That Hustle Mama

My eyes popped off right open and wide opened.  Them lids just flashed back just like that.  Shit was quiet all around and it was only ten days before Christmas.  I was keeping track of the days 'till Christmas, and I was keeping track of that fat wad of cash that was growing under my mattress.

I stared down that motherfucker Alarm Clock.  It was 4:58am.  Why does my brain always turn on right before the alarm clock goes off?  Something about an internal clock.  Whatever.

4:59 and 43 seconds... 4:59 and 51 seconds... I turned it off before it went off.  No use in waking my baby too.  There was enough suffering in the world with me waking up.  No need to compound the misery that the world groans under by waking up my baby too.  Nobody ever really wants to wake up, do they?  Don't we all just want to be peacefully asleep for like ever and dreaming cool, nice dreams?  I don't know.

My kid walked up to my bed and tugged at the sheets.

"Momma, you awake?  Are you leaving now?  Are you going to work?  It's almost Christmas, right?"

"Yes, I'm up.  You have an internal alarm clock too?"

"Yes.  What is a manternal-ma-long-block, mama?"

The tap, tap, tap came at the door.  I let the neighbor in.  Our apartments weren't too bad.  She lived a couple floors up, and she took care of my daughter, for real fucking cheap.

"Be nice to Consuela Ju-Ju-Bee.  I'll see you when I get back from work.  Thanks, Consuela.  See ya later."

"No problem miss Avenger."  They left, and I went back to my room to get dressed.

Miss Avenger: I gave her a fake name for no fucking reason.  I don't know why I did that--just being silly I guess.  It sounded more bad ass than miss Minchin; that's for sure.  That wasn't my name either--just saying.  I noticed myself in a mirror and thought: my name should be miss Hot Mess.  Fuck it.

I was dressed and ready to serve the world, to get mine.  I reached in between my mattress and box-spring and pulled out my fat, black glock; I admired it.  Either this city was going to eat my daughter and me alive, or I was going to end up having to use this motherfucker.  A false dichotomy?  No.  This city is a rampaging monster, but I'm a mad woman.

I walked out of my apartment, and into the indoor hallway of our building.  I locked up behind me and heard a voice down the way, "Excuse me, do you know where the bathroom is?"

This guy looked worse than I did, and he was walking fast toward me.

I pulled my gun out, and he just kept coming, "Hey stop right there!"  No.  He just kept coming.

"What are you going to do wit dat?  Come here honey.  I'm a rapist!  Arg!"  Stumbling and falling toward me, that's what rapists say, right before they rape you.

Then my ears started ringing from all the lead I was unloading on him.

Deaf, I looked up.  Suddenly, it occurred to me that it probably wasn't a good idea to try to shoot someone, while closing my eyes, head cocked downward.

I saw this wild man on the ground holding his belly and grunting like a dying man.  I had blasted the poor old rapist in the gut!  There was blood everywhere!  "Help me... you old... haggard... bitch!  Help me please."  As he sat up against the wall, his belly was vomiting blood all over the goddamn place.  I sat down next to him; he smelled like shit and alcohol.  I was sitting in a pool of blood.  I placed my left palm flat on the ground, immersing it in blood.  I was beside myself--don't you understand that I was in shock?  "Help me," the old fool died out.

I whispered, "I killed you, you old fool," as I put my left arm around his shoulders, the gun hanging loosely in my right hand.

An old ass Asian lady (she must have been 73) neighbor came out and saw us, "You kill him."  And she pointed at me.

I was exhausted, "Yes."

"Give gun to me.  Policeman come.  You no want to be trouble," she said gravely and Asian-ly, as her eyes widened.  She bent over; she took the gun; she put it in her apron.  I was starting to black out.  The lady said, "You lie to policeman when he come.  I give back you gun when safe.  Fuck the policeman.  They always trouble me when I play my rock and roll loud," and she was gone.

I heard the police coming up the stairs.  I pushed the old fool over and started frantically searching his pockets for any money.  I pulled out two giant stacks of cash and shoved them deep into my purse.  Then I pulled my wallet out and left it next to my purse.  I closed my purse and jumped on top of the old fool and tried to cover his stomach wounds with my hands, "help!"

