French Prick

I smoked a thin cigarette quickly in one puff. It was what I do. I'm currently unemployed.

From the end of the beach I could see the shaky man coming, walking his dog. The shaky man is called that, by me, because of his never-ending addict trembles that riddle his body. I don't know his name, I've always called him the shaky man, though the dog's name is Boner.

"Bon jour, Boner," I say, feeling it would be silly to address the man, whose name I do not know.

"Don't talk to my dog, you insignificant French asshole," says the shaky man. He has a slight stutter when he says "t-t-t-t-talk" and "F-F-F-F-French." I can't say I disagree with him, I certainly am insignificant and French. I suppose I'm an asshole as well, at least as the standard slang meaning goes.

Once the shaky man with the dog is gone I leave the beach. I am not hurt by what he says, I am dead inside, I feel, but my leg and shoes are alive, and his dog has pissed on them.

In front of my Los Angeles beach house I find a woman waiting. Her cigarette is fat, and the smoke smells funny. It makes me hungry.

"Bon jour," she tells me. "What's your name?"

I do not want to tell her, but she is beautiful, and warrants my attention. I also wouldn't mind getting a toke off her cigarette.

"My name is Michel, not that it matters," I tell her bluntly. She smokes bluntly in return.

"How true it is, but what an asshole you sound like in saying so." I cannot disagree.

"You are from France?" I ask her. She nods curtly. "Kick ass. I am French as well."

"I could tell when you knew what I meant by 'Bon jour'," she said. "You are not unattractive."

"And I might say you are not unbeautiful yourself," I retort, unsmiling.

"It would not be great unsleeping with you." I nod, not sure if it was a positive or negative statement. "You appear sad," she coos in a voice like the waves of the ocean.

For a brief moment, there is an unsettling feeling in the pit of me. I worry it is the start of a real emotion, that I am no longer drab and unfeeling inside upon meeting her. I make a small noise instead.

"Forgive me my fart," I tell her. She shrugs.

"It's not mine, I have not smelt it."

We stare at each other blankly for minutes. We cannot read each other, we are like comic books where the ink has blurred the word balloons. Just drawings on a page, smoking moving smoke, which would be cool, but I don't care.

"You are not sad, but you wish you could be."

"I don't know," I said to her. "I am disturbed to not be disturbed, but it doesn't really bother me. My father's dead."

"Were you there?" she asked of me.

"I had to be if I shot him," I said. She nods, then flees. Nobody loves me.

The Negative Sum of Numbers
There was something disappointing about going home from New York Art College. A depression set in as soon as Smythe drove his middle-class luxury car across the borders of his old California hometown, Burnt Pines. He was here to spend a few weeks of... (6/10/02)

The Heist Planned Over Coffee
"Listen, you fruits!" grumbly Rufus Dent barked to his motley crew. He was beginning the plan, as all the fruits assembled immediately understood with the order, "Listen, you fruits!" In the crowd was Dickie Dicks; Eddie "Lumbar" Kickenback;... (5/27/02)

An American in Tijuana
He strolled through the courtyard of this small Mexican villa like the town was his own. He didn't really own it, not in the sense of actually holding property rights over every square foot of land in the town or anything, but really no one person... (5/13/02)