Not so Subtle

Today’s dietary supplement is Dipenhydramine. This is generally used to treat cold allergies.

Temporarily relieves:

sore or scratchy throat, runny nose, sneezing, coughing

Side affects may include:

drowsiness, haziness, apathy, lethargy, depression, fatigue, loss of motivation, loss of appetite, feeling like you don’t love anything or anyone and never really have,

Reminds you of:

High school, when you took this nearly every day, whether you were sick or not, because it killed the anxiety, which you considered worse than feeling numb.

Benefits:

11 hours of sleep, apathy, easy to please only yourself with nothing else to worry about.

Have you ever heard your boss declare “Why would you do that?”

Only its like “WHY would you do that?”

The implication is that only a retarderd person would have done whatever you did.

This doesn’t bother you very much. Only a little. Only enough.

Superiority/Inferiority complex kicks in, reminds you that you’re smarter than 96 percent of the people on this planet, and in all likelihood, you are considerably less retarded than him. Perhaps he should be punished.

The wheels in my head need greasing, of late.

Too many people on the list that need to be punished going without it. Spare the rod, spoil the idiot. I’m too busy trying to get heart disease to bother with anything else, vengeance least of all. I’m a sensitive person. Why do I hate everyone?

Interesting.

The last thing I remember is my roommate offering me a drink out of his playboy flask. It’s strong. I’m not quite drunk and I don’t want to be, so I only have a little. I nod off to sleep soon thereafter.

Dream

I’m with Kim in a swanky Sbarro restaurant with tropical plants and little waterfalls in the seating area. We’re drinking vodka. The line to the steaming pans of food is long, but the wait is not for some reason. I order meatballs, three different kinds. The trey they put them onto is flat but they roll around and slide off. I order more meatballs and again they roll around and fall off of my plate. Finally when they spray whip cream onto my 3^rd bath of meatballs; this time they’re Swedish, they hold still. Before I can return to my seat I get into an argument with a black preacher for no good reason. We’re drinking more vodka but all of the sudden in a taxi cab downtown, rounding an onramp onto JFK. A british boy named Matt is with us and he’s wearing navy blue slacks and a dress shirt, with red suspenders. Kim says that we’re driving to Decatur tonight to get some ice cream from a restaurant named Tippy’s that’s infamous for it. I ask if she knows how far it is to Decatur. She nods. I start to say that I can’t do a 7 hour round trip in the middle of the night because I have to wake up for… and I forget what it is. And so I shrug. Why not?

The drive is long especially because we’re no longer in a cab as we trudge down the interstate. Now we are straddling a boat that is attached to a minivan. It feels like we may tip over on every bump. Whoever is driving does a good job of avoiding mud piles. I hold my breath each time a big bump comes and on one of them when I open my eyes all of the sudden I’m downtown again. They’re playing a baseball game in a gigantic Olympic swimming pool. David Ortiz is wearing a white sox uniform. He check-swings at a changeup thrown 80 feet over his head. I cry that he deserves to be taken out just for that, or maybe it was an announcer. I’m not sure.

I see a man who looks like Borat wearing Aviators, a tweed jacket and holding a gun rushing towards the pool. For some reason, I know he is coming for me. I dive into the pool and pull my six-shooter out of my suit jacket and start swimming around. If I keep moving, he won’t be able to see me. The baseball game comes to a halt, everyone watching, waiting to see who will win this game of cat and mouse. At last I pull up out of the water and point my gun, I find myself safely at home in my bed, pointing my gun at little fireflies of different colors. I stumble out of my bed and swat at them. My all white cat Frostie follows me around, mewing and hissing at the little rainbow colored fairies. I can’t hold my balance. Somehow I manage to fall into my bathroom and look into the mirror. My neck and chest are bruised like I’ve been wearing a heavy gold plate of armor. I know this because the skin is green where it would have been. Firefly fairies sneak in under the door and I shoot at them. Where am I.

