Interlude

The first chapter of Jason Duke’s PHOENIX NIGHTLIFE is yours for the listening at Crimewav.com.

Edited to add: You can also read the first part of PHOENIX NIGHTLIFE at Darkest Before The Dawn right now.

Interlude

Jason Duke will be appearing at Crimewav at some point this week with the first episode of his novella, PHOENIX NIGHTLIFE.

From Jason himself:

Keep an eye out @CRIMEWAV.COM this week for the first of four episodes of my serialized novella PHOENIX NIGHTLIFE.

First and foremost, a big shout out to Seth Harwood and Aldo Calcagno for making this happen, who have my respect, gratitutde and appreciation. I can’t thank them enough for giving me this opportunity.

I think the four episodes will be released over the next month or so, about one per week. Not sure, but I think the text version will also be available at some point on Darkest Before the Dawn, if you can’t stand the sound of my voice and would rather read it instead. There’s some writing I left out of the podcasts that you can read in the text.

The novella originated from a short story that was published nine years ago in Plots With Guns. Yeah, it’s taken me nine years, off and on, to finish the thing, but fuck it, better late than never.

So love it or hate it, call it the greatest thing since Dashiell Hammett, call it a piece of shit, just read it and call it something, and spread the word. Thanks.

A Twist Of Noir 509 - Jason Duke

FUCK THE WORLD - JASON DUKE

Previously published at Pulp Pusher

I’m on a flight from São Paulo to Los Angeles. I sit in an aisle seat. Next to me sit two Russian fags. One has spiked hair, the other has a crew cut, both wear plaid board shorts and white tees.

A flight attendant tromps up and down the aisle smacking her fat ass into me. The attendants make their first round with the serving cart and the Russians say they want Pepsi, no ice. I pretend to sleep.

My arms are folded across my chest and I’m holding the vial of Thallium sulfate cupped in my hand. The Russians, they’re dead and they don’t know it. They killed themselves the moment they skipped Phoenix without settling a half a million dollar debt. I think about giving them a pass. Problem is, I’ve seen nothing in this world worth saving.

I crack open my left eye and see the Russians sleeping. The shades are drawn. Everything’s dark.

I unscrew the top of the vial. The Russians share the middle tray and both their drinks are on the tray, so I reach over and tap the Thallium sulfate into their drinks. It dissolves in the Pepsi. They don’t smell it. They don’t taste it.

The next morning, they wake up and feel like complete shit, like they got the flu. It takes a few days. They vomit; they shit themselves. The pain in their arms and legs paralyze them, until they slip into a coma and die.

*

I rent a room at the Marriott outside LAX. Catch a shuttle over to the Marriott and inside the shuttle is this guy who starts talking to me real nice and friendly and I think here’s a man who’s wasted a lot of time perfecting his bullshit.

“I was in the Army from ’75 to ’77,” he says.

He looks forty.

“Oh yeah?” I say, “What’d you do in the Army?”

He tells me he read secret documents for a Colonel.

I ask him if he’s been to ’Nam and he says yes.

I ask him what unit’s he with and he tells me he’s stationed in Germany before they send him to ’Nam, then later he tells me how he’s stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington, and he’s a mine specialist.

I tell him he’s full of shit and he says: “What?”

“You said you read secret documents,” I say. “Now you’re saying you’re a mine specialist, so I say you’re full of shit... you never even served in ’Nam... probably never been in the Army.”

He looks at me for a second; thinks of something to say, a way to cover his tracks.

“Man, fuck you.” He throws up his arms at me for effect.

I jump up in his face and say: “No, fuck you!”

He moves his head to the side and leans away, realizing maybe he’s pissed off the wrong guy.

I say, that’s right, motherfucker, you pissed off the wrong guy, but he still has some spunk left in him and tells me: “Man, you better...” so I shove my face up to his, smack the side of his head with my forehead and shout: “Fucking do something about it!”

“It’s cool, man... sorry,” he says.

I step back away from him.

Not that I give a shit about him.

Fuck him.

I’m just tired and want to sleep.

*

I lay on the bed, propped up against the pillows.

I flip through the channels on the T.V., pissed off about the prick in the shuttle, but more pissed off about the cost of the room.

George Carlin’s on the free HBO channel ranting, ‘It’s all bullshit and it’s bad for ya.’

The room costs $199 plus tax and service fees and all the other bullshit charges they tack on.

I try to get the chick at the lobby desk to cut me a break, but it’s probably that time of the month for the bitch, or maybe she hates people as much as I do, because, behind her phony smile, she’s telling me to fuck off, she’s not going to do shit for me.

I flip it to the porn channels. I’m about to buy a movie when my cell phone buzzes and it’s my client on the other end.

“You know who this is?” he says, in a heavy Spanish accent.

I say, yes, Mr. Simental, tell him he’s not supposed to call me, so why is he calling me.

He calls me a pendejo, and he says: “You don’t tell me anything. Don’t get fucking cute with me, gringo. I’m paying good money for you, so I want to be kept well-informed.”

I tell him to go fuck himself, and he laughs and says: “You got some big huevos, gringo. I like that, but don’t get carried away and let them talk for you, comprende?”

I say fair enough and he asks if I’ve finished my contract on the Russians.

I tell him it’s a done deal.

“Bueno... bueno,” he says. “I have a small favor to ask, mi amigo. I need you to come back to Phoenix and make a stop in Indio along the way to pick up a shipment of guns for me. Deliver these guns to Roy Mercer at a gun shop called the Cross Hairs. I am sending a mule, Jesus Delgado, to retrieve the guns. There is a very special gun that I want you to make sure he gets back to me. Do this for me, and I pay you $10,000 plus the $25,000 for the Russians. You agree this is more than fair compensation for such a simple task, sí?”

I ask him when and he says he wants the guns delivered by tomorrow night.

