YumYum Reed gets drunk in closets and pees in the glass afterwards while waiting for her mother to leave the house of her secret lover.
Two Poems (July 20, 2010. Issue 19.)
Listening to Bob Dylan at 10:46PM When It Feels Like 2AM And the Days Run Together Like You're On Speed But You're So Stone Cold Sober You're In A Deep Depression And Your Central Nervous System Is Done With And You Can't Form Complete Sentences In Your Head Anymore So You Copy Charles Bukowski's Swagger... and Mary O'Hare, too!
i stand on this street corner 5 days a week
at about 2:30PM so i can smoke
my cigarettes in peace
away from the noise
of people. and towards the noise
of passing traffic and yellow busses
pulling into the lot. i'll chat with them soon.
more often than not snow is piling up
on my red faux fur waist-jacket.
as i light menthol 100s with the stub
of another. and look up for answers
only to find a mocking gray sky.
what do you want from me?
but on burdett i talk to myself.
and sometimes ascertain a moment
impervious to the bitter cold.
i talk about getting drunk on cheap wine
in paris, france. or driving down
to california in a convertable
with cadillac soul. and drive
old men crazy.
on burdett i realize astounding philosophical things
as i wave to educators driving by.
like that we are a nation of fast cars and speeding tickets
of coke
a cola and pepsi. of stimulants and opiates, anti-depressants and anti-anxiety narcotics.
not that i'm complaining - if you're handing them out for free.
that's darwinisim.
downtown there are a million bars for a city
of 2 million alcoholics.
when the lights go out they put on the neon,
and it looks so attractive.
the accountants come out of H&R
and go across the street to Valentine's.
there's one named after dylan's song
on 4th street.
maybe if it was just summer
i could get some vitamin d
and these manic depressive, schizophrenic tendencies
would go the fuck away.
Blowing Dice
Charles Bukowski told me
not to try, so I never did.
I realized this in a pounding hot
shower that relieved
my flat spine, and my face
laughed against the heart
of the sun through the window
where people could surely see me,
as the curtains were too sheer.
As he assured me I would,
I had “ridden life straight
into perfect laughter.” I was
“alone with the Gods.” I went
all the way, and everything came
to me. Love, booze, menthols,
men, sunshine, the peace of mind
of the truly insane -
that is when nothing bothers you.
A creamy and naked lady
stood before red, sheer curtains
on the day of the rain and wondered upon
why the lily did not yet bloom
as it promised. But the autumn-sound
of the rustling leaves
in the summer-wind fighting with the storm
for the floor to speak while UV rays battled
with them both made it all OK.
And again I laughed naked,
but against the overcast;
idly observing an overflowing
ashtray, amud with lipstick stains
around the filters of the Empire
of Mr. Phillip Morris.
I noticed on the mantle
a shot glass from the Hard Rock
that was holding two die.
I blew on them in my hand,
and I rolled, never looking back,
not once, not ever.
Not Another Piece of Creative Fiction (July 20, 2010. Issue 19.)
I simply do not know why writing chose me. I snort ibuprofen off poorly-finished hardwood floors, masturbate in bathrooms that do not lock in the first place with my diseased leg up on the running sink, and look fervently for vodka bottles that simply cannot be found because my mother hides them too well lately. I have simply no discipline, as Dan (Mr. Hayes) puts it. And then I tell him I have to leave, to go bullshit with George who’s dying of cancer in the main office, and to go sit with Mickey in her office down in the Guidance wing for hours on end and bullshit further about life, death, and shit in between. Occasionally, we go out and smoke together in front of the school. Then maybe I’ll go to my fourth period - with Jody, Mrs. Boyd. Who, does no doubt love me like the others, but just demands a little more attendance than I am simply capable of due to my living life like a normal fucking person. We get on well though. So, when not in classes (never), I walk into Chris’s class (Miss Mumford, soon to be Mrs. Something else) and start teaching with her… because, to be honest with you, the rules really don’t apply to me anymore. And, I’m on Zoloft.
So, today I was in the main office pulling George’s hair out under protest because he’s going through chemo. I ran into Rich, my principal, who refuses to believe that Elani (Mrs. Karanassiue) told me I didn’t have to come to class anymore as long as I finish her work (true fact - I’m a genius who requires no instruction). After Mickey came back from her dentist appointment and we all three ran into her, he believed me a little more. How ‘bout it? I carried papers for Mickey back to her office and we bullshitted until my mother came to pick me up at 11 to get the results of my TB test. No one has TB anymore - you know what? If you have TB, you’re dead. That’s why no one has TB.
I informed my mother that Mickey thought her lasagna was the absolute best lasagna she’d ever had in her life. Of course, this is a phrase people use, but Mickey was really never one to just say things for the sake of saying them. You could tell by her expression, when she really meant something she looked something like Bambi. Which fits really, because her mother died a horrible and tragic death from dementia. Very similar to my own grandmother (my mother, really, if we’re being honest, and why not be honest) who died a horrible and tragic, graphic death from lung and everything else cancer.
