An Economy of Words

“Oh brother, what kind of stupid shit are you writing now?”

Oxycontin afternoons, watching the rain drizzle

Drip drop down on a Vicodin vista of the imagination

Drowning in the pain, I ache all over again

And the pills usually make it worse

But sometimes, sometimes they work

Kinda like you and me

Scrawling furiously, I look up towards a hovering behemoth. Taunting me with my own soggy notebook, the mammoth beast wonders aloud: “What the hell is a Vicodin vista?”

“Hey, asshole, give that back!”

“Wait a second, are you on drugs again? Ma, your precious little prince is on dope. . .”

“Why don’t you mind your own fucking business, Chip?”

Dropping my book – like it was biohazard – the bastard slapped me across the face.

“Watch your language! Remember, you kiss our mother with that filthy mouth.”

As I leaned over to retrieve my most precious piece of property, the motherfucker snuck up behind me, put me in a vicious headlock, and vigorously rubbed the top of my head.

“Aw shit, bro, I’m just messing with you.”

Mumbling, “douchenozzle,” I broke free of his testosteronic clutch and smoothed out my tangled hair.

“I just don’t get why you waste your time writing that retarded poetry shit?”

“Fuck you, bro! That’s like asking me why I breathe.”

“Well, why do you?”

“The better question is why you write those malignant contracts for multinational corporations that rape the planet, exploit workers, and generally ruin everything for everyone else?”

“What, you mean my internship at Robert, Bow, & Leno? Dude, that’s a sweet-ass gig! Do you have any idea how much they pay me?”

“I’m sure it’s not nearly enough to justify your sins.”

“Whatever, bro, what have you ever gotten from your fairy fucking poems?”

“Nothing that you’d understand.”

“Food’s ready, boys!”

Seething as I stormed off towards the cramped kitchen, I shoved the asswipe in the back and added: “Actually, one time, I did get a handjob.”

“Yeah, from yourself.”

“What’s this about you getting a new job, sweetie pie?”

“Oh, nevermind, mom. So what’s for dinner?”

As soon as we finished eating the tangy stew, I kissed my mother on the cheek, thanked her for supper, surreptitiously flicked my brother off, and headed home.

That night, I had that horrible dream again. The one where all I can see is darkness and all I can hear is white noise. Where nothing I do seems to matter. I’d been having this same nightmare over and over ever since our difficult journey began.

“Hey, sweetness, did you know that we don’t make anything anymore?”

“What?” she hissed at me as we sat in the waiting room. As usual, I was killing time by reading the paper.

“According to this article, America don’t make jackshit no more. No cars. No steel. No pig iron, whatever that is. No nothing. Apparently, the only thing we do nowadays is provide services.”

“Speaking of providing services, what’s this I hear about some poetry groupie giving you a handjob or something?”

“Since when do you talk to Chip?”

“I dunno, maybe since he called this morning to tell me that you were on drugs again and that he was very concerned about your well-being.”

“Whatever, that asshole is so full of shit! I mean, he’s the one who taught Kyle how to smoke weed back in the day. And he’s the one who had a flask hidden in his jacket last night. . .”

“You’re changing the subject, honeypot. So about this handjob?”

The old lady sitting across from us – the one carefully perusing the Reader’s Digest – was giving me the evil eye. I wanted to leap across the aisle and tell her to mind her own damn business. Or, at least, explain to me precisely why she was glaring at me when it was my beautiful fucking wife that was talking dirty.

I also desperately wanted to scream at the skinny little receptionist hiding behind the plexiglass window and demand to know why we always had to wait so motherfucking long at this godawful place.

Unfortunately, most of the time, you can’t really do what you want in life. I mean, I’ve always dreamed of being an artist. A poet. The type of brilliant writer that could change the world with the purity of his prose.

“I’m waiting.”

“I know, sweetness. I am too. But I’m sure you’ll be next.”

“No, I mean about this. . .”

Since the crone with the crooked nose was still staring at us, my (occasionally) shy wife lowered her voice and cooed: “So who’s the slut?”

“Um, well, it’s. . . Kinda sorta, um. . . It’s. . .”

“C’mon, honeypot, I’m not screwing around here, who the fuck is she?”

As the thunderous tone of my wife’s voice echoed throughout the lonely waiting room, the old hag tossed down her compact magazine and waddled up to the window.

“You.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Don’t you remember?”

“I have no fucking clue what you’re talking about.”

“The night we met, sweetness. At that café where Kurt was working. The Berlin Wall. You know, over on Durant. Back when he was into the whole poetry slam thing.”

“And?”

“And I read that one poem of mine about chasing drunken rainbows and finding magical weed leprechauns in the grass. . .”

“Oh yeah, wow, I totally forgot about that.”

Bursting into a boisterous guffaw, she snickered: “I hate to tell you this, honeypot, but you can write some bloody awful poetry.”

“Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to watch your language.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever.”

Still giggling, my stunning yet sometimes cruel wife waved off the anorexic receptionist and whispered in my ear: “I fucking hate it when people call me, ‘Ma’am.’ What’s that even supposed to mean? Ma’am.”

“I think it’s just short for madam.”

“Like at a whorehouse?”

“Actually, I believe it was originally a term of respect. For like queens and shit.”

“Man, you know way too much about words. Maybe, you should spend a little less time doing all those inane crossword puzzles.”

“How come you’re always telling me how to spend my time?”

“Cause I love you.”