A horn blows and I wake up. Without looking at the clock, I know that it’s somewhere between 3 AM and 4 AM. Whisper a little prayer about the power of prayer to defeat fear. Repeat. I am certain that I have been drugged. I write my dream down. Now I am less certain.

Oh what a near perfect day. The Sux lost, but oh well. Everything else went about as well as it could.

So I found out today that my insurance reprocessed all the claims from that shit-storm back in December. So now they’ll be paying most of the 80 grand that I owed!!! What a relief! I wasn’t really bugged by the whole thing because I’ve never believed money is that important, but it’s a big load off my shoulders anyway.

I won poker tonight. Woot.

Thank you! Thank you. Thank you so much!

Newest addition to the Outlaw.  This movement brings me to the 100 page mark! Sweet!
The next night, Louie got home from the casino at two in the morning and didn’t feel like making dinner so he flipped through his catalogue of takeout menus.

Wan Fu Wok. Not open this late.

Thai Thai. Too Spicy.

Finally he found the menu for Mangiano’s and picked up his phone to order. A snotty woman’s voice answered.

“Mangianos.”

“Yeah I wanna order for delivery.”

“Delivery car’s in the shop. You’ll have to do pickup.”

Louie tisked.

“Fine.”

“What can I get ya?”

“I want a large deep dish half sausage half mushroom and a 2 liter bottle of Diet Zap.”
“That’ll be 17.50, cash or charge?”

“Cash.”

“Pickup in one hour.”

“K.”

“Thank you for choosing Mangianos, the finest 24 hour Italian eatery in town.”

Louie hung up the phone and then laid himself out on the couch, which squeaked beneath his girth. The springs of the old furniture were stretched to their limit. Slowly but surely Louie had been gaining weight since he’d taken to ordering delivery three times a week. It wasn’t that he was too lazy to cook his own meals, he just never happened to be in the mood to do it anymore. After a few minutes on the couch, Louie started to sweat and his jogging pants clung to his thighs, and to the small of his back. The ceiling fan stirred around the warm air in vain. Louie wiped his forehead and brushed back his black hair from his eyes. He turned on the TV and flipped from station to station, pausing for only a few seconds before moving on.

A tele-novella was on the Spanish channel. You know, the ones that all have the same baritone narrator and the women with enormous breasts. Louie thought about rubbing one out, but wasn’t really in the mood. Click.

The next channel had a game show on. Some poor kid was stammering, trying to think of an answer, meanwhile the clock was ticking down. “Uuuuummmmm.” The kid shook his head and looked like he was about to cry when… Click.

Louie stopped on a station where a serial killer was stalking the shadows of a sorority house. A skimpy brunette was slowly shuffling down the stairs to the basement, calling out below to the darkness. “Hello?” She was shaking as she gripped the handrail and eased herself downward. The musical score took on an eerie pitch and she called again. “Is anyone down here?”

“Stupid bitch. You’re already dead. Just get it over with.” Louie grumbled and was about the change the channel again when the music jumped and a black cat ran out from the shadows. The brunette threw up her hands and screamed as the feline bounded past her up the stairs. “Jesus. What a tease.”

Something crashed in Louie’s kitchen. It sounded like glass breaking.

“Da fuck?”

Louie narrowed his eyes and stared down the hallway, but couldn’t see anything. He looked back at the TV and estimated that if he got up now he’d probably miss the obligatory stabbing, but oh well. The couch’s springs cried in euphoric release as Louie lifted himself up and walked to the kitchen. On the floor he found a framed photograph lying face down. Louie bent down and picked it up, then turned it over. Three smiling faces looked up at him. His mom was wearing a red dress and matching lipstick and beaming like Rudolph on somebody’s front lawn during winter. He was only nine years old when it was taken and his buckteeth showed prominently with his smile. He remembered fighting his mom tooth and nail about wearing “that retard gray vest” for the family picture, but now he nodded and agreed that it looked good on him. Of course at the time, his dad made him wear it. His dad. That was the sound. A crack had formed in the glass and cut across his father’s frame, chopping his three-piece pinstriped suit in half. His dad. He had black eyes and was bald except in patches around the back of his gigantic head. Leonardo Spatelli towered over both his wife and his son. Louie looked again into his dead father’s black eyes and then put the picture back up on its nail on the wall.