I tell him he has a deal and hang up.

I think about the Russians and I wonder if I’m making the same mistake.

Simental is gearing up to finish his war with the Arellano cartel and take over the Mexican drug trade.

He hires the Russians to smuggle an arsenal across the border, but they get busted trying to cross, and when they make bail, they skip town.

*

The next day, I score the guns in Indio no problem.

I drive a 2007 Dodge Caravan I rent from Hertz, with the guns stashed in back under a blue tarp.

The guns consist of two crates of AK-47s, and one sexy looking 24 karat gold-plated Desert Eagle XIX .50AE cal.

I got the Caravan maxed at 80 MPH and make it to Phoenix in record time.

I pull up to Cross Hairs in an out of the way strip mall wedged between a Korean BBQ and a Beauty Salon.

I tuck the Desert Eagle in my waistline.

The windows and door are barred, it’s dark inside, and the place looks locked up tight.

I go up to the door, there’s a closed sign hanging in the door, so I peer inside and I see this bearded middle-aged slob with a sagging beer gut waddle up to the door.

He unlocks and opens the door; asks if I’m the guy.

“Yeah,” I say. “You Mercer?”

He says: “Yeah, I’m Mercer. Pull the car around back.”

I notice another prick inside, but I don’t get a good look at him, and figure it’s Simental’s mule, Jesus Delgado.

Out back, Mercer is waiting with a young Mexican kid.

The kid has black peach fuzz penciled in along his upper lip and looks sixteen.

I show the goods; hand over the keys.

Mercer checks over everything, while the kid, he tells me about his oldest brother and sister-in-law – how he’s getting paid $400 bucks for this job and how he’s going to help his family with the money.

That’s when I hear the police chopper closing in.

The back door of the gun shop flies open and an undercover cop bursts through the door. The kid bolts. Everything goes to slow motion.

The cop yells for the kid to stop and pivots toward the kid for a kill shot.

I draw the Desert Eagle and pump two in the cop’s chest; run up on him and peel back his dome for good measure; take off after the kid as Mercer drives off in the opposite direction in the Caravan.

The kid jumps a wall and I jump after him.

I see a bunch of cop cars barricade the street, hear Mercer skid to a halt, then a staccato of gunfire.

I tackle the kid and tell him to wait a second, just hold on a goddamn second.

I give him the Desert Eagle and say: “Here, take it.”

The police chopper hovers above, shining its spotlight down on us.

“Why did you save me?” he says.

I shove him and tell him to run, get the fuck out of here.

He takes off running, the spotlight goes to him then comes back to me, and I watch him make his escape.

BIO: Jason Duke is a Sergeant in the U.S. Army and served 15 months in Iraq as part of OIF 07-09. He was borderline before going to Iraq, but now he's totally fucked in the head. He mostly misses killing shit and blowing shit up. His stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Thuglit, Plots With Guns, Spinetingler Magazine, Pulp Pusher, Flash Fiction Offensive, Darkest Before the Dawn, A Twist of Noir, 3AM Magazine, Suspect Thoughts, Shred of Evidence, Outsider Ink, The Hiss Quarterly, Dungeon Magazine, The Murder Hole, A Cruel World. He’s also branched out into horror with his story “Route Cobra” which can be found at House of Horror.

A Twist Of Noir 468 - Jason Duke

SPUN - JASON DUKE

Previously published at Plots With Guns in 2000

Thursday, November 6, 1997

“Mister Hess, can I have a word with you, please?”

Jesse Hess tilted his chair back into an upright position. He lazily stood up, interrupting Angel in mid-braid of his ponytail. He stared down the kids in the rest of the classroom; walked up to the desk of his English teacher, Mr. Daniel. The wide bottoms of his baggy JNCO jeans dragged across the floor.

“What up, teach?”

“What up is the subject matter of your story. I told you when I gave you this assignment I wouldn’t accept another gang-banger story.”

Mr. Daniel handed back Jesse’s story with a giant F in red pen across the front page. Jesse saw the grade and his face hardened.

“Man, why you gotta punk me like that?”

He threw the story on Mr. Daniel’s desk, scattering the papers.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me, mother...”

“Whoa,” the student teacher, Mike, stepped between Jesse and Mr. Daniel’s desk. He flashed his trademark wry smile.

Mr. Daniel exhaled an uneasy sigh. He removed his glasses and massaged his forehead.

“Don’t worry, Mr. Daniel,” Mike whispered. “Let me handle this.”

“Fine... you do that, Mike.”

Jesse and Mike stepped out into the adjoining hallway.

“Man, I’m tired of his shit. He never gives me props for my stories.”

“Jesse, I keep telling you Mr. Daniel is just an old-fashioned teacher who thinks all stories should read like a Hemingway,” Mike stroked the thin, black stubble along his chin that substituted for a goatee. He put a hand on Jesse’s shoulder. “Don’t let Mr. Daniel get to you. You have potential. You should try submitting your stories to magazines. There’s a few right here in Phoenix.”

“Yeah? So why do you like my stories so much?”

“Because, man, you write from experience, and that’s the best way to write a story... you write about what you know. You just have to refine your writing skills a little and learn to turn those experiences into fiction. Remember what I told you?”

“Yeah, yeah. A writer’s not supposed to write ver... ver...”

“Verbatim, man,” Mike laughed. He playfully pushed Jesse toward the classroom door and Jesse pushed back.

Jesse strode back into the classroom over to the pale, thin Mexican girl, Angel, who’d been braiding his hair.

“Sorry about that. Mr. Daniel was trying to play me again, but I put him in check.”

“Yeah, right. Whatever.” Angel gave Jesse an annoyed, sideways look. “You gonna let me finish your hair?”

Jesse went to sit back down when the school bell rang.

“I’ll let you do it tomorrow, promise...”

