A week before Christmas Leonard and I were hitchhiking back from the mall with presents when we got a ride from this blue MG in front of Jax Liquors. The car was small, and a tight fit for me in the back with the presents. Leonard was up front with the driver-a guy with one of those soft red underlips that always looks wet and reminds me of Santa Claus. His name was Mike and he drove like a madman, punching the MG in and out of holes in traffic, wheeling from side to side, roaring up to red lights and braking down. It was impossible not to spill the beer he gave us. Tall Busch in a can.
Turns out he lives near us in an upstairs apartment at the corner of Beaches and 5th. Leonard lives two blocks down on 7th. I live around the corner on 8th. We started hanging out. We'd drop by after school and get high until dinner. Listen to his record collection. I was into Zappa and Mike had all his albums: "Freak Out," and "Weasels Ripped My Flesh," and "Overnight Sensation." I listened to that stuff and liked it. I asked him if he'd ever heard "Peaches in Regalia" and he played it for me.
He also bought stuff. Beer mainly, and bags of Colombian, and a couple of dimes of stepped-on T I had. Once he sprang for a gram of coke. He was new in town and didn't seem to do anything but drink and get high and we were willing to help him spend his money. He'd quit a job with the postal service and was running through his pension.
One day he wanted to buy a pound of good Colombian buds. Just for personal stash. Save him from having to buy lids every couple days. I said I could fix him up for three and a quarter.
I set it up and it went off fine except for that asshole driving of his on the way back home. He only knew one way: flat out. He just laughed and popped the clutch, spun out spraying gravel in a rooster tail and bucked out onto the highway. I thought he knew better, with the open beers and a pound of Colombian in the back seat. But he just didn't give a shit. Pissed me off.
He was driving like crazy. He had to be an alcoholic. His red lip was always wet with beer. He wrecked the MG once and got picked up twice for DWI. He drove like he was trying to kill that car. We were over there all the time that summer. I was hip deep in his record collection, listening to Zappa until my ears bled.
But then school started and we weren't up there so much anymore. I missed the beer and the music. One day I skipped study hall, took Beaches to Mike's and climbed the stairs. The door was half open, Zappa blasting from the stereo: "Peaches in Regalia." I stepped in and looked around, went into the kitchen and got a beer. Popped it open and peeked in the bedroom. Leonard's thrusting buttocks met my eye.
I couldn't meet the bloated face that lolled beneath them, that red underlip wet and hanging. I couldn't help but wondering what would happen when the bottom fell out, when he came to the end of that pile of money. I backed out of the bedroom and eased the paneled door shut. The needle was just returning to the first groove of "Peaches in Regalia" as I stepped out the front door and hurried down the steps.
Then Leonard started hanging out over there all the time and I didn't. He quit school and moved in with Mike. I'd stop by now and then but I couldn't stomach it-the roommate pretense-you could see it in their eyes. They were full of each other and it made me sick.
Leonard was never much on drinking and I could see he'd made a change in Mike. The bloated face was gone. He was washing the MG and taking care of it, even driving normal. Leonard was changed too-he seemed centered, calm. I'm not sure, but it might have been a sort of courage.
Andy Roberts works night shift in a sewage plant in Columbus, Ohio and has recently become interested in yoga and classical music. This is his first story in Sign of the Times - A Chronicle of Decadence in the Atomic Age.
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