Melody
Or:
The Stripper
By
Michael Hemmingson
An Obelisk Library eBook
Smashwords Edition
2012
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy.
Copyright © 2012 Michael Hemmingson
All rights reserved
Originally published in 2005 by Blue Moon Books, now out of print.
1.
Hadn’t seen Melody Johnson in almost eight years—since we were fifteen and sophomores in high school; that night, at a party in Ocean Beach, we recognized each other among the stoned, drunk, laughing people and we embraced like old friends, old lovers really. She kissed me on the cheek and I touched her long, straight hair (that smelled like cigarettes) and kissed her on the forehead. She hadn’t changed all that much; her once golden blonde mane was now platinum with a purple streak; she still had the swimming pool blue eyes and pointy little nose with scattered freckles that made me fall in love with her when we were kids—when we were both trailer park trouble-making white trash punks in El Cajon.
El Cajon, if you don’t know, is the asshole of southern California.
“Well,” she said, holding a cigarette in one hand and a beer in the other, “look at you,” stepping back and giving me the long and slow once over—something she did with everyone back in our days of wayward youth.
I’d changed; I wasn’t as skinny, or tweaked on meth, or pimply. I had muscles and tattoos acquired in prison. I had a tan, from working outdoors.
So when Melody Johnson asked where I’d been all these years, I didn’t hesitate to tell her: “Inside.”
I knew she’d understand. “County or state?”
“Both.”
She nodded and took a drag off her smoke.
“So,” I said.
“Me too, in a way,” she said, exhaling. “Inside.”
“Yeah?”
“Been in L.A. the past three years, doing movies.”
“You’re a star?”
“Not the normal movies you take the rugrats to...”
I nodded.
“You understand?” she said. “I think you of all people should...”
“Yeah,” I said, a little uncomfortable now with the memories, “I certainly I do.”
“But, I couldn’t even cut it as a porn actress,” she laughed, sipping her drink, “so I did the usual thing and ran back home. Here.”
San Diego. I came back because I’d never been anywhere else and didn’t know where I could ever go...
2.
Melody’s uncle—Pete—always said one day she’d make a fine porn star, or stripper, or whore: all three. He’d say it was her destiny, just like his sister: her mother. Oh, he’d say these things—starting when she was nine or ten—as he took nude photos of her and fondled her and kissed her...
3.
I’d always been a small-time criminal and didn’t have any ambitions to graduate to bigger counts. Heists, bank robberies, blackmail, moving large amounts of hard drugs—while guys I knew went that route and either were sent away for ten, fifteen, twenty years or got themselves killed (or got themselves rich)—that wasn’t my thang, man. “The Retirement Score is a myth,” said my prison compadre, Ron Hoagland, in Concoran State, “so don’t you ever buy into that.” I didn’t. “It’s like the lottery,” he also said, “one lucky sucker in a zillion’s gonna get it, but we’re not all gonna get it, and it ain’t worth even trying.” Oh, I believed every word Ron said, and took it to heart to keep me out of trouble—that is, until Melody came back into my life...
...and she told me about her plan for a big score.
4.
It didn’t happen right away, just like that—snap of the fingers and Melody and I were lovers again (like we were picking up where we left off). It didn’t even happen the night we met at the party (seemed we both knew someone who was a friend of someone going to that gathering); there, she gave me her number and said we should catch up on old times, etc. Took me a week and a half to call her—at first I was afraid to; then I didn’t want to; then I forgot about her; then I was looking in my wallet and found the little piece of paper with her number on it so I picked up the phone and dialed.
“I was wondering when you’d call,” she said—her voice was cracked and I knew she was on a cell phone. “Thought you hated seeing me or something.”
“I was just...things got busy,” I said. “Um, you know.”
She said, “I guess I wouldn’t blame you.”
“It not that,” I said, “really.”
“So do you have it in your little brain to take me out to a movie and dinner?” she asked.
“I—”
“Yes?”
“Well—”
“Because if you do, buddy, all I have to say is,” she coughed, “I’d love to. I really want to see that new Clint Eastwood flick—”
So that’s what we did.