Louie shuddered a little bit and dreaded having to go to sleep in a few hours time. He lit a cigarette and felt a calm wash over him; his muscles relaxed and he went to the bathroom then returned to the couch. On an empty stomach an hour seems like a week. When it was finally time to go, Louie brushed the ashes that had collected on his clothes and got his car keys. It was only a half-mile drive to Mangiano’s but there were stoplights at the end of every block.

Louie pulled to a stop at a red light and watched a lone woman sitting at the bus stop. She was short and obese and wearing a short orange skirt and long pink stockings. She was shaking all over and eating ice cream directly from a two-quart bucket. There were several shopping bags lying on either side of her on the bench. She seemed to be worried someone would take them because every four seconds she glanced away from her ice cream and checked on them to make sure they were all still there. A shiver went up Louie’s spine and he was relieved when the light turned green.

There were a bunch of fast-food restaurants on the same block as Mangianos. The burger and fries joint, then the sub sandwich place, then Gary’s Chicken Shack. The salty aroma of fried chicken hit Louie’s nostrils and for a moment he wished that he’d gone there for dinner, instead. Too late now. On the roof of Gary’s there were half a dozen American flags whipping in the gentle breeze. Their white stars and stripes were illuminated by the huge ad sign, which read:

50 pieces for 41.99

100 for 79.99

Not bad, Louie shrugged. Should a person ever need a hundred pieces of chicken, it didn’t sound like a bad deal. Louie got to Mangiano’s and parked then went in and picked up his pizza. Steam was rising from the little slits on the side and the cardboard was warm in his hand. When he came back outside he set the pizza on the roof of the car and then got in and turned the key in the ignition.

That’s when he saw his father’s ghost sitting next to him in the passenger’s seat.

Leo Spatelli was dead, pale, transparent, and dead. He turned towards his son and looked at him with his black eyes. His lips hung open and a frosty air escaped from them as he spoke.

“Hey.”

Louie screamed.

“AHHHHH!”

He jumped out of the car and ran away. He sprinted faster and harder than he ever had in his life; even harder than the quarter mile dash in 9^th grade gym class. Sheer terror drove his legs to push on even though they were burning after just a few seconds. Finally Louie lost his breath and bent over at the waist, he supported himself by placing his hands on his knees, and he gasped and whined.

“Can’t be. Didn’t happen. I’m just seeing things, is all. That’s all it is.”

He repeated these words over and over until he almost believed them. After several minutes of wheezing, he stood up again and dusted himself off. Louie eventually worked up enough courage to walk back to his car. Only this time, he came around from the alley and snuck up on his Buick from behind. Not unlike the brunette in the horror movie from earlier, he crept up slowly, stepping gingerly across the lot, trying not to make a sound. When he reached his car he saw that the ghost was still there. Gusts of breath came out of its mouth, filling the car with frigid air. Louie crouched down and walked around to the driver’s side where the door was still hanging open. Carefully, he pulled himself up and grabbed his pizza and began to step back from the car, slowly. The ghost heard his feet on the blacktop and turned to him again.

“Hey.”

Louie screamed again.

“AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!”

He dropped his pizza and booked it all the way back to his apartment and slammed the door shut behind him. Louie leaned his back on the door and gasped for air, pressing his hand against his chest, feeling his heart racing inside of him. He had almost caught his breath again when there was a knock on the door. Trembling, Louie pried himself up and looked into the peephole. His father’s ghost was floating up and down the hall, carrying his pizza.

“C’mon don’t be such a wuss. Ya act like ya never seen a ghost before.”

