by I N Foggarty
“Ok son. You turn and leave Sammy be, nice and slow like,” Joe the bartender demanded. Ramone slowly rotated to face him and his now primed shotgun. “Now get the hell out of my bar!”
“Screw you,” he spat, tugging on the lapels of his jacket. Still, he elected not to hang around. Passing the now stunned patrons he quickly barged through the tables towards the door. A look passed between a few burly men in front of him and for a second he wondered if they would stop him and avenge their friend’s honour. “You okay there, Sammy?” he heard the bartender say behind him and the men stepped back. He reached the door and kicked it open and stepped back out into the shadowy street.
Outside he was eventually able to light his smoke in peace. Taking a puff he thought for a moment about finding another bar but decided against it. He’d had enough of people for one day. Shoving his hands deep into his pockets Ramone meandered along the sidewalk in the general direction of home. He wasn’t exactly enthralled with the idea of heading straight back to his residence, where another argument probably awaited him. However, any other stops along the way were sure to just aggravate his already bad mood before he eventually did return to the inevitable fight.
To say that things had been rocky between him and his partner of late would have been an understatement. Bitches be crazy sometimes. All the time actually over the past, what… two years. Had it really been that long? It had Ramone realised. Just over two years had passed since the pier five incident. Two years since everything had changed. The sidewalk seemed to swim in front of him and suddenly the scene shifted. No longer was he walking home, the tarmac becoming wooden boards…
…The memories of two years ago slowly receded and Ramone realised he now stood outside his front door. Rummaging around in his pocket for his keys he heard the faint click of the lock and the door swung open.
“Well lookie what the cat finally decided to drag home,” the familiar voice of a woman said from behind the woodwork; her name was Maria. “Drunk as a skunk”
Before he could reply Maria had already turned away and disappeared down the hallway. That was a bad sign Ramone thought, a bubble of anger welling up inside him upon hearing the woman’s tone of loathing. How dare that bitch walk away from him? Slamming the door behind him Ramone couldn’t contain himself. “¿No te alejes de mí perra!” he yelled out after her.
“Ir a la mierda!” came the reply, the sound of Maria’s heels audible on the floor. As he walked down the hallway she suddenly appeared in one of the door frames. “Don’t you say that shit to me, you lazy-ass motherfucker. I worked two jobs today to put food on that table.” She pointed a long bejewelled fingernail to the folding dinner table in the kitchen behind her.
“Rubbing that fat fucking Cuban ass of yours up and down a pole isn’t a fucking j…” Maria’s hand came out of nowhere and caught him across the left cheek producing a wicked slapping sound that echoed briefly down the hallway.
“Oh hell no! Uh-uh.” She held a finger up; and waggled it at him as she continued “First of all I ain't fat dip-shit, second don’t you try telling me what I can and can’t do with my ass or you ain't going to be seeing it anytime soon.”
Ramone looked her up and down, a lustful look spreading across his face. Her short five foot five stature was augmented somewhat by six-inch heels, while the gold stockings, mini skirt and bra ensemble showed off her supple legs, thin waistline and light cleavage perfectly. Her long curled hair cascaded down her back like a velvet curtain and Ramone could see that there were bleached blonde ringlets amongst the ebony. When had she done that?
“Maybe you want me to fuck that ass of yours, coming home dressed like that,” he barked, grabbing her by the waistline and spinning her around so her backside pressed up against his now throbbing groin.
“Third, you drunken motherfucker, I am not someone you can just use when the feeling takes you then toss away once you’re done.” As she spoke indignantly Maria wrestled herself from his grip and turned back to face him. “Now you had better start treating me right or you are out’a here, Ramone…” She clicked her fingers in front of him. “…Like that”
“You want me to start treating you right huh?” he said advancing upon her. “Then I suggest you do something to earn it.”
