Savage Tales

while and then on to the job. I had it all staked out. Watched them for months. Well, days. I knew them. I knew them all. Their type. Their rich smelly clean type. I hated them. I loved their things. Their money. Their deodorant.
    After I killed the dog I found the key they hid in the doghouse. I admit, that's a great place to hide a key. But to a dog-killing guy like me it's as dumb as the doormat.
    I went in and listened to total silence but the percolating percussion of the coffee machine. The kitchen entrance was my way but there was nothing there. Kitchen!
    In the living room just a TV and big shit. I went for the bedroom, the master, where the loot usually was.
    Inside on the bed was an old man. He looked at me.
    "Hello?" he said.
    I started to run and wasn't watching where I was going. I hit the wall and passed out.

    When I came to, the old guy was on the phone. It couldn't have been a minute. But he slammed the phone down, still in bed and looked at me with venom, the old cuss.
    "They're not even two blocks away. You just try and run, boy!"
    He laughed a wheezing old man laugh. I ran.
    Outside the cop car pulled up and two men got out and aimed their guns at me. One of them was black. One was white.
    "Freeze! Get your hands up!"
    "No!" I said, and ran into the bushes and another house's backyard. They started running after me.
    In this backyard were two dogs, and I didn't see them. They bounded on me and floored me. They started ripping into my head with dog teeth and it all went nightmare. I was totally going to be late for second period.

    2.
    Mark was on the bus across town to a neighborhood he would never be wealthy enough to live in. He was headed to a house he thought was empty.
    When he arrived, he fed the dog some poisoned meat. The dog smelled the meat and not the poison and death was his reward.
    A key had been secreted inside the dog's home and this key unlocked any door of the house. Mark found this key and unlocked the kitchen door. He made his way through the house, looking for valuables.
    Inside the master bedroom was Arthur McGlintock, the aging forester and TV personality ( Mythic Forestlandrock ). He would not be on earth much longer. On the television was an advertisement for Viagra and thousands of erect penises ejaculated into the TV camera and Arthur felt absolute disgust at the filth allowed on TV nowadays in these modern times, and yet he stared on with a kind of fascination.
    Then he saw across the room a young man, who couldn't have been more than sixteen. He was black. Arthur never had anything against black people like a lot of people of his generation and class, but he couldn't think of a reason why one should be in his home. Best approach with caution.
    "Hello?" said Arthur.
    Mark was not expecting people inside this house. This was his third "heist" and there had never been people. Only him and the home and the goods. Fuck, thought Mark. He sprinted, panicked, had to get away from the old man, and in his rush he failed to espy the wall that wasn't the best route for departure and met it head on. Death was not his reward, but a momentary lapse of consciousness was.
    Arthur McGlintock used this moment to make a telephone call to his local police station, which he had on speed dial (#8). The phone rang four times and finally a husky female voice said, "Police."
    "Why, hello," said Arthur. "This is Arthur McGlintock."
    "Hi, Arthur. How can we help you?"
    "Well, there seems to be a young negro man on the floor of my bedroom."
    "Wait – when?"
    "Now."
    "And he's dead?"
    "Did I imply that? Or did you just assume because I pointed out that he's colored?"
    "Actually, we don't really use words like colored and negro anymore."
    "Sure we do. I just did. You just did."
    "I was only quoting you."
    "That was a quote? I don't think that was a quote."
    "What's your address, Arthur?"
    "616 Martreefrondish Lane."
    "Is this a crank call?"
    "That's my true address, young lady."
    "I'm not so young."
    "Young enough."
    "For what?"
    "What time will the fuzz arrive?"
    "The what?"
    "Your fellows. The gentlemen in blue. The five-oh."
    "Well… looking at the map… we actually got some people just a few minutes away. They'll be right there. Don't touch the suspect."
    "Why would I touch him?"
    "I don't know."
    "I'm just wondering, since you suggested. Do I sound like someone who touches young men?"
    "…"
    "Hello?" said Arthur.
    "The officers will be right there."
    "Great. Goodbye."
    Arthur slammed the