chapter*Liss
You got my text! “You got my text.” “I got your text.” “I have the gun!” I’m showing it to Winnie. Winnie looks around. She looks pretty, even this time of night. A nightgown is tucked inside her boots. Dad looks up. Jacobi says: “Oh now emphyou’re here?” “Hello Jacobi.” Dad stands up and offers Winnie something to drink. “I better not,” she says. emphYes! There’s someone sane. There’s someone sane. We’ve been looking all night for someone sane. “I tried the neighbors,” I tell Winnie. “I tried several houses down.” “And did you say the police were here?” “Come here,” I tell Winnie. Let’s have a look around.
———————
Okay here you have Dad and Jacobi. Which is a bad sign. Whenever you get Dad and Jacobi together bad things happen. Notice the smoke. That’s just cigarette smoke. As distinguished from Candy, which we’ll get to later. Notice the fatness. Notice the borrowed suit. “Those are board shorts!” Cock shouts from the next room. “Who’s that?” Winnie asks. “That’s Cock,” I say. That’s Cock. “He owns the house.” “I’m RENTING!” Cock shouts. I think we’re done in here. Jacobi’s standing. Gets all that fat to stand. “Winnie! Grab some emphChinois! It’s in the fridge!” “It’s in the fridge in the garage,” Dad says. “You want me to get you some?” “I think I’m fine.” That’s what Winnie says. She’s quite sensible.
———————
“In here you have the boys.” (That’s what I like to call them.) “Can you change the channel?” “What do you want to watch?” I ask. I have it on the cooking channel. “Anything but this. Can you get us the remote?” Winnie’s looking at Cock and Jimmy. I’m shuffling the gun and the remote. Two boys. Handcuffed to the entertainment center. “What do you want? How about like this?” It’s emphCarrie. I would think they would like this. “No please..just..Liss..give us the remote.” Winnie’s turning away. She’s not used to seeing a half-naked cop chained to a television. “They were watching porn earlier! Oh. Oh. How about this?” I say. It’s my favorite show. Bad Girls Tokyo.
———————
“Can we please have something else?” “No,” I say. And I take Winnie down the hall. “What’s back here?” “Mega Cock and Candy,” I say. I push open the door to the bedroom. It’s Becca, and Mega Cock. Mega Cock is sleeping. “Becca, this is my friend Winnie. She works with Dad.” “Hi Becca.” Becca shusshes us and comes into the hallway. She pulls the bedroom door behind her. “I’m going to take Liss home.” Becca’s eyes brighten. “Do you have a car?” “Yes, yes, but whose baby is that?” “That’s Mr. Cock’s baby.” Winnie turns to me. “Which one is Cock?” “He’s the one chained to the TV who’s not a cop.” Now Winnie’s talking with Becca: “And that’s..the cop?” “He is a friend of Senor Cock’s.” “And who are you?” Winnie seems confused. “This is Cock’s maid. She’s the babysitter!” I’m saying. I have to make her understand. “Winnie. Dad and Candy went to get Becca, because Mega Cock was crying. They had him on the emphpool table! So I went next door to get Mega Cock a diaper and that guy was in a wheelchair and he emphknows Mega Cock!” I think she’s getting it now. “Then Candy had a taser but I had a gun.” “Right. Give me that.” I give it to her. “Becca. I’m leaving. You want to bring..the baby..I’ll take you home.” “But what about Mr. Cock?” Winnie says: “What about him?” Winnie gets to the end of the hall. She stops. I bump into her. She smells like Tommy True Star. Winnie looks at me like she’s confused again. “Who’s Candy?” Winnie’s smart. Winnie’s smart. She doesn’t miss a thing. I push open the bathroom door. “That’s Candy.” That’s my little Candycane. She’s in the shower. She’s cut herself. Or picked herself. She’s somehow bleeding. The shower door is closed. The water running. Candycane is bleeding. She’s humming. She’s singing. The whole place is steamy. “Candycane?” Candy sings back her response: “L-L-Liss! Oh baby how are you?” “I’m fine.” That’s my little Candycane. Beyond pale—she’s whiter than white. What she’s singing sounds like opera. Her voice is like a tunnel. Like she’s far away. Winnie steps inside the bathroom. She sets the gun on the sink. “Do you need help?” Candy keeps singing. “Do you need help?” Candy puts her hands on the shower door. They’re covered in blood. We can see the prints. Candy is still singing. She takes her hands away and blood drips down. She lets it drip. Her hands are on her self. She leans against the back of the stall. “Who’s with you Liss? Is that Becca?” “No, this is Winnie.” Candy opens the door. “Do you want to take a shower Winnie?” Winnie picks up the gun.
———————
“See, I told you,” I’m saying.
We’re walking down the hallway. We get to the living room.
The boys are watching my show.
Winnie clomps into the front room.
