Hard, Dark Things
The hard, dark things always seemed to make us feel better. Take, for example, when Bob ate Dotty’s nose. There we were in their kitchen, watching from our dream state, taking it all in, sipping our Cocktails-in-a-Can. I was enjoying a way-too-strong Tom Collins and you were slurping down a margarita. I think you always drank margaritas because they made you feel like you were on vacation in Mexico or something.
Warm golden light coming through yellow and baby-caca ocre vinyl spring loaded pull shades with a cartoon flower pattern fills the kitchen with light while we’re watching as Bob takes the plate and places it neatly in the center of the table. He tucks a napkin into the collar of his pink Izod LaCoste polo shirt that makes him feel athletic every time he wears it, even though it’s pink and he’s no athlete. Bob looks down at the nose on the plate in front of him. There is a carrot coming out of each nostril. It seems to Bob that toaster ovens have one major flaw: they can’t toast for shit. The edges of Dotty’s nose where it was excised are crusty and a bit burned. Edges become more defined as they harden. Hard dark nose hair – poor ugly fucking woman.
Bob lived with one simple rule: Never fuck until you’re fucked with. Someone had left the box open in the cupboard and the crackers were stale. Probably Dotty. Inconsiderate bitch.
Bob and Dotty Chrisman owned the Chef’s Inn, a smelly diner near the exit of a strip mall. Your stupid, junky boyfriend worked there as the Chef, although I’m not sure whether or not what he did could be called cooking. Still, we ate there often, you and I, feeling somehow more important than the rest because you were fucking the cook and all of our meals were free. Plus, there was the cabin in the hills that for some reason Bob and Dotty believed you deserved to live in without having to pay rent. I thought about this often as I watched you and the junky snort cocaine in your cabin’s gratis bathroom.
I will not forget the Chrisman’s narrow shouldered, flat, melba-toast daughter, Patty, who was continually hoisted into my face in the hopes that I would want to mate with her. Humorless, vague and with an aura of disaster, she could not have been more unattractive to me. No, I didn’t want to dance with her nor did I want her putting suntan oil on my back at the beach. I could feel it in my loins that I never wanted to sow my seeds in her field. On some deep, genetic level, my being could sense the darkness surrounding Patty and I recoiled from her on every approach, visibly, my autonomic nervous system taking over when my mind lost control.
We mulled them over, the Chrismans, your erstwhile benefactors. Little did they know the contempt with which you referred to them, not only biting the hands that fed you, but filleting and serving those hands with a sauce of venomous sarcasm. There, on the floor, flat on your back, slipping your fingers into the crevasses of the brown high-low carpet and sipping your canned Mexican vacation, you’d play your game, the junky slumped against the cabin’s wood paneling across from you, dirty dishes around him while he snored and drooled. I’d crawl onto the mattress folded in two under the big mirror, curled up with a pillow between my legs and listen while you’d define the game of the moment.
It was often time to think of the worst possible, hard, dark things that we could. It was the only way to feel power in a world that had no place for us. The Chrisman’s were an easy target – they seemed to have the security we lacked: nice home, nice business, enough money to help you. Perhaps it was your shame that made you play the game. Who knows? So we’d picture Bob eating Dotty’s nose so that the horror in their lives would somehow match our own.
Of course no one could have foreseen what would transpire. As usual, the dry-bread daughter had been thrown in my face for a dance at the Chrisman’s holiday party. I only agreed to go get ice with her so I wouldn’t have to dance. And yes, she seemed small behind the wheel of her brother’s Corvette. You’re right – I felt scared as we rocketed down the twisty, mountain road, her inability to control the giant, rumbling beast apparent as we neared the intersection at high speed. And finally, I admit to my disbelief as the car fishtailed and I saw Patty's hands lift from the wheel as the tops of the pine trees were flooded by the headlights. Sure, there was a moment of exhilarating horripilation as the Corvette lifted-off, sailing for three seconds through the air, until it came crashing to the ground with a horrible, metallic shatter. I’m so sorry she died.
