Saltlick, parts 1 and 2
You can teach any animal to be addicted to something. Especially apes, all mammals really, but the closer you get to 'man', the easier it is. There are zoos that have to supplement ‘Do not feed the animals' signs with ‘Do not throw the animals cigarettes’. Last year, I read in News of the Weird that some scientist was fired for smoking crack in a cage with some of his test chimps. I knew this girl with a chinchilla that got all wired off reefer. Whenever anybody started smokin it would move to that side of the cage. Those are the most fragile animals you'll ever see. They have to take dustbaths because if you drop them in water, their fucking lungs'll collapse. It would get up on its hind legs and put its little tiny claws over the wires, shaking like a hype. It was fucking adorable. Some animals, you have to teach to be addicted; others are just askin for it.
We were sitting at the bar drinking out of each other’s glasses. I had a Makers and Sprite; she was drinking well gin. My hand was in her lap and it was too lazy to find its way up and where it belongs, on my knee or a bowl of bar nuts. I read this thing in Rolling Stone where Johnny Depp said that 100 per cent of bar peanut bowls have traces of piss cause people don’t wash their hands. I guess Johnny Depp owns a bar or something. Still I’d rather be wrist deep in a dozen guys piss poppin peanuts in my mouth than keep my hand on her thigh. If we go home together tonight work tomorrow’ll suck. I'll be tired and stupid and smell like a toilet. If we have sex we’ll have to avoid each other all weekend and I’ll have no one to hang out with. Unfortunately, like I said, my hand is lazy.
She was wearing a white slip or whatever you call it that’s supposed to go under a dress. You could see little half moons of nipple rings through the fabric. I used to love when she wore those. Now I just focus on her legs. I can pinpoint exactly when last week she shaved them. Wednesday or Tuesday. That I can know this without having to think about it disgusts my hand back. How long has this been going on? When did it become un-fun?
It’s so settled. She not out there lookin to get laid; she just expects it, from me, and I’m not worth the effort.
The performer was late. He was described as the Korean Billy Idol. What a weird description, “If he’s not here after my next drink, we should go.”
She was slurring her speech and I was only a drink away. The order was already on my tongue. Switch to beer. If you switch to beer you could still save yourself. Tell her you don’t want her over at your place tonight. She’ll be pissed all weekend but you might end the cycle. She wrapped her arm around my abdomen and scratched my belly with all five fingers. It was a girlfriend move and instantly repulsed me, “I gotta go hit the head.”
She grabbed me close and kissed me, then pushed me towards the pisser, laughing. It was a small bathroom, covered in band stickers and shit-based philosophy. I locked the door.
I studied my face in the mirror. Under the fluorescents, there were dark rings forming under my eyes, the left more than the right like I’d been hit. They were my dad’s eyes, and his brother’s. I pulled out a cigarette and put it in my mouth. How is it highschoolers look cool with cigarettes and I can’t? There’s a group of twelve year old skateboard thugs that hang out on my stoop. They would be totally badass if they didn’t wear talk like idiots and wear cargo pants.
There was a cheer, drunk and raucous and it seemed almost ironic. Hideki had taken the stage. The Korean Billy Idol. He’d be shirtless by mid-set, dripping sweat with a perfect pompadour and a sharpened sneer. This motherfucker looked cool with a cigarette.
I held my eyes closed. Pissed on the tile and ashed in the stall. Red flared behind my eyes in a tribal headache. My face stared back like a drunk in the mirror. Plugged two quarters in the condom machine and pulled the lever; poured the Alka Seltzer packet into my drink. It changed from a watery amber to a foamy yellow. I choked it down and spun, wondering too late how well Alka Seltzer mixed with whiskey and Sprite. I plodded back to the room Hideki was singing in, feeling deranged, hot under the collar and completely disturbed. A red guitar squealed, unraveling in barbed wire and mudded twang. Hideki was a blur of blue leather hips and stomach muscles. I loosened my tie and tumbled to the door blinded by sweat. Outside was cold; the moon was large and seemed to cast a shadow over the street that enveloped all the halogen and kept me cool. I don’t know much of what happened for a little bit after that.
There were buildings wrapped in neon and signs wearing paint. Cars were honking at me, in a way that led me to believe I’d missed the sidewalk. I found a curb and stretched out. I decided it’d be better not to keep walking. My throat burned; bile specked my boots like robin’s eggs. I tried to gag but couldn’t purge any more. Perhaps it would be better not to move at all. I hooked my arm under my neck and laid down to sleep, where I dreamt of country clubs and polaroids and only one murder.
