Get With The Program (Pt. III)

Geraldine didn't like to be talked to disrespectfully, but she also knew it came with the territory. She knew she was an old, broken down, battle-axe of a bitch that no one could stand for more then thirty minutes at a time. That's why she didn't flinch when her son Mick bad-mouthed her before he ran out the door a few minutes prior. She was also aware that if she didn't get her pain meds. soon she was going to cut somebody, and that was not a lie. Her fucking son was off using her scooter; most likely on a drug run. The scooter was her only chance of getting those meds she needed so damned badly. What the hell was she gonna do with that lil' shit?

Mick put his hand over the lighter, as Emma lit his cigarette, smiling at him. Mick stared back at her, remembering her red bush as he thrust inside her, clenching her wrist together as they fucked on her Queen bed. Afterwards, she rolled over nude, and smiled at him over her bare shoulders. It was the same smile she was blanketing him in now. Finally turning away, Emma pocketed the lighter, and mounted her light blue Vespa. Mick waved at her, and mounted his Mom's Yamaha scooter that was parked across the street. His bitch Mom no doubt wanted it back tonight, so he had to get back into the 5 o'clock traffic, and turn at the nearest exit to Vorhees street.

He was now behind a 'wide load' truck that made him feel uneasy, yet allowed him to not crank the speed of his scooter over the top. The truck was starting to slow him down too much, so he switched lanes behind one of those horse carrying vehicles without any windows. It had a large white trunk, and looked to fit about eight horses or so. Mick couldn't see anything inside it though, he could only imagine. A pounding sound started to come from behind the left door to the horse truck, and it echoed on the steel walls. It seemed like the door was loosening from some force on the other side being forcibly applied. Mick started to get nervous, but there weren't any openings in the second lane. He tried to get his bike on the right side of the door in case anything happened. Another minute later, everything did happen. The left door whipped open, and catatonic bodies with no expression tumbled into busy traffic. Mick screamed, and attempted a dangerous swerve. Nude bodies, male and female, with electric probes on their shaven skulls, continued to fall face first like firewood all around Mick. Mick tried to pull off the road, but he couldn't. He was forced to endure death after death as he watched these unknown people get fed into the wheels of the speeding traffic. Car horns honked, and people screamed behind him. Finally, after almost avoiding an extreme traffic pileup, Mick found an exit, and pulled off to the nearest curb. He leaned over to the side of his bike, and spit up into a sewer drain. Mick had no idea what the fuck he had just seen. Did any of it really happen? If so, real life was definitely stranger then the shit they showed you on TV. When he got home he immediately went to sleep, and upon waking, assumed it had all been a dream.

*

Leanette was sitting in her bra, laying back in the heat of her apartment on her green, fluffy couch. She was taking a break before going to the bathroom to start working on her puffy mess of curls again. Everything was a fucking chore on days like these! She wondered why the fuck people got so damn excited for the summer in TV shows when it was just like this every fucking time. Sitting there, her sweaty ass sticking to every damn place she sat. Ass too fucking tired and miserable to ever leave the damn house. What the fuck was the point? She forced herself up, and aimed herself towards the bathroom like a bomber on auto-pilot. What she needed to do was some serious relaxing with her hair, because it was getting out of hand. She was too damn tired right now, so she opted for the natural look. Fuck the chemicals anyway. It was White America that wanted her hair to look like some dumb blonde bombshell and rob her of her identity. The doorbell rang, and she hobbled over to it with her cane. Laid out for two damn days ever since she tripped and fell 'cuz Isiah left his shoe right by their front door, and their damn door happened to be at the top of a set of steep fucking stairs. Now she just had to wait, and hope that her leg got better fast. It ached something horrible, though. She couldn't make no money this way, and being a single mother was expensive as fuck. It was pretty nice to have time with Isiah though, she had to admit. He had almost become like a stranger to her, what with her working two jobs. She whipped open the front door to her apartment, and her jaw dropped. It was two cops. A red haired lady who looked too young, and a fat faced, bald-headed, gopher looking prick with buck-teeth that must have always looked angry even when his Momma was proud of his ass for shooting some brother for stealing bread. Leanette didn't know why these two cops were standing out here on her stair-well with veiled expressions. It was really starting to scare her though, the more she thought of her son Isiah not home. In shock, she waited through the painful silence for someone, anyone, to say something and make it all right.

