Down to the Dirt (14 page)

Took a couple of hours to finish the case. I slept at the table. When I woke up I headed straight for the shop again. Just couldn’t face myself alone. Like that Springsteen song. Took
my ID with me this time so’s I could rub it in that little prick’s face, but he’d already gotten off work. Story of my life. I dug into the second case before I was even back to the apartment. What a fuckin’ dive. Bottles, butts, ashes, tobacco, all mashed into the floor. Something breathin’ in the sink I’m pretty sure. Worse than all that though was the cat had started in sprayin’ again. What a reek. No idea how I was gettin’ through the night alive, I planked myself down at the table and started all over again.

Four or five beer later it came to me.

Brilliant, said I to me.

Fuckin’ brilliant.

—Yes, I’m callin’ to inquire about your rates. St. John’s to Halifax. Well, soon as possible. Right now if one’s available. 8:50 tonight? And what’s the student rate? Jesus. Well, I’d like to book a flight if that’s alright with you. I don’t have a credit card. So I have to come in to book it? Well, what time do you close? And what time is it now? Okay, well I can be there in about ten minutes. Can’t you wait that long? It’s an emergency. Well, I’ll be there in five then? Thank you so much.

Yeah, thanks. Wouldn’t know now but they were doin’ me a favour. Gyppin’ me out of a couple of hundred bucks that I hardly had. What are they like at all?

So, you coulda seen little ol’ me in a mad scramble to the travel agency and havin’ a hard time with my mouth ’cause of this big line-up when I got there. After gettin’ personal on the phone and pleadin’ with the bastards when they made out like they were just about to lock the doors. Lord Jesus. Lucky thing I was in one of my more pleasant moods.

Walkin’ back home, ticket in hand, I realized I had no cash for the trip. I blew every cent on the ticket. No way in hell I was showin’ up in Halifax flat broke and lookin’ to Natasha to go feedin’ me. Fuck that. And I had nothing in my place worth selling.

Time to swallow my pride and spread myself too thin once again.

—Hi, Andy there please?…What’s goin’ on?…Right on. Listen, I got a bit of a favour to ask you…How much money have you got? Well, have you got like fifty bucks to lend me ’til next week?…I can’t tell you…It’s an emergency. I needs about fifty bucks to get me through the weekend. It’s not for booze…Well, yes, I had a few but I’m just sittin’ around with the cat. He’s drunker than I am…No…Listen, you’ll think I’m cracked…Alright, alright, but first I needs to know if you can lend me the money…Well?…I just bought a ticket to Halifax. Ha-li-fax. One hundred and ninety-nine and tax. That’s every cent I had…Well it’s already paid for now and it leaves tonight. No, she don’t know…I’m just gonna surprise her…Well, it’s too late now anyhow. I’d be goin’ up there one way or another, ticket or no…Yes, b’y, for the love of Christ—

Fuck sakes. Our Andy might be a fine candidate for the constabulary. I don’t mind a fella askin’ a few questions, especially if he’s got a bit of money on the line. But it’s his tone. Haughty and superior. And I don’t need to be interrogated by friends. That’s
her
job. I’ll tell you something about Andy now. I won’t play the self-righteous prick to say he’s any worse than what I am, but he’s no better. No, by Christ.

Years ago myself and Andy were down by the fish plant waitin’ for work to start up. I suppose it was about 5:00 in the morning ’cause there was a pretty big racket in the harbour coming from about a dozen punts and skiffs. Whether they were comin’ in or on the way out, I don’t remember. What odds is it? Plant work didn’t start ’til 8:00, but the earlier you were on the ball, the better spot you got on the offal chute. We weren’t workin’ in the plant, see. We were cuttin’ tongues
outside
the plant where the filleted fish made their way down this long aluminum chute. The chute emptied into a barge that was taken out the harbour every evening to be relieved of its mushy contents. Guts and garbage and dead gulls. If you got to sit at the top of the chute, you got first grab at the bigger fish that came down. Which meant bigger tongues. Which meant you could make your money faster because you were sellin’ by the pound. Smaller tongues are better for eatin’ though, less jelly.

Anyhow, the first to arrive had to mark the top spot with their buckets or knives or their maggoty old gloves and then they were free to shag around the wharf ’til work started.