Thrusting his arms out Ramone grabbed the woman around her waist and shoulders and forced his mouth against her own. When his tongue invaded past her soft lips she began to hammer on his back with her fists. He ignored her, tasting every inch of her sweet mouth. Shifting his left hand down from her waist he seized her ass and squeezed it hard, pressing her body up against his own. For a brief moment, the pounding intensified. However, the moment he brought his other hand around to pinch one of her nipples through the bra he felt her turn to putty in his hands.
Maria’s fingers found their way underneath his t-shirt and he felt her nails dig in and claw at his back. He busied his own hands with tearing off her bra. Ramone took hold of her breasts and cupped his hands around them a loud moan from her encouraged his groping. Wasting no time he shouldered out of his jacket and released her for the time it took to haul down her skirt and panties. Wrenching her arms from out beneath his t-shirt he spun Maria around once more and forced her down to the floor with him. After a brief struggle with his zipper, he had freed his manhood and drove it deep inside the woman. Seizing her breasts once more in his hands Ramone thrust himself in and out; extracting a loud moan each time.
By the time he was done he knew she had still not reached her own climax but he didn’t care. Hauling himself to his feet he redid his trousers before cracking his neck. He needed a smoke.
“Why you dirty little piece of shit,” Maria gasped breathlessly from where she still lay sprawled on the floor, she must have been close. “You think you can just waltz in here get your rocks off and then leave me high and dry! This is exactly the kind of shit I’m talking about, Ramone.” She pounded a fist on the floor.
He couldn’t be bothered listening. Turning his back on her Ramone pulled his tobacco out of his pocket and began rolling a smoke.
“Ramone...Ramone? Are you even listening to me you goddamn son of a bitch?”
Licking the paper Ramone finished making his cigarette and pulled out his zippo. Flicking it to life he brought it up and caught the end of the smoke a light in the small orange flame.
“Oh hell no,” he then heard Maria say from behind him and he turned back to face her. “How many times have I told you, you ain't smoking that shit in my kitchen.”
“Aww, can it bitch,” he spat around a draw. What was it with assholes not letting him smoke tonight?
“That’s it I have had it, Ramone. You get your ass outside if you’re gonna smoke that shit. I will not have smoking in my kitchen.”
“Go screw yourself.” The second the insult left his mouth Maria seized a plate from the counter and threw it at him. Ducking his head just in time the blue stoneware flew over the top of him and out into the hall where he heard it shatter against the wall. Before he could straighten up Maria had another in her hand. Fuck this he thought. Hastily he darted out of the doorframe and down the hall, his boots crunching on broken crockery.
“Don’t you dare run out on me you bastard,” Maria yelled from back inside the kitchen. “You better get your ass back here and clean up that mess you made me make.” Ignoring her Ramone headed straight for the front door. “Go ahead run like you always do you pussy!”
Hauling the front door open Ramone stormed out and started off down the broken pathway. “And another thing. If you don’t show at Olivia’s birthday barbeque Wednesday afternoon we are finished. D’you hear me, Ramone? Finished!”
He did not stop; this seemed to annoy her more than anything he had previously done. From behind him, he heard the sound of Maria catching the door before it hit the frame. She then yelled venom practically dripping from the words as she spat them “And for your information, if I went and screwed myself I’d do a much better job of it than you just did
.” The door slammed shut.
Puffing his smoke Ramone checked the time on his watch; it was well after three in the morning. Bastard. He needed a beer, some food and then somewhere to crash for the night. At this time only the strip clubs would be open and only a small number of takeout joints. Cursing his luck he set off down the road. There was only one place he would be able to get all three at this time and that happened to be the place he had been trying to avoid at all costs, headquarters.
Fearless
Across the skyline, the evening clouds stretched out over the cooling blue sky. The air temperature had dropped from its midday high to a more comfortable warmth and the last of the sun’s rays were most likely creating a tranquil sunset somewhere, but not here. Encapsulated by tall buildings this part of the city had lost sight of the sun about an hour ago. Now the streetlamps and the promise of stars later were all that existed to stave off the darkness.