"Ma'am!  What happened here?"  Human police dogs.

"Some crazy man shot this man and ran off!  He went down the stairwell that leads to the alleyway!  This man is dying!"  I just kept pushing hard on his wounds.  "He's bleeding out!"

"Ma'am.  Step away.  He's dead.  You were very lucky.  We have been looking for this man for a long time.  He has raped many women and robbed many rich people in the last couple of days.  He went by The Rape Thief."

I looked blankly at the cop, and then I fainted.  I woke up sitting against the wall, and a paramedic was taking care of me.

"Miss..."

"My husband's name was William Tully."

"Mrs. William Tully, is your husband--"

"He's been dead a long time.  Someone killed him, and he couldn't stop himself from being killed."

"Mrs. Tully, you're in shock.  Please try to relax.  Here's some drugs.  Eat up."

All I could see was blood, and I wondered when I would get the chance to kill again.  Gotta hustle around here.  Now I had some extra capital to add to my wad.  I had some money to spend for Christmas and hopefully some money to get out of this shit hole.  My daughter would be so happy.  I put my left palm to my face.  The blood was still hot.

The Lieutenant, Hemingway, and Darwin: Ch. 1

Chapter 1

Oh shit, I thought to myself.  I didn't open my eyes yet, as I started waking up.  I didn't know where I was yet, and I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

With my eyes half closed, I threw my arms wide and felt around for a bottle.  Shit.  No bottle.  I opened my eyes fully and sat the fuck up on whatever bed I was in.  I looked around.  Very good.  Very good.  I was in my quarters.  I stretched out hard, and looked at the clock: 0500 on the dot.

Ok.  Fuck it.  I'll take a break from the bottle, for now.

Hungover or still drunk, I got up and stumbled around for the shower, then I stopped, stood erect, and looked around to see if anybody else was in the room.  There was a body under the sheets in the bed.  Fuck.

Then, BANG, BANG, BANG, motherfucking, BANG, BANG, BANG, at the fucking door.  It startled the shit out of me, and I clasped my ears with my filthy, hungover hands.

"What?" I roared out.

"Second Lieutenant, we're ready for you."

"Son of a bitch!  Just call me Lieutenant, you bastard!  Who are you?"

"It's Sergeant DeMatteo, sir."

"Get the fuck in here, you son of a bitch."

"Yes sir."

DeMatteo stepped inside, ready and dressed for combat, "Second... I mean, Lieutenant?"  He looked away at my impressive nudity.

"Sergeant, sneak the young lady out of my quarters, right now.  I don't give a fuck if anyone sees.  Just sneak her out."

"Did you have a good time last night, sir?"

"You bet I did... Well, I think I did.  Yes.  Yes I did."

"That's great sir.  I'll sneak her out, and we'll be waiting outside."

"Alright.  Get the fuck out of here you son of a bitch Sergeant DeMatteo, if that is your real name," I was more on the drunk side than on the hungover side.

The sergeant grabbed the young lady's clothes, and then roughly threw her over his shoulder, "Sir,"  and began making his way out.

"Goddamnit, DeMatteo, you fucking guinea spic.  Keep it down, and sneak her out, you bastard."

"Yes sir, Second Lieutenant," he smiled.  Her tits were flying everywhere, and she was grumbling, almost inaudibly, and then they were out the door.

Motherfucker that spic.  Goddamn local beauties.  I should be more careful.  I hoped she would be ok.

I made some coffee.  I drank it.  It was black and hot as hell.  I took a bunch of Advil.  I took one Xanax.  I jumped into the shower, shaved, and, standing there, I dozed off a couple of times.  Finally, I got out of the shower and into my combat gear.  I ate some cold, leftover eggs and a bagel, drank some dirty water, walked outside, and got blinded by the sun.