“I haven’t seen a ghost before and I ain’t seein one now! You’re dead. You’re supposed to be dead!”

“Sharp as a tack this one. Yeah. I’m dead. What’s it to you? Now let me in, I gotta talk to ya.”

“What? You can’t just glide right through walls like Casper or somethin?”

“No, wiseass. I can’t glide through walls.”

“Then how am I supposed to believe you’re a ghost? I’m supposed to just let you in here? Are you fuckin nuts?”

“Who said anything about believing? You got eyes, don’t ya? Come on! I’m floating and all white and shit ova here. And I’m gonna haunt the shit out of you if ya don’t let me in right now.”

Whatever it was, it was either the best impressionist in the world, or it was definitely Louie’s father. Louie unlatched the locks on his door and pulled it open. The ghost hovered into the apartment and smirked.

“Boo.” Louie flinched and his father snickered then dropped the pizza box onto the table with a thud. “Ya forgot your pizza back there.”

“Yeah, yeah whatever. What do you want?”

“Right to the point, huh? No small talk for your old man?”

“I’m a little freaked out for that right now.”

The ghost nodded and opened the pizza box and took a slice out then stuffed his face.

“Boy do I miss that. Don’t get pizza where I’m at now.”

“And where is that?”

“I ain’t allowed to talk about it.”

“What a jip.”

“Hey, it’s the rules. What are ya gonna do?”

“Why are you here?”

“Sangue per sangue, mi figlio.”

“Huh?”

“Jesus Christ, a little culture. Blood for blood. Revenge. Vendetta. Et Cetera.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The guy that did me. He’s still walkin around in the sunshine breathin fresh air. Why is that? I gotta rot in a grave and this asshole is still breathin? That ain’t right.”

“You want me to kill Jimmy Jenks?”

“Fuckin A right. It’s tradition. When your grandfather got popped I was just a kid, but I still did what had to be done. I hunted the guy down in some shithole in the Bronx. What are you doin? Sittin around here, watchin TV, eatin junk food, screaming like a little girl over a few bad dreams? What the hell is that?”

“I ain’t you! This is what ya come back for? To give me a hard time?”

“I’m just sayin. You gotta remember where you come from. Ya know what I mean?”

“How am I supposed to kill the guy? I don’t know where he is! I don’t even know what he looks like. And besides, I heard he’s like invisible or some shit. You know how many guys have tried to take him out?”

“It’s invincible, Louie and he ain’t. He’s just flesh and blood. Like you, or like I used to be. You cut him the right way and he’ll bleed, believe me. You gotta do this.”

“I wouldn’t even know where to get started.”

“Jenks got outta the joint a couple days ago. He’s on his way up north, now. He should be coming through here in a few days.”

“He’s comin here?”

“That’s right. You ain’t even gotta track him down.”

Louie scratched his head.

“I dunno.”

“Bullshit. You do know. And I know. You’re still my boy and you can do this. Make me proud.” The ghost glanced up at the clock hanging from the wall. 3:59 AM. “I’ve gotta get goin, now. Your uncle Andy will get in touch with the details.”

“But how do I?”

“But nothing. Don’t worry, don’t think, don’t try. Just do it.”

And then the ghost of Leonardo Spatelli grabbed another slice of pie and floated out the door, leaving Louie alone in his bachelor pad with his television and his cold pizza.

I am truth’s worst enemy, I am a clever writer. The sun, the moon, the stars, the hopes and dreams and fears of a billion people and a thousand deities are at my whim, but I make them dance. Everyone dances in my universe; everything is taken with a grain in salt and a tongue in cheek. Nothing is serious, nothing is sacred.

I chose this profession because it enabled me to play God. A fact for which I’m certain God is upset with me about. I pretend I’m doing him justice by reflecting reality, but it’s only a spoof.

I am a thousand writers who came before me’s stolen ideas.

Love is a spoof in my universe.

Life and death are different strokes of a brush, trivial, inconsequential outside of my imagination.

