Absence of the Hero

by Charles Bukowski

  Parking was always tough around the court but more so this night. There was a large crowd about the front of the court and I thought, oh-oh, shit.

  I had to park way around the corner and walk back in. The crowd was still there, larger than ever. I never liked crowds of people. People never made sense and the more of them you got into one area the less sense you had. Crowds were just Death with a lot of feet and heads and so forth.

  I had to get to my court. Which, like I told you, was in the back. As I got closer I heard one guy say to another, “Somebody shot the shit out of him. The guy ran out and was gone. Nobody knows where he went. I don’t think they know.”

  The lights of the police cars whirled. There was an ambulance. The cops kept pushing people back.

  “Move back, buddy, or I’ll crack your fucking nuts!”

  “Don’t shove me! This is a Democracy!”

  “Move back! One more fucking word and you got no teeth!”

  Plainclothes men were moving in and out of the front court. There were camera flashes from inside. Then they pulled Laura out of the door. They had her cuffed, for Christ’s sake. They stood with her there outside the door for a moment. The moonlight and the whirling lights showed her face. She was silent but tears were all about her face. I don’t suppose she’d ever felt that nude even before a Saturday night club full of jack-offs. I knew she could use me. I knew she needed help. But I was pretty fucking drunk. I knew I’d get the drunk tank, maybe worse. I watched them lead her off to a squad car.

  Then they came out with the body. The crowd creamed on that. It was better than anything they’d seen on TV since its inception.

  He was in a black sack, and he almost looked good in there: his feet lined up perfectly, his head straight, he was still neat. That was it. They carried him down to the wagon, the doors were open, they rolled him in and moved off, siren even going as if there were a hurry. I never knew what they did that with dead meat. I had learned something. I learned one thing each day and forgot two.

  The crowd still lingered, talking more now, matching notes and thrills. “Shit, I was sitting there listening to Johnny Carson when. . . .”

  I circled around the back of the court, went down the apartment house driveway next door, came up the back, climbed the little chain link fence, walked maybe 30 feet, and I was at my front door.

  Inside, I took off my things, got down to my shorts, went to the refrigerator, and there I had a six-pack and a half of ale. I got out a can, came back, cracked it, found an old cigar in the ashtray, lit it. It occurred to me that Big Guy might be after my ass just for the hell of it. But having that old suicide inclination it didn’t mean that much. Except it did. I preferred my own way out. It was degrading to be killed by somebody you didn’t like except if it were yourself.

  But I felt cheated by the murder of Tod. Perhaps I never would have gotten to his secret, I mean how he did it with the ladies so easily. It was an Art even though most men in the field were not artists. Tod just fucked away in an unmolested and almost boring manner. Why the women just fell and spread their legs for him by the dozens of dozens I would never know.

  I drank four cans of ale, I drank five sitting there in my shorts, alone. In fact, I sat there drinking all of the ale that was left. The sun was up then; it was sliding through the dirty blinds.

  Tod, I thought, you son of a bitch, why didn’t you tell me? One more would hardly cut down on your score. Don’t you realize that there are millions of people upon the earth that go from life to death without even fucking once? And there you go dropping panties and spreading beaver like it’s all a matter of nonsense, on and on and on. . . . And you’re probably fucking the first thing that crosses your path in hell. . . . Why didn’t you tell me? Or, is there nothing to tell?

  I walked to the bathroom, pissed, threw some water upon my hands, then my face, then my hair. I picked up the toothbrush, looked at it, dropped it into the sink. I walked into the bedroom, fell flat upon the bed, face upwards, the legs of the bed rattling and crackling once again to the familiar crash, yet, along with the grace of the Universe, holding but for another morning.

  I would awaken very sick and unknowing, once again.