It was like a date. And then we went and got pizza at that little place in Lemon Grove which we loved in high school; the owners were Greek and the pizza was Greek; sitting there, it was like eight years had never happened because the same family ran the place, the food was just as good. Only thing different was the price was higher and we could legally order beer and she didn’t have to dread going back to the trailer park and dealing with her coked-out uncle climbing into her bed.
“So, Georgie,” she said after two slices of pizza and three bottles of Michelob Dark, “what have you been doing with yourself after getting out of the ol’ pen?”
“Staying away from trouble.”
“I hope so. You have a parole officer and all that?”
“Yeah.”
“He a jerk?”
“She’s okay.”
“She?”
“Yeah.”
“I hear they’re all hard cases.”
“She is. But she’s all right as far as they go.”
My P.O. referred to herself as “pragmatic” when we first met.
“What do you do for work?” Melody asked.
“Gas station.”
“You pump?”
“Fix brakes and change oil.”
“I remember,” she said with a soft smile, “you liked to work on cars. You’d fix people’s cars at Hidden Paradise.”
Hidden Paradise was the name of the trailer park we lived and grew up in. El Cajon—paradise—right.
I asked her what she did for work and Melody shrugged and said, “This and that, you know.”
The “date” was nice and I wasn’t sure what to expect; after all, here I was with the girl who once said she loved me so I figured she’d invite me back to her place, or we’d go to mine. I had no idea where she lived and she didn’t tell me.
“Hey, I really dig this car,” she said about the 1972 Mustang, running her hand along the hood.
“It was a project when I got out,” I said. “I rebuilt her myself.”
“Her. Men always call their cars—”
“Like ships.”
“She’s a beauty.”
“She’s getting there.”
“Don’t let her hear that.”
I drove Melody from the pizza joint in Lemon Grove to the movie theater at the Grossmont Trolley. She had her car there, a beat-up, old little Datsun Z-40 two-seater.
“Hey, I had fun,” she said, kissing me on the cheek.
“Good night,” I said, watching her climb into her car.
“Drive safe,” she said.
Then she reached out her window to take my hand.
“Call me,” she said.
5.
On our second date, a week later, I met her at a miniature golf course in Mission Valley. She was wearing a long leather jacket, her pockets filled with small bottles of Skyy Vodka and Wild Turkey. We got decently drunk, which is the only way to play miniature golf. The evening ended in the parking lot with a long, sloppy kiss—a five-minute smackeroo—the kind of smooch seen in the romantic movies, you know; the kind of lip-locking we did as anxious teens in a different life.
“I had fun,” she said.
“Me too,” I said.
6.
She invited me to her apartment for our third date, which was three days later. “I want to make you dinner,” Melody said on the phone. I wasn’t going to argue with that. “I’m actually a good cook,” she said, “believe it or not.” I believed it and she proved it; she made this sweet and sour chicken with brown rice and vegetables; we drank a six-pack of Hemp Beer and switched to Bushmill’s whiskey. She had a tiny one-bedroom in Pacific Beach, five blocks from the ocean. “Sometimes, late at night, when I wake up and can’t go back to la-la land,” she said, “I can hear the waves crashing, and it sounds so nice. I move my body and the bed moves and I feel like I’m out on the sea, I’m like a pirate—yo-ho-ho-arrragh—and that puts me back to sleep.” She had a waterbed. Sex on a waterbed was—interesting. Unless you’re used to it, it’s not easy—you have to match the rhythm of fucking with the motion of the little ocean.
7.
For the next week and a half, I went over to Melody’s twice and she came over to my studio apartment in Golden Hill once; we fucked and slept in each other’s arms and it was nice...I hadn’t been with a woman—other than a call girl I’d called up the day after I got out of the joint—in more than two years. I’d really only had two girlfriends in my twenty-three years: Melody and then Rhonda when I was nineteen. Rhonda OD’ed and died when we were both twenty. I loved Rhonda but I can’t say what I felt for Melody was love because we were just kids, jaded punks really who never thought we’d live out high school let alone graduate. Turned out we just didn’t graduate but here we were, and holding Melody in my arms I thought that maybe I could love her, it was possible; if this new thing between us was going somewhere. I was afraid to bring it up and the world I came from, men didn’t bring that shit up. Men fucked their women good and hard and got their dicks sucked and never concerned themselves with matters of “a relationship.”
