eleven

Shannon Waters sucked and sucked on Tre’s cock, her head slowly bobbing up and down, up and down. Oil derrick slow. They were at the back end of the parking lot next to the Pizza Hut on Geary, behind an old, rusty van. The windows of the van were yellowed from decades of its owner smoking packs and packs of cigs. Trash was piled up high in the back windows. The trash and the van were washed of color by years in the sun. Tre had a crack pipe in his mouth. Lit it with a lighter. His personal lighter, the one with a bent-over woman etched into its metal side. Shannon could smell that awesome, acrid smell as the crack caught and burned.

She wished that for once he’d let her hit the pipe first before having to hit his pipe. As it was, she always got the seconds directly from his mouth. She took her lips off his cock and he put his mouth close to hers, not touching her lips, of course: her lips were for his cock only. He blew the sharp-tanged smoke into her mouth as she inhaled with all her might, desperate not to let any go to waste.

“That’s a good bitch,” Tre said, his voice husky with the shit that now seared through him. “Good little bitch.” And with that, he pushed her head back down on his cock.

–––––

William Lucas rolled over on his bed made of flattened cardboard boxes and a threadbare Mexican blanket he’d found folded and left on a trash can behind an apartment building over on Eddy. Man, still fucking day out? He’d gotten up too soon. Night was his time. Like a vampire, he had to sleep during the day and get the fuck up at night to roam the streets looking for a high. Or for food. Whichever happened, happened. That was his motto. Couldn’t remember where he got that shit from. He’d eaten late last night, so he was good for a bit longer. Okay then: the high.

Checked his pockets. Just about ten bucks in change and ones. The locals were dead to him. Thank fuck some of the tourists that came to this town had some heart. Ten of them would maybe give him just enough of some garbage to keep him happy overnight. Maybe he would have to raid a dumpster behind some fucking eating joint for food. Or, he guessed, he could go to the church nearby and get fed. But shit, man … he hated going there. Fuck them and their God. God only shit on us now. We weren’t his great experiment: we were his great bowel disorder. Fuck God.

He’d need to make more dough. Thought over who he could intimidate into giving him money, but he’d just about intimidated everyone he could this month, and it was a long month. Maybe he’d be able to find something to hock. Roy had that boombox he’d shown up with one day. Said he’d gotten the money from this dude in a big van, one of those motorhome things. All fitted out like a lab. Dude was even in a lab coat, like out of some science fiction movie. All he had to do, Roy told him, was let this dude in the lab coat take some blood. Weird, that. But, Roy’d been paid. And paid not too bad. Roy had told him (and where was Roy, anyway? Hadn’t seen the shitbag for days) the motorhome was usually parked down in the Mission, just above sixteenth. Maybe he’d just truck down there and see.

The day was turning cold. Lucas zipped up his old cold-weather army coat and pulled up the hood of his faded, black sweatshirt. He headed over to the Mission, stuffed-to-the-seams World War II army pack over his shoulder. So he had to give some blood? So fucking what? He’d done that before.

–––––

The walk down to the Mission had been a fucking pain in the fucking ass. It seemed like Lucas hit every red light, forced to wait at every corner with the zombies. His thermostat seemed to be broken, and he sweated more than he could ever remember. Maybe he was getting weaker? Being on the street could do that to a guy. He’d seen it happen a thousand times. Predators end up prey at some point. No. Fuck that. Not him. What was wrong with him today, he couldn’t guess. He just needed to be high. That would fix everything.

He went to the usual place. A strip of block on 20th street, near Harrison. Shitty place. Didn’t even know the name. There was some faded sign on the wall outside, but it might’ve said The Sandbox as much as it might’ve said The Shitbag. Lucas knew he could find something, something inside here. Hoped for at least a little bud, but knew he’d settle for a painkiller he could powder and snort. Whatever.

Entered the joint, letting his eyes adjust to the smoky dimness. Looked immediately to his left and right. That’s where the predators would hide, waiting to leap the moment he walked in. He had nothing to steal, except the small amount of dough in his pocket, but he also knew that would be enough. Shit, he’d been rolled once just for his hoodie and his shoes. That’s just the way the world worked sometimes.