I take everything in this world. The green grass, the blue sky, the red blood beating in our veins, I mix it up into a giant bowl. Then, I sprinkle in speckles of spirituality, hope and loss, youth and age, wisdom and pain. I stir it all up, and place the bowl on the ground. Then I shit in it.

This is what it means to be a clever writer.

I shit on all that you hold dear. Every heartbreak you or I have ever had is fodder. Dreams, child-hood aspirations are swept away with a scoffing rebuke and these gain the loudest laughs of all.

I am without a doubt, the most conceited person that you will ever meet. No wonder I complain of being lonely. No one could tolerate me but me.

What amuses me most is cultural pride. I smirk seeing flags waved on passing cars. People wave and smile and honk, celebrating a common piece of dirt that bore them. This dirt is from Puerto Rico. This dirt is from Taiwan. This dirt is from Palestine. HOLY SHIT YOU HAVE TO DIE

Adam came from the dirt. And so did all of us.

This is why I make fun of us. This is the function of the jester in any society since the dawn of time; to remind us that we all came from, and will return to dirt.

The descendants of the dear canine friend you played fetch with in the park this morning will urinate on your minerals one day.

Why am I a clever writer?

Life is meaningless in my universe.

I am Mr. Future Melanoma.

In many ways I am already dead.
I am a clever writer, an anti-America American, the smallest fraction of a genetic irregularity, I am the ultimate minority, I am the rebellious 7th grade kid with dreadlocks and black skin shouting at his teacher to fuck himself, only I am doing it on a cosmic scale.

I am a smartass writer. Hear me roar.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article1951462.ece

I know this story isn’t really new but Seriously. You people need to calm the fuck down.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9006414844032752909

I is mad.

The party at Maria’s was crazy as always. Her parents were gone for the weekend and so sweating teenagers were free to grope and make out with each other in every single room of the house. Upstairs in the master bedroom, Chango was standing naked, erect over his girl Angelica as she lie on the bed, waiting. Chango held his hands on his hips and looked admiringly from his member to Angelica.

“You ready for this mami?”

Angelica twirled her hair around her finger and smacked a piece of gum with her lips.

“Ooooh. Yeah.”

“You really ready baby?”

“Mmm hmm.”

“You sure? I don’t think you could handle it.”

His drawn out foreplay would go on for another fifteen minutes or so. Angelica kept nodding and smiling as Chango gave a veritable press conference on his penis.

“It’s all here for you, 100 and ten percent. I’m gonna give it to you. Yeah. I’m gonna give it good.”

Down the hall in the bathroom, Maria’s friend Blanca was making out with a tall black boy who’s name she could not remember at the moment. As he groaned her name she answered with ugghs and yeses. Fuck. What his is name again? Fuck!

The staircase heading down to the main floor was littered with red plastic cups on every other step. Some of them still had bits of drinks in them. A half drunken screwdriver in this one, a few last drops of a Tequila Sunrise in that and so on. Their owners had long since abandoned these drinks and gone on to start others and then still more others after that. Jenny was walking down the stairs in her black high heels trying not to knock them over. She gingerly stepped down, stair by stair, twisting her body to avoid the drinks. The heels made it very hard for her to keep her balance. So, halfway down the sixteen carpeted steps she paused and lifted her cup to her lips. Rum and coke spilled down the side of Jenny’s cup and pitched forward into her waiting mouth. Sizzle. Gulp. Gulp. Sizzle. Aaaaaaaah.

When Jenny finally reached the bottom of the stairs she rounded the corner into the living room. There had to be at least two-dozen kids crammed into the space; some sitting on the couch with sunken eyes, some in the corner pitching dice, the rest huddled around a card table in the middle of the room. Maria had set up three bottles of Jose Cuervo on the table along with a set of shot glasses. A call echoed around the room.

“Shots!”

“Shoooots!”

“SHEEEEOOOOTS!”