  The Bully

  Harry managed to get in one more drink before the landing. Facing Tina again didn’t exactly delight him. She’d come to that desert town after their split. She was living with her married sister, Ann, who didn’t seem to like Harry too much. Ann was a failed writer and Harry was a lucky one. And he was lucky, too, that he had never married Tina. Tina was a nympho, always had it on her mind; sex was the only ultimate truth for her and Harry had tried every trick in the book and some out of the book in an attempt to appease her constant lust. But his drinking and gambling had often gotten in the way of her needs and one day she put it to him: “You either give up drinking and gambling or you give up me.”

  Of course, only a damn fool would give up both drinking and gambling and so that had ended it for them.

  Yet, Tina was a looker: fine ass, legs, hair, breasts, wild eyes, and there was Harry, on a flight, going to see her. She had badgered and pleaded with him so constantly over the phone that he had given in, figured he would fly in, engage in four or five sessions (two days?), and then get out. Besides, he needed a rest from another woman back there, a woman who wasn’t a nympho but who ate at his mind and his feelings by her need to play him against other men. Within that context he’d just as soon the other men had her completely. And by flying out he was giving her the open road. The problem with women was that as soon as you broke with one, another arrived to take her place. They never left you any areas to regroup in. . . .

  As usual, Harry was the last one off the plane. It was a habit he had never analyzed. But it probably had something to do with egomania, oversensibility, plus a dislike of having to stand in an airliner aisle while looking at the backs of heads, and the ears and the elbows and the butts and all that.

  It was a small airport compared to LAX and as he came down the runway, he spotted Tina standing behind a screen fence in the parking lot. He had his flight bag and went on through the exit and there she was. Harry grinned and she ran up, they hugged, kissed, and there was her tongue flicking in and out of his mouth. No commonplace greetings from Tina. Looked like those cowboys had her in fine tune. It was 9:35 P.M. in that desert town.

  And there in the car was the dog. Tina knew he liked Jock. And Jock remembered him, was all over him in the front seat—leaping, twisting, his tail fanning wildly. Harry hugged, petted, talked to Jock, then put him in the back seat along with his flight bag.

  The car was in motion and they were off to the sister’s house. Tina had a slight smile on her lips. To Harry it looked like a smile of victory.

  “You’re looking good, Harry. I’ll bet it’s because you’ve cut down on your drinking.”

  “You look fine, Tina, maybe better than ever. But no, I still drink about the same. . . .”

  “I just wish you’d hold it down while you’re here.”

  “All right, Tina, drive me back to the fucking airport!”

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Jesus Christ, I mean, you’re starting in already!”

  “I only mean it for your own good, Harry; you’re not a young man anymore. That drinking is going to kill you.”

  “Not drinking is what will kill me! Now, tool this thing around and drive me back!”

  “No.”

  “‘No,’ my ass! yelled Harry. He cut the key off on the steering wheel and pulled the emergency brake on. The car ran off the road, crashed through a mass of tall shrubbery, and there they sat.

  Tina looked straight forward for a while, then she said, “All right, Harry, there’s a pint of scotch in the glove compartment.”

  Harry ripped the compartment open, saw the bottle, unpeeled and uncapped it and had a good hit.

  He noted that the headlights were still on, reached over and shut them off.

  “You’re a swee
theart, baby.”

  “Listen, Harry, why don’t we live together again?”

  “People don’t live together, they die together and at the same time they die separately.”

  “You’re a cynical prick, Harry. . . .”

  “Reality is a cynical act.”

  “And you’ve got this humor. . . .”

  “Tina, there’s nothing funny about me. You give me too many credits. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing . . .”

  “You turn me on, Harry. . . .”

  Harry took another hit of the scotch.

  One thing about drinking: you didn’t have to talk to the bottle.

  Then—she was bending over him—unzipping his fly.

  “What the hell you doing?”

  “Hey, look: my little friend!”

  “Don’t be kind to me, Tina. . . .”

  “What’s he been doing lately?”

  “Attempting to avoid the obvious.”