8.
Melody’s tattoos mesmerized me—colorful against her white skin, an eagle with spread wings on the small of her back, a falling angel by her left shoulder and a snake going up her right leg, and a small crucifix below her navel. I would lick and kiss the ink on her flesh; when she was asleep, I would admire the craftsmanship. She said she got them in L.A. “Although tats aren’t so popular in porn anymore,” she added.
9.
I guess it was just a thing. Melody stopped returning my calls and when I did get her on the phone, she was distant, said she was busy, said she’d call me back. It hurt, sure, but I would never let her know how much. I stopped calling and even stopped thinking about her when I jerked-off. Which wasn’t easy...
10.
The night I decided to erase Melody Johnson from my brain, I went out to get drunk, knowing lots of booze would aid me in my goal. I did not want to drink alone in my tiny place—that would just depress me. I walked down to The Turf Club, a bar and grill hangout where they served your steak, hamburger, chicken or tofu patty raw and you had to cook it yourself on a fire grill in the middle of the joint. I liked their hefty Long Island Iced Teas, where I planned to have many. The place was packed. I started to have a conversation with a tall—five-foot-nine—rockabilly chick named Eve. She had many tattoos up and down her arms, on her chest and breasts, on her back and belly. A few hours later, when she was naked in my futon, I traced my fingers over the tats on her ass and by her shaved pussy. “I’m the illustrated woman,” Eve said, “every one of them has a story...”
11.
I liked Eve, and Eve liked me, and that was totally cool. When we both woke up with hellish hangovers and looked at each other and realized what happened during our mutual drunk, there wasn’t any embarrassment or hard feelings. I watched her get dress, she wasn’t shy about it. I told her how much I liked her tattoos and she said, “Thanks.” She said, “We should do this again, okay?”
12.
So we did it again, and again—and again. Two weeks into it, I figured I’d found myself a new girl. Until Eve’s ex-husband showed up. Now here’s a story—
Eve and I were going at it on her waterbed, I was on top, she said, “Holy shit fuck shit,” pointing at the window—
A guy with greased-back black hair was staring in, looking at us; he was pissed and mumbling to himself. He started to pace back and forth, cursing loudly.
I jumped up and pulled my pants on.
This guy removed the window screen and leapt into the bedroom like a superhero, like he knew what he was doing, like he’d done this before. He was a rockabilly guy: the greased hair, the black muscle-shirt, the tight jeans, black boots, and many tattoos on the arms.
“What are you doing?” Eve said. “Just what the fuck do you think you’re doing?!”
“You porking this silly-ass dork?” the guy said, pointing at me, looking me up and down.
“Get out,” Eve said, but she said it softly.
“Who are you?” the guy asked me.
I said, “Who are you?”
“Adam,” he said, “her husband.”
“That’s ex,” said Eve.
“We’re bonded forever, woman,” said Adam.
“Wait a minute,” I said, “Adam and Eve? Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Dude,” he said, “you’re dead.”
“Bring it on.”
We fought. Eve watched, but she had a smile on her face. I got in a few good punches but Adam kicked my ass. I tasted blood, my face was swollen, I was lying on the floor and holding my balls, which were in extreme pain because Adam had kicked them hard.
Adam spat on me, said, “Dork.”
“Baby baby baby,” Eve cooed, “you get me so hot!”
Adam joined her on the bed and they began to have vigorous and rough sex.
I gathered the rest of my clothes and left.
13.
I slept for a day and went back to work and told myself the hell with women, no more women, they’re nothing but trouble...
14.
“The job going good?” asked Sandra O’Connell, my parole officer, crossing her legs, her fingers templed.
I tried not looking at her legs, covered in black stockings like smooth paint.
“Yes,” I said, “very good.”
“How about your personal relationships?” she asked, running her tongue over her lower lip. “Are you dating anyone?”
“No,” I said, “no one.”