I sat up on the curb. I was at my bus stop so, naturally, I was waiting for a bus. My head was still pygmies and drums and my neck felt like it couldn’t support it but I still had my wallet so everything was alright. It was hot with a breeze coming from the lak but neitrher was too oppressive. The moon had gone to some other neighborhood for after-hours and everything was nice and quiet.
My phone was flashing. I had missed twenty calls and half a dozen text messages, dying off about twenty minutes ago. All but one were from her. I could see the light from the
It was later than I thought, maybe four. Four-thiry. A beetle scurried back and forth along the asphalt. It had no idea where it was going. I attempted to breathe smoke from an unlit short I found behind my ear.
You can teach any animal to be addicted to something, especially apes. There are zoos that have to supplement ‘do not feed the animals signs’ with ‘do not throw the animals cigarettes’. Last year, I read in News of the Weird that some scientist was fired for smoking crack in a cage with some of his test chimps.
There was this one time in highschool when a friend of mine–then a well known junkie and now a highly regarded dj–was flicking lit cigarettes at a brave squirrel who’d wandered too close. It was used to students throwing it food all day long. Naturally, he thought it was a snack, and picked up the butt with both hands, and put it to his mouth. The cherry smoldered anew and the squirrel threw it to the ground, coughing up a ball of smoke bigger than its head. From that day forward I started carrying a camera wherever I went, an abnormal rectangular lump in the pocket where I keep my cell phone now. Weird shit always seemed to happen when I was unarmed, taken aback and incapable of processing it, so I’d make myself available to collect weird shit all day and soon fancied myself a photographer. I told a photo teacher about the squirrel once and she mocked me like a sonuvabitch, kept hissing that it woulda been a stupid picture anyway, stupid fat cunt.
There was an old filter on the curb. Dozens of ants were swarming it. Hundreds. Chewing, almost covering the damn thing. It was pretty amusing and I was damn near jealous. Just next to them, five ants were dragging a match from a crack in th sidewalk. It was worn but not spent. Like me, I thought. I wondered if they knew what they were doing. I plucked up the match and shook em off. I held it tight against the heel of my boot like in the movies. I struck it and took in a mouth real smoke. Again I didn’t look cool, with puffy eyes and a worn face, flopsweat and vomit. It didn’t look cool but it tasted like fucking God. I could only get a couple drags in before the bus came. It always comes when you’re smoking. I threw what was left towards the ants, and got on the bus.
I fount the moon in the back window, hiding behind some condos and watched the sun overtake it as I rode on home.
We were sitting at the bar drinking out of each other’s glasses. I had a Makers and Sprite; she was drinking well gin. My hand was in her lap and it was too lazy to find its way up and where it belongs, on my knee or a bowl of bar nuts. I read this thing in Rolling Stone where Johnny Depp said that 100 per cent of bar peanut bowls have traces of piss cause people don’t wash their hands. I guess Johnny Depp owns a bar or something. Still I’d rather be wrist deep in a dozen guys piss poppin peanuts in my mouth than keep my hand on her thigh. If we go home together tonight work tomorrow’ll suck. I'll be tired and stupid and smell like a toilet. If we have sex we’ll have to avoid each other all weekend and I’ll have no one to hang out with. Unfortunately, like I said, my hand is lazy.
She was wearing a white slip or whatever you call it that’s supposed to go under a dress. You could see little half moons of nipple rings through the fabric. I used to love when she wore those. Now I just focus on her legs. I can pinpoint exactly when last week she shaved them. Wednesday or Tuesday. That I can know this without having to think about it disgusts my hand back. How long has this been going on? When did it become un-fun?
It’s so settled. She not out there lookin to get laid; she just expects it, from me, and I’m not worth the effort.
The performer was late. He was described as the Korean Billy Idol. What a weird description, “If he’s not here after my next drink, we should go.”
She was slurring her speech and I was only a drink away. The order was already on my tongue. Switch to beer. If you switch to beer you could still save yourself. Tell her you don’t want her over at your place tonight. She’ll be pissed all weekend but you might end the cycle. She wrapped her arm around my abdomen and scratched my belly with all five fingers. It was a girlfriend move and instantly repulsed me, “I gotta go hit the head.”
She grabbed me close and kissed me, then pushed me towards the pisser, laughing. It was a small bathroom, covered in band stickers and shit-based philosophy. I locked the door.