Angel rolled her eyes, folding her arms.

“Don’t make promises you’re not gonna keep...”

*

Jesse splashed his face with water. He stared into the mirror of the men’s bathroom in back of the Taco Bell off 43rd Avenue south of Dunlap. He studied the scrawl of graffiti etched into the glass; slowly ran a finger over the surface. He followed the maze of lines that riddled the glass and stopped at a name along the bottom of the mirror – CHUKO.

“Hey, Jesse. You almost done in there, homes?” a kid said outside the bathroom door. His voice was hoarse and he pounded on the door anxiously with his fist. “C’mon, me and Jesus wanna hit this pipe.”

Jesse wiped his face with the sleeve of his t-shirt. He opened the door. Lurking near the door in the hazy twilight were two Mexican kids. They were bone thin and their baggy pants and t-shirts hung loose from their bodies, the way skeletons looked dressed in oversized clothes. They hurried into the bathroom; shut and locked the door.

“What was taking you so long up in here? Damon’s been fiending like a little bitch to hit this pipe and shit.” Jesus picked at the speed bumps along his hollow face. He flicked on a lighter; gently touched the flame to the bottom of a glass pipe. The flame licked at the underbelly of the bowl and scorched it black. The meth caked to the inside bubbled and melted. The bowl filled with creamy white smoke that snaked up out of the pipe like an albino demon escaping its prison. Jesus took a long hit and fought to hold it in, wheezing as he exhaled.

“Let me get a hit now.” Damon wiped at the greasy film on his face. He blew out the stale smoke and hit the pipe the same as Jesus.

Jesse batted at the smoke. The acrid smell stung his eyes and nostrils. He threw open the door and ducked outside, exchanging the polluted air of the bathroom for the polluted night air.

Jesus and Damon passed the pipe back and forth as the door swung closed. Jesse strode over to the round plastic tables scattered with food and trash along the side of the Taco Bell. A worker swept up the mess with a wide broom into a long-handled dustpan, glancing up at Jesse.

Jesse scowled and read the worker’s nametag: Freeman.

“What happened to your boys?”

“What?” Jesse said.

“The two other dudes you were with.”

“They can’t take a piss without holding each others dicks.”

“Shiiittt,” Freeman chuckled. “You fellas go to Apollo High School?”

“Yep... you got it. So why you working at Taco Bell, man? No disrespect, but can’t you get a better job than this?”

“Well, it’s the best I can do at the moment. I was taking classes at Glendale Community College a few years back, but I fucked up.”

“What happened?”

Freeman stared at the ground.

“Got hooked on dope...”

Jesus and Damon barrelled over to Jesse like two energizer bunnies. Freeman continued with his sweeping duties, wandering back inside the Taco Bell. He exited the back door a few minutes later toting a rubber garbage can; passed under a flickering streetlight and dragged the can across the parking lot to a dumpster.

“Man, homeboy takes out the trash every night at the same time like clockwork. I’m surprised nobody ain’t robbed this place yet. That shit would be so easy, too... just wait for him behind the dumpster with my gat, then snatch his ass and make him open the back door. I could do it right now if I wanted.”

Jesus lifted up his t-shirt; flashed the handle of a 9mm tucked in his waistline.

“Do it, homes. I got your back, ese,” Damon said.

“Man, that glass dick you been sucking on made you fucking stupid?” Jesse scoffed.

A cherry-red ’62 Park lowrider pulled into the parking space adjacent to the table. The tinted window rolled down. Behind the steering wheel sat the slant-eyed face of an older Mexican kid about 19, with thick eyebrows.

“Hey, Jesse, my man. What up, homes... long time no see.”

“What up, CHUKO?” Jesse looked at the ground. Jesus and Damon dashed to the car like dogs begging at their master’s feet.

“CHUKO, man...” Jesus leaned against the car door. “You gonna front me that eight-ball or what, ese?”

“Shit, here!” CHUKO palmed Jesus a large seal full of dirty white powder and rocks. “You been slinging that shit pretty fast, huh? Almost as good as my boy, Jesse, here. When you gonna come back and work for me, ese?”

“I’ll check you all later... I gotta bounce.”

“I’ll be seeing you around, eh, Jesse,” CHUKO said. He turned his attention to Jesus. “Get the fuck off my car, puto!”

The tinted window rolled back up and the lowrider drove away.

Friday, November 7, 1997

The lifeless hallway waited expectantly for the hour hand of the clock to reach 3:00pm. A giant paper banner with the neatly painted words “Welcome To Apollo” hung beneath the clock. Patches of buffed graffiti marred the white-washed walls and bland, dark-gray lockers that lined each side of the hall, their ranks broken by numbered doors with tiny square glass viewing panes.

The hour hand finally pointed to its destination. A bell rang, the doors swung open one after another, and like crazed animals fleeing a freak show menagerie, the students held captive inside piled out into the hallway, quickly making their way to their next classes.

“Jesse. Over here, ese.”

Jesse peered through the crowded hallway. He spied Jesus and Damon huddled near an open locker. A white stoner kid wearing a Slayer t-shirt flashed a twenty-dollar bill; slipped the money into Jesus’s hand in exchange for a seal of speed.

“What up?” Jesse caught Jesus and the kid in the middle of their transaction. The kid pocketed the seal and hurried off.

“Hey, don’t forget to tell your homies I got plenty more of this shit,” Jesus yelled after the kid.

“What up, homes,” Damon said, “you gonna kick it at my house tonight? CHUKO’s gonna be there... he said he wants to talk to you, homes, so you better come.”

“Yeah, ese. I don’t think he’s fucking around this time,” Jesus chimed in. He turned to Damon. “Hey, hold onto my gat for me.”

“Bet!” Damon eagerly slipped the 9mm into his waistline.