  Harry felt her tongue flick over the mushroom helplessness of his penis, up there, flick, and flick again. He took another hit of the scotch.

  That was the main trouble with Tina: she gave the best head west and south of Boston. She reached down into his pants and yanked everything up and out of there. He felt that tongue roll up from his balls and then roll and whirl further up the vein snake madness to the head, then circle and circle the head in a fathomless and ultimately conquering ingenuity.

  Harry decided to ignore it.

  He looked out of the car window at the low-slung and arid hills. But she was getting to him. He tried to think of eating a bucket of shit, spoonful by spoonful.

  No good. She was getting to him.

  Jock had both paws up on the front seat, was looking over and whimpering. Dear Jock smelled the heat of it all. Harry reached over, pushed him back down, and had another hit of the scotch. After doing that and looking forward, he noticed that the moon was watching also.

  Then, Harry began groaning and then—she bit him hard, right at the center of his cock—

  “You fucking whore!”

  He slapped her—hard—right on the top of her skull and that did it: she began working in immaculate and ultimate fury. Harry could no longer hold back: he ejaculated right into the middle of the desert among the 412 rabbits and 672 snakes and the 10,687 etc.

  Tina then sat up, flicked on the overhead light and began applying lipstick with the aid of the rearview mirror, her slight smile of victory reappearing.

  Then she started the car, got the headlights on and roared away, a large leafy branch of the brush still clinging to the top of the hood. She drove on peering through the obstruction. She’d had electroshock treatments at the age of 22. . . .

  As they parked outside of the ranch, Harry could see that the lights were on. Ann and her husband, Reddough, were waiting for him. Harry had never met Reddough. Tina filled him in at a rather late stage.

  “I’ve seen you lose some good fights, Harry, but Reddough is another matter. He’s the number one bully in this town. He’s filled more hospital beds around here than cancer.”

  “I don’t want any trouble, Tina; I’m working on a novella and I’d like to finish it.”

  “Any excuse is all this guy needs. I don’t want you busted up until we’ve worked out a few times.”

  Harry took another hit: “Your concern for my well-being is appreciated, Tina.”

  They got out of the car and walked in there.

  Reddough and Ann were sitting waiting for them at a table in the kitchen. They appeared to be well into their drinking. And there was a fifth of whiskey on the table. A radio was on, playing country and western. Reddough snapped the radio off: “Sit down, city boy.”

  Harry stuck out his hand. Reddough reached over as if to shake, stuck a beercap into Harry’s hand.

  “What am I supposed to do with this?” Harry asked.

  “I don’t know. Stick it up your ass for all I care.”

  Harry looked around at Tina who was still standing behind him: “I know I’ve said this before but, again, will you please drive me back to the fucking airport?”

  “What’s the matter?” Reddough asked. “Scared?”

  “A little, not much.”

  Reddough pushed the fifth toward him: “Drink?”

  Harry sat down: “Sure.”

  “Harry,” Tina said, “please don’t drink with him!”

  “It tastes the same to me, no matter who’s around. . . .”

  Ann got up, came back with a water glass.

  “How much?” Reddough asked.

  “Topside.”

  “Beer chaser?”

  “Thanks.”

  Harry sucked off half the glass of whiskey and took a hit of the can of beer before him.

  Reddough watched: “Drinking doesn’t make the man.”

  “What does?”

  “Some things are just born in a certain way and that’s it.”

  “You mean, like a skunk?”

  “Hey!” Reddough looked up from lighting his cigar. “What have we here? This guy wants to play, huh?”

  Reddough wasn’t as big as all that, maybe 5'10" but he was blocky, very; he looked almost like a square but of course, he wasn’t. But he was wide and stocked with muscular bulges—and some fat—but it almost looked as if the fat were stacked in the right places, if that were possible. And, his head was too small.

  How the hell you going to beat on a head like that? thought Harry. It’s going to be like trying to crack a walnut shell with your knuckles. Definitely unfair. And his wife, Ann, sitting there overweight and more than frustrated, hating herself and hating the world because she kept getting rejects from the massive novels she mailed to the New York City publishers every other year.