I heard some shuffling, as the small band of Marines I was in charge of came together and made a weak attempt at military formalities.  We had been lost; shot at; starving; and sleepless for a long time--now you know why we were all so tired; it was hard to maintain military customs.  As I waited for my eyes to not be blacked out, I shouted out, "Ten-hut motherfucks!  Attention!"  I rubbed my eyes, and then I squinted until I could see, using one of my hands to try and shade my eyes from the omnipresent sun.

"Sergeant DeMatteo!  Someone speak up!  Where is the Gunny?"  I could see better now, and I saw that we all looked terrible.

"Sir!  The Gunny took thirty men northwest, to look for more men and weapons and to weed out more of the enemy, per your directions from yesterday, sir."

"How many of us are left, Garbanzo Bean?"

"Sir, with the two Privates that just showed up..."

"Fuck.  Go on."

"Sir, that makes eighteen of us, including you."

"I'm in no mood GB.  I'm no mood to hang out with all of you.  We'll be going north.  Contact the Gunny and tell him we'll all be meeting at the rendezvous past the two hills and right of the three trees, but left of the seven goats.  There should be a couple of mansions with electricity and water there, hopefully as nice as this one.  We'll rest there.  The trip is about thirty miles for all of us.  GB you will take the north route; kill all enemy; bring women and children with you, if possible.  If not, kill them.  Bring all weapons you find.  Let DeMatteo know that my orders for him are to bring all enemy and our own POWs he encounters and to kill all civilians.  GB, you take the fourteen men with you.  I will take the two Privates, go northeast, and then we'll turn northwest and meet up with the rest of the company.  Where are those two fucks?"

"Sir, are you sure you don't want a couple extra men, sir?"

"Sergeant Gallo, you take the fourteen men with you and head straight north.  What time is it, anybody?"

"Sir, zero seven hundred, sir."

"Ok, thank you Sergeant."

"Sir, yes sir.  Hemingway!  Darwin!  Sir, see you tonight, sir."

"Be safe, Sergeant.  Thank you."

Two friends came around a corner, dressed in their combat gear and looking fresh and clean, as DB's troop jog-trotted north.  They stopped in front of me and looked straight ahead.  They were still very disciplined.  They must have not been out here long.  Fucking privates.

"I don't mean to put you two in danger, and I'm sorry to your mothers, but it is best if you get a crash course in surviving out here.  No gradual acclimating out here.  You'll die within a couple hours if we take it slow.  You'll probably die during this crash course, but it gives you better odds than slowly learning how to survive this hell hole.  That is why I decided for only the three of us to go west.  Being only three, we are much more vulnerable, so you will have to learn fast or die.  You must be sharp at all times.  You must be stressed at all times.  I need you both to turn into thirty-five year old war-hardened veterans, within a couple days, or you will die.  I'm not going to die, but you might.  So stay sharp.  Fucking Privates.  You have to be kidding me."

"Sir, yes sir," both of them.

"What are you guys fucking best friends, or what?"

"Sir, we're friends sir," Hemingway confidently.

"Private Hemingway, what is your first name?"

"Erne--"

"Never mind.  I don't want to know."

"Private Darwin, is that your first or last name?"

"Sir, I only have one name, sir."

"Well you seem like a depressed fuck, Private Darwin.  Fuck it.  I'm not going to ask.  One of you, tell me how you ended up joining my diminished company."

"Well Second Lieutenant--," 

"Lieutenant.  Call me Lieutenant."

"Sir, we landed about ten miles east of here, about--"

"Shut up Darwin.  Hemingway, tell me what happened."

"Sir, we landed a bit off from here.  Right when we landed mortar fire hit us from every direction.  I saw Darwin on the ground.  I picked him up and threw him over my shoulder.  I ran toward the enemy.  I asked them to fix Darwin.  They fixed him and told me he'd be alright.  They thanked me and went north.  I looked back and saw all of our men dead and in bits.  We went the opposite way of the enemy, and your company found us, sir."

"Interesting," I was spacing the fuck out, staring into the deep blue and bright sky.  "Alright privates.  Give me fifty, and then we'll get going."  They gave me fifty, and then we got going.

But I Love You So Much: Who Am I? Madness.

"But... but... but I love you so much."