“I don’t know, man,” Jesse shook his head. “Why’s CHUKO want me selling for him again? It’s not like I owe him for that shit I got busted with last month. I already paid him back his ends.”

“Yeah, well, he seems to think differently, homes,” Jesus said. “Just come to Damon’s tonight and smooth things out with him. We’ll back you up, right, puto?”

Jesus slugged Damon in the shoulder, who nodded in agreement.

“Yeah, right, ese.”

Jesus glimpsed the blue and white windbreaker of a security guard at the end of the hallway. The guard eyeballed them; raised a radio to his mouth.

“Ah, shit! Bounce!”

The guard stalked through the crowd. Jesse, Jesus and Damon scattered, rounded a corner at the end of the hall, exited through a set of double-doors.

“Stash the tweek for me,” Jesus shoved the eight-ball of meth into Jesse’s hand, but Jesse hesitated. “They ain’t after you, homes. Just hold it til after school and I’ll get it back then. I’ll meet you up at the park. Here, take it motherfucker!”

“Alright!” Jesse jammed the eight-ball into his underwear. Jesus grinned and made a break for it to the school parking lot with Damon on his heels.

Jesse walked to Mr. Daniel’s classroom. He rounded a corner and passed a boys bathroom along the way. He was almost home free when the guard rounded the corner behind him.

“You, hold it right there,” the guard shouted as another guard rounded the corner ahead of the bathroom. “Hey! Stop him!”

Jesse ducked inside the bathroom. He rushed into a toilet stall and flushed the eight-ball. The guards charged in after him, slammed his face into the stall, tackled him to the floor.

“Get the fuck off me. I didn’t do nothing.”

“Oh yeah?” the hall guard smirked. He yanked Jesse up onto his feet. “Why’d you run, then?”

“I had to take a piss, man.”

“My ass,” the other guard scoffed. “You’re taking a little trip with us to the Security Office.”

“Man, let me go. I didn’t do nothing.”

The guards dragged Jesse back outside as Mike walked by the bathroom.

“Hey, Jesse... I’ve been looking all over for you.” Mike flashed a wry smile. “What’s the problem? I’m the student teacher from his seventh-period class.”

“I caught him with his friends selling dope, that’s the problem,” the hall guard said. “We’re taking him to the Security Office to search him.”

“Man, I didn’t do shit,” Jesse said. “I went into the bathroom and they rushed me.”

“He’s already late for class,” Mike smiled again, “so why don’t you just search him here. If he’s clean like he says, I’ll walk him to class.”

“Whatever, pal.” The hall guard patted Jesse down. “You wanna take responsibility for the little punk, be my guest.”

“There, you convinced now?” Mike said.

The hallway guard leaned in close to Jesse.

“Your teacher-buddy here may have bailed you out this time, kid... but next time, you might not be so lucky.”

“So, you finally decided to join us.” Mr. Daniel raised a stern eye at Jesse as he walked into the classroom. “Can I have a word with you please, Mike?”

“Sure. What’s up?”

“Mike, you can’t keep covering for this kid.” Mr. Daniel massaged his forehead. “He’s just going to drag you down with him.”

“What should I do then? Stop helping him because he got into some trouble? Everybody makes mistakes, and everybody deserves a second chance. Not that you’d care, but I submitted one of his stories to the city-wide writing competition.”

“For Christ sakes, Mike!” Mr. Daniel leaned in closer. “He was arrested for drugs. You make it sound like he toilet-papered the ceiling of the boys bathroom. He’s as rotten as they come. Look, all I’m saying is focus on the legitimate kids who are here to learn.”

“Mr. Daniel, that’s exactly what I’m trying to do.”

*

“Mike!”

Angel squeezed through the crowded school hallway.

“Mike, I have to talk to you. It’s Jesse.”

“Calm down.” Mike smiled. “What about Jesse?”

Angel paused a moment to catch her breath. She looked up at Mike and her eyes were wide with panic.

“What is it, Angel? What’s wrong?”

“Jesse told me not to tell you...”

“Tell me what?”

“Jesus is why the guards chased after Jesse. Jesus was dealing and talked Jesse into stashing it. Jesse had to flush it or the guards would’ve busted him.”

“Where’s Jesse now?”

“I don’t know, but they always kick it at the Taco Bell, just north of 43rd Avenue and Olive.”

Mike stared out over the crowd.

“Go straight home and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“What’re you gonna do, Mike?”

“I’m going to stop Jesse from ruining his life.”

*

Jesse flopped down on a cement park bench. He rubbed his face in his hands.

“What up, bitch?” Jesus laughed from behind Jesse. “Where’s my stash?”

“I had to flush it... school security rushed me right after you and Damon bounced,” Jesse exhaled a long sigh. Jesus’s mouth dropped open as he struggled to register what Jesse said.

“Ah, yeah... you’re just fucking with me. Your ass ain’t that stupid to flush CHUKO’s shit...” But as Jesse’s confession sank in deeper, Jesus’s face hardened. “Man, I can’t believe you did that, yo! You done for, now. You gonna have to sell for him again to pay it off,” Jesus said coldly. He walked away, shaking his head.

“I ain’t selling shit.” Jesse blocked Jesus’s path. “It was your punk-ass that wanted me to hold onto his shit in the first place.”

“What, motherfucker?” Jesus growled, clenching his fists, ready to throw down. Jesse jumped up and socked Jesus dead in the eye; knocked Jesus to the ground. Jesus pulled out the 9mm, aiming it at Jesse.

“I oughta smoke your ass.” Jesus nursed his puffy red eye. “But if I do, I’m gonna owe CHUKO your debt.”

Jesus eased up on the trigger; stood up. He threw the gun at Jesse’s feet.

“Take it... you’re gonna need it.”

“Fuck you. You ain’t my friend.”

Jesus smiled.

“I never was...”