"Ma'am. Your son has disappeared from South Central today. His teachers were wondering if you came to pick him up early, or if you had a friend take him for you."

*

Now, slowly creeping to that naggingly ugly stage of every dying relationship, they arrived with a snap of the gears. Fixed in their seats, and gaining speed with each bumpy realization, they rolled down the rickety track to the most loathed spot on this fated Death Trip. They were entering the destination where love starts to swiftly fly out from the swiftly flattening tires, before quickly replacing itself with the abject horror and desperation that shoulders loss. The band-aid had been finally yanked painfully off, and they were left staring into the absurdity of their own existence without any buffers. Pinkman now knew for certain that Aja no longer loved him, and as he grabbed for her flickering warmth in the shadows, he found himself fondling her flinty limbs of granite rock. Aja had used these to barricade her chest with from his needy brand of love. It was definitely over.

Even the tears in Aja's eyes weren't for him, they were for her. She had been a stupid shit, and felt like a dumb-ass for ever sleeping with Pinkman's uncircumcized nightmare. Now she had to talk to Carlos, and everything would be different from then on. Pinkman would definitely never be allowed back to their house again. House? It wasn't even her house. Carlos would probably torture her with his projective jealousy for at least the next several years, if she even wanted to stay at this point. This was her horribly fucked life now.

Pinkman felt a hard, red brick swiftly replacing the hole that had blossomed in his heart. He let go of her fist, and for the first time, looked out towards the street, beyond the wheel-chair access ramp that they had inadvertedly decided to have their final showdown break-up at. Everything was over, no more sex...no more passion...no more getting to know each other. All that was left was the harsh pain of loss now.

As if in answer to his agony, a homeless beggar suddenly appeared from the North-west corner of the building where they were both huddled. He staggered into view, his body bent forward hideously like the Hunchback of Notre-Dame, torn bits of clothing clung to his dirty, raw skin. The beggar's sudden striking presence surprised Pinkman. It oddly calmed him, as he watched the poor wretch stumble off into the approaching darkness. To know that there were others falling apart all around them, outside this selfish bubble of exclusion they'd constructed, made his mind gasp with relief. Now that he was face to face with the realization of his pain Pinkman really needed a fucking joint.

Some low alarm from the North, also started to grow, and intensify. At first Pinkman didn't have a clue what it was. He thought it was just the world coming apart at the seams, but it was an alarm of some type. As it grew louder, he was almost sure that's what it was that was going off. The shadow that Aja's presence cast upon him was swiftly swallowed up. He sat up in a hospital bed, and instantly had a look at himself, reflected in a mirror that was positioned in front of him. His head had a bandage on it, and wires poking out everywhere. There was a eye-patch over his right eye for some reason. He was too drugged to think too much of it, but there was still lots of questions swarming somewhere in the deep of his mind. He turned his head to the right so he could see what was going on better with his left eye. It was the comatose boy with the afro from the van who he remembered staring off into space. They had him strapped to a hospital bed like Pinkman's. It looked like a couple of guys in lab-coats were checking his I.V.'s, and the big computers, as off to the left, in the corner, there were some bored looking guys in black suits and ties. These guys looked like they could be F.B.I. or something official. One was leaning against a table, and enjoying a Twix bar. The other was digging for diamonds up his nose, and trying his damndest to look like he was just scratching the outside of it. It was quite the shit-show to be sure. Pinkman's gaze returned to the zoned out child on the gurney who continued to stare blankly at the ceiling. Pinkman tried to follow his gaze, and like a spider, crawl up the ceiling where the boy was permanently locked in. He was surpised to find a screen on the ceiling that played various children's films by Disney on loop. It was so shockingly surreal. Here he was watching Mickey Mouse run around with a fucking magicians hat on his head, covered in stars. Pinkman had never watched this one before. He never had time for cartoons, even as a kid, but the more he watched, the more his mind started to remember having watched it. He felt his emotions soften, as he became strangely sedate while watching the colorful antics flash to and fro from the projected screen above.

©

2017

Bunny Villaire

(To be continued...)