Kill Kill Faster Faster (14 page)

J
unkies today, they seem to wear their addiction on their sleeves. Their tracks like a badge.

In my day we hid ours.

I gunned my wife down in a fit of jealous rage, and as a result didn’t see the streets for a long time.

Because of it I lost my daughters.

My father died while I was in the penitentiary. My mother’s incapacitated, home with a visiting nurse from the Medicaid. In the three months and twenty-three days I was out, I never once went over to see her.

Yeah, man, in my day it was three days in, one day out with the junk. That was the prescription, that was the way to keep your addiction in order. Yeah, we were all stronger, tougher, wiser, cooler than the next man in those days. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Recidivism can take you back where you belong.

Aw, man, Joster, Clinique says, what you doing back in here?

The sounds men make. The grunts, the roars. The jungle sounds of men coming. The primitive sounds of men coming. Men ensconced in other men’s assholes. Pretending it’s cunts. Closing their eyes and pretending it’s a woman, hearing her purr, and then to be shaken awake, out of it, out of reverie, to come awake, to hear the roar, to feel the hot flash of men’s manly syrup.

It’s me. It’s me. I’m the one. I’m the guilty party. I’m the fuck-up. I’m the whoremonger. I’m the vestal virgin. I’m the indigenous party. I’m the fruit. I’m the ill.

They found Fleur’s body on the floor in the bedroom of Markie’s apartment. My box cutter with my fingerprints was under her. Her throat had been cut.

It didn’t take a big leap for them to be coming after me.

My fingerprints were everywhere. Forensics found them on the bedside lamp, the headboard, the computer, the 3DO. Probably left them from the time I was there with the whore named Mo.

I made a mistake, all right? There’s no denying that. Joey made a mistake.

And for that he’s paying the price.

We all pay the price, one way or the other.

But if I did it, man, I don’t remember. I know I already said it about Kimba, but now I’m saying it about Fleur too. I don’t remember. So shoot me. At any rate, what does it matter? She murdered. Fleur dead. My box cutter did the deed.

Fleur. My Fleur. My Flowers.

Fleur, you’re dead, you’re dead, baby, and I’m back in the lockup and this, this has turned from a fuck book into the sad, sad story of Joey One-Way.

Mec did me and you and us dirty. He come right out and he said it. He admitted it to me, but no one heard. It’s all between the three of us.

Mec was your name for him, not mine.

Fleur, bottom line, you diminished yourself with me. I’m not good enough for you, never was. I’m not good enough. I let you down.

But you weren’t good enough either.

None of us are.

Shouldn’t I be ashamed? Ashamed of what I done, what I am, where I am, even if I didn’t do what they said I done? I still done something.

I’m guilty.

I’m guilty of not being able to exist on any level in any society, except maybe in here, in the lockup.

I remember wanting to kill you, Fleur, wanting to feel the crush of your throat under my fingers. But it wasn’t in me, it wasn’t even in me the first time with Kimba, to take a mother away from her daughters, a mother away from her daughter.

I remember lying on my cot in the halfway, feeling in my pocket for my box cutter, realizing it wasn’t there, remembering that I had lost it at the strip joint.

All I feel is pain and I can’t get over that. I wish I could, but I can’t. I can’t get over it.

Every time I feel the pain, every time I feel the haze is about to disappear, it comes back.

I am the loser. I have lost.

Being dead ain’t nothing, Flowers. Being alive is worse.

Fleur, why aren’t you here with me? Why aren’t you here right now? Why don’t you walk through the cell door, sit down next to me on my bunk, tease me about my clothes, call me knucklehead, put your arm around me, look over my shoulder, try to read my notebook, sit on my lap with your legs spread, facing me, put my hand on your pussy, put my hands on your breasts, ask me, You okay, baby?, call me
monsieur
, ask me what I’m writing.

Flowers, why don’t you walk through that fucking cell door right now?

Baby, it’s not your fault.

Flowers, do you understand the love I hold for you?

What’s the use?

I didn’t do it.

I’m screaming from the rooftops. Does anybody hear me?

I swear to God, I’m innocent.

I’m innocent.

Baby, I didn’t do it.

It was Mec. He framed me.

Did I tell you he put the moves on me? He wanted me to fuck him. I told him a man’s sexuality in prison is one thing. On the outside it’s another.

Why would I lie? All right, I’ve killed. I’ve killed more than once. I’ve killed and maybe I’ll kill again.

Kill kill faster faster.

Help me, baby. Help me in my weakness.

Because, never again am I going to say I’m innocent, never again am I going to say I’m guilty.

I’m in and I’m out and I’m in.

Clinique come to my cell, put his arm around me, hug me. He say, It’s all right, Joey. You’re gonna make it. You’re gonna make it, Joey-man. You the man, Joster. You the man.

The weather is turned.

Fleur, you know when it got hardest for me? It was once I said, Would it be crazy if I said I loved you?

Joey, man.

Joey.

Joey been shot.

Did I say that?

Joey been shot in the head, in the heart, twicet in the balls.

Doc says, It’s all right, it’s okay. Joey can still have kids.

O my brothers.

T
his is a conversation I heard in the halfway house. It was the last thing I heard before the plainclothes cops come down on me, say, Pardon us, sir, can we have a word with you? I swear to God I heard it. It was between a guy with no teeth and a guy high on bennies.

Guy with no teeth said, You know what happened to me? I got hit by a bus.

Guy high on bennies wasn’t paying much attention, probably saw the plainclothes coppers closing in on me, didn’t know if they were coming for him or for me.

Did you hear me? the guy with no teeth said. I got hit by a bus.

Guy high on bennies looked at the guy with no teeth, then looked away, at me.

Couldn’t a done much damage, he muttered, you’re still fucking alive.