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Short Story / Kicking God in the Jaw
The rain had fallen for thirty-six straight hours. Gutters were sagging from the weight of wet leaves. Storm debris was spilling over the edges. Clouds, rescinding in the distance, rumbled while a weary sun cast a weak light over sad, gray buildings. The world looked like an old black and white photograph. Birds were puling worms from out tiny holes in the sodden earth. The moon was out, along with the sun, the two debating who will take over come evening. And there I was, rolling in the grass, naked and wet.
That’s when you walked up, lad.
But I didn’t start the day wet. Or naked. I started out in a coffee shop, ordering a medium cup of coffee with my last bill, the Queen’s lip sealed shut in a reproachful smirk. I sat down with my cup of coffee and yesterday’s paper. I wasn’t bothering anyone you see. I just wanted to get out of the rain. It had started around midnight and didn’t let up. From my armpits a rank, sweaty stink emanated leaving a buttery stain on the sleeve of my t-shirt. I knew I didn’t smell too good. Circumstances lately have been of a foul odor.
I should start earlier in the day. That’d explain all this.
I had spent the night under the Jones Street Bridge. It’s not something I’ve done before and it’s not something I would admit to being proud of. It was something I did because I had no other choice. Cheryl threw me out. I was trying to stay clean that night so I couldn’t see any of my crew. It was my stubborn pride. I should have just given in and gotten high. Instead I tried to talk to my parents. They wouldn’t open the door; even when I yelled out real loud that they were assholes and had touched me; even when I promised I would behave and not do drugs there. They told me to come back in the morning. They knew by then things would change. Basically they knew I wouldn’t come back in the morning. They lectured me through the door, said I was probably better off inside but that they were selfish, they just couldn’t take it any more, and then they said they accept all the blame. It’s the old reverse psychology bit for amateurs. I wasn’t biting. They could kick me out but I wasn’t going to feel sorry for them.
That’s an old story, anyway, just every now and then it returns for some more lemon juice in the wound. I would have been all right on the street, for a couple of days at least, if it weren’t for the storm. I’ve spent the night in the park before and I sleep fairly deeply when I pass out. The problem is I’m an insomniac and a drug addict – chicken or the egg, huh? I can get through the day okay but it’s a long night, you see. The sun treats me better than the moon. The sun is kinder, more straightforward. The sun is a whisperer. The moon, it shouts. It yells at me, “Hey you, hey fucko! Why don’t you do something special for yourself? Why don’t you get something to take the edge off? What? You afraid of something?”
Rain came down from the road and cascaded over the bridge. It was like sleeping on the inside of a waterfall. All around was water and it gathered in the creek and the creek rose but I was well up the bank, drier than a minister on Sunday, as my mom used to say. Fuck her! I could see them through the window, mom in her bathrobe sipping her port. My father with his big meaty hands around her bony shoulders. God I hate them both. All they care about are their papers and their appliances. Their goddamn television set. I wondered what they were watching while I was curled up under the bridge. Down where it smelled of rat and human urine. In the dark I could hear little feet prattling over the ground and the sound of someone chewing. I wondered if they were watching one of their beloved detective shows; was there some screwed-up, junkie as the prime suspect? A mirror image of their beloved son?
I woke up in the morning, it was still raining and the creek was still rising. I looked around and in the light of day the squalor I saw shocked me. The creek, no longer a mere trickle, had turned into a river overnight and carried and deposited at the bridge: rubber tires, shopping carts, trashcans, discarded baby strollers, fast food containers, old election placards, and other junk. It looked like some sort of homeless beaver dam had been erected overnight. Maybe what I thought were semis rolling overhead were the sound of these things crashing together? The more I thought about it the more I considered myself lucky to get out alive.
With that on my mind I was looking to score. I had barely been able to sleep the night before and another day of this and I might lose my mind. The rain droned on while I went to see my crew. I won’t name names in order to keep it legal and on the up and up as they say. Know what I mean? The third door I knocked on was the flat Colgate was squatting in. Colgate didn’t open the door, his girl did. She was holding and I convinced her to sell me some.