It’s me, it’s her, Winnie’s got the gun, her bedtime hair is wisps. Falling out of a ponytail. Nightshirt tucked in her boots.
She motions with the gun.
“You realize you’ve got a cop chained to the emphTV. You realize that. You realize you’ve got..a..emphinfant..sleeping with the maid. If she even emphis the maid! I got a call from Pila earlier—the office got a call—their shark is missing? Somebody knocked out a window at an office next to Sharks..the trading people? Police are coming up to Stephen asking if he knows where you are. There’s a emphboat missing from the landing!”
My Dad stops her.
“I didn’t have anything to do with any boat.”
But Jacobi says: “I did.”
My dad says: “emphWhat!?”
“It’s no big deal. I took this waitress—Candy prob’ly knows er.” Jacobi swirls around his scotch. “This is a emphfine piece of ass. I was telling her about my boat and she wanted to know if we could go out on it and I was like—”
“Jacobi. You don’t emphhave a boat.”
Jacobi thinks of saying something more but settles on: “Exactly.”
My Dad and Jacobi start bickering about the boat.
I tell Winnie that SHARK! is in the pool.
“Go get him.”
“What do I take him in?”
“How did you get him here?”
“A cage, but it’s broke.”
Winnie’s shaking her head.
Broken statues everywhere.
“Um..Richard! Hey Richard.” Then she says to me: “Put him in a bag or something. Hey Richard! I’m taking your daughter. I’m taking Liss. Unless you want to come along—”
“What about me?” Jacobi whines.
“How did you get here?”
“My bike!”
“Ride your bike home. Liss, hurry. We’re leaving now. Richard.”
“What?”
“Sober up. Call me. I’ll take you home.”
“You better leave that here,” my dad says.
I hear Winnie set the gun on the bar in the front room.
It’s marble. It makes a hollow sound.
“Richard.”
“Uhh?”
“Be at work on Monday.” She lowers her voice. “You’ve got a emphcop..handcuffed to..whoever that is..in there. Take care of this. Make it go away. Get a shower. Text me. I’ll take the baby. Who’s baby is that? Cock? Okay, right, whatever. Monday morning, 10am—”
“I’ll be there at 11,” Jacobi says.
“I wasn’t talking to you.”
“But I’ll be there at 11,” Jacobi says.
“No you won’t.”
“You’re right,” Jacobi says, “I’ll be there at 12!!!”
“Stephen fired you,” Candy says, “So..you won’t be there at 12.”
“I have a fucking key bitch!”
“We changed the locks. This afternoon.” Candy hands my dad a key.
My dad looks at Jacobi and just laughs.
———————
I hear him laughing from the pool.
The sliding door is open.
Come’ere SHARK!
Come’ere.
We’re going home.
He’s a stubborn one. Get the net.
He’s a little large for the mojito pitcher but if I place him upright..
It should be enough to get him back to Sharks.
Candy Candy.
Candycane.
That steam in the bathroom wasn’t just steam.
It was the other kind of smoke.
Winnie smelled it.
But she doesn’t know it’s crystal.
I asked my dad what pot smelled like one time.
He said it smelled like nature..after it rains.
Candy and Dad’s smoke is more like cake..or icing.
Dad and Candy’s smoke is like convection. Like bubble gum.
Sour apple.
Pixy Stix.
Get in here SHARK!
Bad Girls sounds terrible if you’re not watching it.
It’s just a bunch of people screaming.
Grab that..yeah. Come on. SHARK! We’re going home.
Maybe I can sleep on Winnie’s couch.
Maybe she’ll take me home.
Sharks doesn’t open till later.
Oh fuck SHARK!
The stupid fish isn’t even going to have enough oxygen!
Winnie will solve it.
Just get him in the net.
I bet Winnie’s house is all beige.
I can quiz her on Pilates.
We’ll do Yoga.
———————
This is what I’m thinking: all this and Bad Girls.
SHARK! is almost in his cage.
Then it’s not just Bad Girls screaming.
It’s Candy. Candycane.
Jimmy’s squealing and Cock is saying: “NO!”
Then it’s Candycane.
Cock is wailing “Awwwwwwwwwwwwww.”
Candycane slides the porch door closed behind her.
I hear it slide shut.
I hear the click.
Then Winnie’s at the door. She’s pulling.
Candycane is naked.
Footprints, blood.
She’s got the taser.
I’m running backward.
Void the pool!
Candy’s crawling up on the fence with me, at the vista.
I drop the net.
Candy’s crawling at me like a spider.
Hair stringing down.
I throw the mojito pitcher over the vista. “HHHEEEELLLPPP!”
I never hear it land.
RIB-CRUSH! SPIKING! CUT MY HEAD!
SHE SPARKS MY ARM!
MAKING FISTS
I’M DEAD
Winnie screaming at her and she’s dripping her candycane blood on my leg.