You Suck: A Love Story

Witnesses.
    The Chinese guys weren’t harmless, by any means, but she didn’t think they’d attack her, and she felt a twinge of regret. One of them, the one with the gun, yelled something at her in Cantonese-something sleazy and insulting, she could tell by the tone. She spun as she walked, smiled her biggest red carpet smile, and without breaking stride, said, “Hey, nano-dick, go fuck yourself!”
    There was a lot of bluster and shuffle, the smart one, the one with fear coming off him, held his friend Nano-dick back, thus saving his life. She must be a cop, or just crazy. Something’s wrong. They clustered around their tricked-out Honda and huffed out great breaths of testosterone and frustration.
    Jody grinned, and detoured up a side street, away from traffic.
    “My night,” she said to herself. “Mine.”
    Now off the main drag, she saw only a single old man shuffling ahead of her. His life aura looked like a burned-out bulb, a spot of dark gray around him. He walked stooped over, with a dogged determination, as if he knew that if he stopped, he would never start again. From what she could tell, he never would.
    He wore baggy, wide-wale corduroys that made the sound of rodents nesting when he walked. A wisp of breeze off the Bay brought Jody the acrid smell of failing organs, of stale tobacco, of despair, of a deep, rotting sickness, and she felt the elation leave her.
    She slipped comfortably into the new slot the night had made for her, like tumblers of a lock slipping into place.
    She made sure that she made enough noise so that he could hear her approaching, and when she was beside him, he paused, his feet still moving in tiny steps that turned him to the side, as if his motor was idling.
    “Hi,” she said.
    He smiled. “My, you are a lovely girl. Would you walk with me?”
    “Sure.”
    They walked a few steps together before he said, “I’m dying, you know.”
    “Yeah, I kind of figured,” Jody said.
    “I’m just walking. Thinking, and walking. Mostly walking.”
    “Nice night for it.”
    “A little cold, but I don’t feel it. I got a whole pocketful of painkillers. You want one?”
    “No, I’m good. Thanks.”
    “I ran out of things to think about.”
    “Just in time.”
    “I wondered if I’d get to kiss a pretty girl once before the end. I think that would be all I’d want.”
    “What’s your name?”
    “James. James O’Mally.”
    “James. My name is Jody. I’m pleased to meet you.” She stopped and offered her hand to shake.
    “The pleasure is all mine, I assure you,” said James, bowing as best he could.
    She took his face in her hands, and steadied him, then kissed him on the lips, softly and for a long time, and when she pulled away they were both smiling.
    “That was lovely,” James O’Mally said.
    “Yes it was,” Jody said.
    “I suppose I’m finished now,” James said. “Thank you.”
    “The pleasure was all mine,” Jody said. “I assure you.”
    Then she put her arms around his slight frame, and held him, one hand cradling the back of his head like an infant, and he only trembled a little when she drank.
    A little later, she bundled his clothes together under her arm, and hooked his old wing tips on two fingers. The dust that had been James O’Mally was spread in a powdery-gray pile on the sidewalk, like a negative shadow, a bleached spot. She brushed it flat with her palm, and wrote, Nice kiss, James, with her fingernail.
    As she walked away, an hourglass trickle of James trailed out of his clothes behind her and was carried off on the chill bay breeze.
    T he guy working the door of the Glas Kat looked like a raven had exploded on his head, his hair plastered out in a chaos of black spikes. The music coming from inside sounded like robots fucking. And complaining about it. In rhythmic monotone. European robots.
    Tommy was a little intimidated. ’Sploded raven-head guy had better fangs than he did, was paler, and had seventeen silver rings in his lips. (Tommy had counted.) “Bet it’s hard to whistle with those in, huh?” Tommy asked.
    “Ten dollars,” said ’Sploded.
    Tommy gave him the money. He checked Tommy’s ID and stamped his wrist with a red slash. Just then a group of Japanese girls dressed like tragic Victorian baby dolls breezed by behind Tommy, waving their wrist slashes like they’d just returned from a joyful suicide party instead of smoking cloves on the street. They, too, looked more like vampires than Tommy did.
    He