“Just a small bit.” She opened the door and I was in.“It’s terribly cold out there,” I said just to make conversation.
“Yeah. It’s raining,” she stated matter-of-factly.
“Yeah, I know, but what I mean is… I was cold.” My head was in a mixed-up place. I usually am not this stupid. Her indifference was making my brain hurt. “It’s nice and warm in here, that’s all,” I barked.
She shrugged her shoulders. “Sorry.”
We sat on the couch; she with her arms crossed, me picking at the hair on my neck. They had laid an old towel out for a rug and in spots the cotton had worn into holes. Around it, in a séance circle, Spanish candles stood mournfully half-burned.
I pointed at them. “What’s up with that? You guys steal them?”
She nodded. “You know that restaurant down on St. Laurent? The one with the bronze lamps.”
“Yeah.”
She looked away, her eyes a moldy pair of avocados, out the window at a man walking a gray pit bull. She spoke from a detached canoe. “I guess I can spare a bag.” She watched the pit bull squat in the yard and leave behind a steaming pile on the patchy grass. Then she stood up and got me my bag. I handed her my second to last bill. She took it and sat down. “I guess you can leave now.”
The rain was still falling. “Do you mind if I use your shower?”
Her eyes rose above the carpet to meet mine, she looked as if she hadn’t noticed I was there until then. “No. What are you crazy. There’ll know we’re here. Get out,” she screamed. “Get the fuck… out… now.”
People react to me in a strange way, like they turned on a light and seen a mouse. But I’m not a mouse. At least I don’t think I am. People talk to me. They use English. Rats don’t speak English. They may turn away and speak out of the corners of their mouths but they acknowledge my existence, my simple humanness. Other people. Most of the time, though, they ignore me like the boy who cried wolf. It’s always been that way. Sometimes I check my back for ‘Kick Me’ signs. When I was younger I used to throw tantrums. If people were going to spite me I might as well give them good cause, know what I’m saying? I’d lie down in the middle of a busy store and scream my lungs out. I’d scream bloody murder. I don’t need no one’s friendship, no one’s pity. No one’s pity friendship. I’m not a mouse. I’m a human being, know what I’m saying? I know what you’re thinking. Thief. Junkie. Degenerate. Punk. It’s not true, it’s not so simply wrapped, lad. You see, I’m not your… word. I’m not your silly definition.
I didn’t want to push Cheryl over the edge. I wasn’t trying to, as she claimed, drive her crazy. I loved her. When the world looked like it would spit me out, and I was all chewed up and ready to be spat, she was there to catch me. She was there to say, “look here, you ain’t a piece of shit pushover. You can take this and much worse.”
I think she was lying. Although she meant it, bless her heart, she was a poor judge of character. I didn’t want to drive her crazy as much as save her. I wanted to free her from me.
If I told you you wouldn’t believe me but my hands were tied; the forces of the universe are allied against me. She tried to fight the good fight. Even the world’s greatest mechanic can’t make some cars run. I couldn’t be the man she wanted, needed. She said she didn’t like my antics. She said breaking windows is not a form of self-expression. She said two wrongs don’t make a right. When I said, “fuck society.” She said I was jealous. When I came home with those avocado eyes, she tossed me out on the street. I don’t blame Cheryl. She had her hands full.
So I did her a favor.
You see, shit was already piled up against me but I told you, the day began all right, except for the bridge and all that but that was behind me. Colgate’s girl had saved the day. The real trouble started while I was in the coffee shop, reading an article in the paper. It said there was a mudslide that wiped out an entire village somewhere in the Philippines. The article said that thousands might have died, suffocated in the mud. As I read the paper the words began their own mudslide, bleeding together into a jumble of nonsense, a squadron of squiggly lines that danced on the page and blew cannons in the war, a mob of ants running amuck.
Before I knew it I had started to nod off.