So then we started to drive. By the time my mother got there, I had spent so much time bullshitting with Mickey I had had no time to smoke. Anyone who has known me for more than five minutes knows that I smoke, because frankly I rarely go that long without one between my fingers that so often spread like my legs in a V-for-Victory sign. So I says to my mother,
“When we get there I’m just gonna have a smoke real quick.”
And she goes mother-ape-fucking-bat-out-of-hell-shit on me. Out of nowhere. Alcoholism is a bafflin’ disease, even if they‘re in recovery all addicts are fucking nuts. Evidently, because, I am an addict. I’ve been 2 packs a day for 5 fucking years. No one’s ever said shit. I smoke everywhere. I smoke in school. I smoke in cars. I smoke on street corners. I smoke in bed. I smoke in other people’s houses. I once tried to smoke out of my vaginal cavity, however, even though I’m a snapper, I have no ability to suck into my lungs through there - so, point was moot. I can, however, smoke through my nose and blow out my mouth and vice versa. I’ve tried through my ears, but again, only in vain. I refuse to try with the one you’re thinking of. Sicko.
So we’re fighting all down the highway. I had a cigarette in the car while she stood out in the rain (I would have stood out, have done it many, many times, but she sort of stormed out). We’re fighting in the waiting room. The receptionist knows we’re fighting. We smile at strangers, which in turn and ironically makes us look more insane. We’re fighting in earshot of patients, she’s screaming she feels no shame for being a drunk. People are trying not to stare. The doctor calls us in.
“Is that your mother?”
“I don’t know.”
“What?”
“Yes.”
Guess the fuck what. I didn’t have TB. Tell that to fucking Harvard on the Hudson.
So we’re walking out, deliberately pushing each other into walls and doors, trying not to be acrimonious, y’know. Grunting at each other like overly-ambitious cave men. And we get to the car.
“Are we having coffee at Pop’s?”
“Yeah. I just gotta go to the bank first.”
We start going. Every time the car moved, it seemed, the screaming would start again. Usually I handle these things well and just don’t say anything back. But come on man, this is my smoking we’re talking about. This is my ability to choose my own death! She had hers. I’d rather die pale with blood on my lips than orange with a stomach out-to-here. Although, please, a wig?
We go to the bank. We have a half hour wait for my father - the French connection, the middle man, the man with the plan, the cash-handler, the man of the house, the bread-winner, and all that jazz. So we sit there in silence.
“I’m gonna go outside and smoke.”
“No you’re fucking not.”
I considered calmly.
“Well. What would happened if I just went?”
“I would never like you again.”
My mother is a child. I got out of the car.
“Fuck you. I hate you,” she says. I laughed and lighted my cigarette. Walked to the post across the way, leaned against it. You know, because I have degenerative structural and bio mechanical skeletal disorder.
I smoked two and a half cigarettes when my mother got out of the car and walked to the liquor store behind us. I let that sink in - it’s not my fault just like my smoking or drugging or drinking or gambling or sexing it up is not hers. People are gonna do what they’re gonna do. She walked back with a fifth of cheap, awful vodka and walked over to me.
“Ok! WANNA BE LOSERS TOGETHER AND JUST WALK AROUND THE HOUSE SMOKIN’ AND TRASHED ALL THE TIME? HERE COME ON!” She took a sip and handed it to me. Well I showed her. I drank a quarter of the bottle. I hate vodka though, especially straight. I like to think I drink with a bit more style. I like the dark stuff mostly, with a soda or juice, always on ice. At least I had a cigarette with it, though.
I didn’t speak to her. She walked back to the car. I finished my cigarette and lighted another. In the middle of that one I asked a God I don’t believe in what he wanted from me. She flipped me off from the car. So, I walked over.
“Get in the car.”
“No.”
“GET IN THE FUCKING CAR. YOU’RE DRINKING MORE OF THIS.”
Well. You don’t have to ask me twice.
So I got in the car. Into my little passenger seat.
“Ok, Ma. Ok. Let’s piss with big dogs.”
“OH BELIEVE ME YOU HONEY I’VE PISSED WITH ‘EM, AND I’VE PUKED WITH ‘EM!”
“All right.”
She gave me the fifth and I drank about another quarter or more of it without flinching. I was proud of myself.
“Thank you,” I says.
‘FUCK YOU YOU FUCKING BITCH SDFSKJDFHSJ,” she continued screaming.
“Fuck this,” I says. I walked out of the car.
“GET THE FUCK BACK IN HERE!!!”
“No.”
I lighted another cigarette and walked back to the post.
“FUCK YOU! I HATE YOU! YOU LITTLE BITCH!”
“Ok.”
She continued screaming and finally I got a wild idea. I walked back over to her and started to take a good, long, heavy, throat-burning drag. She opened her window.
“Alexis Marie Stone you better not blow that in my face. I HAVE ASTHMA!”
I smile at her and blew from far away.
“Yeah yer not that close.” She chuckled.
I dragged long and hard again. “ALEXIS. I WILL GET OUT OF THIS CAR AND ROCK YOU. I DON’T CARE IF I GET ARRESTED.”
