No Loitering

And then Emily died. A bunch of guys in an empty mall parking lot talking about it. Not quite dusk. The dusk of dusk. Boozy belches acting as ellipses. Liquor from that place that sold Jack Daniels by the gallon. Or, if you didn't need something fancy, Old Crow and Red Savage in thin bottles with a curve to fit in the back pocket of your jeans. A sign on the brick wall that said No Loitering, right above a bench. And an overflowing trashcan. Always overflowing. Always.

The mall just a hill and a railroad track away. The nice part of town, maybe. When the parking lot was full. But not so much when it was empty, except for Colby's mustang. Not a cool mustang, just a busted up heap named after a horse instead of some Japanese guy. Colby, ancient, almost 40. Almost. Blonde mustache. Van Halen on the tape deck. 1984, and here's some magic realism for you: once Van Halen recorded 1984, every album they'd made before that, and everyone since, was 1984. Turn on the radio, find out for yourself.

A bunch of guys, four or five, all of 'em, no matter how old they were, twenty-fucking-two years old. The most worthless age. Taking hits of hooch. If one said, can I get a hit of that? the other replied, a hit of what? And if he was in a good mood, he'd say, a hit of what, faggot. Acid washed jeans and half-shirts and not mullets exactly, but what mullets would be if there wasn't a name for mullets. Can something that happened by accident be given a name? That sounds like philosophy, faggot.

Twenty fucking two, and so nothing left to live for. But nothing to die for either, so whatever. Talking about old Emily. Older even than Colby. Crazy old broad. No one knew about her because no one talked about her. Then she died, and everybody knew her because everybody talked about her.

About how she was a rich bitch once, but not so much anymore. Her dad, Sergeant Asshole, back from some war or another, glaring at people until all they could do was look him in the crew-cut. Some kind of army pension. Probably wasn't even a Sergeant, probably an officer of some kind, probably stole something from over there and sold it and lived off it and glared at people like he was daring them to say something about it. But no one did.

Died young. What's young. Young enough to still look angry in his coffin. That same look in the picture on the mantel, someone said. How would you know. Saw it. When. When I was there. How. Emily used to give lessons. I don't know, embroidery or French or maybe she sold dope. My mom dragged me along once when I was just a kid. Shut up, faggot, what do you think you are now?

Emily all by herself in that big old house. At the end of the street, standing proud while its brothers and sister houses got knocked down to subdivide lots for new split-levels. Proud, the judgey kind of proud. I'm better than you proud. I'm falling apart and a man hasn't lived here in 20 years and I was built with money from something stolen from some war over there and sometimes there's dead birds in the yard proud. Cats all around for a while, who knows, maybe Sanitation let 'em out to clean up the birds.

That day she jumped out of her door, almost tackled the post man. Stop putting these in my mail slot! she screamed. They said. Not really sure who was there to hear but, but the story goes, she screamed. Kids snickered at the word slot. The post man just standing there, holding a clutch wadded-up envelopes. Bills from the city. Taxes and electric and garbage and water. Years later, you still saw lights on at her place. And that old black guy with the hose on the roses. So who knows.

Standing in the parking lot, Colby's mustang, David Lee Roth, drop dead Legs, pretty smile, hurts my head, gets me wild, dig those jeans, giant butt, makes me scream. Fake dusk became real dusk, a cop car wanders by, nose to the air for pot. No pot. Seriously, Emily sold your mom dope? Gimme a hit and I'll tell you. Fuck off, faggot. But good naturedly.

Remember when that guy with the pick up truck was there? No one did, so everyone nodded. He was a---get this---an A-rab. Say A like the letter, then sneer the word rest, rab. Had a turban and everything. A real rag-head, honest to god, with the beard. Saw a sword in his truck once. Bullshit. Fuck you, faggot I did.

Arab shows up and starts fixing up the place. An Arab swinging a hammer. An Arab. Maybe Sergeant asshole knew him. Maybe he was a traitor to Arab land and that's how Sergeant Asshole got all that war loot. And Arab hears he's dead so he makes his way over with a bomb strapped to his chest just in case and finds old Emily and decides to help out. And her in that truck with him! Driving around! Like, what, they're gonna go to Sonic together or something?

Not the only A-rab in town. Not like there wasn't black guys dating white girls. Or Mexicans. Or them Vietnamese that seemed to be everywhere sometimes. But still. You got to thinking about old Emily with, well, anyone, and, well. Another boozy belch. Streetlights starting to come on. Pretty, as long as you didn't say so out loud.

Instead you said something about how people Emily's age came from a different time, when there was black and white TV and a drive-ins and, like, racism. What was your point? Just hard to picture her. She bought a man's suit from Sears. She was dressing him. And then you thought about an Arab in a turbin and suit in a pickup truck taking Emily to the drive in and that got a chuckle and somebody said to see Friday the 13th and that got a chuckle and then the cop whooped and tore out of there and every looked surprised.

Emily at the K Mart. Bought a gun. A shitty little thing, paid in cash. Yellowed twenties and fifties, none of them wrinkled, exactly, but just old looking. And a box of ammo. Rumors now that she was going to kill herself. Idiotic. Old women don't kill themselves with guns. They use toasters. What the fuck? In the bathtub. Oh. Old Emily, naked in the tub, another chuckle.

Her pastor went over to her house, since she stopped going to services. It was probably the Arab. She was probably going to marry him and convert to Muslim. Or whatever they worshipped. Pastor would put a stop to that! Pastor marched right over there, in the bow-backed way he had, slinking up the sidewalk, dodging grass growing out of cracks. Timidly pounding on the door, demanding an explanation in a tiny voice. Door opened by that black guy. In goes the pastor. Ten minutes later, out comes the pastor, white as a sheet, white as a pastor. Back down the sidewalk, tromping on grass in the cracks. Never a word about it again.

The Arab goes back to Arab land to fetch horses and a Muslim alter and maybe some tents and, do Arab women wear rag heads too? Probably. He's off to fetch that. His pick-up just sits there for a while. One night it's stolen. Probably. That is, who wants some Arab's old pick-up truck? But then how the hell could Emily drive it? She can't drive, can she? And see, a few days later, found wrecked in the big ditch outside of town. So there you go.

Well guys. Van Halen silent for a second, Colby turning over the engine. Then back on and cranked over the noise. House of Pain, If I had it all to do, I'd keep it all the same. Colby shouting over the lyrics, Gotta be someplace. The quiet that's quieter after loud, until june bugs start their whirring, dusk forgotten somehow for dark of night without anyone noticing. The clink of an empty bottle dropped on the asphalt. They never break. And then another one. And then cigarette smoke as guys wanders off in different directions. In the distance, can I bum a cigarette. Fuck off, faggot.

Somebody eventually bought up old Emily's house. For the land, to subdivide for a few more split-levels. But before that, kids broke in, looking for a place to smoke some dope, fondle somebody's else's, graffiti the walls. A place to waste time. That door to the basement, locked. Holes in the door where someone before had tried to kick it in. Finally, a sledgehammer. A creepy walk down, each step creaking.

By lighter-light: on a bare mattress, a guy in a turban. Long dead. Dressed in a suit too big for him now. On the dented pillow next to him, a single gray hair. Just waiting there.