So myself and Andy had the place to ourselves. Throwin’ rocks at gulls, jiggin’ sculpins, smokin’ butts out of the fishermen’s cars. We wandered over to the twine shed on the other side of the plant, lookin’ for bottles, when we spied an old flatbed truck parked all by its lonesome, half-hidden in the alders. Tryin’ to hide on us. It was likely sittin’ there all summer but we never really noticed it before. I s’pose we saw it in a new light. We had a laugh at our luck, but before the thought even entered my mind, Andy picked up this old rusty rim of a tire, raised it over his head and slung it at the windshield. It crunched into the lower corner but never
done much damage. It certainly got the blood pumpin’ though.

The doors were locked so I bashed the driver’s side window out with a rock. I found a hammer under the seat in the cab. Next thing you know the glass to the speedometer was broke out and we were roarin’. Then it was the gas gauge. Bustin’ our guts laughin’. The rearview mirror. The dashboard. Andy, slashin’ up the seats with an old guttin’ knife. Slashin’. He hauled the steering wheel off. The gearshift got broke off. The passenger side window exploded. I was bangin’ on the windshield with the hammer. I s’pose we really lost it. Tears streamin’ down our faces. Then Andy made an odd sound. I had a glance at him. His face was wet with tears but he wasn’t laughin’ no more. His chin was quiverin’ and his eyes were fuckin’ savage. Pure rage runnin’ down his cheeks as he drove the knife into the seat cushions over and over. I guess I’d stopped laughin’ sometime back too. Years and years of smalltown bullshit rose up in us. Nuns and straps and bitter, petty teachers. Comin’ in second. Being the last pick for a game of ball up in the fuckin’ meadow. The dashboard became the face of some big prick from the North Side of the Cove, his knees pinnin’ your shoulders to the ground, rubbin’ horse shit on your face and smackin’ you ’til you bled or bawled, whichever came first. Fuck the repercussions. Fuck it all. When we started on the outside of the truck, there wasn’t really much left to do to the inside, aside from burnin’ it I s’pose. Which crossed my mind, but I wasn’t that bad.

Then we started in laughin’ again. Laughin’ at our own savagery. We stood there in the early morning, cool as you please, like we had every right to do what we were doin’, popped up the hood and started slammin’ the biggest kinds of
rocks down into the engine. Cars passin’ up the road. Not a fuck did we give. We were hell-bent to shag that truck up. Headlights, windshield, tires slashed. That hammer went
through
the bonnet, the doors. We even tried to beat the front bumper off. You name it. And you’d be amazed what damage two young fellas like us could do. I spent an hour in jail for that little episode. Not Andy. Me.

See what I’m gettin’ at? He’s no better. Where did he get off to sit there in judgment of what I should or shouldn’t allow myself to do? Drillin’ me for information like I was some kind of criminal. How many sociology electives do you have to take before your sins are forgiven?

—Andy, I can’t take it anymore. I can’t just sit around on a Friday night, wonderin’. Torturin’ myself. I have to see her. I have to look her in the eye. So I can get on with it…Jesus, Andy, you saw the state I was in last night. That’s nothing. I can’t sleep, can’t eat. I can’t take it no more. I
have
to see her…Well, I’ll worry about gettin’ home when the time comes to turn around. Besides, I might just keep on goin’. This town makes me sick to my guts half the time. The rest of the time it just depresses me…Look, I needs the money for food, probably a cab from the airport, smokes and shit like that. You knows I’ll pay you back. I paid you back the last time…Well, yeah, but I still paid you…I’ll get you the money next week…Right…That’s perfect…Oh listen, if I leaves you my key will you come by and feed the cat? I’m afraid he’ll fret to death with no company…Dandy. Well, I’ll see you soon then…Listen man, I really appreciates this you know. Pay you back the week. Alright.

Click.

Know what pissed me off the most about that? It’s that I likes
things to move in a more secretive nature. I was wantin’ to just vanish, so that if the plane went down no one in the world would know that I was on it. Leave without a trace. Vanish. I likes the notion of just bein’ out there somewhere, reinventin’ myself with every step, leavin’ it all behind like a good clean fire. Like the
Poetry of Departures.
How difficult it is to make such a simple fuckin’ move. But I s’pose you can’t expect to get away that easy. Because no one believes in adventure anymore. Anything out of the ordinary constitutes a scandal nowadays. I was just a bit of juicy gossip for Andy to run to his girlfriend with. I tell you, my generation is numbed and ruined by the modern convenience of mind-blowing entertainment. Who in their right mind is gonna open up a bookstore this day and age? Hollywood and prime time gibberish has got my crowd by the balls. No one has a sense of adventure anymore ’cause there’s no need for one. You can go and rent the grand adventure at any old time and experience it risk-free. Eat your fuckin’ Doritos and drink your goddamn Pepsi and fuck off to your bloated bed. Get up and go to school or go to work. No cuts or bruises. No scars. You get to look your best and feel alright about not doing anything out of line, out of the ordinary. Every now and then you’ll have made an arse of yourself at the bar and
that’s
your big crime.