“Then why do you want to change me?”

“Also cause I love you.”

“Now, see, that doesn’t make sense to me.”

“You know what really doesn’t make any sense? Telling someone to watch their language. I mean, isn’t that like the textbook definition of a mixed metaphor? How the hell can you watch something that you hear?”

“You mean, ‘speak.’”

“No, I mean, ‘hear.’ You hear language, honeypot.” Pointing to the sides of her recently shaven head, my still-gorgeous wife screeched: “With your fucking ears!”

“Well, not if it’s your language you’re watching, then you’re the one speaking,” I tried to explain. Alas, my words were drowned out by the receptionist – who, despite her meager frame – could really fucking wail. Seriously, she should’ve been like singing in some sweaty basement for a hardcore band back in 1984.

“Ma’am, I’m not going to ask you again!”

“Whatever, princess, I’m going outside. So you just holla when you’re finally fucking ready for me, okay?”

I know it’s kinda odd, but there’s really like no fucking time when I adore my increasingly temperamental wife more than when she’s acting like a big ol’ b-i-t-c-h in public. Honestly, I wanted to grab her and make sweet waiting room love to her right then and there. Is that so wrong?

Before I could discover the opinion of the lady once again cradling the world’s most boring periodical like it was the Bible – or, God forbid, the receptionist with the Henry Rollins pipes – on such complex ethical matters, I was being dragged outside through the revolving glass door.

“Hey, sweetness, how much do you think they pay?”

“Who? The receptionist? Probably jackshit. And she doesn’t deserve a penny more!”

“No, I meant the Reader’s Digest. Cause I’ve been working on some stories that are a little more mainstream. . .”

Popping a lozenge into her chapped mouth, my nic-fitting wife hooted: “Are you fucking kidding me? Oh brother, I don’t think they even publish fiction these days.”

“But I heard they pay pretty good for those lame jokes. . .”

“Well, I’m pretty sure that they would never publish any of your crazy-ass shit. I mean, you can’t even write a story that doesn’t completely revolve around some sort of elaborate poop joke.”

“Yes, I can.”

“I bet you can’t.”

“How much?”

“If you can write a single piece of prose that doesn’t involve any scatological humor, I’ll stop telling you how to live your life.”

“That’s bloody unlikely.”

“I swear to God, I will.”

Practically choking on her lozenge, she chortled: “But if I’m right – which I am – then you have to let me smoke one cigarette a week.”

“Now that’s something that’s never gonna fucking happen! Man, I can’t believe that you’d even joke about that.”

“That reminds me, while we’re on the subject of inappropriate jokes, did you happen to get to the part in the paper today about Cheney?”

“No, what happened? Did his dark dark heart finally conk out?”

“Sadly, no. Apparently, he’s just really pissed off that W didn’t pardon Libby.”

“Hey, that reminds me, you know Kyle’s friend, Scooter. . .”

“Kyle has friends?”

“A few. Here and there. Scattered across the universe.”

“Okay, now that’s something that is truly fucking shocking.”

“Yeah, well, anyway, Scooter’s the dude with the bad acne that’s always sporting expensive clothes and rocking the latest gadgets.”

“Oh, you mean his drug dealer. That doesn’t count.”

“Whatever, I’m not keeping score. Anyway, Kyle was telling me the other day that Scooter went to Australia last year and was, apparently, getting hassled by customs at the airport.”

“Probably cause the dumbass had a suitcase full of weed. So what’s your fucking point?”

“Yeah, probably. But if you’d let me finish my story, I’d get to the point.”

“Well, hurry it up already. That emaciated little twat’s probably gonna come out here and yell for me any minute now.”

“Okay, so the customs guys were giving him the once over and. . .”

“You already said that, honeypot.”

“If you’d listen for once in your life, sweetness, I’m like building up some suspense here. It’s called story-fucking-telling, perhaps you’ve heard of it?”

“And if you only knew how to tell a story, maybe I wouldn’t have to interrupt you. . .”

“So, anyway, as I was saying. They were really giving him the once over at the airport and they started asking him all these questions. Like if he had a criminal record and, without a missing a beat, the guy was all like: ‘Why, is that still required to get into the country?’”

As I laughed with gleeful abandon at my own joke, she hollered back at me: “Bullshit! There’s no way that fucking loser would have the balls – or the intelligence – to say something witty like that under those circumstances. They’d kill him. I bet Kyle just made the whole thing up.”

“Who gives a shit? It’s hilarious. I’m totally gonna send that shit off to the Reader’s Digest and finally get paid for my words.”

“But they’re not even your words. They’re Kyle’s. I mean, how pathetic is that?”

“Well, obviously, I’ll tweak them a little. . .”

“Which reminds me, so what’s up with this fucking handjob?”

“Don’t you remember? You came up to me after I read my poem and were like, ‘Oh my God, you are so brilliant and passionate and. . .’”

“Really? That doesn’t sound like me.”

“Then we went for a bike ride down to the marina and I read you some more killer shit and you like literally swooned.”

“Whatever, it was probably just windy.”

“And then we grabbed some forties and made out on the roof of that huge apartment complex over on Ellsworth. You know, the one across from the Roxy Mart.”

“Okay, now, that sounds kinda familiar. Still, just cause we were kissing and I may’ve accidentally touched your crotch or something, it doesn’t mean you got a handjob.”

“It does if I. . .”

“Ma’am, the doctor’s ready for you now.”