I smiled. Good. I blew right in her face. “GOOD.”
She got out of the car. Tried to strangle me, pushed me against the pathetic, white Ford Contour who’s front-end will fall off sometime in the next 3 days when we’ll all die in a car crash on Hoosick Street, I took a hit to the stomach I think, she was grabbing at my cigarette trying to put it out and that was just unacceptable to me. But, because I am diseased and she is bigger and stronger than her petite and adorable daughter, she did get my Marlboro Menthol 100. I lose everything. Although, George thinks I run Troy High and they should give me a name tag and let me work there. George said to me the other day that I have a heart THIS BIG and that I am one of the most caring and loving people he has ever met, that I was meant to care for people, that I will touch so many people’s lives. George and I tear up together a lot. Mickey and I, too.
So. With only one cigarette left in the pack I had on me (I had half a carton at home), I figured, why not sit in the car? It was raining out, anyway. Not that it affected me. As my great uncle likes to say, I’m the toughest chick I know (not that Ken’s a chick, he says “guy”). So, we got in the car and heard sirens.
“Great,” she says, “somebody called the cops. Somebody saw us.”
“GOOD!”
“Fuck you. You better say nothing happened.”
“Fuck that.”
“You want me to go to jail?”
“Would that be such a bad thing?”
“Fuck you. You’re a bitch.”
I laughed.
“How ‘bout YOU get arrested ‘huh?” She says.
“Yeah for what?”
“All the DRUGS you do!”
“Ain’t nothing on me but the pills prescribed to me for medical conditions, babycakes.”
“Fuck you.”
“Give me your cigarettes.”
“No.”
“Fuck you. Whatever.”
My dad pulled up shortly after and said he could hear us screaming across the parking lot. In which instance my voice was compared to my great aunt Tanya’s - which I was not happy about because honest to God or whoever, she has the most annoying fucking laugh I have ever heard in my life when she’s on the sauce. And, you know, she’s jealous of me for stealing her sister from her (Gram), and then stealing her brother (Ken), and you know her party buddy (my mother, you know, ‘cause I had to be born and all). And in turn, she quite dislikes me. But I do not take this personally in anyway shape or form because not only does she dislike me, but she does not like anything.
My father gave my mother $500 for the week. They are still married, he still lives with us, they have been married for about 14 years now, I was the flower girl at their wedding, he is my biological father, I am a bastard child, and god knows I’m a bitch. They just meet at the bank at lunch time so he can give her money so she can make deposits so her checks don’t bounce so she won’t get arrested because she uses my dead grandmother’s checking account still. After he left we drove to her bank up the street and I almost swerved us into a moving car, and we both laughed about it and had a good time and shit like that.
So by the time we got to her bank, she was light headed and asked me to go deposit. I didn’t get arrested, but I did ask for a dog biscuit behind the counter. The only dog I have belongs to my grandfather, and in retrospect I could have saved it for him, but I ate it myself in front of the lady at the counter and turned around and walked out, eating some more in front of the customers. No one seemed to care very much but I’m sure it’ll be something that pops up at their dinner tables tonight. “Honey, I saw such a weird thing at the bank today… this crazy looking lady came in with all this crazy, messy curly hair on her head wearing these huge, oversized old lady glasses and this big, black long coat… and she was eating a doggie biscuit.” “I suppose that is strange dear, yes.” “Eat your peas, Patti.”
At Pop’s house the coffee was good and I got to smoke because Pop is also a heavy smoker. Gus the dog hung out with us on the table and I put his snout in my mouth. He loves attention. It was rare that we didn’t talk about death or anything. Pop and I decided to bet the Preakness on Saturday. His eyes were very blue today. That always meant good things.
I came home and toyed with the idea of sleeping on the couch. I then made myself get up and take a long, hot bath that turned cold. I then saw a reflection of the shower rod in the white tiles in our bathroom and began believing I had discovered the parallel universe. I then found proof that I had when I saw another reflection in the bath water of my own hand, and when I pressed down on it I could feel the parallel me pressing back! So exciting. We must notify MENSA immediately.
I got out and went to smoke downstairs in the cold because I’m stupid and don’t give a shit about pneumonia or any bullshit like that. It’s for the dogs, really. Pussy worries like that… Anyway. After that I decided to make myself a drink, except I could not find the vodka we were swigging in the parking lot earlier. So instead I found ibuprofen, brought it upstairs, first masturbated in the bathroom that has no lock and never has, then cleaned up, came back into my place of sleep, put the pills down on the floor, grinded them with a stolen crystal ashtray from Foxwoods Resort and Casino (thank you, Gram, for being a klepto and a weirdo who thought they wouldn’t notice - I can’t believe you took the coffee maker, too, right out of the room), shuffled the powder with a “feel good” plastic card that had a poem on it - some shit about “Things Will Get Better” - and snorted up like a pro. I had the Rolling Stones on. It felt good. I had a pretty good day today. My throat burns like hell and I need another drink and another cigarette but all in all, I’ve had a pretty good day.