At street level, people and vehicles had dwindled to the dregs of life and a silence threatened to envelop the area and swaddle it in nights embrace. Into this would be quiet, at the end of one street in particular, the patchy rumble and clang of a metal shutter descending ripped through the tranquillity and had been enough to startle a cluster of birds into flight. The tree on which they had been perched being one of several equally spaced cherry blossoms that had not long transformed from their wintery haunted forest-guise to a more pleasing, almost picturesque portrayal of spring. It was the season of change after all.
Unfortunately, not all of nature's creatures were blessed with the ability to completely change themselves. Clad in black cargo pants and matching polo shirt bearing a spaceship logo and the words ‘Lunar DVD Rental’ the red-haired form of Anna Richards stood considering this philosophy; a large plastic bag clutched cumbersomely under her arm. She watched on while a man in identical attire struggled to reach up and haul the second shutter down over the shop windows. Though shorter than her by a good few inches his manly pride prohibited him from making her do the job instead. Not that he had much man in him to Anna’s mind. He had skinny limbs with a little pot belly and hunched shoulders, a pointed nose and a lot of dull lifeless hair over almost every part of his exposed skin except the top of his head. She often felt he would be much more at home with his brethren in one of the sewer colonies.
“See you Wednesday, Richards,” he stated when finally the shutter had slammed home and rained a shower of dirt and rust down onto her.
You really are a rat Anna thought as the man stood up and walked away without even looking at her; car keys in one hand and a supersize Snickers appearing in the other. At least she had the decency to wait while he shut up shop.
“Yeah, later,” she replied coldly. She watched her boss walk the short distance from the shop to his car, his elongated incisors gnawing on the candy bar. When the door slammed shut the sound of the engine creaking into life filled the quiet street. Anna smirked mirthlessly to herself, yeah people don’t change. She set off in the opposite direction. The sky had turned a deep shade of navy and the cloudy dregs had long since gone. It was twilight time and she liked it. The long walk home gave her time to think.
For once the thought of work had almost been a welcome distraction from the pettiness of her peers. Until she had got in the door and discovered she would be spending the evening alone with Jason; her boss. The man-rat, or should that be rat-man, could be prettier than Dylan, Natalie and Raymond combined; the virtue of age had also made him a complete sleaze to boot.
Things had gone from bad to worse as one whiff of her bourbon-soaked first customer had told her the evening would be long. Half an hour she had spent arguing with him that the alcohol he had tried to ‘polish’ the Disc with had done more damage to it that it would have done his liver. This had escalated when on his insistence Anna tried to play the disc only for it to confirm her side of the story. After furiously yelling about the store trying to rob him he then stormed off without paying the fine; knocking over a rocket-shaped display on his way out. A shouting match with Jason had then wound up costing her $8 off her pay (bringing the total for the day to $23) and the arduous task of rebuilding the stupid sci-fi stand.
When closing time had finally rolled around she had managed to recoup some of the $8 loss by spending two more on the mass amount of stale popcorn that had gone unsold over the course of the evening. With Jason now skulking off to the nearest open manhole or his basement apartment in his mother’s house, whatever came first, she was free to make her way home. Exhausted from the day’s endeavours Anna would have liked nothing more than to jump a bus and head straight to bed. Neither were going to happen tonight. Her required expenditure for the day now totalled a whopping $25. That ruled out any form of transport other than her own legs. As for sleep, she had lost that privilege the moment Stevens had demanded her literature report by eight am the next morning. Three hours detention would be far easier to wriggle out off than six so her body clock would just have to take the hit while she finished writing the damn thing.
A thin smile spread across Anna’s lips. She could just imagine the look of pure rage that would form on Stevens’s face the moment her guidance counsellor told him point blank that she wouldn’t be doing his detention. It was a card she used sparingly but with Steven’s, it would be her only way out of a punishment that she neither had the time nor mental capacity to deal with.