There were tangerine suns splashing into an ocean of ice tea. Swans drifted in and out of the coffee shop. My clothes were made of silk. Made of silkworms. Fish were staring at me, cold round eyes in a sea of newspaper. Dead eyes moving. Cars on the street were record players, old fashion phonographs playing my favorite songs. A mellifluous melody held the room together. Rain outside splashed against the windows in waves. I went under; my lungs, my scuba tank, my head, my diving bell. There were octopi and jellyfish and eels. I swam over a hot ocean vent. I thought I saw my mother and father drowning and clownfish swimming with deadpan strokes. Underneath the sea there was a castle made of sand and choral. Then the dream went blurry.
The lady who served me my coffee was shaking my shoulder. The coffee was spilt in my lap. It was burning hot. “You can’t stay here,” she said. I jumped straight up, leapt up to the ceiling and banged my head.
“What the hell is going on?” I asked, water and starfish escaping from my mouth.
“I’m sorry,” she said, her hand resting sympathetically on my shoulder. “You have to go. You can’t sleep here. I’ll get you another coffee, just hold on, but then you go, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, sure,” I said. I must have still been dreaming, she looked like seaweed to me. “You’re the captain.” Slowly the room dried out and I realized that everybody was looking at me with Chinese eyes. The girl handed me another Styrofoam cup, steam coming through the small slit in the lid. I thanked her and then turned to the room and politely informed them, “You all got one foot chained to hell and the other foot kicking God in the jaw.”
Your first taste goes like this: instant intense anguish, softening into a purple lull of numbness, which settles into a soothing, tingling blissful ride. My first kiss went like this: wet lips, hesitant pause, slobber, slobber, and then she wiped it off with the back of her hand and giggled. My first car accident sounded like this: wet road, squealing tires, screeching brakes, tree going thump, ambulance siren.
I had nowhere to go and my high was coming on strong. Stronger than it’s ever knocked me. Colgate’s girl had some good shit. Pure shit. Her stuff had a real laughing gas element to it. A real Abbey Road quality. I walked through streets I grew up on and was completely at a loss for where I was. What was familiar seemed outright hysterically strange. I had walked for a few blocks, maybe half a mile, when I realized I was completely drenched. I looked up and fucking raindrops got in my eye, blinding me. Just then the clouds parted though, the rain stopped, and a silver ray of light broke through, falling across the street on some dripping blue mailboxes.
I thought of Cheryl sleeping alone in our bed. The air smelt like her shampoo. As much as I wanted to go to her and convince her I’ll change if she took me back I had to resist, knowing that this will not happen and for her sake I should keep on walking. Each stride my shoe planted forward brought me closer to being completely alone. And for the first time in my life I felt like I was doing the right thing.
There was an open field full of inviting grass beckoning me; each blade waving at me like an excited relative at the airport. That’s when I took off my clothes. I don’t know what made me do it. I guess everything I just related, but something else as well, something more elaborate and abstract was at play. You could say I ran out of words. Ran out of emotions.
Maybe I’m tired of breaking windows.
Destruction for fuck’s sake gets old; know what I’m saying.
Maybe I was sick of the way my life was going.
‘Fuck Society’ is not a philosophy.
Maybe I just wanted out of my clothes.
Anyway, that’s when you walked up and found me here, lad. Think of me as one of the worms that dug its way to the surface to get some air. Keep walking. Forget you saw a naked man in the wet grass. Just note that the clouds departed and the sun is making everything sparkle like a diamond mine. Maybe you’ll mention it to someone later in the day, you’ll say, “I saw the strangest thing today.”
He’ll say, “What’s that?” Go ahead and tell him.
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beatnikboy reviewed Version 1 -
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This would work really well as a monologue for a play. The character was amazingly in depth, and the images were great. I wouldn’t change a thing! Great work!
The only thing I can think of is I’d like to see the final conversation with the character and his girlfriend.
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Eldi reviewed Version 1 -
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This is my first ten so far, out of 12 reviews. I think this story is absolutely amazing and I really do not know what else to say, here is a quick run down of what I really liked:
I wanted to free her from me.
That is my favorite sentence because I often feel like a burden on my loved ones. I’ve never been a transient, and I’ve never even explored drug usage, but I feel so similar to the narrator. His thoughts are not all that different from mine.
