the bandanna. I couldn’t remember what inside the house had made me so mad but I felt a sense of dread as I looked at it. There had to be something in there that caused me to get mad and go try to lift a truck. As hard as I tried to think about it, it wouldn’t come. So, not knowing what else to do, I put the snorkel in my mouth and opened the front door.

It all came flooding back but it was too late to turn and run.

Handsome

2007-08-14T21:52:00.001-07:00

I wake up and realize I’m the best looking man in the world. I study myself in the mirror. I am stunning, breathtaking. My eyes are a penetrating blue, set deep into my head and framed perfectly by black eyelashes and perfectly arched black eyebrows. My jawline is strong and chiseled. My cheekbones are high and just the slightest bit flushed.

I inspect myself for hours but I can’t find a single flaw.

People have to see me. I have to get out of the house. My parents are in the kitchen but, luckily, their backs are turned as they work away at the dishes. I don’t want them to fawn over me.

I step outside onto a crowded street and am overcome by the feeling that being beautiful is now hopelessly out of fashion.

Everyone looks like a walking Picasso. They have had their eyes rearranged so they sit atop one another, or on each side of their heads. Many have had their noses surgically enhanced or, in some cases, lopped off altogether. Slings, casts, and bandages abound from where they have had their arms and legs broken so they’ll grow back in some unnaturally twisted form.

One girl with a giant deformed nipple protruding from her neck throws a glance at me and rolls her hideous eyes back into her ears.

Mister God

2007-08-14T21:50:00.000-07:00

Famous now, I finish jacking off in the first groupie’s face while the second tongues my asshole. I roll out of bed, light an imported cigarette and pull on my leather pants and mesh shirt, complimented with a silver cape. I stroll outside to my car where the driver is sleeping at the wheel, waiting. Waiting for me to tell him what to do.

The paperboy buzzes by on his bike. “Good morning, Mr. God,” he says, handing me the paper.

“Fuck off, you little shit,” I snarl.

I get into the car and crush my cigarette out on the driver’s face to wake him up. He screams and I spit in his wound and he shuts up because my spit is curative, as are all of my fluids.

“Where to, Boss?” the driver asks.

“Take me to heaven,” I say, laughing. “Take me to fucking heaven.”