I cringed hard.  What the fuck could I say back to her?  There was that ever so familiar silence over the damned phone.  Fuck me this sucks.

Fuck it, I thought.

"Well, you won't love me so much very soon," I said.  Well that kind of felt good, I thought.

"You're an ASSHOLE!  You know that?  Why don't you love me back?  What's wrong with me?  I'm pretty, and I'm smart."

She sounded so desperate, and that made me kind of like her.  She was like a wounded little bird that you just want to take care of and love.

Silence.

"I never said I wasn't an asshole.  I'm sorry."

"Listen.  Listen for a second," her voice was kind of shaking.

I listened.

"Are you still there?"  Her voice was still shaking, and she might have been crying.  She was probably crying.  For sure she was crying.  She was probably crying.  I wondered if she was crying.

"Ya."

"Listen... just please... please love me back.  Please?  What can I do?  I'll do anything... you know there's always going to be other women, no matter who you're with... prettier women.  Why not me?  No one will ever love you like I love you.  I'll love you forever, Danny,"  The desperation was seeping through her voice, but toward the end there... there was some resignation.

"I'm sorry..." and, well, she hung up the damned phone just like that.

I put the phone down.  I took my stupid glasses off and rubbed my face hard with my palms, "Fuck me.  Fuck me for sure."  I glanced at my haggard face in a mirror.  I sat down somewhere.

I just sat there.

"Fuck man.  What a bitch."

A thought flashed into my head: I wondered if I would call her sometime in the near future.  As fast as that thought flashed into my head, it was gone, and I was thinking about something else.

A couple months later, she popped into my head.  One millisecond later, she popped out of my head.

Years later, she might have popped into my head, but I couldn't be sure.  How can one be sure about such things?

Some time later--probably years--I stared into my mirror (I had bought it with money earned, so it was mine).  I looked at my face.  I took off my glasses.  I rubbed my face hard, and it felt good.  I leaned closer into the mirror.  I admired my full head of hair.  I was thirty-five years old.  I was handsome, as I'd always be.

"Who am I?"

"Honey!  We have to go!  We're going to be late!"  My beautiful wife's breathtaking voice joyfully bounced off the tall walls of our massive and massively elegant mansion and reached and soothed and massaged my thirty-five year old ears.  Her face flashed in my mind--my wife's face that is.

Leaning closer to the mirror, "Who am I?"

She floated into our bright, fresh, airy room, like a good wind, "We're going to be late, and you're the guest of honor?"

"Showing up late is showing up early.  You know that," I smiled at her.

"Let's go," she kissed onto my lips.

"Let's stay here and have sex," I countered.

"After.  Let's do that after.  The limo is waiting, and the champagne is on ice," she was so happy, and she loved me perfectly and as much as is humanly possible (that is she loved me maximally), and my love for her was equal in measure.  This was the truth.  Let no man or woman doubt it.  We loved no others, as we loved each other, and we never would; and neither could we either; nor would we ever want to.  EVER.

"Okay, I'll be right down.  Wait for me in the car.  I'll lock up."

"Hurry," she hugged me hard and kissed my left cheek.  She floated away.  She looked perfect, as all heaven.  I waited until I bet myself that she was in the car.

I stared at the mirror, without expression on my face, "Who am I?"

 Madness.

 I knew she would always love me.

A Quick/Short Word on Abortion: VP Debate 2012

I just wanted to say some things about things that were said at the 2012 Vice Presidential debate.

I paraphrase.

Paul Ryan said that he believes life begins at conception.  He said he does not just believe this because of his Catholic beliefs; he also believes this because of what the sciences have shown and because of morality.  So, he said that if Mitt Romney was elected they would make abortion illegal, except in cases of rape, incest, and threat to the mother's life.

If one believes that life begins at conception (that, once a sperm gets into an egg, the union is a human, as much a human as a full, grown ass human), then Ryan's beliefs make sense.  You think something is wrong, so you act against it.  You believe something is a human, and you believe it is wrong to kill innocent humans, so you make it illegal to kill (abort) humans.  That makes sense.

