The banjo song ends, eventually. Ahab does not notice. When he finally realizes the banjo is gone, some musical burnout is on the radio talking about the song in his soft, smug, broadcaster’s voice. Inflicting a history lesson longer than the song itself.
She shuts the radio off.
He turns the car around.
They drive in silence, heading back to the gas station. Passing over the river, she points to a dirt track into the woods just past the bridge.
“Pull in over there,” she says.
His cock twitches. He does as she told him and takes the car off the road and down the track. It is not far through the woods to the clearing on the riverbank.
In the golden age, this was a campsite for local kids. A big adventure, getting here on their bicycles. Fishing hole right there. Just upstream: the bridge. Low enough for jumping off into the river. High enough to be a thrill. There is still an old rope tied under the bridge for swinging off the bank. He can almost hear the screams and shrieks of free-range, country kids at play.
Now the rope is broken off, too short to be anything but a memory of better times. Dangling there, under the bridge, frayed and limp.
The campsite is something else now, too. Ground littered with trash. Used needles and rubbers, empty baggies and prescription bottles.
He stops the car and shuts it off. The windows down, they listen to the engine’s cooling clinks and the breeze through the trees. Little birds twitter in the bushes, carrying on with their lives, oblivious to the state of the world.
“Nice spot,” he eventually says.
“Yeah. It’s private.”
“You come here often?”
She gives him a look. “I used to. Back in the day. D’ya got any smokes?”
“No. I quit.”
She frowns at him. Disappointed. Not just at the lack of cigarettes, but in his life decision.
“Why would you do something as stupid as that? What are you saving yourself for? More of this shit?” she asks with a smile as she waves her hand around dismissively.
She might have a point.
“That’s okay,” she says. “I’ll get us some when we get gas. I’m flush.”
“Yeah, you sure are,” he says.
“Thank you, hon,” she says in a tone of a diner waitress hunting tips.
She pulls her purse around into her lap. It is a little strappy number. Looks designer. Bright golden zipper with a shiny golden brand logo to pull the runner. She unzips the purse. Extracts a busted-up cigarette box and a Zippo.
This time, he gives her the look. She giggles.
“I aint as bad as all that. I’m outta smokes. All I got is smoke.”
From the cigarette box she extracts a joint. Puts the box back in her purse and wiggles the joint at him.
“You wanna smoke up? It’s good shit,” she purrs, rolling the joint between her fingertips to loosen its cargo.
Fuck.
“I shouldn’t,” he says. “I get funny ideas from that shit.”
“Those are my favorite kind. So we’re gonna smoke this now, Ahab. Don’t be a pussy.”
She opens her mouth just so, and wets her lips with her pierced tongue. Then, slowly, she inserts the joint all the way into her mouth and closes her lips around it. Draws it back out, now moist enough to prevent the paper burning too quickly.
She flicks the Zippo open expertly. The clink and scrape are loud in the car. It lights the first time. The flame is perfect. She holds the flame up between them, as though it is significant somehow.
She blows on the joint just a little to dry if off, putting on another lip show. Then lights the joint and snaps the Zippo shut. Snuffs the prefect flame with the harsh mechanical bite.
She gets the joint going expertly. Rotating it and puffing little by little to get a good ember going without burning too much, taking all the smoke on board as she does. Not a bit wasted. Then she leans back in her seat, lungs full, and holds the joint out to him with a smile.
He takes it. There is no other choice.
She finally exhales as he passes the joint back to her. Once again, she takes her time with little puffs to manage the burn. Spits a little on the tip of her index finger. Puts the tiny orb of spit down on the paper where a run is threatening. Then she puffs the ember up with a few quick tokes before it can go out. Examines her handiwork. Perfection.
He exhales with a cough.
“There you go,” she says as she exhales herself. “Some sugar for your tank.”
They finish the joint together. Take their time with it.
She snuffs the joint with more spit on her fingers, leaving a good roach. This, she puts back into the empty cigarette box in her purse. Then she eases back into her bucket seat to play with the Zippo.
It is an old one. Worn right in. On one side is a Betti Page pinup, like they used to put on the sides of bombers. She’s dressed like a devil, with horns and pronged tail curling up from her upthrust ass. The image is worn down with age too, so Betti looks like she’s in a fog.
Maybe the same fog he’s in.
What else might be in there with them? Lurking around the edges. Waiting to pounce.
Funny ideas already. Yeah, that was good weed.
Fuck. Here we go.
It takes a while, but he is eventually able to rub his face and get ready to talk. Something she said is sticking in his mind like a fish bone in the throat. He gets his hands around it enough to push on up out of the fog.
“Sugar. You said sugar in the tank,” he says.
“What’s that, baby?”
Clink, goes Betti. Then, snap.
“You said sugar for my tank. You mean fuel. Sugar ruins the engine.”