*

Jesse climbed a short flight of stairs. He stopped at an apartment door. A large crack taped shut with duct tape ran the length of the front window. The door was splintered from years of abuse and neglect. Jesse stepped up to the door, listening to the ruckus inside. He chambered the 9mm; slipped the gun into his baggy pocket; banged against the door. The ruckus died as Damon peeked through the window’s curtains.

“Yo, what up, Jesse?” Damon poked his face back through the curtains. The door unlocked and opened. “Come in, ese.”

“Where’s CHUKO and Jesus?”

Jesse walked into a smoky living room. He scanned the faces of the partygoers. He thumbed the hammer of the 9mm as he looked around. The partygoers resumed in hushed voices. Someone hit a glass pipe, adding to the stench of meth and weed that filled the air.

“They around?” Jesse asked again.

“Nah.” Damon noticed the gun-shaped bulge in Jesse’s pocket. “Jesus never showed and CHUKO said he was going to Taco Bell after he finished with some business.”

“CHUKO say anything to you?”

“Nah, just that he wanted to talk to you about some shit... probably about last night.”

Damon turned to the kid hitting the pipe.

“Let me get a hit off that, puto. And keep it down... my grandma’s trying to sleep.”

Damon leveled a lighter beneath the bowl but Jesse snatched the pipe and lighter from Damon’s hands. Jesse lit the pipe; inhaled a long, deep hit. His eyes went blank. He hit the pipe again and again, walking stiffly into the bathroom. It was just him, the pipe, and the raw, jittery sensations that followed.

“You okay, ese?” Damon said.

Jesse dropped the pipe outside the bathroom and shut the door. He stared into the mirror. His heart thumped against his chest like someone trying to pummel him to death with a hammer. He hit himself hard in the chest, as if doing so would override the pain of his racing heart and dull it with pain of his own.

“Jesse?” Damon said through the door.

“Leave me alone, motherfucker! I’ll be alright.”

Jesse rummaged through the drawers along the side of the bathroom sink. He grabbed a pair of electric clippers, plugged them in, flipped the ON switch, and ran them over his head. His hair fell into the sink in long, dirty blonde locks, filling the basin until every last strand was gone. He threw the hair into a small trashcan; rinsed his shaved head and neck in the sink.

“What’d you do to your hair, homes?” Damon said.

Jesse walked out into the living room, to the apartment door. Damon and the partygoers stared and everything seemed frozen in the moment – even the smoke stood still. Jesse opened the door. He leered at Damon; pulled the gun out of his pocket and pointed it to his head.

“Now I’m like you... spun out my mind.”

*

“Why I always gotta do this shit?”

Freeman threw open the back door of the Taco Bell. He toted a rubber garbage can across the vacant parking lot to the dumpster. Jesse ducked down into the darkness behind the dumpster, but Freeman saw him and stopped under the flickering streetlight.

“Hey, you can’t loiter here.”

Jesse sprang up. He aimed the 9mm and Freeman tripped over the garbage can.

“Man, you gotta be the dumbest motherfucker.” Jesse motioned with the gun for Freeman to get up. “Get your ass up. I said now, bitch!”

“It’s cool, it’s cool,” Freeman shielded his face. “You got it, kid... whatever you say...”

“Man, just shut up and open the door,” Jesse nudged Freeman toward the backdoor with the gun barrel and Freeman stumbled back over the garbage can. “Take the fucking trashcan with you.”

“Alright, alright.”

Jesse followed on Freeman’s heels. Freeman started to open the back door.

“Hey, I know you,” Freeman opened the door.

“Yeah, you know shit,” Jesse said and shoved Freeman inside.

*

Mike walked to the back door of the Taco Bell. He glanced over his shoulder at his faded-yellow Toyota parked in the empty parking lot. He reached for the doorknob when the door cracked open and a large shoed foot poked out, wedging open the door. Mike opened the door the rest of the way and looked down at Freeman sitting on the floor, gagged and bound by duct tape.

“Man, your pants fit too tight,” Jesse yelled from up front near the counter.

Mike stepped inside as Freeman pleaded for help through muffled cries. Mike put a finger to his lips; positioned himself to one side of the open doorway leading to the front. He peered around the corner and saw Jesse struggling to fit into a Taco Bell uniform.

“I oughta kick your ass for lying to me, bitch.”

“Jesse.” Mike stepped out.

“Mike? What the hell are you doing here, man?”

Mike took a step forward.

“Why’re you doing this, Jesse?”

“This was the only way I could get close enough to CHUKO.” Jesse gripped the 9mm tight in his hand.

“You’re better than this. I know you are.”

“Nah.” Jesse’s face hardened and he squeezed the gun tighter. “It’s too late for that shit. Mr. Daniel was right about me. You should’ve listened to him.”

“C’mon, man.” Mike took another step closer. “You don’t really believe that, do you? You’re a writer, man... a good writer. Don’t throw it all away. Let’s make things right.”

A cherry-red ’62 Park lowrider pulled up next to the drive-thru window.

“Hey, motherfuckers. I’ve been out here trying to order for forever and shit,” CHUKO shouted up at the window.

Jesse looked to the window; cocked back the gun’s hammer.

“There’s only one way I can make things right.”

“Jesse!” Mike leapt forward and grappled Jesse to wrestle the gun away. The gun fired and Mike hit the floor, blood seeping out from underneath his limp body.

The lowrider peeled out. Jesse fired into the back windshield and the lowrider rolled into the side of the Taco Bell, smashing into the building with a crunch of metal and shattered glass. CHUKO threw open the car door and scrambled out, Mac 10 Ingram in his hand.

A staccato of bullets exploded into the drive-thru and tore through Jesse as his own bullets plugged CHUKO in the head and chest. A cloud of blood sprayed the air from behind CHUKO’s head and he dropped, firing the Ingram into the sky.