We don’t play the game anymore. No more noses, no more kitchens. The hard, dark things have stopped making us laugh.
Warm golden light coming through yellow and baby-caca ocre vinyl spring loaded pull shades with a cartoon flower pattern fills the kitchen with light while we’re watching as Bob takes the plate and places it neatly in the center of the table. He tucks a napkin into the collar of his pink Izod LaCoste polo shirt that makes him feel athletic every time he wears it, even though it’s pink and he’s no athlete. Bob looks down at the nose on the plate in front of him. There is a carrot coming out of each nostril. It seems to Bob that toaster ovens have one major flaw: they can’t toast for shit. The edges of Dotty’s nose where it was excised are crusty and a bit burned. Edges become more defined as they harden. Hard dark nose hair – poor ugly fucking woman.
Bob lived with one simple rule: Never fuck until you’re fucked with. Someone had left the box open in the cupboard and the crackers were stale. Probably Dotty. Inconsiderate bitch.
Bob and Dotty Chrisman owned the Chef’s Inn, a smelly diner near the exit of a strip mall. Your stupid, junky boyfriend worked there as the Chef, although I’m not sure whether or not what he did could be called cooking. Still, we ate there often, you and I, feeling somehow more important than the rest because you were fucking the cook and all of our meals were free. Plus, there was the cabin in the hills that for some reason Bob and Dotty believed you deserved to live in without having to pay rent. I thought about this often as I watched you and the junky snort cocaine in your cabin’s gratis bathroom.
I will not forget the Chrisman’s narrow shouldered, flat, melba-toast daughter, Patty, who was continually hoisted into my face in the hopes that I would want to mate with her. Humorless, vague and with an aura of disaster, she could not have been more unattractive to me. No, I didn’t want to dance with her nor did I want her putting suntan oil on my back at the beach. I could feel it in my loins that I never wanted to sow my seeds in her field. On some deep, genetic level, my being could sense the darkness surrounding Patty and I recoiled from her on every approach, visibly, my autonomic nervous system taking over when my mind lost control.
We mulled them over, the Chrismans, your erstwhile benefactors. Little did they know the contempt with which you referred to them, not only biting the hands that fed you, but filleting and serving those hands with a sauce of venomous sarcasm. There, on the floor, flat on your back, slipping your fingers into the crevasses of the brown high-low carpet and sipping your canned Mexican vacation, you’d play your game, the junky slumped against the cabin’s wood paneling across from you, dirty dishes around him while he snored and drooled. I’d crawl onto the mattress folded in two under the big mirror, curled up with a pillow between my legs and listen while you’d define the game of the moment.
It was often time to think of the worst possible, hard, dark things that we could. It was the only way to feel power in a world that had no place for us. The Chrisman’s were an easy target – they seemed to have the security we lacked: nice home, nice business, enough money to help you. Perhaps it was your shame that made you play the game. Who knows? So we’d picture Bob eating Dotty’s nose so that the horror in their lives would somehow match our own.
Of course no one could have foreseen what would transpire. As usual, the dry-bread daughter had been thrown in my face for a dance at the Chrisman’s holiday party. I only agreed to go get ice with her so I wouldn’t have to dance. And yes, she seemed small behind the wheel of her brother’s Corvette. You’re right – I felt scared as we rocketed down the twisty, mountain road, her inability to control the giant, rumbling beast apparent as we neared the intersection at high speed. And finally, I admit to my disbelief as the car fishtailed and I saw Patty's hands lift from the wheel as the tops of the pine trees were flooded by the headlights. Sure, there was a moment of exhilarating horripilation as the Corvette lifted-off, sailing for three seconds through the air, until it came crashing to the ground with a horrible, metallic shatter. I’m so sorry she died.
We don’t play the game anymore. No more noses, no more kitchens. The hard, dark things have stopped making us laugh.
posted by Lord Erstwhile Hopton at 10:37 AM
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