CHAPTER 17: VAUDEVILLE ONLY HINTED
The Mars Bar was a seedy two story brownstone affair with a red neon sign on the outside. I'm not the most sociable guy in the galaxy, and to tell the truth, these kinds of places always make me want to change species. There's nothing like a couple of million miles and a mission to put you in the mood, though. Without a warning, a spikey head in a leather jacket bum rushed through the swinging doors and square into yours truly.
"Say cat, is this the Mars Bar?"
"Oh fukk, I feel like shit, I think I'm gonna puke."
"Well, make up your mind kid, you're confusing me."
The kid looked up bewildered, his big mouth hanging open like an Egyptian tomb. By the looks of him he'd barely escaped puberty, but already a history of mankinds' dullness had carved its way onto his cold pizza face.
"I don't fukkin' know... I feel real shitty..." his head lolled from side to side, "and if I don't puke soon, I think I'm gonna die."
"Say, you're a real renaissance pig, ain'tcha?"
At that the punk seemed to take notice of me for the first time. Reeling on spindly legs he looked me up and down with a sneer. Putrid as his personality seemed, I had the universal alien jones to talk too much, to whoever. He also looked like he might be able to score for some crank.
"Fukk off, ya rancid slice of headcheese. I'm here to get some skank."
He tried to push by me, but I was running low on good sportsmanship. I grabbed him by the neck of his strategically ripped t-shirt and popped the question --
"The owner of this dump, he wouldn't happen to be a mug with a chest like a deflated water balloon and a tattoo of E=mc2 on it, would he?"
The silence was deafening, but the quiver on the punk's downy lip told the whole sad story.
"You may be in over your circumspective head junior, 'cause that's Geek Pederast. He claims that his peter's a holy flesh crucible, known to lure stupid kids, hairdressers and other New York artists to sleazy holes like this one. Only one false move and they go from Times Square to where time and space are squared and vaudeville only hinted at."
I guess I lost my mind in the verbiage, but I wanted this stringbean to savvy before it was too goddamn late for him. He just looked at me slightly psycho and said --
"You're a fascist...you're a creep...you're an asshole."
"Simmer down you little weasel, you'll muss your D.A."
"D.A? Motherfukker's got nothing on me."
"I mean your hairdo, daddio. It's really bitchin'."
The punk got a weird glint in his eye like an amphetamine blowfish in a shooting gallery. He started to ease away from me, disgust clouding his acneed mug.
"Holy shit! You're a queer, I'm calling a cop."
"I am a cop."
"I'm calling a straight one then."
That one snapped me back to the here and now. I'd had enough of the New York heat to last me a lifetime, and I didn't want this little miscreant to think I was some kind of nervous nellie. I figured on smoothing things over with him.
"Look kid, be a sport. I'll buy you a root beer and we'll throw some Elvis on the nickelodeon."
"Elvis? That bloated capitalist shitheel? Guys like him ruin rock 'n' roll."
That tore it. Like a lesbian track star's hamstrings, that tore it. I saw red, white and purple and I punched the little fukker hard in the throat. We traded knuckles for awhile, me getting in five or six for every lame attempt from his corner.
I thought about Elvis, the once and future Thing, eating bacon with peanut butter and worshipping his mommy. Now that's rock 'n' roll. I was holding the kid up with the force of my blows and I knew I should quit before he woke up dead. Instead, I took out the old Fly-Rite and started to strangle him with it.
Warm ooze trickled down my fingers and I saw a knifeblade glinting in the grimey sun. Whether he was slicing for the yo-yo or my ding-a-ling, we'll never know. The bang from my Luger was deafening.
Click here for
CHAPTER 18: BOLOGNA SANDWICHES AND AN ENEMA BAG
No comments:
Post a Comment