You write a believable person, in a way that few people do. While reading, not only did it remind me of me, but of some people I know and promptly linked. And people I work with’s children, and family. I think bits and peices of the narrator are in everybody I know.
I love how he sort of gives up at the end, “maybe I’m tired of breaking widnows” or what have you. Just really made me wanna buy homie a cup of coffee and tell him I been there, even though I havent.
Great job. I’m adding this story to my favorites and I will be keeping my eye out for you in the future.
MrWonderfulMax reviewed Version 1 -
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This was good. I have no big complaints about it, aside from your spelling and grammar here and there. You might want to watch your narrative tone and POV at times, aside from that everything was good. Your charactor was brillent and I loved how well the charactor was developed. I think you could actually write more about this, a past and future. Good luck and Good Job.
Death_Mask reviewed Version 1 -
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I got pulled in almost right away. I love the way it ends as well. I like the way this kept my interest all through. Got me thinking, too. I like this.
Fletcher_Bounty reviewed Version 1 -
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I thought I had just reviewed this, but as nothing has appeared I’ll do it again.
The first thing one feels like doing is moralising…but it is a good piece of writing, real or imaginery (a lot of truths are told in imaginery writing) and I won’t moralise, even though I had two sons who were addicts not one, and two children who wern’t. I am afraid I despise Freud and do not believe that people’s sexuality motivate them, I believe it is the society and your genetic make-up
which shapes our actions. You take us through your day emotionally and physically.
Why you thought some weirdo in a park would get further mention, I am not sure, nowadays we expect weirdos in parks, but I think that is the key to your subconscious.
MacDuff reviewed Version 1 -
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This is well written and the descriptions are rich and imaginative. The confusion and anger of the narrator can be easily felt by the reader. I like it how it feels like he doesn’t have anything to direct his anger at (except maybe his parents but I don’t think they’re the main source of his frustration) so turns to philosophy.
In summary – a well executed piece with rich and varied descriptions.
Specialk7719 reviewed Version 1 -
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Interesting story, it depicts the chaos of drug abuse very well. I liked how you described the high without actually describing the high. It was a very chaotic story jumping from topic to topic but at the same time keeping the overall theme. I got a hint that Colgate was the name of the main character at the end of this story but I’m not sure that is the case. That maybe something you might want to clarify. Your descriptions of scenes were very good. I could see what you were describing in the mind’s eye. The chaos in reference to the rain was a good idea for this story although it has often been used similarly and when the sun came out and the sky opened up the world seemed a better place was a nice way to end the story. Over all I liked this story, the only thing that I would watch out for is changing from topic to topic with nothing connecting the topics. You don’t have to connect them immediately but it helps the reader understand the story if they have something to reference it to. Keep up the good work!
CanguroArgentino reviewed Version 1 -
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“...know what I’m saying?” No, not much!
So, just to get this straight, are you saying your whole life was “just a story”, or just the part where you’re lying naked in the grass?
Love, Drugs and Chinese Coffee related by a Clockwork Orange-type (not in stereo!), heartbroken, broke, head-banged solitary figure that finally sees the light via an opening in the clouds.
From James Joyce to the final scenes in High Fidelity where John Cusack is in the rain, passing through every feeling of pain and paranoia only love and drugs can provide.
Is there a Part Two? I need to know what ‘You all got one foot chained to hell and the other foot kicking God in the jaw’ refers to, and to whom it was said: all the readers, the Chinese-eyed customers, junkies or you?
I give it 10 only because I empathize with that feeling. You should put a warning on the cover, something like: Only read if you’ve been high, loaded, in or out of love, or totally broke, otherwise Stay Away! Do not read under the efftects. Content may entice activity involving sharp object and wrist.
Mozart reviewed Version 1 -
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I liked this alot. A beautiful tale of love and hardship.
For me the ending rounds it off really well. Philosophy great.
I hate giving these kinds of reviews, but i simply didn’t find fault with it.
Rob
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