I told myself to not have any fantasies about my P.O.—she was in her forties, she was as old as my long lost mother, and she had the power over my freedom or going back inside.
“But if you do,” Sandra said, “you’ll tell the young lady the truth?”
“Of course.”
“Like we discussed.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re doing good.”
“I hope so.”
“I like that.”
“I’m glad.”
“Keep it up.”
“I’ll try, ma’am.”
“Hey.”
“What?”
“What did I say?”
“That I have to keep my shit straight.”
“No ‘ma’am’ stuff.”
“Right. Sorry.”
“I hate the insinuation.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“I forget, you know.”
“It’s Sandra.”
“Sandra.”
“Good.”
“Thank you.”
“You can go now.”
“Thank you.”
“Hey,” she said.
“Yes, Sandra?”
“I’m proud of you,” she said, and winked.
15.
A week later, Melody called. At midnight:
“Georgie.”
“Hello?”
“It’s me,” she said.
“Oh, hey,” I said.
“Are you mad at me?”
I didn’t reply.
“Do you hate me?” she asked again.
I said, “No.”
She said, “I wouldn’t blame you.”
“I’m not mad at you,” I lied.
“Good.”
“I don’t hate you,” I said, happy that she was on the phone.
“That’s good,” she said.
Silence.
“Will you meet me?” she asked.
“Why?”
“You are mad at—”
“No,” I said.
“Meet me, okay?” she said. “We need to talk,” she said...
16.
She suggested an ice cream parlor downtown. It stayed open late for when the bars closed. Drunk people liked ice cream, and so did we. Melody had a waffle cone and I had a banana split.
“Just like the good old days, huh?” she said. “When we’d go to the Frostee Freeze...”
I nodded and she looked sad. She had dyed her hair a bright burgundy since I’d last seen her. I liked it, and I wanted to tell her so but I started to wonder: what was the point? Men complimented her, flirted with her, tried to seduce her all the time, and she was jaded about it. She was gorgeous and she knew it, she didn’t need anyone to affirm this.
“The good ol’ days,” I said.
She said, “Well, I guess those days weren’t so ‘good’ and not that ‘old.’”
“No,” I said, “guess not.”
“You are mad.”
“No.”
“I can tell.”
“Maybe a little,” I said.
“It wasn’t my intention to hurt you,” she said.
I lied to her with a shrug.
“I didn’t mean to brush you off or not call you back,” Melody said. “It’s just—I got into this weird head space. I was down and I mean really down. I couldn’t see you, not when I was that black in the brain. So I shut the world out, and then I decided to go to Los Angeles and see some people I didn’t want to see, that I shouldn’t see...I ran away from that scene once but like a fool I lapsed. But, anyway, I’m back,” she smiled, and licked her cone real sexy-like, “I’m here, and I’m alive, and I’m feeling a little better in the noggin.”
I asked, “What happened?”
She shrugged.
“You can tell me.”
“No,” she said, “I can’t.”
“Okay. That’s cool.”
“Let’s just forget this sour interlude and pick up where we left off. Is that cool?”
Something told me to tell her no—to walk away—but I said, “Yeah, sure, I’d like that.”
“Do you know what I’d like?” she said, touching my leg and squeezing. “Georgie boy?”
17.
We went back to my place and fucked for hours and it was so goddamn good like it’s supposed to be good.
It was gratifying for me. For Melody, sex was something else—it always had been thanks to her pervert of an uncle...
Pete—
18.
In the dark, lying on my futon, the air thick with sweat and sex, Melody said, “I feel like I can talk to you about this. Only you would know. You’re so sweet,” she said, touching my face, “my Georgie boy.”
“What?” I said. “What is it, girl?”
“Why I freaked out and went dark,” she said, “why I ran back to L.A.”
“Tell me,” I said, “talk to me, girl.”
“It’s my uncle, my sonofabitch uncle.”
“I thought he left San Diego.”
“He did. Then he came back, and then he went to jail for six months and when he got out he looked me up and he wanted to crash with me and of course I told him where to go. But he started to stalk me, hang around, and knock on the door, so I moved. I moved to L.A. because I figured he’d never be able to find me there. It’s a big place and every corner you turn, there’s a girl just like me: running away from something. So I knew if he did try to find me—”
“Did he?”