  Harry always hoped that she would hit so that she would get off his case. And he had read some pages of her output—pages of humorless self-yearning and falsified sex-excursions. Her driving desire to be a great writer only seemed to drive her straight toward mediocrity.

  Now she glared at Harry: “You still writing that shit and getting paid for it?”

  “Oh yes, regularly.”

  “We got one of your books here,” said Reddough. “We hang it from a string in the henhouse. There’s one story in there where a man rapes a little girl. You call that writing?”

  “Yes.”

  Tina came around and sat down. She had a Pepsi-Cola. She poured it into half a glass of ice.

  “Listen, Harry, let’s sleep now. We can talk in the morning.”

  “I’m a night creature, Tina. Mornings are bad for me.”

  “I don’t want any trouble between you and Reddough.”

  “I’ll chance that for a few more drinks. . . .”

  Reddough blew a blast of cigar smoke across the table at Harry.

  “Don’tcha think you’re a little old for Tina?”

  “‘Old’ is just a word in the dictionary.”

  “No, ‘old’ is sometimes something that happens.”

  “You might be right there.”

  Ann had left. Then she was back. She had a sheaf of paper in her hand. She tossed it in front of Harry.

  “First chapter of my new novel. Give it a read.”

  Just like that. But they all did it—just like that.

  Harry drained his glass, looked at Reddough: “How about a refill?”

  “Well, looky here!” said Reddough, filling the glass.

  Harry began reading, hoping for the best. It wasn’t there. Where did that urge toward dullness come from? There wasn’t a writer in the world who thought they couldn’t write. But it took more than one vote. And many crappy writers were published. And maybe he was one of them. But Harry didn’t like Ann’s writing. It just bogged and bawled and bitched—a tedious drumming of ineffectiveness.

  He handed the sheets back to Ann. “There are some good parts, but all in all, I don’t care for it.”

  “What do you find wrong?” Ann asked.

  “I don�
��t know. It’s kind of a cross between Faulkner, Thomas Wolfe, and an ordinary soap opera.”

  “Maybe,” said Reddough, leaning forward against the table, “maybe she ought to write about some man raping a little girl?”

  “She can write about anything she wants as long as she does it truly.”

  “‘Truly’? What kind of word is that? You think you’ve got the inside to truth? I don’t think so.”

  “Drink up and calm down.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do in my own house!”

  “Look, Red, we can get along. Let’s just relax. They might drop the Bomb at any minute. We’re all trapped in this shit. What’s the need for us to destroy each other? We should be laughing through our last moments. Wouldn’t that be best?”

  “Hey, fucker,” said Reddough, “lemme tell you something: God is going to protect His own!”

  “Red, maybe there isn’t a God.”

  Reddough stood up. “THAT’S IT!”

  “What?”

  “NOBODY SAYS WORDS LIKE THAT IN MY HOUSE!”

  With that, he came flying across the table, a big wingless sodden thing. Harry ducked to the left and the mass of muscle (and fat) fell face forward across the floor, skidded against the wall, then rose, puffing, chest out, eyebrows twisted. Reddough moved toward Harry who had rolled under the table and had come up on the other side.

  “Red, I was just kidding. I’m sure there’s a God somewhere. Right?”

  Reddough wavered there across the table. “You’re a coward!”

  “Right. And listen, it might make you feel better to know that I don’t even want to fuck your sister-in-law. She wants to fuck me.”

  Tina screamed and threw her Pepsi-Cola bottle at Harry. It bounced off his head, fell to the floor. There was a tiny ringing sound inside of Harry’s skull.

  Reddough moved forward a couple of steps as if to circle the table.

  “Listen, Red, all men are brothers. Similar blood, similar fingers, similar bungholes, similar sorrows. Think about it!”

  “Huh?”