Clink goes Betti. This time a scrape too, and the fire is up there between them. Yellow. Just big enough to be a proper flame. Not so big that she spews black smoke. Betti’s wick has been trimmed perfectly.
Snap. Flame and Betti are gone, palmed away by their master.
“I know what I said, Ahab. I meant what I said. Now don’t be a pussy about it.”
Fuck.
They sit easy for a while. Listen to the wind and the birds. Slither onwards through the fog together.
“We should go to Mozambique,” she says.
“Huh?”
“Mozambique. We should go.”
“Is it far? You got enough money for gas?” he asks.
She laughs.
“It aint a joint, dummy. It’s a city. Across the big pond.”
“Where?” he asks.
“Morocco. They got the most incredible hash there. You can buy it by the kilo and smoke it in these streetside coffee shops. Hookahs going everywhere. Over the markets, the hash smoke is like a fog.”
“You been there?”
“No. But I’ve heard all about it,” she says.
It’s probably not that way anymore. It was probably only that way for something like six months. Everything gets fucked up. Changed. Throttled to death and shoved into a meatgrinder so the bosses can wrap it in plastic and sell it bit by bit.
“They got the barbers there,” she says.
“What? Who?” he asks.
“Yeah, barbers. Not like they’re shaving people. That’s the name of their people, right? They’re out there in the desert and the hills on their horses and camels. Riflemen. Best in the world. Can hit the eye out of a bird on the wing at two-hundred yards.”
“You heard about them too, huh?”
“My grandpa told me. And he should know, he was a hell of a shot himself. And he did love his hash. He was there during the war.”
“Which one?” he asks.
“I dunno. All of them,” she says, real quiet now.
She plays with the lighter for a while more, staring out the window at a far-off place. Somewhere out in the fog.
“This lighter was his,” she says, looking at Betti. “From the big one. You know, the one they thought mattered.”
“What, it didn’t?”
“No. None of them did.”
She snaps Betti shut again and disappears her into the pocket of her jeans skirt. She looks over at him. Smiles.
His cock twitches again.
“I like your mustache,” she says.
First the car, and now this.
“That’s a pretty stupid thing to like someone about, isn’t it?” he says.
She brings her legs up into the seat with her and leans into him across the divide. Reaches out to stroke his mustache. Gives it little tweaks and pinches, styling it.
“Didn’t say I like you for it. I said I like it,” she whispers. “Now sit still and let me work.”
She blows him right there in the driver’s seat.
Eases forward and reaches down in front of him to pop the seat lock. Pushes the seat with him in it back from the steering wheel to make room for herself. She’s strong. Has obviously done this before with a model not so different. Knows right where everything is.
The head is great. And not just because he’s high as fuck neither. Although that helps.
No, this is not some shitty truck stop job here, with locked jaw and piston motion in metronome timing. Like some kind of mechanical pump sucking another object in transaction.
Her performance is exactly that. She’s expressive with it. An artist. Articulate.
He holds out as long as he can, which is not very long at all.
She swallows his load. Then she’s back into her seat, the divide between them restored, leaving him to put himself away and get back together.
“I have to pee,” she says, kicking her car door open. “Don’t you ditch me. I aint done with you yet. And I still owe you a tank of gas.”
“I know,” he says.
“I just thought you might have forgot. What with all your funny ideas, and all. I’ll be right back, honey.”
She leaves the car door open and slips off into the bushes like one of the little sparrows fluttering around.
Are there some in the car? He swats at them.
Realizes they can’t be sparrows. Gotta be flies, buzzing around in tight little circles. He focuses up so he can swat at them properly. Realizes there aren’t any flies either.
Fuck.
He reaches over and pops the glove compartment. The pill bottle is right where he left it.
Empty.
Fuck.
He filled that prescription before leaving the city. He is sure of that. And he hasn’t been taking his meds. The bottle should be full.
He gives it another shake. Holds it up to the light. Empty amber plastic cackling back at him. Pops the cap off and looks inside.
Still empty.
Oh, fuck no.
She’s heading back to the car. Her flip-flops smacking against the dirty soles of her pretty little feet.
He quickly puts the bottle back and shuts the glove compartment. Settles into his seat, his heart racing.
She gets back in the car.
He hasn’t taken a pill since town. He’s sure of that. And he got that full bottle, fair and square, before he left. He’s sure of that too.
Did she steal them? At any point, was she alone in the car?
This, he is not sure of. He can’t remember.
She must have taken them when he was listening to that fucking banjo. Or done some magic with her feet while she was sucking him off.
Something.
Somehow she stole those pills. It’s the only explanation.
She smiles at him.
He smiles back.
“Okay, baby. Let’s go and get some fuel in your tank now,” she says.
His heart racing, he starts the car and eases her back out onto the road to do just that.
Muse Vassal 