| ZYGOTE IN MY COFFEE.COM |
| ***BIO*** Greg Gerke lives in Buffalo . His work has or will appear in Rosebud, Fourteen Hills, Pedestal Magazine, Pindeldyboz,, and others. Blaze Vox Books will soon publish a book of his short fiction. His website is www.greggerke.com |
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| © 2009 zygoteinmycoffee Ink. |
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| A NINCOMPOOP |
| by Greg Gerke |
| Keith didn’t have much to do so he went down to the neighborhood bar to see if he could make some male friends. He was a man tired with life, money and imitation. He liked male friends, they smelt like the thing he didn’t want to kiss, they farted and belched and he could lie to them for hours on end and they’d forgive him.
It was early when Keith arrived, only a few gloomy regulars hunched over—the old man from Tibet and the fiftyish guy who used to be a lawyer. Keith sat between them, one chair separating him from each. He slammed the bar like a gorilla, “Give me the best goddamn drink you have in this hellhole, the best goddamn one and then give these two troublemakers another of what they’re having.” The bartender was slow to act. Who likes to serve someone who impregnated his girlfriend? June decided to have it. She wasn’t from around Portland and she didn’t stay long. She was last seen in New Mexico living with a woman named Carly who supported her while she tried to sell landscape paintings. “Come on Al, give it a rest. If it wasn’t me, it’d a been you. At least your name isn’t on some birth certificate. What if in twenty years that kid freaks ‘cause he got a D in chemistry while some broad he sweeted on started up with Joe Zantigo and he decides to kill people? The press comes to my doorstep, not yours. So let’s have some good cheer.” Al shook his head, hoping something, anything might rise up outside and change the evening. A large hairy man came in. He was well over three-hundred pounds and had a massive cast on his forearm. He sat between Keith and the lawyer, the stool creaking under his heft. “Just seltzer water,” he said in a flowery voice. Keith shook his head, “No, no, nobody’s drinking no fucking seltzer water on my watch. Since I got enough green give him the hard stuff. I robbed three banks this week not just two.” The giant man’s little black eyes darted about Keith and he felt an infrared sizzle touch his nervous system. The giant man sniffled and said, “Will you pay for my sex change operation too big boy?” Keith’s eyebrows sunk, “The fuck you want to do that for? You’re a man.” “I’ve never been comfortable in this body. And it’s not the weight, believe me. If I could just express my feminine side, wear a corset, have periods, subscribe to Vogue, I think my life would be better off.” “Well, you’re still a man, so let’s drink up.” “What are we drinking to?” “To friendship.” “You’ll be my friend?” “To have and to hold.” “Even when the doctor scissor me off?” “Crazy talk.” Two women stepped in and sat down at the end of the bar. They giggled softly at first but then became very loud. “Ladies,” Keith announced with a thick smile, “Excuse me but this is men’s night. Just so you know.” They were in their late thirties. They came from rough neighborhoods and just got off their factory jobs. The voluptuous one didn’t say anything but the taller one didn’t hesitate, “I’ve got a hacksaw in the trunk of my Dodge. I’ll start with your tongue so you can’t yell when I rip off the little boy between your legs.” Keith raised his drink. “Are you having a bad day?” “None of your fucking business and kiss a monkey’s ass.” Keith nodded to the giant man, “Your surgeon has arrived.” He thought about the lawyer but the grizzled counselor was mostly comatose after seven martinis. That left Tibet. “Member that time you told me about you being beat up in India by everyone in that village?” Tibet nodded furiously. “Well maybe this isn’t the first time you’ve been told this, but you should write a screenplay. It’s a very visual story. Visual—I mean that the eyes can see it good. So here’s what you do. You mail it down to LA. They read it and you get your 80 grand minimum. 80 grand is a lot of whiskey sours.” Tibet waved his hand for Keith to stop talking. “Do you get cable sports channel?” he said. “No, no cable.” “I really want to see soccer match.” “Yeah I know what you mean.” “You like soccer?” “No I just know what you mean about wanting something. I wanted to make some male friends tonight but I see that’s not going to happen.” Tibet made a clucking sound and shook his head. “Don’t watch it happen or not. Do.” “Whaddya think I do here most every night?” “You come but your tongue keeps you in a jail. Next time leave it at home.” “Listen to this mother telling me to desecrate my body.” “You get what you ask for.” “I asked for friends Tibet.” “You asked for your own way.” Irritated, Keith wrapped his fingers on the bar. “This conversation isn’t making me happy. You know? I have feelings too. If you don’t watch out I just might cry.” Tibet keeled back and put his hands in the air gingerly pronouncing, “America,” before shaking his fingers at Keith. “I’m crying! I am crying! Are you happy? Are all you people in this bar happy that I’m crying, that I’m in pain? I’m an awful prick and I see it and I cry and I bleed.” He cowered on the floor but everyone went on drinking. Then he rolled himself into a ball and waited. Years on he is still there. He has hardened and people use him as a stool to sit on while they crack jokes and remind each other how their problems could always be worse. |
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| April 2009 |
| 116 |