The bottles of Cuervo got passed around the table and filled the tiny glasses with their burning, golden goodness. Jenny walked towards the table and a cloud of cigarette smoke blew by her and stung her eyes. Maria spotted her from across the room and jumped up from her seat to greet her.

“Jennyyyyyyyyyyy! Come here and do a shot with us!” Maria patted the seat of an empty metal folding chair next to her and waved for Jenny to come over. But the wave threw off her delicate balance and Maria stumbled backwards. Her arms flung out and struck her mother’s eighteen- inch porcelain Virgin Mary lamp. The lamp tipped to the side and started to fall to the floor. Maria was drunk enough to knock it over, but she was still sober enough to know that if it was broken, she would be in deep shit. She dived to the floor and caught Mother Mary just before she would have shattered into a hundred little shards. Maria let out a sigh and set the lamp up on a counter, away from where anyone could bump into it again. The Madonna lamp looked down at her with palms open, glowing in gratitude with its artificial halo. Maria nodded at Mary and then crossed herself before returning to her seat.

“Damn that was close. My mama paid 39.99 for that lamp at a garage sale last year. She woulda KILLED me if anything happened to it.”

Jenny snickered and filled up her shot glass. The call echoed around the room again.

“Shoooooooooots!”

“Oh my god Shots!”

The matching set of shot glasses clinked together and got emptied. Everyone sitting around the table shook their heads or whooped and hollered. Then, they started all over again. Fifteen minutes and several shots later Jenny felt her phone vibrating in her jeans. She let it ring for a moment, enjoying the vibration along her hip. Jenny stood up and got a head rush but steadied herself and walked out of the crowded living room to answer.

“Hey sexy, talk to me.”

“Now is that any way for an innocent young lady to answer her phone on a Saturday night?”

“Dad?”

“That’s right angel.”

“Oh my god! Dad! Where are you? Are you almost here? You’re not driving straight through from Florida are you? People get into accidents like that.”

“Jeez hold your horsepower there. You sound drunk. Are you drunk?”

“Yeah, a little bit.”

“That’s my girl.”

“Hehehe. So when will you be here?”

“Coupla more days, I think. I got some business to take care of along the way but it shouldn’t take too long.”

“What business?”

“Don’t you worry about it, angel.”

“Dad, don’t do anything crazy. I don’t want you to get arrested before you even see me again. Just be careful.”

“When have you known me not to be careful?”

Jenny rolled her eyes.

“Just promise me.”

Jimmy rolled his eyes.

“Alright, I promise I’ll get there without getting into too much trouble.”

“Alright. Give me a call when you’re getting close. I’ve got to get going, dad. There’s this Puerto Rican boy who wants to make out with me in the basement.”

“K. Have fun, angel. Love you.”

“Love you too.”

Jenny flipped her phone shut and then rejoined the festivities in the living room. After another shot she tapped Maria on the shoulder.

“Hey, do you know where Paco is? I haven’t seen him yet.”

“I think he’s down in the basement watching Scarface with the other guys.”

“Okee. I’m gonna go visit.”

“Good luck, baby. Give me some love.”

Jenny and Maria pecked each other on the cheek. They left red lipstick imprints on their cheeks and giggled as they wiped them off with their sleeves. Jenny walked down the hallway and opened the door to the basement. A strobe light was flashing in the darkness below, illuminated a huge, hovering cloud of smoke. She heard the sounds of the television roaring over the clatter of her heels on the stairs. Jenny walked in on the scene where Tony Montana shouts at Manny from the hot tub.

“Hey! Fuck you, man! Who put this ting together? ME! Dass who! Who do I trust? ME!”

The SLSS boys and the boys who wanted to be SLSS boys were playing Tony Montana karaoke again. Box was standing next to the TV, peeking out of the corner of his eye to time his impression. He was wearing a gigantic black t-shirt with a picture of Al Pacino on it, holding a gun. Box did one of the better Tony Montana impersonations out of the group and the kids watching from the floor smiled and watched him with bright eyes.