##
By the time she turned the last corner into her deserted street Anna’s limbs were heavy and it was almost an effort to carry the weightless popcorn. During the journey, the site of a convenience store had reminded her of a pressing need for shampoo. With little choice, she had been forced to endure a trek beneath migraine inducing white strip lights in order to purchase a bottle. Bringing her total for the day up to $26.25.
Making her way along the only sound to be heard aside from her own light footsteps came from the direction of the strip club. Outside her own building, Mrs Vandabedian had moved indoors though even in the darkness of a broken street light Anna could tell that the old bat's windows were still as dirty as they had been that morning despite the crazy woman’s ministrations. Forcing her aching legs to climb the stairs she fumbled around in the side compartment of her rucksack for her keys. By the time she had reached the top she had a firm grasp on them and wasted no time stuffing the relative one into the stiff lock. She didn’t even bother trying to push the monstrosity open. Instead, she took a step back, raised her leg and kicked the door out of its housing in one clean blow.
Anna staggered slightly as she struggled to control her balance, she wobbled for a second and managed to catch herself. It took effort to stay upright. Opening the door had taken far more energy than she had anticipated. Sighing at the idiocy of her actions, she made for the stairs up to the second floor. Finally, back in her apartment, she firmly closed her door and locked it tightly with key and chain; you could never be too careful in this neighbourhood.
She took a deep breath and leant against the door; eyes closed. Unfortunately, the slowly intensifying smell of damp from the hallway brought a swift end to the peace. She sighed and pushed herself off the door. Wandering down the short dark hallway she entered her bedroom and flicked on the light. What lay before her was nothing short of a bomb site. Hell, an atomic bomb going off would probably have made less of a mess than she had in her hurry that morning. Though to be fair the room hadn’t exactly been tidy beforehand.
Sighing Anna dropped her bags onto the bed and began stripping off her work clothes. She would have to find time to tidy up in here, along with the rest of the apartment before Matt came over on Friday night. What on earth had possessed her to demand that he come over to her place? Why couldn’t she have made him take her out to dinner? Or anything else that didn’t involve her having to clean? Even Matt’s sweaty-sock smelling bedroom and putting up with Donny eavesdropping would have been a better option.
She shook her head, opened her rucksack and withdrew the stuffed up clump t
hat her regular clothes had become. She didn’t have an aversion to cleaning, just never the time to do it properly. School typically took up her entire mornings and afternoons five days out of seven. While during the week work took up three evenings till after nine. As for the weekends, she lost all of Saturday after eleven until late and Sunday afternoons to work, while a trip to Walmart swallowed up most of Sunday evening. That left her with two evenings a week and the mornings before work at the weekends to do all her school and housework. Of late, the latter had needed to give and even then she had been so short of time she had forgotten all about the report for Stevens.
Once changed she removed her notebook, a pen and an exceptionally battered copy of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein from her rucksack and picked up the bag of popcorn. She looked at the popped kernels through the clear plastic bag and sighed. Deep down she knew exactly why she had invited Matt over on Friday. Though she desperately wanted to spend time alone with him and distract herself from life, her second request for Chinese food and Pepsi was the real reason behind choosing here for the location. Matt, with a bottomless stomach and a metabolism that craved fuel pretty much 24/7, had a habit of being overly excessive when buying takeout food and if she were careful the leftovers could be made to last the rest of the weekend. It wasn’t a nice thing to do nor something she took any pleasure in, but she could ill afford to pass up such an opportunity. In the end, if her only crime towards Matt involved trying to feed herself into the bargain then that still made her a damn site better person than either Natalie or Dylan, who were more likely out for blood rather than Moo Shu Pork.
Taking a last look at the disaster she called her bedroom Anna flicked the light switch off and headed for the kitchen. Expertly she guided her way around the room in the dark and filled herself out a glass of tap water and fetched a large green plastic bowl into which she poured a quarter of the popcorn bag. She then headed for the living room.