Jesse gasped for breath on the floor at the bottom of the drive-thru window. His breaths grew shorter and shorter, until they stopped altogether, his dead, glassy eyes staring blankly ahead at Mike’s body.

Wednesday, November 12, 1997

“Michael Devroe was taken suddenly and unexpectedly from this world by the sins of another. Although we take solace in the knowledge that he is in the hands of God now, a tough road lies ahead of us as we struggle with the anger and sorrow his death has left us with...”

Mr. Daniel’s attention wandered from the Minister. He looked past the large group of family and friends gathered around Mike’s coffin, to a small group of only three people at the opposite end of the cemetery where Jesse’s coffin was being interred into the ground. The Minister’s words focused Mr. Daniel back onto Mike’s coffin.

“We commit this body to the ground... ashes to ashes... dust to dust.”

Monday, January 19, 1998

The school bell rang. Mr. Daniel watched his students eagerly file out of his classroom until the last of them disappeared out of the door. He exhaled an uneasy sigh and rubbed his face in his hands.

“Mr. Daniel? I have a letter here for you.”

He looked up at one of the young secretaries from the front office.

“Actually,” she gently set the letter on his desk, “it was addressed to Mike, but... since he’s...”

She looked at the floor.

“Well, I thought I’d just give it to you since he was your student teacher and all.”

Mr. Daniel rested his face back in his hands. She waited for a response, turned and left. He opened the letter.

“Dear Mr. Hess:”

He crumpled the letter in his hands and threw it into the trashcan next to his desk, getting up to leave. He stopped in the doorway; looked back at the trashcan. He walked over to it, digging out the letter.

“Thank you for entering your story into our writing competition. Although your story didn’t win, you show great promise as a writer...”

Mr. Daniel lowered the letter. He opened a desk drawer and pulled out Jesse’s story, staring long and hard at it. He read through the story one more time, taking his time with it, carefully reading it so he understood, the way he would a Hemingway. When he finished, he set the story down. He took a red ink pen, scribbled out the F, and next to it wrote the letter A.

BIO: Jason Duke is a Sergeant in the U.S. Army and served 15 months in Iraq as part of OIF 07-09. He was borderline before going to Iraq, but now he's totally fucked in the head. He mostly misses killing shit and blowing shit up. His stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Thuglit, Plots With Guns, Spinetingler Magazine, Pulp Pusher, Flash Fiction Offensive, Darkest Before the Dawn, A Twist of Noir, 3AM Magazine, Suspect Thoughts, Shred of Evidence, Outsider Ink, The Hiss Quarterly, Dungeon Magazine, The Murder Hole, A Cruel World. He’s also branched out into horror with his story “Route Cobra” which can be found at House of Horror.

A Twist Of Noir 438 - Jason Duke

LIE DOWN WITH DOGS - JASON DUKE

Dog cries carry on the raw wind.

My breath, fast and heavy, parts the shadows on the cold night air.

I hide in the shadows, at the side of a 24/7 Mexican fast food joint. The Hilbertos, Albertos, Robertos, that are a dime a dozen throughout Phoenix – I don’t give a shit which.

Across the street, I hear dogs whine and bark at the place I’ve been staking out for the past twenty minutes, called Alpha Dog. I’m here because of another man’s wife, and a dog. I regrip my .45 Glock, squeeze tighter. I see my breath, squat down, lower my head, cup a hand over my mouth.

It all starts with a dog: a one year-old female Heinz-57 Pointer I adopt for my dead Army buddy’s wife. Her name is Pollyanna and she gives good head. The dog pisses on the floor, I don’t give a shit, as much as Pollyanna loves the mutt, she bitches about it pissing on the floor, until one day I come home and Pollyanna’s crying because the dog ran away.

I duck walk backward into the shadows.

I adopt the dog from the Arizona Humane Society. I read about animal euthanasia out of a pamphlet while I wait. Some of the different methods of animal euthanasia include Somulose and Tributame injections, carbon monoxide poisoning, snapping the neck, and putting a bullet through the head.

*

I meet Pollyanna while her husband’s in Iraq.

His name is Sergeant Thoman.

He brags about her all the time. Then he gets home on his 15-day leave, and breaks the news that he and Pollyanna get hitched. He tells me how he’s on his laptop all the time e-mailing her and instant messaging her.

He has photos of Pollyanna, or him and Pollyanna together, or Pollyanna with her friends, with cute little pussy-whipped frames painted in faggoty flowers and hearts.

I steal one of the photos from him and jerk off to it the whole time he’s gone.

I tell him before he leaves back to Iraq: “You’re a lucky man, buddy, but you should’ve waited until you got back for good.”

He asks me why, and I say: “A girl like that, sometimes they don’t wanna wait around, you know?”

He says it’s different with Pollyanna, so I smile and end it at that.

Two months later, I get word that Thoman’s part of a convoy of Strykers transporting some troops from Camp Taji to Camp Liberty. He’s pulling guard in the left gunner’s hatch, they’re passing through a hot grid for sniper activity, one of the Strykers breaks down, they exit the Strykers to pull security, and bang. The sniper knows what he’s doing and hits Thoman in the side just under his armpit, where the side plates don’t cover, and the round bounces around inside his body armor like ping pong.

I call Pollyanna before his body is cold. I offer my condolences, offer a shoulder to cry on, dry her tears. We go to Vegas about a month later. She’s a widow on the rebound who’s been married only two months to a husband she barely knew. Pollyanna has nowhere to go and no one to turn to, so I fill the gap. I pay for everything; throw down two grand easy for a three night stay – room at the Hilton; $200 dollar dinner at Ruth’s Chris and $80 dollar bottle of Chardonnay; lots of gambling; lots of drinking and shows; $40 bucks to get into the VooDoo Lounge at the Rio and $400+ for a bottle of Cristal and seats in the V.I.P booth.