“No. And when I came back, I heard he was in prison for assault, a bar fight or something. He blinded the man he was fighting, with broken glass. When you told me you were inside, the first thing I thought was: ‘Did Georgie boy do time with Uncle Pete?’”
“Where’s he—”
“Was doing time. He just got out. He was in Chico.”
“I wasn’t—”
“I know,” and she touched my face again.
“So he’s out,” I said, “and did he try looking you up?”
“No. Not yet. But I’m sure he will.”
“Does he know where you live? Your phone number?”
“No, but he’s resourceful.”
“How did you hear he was released?”
“Oh, a little bird,” she said.
I didn’t push it.
“My worst nightmare is that he’ll walk into where I work and see me and laugh—you remember that horrible screech of a laugh—”
“Yeah,” I said. “Where do you work, anyway?”
“I didn’t tell you...”
“No.”
“I’m dancing, three nights a week, at The Body Shop.”
“All nude.”
“Better money. Have you been there?”
“It’s been a while.”
“Are you surprised? Shocked?”
“Why would I,” I said.
“I know you understand,” she said.
“I do, girl,” and I did.
“And you know my uncle likes strip clubs. That’s my nightmare. He’d see me shaking my ass and say: ‘I always said this is what you’d be good at...’”
She snuggled against me; she wanted to be held and I held her.
“I am good at it,” Melody said, “but the last thing I need to hear is that coming from his big ugly mouth...”
19.
Like I said, Melody and I knew each other when we were fifteen. I noticed her before she even knew I existed, even though she was in two of my classes (Biology and English) and lived with her mother in the same trailer park where I lived with my dad and his girlfriend—friends, actually, because there was a new one every six months or so, and every one of them was a drunk or an addict...and, to me, ugly. I’m not talking about looks, although to me these were not appealing women. They were vampires sucking off my father; he always needed a lady around to, as he said, “grab a beer, cook up some grub, and suck the dick.” Melody, it goes without saying, in my eyes, and the eyes of many boys I’m sure, was far beyond ugly—which is why she never noticed me. I was a skinny heavy metal kid with long hair, acne, and a lot of Slayer, Iron Maiden and Led Zeppelin t-shirts. Melody was what you expect from a trailer park chick—super tight pants or short skirts, tank tops and no bra and blonde hair and pink skin, always with a cigarette and booze on the breath and always a lot of lipstick and make-up. She noticed me when I started carrying a bird on my shoulder, a cockatiel named Gypsy. Gypsy was a gift from one of my Dad’s girlfriends, Carlee; the only transitory pseudo-mom I really liked and who was around the summer before tenth grade but disappeared just after New Year’s. Gypsy was a Christmas gift, eight weeks old, gray with yellow and red circles on her cheeks. Carlee kept saying, kept telling my old man, that what I needed was a pet. “The kid needs something to take care of,” she said, “to love, and the creature will love him back...” But my father hated dogs and said a cat would stink the place up with litter and shit. “I want to get him a pet for Christmas,” I heard Carlee say one night, while I was lying in bed and glad I didn’t have to hear them having sex in the other bedroom. So my dad said something like, “Get him a turtle or a snake,” and on Christmas Day, Carlee presented me with the cockatiel.
“Her name is Gypsy,” said Carlee.
“You named the bird?” said Dad. “Georgie is supposed to do that—I mean, it’s his bird, right?”
“She told me her name,” said Carlee.
“What? The bird?”
“Yeah.”
“How?”
“She communicated this to me.”
“The bird talked to you?”
“In a way.”
My dad laughed. “Woman, you’re crazy.”
“So they say,” said Carlee, who made money by working at a psychic phone line and doing private Tarot card readings. “Her name is Gypsy,” she told me, “but if you want to call her something else—”
“I like Gypsy,” I said.
“Just make sure the damn thing shits in one place,” said my father, “and keep a lot of newspaper under it.”
20.
