He didn't want to cry. Squeezing his eyes shut, Slick pushed aside the memory of his mother and her sweet dreams and waited for the fortune cookie wisdom of his father to emerge. "Tears are for pussies," he'd say every time Slick's tear ducts betrayed him. "And I ain't talkin' 'bout no goddamn kitty cats, you understand?" Of course he didn't understand. "He's only 8, for heaven's sake!" his mother would sigh, adding a number every year until Slick was 12 and actually started to grasp the difference. It would be another four before he clumsily grasped it for good. So, no, Slick didn't want to cry. A man already caked with the blood of everyone who'd come before him - not to mention a key lime pie pilfering bastard - ought to be able to hold onto a sliver of dignity. Here's a tip, dumb ass. You should have thought of that before you opted to marinate yourself in the heady broth of coffee and temporary stupidity your bladder served up, he thought, as once again the toxic perfume of the day's events wafted up and danced under his nose.

Not the way Charlie could dance atop bars. Her body swirled like light reflected through fragments of broken glass. A beautiful thing to take in. No. This was the last call, flop sweat dance of someone who should've left the stage long ago. Charlie. She's going to be pissed, Slick thought, his eyes still closed, the back of his head intimate with the pleather interior. So what. What's done is done. That's what she'd said in her letter. It was one of those tasty little life cliches his father liked to serve up, too. "Don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining!" was another. The irony of it made Slick smirk, and as his lips crept up, he felt the thick, warm liquid slide down his cheek and hug the curve of his face before stopping at his upper lip. For a man who'd turned his back on tears years ago, he was suitably irritated by their return. "Dad would be so proud," he thought. "So much for what doesn't kill you making you stronger." Goddamn cliches.

How about this one - Absence makes the heart grow fonder. He'd told Charlie more times than he could count that it would serve her well to forget their arrangement, but he missed the perks it entailed. A woman who can stick a landing like Charlie wasn't one you declined to do business with if the deal was good. "If I had a nickel for every..." he could hear his father say, but Slick lifted the needle off the worn out mental track before the song was over. "Just shut up and let me miss her."

"Miss her? What? Open your damn eyes," Euri demanded. "What the fuck? You think this is nap time? You think I'm your goddamn chauffeur now? Open your damn eyes!" Slick rolled his head back to center, cracked the lid of one eye, and through a crimson veil ("I bleed from the eyes now? This fuckin' day just keeps getting better," he mistakenly assumed)("You know what they say about assumptions, don'tcha, kid?" his father would've said) he stared at the hulking Greek behind the wheel. So much for thinking he'd been crying, Slick thought. And so much for Doug, who was slumped down in the passenger seat like a lover's cast off dress, the crater in his left temple a gift from the butt of Euri's gun and incredible upper body strength. It's true what they say, Slick thought as he wiped Doug's blood from his own face. A metal napkin holder won't do shit for you in a fight, and head wounds really do bleed like a bitch. "It was a nice touch the way you threw out that whole 'Are we still going to headquarters?' line," chuckled Slick.

Comments

[cIII]

You said you were having trouble being creative.

I think someone's pants may be on fire.

[TwoBusy]

Exactamundo. You suck at sucking.

[justlori2day]

Holy Wow! Where have I been? This rocks - so now I have to go find your earlier prose, and then read everyone else too! SO MUCH CATCHING UP TO DO!!! lo

[ms picket to you]

grrrl... grrl!

and fortune cookie wisdom? yeah, i got it.