She sinks her head into my chest and I wrap an arm around her, she looks up into my eyes and we kiss, then she says, “Tell me a story... something about you, about your past.”

I look out of the large glass panes behind the booth, enjoying the Vegas view, considered one of the best on the strip. All the lights of every casino and high rise has a fuzzy glow and sway back and forth because I’m lit up from a night’s worth of drinking.

I think about it for a moment and say, “I used to work security for a Macy’s... you know, catching shop lifters and shit like that. Did it for years. The last year or so, I was struggling to pay bills, keep my head above water, so it was important I didn’t lose my job, otherwise I’d be fucked. I had been sick for about a week this one time... had some kind of cold or flu I couldn’t get over. I couldn’t take any time off work because I couldn’t afford it, and I couldn’t afford any medicine because I didn’t have the money, so I went to a nearby Walmart, grabbed a thing of cold medicine off the shelf, ripped open the package, and stuck the bottle in my pocket.”

“So you stole it,” she smiles.

“Yeah, I stole it.”

“Then what happened?” she says.

“I got busted trying to leave the store, spent a night in jail, and ended up losing my job.”

“Awwww,” she says and rubs the inside of my thigh, “poor baby. I know how to make it better.”

*

I stalk across the street, hunched low, gun at the ready. Alpha Dog is small, no bigger than the Mexican joint, with the same ugly brown stucco and red tile roof. The windows and door are barred, everything’s locked up tight.

I creep along the side, through the shadows, follow a narrow driveway between the shelter and a foreclosed shop for sale that are even more common in Phoenix than the Mexican joints. When I get the dog from the humane society, one of the workers tells me a story about a pit bull at a no-kill shelter that’s been locked in a tiny cage for over 12 years. Now it’s fucked in the head, spends all day slamming its body against its cage, and everyone’s scared of messing with it.

The driveway leads to a small parking lot behind the shelter. A floodlight over the back door lights the lot up like an afternoon sun. I lurk at the edge of the building, where the reach of the light ends and blurs into shadow then darkness.

Pollyanna is a complete mess ever since the dog runs off. Every time I go to touch her, she withdraws and pulls away. She had a dog when she was married to Thoman, but it got loose and got hit by a car. I adopt the new dog for Pollyanna from the humane society and when it runs away she swears she loves it, piss and all.

I snatch up a rock, chuck it at the light, smash the glass case. Sparks explode and fizzle through the air.

*

I look at the piece of paper with Matt Sherman’s address.

Sherman is a dead-beat dad who’d rather smoke meth than take care of his kids. I hate pricks like this, so when Sherman’s brother-in-law hires me to track him down and persuade him to pay up, I’m more than happy to take the job.

The Monroe Street Abbey off of 4th Avenue and Monroe Street in downtown Phoenix is the rusty steel grate in the gutter that collects all the grime and shit as it passes through to the sewers – a hollowed-out square building around a gravel courtyard with a small island of grass and a few trees.

The residents are prisoners of their social security checks. The rest are the gutter trash hoi polloi of society, live here because the $465 a month rent means more money for dope and booze and the hookers one block up strutting their stuff on Van Buren Street.

Sherman doesn’t expect me.

He answers the door, sees me looming in the threshold, and the shock registered across his face says he knows what comes next.

Sherman is bone-thin, long greasy black hair, thin goatee, sunken face full of rings and studs. His ribcage pokes out. Like his skeleton is a convict doing twenty-to-life of hard time, trying to break free.

At the rate he’s going, the life sentence won’t stick.

I kick in the door before Sherman has a chance to close it. I charge inside, nail him square in the nuts. He crumples to the stained carpet riddled with cigarette burns; screams, holds his balls. I pull out a roll of duct tape, tear off a piece, and slap it over his mouth.

I ask him: “You ever heard the moral of the mousetrap?” but he cries, and I tell him: “Don’t be a little bitch, man up, you did this to yourself… you had this coming.”

I yank a temple piercing from his face, and he screams through the tape: “A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package. ‘Time to eat,’ the mouse thought, but couldn’t believe it when he saw it was a mousetrap. The mouse was scared shitless, so he ran out to the farmyard and started shouting, ‘There’s a mousetrap in the house!’ The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, ‘Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is life and death to you, but I don’t give a rat’s ass.’ Get it? Stay with me. That’s not the moral. She said she couldn’t be bothered.”

I yank out the other temple piercing, and he screams some more. I pinch his eyebrow stud between my fingers: “The mouse turned to the pig and said, ‘There’s a mousetrap in the house!’ but the pig said, ‘I’m sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there ain’t shit I can do about it except pray, so I’ll keep you in my prayers.’ The mouse turned to the cow and said, ‘There’s a mousetrap in the house!’ and the cow told the mouse to go fuck himself.”

I rip the stud from his eyebrow, spray out a little squirt of blood. He screams hard, starts to choke and gurgle: “The mouse returned to the house alone to face the farmer’s trap, its little head down, bummed out none of the other animals would help him. That night, a sound was heard throughout the house... like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The wife ran to see what was caught, but it was dark as shit, and didn’t see it was the tail of a rattlesnake, so she got bit. The farmer rushed her to the hospital, she returned home with a fever, and we all know how you treat a fever... with chicken soup, right?”

I finger his bull ring, flicking it with my fingers. His eyes grow wider: “But the wife didn’t get better, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her round the clock, and to feed them, the farmer butchered the pig. The bitch still didn’t get better and she died, a shitload of people came to the funeral, and the farmer slaughtered the cow for food. And the mouse...” I pat him on the cheek, stand up, looking down at him: “...the mouse looked upon everything from his crack in the wall with great sadness.”