I studied my face in the mirror. Under the fluorescents, there were dark rings forming under my eyes, the left more than the right like I’d been hit. They were my dad’s eyes, and his brother’s. I pulled out a cigarette and put it in my mouth. How is it highschoolers look cool with cigarettes and I can’t? There’s a group of twelve year old skateboard thugs that hang out on my stoop. They would be totally badass if they didn’t wear talk like idiots and wear cargo pants.
There was a cheer, drunk and raucous and it seemed almost ironic. Hideki had taken the stage. The Korean Billy Idol. He’d be shirtless by mid-set, dripping sweat with a perfect pompadour and a sharpened sneer. This motherfucker looked cool with a cigarette.
I held my eyes closed. Pissed on the tile and ashed in the stall. Red flared behind my eyes in a tribal headache. My face stared back like a drunk in the mirror. Plugged two quarters in the condom machine and pulled the lever; poured the Alka Seltzer packet into my drink. It changed from a watery amber to a foamy yellow. I choked it down and spun, wondering too late how well Alka Seltzer mixed with whiskey and Sprite. I plodded back to the room Hideki was singing in, feeling deranged, hot under the collar and completely disturbed. A red guitar squealed, unraveling in barbed wire and mudded twang. Hideki was a blur of blue leather hips and stomach muscles. I loosened my tie and tumbled to the door blinded by sweat. Outside was cold; the moon was large and seemed to cast a shadow over the street that enveloped all the halogen and kept me cool. I don’t know much of what happened for a little bit after that.
There were buildings wrapped in neon and signs wearing paint. Cars were honking at me, in a way that led me to believe I’d missed the sidewalk. I found a curb and stretched out. I decided it’d be better not to keep walking. My throat burned; bile specked my boots like robin’s eggs. I tried to gag but couldn’t purge any more. Perhaps it would be better not to move at all. I hooked my arm under my neck and laid down to sleep, where I dreamt of country clubs and polaroids and only one murder.
I sat up on the curb. I was at my bus stop so, naturally, I was waiting for a bus. My head was still pygmies and drums and my neck felt like it couldn’t support it but I still had my wallet so everything was alright. It was hot with a breeze coming from the lak but neitrher was too oppressive. The moon had gone to some other neighborhood for after-hours and everything was nice and quiet.
My phone was flashing. I had missed twenty calls and half a dozen text messages, dying off about twenty minutes ago. All but one were from her. I could see the light from the
It was later than I thought, maybe four. Four-thiry. A beetle scurried back and forth along the asphalt. It had no idea where it was going. I attempted to breathe smoke from an unlit short I found behind my ear.
You can teach any animal to be addicted to something, especially apes. There are zoos that have to supplement ‘do not feed the animals signs’ with ‘do not throw the animals cigarettes’. Last year, I read in News of the Weird that some scientist was fired for smoking crack in a cage with some of his test chimps.
There was this one time in highschool when a friend of mine–then a well known junkie and now a highly regarded dj–was flicking lit cigarettes at a brave squirrel who’d wandered too close. It was used to students throwing it food all day long. Naturally, he thought it was a snack, and picked up the butt with both hands, and put it to his mouth. The cherry smoldered anew and the squirrel threw it to the ground, coughing up a ball of smoke bigger than its head. From that day forward I started carrying a camera wherever I went, an abnormal rectangular lump in the pocket where I keep my cell phone now. Weird shit always seemed to happen when I was unarmed, taken aback and incapable of processing it, so I’d make myself available to collect weird shit all day and soon fancied myself a photographer. I told a photo teacher about the squirrel once and she mocked me like a sonuvabitch, kept hissing that it woulda been a stupid picture anyway, stupid fat cunt.
There was an old filter on the curb. Dozens of ants were swarming it. Hundreds. Chewing, almost covering the damn thing. It was pretty amusing and I was damn near jealous. Just next to them, five ants were dragging a match from a crack in th sidewalk. It was worn but not spent. Like me, I thought. I wondered if they knew what they were doing. I plucked up the match and shook em off. I held it tight against the heel of my boot like in the movies. I struck it and took in a mouth real smoke. Again I didn’t look cool, with puffy eyes and a worn face, flopsweat and vomit. It didn’t look cool but it tasted like fucking God. I could only get a couple drags in before the bus came. It always comes when you’re smoking. I threw what was left towards the ants, and got on the bus.
I fount the moon in the back window, hiding behind some condos and watched the sun overtake it as I rode on home.
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