It was Gypsy who caused Melody and I to become friends. I brought my bird to the biology class, because we were doing a week of aviary studies. I told the biology teacher, Mr. Klass, who was a cool old guy, about my cockatiel and he said, “Bring her, it’ll be like show and tell.” Melody Johnson and Gypsy seemed to fall in love with each other—well that’s what I thought when Melody came up to me and said, “Oh what a pretty bird, aren’t you afraid she’ll fly away?”
Gypsy was sitting on my shoulder and jumped on top of Melody’s head.
Melody went, “Ohhh!”
“Sorry,” I said, reaching for my bird.
“No, it’s okay, it’s awesome,” said Melody, “it’s totally rad. This,” she laughed, “is really cool.”
I remember hoping to God that Gypsy would not take a crap on this hot blonde girl’s head.
“Hey,” Melody Johnson asked, “don’t you live by me?”
I said, “Yeah.”
She smiled and Gypsy chirped.
And that’s how we got to be friends—how we became lovers is another story...
21.
Melody liked hanging out with me, and it goes without saying I did not mind her company or attention, but we didn’t kiss or fuck and if I tried she would have probably laughed at me. Or so I thought.
22.
I wasn’t a virgin—I’d lost it at thirteen to one of my father’s girlfriend’s: her name was Jan and she had muscles. Yeah, she liked to lift the weights. She came into my room one night when paps was out with Carlee (long before Carlee moved in because Jan was in the trailer) and said: “I’m gonna make you a man, boy.” And so she did. It was nice and strange. Two weeks later she vanished like all of Dad’s women...
23.
Tommy was this guy who was sixteen but still a freshman because he kept flunking or getting into trouble. He lived in the trailer across from me with his grandmother, an old woman who drank wine all day and had no idea about the petty thefts Tommy committed and the drugs he used. Tommy always had pot or acid but my thing was crystal meth and he knew plenty of people who cooked and sold the shit.
El Cajon was, and still is, crystal meth central in San Diego; on hot days you could walk down the streets and smell it being cooked, and I used to joke I could get a contact high from the air.
Tommy had long shaggy blonde hair and was a true rocker. He loved Black Sabbath and introduced me to Pink Floyd.
One day, while his grandmother was out playing bingo, Melody and I found ourselves in Tommy’s room smoking some weed and drinking cheap beer and listening to The Wall. Tommy couldn’t keep his eyes off Melody’s body—she acted like she didn’t know, or care, and I was trying to hide that this made me feel weird. It was difficult not to look at Melody’s form: she was wearing cut-off jeans, her ass cheeks hanging out; and a blue tank top, no bra. She was drinking twice as much beer, but little pot—and she did two lines of meth with me.
We were fucked up and loose and Melody started to dance to the music.
“You sure look fine,” Tommy finally said.
“Thanks,” she said, dancing.
“Take your clothes off,” he said, “strip for us.”
“Ha ha.”
“Really.”
“Ha ha.”
I was wishing she’d go, “Sure,” and do it. I so badly wanted to see her naked.
“I hear you fuck,” Tommy said, “is that true?”
I couldn’t believe he asked her that. I expected Melody to stop dancing and get pissed off, but she just smiled and said, “Yeah? Where did you hear that, Tommy boy?”
“Around.”
“Around where?”
“You know where.”
“You don’t know dick,” she said.
“Oh come on,” he laughed.
“What do you think I am?” she asked.
“I dunno, babe, what are you?”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Babe.”
“That’s not my name.”
“Slut.”
She stopped smiling, but continued dancing. “Well, you’re wrong. I don’t fuck, not casually. Fucking is for love.”
“Yeah,” Tommy said, “you ever been in love?”
“The question,” she said, “is have you ever?”
“Yeah,” Tommy said, “I’m in love with you right now and I wanna fuck you. Georgie’s is love with you too, can’t you tell?”
She stopped dancing and smiled, deviously. “Tell you what,” she said slowly, “I’ll give you both head. Will that make you horny boys happy?”
Tommy was quick to unzip his pants and pull out his cock. “Here it is,” he said, “suck it dry, slut.”