Joe Biden said that he also believes life begins at conception.  He said he believes this, because he accepts the Catholic church's position/beliefs about this.  After saying this, he said that he does not believe in telling women what they can and cannot do with/to their bodies (it's between them and their doctors, he said).  He said he doesn't believe in forcing his religious beliefs on others.  He completely changed the subject.  He hid behind his religion; in essence, he made abortion a religious issue, so that he wouldn't have to defend it, and so Obama and he wouldn't have to hold people accountable for their actions.  If abortion is a religious issue, then Biden doesn't have to push it on anyone.  How can someone say that they believe that life (being human) starts at conception (for whatever reason: religious or scientific), and then say it's ok for people to kill (abort) those humans?  Is Biden ok with people killing each other?  Maybe he doesn't want to push his religious beliefs that say killing innocent people is wrong on others.  Maybe he thinks murder is a religious issue too.

Also, if life begins at conception (according to both candidates), then the issue is not one of what women can and cannot do to/with their bodies.  The issue is about what people can and cannot do about a human that is growing in a women or wherever; no one agrees that mothers should have the choice to kill a life.  People say 'pro choice,' as if it is solely about a woman doing something to her body--it is not the case that she is only affecting her body, though.  I don't think women should be forced to have babies, if they don't want to, but I don't think lives should be terminated.  Freeze them maybe?  Or maybe pick the lesser of two evils: force women and men to have the babies they 'accidentally' created; do this, at the cost of taking some freedoms away--life vs some freedom.

In my opinion the issue is a scientific and philosophical one.  If one cannot draw a non-arbitrary line where life begins, then life begins at conception.  This is the case, so life begins at conception.  That means that when sperm enters an egg it becomes fully human and should be entitled to all the rights that all humans should have.

Ryan made abortion a scientific and moral issue.  I commend him for that, and I agree with him.

Whether you are for or against abortion, at least be consistent and have good reasons for believing what you believe.

By the way, you don't have to be a woman to talk about abortion.  I didn't ask to be born, or to be a man (boy?), or to be so handsome.  All people should be free to think philosophically and critically about all issues: this promotes critical and new ways of thinking about things.  Obviously, it affects women in more and different ways, but abortion can affect everyone: woman and man.

Everything can be made into a religious issue, and many things can be considered non-religious issues.  If you believe such things as stealing, raping, physically hurting others, deceiving, killing, lying, cheating, being rich, being skinny and hot are moral issues that governments can address outside of religion--leaving religion out of it--then abortion isn't a religious issue at all.  It is a scientific and moral issue that should be dealt with by a just and moral government that is for and by the people and that protects ALL of its people.

If you're reading this, you weren't aborted... just sayin'.  You might wish you had been aborted, but ya... you weren't.  Weird, huh?  Not weird because I think you should have been aborted, existing is just so strange in general... sometimes--to me at least.

Look at these un-aborted humans--so handsome!

I Have to Tell Her That I Love Her

"I love you," I said to her.

"Oh.  See what you've done?  Now I have to tell you that I love you too.  What did you do that for?"

"Not so that you would say it back to me.  You don't have to say it back.  Anyway, I gotta go.  Bye."

"Bye."

I hung up and started doing something.  I scrolled through some pages online, and then I started writing in my blog or whatever the fuck I usually do, when I'm not really doing anything.  Sometimes I like not really doing anything.

I found a picture of her.

I just looked at it and loved trying to memorize it.  She is so beautiful, and I thought about that for a while.  That's really cool that she looks so good to me, I thought.

And then I had shitty thoughts.

If she got married, I thought, I would definitely wait for her to get divorced or for her husband to die, and then I would hit on her again.  I wonder if she really knows that I try to hit on her sometimes.  I wonder if she likes me at all.

I thought, if I ever marry someone else, and she marries someone else, I'd divorce my wife, as soon as she wasn't married any more.  I would totally do that for her.  But if I married her, I would never want to divorce her.

That's pretty shitty.  Don't you think?

I'm just going to keep looking at how beautiful she is.  I'll probably tell her I love her.  I have to tell her that I love her.