Despair was about to set in when he didn’t see anyone he could score from, but then he saw Viv. She sat at the end of the bar, hands wrapped around a glass of clear liquid he figured was vodka. He’d heard that’s what she was drinking now, her liver giving up the fight. Her black hair was pulled back in a raggedy ponytail. Her clothes looked like she’d been sleeping in them. Probably had been. But Lucas knew that she’d be carrying … something. He went over to her. She barely looked his way as he stood at the stool next to her. This was the part he fucking hated the most: having to be all like a begging dog. Anger slammed him. He wanted nothing more than to clamp one of his hands over her face and with the other punch her in the throat. Bitch.

“Hey Viv,” he said. “How’s it going?”

She took a drink. Looked at him like he was the most insignificant thing on the planet. Shrugged like she couldn’t be bothered. “Fine.”

“Hey, was wonderin’, you know? Got ten.”

“You’re going to break the bank, buying like that. Or maybe have the FBI down on your ass.” Took another drink.

Fuck you, cunt. “Yeah, but I’m working on something that will net me a fucking lot more. You know I’ll come right here, too.”

“Uh huh.”

He pulled out his dough. Put it on the bar. “What will that get me?”

Viv sighed. “Just because I like you, right? I’ll give you some bud I picked up yesterday. I’ll even do 1980s prices, since it came from some asshole’s back yard.” She reached under her dirty skirt. Pulled out a small baggy. He hoped she pulled it from something other than her hole. She tossed it on the bar. It didn’t look like shake. Looked like small buds. Very small. Very wizened and dry. He scooped it up as she scooped up his money. “Goodbye,” she said in a monotone.

Lucas nodded. Walked away fast, knowing that this was the most dangerous of times. Now people knew he had something. Something they wanted. Everyone seemed to want something. Especially that something that would get them the fuck out of life, any way they could.

He was heading to the door when the bartender, Crow, waved him over from behind the bar. Lucas always figured that Crow got his name because the fucker possessed black hair, black eyes, and black painted nails on his fat, sausage fucking fingers. Crow led him away to the other end of the bar, out of earshot

“Someone lookin’ for you,” the bartender said as he wiped down the bar.

That wasn’t what he’d expected. Lucas had expected Crow to ask him for some of the weed. Carrying charges, for letting the deal go down in his joint. “Yeah? Me?”

A nod. “Some guy. Dressed in black. Mallen. Guy used to be a cop. Then was a needle freak. Then was nothing but some fucker walking around asking questions.”

He thought hard. He’d never known anybody named Mallen. “You sure he was looking for me?”

Another nod.

Why would this guy be looking for him? And how would he know to be out looking for him? Nobody knew about him. He was a nothing. A dark hole. Man, he was more under the radar now than he was a year ago before anyone in his family even realized he was gone. What the living fuck? “You sure?” he asked again.

Crow almost threw the glass in his hand at him. “You think I don’t know my shit, asshole? I just said someone was looking for you. Doing you a fucking favor. And what do you do? You question my authority.” Crow then turned his back on Lucas and moved down the bar. End of session.

Lucas stood there a moment. Why would some ex-cop, ex-junkie, be looking for him? He hadn’t done anything wrong. Well, not that wrong. His mind raced over all the crap he’d done in the last couple weeks. All the people he’d fucked up or stolen from. There was nothing. No one that would even have enough dough to hire a dude to look him up. Nobody even cared about him. Nobody had—

Wait … .

He remembered then that he had given out his name in the last couple weeks. Just once.

That fucker Hendrix. Hendrix had found some shit to pawn. Lucas and Shannon were sharing the butt end of a joint when Hendrix walked up and showed them what he’d stolen. It was some good stuff: an iPod, gold watch, and some rings. Hendrix said it would look less suspicious if Lucas and Shannon walked in carrying some of the stuff, instead of him walking in on his own with all of it. If Lucas and Shannon walked in after, or before him, with some of the pieces it would be more … quiet. Asshole. And that’s when Lucas got it all squared away in his head.

The pawnshop fucker. That money-lending fucker. That shop was the ONLY place Lucas had given his name recently. Why had he done that? Oh yeah … he’d been desperate. Being desperate fucked with a guy’s judgment. A guy would do anything when he needed to get high. That day, Lucas would’ve pawned his mother’s asshole for something to take him away.

Shit … .