I still couldn’t believe this was happening. She went to him, got on her knees, and did it. Tommy came quickly. Melody turned to me and said, “You’re next, Georgie.” I was frozen but excited and my prick was hard. Melody crawled on her hands and knees to me and that just made me crazy with lust because I could see down her tank top, I could see her white tits and pink nipples. “It’s okay,” she whispered, “don’t be shy, it’s cool, I like this,” and she pulled my pants down, took my dick in her hand, looked at it for a moment, and then put it in her mouth.
Tommy watched, opening a beer and smoking a bong hit.
Being young virile men, Tommy and I were immediately ready for more. He wanted to fuck her but she still said no.
“You still don’t believe I love you?” Tommy said jokingly.
“I don’t love you,” she said seriously, “I’m not even sure I like you.”
He laughed.
She said, “But I’ll suck you guys until your balls are totally dry.”
“Oh you’re wicked,” Tommy laughed.
24.
Later that day, Melody said to me, “You must think I’m terrible now.”
“No,” I said.
“I can tell.”
I didn’t know what to say.
She said, “Sometimes when I get stoned...”
“It’s cool,” I said.
“It’s not cool,” she said. “I wish it was just you and me, not you and me and him.”
I wanted to hold her, I knew she would like this but I was too inexperienced and young to know how to do this...right.
“I don’t really want to party with Tommy again. I know he’s your friend and all, but he reminds me too much of my uncle.”
“Okay,” I said.
“We can still be friends after...?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Cool,” she said, brushing her hand against mine.
25.
“She’s a slut, a whore,” Tommy said, “everyone knows that...”
“She’s awesome,” I said. I didn’t want to talk about Melody with him.
“She’s probably done half the men here in Hidden Paradise,” Tommy said, laughing, cutting up lines of meth on a mirror, using one of his grandmother’s cancelled credit cards.
“Yeah?” I said.
“Yeah,” he said.
I didn’t believe him.
“I don’t think she likes me,” he said.
I didn’t reply.
“She likes you.”
I tried to not let that show.
“But be careful, dude,” Tommy said, “with chicks like that.”
“Like what?”
“Oh come on,” he said. “I’ve talked to her uncle. I bet he’s done her. The way he talks about her. He says she’s a whore like her mother is a whore. Hey, would you do her mother?”
“Me?” I said. “No.”
“I would,” he said, and laughed, and snorted up a line.
26.
I’d seen Melody’s uncle come and go—one day he was there, living with them, and then he’d be gone for a while; then he’d come back, and then he’d be gone...
27.
...and one sunny day, Tommy was on some poisoned acid and really bad speed and feeling mean, at least that’s what I heard. He came across a neighbor’s cat that’d just delivered a litter of five kittens. He used a knife to slit the mother cat open and behead all the kittens. The woman who owned the cat caught him and tried to stop him but Tommy stabbed her twice—he didn’t kill her but he hurt her bad, and the cops were called. I didn’t see this happen—I heard Tommy was laughing the whole time and didn’t resist arrest.
I never saw him again.
“Good riddance to bad rubbish,” Melody said when she heard the news.
28.
Melody disappeared for a week and a half. She wasn’t in school, her mother didn’t know where she was and didn’t seem to care.
“Sometimes she does that,” her mother told me, smoking a cigarette and drinking from a bottle of Southern Comfort, “she just ups and goes. She says she gets dark in the head. She’s probably just off some with guy. Or are you her guy? Are you her beau? You don’t seem the type, she likes the boys with muscles and bikes. But you’re always around. Speak up, young one, are you her man or what?”
“I’m worried about her,” I said.
“Don’t be. You wanna blowjob? Get your dick hosed? See these teeth? They come out. If you’ve never had a gumjob, you’ve never had a blowjob,” she laughed, drinking.
I laughed too, just so she wouldn’t feel insulted. “Next time,” I said.
“Any time,” she said.
29.
Melody did finally return—back to Hidden Paradise and school.
“Where were you?” I asked.
“Nowhere,” she said, and from the look she gave me I knew not to press it.
30.
Later, she would tell me that she was off getting high with her uncle and some friends of his—who paid money for the good time...