I feel like love can be a mean thing sometimes, for some reason.

The Nun in the Cellar

It was raining so I put on a hooded jacket and a beanie--I fixed the beanie on my head like Enrique Iglesias does--then I turned off the lights and lied down again.  The grey light sifted through my shades into my room.

My homie started banging on the window and yelling to let him in.  I cooly walked to the door that led into my room from outside and said what's up and let him.

"Hey man, I know this big ass Catholic church we can sneak into right now and there's no one there and I know where they keep all the money--let's go rob that shit!"

"No no no.  I ain't robbing shit.  I'll go with you if you want, but I don't want to rob shit tonight.  I'm not in the mood."  I lied back down and stared at the wall and enjoyed the fact that it was raining outside.  I breathed in real deep.

"Ok, well, fuck it.  Let's go!"

I got up, and we went out, and I locked my door.  I felt like horsing around, so I danced around as we walked to the empty church.  It was behind some broken down and abandoned buildings, mostly where bums hung out.

"Shit man," I said, "You should have told me there were bums over here!  I would have come even more than I did come!  I would have been here more than I'm here right now!  But I'm super here now!"  I ran over to one of the bums and shoved her, "Hey!  Tell me something crazy!"

I turned around and saw my good friend walking around to the back of the church, so I left the bum, "I'll be back for you!  You better have some good bum stories for me when I get back!  I'll give you a sandwich!"

I ran over to behind the church just in time to see my friend throw an awesome, big, dark orange brick through a stained glass window.  SMASH!  I picked up a stick and cleared all the jagged glass still left on the frame of the window and we climbed in.  Once inside the church, we high-fived each other.

"This way!" My buddy whispered super fucking loud.

Down some awesome stone stairs we went, and there were candles everywhere lit.

"Why there candles lit, if no one here, dude?"

"Just shut up, dude.  We'll get the money, and we'll get the fuck out of here, and we can pay rent for like three more months!"

"Whatever."  I stuck my hands in my pockets and enjoyed the fact that it was grey and raining outside.  I thought about it as we slowly walked and carefully walked down the stone stairway steps.  I became a poet.

Rain.
Why do I love thee much?
Pain.
Does thou inflict it much?
Not me.
Bring me grey happiness.
Be-ing.
Three, me you do so bless.

We reached the bottom--it must have been the basement of the church or something cool.  My buddy was right in front of me, and then WHACK!  A stick came out nowhere and hit my stupid buddy right in the face and down he went.

"Wow!  You got hit!"

"Let's go!"  My good friend ran away, but I stayed; I stared; I liked the golden light that lit this bottom floor.  A feeble drunk voice spoke to me.

"Are you going to run too?"

"Are you going to smack me too?"

A pause.

"No.  I'm not going to whack you."

"There is so much wine down here.  You sound drunk."

"Mmmmmmmmmm.  I AM drunk.  I think I'll stay this way, but you cannot have the money of the church."

"I don't want the money.  Can I have some wine?  Are you a nun?"

"Good.  Yes, and yes."

"You're a drunken old nun!"

This old nun was wearing the whole nun get-up.  It was great.  She walked over, grabbed a bottle of wine for me, and one for her, and we walked over to some corner of the wine cellar.  We slouched down to the floor and sat on the floor with our legs out in front of us.  We became old drinking buddies within a couple seconds.

"This is great isn't it?"

"Sure it is."

"This wine is great madam nun."

She put her hand frailly on my shoulder; she looked at me gravely; she looked right into mine eyes; the buzz was getting on in my brain; I looked at her; she was old as hell; she had maintained her beauty very well.

A pause... "Well?  Are you gonna tell me something?"  I laughed.

"Because it is literally the blood of Christ, this wine is great."  Her eyes widened, and she nodded at me as if to say, "It's TRUE!"  Her mouth opened a little too.

I laughed, "Hey!  You're drunk!"  And I slapped her back kind of hard.

She laughed good and long, and I did too.

"I AM drunk!  Jesus makes me drunk, sometimes."

"Me sometimes too."