“Fuck em. I don’t need nobody.”

Jenny eyed Paco lounging into the black leather sofa cushion. He had put his hair into a jerry curl the day before and it was the first time she’d gotten to see it. Paco’s soft brown eyes were dilated, making them darker, bigger, and even more irresistible to her. Unfortunately he had his arm around his fuck buddy Esmerelda, who glared at Jenny the way women will do in such a case. Of course they made it a point to be extremely nice and go out of the way to compliment each other. As Jenny sat in an empty chair she smirked at her mortal enemy.

“Hi, Essie. I LOVE your hair!”

“Oh, thank you so much. I’m SO jealous. I wish I had your heels. Where did you get them?”

“Carsons.”

“Nice!”

Box raised his arms in exasperation.

“Yo, we tryin to watch a movie here.”

The movie went on without interruption except for the occasional gaffed line. Every few minutes Paco peaked out of the corner of his eye at Jenny, who squirmed in her seat and wished to God that Esmerelda would spontaneously explode, or something to that effect. Fucking Bitch couldn’t afford my shoes anyway. Fake ass fucking play nice bitch. I’m gonna get him. You watch. Although Jenny liked Scarface, she didn’t care to watch it for the third time this month. So after a few minutes she got up and walked upstairs, praying that Paco would follow her. Machine guns rattled and fired in the darkness below as Jenny tapped her heel impatiently on the top step. Finally she realized that he wasn’t going to come up and let her suck his tongue. She walked up the last stair, groaned, slammed the basement door shut and went to rejoin the party.

© Tim Weaver

In 2002, I wrote a story about a 3 piece suit with a narcissistic personality. The gray double breasted suit spoke with an air of grandiosity. I own this guy. He needs me, I don’t need him. Anyone would want to wear me, who would want to wear him?

I paraded around in front of the mirror, sweating in the May heat and recalled myself walking into the prom wearing it. Came out of that limousine, shining shoes, shining suit, shining hair, Stick em Up blasting out the stereo system, nose in the air, head held high. The suit was thinking for me: that’s me right here. John Mothafuckin Gotti. Nobody at this place is gonna out dress me. Nobody. That’s all me. Gotti all the way. I remembered the resident class slut, named Roxeanne complimenting me on my suit.

“You look good.”

“Yeah, thanks. So do you.”

Not sure if that was the suit, or I doing the talking. The piece was good. It was the best thing I’d written since graduating high school. I was on my way up. I was gonna wear that suit to my first real job, was gonna parade that mothafucka around. John Gotti. All the way.

Today I walked the three blocks from the bus stop to my mortgage company. Sweat collected in the small of my back, sticking to my Marshall Fields shirt, which I bought when Marshall Fields was motherfuckin Marshall Fields. Blue stripes, white background, tied cuff-links. Sweat stained. Sticking to me. I rubbed and struggled against the sensation. Too early to be stinking up my wardrobe. Those same black and shiny dress shoes click-clacked on the sidewalk, that same nose held in the air.  I don’t feel much like John Gotti anymore, these days. I had the look down- the stare- the cigarette- unaware of the irony- the squint of the eyes.

Today I just felt like a guy wearing a suit. I still rode the subway back home at the end of the day. Something has changed. When I paraded in front of the mirror; my one man fashion show, everything felt and looked right. I cocked my head at just the right angle, I walked with just the right step, the gray suit fit my body perfectly. The suit has not changed. Or so it tells me. Sometimes I think he’s lying.

I’m still writing the next great american novel; I’ve still got my whole life ahead of me. The suit says it will take me places: book signings, lines of fans, autographs waiting, lusty women in dingy bars, sweat stained mattresses the mornings thereafter. He will not steer me wrong, I think. But I can’t shake the feeling. Something is different now. Something is not quite so invincible. I can’t put my finger on it because I’m too busy scraping a loose strand of auburn hair from the gray fabric. Maybe I’ll figure it out soon.

Until then, I will keep listening to the suit.