—Oh my God, I didn’t say that to her, did I?

—Jesus, I went right out over the table and took the whole works down with me.

—Gave some sauce to that bartender.

And that’s the worst you’ll get.

See, I’m of the firm belief that each and every little misadventure should be marked with a scar of some sort. Battle scars
to document your passage in the battle of life. Life
is
a fuckin’ battle. Theodore Roethke was not an idle man. Manic maybe, but never idle.

I packed a bag two hours ahead of time and then sat down to a couple of beer. Decided to drop by Andy’s for the cash at the last minute so’s I wouldn’t have time to talk about it all. He handed me the money and shook his head with this totally condescending,
poor-old-Keith-when-are-you-gonna-smarten-up
grin on his face. He was wearing a Habs sweater and I said a silent prayer that the day he was caught dead he’d be wearin’ that very same sweater. Not that I wants him dead or nothing.

Made it to the airport with no time to spare, just the way I wanted it. The cab cost me ten fuckin’ bucks.

Metal detectors. Jesus Christ. Wouldn’t know now but we were in Saudi Arabia somewhere. This is St. John’s we’re talkin’ about. Nothing ever happens in St. John’s. Mag-light, belt buckle, boot buckles, Zippo lighter. I likes metal shit. I’m also very particular about what I carries in my pockets. That’s how they’ll judge you in the end. They’ll find you scattered in bits, strewn across the highway with your head crushed and mangled, and of course they’ll check your pockets. And if you happens to be carrying the latest Stephen King novel, then that will be the level you achieved in reading. That’s the degree to which your literary tastes will have matured. And if you happens to have a big Nike swoosh plastered across your chest, they’ll assume you spent your final moments in a feeble
attempt to promote the benefits of overseas slave labour to the fat bastard who knocked you down. Listen, you gotta keep yourself dressed for the weather this day and age.

Security took my fuckin’ Zippo. I filled it up right before I left the apartment and it was still drippin’ a bit. They said it posed a threat. For the love of Jesus. The very lighter I robbed from the evidence locker at the cop shop all them years ago. The very lighter I almost burned down half the Cove with. I’ve turned cafeterias and games rooms bottom up over that lighter. I wanted to have that lighter on my person when I packs it all in. But no such luck. It’s a threat to health and safety. Not like I was plannin’ to set fire to anything in mid-air for Christ sakes. Then again, that’d be a pretty evil way to hijack a plane. Wait now, was I allowed thinkin’ that?

Security shoves my lighter into a little plastic bag.

—So I’ll get it back in Halifax, will I? Definitely? Alright then

Christ Jesus. Downright discrimination. Why is it that every psychopathic, child molestin’, drugged-up Nazi dresses just like me?

The lighter incident pissed me off even further when who should I spy with my twisted eye, breezin’ on through the metal detectors, beepin’ and fluttering to beat the band, no one battin’ a Jesus eye at her but me? Juliet Carey. Who in their right mind would call a child Juliet? Suits this one to a tee nevertheless.

Well, you knows them types of youngsters that bawls in such a way that you wants to peel the skin off their snotty little faces? Now I ain’t sayin’ that
I’d
do that. Certainly I’d nail anyone who tried it. I’m just sayin’ that there
are
some children
who screeches and bawls in such a way that you’d just love to grab ’em by the cheeks and rip the flesh right off the bone. It’s not necessarily the sound of the cryin’, children needs to throw a good fit every now and then, but it’s the way their faces twists and contorts to such a state of hideous and hateful vulgarity. Maybe I was one of those children? Although I highly doubt it.

Anyhow, the lovely Juliet got a face like that. Always. But you have to get pretty close to spot it. And let’s just say I got pretty goddamn close. Long before Natasha. I spent a small fortune one time on some stupid silver chain with a fuckin’ dancin’ unicorn on it. Dickhead. Princess Juliet. That’s what she’s got, precious princess syndrome. But how can you blame her with a name like that? Our little princess. Little Miss fuckin’ Priss, who thinks that the very reason the earth revolves around the sun is ’cause it shines directly out of her arse.