*

I post missing dog posters everywhere, waste fifty bucks on the posters at Kinkos, but no-one ever pays attention to missing dog posters, so I spend another fifty bucks on more posters advertising a $500 dollar reward. This will get someone’s attention, I figure, because money talks and bullshit walks, and I know people will eat their children for money. I put giant dollar signs across the top and bottom of the posters, figuring this will grab people’s attention even more.

The back door of the shelter opens and a young brunette chick, maybe 19 or 20, in daisy dukes and flannel tied off at her midriff like she’s fresh off the farm, pokes her head out and looks around. I rush the door, she sees me, lets out a little shriek. She tries to slam the door shut, but I’m faster and throw my shoulder into the door.

The dogs are going crazy now. Alpha Dog sounds like a fucking insane asylum for dogs. I can barely hear anything above their cacophony. I knock her back on her ass, bulldoze inside. Daisy Dukes screams as I wave the gun around, jumps back up and runs inside a room.

*

I leave Sherman’s apartment after collecting the cash. I’m on my way back to the office when my cell phone rings. The guy on the other end says he saw one of the missing dog posters; says he knows where I can find the dog.

“For $500 I can tell you where your dog’s at... meet me at Pink Cabaret off Glendale Avenue just past...” and I cut him off and say I know the place.

“Good,” the guy says. “Meet me there tonight... bring the cash and I’ll tell you where to find her.”

The place is low-key. Judging by the handful of cars in the parking lot, doesn’t seem to have a lot of business. A parked jet black ’87 Camaro has a bumper sticker: ‘Fuck Off, This Message Brought To You By The First Amendment.’

The girls are sexy, not drop-dead gorgeous sexy, but definitely sexy. I’ve blown both kinds of wads here once or twice.

The cabaret sits just past the overpass and railroad tracks at Grand Avenue and Northern Avenue. There’s a portico out front, pink neon lights along the trim of the roof. Everything looks new and clean. The hot pink neon sign in graffiti sans-serif and the brown marble paneling is a veneer of high-class and high-dollar.

I walk inside.

Mirrored walls; deep plush chairs and tiny oval tables; hot pink dance poles and creamy white stages; flat plasma TV screens; fully stocked bar; twin mezzanine balconies.

I scan around, take a seat at the bar.

Middle-aged low-lifes wave dollar bills at the dancers. Most of the crowd is young and thugged out in hip-hop fashion. I hate these pricks the most. Some wear suits and sit up on the balconies getting lap dances.

“You the guy looking for the dog?”

I feel a hand on my shoulder, turn around. Standing there is a middle-aged slob, with the worst outbreak of herpes on his lips I’ve ever seen.

“Name’s Dickie.”

Dickie licks his lips, picks at his mouth. I shrug off his hand, but he shoves it back at me for a shake.

“You gotta be kidding,” I say.

“What?” he says sheepishly.

“I’m not shaking your fucking hand... you need to get that shit looked at.”

“Whatever,” he withdraws his hand. “You have the money?”

I pull a wad of rolled twenties out of my pocket, pass it under the bar to Dickie, and tell him: “You better be for real. If not, I’m gonna fuck you up bad.”

He sizes me up for the first time, swallows, then says, “Don’t worry, it’s legit, your dog’s at a place called Alpha Dog.”

“How do you know this?” I want to know, and he says he’s been there before, saw the dog there firsthand with his own two eyes.

I tell him to hand over his drivers license: “If it checks out, you get it back, and if it doesn’t check out, I pay you a visit and fuck you up.”

He hesitates, sighs, reluctantly gives his drivers license to me, then says: “Don’t worry, it’ll check out.”

*

I have second thoughts about my whole approach. I think maybe I got it all wrong. I wave the gun around, the dogs go ape shit, Daisy Dukes screams her head off and runs inside the room. The place is rank with stale dog, dog hairs float around in the air, get in my mouth, and I swear I hear moaning, like some chick in mid-orgasm getting her brains fucked out.

I move toward the room. A man runs out, buck naked, with a rock hard dick flopping up and down. The prick yells at me. He wants to know what the hell is going on, and I shoot him in the leg. He drops to the floor, screaming. Daisy Dukes is screaming. All the dogs are in a frenzy, when two more doors open and gorgeous naked chicks pour out of the rooms, all screaming their heads off, too.

I look inside the first room. Daisy Dukes cowers in the corner, holding the dog in her arms. Camera equipment and microphones are set up all over the room. Dog kennels line the walls. Alpha Dog is a freak show menagerie of dogs.

I walk up to the girl. She begs me not to shoot, please don’t kill her, for the love of God, just let her go. I shove her away with my boot, grab the dog, point the gun at her and hold it there.

The hallway is a bedlam of screaming naked chicks fleeing every which way.

I drop the gun to my side, do an about face, walk out into the hall with the dog tucked under my arm. I look inside one of the other rooms. Tethered to a post is a miniature horse or pony, I can’t tell which.

I take the dog home, it licks my face, happy to be back, happy that I found it. The dog shakes, so I set it down, it lies down in the corner, as Pollyanna runs in crying tears of joy. She scoops the dog in her arms. She squeezes it tight, kisses its face. The dog pisses down her front. Pollyanna drops the dog on the floor, and starts in on her bitching all over again.

BIO: Jason Duke is a Sergeant in the U.S. Army and served 15 months in Iraq as part of OIF 07-09. He was borderline before going to Iraq, but now he's totally fucked in the head. He mostly misses killing shit and blowing shit up. His stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Thuglit, Plots With Guns, Spinetingler Magazine, Pulp Pusher, Flash Fiction Offensive, Darkest Before the Dawn, A Twist of Noir, 3AM Magazine, Suspect Thoughts, Shred of Evidence, Outsider Ink, The Hiss Quarterly, Dungeon Magazine, The Murder Hole, A Cruel World. He’s also branched out into horror with his story “Route Cobra” which can be found at House of Horror.

A Twist Of Noir 097 - Jason Duke

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.